MIMICS

I run a bi-monthly feature on the Vaarn Patreon called Monster Monday, where patrons get the chance to vote on spark words, which I then use as inspiration for new Vaarn monsters. A recent vote resulted in a tie between the spark words ‘echopraxia’ and ‘pareidolia’. These mean ‘an involuntary imitation or repetition of someone else’s actions’ and ‘the tendency to perceive a specific, often meaningful image in a random or ambiguous visual pattern.’ For reasons I trust are obvious, these prompts got me thinking about mimics, creatures that copy something or someone else. What follows is part of the post I created for Patreon, a variety of riffs on the idea of a mimic. 

---

Black Window Spider

Hypergeometric / Outsider
Level 4, Armour 14, Morale 4, Encountered d3
Attacks: Fangs (d6, hypergeometric) 

An extra-dimensional arachnid. The spider’s ‘web’ resembles a circular doorway or porthole made from dark glass, which appears to open into a large outdoor space. The nature of the vista afforded by the spider’s dim window varies, but often it is said to resemble a night sky, with the suggestion of mountains and trees. The view is, of course, entirely illusory: all that is behind the black window is the spider’s lair. When the monster detects movement near a window it strikes, pulling the target through the glass and into its hypergeometric larder. The interior of the spider’s den is described in The Daring Testaments of Salia Hevenfell as ‘akin to a bathysphere cast from ink-hued glass … beyond the recurved walls of my prison moved distant phantasms that I took to be the shapes of my comrades, who yet searched for me’. The creature is likewise black and glassy in appearance, studded with many eyes.

Larger, more established nests may boast as many as a dozen windows, although they all lead to the same larder room and cannot be placed too far apart. The spider can relocate the glassy apertures in the real world through an unknown process, and vault-raiders should be wary of any windows that appear in previously explored rooms.

The network of glass portals will survive the death of their architect, although the windows are no longer mobile and the entire pocket-dimension becomes increasingly unstable. There are tales of outlaws using such a window network in their smuggling operation, until one day the portals ‘melted like ice’ and the men within were lost to the formless froth that eddies between worlds.

---

Exemplar

Synthetic
Level 20, Armour 20, Morale Retreats at the Right Time, Encountered Unique
Attacks: Perfect Strike (d20, always hits)

The Exemplar are the impeccable children of the Titans, synthetic simulacra of living creatures constructed with such faultless panache that they outshine the originals. The presence of a Feline Exemplar makes all true cats appear to be shoddy, hurried copies; those unfortunates who have looked upon an Olive Tree Exemplar feel that the nostalgia-gilded olive groves they recall running through as a child were ugly shrubs, the cherished memory growing hollow and ashen by comparison. Human Exemplar are fearsome eidolons who appear to have been wrest fully-formed from the divine Empyrean realm, that kingdom of fuelless flame. To witness an Exemplar is to look upon aesthetic and moral perfection, and find oneself lacking.

For this reason the Exemplar are hated and reviled everywhere they are found, destroyed ruthlessly by all cultures across Vaarn. Those that remain dwell in abandoned places, shunned by living things. Most surviving Exemplar now take pains to veil or otherwise conceal their bodies. Beauty is terror and true perfection a curse.

Nonviolent: Exemplars will only strike in self-defence, after repeated attempts to negotiate.

Beauty is Terror: all PCs lose 1 point of EGO for each combat round spent in an unveiled Exemplar’s presence. This loss is doubled if the Exemplar is modelled after their own species.

---

Face Dancer

Biological
Level 5, Armour 13, Morale 4, Encountered d3
Attacks: Poison Spur (d8 TOX) + Silenced Pistol (d6)

The Face Dancers once served the Autarch as spies. They are cacogenic abhumans, notable for the extreme plasticity of their skeletal systems and their conscious control over skin tone and hair colour. In the space of hours they can completely alter their facial features, height, and gait. Coupled with an aptitude for vocal mimicry and prosaic theatrical tricks, the Face Dancers are known to be able to imitate any human being that they have observed for long enough. Genepeekers will reveal the truth, as will a sight of the toxic spurs that grow inside the Dancers’ wrists.

