The Deerclops is probably one of the most annoying yet dangerous boss monsters you will encounter in Don’t Starve Together. It will usually first appear around Winter or in the first days of Spring, but we will go in-depth on the exact spawning values below.

What makes the Deerclops particularly dangerous is the fact that it will not only attack and hunt the player, but it will also target buildings and basically everything that is in its path. Failing to deal with the Deerclops properly could potentially mean losing tons of structures and countless hours of base-building.

Another issue is that it has a very huge Area of Effect attack as well as a particularly painful sanity drain. Thorough preparation will be required to deal with this boss.

Deerclops Stats

Health: 4000

Damage: 75 to the player, 150 to monsters

Attack delay: 4 seconds

Attack range: 8

Walking Speed: 3

Insanity Aura: -400/min

Special Ability: AoE attack. Destroys structures and trees

Loot: 8 Meat, Deerclops Eyeball, Deerclops Sketch

Deerclops Behaviour

Deerclops roams the lands during Winter, usually finding the player eventually when they’re in its path. As with many other monsters and attacks, there will be a sound cue foreboding the appearance of the Deerclops. Your character will comment on said sound, which is another clear sign of its approach. The Deerclops does not necessarily follow the player around, which means that there is a chance to simply evade and escape it. It will however target player buildings with a high priority, making dealing with the Deerclops a high priority.

Furthermore, you could theoretically run away from the Deerclops as soon as you realize that it is coming, but if you are too close in proximity to your own base, it might still target your buildings or simply walk through it in the course of its natural path. Mind that if you try to avoid the Deerclops by entering the Caves, it might be that it will be waiting for you at the exit of a cave.

It has two attacks that are aimed at its current target. One being a large swipe while the other is a pound on the ground. Each attack has the same effect and will have a large Area of Effect (AoE).

The Deerclops’ aggro behaviour is very peculiar. It will target any monster that is close enough to it, and after that will prioritize structures that the player has built and eventually the player if there are no structures to be found.

While the Deerclops does not target walls, it will want to destroy all structures the player has built and as such, might destroy the walls if they are either in its path or are within the large Area of Effect of its devastating attacks. Additionally, combat with monsters or the player might lead to building damage as a type of collateral damage. Lastly, the Deerclops can also damage buildings in its death animation, as upon killing it, it will collapse on nearby structures.

Preparing for a fight against the Deerclops

As a rule of thumb, you should start your preparations about 5 days before the Deerclops spawns.

As the Deerclops dishes out heavy damage, you should have enough armor to tank some hits if you plan to engage in combat. Consider creating about two to three Log Suits as well as two to three Football Helmets for protection. Mind, that the Deerclops has an insane sanity degeneration, so make sure to have enough food to quickly restore your sanity if necessary. 10 pieces of Jerky should do the trick, but having something like Taffy instead also can help.

For the right choice of weapons, refer to the list of hits needed to kill the Deerclops below. Tentacle Spikes or Ham Bats are however a good allrounder weapon.

Fighting the Deerclops means a lot of running around in the winter, so make sure to have one or two thermal stones with you to not suffer freezing damage.

If you choose to put it to sleep, make sure to have a Pan Flute or multiple Sleep Darts in stock.

Depending on the strategy that you use, you might also want to stack up on Gunpowder (19 or 20) or Tooth Traps (66 or 67).

Remember that the Deerclops very aggressively targets buildings, so if you want to fight him, you should avoid doing so near your own base, unless you want to risk having it completely destroyed. It is advisable to create secondary small combat base instead, with the most necessary resources, weapons and armors to fight him. This combat base should ideally be far away from your main base.

Quick reference preparation list:

• 3 Log Suits
• 3 Football Helmets
• 10-20 Dried Jerky
• 1 Tentacle Spike
• 1-2 Thermal Stones

If preferred, you can take with you any or all of these in varying numbers:

• Pan Flute or Sleeping Darts
• Freezing Staff
• Gunpowder
• Tooth Traps
• Secondary Base

How to kill the Deerclops

Damage Table

In order to better plan all the strategies focusing on dishing out many hits, here is a table outlining the number of hits needed to kill the Deerclops in Don’t Starve Together with each weapon.

Weapon	Number of hits
Fishing Rod, Bug Net	942
Lucy the Axe	296
Shovel, Pitchfork, Hammer, Torch, Umbrella, Walking Cane, Willow’s Lighter	224
Axe, Pickaxe, Golden Axe, Golden Pickaxe, Boomerang	148
Pick/Axe	132
Spear	118
Bat Bat	96
Ham Bat	68-136
Morning Star	56 or 94
Tentacle Spike	80
Battle Spear	78
Thulecite Club	68
Tooth Trap	67
Dark Sword	60
Blow Dart, Fire Dart, Fire Staff	40
Gunpowder	20
Old Bell	4

Mind that killing the Deerclops by burning it with a Fire Dart or a Fire Staff will make the loot burn and subsequently also the Deerclops Eye that drops from it.

It should also be mentioned that you need 4 Sleep Darts to put it to sleep, and 6 attacks with the Freeze Staff to freeze it.

Kiting Strategy

One of the most effective methods to kill the Deerclops is kiting it. This means that you will try to attack it as many times as possible before it can retaliate while running away whenever it tries to fight back. Kiting also means that you should take some time to study the attack animations of both attacks, in order to figure out when to exactly strike.

