Random Bosses: Are they really as random as they seem?

You know the bosses I'm referring to: Pinwheel, Stray Demon, Asylum Demon, Demon Firesage, the Butchers (not technically a boss, I know), and even the black phantoms. For the most part they seem, at first glance, to simply be a transition fight between areas with minimal lore behind them.

Well...this is kinda true, but I refuse to accept it!

With this topic, I'm hoping to generate a general consensus as to why these bosses exist, where they exist, and their significance.

Feel free to post your most speculative, ridiculous ideas. I know I will.

Just a theory I thought up, but perhaps the three hammer demons(asylum,stray, and firesage) are not just related physiologically, but from an origin perspective.

To the point, (speculation ahead) since firesage is located in the Demon Ruins (and near The Bed of Chaos), perhaps the other two were, at one time, located there too, seeing as The Bed of Chaos is the source of all demons.

My flimsy, circumstantial evidence?

The Way of White. Seeing as they seem to "maintain" the Undead Asylum, perhaps they captured the stray and asylum demons from the Demon Ruins so they could act essentially as watchdogs to prevent undead from escaping. In addition, (incredibly flimsy evidence ahead) all souls you pick up in the Demon Ruins are those of knights/warriors-i.e, most members of the Way of White.

Pinwheel has actually been speculated to have been a Necromancer who stole the Rite of Kindling from Nito himself. People have gone so far to say that his necromancy links him to the Occult revolt against the Gods mentioned on the Effigy Shielf description, but for some reason went mad and started experimenting and then just sent his necromancer bros to take over the rest of the catacombs with skellies.

Personally, I don't understand how his little pit was functional before it was like a crazy necrohaven. Like I thought maybe they offered bodies to Nito from there, as that's just before the light ceases? But then like I dunno, if Lordran is Undead land, I find it peculiar they have Catacombs to begin with.

Very confusing.

The Demon firesage is the first demon born out of the chaos.

But I speculate also that there are some non-chaotic demons that are in a connection with the gods- like the Bat demons. That they were part of the Anor Londo transportation system. Because that they existed already when Sens Fortress was built shows the pcitures on the platfrom where you fight the Iron Golem.

Since the Way of White are followers of Gwyn who was afraid of the Dark Lord who was said to be an undead I think they built the asylum and conditioned 2 chaos- demons to guard it.
Also another speculation of mine is that the Demons are in fact living statues. I think like this because the stone demons in Demon Ruins look like little Asylum/Stray/Firesage demons.

[font=Arial Black]The location in which you fight Pinwheel is really intriguing to me as well; especially the presence of books on the ground and the sheer volume of corpses. Pinwheel being a necromancer is actually evidenced by the descriptions of all of his masks
"One of the three masks of the Pinwheel,
the necromancer who stole the power of the
Gravelord, and reigns over the Catacombs."

As for Pinwheel being a member of the occult, it's obviously very possible, knowing who some of the other possible members are would be great for determination.

The possibility of the bat demons having been conditioned to guard the asylum is interesting as well, and grants insight into the Way of White; i.e, why would they go though the trouble of capturing/training demons when they could simply station members there; or are they so vehemently fearful of the rise of the dark lord/chosen undead that they saw it necessary to do so.

Or perhaps they were concerned about something else entirely... :shock:

Yeah Pinwheel was definitely up to some crazy stuff, I don't know why he started experimenting on people when he seemed to want to kill the Gods, though.

Some of the bits and pieces of lore behind Xanthous King Jeremiah are quite intriguing; namely, the description of his armor states that he is a "legendary exile," though it doesn't specify where from.

I've also heard his armor set is a reference to Demon's Souls; can anyone clarify this?

moaiguy42 wrote:Some of the bits and pieces of lore behind Xanthous King Jeremiah are quite intriguing; namely, the description of his armor states that he is a "legendary exile," though it doesn't specify where from.

I've also heard his armor set is a reference to Demon's Souls; can anyone clarify this?

In Demon Souls there was a boss called the Mad Monk who wore a gold cloak/robe. While you are precceding up the stairs to his fog gate you get a cutscene where he summons a black phantom and the robe he's wearing flies off him and covers the head of the Phantom. Xan's Head peice is a refrence to that boss fight. And also the Mad Monk was orginally a King who was exiled by his wife for corruption.

OP, I find it odd that you think Pinwheel is random? He drops the rite, he's got connections to Nito, he's said to rule over the catacombs and he is guarding it. How is any of this random?

As it has been said, the Firesage demon was the first one to 'be born' after bed of chaos was created, so, not random.

Considering they put away 'sane' undeads in the asylum until they turn into accursed ones, it's fair to say that the asylum merits guards to watch over the sane, which is why the stray and asylum demons are there as far as I can tell. Although, the former just seems to have wondered off according to its name. Still not very random.

If you ask me, random bosses are the Taurus Demon and the Capra Demon, which are simply slightly different versions of the enemies you encounter after defeating poor Ceaseless. The undead seller in the burg just tells you that they have 'moved' here, which could just be demons roaming around Lordran I suppose, but it's as close as you're gonna get to randomity.

I wouldn't overthink the butchers too much, they're just people who like to cut meat up.

I do think there's at least a minor backstory for most phantoms, however, I have read somewhere on these forums a theory about how each phantom is a different player personality, which I did find plausible. e.g. solaire is a helper, lautrec is a bastard - the kind of guy who screws up your world - , manhunter redeems herself after trying to gank you, and so on.

When I referred to Pinwheel as being "random," I was referring to how he is oftentimes easily overlooked for pure reason of being mostly considered one of the "easiest bosses in the game." I don't know what I was thinking when I referred to firesage as being random-that's simply ineptitude on my part.

I'm really intrigued about Xanthous king Jeremiah though- will look up that boss fight.

I'm not sure that the Asylum demon and the Stray demon were guards. The Stray demon is stuck underground in a room that's basically inaccessible. We fall in through the ceiling, but there are no other ways to get in or leave.

I don't remember where I read it, but there's an item in game that basically says that the Taurus demon and the Capra demon kind of wandered up from Izalith and made base in the Undead Burg. It's possible that the Stray/Asylum demons did the same thing, but they made it out of Lordran. People needed a place to put them, so maybe they just decided to chuck them with the rest of the abominations.

TheLolrider wrote: The Stray demon is stuck underground in a room that's basically inaccessible. We fall in through the ceiling, but there are no other ways to get in or leave.

When it is inaccessible, how did the demon get in? It seems to me like the asylum was biult around the Demons OR they got there trough the canalisation which collapsed in the big room with the stray demon.

Right, I may have worded it confusingly, but I was suggesting that the Asylum was built around at least one of the demons, so I agree with you there. It's hard to determine exactly whats going on with the demon you fight first, because he drops down from the ceiling. Maybe the Asylum is bigger than we see, or maybe the Asylum demon came later.