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Outsiders native to the Abyss, the plane exemplifying the Chaotic Evil alignment, and exactly as nasty as that seems. Demons are a blanket term for all creatures native to the Abyss, and there are three notable subspecies; Tanar'ri, Obyriths and Loumara.

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    Demons in General 
  • Apocalypse How: A successful demon incursion will result in a class 4. The world will still exist, but it will be dragged into the Abyss and conquered by demons. All life will adapt or die. Or adapt and then die; the Abyss is equal-opportunity about murder.
  • Asskicking Leads to Leadership: Demons get stronger by killing things, and the various demon lords have been killing for a long time. Appeal to force is the only kind of authority demons respect: a weak demon obeys a stronger one because the stronger one can annihilate it if it doesn't. Currently, the strongest among them is the Demogorgon.
  • Continuing is Painful: Like most outsiders, demons can only be destroyed for good on their home plane. However, while a demon who is killed on another plane will eventually reincarnate back in the Abyss, they run the risk of returning to the general pool of demonspawn and ending up "demoted" to a lesser form of demon for their failure.
  • Demon of Human Origin: Some demons are born from the souls of particularly evil people, and others are people who became trapped in the Abyss and were corrupted by its evil. These are the minority, however: most demons just spring fully formed from the stuff of the Abyss itself.
  • Enemy Civil War: One of the reasons the Devils can fight the Blood War to a stalemate despite the demons' massive numbers advantage is that demons hate other demons as much as they hate everything else; getting together a demon army is basically an exercise in throwing enough demons at a problem that the survivors from various squabbles are still a threat to whoever you're fighting.
  • Dimension Lord: Every demon lord rules at least one layer of the Abyss and can reshape it to their will. The mightiest of them rule multiple layers.
  • Great Offscreen War: The Upheaval, which resulted in the current status quo within the Abyss. Back in the Age Before Ages, when the great conflict of the multiverse was between Law and Chaos and the Abyss was ascendant, the forces of the Queen of Chaos suffered a shocking defeat on the world of Oerth when her champion, Miska the Wolf-Spider, was sealed in Pandemonium by the Rod of Seven Parts. Her alliance of obyriths fractured, their tanar'ri servitors revolted, and an eladrin warhost took advantage of the anarchy by invading the Plain of Infinite Portals, driving the demons into the pits leading to the Abyss' other layers. When the celestials were finally driven out, the power of the obyriths was broken, and the tanar'ri began squabbling amongst themselves for control of the Abyss.
  • Hell on Earth: Demons constantly seek to invade other planes of existence, and the Material Plane is no exception. Sometimes they even succeed, which is never a good time for the hapless mortal civilizations that find themselves in the path of a rampaging demon horde. Taken to the extreme, these incursions can result in the entire realm being dragged into the Abyss, becoming a new layer.
  • The Horde: There are functionally infinite numbers of demons, but their highly chaotic nature means that "disorganized horde" is basically the best you're ever going to get out of a demon army.
  • It's All About Me: Every demon is a self-absorbed narcissist which believes that it, and it alone, is destined to one day rule the universe. They have no empathy for other creatures, not even other demons, and cooperate with one another only when forced to by a stronger entity.
  • Our Demons Are Different: Demons, or tanar'ri, are Chaotic Evil fiends from the Abyss, and want to destroy everything. In 4E, they are corrupted elementals.
  • Predecessor Villain: The Queen of Chaos, an obyrith lord powerful enough to unite her kind beneath her banner, and who also secured the loyalty of the tanar'ri with the help of her consort Miska the Wolf-Spider, the first Prince of Demons. When Miska was sealed and the Upheaval wracked the Abyss, the Queen of Chaos was forced to flee to layer 14, the Steaming Fen, and hasn't emerged since.
  • Primordial Chaos: The demonologist Tulket nor Ahm asserts that the Abyss is the primordial chaos the gods imposed order upon to shape creation. The plane's native demons — and likely the Abyss itself — greatly resent the gods for "corrupting" the purity of their chaos, and seek to tear down creation and bring the multiverse back to its original state.
  • Resurrective Immortality: While normally killing a demon in the Abyss is the only way to end it for good, demon princes can take this a step further and will return unless they're specifically slain in their own domains.
  • Walking Wasteland: Any demon that ends up on a plane other than the Abyss has a chance to corrupt the area immediately around it, with the corruption eventually opening a Hell Gate to the Abyss that more demons can come through. Fortunately, in practise, the demon would need to stay in the same spot for anything up to several years for the corruption to get bad enough for a Hell Gate to open, and most demons are too easily bored to stay in one spot for that long.
  • Zerg Rush: Demons are incredibly numerous and so chaotic and evil that this is actually amazing tactics by their standards — at least they're directing their charge at the enemy.

Tanar'ri

    Adaru 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_adaru_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 10 (3E)

Fiendish millipedes with humanoid faces, these cunning demons amass retinues of fawning lackeys that they lead into battle.


  • Beast with a Human Face: Mostly insect, but with the disturbing fanged face of a human child.
  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: An eight-foot demonic millipede scuttling on countless orange legs.
  • Bloody Murder: As they take damage, their foul blood turns the ground around them into difficult terrain, but only for non-evil creatures.
  • Charm Person: Adarus can use charm monster three times per day, with the catch that it only affects other tanar'ri. They thus recruit their lackeys from lesser demons that can't resist their magic.
  • Creepy Souvenir: They're fascinated by body parts they don't possess, and will take pieces of their victims as trophies.
  • Demon of Human Origin: An adaru is spawned each time a mortal tells a lie with grave consequences, and the demon will sometimes attempt to track down the mortal that created them to reward the mortal with endless torment.
  • Manipulative Bastard: Beyond their charm ability, adarus are adept liars and manipulators who can easily control the weak-willed with false promises.
  • Poisonous Person: They constantly emit a vile mist that bolsters evil creatures while sickening others.
  • We Have Reserves: For all their cunning in battle, adarus are careless when expending the lives of their minions, and will giggle to themselves even in losing fights as their lackeys die around them.

    Alkilith 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_alkalith_5e.png
5e
3e
Challenge Rating: 14 (3E), 11 (5E)

Mold-like fiends that grow around gateways and openings in the Material Plane, and if left unchecked will create a portal to the Abyss.


  • Acid Attack: If forced to fight, an alkilith can lash its foes with acidic Combat Tentacles.
  • Alien Kudzu: They are alien kudzu. While other demons exist to lure mortals to the Abyss, alkiliths exist to bring the Abyss to the Material Plane.
  • Blob Monster: They mostly appear as masses of demonic mold, but in some editions can assume a vaguely-humanoid shape of acidic corruption contained in a cracked, leathery coating.
  • Brown Note: Being close to an alkilith can cause creatures to become distracted by the demonic buzzing in their heads, or at worst become confused and act randomly.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes notes that most demon cultists refuse to summon alkiliths, due to the danger of the fiends creating an unchecked Abyssal portal. Meanwhile, other demons fear alkiliths because most tanar'ri have no innate protection against their acidic attacks.
  • Hellgate: They can open these independently, which is what makes them so dangerous.

    Armanite 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_armanite_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 7 (3E, 5E)
Centaur-like fiends which serve as the heavy cavalry of a demonic horde.
  • Beware My Stinger Tail: An armanite's tail ends in a serrated blade like that of a sword.
  • Blood Knight: Armanites are vicious and obsessed with combat, fighting any potential foe they find and turning on each other if no better target presents itself. More powerful demons find them useful as shock troops for this purpose, as they're brave to the point of insanity and terrifyingly savage.
  • Our Centaurs Are Different: Armanites are demons with a horse-like body below the waist and a humanoid torso above it.
  • Natural Weapon: Armanite bodies bristle with tools for killing, including horns, wicked talons, sharp hooves and serrated blades on their tails.
  • Private Military Contractors: Bands of armanites, led by commanders alternately known as pathwardens and knechts, serve as mercenary companies in the Blood War, marching beneath the banner of the demon lord currently employing them. But being creatures of chaos, armanites are known to switch sides should they ever lose their current employer's banner, and if they're given orders they dislike, they'll quit the field.
  • Shock and Awe: Against tough enemies, armanites can call on their innate magic to loose bolts of lightning, or add electricity damage to their weapon attacks.

    Arrow Demon 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_arrow_demon_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 7 (3E)

Humanoid demons with an extra set of arms and the skill to use a pair of oversized longbows to devastating effect.


  • Depleted Phlebotinum Shells: Arrow demons are sometimes equipped with adamantine, cold iron, or silvered arrows, depending on what they need to overcome the Damage Reduction of their enemy.
  • More Dakka: A non-gunpowder example. Arrow demons can shoot both bows after moving, or take a full attack action for a whopping four shots. Since these are Large-sized weapons, and composite ones at that, arrow demons can potentially deal 72 points of damage in a single round of shooting, even without the benefit of a Critical Hit.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Arrow demons have four arms each, allowing them to Dual Wield longbows.

    Babau 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_babau_5e.jpg
4e
Challenge Rating: 6 (3E), 13 (4E), 4 (5E)

Gaunt fiends with the cunning of devils but the bloodthirst of demons.


  • Covered in Gunge: Prior to 5th edition, babaus secreted an acidic slime while in combat, the effects of which vary by edition, either protecting the babau from piercing and slashing attacks (2E), corroding any weapons that touch the babau (3E), or just harming adjacent attackers (4E).
  • Deadly Gaze: Their magical gaze saps the strength of their target.
  • Fertile Blood: According to 4th and 5th Edition, babaus were born from the blood of Graz'zt when the Archduchess Glasya struck him in close combat, only for the newborn demons to help drive her from the field.
  • Horned Humanoid: A babau has a single horn growing from the back of its head, which curls forward like a scorpion's tail.
  • Lean and Mean: They are tall and skinny, and vicious even by the standards of demons.
  • Press-Ganged: Babaus not serving a particular demon lord as spies or assassins tend to roam the Abyss, rounding up "recruits" for the Blood War. This can lead lesser demons to band together and try to kill babaus, but greater tanar'ri may come to the babaus' aid out of recognition for their important role in the war against the devils.

    Balor 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_balor_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 20 (3E), 27 (4E), 19 (5E)

The dreaded lords of the Abyss, and the highest a demon can go before evolving into a unique form, most likely as a Demon Prince in its own right.


  • Big Red Devil: Balors are towering demons with horned heads, large wings, hoofed feet and bright red skin.
  • Defeat Equals Explosion: Killing one for good in the Abyss results in a powerful explosion.
  • Elite Mook: They're designed to be among the top tier demons one can encounter. A single Balor is strong enough that it can take hordes of enemies down before being weakened amd slain.
  • Expy: They're based on the Balrogs from The Lord of the Rings, with whom they share their appearance, an association with fire and a preference for flaming swords and whips, to the point of being explicitly named that in early editions before the Tolkien estate threatened lawsuits.
  • Flaming Weapon: Balor weapons, usually swords and whips, are coated in ever-burning fire.
  • Taking You with Me: When a balor dies in battle, it releases a powerful explosion within the area it was slain, the intent seemingly being to ensure whoever slew it cannot escape.
  • Whip of Dominance: Balors are one of the greatest demons of the Abyss aside from outright Demon Lords, Dual Wield a sword and flaming whip in combat. It's a nod to both their command over lesser demons and the balrogs that inspired them.
  • Wreathed in Flames: Balors are constantly wreathed in fire, burning anyone they drag into melee combat with them.

    Bar-lgura 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_barlgura_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 5 (3E), 8 (4E), 5 (5E)

Primate-like demons that excel at snatching victims.


  • Hidden Elf Village: Their AD&D lore describes isolated communities of a few hundred bar-lgura dwelling in simple tribal societies, using their weight of numbers to ensure their independence from Abyssal politics and the Blood War. There are also stories of vengeful balors singlehandedly wiping out such communities of "rebellious" tanar'ri.
  • Killer Gorilla: A bar-lgura looks like a hulking orangutan with a gruesome, drooping visage and tusks jutting from its jaw.
  • Spell My Name With An S: The name is written without a hyphen (i.e., "barlgura") in certain editions.
  • Teleport Spam: Like other powerful demons, a bar-lgura can use greater teleport at will. Unlike other demons, it can also take other creatures with it (willing or not, though unwilling targets get a Will save to avoid being abducted).

    Bulezau 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_bulezau_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 9 (3E), 3 (5E)

Bloodthirsty, goat-headed fiends who spread disease.


  • The Berserker: Their AD&D rules give a bulezau a 25% chance each round of combat to fly into a berserk frenzy, gaining bonuses to attack rolls and saves at the expense of their Armor Class, as the demon refuses to stop attacking until all its opponents are dead or routed. The chance of this happening rises to 75% during rounds in which a bulezau takes damage but is unable to hit its opponent — "They don't take failure well."
  • Beware My Stinger Tail: Bulezaus have a barbed tail with which to stab their enemies. It infects the target with a supernatural disease which makes their flesh rot and develop festering boils, amongst other nasty symptoms.
  • Blood Knight: Bulezaus embody the violence inherent in nature, and eagerly fight and maul whatever beings they encounter. More powerful demons often use them as shock troops and thugs for this purpose, and bulezaus often turn on each other when deprived of other targets. This makes them ill-suited as guardians or sentries, and only an iron-willed tanar'ri commander can keep bulezaus from charging at the first enemy they see.
  • Dumb Muscle: Their Planescape entry explains that a bulezau's "chief vulnerability's found in the hollow space between their ears," and the only thing dumber than one is two of the demons.
  • Gruesome Goat: They are ornery demons with the heads of goats.
  • Make Them Rot: Their mere presence inflicts necrotic damage to nearby non-demons. The more bulezaus there are, the more concentrated and deadly their rotting presence becomes.

    Cambion ( 3 E) 
Challenge Rating: 5 (standard), 6 (noble) (3E)

While "cambion" is usually a generic term for half-fiends, Expedition to the Demonweb Pits introduces true cambions as a specific creature born from a tanar'ri father and a planetouched mother (usually a tiefling), producing something that is less a Half-Human Hybrid than a "humanoid-touched demon". While they do not technically have the tanar'ri subtype, they have all generic tanar'ri abilities apart from summoning other demons. Cambions breed true among their own kind but prefer taking mortal partners, with the children of such unions always being tieflings.

There also exist the marquis and baron cambions, a slightly stronger variety born when a demon lord or prince mates with a humanoid half-fiend.

See Dungeons And Dragons Creatures C for the more common usage of Cambion.


  • Charm Person: Noble cambions can use the charm person spell at will, on top of being much more charismatic than the common variety.
  • Death by Childbirth: Giving birth to a cambion always kills the mother.
  • Doppelgänger Spin: Capable of using the mirror image spell at will.
  • Extreme Doormat: Standard cambions have -4 Wisdom and -10 Charisma. Averted for noble varieties, which get +6 Wisdom and no Charisma penalty.
  • Humanshifting: Each cambion has an alternate form as a mundane humanoid, which it may transform into once per day.
  • Native Guide: A favoured tactic of cambions is passing themselves off as friendly experts on the planes or the Abyss in particular, which they use to trick plane-hopping adventurers into demonic ambushes.
  • Oxymoronic Being: Despite being Outsiders with the chaotic and evil subtypes like all true demons (i.e. being literally Made of Evil), cambions are less inherently prone to evil than even 3E tieflings, leaving them outcasts both on the Material Plane and the Abyss. Their alignment is merely "Often Chaotic Evil", and on the rare occasion a cambion is born from a good-aligned mother their alignment can also be good.
  • Professional Killer: A common career path - they have great stealth abilities, Assassin as their favoured class, and the cambion in the default stat block carries doses of a paralytic poison.
  • Stealth Expert: The cambion can use invisibility 7 times per day, and its "Silent Metal" ability allows it to ignore penalties on Hide and Move Silently checks from wearing armour.
  • Supernatural Fear Inducer: Capable of using the fear spell at will.
  • Uneven Hybrid: Cambions are the product of a demon mating with a humanoid who already has some level of otherworldly blood, producing offspring who are less than half human. This likewise means that they cannot sire half-fiends like other demons, producing tieflings instead.

