Looking for advice on designing a league of undead assassins

[Ranaul]

I am basing this partially on The Court of Owls from a recent Batman comic run. So possible spoilers if you read Batman and haven't finished the Court of Owls story line.

The assassins are called Talons and they are trained from a very young age and once they pass the trials to become a Talon they undergo a procedure that turns them undead. They feel no pain, all of their wounds heal. Even a head will reattach to its body if left near by. The only way to stop them is to freeze them, but as soon as they thaw they will start to regenerate.

Their weapon of choice are throwing knives which are all poisoned with a paralyzing agent. In fights they usually end up stabbing upwards of 10 into their victim during the fight.

I basically want to recreate them in pathfinder as opponents for my party which is currently APL 4. I can scale them up later but 2 should be a tough fight with 4 or 5 being a "We need to run" situation. I was thinking of just building them as NPC with 3 Rogue class levels. Taking TWF, Quick Draw, and Weapon Focus (dagger). I'm unsure as to how to handle the regeneration, maybe Fast Healing/3ish. Or what poison to use, I want the players to be able to be poisoned and feel like their character is getting weaker. But I want to make sure it doesn't feel like Save or Die.

Any advice or thoughts would be great.

[VRMH]

You say "undead", but I'm reading "trolls". Maybe a Trollblood infusion could create Pathfinder's equivalent?

[Ranaul]

You know I think you are right. I was thinking undead because thats how they were portrayed in the comic but they don't really resemble traditional fantasy undead.

Well a CR 5 Troll has Regeneration 5(acid or fire). What would adding Regeneration 5 (Cold) do to a CR 2 creature?

[Ranaul]

I went ahead and put together something pretty quickly. The idea is that the assassin has daggers sheathed all over his body. Easily has atleast 20 with poison already applied.

The Build so far:

Blade Assassin CR 3
XP 800
NE Med Humanoid
Init +4; Senses darkvision 60 ft., Perception +7

DEFENSE
AC 17, touch 14, flat-footed 13 (+3 armor, +4 Dex)
hp 21 (3d8+3)
Fort +2, Ref +7, Will +2
Immune mind-affecting effects
Regeneration 3 (cold)

OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft.
Melee dagger +4 (1d4+1 plus poison)
Range dagger +7 (1d4+1 plus poison)
STATISTICS
Str 12, Dex 18, Con 12, Int 11, Wis 12, Cha 8
Base Atk +2; CMB +3 ; CMD 17
Skills Acrobatics +9, Climb +6, Disable Device +10, Escape Artist +9, Intimidate +5, Perception +7, Sense Motive +6, Sleight of Hand +9, Stealth +9, Survival +4
Feats: Quick Draw, Two Weapon Fighting, Weapon Focus (Dagger)

Poison injury; save Fort DC 16; frequency 1/round for 6 rounds; effect 1d2 Dexterity damage; cure 1 save

Do you think that is a CR 3 creature? I'm not used to building monsters like this so I just made a human with 3 rogue levels and made some adjustments to the human.

[Movin]

For your CR 3
Compare:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/outsiders/daemons/lacrida emon
Or
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/humanoids/dark-slayer

See how they stack up.

Ok, this is what I'm seeing.
this foe is/has:
1. decent mook
2. regeneration
3. paralytic poison
4. thrown weapon focus
5. ninja

So heres my suggestions for the various facets of this.
1. 20 hp, 15-18 AC ball park of +3,+6+2 for fort,ref,will saves.
Likely mind immune.

2. annoying regeneration (much less of a problem for murderous adventurers than our ever merciful batman and his knockout blows.)
Fast healing = 1/2HD + Deathless (as the Bloody skeleton template, switch holy water with cold damage, reduce time to 10 mins.
Idea would be to grant ever increasingly specific requirements in order to kill more powerful versions of these things.

3.
Talon venom: DC 13, 2 consecutive saves
Failure = +1 stage (starts at 0)
(the effects apply separately and do not stack)
Stage 1. Speed is halved, cannot run or charge
Stage 2. considered Staggered
Stage 3. Paralysis 1d4 rounds (+1 round for each failed save,)

gives players a fighting chance while making the poison still a viable threat.

4. Consider changing the flavor a bit and springboarding off the troll concept more than human.
dont use daggers, Claw attacks for melee and Hurling your fingers as ranged weapons.
After all we dont want the hapless players calling you on your yoinking of comic book material right?
*added bonus, you don't need to carry dozens of throwing knives and you make the troll assassins even creepier.

Thrown fingers: Talons may throw their clawed fingers as ranged weapons, relying on their regeneration to return them to full function.
deals damage as a Dagger + 1 dose of Talon venom 20 ft range increment.
Talons regenerate fingers at a rate of 1 per round
Talons missing 3 or more fingers on a hand cannot use it as a claw attack that round

5.
Add +1d6 sneak attack and a racial +4 bonus to Stealth+ acrobatics

Might be a High CR2 low Cr3. Compare contrast and add other stuff as you see fit.
Hope this helps.

