Bestiary

Classified hostile morphologies, heretic combatant profiles, xenos threat patterns, and warp entity contact risks — catalogued for the game master who has to field them tonight. Read as an Imperial threat archive: harsh, biased, and useful.

// Codex Doctrine · Threat Archive

The Bestiary is the enemy codex of Bolt & Blade: fast threats to drop into a session, premade stat blocks, Threat Ratings, enemy families, battlefield roles, tags, tactics, morale, and templates. Enemies are not built like player characters — they use simplified GM-facing profiles built to answer five questions: how hard is it to hit, how long does it stay up, what does it do, how does it behave, and why does it feel like Bolt & Blade.

How to Read a Stat Block

GM Reference

Threat Ratings

TR · Not Challenge Rating

Threat Rating Bands

Threat Rating	Meaning
TR 1–2	Rabble, grunts, lesser beasts, disposable cultists
TR 3–4	Trained troops, specialists, minor leaders
TR 5–8	Elites, monsters, heavy infantry, lesser daemons
TR 9–12	Champions, major monsters, daemon engines, powerful psykers
TR 13–16	Greater daemons, warlords, major xenos horrors, heavy war engines
TR 17–20+	C'tan shards, titan-scale threats, campaign-ending horrors

Threat Rating is a GM-facing guide. Encounter danger also depends on battlefield layout, cover, objectives, enemy tactics, morale, corruption risk, reinforcements, and whether the party is supposed to kill the threat or merely survive it.

// Defense & Vitality Baselines

Low-Level Enemies

Enemy Kind	Defense	Vitality
Rabble / Civilian threat	9–11	4–8
Basic cultist / ganger	10–12	6–10
Trained trooper	12–14	10–18
Specialist	12–15	14–24
Minor leader	13–15	20–35

Mid-Level Enemies

Enemy Kind	Defense	Vitality
Elite human	14–16	30–50
Monster / brute	13–16	45–80
Lesser daemon	14–17	35–70
Astartes-level enemy	16–19	70–120
Heavy machine / walker	16–20	80–160

High-Level Enemies

Enemy Kind	Defense	Vitality
Greater daemon / major monster	18–22	180–300
Major war engine	18–24	250–500
C'tan shard / cosmic threat	20–26	300+ or objective-based

Some threats should not be designed as “kill it by reducing Vitality.” C'tan shards, titan-scale threats, reality wounds, and major daemons may require objectives, rituals, containment, escape, banishment, or survival timers.

Types, Roles & Tags

Classification

// Tags — filter the archive

HumanForge-BoundAstartesXenosDaemonWarpBeastMachineVehicleHereticCorruptedPsychicNullEliteLeaderHordeSwarmHeavySniperMeleeRangedSuppressionFearCorruptionArmorFlamePoisonDiseaseStealthAmbushFlyingBurrowingObjectiveBossNemesisKhorneNurgleTzeentchSlaaneshUndividedImperialAeldariDrukhariT'auKrootOrkTyranidGenestealer CultNecronC'tanKin

Tags drive the Enemy Archive’s quick search below and mark template eligibility.

Templates

11 Drafted

Templates modify a base enemy quickly: Traitor Guardsman + Nurgle-Marked = Plague-Touched Traitor Guardsman. Chaos Marine + Khorne-Marked = Blood-Mad Heretic Astartes. Cult Demagogue + Tzeentch-Marked = Warp-Cabal Prophet.