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A page for the various monsters roaming Hyrule in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. For tropes pertaining to these foes in the series as a whole, see here.

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Aggressive Animals

    General tropes 
Predatory animals are common in Hyrule's wilds. They will attack Link on sight, but will flee from true monsters and won't stick around if other animals are killed. There are also some non-predatory animals that may opt to charge at Link, like mountain goats, wild oxen, moose and wooly rhinoceroses.
  • Interface Screw: You can't "lock on" to them, since they're technically not monsters; the exception is the humble swarm of Courser Bees, which (coming from Courser Honey) "respawns" at the Blood Moon like actual monsters, and would be very difficult to handle without locking. The lack of targeting incidentally makes Wolves (and the odd Bear) quite dangerous, since it makes hitting and blocking much tougher.
  • Non-Malicious Monster: Unlike the true monsters, these creatures are simply hungry or territorial animals.
  • Organ Drops: As with other animals, wolves and bears will drop cuts of meat when killed.

    Courser Bees 

Courser Bees

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/courser_bee_botw.png

Energetic insects that build small hives hanging from trees, where they store the honey they produce. Gathering their honeycombs will provide a rich, nutritious food source for Link, but doing so risks rousing the extremely territorial insects.


  • Bee Afraid: These bees are highly territorial creatures that will go after anything that threatens their nests and attack until either it or they are dead.
  • Bee-Bee Gun: In Tears of the Kingdom, Fusing a beehive to a weapon will allow it to summon a swarm of bees that will sting nearby enemies when swung. While it can only have one swarm out at a time, said weapon can continuously summon more swarms until its durability is depleted. Unfortunately, if there are no enemies around, the swarm will instead turn against you as usual.
  • Fragile Flyer: They're some of the few flying threats in the game, and the only flying animals that will attack Link. They will also be defeated by two strikes from even a weak weapon or bow, and will rarely even close in with Link unless they catch him unawares.
  • Scary Stinging Swarm: If Link approaches their hive or knocks it down, the swarm will fly off and relentlessly pursue the nearest living thing in an attempt to sting it to death.
  • Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: Shooting down a beehive causes its bees to attack the closest living thing. This is usually Link, but with careful sniping it's fairly easy to knock a hive down from a distance and send the bees swarming after an enemy instead. They won't typically do enough damage to kill a foe, but will still send monsters fleeing in panic (which is useful for both scaring sentries away from their posts and scattering groups of enemies) and can soften a foe by taking off a chunk of their health.
  • Stock Beehive: Their beehives, round fans of hexagonal cells hanging from a stem, look like wasp nests far more than anything bees make — wild beehives consist of parallel sheets of honeycomb hanging down from a support structure.
  • Synchronized Swarming: When a swarm of bees is turned hostile, it forms itself into an X shape and flies towards Link. It will temporarily scatter if struck, but will quickly return to formation if it wasn't enough to defeat it.

    Wolves 

Wolves

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/maraudo_wolf.png
A maraudo wolf.

Wolves are common predators in the wilds of Hyrule, where they wander the wilderness in packs of three or four. When one spots Link, it will howl to alert their packmates, after which they will try to surround him and wear him down with darting attacks. They lack the dogged viciousness of Ganon's monsters, however, and if Link proves too tough to handle they will beat a hasty retreat.

The most common variant, the maraudo wolf, can be found throughout the fields and forests of Akkala, the Great Hyrule Forest and the Tabantha Frontier. A stronger variant, the pale-furred cold-footed wolf, is common in Hebra, the snowy peaks of the Gerudo Highlands and Mount Lanayru. A final variant, the brown-furred wasteland coyote, inhabits the lower elevations of the Gerudo Highlands and portions of the desert itself.


  • Artistic License – Biology: Wasteland coyotes have very little in common with the actual animals. Real-life coyotes are much smaller than wolves and far less social (they're usually solitary, and at most form mated pairs) and, while they are found in rocky or scrubland deserts, they don't inhabit sand seas of the kind that makes up the Gerudo Desert.
  • Attack! Attack... Retreat! Retreat!: Despite their initial aggressiveness, they will cut their losses and run for the hills do should Link kill one of their packmates.
  • Cruel Coyotes: Wasteland Coyotes are aggressive canines native to Hyrule's arid regions that are known to prey on humans and will attack Link on sight.
  • Hit-and-Run Tactics: Once they spot Link, wolves attack by spreading out around him and trying to wear him down with attacks from multiple directions, quickly darting in and out to bite at him before retreating back to beyond melee range.
  • Piñata Enemy: They always drop Raw Prime or Gourmet Meat when killed, which can be cooked into Meat Skewers that can be sold for a lot of money.
  • Savage Wolves: These wolves are aggressive predators who prowl the wilderness in groups, and will attack Link on sight — their entry in the Compendium even claiming that humans are their main prey — howling to alert their pack and then trying to flank and surround him, but quickly retreat if any are killed.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: They very strongly resembles the Wolfos, an older enemy type that they largely replace in Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom. Besides both being hostile lupine creatures, the Breath and Tears wolves also mirror the Wolfos in coming in a standard grey-furred variant that inhabits forested areas and a stronger white-furred one found in snowy regions.
  • Underground Monkey: In addition to basic grey wolves, there are white-furred wolves found in snowy areas and brown-furred coyotes found in deserts and badlands.

    Bears 

Bears

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/honeyvore_bear_botw.png
A honeyvore bear.

Bears are the most dangerous and powerful of the aggressive animals inhabiting Hyrule, and can pose a greater threat than most low-level monsters. Honeyvore bears, the most common variant, can be encountered in highlands and forests throughout central and northern Hyrule. A stronger variant, the grizzlemaw bears, inhabit the cold wildernesses of the Hebra Mountains and Gerudo Highlands.


  • Bears Are Bad News: Bears are the strongest animals that aren't explicitly one of Calamity Ganon's monsters. Alongside wolves, they're also some of the few animals that will actively try to kill you if they spot you (as opposed to at most charging you down if you're in front of them and then running for it, as most large animals do). They hit hard and take a lot more damage to kill than regular wildlife usually does, and the Hyrule Compendium states that grizzlemaw bears are considered to be the most dangerous wild animals in Hyrule.
  • Horse of a Different Color: If Link manages to get close enough to one, he can mount it, soothe it and ride it like a horse, although they cannot be stabled. On Meadela's Mantle, Bokoblins can be encountered also riding on bears.
  • Metal Slime: Bears are very rarely encountered in the game; they are fixed spawns in very remote, sparse areas and extremely rare random spawns in most other forested areas. Aside from that, they can take a lot of punishment unless they are shot in the head with an arrow and can deal heavy damage if they maul Link. Successfully killing a bear nets Link a generous amount of Prime and Gourmet Meat with an occasional Courser Bee Honey or Hearty Salmon thrown in.
  • Stock Animal Diet:
    • As the name "honeyvore" implies, these guys are fond of honey, something their Compendium entry points out. One location in the Crenel Hills includes a pair of honeyvore bears hanging around an alcove holding a beehive.
    • Grizzlemaw bears don't have this association, but can drop hearty salmons when killed.

Monsters and Mooks

    General tropes 
Ganon's minions, who have overrun most of Hyrule and now often lurk outside its surviving settlements.
  • Always Chaotic Evil: Every monster is always hostile on-sight to Link and every NPC race, even though they are peaceful and sometimes even friendly to one another, and several, particularly the blins and Lizalfos, show evidence of intelligence and culture (it's mentioned that the Lizalfos once had a powerful nation that rivaled the Zoras). This is justified in that monsters are literally Made of Evil.
  • Art Evolution: Zigzagged. Tears of the Kingdom changes their appearances such as Bokoblins having bigger horns and Lynels having antlers, while the other monsters such as Chuchus and Octoroks stay the same as they've been in Breath of the Wild.
  • Beat Still, My Heart: Monster guts continue to beat and pulse after their owners' deaths.
  • Beware the Skull Base: The basic monster encampments used by all humanoid enemy types consist of giant, hollow stone skulls.
  • Blow That Horn: Monster encampments tend to have at least one monster acting as a lookout (usually a Bokoblin or Lizalfos). If you wander into their field of vision and alert the lookout, they'll blow a horn and alert the whole encampment to your position.
  • Bottomless Magazines:
    • Unlike Link, bow-wielding enemies have unlimited arrows. This can be exploited by the player, because their arrows can become embedded in surfaces like wood, soil and sand, allowing Link to pick them up when they miss and have access to a steady (but slow) supply of free arrows.
    • In Tears of the Kingdom certain Bokoblins will be carrying baskets on their backs, usually filled with elemental items to Fuse to their arrows, that are as bottomless as their arrows when used. Players have figured out how to disarm them to force them to throw these items instead, draw fire with an overturned homing cart, and steal these items out of their hands before they throw them, while wearing the Bokoblin or Majora's Mask to avoid detection.
  • Color-Coded Elements: Very consistently, fiery variants of enemy species are recolored to be red with occasional orange highlights, icy ones are white and light blue, and electric ones are bright yellow.
  • Elemental Variation: The Fire, Ice, Lightning elemental triad is used extensively to expand enemy variety. As a result, multiple enemy families exist consisting of a basic variant plus three types capable of either breathing out or shooting their associated element or permanently shrouded in it, ranging all the way from the extremely common and weak Keese and Chuchus to the mighty draconic Gleeoks in the sequel.
  • Enemy Chatter: Idle Bokoblins, Moblin and Lizalfos found in enemy camps can be seen chattering away at each other as long as they aren't aware of Link's presence. Vocally it's all indecipherable squeals, growls and chirping noises, respectively, but their tones and body language convey the impression of a pleasant conversation between pals — Bokoblins in particular tend to accentuate their stories with expansive hand and arm gestures.
  • Eternal Villain: Monsters are impossible to put down forever because they always come back from the dead during a Blood Moon, revealed in Tears of the Kingdom to be brought into being by Ganondorf after he became the Demon King by murdering Queen Sonia and stealing her Secret Stone. However, it is noted that during Hyrule's golden age in ancient times, their technology was so advanced that no monster could threaten them. This does prove troublesome in Age of Calamity, when the Blood Moon arises right at the tail end of a decisive battle.
  • Evil Is Bigger: As a rule, the monsters are quite big. Bokoblins, the smallest humanoid monsters, are about a head taller than Link when standing upright. In their default hunched posture, where they're bent nearly double, Lizalfos are tall enough that Link can stand under them with the top of his head about touching their chins. Moblins are around three times Link's height, and Lynels nearly the size of elephants. Even the batlike Keese, the smallest monsters, have bodies bigger than Link's head.
  • Evil Is One Big, Happy Family:
    • For all their hostility to you and NPCs, the monsters get along quite well with one another. Mixed Bokoblin/Moblin groups and camps are very common and often include Lizalfos as well, and it's fairly common for Chuchus to hang around them as well and for Keese to roost on the ceilings of the larger monster's strongholds. In Tears of the Kingdom, Aerocudas and Evermeans will also hang around enemy camps, while you'll often run into big Boss Bokoblins just marching and patrolling a little area while leading a few Bokoblins around with it.
    • Subverted with the Yiga Clan during the events of Tears of the Kingdom. While the two should obviously be working together to fight Link and other enemies of villain's prosperity, the two factions actually clash over the Zonai resources and the Yiga Clan aren't immune to the Gloom effects. It's not as surprising since Ganondorf predates the Yiga Clan's formation, and he always prefers minions he created from his evil magic than fanatical Hylians serving under their own free will.
  • Evil vs. Evil: While Constructs aren't exactly evil and more "defending their territory from invaders", you'll occasionally run into a group of Constructs going head to head with a nearby group of monsters, or find two nearby camps that can be goaded into fighting each other. You can then just mop up the survivors at the end and loot whatever they dropped.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: Chuchus, Keese, Lizalfos, and Wizzrobes all feature trios of elemental variants that each wield the element in their own way. Tears of the Kingdom expands this to the Like Likes as well.
  • Friendly Fireproof: Downplayed. Monsters are immune to direct attacks from each other, preventing them from being harmed when another monster swings a club, waves a sword or lands on it with a spear thrust, but can still be harmed by each other's ranged projectiles and AOE attacks. The effect of Muddle Buds in Tears of the Kingdom removes all of this immunity, as they confuse monsters and incite them to directly target and attack their fellows, which cam lead to lethal inter-monster melee fights.
  • Heavily Armored Mook: Tears of the Kingdom introduces armored monsters whose armor has to be destroyed before they can take damage.
  • Law of Chromatic Superiority: Most of the basic enemy types comes in ranks denoted by color, starting with basic enemies (usually red, green for the Lizalfos) and moving through increasingly strong and powerful blue, black, silver, and gold variants.
  • Low-Tech Spears: While just about every group in Hyrule capable of wielding weapons has at least one type of native polearm, the -blin enemies have the simplest cultures and the most crude examples by extension:
    • The Bokoblins are depicted as amongst the most primitive of Hyrule's humanoid non-boss monsters, living in simple camps at a roughly Stone Age level of technology, and wear nothing but skull necklaces, caveman-print sashes, and loincloths. Their primary native melee weapons apart from simple Boko Clubs are Boko Spears which are little more than sharpened sticks carved from tree branches at their base level, with the stronger variants reinforced with bone.
    • Moblins are savage brutes generally depicted as the least developed of Ganon's humanoid minions, with a similar caveman aesthetic of loincloths and strips of cloth to wear. Unlike even the Stone Age-level Bokoblins, Moblins don't make camps and lack the ability to cook as their smaller brethren do. Save for when they live in mixed groups of monsters, Moblins live as essentially dangerous wild animals that are capable of using weapons. One of the two native weapons archetypes of the Moblins apart from heavy wooden clubs are long Moblin Spears crudely whittled out of tree limbs and adorned with bones and horns to make them stronger. While they do some decent damage, their sloppy and unsophisticated construction means that they're fairly fragile. In battle, spear-carrying Moblins favor headlong point-first charges and crude but powerful swinging attacks.
    • Horriblins are Maniac Monkeys introduced in Tears of the Kingdom that wield spears fused with second spears allowing them to attack from a distance as they cling to the ceilings of their caves. They're portrayed as even more primitive than their other -blin relatives returning from Breath of the Wild, wearing ragged shorts and a few leather straps and living in "camps" that are little more than hoards of scavenged loot.
  • Made of Evil:
    • Monsters appear to be primarily made out of Malice/Gloom, dissipating back into their essence when slain, and congealing back again in shrouds of Malice/Gloom in the light of the Blood Moon. Ganondorf is able to instantly create a huge army of monsters at will from a massive fountain of Gloom.
  • Monster in the Ice: Icy mountain areas contain large chunks of ice scattered about the landscape, often blocking off passages and roads unless Link melts them with fire arrows or fire-infused weapons. However, many of them also contain monsters frozen within them, visible as dim outlines from the outside, and if the block holding them is melted through they will break free and attack.
  • Organ Drops: Slain monsters will vanish in a puff of Malice, leaving behind only an assortment of body parts. These mostly consist of a variety of guts, alongside assorted claws, fangs, horns, tails, eyeballs, fins and hooves, depending on the specific creature. They're mostly useful for brewing elixirs, fusing onto weapons and arrows, and selling to Kilton. Notable cases include the skeletal stal- enemies, who only drop horns and fangs and lack the fleshy drops of their living counterparts; the stony Pebblits, who drop bits of mineral; Chuchus, which drop lumps of jelly; Guardians, who drop assortments of screws, springs, gears, wheel shafts and power cores; and the tree-like Evermeans, which drop a log and an assortment of sticks, leaves, and tree-dwelling animals like beetles and lizards.
  • Perpetual-Motion Monster: In Tears of the Kingdom, the Yiga Clan notes at one of their Depths bases that the Gloom-wreathed monsters of the Depths do not eat or sleep, which justifies how Surface monster camps often have food and cooking pots lying around while the the monster mines of the Depths have none of these.
  • Purple Is Powerful: Silver-ranked monsters often have purple stripes as a result of Malice/Gloom, and are the most powerful of their species in the base game.
  • Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: Enemies are immune to friendly fire from each other's melee attacks, but not from ranged attacks. Thus, it's possible to position yourself so as to make the Mooks you're fighting absorb the arrow fire of the archers sniping at you, and when an enemy tries to throw a rock or barrel at you it's quite possible for them to miss and hit and injure or kill another foe. Muddle Buds in Tears of the Kingdom expand on and encourage this idea, as their effect is to confuse enemies and make them directly attack (and possibly kill) other monsters around them. Per Gameplay and Story Integration, Zonai Constructs will attack non-construct enemies on sight, allowing for camps of constructs to battle camps of other enemies.
  • Sleepy Enemy: During the nighttime, Bokoblins and Moblins lie down and go to sleep, remaining like that until dawn unless woken by noises, which allows Link to sneak around their camps and take them out in their sleep or steal their weapons. If woken, they'll remain awake and hostile as long as Link is in their field of sight; if he leaves their field of vision for long enough before dawn breaks, they'll give up looking after a while and return to sleep. However, other than the Hinoxes, no monster in the Depths will ever fall asleep.
  • Super Drowning Skills: Most monsters will flail around and die if they enter or are knocked into anything but the shallowest water, making this a useful tactic where there's a suitable environment. Exceptions are Lizalfos, who are all cheerful swimmers, the aquatic Water Octoroks, and Wizzrobes (which probably can't swim but also can't be submerged).
  • Unbreakable Weapons: Enemies do not consume the durability of weapons when they use them, and can swing them indefinitely without damaging them in any way. The only way to break their weapons is for them to be set on fire, which steadily eat away at their hardness in the same way as it does when Link's holding a burning weapon.
  • Underground Monkey: Multiple kinds of enemies come in a few to several variants themed around specific environments.
  • We Have Become Complacent: After Ganon's victory 100 years ago in Breath of the Wild's backstory, his various minions such as Bokoblins and Moblins just mostly chill out at their lairs, as well as Hyrule Castle, until Link comes barging in, forcing them to fight his hated enemy. The only ones to avert this are the Lynels, who will waste no time in attacking Link if he enters their sight.

Introduced in Breath of the Wild

    Chuchus 

Chuchus

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/chuchus_botw.png
Clockwise from top-left: Regular, Fire, Electric, and Ice

The most basic of all monsters. These gelatinous goons can be seen all over Hyrule, in various sizes and colors, though one thing is consistent among them: they're all rather weak.


  • Adaptive Ability: Regular Chuchu Jelly can be given any other elemental attribute if exposed to relevant elemental stimuli, most easily using an elemental weapon to kill them.
  • Ambushing Enemy: They often hide underground or in trees with nothing to mark their presence, and pop out onto the surface or drop down to the ground when Link passes close.
  • Artificial Stupidity:
    • They attack Link by jumping directly at him. This does not take into account what Link is standing in front of or above, however, making it very easy to goad them into jumping to their deaths off of cliffs, into water (they can't swim and die the moment they go into water deeper than they're tall), or into lava. In fact, if Link simply stands in deep water, they will just crawl over to him and drown themselves once they get too far out.
    • Like all other enemies, they will head over to investigate when they hear a sound. Fire Chuchus are no different, and can be found in enemy camps with Bomb Barrels. Thus, if Link shoots an arrow at one such barrel, all enemies will duly head over to it... including the Chuchus, which will detonate it the moment they touch it, wiping out the whole band in a single stroke.
  • Blob Monster: They're living slime blobs that serve as the game's most basic Mooks.
  • Defeat Equals Explosion: While all Chuchus burst apart after defeat, the elemental ones create an area-of-effect blast of their element upon dying, which deal damage and inflict status effects. Players should take them out from a distance from the explosion lest they want to be forced to leave an opening for other enemies to take advantage of. This can be weaponized if done right.
  • Elemental Powers: Elemental Chuchus appear in specific regions of Hyrule, and their simple tackle attacks become more dangerous thanks to the status effects their respective elements inflict on Link. Fire Chuchus will inflict burns that deal Damage Over Time, Ice Chuchus will turn Link into a Human Popsicle, and Electric Chuchus force him to drop his weapons. Tears of the Kingdom, which introduces water into the elemental effects, assigns the water element to the bursting of normal Chuchus and their jelly item drops.
  • Eyes Are Unbreakable: If their HP is brought down to 0, their bodies burst like water balloons, but their eyeballs remain intact.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: The elemental Chuchus correspond to Fire (hot regions), Ice (cold regions), and Lightning (Gerudo Desert and other regions associated with Lightning). Each one can create a blast of their element (setting Link on fire, freezing him, or shocking him) on a jump or on death, and their jelly drop can be used as a grenade that creates their elemental effect.
  • Giant Mook: The strength of a Chuchu is proportional to their size. Larger ones have more HP and strength, though it usually just makes them into bigger targets.
  • Go for the Eye: Since they don't have heads, only their eyeballs can be shot with arrows for extra damage. However, since most of them die in one hit anyway, and the eyes themselves are small, moving targets that are hard to hit, this is an Awesome, but Impractical way to defeat them.
  • The Goomba: The majority of Chuchus have very low HP and minimal attack power, and are as slow as rocks. They're essentially punching bags for the player to use in order to get used to the game's combat system.
  • Logical Weakness: Fire and Ice Chuchus instantly die when exposed to the opposite element.
  • Super Drowning Skills: If any of them fall in water that's deep enough that they can't touch the bottom, they burst.
  • Too Dumb to Fool: Link can trick some monster types with disguises or Majora's Mask, but Chuchus cannot be distracted from attacking Link on sight.
  • Underground Monkey: Chuchus of various elements inhabit specific parts of Hyrule. The regular blue Chuchus are the most common and can show up almost anywhere, Ice Chuchus tend to appear in frigid climates like in the Hebra Mountains, Fire Chuchus pop up near the volcanic Death Mountain, and Electric Chuchus usually stay within the Gerudo Desert.

    Keese 

Keese

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/botw_keese.png
Top to bottom: regular, fire, electric, and ice keese.

Recurring bat-like enemies that fly during the night. They are easily killable but annoying to deal with, and there are elemental variants such as fiery, icy, and electric ones.


