The bosses

Every boss is the exam for the floor it ends, and every one is beatable with that floor's own gear, provided you have been identifying and socketing it. This page covers where each fight is, what the boss actually does, and what it drops.

Bosses show their level in the bracket before their name, and their health scales with it. Most of them announce their big attacks out loud. The lines are quoted below, because hearing one is your cue to move.

Troll Leader, Floor 1

The forest's master, fought in the open at the end of The Forest's Master, Floor 1's final quest. You will be level 1 or 2, and so is it.

It is a melee bruiser with two tricks. When it shouts “You will be crushed!” it leaps at you and explodes on landing. The blast ignores armour and throws you into the air, so the shout means step away, not block. Its ordinary hits also knock you back with extra force, which matters more than it sounds if you fight it near the archers that spawn alongside it. Kill those first.

Rocky, Floor 2

The thing at the bottom of the great cavern, at the end of The Thing Below. Killing it opens the way to Floor 3. Be level 3 with identified Floor 2 gear; this is the first fight that will kill a careless player.

Everything Rocky does is rock. It lobs stones at you constantly. When the message “The ground trembles!” appears, a shockwave follows that ignores armour and launches you; get out of arm's reach before it lands. When “Boulders rain from above!” appears, four volleys of stone fall where you are standing, so keep moving until they stop.

One thing to know before you draw a bow: Rocky shrugs off projectiles, taking about a quarter of their damage. Melee and skills do full work.

Necromancer, Floor 3

The end of The Source, the quest that takes you into the game's only instanced dungeon. You need the dungeon key from the quest line to enter, and the boss waits at the bottom at level 6, a step above the floor's monsters at 4 to 5.

The fight as it plays, from the door to the drop.

This is a summon fight. The Necromancer's own health is modest; the danger is the room filling up while you tunnel on it. It raises waves of corruption from the ground: light waves of up to six spitters, runners and scavengers, and heavy waves of two Corrupted Crushers. Waves come at least fifteen seconds apart and cap out, but only if you are killing what rises. The rise itself is slow enough to punish; a summon crawling out of the dirt is a free hit.

The boss itself fights from range with a bolt of fire damage, and if you stand next to it, a warden's roar telegraphs a burning slam around it. It wears wards against fire, ice, lightning and physical damage, so no single element trivialises it. Clear the adds, take your openings, and it goes down.

Two pieces of the Torn Necromancer set give +20 maximum health; all four give Speed I. It is worth repeat runs, and the boss pays the biggest experience in the game so far.

Rocky (Caged), Floor 4

The Floor 2 boss again, found in a cage on the sixth island during Kin in the Cage. The quest is easy to walk past and you should not: it must be finished before the floor's main line closes, and completing it pays a bonus skill point.

The moveset is the Floor 2 fight, faster and hitting harder, at level 6 to 7. The important difference is the plating: this Rocky carries a heavy ward against physical damage on top of the projectile resistance, so a weapons-only approach hits a wall. Elemental skills still do full work, and this is the fight that teaches you why you slotted them.

It has no unique drop; the reward is the quest itself and the floor's normal tables.

Cult Captain, Floor 4

The cult's field commander on Hearth Ranch. The fight is a flaming sweep up close and fireballs at range, wearing wards against both fire and physical damage.

Next: what level to be for each of these, the full bestiary, or what to do with what they drop.