This past Sunday, I achieved a career goal of mine! I spoke at at my first security conference! This post is the companion to go along with the talk, where I link the slides and provide some additional context on Merethyl Ulayra, the villain I created for the second half of the talk.

The Creation of Merethyl

As I mentioned in the talk, my primary method of creating new villains is essentially doing a case study on some villains that have traits that I think would be useful for a party antagonist, then essentially spinning parts I like in to a new villain. It doesn't have to be a formal case study, as I have spun traits from characters I enjoy through my many hours of Forgotten Realms Wiki diving over the years into new villains. There are some limits to this, mostly that it requires a lot of reading. I've found this method of creating villains most useful when you don't have an impending deadline to worry about. For the talk, I essentially spent a week of my free time for the necessary background reading required to get Merethyl created. I also wanted to make sure that some facts I presented in the talk were correct before going on camera.

Additionally, there are some DMs which prefer having a party created before creating their villain, so they can tune them specifically to the party. This is an approach I'm not personally fond of because if you have a situation where the party composition changes or they simply evolve in an unexpected way, they can ruin your plans. When creating Merethyl, I had planned on her being embedded in the setting before a party is created. I spent roughly an hour drafting her outline, then It took me an evening to get her information written down and formatted into a stat block.

New villain
- Illusionist wizard who's puppeteering a kingdom
- Grew up poor, but was skilled with magic
- Had someone take pity on her, vouch for her in a magic academy
- Became an apprentice
- School was horrible to it's students
- Found she was good at illusion spells
- Eventually graduated, but was asked to stay on to teach
- Started using illusion spells against her masters 
	- Initially to make her life easier
	- Later to make them suffer
- Eventually drove her masters to madness, before pulling a slow coup to take over the academy
	- Killed masters
	- Replaced them with her own friends and contacts
- Nearby king takes notice of wizard's prowess
- Enrolls son in magic academy
- Wizard uses this connection to start manipulating son, elevating her status
- Prince does poorly, summons wizard lady to court to answer why
- Wizard lady starts working her illusions on the royal family and courtiers
- Convinced king he just needs some more time and training. Developing slower than expected, but hoping for a breakthrough.
- Breakthrough comes
- King elated, invites her to become courtier while she continues to train the prince
- Eventually prince graduates
- Wizard invited to become royal wizard
- She continues to work her magic long term, starts orchestrating madness and "accidents." 
	- Goal is to get her former student on the throne
	- She intends to rule from the shadows
		- Initially
- A campaign would start here
- Starts picking off those in line, starting with middle children, then oldest.
- Orchestrates the end of the family line
	- Frames wizard prince 
	- Manipulates him into assigning her as a regent should he perish too early
	- Prevents him from marrying, fathering and kids himself by keeping him mad
- Eventually wrests control over kingdom
- Starts to devote resources to unearthing forbidden knowledge to consolidate power
- Starts planning kingdom expansion and war with neighbors 

This outline does a pretty clear job on where I wanted the big beats of her backstory to go, before presenting it. Later in this article I cover additional details on her backstory, as promised in the talk.

Merethyl's Statblock

Challenge Rating

So, in 5e there's the concept of levels, and challenge rating. Most folks understand how levels work, since D&D more or less invented the idea of leveling up a character in an RPG. Challenge Rating (CR) is a little different however. CR is used by DMs to determine the strength of an encounter compared to the party's level. For example, a CR 4 monster is designed to be fought by a party of 4 characters, averaging level 4. So you could potentially have 2 characters at level 5, and 2 at level 3, and that would make CR 4 the "target" for what should be a fair fight. If you have 4 party members at level 4, that would also be considered appropriate for a CR 4 fight. CR isn't perfect, but it does a good enough job of explaining the difficulty of an enemy to the DM. There are also resources in the Dungeon Masters Guide, and Xanathar's guide to everything in encounter creation. There's also online resources like Kobald Fight Club which can help DMs create encounters. My goal in creating Merethyl was to make her CR somewhere around 17. Meaning that you'd need a party of 4 average 17th level characters to take her down in a fight.

