Thanks for watching everyone! Be sure to check out Dr. Dhrolin's Dictionary of Dinosaurs right here : www.kickstarter.com/projects/palaeogames/dr-dhrolins-dictionary-of-dinosaurs Also a huge shoutout to these awesome folks; DnD Shorts - th-cam.com/users/DnDShorts The Hype Goblin - th-cam.com/users/TheHypeGoblin AJ Pickett - th-cam.com/users/AJPickett Behold This Crit - th-cam.com/users/BeholdThisCrit Indestructoboy - th-cam.com/users/Indestructoboy
You could make a village of faceless stalkers who transform before leaving their houses, and only stay in their true forms indoors to hide from random visitors….
This is legit the first time I've backed something on kickstarter. Since I LOVE DINOSAURS! And even though I haven't played 5e in a while, I'm still interested enough to purchase it and hope I remember I bought it when I receive it.
If the dinos have feathers they aren't scientifically accurate, no dino fossils, including T-rex & Raptors, have ever been found to have feathers. In fact they have found skin imprint fossils that show that dinos have only scales & zero feathers. So if the illustrations & Dinos in the sponsors books have feathers they are crap & far from scientifically accurate.
Neat little plot hook I thought of with these guys: In a village there is an infamous bandit, and whenever this bandit is caught somehow escapes and replaces themselves with an innocent person. What’s really going on is there is a group of faceless stalkers that are committing crimes under 1 alias and when one gets caught it transforms overnight and pretends to be innocent and gets released, and will definitely get released once another one of the stalkers commits crimes under this alias, furthermore this “one bandit” could commit multiple crimes at once. So, basically you get this legendary bandit who is said to be able escape any prison and can be in multiple places at once that’s terrorizing this village that your party is asked to take care of.
What happens to the original innocent they transformed into? wouldn't any of them reach out if they heard they were kidnapped by the bandit? if they're turning into completely new faces, then haven't the authorities done any background check or interrogation to figure out their criteria for kidnapping?
@@ZakuInATopHat yeah i covered that in my comment, it wouldn't make sense for no one to keep track of who got kidnapped, it's a village, most people know eachother and someone would find it strange how all innocents he captures are complete outsiders to the village that are never seen again after being released
@@sthwrth3250 That kinda depends on other factors. Do the residents trust each other in the first place? How large is said village? Because too large and there would be too many people to get to know everyone in town. Assuming that none of them are paranoid shut-ins, suffering from mental illness, well known criminals that no one trusts, corrupt officials, and so on.
@@darklordmathias9405 another example is the series, midsummer murders. A murder-mystery series that all take place in a single town in England. The only recurring characters are the main character (who's a police detective), the police force, and the main character's family. And throughout every single episode I've seen, there is almost always a completely new cast of suspects and characters that are then never seen again.
Reminds me of a Call of Cthulu character, but he forgot he wasn't an evil monster person from 1940's Germany, but was an undercover black American war hero.
Maybe a Faceless Stalker is impersonating someone and hires a doppelganger to also impersonate that person so people will sense the magical impersonator but not the boss.
Not magical. Doppelganger Shapechange doesn't qualify for the definition of Magical. Detect Magic doesn't detect anything, Antimagic Field doesn't suppress anything, the same way Detect Magic doesn't detect your fingernails growing.
The players might sniff around and discover some partially transformed Stalkers, thinking its some kind of 'Horror out of Innsmouth" HP Lovecraft story, they will attempt to uncover this secret, only to have their evidence vanish before they get back to it... the stalkers all transform and act like the characters are crazy and Why do they have some vendetta against their harmless village?! Complicate this with a bunch of rival adventurers who now champion the cause of the victimised villagers.
@@DungeonDad Sometimes I imagine walking up to Matt Mercer and he will just be like "And three , two, one... Immersed" and I will be in some sort of imagination catatonia, unable to see anything but what he is describing, he no longer even needs descriptive text.... he has become a stage show hypnotist.
Being able to slightly change their appearance is a pretty interesting advantage in terms of setting. For example, You could pretend to be someones child that doesn't exist. (Monster POV) You are in a bar and you hear a mage talk about how 25 years ago he had a fling with a blond hair girl with blue eyes. You could make yourself look like that guy, but tweak your appearance to be in the middle of them. Then you could show up a month later pretending to be his long lost son. They wouldn't be able to detect that you are not because your transformation isn't magic based. You could get a free place to stay, maybe some magic lessons or money. A really tricky way to mess with people and or sneak around city to city.
"A different pair of clothes" Also, by far the best idea for a one-shot is... You get a message, "Go to the royal ball, there's been an infiltration of doppelganger. Anyone could be the enemy, be careful." And everyone but the players are the doppelgangers, the doppelgangers don't know that they actually got every position already, and are planning on assassinating the king, also a doppelganger.
reminds me of a news story where some members of the FBI tried to arrest each other because half of them were posing as drug dealers to arrest drug addicts while the rest were undercover as drug addicts to arrest drug dealers.
Trick for the faceless stalker: If it wishes to take form of a small target, it could mimic the appearance of the target covered in boils. Making boil as dense as the stalker is able (thus covering for excess mass). The reason I wanted to point this out is because after a campaign has progressed a good bit, something like leprosy could be mistaken for a shifted monster. On top of that, imagine the raw amount of hysteria that would plague such a city if the villagers are fighting off both a plague and this type of creature.
13:41 Friend: "You going to change form?" Faceless Stalker: "Not out here in the open no." *Goes into changing room* Friend: *Takes a peek* Faceless Stalker: "A moment of privacy please?" Friend: "My apologies, I just wanted to know how it works."
04:55 except the changeling. Changelings can also transform into basically any humanoid they can imagine. The ability says that if they want to transform into a specific person they have to have seen them (because descriptions will never measure up) but it also says 'you determine the specifics of the changes'. So the Faceless Stalker is a slow, painful changeling that can't change size and is possibly (but not confirmed) immune to true seeing. This is why I like Changelings so much, they're basically better doppelgangers, though they don't have telepathy
I mean, you could tweak it if you wanted to make it faster. Maybe to be a perfect change they have to take their 10 minutes, but they could, at the expense of more suffering and accuracy, make it faster.
I've always liked leaving disguise-based monsters sprinkled throughout my settings for the red herring effect, and these seem like they'd be perfect for that. There're all sorts of fun ways a monster bursting out of a random mob can be used. A murder-mystery hits a curve ball when one of the suspects turns out to be an uninvolved monster. Or, A battle to defend a small village starts going south on the players? Good thing the town drunk/faceless stalker was inspired to help by the party's kindly barbarian.
I'm intrigued by the idea that they don't actually need to drink blood. Maybe most of them live completely isolated from humanoids, except a few that choose to masquerade and kill, exiled for the danger they can bring to their people. This would let you have sympathetic and antagonistic stalkers with much more complicated more human motivations.
This is perfect! The City Corrupter was just gonna be using some regular doppelgangers, but it would be awesome for them to have found a small family of Faceless Stalkers to be like a half dozen major names each. I see it being a transactional relationship; The family helps turn the city and even spreads corruption to other cities along the trade routes for the City Corrupterto work on next, and the City Corrupter gives them all the magical items and treasures they want to take from the city before it gets pulled from the plane to set them for a thousand lifetimes. The common lead of "someone saw one person in two places" can instead be the vague "a body was found drained of blood with 3 wounds on the neck", and it can involve the interpersonal relationships between the Faceless Stalkers; One is basically the "rebel/drunkard" of the family and taking way too many risks, not only leaving a small trail for someone to follow but maybe even being a liability that might turn on them, but the rest of the family is torn on what they should do since they are still family.
