Hi All,
Gate to Hell in the basement of a dungeon. One of the preceding rooms has mirrored walls, which reflects the mutilated corpses of the PCs nearest and dearest. To open the secret door, a PC must cry at least three tears into the font provided.
If they're not easily moved and decide instead to break the door down, something nasty emerges from the shattered mirror. Any ideas?
I'd like to avoid the tired "fight your reflection" cliche? I play 3.5 and have most of the monster manuals, but I can probably track down monsters from other sources. Ideally something around about CR 10, but interesting candidates of greater and lesser CRs can be adapted accordingly.
Any suggestions appreciated.
Use an evil outsider that best matches their greatest sin,
and tweak it as needed
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If you've got the 3.0 Fiend Folio, look up the Nerra. They're a race of neutral outsiders from The Plane of Mirrors who occasionally pop out of mirrors to kidnap people or gather intelligence for an upcoming invasion. They're not mirror-image doppelgangers so you don't have to worry about the cliche, and I doubt very many players know about them so your party shouldn't be have any preconcieved notions on how to deal with them.
If you don't like the fluff for the race, you could just use their stat blocks to make them generic mirror monsters. The three types of Nerra range from CR1 to CR7 and they often take class levels. If you don't have a Fiend Folio and want to check them out, I might be able to post some statblocks.
Yes, I considered the Nerra already, but as a neutral race I didn't feel they really fitted the more evil theme of the stronghold. I'd rather not deprive them of their fluff, as I rather like it!
What about imbuing a glass golem (CR 8) with a fiendish template? Throw in the advanced simple template for extra goodness and challenge if you so desire.
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Hmmm, what if a Glass Golem assembles itself from the mirror or it turns out the mirror (or part of it) is really a Quicksilver Ooze?
Or howabout this: The party walks into the mirrored room and sees the font and the reflection of a gate (like an actual iron gate, not a magic gate) in one or multiple walls of the room, but there's no visible gate in the corresponding wall. They can only see its reflection. Next, you take a suitably evil monster, maybe one or four Dune Stalkers from Monster Manual 2, and you stick him behind the gate. The party can see him in the reflection, but he isn't doing anything. He's just standing there, behind the reflected gate, motionless, hardly even breathing. Now, they're nervous. They can't find any sign of a hidden door in the wall. They could try to do the safe thing with the tears and the font, but they might get froggy and smash the mirror to get to the gate and confront the beast within.
Striking the mirror causes a gong-like sound to thunder across the chamber, but the mirror doesn't break. Instead, the gate (or gates in the case of multiple Dune Stalkers) reflected in the mirrors open up allowing the reflected monsters to exit into the room except the party doesn't see any monsters in the room with them. They can, however, see the reflected Dune Stalker approaching the closest member of the party menacingly and then prepare to strike. If they haven't figured it out by now, the monster attacks the guy flat-footed and they quickly realize the thing is invisible in all but its reflection. In order to fight it, they basically need to watch the mirror to see where it goes (i.e. avert their gaze the way they might fighting a medusa.) This gives the monster the appropriate concealment and other related bonuses. The situation might also screw with the players' perceptions of where the monster actually is so you might want them to make Perception checks to determine the correct square to attack.
If the party wins the combat, you either let them off the hook and one of the mirrored walls slides into the floor to reveal the exit or go for round two and tell the party they see the gate is once again closed and another monster awaits them.
Hmmm, what if a Glass Golem assembles itself from the mirror or it turns out the mirror (or part of it) is really a Quicksilver Ooze?
Or howabout this: The party walks into the mirrored room and sees the font and the reflection of a gate (like an actual iron gate, not a magic gate) in one or multiple walls of the room, but there's no visible gate in the corresponding wall. They can only see its reflection. Next, you take a suitably evil monster, maybe one or four Dune Stalkers from Monster Manual 2, and you stick him behind the gate. The party can see him in the reflection, but he isn't doing anything. He's just standing there, behind the reflected gate, motionless, hardly even breathing. Now, they're nervous. They can't find any sign of a hidden door in the wall. They could try to do the safe thing with the tears and the font, but they might get froggy and smash the mirror to get to the gate and confront the beast within.
