Xallace
2015-06-18, 12:57 PM
Here's a race I've been working on for a few days, and I was hoping some kind people here could look them over for balance, and maybe even help me flesh them out a little more as a race. Something feels like its missing, but I can't quite put my finger on it.
The ilth are a parasitic, squid-like race that burrow their young into the bodies of dead humanoids and raise them to use as unliving hosts. Despite this horribly morbid method of reproduction, the ilth are not inherently evil or malicious. In fact, in the swampy, coastal regions where the ilth live these cephalopodal aberrations have made pacts with their local humanoid neighbors for bodies. This usually results in executed criminals being ferried to the ilth for use, since the squids don't need a body in perfect condition to operate, filling up wounds with rubbery flesh and sealing decpaitated heads back to their necks.
Physical Description: Ilth are tiny, squid-like creatures about the size and shape of a human brain. Eight short tentacles issue from their underside, and two longer, thinner tentacles issue out the front. While in the water, an ilth uses a method of jet propulsion to swim, sucking in water and blasting it out their bottoms to move through liquid. On land, they waddle along on their stubby tentacles.
This is not the shape of the ilth that most see, however. Ilth do not stay this way as long as they can find a host for their vulnerable form: a humanoid corpse.
When the ilth finds a suitable host, it squeezes in through the ear (if a larger head wound doesn't present itself) and burrows into the brain. Tiny pores all over the ilth's body open up and release millions of small tendrils that attach to the greater nervous system of the host, making the two bodies indistinguishable. Over time, these tendrils can grow and slide between and muscles and under skin, pressing out under the host's skin in long, tentacle shapes.
Once the ilth has fully integrated into its new form, a subconcious system takes over repairing any damage to the body. Wounds, even fatal ones, are quickly filled up with a shiny, sleek flesh, reminscient of the ilth's original form. The new flesh fuses with the old, so that the bodily integrity is retained, but it can be certainly unnerving to see, and makes an ilth fairly obvious to spot. Some humanoid societies will drill holes into the foreheads of their offered corpses so that the squid-flesh that fills it in becomes a mark signifying an ilth's presence. Hosts taken by the ilth cease to decay until the ilth dies as well.
A host operated by an ilth is unnerving to watch, quite resembling zombies and other undead, mostly thanks to the ilth's incomplete control over the musculature of the host body. Still, the humanoid form is much more useful than the pathetic and vulnerable squid bodies they would otherwise possess.
Religion: The ilth have a godless religion that reveres the deep, murky water of their home. This religion's alignment is True Neutral, its domains are Blackwater*, Ocean*, Ooze, and Water, and its favored weapon is the shortspear.
*Found in Stormwrack.
Lands: Ilth live in small, communal societies in swampy or coastal areas. They have few real lands of their own, however, always setting up near humanoid societies in order to obtain fresh hosts for their young. Water is very important to the ilth, both biologically and spiritually, so those who move inland always make sure to reside by rivers, lakes, or at least some place where they can build a large pool.
Society: Ilth do not reproduce often, so their populations tend to remain low. Because of this, they find it easy to live on the fringes of the humanoid societies to which they have attached. Although many try to integrate themselves into their host societies, they do have some peculiar habits among their own kind.
Ilth always live somewhere where they can see the water, and most cultural rituals involve some amount of being submerged. Public baths are a popular way of spending time with family and neighbors. Both births and deaths are celebrated (or memorialized) in the water, and every year on the first summer's full moon the ilth hold the Festival of Floods, a day-long celebration with singing, feasts (primarily fish), games, plays and skits, and finally ending with "waterworks," a special alchemical concoction that brilliantly (and safely) turns a pool of water into a series of beautiful, colorful patterns. Outsiders are readily invited to most of these festivals, though few tend to actually show.
The ilth hold a particular reverence for magic that colors their culture. For them, Conjuration and Transmutation are the most noble and purest forms of spellcasting. Those who master these arts are awarded high rankings within ilth communities. On the opposite end, Evocation and Illusion are considered the corruptions and taints; destructive and deceptive spells used only to harm have no place in an ilth's known spells. No ilth would be caught dead with even so much as a Minor Image written into their spellbook. They tend to look similarly down on other races who use such magics.