  • Attack! Attack... Retreat! Retreat!: When you encounter huge swarms of Keese, this is how they operate. Slaying even one will cause the whole swarm to book it.
  • Bat Out of Hell: Naturally. And as if to highlight their monstrous nature, they have one bulging eye and an insect-like mouth.
  • Bat Scare: In Tears of the Kingdom, Keese swarms will sometimes harmlessly flee out of cave mouths when you approach them. This can be extremely to your benefit if you have the reaction time to hit them with a Bomb Flower, since it will give you plenty of their very valuable eyes and wings for fusing and upgrading armor.
  • Commonplace Rare: Despite being everywhere in Breath of the Wild, they're notably harder to come by in Tears of the Kingdom due to their drops being two of the most useful arrow fusions in the gamenote . On top of that, their eyes have become more likely to drop than even one of their wings.
  • Cyclops: Unlike previous Zelda games, these Keese have a single eye instead of a pair. Only their Dark World counterparts in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, the Chasupas, share this trait.
  • Elemental Powers: Elemental Keese appear in specific regions of Hyrule and like the Chuchus, they are much more dangerous. Ice Keese can freeze Link's movement, Fire Keese can inflict lasting burns, and the Electric Keese can deal nasty paralysis. And they come in swarms, so watch your position.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: The elemental Keese are surrounded by Fire, Ice, or Lightning depending on where they're found. They carry an elemental effect on their attacks (setting Link on fire, freezing him, or shocking him).
  • Fragile Flyer: Batlike creatures that, having precisely one hit point apiece, rely on their ability to stay above the range of Link's attacks and ignore terrain obstacles.
  • Fragile Speedster: They're fairly nimble for enemies not named Lizalfos, but they have exactly one health apiece.
  • The Goomba: Like the Chuchus, they can be easily killed with a single swing of the sword or any other methods.
  • Kill It with Water: If a Fire Keese gets caught in the rain, its flames will go out and it'll quickly die.
  • Oculothorax: In contrast to their more batlike appearances in earlier titles, these Keese are effectively giant orange eyeballs with ears, fangs and wings.
  • One-Eyed Bats: Unlike previous games, where they have two eyes like regular bats, Keese here are depicted as a species of one-eyed bats with singular, glowing, orange eyes. When killed, they drop Keese Eyes, which can be used to make elixirs that strengthen Link, or in Tears of the Kingdom also used to make homing arrows via Fuse.
  • One-Hit-Point Wonder: Keese have only one hit point, meaning that even a Korok Leaf or shield parry will take them out with one swing.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning: If the Keese's eye turns red, that means it's about lunge with lighting speed.
  • Super Drowning Skills: If you use the Korok Leaf to blow them, they will fall to the ground and get back up. But if they fall in water, they drown.
  • The Swarm: They are rarely seen alone. If there is one Keese in the area, the rest are not far behind.
  • Turn Red: When they are about to charge at Link, their eye turns red.
  • Underground Monkey: The elemental variants tend to be found in thematically appropriate areas — Fire Keese are found around Death Mountain, Ice Keese in snowy mountains and Electric Keese around the Gerudo Desert.
  • Wreathed in Flames: Fire Keese are permanently shrouded in a halo of flames. The ones found outside of the barren rocks of Death Mountain itself have a tendency to leave wide trails of burning grass and foliage behind themselves whenever they fly down to attack.
  • Zerg Rush: When they are in massive swarms, they use this tactic to cover their weak strength. Thankfully, killing just one of them will scare the rest off.

    Octoroks 

Octoroks

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/octoroks.png
Left to right: Forest, Rock, Snow; Water, Treasure, Skynote 

These recurring octopus-like monsters show up once again to impede Link's progress. They attack by shooting rocks at Link from afar, and tend to stay hidden from sight unless they’re attacking. Unlike most enemies, their differently-colored variants are based on where they are found rather than their difficulty.


  • Ambushing Enemy: They all spend their time hidden underground or underwater, pretending to be harmless grass, shrubs, or rocks. When Link is within shooting range, they pop out to launch a projectile and immediately duck back under cover, and they refuse to show themselves when he's near their spot. While they're weak enough to go down to a single blow from most weapons, finding them in the first place can be a real problem.
  • Aquatic Mook: Water Octoroks, which hide in bodies of water and float up into the air to shoot rocks at you.
  • Artificial Brilliance:
    • Instead of shooting where Link is, they'll shoot where he's going to be.
    • Rock Octoroks are very good at avoiding arrows, and will refuse to pop up should Link have an arrow ready.
    • In Tears of the Kingdom, land-based Octoroks won't rise to attack Link if he's aiming a bow and arrow in their direction.
  • Balloonacy:
    • Octoroks may drop Octo Balloons when killed, which can be attached to movable objects to make them float up into the air for a short period of time.
    • In Master Mode, enemies use Sky Octoroks to make floating fortresses made of wooden planks. These types of Octoroks are harmless, however.
  • Chest Monster: Certain Octoroks mimic buried chests that Link can find around the overworld, the difference being that Link can’t grab their chests using Magnesis. The Compendium notes that this is a sign that the chests are actually part of their bodies.
  • Fast Tunnelling: If you get out of their range or if their shrubbery disguises are destroyed and you don't kill them, Forest Octoroks will chase you down by burrowing through the ground faster than Link can run, without leaving any visible trail or furrow. Snow Octoroks do this before every shot.
  • Flying Seafood Special: Water Octoroks can balloon up to float in midair, usually when it rains. Master Mode introduces a monster-domesticated form known as the Sky Octorok, which they use to levitate wooden planks.
  • Feed It a Bomb: The easiest way to take out a Rock Octorok is to wait for it to start inhaling everything, throw a round Remote Bomb at it, and detonate the bomb once it's consumed.
  • Glass Cannon: They are the best shots in all of Hyrule short of the Lynels, but have so little health that all but the very weakest weapons will kill them in one shot.
  • Helpful Mook:
    • Rock Octoroks on Death Mountain inhale before spitting out their rocks. If Link lets them inhale rusty equipment, they will crunch the rust off and spit out a pristine weapon of the same type.
    • In Tears of the Kingdom, instead of clearing corrosion, Rock Octoroks reset the durability of the item they're fed, making them useful in preserving rare weapons, bows and shields. They may also randomly provide bonus features like Long Throw or Durability Up. To balance this, each Octorok can only restore a single item until the next Blood Moon.
  • Harmless Enemy: Sky Octoroks cannot harm Link in any way, and only serve to support the floating platforms.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard:
  • Immune to Fire: The Rock Octoroks of Death Mountain are immune to fire and environmental heat.
  • Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: The first two shots Forest and Water Octoroks fire will almost always miss, serving as a warning to their presence. Afterwards, unless you're actively trying to avoid them, they will be always on target.
  • Lead the Target: When firing, they'll take into account where Link is, how fast he's moving, and his trajectory. If they can get a bead on Link and he's not moving evasively, they will be on target.
  • Living Gasbag: Sky Octoroks float thanks to lighter-than-air gases filling their mantles. Water Octoroks can likewise float through the air when changes in barometric pressure cause gases in their bodies to inflate, swelling them up like balloons and lifting them out of the water. All Octoroks will drop their internal flotation bladders when slain, which if attached to objects will automatically inflated and lift their burdens into the air.
  • Metal Slime: Treasure Octoroks are the only monsters that drop Rupees, and unlike their Octorok kin, they are non-aggressive and instead will run away in rapid circles before burrowing underground and disappearing once they see you. Your limited time to hit them and the fact that you don't get another chance to fight them until the next Blood Moon makes them some of the trickiest enemies to kill. However, hitting their chest with a bomb or arrows and hitting the Octorok while it pops up to investigate will work.
  • Money Spider: The Treasure Octoroks mentioned above are one of the few enemies in this game that drop Rupees. Justified in that they have chests on their head where the Rupees are being kept.
  • One-Hit-Point Wonder: Octoroks are a downplayed example. They technically have eight hit points, but that's still low enough that a single blow of all but the weakest Joke Items will do them in, and they mostly rely on being safely hidden under the ground except when firing projectiles.
  • Random Loot Exchanger: Rock Octoroks inhale a large volume of air before spitting a projectile, and will swallow whatever loose objects are in their range when doing so. Normally, these are simply spat out in lieu of the default magma bomb; however, if the swallowed item is a rusty weapon — one of the weakest, least durable weapon types in the game — the Octorok will crunch off the rust and spit it back out as a clean version of itself. The resulting item can be of either the low-tier but still better Traveler's archetype (50% chance), Soldier's archetype (35%), Knight's archetype (10%), or the very high-quality Royal archetype (5%).
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Like in the previous 3D Zelda, the land-based Octorok types fight similarly to Deku Scrubs, while the Water Octoroks fight similarly to the Octoroks in Ocarina of Time and The Wind Waker.
  • Tentacled Terror: They're based on octopuses and they're evil, if not particularly strong.

    Wizzrobes 

Wizzrobes

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/elite_wizzrobes.jpg

Robed imp-like enemies wielding elemental rods that can turn invisible and attack Link with their elemental magic.


  • Color-Coded Wizardry: The red ones wield fire rods and can raise the temperature, the blue ones wield ice and can freeze the area, and the yellow ones wield electricity and can cause thunderstorms.
  • Elite Mooks: There are two tiers of Wizzrobes. Fire Wizzrobes, Ice Wizzrobes, and Thunder Wizzrobes form tier one and are the basic variants. Meteo Wizzrobes, Blizzrobes, and Thunderstorm Wizzrobes form tier two and are the elites of their kind, having more health and wielding stronger magic, being distinguished by the colorful patterns on their robes.
  • Enemy Summoner: If they stay alive long enough to change the weather, their spells afterward can conjure up Keese and Chuchus that match their elements.
  • Faux Affably Evil: When they spot Link, they'll wave to him in a mockingly-friendly way, and mess around with him as if playing a game when they're not attacking.
  • Field Power Effect: If left alive for too long, they will summon a harmful area effect that will last until they are felled. Fire Wizzrobes increase the temperature of the area to harmful levels, Ice Wizzrobes do the same but with cold temperatures, and Thunder Wizzrobes summon thunderstorms that strike metal weapons as usual.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: The types of Wizzrobes wield magic rods that let them use projectiles corresponding to the Fire, Ice, and Lightning elements. Higher-tier ones can alter the temperature to be hot, cold, or a storm.
  • Gag Nose: It's hard to see due to their hoods and dark skin, but they have round bulbous noses.
  • Giggling Villain: They giggle in amusement when attacking Link.
  • Improvised Weapon: In Tears of the Kingdom, rather than elemental rods, tier one Wizzrobes wield swords with gemstones fused to them, cluing players in that they can do the same.
  • Invisibility: Instead of teleporting like in other games, Wizzrobes make themselves invisible while moving, only dropping their cloak to attack.
  • I Shall Taunt You: If Link fails to hit them, Wizzrobes will start dancing and shout a distinct sing-song taunt that is unmistakable as "you can't hit me" in their strange language. Can become a Hoist by His Own Petard, since they remain in a single spot when doing so, making it easier to target them. But if you fail to hit them still, they summon the aforementioned Field Power Effect.
  • Lean and Mean: They're visibly skinny under their robes, and rather annoying enemies to boot.
  • Level Scaling: Wizzrobes don't actually scale with your level, so they're likely to be the first enemy Link runs into who seems oddly high in HP; unless Link veers well off the beaten path and bumps into an elemental Lizalfos, anyway. On another note, regular Wizzrobes have the lowest non-zero contribution to World Level, at exactly 1 point; they also have the lowest HP of anyone on the list, but higher HP than all monsters off the list.
  • Logical Weakness: Being elemental enemies, Fire and Ice Wizzrobes (and even their higher-tier counterparts) can be killed in a single hit by any ice or fire attack respectively.
  • Magic Wand: They wield an elemental rod of their chosen element, which Link can take for himself. In Tears of the Kingdom, most instead use swords with gemstones fused to them, but the stronger variants wield Magic Rods that enhance the spells from the attached gem.
  • No-Neck Chump: They have no neck, with their head positioned right on top of their collarbone. This is noticable in-game but explicitly called out in Creating a Champion.
  • No Ontological Inertia: Once they're killed, any field effects they caused will end.
  • Not Quite Flight: Wizzrobes prance around in the air, leaving a ripple effect wherever they hop, even when invisible. They don't go any higher or lower unless you stun them and bring them to the ground.
  • One-Hit Kill: Ice and Fire Wizzrobes will be instantly slain if struck with any weapon of the opposite element, which will cause them to vanish in a puff of steam.
  • Piñata Enemy: In Tears of the Kingdom, once the player discovers Pelison's disassembly service, Wizzrobes of all types become this. Because Link can take their elemental rods to Pelison to have the attached gem removed, the profit of selling said gem greatly outweighs the 20-rupee fee for Pelison's service.
  • Power Crystal: Tears of the Kingdom plays on the flavor text and crafting system of Breath of the Wild by demonstrating the elemental properties of certain gemstones. Fire Wizzrobes have wands tipped in rubies, Electric Wizzrobes tipped in topaz, and Ice Wizzrobes use sapphires. This can be a decent source of valuable gems for players if they visit Pelison in Tarrey Town.
  • Punny Name: The stronger variant of Ice Wizzrobes are known as Blizzrobes.
  • Pyromaniac: Fire Wizzrobes are often surrounded by charred remains of trees and wooden buildings, with the implication that they simply love to ignite everything they can.
  • Robe and Wizard Hat: They wear simple robes and a hood that ends in a tall point above the top of their heads.
  • Slasher Smile: They have huge grins of pointy teeth, and never mean anything but trouble for the player.
  • Weather Manipulation: Thunder Wizzrobes can summon thunderstorms as a Field Power Effect.

    Bokoblins 

Bokoblins

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_breath_of_the_wild_artwork_red_bokoblin_official_artwork.png

A race of monsters that once served the Demon King, they now form small hunter-scavenger societies. However, they remain as hostile to Hylians as ever.


  • Affably Evil: More than any other enemy type in the game, Bokoblins are typically laidback and friendly towards both each other and other monsters, so long as there are no humans around.
  • Ambushing Enemy: Some Bokoblins stay crouched down in areas of tall grass, usually on the side of roads, staying still and hidden until they can spring out and ambush passing travelers such as Link.
  • Artificial Brilliance: Their AI is noticeably more advanced than normal for videogame mooks. If they have a wooden weapon, they'll set it on fire to improve its effectiveness; if they're disarmed, they'll try to retrieve their weapons as quickly as possible, or otherwise improvise with whatever they can find, such as sticks and small rocks; if bombs are thrown in their path, they'll avoid the blast's reach, and if armed with ranged weapons, they'll snipe Link from a safe distance; they even hunt animals sometimes to gather food.
  • Bad with the Bone: The more advanced Bokoblin gear is strengthened by using bones (tier 2) or fossils (tier 3) to bolster the crude woodwork that sits at the basis. For example, Boko Clubs that have large and spiky bones lashed to them in order to give them more striking power.
  • Beware the Skull Base: The tiered camps Bokoblins use tend to be decorated with skull-like ornamentation, either hung on their sides or as horned domes raised above the topmost tier to serve as a roof of sorts.
  • Bling of War: Black and Golden Bokoblins have golden skull necklaces as opposed to the grayish ones worn by other types of Bokoblin.
  • Brains and Brawn: Bokoblins have a species-wide relationship of this sort with Moblins. Neither is portrayed as especially bright, but the smaller and weaker Bokoblins are the only ones of the two to make and use ranged weaponry and tame horses. Additionally, only purely Bokoblin and Bokoblin-Moblin groups inhabit structured camps and forts, implying that only Bokoblins know how to build and maintain even crude buildings and structures.
  • Crafted from Animals: Bokoblin weapons are simple wooden sticks at their base levels but are reinforced with bones and then fossils at higher tiers, mostly in the form of nonspecific spikes of sharpened bone used to make clubs, spears, shields and bows harder-hitting, more durable or just more menacing.
  • Dem Bones: Skeletal Bokoblins, called Stalkoblins, can be fought at night, and keep fighting even if dismembered and decapitated. They can be found riding Stalhorses which Link can take for himself like a normal wild horse. (The stablemasters refuse to board Stalhorses out of fear they will eat the living horses.)
  • Emergency Weapon: If they don't have weapons, they'll scrounge up rocks, use their fists, or in the case of Tears of the Kingdom, ram Link with their Bokoblin Horns. The skeletal variation takes off its arm to fight.
  • Fantastic Race Weapon Affinity: They usually favor wooden clubs and shields, occasionally reinforced with bones. Sometimes they throw simple bows to the mix, and occasionally scavenge Hylian weapons.
  • Fastball Special: In both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, Moblins in both games and Boss Bokoblins in the latter can throw their Bokoblin allies towards Link, dealing hefty damage if they connect and getting them into striking range if they don't.
  • Grievous Harm with a Body: If a Stalkoblin has no weapons, it will use one of its arms as one. Link can also use one himself, that still wriggles no less. He can also carry a Stalkoblin's severed head and kick it as a projectile.
  • Heavily Armored Mook: In Tears of the Kingdom, some Bokoblins wear full-body armor that protects them from harm until broken off by blunt weapons or bombs.
  • Hero of Another Story: Amusingly enough from their side of things, a lone Bokoblin in the Gerudo Highlands can be found trying to free their friends trapped in ice with a Fire Rod, while an Ice Wizzrobe prances in the air nearby. Assuming the Bokoblin didn't just steal the Fire Rod from some poor traveler, they would have gone through a lot to get their hands on it and make their way back up the mountains to help their friends. Of course, because Link has no way to talk to enemies, even when wearing a monster mask to blend in, the player never finds out what exactly went down by the time Link gets there.
  • Hidden Depths: A lot can be inferred about them from their idle animations, equipment and locations within the game. They're stone tool users who've mastered fire, while resourceful enough to scrounge and adapt material (like explosives) from technologically advanced races. They have their own language, can tame horses, construct (admittedly crude) settlements, understand rudimentary warfare, and are natural allies with Moblins. They prefer to live in forests, but can adapt to other surroundings. Like Hylians, they are diurnal omnivores who, though they mostly eat meat, also greatly enjoy fruit. Bokoblins are also fascinated with skull ornamentation, shaping stone necklaces and massive huts in the likeness.
  • Horse Archer: Several areas contain groups of Bokoblins that spawn riding horses. While a few carry spears, the majority wield bows; on spotting Link, they attempt to encircle him while pelting him with arrows, using their constant movement to make themselves harder targets and keeping themselves at range to keep Link from using melee weapons.
  • Hyperactive Metabolism: Whenever an enemy eats, they are fully healed, and Bokoblins aren't picky eaters.note  Fortunately, they only seem to eat food left on the ground, and they prefer throwing magic fruits at Link over eating them. Tears of the Kingdom has some Bokoblins carry meat in baskets on their backs, and Link should act quickly if any of it falls out.
  • Law of Chromatic Superiority: There are four different colors of Bokoblin, with increasing levels of toughness and danger. Common Bokoblins are a reddish brown color and are among the weakest enemies in the game. They only wield basic wooden equipment and drop either a horn or a fang when slain. Blue Bokoblins are tougher than the red ones, usually wield Spiked Bokoblin gear, always drop both a horn and a fang or two, and may on rare occasions drop Bokoblin Guts. Black Bokoblins are much rarer than Blue Bokoblins, but tougher still; they usually wield Dragonbone Bokoblin gear, and always drop horns, fangs, and guts when slain. Finally, the rarest and most deadly Bokoblins are the Silver Bokoblins, who are powered-up versions of Black Bokoblins that drop gemstones like sapphires, rubies, and diamonds when slain as well as the horns, fangs, and guts. Master Mode adds a stronger fifth variant, Gold Bokoblins, with similar drops to Silver Bokoblins. In Tears of the Kingdom, higher-tier Bokoblins drop better horns, which in turn, make better fuse materials.
  • Mascot Mook: They're a rather well-known enemy at this point. Bokoblin statues were used in promoting Breath of the Wild at E3, and they got an amiibo that generates the more powerful types of Bokoblin equipment.
  • Mounted Mook: Bokoblins often appear in plains areas mounted on horses; most of them wield either bows or spears, allowing them to capitalize on their mobility by fighting Link from a distance. Should Link dismount them, the Bokoblin will attempt to get its horse back. In the Gerudo Highlands, they instead ride on top of Honeyvore and Grizzlemaw Bears, themselves aggressive animals, to make them very formidable enemies.
  • Mundane Utility: Their camps occasionally have Boko Spears being used to roast fish over a fire.
  • Our Goblins Are Different: They're essentially the Zelda equivalent of goblins, and it really shows here.
  • Pet the Dog: The horses that they ride are fully tamed, suggesting that they take good care of them.
  • Pig Man: A downplayed example. They have porcine snouts and ears, likely due to their association with Ganon, but are otherwise humanoid in shape and appearance.
  • Piñata Enemy: Tears of the Kingdom introduces a variety of Bokoblin with makeshift baskets on their backs filled with useful items like elemental fruits, Zonaite ore, and meat. Killing them will scatter the items for Link to collect, though there's also nothing stopping the player from just sneaking up from behind and robbing them blind without even needing to fight.
  • Primal Stance: Their default standing posture has their heads slumping forward, their long arms handing down and to the side, and their short legs bent and splayed. Notably, when they stand up straight, they're a solid head taller than Link, but their usual postures put them at about eye level.
  • Primitive Clubs: All of their weapons are simple, crudely built and made of wood, and their primary gear consists of one- and two-handed clubs, although crude spears made by sharpening long sticks are also in their arsenal. Their basic variants are simple wooden cudgels with tapered hilts; stronger variants are reinforced with bones, fangs, and fossils to give them extra strength.
  • Ramming Always Works: In Tears of the Kingdom, they can ram their enemies with their new and improved Bokoblin horns.
  • Rock Beats Laser: Most Bokoblins wield "stone-age" tools, such as Stone Hammers or Stone Axes. Some of these, amusingly, have metal weapons as the shafts. Regardless, they hold their own fairly well against Constructs, and are the cause of death for many a player.
  • Savage Spiked Weapons: Stereotypically dumb and barbaric, and love adding spikes onto as many of their weapons as possible, including ones that make no sense like bows. The ingame descriptions say that adding bones reinforces the durability and firepower of ranged weapons, but points out the brutally effective yet sloppy construction in other cases.
    "After much consideration by Bokoblins on how to improve the Boko bat, they simply attached sharp spikes to it."
  • Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: Sometimes Bokoblins hurt each other by accident.
  • Super Drowning Skills: They immediately die, even at full health, if Link knocks them into swimming depth water. In Tears of the Kingdom, Bokoblins also have a drowning animation.
  • Tennis Boss: You can do so with the rocks thrown by regular Bokoblins here; if you time it right, you can bat away their rock projectiles.
  • Video Game Caring Potential: If wearing an appropriate monster mask so they don't attack Link, you can peacefully help a Bokoblin in the Gerudo Highlands free their friends who are trapped in ice.
  • Video Game Cruelty Potential:
    • You can attack them when they're minding their own business.
    • As noted earlier, with the right equipment, Link can peacefully help a Bokoblin free their friends trapped in ice. Of course, there’s nothing stopping players from brutally slaughtering them all right after they’re finally reunited.
  • Villains Out Shopping: When they're not attacking travelers or hunting, Bokoblins can often be found hosting bonfires, dancing wildly, sleeping, and/or holding (unintelligible) conversations with each other.
  • Zerg Rush: They might not be the most powerful of Hyrule's monsters, but they make up for it in numbers; Bokoblins are almost always the most numerous enemies in any given area. For the giant battle right before fighting Ganondorf in Tears of the Kingdom, the Bokoblin phase alone is enough to exhaust a Royal Broadsword-based White-Maned Lynel Reaper or a freshly-restored Master Sword on in-the-face-of-evil mode if you choose to be proactive in the battle, even with backup from the Sages; for context, the White-Maned Lynel Reaper is enough to comfortably go through both the Lizalfos and Moblin phases if you deal with the Gibdo phase through archery alone.

