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Your party may have been infiltrated by a doppelganger.
Without the use of magic, how do you go about finding out who it is?
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I tell each person to meet me at the cemetery.
The one who is missing when we meet up at the pub is the doppelganger.
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Very difficult. The only sure fire way I can come up with would be to have a prearranged call/response long before the doppelganger enters the mix. While they can use detect thoughts at will, it takes three rounds to read surface thoughts.
Round 1: Initiate call. Doppelganger suspects the gig is up, and starts using detect thoughts. All it learns this round is that we have thoughts.
Round 2: Party responds. Doppelganger has no idea what the response should be right now, and wishes it could get to round three to read what the proper response is.
Round 3: The jig is up - initiative is called for.
If there hasn't been a prearranged call/response, then this becomes much harder. I'm not sure you have a really good way to deal with it, other than force everyone to be on the buddy system, forcing the doppelganger to outwit its partner.
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Assuming no one has any reason to suspect then this will be difficult. It can simply keep scanning everyone with detect thoughts and as such it would know when you ask it (to meet at the pub rather than the cemetery) (or the expected pass phrase). However it's abilities to copy don't include skills, magic, or many other abilities. So if the mage/cleric suddenly isn't casting spells, the fighter stops doing his usual cleaving, or the elf suddenly can't trance and needs real sleep... then you know you have issues.
Whip up a pot of hellfire chili and feed it to your party. It is a well-known fact doppelgangers have deadened taste buds.
Ummmm I have just realized that I may have just incapacitated everyone but the doppelganger with that plan. Must remember to have antacids+3 when pulling this off.
This is an interesting idea.
For sake of the discussion, I'm presuming a basic doppelganger and across all levels of play for all PC classes. Furthermore, for the sake of this discussion, I'm presuming the doppelganger replacing your crew is a bad thing. :)
The most important thing is ascertaining the truth of the accusations, or, if there are no accusations, going about discovering it in the first place.
First, let's look at the doppleganger. Excellent at infiltration. Cool, good to know.
Decent stats, Change Shape, Detect Thoughts, Mimicry, Perfect Copy, and a great bluff and great disguise are potent, but not unbeatable.
Let's look at each ability one at a time:
1) Change Shape
Notable on this one is that a) the creature doesn't change ability scores (meaning something I'd posted elsewhere a couple days ago is wrong) and b) it otherwise functions as the kind of polymorph spell listed in the description - in this case alter self. This can grant darkvision 60 (it already has this, though), lowlight vision, scent, and swim. It also notes that this (effectively) grants a +4 bluff and +20 disguise when utilized (see the stat-block for details). The interesting thing, to me, has always been that this doesn't make a perfect disguise. The doppelganger can make mistakes. Roll low on its disguise check, or bluff check, for example.
1) Detect Thoughts
First, defeating it with a will save negates this ability. You can outwit detect thoughts. Just have, at the surface of your mind, "Only the real <X> would know <Y>." and the doppleganger would have no real reason to think otherwise, though opposed bluff/sense motive checks might be called for. Also, it doesn't grant a bonus to bluff or sense motive checks, interestingly enough - neither the spell description nor the monster entry grant this bonus... probably because the doppelganger needs to concentrate (which is a standard action; see duration rules) on the ability to have it function instead of running automatically - this effectively negates its ability to utilize either skill in a given round. In any event, although it does afford the doppelganger a powerful tool, it's not inviolable in itself.
2) Mimicry
This is a useful ability... but it is worthless when dealing with spellcasters, unless they're excessively focusing on magic items. So let's break down the individual methods here. If Al, Bardnaby, Clerice, Druivan, Inquincy, Magorge, Palamy (or Antinita), Oraclina, Rangina, Sorcha, Sue, Witater, or Wizendo suddenly start exclusively relying on magic items, you know something is strange. It's the others that get a little iffier, but there are ways. This will take some detailed looking.
2-a)Four (or five) of 'em might (Clerice, Druivan, Inquincy, or Palamy (or Antinita)) have done something foolish to lose their abilities (in which case going to the local church to get atoned should be the thing you do right away - you either end up with a caught doppleganger or a redeemed one, which is win/win).
2-b) Three (Al, Magorge, or Wizendo) might have lost their book (in which case... it'll be an expensive time-consuming quest), and one might have lost his familiar (in which case you've got a really big problem).
2-c) Four (Bardnaby, Oraclina, Rangina, or Sorcha) really have no excuse, except, I guess, a loss of a spell-component pouch (which is easily replaceable).
2-a/b/c-result: In any event you're going to immediately shut down the party, make sure klutzy McDumbFace who cost themselves phenomenal cosmic powers isn't the one on guard duty (because, really, how stupid was that), and generally keep two awake and together at the same time, in which case you've got Misroi's mention of the buddy system.
2-d) Even if Palamy (or Antinita) or Rangina aren't potent enough to cast spells, they and the Barbara, Mo, (and possibly Rogueric or Nina) have notable mystical abilities that are capable of designating an imposter the doppleganger.
