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View Full Version : Favorite Uses for Dopplegangers and other shapeshifters



BlackStaticWolf
2007-06-15, 11:08 AM
I'm curious to see how other people like to use dopplegangers and other similar shapeshifters. I don't mean obvious and cliche'd uses like impersonating a king or other figure of authority.

I mean creative, fun, and altogether entertaining uses.

I've really only used two doppleganger type creatures as DM. The first was when I was running a Legend of the Five Rings game. The creature was a type of demon called an oni no pekkle (basically, they're spies that can't be detected through magical means and if a person drinks the pekkle's blood, the pekkle can give them irresistable orders... they have absolutely no combat ability). The pekkle in question was disguised as a child who one of the PCs sort of "adopted."

The really funny thing is that the second I introduced the pekkle, one of the players announced: "I don't trust him! He's a pekkle!" His paranoia was overruled, and the child was brought on to be a servant for the party, whereby he ended up cooking ALL of their meals while travelling.

Fast foward about six or seven adventures, the party is attempting to thwart a maho-tsukai from acquiring several very powerful nemuranai. They beat him to the most important nemuranai, and the pekkle promptly orders them to give it to him and wait give him an impossible to overcome headstart before pursuing. Having consumed his blood with practically every meal, the PCs are unable to refuse. The paranoid player immediately announces: "I effing knew it. You can't trust orphans!"


The second incident is in my current DnD campaign and is pure comic relief. The creature is a doppleganger that I use to hit on the ENTIRE party (male and female alike). I violate their personal space and make blatant innuendo and suggestion, all the while making them think that it's either a very effeminate man, or a very masculine woman. The doppleganger has introduced itself as "Vagary," a name my players have deemed quite appropriate.

YuanTi
2007-06-15, 11:14 AM
Doppelganger rogues are the best. You walk past the guard, Sneak Attack!, you give the beggar a coin, Sneak Attack!. Pure hilarity ensues. Unfortunately the PCs don't enjoy this particularly. Also doppelgangers make great decoys.

Human Paragon 3
2007-06-15, 11:51 AM
In the campaign I'm running now, two of the characters (not the players) have a heated feud and are constantly threatening and belittling eachother (more fun than it sounds). Their characters are finally starting to trust one another and build up a friendship and comraderie, and then I had a doupleganger sent by the BBEG impersonate one of them and then ambush and kill the other. The best part was that I had the player roleplay the doppleganger. It worked like this:

I sent player A out of the room for "secret quest reasons". His character was back at the Inn while Player B went on a mission that was secret. As soon as player A was out of the room, I instructed player B that he would be playing a doppleganger with his exact combat abillities and hitpoints (a Dark One in our campaign setting). I gave him a gem that would act as a silence spell, and told him to tell player A that he had something very important to tell him in the next room that nobody else could hear. Once the two players were alone, he was to activate the gem and initiate a grapple (he was a grappling monk). He was then to grapple the player to death, open the door, kick the gem into the next room to silence the spellcasters and kill them all, too. Then he was to heal himself and wait by the door to kill anyone who entered, eventually leading to a TPK.

He then attempted to do just this, exactly as I'd instructed him. I intended to send in help for player A, and did, but player A still died. The rest of the party lived though.

And before you jump down my throat, it was a fair fight. Player A was one level higher than player B, but player B had the drop on him.

Anyway, the entire scene was amazing. My favorite part about it was how intensely the players played it, since they were fully committed to killing the other, and they were both much loved characters. Player B's had shook as he reached for the dice like he was reaching for a gun to actually kill his friend. It was brilliant.

EDIT: Player A was raised from the dead and the corpsese were actually useful to us, since we were wanted by the government as traitors and they were evidence that our two main fighters were "dead." We had our master of disguise rogue pretend to be a bounty hunter and turn the corpses over to the police.

Ramza00
2007-06-15, 12:44 PM
Dopplegangers got a big nerf recently with two new spells. Profane item and Sacred item from complete champion. If a creature of certain types (sacred is undead of any alignment, evil outsider or evil shapechanger; profane is animal or plant of any alignment, outsider good or or shapechanger good) touch the item that is enchanted by these spells and you take 10d4 damage as well as a magical overlay over your current form showing your default form. These spells remain on these items indefinitely till the spell is discharged.

Thus any sensible court/insitution/etc that has access to clerics, paladins, archivist, or blackguards that can cast 4th lvl spells, will cast one spell on one item and one spell of the other item (for example two rods or two rings). Before any important meeting, or you being allowed in the king's thrown room you must touch said items else be executed or not granted entrance.

