#bodythief

 Archetypes for psychics are very rare, so imagine my surprise when we got a new one in Heroes of the Fringe!

One of the greatest weapons of the mind is fear, but you don’t need overt physical threats to strike fear into foes or minion. The right attitude of disdainful calm can also get across how dangerous it is to cross you, and even more so if you can literally worm your way into someone’s mind and directly induce those emotions.

While associated with rare orc individuals that master their minds instead of their bodies, any person can be a so-called terror weaver, manipulating foes and thralls alike with fear or more benign, but no less insidious mental magics.

Regardless of their methods and goals, however, it is clear these figures can get what they want, regardless of if those around them even realize it.

 Surprisingly, the first ability these psychics learn isn’t fear-based, but charm. They gain a reserve of energy to quickly cast a basic charming spell, but can also expend spell energy to do the same without officially learning the spell, the potency of the casting determined by the potency of the energy sacrificed.

Similarly, they can exude an aura of fear around themselves both from an inner reserve and sacrificed spells, even adding metamagical techniques to it as well. Additionally, as they grow more powerful, the potency of the fear increases, causing foes to outright flee.

Their mental powers rarely ever not exuding palpable menace, these mystics can choose to expend phrenic power when casting a mental spell to give the target nightmares, tormenting their dreams with visions of the psychic, making them more susceptible to them the next day.

With the ability to sacrifice spells to charm and debuff others, this archetype screams to be used for a debuff and control-heavy build, leaving foes confused, fearful, and bewildered by their magic. Don’t forget to pack some offensive options though, granting some force to back up their bluster.

 The context this archetype is originally given with speaks of shadow leaders of brutish tribes that only respect strength, but they might also be leaders of thieves guilds, or vagrants that use their power to make sure they are left alone, or perhaps sad figures that only know how to interact with folks with negative emotions.

  Rumors are heard throughout the region of a dragon ruling a band of goblins, demanding absolute loyalty, and striking fear into those that see it. However, those who seek it find only an illusion, the real source being an awakened gila monster with potent psychic abilities.

 Recently triton raids have become a serious problem in Bernai Atoll, which is uncharacteristic for that aquatic race. In truth, the tritons have been subjugated by one of their own, a violent and hateful sort who has taken to calling himself Blackfin.

It may be called an art, but swordplay is also a science, the measured dance of attack, defend, parry, and riposte. Many swashbucklers and other types of warriors strive to master it to better be able to fight.

Today’s entry, however, revolves around mastering the rapier, and using its unique control and speed to accurately strike and position itself to block blows as well. Rapiers are actually just as heavy as your average longsword, but all of the weight is focused on the hilt and grip, making every motion as simple as a flick of the wrist.

Called inspired blades by some, these skilled fencers prove that fighting with a rapier is just as deadly as most any other sort of weapon.

 These inspired blades mix the science of their precise weapons with the daring of most swashbucklers to create an expression of precise and perfected lethality, though they seem more interested in the perfection of each thrust, rather than killing blows, bolstering their determination and daring with particularly accurate strikes.

As implied previously, these are rapier specialists, and learn to fence with finesse and grace.

With a bit of focus and an expenditure of panache, these fencers can strike with uncanny precision, and even spend more such power to threaten particularly deadly strikes with them.

As they grow in skill, their mastery with a rapier only grows, becoming ever more lethal.

Truly masterful swashbucklers of this archetype prove all the more lethal, their deadly strikes landing all the more often and doing staggering amounts of damage to foes.

Interested in a rapier-focused swashbuckler? This archetype can give you added abilities centered on their signature weapon. Their focus on critical hits makes them ripe for a build focused on adding all sorts of bonuses to such strikes, crippling foes with strike after strike. Also consider defensive choices as well to protect them, and appropriate weapon enchantments.

 While it’s clear that these swashbucklers have definitely had intense training to be as good with their rapiers as they are, that really doesn’t inform their motives at all. They might be arrogant braggarts eager to prove their skill, or perhaps they are self-taught adventurers striving to be the very best to defeat some vile threat?

  After avoiding them for weeks, the party warrior finally gets to have a duel with the rapier-wielding grand master, only to find him abysmally unskilled, and furthermore, bleeding green sap! A bodythief has been replacing warriors at the military college, but locating the insidious plant may be difficult indeed.

 One might not expect it from the shobhab, but a rare few of them specialize in their own version of the rapier. Derived from a hunting tool meant to quickly aim at and stab crawling things from within rocks, masters of this weapon study paintings and the words of oral tradition to learn to master such blades with ease, lending their prodigious strength to their stabbing weapons.

Ok so let's just start with the fact that this may just be one of the weirdest rips from popular media that Pathfinder has ever done. I mean Lovecraft sure, cryptids sure, Godzilla franchise sure. But one random monster from one science fiction horror movie from 1978. I just.... like. Why this one? Why not like... Space Amoeba or Creature From The Black Lake. Do I know if either is any good? Absolutely not those are just the first monsters I came up with for 70s creature features. Ok besides Alien but that one I can understand Pathfinder not getting the rights for. Bodythief off of Invasion of the Bodysnatchers just seems so... random. Now do if I know if that one is any good? No.

Honestly, I'm sure there's a very interesting licensing reason behind it but irregardless of my ignorance of that history, I will say that the Bodythief is pretty rad. They enhance immensely upon our previous entry of Fungus Queen in that instead of having fungal zombies they have exact duplicates who are also zombies. Well not quite. The duplicates seem to be capable of all the same mannerisms necessary to blend in to typical human life and even gain access to the memories of the victims killed in order to produce them. The one thing they lack however is the ability to reproduce sincere human emotion.

Now, in a brief description of the movie, it seems to be indicated that this makes the replacements somewhat wooden and zombie-like (though I'm inferring based on the usage of terms and references, I haven't seen it so don't come after me). The Pathfinder description doesn't actually make note of any such change in behavior however. I think instead it seems reasonable to keep it a little more subtle than that.

Think of the alien horror and roleplay that can be derived out of that. Where you would have to check the pulse of a person or investigate via magic to ensure that the emotions are real. For the pod-spawned to be feigning emotions based off memory alone gives few genuine moments to catch one of them in the act. Of course this is also skipping ahead from how long it would take for your players to even register that something is off in whatever town or city this is taking place in.

The psyche of the actual creature is also in interesting one. Although its unlikely the players would ever get much active chance to engage with it. Given its hatred for emotions, it is far more likely to attempt to kill them immediately upon their actual interaction with it rather than discuss its reasoning. Also... I don't feel like giving it motivation for its creations was wholly necessary, as leaving the reasoning vague made it seem a bit more alien. I'd also avoid using the temptation of killing the players to do some sort of secret machinations with a player. The more people get invested in their characters in recent times (which is good, by the way), the less relevant any sort of additional mechanics on death become to players. Unless you have a very committed player you wanna run such an idea by, it's a super dicey ask.

Body Thief Sessions- Orphan Organism