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Fantasy Races: Faerzon Andal
Born of eldritch tears and fey blood, faerzon andal consider themselves aristocracy of the Otherworlds, dwelling where fey world touches mortal realms.
Faerzon andal are cold in their demeanor most of the time, maintaining distanced and blase dignity of an ageless aristocrat, but can occasional show great passion when roused by extreme anger, insult, lust, or desire for vengeance. They are used to living in luxuries provided by their numerous servants, but at the same time they have less base needs, withstanding natural cold and heat with ease. They keep to themselves in their timeless realms but they occasionally fall for a mortal paramour. They profess loyalty to mythical sovereigns of their race, but scheme among themselves vying for position, favors, and fancy titles.
Physical Description: Faerzon andal are anthropomorphic in shape, though taller than humans, lithe and beautiful, often described as elf-like, with horns of various shapes adorning their brows — some faerzon andal have curled ram-like horns, others have longer horns like a deer's, or small thick stubs resembling calf ones. Despite their threatening appearance, faerzon horns are usually too soft and delicate to be used as a natural weapon. Their legs are animalistic too, resembling legs of deer, goat, or other hoofed animals, covered with a delicate fur and ending with an actual hoof. Their skin varies in color, ranging from pale ivory, through various shades of tan, into mahogany and deep browns. Their hair are usually raven-black, green-black, various shades of red, or silvery, and their eyes are emerald, sapphire, amber, or amethyst. Some males may grow goatees, though their beards never extend to checks.
While faerzon andal horns are too delicate to be used as weapons, they also regrow easily, often being used by faerzon to fashion trinkets of affection, magic items, or to carve them into seeds. Another notable thing is that faerzon horns can go through significant changes across their lives, altering their shape while regrowing or going through significant change of status or outlook.
When faerzon andal are close to death, their flesh hardens starting to resemble ivory, hardwood, or soft stone, with corpses of deceased and those who went into endless sleep after passing their allotted lifetime of five centuries turning into statues, slowly weathered by time until they erode into dust a millennium or two later.
Society: Faerzon andal consider themselves fey gentry, and live as such in realms where they play roles of aristocracy attended by their own stunted spawn and lesser fey. Each faerzon andal realm is headed by a single faerzon sovereign, though their actual participation in government varies — some sovereigns are despotic tyrants managing every aspect of life in their dominion, others are affable royals that follow the council of their favorites, while some are merely spiritual presence, distant from the affairs of their subjects. What links all the faerzon sovereigns is their power to bless the seed of faerzon andal letting it grow into a full-blooded faerzon andal instead of a stunted mignon.
Majority of the faerzon andal is divided into courtiers—who dwell close to their sovereigns, forming complex courts rife with intrigue, and vassals, who oversee the land and infrastructure further from courts, usually more focused on military matters, though often participating in intrigues from afar. Nominally all faerzon andal can retract their loyalty and move from one court to another and from one realm to another, though it requires learning the power structures and rebuilding social network from scratch, and might leave bad feelings from members of abandoned group.
A few faerzon andal are freeholders, keeping their own independent demesnes without the full mythical might of a faerzon sovereign. Unlike true sovereigns, they are empowered to bless a single seed in their lifetime only, giving life to the heir of their demesne. Without the ability to bless many seeds they are less likely to attract faerzon vassals of their own, either living solitary lives, served by their mignons, or forming small courts out of minor fey and humanoids.
Invariably, all faerzon andal settlements and realms rely on work of others to sustain their economic needs, mostly the mignons, but also servants, serfs, slaves, and hired workers from other races, preferably those having some connection to fey.
Relations: Faerzon andal prefer to maintain distance of mortal races, having some occasional alliance of convenience with elves. They trade with dwarves and hire their artisans and builders, to supplement meager engineering skills of their mignons. They often expect therigens and small races such as gnomes, halflings, and goblins to be servants and pay them little respect or attention. Troldhrym are sometimes allies and sometimes foes to be repelled or raided.
Alignment And Religion: Pride and sense of superior birthright are defining faerzon andal traits, they revere their sovereigns as lifegivers, and don't care about afterlife, well knowing they will exist in timeless reverie of their petrified bodies for centuries, until they fade away into dust and nothingness. Faerzon also lack much in the field of compassion, being cold, often borderline callous and merciless, and yet passionate on a whim. Even those of them who are good, act that way because of their individual sense of nobility and propriety rather than empathy.
In addition to their semidivine sovereigns, faerzon andal hold a group of eldritch fey powers known as Coldness, Sorrow, Vanity, and Vengeance in reverence, considering them their mythical role models, and possibly progenitors or at least legendary early members of their race.
Adventurers: Each faerzon andal is the hero of a story in their own mind. Many faerzon andal participate in local adventures pertaining to their realms affairs, hunting monsters and intriguing, and each is expected to hone skills in blade, words, or magic above and beyond capabilities of mortal commoners, but only a few become full time adventurers. Those who do, often follow a narrow path between being a hero and a villain, with their penchant for callousness, wild passion, and cruel vengeance. Bloodragers, slayers, and casters of various sorts are the most popular paths for faerzon adventurers.
Names: Faerzon andal have long and complex names, including many epithets and titles. Faerzon andal that lack title related to their sovereign often include Seed Of... to indicate the sovereign who blessed their existence. Sovereigns and their champions lack first name whatsoever and are only known by their titles and epithets.
Sample Names: Enseylos Red Spear Worm-Slayer; The Vines-Grown Throne, The Leaves On Autumn Wind, Queen Of Thrice Tied Serpent.