1 Version, 2 Rulesets

I kept this somewhat vague in my talk, but I built Merethyl using the 2014 version of 5e rules. The 2024 version of the ruleset has been out for almost a year now, but I didn't feel compelled to update my rulebooks with the changes made. They made some tweaks that are wonderful for character creation in that they stopped tying races to stat bumps, changed wording to become more inclusive, and made feats a lot more engaging than they were in the 2014 rules. They even managed to keep compatibility between adventures released in the 2014 rules with the new 2024 rules. These are great! Wizards of the Coast also simplified some of the enemy management for DMs, which I personally don't like. I prefer having more flexibility in the way I run NPCs even if there's of additional complexity. I think this is partially why I think Wizards of the Coast handled Vecna poorly in Vecna in Vecna: Eve of Ruin. Also, I have limited shelf space so I decided that to stop buying books at the end of 2014 content, and keep using those rules. I own all the 5e books from the D&D Next transition period until Quests from the Infinite Staircase. So, I think I have enough books for a while.

Building Merethyl

Did you know there's a free version of D&D you can just download and play? No books required? That's the System Reference Document. Essentially, a Creative Commons version of D&D that is free for anyone to use. The 5.1 version of the Systems Reference Document is available here and features the 2014 rules, and 5.2 version for the 2024 rules can be found here.

If you look at either SRD, an Archmage is CR 12. Archmages are level 18 Wizards, so bumping Merethyl to Level 20 should bump her up in CR, as she would then get an ability score improvement and a free casting of two 3rd level spells. I also asked my party members for ideas for magic items I could equip to her to make her a little more challenging to fight, like the Cloak of Invisibility and the Rod of Rulership. Here's the final stat block I made for Merethyl. It has some changes and clarifications that don't exist in the original stat block I used in the presentation, but this should be essentially ready to use, if you wish.

When creating this stat block, I essentially started by building out a level 20 Illusion Wizard. I made her a high elf as I thought it would make most sense for a character I knew would be planning for the long term, doubly so for a mage. I then leveled her up in accordance with her goals of manipulating folks, getting in their heads in order to seize power. To me, this means a focus on illusion and enchantment magic would be paramount. I don't usually see illusion or enchantment wizards, so I wanted to play around with it.

Once I had her built out, I named Merethyl after a few minutes on Fantasy Name Generators. Xanathar's Guide to Everything also contains great resources on naming characters based on their race and cultures. Additionally, Xanathar's guide to everything has other helpful tables to help generate backstory ideas for your characters. They cover lineage, where your character was born, siblings, family structures, and childhood memories. Additionally, it contains some tables to help flesh out backstory based on the Players Handbook backgrounds, and some additional class-specific backstory information. Then there are a ton of life event tables you can check out which can help provide a spark that your character can use as their call to adventure.

Expanding Merethyl's backstory

In this section, I expanded Merethyl's backstory with additional details and bringing her story to the beginning. Including the time before she was an academy headmaster turned puppeteer queen. In total, this section took me about 4 hours to write, using the outline from earlier. I also wanted to highlight significant acts of evil like I did with the villains in my talk. I probably went a little too in depth for some stuff, but I like this character and I think I'll use her sometime. Sorry Ben.

The Early Days

Merethyl is the daughter of Siora Ulayra, her mother and Elas Ulayra, her father. Elas was a sculptor who crafted artisan furniture out of wood. Siora was a member of the Lliiran clergy, and spent most of her free time at the local temple. Merethyl is brown of hair which is most often kept in three braids, and green of eyes. Merethyl is a short, petite elvish woman who carefully calculates her actions before taking them. She's known to be warm to friends, colleague, and students. However colder and more distant to strangers.

The village she grew up in was subject to occasional Orc attacks over the years, and during one of these Orc attacks Elas's shop was ransacked and burned down. Elas was killed by the raiders while he was out looking for Merethyl to ensure she was safe. Siora and Merethyl were held up in a nearby temple of Tempus, as it was the closest shelter available. When the smoke cleared, the villagers buried their dead and took tally of their missing. From then on, Siora and Merethyl lived a simple life until Merethyl came of age.

Enrolling at Jaestradale

Some years after the raid which killed Elas, Merethyl discovered she possessed the ability to cast spells, and frequently used cantrips like Prestidigitation and Minor Illusion as party tricks. One day, a Githzerai man named Rantig and some compatriots came through the village on their way to some ruins a few days march east. Rantig took notice of Merethyl's party tricks and approached her about enrolling at his arcane academy, Jaestradale. Merethyl was delighted at the idea and wanted to join Rantig on his adventure, but was told to stay in the village until Rantig returned, as the ruins were too dangerous for a novice wizard. When Rantig arrived in the village once more, Merethyl left with the party as Jaestradale's newest student.

