Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Khatoblepas 05-16-07, 05:10 PM	Note: This race is for a WIP homebrew campaign setting. I will explain the following changes from the norm now, so that it isn't so confusing: The magic system (astral points) now resembles the psionics system mechancially. Any references to astral points or spells, substitute power points and powers. 'Azcatian' is a subtype used in a few class abilities, spells, and feats - it's a racial subtype like orc or elf, but only for creatures specifically engineered by Azcatia. Since WoTC doesn't seem to adhere to it, I won't either. Mental bonuses seem to be okay for LA+0s. =) "Dead Magic" is any area of antimagic, common in this campaign setting, sometimes being fifteen or so miles in diameter. This was because of the Mage War, which torn asunder the fabric of magic. I wanted another mechanic for more-powerful-than usual races. So, why not give them a watered down taster of abilities, and give them their abilities through a special prestige class? Azcatian Gnoll http://khato.fatfurs.co.uk/art/azcatiangnoll.png Azcatian Gnolls are the vestigial remains of a once great empire. Created by the cruel warmongers of Azcatia for the sole purpose of filling the ranks with able, magic using soldiers, these creatures have a natural talent for the arcane arts. However, since the fall of Azcatia, the remaining units have formed small communities of their own. Personality: Covetous and possessive of what magical artefacts remain in their lands, Azcatian Gnolls often will wear and carry an excessive amount of useless or burnt out magical items just as a status symbol. Azcatian gnolls generally have a busy, unfocused outlook, along with a relatively simple mind makes any kind of activity with an obvious stimulus attractive to the gnoll. They particularly value mythril for it's beauty and ease of handling (indeed, they were bred to be experts with these weapons). Even a gnoll not proficient in a certain mythril weapon is willing to carry it on their person, just for the prestige. Physical Description: Azcatian Gnolls stand from 5'11 to 6'7 feet tall, and weigh around 160lbs. They have a slight stature, and often they can look emaciated. Their fur (which covers almost all of them), ranges from a deep brown to a faded crimson. Regardless of this, they are always patterned with eldritch runes, in a deep scarlet colour. These sometimes glow a soft red light when they are storing a spell, fainter than a candle. Young gnolls lack these prominent markings, though they can sometimes be spotted as darker or lighter outlines on the fur of the shoulders and chest. Azcatian Gnolls reach adulthood at 10, and live 70 to a hundred years. Their intensive breeding led to a long, unhindered adult life, with their decent into old age being quick and relatively late on in their life.Relations: Azcatian Gnolls are almost reclusive in their societies, not having seen many other races outside of battle. They are universally hated by the races who live in the surrounding areas of Azcatia, due to the frequency that the Azcatian empire invaded their neighbours. So while these gnolls have no particular hatred or affinity towards any race, their reception with other races will always be one of discomfort. To each other, gnolls will show a strong sense of camaraderie, and often set up villages close to each other so that they can remain in close contact. The reason for this is simple – their trade of magical items. Azcatian Gnolls were bred in a highly magical environment, and the lack of magic of the new world makes them extremely uncomfortable. Having a close contact with others of their kind ensures that even if one village gets attacked and looted, they can borrow magic from the other village until they gain more of their own artefacts. Alignment: Due to their breeding, Azcatian gnolls tend towards Lawful Neutral. Even when they aren't these alignments, gnolls generally adhere to a set of rules to make themselves feel more comfortable. Chaos is abhorrent and frightening to them. Some gnolls can become good or evil, though truly good gnolls are more difficult to come by. Gnoll Lands: Though they have no lands of their own, Azcatian gnolls prefer to make their settlements in areas of high magic. They rarely venture out of these places. Gnolls often make their lands where there was once an extremely high level of magic, for instance the ruins of a metropolis, as the chances for magical artefacts is likely to be higher. Religion: The Azcatian empire was largely atheist, and so are it's creations. Gnolls have learnt to survive without divine aid, though some may make small sacrifices to abstract concepts, such as