Alright so part of my character's backstory is telling his tall tales, these stories almost always include a "good friend named Lewis". This good friend is in reality a demon that has been chasing him for years ever since he stole an artifact from a wizard and caused its destruction. The demon the wizard summoned needs enough skill to track him wherever he might be but it doesn't have 100% tracking, just general area (maybe within 10-50 miles or so) he also needs to be fairly stealthy so he can't just get spotted by everyone.
Here's where its gets complex.
Myself and the party are starting this game at lvl 1 but me and the DM have agreed to have the demon possibly show-up anytime any try killing me. We don't want the demon around forever so he should be within CR 5-9 so the party can kill him once we get enough levels.
The demon needs to be quick-tempered and easily lured but also persistent, like his soul purpose is killing me at this point as well as having some kind of weakness we can exploit to escape mostly, something that restricts mobility would be perfect (like sunlight powerlessness)
This demon is the kind of guy who's name is written in fancy spell-books so he's unique, he's got character not just your run-of-the-mill bloodthirsty demon so give him some "pizzazz" in the looks and abilities department.
On a side note i'm not really concerned with only core pathfinder material, if it works for the concept i'm all ears as is the DM
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Sounds like a Shadow Demon would work.
I had looked at a shadow demon and it's fairly close to what we're looking for except that its defensive capabilities are too good, it's not "jazzy" enough i.e shadow demons are generic, some kind of modification could be done to it though. A modified enemy with aspects of what i've described is what i'm really looking for. Shadow demons are a little too good at locking down a target too. something similar but more brutish in its approach and style
I forgot to mention that really any evil outsider a mage could bind would work, doesn't have to be a demon particularly.
In reading through your opening post a shadow demon does seem to fit closely to your desired concept.
Perhaps the reason the shadow demon can't track your exact location is that the artefact you are carrying hides tracks that are only one day or less old. The shadow demon is always one day behind, better not linger too long anywhere.
Sounds like a Shadow Demon would work.
I agree.
This is... almost literally... exactly what you are describing.
His high stealth, sunlight powerlessness, and magic jar possession abilities means that he's exceptionally tricky, hard to detect and good at infiltration, but hampered in his goals.
Due to the intersection of the Perception rules and the Survival rules, he'd be very good at finding sign of your passage, but not good at tracking, per se: hence, given his great speed and excellent natural skill at noticing details, he'd find your trail and follow eventually, but be hampered from quickly following you, due to his lack of genuine tracking ability, and sunlight powerlessness... allowing your character to stay one step ahead so far.
Meanwhile, he'd bluff his way into society, and use charisma checks to gather information (at a +4 bonus) to learn of your passing in civilized areas... which you've conveniently left a trail of stories about him that he can follow, though, again, it's not a quick following.
I mean... this seems tailor made to be your character, and it seems so straight-out-of-the-box.
Shadow demons are specifically called out as "little more than jealous malevolence without the impediment of a physical body" which seems, to me, both ready for deep-seated rage/wrath potential and long-held grudge/bitterness potential. What's more, their patron is in charge of assassins (and darkness and lust), which seems pretty solid on that front, as well (she gained power over them after she assassinated their patron and turned his body into the largest of her islands).
Other options don't really work quite as well:
- good for the rage, not for the tracking, stealth, or patience
- even better at stealth, infiltration, and gathering information, but losing out on tracking; that said, he comes with a nifty alternate patron so that could be a thing
- great at stealth and perception, solid story-potential, but not so much the "not sticking out" so you couldn't enrage him with your stories
- perfect, except for the weakness, so less perfect than the shadow demon (like the incubus)
Demon Lords, if you care to look them up/relate this to them at all.
Similarly, all the demons, if you care.
I know you said,
This demon is the kind of guy who's name is written in fancy spell-books so he's unique, he's got character not just your run-of-the-mill bloodthirsty demon so give him some "pizzazz" in the looks and abilities department.
... but, I mean... a shadow demon literally suits all of your needs.
If you want to alter him up, just a bit, you might want to "spice" him up a tad with animate dream traits and undead shadow stuff. Specifically, the SLAs and the nightmare curse of the Animate Dream, and maybe a variant or two from the undead shadow (as well as their create spawn ability*) and the unhallowed template (put a desecrate effect and make him undead for a real unique approach).
Bear in mind, with those alterations, he will be higher than CR 7 - possibly way too much higher. Just be careful with it, and discuss things with your GM. Don't go crazy with it, either.
