Jack Mann
2006-03-14, 06:55 PM
I'm currently running a custom campaign. It involves airships, and I wanted an inventor race. Since gnomes tend more for a gypsy-like feel in my campaign, I decided to make a custom race for the purpose. I ended up with the Drazai, a small reptilian species.
Drazai
Drazai live deep in the mountains of the Aralech's Mountain Range, where they fight for metal ores with the dwarves. They are known far and wide as celebrated magic users, being among the best wizards in Brenak. They are constantly experimenting with new magics.
Personality: Drazai are often cautious, though they are not afraid to take risks once they've identified a potential gain. They constantly experiment and try to learn more about their environments and their comrades. Living in tight warrens as they do, they have little or no sense of privacy. They see nothing wrong with going through a companion's bags, or walking into a privy that's in use.
Physical Description: Drazai are small, lizard-like humanoids. Their colors range from light bronze to nearly black, with colorful strips and crests in blues and greens. The males stand at three-and-a-half feet tall, with the females standing slightly taller and broader. Eye color ranges from yellow, to green, to the occasional brown. Their clothing tends towards thick, leather robes.
Relations: Drazai get along well with humans and gnomes, in whom they see fellow explorers and experimenters. They see elves as being too chaotic to be interesting. Halflings are nice, but don't always make enough effort to find out new things. Half-orcs are useful mercenaries and allies. Dwarves are too obsessed with gold, and waste iron and other valuable ores by turning them into weapons.
Alignment: Drazai are usually lawful, with a tendency towards good. They believe in a strong, unified community, with various members working for the good of the whole. However, they have a strong individualistic streak as a group, making them resist other races who try to impose their ways on them.
Religion: The drazai don't worship the gods. Instead, they engage in a peculiar form of ancestor worship focusing on the mythical hero Trechnar, who wrested the secret of iron from the gods.
Language: Drazai speak Draz, a language that uses the Dwarven alphabet, but has both Terran and Draconic roots.
Adventurers: Drazai feel a strong compulsion to explore and discover new things. A drazai adventurer is either looking for new magic (or other learning) or else is looking for something to strengthen the community. A very few drazai adventurers are outcasts who were unable to fit into the rigid mold of Drazai society. Generally, other drazai look at them with pity, rather than scorn or anger.
Aging: Drazai reach adulthood at twenty, middle age at fifty, old age at sixty-five, and venerable at ninety.
Drazai Racial Traits
Darkvision 60'
Small Size
Base Speed 20 ft.
+2 Int, -2 Str
+2 to craft checks involving metal objects.
+2 to climb checks
+2 racial bonus to saves vs. confusion
Education Feat (Eb. 52)
Favored Class: Artificer
I made 'em a race of unbelievers to help give them some flavor. They know the gods are there, but they don't see any reason to worship them. They see the gods more as obstacles and nuisances than anything else.
That gave me a bit of a problem when a player wanted to play a cleric. I felt the PH solution (just pick two domains and forget about deity) lacked interest. So I decided to work back to the Drazai culture and psychology. They're basically magical scientists. They like to experiment. They believe that everything is understandable. Everything can be measured, figured out. They fully believe that there is nothing in the universe that can't be understood and used as needed.
For them, a cleric isn't the same as a priest. They have priests, but these are basically storytellers and givers of rites. It's just an occupation. Clerics are divine magic users, nothing more. The difference between a wizard and a cleric for them is more a matter of specialization than philosophy.
Now, that magic has to come from somewhere. If it isn't a god, then where?
I decided they built their own source of divine magic. They'd gather magic from various sources and pool it together into a sort of makeshift god. The sources of magic would be from several sources. One, early on in this experiment, would have been holy objects from other religions, mostly from kobolds, orcs and goblins, with any taint of the god itself removed. This would form the basis of a pool of divine magic. Next, they would use certain spells to transform arcane magic into divine, and add that to the pool. They would also pray to their ancestors, who would add their own energy to the pool. They also made deals with certain lesser powers, like elementals, demigods, and some outsiders.
The pool can act as a god, though it has no intelligence of its own. Its neutral, but it can be used by any cleric given access by the Drazai Chancellors. The Drazai guard this pool of energy very carefully.
Any domain is, in theory, accessible, but there are some that most drazai wouldn't use, such as trickery or evil.
