Lion's Tactical Guide to Bebiliths

Bebiliths are a monster that I’m honestly surprised haven’t gotten a stat block until now, and in a book that hardly anyone has heard of no less, but they are the powerful spider demons that drow pull from the Abyss to stuff into their mechanical retrievers (or at least used to; the new flavor text for them in Monsters of the Multiverse doesn’t seem to make any mention of them). Aside from this means of summoning their spirit to the Material Plane, bebiliths are stated to not be able to be summoned away from the Abyss, meaning that it won’t be encountered anywhere other than the one place that it can be permanently killed. Bebiliths weren’t actually created by Lolth like one would expect, and are instead theorized to be some of the first demons in existence. They hunt other demons primarily, but will attack anything they come across in the Abyss, and with their CR of 12, they are definitely a high level party encounter only.

Bebeliths’ highest ability score is their exceptional Dexterity followed by their really great Constitution and above-average Strength, although their mental ability scores aren’t nearly as great. They have proficiency in Constitution and Wisdom saving throws and have proficiency in Perception and Stealth, making them perfect for tracking down their prey and ambushing them. They have resistance to cold and lightning damage alongside nonmagical weapon attacks, and immunity to fire and poison damage along with the poisoned condition. They have standard 60 feet darkvision and 30 feet of blindsight, which synergizes very well with their innate ability to cast Darkness three times per day, allowing them to have unseen attacker advantage and their enemies to have disadvantage on attacks against them. They have Spider Climb like one would expect, but their version combines the Spider Climb and Web Walker traits into a single trait. Their standout feature, however, is Relentless Hunter, a bonus action ability that allows them to mark a creature such that they can always know their location on the Abyss and always have advantage on attack rolls against them.

Bebeliths begin combat by attempting to ambush their opponents, using Relentless Hunter on an opponent who looks to be physically weaker than the rest and dropping Darkness wherever they can get that target and as many others as they can. After that, they use their Multiattack to fire off a Poisoned Web that recharges on a roll of 5 or 6, then make two Strength-based melee attacks with either a severely poisonous Bite attack or a longer ranged Foreleg attack, but the poison damage on the Bite attack outclasses the Foreleg attack damage by so much that there’s pretty much no reason for them to use the latter over the former. What’s more, their Bite attack also has an additional rider whenever it reduces a creature to 0 hit points: they light on fire and take 2d6 fire damage each round until they’re healed. The Poisoned Web attack deals considerable poison damage and restrains on a hit, dealing 2d8 poison damage at the start of each of their turns until they make a DC 17 Strength check to get out. The webbing is also particularly flammable, dealing an additional 1d6 fire damage to targets trapped in it while it’s burning, so the bebilith actually has additional incentive to focus their Bite attacks on opponents restrained by their webbing so that they can set their prey on fire in two different ways. Once they’re got something burned to a crisp, they carry it off up a wall to go eat it later, using their action to Dash away in order to escape pursuit, and they also retreat this way when they’re reduced to 75 hit points or less.