Planetouched- Verrück PEACH (Yet Another Aasimar-Tiefling Hybrid)

[Salasay]

Verrücken

Created by the unnatural union of an aasimar and a tiefling, Verrücken are a conflicted race, having two opposing influences on their actions. The first Verrücken were born during the middle days of the Vackel Empire, once aasimar and tiefling relations had improved due to joint slavery.

Personality

Verrücken tend to be withdrawn and quiet, only speaking when they need to. While most people would assume that such a trait means that they are shy and meek, the truth is much different. Verrücken have two sides to their person, the demonic side and the celestial side. While Verrücken also have good and evil sides, the celestial side is not always the “good” side and the demonic side is not always the “evil” side. This dual personality results in odd peculiarities in certain situations. A “Good” Verrück might perform cold-blooded torture on an evildoer, or an “Evil” Verrück might drop a few gold pieces into a beggars bowl every once and a while. Both sides need to be appeased occasionally, leading to a Verrück who is good most of the time to perform intensely evil acts every so often. While a Verrück normally has one dominant side, both sides are always present. A Verrück will try to hide his non-dominant side, much like an alcoholic priest. Neutral Verrücken, however, will not have such compunctions. They will perform evil and good acts in equal quantities, depending on which is best for the situation.

Physical Description

While they usually appear to be normal humans, most Verrücken have minor characteristics from both heritages, such as small horns and golden eyes, or silver hair and a sulfuric smell. If they have traits indicative of their nature, they will have traits from both parents. In general Verrücken are tall but slim, with slightly paler than normal skin. They often have minor fevers and chills.

Relations

In a normal planetouched society, Verrücken would be banished or killed, but on Paramýth they are treated exactly like humans by the planetouched (mildly inferior) and similar to elves by the humans. The Verrücken are very unbiased as far as race is concerned, judging individuals by who they are as a person, not by what race they are. If the first three hundred humans a Verrück meets shun and ridicule him, he will treat the three hundred and first the exact same as he treated the first human he met.

Alignment

The Verrücken are very unique as far as alignment is concerned. First, a Verrück cannot qualify for anything that requires that he be good or evil. Second, any non-neutral Verrücken will have a tendency to commit acts on the opposite side of the good-evil axis (but the same on the law-chaos axis). Thus a Lawful Good Verrück would occasionally commit Lawful Evil acts. A Verrück may attempt to alleviate the impact of his cross-alignment acts (a Good Verrück who kills someone in a fit of evilness can then send money to his family). The non-dominant alignment will not attempt to thwart the dominant sides plans, but will do cross-alignment acts within that goal.

Lands

Verrücken live throughout Paramýth, but mostly in the Planetouched Lands. They are, however, more evenly spread around Paramýth than other planetouched.

Religion

Verrücken usually aren’t religious, but if they are they will worship a more neutral god.

Language

Common, Infernal, Celestial, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Gnome, Goblin, Halfling, Orc, Sylvan.

Names

Verrücken are usually named the same as humans, but may have a tiefling or aasimar name, depending on which parent raised them more.

Racial Traits
+2 Wisdom, +2 Dexterity, −2 Constitution: Verrücken are intuitive and graceful, but because they have blood from opposing planes in them, they are often unhealthy.

Outsider (Native)
Medium size.
A Verrück’s base land speed is 30 feet.
Darkvision: Verrücken can see in the dark up to 60 feet.
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: A Verrück is automatically proficient with all simple and martial weapons.
Resistance to fire 5, cold 5, and electricity 5.
+2 racial bonus on Spot and Intimidate
Spell-Like Ability: 1/day— faerie fire. Caster level equals the Verrück’s class levels.
Spell-Like Ability: 1/day— darkness or daylight (This means he can use either one once per day, but not both in the same day). Caster level equals the Verrück’s class levels.
Automatic Languages: Common. Bonus Languages: Infernal and Celestial, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Gnome, Goblin, Halfling, Orc, Sylvan (Infernal and Celestial may be learned as one language).
Favored Class: Any
Level Adjustment: +1

Verrück belong to the Paramyth Campaign Setting (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?385265-Paramyth-Campaign-Setting-PEACH)

[Ralcos]

This is actually pretty cool!
*yoink*

[RoyVG]

I'm always a sucker for Good-race-Evil-race-hybrids. They always have very interesting fluff surrounding them or have interesting stories related to their existence.