7:50 Idea for a campaign The local prison has been having a series of strange deaths among the inmates. Originally thought to be caused by simple inter-inmate violence, it has become clear at this point that something else is causing this. The party has been tasked with figuring out what's happening. Spoilers: It's a Faceless Stalker (this assumes that they are carnivores, so cannot just drink orange juice or something) that doesn't want to kill people, but has to to survive (as far as they can tell, maybe the party can figure something out). They choose prisoners as they are "acceptable targets".
The sub-species of aboleth in Pathfinder 1e are fantastic. The Veiled Master or Omnipath are bosses i have used in the past and they have been great bosses. Also the Charnel God and Immortal Ichor are also fantastic end game bosses.
@@MoondustManwiseVeiled Masters are deceivers and illusionists that transform themselves into humanoids in order to rule entire nations while disguised. they live for millennia, posing as kings, politicians, etc. using polymorph, greater image and other powerful and deceptive spells to dominate and trick every lower lifeform. Even to regular aboleths, the Veiled Masters would be nobility. The Veiled Master can eat memories even to hide their presence, greater polymorph as a swift action (bonus action in 5e) and produces a slime cloud if in water like a regular Aboleth. CR 14 in PF 1e Omnipaths are like living servers and information hubs for Aboleths. They are secluded and experts of possession, domination, and Knowledge. they can link minds together on a sort of telepathic network, sometimes these networks can be hundreds strong. after being added to the mesh of an omnipath, there is nowhere you can go to escape its influence as there is no distance limitation on its possession and telepathic control. Only planar travel can sever it, but only temporarily. While dominated by the Omnipath, it can see through your eyes and sense all you sense. It can even allow other aboleths this ability as well and can control any subject as it is able to cast geas or quest several times a day. they have three sets of consecutive jaws that can all attack at once and use telepathic attacks to stun, weaken and manipulate in a fight. CR 18 in PF 1e
The sewer Murder mystery plot hook could be so good. Maybe have some of the bodies smell of sewage, or have them all appear near sewage drains (as one of the only things connecting the murders). Then you could throw in a few lines of random NPCs smelling like sewage every once and a while before they realize what it means, and then after they realize what it means, maybe they'll attack an innocent NPC who smells bad (which wouldn't be out of the ordinary in a Medieval setting). So much potential. Hell, you could even have the Stalker begin to masquerade as a Vampire once it realizes it's being investigated to throw the investigation of the track, then have clues during the Vampire sightings pointing to the fact that it's not a real vampire, like it ignoring rules about crossing running water and requiring an invitation to enter homes and such. Definitely swiping this for my game.
So could we get away with let's say the drained bodies scenario with two puncture wounds on the neck, the team says vampires, and it was actually a faceless stalker with a missing tongue tooth? Do they loose or retain all scars/missing limbs and such that had been done to their true form after going through a transformation session?
You have to wonder, where does the unused flesh go? Perhaps the Faceless Stalker keeps it’s unused meat in a drawer or jar for the players to come across. A bit gross, but an effective way to get across that this thing is no mere doppleganger/vampire.
Love ya Dungeon Dad. I made the unfortunate decision to show my DM your channel, things have gotten more interesting, but character deaths have definitely gone up. Great content as always.
@@DungeonDad With a Necromancy Wizard they develop resistance to Necrotic Damage, so in case they encountered this creature and was grappled wouldn't that resistance protect them? Also can this creature count as Undead?
Knowing that they drink any fluid, I could see a faceless stalker lady of the night. I could see a "good" vampire, or even a dhampir, trying to side with the party to track down who has framed the vamp. Maybe there's even a lineage dhampir or Innistrad vampire PC in the party, and is accused of the murders that are coincidentally happening not too long after the party arrived in the city. Appreciate you doing this monster. I first learned of it in an adventure module where the party had to discover who was killing a bunch of people, and was initally thought to be a serial killer. A little late, but this feels like it'd have been a perfect October monster. Appreciate all the cameos you got together for this. Extremely fitting.
I'd imagine being a hooker stalker would be pretty lucrative. That's essentially an endless catalogue/roster at your disposal; maybe even have a special service for the most generous clients that allows them to choose a combination of their preferred features. Only downside would be the requisite 10 minutes of agony for every meeting.
Imagine a city (or any community large enough for that matter) which get infiltrated by a group of doppleganger and some faceless stalkers. Of course both species are rival and would try to manipulate the player characters to fulfill their own agenda. Probably not easy to master but the paranoia that ensues could be very interesting.
Thanks for giving me the perfect addition for the shape shifter gang war between werewolves, changelings, doppelgangers, and now the faceless stalkers. The town guard and players are going to be so confused. 😂
To be fair to them, if transforming takes around 10 minutes AND is an agonisingly painful experience, yeah I don't blame them for not being fond of doing so in front of anyone else. It seems like a quirky little flavour bit in the context of the near instant magical Doppelganger transformations, but if you compare it to something like breaking your own arms and then trying to set the bones back into place to change their length, it makes a lot of sense. It'd not a quick process you can whip out to get out of a tight situation. You'd feel pretty vulnerable during that time period, and given that it's a physical non-magical transformation, it's not likely something they'd instantly snap out of if interrupted; The transformation wouldn't just "fail" like a spell might, it'd be like getting caught with your head stuck between a wall and bedpost or with your clothes and limbs in a tangle, they'd have to physically work themselves back out of that position (whether by reverting or just finishing the transformation based on how far along it is). If one of these were ever "rehired" by an Aboleth as a GOOlock I could see them picking _mask of many faces_ just to have a means of "transforming" that's both much faster and painless, albeit easier to see through. Maybe they only use their inherent transformation ability when they need to maintain it for a long time and have advance warning, but default to the illusion if they think they can get away with it, along with having the usual "magical change of clothes" function. Amusingly if they got the level 10 subclass feature they'd have protection from mindreading, which would both help block a means of discovering them and mess with Doppelgangers who actually do have mind reading. Witch Sight is there at 14th Lvl too, which makes for a shapeshifter whose form can't be detected or seen through with detect magic or true sight, whose mind cannot be read, and who can see through magical disguises including polymorphing. Maybe there's a high level Goolock stalker tasked with hunting down doppelgangers because it'll cause problems for the Gods somehow according to that big Aboleth brain. Perhaps the doppelgangers hear enough rumours to be aware they're being hunted down but not by whom, and are getting more aggressive with their identity theft in attempts to hide from this unknown threat they can't see coming. The effects that could have on the groups they try to take refuge in could well be what causes the direct issues for the divines depending on who they're hiding amongst, which in turn would be a way for the Aboleth to set the Gods _against_ the doppelgangers they're hunting. It also provides a "twist villain" since the way the party would likely find out about all this would be by investigating into the doppelgangers crimes; The party could even be pointed in their direction by the faceless stalker who's seeing an opportunity to get some eager ignorant faces to do some of the work for them, perhaps posing as a guardsman or such.
It's a morph, not a polymorph! And turning into a small creature with excess flesh reminds me of the Homer Simpson meme where he clothespins his fat towards his back.