    Moblins 

Moblins

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/botw_moblin_model_0.png

Monsters that are bigger and stronger than Bokoblins. They are often found alongside Bokoblin tribes.


  • Artificial Brilliance: While their AI isn't as complex as the Bokoblins', and they mostly rely on absorbing your attacks with their higher health pools, they have their own moments of cleverness. In particular, if you try to get inside of a spear-wielding Moblin's jabbing range, it will respond by swinging its spear in a wide arc to slam you off your feet. If you try to stay out of their melee range, they will grab whatever loose objects or Bokoblins happen to be on hand and throw them at you instead.
  • Bad with the Bone: Like Bokoblins. Though they can and do scavenge metal weapons, their own native gear is based on wooden cudgels and spears augmented by strapping bones or fossils to them.
  • BFS: Some of them wield greatswords as long as they are tall, making them truly massive weapons.
  • Crafted from Animals: Moblin weapons are simple wooden sticks at their base levels but are reinforced with bones and then fossils at higher tiers. Their second-tier spear has an entire antelope skull tied to it to form its point, while their third-tier club's head is a vertebra from some unknown giant beast tied down to its central stick.
  • Dem Bones: Undead Moblins, called Stalmoblins, can be fought at night.
  • Dumb Muscle: They're this in comparison to the Bokoblins. Neither is portrayed as especially bright, but Moblins are distinctive for never inhabiting complex camps unless Bokoblins are also present — Moblins found by themselves simply live in the wilderness without even the simplest shelter or even just a firepit area and crates that even the simplest Bokoblin-only camps have. However, they're a lot bigger and a lot stronger than Bokoblins, and serve as the main combat muscle and damage sponges in mixed bands.
  • Elite Mooks: Compared to Bokoblins they're bigger and stronger.
  • Fantastic Race Weapon Affinity: They favor immense two-handed clubs and crude spears, both made by roughly carving tree branches into shape.
  • Fastball Special: They can pick up any small allies and chuck them at Link.
  • Giant's Knife; Human's Greatsword: They wield normally two-handed weapons, such as Boko Clubs and claymores, one-handed due to their large size.
  • Giant Mook: Compared to Bokoblins and even Lizalfos, Moblins are huge and Immune to Flinching.
  • Grievous Harm with a Body: Much like their smaller kin, Moblins and Stalmoblins won't hesitate to throw things at you (or in the case of the Stalmoblins, use their own limbs to attack you). Unlike their smaller kin, they aren't above throwing those same Bokoblins at you...sometimes with hilarious results.
  • Horned Humanoid: They have a single unicorn-like horn protruding from their foreheads.
  • Immune to Fire: While most Moblins are fully flammable, the Black Moblins found on Death Mountains have constant fire immunity in order to make it possible to place them in that environment.
  • Immune to Flinching: These guys are the smallest of the enemies that are large enough to be immune to getting stun-locked by a combo attack or sent flying from a bomb blast. From these guys and up, they'll just wade through your attacks. The way to knock over Moblins is with a shockwave from a jump attack or by landing the final hit in a combo.
  • Large and in Charge: They seem to serve as leaders to Bokoblins when found together, mostly due to being much bigger than them. Averted sometimes when there's just one Bokoblin and one Moblin — they just sit down and chat.
  • Law of Chromatic Superiority: Like Bokoblins, they're divided into four castes based on color; Red, Blue, Black, and Silver. The same alterations to drop rates applies as in Bokoblins, as well. There are also Gold Moblins in Master Mode, which make their first appearance in the series since Oracle of Seasons.
  • Lean and Mean: They are thin and tall in this iteration, but no less antagonistic.
  • Left Stuck After Attack: Moblins holding two-handed weapons such as clubs, axes or claymores will often attack with a powerful overhead blow. If this attack misses, the weapon will embed itself in the ground and remain stuck there for a few seconds while the Moblin tries to pull it free, giving Link a few seconds to attack it while it's immobilized and vulnerable.
  • Our Orcs Are Different: They're enormous — half as tall as the Hinox, but more than four times Link's— and slenderly built monsters with porcine features and a unicorn-like horn.
  • Pig Man: They're humanoid beings with elongated porcine snouts, though their pig qualities are subtler than Bokoblins'.
  • Primal Stance: Their default standing posture has their heads slumping forward, their long arms handing down and to the side, and their short legs bent and splayed.
  • Primitive Clubs: All of their weapons are simple, crudely built, and made of wood, and their primary gear consists of giant two-handed clubs, although crude spears made by sharpening long sticks are also in their arsenal. Their basic variants are simply tree branches crudely hacked into shape; stronger variants are reinforced with animal skulls and fossils.
  • Smash Mook: They're the biggest, toughest, and least subtle of the basic enemy types. They largely lack the more complex fighting styles used by Bokoblins and Lizalfos, and instead are hulking bruisers who rely on their health pools, high mass, and being Immune to Flinching to wade through attacks that would stun smaller foes or send them flying.
  • Use Your Head: In Tears of the Kingdom, they can slam their heads down at Link with their new Moblin Horns.
  • Weapon Twirling: A Moblin holding a one-handed melee weapon such a sword will perform occasional flourishes with it when in combat, flicking it into the air and catching it again by the hilt before striking a blow.

    Lizalfos 

Lizalfos

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/botw_lizalfos_model_5.png

Lizard-like monsters that are slightly more powerful than the Bokoblins.


  • Ambushing Enemy: They often use their ability to change color to blend with their surroundings while lying down. They can often be found lying in ambush in this manner, using their cryptic coloring to try to avoid notice. Notably, unlike other enemies, these hiding Lizalfos will not instantly charge forward when they see Link; instead, they remain still and hold off attacking until he's right on top of them, with the only sign that they're aware of his presence being a brief tilt of their heads. They can be fairly easy to see when in the open, as their mimicry only allows them to take on a more-or-less solid coloring, but can be very difficult to spot when hiding in tall grass or in bushes or when clinging to rocky outcrops.
  • Artificial Brilliance: They're programmed to capitalize on their ranged attacks and superior speed and agility. Since Lizalfos weapons — Lizal Bows, Lizal Boomerangs, Lizal Spears, water bullets, and their long tongues — all work best at range, Lizalfos will obstinately refuse to stick around in melee combat, either constantly keeping their distance from you or and using Hit-and-Run Tactics, darting in to strike a blow and then leaping back several meters to stay out of your melee range. When they dart in for an attack, they also run in zigzag patterns to make themselves harder to hit with arrows.
  • Battle Boomerang: The Lizalfos' favored one-handed weapon is a bent throwing knife that flies back to them when thrown called the Lizal Boomerang. Even Lizalfos Arms have boomerang properties.
  • Beef Gate: The elemental Lizalfos are untouched by Level Scaling and have more HP than Black Bokoblins, making them a significant threat for those caught heading off the beaten path too early. Their presence sections off areas ranging from Mount Lanayru (if you lack Fire magic) to the lake around Hyrule Ridge's Tower, and can even railroad players a bit around Goron City (if you lack Ice magic) and the Gerudo Desert. On the other hand, they're significantly less of a problem later on, around when Black Lizalfos start appearing.
  • Breath Weapon: Fire-Breath Lizalfos can breathe fire like a dragon and Ice-Breath Lizalfos can spit balls of ice at you. All variants can spit water bullets at Link.
  • Commonplace Rare: In Tears of the Kingdom, the elemental Lizalfos are a bit rarer than before, possibly because their item drops have elemental effects to go with their technique modifications.
  • Composite Character: This game's incarnation of Lizalfos takes cues from a few otherwise absent enemy races from previous games. They use and sometimes throw boomerangs much like the Goriyas, and their strong swimming abilities and ability to spit projectiles from the water call to mind the River Zoras.
  • Crafted from Animals: Lizal Bows are partially reinforced with fish bones, with the stronger versions being further enhanced with metal.
  • Dem Bones: Undead Lizalfos, called Stallizalfos, can be fought at night.
  • Evil Counterpart Race: To the Zora. Like the Zora, they primarily wield polearms and can often be found in bodies of water, and historical recordings reveal they went to war with each other long ago.
  • Fantastic Race Weapon Affinity: They prefer weapons usable from range. They mostly wield curved throwing knives, either simple one-bladed versions or stronger kinds with multiple forks, that fly back like boomerangs when thrown, but are also proficient archers and often use long, barbed spears as well.
  • Fiery Salamander: Fire-Breath Lizalfos can have this vibe to them, complete with the ability to "swim" through lava.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: The Fire-Breath, Ice-Breath, and Electric variants can use attacks corresponding to their element such as a Breath Weapon (Fire or Ice) or creating a burst of energy (Electric)
  • Giant's Knife; Human's Greatsword: Due to their greater size than Link — they stand about a head taller, but would be over twice his height if they stood up straight — they can wield two-handed weapons like spears and claymores in a single hand.
  • Hidden Depths: Though not quite as detailed as the Bokoblins, the developers devoted a lot of thought and imagination into their design:
    • They are communal creatures who've mastered iron and steel working. Though initially amphibian (all Lizalfos can swim), their physiology has extraordinary adaptability, able to survive in extreme temperatures and gain abilities suited to the environment. Consequently, basic Lizalfos tend to live close to water, but their elemental variants are often found in much more extreme environments. They favor ranged tactics, using bladed boomerangs and bows, but are also experts in melee combat, employing agile feints with hit-and-run tactics, which is helped by the fact that are very energetic and do not require sleep. They are carnivorous by nature, but they enjoy fishing and occasionally eat insects. They seem less antagonistic against Hylians than the Bokoblins, since they generally avoid major routes and don't harass travelers with the same ferocity, but many Lizalfos communities are built upon the ruins of lost Hylian villages and forgotten monuments.
    • There is an optional side quest involving giant stone tablets the Zora used to record their history. Reading them reveals the Lizalfos once had a nation that rivaled the Zora and were led by a cunning general who nearly defeated them. The Lizalfos also have what appears to be a village between Mercay Island and the Bone Pond, with several additional outposts scattered throughout Hyrule.
  • Hit-and-Run Tactics: Lizalfos make heavy use of this to take advantage of their high speed and agility, contrasting the more direct aggression of Bokoblins and Moblins. In melee combat, they favor quick, darting offensives, delivering a flurry of blows before leaping back several meters and out of your reach. Spears are the favored two-handed weapons of the Lizalfos, and spear-wielding specimens will make an effort to keep their distance in order to use their long weapons effectively.
  • Hollywood Chameleons: They can blend in with the environment, not quite turning invisible but making it very easy to overlook them until they ambush Link. They also do so when idle just to take a nap in relative safety.
  • Horn Attack: In Tears of the Kingdom, Lizalfos will swing their heads back and forth, using their blade-shaped Lizalfos Horns as swords. This also applies to their elemental variants.
  • Hydro-Electro Combo: Electric Lizalfos outside Gerudo are quite fond of this combination. Regular Lizalfos on the path to Zora's Domain like it too, spamming Shock Arrows at Link in the perpetual rain.
  • Immune to Fire: Fire-Breath Lizalfos cannot be set on fire or damaged by contact with flame.
  • Katanas Are Just Better: Blue Lizalfos Horns in Tears of the Kingdom look exactly like katana blades and essentially turn any sword-type weapon fused with them into one or something similar.
  • Kukris Are Kool: Their single-bladed boomerangs have this aesthetic.
  • Law of Chromatic Superiority: As per the standard set by Bokoblins, Moblins and Lynels, Lizalfos are divided into tiers based on colors, going from Green (the weakest) through Blue, Black, and Silver. Master Mode adds Gold Lizalfos.
  • Left Stuck After Attack: Lizalfos armed with spears will occasionally leap high into the air and try to impale Link as they fall back down. If they miss, however, their spear will jam itself in the ground and leave them briefly vulnerable as they pull it back out.
  • Lizard Folk: They look like bipedal chameleons.
  • Logical Weakness: The Fire-Breath and Ice-Breath Lizalfos are unique in this regard as ice and fire cancel each other out in this setting, so both types are instantly killed when hit with the opposing element instead of being frozen or burnt respectively.
  • Long-Range Fighter: Out of all the regular enemies Link can face, Lizalfos have the most propensity to attacking from a distance. They're the only enemy race that doesn't have a two-handed weapon specific to them, they tend to leap backwards in combat, they have up to four ranged attacks*, and their one-handed blade weapons can function like boomerangs when thrown.
  • Making a Splash: They can spit water bullets at Link from range.
  • Multipurpose Tongue: As part of their chameleon-like redesign, they have long, brightly colored tongues that can extend to be as long as their bodies. They can shoot these out with some force, and use this as a ranged attack when without weapons.
  • Mundane Utility: The Compendium mentions that Lizalfos use Enhanced Lizal Spears to hunt fish as well as in combat.
  • Natural Weapon: Lizalfos have a fairly extensive assortment of these, which they will resort to when disarmed — their tongues can shoot out with enough force to take some hearts off of Link's health, they can use their tails like whips, and they can spit water bullets. In Tears of the Kingdom, Lizalfos will also use their horns to slash at Link.
  • Oddly Shaped Sword: Their "boomerangs" are actually swords that are designed to be thrown like boomerangs. It gets ridiculous with the Lizal Tri-Boomerang, which is an oversized African mambele throwing knife that somehow returns to sender when thrown.
  • One-Hit Kill: Frost and Fire-Breath Lizalfos will be instantly slain if struck with any weapon of the opposite element, which will cause them to vanish in a puff of steam.
  • Sinister Scythe: In Tears of the Kingdom, the Silver Lizalfos Horn is a scythe-shaped horn that can be fused onto weapons, or the Lizalfos can attack Link with it when it does its Horn Attack.
  • Shock and Awe: The Electric Lizalfos can conduct electricity through its nasal horn. Scoring a direct hit on the horn will cause the energy stored within to discharge, for good or ill.
  • Shmuck Bait: While the other elemental Lizalfos breathe out their elements, Electric Lizalfos emit theirs by bonking their horn against the ground, and the movement can easily be mistaken for a safe opening to attack — though, if their HP is low enough, that's a fair time to attempt a finisher.
  • The Sleepless: In contrast to the diurnal Moblins and Bokoblins, Lizalfos are always active regardless of the time of day. Because of this, simply sneaking into their camps at night and taking them out one by one is not an option. They sometimes lie down on the ground, camouflage themselves and remain unmoving for long periods of time, but this is as much a way to ambush or trick foes as anything else.
  • Super Not-Drowning Skills: The only terrestrial monsters that can swim indefinitely (Bokoblins, Moblins and Horriblins can't swim, Lynels and Taluses can't enter water, and Hinox can only swim for a short time).
  • Tail Slap: If unarmed, a Lizalfos will sometimes attack by using its tail as a whip. In Tears of the Kingdom their tails can be fused with weapons to give them added range as whips. The tails of the elemental Lizalfos also give them elemental properties.
  • Throwing Your Sword Always Works: Lizalfos occasionally throw their weapon if you're out of their reach. This makes sense if they're wielding their native boomerangs, but they'll do this even with their scavenged non-boomerang weapons.
  • Underground Monkey: Uniquely amongst the Monstrous Humanoids of the game, there are Lizalfos variants other than the chromatic ones, following the Fire, Ice, Lightning scheme. Crimson-scaled Fire Lizalfos live mostly around Death Mountain (though a few reside in the Gerudo Desert) and use a fiery Breath Weapon. Light-scaled Ice Lizalfos live in snowy areas (the Hebra region, Gerudo Highlands region, and Mount Lanayru in the Hateno region) and can launch a barrage of ice-balls at Link. Yellow-scaled Electric Lizalfos are more widespread, although they are more common in the south (most of the Gerudo and Faron regions), and can produce spherical surges of electrical energy.
  • Villains Out Shopping: Uniquely among all monsters, when you walk up to a Lizalfos while wearing its mask, it will actually try to hold a conversation with you. It’s all unintelligible "reep-reeps", but its body language clearly speaks of someone having a pleasant chat with one of his mates. And yes, Stalizalfos do this as well.

    Lynels 

Lynels

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/botw_silver_lynel.png

Savage and fierce centaur-like lion folk. They are among the most dangerous enemies in the game due to their strength, speed and tenacity, as well as being heavily armed and adept at using their weapons. Lynels are mostly found on the edges of the game map, usually among mountains, where they stand in lonely vigil over the wilderness.