So let's see, Responses in green

+2 Wisdom, +2 Dexterity, −2 Constitution: Verrücken are intuitive and graceful, but because they have blood from opposing planes in them, they are often unhealthy.
Interesting. The -Con will hurt them, but considering their mixed heritage making them physically weaker it fits. The +2 Dex and Wis makes them excellent scouts, rangers and pretty good clerics.

Outsider (Native)
Medium size.
A Verrück’s base land speed is 30 feet.
No comment here, all very standard for planetouched

Darkvision: Verrücken can see in the dark up to 60 feet.
Outsider type gives this by definition, but then again, it is mentioned in the 'Aasimar and Tiefling as races' anyway. No comment

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: A Verrück is automatically proficient with all simple and martial weapons, light and medium armor, and shields.
Technically Outsider type gives them proficiency with all simple and martial weapons (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm#outsiderType). Giving a race armor porficicnty as a racial feature is something generally unheard, of at least as far as I know. If you are going to stick to it, I would at least add 'but not with tower shields'.

Resistance to acid 3, fire 3, cold 5, and electricity 5.
I would say Cold 5 and Electricity 5 as Aasimar and Tiefling share both of those, but leave out the rest or improve them to 5 as well.

+2 racial bonus on Spot and Intimidate
Intimidate is a logical choice because of their mixed looks and Spot probably comes from Aasimar. A very strange combination to see, but it makes sense.

Spell-Like Ability: 1/day— faerie fire. Caster level equals the Verrück’s class levels.
Interesting choice and a pretty helpful spell in general. I approve of this one.

Spell-Like Ability: 1/day— darkness or daylight (This means he can use either one once per day, but not both in the same day). Caster level equals the Verrück’s class levels.
The Light-Darkness is something that would fit very well but giving them the choice of either one feels kind of strange. Maybe have a look at this Power (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/controlLight.htm), I feel it fits really well for the light-darkness-feeling you may want to go for. Take out the PP requirement and you basically have a complete SLA.

Automatic Languages: Common. Bonus Languages: Infernal and Celestial, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Gnome, Goblin, Halfling, Orc, Sylvan (Infernal and Celestial may be learned as one language).
I would change automatic languages to 'Common and either Celestial or Infernal' with the other one available to them as bonus. This seems more logical in my opinion. Consider a Verrück with 10 Int, he would be unable to speak either one of the 'exotic' languages of one of its parents unless he puts a skill point in Speak Language :smallwink:.

Favored Class: Any
I already said rangers and scouts are pretty good classes for Verrücken, as well as cleric. I feel that only Humans and very human-like races are supposed to have 'Any'. Aasimar has Paladin and Tiefling has Rogue as favored classes, so I feel these should have something as well, but different. I would go for Cleric honestly.

Level Adjustment: +1
The original Aasimar and Tiefling are (almost) not worthy of an LA+1 and I feel the Verrücken fall into the same catagory. While it gets more SLAs than either of them, there are LA+0 races that have more. With the changes I suggest (Reduced resistances and Control Light), LA+1 would be flat out be too much. The ability modifiers even each other out almost completely, Con is a terrible stat to lose, especially if you benefit of only one of the Dex and Wis increases


Generally, I like it, but I feel it lacks a little bit the uniqueness an Aasimar-Tiefling hybrid could bring. I already gave some ideas about it, but these changes will weaken them a bit to make them more LA+0 (Maybe add Humanoid (Planetouched) to that instead of Outsider, like all the lesser Planetouched). Their most important feature is their mixed heritage, do something with that. Have these guys do something that no other planetouched or outsider can do. An example could be that they can cast evil spells if they are good-aligned and vice-versa, especially clerics will like this (Or make an Alternative Class feature that allows this).

[Salasay]

Technically Outsider type gives them proficiency with all simple and martial weapons. Giving a race armor porficicnty as a racial feature is something generally unheard, of at least as far as I know. If you are going to stick to it, I would at least add 'but not with tower shields'.

