BBEG who learns/mirrors the abilities of PCs

[ffone]

Looking for a way to design a recurring antagonist whose schitick is to somehow learn/mirror/mimic/copy a PC's abilities and use them, possibly posing as a friendly NPC in order to have the necessary contact to 'attune' herself to a PC, and appear as a recurring enemy in various battles, using the tactics and abilities of a different party member each time.

A bit like Rogue from X-Men, Peter from Heroes, or Shang Tsung from Mortal Kombat, or Blue Mages and Mimics form Final Fantasy, if you are familiar with them.

The details are flexible: for example, the enemy might create/summon a doppleganger of a PC, rather than becoming one; the mirroring might be 'immediate' (see a PC do X, then do X back on the same round) or learned offstage (meet PCs in a friendly disguise, go off to prepare absorbed abilities, fight them the next day).

Thoughts so far:

1. A character who somehow has a Mirror of Opposition as an attended item (disguised as a tower shield?), possibly the mirror is an Intelligent item. (Shades of Snow White...)

2. A jack of all trades -ish build like Factotum, Chameleon whose uses the class abilities (and for example maybe Alter Self or Polymoprh from Factotum's spell-like abilities) to act like a certain archetype in combat.

[DragonOfUndeath]

By RAW or not?
if not just homebrew an item that let's you copy 1 ability per day.
Slowly copy their spells, their buffs, their schticks.
Have him copy powerful beings or copy an image of NPCs allowing him to disguise himself perfectly as them.

[JeminiZero]

If this is for 3.5, there is one PrC that can steal *any* ability. Its the Illithid Savant from Savage Species, and its also hideously broken.

[Frozen_Feet]

If I recall right, there's a spell called Mirror Move somewhere which allows the caster to gain a feat for a while after observing it in action.

[dobu]

Yea. It's a Spell found online: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/article.a...sb/sb20000901a
And there's also "Heroics" in the Spell Compendium.

[Prime32]

Chameleon PrC? With the changeling race.

There's a homebrew Red Mage (or was it Blue Mage?) class that adds more options to it - IIRC it can copy things like ToB and incarnum.

[Chilingsworth]

There's a PrC on Pg 55 Planar Handbook called the Ardent Dilettante that can do this 1/day at eigth level. Also, spellthief.

EDIT: Also, the Ur-Priest PrC, can at tenth level steal spell-like abilities 1/day.

[Amnestic]

Mimic Class might be up your alley

Also a psionic Blue Mage

I think Mimic is probably better for you, but you might want to tweak it a bit yourself if you're going to use it for a Big Bad.

Edit: "pisonic" Blue mage? Uses maths and sound to do its thing, I guess. *bonk* Silly typos.

[big teej]

Kirby as a BBEG?


I am intrigued.....

MWUAHAHAHAH my diabolical plan is foolproof!!!

but your a pink puffball..... that eats people

SILENCE CRETIN!!!

[Pika...]

Kirby as a BBEG?


I am intrigued.....

MWUAHAHAHAH my diabolical plan is foolproof!!!

but your a pink puffball..... that eats people

SILENCE CRETIN!!!

Now I want Kirby stated out.

[Pechvarry]

Perhaps a craftsman of some sort? An Effigy Master would work well, for example, crafting replicas of the party members. Unfortunately, the effigy template is a bit lacking for the job.

If the BBEG himself is a mimic, then you'll likely have to leave RAW behind. A chameleon or factotum, for example, can play similar to most of your party members. But the PCs likely won't make the connection that they're being mimicked. They'll likely just notice stuff like "oh hey, he's casting divine spells now." "weird. he has spring attack." And think you made a gestalt or something.

[big teej]

Perhaps a craftsman of some sort? An Effigy Master would work well, for example, crafting replicas of the party members. Unfortunately, the effigy template is a bit lacking for the job.