I actually want a police station using a faceless stalker the same way as the sketcher. “His nose was a little pointier and he was a tiny bit shorter but yes that’s the man who killed my wife”
14:05 That would also make an Ugothol village incredibly strange. Houses would be larger with rooms for each "family member", there would be outhouses and basements aplenty, or all the homes would be for individual people. A normal human village would have homes with one or two rooms, chamber-pots for relieving onself, and relatively large families. While not every player would notice this, it could set some players on edge.
Plot hook idea: a noble family, maybe even a royal family, has a member that's kept out of the public eye. Then people in town start being found dead and drained of blood, with witnesses saying they've seen a mysterious figure in noble clothing near the crime scene and when asking around some people that work at the noble's house might be able to identify the description as being the family member that's kept hidden. Actually, some villain is using a Faceless Stalker to make it seem like the nobles are hiding a vampire family member and letting them feed on the townspeople, because they want to cause unrest, riots, and revolts.
This was a great video. Really got me thinking about a plot hook. What if a faceless stalker is hunting in an area that has a vampire and a doppelgänger in it. The increase in security is bad for both, so they want the party to get rid of the issue. However they are both convinced that the other species is what is behind the attack. Could be fun to throw the players for a loop.
Vampire: Listen, I only drink enough blood to feed, but I don't kill anyone! You know, I heard there's a doppelganger hanging around these parts. Maybe they know about me and want my territory for themselves Doppelganger: Hey man, I'm just doing some honest living, y'know? I transform into anything people desire, have a good time... Maybe get a little bit extra payment when they're asleep, you get what I'm saying? But I ain't harming anyone! The victims don't even have blood, we don't do that. I mean, isn't it obvious? There's a vampire in town!
Gonna add a faceless stalker to my city's detective agency that sits in the next room over listening to witness testimonies and uses itself as a living police sketch
I like this I can see maybe an alpha or king version of these that can shape shift into multiple forms at once kinda like prisoner zero from doctor who.
These videos are keeping me going. Don't ever stop, or I won't know what to do with myself between game sessions. These vids always make my day better, so thanks! I love this Dnd TH-cam community, and you content creators are the real heroes. Looking forward to getting my copy of Monster Encounters.
I’d love to have a changeling vs faceless stalker battle. Have the party come in to a town where a changeling has taken one spot of the local government such as the mayor. They give the quest to the party to hunt the creature is killing towns folk/stalker only for the stalker to copy the Changeling’s form to try to pin the blame back on the changeling either by pretending he is the real mayor or framing “himself“ to have the party turn on the changeling.
The Ugothol community uplifted from their previous masters by their new silver dragon friends, they are often sent out to towns by silver dragons that have connections that they wish to check up on but no time to do so currently. as long as they don't kill lawful good or good or lawful humans, the silver dragons usually don't care as long as they do not reveal the dragons intent or connection to thereof. Sentience is overpowered.
Love that you did these guys, but they did actually start in D&D. The original Rise of the Runelord AP came out for 3.5 edition, and these guys were there. Obligatory request for the Tsochar from Lords of Madness. Can’t wait for your next video!
A twist on the false vampire attacks: There /is/ a vampire or group of vampires in the city. They're in a rivalry or gang war with the ugothol or community of ugothols (depending on how many you want on each side). They will both try to play the party against the other group, trying to be the last bloodsuckers standing. The party may end up allying with one group (deciding that one is less of a threat than the other) or they may end up taking out both.
I've been watching you for about a year now and I just want to compliment you on the increase in production value of your videos. The editing and audio is fantastic and I look forward to each and every release. Thanks for the great content!
The Faceless Stalker reminds me of those Faceless creatures in XCOM 2, especially with how it just physically breaks it's own disguise via transfiguration. The claw marks and sheer hulking height add to this (arguably a Skinwalker with Eldritch flavoring and a twist to the traditional legend of them) I absolutely will love to use this Monster down the line for sure in my campaign. The added bit of subtly changing details of their face to downright uncanny valley moments of having their body appearing more disfigured until the party realizes their "friend" was this while hiding the fact where their real friend went. The reaction they'll have will be priceless
I love the idea of having these guys as nonhostile NPCs or even allies. Maybe you could have a town finding blood-drained livestock, some with 2 puncture wounds and some with 3. Throw in some red herrings about the significance of the amount of wounds, and eventually reveal that the 2-wounded kills were the work of vampires secretly infiltrating the region, and the 3-wounded ones were the work of normally peaceful ugothols living in the nearby swamp, forced to hunt nearer and nearer to the settlement because of the vampires stealing their prey. The players could then team up with the ugothols against the vampires, maybe getting up to some shapeshifting-based hijinks on the side.
Thank you so much for this monster! I just ran this in a one shot where one was trying to summon an Aboleth and it scared the hell out of my players! We had a total blast!
What I thought immediately was "long lost child/relative". It could literally mix two people to approximate how their child could look, or insert themselves into some family as a distant cousin who is definitely related cause they have very characteristic nose and eyebrow shape
What can I say. I like the weird shit. Among all the demon lords or extraplanar entities or demigods/angelic figures, weird aberrant things such as this meatman looking dude are the most interesting to me.
This actually has some cool player character potential. I would put this species together with say, lycanthopes as they both physically transform into something else, however the Faceless Stalker doesn't have the limitation of needed a full moon to transform. I could imagine a group of adventurers meeting together in a desolate city, being brought together due to some horrific rumor about people disappearing into the night. Little does the party know, one of their members is a Faceless Stalker, the one making everyone dissappear. The only way I could perceive someone figuring out that one of their members being a Faceless Stalker is through a mistake on the Stalker's part. Imagine the Stalker making an excuse to leave the party at a tavern to settle some "urgent business". One of the party members quietly follow from the rooftops, curious to find out what their friend is doing. As the two head towards a dark alley, the Stalker begins to shift, their once uncanny humanoid features melting and shifting into the amorphous blob. A towering foe of unimaginable power. The Stalker lurks through the city and finds their next victim, their hidden party member witnessing everything. The party member runs back to the rest of the party in a panic, describing what they saw. Their fellow member dont believe them. Oooo! I want to play this now!!
NPC Idea: A faceless stalker in a city that works as a detective for the cities law enforcement, using their abilities to become 3D police sketches and go undercover for investigations
I’m pretty sure the faceless stalker appeared first in 2007 in The Skinsaw Murders, second book of the Rise of the Runelord AP. It was then reprinted in Bestiary 2
These would be perfect for a heist. The party needs to infiltrate somewhere posed as a VIP, but they need to get past detect magic security and they don't have the person physically available or they murdered him too hard. As such, they need the faceless stalker so they can infiltrate the area. Maybe have a side mission to steal a portrait of the individual to use a reference and increase the quality of the disguise form.
I love using weird stuff outside of conventional magic to get around things like Truesight. Like, imagine True Polymorphing yourself into one of these to get around the Truesight of a Lich or something
I just want to point out, because this is important information. Truesight sees through all shape changes and transformations. The magical part and physical shape changing are separated by a ‘, and’ to clarify it covers both. This video just committed a syntax error.
