An orb of darkness hovered several feet off of the ground, slowly growing and gathering in size. Blots of inky blackness, dripped from it, splattering across the ground. As the ebon matter splashed onto the earth, the grass wilted and decayed. From the swelling portal, a claw reached out until it touched upon the ground, razor sharp claws digging furrows into the dirt. More of the beast pulled itself from the portal, a head with large bat-like ears and ominously glowing eyes. The creature sleekly slid from the portal, stepping onto the Material Plane as a hungry, rumbling growl emerged from its fanged maw.
The riftstalker is an umbral behemoth from the game of Dauntless, where it can be found as a guaranteed encounter from level 12-15. Armed with a fascinating array of unique abilities, the Pathfinder 2e version of the riftstalker is designed as a skirmisher though much of its movement comes from traversing between dimensions, rather than going over ground. When I built a radiant behemoth, I made a big stink about how 'radiant doesn't equal positive' but when it comes to the riftstalker, I fully accepted that 'umbral equals negative' and built the riftstalker accordingly, with a heavy association to the Plane of Shadows. It has negative healing and a weakness to positive energy, but it also takes Shrink From the Light, an ability I found on PF2e's shadow worm. This reinforces the weakness to light, which may be a trait I add to radiant creature abilities going forward. Defensively, it has a high AC but only a low HP. It has a few abilities to help defend it such as Shadow Cloak making it harder to hit, which is further enhanced by Warp Shadows, based off of the fetchling's Shadow Blending but adding a frightened effect for flavor reasons.
It uses a moderate attack bonus with low claw damage and high tail damage with the attack bonus mainly accounting for its Teleportation Tactics ability, which is based off of an original monster I did, the feycap. This ability to regularly and easily afflict flat-footed had my testers suggest scaling its attack back slightly. Umbral Charge is a double-threat ability - in its base state, it is intended to resemble the riftstalker's general 'pop out of a portal and take a swipe,' but a crit removes the flourish trait on it, which means that it can be used multiple times in a round. This is based on the move where riftstalker will dive in and out of portals while chasing a target. Additionally, this ability is one of the ways that the riftstalker can inflict the 'corrupted status' from Dauntless, represented by persistent negative for the health drain and the fatigued condition for the stamina drain. Momentum Leap is probably my favorite ability in the riftstalker's arsenal, where it sends itself though a pair of portals to pick up speed before launching itself in a line. I debated on the design for this ability for a while before deciding to have it function akin to Trample. However, with the limited range and direction of this ability, this is only a two action ability and can also inflict corrupted.
Finally, the riftstalker has an ability to draw foes into the Umbral Void in realms known as 'murder palaces.' Representing this is Drag Into Darkness, which is the main reason this creature needed two tests. My initial attempt at it was in hopes of simplifying it but ended up making it too difficult to escape. The save to avoid being dragged into it and escape it is moderate, given how much it disadvantages players, whereas its damaging effect uses a high DC. Additionally, the damage portion of the ability is based off of feral shades, particularly with the persistent damage inflicting a penalty on the save. This damage at the end is intended to represent the orbs or riftstalker fascimiles launched from the portals. However, this design misses out on a final ability of the riftstalker - where it opens portals in the real world that periodically launch shadow orbs. It was difficult to make this ability work with the design I had in place for the riftstalker, and I ultimately left it at the wayside.
I also designed a weapon for the 2e riftstalker, but didn't like the abilities of the riftstalker weapons in Dauntless. I left that concept behind for something more original, creating eyecutter to steal the sight of others, much like how the riftstalker can douse the environment in darkness. I also had to represent some manner of teleportation in this ability given its relation to the riftstalker, and I settled for something a little more utility based with its effect.
Pathfinder 2e:
It's always easier to write-up the second portion of these discussions because they follow the same concept, they just have a different way of going about it. For the riftstalker's teleportation abilities, it uses a the Dimensional Agility feat line, building into Dimensional Dervish but then one I haven't noticed before - dimensional savant. This allows the riftstalker to flank with itself. I included Umbral Corruption instead of a sneak attack effect to represent the corrupted status from Dauntless. I couldn't quite capture the same weaknesses from Pathfinder 2e, so I simply used the light aversion of the nightshades, though I refrained from using its total effect since riftstalkers aren't completely made of darkness, like nightshades. Though it does have shadow blend, based on the shadow hound.
Pathfinder 1e:
Blue's D&D 5e:
ENCOUNTER HOOKS
Attack in Black: The heroes have recently traveled to the Shadow Plane or traveled using shadow walk, where a riftstalker picked up their scent. It has started hunting the party, waiting for an opportune moment to strike. At the very least, it waits for them to be steeped in darkness, such as at night, when they are within a lightless domain, or when they're back on Shadow Plane.
If you're interested in joining the discussion on what creatures I'm working on or just discussing your own homebrew works, check out our Discord! If you want to get some teasers or help us get to our yet unlisted milestones for extra content, check out the Twitter.
I've been keeping at making vids for the Ready to Die YouTube channel. The lunagaron video seemed to go over well, so I hope you guys like the riftstalker video. If you want to see how the test went for it, you can also check out the Monster Mash video for it as well! Feel free to check it out or share it with others, and then let me know what you think. Still learning how to best make these.
Have a monstrous Monday!
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