Pit Fiend 5e: Stat Block, Encounter Suggestions and More

Stat Block: Pit Fiend

Large Fiend (Devil), Lawful Evil

• Armor Class: 21
• Hit Points: 337 (27d10+189)
• Speed: 30 ft., Fly 60 ft.
• STR 26 (+8) DEX 14 (+2) CON 24 (+7) INT 22 (+6) WIS 18 (+4) CHA 24 (+7)
• Damage Immunities: Fire, Poison
• Condition Immunities: Poisoned
• Senses: Truesight 120 ft., Passive Perception 20
• Languages: Infernal; telepathy 120 ft.
• Challenge: 20 (25,000 XP)
• Proficiency Bonus: +6

Suggested Encounters

• Suggested Party Size: 3-4
• Recommended Party Level: 19+

Quick Tactics for Pit Fiends

• Spells at a distance
• Melee Multiattack
• Commander

The combination of Wall of Fire and Fireball is deadly. Even Hold Monster sets the pit fiend up perfectly. When far away, the pit fiend’s goal is to impede the movement of its foes, setting them in one place so it can unleash as many fireballs as possible, taking out huge chunks of its opposition’s HP.

When the distance is closed, the pit fiend isn’t out of luck. Its four melee attacks add up to a lot of damage in a single turn, whether it’s aimed at one creature or several. Include the poison of its bite, and you can end up with a TPK in a few turns.

The pit fiend also benefits from being among the highest-ranking devils. It will often be flanked by, or summon, a group of lesser devils to command. With minions to command and use as pawns, this creature goes from a threat to an absolutely deadly encounter in seconds.

What Is a Pit Fiend?

A pit fiend is a hulking devil with large wings, armored scales, and a whip-like tail that is perfectly bred to be among the strongest and deadliest fiends. It’s more than just powerful though; pit fiends sit right below the Lords of the Nine in the infernal hierarchy, serving as generals and leaders for the armies of hell.

Pit Fiends – Generals of Hell

Baatezu, or demons, follow a strict hierarchy with pit fiends sitting almost at the top. In fact, pit fiends are undeniably the most powerful of the non-unique devils. You see, like most fiends, baatezu can attain new forms in a process known as promotion.

Since devils are just as lawful as they are evil, their promotions are received once they learn the lesson their current form was meant to teach them. For each rank of devil, from spinagon to gelugon, this is something specific. 

Pit fiends, however, sitting at the precipice of this hierarchy, have learned all the lessons of the lower ranks. Once they’ve done so, they are thrown into the Pit of Flame from which they rise with a perfect knowledge and understanding of their nature as devils. This is what gives these creatures their incredible intelligence and tactical minds.

The downside is that there is little room for promotion from this point on. Pit fiends could rise to the level of archfiend, assuming a role as a unique devil, but that’s incredibly rare and requires one of a few devils dying or being overthrown, something that almost never happens.

So, where does that leave us? Well, still at the top. It takes a lot for a devil to become a pit fiend, and once they’re there, they hold a wide range of responsibilities. These incredibly intelligent, yet narcissistic, devils fill all sorts of leadership roles from generals of the armies of hell to judges of mortal souls to lesser lords ruling over cities within the nine layers.

All of this just means that these are creatures with power, both on their own and over their subordinates. The wide range of influence these creatures have means DMs can use them to tell a lot of different stories so long as they concern the Nine Hells of Baator in some way.

Pit Fiends in Combat

Pit fiends are generally pretty terrifying in combat, even if they’re not quite as much of a threat as some other CR 20 monsters we might encounter. Still, with a massive chunk of hit points, decent spellcasting, vicious melee attacks, and most of all, minions, these are creatures you don’t want to go toe to toe with.

Core Stats

These creatures have quite the impressive stat block. The natural place to start is by looking at their core stats, their HP, AC, ability scores, etc. Here, we see some things that should immediately scare us.

Everything about their basic stats, before you get to abilities and actions, screams legendary creature, and that’s because they basically are. As we discussed, they’re just short of being unique archdevils with lair and legendary actions. In fact, you might make a named pit fiend and give them a few of those special actions for fun, but we’re not there yet.

Their important ability scores are very clearly strength, constitution, and intelligence. This is because, realistically, pit fiends are gish characters, employing a balanced mix of spellcasting and melee attacks. They need a good constitution to hold concentration and reinforce the fact that they are a huge bag of hit points.

We also see some resistances and immunities that we should be aware of, even if they’re not incredibly worrying. We should know by this point that fire and poison aren’t touching devils. Additionally, any melee combatant worth their salt should have a magical weapon at this point and shouldn’t have to worry about the non-silvered resistance.

