D&D 5E Shield Guardian

[Fuchi Miller]

Would you ever give your party a Shield Guardian?

Shield Guardian


Traits

Bound: The Shield guardian is magically bound to an Amulet. As long as the guardian and its Amulet are on the same plane of existence, the amulet's wearer can telepathically call the guardian to travel to it, and the guardian knows the distance and direction to the Amulet. If the guardian is within 60 feet of the amulet's wearer, half of any damage the wearer takes (rounded up) is transferred to the guardian.

Regeneration: The Shield guardian regains 10 hit points at the start of its turn if it has at least 1 hit. point.

Spell Storing: A spellcaster who wears the Shield guardian's Amulet can cause the guardian to store one spell of 4th level or lower. To do so, the wearer must cast the spell on the guardian. The spell has no effect but is stored within the guardian. When commanded to do so by the wearer or when a situation arises that was predefined by the spellcaster, the guardian casts the stored spell with any parameters set by the original caster, requiring no Components. When the spell is cast or a new spell is stored, any previously stored spell is lost.

Actions

Multiattack: The guardian makes two fist attacks.

Fist: Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) bludgeoning damage.

Reactions

Shield: When a creature makes an Attack against the wearer of the guardian's Amulet, the guardian grants a +2 bonus to the wearer's AC if the guardian is within 5 feet of the wearer.

Attributes

Size Large
Type Construct
Alignment Unaligned
AC 17 (Natural Armor)
HP 142 (15d10+60)
Speed 30 ft.
STR 18
DEX 8
CON 18
INT 7
WIS 10
CHA 3
Senses Blindsight 10 Ft., Darkvision 60 Ft.
Passive Perception 10
Languages : Understands Commands Given In Any Language But Can't Speak
Immunities : Poison
Condition Immunities : Charmed, Exhaustion, Frightened, Paralyzed, Poisoned
Challenge Rating : 7

If you would, would you let it have its own turn or take the wielders bonus action?
Also would the amulet need to be attuned?

Im asking cause im curious. Based off what i know, this creature isnt used a lot even for the enemies

 

[tglassy]

My Rogue managed to get his hand on a shield guardian. I named him Hermon and gave him my Hat of Disguise, making him look like a half orc bouncer in a suit and shades.

And it was very broken. Let me put it this way. This Rogue had a frost brand saber. If he got hit by a Fireball, and was supposed to get 100 points of damage, and FAILED the Save, then he would take half damage from being a Rogue (50), half that from resistance given by his sword (25), then half the damage goes to the shield guardian (12.5). So, from a 100 point damage spell, he'd only take 13.

The Rogue became a tank. And the Shield Guardian helped give Sneak Attack.

My DM always played it as a creature under my control, with its own initiative and everything, which made it worse, but even if you didn't, those are some powerful bonuses. It's meant to compliment a caster, or someone who isn't in melee, protecting them if someone attacks them. But in the hands of a melee attacker...my goodness...

I will say I did a number of adventures with him when I had only one other player, so he helped tremendously in giving us a third "PC" that boosted my character. He actually got the pair of us through the Tomb of Horrors. Carrying us over spikes, tripping traps, taking tons of damage and just waiting a minute or two to regenerate. Much to my DM's chagrin.


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[Croesus]

We had one until this very last session, when "Frank" was finally destroyed by several vrocks.

We required attunement for the amulet. We generally attuned whichever character had the lowest hit points, to take advantage of the damage transfer. The SG moved at the same time as the attuned character, no bonus action required. However, we only allowed very simple commands: hit those folks, stay with me, dodge, etc. Dodge was especially important because we never found a way to magically repair the SG and its 10 point regeneration doesn't do much if the SG is taking 50+ points a round.

We often stored counterspell in the SG, telling it to simply counter the first spell it saw being cast by someone other than the party. Other spells could have been useful, but again, we only allowed very simple commands, so it's not like the SG could strategically plan out when to cast spells and how to target them.

Frank was a lot of fun, but very powerful (our party was 7th - 9th level). Offensively he didn't do much, but defensively 142 hit points of damage sink really adds up. Encounters sometimes were too weak in large part because of Frank. That said, he was a big help when we were forced to punch above our weight class, and would not be unbalancing for higher level characters, say 11th level and up, or really small parties.

 

[tglassy]

Hermon died at the end of Tomb of Horrors. Got crushed by the last trap before the Vault. After leaving the Tomb of Horrors, splitting all the riches between the two of us and taking Hermon's broken parts, we paid something like 75,000 gp to have him repaired.


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[CapnZapp]

You can get one in Out of the Abyss

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[tglassy]

You can get one in Curse of Strahd, as well, at the Amber Temple. The group I'm running it with just found him. I'm a little worried, considering the antics I pulled...


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[discosoc]

My Rogue managed to get his hand on a shield guardian. I named him Hermon and gave him my Hat of Disguise, making him look like a half orc bouncer in a suit and shades.

And it was very broken. Let me put it this way. This Rogue had a frost brand saber. If he got hit by a Fireball, and was supposed to get 100 points of damage, and FAILED the Save, then he would take half damage from being a Rogue (50), half that from resistance given by his sword (25), then half the damage goes to the shield guardian (12.5). So, from a 100 point damage spell, he'd only take 13.

The Rogue became a tank. And the Shield Guardian helped give Sneak Attack.

My DM always played it as a creature under my control, with its own initiative and everything, which made it worse, but even if you didn't, those are some powerful bonuses. It's meant to compliment a caster, or someone who isn't in melee, protecting them if someone attacks them. But in the hands of a melee attacker...my goodness...

I will say I did a number of adventures with him when I had only one other player, so he helped tremendously in giving us a third "PC" that boosted my character. He actually got the pair of us through the Tomb of Horrors. Carrying us over spikes, tripping traps, taking tons of damage and just waiting a minute or two to regenerate. Much to my DM's chagrin.


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That almost sounds more like a problem with magic item glut than with the Shield Guardian itself. I'm also not sure why a Hat of Disguise would even work on a Shield Guardian in the first place (does it work when you place it on a sword, or on a hat rack?), so that also removed a lot of the disadvantages of the thing. Not to mention a Shield Guardian is supposed to be limited to either attacking an enemy or guarding the amulet wearer. Carrying people over spikes and triggering traps is also a bit of a stretch since the SG isn't meant to be taking orders like a normal golem.

 

[Bardbarian]

What do you base that from? I'm curious because the nature of the amulet seems to me that the controller would have better control over the guardian than most golems due to the direct mental link.

To answer the OP. The SG is godlike at t1, very strong at t2, just about right at t3 and by t4 play its almost more of a liability than a benefit. The golem fits well in the level band from around 10 - 14 and outside that is not well suited to the challenges faced by a group in that level band. It should almost never be in combat after level 10 and an easy way to turn up the heat on the group is to have enemies attack it directly or to catch the amulet wearer in the same aoe as the golem causing it to take 1.5x normal damage from many spells burning its HP extremely fast.

 

[LordEntrails]

My players picked up one in PotA. It took me many sessions to finally destroy it. But it was fun while it lasted

 

[The Crimson Binome]

It's not like the party is in any danger otherwise. If they have a Shield Guardian or two, then they'll trounce through any encounter and any damage they take will be gone by morning. If they don't have a Shield Guardian, then they'll still trounce through any encounter and any damage they take will be gone by morning.