Pale Mantis Assassin (Apath)

Unofficial rules compendium

Pale mantis assassins are a dread cult of bone-cold murderer.

Background

Pale mantis assassins are a sect dedicated to murder. In their philosophy, death is a cosmic force and the continued order of the universe requires that some creatures die so that others might live.

Dressed in bone and bone-colored clothes and often painting their skin bone white, Their weapons and methods of killing emulate those of the mantis, wielding dual saw-toothed sabres in a slowly swaying stance and making lighting-quick dual strikes. Pale mantis assassins strike mercilessly to eliminate their targets—and preferably only their targets. They strive to avoid general mayhem and look down on missions of larceny, but have been known to perform murder for pay or to open up a position for an ally to inherit. But these murders are not the holiest deaths. The pale mantis claims to have a certain quota of death to fill in order to support the universal order, assassinations that follow a strict divine mandate. The reason for these holiest of deaths follow a strict divine order, which is beyond mortal comprehension and can appear random to outsiders.

While not on sacred missions, pale mantis often live in seclusion, or masquerade as some other profession. Others live as recluses in the wilderness. The pale assassins seek to make themselves perfect agents of death, emulating their namesake the pale mantis. The mantis strikes all kinds of prey without discrimination, being universal killers. The mantis bringing order to chaos by perfecting their killing.

Laws of Death

The pale mantis assassins have certain rules they adhere to, upholding the laws of death. They will never knowingly accept a contract involving any of the following, and may turn on a client that tricked them into doing so. These laws apply to marks, but less so to general combat; not even the pale assassins bother to learn the pedigree of every guard they kill.

• Always strike precisely and surgically, needless slaughter breeds chaos.
• Never strike the captain of a ship, the ruler of a country, or the pathfinder of a caravan. People left leaderless are an invitation to chaos.
• Do not kill children or obliterate a family. A gardener prunes, to destroy is to leave room for chaos to grow.

Pale Mantis Assassins on Porphyra

The god Shankhil is venerated across Porphyra as the god of gates and passage. As the master of the porphyry passages that is the final hedge between elemental savagery and deist perfection he is responsible for the continuation of history on Porphyra, a god of discreet but strict law. He is also the main psychopomp diety, and has an uniquely neutral position; everybody and everything dies in time. Deist or elementalist, living or undead, intelligent, animal or mindless matters not. Death is absolute and claims all equally.

One sect of the church that is unknown even to most of the faith are the pale mantis assassins, who worship Shankhil as the master of deadly necessity. Just as some births are special and contribute to the order of the world, some lives must be ended at specific times for the system of the world to continue smoothly. The task of the pale mantis assassins is to find and execute these key persons while disturbing the world as little as possible.

The master of the pale mantis assassins reside in a bone temple in the city of Da'mulus, in New Watis. From there he sends his agents all over the world according to a pattern Shankhil alone knows. Shankhil is a mysterious god, and never gives clear signs to her worshippers, including the pale assassins, who are supposed to find the ones they are to slay through subtle clues. Over times, the sect has come to rely on one of Shankhil's symbols, the coin, to find their victims; provide the assassins with enough coin, and they might take it as a divine sign.

Class Information

This is a prestige archetype built on the red mantis assassin prestige class from Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Adventurer’s Guide with elements of the alchemist, mesmerist, and rogue.

Alignment: A pale mantis assassin’s alignment must be within one step of her deity’s, along either the law/chaos axis or the good/evil axis. Deaths slayers generally serve a lawful neutral or lawful evil god of necessity and death. Pale mantis assassins are of good alignment are possible, but extremely rare as murder for pay is an inherently evil act.

Hit Die: d8.

Starting Wealth: 4d6 × 10 gp (average 140 gp.) In addition, each character begins play with an outfit worth 10 gp or less.

Class Skills

The pale mantis assassin's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Acrobatics (Dex), Appraise (Int), Bluff (Cha), Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Disable Device (Dex), Disguise (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Heal (Wis), Intimidate (Cha), Knowledge (Local) (Int), Knowledge (Nobility) (Int), Knowledge (Religion) (Int), Linguistics (Int), Perception (Wis), Profession (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), Sleight of Hand (Dex), Stealth (Dex), Swim (Str), and Use Magic Device (Cha).

Skill Ranks at Each Level: 6 + Int modifier.

Class Features

The pale mantis assassin has the class features of the rogue, except as follows.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency

Pale mantis assassins are proficient with all simple weapons, plus the hand crossbow, rapier, sap, sawtooth sabre, shortbow, and short sword. They are proficient with light armor but not with any shields.

A Pale mantis assassin can cast spells while wearing light armor without incurring the normal arcane spell failure chance. Like any other arcane spellcaster, a Pale mantis assassin wearing medium or heavy armor incurs a chance of arcane spell failure if the spell in question has a somatic component. A multiclass Pale mantis assassin still incurs the normal arcane spell failure chance for arcane spells received from other classes.