Alignment: Any, though most often neutral along the moral alignment axis.
Roleplaying an Ilth: There are a few questions to consider while playing an ilth:
• You are a parasite inside a host body, but it is a necessary part of your life cycle. Do you feel any guilt over this fact, or is it simply the way it is? Are you interested in finding out who your body was, or do you consider their past life to be irrelevant?
• Ilth reproduce on their own, and thus the concept of romance is foreign to them. How does your character feel about romance? Does spending life with another creature seem appealing or offputting? Do they try courting another creature to fit in with their host society, or avoid the matter altogether?
• Your society is small and close-knit, and often the only source of comfort in world that finds you strange and unnerving. As an adventurer, what led you to leave them? Do you have dreams beyond what your small community could provide? Did you have a falling out with them? Or was it something different?
The Ilth
• +2 Intelligence, -2 Dexterity. Ilth are very intelligent creatures, but their incomplete control over their host's musculature and nervous systems make them clumsy and shaky.
• Aberration (Augmented Humanoid): An ilth is a strange creature living parasitically inside a humanoid corpse. Like other aberrations, an ilth has Darkvision out to 60 ft. Ilth are susceptible to any spell that targets either humanoids or aberrations.
• Medium-Sized: Ilth don't fit into the heads of small-sized humanoids.
• Base Land Speed: 25 ft (5 squares). Ilth's new bodies lose a little speed compared to their former lives, moving in jerky and unnerving ways.
• +2 bonus on saves against poison or disease.
• Ilth manifest [Cold] or [Water] powers at +1 manifester level. They also gain a +2 bonus on saves against any [Water] spell, power, or effect.
• Ilth gain a +2 bonus to Swim checks and Survival checks made regarding aquatic or swampy environments.
• Brain Bite: An ilth's beak and gustatory tentacles are usually kept safely in the throat of the host, ready to catch any food already chewed and transfer it down to the creature's stomach. Once per day as a swift action, the ilth may extend these tentacles out of the host's mouth in an awful display. If the ilth is grappling a creature, the tentacles wrap around the victim's head and try to slither in through the ears, nose, mouth, any way it can to get to the brain. The target must succeed on a Fortitude Save (DC10 + 1/2 the ilth's character level + the ilth's Strength modifier) or take 2d4 points of Intelligence damage. Obviously, this only works if the target has a brain to damage.
• Increased Healing Rate: The presence of an ilth causes the host body to heal in overdrive. When healing hit points or ability damage through time and rest, the ilth heals at double the normal rate.
• Eject Self: An ilth who is reduced to -10 hitpoints or fewer does not immediately die, but may leave their host body in an attempt to slither to safety. The detachment takes a full round, at which point the ilth appears in a square adjacent to their previous body, conscious and alive. They are Tiny, have Strength 1, Dexterity 1, and Con 3, and have 1/4 their previous host's hit points. The ilth can move 5 feet per round, but has a Swim Speed of 30 ft (and gains a +8 racial bonus to Swim Checks). An ilth who is killed while in this form is actually dead.
The ilth can either reattach themselves to their previous host body or seek out a new one. Integrating back into their old body requires 30 minutes of uninterrupted work, during which the ilth is very vulnerable. Once the period is over, the ilth regains its previous physical ability scores and returns at -9 HP and stable. If the ilth chooses to seek out a new host, the integration process takes an hour, during which the ilth is also very vulnerable. Once the process is over, the new host begins at 1 hp. The ilth retains the ability scores of their old host, as their physical attributes better represent their control over the body than the host's living attributes.
• Tentacle Reach: An ilth can slide their cephalopodal tentacles through slits in their host's hands as a free action, providing them with an additional 5 feet of reach in exhange for a -2 penalty to any roll made using the extended reach; the tentacles are meant for manipulating musculature, not weapons or locks.
• Water Breathing: An ilth can breathe water as well as air.
• Languages: Common. Bonus Languages: Aquan, Undercommon.
• Favored Class: Psion
• Level Adjustment: +0
Large Host [General]
You are a rare ilth who has acquired a sizable host. While the extra bulk is useful, it's much more difficult to control a body this size.
Prerequisites: Ilth, 1st level only
Benefit: Your size changes to Large, with all the attendant benefits and drawbacks. In addition, you gain a +2 bonus to Strength, but an additional -2 penalty to Dexterity, as you have more trouble manipulating a body this size.