    Carnevus 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_carnevus_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 9 (3E)

Through a special ritual, a tanar'ri can mate with a lamia noble to produce not a half-fiend lamia, but a unique species of demon which resembles two humanoid bodies squashed together, having four arms and two mouths. Carnevi have a wide range of spell-like abilities from the wizard list, though the exact spells vary from specimen to specimen. Unlike "full" demons they cannot summon more of their kind, though they breed true.


  • Counterspell: A carnevus can use the counterspell version of dispel magic once per round for free, as long as it has not cast a second spell.
  • Extra Turn: In addition to extra physical attacks with its multiple arms, a carnevus's two tongues allow it to apply the benefits of Quicken Spell and Maximise Spell to all its spells for free, the former allowing it to cast two spells per round.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Has the Superior Multiweapon Fighting ability, allowing it to attack with weapons in all its hands without penalty; it also gets a special clause which allows it to attack with weapons in two of its hands as a standard action.

    Cerebrilith 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_cerebrilith_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 10 (3E)

These hunched demons augment their natural magic with psionic power, and are often employed by other tanar'ri to counter mortal psionicists.


  • My Brain Is Big: Not only is a cerebrilith's brain exposed though the gaps in their ribcage-like skulls, said brain is so large that it extends down much of their spine.
  • No-Neck Chump: As a result of the above, they don't have a functional neck.
  • Psychic Powers: The only demon devoted to them. They particularly enjoy extracting and studying the brains of defeated psionic enemies, in hopes of gaining new insights into the psionic arts.

    Chasme 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_chasme_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 10 (3E), 14 (4E), 6 (5E)

Large fly-like demons with disturbingly humanoid, beaked heads.


  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: They resemble large flies.
  • Brown Note: Chasmes produce a droning sound so horrid that it can turn non-demons that hear it unconscious.
  • Sadist: Chasmes are intensely sadistic and greatly enjoy the fear and suffering of other beings, which often leads them to work for more powerful masters as torturers.
  • Torture Technician: Chasmes often serve demon lords as torturers, typically plying their craft to extract knowledge from victims and to make examples of traitorous minions.
  • Villainous Demotivator: They have the uncanny ability to sniff out Blood War deserters, and punish such demons with hideous deaths. Chasmes are rewarded for this service by having lesser tanar'ri sent to the front lines in their stead, which only feeds the fear and hatred those demons have for them.

    Draegloth 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_draegloth_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 5 (3E), 24 (4E), 7 (5E)

A specific kind of half-fiend, the result of an aspiring drow priestess consorting with a glabrezu during her initiation ritual. Draegloths are thankfully rare, viewed as signs of Lolth's favor, and used as potent weapons by their parent houses.


  • Bizarre Sexual Dimorphism: The draegloth pictured to the right is a male. Female draegloths are much rarer and look like female drow with four arms and distinctly lupine characteristics.
  • Dumb Muscle: Male draegloths, at least, tend to lack the cunning and patience of their demonic parents, typically using their brute strength to kill at the whims of the drow families that they were born into.
    • Genius Bruiser: Females, on the other hand, tend to approach combat more cleverly and are a lot smarter in general.
  • Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Male draegloth are beserkers who charge into battle and tear foes apart with their claws, while female draegloth are all raised to be clerics and stay on the backline casting spells while their underlings kept foes at bay (although they are still fearsome in melee combat).
  • Hot Skitty-on-Wailord Action: The result of it. Glabrezus are Large, dog-headed, four-armed monsters that cannot shapeshift into a form more compatible with a slight Medium-sized elf.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Each kind of draegloth possess four arms.
  • Nonhuman Humanoid Hybrid: Draegloths are a specific type of half-fiend born from the union of a Drow priestess and a Glabrezu.
  • Slave Race: Despite their power, draegloths are generally enslaved to the priestess who birthed them.
  • Spider People: Very rarely draegloths can be born to driders, resulting in what are called Draegloth Abominations; uncontrollable, blood-crazed monsters with the lower half of spiders that hunt from the shadows. These abominations were almost always cast through a portal to the Demonweb Pits as an offering to Lolth, lest they bring ruin to their mother and all surrounding drow.

    Dretch 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_dretch_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 2 (3E, 4E), 1/4 (5E)

Small, squat, pot-bellied wretches that reluctantly serve as minions for stronger demons.


  • Cannon Fodder: Stupid, craven, and ineffectual in combat except in great numbers.
  • Dirty Coward: Dretches are profoundly cowardly creatures, and will flee from combat at the first sign of danger. If they don't, it's inevitably because they fear their superiors more than they fear dying.
  • Zerg Rush: Dretches faced with stronger opponents than they are (read: opponents) tend to rely on sheer numbers to win, usually summoning other dretches before and during battle in order to drown individually stronger creatures in a tide of bodies.

    Gadacro 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_gadacro_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 3(3E)

Demonic parodies of cherubs, which follow Abyssal hosts in flocks that pursue stragglers and feast on the eyes of the fallen.


  • Eye Scream: Gadacros relish consuming the eyeballs of their victims, preferrably while said victims are still alive, and their claw attacks can temporarily blind opponents.
  • Putto: A sick twist on the concept, with bat-like wings, purple skin, and clawed fingers.
  • Teleportation: Gadacros can trigger a short-ranged teleport in reaction to getting hit in melee.

    Glabrezu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_glabrezu_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 13 (3E), 23 (4E), 9 (5E)

Large demons with canine heads, an extra pair of massive pincer arms, and most dangerously, the patience to interact with mortals in any way other than immediate violence.


  • The Chessmaster: Glabrezu are the covert agents of the Abyss, subtly manipulating events in other planes to secure power for the Abyss in the long term, often waiting centuries or millennia for plans to come to fruition.
  • The Corrupter: Their usual modus operandi. They love using their deals to encourage mortals to become Chaotic Evil.
  • Deal with the Devil: They occupy this niche among the demons, manipulating and tempting weak-willed mortals with the promise of a wish spell. The catch, however, is that the wish can only be used for an evil cause, or one that would spread destruction and suffering. Failing that, an act of immense wickedness or great sacrifice is required as payment.
  • Evil Is Not a Toy: Glabrezu are often summoned by mortals who think that, as demons, they're dumber and easier to handle than devils. But anyone under the impression that they can trick a glabrezu is in for a nasty surprise, and anyone who thinks they can overpower one is most likely just as wrong. Even those who try to deal "fairly" with a glabrezu are in danger — at least with a devil you have assurance that it will stick to the letter of the bargain.
  • Genius Bruiser: Glabrezus have 20 Strength and 19 Intelligence, compared to the human max of 18. These ain't your average Abyssal Dumb Muscle...
  • Jack of All Trades: While their primary skills revolve around intrigue and subterfuge, glabrezu also posses great physical strength and can wield various magic spells. However, despite these various skills they actually occupy the middle class of the Abyss hierarchy.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: A glabrezu has four arms. Two of them end in humanlike hands, while the other two end in lobster-like pincers. It uses all four arms when attacking.

    Goristro 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_goristro_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 16 (3E), 19 (4E), 17 (5E)

Huge bison-headed demons who largely serve Baphomet, demon lord of minotaurs.


  • Anti-Structure: 5th Edition gives them the "Siege Monster" rule, letting them deal double damage to objects and structures.
  • Beast of Battle: They're sometimes equipped with "citadels," fortified howdahs a goristro wears on its head and shoulders with the ease of a helmet. Generally speaking, goristros are treated more like war beasts than soldiers, and carefully bred by stronger, more intelligent tanar'ri to excel as siege monsters.
  • Our Minotaurs Are Different: Goristros are massive demons that resemble fiendish minotaurs. They're Baphomet's preferred demonic servants and sometimes seem in the armies of other demon lords as living siege engines. They're also associated with mazes — they can perfectly recall any path they've taken and have an excellent sense of direction, and delight in chasing prey through twisting and confusing labyrinths.
  • Shockwave Stomp: Their 3rd Edition rules give them a stomp attack that imitates the earthquake spell.

    Hezrou 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_hezrou_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 11 (3E), 22 (4E), 8 (5E)

Large, reeking, toad-like demons that act as Abyssal sergeants, directing lesser demons on behalf of more intelligent superiors.


  • Deal with the Devil: According to their AD&D lore, a few times each century, hezrou are able to plane shift to the Prime Material Plane in events known as Dark Walks. The hezrous will then try to make pacts with mortals, offering a service such as destroying an enemy or retrieving an artifact, in exchange for eternal subservience... though the demons will also accept the soul of the mortal's family member, friend or lover in their place.
  • Dumb Muscle: Hezrou are very strong, but aren't especially smart and are fairly easily duped.
  • Evil Smells Bad: The stench a hezrou gives off is so vile and overpowering that nearby creatures need to make saving throws to avoid being poisoned by it.
  • Frog Men: These demons resemble eight-foot-tall humanoid toads.
  • The Neidermeyer: They're vicious and cruel commanders, prone to attacking even those minions who follow their orders, just to amuse themselves.

    Incubus 
Challenge Rating: 3 (3E)

Introduced in Dragon Magazine #353, incubi are the lesser-known Spear Counterpart of succubi, being embodiments less of seduction than rape. Incubi resemble handsome wiry young men with hooves and gazelle-like horns, typically dressed in leather. While physically stronger than succubi they otherwise have worse stats in most areas, and lack the succubi's wings and ability to turn ethereal.


  • Back Stab: Innately possess the rogue's sneak attack ability, dealing extra damage when a foe is caught off guard.
  • Horn Attack: Their horns are large enough to be used as a weak secondary attack.
  • Kiss of Death: They have a variant of the succubus ability to drain their target through intimacy - instead of inflicting negative levels until they die, they inflict Wisdom damage until they fall into a coma.
  • Laser-Guided Amnesia: In place of the at-will suggestion power of succubi, they can use modify memory once per day.
  • Lie to the Beholder: Incubi cannot shapeshift into humans like succubi can, only project an illusion of such (meaning that observers have a chance to see through it by Spotting the Thread). Curiously, their description claims that they have no ability to hide their true appearance at all.
  • Monster Knight: They come equipped with magic leather armour and a magic sword, and spend most of their time acting as the rank-and-file troops of the Succubus Queen Malcanthet in conflicts against other demon lords.
  • Retcon: Whether an incubus is a separate species from a succubus, a creature identical to a succubus apart from being male, or just a succubus in male form, goes back and forth between editions.
  • Succubi and Incubi: Leaning more towards the older "assault women in their sleep" model of incubi.
  • Surprise Pregnancy: Their speciality when they bother with subtlety - they're capable of approaching a woman in disguise, impairing her judgement through Wisdom damage, and then erasing her memory of intimacy.
  • Viewer Species Confusion: While succubi and incubi are described as perversions of female and male sexuality respectively, neither are limited to assuming forms of the same sex, and incubi aren't summoned to the Material Plane very often. As a result, most of the reports of "incubi" seducing women are actually succubi.
  • What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: Unpopular among summoners due to succubi generally doing their job better.

    Jarilith 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_jarilith_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 13 (3E)

Fiendish felines that take the form of red-furred lions, and have a predatory sense for weakness.


  • Deadly Lunge: They can make a pounce attack on a charge, possibly followed by a rake attack with their claws.
  • Hunter of Their Own Kind: Their favorite prey is other fiends, and they are notoriously difficult to control, so even balors have to watch themselves around jariliths.
  • Supernatural Fear Inducer: Anyone who sees a jarilith charge or attack must make a saving throw or become shaken.

    Jovoc 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_jovoc_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 5 (3E)

Short fiends that resemble a gnome's corpse left to blacken and bloat in the sun, with blood-red, long-fingered hands.


  • Healing Factor: Unusually for fiends of their level, jovocs have Fast Healing 5.
  • Synchronization: Jovocs' gimmick is that whenever they take damage, every non-tanar'ri around them suffers the same amount of damage (or half damage, with a successful saving throw). The smarter jovocs can abuse this by hiding out of sight of neary enemies and taking turns attacking each other, letting their fast healing restore the damage between rounds.
  • Victory by Endurance: A jovoc's natural attacks don't deal much damage, but between their fast healing and the fact that they reflect damage on their attackers, they can outlast any foes who commit to a protracted fight with them.

    Kastighur 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_kastighur_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 11 (3E)

Huge, horned sadists often employed as hunters or prison wardens by other tanar'ri.


  • Emotion Eater: As outsiders, kastighurs don't need to eat or drink, instead they feed upon the fear, panic and hopelessness of those they attack or imprison. This incidentally gives them an attack bonus against opponents that are under the frightened condition.
  • Supernatural Fear Inducer: Anything that sees them charge or attack has a chance to become shaken.
  • Teleport Spam: Kastighurs can teleport at will, which they use to surprise foes or try to grab flying enemies. But since this isn't the more reliable greater teleport, they're leery of resorting to teleport tactics on unfamiliar battlefields.
  • Use Your Head: They can make a powerful gore attack when they charge that, on top of dealing a lot of damage, can stun anything that survives the hit.

    Kelvezu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_kelvezu_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 18 (3E)

Remarkably unassuming humanoid demons, kelvezus work as infiltrators and assassins for the lords of the Abyss.


  • Amazing Technicolor Population: About the only indication of a kelvezu's fiendish heritage is its rosy red skin, so with a minimal disguise they can pass for human.
  • Back Stab: They can deal Sneak Attack damage as a high-level Rogue.
  • Damage Over Time: Their scimitar and dagger have the greater wounding and wounding enchantments, respectively, causing injuries that bleed for extra damage each turn until the victim is healed.
  • Professional Killer: They serve as such for the demon princes, and have an array of spell-like abilities such as improved invisibility and teleport without error to help with their trade.

    Klurichir 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_klurichir_4e.png
4e
Challenge Rating: 25 (3E), 28 (4E)

One of the few things capable of giving a balor nightmares, klurichirs serve as generals in the armies of the most powerful demon lords.


  • Belly Mouth: A huge one, with multiple rows of grinding teeth, which it can use to grapple and gnaw on victims.
  • Genius Bruiser: Klurichirs are physical powerhouses and brilliant tacticians, able to direct lesser demons while they support them with their spells, or charge into melee to terrifying effect.
  • Monstrous Mandibles: Their belly-mouths are flanked by wicked pincers.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Despite their four arms, klurichirs only wield a single battleaxe in melee, since they prefer to leave their other hands free to grab victims and stuff them into their belly-mouth.
  • Off with His Head!: Their pincers are specifically vorpal pincers, giving them a 15% chance to deal a One-Hit Kill.
  • Spike Shooter: They have spines covering their body in lieu of hair, and can launch them at foes that try to attack from beyond their reach.
  • Supernatural Fear Inducer: Anything that comes close to them must make saves against fear.

    Lilitu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_lilitu_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 12 (3E)

An evolved form of succubi, these comely demons specialize in infiltrating and corrupting goodly churches and turning their worship towards demon lords.


