Waff

A waff is a copy of a living person as that person will look when they die. The shadowy faerie realm spins these illusions out of fey glamour to frighten trespassers, and either the subject or someone who knows them may be the one to see it. The double may match the person exactly or look much older, and glamour can twist even this: a sixty-year-old double of a twenty-year-old friend does not promise forty more years, nor does the image guarantee how death will come, though few who see one believe otherwise.

The manner of death may be plain, a knife between the shoulder blades, a rope around the throat, a gaping hole in the chest, or hinted at only by a look of horror. Either way the sight is upsetting. Waffs look solid but are pure illusion, made of shadow-stuff they melt back into once their work is done, and they cannot be hurt, healed or held. They never speak or respond when addressed, and they know nothing of the future, so they could not warn anyone even if they wished to.

Most encounters are frightening but bloodless, since the double vanishes once seen. Anyone who spots a waff falls into shock on a failed save vs. petrification, and seeing your own double imposes a +3 penalty on the roll. A shocked character cannot act for 1d6 rounds, then spends the rest of the turn muddled, at -2 (or -10%) on all actions and -4 (or -20%) on anything relying on Intelligence or Wisdom. The DM may ease these penalties when the waff copies someone else, and should invent fitting penalties for actions that use no dice.

As soon as someone recognizes who it imitates, the waff fades back into glamour. A blow landed before then passes straight through and seems to be what made it vanish. Waffs cannot shape glamour themselves.

The true horror comes afterward. Folklore holds that seeing your own waff foretells death, and the DM decides whether that is so, but even if the doom never arrives, the sighting should breed dread and paranoia in characters and players alike. Lingering penalties tied to the vision are fair game, such as -3 against axe-wielders for someone who saw their double with an axe wound, as are nightmares and obsession. A waff can launch an adventure or simply leave a party glancing over its shoulder for the rest of the campaign.

Waffs appear almost only in the shadowy faerie realm. One seen on the waking continent would foretell more than a single death: it would mean shadow-stuff spilling over into the mortal world. Because they ignore anyone who speaks to them, they seem cold and aloof, and a traveler who greets what looks like an old comrade may walk away believing the friend snubbed her.

Waffs form out of glamour, last just long enough to horrify someone, then fade, sometimes before a witness's eyes and sometimes during a moment's glance away. Most arise on their own, though a native of the faerie realm with a high enough glamour score can shape one deliberately, perhaps as a distraction. Now and then a waff shows a perfectly healthy person going about ordinary business. These exist to sow confusion, as when a rescue party finds six identical copies of the friend it came to save.