the seasons or the weather. Festivals for gnolls tend to revolve around the worship of magic, and the celebration thereof. Language: Azcatian Gnolls speak a bastardisation of ancient Azcat, which consists of it's own, simplified alphabet and easy to pronounce syllables. Gnolls have slightly underdeveloped vocal muscles compared to humans, and find it difficult to pronounce certain words, especially those with harsh “th” and “ch” sounds. Their words are often quite slurred together, though this doesn't interfere with understanding their speech. Some enterprising Gnolls learn Common in order to communicate with other races, and when they do, they can usually mask their slurring to a reasonable extent. Gnoll Names: Having been bred, raised and their society developed around magic, most of the words in their speech reference the spells their masters had them cast on a regular basis. Thus, most of the names they give their children are usually shortened or obfuscated spell names, such as: Fiirbal, Mizzel, H'el, or Strise. (Fireball, Magic Missile, Heal, and True Strike). Family names will often be based on the battalions that they once fought in years ago. Though the new generations do not know the significance of these names, they marked which area of Azcatia they attacked from. Often these were just nonsense words made up specifically for the use of making it harder for the enemy to detect movements with divination spells. Sample family names include: Maccinatan, Serraboa, Lilolato. Adventurers: Azcatian Gnolls rarely adventure if they can help it. The dangers of running into a dead magic area are too great for most to consider going without a real reason. If a village is looted, or a magic item has been found somewhere remote, then Azcatian Gnolls will let themselves go on whatever grand adventure needs be. Some gnolls strike out in order to find another empire like Azcatia used to be.. a land of high atmospheric background magic and a wealth of magical items. When a gnoll sets out on these quests, they will do anything to find it, fruitless as it may be. GNOLL RACIAL TRAITS Humanoid (Gnoll, Azcatian) +2 Constitution, -2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, +2 Charisma: Azcatian gnolls are hardy and striking, though lacking in wit and foresight. Medium: As Medium creatures, gnolls have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size. Darkvision out to 60ft Proficient with all simple weapons: Gnolls have a natural talent for weaponry. Runestoring: An Azcatian gnoll can hold the charge of a single touch spell inside one of the many runic markings on their fur. Once the spell is cast, they can choose to use a move action to store it inside a rune on their body. It remains there indefinitely, or until the gnoll retrieves it back into their hand, which requires another move action. In an area of dead magic, the charge persists for one hour, then fades away. Magic Dependency: An Azcatian gnoll is heavily dependant on magical auras for their wellbeing. In an area of dead magic, they become skittish and paranoid, often showing signs of depression. In areas of dead magic, gnolls take a -1 penalty on all attacks, save and skill check rolls. Gnolls have a +1 racial bonus on attack rolls with mythril weapons. Their racial training by the Azcatians used mythril almost exclusively. +2 racial bonus on Appraise to identify the value of and Use Magic Device checks to activate magical items. Their heritage has always been to be finely attuned to magical items. Naturally Attuned: An Azcatian Gnoll gains 2 bonus astral points. Spell like abilities: 3/day – detect magic, 1/day – read magic. +1 racial bonus on Fortitude saves against spells. Azcatian Gnolls were bred to be tough against magic that attacked the body. Automatic Languages: Azcat. Bonus Languages: Common, Elven, Orc, Dwarven, Gnoll Favoured Class: Astral Warrior (Psychic Warrior) or Duskblade (Pre-war) Azcatian Paragon The empire of Azcatia had a harsh, and often brutal training regime for their soldiers. Not only were they bred to be supreme warriors, they were given special training almost from birth. This, combined with a strong racial memory, has kept the idea of Azcatian Paragons alive in the gnoll race. Though time and lack of discipline has degraded the quality of the training, it remains a popular choice for the remaining Azcatian gnoll warriors. Most high-ranking gnolls have at least one level in this class. BECOMING AN AZCATIAN PARAGON To become an Azcatian Paragon, you must meet the following prerequisites: Base Attack Bonus: +3 Type: Azcatian Subtype Special: Runestoring ability The Azcatian Paragon Hit Die: d8 Level BAB Fort Ref Will Special 1 +1 +2 +2 +0 Improved