If the BBEG himself is a mimic, then you'll likely have to leave RAW behind. A chameleon or factotum, for example, can play similar to most of your party members. But the PCs likely won't make the connection that they're being mimicked. They'll likely just notice stuff like "oh hey, he's casting divine spells now." "weird. he has spring attack." And think you made a gestalt or something.

it sounds to me like a certain pink puffball is the solution
kirby

[HMS Invincible]

1. Make sure that your alignment is not CE. LG would work best. You want to benefit the multiverse and there is no better way to do that than for it to be like puddy in your hands.
2. You need a Knowledge check of 25 to know that you can summon Pazazu like Beetlejuice. As a Psion with a Sage Psicrystal, an 18 Intelligence, the Skill Focus feat, four ranks in Knowledge (The Planes) and a masterwork item of relevance (say a book), you can take 10 to get 25. It's ok that you got bullied as a child for your narrow focus and strange fascination in all things relating to the planes. It will pay off in the end.
3. Summon Pazuzu by calling out his name three times. He'll appear and be like "Yo! What the hell?!?! What do you want Mor-tal? Power? I can give it!" You'll look all calm and not impressed and be like "I'd prefer a Lawful Evil aligned Candle of Invocation". "There is a price!" the demon lord will scream. "You must go closer to EV-ILL!!!" "Ok" you will say. "I shall be Neutral Good from now on." Pazuzu shouts "If you're going to stick with the one shift limit I would greatly prefer that you shifted to Lawful Neutral over Neutral Good!!!" You will look as if this is a deal breaker and you are ready to leave, then say "You're a real ballbuster but we have a deal."

Now you have your candle.
4. Use the Candle to Gate in an Efreeti. He is under your control so you will command him to grant you three wishes. The first is to Plane Shift to the Astral Plane. The second is for another Candle of Invocation. The third is to stop George Lucas from moving forward on Indiana Jones 5.
5. Use the Candle to Gate in a Sarruhk. Command him to grant you Manipulate Form through the use of Manipulate Form.

Ascend.
Now you can mirror any ability that the PCs have. Have fun. =P

[ffone]

lol, when I googled 'sarrukh' one of the first results was the CO board Pun-Pun post which HMS's text above is lifted from:

http://community.wizards.com/go/thre...haracter._EVER.

Since this is an NPC I guess it could also be a sarrukh itself.

Pechvarry, good point; probably the NPC would want to mimic the NPCs visually as well (Disguise/Alter self etc.) Even when it serves no tactical purpose, it can be explained as an attempt at psychological warfare on the NPC's part.

Thanks for the pointers everyone (Heroics, Mirror Move, Illithid Savant, Arcane Dilletante, Spell-Thief, Ur-Priest etc.). Now I want Kirby too...

[randomhero00]

shrug, make him a hands off BBEG, have him carry a mirror of relfection or whatever. The thing that makes you fight yourself. Fragile, but around 90k gold. Probably one of the most over powered items in game ( at least for PCs). So boom, you'll literally have a copy of a player fighting for you.

[ericgrau]

^EDIT: Mirror of opposition. Ooh, that could work.

Time travel to the future, grab fallen hairs or etc. from the PCs, time travel
back, make simalucrums of the PCs future selves, which are half their future level which incidentally puts the simalucrums closer to their current selves. I think wizards.com has some time spells to try (try googling "time travel site:www.wizards.com" maybe), but they might be limited on what they can do until high level. Could also lead into a time loop plot line on two timelines.

[Grelna the Blue]

Shadow Conjuration and Greater Shadow Conjuration. Give the BBEG a homebrew PrC or item that allows these spells to copy PCs and grant a little extra solidity.

Alternatively, the BBEG could be able to draw on the Plane of Mirrors rather than the Plane of Shadow. So suddenly the party could be under attack from an army of copies, each individually weaker in hp, but with identical abilities. Plus, there are some cool mirror spells out there if you look (esp. if you widen the net to include obscure 2nd Ed. stuff).

[Darrin]

Psychic Reformation + Thought Bottle, rinse & repeat. Every time the PCs run into him, he has a completely different set of class abilities.

[Prime32]

Kirby as a BBEG?


I am intrigued.....

MWUAHAHAHAH my diabolical plan is foolproof!!!

but your a pink puffball..... that eats people

SILENCE CRETIN!!!

There Will Be Brawl.

That is all.

[Garryl]

Step 1: Simulacrum, or for bonus points, Ice Assassin. You can stop here if you want, or push past into the realm of insanity.

