This is part of a series! Go here to see the other entries.

Like beholders and mind flayers, Displacer Beasts are one of those monsters who are so uniquely D&D that they’ve been excluded from the SRD. They look like big black panthers with two squid-like tentacles protruding from their shoulder blades. The trait that gives them their name, however, is the ability to look like they’re about two meters to the left of their real location. They appear both on the Monster Manual and on the Monster Vault.

The Lore

The Monster Manual contains only the usual couple of paragraphs for its entries, but the MV piles on the lore.

Displacer beasts are native to the Feywild, but can also be found in the world. They’re cunning carnivores who make extensive use of their illusory powers both to hunt and to escape from danger. Their preferred habitats are dense forests with plenty of foliage and caves to use as hiding spots. When hunting, they stalk their prey and attack from ambush at the most opportune time.

These creatures have gained such fame for their strength and cunning that they often feature in heraldic devices for noble houses and organizations that want to be known for possessing these qualities.

As magical beasts they’re smarter than most animals, but still have a bestial disposition. They have no language or civilization, but they are quite able to set up really clever ambushes, track prey by following clues in addition to using their scent, remember good hunting spots like, say, a seasonal trade route. They’re also smart enough to retreat if outmatched, and prefer attacking animals to humanoids.

Though displacer beasts rarely gather in groups larger than a mated pair, particularly large and intelligent specimens have been known to form and lead packs composed mostly of other, lesser predators. Some humanoids can also befriend them and employ them for hunting, war, or guarding territory.

The Numbers

The standard Displacer Beast has MM and MV versions. In both, it’s a Large Fey Magical Beast, and a Level 9 Skirmisher with 97 HP. Its Speed is 12, it’s trained in Perception and has low-light vision.

The displacer beast has two passive traits: Threatening Reach and the expected Displacement. The first makes it able to perform opportunity attacks against targets anywhere within the reach of its attacks, and applies mainly to the tentacles. The displacement power has significantly different wording between versions.

The Monster Manual says all melee and ranged attacks have a 50% chance to miss the beast. The effect ends when the beast is hit by an attack but it resumes when it moves 2+ squares on its turn.

The Monster Vault clarifies the miss chance: any melee or ranged attack that would hit the beast actually misses if the attack roll was odd. You can see how 13th Age evolved from D&D 4 here! The effect still stops when the beast does get hit, but it resumes automatically at the start of its next turn.

Its basic attack is a Reach 2 tentacle, which in the MM suffers from the damage bug. It also has a slightly stronger Reach 1 bite. The MM version has a Beast’s Fury standard-action ability that allows it to make two tentacle attacks and a bite against a single target it has combat advantage against. The MV trades that for Cunning Blitz, which allows it to shift half its speed (6 squares!) and make tentacle attacks against one or two targets.

Both versions can shift 1 square as a reaction when an attack misses them, though the MM version weirdly restricts that to attacks that miss because of the displacement. I prefer the broader MV power here.

The MV-only Savage Displacer Beast is the slower, beefier variant. A Level 11 Brute with 136 HP, it loses the Perception training and runs at “only” Speed 8.

The Displacement and Threatening Reach abilities are the same, but this beast prefers to push others around instead of shifting. Its tentacle and bite attacks do level-appropriate Brute damage, and the tentacle pushes 1 square on a hit. The beast can also push someone who misses it with a melee attack 1 square.

And finally we have the Displacer Beast Pack Lord, present in both books. It’s a Huge Fey Magical Beast and a Level 13 Elite Skirmisher with 258 HP. In both books, the Pack Lord has all the same abilities as the standard beast, plus a few additions.

First, while the other two types of displacer beats have an Int of 4, the Pack Lord has 10! As the name implies, this is the one that can tame other animals and form them into a pack.

In addition to doing more damage with all of its attacks, it has Reach 3 tentacles. The MV version also gains an attack called Clear The Path, which targets Reflex in a Close Burst 3 and slides everyone it hits up to 3 squares. On a miss, it does half damage and still slides the target 1 square. This recharges when the beast is first bloodied.

When someone misses the Pack Lord with an attack, both versions can make a tentacle attack against the attacker in addition to shifting 1 square. It also ignores all difficult terrain and penalties for squeezing, an ability which surely makes it a joy to fight in a thicket tangled with undergrowth.

The sample encounter is level 13: a pack lord, two regular displacer beasts, and a briar witch dryad. This is likely to be an equal partnership between the pack lord and the dryad.

Final Impressions

I definitely prefer the MV writeup on this one. It’s a little more powerful and sounds a little more fun. I also like that the displacer beast is explicitly not an “attacks on sight and fights to the death” monster, and someone who can talk to animals can even make an ally of it. Even the regular variant: it has the brainpower of your average ogre and a much better disposition (they’re Unaligned).