Race Sirian (marsupial race for sci-fantasy)

[Fragsie]

Sirian
A diciplined and focused, psionic people from a caste system that develops a persons idividual nature.

Racial Traits
Average Height: 5'10" - 7'
Average Weight: 150 - 250 lb
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Ability Scores: +2 Constitution
Size: Medium
Speed: 6
Vision: Normal
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Languages: Siran, InGal
Skill Bonuses: +2 Insight

Natural Telepath All Sirians are passive telepaths; you are able to transmit your concious thoughts into the mind of another creature within 10 squares. The creature must share a language with the you to understand fully, If there isn't a shared language you can only communicate basic emotions or concepts such as hunger, fear, pain or hot etc.

Caste Family As a Sirian; when you reached the age of passing (10 years) you left the care of your blood-parents and were adopted into the caste, or Mensura (trans: family), that would best develop your mind, body and spirit to reach your full potential. Choose one mensura nature: Great, Fire, Loneliness or Blessed. Your choice represents both your characters innate potential and your education and training in early life. Each mensura nature offers particular benefits and may provide an associated power.

Great Families:
Ability Scores: +2 Charisma
Skill Bonuses: +2 Diplomacy
Great Purpose: Sirians of the Great families speak for the whole of the sirian people, as such they are trained to resist outside influence while their natural authority allows them to manipulate others effortlessly. You have resist psychic 2 + one-half your level, and you can use voice of authority as an encounter power.

Voice of Authority

Voice of Authority Sirian (Great) Racial Power
Empowered by the authority of your caste, with a single word you imprint the command to halt into the mind of your foe.
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Encounter ✦ Psionic, Charm, Psychic
Standard Action Melee or Ranged 5
Target: One creature who can hear you.
Attack: Charisma +2 vs. Will
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Hit: Constitution modifier psychic damage
Effect: Target is dazed until the end of your next turn.

Families of Fire
Ability Scores: +2 Strength
Skill Bonuses: +2 Intimidate
Efirn Weapon Proficiency: You gain proficiency with the glaive.
Efirn Resilience: Once per day you can use your second wind as a minor action instead of a standard action.
Battle Trance: You can use battle trance as an encounter power.

Battle Trance

Battle Trance Sirian (Fire) Racial Power
Through ritual motions your mind and body focus entirely on the battle at hand, allowing you to avoid foes attacks, and strike where you will do the most damage.
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Encounter ✦ Martial Standard Action Personal
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Special: You must be bloodied to use this power.
Effect: Until the end of the encounter or until rendered unconscious, you gain a +1 racial bonus to attacks or AC and Reflex defense.

Families of Loneliness
Ability Scores: +2 Intelligence
Skill Bonuses: +2 Engineering, +2 Exploration (dungeoneering)
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Families of the Blessed
Ability Scores: +2 Wisdom
Skill Bonuses: +2 Psychic (arcana) or +2 Religion (see monastic education)
Blessed Reflexes: you gain a +1 racial bonus to your Reflex defence.
Trance: Rather than sleep, Blessed sirians enter a meditative state known as trance. You need to spend 4 hours in this state to gain the same benefits other species gain from taking a 6-hour extended rest. While in a trance, you are fully aware of your surroundings and notice approaching enemies and other events as normal.
Monastic Education: At first level, you choose an at-will power from a class different than yours with the Divine or Psyonic power source. You can use that power as an encounter power. Your choice determines the skill bonus that you recieve.

Creatures of the mind; Sirians are all telepaths and many of their number are powerful psions. Their caste-based society is founded around an individuals personality and mental abilities. As a species they are often said to be overly emotional. Because of this tendancy to feel emotions to the extreme they have a sordid ancient history full of bloody wars and insane rulers. On the brink of destroying themselves, a more ritualistic lifestyle, and a caste system designed to focus and develop their emotions in a less destructive way was introduced almost 900 years ago. Now, Sirians are a focused and driven people who's lives are structured by rituals that govern all things, from the ceremony of greeting to the rites of war. Their telepathic abilities make them formidable diplomats and a force to be rekoned with in intergalactic politics, while their anger and dicipline makes their armies a force to fear.

Caste Descriptions

Mensura A'gren (trans: the Great families): Those who are predisposed to the ways of leadership, politics and logical thought are adopted into the great families, whose upper ranks include all the politicians and public speakers of the sirian people. From the Alliance leaders in the Emerald Palace on Nay’Li to village councillors on the outer colonies of the Alliance, all the roles that require diplomacy, leadership or tact are filled my members of this Mensura including people who provide public services, merchants and traders and other less involved social roles. The great families (of which there are 6) rotate the rule of the government; the leading 200 members of each family take the role of the council, shifting from family to family every 50 years. At their inauguration, these 200 sirians will fill the ‘Chamber of Voices’ within the Emerald Palace on the homeworld. Once there, they enter a psychic trance that allows them to meld their thoughts and knowledge into a geshtalt hive mind. In this combined state the 200 will administer the government of the Sirian Alliance through one Sirian chosen at random from the entire race; being chosen as the ‘A’erspe’ (trans: speaker) is considered a great honour, those who are or have been the A’erspe are treated with great respect.

Mensura Efirn (Families of Fire): Those who's mind is geared toward strategic, tactical thought, or have violent tendancies, are mentality unable to control their extreme emotions, are placed within the Families of Fire (of which there are only 5). The majority of this caste makes up the Sirians military and policing forces, as well as private security and other roles that require a bit of muscle or war-craft. As a child is raised in this caste, they are taught to harness the power of their emotions, to utilise them within the art of warfare and combat. Their training teaches them to control their own vital systems (e.g. endocrine, cardio/vascular, and nervous) to enhance their abilities on the battlefield, making them fearsome, focused warriors. The Mensura Efirn are also responsible for the design, construction and maintenance of the Alliances navy.