The ilth are a parasitic, squid-like race that burrow their young into the bodies of dead humanoids and raise them to use as unliving hosts. Despite this horribly morbid method of reproduction, the ilth are not inherently evil or malicious. In fact, in the swampy, coastal regions where the ilth live these cephalopodal aberrations have made pacts with their local humanoid neighbors for bodies. This usually results in executed criminals being ferried to the ilth for use, since the squids don't need a body in perfect condition to operate, filling up wounds with rubbery flesh and sealing decpaitated heads back to their necks.
Physical Description: Ilth are tiny, squid-like creatures about the size and shape of a human brain. Eight short tentacles issue from their underside, and two longer, thinner tentacles issue out the front. While in the water, an ilth uses a method of jet propulsion to swim, sucking in water and blasting it out their bottoms to move through liquid. On land, they waddle along on their stubby tentacles.
This is not the shape of the ilth that most see, however. Ilth do not stay this way as long as they can find a host for their vulnerable form: a humanoid corpse.
When the ilth finds a suitable host, it squeezes in through the ear (if a larger head wound doesn't present itself) and burrows into the brain. Tiny pores all over the ilth's body open up and release millions of small tendrils that attach to the greater nervous system of the host, making the two bodies indistinguishable. Over time, these tendrils can grow and slide between and muscles and under skin, pressing out under the host's skin in long, tentacle shapes.
Once the ilth has fully integrated into its new form, a subconcious system takes over repairing any damage to the body. Wounds, even fatal ones, are quickly filled up with a shiny, sleek flesh, reminscient of the ilth's original form. The new flesh fuses with the old, so that the bodily integrity is retained, but it can be certainly unnerving to see, and makes an ilth fairly obvious to spot. Some humanoid societies will drill holes into the foreheads of their offered corpses so that the squid-flesh that fills it in becomes a mark signifying an ilth's presence. Hosts taken by the ilth cease to decay until the ilth dies as well.
A host operated by an ilth is unnerving to watch, quite resembling zombies and other undead, mostly thanks to the ilth's incomplete control over the musculature of the host body. Still, the humanoid form is much more useful than the pathetic and vulnerable squid bodies they would otherwise possess.
Religion: The ilth have a godless religion that reveres the deep, murky water of their home. This religion's alignment is True Neutral, its domains are Blackwater*, Ocean*, Ooze, and Water, and its favored weapon is the shortspear.
*Found in Stormwrack.
Lands: Ilth live in small, communal societies in swampy or coastal areas. They have few real lands of their own, however, always setting up near humanoid societies in order to obtain fresh hosts for their young. Water is very important to the ilth, both biologically and spiritually, so those who move inland always make sure to reside by rivers, lakes, or at least some place where they can build a large pool.
Society: Ilth do not reproduce often, so their populations tend to remain low. Because of this, they find it easy to live on the fringes of the humanoid societies to which they have attached. Although many try to integrate themselves into their host societies, they do have some peculiar habits among their own kind.
Ilth always live somewhere where they can see the water, and most cultural rituals involve some amount of being submerged. Public baths are a popular way of spending time with family and neighbors. Both births and deaths are celebrated (or memorialized) in the water, and every year on the first summer's full moon the ilth hold the Festival of Floods, a day-long celebration with singing, feasts (primarily fish), games, plays and skits, and finally ending with "waterworks," a special alchemical concoction that brilliantly (and safely) turns a pool of water into a series of beautiful, colorful patterns. Outsiders are readily invited to most of these festivals, though few tend to actually show.
The ilth hold a particular reverence for magic that colors their culture. For them, Conjuration and Transmutation are the most noble and purest forms of spellcasting. Those who master these arts are awarded high rankings within ilth communities. On the opposite end, Evocation and Illusion are considered the corruptions and taints; destructive and deceptive spells used only to harm have no place in an ilth's known spells. No ilth would be caught dead with even so much as a Minor Image written into their spellbook. They tend to look similarly down on other races who use such magics.
Alignment: Any, though most often neutral along the moral alignment axis.