When Merethyl first set eyes on Jaestradale, she had no idea what horrors would come to her. The teaching methods at Jaestradale were cruel. Oftentimes this would mean putting students in seemingly impossible situations and forcing them to think quickly to find an outside the box solution for a way out, or die trying. For example, a novice wizard could be locked in a room with a large lock, 100 keys, and a beholder. The wizard must find a way to survive the beholder's attacks, while attempting to solve the puzzle that reveals which key works on the lock, or cast the Knock spell. Many students would be killed in these trials long before their prime.

Merethyl, however discovered her aptitude for illusion magic. She quickly became the Jaestradale's best student of the illusionist school, and after a few years would surpass even her masters. Merethyl would regularly trick her masters with her spells and as she continued training, started casting enchantments on them in their sleep. Merethyl had slowly instilled madness to the teachers she disliked, then she worked behind the scenes to orchestrate "accidents" on some of the particularly nasty instructors.

Master of Illusions

A few years later, Merethyl graduated and was offered the position of Master of Illusions in the academy, giving her license to teach with Jaestradale's methods. She determined that she was to have a direct hand with her students. This is contrary to the previous Master of Illusions who focused more crafting trials which required increasing cunning to successfully overcome. Merethyl determined she could more acutely develop her students' skills while dialing back on the danger her trials would pose. This saw an improvement in the life expectancy of her students compared to the other masters'. Consequently, her students were outperforming the students of the other masters, which caused some strife between Merethyl and the other masters.

Merethyl solved by getting in their heads, and turning them to her side by modifying their memories and continuing to charm them. She also instilled a sense of paranoia in that she appeared everywhere in the academy. No master would know where or when Merethyl would appear next. You could have just seen her in a lecture hall two minutes ago, then suddenly she's in the courtyard demonstrating a spell for her students. Ten minutes later she could be in the faculty lounge, smoking a pipe.

One evening after a lecture, Merethyl approached Rantig about the performance of some of her students and recommended some of them for graduation from Jaestradale. Rantig stated he would evaluate those students in the coming days before shifting the conversation to research. Rantig mentioned he had a contingent of volunteers coming to his off site lab in the morning, and asked Merethyl to come with to help orient them. To which Merethyl agreed.

In the morning, Merethyl met Rantig at the off-site lab and found a sizable contingent of common folk with burlap sacks over their heads and orcish guards watching over them. Merethyl asked Rantig where these volunteers came from, then Rantig replied that he buys them off the orcish raiders. The images of fire, soot, and blood intruded upon on her mind. She could hear the screams of her neighbors falling off in the distance. Merethyl asked Rantig how long he had been buying test subjects, which he replied that he lost count, but somewhere between 25 and 35 years. Merethyl realized her fellow villagers had been kidnapped by this same orcish clan, then sold to the man who trained her. That night, she killed Rantig by waiting for him to take his nightly walk, casting Hallucinatory Terrain over a spike pit just outside the lab. After he died, Merethyl set free the test subjects, and returned to the academy.

Headmaster Merethyl

Upon returning to Jaestradale, Merethyl informed the other masters that Rantig would be in his lab for a few days to work on some experiments. Knowing that Rantig wouldn't return, she worked to buy time while she continued to influence the faculty to ensure that when the news of Rantig's death inevitably reaches the rest of the academy, she would be best prepared to assume the role of headmaster. A few weeks later, an orc came by Jaestradale to deliver one of the escaped test subjects. When the masters told the orc that Rantig hasn't been seen in weeks, the orc replied by saying that she had attempted to deliver the test subject to Rantig's lab, but nobody was there, and it looked like it had been ransacked. In a panic, half the masters went to the lab, and the other half stayed at the academy.

A few hours later, the masters that went to the lab returned with Rantig's corpse in hand. The masters started funeral arrangements, and succession planning. Merethyl's attempts to influence the other masters paid off, as she was unanimously selected as the next headmaster. Merethyl also assumed control over the ransacked lab, and started plundering it for secrets.

An Unexpected Student

A few years after becoming the headmaster of Jaestradale, Merethyl was visited by an envoy of the king who was asking about the history of the academy, it's teaching methods, alumni, and facilities. After conducting a tour and answering questions, the envoy offered an invitation to Court to make an introduction to King Dalias and his son, Prince Cralen. Merethyl packed her things into her bag of holding, then set off with the envoy.

After a few days travel, Merethyl arrived in the capitol to meet the king. Prince Cralen is a young budding wizard, so King Dalias summoned all the magic academies in the region to make their bid to train the prince. A few weeks of debate between the academies, scholars, the king, and the prince came and went, before the Prince Cralen picked Jaestradale as his academy of choice. The budding wizard would depart in 3 weeks time.