Step 2: Manifest Fusion to join with the simulacra or ice assassins.

Step 3: Cackle in glee as you have 50% (or all) of your quarries' abilities on top of your own.

Step 4: ???

Step 5: Profit!


Your best bet is to do this as a Thrallherd who masterminds it all, rather than the actual creature who fuses. One thrall takes the arcane spellcasting side of things, the other is an Egoist who manifests Fusion on the icy clones. You can use your nondescript followers to get close to the PCs to steal some bits of flesh, hair, or nail.

For (more) bonus points, have your Egoist gain access to the Astral Seed power, even temporarily through Metaconcert, a power stone, Thieving Mindlink, or just manifesting from another's known powers. Astral Seed re-grows your body to what it was when you manifested it, not when you died, so if your thrall manifests it while fused, it should respawn postmortem in the combined body of the fused entity. You can counteract your thrall's level loss with a Thought Bottle (from Complete Arcane, I think). If you want to get creepier, have it come after the PCs as only one of them the first time, and add in another one's abilities and features each time they kill it. It's inconvenient, but doesn't even matter if they off your thrall for good; you're a Thrallherd, just get a new one 24 hours later.

[ArcanistSupreme]

Step 1: Simulacrum, or for bonus points, Ice Assassin. You can stop here if you want, or push past into the realm of insanity.

Step 2: Manifest Fusion to join with the simulacra or ice assassins.

Step 3: Cackle in glee as you have 50% (or all) of your quarries' abilities on top of your own.

Step 4: ???

Step 5: Profit!


Your best bet is to do this as a Thrallherd who masterminds it all, rather than the actual creature who fuses. One thrall takes the arcane spellcasting side of things, the other is an Egoist who manifests Fusion on the icy clones. You can use your nondescript followers to get close to the PCs to steal some bits of flesh, hair, or nail.

For (more) bonus points, have your Egoist gain access to the Astral Seed power, even temporarily through Metaconcert, a power stone, Thieving Mindlink, or just manifesting from another's known powers. Astral Seed re-grows your body to what it was when you manifested it, not when you died, so if your thrall manifests it while fused, it should respawn postmortem in the combined body of the fused entity. You can counteract your thrall's level loss with a Thought Bottle (from Complete Arcane, I think). If you want to get creepier, have it come after the PCs as only one of them the first time, and add in another one's abilities and features each time they kill it. It's inconvenient, but doesn't even matter if they off your thrall for good; you're a Thrallherd, just get a new one 24 hours later.

And the only way to stop the BBEG is to cut off the supply of diamond dust. This is pretty cool. How would healing interact with someone fused with a simualcrum?

[ffone]

Very cool. I think I like Ice Assassin slightly better than the Mirror of Opposition, b/c the latter (while simpler, and core) just seems 'too good': if the PCs get their hands on a mirror of opposition, how could every single battle after that (at least those vs one big enemy rather than a horde) NOT start with them showing the big enemy the mirror so it has to fight itself + the PCs? The Mirror of Opposition AFAICT is like having an at-will Ice Assassin w/ no XP cost, casting time, or even an action requires on the part of the 'wielder' of the mirror. (Its downside, as someone said above, is a PC can easily sunder it, or, if smarter, grab it themselves.)

Ice Assassin + Fusion is great too...that seems like it would work for allowing an enemy (the Fusion caster) to gain the abilities of any one PC (the Ice Assasssin 'model'). That pretty much fulfills the 'add someone else's abilities onto your own' idea.

Ice Assassin's long casting time and XP cost keep it from being too ridiculous in the hands of most PCs, even if they learn what was being used against them (and get a spellbook / scroll with it).

[dextercorvia]

Ice Assassin's long casting time and XP cost keep it from being too ridiculous in the hands of most PCs, even if they learn what was being used against them (and get a spellbook / scroll with it).

Uncanny Forethought will let you cast it as a Standard action (or Full Round with a hit to CL if you don't have Spell Mastery for Ice Assassin) Int mod times per day.

[ffone]

Ooh, nice find, thanks. Especially b/c Ice Assassin doesn't appear to depend on its caster level.