  • Always Chaotic Evil: Of all the enemy groups, Lynels are regarded as the most vicious and antagonistic monster types, attacking innocent travelers with no hesitation or regrets. Although, as stated below, this is a case of Gameplay and Story Segregation as Lynels are the only enemies in the game that don't attack on sight, instead choosing to give you ample time to clear off and only attacking if you linger too long, get too close or make an aggressive move against them.
  • And Your Reward Is Clothes: Defeating all of the Lynels in the floating coliseum in the Depths will reward Link with Majora's Mask.
  • Artificial Brilliance: Lynels have a much more advanced AI than other enemies, and are capable of some surprising tactical behavior for videogame enemies.
    • If you make a noise via a missed arrow against even the smartest Lizalfos or Moblin group, they'll give up on it after maybe thirty seconds at the most. A Lynel will examine the same spot for upwards of a minute before losing interest. Worse, if they do spot you, sometimes they'll just sit and observe instead of actually attacking, waiting for you to drop your guard or make the first move, and if you run and they're too far out, they'll calmly snipe you instead of chasing you.
    • Lynels are the only group who aren't easily fooled by the masks you can buy at the Fang & Bone shop. If you linger too long around a Lynel (thirty seconds according to this video), they'll eventually see through the mask and attack.
    • While hiding behind something will protect you from the ranged attacks of any other enemy, it won't help in the slightest against a Lynel. They'll shoot up and arc their arrows over the terrain with terrifying accuracy to hit you from above.
    • The Lynel at Ploymus Mountain in the Lanayru Province that you have to fight to get Shock Arrows will sometimes teleport away if you try to hide from it, and will wait until you come back to reappear right next to you and wreck you.
    • While other enemies use predictable and often very slow swings, Lynels have an array of attacks that are hard to dodge. If they catch you off guard, you have no choice but to keep avoiding it, as it's too fast to just run out of range from. Lynels can even feint you by running away to seemingly breathe fire or charge at you, but end up doing the other.
  • Beef Gate: In Tears of the Kingdom, should you try to go into Hyrule Castle's Chasm early, if you manage to go through the small horde of Black Horriblins, Shock Likes and Electric Keeses, you will reach a room where a single White-Maned Lynel is waiting for you. While it can be avoided if one is fast enough, this is the game telling you in no uncertain terms that you have no business being here, as it will zero in on Link quickly and inevitably kill him in a single hit.
  • BFS:
    • Normal Lynels wield enormous Lynel Swords single-handedly. Since they shrink after dropping like Moblin one-handed weapons, Link uses them single-handedly too.
    • Lynel Spears are absolutely massive halberds.
  • Boss in Mook Clothing: Lynels do not have the on-screen boss health meter that Hinox, Taluses, Molduga, Froxes, Flux Constructs, and Gleeoks do, nor do they have a unique battle theme. They also scale according to your progress like most regular enemies, and despite their otherwise Contractual Boss Immunity, are able to be one-hit killed by Ancient Arrows (which also comes at the cost of item drops like any regular enemy). However, they're extremely fast, strong and durable, are usually found alone in out-of-the-way areas like the overworld bosses are, and are far and away the most challenging and dangerous of the "regular" enemies — in fact, a typical Lynel is usually a harder and more challenging foe than any of the actual bosses. Of any opponents in these games, Lynels are by far the hardest to fight and survive without strong command of parrying and Perfect Dodges, advanced combat mechanics which are very useful but are otherwise not that necessary for success.
  • Bow and Sword in Accord: In addition to whatever melee weapon they're armed with, they use powerful bows. Get too far away from them, and watch them rain Fire, Ice, or Shock Arrows on you with frightening accuracy.
  • Breath Weapon: Lynels can breathe fire, and will use this to attack Link from a distance.
  • The Bus Came Back: Lynels made their first appearance in the original Legend of Zelda game, as well as A Link to the Past and the Oracle games. Then, they disappeared from the series for 15 years before being brought back in A Link Between Worlds. Now, in Breath of the Wild, not only are they back again, but they're back for the first time in one of the mainline console games, and they have a full 3D makeover.
  • Carry a Big Stick: The favored two-handed weapons of Lynels are giant metal clubs called "Crushers" that deal enormous amounts of damage. They're also the hardest to fight by far, as the dodge timing on their Crushers is far trickier, the shockwave generated by the overhead slam will still catch you if you try to jump to the side of it, and you will feel those hits no matter how overloaded your defense is if you mess up. Savage Lynel Crushers are also among the most powerful weapons in Breath of the Wild.
  • Contractual Boss Immunity: They may not be officially bosses, but Lynels are immune to being frozen, electrocuted, or set on fire. They are, however, NOT immune to being vaporized by Ancient Arrows (though this destroys all of their drops as well). As a lesser aversion Urbosa's Fury still stuns them despite their above mentioned immunity to its electrocution side effect.
  • Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Different colored Lynels each have different strengths, with the weakest being Red, followed by Blue, White, Silver, and Gold, with Gold being the strongest.
  • Covered with Scars: It's hard to notice in the heat of battle, but they have scars from the fierce battles they have fought. Fighting a Lynel makes it clear why they won those battles.
  • Damage-Sponge Boss: While not bosses officially, Lynels have a lot of HP — basic red Lynels have 2,000 (twice as much as Black Hinox), and Silver Lynels have a staggering 5,000 (more than the final bossnote ), and that's before you bring Gold Lynels (which has 7,500note ) into the equation.
  • Death Glare: This is their response to you wearing a Lynel Mask; they’ll stare angrily at you like you’re some kind of idiot for about a minute, before drawing their weapons.
  • Determinator: Known for their tenacity, they'll take whatever you throw at them and respond in an equal or worse manner.
  • The Dreaded: Lynels are feared throughout Hyrule as savage and vicious monsters. Nearly all the Compendium entries on them outright warn you that Lynels should be avoided at all costs and should only be fought if you're well prepared. This is even used as an Exploited Trope in one Zora's Domain sidequest where a Zora asks Link to take a photo of a Lynel so she can use it to warn others to avoid jumping off Ploymus Mountain; she herself screams upon being shown said photo. Even Prince Sidon has an Oh, Crap! moment upon finding out Link will have to collect Shock Arrows from this same Lynel's territory, and this is a guy who has no worries about going up against Divine Beast Vah Ruta afterward. Reinforcing the point is that this particular Lynel is always of the red variety, the weakest. The Hyrule Compendium outright states that if one comes across a Golden Lynel, the strongest and sturdiest type, having more health than even the final boss note  with a whopping 7,500 hit points, the best strategy is to "get away as fast as you can."
  • Elemental Weapon: All of them wield Fire, Ice, and Shock Arrows, as well as Bomb Arrows and the Silver Lynelnote  in the Coliseum Ruins wields a Flameblade as its weapon rather than a Savage Lynel Sword.
  • Elite Mooks: Lynels are essentially a combination of all Bokoblin specialties (melee, archery, and horseback fighting) in a single enemy, combined with high health, powerful attacks, and a lack of the tells and openings exploitable in other foes. These combined factors mean that even regular ones are Bosses in Mook Clothing, stronger than any other common foe and more complex than Guardian Stalkers, and Blue-Maned and/or White-Maned Lynels are even stronger. The rare Silver Lynels are the strongest enemies in the base game, while in Master Mode, Golden Lynels are the strongest enemies of any sort.
  • Evil Counterpart: In the Depths, armored Gloom-wreathed Lynels appear as the counterpart to something on the Surface: Stables, in line with how are they are the unholy fusion of monster and horse in contrast to the peaceful Stables blessed by Malanya.
  • Evil Redhead: The basic Lynels have red manes and they are incredibly vicious.
  • Fiery Lion: Lion-centaurs who can breathe fire.
  • Foe-Tossing Charge: They can get down on all six limbs and charge at you at alarming speed. The dodge timing is pretty forgiving, but aside from the indication that they're about to do some sort of running attack, they do not telegraph it.
  • Gameplay and Story Segregation: The Hyrule Compendium entries suggest that Lynels, specifically the White-Maned variety, are fiercely territorial and will kill on sight if they notice someone. However, unlike nearly every other enemy in the game, this actually isn't how Lynels behave. When a Lynel notices you, it will first stand and observe you — if you move closer it will draw its weapon in warning, but won't actually start attacking until you either get closer still or draw your own weapons. In fact, the only Lynel in the game that attacks Link on sight is the one of Ploymus Mountain, and that one is coded to always be Red-Maned, the weakest type out of them all. Once it decides you're a threat, however, it will make short work of a player if they're not powered up enough.
  • Genius Bruiser: Lynels are not only powerful, but know how to use the battlefield and their weapons at best and in a unique way.
  • Giant's Knife; Human's Greatsword: Lynels are colossal, standing well around the height of an elephant, and can wield even their native two-handed Lynel Spears and Lynel Crushers in a single hand if they so need to, despite Link needing both to even be able to drag a Lynel Crusher along.
  • Heavily Armored Mook: Some Lynels in Tears of the Kingdom wear thick armor that has to be destroyed before you can actually damage them.
  • Horn Attack: In Tears of the Kingdom, Lynels will swing their heads in an arc to slash with their Lynel Saber Horns.
  • Implacable Man: Without using the Sheikah Slate/Purah Pad's teleport function, it is incredibly difficult to run from a Lynel. Their centaur-like bodies can easily outpace Link at a full sprint, and if one is even able to get out of range, Lynels will use their bows with terrifying accuracy, aiming up over cover to bring down the pain.
  • Infinity +1 Sword: As far as the game's "expendable" weapons go, Savage Lynel equipment is the best in the game, surpassing even the Royal Guard weapons in base damage and surpassing the Royal weapons in durability. The caveat to obtaining them is that, prior to Level Scaling, Lynels holding them can only be found in obscure far-off areas, and after Level Scaling causes nearly all Lynels to become White or Silver, you'll need to deal with their overwhelming strength and durability to win their powerful gear. In Tears of the Kingdom, Silver Lynel Mace/Saber Horns are the strongest fuse materials you can acquire, with the blade shaped horn boasting a whopping 55 attack power.
  • It Can Think: The Hyrule Compendium states that the Lynels possess "intense intelligence", making them even more deadly, which is reflected by them having much more complex AI and perception than regular enemies do.
  • Katanas Are Just Better: In Tears of the Kingdom, the Silver Lynel's Saber Horn is shaped like an ornate katana blade. It's also the strongest fuse material that goes in Link's inventory, at a lethal 55 Fuse Attack Power.
  • Law of Chromatic Superiority: Like other enemy races, they're tiered by color. From weakest to strongest, they are Red-maned, Blue-maned, White-maned, and Silver. Master Mode adds an even stronger Golden variant on top of this. In addition, the three tiers of Lynel weaponry are color-coded to mark their increasing strength. Basic Lynel gear has bronze or copper bindings and details, which become silver in Mighty Lynel gear and golden in Savage Lynel gear.
  • Leave No Witnesses: According to the White-Maned Lynel's Compendium entry, the reason there are so few eyewitness accounts of them is because White-Maned Lynels won't let even a single passerby escape with their lives.
  • Level Scaling: In Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, most enemy camps will scale based on your progress through the game, usually by having one or two in a group become a Silver (or Golden in Master Mode) enemy. Lynels are unique in that, with three exceptions in Breathnote , all Lynels scale based on your progress in order to maintain their position as the most dangerous enemies in the game. You'll eventually reach a point where all Lynels are Silver (or Golden in Master Mode) aside from the aforementioned exceptions. Tears of the Kingdom has more Lynels with fixed levels and an underground arena with all colors, including two silver, making gathering their unique materials to upgrade the Barbarian armor set easier.
  • Lightning Bruiser: They can soak up damage like a sponge, flatten Link with one or two hits, and move as fast as a galloping horse. Escaping these guys without using the Sheikah Slate or Purah Pad to teleport away is almost as much of a challenge as successfully killing them.
  • Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: They carry blade-edged Lynel Shields that they use in conjunction with their swords to attack Link.
  • Mascot Mook: Not of the base game, but the first DLC pack, The Master Trials, uses the Gold Lynels it introduces as advertisement for itself.
  • Mighty Roar: Like the lions they have traits of, at-ease Lynels will let out loud roars to scare off potential intruders to their territory. In Breath of the Wild, they also telegraph their fire explosion attack by doing this. In Tears of the Kingdom, they additionally use their roars to instantly disassemble Zonai contraptions being used against them in order to force Link to fight them fair and square.
  • Mix-and-Match Critters: Lynels have the head of a lion, the horns of a goat, the upper body of a human, and the lower body of a horse.
  • Multi Shot: Their Lynel Bows can fire up to three arrows at once normally, or five arrows as a random bonus attribute.
  • Mythology Gag: In the original Zelda's instructional manual, Lynels carried swords and shields, unlike their in-game sprites. In these games, they do have (among other weapons) a sword and shield, and make damn good use of it.
  • Nerf:
    • They are slightly less powerful in Tears of the Kingdom, presumably since you can no longer freeze them with Stasis+. Plus, they no longer wield Lynel Swords, Spears, and/or Crushers (as most monster-name weapons have been removed) and usually wield significantly less-powerful unfused weapons.
    • Claymore Lynels in particular have had the biggest nerf from their Crusher counterparts in the previous game. In Breath of the Wild, Crusher Lynels were very hard to fight primarily because the shockwaves of their downward swings could cancel a Perfect Dodge. This is no longer the case in Tears of the Kingdom, which makes Flurry Rushing much more reliable against Claymore Lynels.
    • Adding on to this, while Lynels still wield Lynel Bows, they no longer use elemental arrows.
  • No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Played with. Link can mount a stunned Lynel and keep hitting it in the back. While the Lynel can't avoid taking these hits, it's not completely helpless — it can eventually buck Link off of its back if it's still alive.
  • One-Man Army: In Tears of the Kingdom, there are Monster Arenas in The Depths which send out consecutive waves of Gloom-infected monsters. Whilst every other coliseum sends out groups of monsters, the Lynel coliseum only sends out one Lynel at a time.
  • Our Centaurs Are Different: Lynels are centaur-like monsters with leonine heads, crimson manes and beards, and large upward-curved horns. They can also breathe fire.
  • Permanently Missable Content: Due to the Level Scaling nature of most Lynels, all sub-Savage Lynel gear apart from the base Lynel Sword, Shield, and Bow can never be obtained past a certain point in the gamenote . Thankfully, Symin can still give you pictures for them in the Hyrule Compendium after this point. This is averted in Tears of the Kingdom, as not only have all Lynel weapons been removed (except for their bows and shields), there are more Lynels with fixed levels across Hyrule in spite of the Level Scaling still being present (which is necessary for monster horn farming, as monsters subject to the scale have unique horns for each level).
  • Playing with Fire: When Lynels reach half health, they will begin breathing fire. Blue-Maned Lynels will use this attack from the start, but start using a second fire-based attack, a roar followed by a massive burst of fire, when they reach half health. White-Maned and Silver Lynels use all of these attacks right from the get-go.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning: Silver Lynels. While all Silver enemies have red eyes to highlight their high ranked tier status, the red eyes of a Silver Lynel as it lunges after Link will haunt many players and for good reason.
  • Refuge in Audacity: Assuming that Lynels are intelligent, and not acting out of pure ass-kicking instinct, the Lynel Mask temporarily works on them because they're just completely bewildered by what they're seeing; Link is way too short to be a Lynel, after all, not to mention the lack of a horse half.
  • Resistant to Magic: They are not affected by elemental attacks, meaning you cannot freeze, electrocute (with the exception of Urbosa's Fury), or set them on fire. This means that elemental weapons are basically wasted in a Lynel battle.
  • Roar Before Beating: White-Maned and Silver Lynels in Breath of the Wild usually open a battle with a Mighty Roar followed by them slamming their weapon to the ground and creating an explosion of fire.
  • Running on All Fours: The Lynels are an unusual variant. Being centaur monsters, they already move around on their four horse-like legs most of the time while attacking with blades and arrows with their humanoid upper arms. But occasionally, they'll charge at Link on all six limbs to knock him over.
  • Serrated Blade of Pain: The Savage Lynel Sword and Spear have a serrated edge. In Tears of the Kingdom, this instead is the case for the Blue and White-Maned Lynels' Saber Horns.
  • The Sleepless: Unlike most common enemies, Lynels never sleep or rest, but instead patrol their territories endlessly, day and night.
  • Strong and Skilled: What makes Lynels terrifying is not only their physical strength, but also how skilled they are at using weapons: in addition to using a variety of swift, powerful and difficult-to-counter technique with their melee weapons, they also carry bows to shoot arrows which almost never miss their target.
  • Tiered by Name: The equipment that Lynels use starts with basic "Lynel" equipment, moves to "Mighty Lynel", and finishes with "Savage Lynel". Savage Lynel equipment is among the best in Breath of the Wild.
  • Took a Level in Badass: There's no doubt that these are the most innovative, strongest, and dangerous iteration of Lynels to date in the Zelda series. Just a small pack of them could easily defeat a thousand regular soldiers without breaking a sweat.
  • Trick Arrow: They wield all three Fire, Ice, Lightning Arrows depending on the variant and can multi-shot fire them using their bows with ridiculous accuracy.
  • Underground Monkey: Like most enemies, Lynels follow the standard Red-Blue-Black Law of Chromatic Superiority, though even the basic Red Lynel is a Boss in Mook Clothing on par with Guardians, but lacking their weak spot. Silver Lynels are practically a Super Boss.
  • Villain Teleportation: If they somehow get knocked out of the territory they claim as their own (e.g. if the one on Ploymus Mountain gets knocked off the peak), they will teleport back to their home turf.

    Guardians 

Guardians

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_guardian_artwork.png

Robots built by the Ancient Sheikah that were originally made to protect Hyrule and combat Calamity Ganon. When Ganon re-emerged a century prior, it corrupted them and turned them against Hyrule. Even after a hundred years, Guardians still roam the area around Hyrule Castle and other sections of the kingdom, attacking Hylians and other species whenever they can. There are several variants:

  • Guardian Stalkers: The main type which are seen prowling about Hyrule, Spider Tanks with six legs and a central turret.
  • Guardian Scouts: Miniature variants that can wield handheld weaponry, they inhabit the various shrines and the four Divine Beasts.
  • Guardian Skywatchers: Flying units which guard specific important areas.
  • Guardian Turrets: Stationary units found only in Hyrule Castle (though ones outside the castle are later added in the DLC).
  • Decayed Guardians: Stalkers which can no longer move, but still have functioning turret systems.

  • Activation Sequence: Dormant Guardian Stalkers that can still walk demonstrate this. Tron Lines across its body flicker as it twitches to life, then a ring of blue light shines along the turret neck. The Tron Lines remain steady as the Cyber Cyclops eye brightens blue with a distinct BONG sound. Spider Tank legs raise the Guardian up as this boot up completes, moving the machine towards Link as the Laser Sight activates.
  • Airborne Mook: Skywatchers function largely identically to Stalkers, except for the fact that they're up in the sky and thus capable of raining down lasers without coming in range of your melee attacks.
  • Ambushing Enemy:
    • Decayed Guardians are for the most part indistinguishable from the husks of dead Guardians they usually spawn amongst and remain still and inert until Link comes close to them, at which point they power up and start firing.
    • A few Guardian graveyards also hide some fully intact and mobile Stalkers. While most Stalkers roam about openly and attack Link as soon as they see him, these ones play dead and pretend to be broken down until Link either approaches or hits them with a ranged attack, which will prompt them to drop the ruse and attack.
  • Artificial Brilliance:
    • While cutting the Guardian Stalkers' legs off does reduce their mobility, it can backfire if you let them recover. They'll frantically and actively escape you to avoid getting crippled further, making them much harder to hit. They’re also capable of strafing to try and throw off your aim when aiming for the eye.
    • Stalkers and Skywatchers will constantly move about should the player try to go for their eyes with a bow or by throwing their weapon.
    • In Master Mode, Guardians gain the ability to delay their laser blasts slightly to throw off your parry timing.
  • Attack Its Weak Point:
    • Each of them has a large, glowing eye that, when struck, stuns them and renders them unable to fire their signature lasers for a few seconds. Exploiting this is key to beating them, and Ancient Arrows will kill Guardians with one hit if they hit the eye.
    • The discs on the undersides of Stalkers and the tops of Skywatchers are also vulnerable, and Ancient Arrows striking those spots also one-shot the Guardians.
    • Additionally, Guardian Stalkers can have their legs chopped off, which will also stun them similarly to when they are struck in the eye. It also significantly reduces their mobility, making them easier to attack as long as you don't let them recover. It's even possible for a crippled Guardian to topple over entirely, rendering them completely unable to move or bring their laser to bear. A Skywatcher's rotors can be destroyed in a similar manner, which will reduce their speed and mobility and, once the last rotor is gone, send them falling out of the sky.
  • Beat Them at Their Own Game: Ancient and Guardian equipment are the most effective weapons against Guardians. Guardian Swords, Spears, and Ancient Battle Axes can slice off a Stalker's legs and render it immobile, while an Ancient Arrow can instantly kill any Guardian shot in the eye with it. With really good timing, you can even use a shield to knock their eye beams right back into them, for incredible damage; the damage is enough to destroy a Decayed Guardian outright. Armor forged from their mechanisms also greatly reduces the damage a Guardian laser will do to Link, which can make them much easier to survive if they hit him.
  • Boss in Mook Clothing: The Stalkers, Skywatchers, and Turrets are only non-overworld mini-boss enemies in the game that don't scale and are very challenging to face against with the Stalkers having 1,500 HP, which is only 500 HP less than a Red Lynel. However, thanks to a multitude of ways to counter them, including the Ancient Armor, Ancient Arrows, and the various Laser Blades equipped by Guardian Scouts and manufactured by Robbie, these enemies do become really easy later on, turning the overworld Guardians into a Downplayed Trope.
  • Can't Catch Up: They’re a grave threat early on due to their massive health bar, high defense, and One-Hit Kill laser beam, but past the early game they become relatively trivial once you gain more health and powerful weapons, particularly the Guardian Scout and Ancient Gear specifically meant to counter them. Unlike other enemies, they do not scale and become stronger or gain any attacks beyond their eye beams. Even early on they can be trivialized if you’re good enough to parry their laser beams (which have a pretty generous timing window).
  • Clip Its Wings: A Skywatcher's three propellers can be targeted and destroyed separately from the rest of its body. Destroying one will lower its flying speed a little; destroying two will do so to a greater degree and make it list noticeably. Destroying all three will make the robot plummet from the sky and render it immobile outside of its rotating turret.
  • Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Guardians with magenta Tron Lines are infected by Ganon's corruptive Malice. While those with orange Tron Lines are uncorrupted, they will still attack Link as a part of his test, ultimately making no functional difference from their corrupted counterparts unless you have the Master Sword, which empowers itself when near corrupted Guardians but not uncorrupted ones.
  • Cyber Cyclops: They're magitek robots with only one eye.
  • Demonic Possession: They were infected by Ganon's Malice and turned against the Kingdom of Hyrule. The Guardian Scouts in the shrines were not corrupted, however, and the DLC adds Turrets and Skywatchers that are operating as normal with orange light, as they're also part of a monk's test. These benevolent Guardians are still dangerous to Link, however, as they're meant to test his strength as a warrior.
  • The Dreaded: Only Calamity Ganon itself is feared more by the populace. If you lure one towards an NPC adventurer wandering the field map, they'll scream out "It's a Guardian!" while fleeing or cowering in terror.
  • Dub Name Change:
    • Overall, Dutch refers to them as "Watchers".
    • In most translations, Stalkers are referred to as some variant of "Walking Guardians" or "Foot Guardians".
    • Decayed Guardians are typically called "Deteriorated Guardians". German uses "Wächter-Wrack" ("Watcher-Wreck").
    • Turrets are referred to as "Battery-Type Guardians" in Japanese, but are some variant of "turret" everywhere else.
    • Skywatchers are mostly called "Flying Guardians".
  • Eye Beams: Their main method of attacking is shooting lasers that create explosions from their eye. The Guardian Scouts can use sustained Eye Beams in a wide sweeping motion as well.
  • Freak Out: If Link can sneak up on an immobile Guardian and use weapons that inflict significant damage per hit (can kill in a dozen hits or less), after suffering 50% damage it will fire Eye Beams at random without bothering to target with Laser Sight as it tries in vain to turn towards the direction Link is performing a Curb-Stomp Battle. They'll also fire single shots in response to Link hitting them unnoticed, as they have no idea what's going on, but know something needs to be taken out if they're being attacked.
  • Go for the Eye: Their eye is their weak spot, and being struck there stuns them and renders them unable to fire their lasers for a few seconds. Additionally, Ancient Arrows will kill Guardians with one strike if they hit the eye.
  • Hell Is That Noise: When in attack mode they emit an artificial and distinctly mechanical warning siren. Their Laser Sight also have an audible aspect that anyone understanding a smidgen of modern warfare will immediately realize This Is Gonna Suck. There's also the icy cascading piano that begins their battle theme, instantly letting the player know they've been spotted in a panic-inducing cue.
  • Hoist by Their Own Petard: Link can defeat them by using his shield or Daruk's Protection to reflect their deadly lasers right back at them. In Master Mode, however, they can delay their lasers if you rely on this tactic too much.
  • It Can Think: Guardian Stalkers in Master Mode can learn to vary the time between the charging and firing for their laser. In addition, managing to sneak up on them and deal heavy damage will cause them to start panicking, firing their laser recklessly as they try to figure out where you are every time you hit them.
  • Just Following Orders: Sheikah-controlled ones that glow blue and orange aren't being manipulated by Ganon; rather just following their programming to fight Link for his Shrine trials or whatever upcoming Champion is taking their test.
  • Laser Sight: With exception to the Guardian Scout models, their Eye Beams require maintaining a clear line of sight on the target for a few seconds before it can fire. This comes with a red dot and faint red mean tracking Link's location, and it serves as a clear visual cue that you're in danger of being shot.
  • Leitmotif: They have their own distinct piano theme that plays upon finding you. Decayed Guardians have a slower variation.
  • Lightning Bruiser: The Stalkers are as fast as Link is on horseback, are incredibly durable, and their laser blasts can deal a horrific six hearts per hit, potentially killing Link in a single shot until he upgrades his health.
  • Logical Weakness: Because of how Stalkers and Skywatchers are designed, they can't look directly up. Thus, if the player is careful enough, they can cripple the Guardian without even alerting them to what attacked them in the first place.
  • Mascot Mook: The Stalkers are a very well-known part of the game (one was the first enemy shown in the initial trailer, and they have an amiibo as well). The fact that they were the ones directly responsible for destroying the Kingdom of Hyrule has a lot to do with it. It's also rather telling that they are the only Guardian to not be seen uncorrupted in modern Hyrule — while the DLC add Sheikah-commanded Turrets and Skywatchers that test Link in addition to the Scouts in shrines, Stalkers never appear outside of Ganon's control.
  • Mecha-Mook: Zig-zagged: Guardian Scouts not in Tests of Strength are no more difficult than most monsters you fight. Guardian Stalkers, on the other hand, are among the most dangerous non-boss threats in Hyrule, and early on, your only way to survive an encounter with them is to Run or Die or risk a very precise laser parry.
  • Motifs: The Guardians, and Ancient Sheikah technology in general, are based off of Jōmon Pottery, an ancient form of pottery from Japan dating back about 3000 years.
  • Non-Indicative Name: Meant to be Hyrule's protectors, they instead became its destroyers.
  • Not Quite Dead: Broken Guardians can be found rusting and growing moss across Hyrule. Unfortunately, despite their dilapidated condition, some of them are still operational and "wake up" if Link draws near. You can use the Stasis+ Rune or the Camera Rune as a sort of Interface Spoiler to tell which dilapidated Guardians are actually dead and which will wake up when Link gets too close. Wearing the Champion's Tunic also displays their health bar beforehand.
  • One-Hit Kill: On both sides of the spectrum. If you don't have enough health and/or defense, their laser becomes this to you, even ignoring the hidden protection against being killed instantly by enemy attacks otherwise. On the other hand, firing an Ancient Arrow at one's eye (or parrying a weaker Decayed Guardian's beam) destroys it instantly.
  • Playing Possum: In a few Guardian graveyards, a fully intact Stalker will disguise itself as a non-functioning Decayed Guardian to ambush an unwary Link. Most intact Decayed Guardians really are deactivated, though, keeping the player paranoid.
  • Scare Chord: Unless a player has mastered the game's combat system or become well equipped, the fast piano intro to their Leitmotif will instill immediate panic.
  • Sealed Army in a Can: Meant to be the brunt force of attack against Calamity Ganon, they're extremely resilient, and are a significant threat even when decayed. They survived millennia underground to begin with, and could be brought to full capacity operation within a relatively short time by the contemporary Hyruleans. The Sheikah built them to last, so much that only moss is able to stick to them. All it took from Ganon was to take over them, and they razed Hyrule to the ground.
  • Sequel Non-Entity: Despite how prominent and numerous they were in Breath of the Wild, not a single Guardian appears during the events of Tears of the Kingdom. It's not even mentioned what happened to the Guardians that caused them to disappear in the first place, making their absence here even more curious.
  • Spider Tank: The Guardian Stalkers are the magitek equivalent, possessing a laser-shooting eye and several tentacle-like legs. Some of them no longer have legs, leaving them immobile, but they can still rotate and fire lasers, making them similar to the Beamos.
  • Slow Laser: Their Eye Beams are ridiculously fast and difficult to block or dodge, but they can be blocked and dodged. On the other hand, their targeting Laser Sight is instantaneous and cannot be escaped without intervening obstructions.
  • Stationary Enemy: Decayed Guardians and Guardian Turrets are rooted to their spots and cannot move — the former having lost the use of their legs and the latter having been built that way — and instead rotate in place, firing their lasers and acting as automated gun emplacements.
  • Subsystem Damage: The legs of Stalkers and propellers of Skywatchers can be targeted and destroyed separately from their bodies — in fact, they can be attacked even in the window between the Guardian being defeated and exploding. In addition to dropping some additional parts, this will reduce the speed and mobility of the Guardian and, if all are destroyed, immobilize them entirely outside of their rotating turret.
  • Sucking-In Lines: Larger Guardian models produce a very rapid sucking-in effect when firing their lasers. It's seen most easily during the Bullet Time when Link executes a perfect shield block Attack Reflector.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Guardian Turrets are stationary, pillar-shaped enemies capable of full rotation and shooting lasers from their single eye. In other words, they're Beamos in everything but name.note 
  • Tron Lines: They're covered in glowing magic markings and lines.
  • Turned Against Their Masters: The Old Man and Impa both elaborate that the Guardians were originally supposed to assist Link in defeating Calamity Ganon when he arose, but Ganon was able to infuse his Malice into them and turn them to his side instead. Only the Guardian Scouts in shrines and the Guardian Skywatchers and Turrets in the monks' trials in the DLC are uncorrupted, though since they are meant to test you, their behavior is no different and just as hostile.
  • Weaksauce Weakness:
    • Guardian Stalkers are deadly, durable and fast. However, their eyes take massive damage from the very lasers that fire out of them, and since they are mounted on the front of their cylindrical heads, the space above them (or even right on top of their heads) is a blind spot.
    • Skywatchers are everything Stalkers are, but can also fly. However, their heads are mounted directly below them, thus giving them a pretty obvious blind spot that's right next to their propellers.
  • When All You Have Is a Hammer…: All Guardians aside from Scouts only have one attack, their energy beam, and it's usually all they ever need.