Faerzon Andal Racial Traits
Ability Scores: +2 Strength, +2 Charisma, –2 Constitution. Faerzon andal lithe bodies are surprisingly strong, matching their focused will, but they are not built for endurance and durability.
Type: Faerzon andal are fey.
Normal Speed: Faerzon andal have land speed of 30 feet.
Low-Light Vision: In dim light, faerzon andal can see twice as far as humans.
Fey Agelessness: Faerzon andal don't age like mortals, remaining active for five hundred years before falling into a state of dormancy and slowly turning into a statue of oneself while in a deep sleep-like state until their bodies crumble away to dust centuries later. They ignore any magical effect that would age them.
Fey Magic (Sp): Faerzon andal can use prestidigitation three times per day.
Inured To Elements: Faerzon andal are far above mere mortals when facing harshness of nature. They can exist comfortably between –50 and 140 degree Fahrenheit without having to make Fortitude saves.
Ivory Repose: Dying faerzon andal's flesh hardens starting to resemble ivory or mahogany. A faerzon andals gain hardness rating equal to the negative value of their hit points.
Mignon Retinue: Faerzon andal can keep a retinue of their misbegotten spawn, grown from seeds that weren't blessed by a faerzon sovereign, having up to 2 + Charisma bonus mignons at their services at any one time.
Right Of Way (Sp): Faerzon andal are rightful denizens of the fey Otherworld and can sense presence of gate, rifts, and passages between that realm and the world of mortals. With a round of concentration, faerzon andal can locate nearest such connection as if using locate object spell. By extending the concentration to a full minute, they can sense the general direction toward the nearest such connection within 1 mile, and after 10 minutes of concentration, within 100 miles. After reaching 10th level, faerzon andal can use fey road (works like shadow walk, except uses border of the fey otherworld to skirt the distance and can be used only in forests, hills, mountains, or at crossroads) once per day.
Language: Faerzon andal begin play speaking Common and Sylvan, though they speak a very characteristic courtly dialect with distinct accent. Faerzon andal with high Intelligence scores can choose from the following languages as well: Aklo, Draconic, Elven, Giant, and Gnome.
Faerzon Andal Alternate Racial Traits
Some faerzon andal have slightly different racial abilities.
Barren: Some faerzon andal lack even the smallest spark of creative power without their sovereign's blessing, unable to grow mignons from their seeds. Such lone spirits often grow to be master hunters living off the land instead of relying on their mignons' work and gain +2 racial bonus to Survival checks and single Craft or Profession skill of their choice. This ability replaces mignon retinue.
Otherworldly Exile (Ex and Sp): Some faerzon andal are severed from the otherworlds, denied link to their fey heritage. They gain +4 racial bonus to saving throws against teleportation effects and can use detect fey (as detect animals and plants but detect fey creatures) three times per day. This ability replaces right of way.
Faerzon Sovereigns, Seeds, And Mignons
Faerzon sovereigns are mythic beings, bound to their realms but also wielding great power over them—controlling weather, animals, paths, and boundaries of the land itself. In addition to their varied powers, all sovereigns can bless a faerzon seed allowing it to grow into a full-blooded faerzon andal instead of spawning a lowly mignon. When a faerzon sovereign dies, their power passes to a designated heir, or passes back to the land itself if there is no heir, marking the decline of the orphaned realm until a faerzon andal of great will performs a mythic deed to reclaim the dormant sovereign power.
Faerzon seeds are tokens carved by an individual faerzon andal out of wood, bone, stone, or horn and anointed with their own blood or other bodily fluids. Faerzon andal often use pieces of their own horns (which regrow within months) to carve such tokens. Faerzon lovers often mix their blood and their saliva to anoint the seed. Once prepared, the token has to be planted, usually in royal gardens or parks of their realms, though it is not necessary. If the land is fertile, a small tree or a menhir grows out of the seed after a few weeks. If the seed or the place where it was planted was blessed by a faerzon sovereign, the tree or stone will grow for a season and then will crack or splinter in the presence of the sovereign or the parents, revealing a young faerzon andal within, blood-tied as a child to anyone who donated fluids used to anoint the seed.
If the seed isn't blessed prior to planting or within the first week or so afterwards, the tree or stone is much smaller, and splits open after around a month, revealing a full grown mignon, ready to serve faerzon andal who grew it. Each mignon is a Tiny fey creature with 2 hit points AC 11, 20 feet speed, ability scores of 8, and +0 bonus in Craft and Profession skills relevant to their service to their faerzon progenitors. They are completely incapable of fight cowering in threatening situations. They are particularly talented in making feycrafted items of various sorts, and performing daily services for their progenitors, using materials such as leaves, cobwebs, moonlight, morning dew and other mystical materials, which remain of utility only when worn or carried by fey beings, falling apart when unattended and touched by mortals. Mignons gain +10 insight bonus to Craft and Profession checks while producing such items, and can finish their creation withing one night for most items, with the check result determining quality of the created goods.
Favored Class Options
Faerzon andal can select following options as their favored class bonuses.
Bloodrager: Gain 1/2 point of hardness while bloodraging.
Bard: Add 1 to the maximum number of loyal mignons.
Commander: Add 1 to the maximum number of loyal mignons.
Metamorph: +2 to Constitution when determining the negative hit points at which death occurs.
Oracle: Add 1/4 of a druid spell with a level up to one spell level lower than the current highest spell level available to spells list and spells known.
Slayer: Increase speed by 1 feet (this has actual effect in combat every five levels).
Sorcerer: Add 1/4 of a druid spell with a level up to one spell level lower than the current highest spell level available to spells list and spells known.
Summoner: +1/4 enhancement bonus to natural weapon attack and damage rolls of creatures summoned with summon monster spell-like ability.