Mensura Elisonn (trans: Families of loneliness): Sirians that have minds capable of deep analytical thought, with a philosophical or scientific nature, artisans and architects, are all adopted into the families of loneliness. Though this caste has many roles within Sirian society their main responsibilities lie within the realm of science. Unlike the other castes, the Mensura Elisonn are primarily divided by role rather than simply by number. The first family is devoted to the arts. The second family concentrates on theoretical science and philosophy. The third (often referred to as Esin’erren, Trans: tree-singers) are responsible for architecture and construction/creation of artificial buildings and, via psionic abilities, encouraging the rapid growth of nature (e.g. trees, rocks etc) into desired forms to create buildings. The fourth has the duty of applying theory to practice, innovating and creating new technologies. The fifth and sixth families both live in space, claiming no link to any stable colony or system; instead they travel where they are needed in small fleets under the guidance of huge vessels called Vellise’ran (Trans: travel-stars) that serve as their homes; giant mobile colonies. The fifth family travels through space conducting research into spatial phenomenon and the theories/technologies developed by their fellow caste cousins. The sixth and final Family has perhaps one of the most important responsibilities within the Alliance; it is their role to explore and discover new systems and planetoids for colonisation, to conduct the necessary tests, and finally to begin the siranising (a process akin to terraforming, with the addition of a concentrated psionic influence upon any existent ecosystem to gradually intergrate it with the sirian way of life), until the new colonists arrive.

Mensura Se'blen (trans: Families of the Blessed): Those who find themselves gifted by God(s); able to see the hidden ways of the universe clearly, the devout and Sirians who’s understanding of the spirit world and other realms is so clear that they may influence and control the spiritual elements are fostered into the Mensura Se'blen. Within each Family there are a few high priests that have undergone a lonely pilgrimage on the sacred moon of Onehr Zar (Sirianus IIb) where they have had the opportunity to commune directly to Zari (God / the universe) and afterwards are much wiser (and usually more cryptic), and can call on Zari to give much more powerful spiritual sources and often very powerful, rare psionic powers. Each family also has a militant branch; though they often work closely with the Families of Fire, they do so for the interests of their own caste. These warrior priests are taught the art of combat differently, focussing on their psionic abilities and psionically controlled/charged weaponry, or wield the will of Zari through powerful battle prayers.

Physical Qualities
Sirians are generally taller than humans, standing on average 6'5", they are slim and often very toned, the strongest of them have dense muscles rather than large ones. Due to the high copper content of their homeworlds ecosystem their skin tone ranges from a pale pastel green through to deep forest green in colour, their eyes are most often yellow but red and orange tones are sometimes seen. They have pointed ears and a cranial bone-plate that helps to protect the psionic areas of their brains. Their hair is naturally straight and almost always black in colour, they do not grow facial hair and have very little body hair. As marsupials, the fmale of the species has a pouch that stretches across the lower back, a sirians umbilical scar is located at the top of their chest father than their belly. A Sirian child often spends the first two years of its life within its mothers pouch, only exiting to feed. At the age of 2-3 the child is raised by its blood parents until the age of passing (usually 10 years), when the child undergoes a series of ritual psionic screenings that dictate which caste they will belong to. When this is descided, the adolescant is adopted by an appropriate couple within the determined caste, usually these adoptive parents have a much larger role in the child's life than the blood-parents.

Sirian Characteristics: Aethetic, deliberate, driven, focused, insightful, ritualistic, spiritual.

Feats

Heritage of the Seer
Tier: Heroic
Prerequisites: Sirian: Families of the Blessed, Navigator, Temporal Influence class feature.
Benefit: You grant allies within 10 squares of you a +2 racial bonus to initiative.

[Fragsie]

Reserved for...

The Sirian Alliance

[the Jester]

A couple things.

Battle Trance seems overpowered to me. You get quite a bit out of it, especially since you're also getting your second wind as a minor action. Same with monastic education- given the other benefits that you're getting, I think it's too much. It kind of seems like you're mixing and matching other race's benefits in here, but without looking at how good the package deal is rather than the individual ability is.

Also, PLEASE drop the term PEACH. It's not like the WotC boards over here; we examine and critique everything honestly.

[Fragsie]

I know this race isn't balamced yet, i've had it up on WotC forums for a while and not had any feedback on the mechanics, i just put in off the cuff powers that represent what i want the caste to be like. I kinda expected that the families of fire had it a bit too easy. The monastic education i've been meaning to change for a while; it was (mis)copied from the half-elf dilletant ability.
Do you have any suggestions for the families of loneliness abilities? I'm a bit stumped and i don't want them to be too similar to the Mobal race.

[Fragsie]

Originally Posted by the Jester

A couple things.

Battle Trance seems overpowered to me. You get quite a bit out of it, especially since you're also getting your second wind as a minor action. Same with monastic education- given the other benefits that you're getting, I think it's too much. It kind of seems like you're mixing and matching other race's benefits in here, but without looking at how good the package deal is rather than the individual ability is.

Battle trance: I've added an 'or' into the power to drop it a little, but i don't think it's as powerful as all that. It was balanced on the Shifter racial abilities from the MM, but is a standard action rather than a minor. True, i probably hadn't thought about how much of an advantage it would be to use second wind as a minor.

Monastic education: I've re-written this to behave as the halfelfs dilletantte ability, do you think this is well balanced now?

[Fragsie]

Bump!