The Aasimar and Tiefling both give light armor and shields, and the aasimar gives medium armor as well. this is from the outsider type as well, quoted here:


Proficient with all simple and martial weapons and any weapons mentioned in its entry.
Proficient with whatever type of armor (light, medium, or heavy) it is described as wearing, as well as all lighter types. Outsiders not indicated as wearing armor are not proficient with armor. Outsiders are proficient with shields if they are proficient with any form of armor.
I'll add the tower shield restriction and can prune the medium armor proficiency to just breastplates.


I would say Cold 5 and Electricity 5 as Aasimar and Tiefling share both of those, but leave out the rest or improve them to 5 as well.

These are reduced because they are the non-shared resistances, so they only have half of the resistance. I can drop it to 2, but the existence of them adds to the "hybrid" feel a little bit. If you think it's needed to drop them, I will, though.


The Light-Darkness is something that would fit very well but giving them the choice of either one feels kind of strange. Maybe have a look at this Power, I feel it fits really well for the light-darkness-feeling you may want to go for. Take out the PP requirement and you basically have a complete SLA.

Mein Gott! That's PERFECT! Where is it from?


I already said rangers and scouts are pretty good classes for Verrücken, as well as cleric. I feel that only Humans and very human-like races are supposed to have 'Any'. Aasimar has Paladin and Tiefling has Rogue as favored classes, so I feel these should have something as well, but different. I would go for Cleric honestly.

There is a class that I've made, a Monk or Ranger PRC, called the Verrück Balancer (or Ausgleichn), which focuses on appeasing both halves of their blood. Part of the flavor for the Verrück is their tendency to go insane later in life. I didn't want to add it as a mechanic to the race, so its just a flavor piece. The Ausgleichn prevent that. Also, in one of the religions of the campaign setting that the Verrück are from, humans and Verrück are represented by the same god. So, to wrap my ramblings up rapidly, I think "Any" fits, but Monk or Ranger (Probably Monk)would be my other choice.

Since y'all obviously like the flavor, below is some mildly Verrück flavored bits from my Setting (this is totally not shameless product promotion). As for how they exist, read the history of the Paramyth Campaign Setting (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?385265-Paramyth-Campaign-Setting-PEACH).

Flavor

The Herznechten families are descendant from 10 Planetouched (5 Aasimar and 5 Tiefling ) who helped the Vackel (Romans/Greeks) during the conquering of Paramýth. They, in exchange for betraying their Planetouched brothers, were given status as peers within their chosen nations. The 10 families were named for colors that they took as their own: Kokino (Red), Portokali (Orange), Kitrino (Yellow), Chryso (Gold), Lef̱ko (White), Ble (Blue), Prasino (Green), Mov (Purple), Ysimi (Silver), and Mavro (Black). There are also many subfamilies, formed by intermarriage of certain families. The most notable are the Roz (Red and White, or Pink), Kyano (Blue and Green, or Teal), Levanta (Purple and Silver, or Lavender), and Nkrizo (Black and White, or Grey). Thus Verrück families will often be named after combinations of "warm or light" colors or "cold and dark" colors.

The aasimar are associated with the elements fire and wind, while the tieflings are associated with the elements ice and earth. Thus Verrück are sometimes known as "Children of Water and Sandstorm".

The first settlers of the continent of Paramýth were the planetouched. Because of its strong connection to the outer planes, planetouched were drawn to it. The tieflings were the first to leave and follow their calling to Paramýth, followed approximately 50 years later by the aasimar. After more than a century and a half of fighting and a century of joint enslavement under the Vake, the Outsider blood running in their veins had been diluted and corrupted, severing the strong ties that the planetouched had to their ancestors home planes. While they were physically identical, the strong influence that their planar roots had had over their alignments had been severed, making the aasimar as likely as humans to be evil, and the tieflings as likely as humans to be good. The two nations no longer have deep-seated animosity towards each other, and get along as well as most human nations with a history of war do (i.e. wary, but cooperating). Thus interbreeding was not as impossible as it was previously, allowing Verrück to be born.

Planetouched in the Paramýth universe differ from those in the normal D&D universe in that racial inheritance is guaranteed (with a planetouched and planetouched parentage). If a human has a child with a planetouched, the child has a 50% chance to be completely human or completely planetouched. They may have some slight differences (a human child of a planetouched and a human might be a little prettier than average), but otherwise they are perfectly normal.