Truesight is something that’s easily overlooked, but it tells us that pit fiends are incredibly aware of their surroundings, even if their Passive Perception is a little bit lacking. They’ll be able to see past invisibility and into the Astral Plane, so you’re probably not sneaking up on these big red meanies anytime soon.

Lastly, I need to call attention to their telepathy. This might seem like a tacked-on piece of info, but in reality, it means they can command all of their minions without our adventurers being any the wiser. There’s no need to bellow “Attack!” or “Rush the wizard!” unless the pit fiend is deliberately trying to intimidate or trick the party.

Attacks and Abilities

While most of the abilities and attacks are pretty standard, the combination of all of them make for a pretty terrifying creature. Using them in harmony as a DM will make for a punishing encounter.

We start with a fear aura, a common ability that is typically used to frighten creatures approaching the pit fiend. Once a character starts their turn within 20 feet, they’ll have to roll incredibly well to avoid being frightened and turning tail to run away.

This works in tandem with the main starting tactics of the pit fiend, dealing damage at a distance. With few creatures having enough mental fortitude to approach the pit fiend, it can relax as it chooses a concentration spell and then launches fireballs like a meteor shower.

Those 3/day spells are both useful for this tactic. A Wall of Fire can deter the progression of several characters, while Hold Monster is typically going to be used to immobilize the character perceived as the biggest threat to the Pit Fiend. 

Naturally, the pit fiend is going to try to keep the battle in this stage as long as possible. Its multiattack might deal more damage, but it’s also taking less damage at a distance.

We move on to phase two when the party breaks through their barriers or when the pit fiend is taking enough damage at a distance that it decides to move in and finish things. 

When the pit fiend approaches, it’s likely going to do so in flight, covering a lot of ground rapidly, which might throw the players off guard. Then, it can unleash its four melee attacks.

All four attacks aimed at a single target is absolutely terrifying, although it’s typically going to be the best move for the pit fiend as it just might be enough to finish off a character. This is another moment where the pit fiend will choose its biggest threat first, obviously ignoring the held creature if that’s the concentration spell it’s using at the time.

All together, the pit fiend can deal an average of 99 damage with its melee attacks. This is average though, and with that many dice being rolled, I find things tend to run high more often than not.

Lastly, some pit fiends may be able to summon other demons. The options are pretty CR balanced, even if they’ll greatly change the difficulty of the encounter. It typically makes sense to choose the demons at random, although you might want to choose which are summoned based on their specific abilities.

Bearded devils are useful for stopping a party from recovering hit points. With a good number of them summoned, each creature is pretty likely to get poisoned and deal with the unfortunate side effects.

Barbed get an impressive amount of attacks for their CR, so they’re a perfect option if the pit fiend is struggling to drop any of the players to 0 hp. They also make a good early option for keeping the fight at a distance.

Lastly, a single erinyes feels like a second in command brought into the battle and is useful for a lot of damage without the fear of being an expendable flesh shield.

Commanding Minions and Armies

While the pit fiend is a challenge for a party of level 20 characters on its own, it’s still a creature that’s known for commanding minions. Starting off a combat with a large amount of creatures at the pit fiend’s command can be an interesting way to terrify your players.

To pull this off with any semblance of balance, you’ll have to make these minions “reduced threat” versions. You can do this by reducing their hit points, AC, and damage output while maintaining any special abilities.

Since there are many different types of devils, there’s no optimal combination. My simple suggestion is to create an encounter that includes the pit fiend plus a combined CR of 20 when adding up the other creatures. You also shouldn’t exceed 10 other creatures, unless you’re willing to turn this into a full-scaled war game.

From there, you stifle the minions by modifying their stat blocks and use them as tools of the pit fiend. 

This is a moment where you can really put yourself, the DM, in the driver’s seat, using the knowledge of your players’ stats against them. Since the pit fiend is incredibly intelligent and knowledgeable, this is information it would’ve been able to glean at some point.

You can use this information to inform the tactical decisions. I find the best way to do this is by using a mock lair action I like to call “Command Forces.” At the top of the initiative order, the pit fiend issues commands to its minions, rearranging them in tactical formations and setting up their actions.

Instead of your normal combat with each creature acting mostly on their own drive to kill and stay alive, this should be a clear organized effort: Sudden switches to attacking a single creature in a turn, strategic positioning to prevent the advance of a hero through opportunity attacks, retreats to bait the adventurers into a trap. 

This is also one of the few times enemies will really lean on actions like Help, Disengage, and Ready as they’ll be moving like a well-oiled machine.

Remember, no two encounters of this variety should be similar, so really spend some time thinking of which devils you want to put on display. 

Also, don’t forget that this should be a battle the players can win, although it should be incredibly hard to do so. While they are facing one of the most powerful devils, this doesn’t even come close to an encounter with one of the Lords of the Nine.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this article, and as always, happy adventuring.