Guardian Scouts

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/guardian_scouts.png
Clockwise from the top left, Guardian Scouts I, II, III and IV.

Smaller guardians placed inside Divine Beasts and Shrines as internal security and part of their trials. They have only three legs and fire barrages of laser blasts instead of their bigger counterparts' single powerful beam, but more advanced models are also equipped with melee weapons.

Guardian Scouts I, the weakest model, are found scattered around the Divine Beasts and inside Shrine challenges, serving as minor obstacles for Link. Guardian Scouts II, III and IV are found in Minor, Moderate and Major Tests of Strength, respectively, where a battle against a single Guardian serves as that Shrine's trial. Guardian Scouts II are also encountered as obstacles in a few other shrines and Vah Naboris, Medoh, and Ruta.


  • A.I. Breaker: In some Tests of Strength, there's nothing notable about the arena save for a flooded floor, intended for you to use Cryonis to stop the Guardian Scout's spinning attack. However, if you freeze the floor at just the right moment between the spin attack's start and the Guardian Scout's collision with Link, the Cryonis pillar will sprout up, launch the Guardian Scout into the air, and when it lands, it will be "dizzy" for a moment due to the game not knowing what to do in that turn of events, as it just frantically whirls its weapons around while its arms are folded up, allowing you to whale on it.
  • Boss in Mook Clothing: The Guardian Scouts in Test of Strength Shrines are essentially minibosses, as they're the sole challenge for their Shrines, but they don't have a HP Bar at the top of the screen like other overworld bosses despite having more health than a Black Hinox. In particular, Guardian Scout IV model found in the Major Tests of Strength has 3000 HP and weapons on par with the Royal gear, making it as strong as a Blue Lynel.
  • Dub Name Change: They're called "Small Guardians" in Japanese (小型ガーディアン, "Kogata Gādian"), Miniguardians in Spanish (Miniguardián), and some variant of Nano-Guardians everywhere else (Nano-Wächter, Nano Gardien, Nanoguardiano).
  • Laser Blade: Guardian Scouts wield swords, axes, spears, and shields fashioned from blue energy. Link can take them for himself, and they deal 1.3x effective damage on all enemies made with Ancient Technology, including other Guardians and the Blight Ganons. That said, the Guardian++ weapons still pale in comparison to Robbie's manufactured Ancient Weapons, which deal more effective damage to Guardians while being much more durable.
  • Mini-Boss: Guardian Scout II, III, and IV models serve as these in Minor, Modest, and Major Tests of Strength trials respectively.
  • Mini Mook: Guardian Scouts, smaller versions of Guardians around Link's height, can be found inside the Shrines as a test for the Hero; corrupted Scouts are also found in the four Divine Beasts. Notably, the fourth and highest tier of Guardian Scouts has twice the health of and can hit harder than basic Stalkers.
  • Multi-Melee Master: Guardian Scouts can wield up to three weapons at once, or two and a shield. They don't double up on weapons, and thus come equipped with one each of the Guardian swords, spears and/or axes.
  • Non-Indicative Name: They don't really do much in the way of scouting — the basic type serve as security for shrines and Divine Beasts, while the stronger variants are sedentary residents of combat challenges. This is a bit of a translation artifact, as only the English dub calls them Scouts — all other languages, including Japanese, use more accurate variants on the theme of Small/Mini/Nano-Guardian.
  • Spin Attack: Guardian Scouts in Test of Strength shrines will occasionally leap backward and twirl across the arena with their weapons extended to hit Link. If the shrine has breakable or magnetic pillars in it, he can lure them to crash into one, stunning them. If there's water in the shrine, he can do the same using the Cryonis rune. Even if Link chooses not to go with any of these strategies, the move can still be countered with a backwards Perfect Dodge and Flurry Rush.
  • Sucking-In Lines: When their health is reduced to around 10% and they're charging up a Stalker-level laser, Scouts go through an extended sequence where streamers of blue light are drawn in a tightening circle around their eye before, eventually, their laser fires.
  • Warm-Up Boss: The Guardian Scout II in the Ta‘loh Naeg Shrine at Kakariko Village serves primarily to teach you about the more advanced aspects of combat, like parrying, dodging, and charge attacks.
  • Zero-Effort Boss: If you take a Thunder weapon into any of the Test of Strength shrines that has metal blocks in it, luring the Guardian Scout onto one that's been electrified by placing said weapon on it will cause the Guardian to stun-lock and take damage infinitely until it dies.

    Pebblits 

Pebblits

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/botw_pebblits.png
Top to bottom: Stone, Frost, and Igneo Pebblits.

The tiny offspring of the larger Taluses. Pebblits are often encountered in Hyrule's mountains and badlands, where they lie half-buried in the ground and pose as regular rocks until approached.


  • Action Bomb: Once picked up, Pebblits will twitch for a bit, slowing to a stop, before exploding. Throwing them will break them apart on impact.
  • Cephalothorax: Their bodies consist primarily of a large, rocky "head", to which their stumpy limbs are attached.
  • Living Lava: Igneo Pebblits are clusters of glowing, semi-molten rock that live near the lava lakes around the Death Mountain area.
  • Logical Weakness: Iron Sledgehammers, Goron greatswords, and Drillshafts will instantly shatter Pebblits as they are designed to break rocks.
  • Mini Mook: The Taluses' tiny young, fought as regular enemies. They're even found in the same molten and freezing variants as Taluses.
  • One-Hit Kill: Pebblits will be instantly destroyed if hit by a Cobble Crusher or its stronger variants, Drillshaft, Sledgehammer, or Bomb Arrow, as these are tools meant to break apart rock, and which are thus very effective against beings of living stone. They are also brittle enough that throwing them from above your head is enough to break them.
  • Palette Swap: Pebblits come in purely aesthetic color variants depending on where they're found — most are the same light grey as most common rocks, but the ones found on Death Mountain are dark grey and those around the Gerudo Highlands are the same reddish color as the local rocks.
  • Piñata Enemy: While they don't give tons of valuable stones like their larger parents, Pebblits can be used to farm them when in groups, and they even go down in a single bomb explosion.
  • Rock Monster: They're made up of numerous rounded boulders and an ore deposit assembled into a vaguely humanoid form. This makes them extremely resistant, and often all but impervious to, damage from most weapons, but tools meant for mining and breaking apart rocks (such as the Goron weapons or Sledgehammers) will smash Pebblits to pieces.
  • Underground Monkey: Besides the common Stone Pebblits, there are the Igneo Pebblits, which are made of burning volcanic rock and found on the slopes of Death Mountain, and the Frost Pebblits, whose bodies are frozen solid and which can be found in cold, snowy uplands.
  • Weaksauce Weakness: Pebblits can be defeated by simply picking them up. In the process Link flips them upside-down, so even if they're set down gently they can't move, and explode shortly after.

    Stalfos varieties 

Stalkoblins, Stalmoblins and Stalizalfos

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/botw_stalkoblin_model.png
Stalkoblin
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/stalmoblin.png
Stalmoblin
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/stalizalfos.jpg
Stalizalfos

At night, Link will occasionally be accosted by skeletal versions of Bokoblins, Moblins, Lizalfos, and Hinox. In dungeons, mouthed pools of Malice will also spawn Cursed versions of these enemies that consist only of a floating head.

For the Stalnox, see the Hinox folder below.


  • Ambushing Enemy: Some Stalkoblins and Stalizalfos pretend to be inert piles of bones in order to ambush Link, and will only spring up to attack when he's right on top of them.
  • Bad with the Bone: Both Link and enemy alike can snatch up a fallen Stal- monster's arm and and use it like a weapon. Bokoblin Arms function like a typical one-handed club, Moblin Arms are used as a two-handed club, and Llizalfos arms can be thrown like a boomerang.
  • Boom, Headshot!: The only way to kill a Stal- enemy (aside from the Stalnox) is to destroy their skull. If they are in a group even this won't work until every skull is gone as if one is present it can be "shared" between the all of the bodies. Additionally, scoring a headshot on one with an arrow will instantly kill that head, without needing to collapse the stal- and destroy its head once it's on the ground.
  • Cranium Chase: A headless Stal- body will try to find and reattach its lost head, aided in this by its cranium actively hopping towards it. In fact, any stal body will happily reattach any head of the same type.
  • Damn You, Muscle Memory!: Stalizalfos will occasionally attempt to attack you with their tongue attacks like their living counterparts. This is completely harmless to Link because they don't have them, for obvious reasons.
  • Dem Bones: Skeletal versions of common enemies.
  • Fastball Special: Much like how regular Moblins will throw Bokoblins when lacking for weapons, Stalmoblins will throw Stals' skulls.
  • Flying Face: Cursed enemies are variants of the stal- foes that consist of nothing but a flying skull animated by Ganon's power and dregs of its former personality.
  • Fragile Flyer: Cursed skulls are among the very few flying monsters in the game, but have a single point of health apiece, will die from any attack, and rely on staying above Link's melee range most of the time. Their primary advantage is that, during Divine Beast segments, they simply ignore the pit-and-platform navigation puzzles that limit Link's mobility.
  • Glass Cannon: They can hit pretty hard, but they can be killed in just two hits: one to scatter their bones, the second to smash their skulls. If you're good with your bow you can even kill them with only one shot directly to the skull, as the skulls only have one HP. The Stalnox, though, is just as strong as its flesh-and-blood equivalent and has a far more durable weak point.
  • Glowing Eyelights of Undeath: Stal-enemies, including Stalhorses, have glowing red, yellow or green orbs in their otherwise empty eye sockets.
  • Hellish Horse: Stalkoblins can sometimes ride undead skeletal horses called Stalhorses. However, the Stalhorses themselves aren't hostile to Link and thus he can actually ride them like any other horse. They can't be registered at a stable because the stablekeepers think that they'll eat the regular horses and they disintegrate during the day like all Stal enemies, though.
  • Horn Attack: Just like their living Lizalfos counterparts, Stalizalfos will swing their heads back and forth, using their new Lizalfos Horns as swords.
  • Non-Human Undead: The skeletal remains of porcine orc-like creatures and of Lizard Folk.
  • One-Hit-Point Wonder: Stal- skulls have only a single hit point each, and need a single blow when on the ground — or a single arrow at any time — to be destroyed. Full skeletons can use their otherwise indestructible bodies to absorb blows, but cursed heads lack even this protection.
  • Pulling Themselves Together: Attacking a Stal- enemy will cause its body to collapse in a jumble of bones. If the head isn't killed in a set amount of time, the bones will drift back towards each other and reassemble into a headless skeleton, which will then try to chase down its cranium.
  • Ramming Always Works: In Tears of the Kingdom, like their living Bokoblin counterparts, Stalkoblins can ram their enemies with their new Bokoblin Horns.
  • Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain: A variation in that, if they spawn in a group, they'll all keep Pulling Themselves Together until all their skulls are destroyed.
  • Soulless Shell: The Cursed enemies are stated by the Compendium to have been brought back to a simple mockery of life by Ganon's power in a way that cost them all intelligence and personality, leaving only mindless shells directed only by lingering malice. In-game, this is reflected by their very simple behavioral patterns — they hover passively in place until they spot Link, at which point they attack by simply flying right towards him, and lack the complex attack patterns and idle animations of both regular Stal- creatures and their living counterparts.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute:
    • They are this for the ordinary Stalfos, which don't appear in this game and its sequel.
    • The Cursed heads act almost exactly the same as Bubbles, another type of flying skull enemies found in previous games.
  • Token Good Teammate: The Stalhorses. While they're commonly ridden by Stalkoblins and look creepy as hell, they won't attack Link, even letting him ride them. In Tears of the Kingdom, this is useful for crossing Gloom in The Depths.
  • Undead Counterpart: They're skeletal, undead counterparts to the game's main humanoid enemies.
  • Use Your Head: Just like their living Moblin counterparts, Stalmoblins can slam their heads down on Link with their new Moblin Horns.
  • Weakened by the Light: They only attack at night because they instantly disintegrate when dawn comes. This also means that in the Depths, where it's essentially Always Night, they can show up anywhere, anytime. They can be instantly defeated with the newly introduced Dazzle Fruit in Tears of the Kingdom.
  • Weaksauce Weakness: None of the Stal- enemies can swim. In fact, if they or their skulls hit water too deep to wade in, they dissolve instantly. They're generally smart enough to avoid going into the water, but Link can knock them into nearby water sources (or just throw the skulls into the water).

Introduced in Tears of the Kingdom

    Constructs 

Constructs

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/450px_alpha_elitekonstrukt_totk_illustration.png
A Captain Construct

A line of ancient automatons built by the mysterious Zonai, first introduced in Tears of the Kingdom. While many varieties of Construct exist, each performing different functions, the combat-based models are actively aggressive to Link, and thus those varieties are considered enemies.

These models of Construct will defend their territory from any invaders, attacking both Link and Ganon's minions alike to follow their original programming to the letter.

  • Soldier Constructs: The most common variant of enemy Construct, one-eyed infantry found guarding Zonai ruins all across the world.
  • Captain Constructs: A more elite variant of the Construct infantry, easily recognizable by their three-eyed, cone-shaped heads. These more dangerous Constructs are capable of utilizing the Fuse ability to deadly effect, creating improvised weapons from nearby (often pre-placed) materials and devices on the fly.
  • Flux Constructs: The most powerful form of enemy Construct, a gestalt collection of giant cubes able to take a variety of forms, and act as mini-bosses that can be found throughout Hyrule. For tropes on these particular Constructs, see their entry in Overworld Mini-Bosses below.

In addition, all models of enemy Construct each have multiple varieties of increasing strength and difficulty, from levels I up to IV.


  • Cyber Cyclops: Soldier Constructs have a single large eye, in contrast to the many-eyed Captains. The Captain Construct IV only has one eye, however.
  • Dub Name Change: In the original Japanese, they are just called Golems (ゴーレム).
  • Fire-Breathing Weapon: The Zonai invented Flame Emitters, and their Constructs (mainly their Captains) are keen on using them.
  • Go for the Eye: In normal Zelda fashion, their very prominent eyes also double as weak points for arrows.
  • Gold-Colored Superiority: The Mark IV versions of the Soldier and Captain lines are distinguished from their lower-grade green counterparts by their full-body golden finish.
  • Horn Attack: Soldier Constructs can swing their heads at Link to attack him with their horns.
  • Hover Bot: The Soldiers and Captains have no legs, simply floating slightly above the ground.
  • Improbable Weapon User: As natural for Zonai creations, they are more than capable of using and spawning with Fused weapons, with the Captain Constructs even able to use Fuse themselves on the spot. This leads to even basic Soldiers firing at Link with Fused Rocket-arrows, or Captains creating flamethrowers using nearby rubies.
  • Literally Shattered Lives: Upon their defeat, the energy holding their components together dies with them, causing them to collapse into their component pieces.
  • Mêlée à Trois: If Link decides to get in the middle of a skirmish between Ganon's monsters and Constructs, it will result in a three-faction battle of Link vs. the Monsters vs. the Constructs, with the latter two factions trying just as hard to kill each other as they do Link.
  • Mook Lieutenant: The Captain Constructs are the captains of the constructs as their names imply.
  • Punch-Clock Villain: Unlike the Sheikah Guardians of Breath of the Wild, these automatons are not corrupted at all, but are simply following their original programming to defend their territory — regardless of who the intruder is. Even the friendly Constructs will warn Link that the Soldiers cannot be reasoned with and have no qualms about him defending himself from them.
  • Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: Unlike the Malice-corrupted Guardians in the previous game, Constructs are functioning properly, meaning that they are not allied to the monsters. In certain situations, it is possible to get them to fight nearby monsters by luring them together.
  • Slasher Smile: The non-Flux types have a Tombstone Teeth-like design below their eyes to evoke this.
  • Spin Attack: Their cylindrical and segmented structure allows them to rotate their entire bodies about their axis to make stronger attacks.
  • Underground Monkey: Much like other common enemy species, enemy Constructs have their own varieties of increasing strength and difficulty, going from levels I up to potentially IV marked by an increasing amount of armour, ornamentation, and more elaborate horns (which in turn make for stronger Fuse materials).

    Boss Bokoblins 

Boss Bokoblins

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/bosskoblin.png

Much stronger and much larger than the regular Bokoblin, introduced in Tears of the Kingdom. Often found as leaders of larger Bokoblin tribes and encampments.


  • Blow That Horn: They're equipped with much larger horns than the tower sentries, using such to command their smaller Bokoblin grunts in various formations.
  • Boss in Mook Clothing: The fact that they have "Boss" in their name aside, Boss Bokoblins are much tougher than your average Bokoblin, being able to not only command their smaller counterparts, but have an extraordinary amount of health and hit quite hard.
  • Brutish Character, Brutish Weapon: Boss Bokoblins almost always wield two-handed heavy weapons such as Sturdy/Gnarled Thick Stick and Claymore hammers, showing their preference for brute strength when on their own. They typically only use other weapon types when disarmed and scrambling to grab the first thing they see.
  • Composite Character: Aside from being based on the Boss Blins from Spirit Tracks and Hyrule Warriors' Legends Wind Waker storyline, they also command Bokoblins in formations just like Chief Soldiers in Four Swords Adventures, though killing Boss Bokoblins does not cause the Bokoblins to lose cohesion.
  • Cycle of Hurting: Boss Bokoblins are probably the biggest monsters who aren't immune to the stunning effects of elemental damage; ice freezes them, lightning jitters them, and fire has them hop around to put themselves out.
  • Elite Mooks: Boss Bokoblins are implied to be much smarter and more competent at security than regular Bokoblins, since they're usually found in elaborate Bokoblin-built fortresses rather than the usual skull-shaped or tower-shaped enemy encampments the regular Bokoblins make in Breath of the Wild.
  • Emergency Weapon: If disarmed, or if Link is out of range of their melee attacks, Boss Bokoblins will dig up boulders out of the ground and toss them at him.
  • Fat Bastard: They have quite a large gut compared to Moblins or regular Bokoblins, but are just as aggressive and monstrous.
  • Giant's Knife; Human's Greatsword: Boss Bokoblins tower over Link, and as a result, wield two-handed weapons like claymores and Sturdy Thick Sticks with only a single hand.
  • King Mook: These guys are bigger than the average Bokoblin, and they lead the charge by sounding their horn.
  • Large and in Charge: They are much bigger than the standard Bokoblins and, as their name suggests, act as their bosses whenever present.
  • Mook Commander: They command groups of Bokoblins to form up in various ways. Once they sight Link, they command the surrounding Bokoblins into a shield wall so the Boss is (mostly) protected from frontal attacks like Flurry Rushes. If Link is up close, they will order their Bokoblins to do a group overhead-swinging attack so that Link can't easily dodge them all at once. If Link is far away, they will order their Bokoblins to continuously throw small rocks at Link to tack on bits of damage.
  • Mook Lieutenant: As the name implies, Boss Bokoblins command the Bokoblins around them.
  • Ramming Always Works: Just like Bokoblins, Boss Bokoblins can ram Link with their Boss Bokoblin Horns if they have weapons or no weapons equipped.
  • Slouch of Villainy: Boss Bokoblins can often be found lounging on their sides, ala King Dedede, when they aren't patrolling the area or in combat.
  • Super Drowning Skills: Like their lesser kin, Boss Bokoblins will die if they fall in the water and have a unique drowning animation if that happens.