Striking the mirror causes a gong-like sound to thunder across the chamber, but the mirror doesn't break. Instead, the gate (or gates in the case of multiple Dune Stalkers) reflected in the mirrors open up allowing the reflected monsters to exit into the room except the party doesn't see any monsters in the room with them. They can, however, see the reflected Dune Stalker approaching the closest member of the party menacingly and then prepare to strike. If they haven't figured it out by now, the monster attacks the guy flat-footed and they quickly realize the thing is invisible in all but its reflection. In order to fight it, they basically need to watch the mirror to see where it goes (i.e. avert their gaze the way they might fighting a medusa.) This gives the monster the appropriate concealment and other related bonuses. The situation might...
That sounds really awesome! I am definitely using this.
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Hmmm, what if a Glass Golem assembles itself from the mirror or it turns out the mirror (or part of it) is really a Quicksilver Ooze?
Or howabout this: The party walks into the mirrored room and sees the font and the reflection of a gate (like an actual iron gate, not a magic gate) in one or multiple walls of the room, but there's no visible gate in the corresponding wall. They can only see its reflection. Next, you take a suitably evil monster, maybe one or four Dune Stalkers from Monster Manual 2, and you stick him behind the gate. The party can see him in the reflection, but he isn't doing anything. He's just standing there, behind the reflected gate, motionless, hardly even breathing. Now, they're nervous. They can't find any sign of a hidden door in the wall. They could try to do the safe thing with the tears and the font, but they might get froggy and smash the mirror to get to the gate and confront the beast within.
Striking the mirror causes a gong-like sound to thunder across the chamber, but the mirror doesn't break. Instead, the gate (or gates in the case of multiple Dune Stalkers) reflected in the mirrors open up allowing the reflected monsters to exit into the room except the party doesn't see any monsters in the room with them. They can, however, see the reflected Dune Stalker approaching the closest member of the party menacingly and then prepare to strike. If they haven't figured it out by now, the monster attacks the guy flat-footed and they quickly realize the thing is invisible in all but its reflection. In order to fight it, they basically need to watch the mirror to see where it goes (i.e. avert their gaze the way they might fighting a medusa.) This gives the monster the appropriate concealment and other related bonuses. The situation might...
OK so I'm going to have to steal that. it's too awesome not to use.
How about using Medusas on the the other side of the one way mirrors? They could have wands that allow them to strike the party first since the mirrors would be one way only?
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As an aside, I kind of randomly picked Dune Stalkers because I remembered them being weird, wicked and deadly but, if you use them, I'd definitely retool them for Pathfinder. That Kiss of Death ability of theirs might be too powerful considering the general nerfing of Save-or-Die effects. Off the top of my head, I'd maybe change the Kiss to 2d6 Sonic + some CON damage with a Fort Save to negate the CON damage. That way, it's still deadly, but not immediately lethal.
Also, Alex the Rogue gave me the idea to maybe make the gates walls of force covered with a permeable reflective sheath. The monster in the reflection will look like it's standing just outside the room in a narrow passage or cell, but anyone touching the mirror containing the monster will feel a solid wall unless the gate is open in which case their hand goes through the mirror. When the force wall opens, it either simply vanishes or raises or lowers instead of swinging open.
Alternately, have the reflection of the monster standing right in the middle of the room, trapped in an ethereal state like the reflection of an invisible hologram (mind=blown) so it can't be touched by the party until it's been released by their useless attack against the mirror. If anyone strikes the mirror, the sonic vibrations of the gong allows the monster to rephase and attack (though only its reflection is visible.) Once the monster is dead, the mirror containing the exit shatters like safety glass or tiny, cascading ice, allowing the party to pass through.
Thanks for everyone suggestions. I do like Velcro Zipper only visible in the mirror suggestion - pretty awesome! However, it doesn't quite fit the tone of this particular dungeon (I'll save it up for later).
I've decided to opt for the fiendish glass golem Dosgamer suggested. After the mirror is broken, it begin to assemble into the glass golem, allowing the PCs a round to react, and attack if they're willing to risk being shredded by the whirling glass.
Thanks for the ideas!