Prince Cralen had little talent with magic, his development slow and often hindered. His masters were often frustrated as Merethyl would not allow the fullest extent of their cruelty displayed when working with the prince, as to not kill him. She began slowly replacing them with mages more closely aligned with her harsh, but not as deadly teaching tactics. A few months in with little growth in Prince Cralen's capabilities, King Dalias summoned Merethyl back to court to answer for why progress was slow. Merethyl demonstrated that Prince Cralen had grown, but not as fast as she hoped. She pledged to take personal charge of his development. King Dalias was satisfied with this outcome, but warned if Merethyl wasn't capable of training his son, he would find another academy that could.

Breakthrough

A few weeks after personally taking over Prince Cralen's training, Merethyl had a breakthrough. Cralen's capabilities were expanding at a steady pace, and Merethyl did everything in her power to ensure that he would evolve into a fine wizard. Prince Cralen didn't have exceptional talent or skill, but over the course of many years, Merethyl would train him to be a competent practitioner of evocation magic. When she deemed him ready for graduation, Merethyl personally oversaw the trip back to the capitol to deliver Prince Cralen back to King Dalias. As thanks for her services, King Dalias offered to create the position of Court Wizard for Merethyl, if she wished to accept it. Merethyl took a few days to decide before giving King Dalias her answer. She returned to Jaestradale to inform the other masters that she would be departing from the academy in a few weeks. She nominated her successor, wrapped up some loose ends, then packed her things into a cart, and left for the capitol.

The Madness Begins

When Merethyl arrived in Court, she arrived with a plan. She foresaw a way to assume the throne and become queen. It would take years of influence, trickery, and spellcasting, but she developed a plan to use Prince Cralen as her vector to ascend to the throne. A little over a year after arriving to court, she started to put this plan into action. She spent the last year learning about her fellow courtiers, the royal family, the castle, the city, and most importantly, who was holding power in the shadows.

Merethyl knew if she started using her trickery, illusions, and enchantments too early, it would be obvious she was pulling strings. She embedded herself in court politics, and started working to bring allies to her side. As the first Court Wizard, she had an easier time than most for getting folks on her side, as her fellow courtiers saw her introduction as an opportunity to grow their own influence. As her reputation grew, Merethyl started working her enchantments and illusions on allies to ensure their loyalty, before starting to drive her adversaries mad. The plan was essentially the same as what she had done in Jaestradale, but this time more targeted. Refined. Intentional. She was going to be queen, amateur hour was over.

Dungeons, Dragons, and Troglodytes

She started driving minor adversaries mad, and getting them replaced with successors who were more amicable to her plans. Once she had sidelined a few rivals, whether by driving them to madness or staging accidents, she started working her magic on Princess Kaissana, one of Prince Craelen's older sisters. Princess Kaissana was the middle child, stately, and adept at managing the bureaucracy of the kingdom. She served as the council member in charge of the capital's finances. Merethyl became close to Kaissana when she started working her magic, but over the course of a few months, staged an accident for her by joining her in the crypt below the castle, casting Seeming on her to make her appear as a troglodyte, and using a simulacrum to cast Illusory Dragon to scare Kaissana towards some guards, who would kill her. The guards would later be hanged for killing a princess.

Merethyl then focused on Princess Cylraste, the heir. Driving her to madness to where she would eventually take her own life. At this point, Queen Liahana was grief stricken at losing her two girls, and would start searching for answers. King Dalias encouraged her search for the cause of the court madness. Merethyl slowed down, but started focusing her efforts on Prince Craelen, as she would need him alive to name herself Regent. As Regent, she intended to usurp the throne from him once the king and queen were dead. The queen started getting on Merethyl's trail, determining that she was a master of enchantments and illusions based on records from Jaestradale.

Queen Liahana began to compile evidence of Merethyl's wrongdoing, and eventually accused her of murder and driving the family to madness in court. Merethyl would refute these claims, claiming that while she is a master of illusions and enchantment magic, she has only the royal family's best interest in mind. These accusations were rebuffed by many of the other courtiers, as Merethyl had either replaced them with her own allies, or modified their memories to erase any recollection of her wrongdoing. King Dalias demanded that Queen Liahana apologize for levying such lofty accusations on one of his most loyal servants.