  • Broken Angel: Lilitus are born from succubi who ritualistically sacrifice a religious congregation that believed they were worshiping a good deity, but are in fact opening an Abyssal portal that blasts the dupes with unholy fire. The process reduces the succubi's wings to blackened stumps of bone, but they are reborn as a more powerful lilitu.
  • Claimed by the Supernatural: A lilitu can gift a willing (or helpless) subject with a profane bonus to their Charisma and saving throws for 24 hours, but this causes them to register as chaotic to magic that detects alignment, and a tattoo of the lilitu's name, written in Abyssal, appears somewhere on the subject's body, usually someplace that won't be seen in public.
  • Combat Tentacles: Sport four poisonous tendrils extending from their waists.
  • The Corrupter: They take profane joy in corrupting priests and congregations.
  • Good Hurts Evil: Even more so than normal demons, lilitus' blasphemous nature makes them particularly susceptible to divine magic, resulting in penalties on saving throws and to overcome spell resistance.
  • Removing the Rival: Lilitus view each other as competition to be defeated, and succubi as potential threats to be neutralized while they're weak. They particularly enjoy taking a goodly guise and hiring adventurers to hunt down a succubus too close to their area of operation.
  • Succubi and Incubi: Played with in that lilitus are still supernaturally attractive and adept at using their looks to their advantage, but are more interested in perverting good religions than seducing individuals.

    Manes 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_manes_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 1 (3E), 1/8 (5E)

Manes are the initial Petitioner form of Chaotic Evil souls, and as such are the lowliest of all demons. Aggressive and violent, they attack any non-demon they see.


  • Body Horror: The artwork for some editions shows that manes are covered in open, maggot-infested sores, often deep enough to show their rotting musculature.
  • Demon of Human Origin: Manes are born from evil souls that wound up in the Abyss. They are the only demons which are guaranteed to have once been mortal.
  • Fearless Fool: They have an Intelligence score of 3 and an immunity to the frightened condition. Accordingly, they have no sense of self-preservation and will attack things that could easily squash them like bugs.

    Marilith 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_marilith_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 17 (3E), 24 (4E), 16 (5E)

Powerful, multi-armed, serpentine, feminine demons who serve as Abyssal tacticians and generals in the Blood War.


  • Battle Trophy: When a marilith overcomes a particularly challenging foe, she often takes their weapons as trophies of her victory.
  • Curb-Stomp Battle: One of the most famous depictions of the Forgotten Realms god Helm has him fighting a Marilith. The Marilith is losing. Badly.
  • The Evil Genius: They're wickedly clever, combining their keen minds with their chaotic free-thinking natures to produce plots of literally fiendish ingenuity.
  • Fantastic Racism: Mariliths are fierce rivals with glabrezu, whose subtle covert actions they deride as inferior to "proper" warfare. They're also not fond of balors, both because they favor the glabrezu over the mariliths, and because the mariliths consider the balors less important to the Blood War, only dominating the rest of the tanar'ri through their brute strength.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: A marilith wields a wicked blade in each of her six hands.
  • One-Gender Race: Mariliths always appear as female.
  • Snake People: A marilith has the lower body of a great serpent and the upper torso of a humanoid female with six arms.

    Maurezhi 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_maurezhi_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 9 (3E), 7 (5E)

Demonic super-ghouls created from corrupted elves. Despite their appearance and habits, they are not actually undead.


  • Kill and Replace: When a maurezhi eats someone, it gains the victim's memories and can magically take on their form. It cannot remain in this form indefinitely, however, as its disguise gradually rots away before sloughing off.
  • Necromancer: A maurezhi can bring slain ghouls and ghasts back to unlife, fully restoring their hit points in the process.
  • The Paralyzer: Much like a regular ghoul, a maurezhi can paralyze creatures just by touching them. Unlike regular ghouls, this paralysis can even affect elves.
  • Viral Transformation: The bite of a maurezhi drains the victim's personality, which can potentially kill them. Anyone who dies from this personality drain reanimates as a ghoul within 24 hours.

    Molydeus 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_molydeus_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 19 (3E), 29 (4E), 21 (5E)

Mightier even than balors, the two-headed molydei are the personal heralds of the demon lords.


  • Big Brother Is Watching: At any moment, a demon lord could be using its link through the molydeus' snake head to observe its minion, ensuring the molydeus' loyalty.
  • Mouth of Sauron: Every molydeus speaks with the authority of its patron demon lord. In some cases, they do this quite literally: the demon lord can see and speak through the molydeus' snake head.
  • Multiple Head Case: A molydeus has two heads: one like a wolf, the other like a snake. The wolf head is the demon's own, while the snake head has a direct connection to the molydeus's demon lord, who can see and speak through the snake at any time.
  • Off with His Head!: In 5th edition, a molydeus's demonic weapon decapitates its target on a natural 20, inflicting an instant kill to most creatures.
  • Press-Ganged: When they aren't on particular business on behalf of their lords, molydei wander the Abyss, gathering conscripts for their master's armies.
  • Weapon Specialization: In 5th edition, each molydeus wields a demonic weapon associated with its patron demon lord: a glaive for Baphomet, a whip for Demogorgon, a flail for Yeenoghu, and so on. No matter what form this weapon takes, it always has the power to decapitate on a critical hit.

    Myrmyxicus 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_myrmyxicus_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 21 (3E)

Serpentine masters of the Abyssal oceans, these creatures have eel-like bodies, arms as well as tentacles, and reptillian heads capped with three sets of ram-like horns.


    Nabassu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_nabassu_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 5 (juvenile) and 15 (mature) (3E), 15 (5E)

Gargoyle-like demons that are Abyssal outcasts, due to their habit of preying on others' souls.


  • Chameleon Camouflage: Their 3rd Edition rules let them shift their skin's color to shades of green, gray or brown, resulting in a bonus on Hide checks.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: Demons are not generally known for their strong sense of morals, and indeed most of a nabassu's behaviors, including their habit of preying opportunistically on other demons, raise few eyebrows. However, even demons consider Soul Eating to be disgusting and obscene, and nabassus are considered hated outcasts and forced on the fringes of demonic society.
  • Soul Eating: Nabassus are driven chiefly by their hunger for the souls of others, which they can devour when they slay their owners. This is act renders the victim Deader than Dead, and is considered obscene even in the Abyss.
  • Step into the Blinding Fight: Nabassus create an area of supernatural darkness around themselves, which can only be pierced by magical lights.

    Nalfeshnee 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_nalfeshnee_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 14 (3E), 20 (4E), 13 (5E)

Huge, hideous, boar-like demons who fancy themselves great, and particularly relish tormenting the mortal souls that arrive in the Abyss.


  • Eaten Alive: A nalfeshnee's victims often find themselves carved up on the demon's dining table while still alive.
  • Emotion Eater: They can consume negative emotions such as misery, fear and rage, draining mortal souls into husks that can then be converted into demons through unimaginable torture.
  • Judgement of the Dead: Nalfeshnees often preside over Kangaroo Court versions of this, making a show of judging the souls of the already damned before getting to the fun part and administering punishment.
  • Ridiculously Small Wings: A Nalfeshnee's wings look comically small in comparison to the rest of its body. Despite this, it can fly faster than it can walk.
  • To Serve Man: Nalfeshnees have a marked taste for humanoid flesh.
  • Wicked Pretentious: When at home in the Abyss and not engaging in violence, Nalfeshnees are said to conduct ritual banquets that mock those hosted by mortal nobility, eating still-living creatures with rusted cutlery.

    Palrethee 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_palrethee_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 8 (3E)

Ambitious demons that, according to legend, failed some test to become balors, leaving them bitter and broken creatures desperate to acquire power.


  • Broken Angel: Their boney, vestigial wings are useless for flight.
  • Technicolor Fire: They can alter the hue and appearance of their flames at will, but can never extinguish them.
  • Wreathed in Flames: Palrethees are constantly burning, so that their attacks set foes on fire, and anyone who strikes them will take damage as per the fire shield spell. This also gives them the fire subtype, making them one of the very few tanar'ri to be immune, instead of merely resistant, to fire damage.

    Rutterkin 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_rutterkin_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 3 (3E), 2 (5E)

Hideously deformed and misshapen demons that commonly serve as Abyssal foot soldiers.


  • Body Horror: Rutterkin tend to look like they've been broken on the wrack and disfigured by torture, not that this impedes them in combat.
  • Spawn Broodling: In 5th Edition, a rutterkin's bite subjects victims to a warping plague that can transform them into twisted abyssal wretches that proceed to shamble behind the demon that corrupted them.
  • Supernatural Fear Inducer: When encountered in groups of three or more, rutterkin can cause enemies to freeze up in terror, an effect that grows more difficult to overcome the more rutterkin are around.

    Solamith 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_solamith_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 8 (3E), 15 (4E)

Tall but obese, these gluttonous demons serve as Abyssal artillery, tearing off and hurling chunks of their own flesh to explode into unholy fireballs.


  • Bloody Murder: If a solamith takes damage from a melee attack, it can retaliate by venting a blast of soulfire that doesn't deal any additional damage to the demon.
  • Cast from Hit Points: Each soulfire attack deals damage to the solamith, and they can enhance their attacks' blast radius and damage by taking additional damage. Solamiths' Healing Factor offsets this, and for all their dimness, they have a good sense of when to hold back and let themselves regenerate before hurling another chunk of burning flesh.
  • Hellfire: Their soulfire, not to be confused with devilish hellfire, similarly deals damage that is half fire, half Non-Elemental.
  • Soul Eating: They feast upon petitioners and other demons, and with each meal a new anguished face appears pressing against the inside of the solamith's stomach.
  • Villainous Glutton: Solamiths are constantly looking for food, but avert Jabba Table Manners and are surprisingly dainty when they do eat, chewing slowly so they can fully appreciate the spiritual effervescence of their meals.

    Sorrowsworn Demon 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_sorrowsworn_demon_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 17 (3E)

Tall but emaciated demons whose faces are twisted into parodies of mourning, and who prefer to haunt dismal locations such as battlefields, hospitals, orphanages, and other places of loss.


  • Break Them by Talking: While in combat, these demons can stun, confuse or daze a victim by voicing their enemy's past losses or fears of future sorrow.
  • Emotion Bomb: Anything around a sorrowsworn can become overwhelmed by despair, leading to penalties on rolls and difficulty casting spells.
  • Telepathy: Beyond communicating through telepathy, sorrowsworn demons can read others' thoughts, which they use to aid in their mind games.

    Succubus 
Challenge Rating: 7 (3E), 9 (4E), 4 (5E)

Succubui in 3E are the first species of tanar'ri to spawn naturally from the Abyss without obyrith intervention, lead by their queen the demon lord (lady) Malcanthet. Later editions Retcon succubi as not being demons at all.

See Dungeons And Dragons Creatures S for more general tropes.

    Uridezu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_uridezu_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 6 (3E)

Rat-like fiends commonly dispatched to the Material Plane by more powerful demons, some ending up stranded there for centuries.


  • The Paralyzer: Their bites cause paralysis for up to twelve minutes.
  • Pest Controller: Uridezu have an affinity for rodents, so that rats and dire rats instinctively recognize them as their master.
  • Rat Men: Man-sized bipedal demons that resemble hairless rodents.
  • Tail Slap: Uridezu can use their tails with all the dexterity of whips, disarming or tripping opponents.
  • You Dirty Rat!: Thoroughly evil, and the fiends enjoy compelling more mundane rodents to cause chaos and suffering.

    Vrock 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_vrock_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 9 (3E), 13 (4E), 6 (5E)

Vulture-like demons who serve as aerial shock troops in Abyssal hordes, or guards for more powerful demons.


  • Bird People: Vrocks resemble haggard humanoid vultures, with wings sprouting from their backs and claw-like hands.
  • Brown Note: Vrocks can let out a screech that stuns any creature who hears it.
  • Feathered Fiend: Literally. Vrocks are vicious, feathery-winged demons that resemble anthropomorphic vultures.
  • Magic Dance: In older editions, a group of vrocks can form a circle and start a dance of ruin over a few rounds, which if not disrupted by dealing enough damage to one of the vrocks performing it, unleashes a wave of destructive energy that inflicts tremendous damage to everything that isn't a demon within a 100-foot radius.
  • Poisonous Person: Vrocks can release a cloud of poisonous spores that latch onto a nearby creature and inflict continuous damage until removed.
  • Thieving Magpie: Vrocks obsessively covet trinkets and shiny things, and squabble endlessly with each other over claims to slain foes' cheap jewelry or colored stones.

    Zovvut 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_zovvut_4e.png
4e
Challenge Rating: 9 (3E)

Pale, winged and clawed demons thought to be originally created by Orcus, though they can now be found supporting the forces of numerous demon lords.


  • Deadly Gaze: Any living creature that meets a zovvut's gaze and fails a saving throw gains a negative level, while the zovvut heals some damage.
  • Extra Eyes: Though largely humanoid, they have a third red eye in their forehead.
  • Spawn Broodling: Any humanoid slain by a zovvut's gaze attacks becomes an undead wight under their control.

Obyriths

The original inhabitants of the Abyss, obyriths predate intelligent life on the Material Plane (or, in some tellings, hail from the reality that came before this multiverse), and as such have utterly alien appearances that other creatures find horrifying. Though largely supplanted by the tanar'ri, some obyriths still survive to spared evil and terror throughout the cosmos.
    Obyriths in General 
  • Asshole Victim: In their 3rd Edition backstory, they were the original masters of the Abyss and created the tanar'ri as slaves, only for the latter to betray them while the obyriths were distracted fighting an eladrin invasion.
  • Brown Note Being: All obyriths have the Form of Madness rule that means anyone that comes close to them runs the risk of developing a permanent form of insanity or phobia. Even being blind is no defense, as obyriths are "an affront to all five senses."
  • The Corrupter: According to 4th Edition lore, they gave the Shard of Ultimate Evil — the singularity that was their original Abyss-consumed multiverse — to one of the old gods, Tharizdun, as a gift. It corrupted him into the biggest Big Bad of them all.
  • Eldritch Abomination: An even better example than the game's certified Aberrations, which usually don't make you go crazy just from being near them.
  • Greater-Scope Villain: In 4th Edition, they're arguably the greatest scope of all of D&D. They're responsible for the creation of the Abyss and its demons, they corrupted Tharizdun, and their ultimate goal is the end of creation.
  • Time Abyss: No pun intended. In their original lore, they're older than intelligent life on the Material Plane, while in their 4E material, obyriths predate the multiverse itself, hailing from a reality where their Abyss consumed all.

    Draudnu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_draudnu_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 10 (3E)

A demon whose three legs are attached to the top of its body, while its shapeless head is near the bottom, surrounded by three hooked arms. Those who encounter them may become convinced that something foul is growing inside their bodies.


  • Bloody Murder: A draudnu's body is covered in sacs that, when ruptured by melee attacks, spray acid at everything around it.
  • Hopeless War: They were created as frontline soldiers in the obyriths' effort to drive the tanar'ri from the Abyss. Needless to say, the tanar'ri are thriving and it's the obyriths who are in danger of extinction.
  • Pinned to the Wall: If a draudnu lands an attack with its flesh hooks, they can detach the limb (and regrow it immediately) to give their target the immobilized condition, forcing them to make a Strength check and take damage as they try to free themselves.

    Ekolid 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_ekolid_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 4 (3E)

An insectile demon that propagates itself by attacking prey. Those who encounter them may hallucinate that they are being consumed by tiny biting insects.


