Green chaos serpent


 * This article is about the green chaos serpent in Hexen. For D'Sparil's steed in Heretic, see D'Sparil.

The green chaos serpent is an enemy from Hexen. They appear as tall serpentine humanoids with large three-horned heads, looking almost identical to D'Sparil's steed but with sharper dorsal spines. Green chaos serpents have 250 hit points and first appear on the Seven Portals. The manual describes them thusly:

"D'Sparil once had a Chaos Serpent for a mount. On this world the Serpents run loose, uncontrolled by any higher intelligence. One breed of Chaos Serpent will scorch you with fiery blasts, while a second variant of this creature belches poisonous gas."

- Hexen instruction manual

Combat characteristics
The chaos serpents are tied with slaughtaurs as the most durable non-boss monster in Hexen, lacking their defensive ability but doing a bit more damage per projectile at range. They belch out highly damaging fireballs at a rate of one per attack state, and can also bite the player in melee, but their bites can be easily avoided because it takes them a long time to perform. Despite the chaos serpent's high stats, their straightforward behavior can make them easier to deal with than creatures with more exotic fighting styles. They may pose a particular threat to the Fighter early in the game before the Hammer of Retribution is available to him; a good approach is to throw two or three flechettes in succession at them from medium range, which will kill them quickly if every flechette makes a direct hit. An alternative strategy for the fighter is to close into melee range and use Timon's Axe; although this carries more risk, it is effective because the serpent's melee biting attack is slow and does significantly less damage than the fireballs.

When killed with sufficient force or by a player's fourth weapon, the chaos serpent suffers a gib death. This uses the same animation as the regular death, but the serpent's severed arms are thrown free of the corpse as separate objects.