I am looking for a race for a NPC

[Shin Okada]

I am looking for a race appropriate for the following NPC concept.

He is an agent of a powerful chaotic planar being. So, better be a race with long or infinite lifespan.

He is a subtle spy type and not a powerful combatant. Yet he should be able to travel between planes alone and survive. He should better have various divination spells or abilities, too. My current plan is to make him an Unseen Seer. As caster level determines the effectiveness of many of his abilities, his race should not have much racial HDs nor higher LA.

He should be either look like popular PC race or at least should not be obviously of evil race. PCs will eventually use True Seeing and likely to beat his disguising spells and Nonditection. He should not look obviously evil evan this happens. He is a CN character, but if PCs find him to be, say, a demon, PCs will attack him or distrust him even his alignment is CN.

 

[balthanon]

I am looking for a race appropriate for the following NPC concept.

He is an agent of a powerful chaotic planar being. So, better be a race with long or infinite lifespan.

He is a subtle spy type and not a powerful combatant. Yet he should be able to travel between planes alone and survive. He should better have various divination spells or abilities, too. My current plan is to make him an Unseen Seer. As caster level determines the effectiveness of many of his abilities, his race should not have much racial HDs nor higher LA.

He should be either look like popular PC race or at least should not be obviously of evil race. PCs will eventually use True Seeing and likely to beat his disguising spells and Nonditection. He should not look obviously evil evan this happens. He is a CN character, but if PCs find him to be, say, a demon, PCs will attack him or distrust him even his alignment is CN.

Racial hit dice actually shouldn't be much of a problem. If you look in the back of the MM, they talk about associated levels. Essentially, if you take a skill based or melee race and add caster levels, they only count for 1/2 a CR until you reach the number of hit dice the race has.

A doppleganger using this could take 4 levels of sorcerer and be a 5th level challenge for instance-- though after that more levels of sorcerer or other spellcasting classes will raise his CR at a 1 for 1 level.

If you want the ultimate in shapeshifting, I would suggest a phasm-- I've never actually seen one in play, but they can become almost anything in the game that is Large or smaller. At CR 7, with 15 hit dice they are going to be very durable and you could then begin adding wizard and unseen seer levels. They should be able to cross-class most of the skill requirements (or acquire the skill with a feat) so they can start into unseen seer after only a single level of wizard.

Phasm 15/Wizard 1/Unseen Seer 3 - CR 9
Phasm 15/Wizard 1/Unseen Seer 7 - CR 11
Phasm 15/Wizard 3/Unseen Seer 10 - CR 13 (plane shift)

Depending on the level you want for this character, you might need to have him depend on portals and items to travel the planes. (Unless CR 13 is fine or you want to go with clerical casting instead.)

If you want to ignore spellcasting and depend on the shapeshifting and feats like Assume Supernatural ability for the divination abilities, then you could go with Gatecrasher for the class. That would certainly be appropriate for a planar spy.

 

[Shin Okada]

Thanks. Phasm .... I have never tried to use it as an NPC but seems interesting.

 

[dulsi]

Racial hit dice actually shouldn't be much of a problem. If you look in the back of the MM, they talk about associated levels. Essentially, if you take a skill based or melee race and add caster levels, they only count for 1/2 a CR until you reach the number of hit dice the race has.

The CR system is just a guide anyway. It is entirely possible to create a monster whose CR is appropriate for the party but is unbeatable. I think the Core Coliseum on the WotC forum stopped using non associated levels for the monster fights because people felt they were too tough in some combination or argued that some class shouldn't be non associated. I'm not saying this is the case for the phasm. I just think you should think about how your party will do against it instead of just saying the CR says it is ok.

 

[Darklone]

If you like something more humanlike...

Elan. In the psio handbook.

 

[Voadam]

I am looking for a race appropriate for the following NPC concept.

He is an agent of a powerful chaotic planar being. So, better be a race with long or infinite lifespan.

He is a subtle spy type and not a powerful combatant. Yet he should be able to travel between planes alone and survive. He should better have various divination spells or abilities, too. My current plan is to make him an Unseen Seer. As caster level determines the effectiveness of many of his abilities, his race should not have much racial HDs nor higher LA.

He should be either look like popular PC race or at least should not be obviously of evil race. PCs will eventually use True Seeing and likely to beat his disguising spells and Nonditection. He should not look obviously evil evan this happens. He is a CN character, but if PCs find him to be, say, a demon, PCs will attack him or distrust him even his alignment is CN.

Long-lived with an association with chaos? Ability to infiltrate PC race areas?

Elf.

Get the planar and disguise abilities through class features like spells.

 

[balthanon]

The CR system is just a guide anyway. It is entirely possible to create a monster whose CR is appropriate for the party but is unbeatable. I think the Core Coliseum on the WotC forum stopped using non associated levels for the monster fights because people felt they were too tough in some combination or argued that some class shouldn't be non associated. I'm not saying this is the case for the phasm. I just think you should think about how your party will do against it instead of just saying the CR says it is ok.

That can definitely be the case and every monster should be evaluated to see how bad it is going to get when you start customizing them. This can happen in most of the areas where you can change monsters-- like templates, for instance. The lycanthrope template is one example that can create monsters that are far and away better than would be expected for their CR. Particularly with some of the really high hit dice dire animals like dire shark.

Even standard class levels can significantly bump up a monster's abilities-- I put martial adept levels on some elder elementals once and it was absolutely brutal. Certainly surprised the players.

 

[Shin Okada]

Ah Elf! I almost forgot the race does exist in 3.Xe.
The last Elf PC in my play group died about 4 years ago.
Now we see rather a lot of them in 4e, though.

Anyway, thanks. As a subtle type NPC, Elf should surely work.