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View Full Version : Acrimima (D&D 3.5 race. Such neutral. Very balance. Wow.)



Kazyan
2013-11-12, 03:59 PM
ACRIMIMA

Shunned by races and peoples with strong moral or ethical opinions, the acrimima live a sidelined existence. They seem to belong nowhere in the cosmic order, so they collectively have carved out their own place, blending their heritages into a cohorent line of power--the descendents of neutrality.

The actual bloodline of acrimima is hard to disentangle, and is still in the process of thoroughly mixing. However, it is believed that the ultimate parents of the acrimima race were a pair of planetouched--the twisted-looking male descendent of a mechanatrix and a neraph, and a morally-conflicted woman born from a tiefling and aasimar. The two bonded over their internal conflicts over their alignments, and their children were the first of what could be recognized as acrimima.

Personality

Acrimima are neutral, above all else, though that does not make them ambivalent. Despite their mixed heritage, they have come to have solid opinions of neutrality. They will not kill unless the situation calls for it, they follow the rules until they significantly get in the way, and seek a happy medium in all things. Acrimima are often considered disciplines for their moderation-in-all-things approach to life, but it is simply natural for them to avoid excesses--they eat until comfortable, exercise just enough to keep their bodies from atrophy, or may enjoy only one or two glasses of wine during revelry.

Acrimima are often criticized for lacking strong opinions, but the truth is they do feel strongly--it's just towards the middle ground, which comes off as indecisiveness. This has led to the race being collectively irritated at those who champion alignment-based causes or who are unwilling to compromise.

Physical Description

An acrimima appears as an androgynously proportioned human-like individual, perfectly symmetrical except for some pronounced flaw--mismatched eyes, a sixth finger on one hand, or a shock of discolored hair. Acrmima have pale, charming faces that almost seem to glow, with grayed or black fingernails, eyes and hair, and sharp-looking teeth. The flesh of their skin is a light gray, tinted with violet patches where a human would otherwise be tanned. Acrimima are stout like dwarves, and one can often make out clear muscles (such as on the shoulders or arms) on the same bodies that have round midsections. A 'beautiful' acrimima, to them, is heavy with fat and muscle, but not too much so.

Relations

Acrimima avoid gnomes--a race of goody-two-shoes pranksters is anathema to them. Halflings are avoided to a smaller degree; the average acrimima can actually stand to be around one for five minutes. Dwarves stick so rigidly to tradition and law that acrimima tend to just back away slowly from dwarven communities. Elves, aloof as they are, do not bother acrimima much--but the savage and 'chaotic evil society' races do, and how. The typical acrimima is most at home with half-elves, which make good mediators between two extremes in more ways than one. Relations with humans depends on the individual human, but is usually strained--they typically have a well-defined moral leaning, more often than not, making acrimima society shy away from everyone's second-best friend.

Alignment

Acrimima are neutral to the core, with divergences being very rare, but less rare than the deviations among aligned outsiders. About 90% of acrimima adhere to neutrality as its own force of the cosmos, seeking balance in all things, though their strength of this conviction varies. About 10% are simply apathetic to the forces of good, law, evil and chaos, and will not be swayed one way or another.

Lands

On the Material Plane, Acrimima take to the borders between defined biomes, drawing from the resources of both. Many acrimima, however, live in various independent regions of the Outlands.

Religion

Dieties of nature are coincidentally the favorites of acrimima, because they often uphold balance. Acrimima worship Obad-Hai as their primary deity, though a small minority worship Boccob, as he takes the other stance of neutrality.

Language

Acrimima adore Common. A widespread belief among them is that Common is the neutral equivalent of the alignment-related languages, such as Abyssal and Celestial. Acrimima are taught the nuances of Common at an early age.

Names

Acrimima like three kinds of names: human names, palindromes, and nicknames. For the latter, they don't pick their own nicknames (too chaotic), but prefer anyone who would use a nickname to do that for them.

Male examples: Jacob, Rasputin, Salas, Nollon
Female Examples: Lily, Cass, Elisile, Atrorta

Adventurers

Acrimima adventurers are usually those who feel so strongly about their neutrality that they go out to try and correct the excesses and swinginness of the universe. Alternatively, since acrimima don't get along with many races, they may adventure just to find a group of people they enjoy being with.

Racial Traits

+2 Con, -2 Wis: Acrimima have the durable bodies of the more conventional alignment-based outsiders, but they are fundamentally chasing a shadow of the 'real' alignment concepts--one could call it misguided, unwise, apathetic...in any case, the result is that they're not as mentally sound as many races.
Outsider (Native, Neutral): Acrimima are outsiders native to the Material Plane, and have the [Neutral] subtype. This works like other alignment subtypes, and the acrimima's natural weapons bypass damage reduction as if they were neutral-aligned, in the case of a source of damage reduction bypassed by neutral weapons.
Medium size
Land speed: 30 feet.
+2 to Diplomacy checks: Acrimima are good at mediating between extremes.
Common specialization: Acrimima understand the subtleties of Common. They gain a +2 bonus to Sense Motive if the subject is speaking Common, +2 to Diplomacy and Bluff checks when speaking Common (this stacks with the above racial trait), and a +2 to Forgery and Decipher Script checks when dealing with Common texts.
Heavy: Acrimima gain a +2 bonus on Strength checks to avoid being bull rushed or overrun.
Energy Resistance: Acrimima gain resistance to acid 5 and sonic 5.
Balance Action: Once per day, an acrimima can treat the result of a d20 roll as an 11. They must use this ability before rolling. If the actual die result is above 11, use that result in place of the 11. This ability can be an additional time per day for every 5 Hit Dice the acrimima has.
Languages: Common. Bonus languages: Any.
Favored Class: Fighter, unless Magic of Incarnum is used in the campaign, in which case, use the Incarnate (Neutrality (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=16142410&postcount=1) variant).
Level Adjustment: +1


Lesser Acrimima

Lesser acrimima have the same statistics as standard acrimima, except as listed below.

Humanoid (Planetouched): Lesser acrimima are planetouched humanoids.
No Energy Resistances: Lesser acrimima do not have resistance to acid 5 or resistance to sonic 5.
No Diplomacy Bonus: Lesser acrimima do not receive a +2 bonus to Diplomacy, though they still gain the benefits of Common Specialization.
Level Adjustment: +0

Ralcos
2013-11-12, 04:04 PM
This is an Intreaging race, to say the least.
I would consider making most PCs of this race ostrasized by their own kin, however, due to adventurers RARELY being true neutral.

Arcanist
2013-11-12, 07:14 PM
Much Outsider.
Original Neutrality.
Such balance.
Wow intensifies.

Doge would be proud.

Honestly, I believe these outsiders should be native to the Outlands. I don't think the Outlands has an actually specific type of Outsider... Otherwise, I would want to play as one. :smalltongue:

Zaydos
2013-11-12, 07:30 PM
I like the Balance Action ability a lot. Like most planetouched I still worry they're a little too weak for +1 LA, though the lesser variant seems about on the money (maybe too good at Diplomacy).

As for fluff, I'd say dwarves would give them more trouble than gnomes; not only are they so rigidly lawful they're as much do-goods as gnomes.

Also there is an Outlands native outsider, it's called Rilmani, they were updated to 3.2ish in the Fiend Folio.

Just to Browse
2013-11-13, 03:54 PM
much lesser
very constitution

I figured they'd get a balance bonus instead of the minor stability thing.

Decent race for meldshaping, not good for druid (-2 to casting stat). I'd just remove the -2 Wis and call it a day--this is an LA +1 race anyways.