    Aerocudas 

Aerocudas

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/aerocuda.png

Flying enemies introduced in Tears of the Kingdom that can carry around other monsters to drop down on Link.


  • Airborne Mooks: They're flying enemies, and groups of them can be found patrolling sky islands and the Wind Temple.
  • Bombardier Mook: They can carry items such as rocks, barrels, Snowballs, or other monsters to drop on Link. In combat, unarmed Aerocudas will prioritize grabbing loose rocks and similar items when these are available over simply dive-bombing Link.
  • Fragile Flyer: Although marginally stronger than Keese, they are still extremely weak, roughly equal to a Bokoblin in strength, and can be killed just by shield-parrying their diving attacks. Unlike most other enemies, they also do not come in stronger variants.
  • Patrolling Mook: Aerocudas are usually found flying around enemy bases; and upon spotting Link, they will screech loudly, alerting all other monsters in the area.
  • Portmanteau: A combination of "aero-" and the predatory fish "barracuda", a wordplay also present in the original Japanese name Kakkuuda (a combination of kakkuu/滑空 — meaning "to glide" — and barracuda).
  • Sleepy Enemy: When not fighting Link and/or patrolling, they'll hang upside down and sleep like bats do, or just rest on a cliff face.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute : To the Kargaroks of The Wind Waker and Twilight Princess, being common and weak flying enemies that can often be found carrying objects or other monsters in their strong talons.

    Like Likes 

Like Likes

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/like_like.png

Worm-like enemies often found attached to the walls or ceilings of caves who will attempt to swallow Link whole if he comes near them.


  • Adaptational Ugliness: Unlike previous iterations, which were just ringed tubes or blobs, this version of the classic Like Like is far more grotesque and monstrous looking, being covered in spines and warty growths, having numerous and irregularly-spaced sharp teeth, prominent, fleshy lips, and two stumpy legs.
  • Attack Its Weak Point: When getting ready to eat Link, they will expose their teardrop-shaped tongues. Any hit on these will cause large damage and temporarily stun the Like Like, allowing Link to further whale on the exposed appendage.
  • Early-Bird Boss: There's a Like Like on the Great Sky Island, where you'll have only sticks with bits of scrap and out-of-date bows to handle it.
  • Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: Fire and Ice Like Likes can be stunned with elements they're weak to, allowing you to start whaling on them without waiting for an opening. They're actually far more resilient than other elemental enemies, though, who poof instead.
  • Feed It a Bomb: They can be fed bombs when their weak points are exposed, but, since you can easily stun them with just about anything it's probably a waste of a bomb unless it's a Rock Like.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: There exist Fire, Ice, and Shock versions of Like Likes, in addition to the standard and Rock variations. They spit balls of their element, and their Stones can be used to make elemental bludgeons.
  • Heavily Armored Mook: Rock Likes have a rocky coating on their bodies and tongues, which protects them from harm until broken off by bashing weapons or bombs.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard: You can use Recall to reflect a Rock Like's rocks back at it, cracking its armor and stunning it, though it does take a bit of timing to make sure the rock isn't just destroyed by the next one it spits up.
  • Money Spider: They always drop a treasure chest containing a shield or weapon on defeat... and either a weapon or five arrows, for good measure.
  • Mooks Ate My Equipment: As is tradition with Like Likes, after they spit Link out again they will keep either the weapon or shield he had equipped, with killing them being the only way to get it back.
  • Stationary Enemy: Unlike previous games where they were mobile enemies, Like Likes in this game anchor themselves to cave walls, and less commonly outdoor cliffs, and never move. The regular variety relies on baiting Link close enough to itself to snatch him up and try to eat him, while the more specialized kinds can fire off fire, electricity, frost or rocks to fight from a distance.
  • Tongue Trauma: They will periodically expose their glowing, bulbous tongues right before they try and swallow Link. The rest of their body is pretty tough, but their tongue is their most vulnerable point, and even a single arrow to the tongue will paralyze the Like Like for several seconds, allowing you to whale on it.
  • Underground Monkey: Rock, lightning, ice, and fire variants can be encountered, with each having a respective elemental long range attack.

    Horriblins 

Horriblins

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/horriblin.png

Cave dwelling monsters that appeared following the Upheaval. They hang on the ceiling of caves, waiting to drop down on unsuspecting prey.


  • Ceiling Cling: They like to hang from the ceiling of caves before dropping down on any passersby.
  • Gag Nose: They all sport large bulbous noses and even the Horriblin Mask also sports a comically crafted one.
  • Lightning Bruiser: They're fast, durable, strong, and are always prepared with some form of spear equipped when encountered.
  • Long-Range Fighter: They tend to stick to the ceilings of their cave dwellings, attacking by throwing rocks from a distance and with spear-type weapons, usually with a second spear weapon fused to them.
  • Maniac Monkeys: Monsters resembling monkeys that are hostile to Link. When knocking them off the ceiling, they hold their rears in pain like Twilight Princess's Ook.
  • Pain to the Ass: If they're knocked from the ceiling via a headshot or Dazzle Fruit, they'll hit the ground butt-first while taking Fall Damage and spend a long amount of time whimpering while clutching their behinds.
  • Portmanteau: A combination of "horrible" and the "-blin" suffix used for Zelda's common goblin-like enemy species.
  • Running on All Fours: Downplayed, since they usually fight on their two legs or hang on ceilings, but if put in a situation where they don't have a ceiling to cling to (such as after being lured outside with the Horriblin Mask or knocked out of their caves) they will drop to all fours and dash back to where they have the advantage. This can also be seen during the scene of Ganondorf leading his army to obliterate Hyrule to make his new kingdom.

    Evermeans 

Evermeans

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/evermean.png

Monsters that mimic trees that attack passersby, first introduced in Tears of the Kingdom.


  • Achilles' Heel: While Pebblits are vulnerable to blunt weapons (hammers in particular), Evermeans are vulnerable to edged weapons (axes in particular).
  • Ambushing Enemy: They spend most of their time still and rooted in the dirt, looking precisely the same as regular trees up until the moment when Link wanders close enough that they uproot themselves and attack. They can thankfully be told apart by how they wiggle a bit when Link draws somewhat near; additionally, they will visibly flinch if shot with an arrow, whereas regular trees obviously don't.
  • Antepiece: The sidequest to get Hestu's help has you fight two Evermeans for him, which he warns you about beforehand. Downplayed in that you might fight Evermeans before this, by entering a forest before pursuing any of the Regional Phenomena.
  • Death Throws: They're chopped down like regular trees upon defeat, their upper bodies tipping back before they poof into logs.
  • Delicious Distraction: Some Evermeans disguise themselves as apple trees, in essence attempting to lure Link into picking their apples so that they can kill him. These aren't limited to regular, low-level apples either; they might hold rare Golden Apples or Courser Bee hives as well.
  • Impossible Item Drop: The critters Evermeans drop are still alive, unlike the fish Octoroks drop, and will fly or skitter away if not picked up in a few seconds. The item drops also emerge from the Evermean's trunk, much like the occasional item drop from felling regular trees.
  • Logical Weakness: Ambulatory trees are still trees, so they can be chopped down quickly with any axe, sword, and/or claymore weapon. They are also still made of wood, so they don't respond well to fire.
  • No-Sell: Like regular trees, most spear thrusts, most arrow shots, and any blunt weapon attack are wasted durability against them.
  • Portmanteau: A portmanteau of "evergreen" and "mean".
  • Smash Mook: Their only attack is to smash Link with their foliage.
  • Weak to Fire: As they're nothing but mobile trees, fire does some heavy damage to them.
  • When Trees Attack: They are basically attack trees and yield the same drops as them.

    Gibdos 

Gibdos

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/gibdos_7.jpeg

A race of classic Zelda monsters making their return in Tears of the Kingdom, descending after the Upheaval to terrorize the Gerudo region. From afar, they resemble desiccated humanoid corpses - until closer inspection reveals that they are not the simple undead they appear to be. They possess tough skin that strongly resists normal physical damage, requiring the use of elemental attacks to make them effectively vulnerable.


  • Adaptational Species Change: Gibdos have traditionally been depicted as either reanimated corpses wrapped in bandages or magical constructs in the appearance of dead people. This incarnation of the Gibdo is an almost insectoid creature that just happens to resemble a mummified corpse, with other variants appearing even more moth-like, and all of them are the hive spawn of an firmly insectoid monster.
  • Armored But Frail: Under most circumstances, Gibdos are invulnerable to most physical weapons. However, once they are hit with elemental magic, it doesn't take much to bring them down.
  • Attack Its Weak Point: Not the Gibdos themselves, but the Gibdo Hives from which they can emerge, which possess a glowing bulb in their stalks as their weak point. The bulb is only vulnerable while the hive is birthing Gibdos, during which it can be attacked to destroy the entire hive.
  • Bee People: Befitting their new insectoid nature, they are born from mushroom-like hives and even have their own Queen.
  • Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Gibdos are normally a dark sandy brown, but turn a pale white when attacked with fire, lightning, ice, water or light, indicating that they are now vulnerable to physical attacks.
  • Composite Character: Gibdos and ReDeads fall in a grey area as to whether they're two separate monsters or not, including one entity being translated as each depending on the country, but this incarnation seems to evoke the masked toothy grimace and corpselike look of Ocarina of Time's ReDeads (as well as inhabiting a desolate town in the same manner) while having the desert habitat and the name of the typically more mummy-themed Gibdo species. Their new insect elements also make them evoke the Mothula enemy species.
  • Fragile Flyer: Moth Gibdos are frailer than walking ones, as an elemental attack that can dispatch the flying Gibdos in one hit may not be enough to immediately kill a walking Gibdo by itself.
  • Glass Cannon: Not the monsters themselves, but their drops follow this principle. Gibdo Bones have a massive power stat for how easy Gibdos are to defeat (following Riju's story quest alone will net you dozens of bones) but break in a single hit, forcing you to strategize around repeated mid-battle fusing to make any use of them. (Or Fuse them to your arrows and let the quick-select make your life easier.)
  • Kung Fu-Proof Mook: They're mostly impervious to physical damage without getting hit with an elemental attack first, which poses quite the problem to the Gerudo when the undead bug things start invading their desert. Riju has been honing her lightning powers specifically to deal with them.
  • Left Stuck After Attack: Many Gibdos found on the map which aren't newly-birthed have weapons and arrow shafts stuck in them from unsuccessful warriors' attempts to physically attack them. Given they already resemble unhuman zombies, this adds a lot to their unsettling tone. As with Hinox types, these weapons can be collected from them.
  • Monstrous Humanoid: In contrast to their previous incarnations which were presumably mummified corpses, they are instead insect-like monsters that just happen to resemble decayed corpses.
  • Monstrous Mandibles: The most obvious sign that they aren't simple human undead are their insectoid mouthparts.
  • Mook Maker: Gibdo Hives are giant mushroom-like structures that can infinitely spawn Gibdos from their "caps", and are only vulnerable during this birthing process.
  • Moth Menace: The Moth Gibdos, an airborne variant of the Gibdo with a far more insectoid-leaning appearance than humanoid, most prominently their enormous moth wings.
  • Underground Monkey: Aside from regular Gibdos, the Moth Gibdos exist as a flying variant.
  • Weak to Fire: Gibdos are weakened by three basic elements, fire, ice, and lightning, as well as the less commonly used water, regardless of source.
  • Weakened by the Light: As is tradition, bright light and use of a mirror shield are a way to break a Gibdo's defense and make it vulnerable. As such, this affects where they can go—they only become able to menace the surface because the Queen Gibdo creates a dark sand shroud over the desert, and after her defeat, they stick to caves, tombs, and the Depths.
  • Weaksauce Weakness: They're weak to every element. Combine that with the fact the game nudges the player to visit Gerudo Desert last, most players will have a surplus of elemental fruit, gems and chu jellies, as well as elemental monster parts such as eyes, wings or horns, to shoot, throw at, or hit them with. Additionally, the powers bestowed by Sidon and Yunobo are elemental and work just as well as Riju's lightning, letting a well stocked player that figures out the trick (or reads the loading screen tip) mow them down by the dozen before even reaching Gerudo Town. Conversely a player that heads right for the Gerudo region, in addition to stronger monsters on the way, will have to deal with the Early Game Hell of low supplies.
  • Zombie Gait: Gibdos are normally slow and ungainly, but during the Gerudo Town siege after the hives are destroyed, the last phase of the Queen Gibdo boss fight, and the Demon King's Army battle in the Depths, they start scuttling forward on all fours quite quickly.
  • Zombie Puke Attack: Moth Gibdos primarily attack by vomiting. One of Queen Gibdo's attacks also involves spitting in much the same way.

    Little Frox 

Little Frox

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/little_frox.png

The miniature offspring of the large frog-like beasts prowling the Depths, these can be commonly encountered in packs separate from their parents throughout Hyrule's underground.


  • Amphibian Assault: They are tiny frog-like monsters hostile to Link.
  • Helpful Mook: They're apparently immune to the Gloom (seeing how they don't spread it to Link), and they drop Brightbloom Seeds upon defeat, along with the Zoanite yielded by most foes of the Depths.
  • Mini Mook: The offspring of the Frox, fought as regular enemies, similar to the Pebblits to the Taluses.
  • Mooks Ate My Equipment: An interesting variation. The Little Frox are drawn to and will voraciously consume any sprouted Brightbloom Seeds near them, making them an active danger to Link's temporary light sources when traversing the Depths (and fittingly of course, they drop these same seeds when killed), though this also makes them vulnerable to Link attacking them if he's fast enough since they're too busy eating the sprouted Brightbloom Seeds to notice him.
  • Zerg Rush: They are very weak enemies, but make up for it by always attacking in numbers.

Overworld Mini-Bosses

    General Tropes 
A number of powerful beings found alone in specific areas, where Link can battle them for considerable rewards.
  • Contractual Boss Immunity: Overworld bosses cannot be frozen solid, electrocuted or vaporized with ancient arrows. The only exception to this are black Hinoxes, who can be electrocuted if you hit them on their metal greaves.
  • Gotta Kill 'Em All:
    • In Breath of the Wild after defeating Calamity Ganon and reloading your save, Kilton challenges you to find and slay every single one of these mini-bosses. Easy enough for the Molduga, of which there are only four in a single area of the map; not so much for the Taluses and Hinox, of which there are forty each scattered about everywhere. Defeat all of a single type and Kilton gives you a medal as proof of your accomplishment.
    • In Tears of the Kingdom, completing the mini-boss hunting quests given by Gralens at Lookout Landing (this time before beating the final boss) will have him give the same challenge to kill all of the mini-bosses, also giving you medals as a reward.
  • Mini-Boss: They're strong enemies that inhabit remote parts of Hyrule, and they each get a special health bar and Battle Theme Music to go with it.
  • Optional Boss: All of them are story-optional encounters, they are not necessary for game completion (although defeating some of them may be needed for certain side-quests) and only grant extra, usually valuable, loot.
  • Organ Drops: As with the regular monsters, they will vanish in a puff of Malice, leaving behind only an assortment of body parts or other valuable materials. In Tears of the Kingdom, Taluses and Flux Constructs will also drop a special material (Talus Hearts and Flux Construct Cores respectively) that is presumably too big to keep in your inventory and can't be picked up without the use of Ultrahand, but can be fused to a weapon to greatly raise its attack power.
  • Piñata Enemy: They drop a considerable amount of loot upon defeat, either powerful weapons or high-selling materials.

Introduced in Breath of the Wild

    Taluses 

Taluses

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/botw_taluses.jpg
Top to bottom: Stone, Frost, and Igneo Taluses.

Living rock monsters that are made up of uneven boulders, Taluses lie inert in the soil until you approach and surge to life under your feet.


  • Attack Its Weak Point: Most of a Talus' body is invulnerable, except for an ore deposit on its back.
  • Base on Wheels: Tears of The Kingdom introduces Battle Taluses, Taluses that Bokoblins built a base on, which act as their transportation when encountered on roads.
  • Catch and Return: The best way to deal with them in Tears of the Kingdom, if you have the reflexes for it, is the Recall ability. When they hurl one of their boulder arms at Link, simply cast Recall on it midair and send it back at the Talus to stun them.
  • Cephalothorax: Their bodies consist primarily of a large, rocky "head", to which their stumpy limbs are attached.
  • Colossus Climb: Link can climb a Talus' body, but given that they tend to slam forward into the ground, it's not wise to climb up the front.
  • Dub Name Change: In the original Japanese, the Taluses are all variations of "-rokku", literally the English word rock rendered in Japanese. For example, the Stone Talus is called Iwarokku (a Portmanteau of the Japanese word for rock - "iwa" - with the English word, making it literally "Rock-rock"). This "-rok" naming convention is preserved in some other languages - Lithorok in French, Sassorok in Italian and Petrarok in Spanish (from "sasso" and "petra", both meaning "stone").
  • He Was Right There All Along: By default, Taluses remain inert and half-buried in the ground, giving absolutely no indication that they're alive until Link's approach stirs them into action. Often, the player won't notice their presence until the pile of boulders that they're scrambling over digs itself out of the ground and attacks.
  • Interface Spoiler: Once you unlock the Camera Rune, you can tell which boulders are actually a Talus or not by hovering the camera over it and seeing if the ID appears.
  • King Mook:
    • Taluses are much bigger and tougher than Pebblits, to the point that they're fought as bosses.
    • The Igneo Talus Titan introduced in "The Champion's Ballad" DLC serves as this to regular-size Igneo Taluses, being even bigger and stronger.
  • Living Lava: Igneo Taluses are clusters of glowing, semi-molten rock that live near the lava lakes around the Death Mountain.
  • Logical Weakness:
    • Weapons built for mining or breaking rocks (particularly Goron weapons) do increased damage to Taluses. The Cobble Crusher, Stone Smasher, Boulder Breaker, and Drillshaft all do double damage while the Iron Sledgehammer does quadruple damage. In Tears of the Kingdom, any weapons with blunt Fuse materials attached rather than sharp ones are similarly effective.
    • Ice-related attacks such as Ice Arrows will extinguish Igneo Taluses and stop them flat for a few moments, as will fire attacks with Frost Taluses.
  • Meaningful Name: Talus is an alternate reading of Talos, which in Greek mythology was said to be a giant golem made of bronze. Equally appropriately, it's also another word for a scree slope, a deposit of broken rock built up at the foot of a cliff.
  • Mighty Glacier: Their stone body makes all attacks on it completely ineffective, even its ore deposit can take quite a beating without the right weapon, and also hit extremely hard and can easily kill Link in just a few blows due to them being sentient bunches of boulders as well, but their immense size and weight also means they're very slow, with all their attacks being telegraphed as well. The Battle Talus tries to get around this by having Bokoblins try to shoot you from a distance, though it's still just as slow as always.
  • Palette Swap: Taluses come in purely aesthetic color variants depending on where they're found — most are the same light grey as most common rocks, but others match the color of their surrounding geology — some are sandstone-tan, others mossy green, and one Talus found in the Zora's Domain area is blue. In practice, this is due to the game being coded so that Taluses automatically mimic the color of the bedrock in areas where they spawn — if game tools are used to make them spawn elsewhere on the map, they will similarly resemble the local soil or rock, including beach gravel, cobblestone, or rubble.
  • Piñata Enemy: Stone Taluses drop tons of gems, and as long as you have a healthy supply of Bomb Arrows and/or a reasonably powerful heavy weapon, you can easily defeat them. You can farm their stones for rupees and Item Crafting by returning to their locations every Blood Moon.
  • Portmanteau: In the original Japanese, the Taluses are all portmanteaus of a word relating to their element with the base name "-rokku" - quite literally the English word "rock" rendered in Japanese.
    • The Stone Talus is "Iwarokku", combining it with the Japanese word for rock, "iwa" (making it literally "Rock-rock").
    • The Igneo Talus is "Magurokku", obviously combined with the English word "magma" (this goes even further with the Igneo Talus Titan in the DLC - "Megamagurokku" - "Mega-Magma-Rock").
    • The Frost Talus is "Gachirokku", which combines with the Japanese expression "gachigachi", used to denote chattering teeth (as if from cold) or objects that are frozen solid.
    • Amusingly, the Battle Talus introduced in Tears of the Kingdom is "Ierokku", which combines with "ie" — the Japanese word for house (making it literally the "House-rock").
  • Rock Monster: They're made up of numerous rounded boulders and an ore deposit assembled into a vaguely humanoid form. This makes them extremely resistant, and often all but impervious to, damage from most weapons, but tools meant for mining and breaking apart rocks (such as the Goron weapons or Sledgehammers) will deal high damage to Taluses.
  • Schmuck Bait: A Talus' weak spot is an ore deposit that will periodically drop valuable minerals. Trying to pick them up can leave Link wide open for the Talus to attack. Thankfully, they don't despawn and you can safely pick them up after it falls.
  • Smash Mook: They have only four attacks: they hurl their rocky arms at you if you're far away, use two different punching attacks with their arms at close range, and try to fall over on top of you if you're under their torso. They're also slow and far from nimble and tend to telegraph their attacks. They get away with this by virtue of their high health pools and by being completely invulnerable to damage unless hit in one specific weak spot, allowing them to soak up considerable punishment while they try to smash you flat.
  • Subsystem Damage: Downplayed with Igneo and Frost Taluses. Their limbs cannot be destroyed separately from their bodies, but their fiery or icy coatings can be quenched or melted off separately from each other and their central body's using counter-elemental attacks. The Talus can re-ignite or -freeze them as the fight goes on, but until then this will allow Link to scale the targeted body parts without being set on fire or frozen.
  • Underground Monkey: There are three variations of Stone Talus, with weak points composed of one of the three types of ore deposits (regular, luminous stone, and rare stone). Then there are the Igneo Taluses, which are made of burning volcanic rock and found on the slopes of Death Mountain, and the Frost Taluses, whose bodies are frozen solid and which can be found in cold, snowy uplands. The DLC adds an Igneo Talus Titan as well, which is much larger. Tears of the Kingdom adds a fourth variation called the Battle Talus, which is a regular Stone Talus with a Bokoblin camp on top of it.

    Hinox 

Hinox

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/botw_black_hinox_model_9.png

Giant boar-like cyclopes that roam across Hyrule. Hinox carry a lot of useful loot on their bodies, including both high-end weapons strung on rope necklaces and large quantities of food. With sufficient stealth, Link can climb onto their sleeping forms and steal the weapons they guard without the Hinox ever noticing.


