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View Full Version : Chromatic Elves (3.5, PEACH)



Zale
2012-04-04, 04:39 PM
So, my first piece of Homebrew, please PEACH.

The Elves we know of now are not human, though they once were, before the strange invaders came.

Beings from another world, banished to this more mundane existence- These beings took the name of True Elves. They were mighty in magic, inclined to a life of idleness and indulgence. The True Elves wanted for servants.

With wicked magic and powerful enchantment, they spirited away the nearby inhabitants of the world they invaded. Humans were changed and transmuted into a pale reflection of True Elves. Terrified from their change, the new slaves were organized in castes, to better serve their cruel and exacting Masters.

Decades passed as the Elves toiled for their masters. However, cut-off from their old world the invader's magic waned. Eventually, the enslaved saw their chance. They rebelled, turning the powers they had been given against their former masters.

Many died, but many more escaped into freedom. The True Elves had lost to much power in the struggle to follow and were forced to bind themselves to the lands they ruled to ensure their continued survival.

Elf Subtype

All Elves share some common traits, due to the magic that was used to create them. Their forms resist change and have a magical aura.


Low-Light Vision (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#lowLightVision)
+2 bonus to saves against transmutation spells and spell-like effects
Faint aura of transmutation magic



Green Elves

Made to be gardeners, green-house keepers and farmers. They have an enormous love of plants.

Personality

Green Elves are known for their calm and reserved demeanor, as well as their tendency towards quietness. However, with their expressive faces, they are far from remote or emotionally distant. Green Elves love plants above nearly anything else, often spending large amounts of free time tending to personal gardens. Fire is something all Green Elves fear, a relic of when the True Elves used it to coerce them.

Physical Description

As their name implied, Green Elves are usually green in skin, hair and eye color. The exact shade varies wildly, from light sea-green colors to dark forest shades. Green Elves tend to have dark hair and eye colors.

For the most part, they tend to have long, wild hair and simple, durable clothing. Green Elves care little for their appearance or apparel. Most of them are fond of pouches and bags to carry things in, typically seeds.

Relations

Easily one of the most loved of the elven races, especially among farmers. Due to their reverence for plant-life, it's rare for them to leave a field in worse condition than when they arrived. However, relations with lumber harvesters can be very strained for them.

Alignment

Green Elves tend to be kind or altruistic, and favor good. They also enjoy reliability and order, but also respect the wildness of nature. As such, they have no great leanings towards law or chaos.

Lands

Like most of their kin, the Green Elves avoid having large settlements in case of attracting the attention of their former masters. Those that do settle in fertile plains or forested areas, creating elaborate gardens or arbors. The forest settlements can sometimes be isolated and parochial, though elven gardens are usually open to well-meaning visitors. Most Green Elves are wanders and nomads, criss-crossing the lands.

Religion

While not highly religious, most Green Elves worship gods of forest, plant and harvest. They also tend to revere especially old trees, and animated plants.

Language

Green Elves speak Elvish and Sylvan, most also know Common.

Names

Names for the Green Elves are usually nothing more than plant names in the Elvish tongue.

Adventurers

With their tendency to wander, and altruistic urges, most Green Elves find it easy to adventure. Many do feel reluctant to fight if not wholly necessary.

Green Elf Racial Traits


+2 Wis, -2 Int. Green Elves are perceptive, but not overtly bright.
Humanoid (Elf Subtype)
Medium: As medium creatures, Green Elves have no special bonuses or penalties.
Base land speed is 30 ft
Racial +2 bonus on saves against plant poisons.
Spell-Like Abilities: A Green Elf may use the following spell-like ability once per day: Speak with Plants. If a Green Elf has a Wisdom score of 13 or higher, they may also use Pass without Trace and Plant Growth 1/day. Caster level equal to half his class levels round down, minimum 1.
Fire Weakness: Green Elves suffer from a -2 penalty to resist spells, spell-like abilities or supernatural abilities that cause fire damage. Additionally, any creature with the Fire subtype gains a +2 bonus to intimidate checks versus a Green Elf.
+2 Racial Bonus on Survival, Knowledge (Nature) and Spot checks.
Favored Class: Druid
LA: 0


Blue Elves



Created to become fishers, sailors and navigators. Known for their bluntness.