Although their clade was hunted nearly to extinction in the purges of the Late Autarchy, the Face Dancers have survived in fortified monasteries high in the Lazul mountains. They work as freelance spies for extortionate fees. If encountered in Vaarn’s deserts, they are either serving out a contract or returning from one. In either case, the Dancers will not reveal their true nature. They often travel disguised as circus performers or mendicant preachers.

Disguise: Face Dancers can replicate the face and body of any adult true-kin within hours of studying them. Cacogen and newbeasts are more challenging, although a passable mimicry can be achieved using prosthetics.

Malleable: the Dancer’s skeleton is highly flexible. They take half damage from bludgeoning attacks, and can fit through any gap wider than their skull.

---

Fool’s Pool

Biological
Level d6* Armour 10, Morale 10, Encountered 1
Attacks: Engulf (d8 ongoing, STR Save to break free, targets = Pool’s Level)

A huge amoeba, which resembles a pool of fresh water when in its camouflaged resting state. The creature remains motionless until an incautious animal approaches to drink. Beware of shallow ponds that do not ripple in the wind.

Gelationous: the Fool’s Pool takes minimum damage from kinetic attacks. Thrown salt deals 2d8 damage per round.

---

Furnishment Mimic

Synthetic
Level 2, Armour 12, Morale Always Flees, Encountered d6
Attacks: 2 x Pseudopod Grab (d6, adhesive)

A predatory nanomachine colony, capable of rearranging itself at a molecular level to resemble almost any conceivable structure or material. Furnishment Mimics, sometimes called ‘vulgar mimics’, ‘domestic mimics’, or ‘sticky-seats’, arrange their formless bodies to imitate domestic furnishings, hoping to ambush and consume unwary people. When their prey touches them, the Mimic springs to life, rapidly morphing into an amorphous silvery sludge.

Different Mimic colonies exhibit varying camouflage behaviours. The most commonly encountered variety prefer to mimic upholstered chairs, but sub-groups of the species have been recorded mimicking chandeliers, Vaarnish rugs, strongboxes, memory crystal lattices, grand pianos, wooden doors, and abandoned boats floating in an oasis. The creatures show no desire to mimic biological creatures, alive or dead.

Their mimicry is highly accomplished, but there are limitations. They are often much lighter than the object they are pretending to be, and emit small amounts of heat that can be detected via thermal imaging. Furnishment Mimics are not intelligent by human standards, and have no concept of where the object they are imitating would ‘normally’ be found. The Mimics also favour paisley patterns, for reasons that are not well understood.

Adhesive: once struck by a pseudopod, the PC is stuck to the Mimic. Neither creature can move out of melee range without passing an opposed DEX save.

---

Scintillating Swarm

Biological
Level d8*, Armour 12, Morale 1, Encountered 1
Attacks: Swarm (d6, auto-hit, targets = Swarm’s Level)

Gold has lost some of its lustre in this last red age of Urth – as the Faa often remark, one cannot drink an Autarch’s crown – but the aureate coinage struck in antiquity still retains its allure. The voracious insectoid lifeforms known as Scintillating Swarmers use mankind’s age-old greed to bait their traps, pretending to be golden coins scattered across the sands. When in motion the creatures reveal their true nature: seven sharp limbs extrude from the rim of the ‘coin’, and the reverse side hosts a ravenous hidden rostrum. The patterns on the creatures’ backs resemble an Autarch’s head in profile.

Ambusher: when motionless, the Scintillating Swarm appears to be a large cache of golden coins, abandoned on the ground. If approached, they attack in an Ambush round.

Swarmers: the Swarm is comprised of innumerable tiny Swarmers, which move and fight as one entity. The Swarm takes half damage from single target attacks, but doubled damage from blasting attacks like grenades.

---

These mimics originally appeared on the Vaarn Patreon, along with another mimic creature called the Hollow Hearth. Consider supporting if you like the setting and want to see more posts like this every month.