Roleplaying an Ilth: There are a few questions to consider while playing an ilth:
• You are a parasite inside a host body, but it is a necessary part of your life cycle. Do you feel any guilt over this fact, or is it simply the way it is? Are you interested in finding out who your body was, or do you consider their past life to be irrelevant?
• Ilth reproduce on their own, and thus the concept of romance is foreign to them. How does your character feel about romance? Does spending life with another creature seem appealing or offputting? Do they try courting another creature to fit in with their host society, or avoid the matter altogether?
• Your society is small and close-knit, and often the only source of comfort in world that finds you strange and unnerving. As an adventurer, what led you to leave them? Do you have dreams beyond what your small community could provide? Did you have a falling out with them? Or was it something different?
The Ilth
• +2 Intelligence, -2 Dexterity. Ilth are very intelligent creatures, but their incomplete control over their host's musculature and nervous systems make them clumsy and shaky.
• Aberration (Augmented Humanoid): An ilth is a strange creature living parasitically inside a humanoid corpse. Like other aberrations, an ilth has Darkvision out to 60 ft. Ilth are susceptible to any spell that targets either humanoids or aberrations.
• Medium-Sized: Ilth don't fit into the heads of small-sized humanoids.
• Base Land Speed: 25 ft (5 squares). Ilth's new bodies lose a little speed compared to their former lives, moving in jerky and unnerving ways.
• +2 bonus on saves against poison or disease.
• Ilth manifest [Cold] or [Water] powers at +1 manifester level. They also gain a +2 bonus on saves against any [Water] spell, power, or effect.
• Ilth gain a +2 bonus to Swim checks and Survival checks made regarding aquatic or swampy environments.
• Brain Bite: An ilth's beak and gustatory tentacles are usually kept safely in the throat of the host, ready to catch any food already chewed and transfer it down to the creature's stomach. Once per day as a swift action, the ilth may extend these tentacles out of the host's mouth in an awful display. If the ilth is grappling a creature, the tentacles wrap around the victim's head and try to slither in through the ears, nose, mouth, any way it can to get to the brain. The target must succeed on a Fortitude Save (DC10 + 1/2 the ilth's character level + the ilth's Strength modifier) or take 2d4 points of Intelligence damage. Obviously, this only works if the target has a brain to damage.
• Increased Healing Rate: The presence of an ilth causes the host body to heal in overdrive. When healing hit points or ability damage through time and rest, the ilth heals at double the normal rate.
• Eject Self: An ilth who is reduced to -10 hitpoints or fewer does not immediately die, but may leave their host body in an attempt to slither to safety. The detachment takes a full round, at which point the ilth appears in a square adjacent to their previous body, conscious and alive. They are Tiny, have Strength 1, Dexterity 1, and Con 3, and have 1/4 their previous host's hit points. The ilth can move 5 feet per round, but has a Swim Speed of 30 ft (and gains a +8 racial bonus to Swim Checks). An ilth who is killed while in this form is actually dead.
The ilth can either reattach themselves to their previous host body or seek out a new one. Integrating back into their old body requires 30 minutes of uninterrupted work, during which the ilth is very vulnerable. Once the period is over, the ilth regains its previous physical ability scores and returns at -9 HP and stable. If the ilth chooses to seek out a new host, the integration process takes an hour, during which the ilth is also very vulnerable. Once the process is over, the new host begins at 1 hp. The ilth retains the ability scores of their old host, as their physical attributes better represent their control over the body than the host's living attributes.
• Tentacle Reach: An ilth can slide their cephalopodal tentacles through slits in their host's hands as a free action, providing them with an additional 5 feet of reach in exhange for a -2 penalty to any roll made using the extended reach; the tentacles are meant for manipulating musculature, not weapons or locks.
• Water Breathing: An ilth can breathe water as well as air.
• Languages: Common. Bonus Languages: Aquan, Undercommon.
• Favored Class: Psion
• Level Adjustment: +0
Large Host [General]
You are a rare ilth who has acquired a sizable host. While the extra bulk is useful, it's much more difficult to control a body this size.
Prerequisites: Ilth, 1st level only
Benefit: Your size changes to Large, with all the attendant benefits and drawbacks. In addition, you gain a +2 bonus to Strength, but an additional -2 penalty to Dexterity, as you have more trouble manipulating a body this size.