Devourer

The devourer is a type of rotfiend, and the bestiary marks it as an especially dangerous one. Like its cousins it looks like a decaying human body stripped of skin, and it gives itself away with the stink of rot. What sets devourers apart is their endless hunger for human flesh.

They behave like other rotfiends. They gather in groups, often next to ghouls, and they share the rotfiend’s nasty trick of exploding once their health drops low. You can see it coming: the creature starts to choke and its head swells. The blast also hurts other monsters standing nearby.

In The Witcher 3, devourers are mostly found in the Skellige Isles. In For Fame and Glory, west of Larvik, you clear a cave full of ghouls and devourers before facing an alghoul. A few also lurk in the mine tunnel on Undvik during The Lord of Undvik, and one waits with nekker warriors in the cave north of Kaer Morhen in Trail of Echoes. In Velen, the abandoned village of Toderas, between Benek and Reardon Manor, can spawn a group of four or five.

Across the games

In The Witcher, devourers turn up in Act IV, around the Village at Murky Waters. They are linked to a single monster contract from Abigail, the local witch.

Abigail pays for devourer teeth and wants ten of them as proof of the hunt. As with many other contracts, the job can only be completed if Geralt‘s Bestiary has an entry on devourers. Once he has gathered ten teeth, he takes them to Abigail. The contract gives 5,000 XP and between 150 and 300 orens.

The Devourer Contract (Act IV, monster contract)

Combat strategy

A single devourer is not much trouble. The danger comes from numbers and from the explosion when one is close to death. Fight them like rotfiends: hit, then step away as soon as one starts to swell, and let the blast go off without you in it. A blast in the middle of a pack can even damage the other monsters for you.

Ghouls and other rotfiends often join in, and a crowd can overwhelm you quickly, so keep moving and don’t let them surround you.

Apply Necrophage Oil to your silver sword.
Keep Quen up to soak stray hits and the odd explosion you can’t escape.
Back away fast when you see a devourer choking with a swollen head.
Blizzard helps you slow things down and pick your moment to dodge.
In the cave in For Fame and Glory, a Northern Wind bomb thrown before you engage the pack gives you a strong start.