I finally managed to kill him after getting to level 54 last night, and he dropped… a random legendary that wasn’t even as good as what I was wearing.
I was expecting at minimum the cleaver, hoping for some title like “Butcher’s Bane” or SOMETHING. I spent like 15 minutes kiting him around - waste of time.
That is a little disappointing. At lower levels, the ONLY source of an actual legendary is killing The Butcher.
Still, you may want to report this as a bug. Just to be sure that he is supposed to drop just one item.
This happened with me but I was on a sorc and assumed it didn’t drop his cleaver because I can’t use it.
He can drop a trophy for your mount called the Butchers Cleaver. It’s just his little meat cleaver that hangs off the side of your horse.
Other than that, he gives one legendary drop which isn’t saying much in this loot system where rare items are more valuable than legendary items.
I killed him 2 times today, at lvl 87.
2 uniques salvaged 
Got the butcher’s mount today and I have to say it is really cool looking 
Best drop I’ve had in a long time.
badass move 
i sell uniques i dont need 
Butcher dropped my first Tempest Roar, so I’d say he has the best loot.
If its any consolation, he dors have a chance to drop a cleaver cosmetic for your horse… lol
I’m disappointed by all loot, and Butcher’s loot is a subset of all loot, so by definition, I am disappointed by Butcher’s loot.
Butcher’s loot is horrible.
For some reason Butcher seems to be stalking me. On my minion necro he frequently appears and tortures me. On my barb I destroy him.
All in all in S1 my record sits at ~15/5. 4 of those losses are necro.
Loot wise, stupid cleaver trophy, 2 uniques that I burned and nothing else of any interest.
For what is supposed to be a rare-ish random mini-boss encounter, his loot table really needs to be reviewed, IMHO.
You don’t even get an achievement for killing the guy. Only thing I can figure is that Blizz is intentionally trolling and insulting their players with the bad loot and no recognition for killing him.
He has an amazing horse skin. Got it the other week. Its one of the coolest skins in the game.
I hate the Butcher, he has owned my Level 97 Druid, solo he and I are not on friendly terms, he wipes the floor with me, then ask if I would like to lick his boots before he smashes me into oblivion. I am fine with his drops, when they happen. I have three of his Prime Weapon on my level 97 Druid, none yet on my Level 80 Rogue.
i’m disappointed about a lot of things in this game.
“amazing” LOL ok anyway
Ive gotten upgrades, uniques and other things off butcher. Just because you kill something once doesnt mean it should drop bis whatever.
This is an aarpg. Diablo with the exception of D3 actually has RNG.
Level 96 Druid here , I just continue the dungeon normally through mobs, which gives me a lot of spirit for my pulverize and damage him alongside the other mobs (that works fine in NM dungeons even +10 levels) , that’s how I kill him, otherwise one on one he is much harder.
I’m disappointed with all of the loot. It is Trash <— with a capital T.
“Fresh meat!” translates to “NPC vendors are about to be very happy with what you salvage or sell” in Diablo IV lore.