One of the nice things about a run-of-the-mill shadow demon, though? That +14 bluff. Get a credulous (if intelligent**) mage, bluff well enough (possibly with the aid of a ghost-touch oil of glibness), and show off your shadow evocation or shadow conjuration, and voila: you've suddenly got all-new spells that are named after you, since you "uniquely created" them... even though it was really the mage***.
From third party spells, shadow snag, dancing shadows, shape shadows, grasp of darkness, shadow stream, deep shadows, shadow weapon^^^, shadow hands, shadow ball, night shield, shadow binding, lesser shadow conjuration, lesser shadow necromancy*^, shadow ribbons, shadow sentry, wall of shadow, shadow vortex, wall of darkness, lesser shadow evocation, shadow healing, greater shadow sentry, and shadow structure all make decent low-to-low/mid-level spells (Cantrips to 3rd level). If you want, you can even give the shadow demon a +4 to intelligence, and provide Knowledge (arcana) and Spellcraft, thereby justifying the research and development of shadow spells - probably [Evil] variants that somehow draw upon/contact/inform/alter/empower (mildly) him in some way. The increase to INT, incidentally, would not significantly alter its CR in any tangible way - you could pull that one for free.
Others include dream learning and weapon of nightmares, if you go with the Animate Dream connection - or, better yet, the night terror spell.
Hope that helps!
* This will excessively ramp up the power-level of the shadow demon. You might want to limit it to either <X> number of creatures who become regular shadows, or maybe shadow-infused young^ "drunk"^^ shadows. It's possible that his magic jar is the only way of affecting them with the nightmare curse, which also does strength drain (like a shadow); hence it only afflicts the people he possesses, and even then only slowly and over-time. If there's a hard limit to how many he could create/control at a time (and he couldn't casually dismiss some to freedom), it sure would be convenient/useful if he "ran out" of room exactly as he ran into you guys...
** Remember: intelligence =/= wisdom; even if you know something, if you're deceived enough, it's possible to believe despite knowledge (thinking that you are the incorrect one, instead).
*** Effectively: make a burning hands look like it's a frost hands by faking it with shadow evocation, and be coy about how it works - the mage now suddenly researches the spell until they finally master the brand-new "unique to that, demon" spell, which is, of course, named after him, which was part of the bargain for "teaching" him in the first place (and acting coy was, naturally, "part of the teaching process" in order to "help <the mage> learn it himself" or some-such).
^ The rebuild rules make shadows stronger instead of weaker. The quick rules weaken them appropriately.
^^ Obviously, they're not literally drunk. This is just a way of giving him minions and reducing their power. Possibly treat them as tortured souls forced into his service by never-ending nightmares that will be "freed" to the plane of shadow as normal shadows or the Abyss as dretches (maybe a 50/50 chance?) after his demise? Maybe they go as their weakened selves and transform over the course of 1d4 days, or 1d3 weeks, or 1d2 months or something (after which they cannot be raised without destroying the monster they've become, before which they can be raised so long as the demon is dead)?
^^^ Pretty sure there's an "official" Paizo version of this. Also, I skipped shadow bullets on purpose - I've no idea what kind of good that would ever do a shadow demon.
*^ This could tie into the shadow demon/shadow thing!
EDIT: to add things I'd forgotten to say that I wanted to.
I had looked at a shadow demon and it's fairly close to what we're looking for except that its defensive capabilities are too good, it's not "jazzy" enough i.e shadow demons are generic, some kind of modification could be done to it though. A modified enemy with aspects of what i've described is what i'm really looking for. Shadow demons are a little too good at locking down a target too. something similar but more brutish in its approach and style
I forgot to mention that really any evil outsider a mage could bind would work, doesn't have to be a demon particularly.
Hm. I was significantly ninja'd while researching, linking, and typing.
What do you mean by "locked down" exactly? What would be an example of "more brutish"?
I'm going to sleep soon, so I'm not likely to respond more tonight, but I'll look into it tomorrow, if I can.
A good way to describe the "brutish and less lock-down" would be that he's more animal-like. He can find me and is relentless but he's more the "charge now question it later" type. The shadow demon has a burst of speed every minute, too much defensive capability, and Fear + Teleport which makes him too sticky. The biggest thing is we need to be able to outsmart and outmaneuver him as lvl 1-3's so we can survive until there's a way to physically deal with him
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
A good way to describe the "brutish and less lock-down" would be that he's more animal-like. He can find me and is relentless but he's more the "charge now question it later" type. The shadow demon has a burst of speed every minute, too much defensive capability, and Fear + Teleport which makes him too sticky. The biggest thing is we need to be able to outsmart and outmaneuver him as lvl 1-3's so we can survive until there's a way to physically deal with him
Protip: Every outsider is going to have greater teleport at will. The only way you outmaneuver that is to box them in and push them into attacks of opportunities. Or kill them before they get a turn to retreat.