@@videogameunderappreciateda8174 The shapechanger ability in 5e has a "true form", the trait can temporarily change the current form, but if they lose the ability to maintain it (like through death) they revert back instantly. This also runs true for pathfinder shapechanger. HOWEVER this is not shapechanger, it's the distinct "change shape", which is maintained indefinitely and the ONLY reversion method listed is the ability being activated again to change its shape again. Because it's not using its power to alter itself, which is overcome by the truesight. It's physically changed itself through mundane means. Truesight cannot see through mundane disguises, like wigs and clothes. It doesn't look at someone with an broken leg and see the leg as normal. It sees the twisted flesh as it is, and therefore sees through the Stalker's twisted flesh as it is. It can no more see the stalker's old form than it can see the tree my desk once was.
@@maromania7 Truesight isn’t referring to the ability. It says a “shapechanger”. A stalker is changing its shape. True sight can see the true forms of werewolves and other creatures that use non magical transformations. Doppelgänger’s specifically don’t use magic, because creatures like golden dragons clarify when they do use magic, and it can see the true form of a doppelgänger just fine. The change shape ability is in 5th addition and truesight can see through it. Edit: A broken leg isn’t shapeshifting. A table also isn’t shapeshifting. The stalker isn’t using a physical disguise. It shifts it’s body, and other creatures that physical shift their body can be seen through by truesight. Edit 2: I just looked it up. And everything I can find says truesight sees through change shape just like shapechange.
My Favorite monsters is the Urdefhan from the pathfinder bestiary 2. It has some extra info in the Darklands revisited. It's a CR3 Fiend native to the underdark that drinks blood, has transparent flesh, and glowing blue blood that can self destruct to harm enemies and heal allies by sacrificing its soul to The Horsemen of the Apocalypses that made them.
Friend in college ran a mini campaign with one as the bbeg. One of the players was secretly disguising themself as a half-orc during the day to avoid detection. The party lost because they decided to split into two groups, and a 1v1 vs a grapple monk doing nonlethal damage, free unarmed strikes and necrotic damage isn't fun.
My idea for using this creature is maybe in a small town, a guy gets dragged off into the woods by the shifter and killed. The shifter would then take the appearance of the man, add a wound to his face or something and go back into the town pretending to be the man
This is such a neat channel. I’ve always thought monsters from pathfinder and older dnd are awesome. Thank you for allowing me to see them come into 5e
This looks SO much like the Faceless from XCOM 2, it’s giving me flashbacks of when my entire squad got wiped by the “civilian” hiding by a natural gas tank 😂
I'm just imagining a city hiring one to go undercover in thieves guilds or to be used for police sketches. And it gets payed in juice and a wizard friend who can use magic to stop the pain it feels when transforming
Ah this reminds me of the time I got to play as a Zern pretending to be a doppleganger pretending to be a suave surgeon. In the setting most abrrration types were actual aliens so I was doing secret works to abduct people for experiments and such. I quite enjoy the idea of shapechangers masquerading as other kinds, maybe there could be an advanced faceless stalker that can hold one shape on top of another? Or an ancient one that has mastered the art and can shift almost as fast as a doppleganger.
I'm getting ready to run Strahd for the first time and I'm imagining a sub-plot involving one of these guys running around as Strahd in... maybe Vallaki, possibly having fooled Fiona Wachter as part of the disguise.
7:11 Wait, these guys have a three-pronged tongue, and their shapeshifting takes several painful minutes? That sounds almost exactly like the shapeshifters from the scifi show Fringe. The only difference is the shapeshifters in Fringe are partly robotic, and subsist on mercury instead of blood (though they also have mercury for blood...). I wonder if Paizo was inspired by Fringe?
In my dnd homebrew world. I’m thinking of merging the Doppelgänger and faceless stalker together, making them same creature. ( in my universe my Doppelgänger shapeshift just like the faceless stalker) making a faceless stalker a more elite/Older Doppelgängers who much more skilled in shape shifting it doesn’t need to copy faces it seen but create completely new faces
One thing that immediately came to mind is to go full Truman Show with them. The players stumble on an isolated village in the forest and are approached by a young person. "Please adventurers, can you help me? I think my father is a vampire. I saw him drink the blood of a rat last night. And our neighbor is also acting strangely lately." Upon investigating it turns out that the entire village is populated by stalkers, and that the child is the only real person. They were summoned or created by a powerful wizard who knew she was dying, and wanted her only child to grow up with people she thought would provide it with the best upbringing. The stalkers realize the child is growing up and that they can't keep the masquerade up for very much longer.
I find this more interesting than Doppelgangers. There is a whole plot for a group of these who actively hunt aboliths for their betrail and perhaps joining monster hunters for both fresh blood and an understanding to have peaceful lives by building trust.
okay its 6am and ive been up all night and the idea of a vegan faceless stalker that eats yop made me laugh hysterically. the word yop was a major factor here.
![โฮ่ง! (SUGOI) - LYKN [ OFFICIAL MV ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/nFp4zjAARFs/mqdefault.jpg)
Thanks for watching everyone! Be sure to check out Dr. Dhrolin's Dictionary of Dinosaurs right here : www.kickstarter.com/projects/palaeogames/dr-dhrolins-dictionary-of-dinosaurs
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You could make a village of faceless stalkers who transform before leaving their houses, and only stay in their true forms indoors to hide from random visitors….
The dinosaur thing seems pretty dope tho
This is legit the first time I've backed something on kickstarter. Since I LOVE DINOSAURS! And even though I haven't played 5e in a while, I'm still interested enough to purchase it and hope I remember I bought it when I receive it.
If the dinos have feathers they aren't scientifically accurate, no dino fossils, including T-rex & Raptors, have ever been found to have feathers. In fact they have found skin imprint fossils that show that dinos have only scales & zero feathers. So if the illustrations & Dinos in the sponsors books have feathers they are crap & far from scientifically accurate.
I only played pathfinder once so I aim pretty much inexperienced but.. Could you play as one?
Neat little plot hook I thought of with these guys:
In a village there is an infamous bandit, and whenever this bandit is caught somehow escapes and replaces themselves with an innocent person. What’s really going on is there is a group of faceless stalkers that are committing crimes under 1 alias and when one gets caught it transforms overnight and pretends to be innocent and gets released, and will definitely get released once another one of the stalkers commits crimes under this alias, furthermore this “one bandit” could commit multiple crimes at once.
So, basically you get this legendary bandit who is said to be able escape any prison and can be in multiple places at once that’s terrorizing this village that your party is asked to take care of.
What happens to the original innocent they transformed into? wouldn't any of them reach out if they heard they were kidnapped by the bandit? if they're turning into completely new faces, then haven't the authorities done any background check or interrogation to figure out their criteria for kidnapping?
@@sthwrth3250 well these guys can make disguise that are entirely original
@@ZakuInATopHat yeah i covered that in my comment, it wouldn't make sense for no one to keep track of who got kidnapped, it's a village, most people know eachother and someone would find it strange how all innocents he captures are complete outsiders to the village that are never seen again after being released
@@sthwrth3250 That kinda depends on other factors. Do the residents trust each other in the first place? How large is said village? Because too large and there would be too many people to get to know everyone in town. Assuming that none of them are paranoid shut-ins, suffering from mental illness, well known criminals that no one trusts, corrupt officials, and so on.
@@darklordmathias9405 another example is the series, midsummer murders. A murder-mystery series that all take place in a single town in England. The only recurring characters are the main character (who's a police detective), the police force, and the main character's family. And throughout every single episode I've seen, there is almost always a completely new cast of suspects and characters that are then never seen again.
Imagine a Faceless Stalker who has forgotten he or she was a Faceless Stalker.
