Lunatic Cultist

     

PC/Console/Mobile/Old Chinese/tModLoader/tModLoader 1.3-Legacy-Only Content: This information applies only to the PC, Console, Mobile, Old Chinese, tModLoader, and tModLoader Legacy versions of Terraria.

Lunatic Cultist

Map Icon

 Classic

 Expert

 Master

Statistics

Type	Boss
Environment	Surface
AI Type	Lunatic Cultist AI
Damage	50/75/112 (melee) 36 / 72 (shadow fireball) 70 / 100 (ice mist) 60 / 80 (fireball) 90 / 120 (lightning orb) 120 / 160 (Ancient Light) 30 / 45 (Ancient Doom)
Max Life	32000/48000/61200
Defense	42
KB Resist	100%
Immune to	All debuffs except Whip debuffs

Inflicts debuff

Inflicts debuff

Inflicts debuff

Debuff	On Fire!
Debuff tooltip	Slowly losing life
Chance	(Fireball) 100%

Drops

Coins	1025

• Item (Quantity)Rate
• Ancient Manipulator
  100%
• Ancient Cultist Mask
  14.29%
• Ancient Cultist Trophy
  10%
• Greater Healing Potion (5-15)
  100%

Sounds

Hurt
Killed

• Internal NPC ID: 439

Ancient Cultist

Map Icon

 Classic

 Expert

 Master

Statistics

Type	Enemy
Environment	Surface
AI Type	Lunatic Cultist AI
Damage	0
Max Life	10000
Defense	35
KB Resist	100%
Immune to	All debuffs

• Internal NPC ID: 440

"The fanatical leader of the Dungeon coven..."

The Lunatic Cultist is a Hardmode, post-Golem boss summoned by killing the Cultists that spawn at the Dungeon's entrance after Golem is defeated. It is somewhat considered to be the penultimate boss of Terraria, seconded only by Moon Lord. Defeating the Lunatic Cultist initiates the Lunar Events.

After all four Celestial Pillars have been destroyed, the Cultists respawn at the Dungeon entrance, allowing you to fight the Lunatic Cultist and initiate the Lunar Events again.

While the Lunatic Cultist is alive, music Boss 5 will play.

Behavior

The Lunatic Cultist makes its first brief appearance at the Mysterious Tablet as soon as the Cultists are defeated. It is not vulnerable to attack at this time. It then warps to a new location in midair and summons one of three attacks:

• A burst of three homing fireballs that explode on impact
• An ice ball that fires ice shards in six directions four times over as it flies in one direction before slowly fading away
• An orb that fires bolts of lightning at the character

As the Lunatic Cultist becomes damaged, it adds two spreads of five destructible Ancient Light projectiles as part of its attack cycle.

In Expert mode, it may also spawn numerous Ancient Dooms that fire four purple projectiles in a cross pattern.

The Lunatic Cultist cycles through its various attacks, performing four to five of them before proceeding to spawn phantom duplicates of itself called Ancient Cultists, along with a larger version of the Mysterious Tablet via a "ritual". Unless the one true Lunatic Cultist is interrupted by an attack from a player during this ritual, the duplicates fly in formation and add their homing shadowflame attacks.

Attacking a duplicate results in the summoning of the Wyvern-like Phantasm Dragon. If there is already a Phantasm Dragon inbound, attacking a duplicate triggers an Ancient Vision, which resembles a miniature Moon Lord head. Duplicates can be eliminated by hitting the true Lunatic Cultist during the ritual, but if not, large quantities of duplicates can amass.

Notes

• If the player loses against the Lunatic Cultist, or goes far away enough for it to despawn, the Lunatic Devotes and Cultist Archers at the Dungeon will respawn after one day passes.
• The Cultists won't spawn if Skeletron has not yet been defeated in the current world, since the Old Man takes spawn priority over the Cultists.
• The Lunatic Cultist will only take 75% of the damage from homing projectiles (e.g, Chlorophyte Bullets and summoned minions).
• The Lunatic Cultist can only have 6 decoys active at the same time.
• The Lunatic Cultist locks on to every player, so if one player uses a Magic Mirror, he will despawn.