  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: An ekolid is an arthropod-like demon that weighs 45 pounds.
  • Mix-and-Match Critters: Combines the features of an ant, a scorpion and a spider.
  • Spawn Broodling: Its stingers are actually ovipositors that implant eggs in its victims. After a few minutes, ravenous ekolid grubs gnaw their way out of the victim.

    Golothoma 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_golothoma_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 16 (3E), 29 (4E)

Spiny, serpentine horrors whose shapes give them an incidental association with Sertrous, the former obyrith lord turned Elder Evil. Those who encounter one might grow obsessed with shadows, to the point of feeling sickened in light or full darkness.


  • Beware My Stinger Tail: Subverted; a golothoma's tail rises behind and above its body like a scorpion's, but they don't actually have stingers. Nevertheless, the coils of acidic shadow that coat their tails deal heavy damage with a melee touch attack, and the sticky goop will deal lingering damage the next turn as well.
  • Dumb Muscle: With an Intelligence score of 4, golothomas are just barely intelligent enough to "belch" a few words of Abyssal in "a mockery of conversation."
  • Shadow Pin: Golothomas lack mouths, but are able to consume flesh by having their writhing shadows fall over creatures, dealing Constitution drain. The demon's shadow persists regardless of the surrounding lighting condition — in fact, total darkness only makes the Reflex save to avoid this attack more difficult.
  • Thinking Up Portals: Golothomas can strike at their targets by reaching between dimensions, essentially letting them treat their melee attacks as thrown weapons with a 120-foot range increment.

    Laghathti 
Challenge Rating: 10 (3E)

Large, octopoid demons that lurk in the waters and banks of the River Styx. Merely encountering one can cause non-demons to suffer partial amnesia.


  • Laser-Guided Amnesia: Their variant of the obyriths' "Form of Madness" means that those who come within 60 feet of a laghathti have to save or suffer up to eight negative levels, while laghathti's tentacle and bite attacks can inflict further negative levels with every strike. These are partial mind-wipes, not negative energy attacks, so such negative levels are never permanent, but need healing with magic like restoration.
  • Tentacled Terror: They seem to lack bodies, instead appearing as "an indistinct knot of writhing ropes and tendrils," some lined with tiny mouths, others ending in paddle-like fins, and two muscular tentacles ending in wailing, crocodilian jaws.
  • Transferable Memory: Laghathti delight in stealing and feasting upon the memories of living creatures, and when they come across a particularly tragic memory, the demon can spend days delighting in it, then try to use their modify memory spell-like ability to "share" it with their other victims, especially those who seem susceptible to depression and sadness.

    Sibriex 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_sibriex_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 15 (3E), 18 (5E)

A gruesome creature resembling an enormous floating head, bloated with disease. Those who encounter one may have their sense of self-worth diminished as they view the sibriex in question as the ideal physical form.


  • Chain Pain: These floating demons anchor themselves to the ground with massive chains, which they can magically animate and attack with.
  • Flying Face: They're just levitating, horrifying heads with a writhing nest of puckered tubes dangling where their necks should be.
  • Kavorka Man: A bizarre supernatural example Played for Horror. As mentioned in their description, they have the power to convince anyone unlucky enough to encounter them that their outlandishly hideous appearances are the pinnacle of beauty that they should worship and aspire to.
  • Mad Artist: Sibriexes view the grafting of flesh as an art form, and are happy to practice on those they encounter, or hire out their talents to abyssal lords. Their superpowered Kavorka Man aura means that those they offer their services to tend to be far more willing to take them up on the offer than they should be.
  • Maker of Monsters: The signature trait of the sibriexes is their penchant for "flesh warping." They can quickly apply fiendish grafts to willing or helpless targets, generating the new limbs or organs out of raw Abyssal chaos, or modify a subject's anatomy by converting their hands to claws, growing their eyes out on stalks, swelling or shrinking their body, and so forth.
    Mordenkainen: No creature embodies the chaotic nature of the Abyss so well as the sibriex. Although the realm of demons is already a place of infinite horrors, sibriexes for some reason make even more of these monstrosities.
  • Randomized Transformation: Their Warp Creature ability allows them to trigger random transformations in other creatures.
  • Poisonous Person: Sibriexes are so foul that they contaiminate the area around them with a virulet poison.
  • Super Spit: They can also spray bile from their mouth or other orifices to deal acid damage.

    Uzollru 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_uzollru_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 16 (3E)

Colossal monsters that lurk in the lightless depths of the Shadowsea, attacking anything they come across, though they also serve as the heralds of the demon prince Dagon. Those who encounter them may have their minds and psyches shattered by the demons' sheer size.


  • Combat Tentacles: Uzollrus feed by burrowing its tentacles into prey, dissolving flesh and bone so the demon can drink its meal, and leaving behind carcasses marked by horrifying tunnels of missing matter (or in gameplay terms, dealing Constitution drain). It's noted that as demons, uzollrus have no strict need to eat, rather their hunting is fueld by their hatred for all other lifeforms.
  • Creepy Centipedes: They're compared to enormous, amphibious centipedes.
  • How the Mighty Have Fallen: At Intelligence 6, uzollrus are fairly dumb bruisers, especially by demonic standards, but in obscure reaches of the Shadowsea there are sunken ruins of "dizzying spires and bulbous buildings" all sized to accomodate uzollrus. This suggests that these obyriths were at one point much more intelligent and civilized than they currently are, though most Abyssal scholars can only hope that the monsters' minds continue to decline.
  • Kraken and Leviathan: They're a demonic variant, certifiably Colossal sea demons who dwell in the depths of an extraplanar ocean. In the thankfully rare event an uzollru escapes to the Material Plane, it swiftly lays waste to everything around it.
  • Magical Eye: Their huge, balefully-glowing eye can stun those who meet its gaze.
  • Power Pincers: They can grapple and constrict victims in their claws for nearly a hundred points of damage.

    Verakia 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_verakia_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 14 (3E)

Gargantuan masses of teeth, claws, horns and scales that exist only to destroy. Those who survive their attacks may become gripped with a homicidal rage of their own.


  • Hate Plague: Those who encounter a verakia may become consumed with a berserk fury, compelling them to take up a weapon and find victims to kill. This insane, murderous urge supercedes all others, so such affected creatures will end up dying of thirst or hunger even if nothing puts them down.
  • Hellfire: The verakia can breathe a blood-red fire that deals both fire and unholy energy damage.
  • Our Centaurs Are Different: Their bodies resemble a fiendish, draconic centaur, with a bestial lower body and a more humanoid torso atop it, capped with a four-eyed head full of horns and fangs.
  • Throat Light: A verakia's throat glows with fire.

Loumaras

A relatively new demonic subtype, loumaras originate from the Abyss' 230th layer, the Dreaming Gulf, where the dreams of dead pantheons coalesce into fiendish form. Loumaras are distinct for lacking physical bodies, leading them to use their other powers to work their mischief on the Material Plane.


    Loumaras in General 
  • Creating Life Is Unforeseen: Eons ago, the 230th layer was known as N'gharl and ruled by Azuvidexus, a demon prince powerful enough to resist Demogorgon's efforts to conquer him. So instead the Prince of Demons proposed an alliance with Azuvidexus, helping him set up a demon cult on a Material Plane world, before retreating to watch the fireworks. As Demogorgon planned, the local, highly territorial, pantheon responded by launching a counter-invasion of the Abyss, shrinking Azuvidexus and his domain into a head-sized sphere and then kicking it onto the Astral Plane. What nobody expected was for the Abyss itself to respond to the invasion by annihilating the offending pantheon. The void left behind by N'gharl became the Dreaming Gulf, and the final thoughts of the slain pantheon gave rise to the loumara.
  • Demonic Possession: While all demons can theoretically pick up this trick, loumaras all have some variant of it out of necessity, since they don't have physical bodies.
  • Intangibility: Loumaras have the incorporeal subtype, and can pass through people or solid objects like a ghost. Though as of 5th Edition, this means that they'll take damage if they end their turn within a solid object.
  • Living Dream: The loumara are the result of the Abyss "digesting" the dreams, desires and final thoughts of a slain pantheon, which results in the different loumara types. Guecubus, for example, are born from the last nightmares of a god of law and peace, and are thus supernatural serial murderers, while dybbuks are born from the twisted dreams of a goddess of love and art, driving them to possess comely mortals and lead them into ruinous depravity. The caligrostos are born from the nightmares of a god of craftsmanship, and thus specialize in possessing and corrupting weapons, while manitous come from the dying echoes of a goddess of fertility and nature, and take pleasure in despoiling the wilderness.

    Caligrosto 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_caligrosto_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 6 (3E)

Loumara that can only possess bladed weapons, which they do so to betray those who try to wield them in battle.


  • Attack Reflector: While it has assumed the shape of an enemy, whenever the fiend's Damage Reduction reduces incoming damage, that negated damage is instead inflicted upon the creature the caligrosto is mimicking.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: Even other demons can be taken aback by caligrostos' cruelty and sadism.
  • Evil Weapon: Caligrostos often act as such, not only possessing swords and the like, but infusing them with additional magical qualities to make them more appealing to potential wielders. They'll even try to pass themselves off as a normal magical weapon by telepathically communicating with their wielder, and insist that their "fiendish shade" ability is a variant of the dancing weapon effect. But as soon as — or even before — the caligrosto and its one-time wielder defeat their current foe, the demon will turn on their "partner."
  • Kill and Replace: A variant; once a caligrosto has damaged an enemy, its "fiendish shade" ability lets them assume a twisted, demonic parody of that foe's appearance, which the loumara can stay in indefinitely. While in this form, a caligrosto gets an attack bonus against the enemy it is mocking, which also becomes the victim of its reflective damage reduction.
  • Non-Health Damage: A caligrosto's incorporeal touch inflicts Strength damage, while also healing the demon.

    Dybbuk 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_dybbuk_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 8 (3E), 4 (5E)

Dybbuks are immaterial fiends capable of possessing dead bodies, which they restore to a semblance of life and use to pursue the vices of mortal civilization. Though they also can't resist terrorizing mortals by making their vessels do horrific and unnatural things.


  • Flying Seafood Special: A dybbuk's true form resembles a jellyfish and can float through the air.
  • Possessing a Dead Body: Their specialty. A dybbuk can possess the corpse of a humanoid or beast and retains control of it while the corpse is intact. When the corpse is damaged beyond repair, the dybbuk abandons it in search of a new one. Note that this is the complete opposite of how dybbuks work in classic Jewish folklore, in which they're incorporeal undead that possess living bodies.
  • Supernatural Fear Inducer: A dybbuk can strike fear into its enemies by forcing the corpse it is possessing to do something unnatural, such as making an animal's corpse walk on its hind legs or giving a humanoid corpse a case of Exorcist Head. If that doesn't work, they can also innately cast the fear spell.
  • Touch of Death: In their 3rd Edition rules, dybbuks can try to create a fresh corpse to inhabit with a "death touch" attack it can attempt once a day.

    Guecubu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_guecubu_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 4 (3E)

Formless demons that possess living creatures to force them to commit murder.


  • Forced Sleep: Touching a creature in a guecubu's natural form puts it to sleep, allowing the demon to possess it.
  • Invisible Monsters: Naturally invisible outside a host body.
  • Mind over Matter: Guecubus can use telekinesis at will, which they use to defend themselves outside a host body, or to subtly kill people while "riding" someone who might not know they're possessed.
  • Serial Killer: A demonic example. The guecubus believe each death they cause this way fits a pattern that will reveal the mystery behind existence.

    Manitou 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_manitou_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 12 (3E)

Like twisted druids, these loumaras have power over nature, and can possess plants, animals and fey creatures, all so they can despoil and destroy the wilderness.


  • Enemy to All Living Things: These demons delight in corrupting nature, and particularly relish the souls of dryads.
  • Green Thumb: Manitou can cast spells like diminish plants, entangle and plant growth.
  • Not Enough to Bury: A manitou can make a "Rend Nature" attack against targets its incorporeal form is overlapping, which deals heavy damage as creatures' bodies are torn apart by invisible force. Animals, elementals, plants and fey take extra damage and have to save or be stunned for a round afterward, while constructs, outsiders and undead are immune to this attack.
  • Tentacled Terror: Under a true seeing effect, a manitou looks like a ghostly mass of thorny tendrils ending in fanged teeth, which briefly solidify when it makes bite attacks. Creatures a manitou possesses are impaled by one of these tentacles, which limits the number of creatures the demon can control at once, and means they must remain within a mile of each other.
  • Weather Manipulation: They know call lightning storm and control winds as once-per-day spell-like abilities.

Other Demons

While the tanar'ri, obyriths and loumaras are the known subraces of demons, not every fiend from the Abyss belongs to those kindreds.

    Abyssal Drake 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_abyssal_drake_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 9 (3E)

These creatures were bred to be mounts for demon princes, but proved too unruly to be tamed, and now roam the Abyss to prey upon anything they come across.


  • Dragons Are Demonic: They have a very draconic appearance, but are native to the Abyss and are more fiend than dragon.
  • Dragon Rider: Their intended purpose was to serve as steeds for the Demon Lords.
  • Hellfire: The abyssal drake's breath weapon deals half fire damage and half Non-Elemental unholy damage.
  • Hybrid Monster: The abyssal drake is the result of an ancient breeding program that combines the worst elements of demons, wyverns and red dragons.
  • Our Wyverns Are Different: Abyssal drakes resemble wyverns with dark red scaled hides, powerful batlike wings, a serpentine neck and razor-sharp claws.
  • Supernatural Fear Inducer: When an abyssal drake charges, attacks or flies overhead, it inspires terror in all creatures within 120 feet.

    Abyssal Scavenger 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_abyssal_scavenger_4e.jpg
4e
Challenge Rating: 2 (3E)

Also known as abyssal skulkers, these small but vicious simian demons attack in mobs.


  • Enemy Summoner: As per their 4th Edition lore, these demons carry within them motes of Abyssal essence that, when gathered in sufficient numbers, could consume the abyssal skavenger to create a short-lived gate to the Abyss that other demons could come through. For this reason, only the most apocalyptic demon cults bring these creatures to the Material Plane.
  • Maniac Monkeys: They look like hairless apes with horrifying heads, and are more intelligent than the average human, but wholly vicious and evil.
  • Monster Mouth: Like the maw demons, they have vertical mouths that asymmetrically split their three eyes.

    Bebilith 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_bebilith_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 10 (3E), 18 (4E)

Spider-like demons that hunt other demons.


  • Armor-Piercing Attack: Bebiliths rend and tear at the armor of their foes, gradually breaking it apart to expose the flesh beneath.
  • Food Chain of Evil: While bebiliths will gladly hunt whatever prey presents itself, their favorite food is the flesh of other demons.
  • Giant Spider: Bebiliths resemble monstrous spiders the size of plow horses.
  • Poisonous Person: A bebilith's bite is laced with a deadly toxin.
  • Telepathy: Bebiliths cannot speak, instead using telepathy to communicate silently among themselves.

    Broodswarm 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_broodswarm_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 6 (3E)

A single-minded swarm of tiny rotund demonlings, created by a night hag to help kidnap fresh victims.


  • Cast from Hit Points: Broodswarms are created in a painful, month-long process that involves a night hag tearing off chunks of her own flesh to feed to manes. This results in a reduction to the hag's Constitution that cannot be healed while the broodswarm is alive.
  • Gulliver Tie-Down: A broodswarm can generate black thread from their hooked hands, and their "Stitching" ability means that anyone a swarm mobs will take cumulative penalties to their Dexterity until they're helpless, their arms sewn to their sides and their eyes and mouth stitched shut.
  • The Swarm: Roughly three hundred little demons acting as a single entity.