Personality

Blue Elves are known for being very.. honest. They tend to be driven, blunt and very direct. Blue Elves tend to seek out the easiest, simplest and most refreshingly direct solution to any problem. This usually involves running over anything that bothers to block their way. Unlike some of their kin, Blue Elves have no problem whatsoever with simply using weapons to solve problems.

Appearance
Blue Elves tend to be taller than the average for elves, with dark blue skin and short, cropped hair. It's common for them to be very athletic looking for an elf, essentially the closest elves ever get to being stocky and muscular.

Among Blue Elves, clan tattoos depicting familial lines are rather popular. As such, most of their clothing is cut to reveal them.

Relations

Due to the often heated arguments they have with land dwelling folks, it's rare to see a Blue Elf being welcomed or liked. Sailors and fishermen, on the other hand, often attempt to remain on friendly terms with the Blue Elves, primarily because they are awfully useful if you happen to be drowning.

Alignment

Blue Elves are very passionate and opinionated. Traditions and order among them tends to change rapidly, over the course of a few years. Most tend to chaos over order, though they show little preference between good and evil.

Lands

For the Blue Elves, the question is no so much lands as waters. Generally speaking, most of them live along the coast or in boat-houses in rivers. Rarely, you'll find a community around or on a lake or marsh. Blue Elves tend to consider any large body of water their sovereign territory. Usually, people don't bother trying to dissuade them.

Religion

Blue Elves are very devout in their worship towards Sea and Water gods, primarily because they understand how changeable the attitudes of those gods can be.

Language

Green Elves speak Elvish and Aquan, most also know Common.

Adventurers

The path of the adventurer is an easy one for the Blue Elves.



+2 Str, -2 Cha
Humanoid (Aquatic Elf)
Medium
Base land speed is 30 ft, Swim 30 ft
+2 Racial bonus on checks to avoid drowning.
Spell-Like Abilities: The Blue Elf may use the following spell-like abilities: At will: Know Direction; Create Water 1/day; If a Blue Elf has a Wisdom score of 13 or higher, they may also use Fog Cloud 1/day. Caster level is half his class levels. (Minimum 1).
Amphibious
+2 Racial Bonus on Survival, Jump and Swim checks.
Favored Class: Fighter/Warblade
LA: 0

Zale
2012-04-04, 04:40 PM
Reserved in case I somehow run out of room.

Zale
2012-04-04, 04:41 PM
Same.

Please feel free to post now, thank you.

Chess435
2012-04-04, 04:43 PM
Ten points if they can use all their colors combined to summon Captain Planet cast a prismatic spray.

Empedocles
2012-04-04, 04:47 PM
Make it so that they only get speak with plants, and if their wisdom is 13 or higher they get the other two spell-like abilities (similar to how a gnome's spell-like abilities work.). That should easily bring the LA down to 0, as opposed to being a little ambiguous (which it is now).

I like the idea :smallsmile:

Zale
2012-04-04, 04:54 PM
Make it so that they only get speak with plants, and if their wisdom is 13 or higher they get the other two spell-like abilities (similar to how a gnome's spell-like abilities work.). That should easily bring the LA down to 0, as opposed to being a little ambiguous (which it is now).

I like the idea :smallsmile:

Thanks!

That's a brilliant idea. Edited it in.

TuggyNE
2012-04-04, 05:15 PM
Yeah, Green Elves at present are very definitely LA 0.

They look pretty solid so far.

Empedocles
2012-04-04, 07:19 PM
Oh also (very nitpicky thing) you don't have to say rounded down in the spell-like abilities description. It's a basic rule that you always round down unless it specifically says not to. Just say CL is equal to 1/2 class levels (minimum 1).

togapika
2012-04-04, 11:19 PM
In a strange reversal, the heart elves (pink?) should be the most awesome...

Zale
2012-04-07, 03:41 PM
Enter the Sea Blue Elves.

I'm wondering if spell-like abilities will unbalance any of these.

SilentNight
2012-04-07, 03:56 PM
Looks interesting, are the stat bonuses in addition to the standard Elf ones or do they replace them? Looking forward to the rest.

Zale
2012-04-07, 04:02 PM
Looks interesting, are the stat bonuses in addition to the standard Elf ones or do they replace them? Looking forward to the rest.