That would be a Backstory for an NPC or something like that
@@SlugcatThe_Hunter Sounds more like an Introduction to a optional Boss or smth
@@SlugcatThe_Hunter That's basically a synth from Fallout 3
@@burnedoutstar1681r all synths
Reminds me of a Call of Cthulu character, but he forgot he wasn't an evil monster person from 1940's Germany, but was an undercover black American war hero.
My player sent me this. They just found a corpse with three marks on its neck. The world has cursed me! Ah well, still be fun
Oh NOOOO! Maybe it's actually just three single-toothed vampires.
Good video though, well done
alas, the drawback of getting more famous XD
Could swap it for a Mohrg they have a tongue with three prongs on the end.
@@TheKypps Will check it out! Cheers
Maybe a Faceless Stalker is impersonating someone and hires a doppelganger to also impersonate that person so people will sense the magical impersonator but not the boss.
Not magical. Doppelganger Shapechange doesn't qualify for the definition of Magical. Detect Magic doesn't detect anything, Antimagic Field doesn't suppress anything, the same way Detect Magic doesn't detect your fingernails growing.
The players might sniff around and discover some partially transformed Stalkers, thinking its some kind of 'Horror out of Innsmouth" HP Lovecraft story, they will attempt to uncover this secret, only to have their evidence vanish before they get back to it... the stalkers all transform and act like the characters are crazy and Why do they have some vendetta against their harmless village?! Complicate this with a bunch of rival adventurers who now champion the cause of the victimised villagers.
Holy shit I’m here for this
@@DungeonDad Sometimes I imagine walking up to Matt Mercer and he will just be like "And three , two, one... Immersed" and I will be in some sort of imagination catatonia, unable to see anything but what he is describing, he no longer even needs descriptive text.... he has become a stage show hypnotist.
This comment deserves more attention, that's an amazing plot hook!
The parties barbarian decides to just rage all over the faceles stalker ripping it limb from limb ruining the dungeon master's storyline
Being able to slightly change their appearance is a pretty interesting advantage in terms of setting.
For example, You could pretend to be someones child that doesn't exist.
(Monster POV) You are in a bar and you hear a mage talk about how 25 years ago he had a fling with a blond hair girl with blue eyes.
You could make yourself look like that guy, but tweak your appearance to be in the middle of them.
Then you could show up a month later pretending to be his long lost son.
They wouldn't be able to detect that you are not because your transformation isn't magic based.
You could get a free place to stay, maybe some magic lessons or money.
A really tricky way to mess with people and or sneak around city to city.
Expanding on this, imagine a conspiracy to take the throne of a kingdom, with a faceless stalker posing as a lost heir.
@@jessicafrost7579 There are a lot of fun (and evil) things you could do with a faceless stalker. 😈
"A different pair of clothes"
Also, by far the best idea for a one-shot is... You get a message, "Go to the royal ball, there's been an infiltration of doppelganger. Anyone could be the enemy, be careful." And everyone but the players are the doppelgangers, the doppelgangers don't know that they actually got every position already, and are planning on assassinating the king, also a doppelganger.
Hang on, I’ve read this webcomic…
reminds me of a news story where some members of the FBI tried to arrest each other because half of them were posing as drug dealers to arrest drug addicts while the rest were undercover as drug addicts to arrest drug dealers.
@@msf2399 I can't put my hand on it but I'm guessing Oglaf...
I don't know about the best idea, but it's certainly an idea
Trick for the faceless stalker:
If it wishes to take form of a small target, it could mimic the appearance of the target covered in boils. Making boil as dense as the stalker is able (thus covering for excess mass). The reason I wanted to point this out is because after a campaign has progressed a good bit, something like leprosy could be mistaken for a shifted monster. On top of that, imagine the raw amount of hysteria that would plague such a city if the villagers are fighting off both a plague and this type of creature.
13:41
Friend: "You going to change form?"
Faceless Stalker: "Not out here in the open no." *Goes into changing room*
Friend: *Takes a peek*
Faceless Stalker: "A moment of privacy please?"
Friend: "My apologies, I just wanted to know how it works."
Faceless Stalker: B-Baka…
*10 minutes of sustained cries of pains*
@@xeth9074 leave
@@IronGiant131 are ye gonna make me pay a toll? Ye Troll….
*followed by agonized screaming.
04:55 except the changeling. Changelings can also transform into basically any humanoid they can imagine. The ability says that if they want to transform into a specific person they have to have seen them (because descriptions will never measure up) but it also says 'you determine the specifics of the changes'. So the Faceless Stalker is a slow, painful changeling that can't change size and is possibly (but not confirmed) immune to true seeing.
This is why I like Changelings so much, they're basically better doppelgangers, though they don't have telepathy
I mean, you could tweak it if you wanted to make it faster. Maybe to be a perfect change they have to take their 10 minutes, but they could, at the expense of more suffering and accuracy, make it faster.
I've always liked leaving disguise-based monsters sprinkled throughout my settings for the red herring effect, and these seem like they'd be perfect for that. There're all sorts of fun ways a monster bursting out of a random mob can be used. A murder-mystery hits a curve ball when one of the suspects turns out to be an uninvolved monster. Or, A battle to defend a small village starts going south on the players? Good thing the town drunk/faceless stalker was inspired to help by the party's kindly barbarian.
How about a murder mystery where there is an ugothol and a vampire in the same city and the party could side with either to take the other down.
I'm intrigued by the idea that they don't actually need to drink blood. Maybe most of them live completely isolated from humanoids, except a few that choose to masquerade and kill, exiled for the danger they can bring to their people. This would let you have sympathetic and antagonistic stalkers with much more complicated more human motivations.
Why would they have human motivations. They're not human
Seriously your videos are addicting. They are a must watch for any Dungeon master.
Thanks, and thanks for watching!
No only for dungeon masters y’know? I’m one of these guys that hasn’t been in a game for over a year, and I still love these videos.
This is perfect! The City Corrupter was just gonna be using some regular doppelgangers, but it would be awesome for them to have found a small family of Faceless Stalkers to be like a half dozen major names each. I see it being a transactional relationship; The family helps turn the city and even spreads corruption to other cities along the trade routes for the City Corrupterto work on next, and the City Corrupter gives them all the magical items and treasures they want to take from the city before it gets pulled from the plane to set them for a thousand lifetimes. The common lead of "someone saw one person in two places" can instead be the vague "a body was found drained of blood with 3 wounds on the neck", and it can involve the interpersonal relationships between the Faceless Stalkers; One is basically the "rebel/drunkard" of the family and taking way too many risks, not only leaving a small trail for someone to follow but maybe even being a liability that might turn on them, but the rest of the family is torn on what they should do since they are still family.
7:50
Idea for a campaign
The local prison has been having a series of strange deaths among the inmates. Originally thought to be caused by simple inter-inmate violence, it has become clear at this point that something else is causing this. The party has been tasked with figuring out what's happening.
Spoilers:
It's a Faceless Stalker (this assumes that they are carnivores, so cannot just drink orange juice or something) that doesn't want to kill people, but has to to survive (as far as they can tell, maybe the party can figure something out). They choose prisoners as they are "acceptable targets".
Bro, I love this shit
I could see one of these giving itself different humanoid parts to give itself a bunch of natural weapons
That is a very cool idea
@@DungeonDad thanks I could imagine tabaxii claws, a dragonborn head for a breath weapon, and a long lizardfolk tail to trip enemies up.
