So, I'm going to be trying my hand at these new monster creation rules by updating one of my old PF1 one-shots into 2e. That, however, lends itself to the glorious challenge and honor of having to translate the Implacable Stalker from 1e into 2.
Does anyone have any ideas on how those abilities would translate, action wise?
First thoughts:
Make fear sense a precise sense only against creatures with the frightened condition (I'd cut it back to 60 feet personally).
Gory display as a reaction triggered by killing a creature and either forcing all creatures who can see it save against fear aura again (even if immunized from a prior save) or make one target save again at a slight penalty (-2 at most).
Fear Aura: To make it scarier than most scary monsters, I'd go with frightful presence but with a caveat that to go down from frightened 1 to not frightened within the aura requires a successful saving throw they can attempt each round (no critical success/critical fail here, just a pass/fail). Or you could say the frightened condition cannot be reduced to 0 while within the implacable stalker's frightful presence.
Nightmare Resurrection: Can probably be more or less ported over as is. Set a DC for a nightmare spell, ditch the dreamscape rules (or convert the entire system to 2e).
Right Behind You: I'd definitely make it a 1-action teleport with similar ranges to a square adjacent to a frightened creature. From there I have two thoughts. First is to have it make a melee strike against flat-footed AC, second is to make adjacent creature's save against fear aura again. The latter is spookier, but the former is a less redundant ability (they already have a hard to shake fear aura and an ability to reset it).
Actually, a smaller range limit is probably best for Right Behind You, at least if you are putting a strike at the end. About the creature's stride speed puts it roughly in line with cat's pounce or predator's pounce, a bit stronger because teleportation but also more limited.
Okay, first, thank you for helping me out so far. Here's what I'm working with now.
The creature is intended to be a CR15 [unique], [devil] solo brute style boss, so I'm playing loose with the template now that I can construct the creature from scratch-ish.
But Fear Aura to -> Horrific Presence: DC X, as Frightful Presence, but cannot be reduced to 0 within the aura and nothing can gain immunity to fear while inside of it (barring other special rules, such as a Paladin's Aura of Courage and whatnot).
Gory Display -> Perhaps as a reaction to a crit, where it can make an intimidate check against everything in range? Or should they have to save again? I tend to not like effects for enemies that trigger on PC deaths, as that's very snowbally when things are already going very badly.
Nightmare Res -> You hit it on the head, I'll do that exactly.
Right Behind You -> The teleport and strike makes sense, as the boss itself would be fairly slow (I think the original template reduces speed to 20). It would also help combo with Gory Display.
Fear Sense -> You hit it on the head, I'll do that exactly.
Terrifying Inevitibility is something else I wanted input on. As a devil, it should be having some sort of weakness to silver and good; my thoughts on this ability is that it improves it's resistance against things based on their individual frightened rating, as well as if something in range is Frightened 4; it's fast healing is upgraded to true Regeneration and it cannot be killed until that drops.
Or perhaps Fear Aura requires a save to reduce fear at all if you end your turn within its melee reach? Or... I don't know. I want part of the fight wincon to be "fear management"
Or perhaps Fear Aura requires a save to reduce fear at all if you end your turn within its melee reach? Or... I don't know. I want part of the fight wincon to be "fear management"
Building off of this, what if:
Fear Aura requires a pass/fail save to reduce the frightened value each round but can go to zero. Then have terrifying inevitability grant regeneration at all frightened values within range, turned off by good/silver attacks from creatures who aren't frightened. The party must overcome fear completely to kill it. Mix in the resistances by fear level to taste, or modify the regeneration based on frightened.
Good call on Gory Display, my initial thought framed this in a scene where there would be 'disposable' creatures (specifically animals in my head) that the monster might occasionally slaughter mid-fight to spook the party. I'd give it the option to demoralize one creature or force a new save for all in the aura, gives the ability more utility and keeps from having to spell out things like the demoralize ignoring language and requiring sight.
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I think I have something that resembles an attack pattern for it. Combat begins and pops Frightful/Horrific Presence. [1] Warp and claw; [1] claw; [1] rend, which Gory Display is tied to. Ideally at this point everything is at Frightened 2; and the battle begins in earnest.
It's [R] would be Harrowing Screech, which would be a fear tagged supernatural ability that prevents things from moving out of it's threatened squares. From there though - I am unsure. Critical Hits could give it a [F] to press fear on the specific creature it hit? Last thing is should it have additional bleed, thematic, and/or some sort of AoE?
EDIT: I suppose it would also need a [2] for a group fear attack. Not meant to be what it uses to stack fear, but as a "rebase" everything into fear. Perhaps it can't take things past Frightened 2 with it?
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Have a working draft, if you'd like to see it. I'm unsure about the numbers
https://drive.google.com/file/d/14avTh2GZfVXcm4Rli2MRoPbVqB-GGbBj/view?usp= sharing