Bosses

The Bosses of Fear Nightfall are the boss-class and mini-boss hostile mobs that the pack's mods add, from the Lich of The Graveyard to the Wistiver of Sons of Sins. Most have several times the health of an ordinary monster, and many are the only source of a weapon, material or key that the mod's later progression depends on. Players meet them through three routes: a ritual or altar that the player must build or fuel, a structure with a boss room, or a rare natural spawn that is tied to a biome or a calendar window. Many of them belong to the pack's horror content, so the fights are part of its night-time and underground threat rather than a separate arena system.

Overview

In the pack's data, a boss is a hostile mob that is classed as a boss or has at least 150 health. Some bosses guard a structure, such as the elder guardian of the Trident Trial Monument. Bosses differ from ordinary hostile mobs in four ways:

• they have high health, high armour and long follow ranges, so they keep chasing a player across the map;
• many have phases, stance breaks or stages that change their attacks at fixed health thresholds;
• several do not despawn once they exist, so an unfinished fight stays in the world;
• many are fire immune or highly resistant to knockback.

The table at the end of the page lists every boss with its stats. The rest of this section gives the summary and links to the pages that describe each boss in full.

How bosses are reached

Summoned bosses

These bosses never generate on their own. The player must gather the ingredients and perform a ritual:

• Lich: summoned at an altar with a Vial of Blood and the three bone staff fragments. The altar sits in the Lich Prison or in cold overworld biomes, and the summoning needs night. The Lich has 400 health in its first phase.
• Headless Horseman: started by placing its pedestal in a Sleepy Hollows Cemetery, which is found only in the Sleepy Hollows biome.
• Lord Pumpkinhead: summoned by using a Transmuting Elixir on an Infernal Evil Pumpkin block, which is found in the Infernal Pumpkin Patch and covered on Evil Pumpkins and Fel Lamps.
• Dead King: appears in the Catacombs as a dormant corpse. It can be brought back after death with a Dead King Phylactery.

Structure bosses

Several bosses are the guardians of a structure, which means they are found by exploring:

• the Pharaoh guards each Better Desert Temple. Until it is killed, players inside the temple are slowed by Mining Fatigue in survival mode;
• the elder guardian boss room of the Trident Trial Monument sits in the deep ocean biomes;
• the boss spawners of the Toxic Lair and the vault of the Lone Citadel (in the snowy biomes) are the rewards for clearing those structures;
• the Ancient Battleground and Citadel structures hold Ancient Knights, the same melee mob that the Echo of Tyros boss summons.

Natural spawns

Some bosses spawn in the open world. Their spawn rules are set by biome or by season:

• the Krampus spawns in cold, dark parts of the overworld, although its naughtiness trigger is switched off in this pack (see Naughtiness and Krampus);
• the Missioner patrols the overworld at night and fires magic charges at players;
• the Mutant Zombie, Mutant Skeleton and Mutant Creeper spawn in many biomes alongside their vanilla counterparts, so they can appear on ordinary night-time terrain;
• the Sir Pumpkinhead appears only during the autumn pumpkin season or while the Halloween event of Born in Chaos is active;
• the Kelvin has no natural spawn entries at all and is found only through its special sources.

Sons of Sins and Born in Chaos bosses

The Sons of Sins mod contributes the most dangerous bosses in the pack, all of them flesh or ether creatures:

• The Butcher has 650 health and 50 attack damage, with a follow range of 128 blocks, so it keeps pursuing over long distances;
• the Wistiver has 750 health and tracks players from up to 128 blocks away;
• the Blud has 540 health, fires blood projectiles, and holds a player while it screams; a summoned or hatched Blud never despawns;
• the Curse has 350 health; each of its hits removes an armour piece, and its aura applies Insanity to nearby players.

The Born in Chaos mod adds the largest group of pumpkin and hound bosses, including the Lord Pumpkinhead, Sir Pumpkinhead, Supreme Bonescaller, Krampus and Missioner.

Mutant Monsters bosses

The Mutant Monsters mod adds boss-scale versions of five vanilla mobs. Each has its own page for its health and attacks: the Mutant Creeper (120 health), the Mutant Enderman (200 health), the Mutant Skeleton (150 health), the Mutant Zombie (150 health, three lives) and the Mutant Snow Golem (80 health, ranged ice blocks). The mod's settings are left at their defaults in this pack.

Pack changes

Fear Nightfall changes the boss experience in several ways that matter to a player:

• Horror weighting. The horror biomes that hold many of these bosses are weighted at six times their normal share, and the horror structures that guard them are placed about 30% closer together. The result is more frequent boss encounters in dark forests, swamps and taigas. See Horror and Spooky Content and Changes to Vanilla.
• Immunity to the Tide Pocket Watch. The pocket watch from Tide freezes mobs, but the Lich, Dead King, Fire Boss (Echo of Tyros), Headless Horseman, Lord Pumpkinhead and every mob in the boss tag are immune to it.
• Halloween helmets. The Halloween event helmets would have overwritten the Pharaoh's head and broken the Better Desert Temple boss. The patch makes the event skip mobs that already wear a helmet.
• Naughtiness is switched off. Born in Chaos would otherwise summon Krampus from a hidden naughtiness score. The gamerule is turned off on every datapack load, so the Krampus spawns only from its natural rules.
• Spawn balance. Born in Chaos mobs had made up most End spawns. Their spawn modifiers are now limited to the overworld, so they no longer crowd out End bosses.

See Progression Guide for the order in which the bosses are normally met and what each one unlocks.

Rewards

Each boss drops a material, weapon or key that the pack's progression depends on. Some examples:

• the Lich drops the five bone staffs, which summon Ghoulings when used;
• the Headless Horseman is the source of the Spectral Horse mount;
• the Krampus drops the Krampus Horn;
• The Butcher drops the Butcher Cleaver, one of the Sons of Sins Tools and Armor;
• the Wistiver drops Wistiver's Jaws, which can only be obtained from it;
• the Kelvin drops a guaranteed Soul Steel and an Ether Engine;
• the Echo of Tyros drops a large stack of materials for the Iron's Spells 'n Spellbooks mod.

Boss drops and chest loot are listed on each boss page. The table below gives the full stat list for every boss in the pack.

Full list