Who Are The Classic D&D Bosses?

[Alcamtar]

Originally Posted by andreww

They appeared in BECMI as the Immortals of Entropy. We only saw Orcus and Demogorgon as demon lords IIRC but they were very powerful.

They weren't in the core rules, but there were demons in the modules. For example X2 introduced the Death Demon. IIRC there were others, and there were also gods (not immortals). There was a discussion of gods and demons in B/X over on Dragonsfoot some time back. Interesting the stuff in the modules was not "family friendly" at all. It tended to be more dark and even lovecraftian IMO, less like the AD&D model.

[Cam Banks]

Fistandantilus wasn't really a boss monster. His demilich form in DL3 might be a problem if you bothered it, but you can beat that module without bothering it (and just in case, there's a vorpal sword lying around in Skullcap just for this purpose.) Because the demilich thing didn't work with the actual story of Fistandantilus as it later unfolded, we retconned him into a "remnant" of Fistandantilus' soul that hung around after Skullcap exploded. I even made up a new monster to cover for it.

Lord Soth, Khisanth/Onyx, Cyan, Sleet, Ember, all of the Dragon Highlords, etc were "true" boss monsters for the classic modules. Thankfully you never have to actually fight Takhisis herself.

Cheers,
Cam