Thus only shapechangers of neutral alignment can impersonate people for campaign plots.

Name the items the rod of faith and rod of trust.
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Also for an Undead Campaign the Cleric Archer just got a lot better. Cast a chain metamagic+divine reach (hierophant ability)+sacred item on these arrows during one of your campaign down times, this spell will remain in effect till discharged. Now fire off an arrow and besides doing its normal damage it will do 10d4 more sacred damage to undead.

Person_Man
2007-06-15, 01:04 PM
Shifter is useful for early entry into Warshaper.

Due to LA and racial Hit Dice, Dopplegangers builds tend to mechanically suck. There is nothing they can do that anyone with access to 4th-ish level spells can do. So compared to strait Beguilers, Psychic Rogues, Wizards, and Sorcerers, Dopplegangers are a bad idea.

Also, Spy like builds tend to get screwed because D&D is a team game. Your best Skills/abilities/tactics/etc depend on your ability to act alone, be hidden, and manipulate your enemies. But unless EVERYONE in the group has similar abilities, you are severely curtailed. You can either go off on your own, suspending the game for everyone else, or you can be given away by your friends, who lack your Spy like abilities and often have a desire to resolve problems by killing them.

Human Paragon 3
2007-06-15, 01:15 PM
Thus any sensible court/insitution/etc that has access to clerics, paladins, archivist, or blackguards that can cast 4th lvl spells, will cast one spell on one item and one spell of the other item (for example two rods or two rings). Before any important meeting, or you being allowed in the king's thrown room you must touch said items else be executed or not granted entrance.



Similarly, they could cast detect evil, or use a paladin.

Person man: Very true about spy-like characters, although that's not a mechanical problem per se, but a roleplaying problem as you said. Groups with infiltraters need to be willing to give the rogue some "alone time" to do their thing. I use "cutaway" to minimize this effect, swtiching back and forth between the rogue and the rest of the party. As a side effect, this often creates good suspense.

Although you did sort of miss the OP's point, which wasn't asking how to make an optimal PC, but rather asking for DM usage of dopplegagners and shifters for storytelling purposes.

Ramza00
2007-06-15, 01:25 PM
Similarly, they could cast detect evil, or use a paladin.

Detect evil just registers as evil it doesn't register as shapeshifter which this spell does. Perhaps the king has a LE advisor which he knows is evil but believes he keeps in check and he likes the LE resourcefulness for it helps the kingdom in the end. A doppleganger can impersonate him and the paladin can't do a thing about it.

Dark Knight Renee
2007-06-15, 10:39 PM
I haven’t got any actual shapeshifters in my D&D games, but I do have a polymorph/illusion-heavy wizard villain known only as “The Doppelganger” aka “Your Doppelganger.” Aside from sending the party riddle notes, randomly kidnapping party members or loved ones to use as threats, and sending them on arbitrary adventures, he also loves to switch out and impersonate party members as well. Instead of trying to kill them (he’s old, bored, and they’re his entertainment), he usually tries to create a huge social mess – often by implying or attempting to create love triangles among the party and their allies. Right now, the to term it a “triangle” is not particularly accurate. It was a hexagon last I checked, complete with tangled friendships and lots of angst, and one very shaky marriage.

What’s worse, they’ve already killed this guy twice (they got lucky and took him by surprise in cinematic scenes, and are nowhere near his level), and by now they can reasonably assume that unless they can trap or destroy his soul somehow, his Clone spells will keep him from actually staying dead.



In my long-running non-D20 Star Wars game, I have occasionally used shapeshifters as doppelgangers. One villain, if I remember correctly, managed to sneak into the most heavily defended, Jedi-heavy location in the galaxy and stay there as a spy not once but twice. Admittedly, he did this as much by being a good enough actor and spy to fool Jedi senses, no small task considering the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy were all around him.

On the good guys side, one of my sister’s characters (now more of an NPC than a main character) is a non-shapeshifting master of disguise, who has been known to similarly fool some of the most powerful dark Jedi in the galaxy. Fun times.

ClericofPhwarrr
2007-06-15, 10:53 PM
(Similar to Renee's post,) My changling rogue would go as other party members when in town and set up dates for them. He'd appear almost like his allies, but just a little better looking. Good times and much confusion!

Krimm_Blackleaf
2007-06-15, 11:08 PM
I usually use changelings in scenarios where normally a doppleganger might be used. If the mind-reading aspect becomes an issue I give them an amulet that simulates the ability to read thoughts.

As for lycanthropes, I've never used them but I'd like to. I'd like a typical werewolf story one o' these days.