Queen Liahana refused, and attempted to leave court with Prince Craelen. Craelen had no intention of leaving court, as he was the heir and was needed should King Dalias become incapacitated or die. Queen Liahana then attempted to take Prince Craelen by force, for which she was apprehended and imprisoned. Finally, with Queen Liahana removed, the only thing standing in Cralen's way as king was his father. Merethyl shifted focus to the king, while keeping Craelen around her finger.

Merethyl orchestrated a rivalry between Prince Craelen and King Dalias, and drove the two of them to hate each other. She set up situations where she would trap the two of them in conversation with topics to deliberately get under each others skin. Then double down by using herself and a simulacrum to antagonize and radicalize the two against each other, while working her magic in to keep them mad. A few months in and King Dalias decided it was time to take a new wife, as he wanted to disinherit Prince Craelen. Dalias decided that he wanted to take Merethyl as his new wife due to her intellect and how well she served the crown.

News of this reached a shocked Merethyl, who was flattered, but wanted power for herself, and not to be at the call of some king. She decided it was time to put her plan in motion. That night she convinced Prince Craylen that it's his time to rule, and that his father was too mad to effectively keep the kingdom functional. Prince Craylen agreed. King Dalias went on a walk through the courtyard, where Prince Craylen cast Delayed Blast Fireball in the garden, timing it to explode with maximum power when King Dalias approached. King Dalias's body was never recovered.

All Hail King Craylen

Despite the rumors, officially King Dalias was killed by a Red Wizard. Some guards found a body in town with a bald head, and red robes. Of course, nobody knew how or why Thay would be involved in an assassination plot. Or who managed to kill a Red Wizard so discretely. From Merethyl's perspective, all that mattered now is that her accession to the throne is all but certain, and nobody could pin her role in the assassination plots. There was a royal funeral, followed by a coronation of King Craylen. One of Craylen's first acts, was to name Merethyl as Regent until Craylen could produce an heir. A week later, Craylen mysteriously fell off the castle walls, to his death.

Years of planning in the background lead Merethyl to take what was hers. She was queen. Not only was Merethyl queen, but she was the ruling body in the kingdom, not some wife to a king. She held the power of the state in her own hands. Now it was time to uncover the secrets she discovered in the lab all those years ago, and to put them to good use.

Fantasy Statblocks

Once I finished building Merethyl and made the final tweaks to her backstory above, I generated the stat block from earlier with Fantasy Statblocks. Fantasy Statblocks is available on both GitHub and Obsidian's Community Plugin page. Here's the expression that generates her stat block. When creating a stat block in Obsidian, just make sure your code block is marked with statblock, ensure it's formatted properly, and it should render.