The sub-species of aboleth in Pathfinder 1e are fantastic. The Veiled Master or Omnipath are bosses i have used in the past and they have been great bosses. Also the Charnel God and Immortal Ichor are also fantastic end game bosses.
Tell me about those aboleth subspecies, I'm curious
@@MoondustManwiseVeiled Masters are deceivers and illusionists that transform themselves into humanoids in order to rule entire nations while disguised. they live for millennia, posing as kings, politicians, etc. using polymorph, greater image and other powerful and deceptive spells to dominate and trick every lower lifeform. Even to regular aboleths, the Veiled Masters would be nobility. The Veiled Master can eat memories even to hide their presence, greater polymorph as a swift action (bonus action in 5e) and produces a slime cloud if in water like a regular Aboleth. CR 14 in PF 1e
Omnipaths are like living servers and information hubs for Aboleths. They are secluded and experts of possession, domination, and Knowledge. they can link minds together on a sort of telepathic network, sometimes these networks can be hundreds strong. after being added to the mesh of an omnipath, there is nowhere you can go to escape its influence as there is no distance limitation on its possession and telepathic control. Only planar travel can sever it, but only temporarily. While dominated by the Omnipath, it can see through your eyes and sense all you sense. It can even allow other aboleths this ability as well and can control any subject as it is able to cast geas or quest several times a day. they have three sets of consecutive jaws that can all attack at once and use telepathic attacks to stun, weaken and manipulate in a fight. CR 18 in PF 1e
@@jamessolano7881 fascinating
@@MoondustManwise was there a deleted comment or are you being sarcastic?
@@InflamedCorgi there was a deleted comment, it really was interesting
The sewer Murder mystery plot hook could be so good. Maybe have some of the bodies smell of sewage, or have them all appear near sewage drains (as one of the only things connecting the murders). Then you could throw in a few lines of random NPCs smelling like sewage every once and a while before they realize what it means, and then after they realize what it means, maybe they'll attack an innocent NPC who smells bad (which wouldn't be out of the ordinary in a Medieval setting). So much potential. Hell, you could even have the Stalker begin to masquerade as a Vampire once it realizes it's being investigated to throw the investigation of the track, then have clues during the Vampire sightings pointing to the fact that it's not a real vampire, like it ignoring rules about crossing running water and requiring an invitation to enter homes and such. Definitely swiping this for my game.
This thing is fantastic, it’s straight out of XCOM.
I was thinking the same thing
My first thought as well.
So could we get away with let's say the drained bodies scenario with two puncture wounds on the neck, the team says vampires, and it was actually a faceless stalker with a missing tongue tooth? Do they loose or retain all scars/missing limbs and such that had been done to their true form after going through a transformation session?
You have to wonder, where does the unused flesh go? Perhaps the Faceless Stalker keeps it’s unused meat in a drawer or jar for the players to come across. A bit gross, but an effective way to get across that this thing is no mere doppleganger/vampire.
Brooo that intro was fire!! Let's gooo!!!
🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Love ya Dungeon Dad.
I made the unfortunate decision to show my DM your channel, things have gotten more interesting, but character deaths have definitely gone up.
Great content as always.
as always incredible work! thank you
Thanks for the kind words and for watching!
@@DungeonDad With a Necromancy Wizard they develop resistance to Necrotic Damage, so in case they encountered this creature and was grappled wouldn't that resistance protect them?
Also can this creature count as Undead?
Knowing that they drink any fluid, I could see a faceless stalker lady of the night.
I could see a "good" vampire, or even a dhampir, trying to side with the party to track down who has framed the vamp. Maybe there's even a lineage dhampir or Innistrad vampire PC in the party, and is accused of the murders that are coincidentally happening not too long after the party arrived in the city.
Appreciate you doing this monster. I first learned of it in an adventure module where the party had to discover who was killing a bunch of people, and was initally thought to be a serial killer.
A little late, but this feels like it'd have been a perfect October monster.
Appreciate all the cameos you got together for this. Extremely fitting.
I'd imagine being a hooker stalker would be pretty lucrative. That's essentially an endless catalogue/roster at your disposal; maybe even have a special service for the most generous clients that allows them to choose a combination of their preferred features. Only downside would be the requisite 10 minutes of agony for every meeting.
Maybe the local butcher is a faceless stalker, who drinks the livestock blood as sustenance and is otherwise a welcome member of the community.
Bruh, never thought that TH-cam D&D multiverse would collide in one video like this.
Imagine a city (or any community large enough for that matter) which get infiltrated by a group of doppleganger and some faceless stalkers. Of course both species are rival and would try to manipulate the player characters to fulfill their own agenda. Probably not easy to master but the paranoia that ensues could be very interesting.
Thanks for giving me the perfect addition for the shape shifter gang war between werewolves, changelings, doppelgangers, and now the faceless stalkers. The town guard and players are going to be so confused. 😂
I really like the whole thing of the Faceless Stalkers not being inherently evil, would make for a very interesting traveling companion.
To be fair to them, if transforming takes around 10 minutes AND is an agonisingly painful experience, yeah I don't blame them for not being fond of doing so in front of anyone else. It seems like a quirky little flavour bit in the context of the near instant magical Doppelganger transformations, but if you compare it to something like breaking your own arms and then trying to set the bones back into place to change their length, it makes a lot of sense.
It'd not a quick process you can whip out to get out of a tight situation. You'd feel pretty vulnerable during that time period, and given that it's a physical non-magical transformation, it's not likely something they'd instantly snap out of if interrupted; The transformation wouldn't just "fail" like a spell might, it'd be like getting caught with your head stuck between a wall and bedpost or with your clothes and limbs in a tangle, they'd have to physically work themselves back out of that position (whether by reverting or just finishing the transformation based on how far along it is).
If one of these were ever "rehired" by an Aboleth as a GOOlock I could see them picking _mask of many faces_ just to have a means of "transforming" that's both much faster and painless, albeit easier to see through. Maybe they only use their inherent transformation ability when they need to maintain it for a long time and have advance warning, but default to the illusion if they think they can get away with it, along with having the usual "magical change of clothes" function. Amusingly if they got the level 10 subclass feature they'd have protection from mindreading, which would both help block a means of discovering them and mess with Doppelgangers who actually do have mind reading. Witch Sight is there at 14th Lvl too, which makes for a shapeshifter whose form can't be detected or seen through with detect magic or true sight, whose mind cannot be read, and who can see through magical disguises including polymorphing.
Maybe there's a high level Goolock stalker tasked with hunting down doppelgangers because it'll cause problems for the Gods somehow according to that big Aboleth brain. Perhaps the doppelgangers hear enough rumours to be aware they're being hunted down but not by whom, and are getting more aggressive with their identity theft in attempts to hide from this unknown threat they can't see coming. The effects that could have on the groups they try to take refuge in could well be what causes the direct issues for the divines depending on who they're hiding amongst, which in turn would be a way for the Aboleth to set the Gods _against_ the doppelgangers they're hunting. It also provides a "twist villain" since the way the party would likely find out about all this would be by investigating into the doppelgangers crimes; The party could even be pointed in their direction by the faceless stalker who's seeing an opportunity to get some eager ignorant faces to do some of the work for them, perhaps posing as a guardsman or such.
I really appreciate your obvious enthusiasm for what you do. It definitely makes your videos more engaging.
When you said puncture marks on the neck and drained of blood my mind went to a Chupacabra.