(Most important part) Verrück is pronounced with a single "rolled R" in the middle, almost a "D". Think Scottish R. The ü is pronounced by making an "ee" sound with your mouth shaped for an "Oh". Or just translate "Crazy" into German and drop the "T".

I'll work on translating the Auslgeichn to the forums.

[Eldan]

Did you have to call them "insane" in German? Spoils it a bit, for me.

[RoyVG]

The Aasimar and Tiefling both give light armor and shields, and the aasimar gives medium armor as well. this is from the outsider type as well, quoted here:


Proficient with all simple and martial weapons and any weapons mentioned in its entry.
Proficient with whatever type of armor (light, medium, or heavy) it is described as wearing, as well as all lighter types. Outsiders not indicated as wearing armor are not proficient with armor. Outsiders are proficient with shields if they are proficient with any form of armor.

I'll add the tower shield restriction and can prune the medium armor proficiency to just breastplates.


I'm not going to argue with the reasoning, it's just that player characters generally do not have armor proficiencies simply for being of a certain race, they get them from their class (and feats). Usually this extends to weapons as well, but there are quite a few Outsider playable races which always have simple and martial weapon profficiency. They are just not present in the 'Aasimar/Tiefling As character' textblock because most weapon based classes are profficicent with them anyway, and those that aren't are usually spellcasters anyway. If this race is not intended for players, then disregard my comments.


These are reduced because they are the non-shared resistances, so they only have half of the resistance. I can drop it to 2, but the existence of them adds to the "hybrid" feel a little bit. If you think it's needed to drop them, I will, though.

I get why they are reduced and it seems logical. I just thought that having 4 resistances (even though 2 are reduced to 3) is very strong, I'd rather have 3 resistances at 5 rather than 4 resistances of which 2 are less strong. Maybe give them the choice of Fire or Acid Resistance 5 at character creation? It gives them another way to diversify themselves and give one aspect (Aasimar/Tiefling) a slight upper hand? Might make some interesting roleplay consequences.


Mein Gott! That's PERFECT! Where is it from?

Expanded Psionics Handbook, it's part of the 3.5 Core Psionics. It's a Psionic power, but if you take out the power point cost and change the 'Display: Visual' to 'Components: Somatic' it becomes a regular spell. Not that the components have any influencs on spell-like abilities, because those have none.

[Salasay]

I'm not going to argue with the reasoning, it's just that player characters generally do not have armor proficiencies simply for being of a certain race, they get them from their class (and feats). Usually this extends to weapons as well, but there are quite a few Outsider playable races which always have simple and martial weapon profficiency. They are just not present in the 'Aasimar/Tiefling As character' textblock because most weapon based classes are profficicent with them anyway, and those that aren't are usually spellcasters anyway. If this race is not intended for players, then disregard my comments.

Makes sense. I'll give that the axe.


I get why they are reduced and it seems logical. I just thought that having 4 resistances (even though 2 are reduced to 3) is very strong, I'd rather have 3 resistances at 5 rather than 4 resistances of which 2 are less strong. Maybe give them the choice of Fire or Acid Resistance 5 at character creation? It gives them another way to diversify themselves and give one aspect (Aasimar/Tiefling) a slight upper hand? Might make some interesting roleplay consequences.

I think I'll just make it Fire Resistance 5, because cold and heat are supposed to be the opposing elements of aasimar and tieflings in my setting.


Expanded Psionics Handbook, it's part of the 3.5 Core Psionics. It's a Psionic power, but if you take out the power point cost and change the 'Display: Visual' to 'Components: Somatic' it becomes a regular spell. Not that the components have any influencs on spell-like abilities, because those have none.

Danke


Did you have to call them "insane" in German? Spoils it a bit, for me.

The "German" or the "insane" part? the insane is because of how often they become such, and the German is because they were first born in Ravnira, Paramýth's version of Germany. I'd have gone with Latin, but Rabidus or Insanus would have been worse.

Also, the promised Ausgleichn (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?394008-Verr%FCck-Balancer-PRC-PEACH) PRC.