It's functionally the same as if I just had the PH solution, but I felt it gives more backstory and potential plot hooks.
Thoughts?
Drazai
Drazai live deep in the mountains of the Aralech's Mountain Range, where they fight for metal ores with the dwarves. They are known far and wide as celebrated magic users, being among the best wizards in Brenak. They are constantly experimenting with new magics.
Personality: Drazai are often cautious, though they are not afraid to take risks once they've identified a potential gain. They constantly experiment and try to learn more about their environments and their comrades. Living in tight warrens as they do, they have little or no sense of privacy. They see nothing wrong with going through a companion's bags, or walking into a privy that's in use.
Physical Description: Drazai are small, lizard-like humanoids. Their colors range from light bronze to nearly black, with colorful strips and crests in blues and greens. The males stand at three-and-a-half feet tall, with the females standing slightly taller and broader. Eye color ranges from yellow, to green, to the occasional brown. Their clothing tends towards thick, leather robes.
Relations: Drazai get along well with humans and gnomes, in whom they see fellow explorers and experimenters. They see elves as being too chaotic to be interesting. Halflings are nice, but don't always make enough effort to find out new things. Half-orcs are useful mercenaries and allies. Dwarves are too obsessed with gold, and waste iron and other valuable ores by turning them into weapons.
Alignment: Drazai are usually lawful, with a tendency towards good. They believe in a strong, unified community, with various members working for the good of the whole. However, they have a strong individualistic streak as a group, making them resist other races who try to impose their ways on them.
Religion: The drazai don't worship the gods. Instead, they engage in a peculiar form of ancestor worship focusing on the mythical hero Trechnar, who wrested the secret of iron from the gods.
Language: Drazai speak Draz, a language that uses the Dwarven alphabet, but has both Terran and Draconic roots.
Adventurers: Drazai feel a strong compulsion to explore and discover new things. A drazai adventurer is either looking for new magic (or other learning) or else is looking for something to strengthen the community. A very few drazai adventurers are outcasts who were unable to fit into the rigid mold of Drazai society. Generally, other drazai look at them with pity, rather than scorn or anger.
Aging: Drazai reach adulthood at twenty, middle age at fifty, old age at sixty-five, and venerable at ninety.
Drazai Racial Traits
Darkvision 60'
Small Size
Base Speed 20 ft.
+2 Int, -2 Str
+2 to craft checks involving metal objects.
+2 to climb checks
+2 racial bonus to saves vs. confusion
Education Feat (Eb. 52)
Favored Class: Artificer
I made 'em a race of unbelievers to help give them some flavor. They know the gods are there, but they don't see any reason to worship them. They see the gods more as obstacles and nuisances than anything else.
That gave me a bit of a problem when a player wanted to play a cleric. I felt the PH solution (just pick two domains and forget about deity) lacked interest. So I decided to work back to the Drazai culture and psychology. They're basically magical scientists. They like to experiment. They believe that everything is understandable. Everything can be measured, figured out. They fully believe that there is nothing in the universe that can't be understood and used as needed.
For them, a cleric isn't the same as a priest. They have priests, but these are basically storytellers and givers of rites. It's just an occupation. Clerics are divine magic users, nothing more. The difference between a wizard and a cleric for them is more a matter of specialization than philosophy.
Now, that magic has to come from somewhere. If it isn't a god, then where?
I decided they built their own source of divine magic. They'd gather magic from various sources and pool it together into a sort of makeshift god. The sources of magic would be from several sources. One, early on in this experiment, would have been holy objects from other religions, mostly from kobolds, orcs and goblins, with any taint of the god itself removed. This would form the basis of a pool of divine magic. Next, they would use certain spells to transform arcane magic into divine, and add that to the pool. They would also pray to their ancestors, who would add their own energy to the pool. They also made deals with certain lesser powers, like elementals, demigods, and some outsiders.
The pool can act as a god, though it has no intelligence of its own. Its neutral, but it can be used by any cleric given access by the Drazai Chancellors. The Drazai guard this pool of energy very carefully.
Any domain is, in theory, accessible, but there are some that most drazai wouldn't use, such as trickery or evil.
It's functionally the same as if I just had the PH solution, but I felt it gives more backstory and potential plot hooks.
Thoughts?