With good coordination, you should be able to deal out 3 to 4 hits before the Deerclops can retaliate. However, trying to dish out 4 hits is very risky and it is advisable to stick to 3 hits per opening. Mind that Deerclops’ attacks can freeze you after two hits, so tanking too many hits can quickly become very dangerous.

Treeguard Strategy

One way of dealing with the Deerclops is either finding an area with a Treeguard already spawned or artificially creating and spawning a Treeguard. Treeguards are extremely effective against the Deerclops, as they are tankier and are able to deal a lot of damage. The only issue is the freezing attack, making the spawn of multiple (usually two is enough) Treeguards necessary.

For simplicity, here is a quick strategy on creating one or multiple Treeguards:

Find an area in which you want to engage the Deerclops with lots of room to spare

• Plant as many Evergreen trees as you can. Make sure they are planted as closely together as possible.
• Let them fully grow and start chopping some in order to spawn Treeguards. For reference, each felled tree has a 1.33% chance of summoning a Treeguard.
• Optionally befriend Pigs to help you chop trees faster as they will initiate chopping trees if they see the player doing it
• Mind that if sufficient time has passed in your world, multiple Treeguards can spawn at once.

You can also simply try to look for Treeguards that have spawned naturally as you chop down Evergreen trees that you have found, with the disadvantage that you cannot choose the spot where you will have said Treeguard.

Gunpowder Strategy

One of the easiest strategies that has also proven effective with many other Boss Monsters is the Gunpowder Strategy which works like this:

• Prepare 19-20 units of Gunpowder and a fire source (like a Torch)
• Put the Deerclops to sleep with a Panflute or 4 Sleeping Darts
• Alternatively, freeze him with a Freezing Staff
• Place the 19-20 units of Gunpowder as close to the sleeping/frozen Deerclops as possible
• Light the Gunpowder with your fire source and run away
• The explosion will deal a total of 3800-4000 damage.

Using 20 Gunpowders and killing him instantly will make the loot drop burned and subsequently turn the Deerclops Eye to ashes. If you want to have the Deerclops Eye, use only 19 Gunpowder and deal the remaining 200 damage differently.

Tooth Trap Strategy

Using Tooth Trap for the Deerclopse can be a costly but very effective strategy, as it will essentially entail just placing all the Tooth Traps that you want to use and luring the Deerclops next to them. As many monsters do, the Deerclops will simply walk through the traps and activate them, suffering the damage.

A Tooth Trap can be crafted the following way:

• 1 Log
• 1 Rope
• 1 Hound’s Tooth

As you can see in the table above, you will need about 66-67 Tooth Traps to completely kill the Deerclops. Each Tooth Trap deals 60 damage, which means that 66 Tooth Traps would deal a total of 3960 damage, leaving the Deerclops with only 40 health.

As it can be very costly to create that many Tooth Traps, you could consider simply placing as many as you can afford. The advantage of using Tooth Traps is that you can prepare them beforehand and do not have to quickly react to any spawning Boss Monster.

Make sure to place the Tooth Traps as close together as possible. You can stack them very closely, meaning that a huge monster like the Deerclops will trigger multiple traps in quick succession.

Deerclops Spawning Rules

When generating your world, you can decide on the amount of Deerclops attacks, but for simplicity, we will only talk about the default values. Bear in mind that other factors like season length will also influence the spawning behavior.

There are a couple of spawning rules for the Deerclops:

• No giant (including the Deerclops) can attack in the first 27 days of your world.
• After the 27th day, the Deerclops will attack in (Season Length – 1) / (Number of attacks)
• For a standard game with standard values, say a winter with 15 days and a standard number of attacks of 4, this means (15-1)/4 = 3.5 Days
• Upon spawning, it will pick a player that to attack, that it will then hunt down.
• It will prioritize players with 4 or more nearby buildings
• It will target those structures as soon as it reaches the player
• Upon completely destroying all structures, it will despawn and set the timer to the same delay as before (see above)
• If the Deerclops is killed, the timer will be 6 times that, meaning it will usually not come again for the rest of the season

Loot

The Deerclops only drops meat, a sketch for a purely cosmetic statue, and the Deerclops Eyeball. The Deerclops Eyeball however is very useful and can be used for two particularly strong recipes:

Eyebrella

• Requires:
  • 1 Deerclops Eyeball
  • 15 Twigs
  • 4 Bone Shards
• Has a total durability of 9 days
• Can be repaired with a Sewing Kit (for 55.5% of its durability)
• Provides 240 points of protection from Overheating
• Provides absolute protection from Rain and Lightning
• Has the highest protective stats in the game for weather effects from Spring and Summer

Houndius Shootius

• Requires:
  • 1 Guardian’s Horn
  • 1 Deerclops Eyeball
  • 5 Thulecite
• A structure that can be placed
• Essentially a turret that attacks nearby enemies
• Has 1000 health and deals 65 damage per hit
• Can be repaired with healing items
• Drains 6.25 Sanity per minute on proximity

Conclusion

The Deerclops is a dangerous monster that can quickly turn hours of work into rubble. It can be considered a challenge to deal with it as well, but with proper preparation it should be more than doable.

Compared with other boss monsters in the game, it has rather low HP. The issue however lies with the fact that you cannot always choose the way you engage it, and it will sometimes simply surprise you in an inappropriate moment.

That being said, choosing to avoid the Deerclops should be possible if implementing the strategies outlined above, but eventually, you will have to face the monster and deal with it.