    Deathdrinker 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_deathdrinker_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 18 (3E)

Huge, horned demons that empower themselves with every foe they slay.


  • Big Red Devil: Horns, red skin, hoofed feet, but don't mistake them for a balor.
  • It's All About Me: Deathdrinkers stay out of Abyssal politics and view such conflicts as beneath them. They're only concerned with their own comfort and finding flatterers to surround themselves with.
  • Life Drain: Every time a deathdrinker kills something, its signature ability heals them based on how many hit dice its victim had.
  • Walking Wasteland: Deathdrinkers are surrounded by an aura of negative energy, healing undead and damaging the living.
  • Worthy Opponent: They actively seek out these, since they get a morale boost to rolls for 1 minute after killing a foe, but only so long as it had at least 10 HD.

    Elemental Demon 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_elemental_demons_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 4 (air, ash), 5 (earth, water), 6 (ice), 7 (fire) (3E)

These fiendish elemental creatures exist as savage wildlife, or as the minions of tanar'ri lords or mortal mages.


  • Bird People: Air demons look a lot like smaller vrocks.
  • Blow You Away: Air demons can blast foes with a sphere of compressed air, dealing damage and potentially knocking them backwards.
  • Creating Life Is Unforeseen: The elemental demons' genesis was when a successful pit fiend named Balruhk the Invincible led an invasion of the Abyss itself, only to fall victim to a conspiracy hatched by his jealous rival baatezu. A powerful mortal diabolist named Yullok, in exchange for the service of the baatezu's hellforged devils, agreed to disrupt Balruhk's campaign by summoning him to the Material Plane, and for good measure bribed the pit fiend's battleloth mercenaries to turn on him. Unfortunately the summoning ritual went awry, trapping Balruhk in Yullok's citadel but causing a magical explosion that wiped out both the devilish and demonic armies. The remnants of the tanar'ri and baatezu essences mixed with the raw elemental materials of the Abyss and coalesced into new fiendish forms, hostile to their progenitors.
  • Damage Over Time: Ice demons have a variant in which attacks from their frozen blades leave small, razor-sharp slivers of ice in the victim's wounds. Two to twelve rounds later, these ice shards surge to life, digging deeper into the victim for a burst of heavier damage before melting.
  • Elemental Embodiment: They're more or less fiendish elementals, composed of the 'natural' materials of the Abyss mixed with the essences of demons and devils.
  • Elemental Shapeshifting: Ash demons can replicate a gaseous form spell by becoming a cloud of powdery soot, while earth demons can take the form of a rocky outcropping or boulder to disguise themselves.
  • Feed the Mole: Air demons are sometimes used as fiendish carrier pigeons, but their stupidity makes it easy for them to deliver a message to the wrong demon. Clever demon lords have been known to give their air demon couriers misleading missives and then sending them off into a rival's path.
  • Fish People: Water demons look like piscine humanoids with bulbous eyes and oversized mouths stuffed with fangs.
  • An Ice Person: Ice demons are creatures of living Abyssal ice, who live in the most frigid corners of the plane. Some demon lords set up huge furnaces near the ice demons' glaciers to try to melt their homes and make the demons vulnerable to press gangs.
  • Playing with Fire: Unsurprisingly, fire demons can set things alight with a mere touch, and are surrounded by an aura of fire that damages those who draw close. More surprisingly, water demons can vent superheated steam from their flanks, causing the water around them to boil.
  • Pyromaniac: Fire demons are simple brutes who delight in spreading flame, and try to start as many fires as possible during combat, but aren't smart enough to distinguish between living creatures and inanimate flammable objects. They'll thus attempt to use their flame touch attack against the nearest potential target instead of prioritizing going after their opponents.
  • La Résistance: As the smartest of the elemental demons, ash demons meet in secret cabals to plot against the tanar'ri, or even muster small armies of elemental demons in isolated corners of the Abyss.
  • The Spiny: Earth demons' blood runs as hot as lava, and sprays out to potentially damage anyone who strikes them with a slashing or piercing weapon. Fire demons similarly damage anyone foolish enough to strike them with a natural weapon or attempt to grapple them.
  • Unusable Enemy Equipment: Ice demons craft a variety of weapons, armor and tools from Abyssal ice, which function as magic items in the demons' hands, but as non-magical equipment when used by other creatures, and the things will melt in an hour after leaving an ice demon's possession.

    Evistro (Carnage Demon) 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_carnage_demon_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 4 (3E), 6 (4E)

Brutish, ape-like demons that resemble red-skinned orcs and exist only to batter other creatures to death.


  • Armor-Piercing Attack: Their slam attacks automatically overcome a target's Damage Reduction as if the carnage demon's fists were silvered, adamantine, etc.
  • The Berserker: They have even odds of going into a frenzy once in combat, attacking the closest thing that isn't another carnage demon.
  • Zerg Rush: Carnage demons gain a morale bonus to attack rolls and damage based on how many more of their kind are nearby.

    Ghour 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_ghour_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 12 (3E)

Creations of the demon lord Baphomet, these horned goliaths help guard the Endless Maze, or act as his emissaries among loyal ogres, minotaurs and giants on the Material Plane.


  • Our Minotaurs Are Different: They could be considered giant-sized, fiendish minotaurs, and fittingly can use maze three times per day.
  • Poisonous Person: Once per minute, a ghour can exhale a long cloud of poisonous gas that deals Strength damage.
  • Super-Scream: Ghours can loose an ear-splitting roar once per day, potentially stunning and deafening those around them.

    Maw Demon 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_maw_demon_5e.jpeg
4e
Challenge Rating: 2 (3E), 7 (4E), 1 (5E)

Also known as abyssal maws, these squat creatures exist only to gorge themselves.


  • Horror Hunger: 5th Edition gave them an association with the demon lord Yeenoghu, as extensions of his endless hunger. Everything a maw demon eats ends up transported directly into Yeenoghu's gullet.
  • Monster Mouth: They have a vertical mouth splitting the top of their stump-like body.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Three arms, three legs, and three eyes to boot.

    Immolith 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_immolith_4e.jpg
4e
Challenge Rating: 15 (4E)

Blazing creatures formed from the spirits of slain demons, known for their intense hatred of the living.


  • Came Back Wrong: Like shadow demons, immoliths are formed when something goes wrong with the process of a killed demon respawning in the Abyss — in this case, several demonic spirits have fused together into a fiery creature that is both fiend and undead.
  • Mook Medic: Though capable combatants, immoliths can also release bursts of necrotic energy that heal nearby undead, as well as the immolith itself.
  • Playing with Fire: Their "Deathfire Curse" both deals ongoing fire damage and slows victims.
  • Wreathed in Flames: Immoliths' frames are covered in fire, which damages those who draw near. They exploit this by sending their fiery claws out to grab opponents and yank them in close.

    Myrlochar 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_myrlochar_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 4 (3E)

Also known as soul spiders, these fiendish arachnids rank below yochlols in Lolth's service, and are thus easier for drow priestesses to summon to the Material Plane.


  • Giant Spider: They're Medium-sized fiendish arachnids, capable of climbing sheer surfaces and ignoring webbing both magical and mundane, though they cannot themselves spin webs.
  • Gravity Screw: Their bite attack can deliver a four-round reverse gravity effect, if the myrlochar wills it.
  • Maximum HP Reduction: Their bite attacks have a 1-in-6 chance of permanently transferring one of the victim's hit points to the myrlochar.
  • Noiseless Walker: Myrlochars move in total silence, and cannot be heard unless they want to be.
  • The Paralyzer: Their bite attacks can deliver a four-round hold person effect, if the myrlochar wills it.
  • Power Glows: Their bodies have a Sickly Green Glow, while their eyes glow an ominous red.
  • You Have Failed Me: Myrlochars are often summoned to the Material Plane to hunt down foes of the drow, but the Spider Queen is also known to send uncontrolled soul spiders when a priestess who has fallen out of her favor attempts to summon a yochlol.

    Nashrou 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_nashrou_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 2 (3E)

Ten-foot tangles of chitinous claws and spines, which rove across the Abyss in animalistic packs.


  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Four legs and six fighting limbs capable of goring or clawing opponents.
  • One-Hit Kill: Nashrous are distinctly vulnerable to Critical Hits, which instantly kill them no matter how much HP they had before.
  • The Social Darwinist: Though nashrous are no more intelligent than beasts, observers have noted that they tend to send the younger, smaller members of the pack into battle as the first wave, to either let them earn their place in the pack or purge said pack of weakness.

    Quasit 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/quasit_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 2 (3E), 7 (4E), 1 (5E)

A tiny, insectile demon often used as a familiar. Essentially the demonic equivalent to Imps.


  • Art Evolution: The quasits' artwork tends to go back and forth on whether they have wings or not.
  • The Corrupter: Quasits who serve as familiars for mortal mages do so with the intention of steering them fully into evil and sending their souls to the Abyss, which they do by goading them into acts of increasing wickedness and depravity and by eagerly encouraging their worst impulses.
  • Familiar: They're favored in this role by spellcasters who regularly consort with demons.
  • Invisibility: Quasits can turn invisible at will.
  • Our Imps Are Different: Quasits are diminutive, impish demons whose role in the Abyss is a mixture of disposable servants, pets, intelligent vermin, and snacks for bored demons.

    Shadow Demon 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_shadow_demon_5e_transparent.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 8 (3E), 12 (4E), 4 (5E)

Formless creatures of darkness that resemble fearsome, winged shadows. Though often mistaken for an undead creature, they are demons.


  • Came Back Wrong: 5th Edition states that shadow demons are normal fiends whose bodies have been destroyed, but their essences are somehow prevented from reforming in the Abyss, leading to their insubstantial forms.
  • The Dragon: On the Material Plane, shadow demons like to serve as advisors or assistants to powerful evil creatures, from dragons to villainous kings. They're generally loyal and useful servants, though should their master die, the shadow demon is happy to take their soul too.
  • Intangibility: Incorporeal like undead shadows. Their 3rd Edition statblock comes with a special rule that allows a shadow demon's claw attacks to bypass their target's armor while still rending the flesh beneath it.
  • Living Shadow: Which renders shadow demons all but invisible in dim or dark areas.
  • Mind Rape: In 5th Edition their claw attacks allow a shadow demon to feed on their victim's memories and thoughts, resulting in psychic damage.
  • Your Soul Is Mine!: Their much more dangerous 3rd Edition stats include the ability to cast magic jar once per week, which they use to trap mortals' souls for trade to the night hags or other fiends.

    Shoosuva 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_shoosuva_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 8 (5E)

Shoosuvas, also known as abyssal ravagers, are hyena-like fiends created by Yeenoghu, who sometimes gifts them to the mightiest members of a gnoll warband as a sign of his favor.


  • Animalistic Abomination: A shoosuva looks like an oversized, white-furred hyena with glowing red eyes and rotting skin, and its insides have a sickly green glow that is visible through its open mouth and the skin of its ribs. It's also covered in spikes and has a nasty stinger on its tail.
  • Beware My Stinger Tail: A shoosuva's tail ends in a venomous stinger. Its venom leaves the target paralyzed indefinitely, making them easy prey for nearby gnolls.

    Skulvyn 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_skulvyn_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 4 (3E)

Aquatic lizard-like demons that menace Abyssal waterways.


  • Damage Over Time: Injuries from their tails causes victims to bleed for additional damage until healed. Since this damage is cumulative with additional wounding attacks, and skulvyns have four tail attacks...
  • Status Infliction Attack: Skulvyns emit an aura of strange magic that can cause those nearby to become slowed for four rounds.
  • Tail Slap: Skulvyns' four spined tails help propel it through the water, but also make deadly weapons.

    Wastilith 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_wastrilith_5e.png
5e
Challenge Rating: 17 (3E), 13 (5E)

Lords of abyssal oceans, these evolved obyriths have humanoid torsos and eel-like lower bodies.


  • Breath Weapon: In some editions, wastriliths can spray a cone of boiling water.
  • Evil Evolves: Much like Pazuzu, wastriliths could be seen as a "missing link" between the obyriths and the tanar'ri on a species-wide level, as former obyriths who eventually transformed into tanar'ri- or at least turned into something more akin to them- after evolving and surviving amidst the now-dominant tanar'ri population for untold eons.
  • Making a Splash: Their control over water lets them create undertows around them that hamper other swimmers.
  • Walking Wasteland: Wastriliths befoul and corrupt water around them, turning it poisonous. In the case of water in containers, this effect is permanent until the liquid evaporates.
  • You Will Not Evade Me: In 5th Edition, they can launch grasping spouts of water that deal acid damage and pull victims closer to the demon.

    Whisper Demon 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_whisper_demon_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 9 (3E)

Ghostly, wild-eyed fiends that exist to drive victims to self-destruction and then subjugate their souls


  • Insanity Immunity: They're all naturally insane, letting them use their Charisma bonus rather than Wisdom bonus on Will saves, and rendering them immune to confusion and insanity effects.
  • Intangibility: Naturally incorporeal.
  • A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Read: Anything that tries to make telepathic contact with one takes Wisdom damage.
  • Spawn Broodling: Any creature that kills itself near a whisper demon rises as an allip under its control.
  • Stop Hitting Yourself: A whisper demon's telepathic assault can confuse victims, but instead of attacking random targets, those victims will harm themselves.

    Wrackspawn 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_wrackspawn_3e.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 3 (3E), 13 (4E)

The result of demonic torture, these twisted beings now exist only to share the pain of their existence.


  • Agony Beam: Their bone weapons are technically shortspears, but deal disproportionate damage by channeling their wielder's pain, and can sicken their foes from the effect.
  • Bad with the Bone: A wrackspawn fights with a bone shortspear that it actually crafted from pieces torn from its own ruined body. Each wrackspawn can only create such a weapon once, and will obsessively search for it if lost.
  • Being Tortured Makes You Evil: Literally! These former good souls were so broken by their torturers that they are now Chaotic Evil beings themselves.
  • Body Horror: Wrackspawn's skin has been flayed and their exposued musculature burned, their eyes have been gouged out, their joints can bend in the wrong direction, and some of their limbs have been lopped off or split in two.
  • Super-Senses: They have impressive blindsight to compensate for their lack of eyes.

    Yochlol 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_yochlol_3e.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 8 (3E), 17 (4E), 10 (5E)

The handmaidens of Lolth, who carry out the Spider Queen's will amongst the drow and act as her agents among rival Abyssal powers.


  • Blob Monster: In its true form, the yochlol appears as a pillar of yellow slime with a single malevolent eye.
  • Enemy Civil War: A notable aversion, especially for a Chaotic Evil creature. Yochlols get along perfectly fine with one another, united as they are in their devotion to Lolth.
  • Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing: Yochlols are nude whenever they go from one form to their elven form, and so try to do so only in situations where they have equipment and clothes ready.
  • Smug Snake: Yochlols are well aware that they're Lolth's favorite servants, and thus enjoy bossing around other demons, even stronger ones, who are leery of incurring the Spider Queen's wrath.
  • Super Smoke: Beyond their solid forms, yochlols can become a cloud of poisonous gas. It's in this form that the demons can use contact other plane to report in to their mistress.
  • Voluntary Shapeshifting: Their true form is a slime pillar, but they can also transform into a giant spider or a beautiful drow woman. It's noted that they don't have enough control over their drow form to take the likeness of a specific individual.

Demon Princes

The unquestioned lords of the Abyss, mostly because they can kill anyone who complains about their claims. Demons aren't actually the only things capable of being Demon Princes- it's just a title, and anything evil and powerful enough to claim a layer of the Abyss for their own and (including some deities) can become one.