These would be stand alone races, with none of the standard elf bonuses, penalties or traits.

Pokonic
2012-04-07, 04:09 PM
Hmm, following this idea, I would think than metellic dwarves, gem gnomes, and ferrous orcs are in order now. :smalltongue:

Grod_The_Giant
2012-04-07, 04:15 PM
Hmm, following this idea, I would think than metellic dwarves, gem gnomes, and ferrous orcs are in order now. :smalltongue:

"Ferrous" just means "iron," but agreed. The races both look pretty balanced-- the SLAs are strong, but not terribly so, and the green elves in particular have a major downside. I'd allow them in a game, no problem.

Ziegander
2012-04-07, 04:31 PM
Is it just me or is the Blue Elf way better than the Green Elf? As a +2 to Wis race, the Green Elf offers me basically nothing that I would want if I were playing a class that cares about Wisdom, such as a Cleric or a Druid. In fact, it carries a fairly stiff drawback. On the other hand, the Blue Elf grants a bonus to Strength, clearly meant for melee, and it offers an extra movement mode (faster than my normal movement), and highly useful spell-like abilities that I have no way to duplicate with my class. With no drawback.

Even looking at it objectively, compared to the Blue Elves the Green Elves offer less useful spell-likes and have a drawback. Am I looking at this wrong or missing something?

Zale
2012-04-07, 04:49 PM
Is it just me or is the Blue Elf way better than the Green Elf? As a +2 to Wis race, the Green Elf offers me basically nothing that I would want if I were playing a class that cares about Wisdom, such as a Cleric or a Druid. In fact, it carries a fairly stiff drawback. On the other hand, the Blue Elf grants a bonus to Strength, clearly meant for melee, and it offers an extra movement mode (faster than my normal movement), and highly useful spell-like abilities that I have no way to duplicate with my class. With no drawback.

Even looking at it objectively, compared to the Blue Elves the Green Elves offer less useful spell-likes and have a drawback. Am I looking at this wrong or missing something?

I was worried about that..

What would you suggest?

I was considering adding something along the lines of..

Sea-Longing: Blue Elves hate to be separated from water and the sea. For each week that they do not spend at least eight hours in the sea or some similarly large body of water, they suffer a cumulative -1 penalty on will-saves.


As well as replacing Fog Cloud with Create Water, and removing the original one. Then lowering the swim speed to 20 ft..

But, honestly, a Druid Green Elf is a Druid. They don't really need help.

However, what features could I add to benefit them?

Ziegander
2012-04-07, 05:08 PM
Well, you can't use races to nerf or buff classes. That just doesn't work on any imaginable level.

The Blue Elves actually seem pretty well balanced to me, but I would make the following adjustments: reduce swim speed to 30ft, make them amphibious by default, and remove the 1/day water-breathing from Wis 13+. That seems quite nice.

It's the Green Elves that aren't powerful enough, in my opinion, but maybe I'm in the minority. I just can't imagine ever playing this over a Human or some other +2 Wis race like Forest Gnome, Lesser Aasimar, or Venerable Dragonwrought Kobold.

Zale
2012-04-07, 05:15 PM
Well, you can't use races to nerf or buff classes. That just doesn't work on any imaginable level.


I know, I know.



The Blue Elves actually seem pretty well balanced to me, but I would make the following adjustments: reduce swim speed to 30ft, make them amphibious by default, and remove the 1/day water-breathing from Wis 13+. That seems quite nice.

It's the Green Elves that aren't powerful enough, in my opinion, but maybe I'm in the minority. I just can't imagine ever playing this over a Human or some other +2 Wis race like Forest Gnome, Lesser Aasimar, or Venerable Dragonwrought Kobold.

Perhaps I should find some way to improve the Green Elves..

Pokonic
2012-04-07, 05:24 PM
"Ferrous" just means "iron," but agreed. The races both look pretty balanced-- the SLAs are strong, but not terribly so, and the green elves in particular have a major downside. I'd allow them in a game, no problem.

There are five Ferrous dragons in one Dragon mag or another that are actualy pretty balanced. Powerful, but balanced. The better part of them are LE, so they fit nicely as opponents.

......

Scrach that, Kobalds are more fitting than orcs.