Think of it this way: The demons goal isn't to kill you or the party. It just wants to ruin your lives and spread discord and misery, then maybe once it has played enough with its prey, when you're say around lvl 6+ish, it will actually attempt to go for a kill.
Sending a shadow demon on a lvl 3 party is likely to be a terrible, terrible idea. Since shadow demons are incredibly jealous of the corporeal maybe the demons personal goal is merely to annoy, then it does its job. If it's doing the bidding of a wizard after all, it probably wants to prolong its time on the material plane as long as it can after all.
When it finds the party maybe it just does a shadow conjuration and sends them into the camp as the party is sleeping. Or maybe it possesses a close friend of the party and has some fun that way.
What you are asking for simply isn't possible at such a low level. You need to make compromises. Or just ask your DM to make a brand new monster to your specifications.
More or less what Heretik said.
What might work best for you is a "scaling" enemy, that gains or loses levels with the characters (though, of course, the characters don't know that).
A good way to describe the "brutish and less lock-down" would be that he's more animal-like. He can find me and is relentless but he's more the "charge now question it later" type. The shadow demon has a burst of speed every minute, too much defensive capability, and Fear + Teleport which makes him too sticky. The biggest thing is we need to be able to outsmart and outmaneuver him as lvl 1-3's so we can survive until there's a way to physically deal with him
I don't see anything within the shadow demon that would prevent what you're asking for.
The problem is that you're asking for a paradox - either you have something specific in mind, or you're asking for too fine-tuned a thing.
What I mentioned is that, with his advanced speed, his skills, and his traits, he can track you, given enough time, so you do have to keep moving (which works for your purposes, as stated in your OP), but he's not instantly going to find you... which means that you can rest a little bit.
As far as tracking abilities, there's nothing in the game as fine-tuned as what you're looking for.
If he shoes up when you're levels 1-3, you've two options: have an aasimar in the group with the daylight SLA (and a GM that lets that work), or die.
But at levels 1-3, you'd die against pretty much any evil outsider except dretches and lemures - even imps and quasits have invisibility and plenty of "tricks of doom" that can punish you for being lower than fifth level without a merciful GM.
As far as anything else goes... I dunno what to tell you. Maybe dress up a dretch or awaken an lemure; give them the shadow creature template or something that improves their stealth. Instant unique creature with decent stealth.
But here's the thing, if you're looking for specific rules support, it's going to be weak, at best.
Without a leveling enemy, you'll simply outclass to the point of needlessness any foe that is a challenge at 1st-to-3rd - once you've hit fifth level, he's not only not a threat, he's boring. There's no clear or easy cut-off or alteration, otherwise.
I mean, taking from my old idea, trade the teleport for something else, slow down the charge time, and otherwise do as suggested?
Effectively: if something's causing a problem, okay, drop it for your game. Otherwise, it's hard to know what to say.
(Of course, something like that 3rd party shadow anchor spell might be fluffed to nicely prevent him from hopping about via teleport... bitter irony, that one...)
By the way - I love the idea and premise! And I don't mind if you don't want to use the ideas we give. But for whatever reason, we don't seem to be getting across what you're looking for and why that isn't covered. I really want to help, but I'm not seeing how that functions in your constraints.
As a GM, I'd use the shadow demon, with the changes I previously noted, and just have his slow tracking (and lack of intimate knowledge of the local area) being the only thing that keeps you guys from getting slammed by a sudden teleport and attack combo at low levels (but with the understanding that if you don't keep moving, he will catch up, eventually). But, once you've leveled enough, or I deem it's dramatic and appropriate for the story, he would.
I can justify this by his skill use and speed - the same way I can justify him not yet catching up with you.
If I wanted it to be "all by the dice rolls", while that's admirable, the short version is: nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnope. I'd, rather, just get a feel for to the speed he'd go and how well he'd track (effectively as if he took 10 on everything) and go from there.
Also, bear in mind, at 3rd level, at least, you've got some good defenses against fear. So that, at least, should be taken care of.
Sorry I don't know how to help beyond that!