  • Acrofatic: Despite their size and being slow on land, Hinox are surprisingly good swimmers.
  • Affably Evil: Of all the enemy types, Hinox are by far the least antagonistic and hostile. With two exceptions, they generally stay away from settlements and roads and are often found sleeping the day away. In fact, with the right amount of stealth, it's possible to avoid fighting them entirely and simply steal whatever item they're wearing. When woken up they smack their lips as if sizing up a meal, and their main hostility is from having an interrupted nap and being hungry.
  • Artificial Brilliance: If a Hinox sees you aiming your bow and it's not in the middle of an attack, it will protect its eye with its hand after it reaches half health.
  • Ass Kicks You: If Link tries to evade their attacks by hiding beneath them, they'll capitalize on it by attempting to squash him with their behinds.
  • Battle Trophy: They wear a necklace of weapons collected from warriors they've defeated.
  • By the Lights of Their Eyes: There is a Hinox fought in a forest where there is no natural sunlight. It is noticeable by a glowing MacGuffin around its neck, and its huge glowing eye. The scenario, minus the glowing orb on its neck, is repeated in the Trial of the Sword DLC.
  • Carry a Big Stick: Hinoxes can snap trees off of their trunks with one hand, turning them into quite strong clubs, though they'll fortunately only swing them a few times before discarding them. A bat from one of these will even smash through Daruk's Protection, ragdolling Link helplessly, though the spell will still prevent damage.
  • Classical Cyclops: Hinox are lumbering, one-eyed giants with small horns on their brows, eager to snack on Hylian meat but vulnerable to blows at their giant, bulging eyes.
  • The Computer Shall Taunt You: Sometimes, Hinox will pause in the middle of a fight to lick their lips and stare at Link, seemingly savoring the future meal he will make. This actually creates a good opportunity to shoot them in the eye, as they won't protect their eye with their hand when they're taunting you.
  • Go for the Eye: Their single giant eye is their main weak point, and attacking them stuns them. You can fight the living Hinox without shooting their eyes, but for Stalnox, this is enforced, as the final blow must be landed on the eye to finish them off.
  • Ground Punch: The main attack used by all Hinox varieties is to hammer their fist into the ground in front of them. Black Hinox have an attack where they slam the ground with their hands in a very Donkey Kong-like fashion.
  • Ground Pound: If you're underneath a Hinox's hindquarters, they'll jump and try to smash you underneath. For Stalnox, this becomes Hoist by His Own Petard, as at half health or lower, this causes them to temporarily crumble, dislodging their eye.
  • Heavy Sleeper: They are constantly found sleeping, which you can use to your advantage by sneaking next to them and wailing down on them before they wake up. This only applies to Hinox; Stalnox don't sleep, but roam ceaselessly save for the one that guards the Hylian Shield underneath Hyrule Castle. In Tears of the Kingdom, they are still mostly asleep, though the game introduces a few living Hinox that walk about awake instead. They are also the only monsters who can be seen sleeping in the Depths, which the Yiga Clan has observed and written down in one of their Depths bases.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard: Hinox often wear armor around their ankles. Armor that is made of either wood or metal. Armor that burns with fire weapons or electrocutes the Hinox when hit with electric weapons, or a bolt of lightning. The lightning also applies to the metal weapons it wears around its neck, and the wooden armor will burn away, leaving its ankle vulnerable to weapons afterward.
  • Improvised Weapon: If you're fighting a Hinox while near trees, it will grab a tree and use it as a weapon.
  • It Can Think: Not only are they smart enough to wear necklaces of rare and powerful weapons, most likely as a lure for greedy travelers, Tears of the Kingdom demonstrates they're smart enough to wrap their horns in various odds and ends to use them as hammers.
  • King Mook: Because of their piglike appearance, ability to use weapons, and color-based strength level, they can be considered giant, one-eyed Bokoblins.
  • Law of Chromatic Superiority: There are several variants of Hinox — Red, Blue, and Black — which are progressively stronger and more difficult to defeat.
  • Lazy Bum: They spend all day and night sleeping. Some Hinox in Tears of the Kingdom do not sleep, but instead roam around. The Yiga Clan even make note that because Hinoxes are the only monster that sleeps in the Depths, they must be exceptionally lazy creatures.
  • Leitmotif: This song plays while fighting Hinox.
  • Mighty Glacier: They're some of the slowest creatures you can encounter and battle, but they are immensely tough.
  • Our Ogres Are Hungrier: They fill the role of "ogre" in the Zeldaverse, being huge, tough, strong, and dangerous, gluttonous, and also implicitly related to the series' equivalents of orcs and goblins.
  • Pig Man: Like Bokoblins, they have upturned, piggish noses and pig-like ears on an otherwise humanoid face. However, they're more porcine than Bokoblins, having tusks and trotter-like feet.
  • Piñata Enemy: They drop a ton of food and weaponry; due to Level Scaling affecting the weapons they carry, Hinoxes will likely be your best source of Royal weapons should you get past that point. Stalnox usually drop better weaponry (generally including an Elemental Weapon and a Giant Boomerang) to make up for the fact that you can't steal it from them like you can from the living ones.note 
  • Primitive Clubs: The only weapons they ever use as tree trunks torn from the ground and used as improvised cudgels.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning: Or just red eye in their case. Although most Hinox have one yellow eye, the eye of the Black Hinox is colored red. They are also the toughest living Hinox encountered. All Hinox encountered in the Depths in Tears of the Kingdom have red eyes.
  • Same Character, But Different: In previous games, Hinox were ogre-like cyclopes that loved to chuck bombs everywhere. In this game, Hinox have been redesigned to be piglike like the Blins, are defined more by their gluttonous appetite, and only throw bombs (actually Bomb Barrels they dig from the ground) as a last resort when Link is somewhere they can't reach.
  • Sleepy Enemy: Hinoxes are found sleeping day and night in isolated spots in the wilderness. They're sound enough sleepers that, with some care, Link can climb right on top of their recumbent bodies to steal the weapons strung on their rope necklaces. They will turn hostile if awoken by repeated loud noises or an attack but, if they lose track of Link, they will simply head back to their spots, stretch, lie down and go right back to sleep. This is even lampshaded by the Yiga Clan in Tears of the Kingdom, where one of their notebooks remarks that they're the only enemy that actually sleeps in the Depths.
  • Snot Bubble: While sleeping, Hinoxes produce a constant stream of bubbles from their piglike snouts.
  • Stout Strength: They're very fat, and very strong.
  • Stylistic Callback: Seem to take some heavy inspiration from Glutko of all things.
  • Super Drowning Skills: Downplayed. While they're strong swimmers, they can't stay afloat forever and will eventually drown. This can be easily exploited with Stalnox however. If you dislodge their eye you can pick it up before they do and punt it into the nearest body of water which will kill them instantly.
  • To Serve Man: It's implied that Hinox eat people as, when fighting Link, Hinox will often lick their lips as if sizing up a potential snack.
  • Troll Bridge: In Tears of the Kingdom, a Red Hinox has taken up residence on Carok Bridge, evidently to feast on passersby unfortunate enough to wake it up. Because this is on the direct path to Rito Village, which the game nudges the player to visit first after Lookout Landing, it intentionally serves as a Warm-Up Boss that introduces the player to the overworld mini-bosses.
  • Use Your Head: Just like the Moblins in Tears of the Kingdom, they can slam their heads down on Link with their new Hinox Horns.

Stalnox

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/stalnox.png

Undead Hinox, which lie half-buried in the earth over the day and pace restlessly at night.


  • Bad with the Bone: Stalnox break off their own ribs, jaws and arms to use as weapons.
  • Dem Bones: Stalnox are skeletal, undead Hinox that appear at night.
  • Eyes Are Unbreakable: Stalnox are completely skeletal, having lost all ligaments, flesh and hide, but their eyeballs remain intact within their bleached skulls.
  • Go for the Eye: Like its standard equivalent but unlike the other Stal- creatures, the Stalnox still has a flesh eye that serves as a weak point. It also serves as the monster's tether like the smaller Stals' skulls— as long as it's still there, the monster can keep going, and will only die when the eye is destroyed. It can get knocked out of its socket to the ground where Link can get extra hits on it or just chuck in in a body of water for an easy kill.
  • Non-Human Undead: The skeletal remains of boar-like cyclopes.
  • Undead Counterpart: They're tougher, undead counterparts to common Hinox.
  • Use Your Head: In Tears of the Kingdom, just like their living counterparts, Stalnoxes can slam their heads down on Link with their new Stalnox Horns, which have several Stalkoblin skulls on them.
  • Weakened by the Light: While sunlight won't disintegrate them like it does weaker stal- creatures, it causes them to become inactive and lie dormant in the ground until dusk. In "Tears of the Kingdom", the new Dazzle Fruit won't instantly defeat them like lesser Stal enemies, but it will instantly stun them the same way as shooting their eye.

    Molduga 

Molduga

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/nr1y7g8.jpg

Giant Land Sharks of the desert.


  • Acrofatic: They're quite rotund in build, but they move like greased lightning and make spectacular breaching attacks.
  • All Animals Are Domesticated: In Tears of the Kingdom, it's revealed that the Gerudo used to have tamed several Molduga, and attempted to send a swarm of them into Hyrule to lower the kingdom's defenses before they were all destroyed by Rauru's Secret Stone. By the present day though, all the Molduga are wild, feral creatures that aren't under the control of anyone.
  • Attack Its Weak Point: Unlike most other monsters, which offer insta-crits when struck on the head, Molduga and the Molduking offer insta-crits when struck on their stomachs.
  • Dub Name Change: In Japanese they're called Morudorajīku (モルドラジーク). Most other languages use some variant of Molduga or Moldora. Italian uses Moldenottera, which is derived from "balenottera", the term for rorqual whales.
  • Expy: They have the ability to detect when prey is walking around on the sand, like Graboids could do with normal earth. They also have striking similarities with the Jhen Mohran and Nibelsnarf, as both creatures swim in the sand and in the case of the latter are vulnerable to bombs.
  • Fantastic Medicinal Bodily Product: Their guts are said to possess healing properties, and one sidequest has you retrieve them to give to a Gerudo woman who needs them to help her sick husband.
  • Feed It a Bomb: The easiest way to defeat one is to prey on their predatory instincts and roll a bomb downhill.
  • King Mook: The Molduking, a new variety introduced in "The Champions' Ballad" DLC pack. It's bigger, stronger, and sports a tan-colored hide.
  • Land Shark: Despite the name, Molduga are actually giant land sharks with tiny amphibian legs, although they burrow like a sand worm all the same.
  • Moby Schtick: Molduking is distinguished by its extreme resilience, a number of lances and weapons stuck in its hide from previous attempts to kill it, and a white coloration as opposed to the usual dark brown, and you have to track it down and slay it as part of a trial.
  • Mole Monster: Molduga tunnel beneath the desert sands, homing in on you when they hear and leaping out to attack once they're beneath you.
  • Monster Whale: Their various names are almost all whale-themed, and they possess several whale-like features among their body structure, the most obvious being a blowhole.
  • Pluralses: A voiced cutscene in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom reveals that "Molduga" is both singular and plural.
  • Portmanteau: Their various names language-wide are based on whales, befitting their whale-like nature, combined with the standard Zelda prefix "Mold-" commonly used for burrowing enemies. Indeed, Japanese players have noticed their original Japanese name Morudorajīku (モルドラジーク) combines "Mold-" with the word for whale - "kujira" (クジラ), with its characters reversed and corrupted slightly. Among others, in English, Molduga is a combination of "Mold-" and "beluga", a species of whale, and the Italian name Moldenottera is derived from "balenottera", the term for rorqual whales, as mentioned in Dub Name Change.
  • Sand Is Water: Molduga swim through the desert sand at an impressive speed, diving through and breaching from it like whales in water.
  • Sdrawkcab Name: As Japanese players have noticed, the second half of their original Japanese name, Morudorajīku (モルドラジーク), is the Japanese word for "whale" (クジラ), reversed and altered slightly. This wordplay is also present in their Korean name Moldeuraego (몰드래고), with the characters for whale (gorae - 고래) similarly reversed.
  • Super-Hearing: They can detect the slightest sound in the sands around them, such as the sound of a fruit being tossed onto the ground.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: From the name and the way it burrows, it can be seen as this to recurring Zelda enemy Moldorm, although it bears more resemblance to the Deku Toad. Its battle theme also sounds a lot like Molgera's, another Moldorm-type monster.
  • Tactical Suicide Boss: You can keep repeating the process of feeding one a bomb, detonating the bomb to incapacitate it, and whacking away at it until it dies, and it never seems to learn to avoid the bombs.
  • Vocal Dissonance: For such large and intimidating creatures, they make very high-pitched and squeaky noises.
  • The Worf Effect: In spite of being one of the strongest overworld creatures found in both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, King Rauru (with Sonia and Zelda's help) manages to completely annihilate a whole swarm of them with a single light beam attack, mostly to show Ganondorf and the viewers the full potential of the Secret Stones.
  • Worm Sign: Molduga create large and highly visible mound trails as they move underground.

Introduced in Tears of the Kingdom

    Gleeoks 

Gleeoks

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/totk_flame_gleeok_model_0.png
A Flame Gleeok.

A classic Zelda enemy making their return in Tears of the Kingdom following the Upheaval, they are large three-headed dragons that patrol areas of Hyrule, with each head bearing both a single eye and power over a certain element.


  • All Your Powers Combined: King Gleeoks have the elemental powers of all three other variants, with one head using each.
  • And Your Reward Is Clothes: Defeating the three King Gleeoks in the Sky rewards Link with a Sage's Will the first time each one is defeated. Defeating the sole King Gleeok in the Depths for the first time will reward Link with the Cap of Twilight.
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: They're absolutely huge, being the second largest out of the overworld bosses in pure size behind only the Molduga.
  • Breath Weapon: Gleeoks primarily attack by breathing their respective element out of their mouths, including as a precise beam.
  • The Bus Came Back: Gleeok was a recurring boss in the NES original, only had two other appearances afterwards, with its second most recent outing being the 2.5-D Phantom Hourglass. Now sixteen years later, they finally return to the series in their first appearance in the 3-D games.
  • Damage-Sponge Boss: Each variation of the Gleeok's have the most amount of health out of any enemy/boss in the gamenote , having 8000 HP, which is more then the Silver Lynel and even the final boss as Ganondorf's two phases has 7500 HP altogether.
  • Death from Above: Once a Gleeok loses enough health, it flies up until it's far out of Link's normal attack range before it rains down attacks of its element on him.
  • Desperation Attack: When low on health, Gleeoks fly up very high and use their most powerful attacks:
    • Flame Gleeoks send down massive fireballs that seem more like meteors.
    • Frost Gleeoks summon massive icicles out of a snowstorm.
    • Thunder Gleeoks intensify their thunderstorms.
    • The King Gleeok does a combination of the Frost and Thunder Gleeoks attacks. It also uses the Fire one if Link flies above the snowstorm and near the monster.
  • Draconic Abomination: Gleeoks are monstrous three-headed dragons created by Ganondorf's dark magic, with each head possessing a single Malice eye.
  • Dragons Are Demonic: In contrast to the four Spirit Dragons in the service of Hylia, they're dragon monsters in the service of Ganondorf that are seemingly made from Gloom, as they have the telltale eye.
  • The Dreaded: The Hyrule Compendium describes Gleeoks as extremely dangerous monsters that are unadvisable to fight alone. No less an authority than Kilton describes King Gleeoks as the mightiest monsters of them all.
  • Elemental Dragon: The three main variants of Gleeok are associated with either fire, ice, or electricity, which they use in battle; Frost Gleeok, in particular, live only on cold peaks and in the frozen tundra. King Gleeoks, found only in the Sky, breathe one element from each of their heads.
  • Falling Damage: Notably, they are the only overworld bosses that can receive this kind of damage, and, unlike for every other enemy that can receive it, it's very much encouraged to inflict it to them, since they always fly to very high heights in order to attack you with their strongest attacks. This means that, if you manage to stun them in this phase, they fall down and take a lot of damage. Due to the amount of damage they tend to accumulate by this point, the fall tends to be enough to outright kill them.
  • Fantastic Medicinal Bodily Product: Gleeok viscera can be used for very powerful medicines. While this doesn't come up in gameplay, one quest requires Link to find Gleeok guts for a Gerudo trying to heal her sick husband.
  • Field Power Effect: Flame and Frost Gleeoks respectively increase and decrease the ambient temperature to harmful levels once they sight Link while Thunder Gleeoks summon a thunderstorm when they notice Link.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning:
    • Gleeoks come in either Flame, Frost, or Thunder varieties with abilities based on their element.
    • The King Gleeok has a flame head, frost head, and thunder head.
  • Go for the Eye: A Gleeok's main weakness is being shot in the single eye on each head, dropping it out of the sky and stunning it once all three take enough damage. However, you need to shoot all three eyes within a short period of each other or else the stunned heads will recover.
  • Hellish Pupils: Each of the Gleeok's heads possesses the trademark gloom eye, symbolizing their ties to Ganondorf and to the gloom. Notably, they are the only mini-bosses to possess the gloom eye.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard:
    • When a Frost Gleeok starts raining down icicles, Link can use Recall to have the icicle rise up to the Gleeok's level so he can shoot its heads with arrows.
    • Flame and Thunder Gleeoks create updrafts with their attacks that Link can use to fly upwards.
    • When reduced to a third of their health, they will fly very high up to avoid Link's attacks, but, as they are one of the only enemies in the game that takes fall damage, this often proves fatal if Link shoots out all their eyes and stuns them, as being so high up does a massive amount of damage to them when they hit the ground.
  • King Mook: The "King Gleeok". It's a downplayed example though, since this variant lacks any indicator of being considered above the other Gleeoks, and can be found in multiple places.
  • No Ontological Inertia: Gleeoks need to manually maintain hostile weathers they summon to impede you; even before you kill them, their weather effects will subside during the period where they lie helpless after you shoot them in the eyes.
  • Our Hydras Are Different: These monsters have three heads, wings, and walk on all fours.
  • Secret Boss: King Gleeok are usually found on isolated, hard-to reach sky islands. A Gloom-tainted King Gleeok can be found within the Depths, and beating it nets Link the Cap of Twilight.
  • Shout-Out: The appearance of the Gleeok heavily resembles that of King Ghidorah, being a giant dragon with three heads akin to the Hydra and large wings that allow it to fly. It's the most obvious with the Thunder Gleeok, as both that and King Ghidorah have electrical powers and are yellow in colour.
  • Superboss: While all the Gleeok types are tough, the King Gleeok is exceptional even among them, and is one of the toughest enemies in the entire game. They are located in very remote regions of the map (they are the only Gleeok type which does not spawn on the surface) and are extremely powerful due to possessing all three elemental attack types, do even more damage and have more health than the other Gleeok types, and they spawn on isolated Sky Islands, which makes avoiding their attacks more difficult. This is made even worse with the King Gleeok that spawns in the Depths, because its attacks have been further enhanced with Gloom. The Hyrule Compendium will outright warn you to be well-prepared if you want to even survive an encounter with one. They also give the most amount of EXP out of any overworld enemy in the game, surpassing regular Gleeoks and Silver Lynels, and are only below the Temple Bosses and Ganondorf in experience.
  • Tail Slap: Should Link get too close to a Gleeok, it may try to hit him with its tail.
  • Turns Red: Once a Gleeok takes enough damage, it flies high up into the sky so it can rain stronger attacks down on Link. Flame Gleeoks use a giant fireball, Frost Gleeoks use giant icicles, and Thunder Gleeoks summon thunderstorms.
  • Underground Monkey: They come in four elemental varieties with different field effects, Breath Weapon types, and late-stage attacks:
    • The Flame Gleeok makes the environment lethally hot, shoots fire beams that will burn Link, and spews out massive, meteor-like fireballs for its climactic attack.
    • The Thunder Gleeok summons a thunderstorm (which will strike Link with lightning should he have any metal on him), shoots electric beams that will paralyze Link, and rains down a barrage of lightning strikes for its climactic attack.
    • The Frost Gleeok makes its surroundings lethally frigid, shoots ice beams that will freeze Link, and starts raining down giant icicles for its climactic attack.
    • The King Gleeok has one head of each element type and combines the climactic attacks of the other three Gleeok types. However, unlike the others, it does not have any passive environmental effects, but makes up for it by hitting much harder and having far more health.
  • Wake-Up Call Boss: These are one of the strongest mini-bosses in Tears of the Kingdom, and the fact they are simply scattered around the world map allows you to fight them at any point. Fighting them early on is a huge challenge however, as their attacks can hit from very far away, have a large area-of-effect, and do massive damage, they have a huge amount of health, and their ability to fly makes them hard to hit in their eyes.
  • Wind from Beneath My Wings: When on the ground, a Gleeok can flap its wings to create powerful gusts that blow Link away.

    Frox 

Frox

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/frox.png

Giant one-eyed frog-like monsters that prowl the Depths of Hyrule, introduced in Tears of the Kingdom.


  • Acrofatic: Despite being massive, rotund frame, and incredibly slow ground movement, they are capable of huge leaps (probably because they are giant frog monsters).
  • Amphibian at Large: They resemble giant rock-covered amphibians as large as a truck.
  • Attack Its Weak Point: They are nigh-invulnerable to almost all conventional damage - except for the collection of ore deposits on their back, much like the Taluses.
  • Boss Subtitles: They may be overworld mini-bosses, but unlike (most) others, the Froxes bear the single unique subtitle of Scourge of the Depths.
  • Dash Attack: One of the Frox's attacks is to rush at Link with its mouth open.
  • Dub Name Change: In the original Japanese version, Froxes are called Diggarmas.
  • Feed It a Bomb: In true Zelda fashion, their powerful lung capacity can be beaten with an explosive down the gullet, which handily stuns them.
  • Go for the Eye: Much like their namesake, the Hinox, their single eye is a weak point for stunning them (though not their main source of health).
  • In a Single Bound: Fittingly enough for a giant frog, if you hover out of reach of a Frox for long enough it will jump towards you, whether you're on the ground or in the air. Froxes can also leap towards Link in an attempt to squash him. Higher-tier Froxes can jump multiple times in a row.
  • King Mook: The grown boss form of the younger Little Froxes that can be found as regular Mooks in the Depths.
  • Law of Chromatic Superiority: There are three different variations of Froxes, each tiered by color. The weakest kind is the regular green Frox, the middle tier in terms of power is the black-colored Obsidian Frox, and the Blue-White Frox is the strongest of the three variants.
  • Logical Weakness: Like Taluses, their ore deposits take increased damage from blunt weapons that are logically suited to breaking rocks.
  • Portmanteau: An obvious combination of frog and Hinox, a fellow and more commonly-known race of one-eyed Overworld boss. (Alternatively, or perhaps simultaneously, a play on 'frog' and 'rocks', for all the ore-filled boulders growing from their backs.)
  • Shockwave Stomp: The impact created when a Frox lands from its jumps creates a large damaging shockwave that can knock Link back. These shockwaves add range to the Frox's attacks.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: They share a lot of similarities with Dodongos from past games, sharing a thick hide that repels all weapons, and especially sharing the same method of defeating them by feeding them bombs.
  • Vacuum Mouth: One of their primary attacks is an immensely strong inhale to consume Link whole, doing damage the longer he remains in their stomach.

