When I first got into D&D, the distinction between Devils and Demons was a novel one to me - the words are generally interchangeable in most contexts, though I tend to think of "Demons" as being the more collective term and "Devil" being the term reserved for the ultimate evil in several Abrahamic religious traditions.
But D&D has a complex cosmos and with it, a complex ecosystem of fiends - and yes, they employ "fiend" as a catch-all term for beings from the lower (read: evil) outer planes. And, among these, you have multiple groups, from Devils and Demons to Yugoloths, Demodands, and others.
One of the rarer varieties has a whole bunch of curious asterisks attached to it.
As mentioned: many of these fiend subtypes are kind of defined by their home plane - Devils from the Nine Hells, Demons from the Abyss, Yugoloths from Gehenna (though it appears the folks at Wizards have never been fully consistent with this, as there are also Baernoloths from Hades, which are Yugoloths but kind of outside the standard hierarchies).
The Rakshasa is from South Asian folklore, though D&D's version is largely its own thing.
Actually, 2025's version of the Rakshasa expands out from the narrow idea presented in earlier D&D - while we've generally always seen them as tiger-headed humanoid-shaped fiends with hands/claws that are inverted (the fingers essentially bending the other way,) the new Monster Manual is a bit more open in terms of what they might look like, with the art showing other Rakshasas (though the tiger one is in the center) with other animal heads.
The thing that I find kind of fascinating about Rakshasas is that they are from the Nine Hells, but are not Devils. There are plenty of unclassified fiends - Succubi/Incubi (which are now quite different stat blocks, but linked to one another) have ping-ponged between devils and demons (perhaps devils because they're very much about luring and ensnaring mortals, but demons because they're often associated with Grazz't) and in 5E have always been unclassified. But they're not given a clear home plane, and don't have the Fiendish Restoration feature that specifies how they come back from death if killed outside their home plane.
Now, the Rakshasa is a single stat block. There are, I believe, some alternates in other books (I believe Eberron) but this is just the one thing.
However, if you want to throw something at your party that is going to be truly scary, let's break down just what the Rakshasa brings to the table:
They're CR 13, which means in theory that a party in high tier 2 could handle them. In theory. Because let's talk about what else they have.
Greater Magic Resistance is going to make your spellcasters truly panic when it comes to these guys. While the 2014 version was immune to spells of 6th and lower level, the new version's magic resistance works differently: they automatically succeed on saving throws against any spell or magical effect. (On top of that, they have blanket immunity to any spell that can detect its thoughts, creature type, or alignment, or view it remotely.) And if you thought you'd deal with all that by using attack-roll spells, sadly these also automatically miss. (That said, True Strike would work, because the attack is actually a weapon attack.)
Now, in a weird, way, I think you could interpret this as a nerf. In 2014, if you hit one of these with a Lightning Bolt, they just would nope out of it, utterly unaffected. In 2025, they automatically succeed on a saving throw against Meteor Swarm, but they still wind up taking half damage from it. Even a simple 1st-level Burning Hands would do some damage to them (unlike their diabolic neighbors, they don't have fire immunity).
Thus, the optimal option here is to go after it with weapons. And in this case, there's even a little beneficial asterisk: if you deal piercing damage to it while you're under the effect of the Bless spell, they have vulnerability to it. This, apparently, dates back to older editions when a good-aligned character who hit it with a crossbow bolt would deal double damage. In 2014 this just became "piercing damage from a good-aligned character using a magical weapon," and here, as both "magical weapons" and caring much about alignment when it comes to mechanics are both kind of out, we have this one.
So, this Greater Magic Resistance clearly makes them tough to fight - at least for spellcasters. A martial-heavy party might not actually have too much trouble with a Rakshasa's very manageable-at-hight-tier-2 17 AC and its decent but not insurmountable 221 HP, especially if they have a Cleric or Paladin to cast Bless on them and they wield weapons that have piercing damage.
But here's the one-two-punch that makes a Rakshasa a profoundly difficult monster to deal with:
First off, their attack inflicts a curse, and it's one of the nastiest curses out there: while cursed by them, a creature doesn't benefit from short or long rests. While I think you might still not die of exhaustion from getting no sleep, you won't regain HP, and worse, spellcasters who might prepare, say, Remove Curse, won't be able to.
This curse has no saving throw: it just lands on the target if they hit with an attack roll, so there's little you can do about it if they get to you.
Now, the true nightmare:
Rakshasas, like devils, demons, and yugoloths, have Fiendish Restoration, which means that if they die outside of their home plane (the Nine Hells,) they reform there instantly with full HP.
And Rakshasas have a 1/day Plane Shift.
Now, as a DM, I would advise against this, but you could, in theory, have the party beat a Rakshasa only for the very next turn have the fiend Plane Shift back to wherever they were defeated. Now, again, without a specific Teleportation Circle, the destination of a Plane Shift spell is more general - I think any fair interpretation would at least give the players a chance to flee or hide.
Still, a Rakshasa is a potentially truly relentless threat. The only way to permanently deal with one is by killing them in the Nine Hells (which happens in Critical Role's first campaign, and is the closest they came to a TPK).
So, how do we use one?
4 10th-level characters would consider one of these a high-level difficulty (though just north of the moderate cap). A 5th party member drops it to moderate. However, these are not legendary creatures, and so I don't think you'd be likely to get a satisfying "end of tier boss fight" out of it.
I think we need to lean into the idea that they're from the Hells but not devils. Their relationship with Asmodeus and all the diabolic hierarchy is thus less clear - if you're a devil, there's a really clear and delineated rank you hold, and the form you have is based on that rank. Rakshasas, I like to believe, are tolerated by the devils because of their freedom to act outside of official channels. Their immunity to spells also means they have an edge when dealing with their infernal neighbors.
Rakshasas are Lawful Evil, fitting for their home plane. But they don't seem to be as concerned with collecting souls, recruiting into the ever-expanding diabolic pyramid scheme. I think they're likely to be more interested in individual goals. Indeed, a Rakshasa need not be an antagonist - they could be a useful, if difficult-to-trust ally.
Again, if you want the party to fight them, a Rakshasa will probably be not quite as good as a true boss fight unless it has lots of help. It's more likely to be a memorably harrowing encounter, and the curse they leave becomes a real problem the party will need to solve. In a lot of ways, the fight itself is not even the scariest thing - it's after you've taken one down and are racing to get the curse cured so that you can properly recover.
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