Tips

Real Lunatic Cultist (left) and decoy (right)

For more elaborate strategies on defeating the Lunatic Cultist, including weapon and arena recommendations, see Guide:Lunatic Cultist strategies.

• Avoid defeating the Lunatic Cultist if you are not yet ready for the Lunar Events. Beating the Lunatic Cultist causes the Lunar Events to begin immediately, and there is no way to de-summon them thereafter (aside from defeating them).
• The real Lunatic Cultist can be distinguished from its fakes in a number of ways:
  • The real Cultist is the only one with a health meter.
  • The real Cultist has a reflection in its eyes, making them appear like sharp triangles, while the clones have round blank eyes.
  • The real Lunatic Cultist has a line on its hood while the fakes don't.
  • Most minions and homing weapons will only attack the real Cultist.
  • The real Cultist does not emit light, while the decoys do; however, this may only be apparent if fought at night.
  • The decoy Cultists are named "Ancient Cultist" instead of "Lunatic Cultist".
  • Using a Hunter Potion will only highlight the real Cultist.
  • Using Autopause grants as much time as needed for identifying the real Cultist.
• Attacking a decoy Cultist is not a bad idea if you use the Vampire Knives. The resulting Phantasm Dragon is very long and may be easily targeted to restore some life.

Trivia

• The Lunatic Cultist's attacks appear to be based on the four pillars from the Lunar Events.
• It is a common belief that the Cultists' design was inspired by Crowno's clothes. However, according to Crowno, the Lunatic Cultist was designed first.
• The boss' appearance resembles a plague doctor costume, which was a garment worn by doctors which in turn was based off 14th century plague doctor bird-like masks.
• It is the smallest boss, and the only one without an awakening message.
• The Lunatic Cultist's mask and trophy are named "Ancient Cultist" rather than "Lunatic Cultist", as they are still using an early development name. Several other enemy drops from 1.3 also retained their early development names until later patches.
• The Lunatic Cultist has an Expert mode Treasure Bag in Terraria's game files, but it is currently unobtainable as it does not actually drop it.
• This is the only boss to use music specifically titled after another boss, Golem, and the only boss whose music starts before the boss itself spawns.
• The term lunatic is nowadays usually used as an informal synonym for "insane", "mentally ill", etc. The word itself, however, originated from the fact that diseases were historically thought to have been caused by the moon, tying in with the moon-themed events following this boss.
• The Lunatic Cultist, Brain of Cthulhu, Moon Lord, King Slime, and, in Expert mode, Duke Fishron are the only bosses that can teleport.
• The head icon displayed on the map is also shown for the Ancient Cultists.
• By using a Magic Mirror, Recall Potion, etc., you can teleport away from the Lunatic Cultist and it will despawn.
• When the Lunatic Cultist first spawns, glowing particles start flowing to it from the Mysterious Tablet, and it makes a noise that sounds like a heavily edited voice clip. After this, he makes a laugh-like sound (also altered) and tilts up its mask and shakes, to appear as if it is laughing at the player.
• Oddly, when the Lunatic Cultist is killed, the text message "Celestial Creatures are invading!" appears before "Lunatic Cultist has been defeated!"

Achievement

Obsessive Devotion • “Defeat the Ancient Cultist, fanatical leader of the dungeon coven.”

Defeat the Lunatic Cultist for the first time.

Category: Slayer

History

 PC version

• Desktop 1.3.0.4:
  • No longer respawns while the Moon Lord is spawning.
  • Can no longer spawn during important events like boss fights, invasions etc.
  • Fixed rare occurrence of cultists sinking into the floor in multiplayer.

• Desktop 1.3.0.1: Introduced.

 Console version

• Console 1.0.933.1: Introduced. ()

• Console 1.0.750.0: Introduced. ()