Level Up (A5E) Interest in a Heritage with Two Bodies?

[xiphumor]

I’ve been cooking up a draft for such a creature and I’m curious as to what people might want. (Working name: “Espeko” - from espejo (mirror) + echo.)

 

[Steampunkette]

While tumbling down Tiktok I actually came across a pretty amazing concept to revamp the Eladrin and make them more than "Elf, but different"

The Tiktok user, a homebrewer and writer, came up with the concept of Eladrin being born as twins, but separated. Two mothers would give birth to the Summer Eladrin and the Winter Eladrin that look almost identical. And some time after puberty they would know of each other. And know that the hunt was on.

The Winter Eladrin -always- knows which direction the Summer Eladrin is in, and is compelled to hunt down their sibling to kill them. But doesn't know how far apart they are.

The Summer Eladrin doesn't know which direction the Winter Eladrin is coming from, but knows their approximate distance to miles until their dark twin is under 1 mile away, then they know exact distances but still not direction.

If the Summer Eladrin kills the Winter, the Winter Eladrin wakes up elsewhere in the world and the hunt resumes. But if the Winter Eladrin kills the Summer Eladrin, they shift places in the cycle, with the newly minted Winter Eladrin waking up somewhere in the world and knowing which direction their twin is in.

This continues 'til one or the other is killed by other means (In which case the remaining Eladrin is freed) or they die of old age at the same day and the same time.

I thought it was pretty cool.

 

[Micah Sweet]

See, when I heard one PC with two.bodies, I immediately went to Tomax and Xamot from G.I.Joe.

 

[VenerableBede]

I'm not sure if this is the direction you're going with it, but swarm/hive mind heritages have always interested me.

 

[J.Quondam]

A pair of tag-team wrestlers who act as a single PC: only one can be active, until he slaps the hand of his partner so they can swap out.

 

[Faolyn]

I answered "sure," but it would also depend on the type of creature. I had a lot of fun playing a kyriotate the one time I played In Nomine--a single entity that could possess multiple bodies at a time--but I wouldn't enjoy playing J.Quondam's suggestion of a pair of people, only one of whom could act at a time.

 

[xiphumor]

I’m kinda going for a Dvati sort of creature. The rules would be similar to this, although not exactly:

 

[xiphumor]

I answered "sure," but it would also depend on the type of creature. I had a lot of fun playing a kyriotate the one time I played In Nomine--a single entity that could possess multiple bodies at a time--but I wouldn't enjoy playing J.Quondam's suggestion of a pair of people, only one of whom could act at a time.

My version could act simultaneously during roleplay, but during turn-based play they would share an Action, Bonus Action, and Reaction while having their own movement and object interactions. They could also split up the extra attack feature between them.

 

[Steampunkette]

That's a pretty solid way to do it, for sure. Splitting the action economy allows them to do some unique positional stuff but generally keeps them limited.

The shared HP Pool is interesting, too... though I think I'd probably split it between the two rather than giving them a shared value with the caveat that they can share hit points through physical contact. Maybe make it so that during a short or long rest they can decide who has how many hit points. That way you could have a "Tanky" one and a "Glass Cannon" for different playstyle options of the same heritage.

That would help offset the "One of them falls into a pit and the other one dies for no apparent reason" and give them the ability to maintain activity when one of the twins is at 0hp, but also makes them individually fairly frail, to encourage them to avoid staying in melee combat and to hide or take cover whenever possible.

 

[xiphumor]

That's a pretty solid way to do it, for sure. Splitting the action economy allows them to do some unique positional stuff but generally keeps them limited.

The shared HP Pool is interesting, too... though I think I'd probably split it between the two rather than giving them a shared value with the caveat that they can share hit points through physical contact. Maybe make it so that during a short or long rest they can decide who has how many hit points. That way you could have a "Tanky" one and a "Glass Cannon" for different playstyle options of the same heritage.

That would help offset the "One of them falls into a pit and the other one dies for no apparent reason" and give them the ability to maintain activity when one of the twins is at 0hp, but also makes them individually fairly frail, to encourage them to avoid staying in melee combat and to hide or take cover whenever possible.

Cool idea, but I’d like to pose a counterpoint for the sake of discussion: One of the fun things such a race could do would be to flank, or use Sanguine Knot maneuvers on themselves.

If they got a slight HP boost, this might work better. That way you could have two bodies with maybe 2/3 the HP of a normal character for their level. One body would be less likely to die that way.