Sabre Finesse (Ex)

The pale mantis assassin can use the sawtooth sabre with Weapon Finesse.

The pale mantis assassin becomes an expert with the order's signature sawtooth sabre, gaining bonus feats at 2nd, 6th, 10th, 14th, and 18th level. She can choose feats from this list even if she does not have the normal prerequisites.

The benefits of the pale mantis assassin’s sabre finesse feats apply only to sawtooth sabres and only when she wears light, medium, or no armor. She loses all benefits of these bonus feats when wearing heavy armor.

The character can choose from the following list whenever he gains a combat style feat: Double Slice, Improved Shield Bash, Quick Draw, Two-Weapon Fighting, Weapon Focus (sawtooth sabre), Weapon Specialization (sawtooth sabre).

At 6th level, he adds these feats to the list. Greater Weapon Focus (sawtooth sabre), Greater Weapon Specialization (sawtooth sabre), Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, Two-Weapon Defense.

At 10th level, he adds these additional feats to the list. Bleeding Critical, Blinding Critcal, Greater Two-Weapon Fighting, Two-Weapon Rend.

Spells

Table: Pale mantis Assassin Spells Known

Level	Spells Known
	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
1st	—	—	—	—
2nd	—	—	—	—
3rd	—	—	—	—
4th	2	—	—	—
5th	3	—	—	—
6th	4	—	—	—
7th	4	2	—	—
8th	4	3	—	—
9th	5	4	—	—
10th	5	4	2	—
11th	5	4	3	—
12th	6	5	4	—
13th	6	5	4	2
14th	6	5	4	3
15th	6	6	5	4
16th	6	6	5	4
17th	6	6	5	4
18th	6	6	6	5
19th	6	6	6	5
20th	6	6	6	5

A Pale mantis assassin casts arcane spells drawn from the sorcerer/wizard spell list, but is limited to illusion and transmutation spells. She can cast any spell she knows without preparing it ahead of time. To cast a spell, a Pale mantis assassin must have a Charisma score of at least 10 + the spell’s level. Her bonus spells are based on Charisma, and saving throws against these spells have a DC of 10 + the spell level + the caster’s Charisma modifier (if any).

In addition to sorcerer/wizard spells from the schools of illusion and transmutation, the pale mantis assassin adds the following spells to her spell list at the indicated spell levels.

1. obscuring mist, true strike.
2. darkness, fog cloud, see invisibility, summon swarm.
3. clairaudience/clairvoyance, hold person.
4. dimension door, modify memory.

Her selection of spells is extremely limited—at each Pale mantis level, she gains one or more new spells, as indicated on Table: Pale mantis Assassin Spells Known. At 7th, 13th, 16th, and 19th level, she can choose to learn a new spell in place of one she already knows, provided the new spell is of the same level as the one she is replacing.

A pale mantis claw only ever learns spells up to level 4, and cannot learn cantrips (level zero spells). Sorcerer/wizard illusion and transmutation spells of level zero or of level 5 or higher are not on the pale mantis claw's spell list.

This replaces two skill points per level.

Prayer Attack (Su)

At 4th level, a Pale mantis assassin learns her signature assassination style. To initiate a prayer attack, she holds her sawtooth sabre (or sabres) out, point down, and weaves the blade in the air. She must be within 30 feet of and visible to her victim. Beginning a prayer attack is a standard action, and causes her victim to be fascinated by her unless he makes a Will save (DC 10 + ½ the Pale mantis assassin’s class level + her Charisma modifier—if she’s wielding two sawtooth sabres, this DC gains a +2 bonus). She can maintain the fascination effect by concentrating. The victim may attempt a new save to escape fascination each time a threat (other than the fascinating assassin) appears. At any point after 3 rounds, she may make a coup de grace attack against the target, provided the target is still fascinated. Activating or concentrating on maintaining a prayer attack does not provoke an attack of opportunity.

Pale Shroud (Su)

At 6th level, a Pale mantis assassin gains the ability to create a veil of pale mist a number of times per day equal to her Constitution bonus (minimum once per day) as a move-equivalent action. The pale shroud persists for 1 round per class level. It grants a +1 dodge bonus to AC and fast healing equal to her Constitution bonus (minimum of fast healing 1). This mist cannot be dissipated by wind. If she is slain while this ability is active, she can choose whether to remain corporeal or to disintegrate into a cloud of pale mist that leaves behind only her gear in order to deprive her enemies of access to her remains. This replaces the level 6 rogue talent.