name: Merethyl Ulayra
size: Medium
type: Humanoid
subtype: High Elf
alignment: Neutral Evil
ac: 11 (14 with *Mage Armor*)
hp: 131
hit_dice: 20d6+40
speed: 30ft
stats: [10, 12, 14, 20, 14, 15]
saves:
  - Int: +11
  - Wis: +8
skillsaves:
  - Arcana: +11
  - Insight: +8
  - Investigation: +11
  - Perception: +8
  - Religion: +11
condition_resistences: Charmed
condition_immunities: Magic induced sleep
senses: Darkvision 60ft, passive Perception 18
languages: Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Halfling, Sylvan
cr: 17
spells:
  - Merethyl is a 20th-level spellcaster. Her spellcasting ability is Intelligence (spell save DC 19, +11 to hit with spell attacks). She has *mage armor* cast on herself at the beginning of battle. Merethyl may also cast *Major Image* and *Enemies Abound* once per day without expending a spell slot. Merethyl has the following spells prepared
  - Cantrip: Eldritch Blast, Fire Bolt, Friends, Mage Hand, Message, Mind Sliver, Minor Illusion, Prestidigitation
  - 1st Level (4 slots): Charm Person, Illusory Script, Mage Armor, Shield
  - 2nd Level (3 slots): Darkness, Mirror Image, Misty Step
  - 3rd Level (3 slots): Counterspell, Fireball, Major Image
  - 4th Level (3 slots): Banishment, Hallucinatory Terrain, Polymorph
  - 5th Level (3 slots): Dream, Mislead, Modify Memory
  - 6th Level (2 slots): Magic Jar, Programmed Illusion
  - 7th Level (2 slots): Etherealness, Project Image, Simulacrum
  - 8th Level (1 slot): Feeblemind, Illusory Dragon
  - 9th Level (1 slot): Psychic Scream, Weird
traits:
  - name: Special Equipment
    desc: Merethyl carries a *Deck of Illusions* which she can use as an action (DMG p.161). She also carries a set of *Nolzur's Marvelous Pigments* (DMG p.183). Additionally, she wears *Boots of False Tracks* (XGE p.136), *Eyes of Minute Seeing* (DMG p.168), *Ring of X-Ray vision* (DMG p.193), a Cloak of Invisibility (see *Actions*) and a *Rod of Rulership* (see *Actions*).
  - name: Arcane Recovery (1/Day)
    desc: When she finishes a shrot rest, Merethyl recovers all her spell slots of 5th level and lower.
  - name: Improved Minor Illusion
    desc: When Merethyl casts minor illusion, she can create both a sound and an image with a single casting of the spell.
  - name: War Caster
    desc: Merethyl has advantage on Constitution saving throws to maintain concentration on a spell. She can also use somatic components when she has a weapon or shield in her hands. When a hostile creature's movement provokes an opportunity attack, Merethyl may use her reaction to cast a spell at the creature, rather than make an opportunity attack. The spell must have a casting time of 1 action and must target only that creature.
  - name: Spell Sniper
    desc: When Merethyl casts a spell with an attack roll, the spell's range is doubled. She also ignores half, and three quarters cover.
  - ...
actions:
  - name: Rod of Rulership (1/Day)
    desc: Merethyl can present the rod and command obediance from each creature of her choice she can see within 120 feet of her. Each target must succeed on a DC 15 Wisdom saving through or be charmed by her for 8 hours. While charmed in this way, the creature regards Merethyl as a trusted leader. If the creature is harmed by Merethyl or her companions, or is commanded to do something contrary to it's nature, a target ceases to be charmed in this way.
  - name: Cloak of Invisibility
    desc: Merethyl can pull the hood of the Cloak of Invisibility over her head to cause herself to turn invisible. While invisible, anything she is carrying or wearing is invisible with you. She becomes visibile when she ceases wearing the hood.
  - name: Fey Teleportation (1/Day)
    desc: Merethyl can cast *misty step* without expending a spell slot. 
  - name: Malleable Illusions
    desc: If an illusion spell has a duration of 1 minute or longer, Merethyl can change the nature of the illusion (Within the spell's normal parameters) provided she can see it.
  - ...
bonus_actions:
  - name: Illusory Reality
    desc: When Merethyl casts an illusion spell of 1st level or higher, she can choose one inanimate, nonmagical object that is part of the illusion and make it real. The object cannot deal damage, or otherwise directly harm anyome. Additionally, the object remains real for 1 minute.
  - ...
reactions:
  - name: Illusory Self (3/Day)
    desc: Merethyl can create an illusory duplicant of herself as an instant, almost instinctual reaction to danger. When a creature makes an attack roll against Merethyl, she can use a reaction to interpose the illusory duplicate between the attacker and herself. The attack automatically misses, then the illusion dissipates. 
  - ...

Merethyl's stat block contains most available options that are supported for 5e, but this template is what I use to generate any custom stat blocks I run. I simply modify what needs to be modified, remove what can be removed like Legendary Actions, then fill it in. There is some trickery with syntax you should be aware of, but generally it's pretty straightforward to use.

```statblock
image: [[Wikilink To Image]]
name: string
size: string
type: string
subtype: string
alignment: string
ac: number
hp: number
hit_dice: string
speed: string
stats: [number, number, number, number, number, number]
saves:
  - <ability-score>: number
skillsaves:
  - <skill-name>: number
damage_vulnerabilities: string
damage_resistances: string
damage_immunities: string
condition_immunities: string
senses: string
languages: string
cr: number
spells:
  - <description>
  - <spell level>: <spell-list>
traits:
  - name: <trait-name>
    desc: <trait-description>
  - ...
actions:
  - name: <trait-name>
    desc: <trait-description>
  - ...
legendary_actions:
  - name: <legendary_actions-name>
    desc: <legendary_actions-description>
  - ...
bonus_actions:
  - name: <trait-name>
    desc: <trait-description>
  - ...
reactions:
  - name: <reaction-name>
    desc: <reaction-description>
  - ...
```

Wrap Up

Well now that I have spent a few more hours creating Merethyl's backstory, it's time to wrap this one up. I hope you enjoyed my PancakesCon talk! I hope you enjoyed learning more about this character! Please, if you want to use her in any campaigns you're running, be my guest! I had a blast putting all this stuff together. If you want to read some of the behind the scenes on how I did it all, that's available here. It's time to get back to working on Maldev academy, as I am way farther behind on it than I would like to be.