We definitely need some cryptid stats. Wendigo, Skinwalker, Chupacabra, Aswang, bigfoot, etc
Can't believe you had a collab with Big Grocery in this one.
Yeah dude, superstore couldn't wait to jump on the DD band wagon.
@@DungeonDad Superstore has the best stuff. Yay for Natural Path aisles for use lactose and gluten sensitive humans.
It's a morph, not a polymorph! And turning into a small creature with excess flesh reminds me of the Homer Simpson meme where he clothespins his fat towards his back.
I actually want a police station using a faceless stalker the same way as the sketcher.
“His nose was a little pointier and he was a tiny bit shorter but yes that’s the man who killed my wife”
14:05 That would also make an Ugothol village incredibly strange. Houses would be larger with rooms for each "family member", there would be outhouses and basements aplenty, or all the homes would be for individual people. A normal human village would have homes with one or two rooms, chamber-pots for relieving onself, and relatively large families. While not every player would notice this, it could set some players on edge.
Bro went to the store to film a 3-4 second shot, just for a transition. Every day, we stray closer to enlightenment.
Plot hook idea: a noble family, maybe even a royal family, has a member that's kept out of the public eye. Then people in town start being found dead and drained of blood, with witnesses saying they've seen a mysterious figure in noble clothing near the crime scene and when asking around some people that work at the noble's house might be able to identify the description as being the family member that's kept hidden. Actually, some villain is using a Faceless Stalker to make it seem like the nobles are hiding a vampire family member and letting them feed on the townspeople, because they want to cause unrest, riots, and revolts.
Never in my life have I wanted a crossover so much and didnt know it until I received it
That sponsor feels so aimed towards me i couldnt not back it, thanks a lot because i would have never found this without your video
You know what else drains blood and leaves 3 pointed bite marks? Chupacabras. Pathfinder has stats for them, too.
You never know who's the real sucker
This was a great video. Really got me thinking about a plot hook.
What if a faceless stalker is hunting in an area that has a vampire and a doppelgänger in it.
The increase in security is bad for both, so they want the party to get rid of the issue. However they are both convinced that the other species is what is behind the attack. Could be fun to throw the players for a loop.
Vampire: Listen, I only drink enough blood to feed, but I don't kill anyone! You know, I heard there's a doppelganger hanging around these parts. Maybe they know about me and want my territory for themselves
Doppelganger: Hey man, I'm just doing some honest living, y'know? I transform into anything people desire, have a good time... Maybe get a little bit extra payment when they're asleep, you get what I'm saying? But I ain't harming anyone! The victims don't even have blood, we don't do that. I mean, isn't it obvious? There's a vampire in town!
One of the best things about having so many monsters with somewhat overlapping traits is being able to play with player expectations.
Gonna add a faceless stalker to my city's detective agency that sits in the next room over listening to witness testimonies and uses itself as a living police sketch
I like this I can see maybe an alpha or king version of these that can shape shift into multiple forms at once kinda like prisoner zero from doctor who.
On god one of the most creative intros to a video talking about shapeshifters I’ve ever seen!
Thanks for bringing me along Josiah!!!!
Thanks for joining in!
Video: *about a shape shifter*
My prehistory nerd af self: *D I N O S A U R S*
These videos are keeping me going. Don't ever stop, or I won't know what to do with myself between game sessions. These vids always make my day better, so thanks!
I love this Dnd TH-cam community, and you content creators are the real heroes. Looking forward to getting my copy of Monster Encounters.
Michael Jackson: The kid is not my son!
The faceless stalker who has assumed a form halfway between Michael & Billie Jean: I'm not a kid anymore, Dad.
You emphasize agonising pain a lot in this video even while showing the stat card is just "Somewhat painful"
I’d love to have a changeling vs faceless stalker battle.
Have the party come in to a town where a changeling has taken one spot of the local government such as the mayor. They give the quest to the party to hunt the creature is killing towns folk/stalker only for the stalker to copy the Changeling’s form to try to pin the blame back on the changeling either by pretending he is the real mayor or framing “himself“ to have the party turn on the changeling.
The Ugothol community uplifted from their previous masters by their new silver dragon friends, they are often sent out to towns by silver dragons that have connections that they wish to check up on but no time to do so currently. as long as they don't kill lawful good or good or lawful humans, the silver dragons usually don't care as long as they do not reveal the dragons intent or connection to thereof.
Sentience is overpowered.
Love that you did these guys, but they did actually start in D&D. The original Rise of the Runelord AP came out for 3.5 edition, and these guys were there.
Obligatory request for the Tsochar from Lords of Madness. Can’t wait for your next video!
Interesting! didn't find that information in my research, I'll have to check it out!
A twist on the false vampire attacks: There /is/ a vampire or group of vampires in the city. They're in a rivalry or gang war with the ugothol or community of ugothols (depending on how many you want on each side). They will both try to play the party against the other group, trying to be the last bloodsuckers standing. The party may end up allying with one group (deciding that one is less of a threat than the other) or they may end up taking out both.
I've been watching you for about a year now and I just want to compliment you on the increase in production value of your videos. The editing and audio is fantastic and I look forward to each and every release. Thanks for the great content!
That really means a lot, thanks so much!
hag dragon takes the memories of a faceless stalker who now does not know it is a faceless stalker and might be capable of player play
The Faceless Stalker reminds me of those Faceless creatures in XCOM 2, especially with how it just physically breaks it's own disguise via transfiguration. The claw marks and sheer hulking height add to this (arguably a Skinwalker with Eldritch flavoring and a twist to the traditional legend of them)
I absolutely will love to use this Monster down the line for sure in my campaign. The added bit of subtly changing details of their face to downright uncanny valley moments of having their body appearing more disfigured until the party realizes their "friend" was this while hiding the fact where their real friend went. The reaction they'll have will be priceless
I love the idea of having these guys as nonhostile NPCs or even allies. Maybe you could have a town finding blood-drained livestock, some with 2 puncture wounds and some with 3. Throw in some red herrings about the significance of the amount of wounds, and eventually reveal that the 2-wounded kills were the work of vampires secretly infiltrating the region, and the 3-wounded ones were the work of normally peaceful ugothols living in the nearby swamp, forced to hunt nearer and nearer to the settlement because of the vampires stealing their prey. The players could then team up with the ugothols against the vampires, maybe getting up to some shapeshifting-based hijinks on the side.
Thank you so much for this monster! I just ran this in a one shot where one was trying to summon an Aboleth and it scared the hell out of my players! We had a total blast!
This deserves the most unyielding compliment I know.... neat!
What I thought immediately was "long lost child/relative". It could literally mix two people to approximate how their child could look, or insert themselves into some family as a distant cousin who is definitely related cause they have very characteristic nose and eyebrow shape
What can I say. I like the weird shit. Among all the demon lords or extraplanar entities or demigods/angelic figures, weird aberrant things such as this meatman looking dude are the most interesting to me.
This actually has some cool player character potential. I would put this species together with say, lycanthopes as they both physically transform into something else, however the Faceless Stalker doesn't have the limitation of needed a full moon to transform.
I could imagine a group of adventurers meeting together in a desolate city, being brought together due to some horrific rumor about people disappearing into the night. Little does the party know, one of their members is a Faceless Stalker, the one making everyone dissappear.