Mantis Form (Su)

At 8th level, a Pale mantis assassin may transform into a pale giant praying mantis once per day as a standard action, as if using vermin shape II (caster level equals her class level). In addition to the normal adjustments to Strength, Dexterity, and natural armor provided by this spell effect, she gains the giant mantis’s darkvision 60 feet, grab, lunge, mandibles, and sudden strike extraordinary abilities, but not its immunity to mind-affecting effects or its racial modifiers to Perception or Stealth. If she wields a magical sawtooth sabre in her hand when she transforms, the magical enhancements for that weapon apply to her corresponding claw attack—if she wields two of them, then the weapons each apply to a different claw attack.

At 14thlevel, her claw attacks inflict 1d6 bleed on a hit. She also gains damage reduction 5/good while in this form.

At 20th level, whenever she uses her mandibles to attack, she inflicts 1 negative level. Each negative level inflicted in this manner grants the Pale mantis assassin 5 temporary hit points that last for 1 hour. The save DC to remove these negative levels is equal to 20 + the Pale mantis assassin’s Constitution modifier. In addition, her damage reduction increases to 10/good while in this form.

Summon Mantis (Sp)

At 10th level, as a standard action, a Pale mantis assassin may summon an advanced fiendish giant mantis, 1d3 fiendish giant mantises, or 1d4+1 giant mantises, as if using summon monster V. She can mentally direct the actions of these summoned vermin as a free action. All mantises summoned by this spell-like ability are pale as bone.

At level 14, using this ability becomes a swift action. At level 16, it becomes a free action. This ability can be used once per day at level 10 and the pale mantis assassin gains another use at level 12 and every two levels thereafter.

Fading (Su)

At 12th level, the Pale mantis assassin can become ethereal for an instant as she is attacked by a weapon or is forced to make a Reflex saving throw. This is a free action and can be used a number of times each day equal to her Constitution modifier (minimum 1/day). She must choose to activate this ability before the weapon’s attack roll or the spell’s effects are adjudicated. This grants the Pale mantis assassin a 50% chance to avoid taking damage from the attack or effect. Force effects and effects that affect ethereal creatures ignore this defense.

Resurrection Sense (Su)

At 16th level, a Pale mantis assassin senses if a creature she has slain within the last year has been restored to life, as long as they are both on the same plane.

Mantis Doom (Sp)

At 18th level, a Pale mantis assassin may use creeping doom as a spell-like ability three times per day. This version of the spell summons swarms of venomous praying mantises, but the effects are otherwise the same as the spell.

Table: Pale Mantis Assassin

Class Level	Base Attack Bonus	Fort Save	Ref Save	Will Save	Special	Spells per Day
						1	2	3	4
1st	+0	+0	+2	+0	Finesse training, sneak attack +1d6, trapfinding	—	—	—	—
2nd	+1	+0	+3	+0	Evasion, sabre finesse	—	—	—	—
3rd	+2	+1	+3	+1	Finesse training, sneak attack +2d6, Weapon Focus	—	—	—	—
4th	+3	+1	+4	+1	Debilitating injury, prayer attack, uncanny dodge	0	—	—	—
5th	+3	+1	+4	+1	Rogue's edge, sneak attack +3d6	1	—	—	—
6th	+4	+2	+5	+2	Red shroud, Weapon Specialization	1	—	—	—
7th	+5	+2	+5	+2	Sneak attack +4d6	1	0	—	—
8th	+6/+1	+2	+6	+2	Improved uncanny dodge, mantis form	1	1	—	—
9th	+6/+1	+3	+6	+3	Sneak attack +5d6, Greater Weapon Focus	2	1	—	—
10th	+7/+2	+3	+7	+3	Advanced talents, rogue's edge, summon mantis	2	1	0	—
11th	+8/+3	+3	+7	+3	Finesse training, sneak attack +6d6	2	1	1	—
12th	+9/+4	+4	+8	+4	Fading, Greater Weapon Specialization	2	2	1	—
13th	+9/+4	+4	+8	+4	Sneak attack +7d6	3	2	1	0
14th	+10/+5	+4	+9	+4	Mantis form (bleed)	3	2	1	1
15th	+11/+6/+1	+5	+9	+5	Rogue's edge, sneak attack +8d6, Bleeding Critical	3	2	2	1
16th	+12/+7/+2	+5	+10	+5	Resurection sense	3	3	2	1
17th	+12/+7/+2	+5	+10	+5	Sneak attack +9d6	4	3	2	1
18th	+13/+8/+3	+6	+11	+6	Blinding Critcal, mantis doom	4	3	2	2
19th	+14/+9/+4	+6	+11	+6	Finesse training, sneak attack +10d6	4	3	3	2
20th	+15/+10/+5	+6	+12	+6	Master strike, mantis form (drain), rogue's edge	4	4	3	3

Summary of Changed Class Abilities

These abilities of the rogue are lost or modified in this archetype:

• Rogue Talents (all)
• Trap Sense
• Improved Uncanny Dodge
• Advanced Rogue Talent

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