    Baphomet 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/baph5e.jpg
5e
4e
Challenge Rating: 20 (3E), 23 (5E)
The Demon Prince of Beasts, and the patron of Minotaurs. Once a mortal being, either a beast who lived as a man or a man who lived as a beast, in the Abyss he plots to destroy civilization and institute a brutal rule of might where the strong hunt the weak. He rules most of layer 600, the Endless Maze, but keeps a respectful distance from the Bone Castle of Pale Night.
  • Baphomet: A demon lord resembling a humanoid with a bestial, horned head, although in this version his head is a minotaur's and his association with occultism is replaced with an association with beasts, monsters and the wilderness.
  • Cursed with Awesome: Some legends claim that Baphomet was a humanoid or animal (possibly a bull) cursed into his current form. Said form is a towering demon prince ruling an entire layer of the abyss.
  • Genius Bruiser: Despite being a hulking brute who wants to tear down all civilization, Baphomet is quite smart and enjoys making complicated plans to take down prey. He's also fond of experimenting on creatures and fiends to breed better servants, and has a dedicated Tower of Science in his Endless Maze.
  • Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: Most of Baphomet's rites involve hunting down human prey.
  • Maker of Monsters: He's said to experiment with the creation of monsters in his personal fortress, with minotaurs and several breeds of demon, such as the goristro, counting amongst his more successful creations.
  • Mystery Cult: Most of his cults operate like this, where the rank and file think they're entering a pastoral religion with rituals involving mazes and ceremonial animal masks and just want some catharsis and relief from social strictures, the higher levels are composed of people more receptive to Baphomet's actual philosophy (those who get cold feet tend to get killed quickly), and only the highest echelons actually know they're worshipping Baphomet.
  • Our Minotaurs Are Different: This version of Baphomet is a giant minotaur, and most normal minotaurs worship him.
  • Politically Incorrect Villain: Not Baphomet himself- all are equally worthless before the horned king- but it's noted that Baphomet's cults attract a lot of bigots and people who generally think themselves above others.

    Dagon 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_dagon_3e.png
3E
Challenge Rating: 22 (3E), 32 (4E)

An ancient obyrith lord who remained neutral during The Upheaval, but was too powerful for the Queen of Chaos to punish for his disloyalty. He is respected by the tanar'ri for both his might and his vast knowledge of Abyssal secrets. Dagon rules the Shadowsea, layer 89, directly beneath Demogorgon's home of the Gaping Maw, and the two princes can be considered allies.


  • Brown Note: Those who encounter Dagon may develop intense thalassophobia and freeze up in terror at the sight of any creature with the Aquatic subtype.
  • Compelling Voice: His "Doomsong" ability, which is as much a sonic as it is a supernatural effect, compels those to hear it to move toward Dagon, even if they start drowning.
  • Expy: Of the Cthulhu Mythos' Dagon in theme if not in form, especially with the note that some groups of degenerate kuo-toa worship Dagon as a god and try to recruit coastal humanoid communities into his worship.
  • Knowledge Broker: Dagon serves this role, taking offerings of weapons and sacrifices from other demons in exchange for ancient knowledge about the Abyss.
  • Mix-and-Match Critters: An eel-like neck supporting the fanged head of a deep-ocean predator, atop a body that is some horrible combination of sea serpent, octopus and shark.

    Demogorgon 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/tumblr_ns9hh7dqvd1tyj78go1_1280.png
5e
4e
3e
1e
Challenge Rating: 23 (3E), 34 (4E), 26 (5E)

The being with the best claim to being the true Prince of Demons. Demogorgon is a monstrous creature with twin tentacles for arms and two baboon-heads, named Amaeul and Hethadriah. The two constantly seek to destroy each other, as their combined form does with all life. He rules over layer 88, The Gaping Maw.


  • Art Evolution: As seen in the pictures to the right, he started out as a bit dorky looking (not unusual for 1st edition artwork), then got more baboon-like with each edition, until 5th edition, where he became more demonic in appearance.
  • Asskicking Leads to Leadership: Demogorgon is probably the most powerful Demon Prince, which is why so many serve him — in the Abyss, the only way to get people to do what you want is to force them.
  • Beware the Silly Ones: While Art Evolution has somewhat mitigated the issue, Demogorgon has always been one of the most ridiculous archdemons when taken at face value, a tentacled baboon with two eternally-bickering, completely insane heads. He's also the single most dangerous and powerful being in the Abyss, and surprisingly cunning despite his quirks. Even his insanity is more dangerous than one might expect, not least because it's highly contagious.
  • Brown Note: A true copy of his symbol (a sort of twisted, spiral Y-shape with no official artwork) can drive mortals to madness and worship if they view or contemplate it for too long. Mordenkainen even tried to work around this by only looking at it through a mirror, which ended up making the effect more subtle and insidious, and he was only saved by the intervention of his disciple.
  • Combat Tentacles: Demogorgon has two tentacles growing from each elbow, and uses said tentacles to lash his opponents in melee combat.
  • The Corrupter: Anyone who sees his true demonic sigil (as drawn by Demogorgon himself or one of his trusted followers) is compelled to worship him, and he's behind more monstrous versions of common races- Ettins are corrupted ogres, and Merrow are corrupted merfolk.
  • Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Demogorgon actually does care for some of his children as well as his mistress, the Succubus Queen Malcanthet, and one of his deepest fears is that they too will betray him... and unfortunately for him, Malcanthet is a Manipulative Bitch who is just using him for her own ends and playing on his feelings.
  • Hate Plague: His presence drives animals, even docile ones, into a violent frenzy.
  • Hypnotic Gaze: Demogorgon's gaze can drive people temporarily insane or put them into a brief stupor. If both heads focus their gaze on a single creature, they hypnotize it, and Demogorgon effectively takes complete control of that creature for one turn.
  • Multiple Head Case: He has two heads, both equally insane.
  • Omnicidal Maniac: His end goal is to kill everything in the universe that isn't him, at which point Amaeul and Hethadriah will finally turn against and destroy each other, leaving the universe empty.
  • The Paranoiac: At his core, Demogorgon is a deeply traumatised and frightened discarded lab experiment that (not wrongly) believes everyone and everything in the Abyss and beyond is out to get him and that the only way for him to survive is to gain as much power as possible and kill everything that might be a threat (which could be literally anything, in his eyes).
  • Super Prototype: Demogorgon was the first tanar'ri demon created by the Queen of Chaos, made from the first soul corrupted by Chaos, and is undoubtedly the most powerful. Despite his great power, however, he was actually discarded by the Queen as a failure, being too crazy to control.
  • Volcanic Veins: 5th edition artwork depicts Demogorgon as having veinlike cracks all over his body which glow with a sulfurous yellow light.

    Eltab 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/eltab.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 28 (3E)

Once a great power of the Abyss on par with the likes of Demogorgon, Orcus, and Graz'zt, after being summoned in the ancient past by the demon-binders of Narfell to fight their enemies Eltab became trapped on the Prime Material Plane, where he would be repeatedly imprisoned and set free throughout the ages. He "rules" over layer 248 of the Abyss, known as the Hidden Layer, fragments of which were dragged into the Prime Material Plane with his summoning.


  • Evil Power Vacuum: With Eltab trapped on the Prime Material Plane, the Hidden Layer is split into various fiefdoms by Eltab's former lieutenants, constantly fighting for control over the realm.
  • Evil Tower of Ominousness: The Citadel of Conjurers, also known as Dun-Orthass, a dark tower built near the end of the Narfelli empire. A massive demoncyst known as the Hall of the Hidden Throne rests deep within it, containing both Eltab's ruined palace and the calling circle that binds him to Faerûn. It is here the Eltab now dwells, plotting plans of conquest and revenge.
  • Horns of Villainy: Numerous horns and antlers adorn the head of this Deomn Prince.
  • Hungry Jungle: While mostly barren rock, much of the Hidden Layer is said to hold vast forests of deadly (often sentient) plant life such as assassin vines, bloodthorns, ironmaws, and viper trees.
  • Sealed Evil in a Can:
    • Ever since his initial summoning, Eltab has been repeatedly imprisoned and set free from numerous demoncysts before he was finally defeated, which resulted in him being teleported to the Citadel of Conjurers where now resides.
    • Many of the demoncysts lay buried underground and contain multitudes of demons that were dragged from the Abyss along with them, just waiting to be released.
  • Shattered World: In a sense. Due to the unique nature of how Eltab was summoned, fragments of his layer of the Abyss were dragged with him, scattered across Northeast Faerûn. These chunks, known as demoncysts, are usually no more than 100 feet across and maintained their own environments (barren rock constantly plagued by lightning storms) that don't mix with the natural world.
  • Summoning Ritual: Eltab was summoned to Faerûn using a unique form of calling circle known as adamantine binding. This spell is so powerful that so long as it remains intact Eltab can never leave the Prime Material Plane, which is a problem as the only weapon believed to be powerful enough to break the binding is the legendary greatsword of Rashemen, Hadryllis.

    Fraz-Urb'luu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/fraz_urbluu_5e.png
5e
4e
3e
1e (S 4 module)
Challenge Rating: 21 (3E), 23 (5E)

The Demon Prince of Deception, able to fool even other demon lords into thinking they've been summoned by a mortal, allowing Fraz-Urb'luu to unleash them upon third parties, usually right after he teleports away from the scene. He spent some two hundred years trapped within a bas relief below Castle Greyhawk by the mad archmage Zagig, until some foolish adventurers accidentally released him. He has spent much of his time since his escape rebuilding his domain of Hollow's Heart, layer 176, and searching for his lost Staff of Fraz-Urb'luu.


  • Art Evolution: He has always been depicted as a gargoyle-like figure, but prior to 5e he was drawn as very muscular. 5e gave him a more hunched over, gargoylish posture. Still got the mutton chops, though.
  • Consummate Liar: Both the demon himself, and anyone who knowingly enters his service.
    • Compulsive Liar: Even people who don't willingly or knowingly serve him can become habitual liars if they succumb to his influence; one of the Madness Of Fraz-Urb'luu options in 5e is "I never let anyone know the truth about my actions or intentions, even if doing so would be beneficial to me".
  • The Corrupter: He uses his powers to trick heroic people into performing increasingly evil acts in pursuit of what they believe to be noble ends, both to serve his goals and for his own perverse amusement.
  • Evil Is Petty: Fraz-Urb'luu is quite possibly the most spiteful and gratuitously sadistic demon in the Abyss... no small feat, given the tanar'ri are already some of the most proactively loathsome and unsavory fiends in the Lower Planes. To count the most prominent examples:
    • He built up his Hated by All status by fooling other demon lords into being summoned into his clutches, before binding them into temporary servitude with his Staff Of Fraz-Urb'luu to take things that he wished from them- and many times which he did simply to amuse himself- before dismissing them once he grew bored with them, presumably to let them wallow in their humiliation.
    • When all of the trickery elaborated above came back to bite him- resulting in a centuries-long imprisonment within the depths of Castle Greyhawk, during which his demonic enemies stormed his Abyssal layer and razed it to the ground, as well as sundered the Staff Of Fraz-Urb'luu and scattered its pieces across the cosmos- and he eventually returned to see his home had been destroyed in his absence, he swore bloody vengeance upon the entire Material Plane for Zagig's hand in his fall from power; in the Dragon magazine issue that details him, it's noted that, unlike other demons- who see the Material Plane as a place ripe for sowing chaos and depravity within mortal hearts- Fraz-Urb'luu just sees it as a massive affront to his wounded pride and would have it all completely destroyed instead.
    • Part of why he even bothers to deceive mortals and be The Corrupter in the first place is so that, when they eventually end up in his clutches, he can sadistically show them the true horrific consequences of them believing in his lies and unknowing serving his interests, driving them over the Despair Event Horizon before devouring their souls... and if the person in question was some unlucky shmuck who happened to be a follower of one of his false religions, he'll typically string them along for a bit longer first with an idyllic-but-false afterlife that gradually fades away, until the poor sap ultimately realizes the horrible truth.
  • Genius Bruiser: His greatest weapons are his silver tongue, potent illusions, and insidious cunning, but he's far from lacking in the area of physical strength and is completely willing to use brute force when guile fails; see Pint-Sized Powerhouse below.
  • Hated by All: Nobody likes Fraz-Urb'luu, and rival demon lords in particular despise him for effectively crank calling them.
  • He Who Fights Monsters: One of his prefered tricks is to pose as a benevolent sponsor to demon hunters, letting them hunt down and sabotage his rivals while pushing them to committ atrocities that will damn them.
  • Manipulative Bastard: He can easily manipulate people into doing what he wants through a combination of illusions and lies.
  • Master of Illusion: He has many illusion spells at his disposal.
  • Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Compared to his fellow Demon Lords, he is the smallest except for Graz'zt. Though he is not the strongest of the demon lords, he is still immensely powerful by mortal standards (in 5e specifically, he has a Strength score of 29- on par with larger and more martially-oriented demon lords like Baphomet, Yeenoghu, and even Demogorgon- among other things).
  • The Plot Reaper: A non-lethal instrument of the trope. Old Fraz was thought up by Gary Gygax himself to deal with a pair of players who had gotten too powerful, so he had them encounter and free the demon lord, who "thanked" them by yanking them into the Abyss and destroying all their gear.
  • Scam Religion: Most of his "cults" are composed of people he or his true followers have lied to.
  • Sealed Evil in a Can: He used to be stuck in Castle Greyhawk back in ye olden days of the 80s. Then some adventurers broke him out by accident.
  • Space Master: In 5th edition his mere presence warps space so that roads turn back on themselves and lead nowhere. He can also use a lair action to turn doors into walls and vice versa.
  • Vocal Dissonance: He's described as having a very melodious and pleasant voice, and looks like... well, look at the images above.
  • Voluntary Shapeshifting: He can take any form he likes, the better to deceive and manipulate people.

    Graz'zt 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/796px_grazzt_5e.png
5e
4e
3e
2e
1e
Challenge Rating: 22 (3E), 32 (4E), 24 (5E)

The Demon Prince of Forbidden Pleasure, and one of the biggest horndogs in the Abyss, rivaled only by the Succubus Queen Malcanthet and the Lord of Incest and Sexual Taboos Socothbenoth. Graz'zt looks like a handsome black-skinned human man who's just a little off, with his unnatural coloration, goatlike legs, six fingers on each hand, and small horns. He's also the biggest Magnificent Bastard of the Demon Princes, which has led to theories that he's a devil who switched sides. Uniquely among demon princes, Graz'zt rules three layers at once, his realm of Azzagrat, spanning layers 45, 46 and 47.