[Shane LeRose]

Dotted for future idea theft (I also thought troll blood infused with my first read through, so the responses are what hooked me).

[Ranaul]

Wow Movin, thanks for all that info. Great stuff.question about how that poison would work. With a high chance of getting multiple doses would that increase the DC by 2 for everyone one?

Lets say they get hit with two claw attacks, the save against the first one at a DC13, then fail the second one. Would the second one have a higher DC? And if they get hit with a third after already being at stage 1 how does that effect the DC and stage of the poison. If it needs two saves to cure, does a new dose start tha over?

I know that's a lot of questions, but I usually don't use many poisons in my game. I will hopefully get a chance to rebuild the character with some of those suggestions tomorrow.

[Movin]

Basically poisons are an end of round effect.
You take each instance of the same poison in the same round and stack them together. the player then makes 1 save against them all = to DC +2 for each strike above the first.

They do have a section on poison in the SRD, heres a decent chunk (spoilered to avoid post bloat.)

PFSRD poison stuff:

How does poison work?
The rules are not very clear on the exact details of how poisons work. This is an attempt to clear up the order of events involving poison. Please keep in mind that this is our best attempt at an comprehensive set of rules based on the published rules, official errata and blog posts, and posts from designers. Please drop us an email if you find similar evidence that contradicts this.

When you are initially exposed to a poison (whether during your action or someone else's), you must make a save to avoid being poisoned.
Success You resist being poisoned. You do not suffer any ill effects and you need not make any further saves.
Failure You are poisoned and immediately suffer the listed effect. You will need to make further saves to avoid more damage and cure the poison.
Exception If the poison has an onset period, failing the initial check does NOT cause you to suffer any effects.
If you are exposed to more of the same poison at any point while you are poisoned, you need to make a new initial save at +2 DC.
Success You resist the new dose and carry on as if it never happened (this success does not count toward the requisite "consecutive saves" for curing any poison that is already in your system)
Failure The DC for all subsequent checks are increased by 2 and the duration of the poison is increased by half of the listed value. (eg if you are poisoned with a poison with a DC 11, being exposed again forces you to make a save at DC 13. If you fail this, all your future checks to cure the poison, avoid damage, or resist being poisoned again are at DC 13 - and the duration is increased by half. If you are exposed for a third time, you would need to save at DC 15 against the new dose, etc)
For the onset period, nothing happens (if there is no onset, the next step happens right away!)
At the next frequency interval (your next turn for 1/round poisons, 1 minute later for 1/minute, next day for 1/day) you must make a save on your turn (at any point during your turn - you must still make this save if you choose to delay).
Success You suffer no ill effects and now have a save towards curing the poison.
If the poison requires only one save to cure, you are cured and no longer need to make saves.
Failure You suffer the listed effects again.
Repeat the previous step until you fulfill either score enough consecutive saves to cure the poison or the duration runs out.

Poisons with initial and secondary effects

For poisons without an onset, failing the initial save causes you to suffer the initial effect of the poison. The subsequent saves are made against the secondary effect.
For poisons with an onset, failing the initial save causes you to be poisoned but not suffer any ill effect. Failing the first save after the onset causes you suffer the initial effect of the poison. Any subsequent saves are made against the secondary effect.
Special If you are exposed to multiple doses of a poison with initial and secondary effects, you only suffer the initial effect once. Subsequent exposures cause you to suffer the secondary effect and add duration to secondary effects.

Edit: (Re-reads the poison rules and looks in confusion)
Or I could be wrong and need to seriously look into how I run poisons in my game.

[yeti1069]

To simplify:
1) If you get hit with a poison, make a save.
2) If you are poisoned (failed your initial save, haven't made enough saves/received a spell to remove poison), and get hit with the same poison again, at any time before the initial poison expires, make a save against the new instance of the poison at DC +2.
3a) If you make that save, continue with the poison as normal.
3b) If you fail that save, extend duration of poison by 50% and add +2 to all future DCs to resist the effects of the poison.
4) No matter what, you only suffer effects of initial effect once, even if you fail vs. the same poison more than once while it's already in your system.

So, let's say you get hit with "generic deadly poison", a no-onset, DC 10 poison that deals 1d6 Con damage as the initial effect, and 1 Con damage as the secondary, and has an effect every round for 6 rounds. Two saves to remove.

You get hit, roll a 9 total, and are poisoned, taking 1d6 Con.
Next round, you roll a 1, are still poisoned, and take 1 Con.
Next round, before your turn, you get hit with the same poison again; the DC against this instance of the poison is 12, you roll a 3 and fail.
Now, the DC to resist the poison is a 12, you've gone through 2 rounds (of 6) of the poison, but now the duration increases by 3 rounds (half of 6), so you have another 5 rounds of poison to look forward to.
On your turn, you roll a total of 10, not enough to beat the new DC, so you take 1 Con.
On your next turn, you roll a total of 12, that's one save, and you take no Con damage this round.
On your next turn, you roll a 20, that's two saves, and you're cured.