    Flux Constructs 

Flux Constructs

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/flux_construct.png

Hulking Zonai automatons that guard various Zonai facilities across Hyrule, composed of collections of giant Zonai cubes linked by Zonai energy to a single glowing core cube. Through telekinetic manipulation of the cubes that make up their "bodies", they are able to take a variety of forms and shapes to attack.


  • Attack Its Weak Point: The only way to damage them is via attacking the glowing cube that contains their core.
  • Boss Subtitles: While the other bosses usually have the subtitle of "Scourge of [their home location]", the Flux Constructs possess the unique subtitle of "Guardian of [their home location]".
  • Detachment Combat: The times they intentionally detach cubes from their main form is to telekinetically send them flying at Link in waves, before teleporting them back soon after. Not too soon for Link to board one and Recall it, however.
  • Dub Name Change: The Flux Construct's original name in Japanese is quite literally "Blockgolem" (ブロックゴーレム) in transliterated English, based on the Constructs' original Japanese name of Golem.
  • Early-Bird Boss: A Flux Construct can found on a little island in the midst of the Great Sky Island.
  • Easily Detachable Robot Parts: The gestalt nature of their being means that their cubes can be very easily detached from the Construct's main "body" - barely impacting their functionality or even fazing them. Only their core cube resists being forcibly detached.
  • Literally Shattered Lives: A unique twist - the main method of stunning them before they can be attacked is to forcefully separate the main core cube from the rest of its components. The result of this is, of course, the immediate deactivation of every component cube and the Construct literally falling into pieces.
  • Logical Weakness: As advanced automata of Zonai design, it should stand to reason that Zonai powers are the best counter:
    • The Construct itself is a collection of cubes bound by Zonaite energy; thus, the best way to expose the core is through the use of Ultrahand. Grappling the core itself requires a bit of wrestling with it, however.
    • The 'platform' shape is impossible to attack from the ground with the core atop the platform, which serves as a shield. The best countermeasures are simply to Ascend straight through the platform, or, in the case of the stronger variants that fly higher than Ascend's range, to bait out its attack cubes, then ride one atop one using Recall.
  • Pulling Themselves Together: Naturally, when stunned, the core cube recovers by telekinetically pulling all its scattered component cubes back to itself.
  • Punch-Clock Villain: As with the other hostile Zonai Constructs, the only reason they're bosses is not because of malice - they're just following their programming of guarding their territory/treasure with extreme prejudice.
  • One to Million to One: Their method of "shapeshifting" is to split into a cloud of cubes and reforming into another shape.
  • Transforming Mecha: A unique variation that can "shapeshift" between multiple forms by forming their cubes into different configurations, including a massive humanoid form, a giant cube that can roll around, or a floating platform that can stay out of reach and attack from above. Stronger Flux Constructs have even finer control over their forms, able to sneakily swap their core cube throughout their internal structure without changing their overall form.

Bosses of Tears of the Kingdom (SPOILERS)

Temple Scourges

    General Tropes 
The boss monsters who have risen under the power of the Demon King Ganondorf. These vile beings have taken residence in their respective regions to wreak havoc.
  • Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: To the Blight Ganons:
    • Whereas the Blights were portions of the power of Calamity Ganon given form, these are organic monsters with the exception of the Seized Construct who have taken residence in their respective areas.
    • The Blights were weapon users who relied on their weapons and powers specifically tailored for their respective champions' weaknesses, while these monsters rely mostly on their natural abilities to fight.
    • The Blights were straightforward enemies which were vulnerable to almost any attack at Link's disposal. These monsters are classical Zelda Puzzle Bosses, where each battle requires (or is at least made much easier with) an ability that Link acquired in the region where that boss is found (namely, the powers of his Sage allies).
    • They also contrast the Blights in that, with the exception of Mucktorok, all of them are massive bosses easily dwarfing the big-by-Gerudo-standards Ganondorf, compared to the Blights being small compared to the much larger Calamity Ganon.
  • Defeat Equals Explosion: Upon their defeat, all of them begin leaking Malice/Gloom from their bodies, before erupting in a massive explosion. Most notable with Mucktorock, who has the same blast animation as the other Scourges, despite being smaller then all of them by far.
  • Degraded Boss: Once you defeat any of the Scourges of the Fire, Water, Lightning and Wind Temples, they will appear in the Depths. There, you can fight up to three instances of each boss, and they will respawn with every Blood Moon. The Scourge of the Fire Temple in particular lacks a ceiling to cling onto during its rematches, so half of its second phase is removed.
  • Evil Is Bigger: With the exception of Mucktorok, all of the Temple Scourge bosses are gigantic (and even the exception disguises itself in a much bigger outer form during its boss fight).
  • Hellish Pupils: With the exception of the Seized Construct, all of the Temple Scourges have the same glowing-red slit eyes (which resemble the eye masses possessed by Malice growths in Breath of the Wild). This shows their origins from Ganondorf, who has the same sort of eyes in his mummified, Demon King, and Demon Dragon forms.
  • No Ontological Inertia: Whenever you successfully defeat an elemental temple boss, the disaster it brings to its respective region also perishes with it: The completely-frozen-over Rito Village instantly thaws upon Colgera's death, Marbled Rock Roasts vanish into thin air and all addicted Gorons immediately regain their senses upon Marbled Gohma's fall, the sand shroud stops when Queen Gibdo is slain, and all traces of sludge just evaporate after Mucktorok is killed.

    Colgera 

Scourge of the Wind Temple, Colgera

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/colgera.jpg

The source of the terrible blizzard that plagues the Rito Village, and the boss of the Stormwind Ark/Wind Temple. Colgera is a massive flying insect, and must be taken down by the duo of Link and Tulin in an aerial battle.


  • Ambiguously Related: The Colgera's long, insectoid appearance; the theme that plays while fighting it; its general combat style; its tendency to set traps in its arena (in the form of tornadoes for the Colgera and quicksand pits for its inspiration); its ability to fly; and its very name all point to the Colgera being related in some way to the Molgera, although any actual link is pure conjecture.
  • Attack Its Weak Point: In order to damage it, you have to shoot the ice crystals in each segment which you have to expose by shooting out the ice covering them from its underside.
  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: By far the largest insectoid enemy in the entire game, being almost as large as one of the divine dragons.
  • Blow You Away: In Phase Two, after being harmed enough times, Colgera starts generating massive tornadoes, making it harder to keep track of it.
  • Boss Subtitles: Scourge of the Wind Temple, Colgera.
  • Creepy Centipedes: It resembles a gigantic flying centipede made out of ice and is the boss of the Wind Temple.
  • Dub Name Change: Its name in the Japanese version was Freezageira (フリザゲイラ), which similarly derives from Molgera's Japanese name (モルド・ゲイラ, or Mold Geira).
  • Fragile Flyer: Colgera's weak points shatter easily from a single arrow shot each, and the encasing ice sheet aren't that much more durable either. This makes Colgera significantly frailer than the other, land-bound temple bosses.
  • Guide Dang It!: While Zelda veterans are likely to just shoot Colgera's obvious weak points with arrows, the game barely hints at all about the fact Link can damage these same weak points by diving through them, making Colgera a special case of a boss you don't need to waste any depletable resources to beat.
  • High-Altitude Battle: The fight against Colgera is fought in the air above the Wind Temple, itself floating in the sky high above Hebra Peak and in the middle of a permanent blizzard. While Link can take temporary respite on small chunks of floating rock, actually winning the battle requires him to spend most of it gliding around and riding on updrafts in order to be able to attack the boss as it flies through the open air, temporarily exposing its weak points as it dives past Link and pelts him with flying snow and whirlwinds.
  • Logical Weakness: Because it's the source of the frigid temperatures, its weak points are especially susceptible to fire arrows, melting away the thin icy protection that normally covers them with one hit.
  • Monstrous Mandibles: It has a nasty-looking pair of giant mandibles befitting its centipede appearance. When defeated, one remains behind to be used as strong Fuse material.
  • Punny Name: Its name is a combination of the word cold and Molgera, referencing how it is essentially an extremely similar monster themed around the cold.
  • Segmented Serpent: Its body consists of a head, three large circular sections, and short chains of smaller trapezoidal segments connecting them all.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: To Molgera from The Wind Waker, the boss of the Wind Temple seeking to keep Link and Makar from helping the latter become a Sage. Much like Molgera, Colgera is capable of flight and can "burrow" underneath to sneak attack (albeit via sky portals). Its name is even one letter off from its inspiration, and it's fought by one of the two ancestries introduced in Wind Waker, a Rito. To remove any doubt regarding its inspiration, its boss theme is a flute remix of the Molgera theme and Dragon Roost Island from Wind Waker, with tiny bits of the 'Boss Advantage' theme from Twilight Princess sprinkled in.
  • Thinking Up Portals: It can conjure up large portals to get away from Link, only to usually manifest them underneath him in a sneak attack.
  • Warm-Up Boss: Although technically speaking there's no strict order the bosses have to be fought in, the game strongly nudges you in the direction of the Rito Village storyline first. Colgera is probably the weakest of the Temple Scourges due to the very open arena allowing you to easily dodge its attacks, while its ice armour can be shattered in a single arrow shot, or even just by dive-bombing onto them. You can skip its third phase simply because each phase can be defeated in seconds.

    Marbled Gohma 

Scourge of the Fire Temple, Marbled Gohma

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/margohma.jpg

The source of the strange Marbled Rock Roast that the brainwashed Yunobo fed to his people, and the boss of the Fire Temple deep in Death Mountain. Marbled Gohma is a large rock crab beetle creature, and must be taken down by the duo of Link and Yunobo using his unique abilities.


  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: Not as big as Colgera, but still a giant insectoid monster big enough to dwarf both Yunobo and Link.
  • Boss Subtitles: Scourge of the Fire Temple, Marbled Gohma.
  • Degraded Boss: Unlike the other elemental temple bosses who can also be refought in the Depths, Marbled Gohma loses some of its arsenal from when it's a story boss, namely, the lack of ceiling which prevents it from doing a Ceiling Cling.
  • Dub Name Change: It was called Bouldogohma (ボルドゴーマ, or Borudogōma) in the Japanese version.
  • Fantastic Drug: Its plague on the Eldin Region is tainting the Gorons food sources into Marbled Rock Roast. It's highly addictive to whoever eats it, making them obsessed with doing nothing but getting more and aggressive towards anyone in their way. Fortunately it's not as palatable to the young or elderly, so they're unaffected, but that's still the majority of Goron society under its thrall.
  • Giant Spider: Much like its influence, Gohma, it's a big crab spider creature that can crawl onto the walls to avoid being hit.
  • Go for the Eye: Also like Gohma, its big eye is the weakpoint. Played with in that getting it to come down requires using Yunobo to knock its legs out in order for Link to reach it.
  • He Was Right There All Along: When the player enters its boss arena, it's present only as an inert pile of Gloom-infused rocks on the ceiling. It will stay that way until the player gets Yunobo to do his Rolling Attack on one of the room's curved walls, which will have him roll into and smash open the cluster, awaking the beast and starting the battle. This serves to clue the player from the start that this is a thing that can be done, since it is necessary to harm the boss when it climbs on the ceiling during the second phase and isn't otherwise an immediately obvious option.
  • Proj-egg-tile: Like other Gohma, it throws egg-like projectiles onto the ground. Unlike other Gohma, these eggs will explode rather than hatch.
  • Rock Monster: Aside from its one eyeball, its entire body seems to be made out of chunks of rock. This also means it can't be harmed by attacking anything except its eyeball; although Yunobo can blow off its legs, it can easily regenerate them and this does not actually do damage to it.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: While it's obviously based on Gohma, it also interestingly has aspects of Blizzeta from Twilight Princess, with the egg attack being used to wall you in akin to her icebergs.
  • Wall Crawl: In its battle's second phase, Marbled Gohma climbs up the walls of its arena, hangs upside-down from the ceiling, and rains explosive bombs down on Link and Yunobo. Defeating it requires using Yunobo's Rolling Attack on the arena's curved walls in order to break the beast's rocky legs and cause it to fall down to ground, allowing Link to attack it until it reforms its limbs and climbs back up.

    Mucktorok 

Scourge of the Water Temple, Mucktorok

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mucktorok.jpg

The source of the sludge falling onto Zora's Domain, and the boss of the Water Temple high in the skies. Mucktorok is a small Octorok-like creature, and must be fought by Link alongside Sidon.


  • Boss Subtitles: Scourge of the Water Temple, Mucktorok.
  • Degraded Boss: Inverted. Mucktorok's moveset is exactly the same when refought in the Depths, but Link can't make the extra high jumps he could during their first bout in the low-gravity Water Temple. As a result, Mucktorok's attacks are much more difficult to evade.
  • Dirty Coward: It is genuinely dangerous when it's using the sludge shark or ranged attacks. Take away both however, and it runs away terrified in the silliest manner possible until it manifests them again.
  • Dub Name Change: In the Japanese version, its name was Octakos (オクタコス), which comes from "Octorok" (オクタロック Okutarokku) and "tako" (蛸), meaning "octopus".
  • Funnel-Mouthed Cephalopod: Like the Octoroks, it has a prominent round mouth — though Mucktorok's resembles a pair of lips.
  • "Get Back Here!" Boss: Amusingly, when it's not hiding behind its shark form or the sludge, it can only vainly attempt to waddle away from your attacks.
  • Kill It with Water: A downplayed case since Mucktorok itself doesn't instantly keel over when washed, but its sludge can be removed only with water.
  • King Mook: A uniquely powerful Octorok that serves as a boss, though it's no bigger than the other common Octoroks. In fact, the Mucktoroks in the Depths leave behind collectible Octorok parts upon death unlike the other bosses which leave behind unique uncollectible parts.
  • Piñata Enemy: Instead of dropping a unique fusible body part, when defeated the version in the Depths leaves a mass of drops common to octoroks.
  • Pintsized Powerhouse: By far the smallest of the Scourges, being barely bigger than Link. That said, it's no less of a threat with all the sludge in the arena, and especially if it's using its sludge shark... unless it doesn't have either. Then...
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: To Cyclok from Phantom Hourglass. It's an Octorok-like creature that is the cause of the troubles in its temple, relies on keeping itself safe using it's unique abilities (Cyclok through tornadoes, Mucktorok through its sludge), and isn't much of a threat without them. It also has an element from Armogohma in Twilight Princess in that, while it isn't a large terrifying spider, it does run away from you when it's vulnerable akin to the final phase of Armogohma after losing its shell. In addition, it's designed similarly to the Ocean Octoroks from the Toon Link games.
  • Threatening Shark: It can conjure a shark made out of its sludge, allowing it to move around much more swiftly and deal damage to Link.

    Queen Gibdo 

Scourge of the Lightning Temple, Queen Gibdo

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/queengibdo.jpg
The source of the sand shroud and Gibdo hives harassing Gerudo Town, and the boss of the Lightning Temple. Queen Gibdo is a massive moth-like beast, harnessing both its hordes of Gibdo and control over sandstorms to defend itself. Link and Riju fight it twice, once before it flees, and a second time inside the Temple itself.
  • Adaptational Species Change: Gibdo are typically either reanimated corpses wrapped in bandages or magical constructs in the appearance of dead people. This variant of Gibdo is an insectoid creature with a skeletal/zombie-like camoflague, and have a Queen with moth-like qualities.
  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: A massive moth monster with a skeletal appearance (especially after harming it with lightning).
  • Boss Subtitles: Scourge of the Lightning Temple, Queen Gibdo.
  • Blow You Away: It will stir up sand tornadoes as an attack, as well as to obscure your vision of it.
  • Degraded Boss: Inverted. When you rematch her in the Depths, not only the Gibdos spawned during phase two now inflict Gloom damage, but destroying the stalks no longer grant you lights to deter her and her spawn.
  • Flunky Boss: Her pre-dungeon fight has two Gibdo Nests, with both the boss fight proper and Depths' rematch raising it to four.
  • Foe-Tossing Charge: She will charge at you for one of her attacks.
  • Moth Menace: A giant, insectoid monster serving Ganondorf that resembles a skeletal/demonic butterfly or moth.
  • Sand Blaster: Uses its wings to stir up massive sandstorms to obscure your vision.
  • Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After she's weakened enough in the first fight, she will flee back into the Lightning Temple to regain her strength. She can only be beaten in the second fight.
  • Non-Mammal Mammaries: Downplayed. A crease on her exoskeleton on her chest coupled with a black piece of plating over it gives her the impression of breasts.
  • Weak to Fire: Like her lesser spawn, she temporarily loses her immunity to physical attacks if she is hit with elemental attacks. Unlike her lesser spawn, she can still attack even in this 'weakened' state, although she can only take so much beating before collapsing for a while, with Riju's thunderbolt being especially painful.
  • Weaksauce Weakness: Despite being called the Scourge of the Lightning Temple, she is made vulnerable by Riju's lighting strikes.
  • Wind from Beneath My Wings: She uses her wings to stir up sandstorms, and during her boss fight, can blow sand twisters to keep Link at a distance. Additionally, her Depths rematches have her leave behind a single wing upon death, which can be used as a "Guster" fuse on melee weapons.

    Seized Construct 

Scourge of the Spirit Temple, Seized Construct

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/seizedconstruct1.jpg

The boss of the Spirit Temple deep underground, the Seized Construct is a former creation of the Sage of Spirit Mineru, but has been possessed by Ganondorf's demonic powers to destroy anything that tries to get in its way. Link and Mineru must combat it with their own construct controlled by Mineru's spirit.


  • Boss-Arena Idiocy: It's an exceptionally resilient construct, being able to tank attacks from Mineru's golem and Link's attacks, which would make it hard to beat...except its boss arena is surrounded by energy fences that can harm it if it gets tossed into them.
  • Boss Subtitles: Scourge of the Spirit Temple, Seized Construct.
  • Demonic Possession: It's been controlled by the demonic energies of Ganondorf, and now fights by his side. Mineru declares that in its current state, the only way to keep it from causing any more trouble is to destroy it.
  • Evil Is Bigger: It towers over Mineru's construct body.
  • Golem: A Zonai construct designed by Mineru eons ago, but is now controlled by Ganondorf's power.
  • Multi-Armed and Dangerous: In its second phase, the Seized Construct forces two more arms to activate, and carries various bits of Zonai tech on said limbs to attack Link with.
  • Murderous Malfunctioning Machine: Unlike the other Scourges, this one is a mechanical being controlled via demonic energy, making it more akin to the Guardians from Breath of the Wild.
  • Recurring Boss:
    • In addition to being the boss of Mineru's plotline, a Yiga-made version serves as the last boss of Master Kohga's Side Adventure chain.
    • This is averted when it comes to the "boss arenas" in the Depths, as unlike the other Scourges, it cannot be refought after its initial fight and Kohga's variant are defeated.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: To Koloktos from Skyward Sword. Both are automatons created by a civilization millennia ago left inside of a sacred temple related to spirits. Both are corrupted by a demonic figure into fighting against a noble hero, and have multiple limbs worth of weaponry in their second phase.

Others

    Moragia 

Rising From the Death Mountain Crater, Moragia

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/moragia_7.jpg

After freeing Yunobo from his brainwashing, he and Link attempt to confront "Zelda" for her actions, only to be stymied by this massive creature rising from Death Mountain's crater.


  • Boss Subtitles: Rising From the Death Mountain Crater, Moragia.
  • Dub Name Change: In Japanese, its name is Ilbajia (イルバジア), which derives from Volvagia's Japanese name (ヴァルバジア Valbajia).
  • Fiendish Fish: They're a giant monster resembling a moray eel formed out of Gloom and magma.
  • Giant Space Flea from Nowhere: Even among the other Temple storyline bosses, this one stands out. While most besides the Seized Construct have no definitive origins and may have simply been conjured into existence by Ganondorf, this one has the bonus of having absolutely zero foreshadowing, unlike its fellow miniboss the Sludge Like, and not getting alluded to again afterwards. The fact that its name is Moragia, implying some kind of connection to Volvagia from Ocarina of Time's own Fire Temple quest only muddies the water further.
  • Playing with Fire: The Moragia attack by spitting fireballs.
  • Stationary Boss: The three heads do not move from their positions, making it relatively easy for you to target them.
  • Unexpected Gameplay Change: An unusual example in that it introduces a regular gameplay mechanic. Link and Yunobo don't fight Moragia normally; rather, a souped-up Fanplane with many batteries is near the starting point for the battle, and Link has to fly it around and launch Yunobo off the nose. Yunobo proves himself able to do the same from atop any vehicle going forward.
  • Warm-Up Boss: It only takes three hits to kill, which is easy because the heads are huge and don't move, making hitting them straight forward, and it only has one attack which is easy to avoid because the battle is in the sky, where there is plenty of room to maneuver. The boss more or less functions as a tutorial for Yunobo's ability in preparation for the climax boss of the region later on.
    Sludge Like 

Ambusher of Mipha Court, Sludge Like

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/sludgelike.jpg

After Sidon is convinced to leave his post to properly figure out what is causing the sludge to fall into Zora's Domain, he and Link are ambushed by this gross creature.


  • Boss Subtitles: Ambusher of Mipha Court, Sludge Like.
  • Broken Armor Boss Battle: A visually unorthodox variant. It's covered in thick sludge that renders it impervious to attack, and its weak point is only exposed if Link uses Sidon's power, a Splash Fruit, or an Opal to wash it off with a blast of water.
  • Dub Name Change: Its name in the Japanese version is "Hedorolike" (ヘドロライク), but as "hedoro" means "sludge" or "ooze", the sentiment is the same.
  • Logical Weakness: The only way to reveal its weakpoint is to clean off the sludge with a well-placed water attack, then wait for it to expose its innards before striking.
  • Muck Monster: Subverted. It spews sludge everywhere, but it's not the source of it, merely controlling it to cover its weak Like Like body.
  • Palette Swap: Removing the sludge that covers it reveals that the Sludge Like looks like a completely normal Like Like, except for its purple color.
  • Underground Monkey: A sludge covered variant of the Like Like enemy with an expanded moveset and the ability to reposition itself.
  • Warm-Up Boss: It has only about as much health as the normal Like Likes, and its main purpose is to help introduce Sidon's ability to the player and the fact water washes the muck away.

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