  • Big, Screwed-Up Family: He is sometimes believed to be the son / creation of of the Obyrinth Lord Pale Night, who summoned a powerful fiendish outsider to be the father- said outsider is sometimes thought to be Asmodeus himself, which might explain why he is also thought to be a former Archdevil. In turn, Graz'zt himself was captured and effectively raped by the witch Iggwilv (aka Tasha), who birthed the cambion demigod and warlord known as Iuz who terrorises the world of Oerth (where the Greyhawk campaign takes place), although Graz'zt has many other fiendish children as well. This origin would also make Graz'zt a half-sibling of several Devils as well as Demons, as both Asmodeus and Pale Night have lots of other offspring too. Among demons, his most notorious siblings are Vucarik-in-Chains, Lupercio, Rhyxali (who shares his features of six-fingered hands and jet-black skin) and Zivorgian. Unsurprisingly, they all hate him and he hates them back just as much, with the sole exception of Rhyxali, the only one he tolerates, mostly because she resembles him a bit, unlike all the others.
  • The Chessmaster: While he can't match Demogorgon or Orcus in terms of sheer power, he has the advantage of not being bonkers, which lets him spread his influence across multiple layers.
  • Cut Lex Luthor a Check: When Graz'zt managed to capture Waukeen, Faerunian Goddess of trade, he forced her to...help him fill his coffers with riches.
  • Defector from Decadence: One of the most common backgrounds for him was that was a Devil who fought his way into the Abyss, and unable to escape, was changed by it's power. In response, he decided to defect to the Abyss and Demons. Of course, this is an example of defecting from decadence into even worse decadence.
  • Going Native: A few of the many versions of his backstory suggest that he began life as an Archdevil serving Asmodeus, who defected from the hierarchy of Hell to become a demon lord.
  • The Hedonist: Graz'zt loves pleasure in all its forms, and delights in pageantry that other demon lords dismiss.
  • Hot as Hell: Both in a literal sense and in a figurative one- there are a lot of demons, cambions, and tieflings who trace lineage to him. Graz'zt is based on stories from witch trials, where witches would claim to copulate with the Devil in the guise of a handsome black-skinned man.
  • Horrifying the Horror: He is one of the top dogs of the Abyss, competing with Demogorgon and Orcus, yet he is terrified of Pale Night.
  • Monster Progenitor: He was stabbed by Glasya during an invasion of the Abyss. The droplets of blood which fell from Graz'zt's wound came to life as the first babaus, who helped him drive off the invading devils.
  • Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Like Fraaz Urb'luu, he's small by Demon Lord standard. Still a demon lord, though.
  • Supernatural Gold Eyes: One of the traits that mark his inhumanity is that his eyes are gold in color.
  • Unholy Matrimony: He has a really complicated relationship with the witch Iggwilv where they do genuinely love each other insomuch as they're capable of positive emotions, but they're too messed up to actually admit it, and instead are stuck in a cycle of mutual exploitation.
  • Weak, but Skilled: By Demon Lord standards at least; Graz'zt generally dislikes brute force and relies on subtleties and manipulation to get his way. By mortal standards, he's still as terrifyingly strong in a fight as you would expect.

    Juiblex 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/juiblex_5e.jpg
5e
4e
3e
1e
Challenge Rating: 19 (3E), 23 (5E)

The demon lord of oozes and slimes, Juiblex lives to consume. Reflecting the nature of his "worshippers," Juiblex is barely sentient. He has vague ambitions of expanding until all the universe is his slime, but other than that he's not bright enough to have plans. He contests layer 222 with Zuggtmoy, and recently expanded his Slime Pits while his rival was trapped within the infamous Temple of Elemental Evil.


  • Acid Attack: His touch is corrosive, and he can spray acidic slime at distant enemies, all as befitting of an ooze.
  • Anthropomorphic Personification: In 4e, far from being some mere demon lord, he is in fact the very personification of evil's infective and corrupting nature. According to the World Axis cosmology of 4e, when Tharizdun plunged the shard of evil into the "flesh" of the Elemental Chaos (thus creating the Abyss), the blood and fluids that spewed forth gained sentience and became Juiblex.
  • Apocalypse Cult: The people who worship Juiblex are the kind of people who are perfectly fine with letting a giant slime monster devour all life in the universe. In fact, they look forward to the day when this happens.
  • Blob Monster: Juiblex is a towering pillar of caustic ooze, with multiple eyeballs floating within his gelatinous bulk.
  • Gameplay and Story Segregation: The notion that Juiblex is barely sentient is not borne out by his stat block in 5th edition. His Intelligence and Wisdom scores are both 20, making him smarter (but not wiser) than both Baphomet and Yeenoghu, equally as intelligent as (and wiser than) Demogorgon and Zuggtmoy, and on par with Orcus in both categories. The only demon lords smarter and wiser than him in this edition are Fraz-Urb’luu and Graz’zt, who are among the smartest of their kind anyway. Even his lowest mental score, Charisma, is still higher than Yeenoghu's at a 16.
  • Lovecraftian Superpower: Cultists of Juiblex can develop ooze-like traits, such as taking on a semiliquid form that can squeeze into tight spaces or gaining acidic blood which sprays out of their wounds to harm their attackers. He can also grant his followers a tremendous bonus to their Constitution scores, but this bonus comes with an equal penalty to their Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma.
  • Morality Pet: If you believe any of the Castle Greyhawk parody module is canon (and why would you?), Jubilex has a beloved pet parrot.
  • Poisonous Person: In 5th edition he has a Corrupting Touch attack which inflicts poison damage and covers the victim in a noxious slime, which poisons any creatures within 10 feet of the victim.
  • Time Abyss: According to 4th edition, Juiblex is the absolute oldest of the non-obyrith demon lords, created as a side-effect of Tharizdun creating the Abyss.
  • Walking Wasteland: His mere presence poisons nearby creatures, turns small bodies of water into Hollywood Acid, and covers most surfaces within 6 miles of him with a thin film of sticky, slippery gunge.

    Kostchtchie 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/812px_kostchtchie_5e.jpg
5e (imprisoned by Zariel)
4e
1e
Challenge Rating: 21 (3E)

Kostchtchie was once a human who, through a deal with Baba Yaga, became a monstrous warlord. He was eventually slain by a legendary hero, and his soul ended up in the Iron Wastes, Abyssal layer 23, which he turned into his domain. Kostchtchie is a popular patron for giants, particularily frost giants who turn to demon worship, and he seeks to eventually usurp the frost giant god Thrym.


  • Deal with the Devil: As a mortal, he made one with Baba Yaga. She took his soul and stuck it in an amulet, making him immortal. The cost was that he would slowly grow into a monster, first resembling an ogre and then a giant.
  • Demon of Human Origin: Kostchtchie started out as a human, but, through a deal with Baba Yaga, became immortal at the cost of growing to monstrous size. When he died, he ended up in the abyss and eventually grew to a Demon Lord.
  • Elemental Weapon: Kostchtchie wielded the warhammer Matalotok, which was forged by the god Thrym. As is to be expected from a weapon forged by the frost giant god, its strikes create explosions of cold, and it makes him utterly immune to cold damage. After his defeat and imprisonment by Zariel, she claimed the hammer herself.
  • Ethnic God: Of a kind, though he's not a god. He is worshipped mostly by giants, and particularily frost giants.
  • Evil Is Not a Toy: Kostchtchie has attempted to forge an alliance with Obox-Ob (see bellow). He is aware of the Lord of Vermin's hatred of tanar'ri, but considers himself a frost giant, not a demon. Obviously Obox-Ob is more likely to consume Kostchtchie than ally with him.
  • From Nobody to Nightmare: An outcast tribal warrior became a feared demon lord.
  • Godhood Seeker: He is already nigh-godlike by virtue of being a demon lord, but he fashions himself the true god of frost giants and wants to usurp Thrym.
  • Going Native: He is not actually a giant, but considers himself one and wants to become the god of frost giants.
  • Offing the Offspring: After forcing himself on a Valkyrie, Kostchtchie abducted his resulting daughter and sacrificed her in a ritual to force open a permanent gate between the Iron Wastes and Ysgard.
  • Politically Incorrect Villain: Kostchtchie is a proud misogynist, convinced that women are inferior weaklings that serve no purpose other than spawning new men.
  • Sealed Evil in a Can: He was defeated by Zariel recently, and she stuck him in a pit in Avernus, guarded by chain devils. The party in Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus can free him to create a distraction.

    Malcanthet 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_malcanthet_3e.png
3E
Challenge Rating: 21 (3E)

The current Queen of the Succubi rules layer 570, the hedonistic paradise of Shendilavri, whose unearthly beauty and decadent pleasures entrapt and corrupt those who succumb to its temptations. Malcanthet counts her fellow demon lords Pazuzu and Demogorgon as lovers, but has had trysts with many others as part of Abyssal politics. While she has a long feud with Yeenoghu over an incident on the Material Plane, her worst rival is Graz'zt, who she constantly schemes against.


  • Attack Reflector: Any enchantment effect that fails to penetrate her Spell Resistance is instead redirected against its caster.
  • Authority Equals Asskicking: She had to fight her way to the top and defeated 3 of her rivals for the title of "Queen of Sucubi". Shami-Amourae, Lynkhab and Xinivrae still want her title but none of them is powerful enough at the moment to pose a threat, hence Malcanthet now reigns supreme.
  • Beware My Stinger Tail: Malcanthet's tail delivers a poison that greatly damages her victim's Wisdom, with a secondary effect identical to the dominate person spell.
  • Charm Person: Beyond her tail, merely meeting Malcanthet's gaze can cause others to fall under her control.
  • Full-Frontal Assault: Her "Profane Beauty" ability gives her a hefty bonus to her Armor Class so long as she doesn't wear any physical protection, ensuring that even if she's caught in flagrante delicto she can put up a fight.
  • It Amused Me: Shendilavri is rife with scheming, and Malcanthet regularly has to defeat attempted coups, but she and her spies are on top of the situation, and Malcanthet prefers to let these plots proceed for as long as possible, before apprehending and personally torturing her would-be rivals.
  • Legacy Character: Malcanthet is merely the most recent fiend to claim to be "Queen of the Succubi," and has to defend her title from several other rivals.
  • Mother Of Monsters: Malcanthet's relationship with Pazuzu has resulted in the birth of several potent succubi children, while with Demogorgon she's sired "things best left unmentioned."
  • Succubi and Incubi: The patron of them, at least before the succubi became independent from demons.
  • Too Much Alike: The heart of her emnity with Graz'zt is that she and the Dark Prince are just too similar, being supremely sensual schemers. Malcanthet claims that their feud began when she turned down Graz'zt's advances and his wounded pride led him to seek vengeance, while he claims exactly the opposite.

    Obox-Ob 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/obox_ob.jpg
3e
Challenge Rating: 22

Ancient am I, ancient and worthy of your fealty. Swear allegiance to me and I will tell you... everything about the secret Abyss.

Obox-Ob is an obyrith demon lord, and one of the oldest. When the planes were still young, an obyrith survivor of the previous multiverse ruled all demon kind, until he was overthrown and slain by the Queen of Chaos, and his title usurped by her creation, Miska the Wolf-Spider (and then Demogorgon). The old prince survived, however, through a single avatar that escaped the Queen's ambush. This avatar became the demon lord Obox-Ob, the Lord of Vermin, ruling a small realm known as the Blood Marshes, located in the distant depths of Zionyn, the 663rd layer of the Abyss.


  • Arch-Nemesis: Obox-Ob hates Demogorgon for usurping his position, and the hatred is mutual.
  • Blood Knight: While Obox-Ob hates taking risks, he enjoys melee combat, and relishes in slaying lesser opponents.
  • Brown Note: Obox-Ob's aberrant form "inflicts mind-rending nightmares on those that looked upon it and instilled a permanent sense of entomophobic dread within the victim"
  • The Corruptor: Obox-Ob is not poisonous, he is far worse. His bite transfers the pure corruptive nature of Chaos.
  • Creepy Centipedes: Appropriately for the lord of Vermin, Obox-Ob appears as a great centipede with three skulls at the end of his tail.
  • The Dreaded: Obox-Ob is the only thing Demogorgon truly fears. This is less for sheer power (Demogorgon would wreck him in a normal fight), and more out of fear that Obox-Ob still retains some of his authority as Prince of Demons, which would allow him to command any demon within sight- Demogorgon included.
  • Fantastic Racism: Obox-Ob hates tanar'ri demons, considering them lesser than his obyrith kin due to their origin as mortals. If he were to retake his position as prince of demons, tanar'ri would be purged from the Abyss. Which of course would weaken the Abyss enough to let the devils win the blood war. Of course, as a demon, he hates everything, he just hates tanar'ri more.
  • How the Mighty Have Fallen: He's still a demon lord, and a powerful one at that, but ruling a small domain, not even an entire layer, in the deepest depths of the Abyss is a far cry from being Prince of all Demons. Obox-Ob used to be the number one menace in the D&D multiverse (and has the potential to be so again), and is directly or indirectly responsible for such calamities as the corruption of Tharizdun and Asmodeus and the creation of the Abyss itself, but nowadays he's the fiendish equivalent of a tin-pot dictator with little real power.
  • Pest Controller: Obviously, as the lord of vermin he can control all sorts of rats and insects. He can also turn objects into vermin, and his sting turns mortals into giant scorpions, which only a Wish spell can reverse.
  • Small Role, Big Impact: He's a fairly obscure villain who hasn't had a big role in things for millenia, but keep in mind that without this evil thing existing there would be no Blood War, no Abyss, no Nine Hells, no Tharizdun, no Asmodeus, no Demogorgon...basically, the multiverse would be a significantly nicer place were it not for Obox-Ob.
  • Was Once a Man: Not Obox-Ob, but his primary servant Lascer, was once the first human unlucky enough to stumble into his lair. Obox-Ob turned him into a tanar'ri (the only in his service) assassin and spy.

    Orcus 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/orcus_5e.jpg
5e
4e
3e
2e (Dead Gods adventure)
1e
Challenge Rating: 22 (3E), 33 (4E), 26 (5E)

I will be the last creature when I am done. The cosmos will then be perfect, free of the braying abominations that are all other living things.

The Demon Lord of the Undead, Orcus was once content with his stalemate against his rivals Demogorgon and Grazzt, only to be slain by the drow goddess Kiranslee and his home layer usurped. Yet somehow he returned from the grave, taking the name of Tenebrous and uncovering the Last Word, a power capable of slaying even deities. Though Orcus-as-Tenebrous was ultimately defeated by a band of adventurers, he was fully resurrected by his faithful servants and reclaimed both his name and his icy domain of Thanatos. Orcus is one of the most dangerous beings in the Abyss, and while his rival Demogorgon may claim the title "Prince of Demons," Orcus' cults on the Material Plane place him closer to full godhood.


