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Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes lists a number of Demonic Boons (p. 30) that a DM can grant to monsters and NPCs dedicated to a particular demon lord. For Juiblex, it says that the "most dedicated devotees of ooze" gain the Slimy Organs trait. Part of the description of this trait states:

Whenever this creature suffers a critical hit or is reduced to 0 hit points, all creatures within 5 feet of it take acid damage equal to its number of Hit Dice.

Does this mean that if the creature with the boon has 12 hit dice, each creature within 5 feet of it takes 6 points of damage? Or am I misinterpreting this?

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    \$\begingroup\$ Hi Arrowkill, welcome to RPG.SE! It looks like you may have answered your own question here - if so, that's great, but for clarity and posterity I'd ask you to do one of three things: either edit your question to be just the question and answer below in an answer (perfectly fine to answer your own!), edit your question to make it clearer what confusion remains, or remove the post entirely if you don't actually have a question. Thanks! \$\endgroup\$
    – SirTechSpec
    May 20, 2018 at 2:33

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Abilities do what they say

Your interpretation is somewhat incorrect. The quote you listed says "number of hit dice", not half of hit dice (emphasis mine)

take acid damage equal to its number of Hit Dice

The number of hit dice is typically listed in the monster stat block next to HP (i.e. "90 (12d10+24)" would mean 12 hit dice or 12 damage).

If it said "half of hit dice", you would be correct.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Could the "its" not be referring to the Creatures being damaged? \$\endgroup\$
    – Exempt-Medic
    May 19, 2018 at 23:16
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    \$\begingroup\$ @Medix2: Nope. First of all, the quoted sentence says "all creatures", plural, so "it" can't refer to it; second, the earlier part of the sentence says "this creature" and then "within five feet of it", so "it" clearly refers to the creature that has that Demonic Boon and is being damaged. \$\endgroup\$
    – V2Blast ♦
    May 19, 2018 at 23:46

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