The only way I could perceive someone figuring out that one of their members being a Faceless Stalker is through a mistake on the Stalker's part. Imagine the Stalker making an excuse to leave the party at a tavern to settle some "urgent business". One of the party members quietly follow from the rooftops, curious to find out what their friend is doing. As the two head towards a dark alley, the Stalker begins to shift, their once uncanny humanoid features melting and shifting into the amorphous blob. A towering foe of unimaginable power. The Stalker lurks through the city and finds their next victim, their hidden party member witnessing everything. The party member runs back to the rest of the party in a panic, describing what they saw. Their fellow member dont believe them.
Oooo! I want to play this now!!
NPC Idea: A faceless stalker in a city that works as a detective for the cities law enforcement, using their abilities to become 3D police sketches and go undercover for investigations
I’m pretty sure the faceless stalker appeared first in 2007 in The Skinsaw Murders, second book of the Rise of the Runelord AP. It was then reprinted in Bestiary 2
These would be perfect for a heist. The party needs to infiltrate somewhere posed as a VIP, but they need to get past detect magic security and they don't have the person physically available or they murdered him too hard. As such, they need the faceless stalker so they can infiltrate the area. Maybe have a side mission to steal a portrait of the individual to use a reference and increase the quality of the disguise form.
I love using weird stuff outside of conventional magic to get around things like Truesight. Like, imagine True Polymorphing yourself into one of these to get around the Truesight of a Lich or something
I just want to point out, because this is important information. Truesight sees through all shape changes and transformations. The magical part and physical shape changing are separated by a ‘, and’ to clarify it covers both.
This video just committed a syntax error.
@@videogameunderappreciateda8174 The shapechanger ability in 5e has a "true form", the trait can temporarily change the current form, but if they lose the ability to maintain it (like through death) they revert back instantly. This also runs true for pathfinder shapechanger. HOWEVER this is not shapechanger, it's the distinct "change shape", which is maintained indefinitely and the ONLY reversion method listed is the ability being activated again to change its shape again. Because it's not using its power to alter itself, which is overcome by the truesight. It's physically changed itself through mundane means. Truesight cannot see through mundane disguises, like wigs and clothes. It doesn't look at someone with an broken leg and see the leg as normal. It sees the twisted flesh as it is, and therefore sees through the Stalker's twisted flesh as it is. It can no more see the stalker's old form than it can see the tree my desk once was.
@@maromania7 Truesight isn’t referring to the ability. It says a “shapechanger”. A stalker is changing its shape. True sight can see the true forms of werewolves and other creatures that use non magical transformations. Doppelgänger’s specifically don’t use magic, because creatures like golden dragons clarify when they do use magic, and it can see the true form of a doppelgänger just fine.
The change shape ability is in 5th addition and truesight can see through it.
Edit: A broken leg isn’t shapeshifting. A table also isn’t shapeshifting. The stalker isn’t using a physical disguise. It shifts it’s body, and other creatures that physical shift their body can be seen through by truesight.
Edit 2: I just looked it up. And everything I can find says truesight sees through change shape just like shapechange.
A faceless stalker takes the form of a legendary vampire thought long destroyed.
Okay, that link to the Aboleth means these are definitely appearing in my campaign
Building an entire campaign right now with a lot of monsters from this channel. Always awesome content!!
A faceless stalker would make a great assassin for an academy of wizardry. They could become anyone without being caught by investigators
Face Dancers of the Dune Universe.
This was truly a masterpiece. Not only an awesome monster, but god, that editing
he could be you, he could be me, it could be in this very room
My Favorite monsters is the Urdefhan from the pathfinder bestiary 2. It has some extra info in the Darklands revisited. It's a CR3 Fiend native to the underdark that drinks blood, has transparent flesh, and glowing blue blood that can self destruct to harm enemies and heal allies by sacrificing its soul to The Horsemen of the Apocalypses that made them.
Friend in college ran a mini campaign with one as the bbeg. One of the players was secretly disguising themself as a half-orc during the day to avoid detection. The party lost because they decided to split into two groups, and a 1v1 vs a grapple monk doing nonlethal damage, free unarmed strikes and necrotic damage isn't fun.
My idea for using this creature is maybe in a small town, a guy gets dragged off into the woods by the shifter and killed. The shifter would then take the appearance of the man, add a wound to his face or something and go back into the town pretending to be the man
This is such a neat channel. I’ve always thought monsters from pathfinder and older dnd are awesome. Thank you for allowing me to see them come into 5e
This thing would also be an awesome monster to tweak into a player race
This looks SO much like the Faceless from XCOM 2, it’s giving me flashbacks of when my entire squad got wiped by the “civilian” hiding by a natural gas tank 😂
I'm just imagining a city hiring one to go undercover in thieves guilds or to be used for police sketches. And it gets payed in juice and a wizard friend who can use magic to stop the pain it feels when transforming
Ah this reminds me of the time I got to play as a Zern pretending to be a doppleganger pretending to be a suave surgeon. In the setting most abrrration types were actual aliens so I was doing secret works to abduct people for experiments and such. I quite enjoy the idea of shapechangers masquerading as other kinds, maybe there could be an advanced faceless stalker that can hold one shape on top of another? Or an ancient one that has mastered the art and can shift almost as fast as a doppleganger.
Truesight specifically calls out shapechangers, so if it gets that tag, it'd be caught by truesight.
The BBEG of my campaign is an Aboleth, though my players haven't learned that yet, they're in for some fun tonight
I'm getting ready to run Strahd for the first time and I'm imagining a sub-plot involving one of these guys running around as Strahd in... maybe Vallaki, possibly having fooled Fiona Wachter as part of the disguise.
7:11 Wait, these guys have a three-pronged tongue, and their shapeshifting takes several painful minutes? That sounds almost exactly like the shapeshifters from the scifi show Fringe. The only difference is the shapeshifters in Fringe are partly robotic, and subsist on mercury instead of blood (though they also have mercury for blood...). I wonder if Paizo was inspired by Fringe?
In my dnd homebrew world. I’m thinking of merging the Doppelgänger and faceless stalker together, making them same creature. ( in my universe my Doppelgänger shapeshift just like the faceless stalker) making a faceless stalker a more elite/Older Doppelgängers who much more skilled in shape shifting it doesn’t need to copy faces it seen but create completely new faces
One thing that immediately came to mind is to go full Truman Show with them. The players stumble on an isolated village in the forest and are approached by a young person. "Please adventurers, can you help me? I think my father is a vampire. I saw him drink the blood of a rat last night. And our neighbor is also acting strangely lately." Upon investigating it turns out that the entire village is populated by stalkers, and that the child is the only real person. They were summoned or created by a powerful wizard who knew she was dying, and wanted her only child to grow up with people she thought would provide it with the best upbringing. The stalkers realize the child is growing up and that they can't keep the masquerade up for very much longer.
I find this more interesting than Doppelgangers. There is a whole plot for a group of these who actively hunt aboliths for their betrail and perhaps joining monster hunters for both fresh blood and an understanding to have peaceful lives by building trust.
love the intro!
This is gonna be so messed up, and i canNOT wait to hear it
okay its 6am and ive been up all night and the idea of a vegan faceless stalker that eats yop made me laugh hysterically. the word yop was a major factor here.
Extra spicy: slip one of your players a note that says they have been replaced by a faceless stalker
Moonbeam would probably still reveal them for what they are. That spell is made to counter shapeshifters.
I just included faceless stalkers in my campaign - this video came out incredibly timely
Imagine someone doing a dnd game based on the Mandela catalog using Faceless stalkers.