Giving a creature Blindsight

[The Grue]

Context:

Had a session today with a brand-new group of 1st-level characters, wherein we fought some goblins. One goblin in particular was struck by an Illusionist's blinding ray, then proceeded to not only beat its miss chance but confirm a crit and roll max damage against another party member. The obvious joke, of course, that somehow being blind had made the goblin a total badass.

As a little joke, I wanted to stat him up as a recurring antagonist, so I was wondering if there's a way to give a creature blindsight through a template or something. I'll also accept some combination of special abilities/feats/class features that can approximate it, but I want to keep the Blind Goblin's CR as low as possible.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

Most of these are ways to get Mindsight, and the rest are ways to get Blindsight... honestly those are easier to find, and in play they'll look very similar.

"I'm the DM, so I have some leeway" methods:

Get a ustom continuous item of Blindsight (Sor/Wiz 3) - leeway because it's a custom item
Get Shape Soulmeld: Shedu Crown, Incarnate 2 or Open Least Chakra (Crown), then Mindsight - leeway because you have to interpret Shedu Crown as specifically granting the Telepathy ability
Reskin goblin as Ghostwise Halfling, get Mindsight - leeway because you're using (superior) halfling stats to represent the goblin... though you could tone those down if you wanted

Actual RAW methods:

Level him up to Mindbender 1, get actual Telepathy, then get Mindsight
Get the Blindsight, 5' radius (http://srd.realmspire.com/divineFeats.html) feat... but it's only 5 feet.
Level him up to Psion 5 (Telepath), take the ACF that swaps the 5th level feat for Telepathy, then get Mindsight
Give him the Blindfold of True Darkness (Arms & Equipment Guide, 9k gp) for 60' blindsight, no nonsense... but it might be too much loot if they kill him, depending on their level.

[The Grue]

Pathfinder, unfortunately.

[Gemini476]

You know that Goblins aren't permanently blinded by Blinding Rays, right? It wears off after 1d4 turns (which may as well be permanent given the average life expectancy of a blinded Goblin, but yeah.)

Anyway, just give 'em Blindsight X ft. You're the GM, you don't need to hunt down templates. It's not like it'll actually be that useful for it at low levels, so I doubt it would even increase CR.

Blindsight

Some creatures possess blindsight, the extraordinary ability to use a non-visual sense (or a combination senses) to operate effectively without vision. Such senses may include sensitivity to vibrations, acute scent, keen hearing, or echolocation. This makes invisibility and concealment (even magical darkness) irrelevant to the creature (though it still can't see ethereal creatures). This ability operates out to a range specified in the creature description.

Blindsight never allows a creature to distinguish color or visual contrast. A creature cannot read with blindsight.
Blindsight does not subject a creature to gaze attacks (even though darkvision does).
Blinding attacks do not penalize creatures that use blindsight.
Deafening attacks thwart blindsight if it relies on hearing.
Blindsight works underwater but not in a vacuum.
Blindsight negates displacement and blur effects.


Since a level 1 party is unlikely to have most of those, all the ability really does is hurt sneaky types and give immunity to Blinding Ray. If you want some penalty to the ability, just remove the normal vision. It'll be completely blind beyond its Blindsight.

If you want to represent it bring a badass, give it some levels in Fighter or Barbarian or Magus or whatever.

[The Grue]

You know that Goblins aren't permanently blinded by Blinding Rays, right? It wears off after 1d4 turns (which may as well be permanent given the average life expectancy of a blinded Goblin, but yeah.)

Just one round actually. Yes, this goblin was blinded, then immediately turned around and whacked a fighter with a max-damage crit. O_O

[Gemini476]

Just one round actually. Yes, this goblin was blinded, then immediately turned around and whacked a fighter with a max-damage crit. O_O

He got through the 50% miss chance, got a natural 19 or 20 on his to-hit roll, managed to beat the Fighter's AC with his +2 to-hit short sword on the confirmation, and rolled 8 out of 2d4?
That's a rather lucky goblin. What did the Fighter have for AC, anyway? 18-ish? 18 AC means that was a... 0,5*0,1*0,25*0,0625=0,00078125, or ~0,08%, or 1 in 1280. It was a 1 in 1280 chance.

[Yanisa]

Some quick googling I did find some options for blindsight... in pathfinder... but you aren't going to like most of them.

Wizard 8 (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/wizard/arcane-schools/paizo---arcane-schools/classic-arcane-schools/necromancy#TOC-Life-Sight-Su-), Synthesist 11 (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/summoner/eidolons#TOC-Blindsight-Ex-), Oracle 15 (www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/oracle/oracle-curses#TOC-Clouded-Vision) and a Third Party Template (CR+1) (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/templates/cave-creature-cr-1). There is also a 4th/5th level spell (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/e/echolocation). But all these options don't seem what you want.

My suggestions:

1) Pick the feat blind-fight (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/blind-fight-combat). It sounds more appropriate then blind sight because the whole blinded things was temporary. But the awesome hit that he goblin did left an everlasting impression on the bugger. So now the he trains with his eyes closed, or a blindfold, trying to simulate that once in a lifetime awesome moment. For a plot hook he could even hunt the fighter in his mad obsessions to figure out why his tactic only worked on that fighter. Higher levels could include a crit focused build... (Owh now I want to play this character)
2) Screw the rules, give him blind sight. Like suggested earlier that is the easier methode and you are the DM.
3) The third party template (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/templates/cave-creature-cr-1) does hit some of right notes, but still third party... It it the lowest level easiest rule based way to gain blind sight.