2-f) That leaves Cavaaron (and Sam) and Figharold as not having much to distinguish them. For Cavaaron (and Sam), their Mount, Order, or special tactical feat are potential failure points for imitation, or their powerful charge or other mounted abilities, though these are not as strongly obvious as the various spell casters. Similarly very low level Rangina would suffer from the loss of favored enemies, tracking ability, and wild empathy, though subtle as those things are, they might not come into play. Figharold is... mostly up the creek, unfortunately. There are veeeery subtle ways of distinguishing, as Aranna pointed out (certain feat abilities and such) but that presumes a detailed knowledge of what they can do, and mostly it just boils down to noting their absence, though, again, depending on their exact selection and level, it could be obvious quickly.
- CONCLUSION: nothing in this proves that a doppelganger is involved, but if there is suspicion, this will point to which is a doppelganger; if there is no suspicion, this might generate suspicion (though not necessarily suspicion of a doppelganger, as it might be several other things as well, depending on the class).
3) Perfect Copy
This ability is the only reason we're having this discussion. It's not directly "beatable" without magic, but it's pretty much worthless without...
4) Skills
... these. The +13 to bluff and +29 to disguise are formidable, and pretty much exactly what needs to be overcome in order to discover the doppelganger. The bluff is actually the easiest to overcome. If you have several people - whether you trust them or not - and you're all using Aid Another on your Sense Motive checks v. each person, you're going to tell (eventually) when someone is lying. Let's presume a typical party of four; there are three trustworthy people, but at worst, one is being interrogated. That's a +6 to Sense Motive (or a +2 if a trustworthy person is being interrogated). Presuming the GM ad-hocs a -2 penalty for "Anti-Aid", that's either a wash (if you're examining a trustworthy fellow) or a +6 (if you're examining the doppelganger). Combined with a decent Sense Motive (not that hard or uncommon), you've got your answer pretty much directly. It is, it's worth noting, unlikely that you'll get around that +29 to disguise in most cases, but it's also not impossible - one more point of failure for the doppelganger.
I'm out of time, if there's more to think about, it'll be tomorrow.
For a samurai party, seppuku en masse.
The samurai that flinches at the suggestion is no true samurai.
Does the Doppelganger know the words to the party's sea shanty?
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I'd do this: Ask each party member something personal about myself they don't know. He reads my thoughts and gets the answer to a question he's not supposed to have it for, I get the answer to who it is.
Tell everyone to take off their boots. When dopplegangers shape shift they generally just shift into having their clothes on. If they can't take off their boots then they are a doppleganger. Kudos to any doppleganger that actually wears clothing.
I know this is the normal presumption, but I don't really see anything in the ability that would let them do that - thus I'm presuming the doppelganger doesn't have "clothesmorph" ability, unlike, say, Otto.
The hair-clipping is really an excellent tactic, then, except I can't see anything that notes where it reverts... and as it's using a magical ability, I could see the argument that it lingers.
Ultimately, it comes to out-bluffing the bluffer.
Though I didn't link it, I thought about it after the fact, and Aid Another does seem to be potentially stackable, but that's up to GM ruling.
You know, you guys...
...
...
...
... yes, to both of you.
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Tell everyone to take off their boots. When dopplegangers shape shift they generally just shift into having their clothes on. If they can't take off their boots then they are a doppleganger. Kudos to any doppleganger that actually wears clothing.
I know this is the normal presumption, but I don't really see anything in the ability that would let them do that - thus I'm presuming the doppelganger doesn't have "clothesmorph" ability, unlike, say, Otto.
That's right, they don't do that, and haven't since at least 3rd edition. There's nothing in their descriptions that say they turn their skin into facsimiles of clothing and equipment.
It would cause some issues, when they come in out of the rain, and won't hang up their sopping wet 'cloak'.A lot of people think they do this, because of their 1st Edition write-up, which I can't recall if it changed or stayed the same in 2nd Edition.
Even some official scenario writers still carried that idea forward into published adventures. There's a certain chapter of a certain Paizo AP, in which the writer obviously didn't get the memo, given the suggested tactics, which consist of splitting the PCs up for a few seconds, in some twisting passages, and having a double step into their place, gear and all. Or flee from strong PCs, to impersonate a helpless prisoner round the corner. Harder to do, when you're still wearing full armor.
Doppelgangers are good, for an intrigue-based game, if they have time to slip off and adopt a new persona, but they aren't all that and a bag of chips, when it comes to the quick-change routine in the middle of combat, that many GMs expect to be able to pull off.
Even testing the whole party with nonlethal sparring could determine a doppelganger. Fighting being highly personalised (and some are near unique in what they do) and each party member will know how the other fights, stands and moves. I don't think the doppelganger went to the same fighting school as old Valeros, so how would they stand the same, swing the same?
Hmm, maybe some doppelganger + samurai warrior spirit could pull off truly copying a melee char, but otherwise the game will be up once there is suspicion and testing.
Bits separated from a polymorphed critter normally revert immediately. The doppleganger doesn't say otherwise.The hair-clipping is really an excellent tactic, then, except I can't see anything that notes where it reverts... and as it's using a magical ability, I could see the argument that it lingers.
See, I'm looking for that rule, but it's not under the polymorph description I linked (in my earlier post and again right before this), at least not that I saw, and I looked several times. My attention deficit might definitely have harmed my reading comprehension, but I'm simply not finding it.
I know I've read a similar rule previously, but I'm just not seeing it there. If you can quote it to me, that would be helpful. :/
Hmm, I wonder how well a sorcerer doppelganger could go pretending to be spellcasters?