#phraint

“Grasshopper” © Fabio Di Castro. Accessed at his ArtStation here

[Commissioned by @crazytrain48. Like the deodanth, the phraints are an Arduin race that, if I took all of their listed abilities, would be ridiculously powerful. So this is a decidedly PC powered version. The emotionless trait is borrowed from the android, and in general these might make good android analogues for those GMs who want to keep science fiction out of their fantasy.]

Phraint CR ½ LN Humanoid This tall, lean humanoid resembles an insect, with two arms, two legs and long antennae.

Phraints are eusocial insects with similarities to grasshoppers and stick insects. According to their lore, they are the descendents of a space-faring civilization. Phraints pride themselves on their logic and reason, but have difficulties understanding the complexities of the emotional spectrum. Their society is rigidly caste-based, with low caste members being completely sterile and blue or green in color. High caste phraints, so called nobles, are purple to red in color, and are capable of reproduction. Typically, only a single female, the queen, lays eggs in a phraint community, and she takes multiple mates to ensure variety in her offspring. Other fertile females typically defer to the queen, but some may leave to form colonies of their own or even turn on and murder their queen in order to take over. The core of phraint society is the “stick”, which refers to a clutch of eggs incubated together—sticks may be comprised of only half-siblings, but the members of each stick work, train and live in close proximity.

Phraints are technologically minded, and their settlements often feature intricate engineering projects in order to increase crop yields, produce tools and goods more efficiently and otherwise make life better. Their diet is omnivorous but mostly liquid. Alcohol has little effect on them, but some poisonous plants have intoxicating qualities to a phraint, and are used by nobles for ritual purposes. Phraint soldiers are renowned for their acrobatic, graceful fighting style, combining mobility with heavy weaponry in order to make pinpoint assaults on key weaknesses in the enemy line.

Phraints as Characters A phraint does not have racial Hit Dice, and advances by character class. A phraint character has the following racial traits

+2 Dex, +2 Int, -2 Cha Phraints are quick in both mind and body, but have a diminished sense of self. Medium size A phraint gains no bonuses and suffers no penalties due to its size Normal speed A phraint has a land speed of 30 feet. Scent +1 natural armor bonus +4 racial bonus to Acrobatics Efficient (Ex) A phraint requires only 1/3 the food and water of an ordinary Medium sized creature. Emotionless (Ex) A phraint can never gain morale bonuses and is immune to fear effects and emotion effects. They have problems processing emotions properly, and thus take a -4 penalty on Sense Motive checks. Languages A phraint begins play speaking Common and Phraint. A phraint with an Intelligence bonus may select from the following bonus languages: Dwarven, Gnoll, Gnome, Goblin, Orc, Undercommon