  • Artifact of Doom: The Wand of Orcus, a wand positively brimming with negative energies, forged from the skull and spine of a legendary hero Orcus killed. Its properties have varied with editions, but it is always an extremely powerful weapon, and usually capable of summoning unending hordes of the undead.
  • Back from the Dead: One of the major storylines back in 2nd edition involved a mysterious entity named Tenebrous who was really Orcus in diguise. He died at the end of the storyline, but has since gotten better.
  • Big Bad Wannabe: He tries his hardest to be this for the demons, but while he is a genuine apocalyptic threat in his own right, Demogorgon is still his better and often defeats Orcus when they come into contact.
  • Big Red Devil: Orcus is consistently depicted as a red-skinned, cloven-hooved, bat-winged demon with a ram's head.
  • The Bus Came Back: He was Put on a Bus for much of 2nd edition, due to the 'Satanic Panic', but he was able to resurrect himself in time for 3e.
  • The Corrupter: As part of his plot to recover his wand back in 2nd edition, he killed and impersonated Primus, the embodiment of Law that rules the plane of Mechanus. In the process, he corrupted a Secundus and a horde of modrons to his chaotic evil ways. Even after he left, the corrupted Secundus remained to cause trouble, until it was thrown out by the new Primus.
  • Damage-Increasing Debuff: In 5th edition, Orcus can create a column of negative energy which makes any creature within its area more vulnerable to necrotic damage.
  • Dangerous Forbidden Technique: The Last Word, a spell powerful enough to slay gods in a single strike. The dangerous part comes from it being extremely corruptive, consuming Tenebrous from the inside as he used it. After Tenebrous was defeated and returned to being Orcus, the gods put measures in place to prevent it from being used again.
  • From Nobody to Nightmare: Twofold. First he was a mortal who became a powerful enough necromancer to snuff out all the life on his home world, then he died, became a lowly Abyssal larva, but clawed his way up the demonic ladder until he became a demon prince who wouldn't stay dead.
  • Kill and Replace: Back in 2e, Orcus killed the ruling Primus and took his place so he could send out the Modrons to search for his wand. He found it eventually and left, but the damage had been done.
  • King Mook: He resembles a Balor, who are the Elite Mooks of the Abyss, and it is known that he was once an evil mortal spellcaster who climbed through the ranks of demonkind over the course of centuries after dying and finding himself a lowly demon larvae and did become a Balor at some point. Quite possibly he is still a Balor and just happens to be a very powerful one with his own layer, powerful magic and legions of undead and demon servants.
  • Literal Split Personality: While Orcus has given up his guise of Tenebrous, the 3rd Edition Tome of Magic revealed that enough divinity remains associated with the name for Tenebrous to exist independently of Orcus as a vestige outside the normal conceptions of life or death.
  • Magic Staff: His weapon of choice is the Wand of Orcus, a skull-headed mace which can be used to brain people or to cast powerful necromancy spells.
  • Misanthrope Supreme: Orcus wants to rid the multiverse of the pestilence known as "life" and "other people" so that he he and alone will be the only thing existing. It is ambiguous if his undead servants will be spared his final wrath as he has expressed his contempt for undead as well.
  • Monster Progenitor: He created the Devourers, and undoubtedly countless other horrors.
  • My Rules Are Not Your Rules: In 5th edition, power word kill is a 9th-level spell. Most creatures, player or otherwise, can only cast one 9th-level spell per day. Orcus, between his lair actions and the charges in his wand, can effectively cast it as often as he likes.
  • Necromancer: As you might expect from the demon lord of the undead, he knows a great many spells which can slay the living and raise the dead. According to Gary Gygax, as a mortal, Orcus created the first undead.
  • Omnicidal Maniac: His end goal is to kill every last living thing in the universe so that there will be nothing left but himself and his undead minions.
  • One-Hit Kill: He can cast power word kill, both as a lair action and by casting it from his wand.
  • Orcus on His Throne: The trope was named for the habit of early adventuring modules with Orcus as the Big Bad to have him remain off in the Abyss for the entire adventure, while the PCs faced his minions and worshippers. Subverted in second edition, where he died, came back in the guise of Tenebrous, killed some gods, broke Mechanus, and nearly became the God of Undeath, before being killed by adventurers. He got better.
    • As of 4 and 5e, he's fully statted out for combat if GMs want to use him in their personal campaigns, though TvTropes takes no responsibility for any consequences that might result from facing Orcus with anything less than a team of epic-level PCs kitted out with all the magical goodies they can find.
  • Oxymoronic Being: Outsiders cannot become undead, but when Orcus rose from the dead as Tenebrous, he was essentially an undead demon.
  • Raising the Steaks: His mere presence can reanimate dead animals as skeletons and zombies.
  • Skull for a Head: 5th edition updated Orcus's design to give him a fleshless skeletal face, presumably to better fit his role as the demon lord of undeath.
  • The Undead: Orcus is the Demon Prince of the Undead, and he's got pretty much every kind listed in his service. In fact, he wants the entire world to ultimately become undead and under his control. Ironically, he is not undead himself, and utterly despises them.

    Oublivae 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/oublivae.png
3e
Challenge Rating: 23 (3E)

The Demon Lord of Ruin and History, Oublivae lives to bring ruin and destruction to all corners of creation and rule over the remains. In the infinite, chaotic layers of the Abyss, it is Oublivae who works to keep things chaotic. She rules over layer 100 of the Abyss, known as The Barrens, a vast expanse filled with ruins from civilizations past, present, and future.


  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: Looks like an attractive female humanoid covered in chitinous plates with a long tail ending in a deadly stinger.
  • The Chessmaster: When her predecessor Ugoreth had her surrounded, she appealed to his vanity by saying she carried a message for his ears only. It worked, and once they were alone she killed him and ate his soul.
  • Eldritch Location: Even by the standards of the Abyss, the Barrens are weird in that it contains ruins of civilizations that haven't even been formed yet. This could be explained by the belief that the Barrens were once an astral domain that fell to the Abyss.
  • Eviler than Thou: When the former ruler of the Barrens, Ugoreth, first met her, he had his minions surround her and demanded her service. Oublivae then outsmarted Ugoreth, killed him, ate his soul, and destroyed his empire before taking his position as Demon Lord for herself.
  • Hidden Depths: Given how she all but embodies destruction, it might come as a surprise that Oublivae holds a knowledge of history rivalled by only the likes of Graz'zt, Vecna, and Iggwilv.
  • Hope Crusher: She enjoys breaking the spirits of those she hunts by showing glimpses of their future where all they love is gone, right before devouring their soul.
  • Mysterious Past: Nothing is known about her past, just that one day she crawled out from the dregs of the Barrens, went straight to Ugoreth's castle, and promptly killed him.
  • Omnicidal Maniac: Her ultimate goal is to turn the world into nothing but wasteland for her to rule over.
  • Overly-Long Tongue: She has a long, ghoulish tongue that she uses to lap up the blood of her victims.
  • Red Baron: She has such lovely titles as the Queen of Desolation, the Demon Monarch of the Barrens, and the Angel of the Everlasting Void.
  • Running on All Fours: When provoked, she drops to all fours and fights like a feral beast.
  • Smarter Than They Look: Has a vast knowlege of history and is just as much a scheemer as Graz'zt.
  • Soul Eating: Is explicitly stated to eat the souls of her victims, and even ate the soul of the former ruler of the Barrens, the demon lord Ugoreth.

    Pale Night 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/pale_night___e_m_gist.jpg
3E
Challenge Rating: 21 (3E)

The enigmatic Pale Night was old even when her fellow obyriths ruled the Abyss. Some sources name her as the mother of the tanar'ri race, others as the progenitor of various monsters like lamias and harpies. Her interactions with interlopers are varied, ranging from sending intruders on their way to "embracing" them with her spectral shroud and adding them to her gallery of victims. She ruled her Bone Palace on layer 600 long before Baphomet converted most of the layer to his Endless Maze, but the demon prince of beasts has kept well away from Pale Night's demense.


  • Brown Note: Reality itself is horrified by her appearance, and what appears to be a piece of cloth covering her true form is in fact a desparate attempt at keeping the world from literally going mad.
  • Horrifying the Horror: Because her true form is so unfathomably loathsome that reality itself just rejects it, even her fellow demons, up to her own children, are terrified of her.
    Disguised Graz'zt: Do not speak to the White Lady. Not one word.
  • Mad God: She acts less insane than other demons, but that's just because she's mad in a different way. Anyone who meets her has an equal chance at getting blown to smithereens, going insane or getting a quest and sent on their way.
  • Monster Progenitor: She is sometimes said to be the creator of the Tanar'ri, making her this to the entire demon race.
  • One-Hit Kill: If someone sees the true form of Pale Night (either by pulling the veil back themselves or by her removing it, which she can do once a day), they must make an extremely high Will save. On a success, they fail to comprehend what they see. On a failure, they die on the spot. If brought back from the dead, all they remember is an indescribable sense of terror.
  • She Who Must Not Be Seen: Reality itself refuses to reveal her beyond the shapely woman in a white shroud that she's usually described as.
  • Time Stands Still: Pale Night can make an "Embrace" attack by wrapping a foe in a part of her shroud. If successful, her victim is rendered an insubstantial, shrouded figure frozen in time as per the temporal stasis spell. Only powerful magic such as wish or miracle can free someone from Pale Night's embrace.
  • You Can Not Grasp The True Form: He true form is horrifying beyond mortal comprehension; her appearance as a woman in a white robe is a result of reality itself trying to hide her.

    Pazuzu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/d&d_pazuzu_3e.png
3E
Challenge Rating: 22 (3E)

The Prince of the Lower Aerial Kingdoms was once an independent obyrith lord, but he weathered The Upheaval and has since been accepted by the tanar'ri. This is largely because Pazuzu is disinterested in Abyssal politics, and wishes only to corrupt mortals on the Material Plane. Though officially he rules layer 503, Torremor, he is usually found in the "top" layer of the Abyss, Pazunia, and other demon lords let him pass as he flies through the skies of their own layers.


  • The Corruptor: Pazuzu's main interest is in consuming innocence and purity, hence why he ignores the Abyss in favor of the Material Plane.
  • Deal with the Devil: Uniquely among demons, Pazuzu loves to strike bargains with desperate mortals, offering his aid to get them out of a difficult situation. It's a tempting offer, especially as Pazuzu is not a Jackass Genie and his help is completely legitimate, but the catch is that taking his aid will shift your alignment one step closer to Chaotic Evil, and once a mortal is completely corrupted, Pazuzu has no more use for them.
  • Evil Evolves: Pazuzu can be considered a fiendish "missing link," an ancient obyrith who has developed a less monstrous appearance and several tanar'ri-like qualities after aeons of association with them.
  • Speak of the Devil: Anyone who says Pazuzu's name three times in quick succession gets his attention, and after using spells like detect thoughts to scope out the situation, Pazuzu is free to plane shift directly to the speaker's location.
  • Winged Humanoid: Sports two pairs of dark-feathered wings, and a beaked face to boot.

    Sertrous 
The Demon Lord of Heretics and Blasphemers. Long ago, Sertrous was cast out of the Abyss and defeated by the servants of gods. Sertrous, confused, asked the servants why they obeyed the gods, when they could obtain divine power by sheer belief alone, without the need for a god to provide it. Thus, Sertrous brought into the world a secret the gods would rather have kept secret forever, becoming the demon prinece of heresy.

See Dungeons & Dragons: Elder Evils.

    Sess'innek 
The Demon Lord of lizardfolk, who works to steal the race away from Semuanya. He rules over layer 7 of the Abyss, Kearackinin, also known as the Phantom Plane.
  • The Corrupter: He corrupts lizardfolk eggs, which then hatch into lizard kings (or queens, as the case may be). Lizard kings are stronger, smarter, and more aggressive than normal lizardfolk, and are Always Chaotic Evil with a taste for the flesh of sapient races.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: Sess'innek grew tired of the Blood War and withdrew from it willingly, and much prefers his self-imposed exile over having to deal with the politics of the Abyss. As such, his layer is sealed off completely, and can only be accessed with his express permission.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: He has six arms, and is a demon lord.
  • Wings Do Nothing: He has vestigial wings.

    Yeenoghu 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/24_yeenoghu.jpg
5e
4e
3e
1e

Challenge Rating: 20 (3E), 24 (5E)

The Demon Lord of Savagery, Yeenoghu is the creator of gnolls. He is a lesser power compared to princes like Orcus and Demogorgon, but was still able to subjugate Doresain, the Demon Prince of Ghouls who was a former vassal of Orcus. He controls the Abyss' 422nd layer, which traditionally, he has simply named "Yeenoghu's Realm" (he isn't very creative. In 5e, it is called Death Dells).


  • Art Evolution: Like the rest of the Demon Lords in Out of the Abyss, he got a substantially more demonic appearance in 5th edition.
  • Base on Wheels: His lair is described as a mobile fortress-city atop hundreds of stone wheels and pulled by legions of slaves and demonic creatures. Inside his lair he can summon iron spikes from the ground to impale others and fill gnolls and hyenas with a bloodthirsty rage.
  • Fisher King: All beings within a certain range of his lair change in accordance to his presence. Within six miles, all predators become wasteful and savage, killing wantonly but leaving the carcasses to rot. Within one mile, iron spike dot the ground, his prey impaled upon them, and all intelligent beings slowly become more deranged and "gnoll-like" in personality. However, should he somehow be defeated, the effects he has on the region would fade within ten days.
  • Epic Flail: His weapon of choice is a three-headed flail, with each head having a different secondary effect. Flinds carry imitations of this flail.
  • Equal-Opportunity Evil: While he certainly favors gnolls, Yeenoghu is noted to accept worshipers from all races.
  • Hate Plague: His mere presence drives predatory beasts into a murderous frenzy, killing far more than they need to survive and leaving the carcasses of their kills to rot. He can also use a lair action to drive any gnolls and hyenas within his lair berserk for one round.
  • Heinous Hyena: He’s a murderous hyena demon who created an entire race of bloodthirsty humanoid hyenas to serve him. He also created other hyena-like beasts such as the shoosuva and the leucrotta, and favors actual hyenas.
  • Horror Hunger: Yeenoghu is consumed with an insatiable hunger for the flesh of sentient beings. He inflicts this hunger upon any creatures who worship him, driving them to commit acts of cannibalism.
  • Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: In 5th edition Yeenoghu can use one of his lair actions to make a giant metal spike erupt from the floor beneath one enemy. If the creature fails its saving throw against this effect, it gets impaled on the spike for tremendous damage and is stuck there until freed.
  • Monster Progenitor: The first gnolls were originally hyenas that were drawn to Yeenoghu as he slaughtered his way across the Material Plane. These hyenas were corrupted by his presence and would gorge themselves on the corpses of his victims until they were literally too fat to move, at which point they exploded. The first gnolls rose from the hyenas' remains.
  • Retcon: In early editions, Yeenoghu was not the creator of the gnolls — that was their god, Gorellik, whom Yeenoghu had gradually displaced after corrupting the gnolls into his worship. In modern editions, no mention is made of Gorellik and Yeenoghu was always the gnolls' lord and maker.
  • Smarter Than They Look: Despite being a being of butchery, savagery, and overall destruction, Yeenoghu is fully capable of subtlety and trickery, he just chooses to forgo it most of the time.

    Zuggtmoy 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/23_zuggtmoy1.jpg
5e
3e
1e
Challenge Rating: 21 (3E), 23 (5E)

The Demon Queen of Fungi, Zuggtmoy wants to infect everything with her parasitic spores. If she had her way all living things would become her slaves and seedbeds for her fungal spawn. She contests layer 222, Shedaklah, with her archnemesis Juiblex, and half of her evil plans are devoted to mopping up the Slime Lord once and for all.


  • Art Evolution: Zuggtmoy originally looked like a humanoid lump of fungus. 3e redesigned her in as an Uncanny Valley humanoid female, which has since stuck.
  • The Assimilator: Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes puts forward the idea that her ultimate goal is to fuse all life into a single fungal organism, which she will then merge with and rule over.
  • Big Bad: She was secretly the big bad of the classic adventure The Temple of Elemental Evil. This was considered a bit of a letdown at the time, since Zuggtmoy is hardly all that impressive compared to Tharizdun, who was the most commonly theorized big bad.
  • Botanical Abomination: Zuggtmoy, Lady of Rot and Decay, manifests as a gigantic fungal humanoid woman. She also rules over a layer of the Abyss that's overgrown with miles-high fungi and tries to spread her corruption to the Material Plane, with And I Must Scream results for anyone who gets interred in her "gardens" or infected with her spores.
  • Mushroom Man: She is an unholy fungal demon which can take the form of a vaguely humanoid woman.
  • The Virus: Zuggtmoy's spores take control of the victim's mind, turning them into her slavish thralls. Most of her cultists are controlled this way, and even those who serve her of their own free will shall get infested sooner or later. Worse, the spores gradually destroy the victim's body from within as they germinate into new fungal organisms.
  • Walking Wasteland: Her presence makes all plant life within several miles become infected with parasitic fungus.

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