Runestoring, Bonus AP 2 +2 +3 +2 +0 Spell Knowledge, Runescar 3 +3 +3 +2 +1 Spell Resistance, Personal Rune Skill Points: 4+Int Modifier Class Skills: Balance (Dex), Concentration (Con) Craft (Int) Jump (Str), Spellcraft (Int), Swim (Str), Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha) Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: Azcatian Paragons gain no additional profiency with any weapons or armor. Class Features Spells: At 2nd level, Azcatian Paragons gain extra astral points and spells known as if they went up a level in the respective class. They do not gain any other class feature granted, such as bonus feats. Improved Runestoring: At 1st level, Azcatian Paragons can store more touch spells in their runic markings. They can now store spells equal to their class level + their Consitution modifier. Bonus AP: Azcatian Paragons gain bonus astral points equal to twice their class level. Spell Knowledge: At 2nd level, Azcatian Paragons gain a bonus spell of the highest level they can cast, chosen from their own spell list. Runescar (Su): Once per encounter, an Azcatian Paragon can sacrifice spell energy invested in one of his runic markings to recover from fierce blows. As an immediate action, he may release the energy of one spell stored with his Runestoring ability to give himself damage reduction 2/silver for each spell level he sacrifices for a single round. The spell sacrificed is then lost, and can no longer be retrieved, though the slot it filled can be replenished with another spell. Personal Rune: At 3rd level, an Azcatian Paragon can store Personal range spells in their runic markings, and cast them with a move action. A personal spell costs two slots, rather than one. Spell Resistance (Ex): At 3rd level, an Azcatian Paragon gains spell resistance equal to 8+Cha mod+class levels. They can lower or raise this spell resistance as a free action, and any spellcaster with the Azcatian subtype gets a +5 bonus to overcome it. An Azcatian Paragon can always choose to lower their spell resistance in order to be afflicted by spells.
GreatOne 05-16-07, 06:08 PM	Looks good to me. I may use the whole concept of Dead Magic in my game if you dont mind. I would like to see some more races and would like to see a race that thrives in the areas of dead magic similar to the ratling that live in the shadowlands without aquiring taint. Nice work. You may need to reword the abilities alittle
Neutronium_Dragon 05-16-07, 06:24 PM	I see a disconnect here. They're nonreligious magic-wielders, yet they've got a +2 to Wisdom (the religious casting stat) and -2 to Intelligence and Charisma (the arcane casting stats). That's a complete mismatch. Their spell-storing is now dependent on a class that they're either awful at or thematically shouldn't be taking. As for type... Humanoid (Gnoll, Azcatian) and they gain Darkvision (and if you want it, Simple Weapon Proficiency). There are several reasons for this: One, Monstrous Humanoid doesn't generally deal in subtypes. That's something which is pretty much limited to Humanoid and Outsider. Two, it's weird to label them as one type and then count them as another type for effects which are type-dependent. The cases where you see "treat them as..." are for humanoid subtypes being treated as another subtype rather than for full types being treated as something else. Three, gnolls are humanoid. This does seem to defy the type definitions (as do lizardfolk and others), but if gnolls are humanoid then variations on them should be too unless they cross into a completely different type of creature. The Magic Dependency thing is far too crippling if it's allowed to progress, and in general it's a bad idea to include blatant "Achilles' Heel" traits like this. A simple "-1 to attacks, saves, and checks when in a dead magic area" is far, far simpler and doesn't create the arbitrary "you lose" scenarios. Likewise, the saving throw penalty creates the same problem. It's probably better to express it as a bonus instead. If they're supposed to be tough, then (in combination with their Con bonus) +1 to Fortitude saves is better than what amounts to -2 to Will saves. I don't like the backfire effect on their Runestoring ability for the same reason. Why not just allow it to be released normally while in a grapple? It's simpler and doesn't create the "dogpile the gnoll" silliness which the current one will.
Khatoblepas 05-16-07, 06:51 PM	Ah-hah! Some awesome critique, there. Looking at it now, it seems that Charisma would be a better option than wisdom. I also fixed up the mechanics so that they were a little less clunky. : )
Neutronium_Dragon 05-16-07, 07:13 PM	That looks much better, and certainly a lot easier to manage.