Planetouched Madness!

[I'm A Banana]

Now that we've done the outer planar critters, let's not forget our inner planar buddies, eh?

It's time for the Air Genasi!

"Air-Touched" Template
For those who can trace some ancestry to the lords of the air, or who have been exposed to powerful energies of wind. For these creatures, this template was made. Apply this to the base race, and only change the following:

* Type changes to Outsider (Air, Native). Their old type and subtypes are removed. This grants them Darkvision with a range of 60 ft.
* +2 Dexterity, +2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. Air-touched creatures are agile both physically and mentally but tend to rush in and have trouble relating to fleshy beasts.
* Racial bonus on saves vs. Air: +1/5 lvs. Air-touched creatures resist the aerial attacks of their foes much better.
* The spell-like ability of Levitate once per day, as a sorcerer of their hit dice, +1 level.
* Breathless. Air-touched creatures need not breathe.
* Level Adjustment +2. This is in addition to the level adjustment of the base creature.
* Fighter class favored. Air-touched creatures tend to be Dexterity based fighters.


"High" Air Genasi
Those closer to the windlords who spawned them have correspondingly stronger bloodlines. They are sometimes referred to as the "High Dukes."

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Dexterity, +2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, +2 Charisma. Alluring, exotic, agile, and clever, the High Dukes suffer only from an impetuous nature.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air effects. High dukes can overcome their own element easily.
* The ability to cast Fly once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice, on themselves only. They revel in the unfettered life.
* Level Adjustment +2
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Sorcerer. Most High Air Genasi specialize in wind-related effects and transportations.


"Low" Air Genasi
More distant, the low air genasi are those who have only remedial showings of their elemental blood. They are sometimes referred to as the "Lesser Dukes."

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Dexterity, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. The low dukes suffer the emotionlessness and overeagerness of other air genasi, but still have the typical agility.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air effects. Air genasi can overcome their own element easily.
* The ability to cast Feather Fall once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice, on themselves only. Lesser dukes can still drift in the currents.
* Level Adjustment +0
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Fighter. Low genasi frequently prefer ranged attacks such as thrown weapons and projectiles.


"Sonic" Air Genasi
These air genasi are strong in the way that air carries the wafting waves of sound, descended from the musical birds and other creatures of song. They are sometimes referred to as the "Sound Dukes."

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Dexterity, -2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, +2 Charisma. Lyrical and agile, sonic genasi suffer from an absent mind and an overeagerness that often leads them into trouble.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air and Sonic effects. Song dukes are masters of their own elements.
* The ability to cast Sound Burst once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice, on themselves only. They can evoke a cacophony at will.
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Bard. Sound dukes have an ear for the natural music in the world.


"Void" Air Genasi
Something of a perversion amongst the air genasi, these black sheep of the family (called "Vacuum Dukes") are intimidating creatures of blackness, silence, and negation.

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Constitution, +2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. Dark and absentminded, vacuum dukes still benefit from the mental agility of their kin, and also have amazing resilience in comparison.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air effects. Vacuum dukes negate the energetic breeze.
* The ability to cast Silence once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice. They can still the air with their very presence.
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Fighter. Vacuum dukes specialize in defensive and negation as a fighting art.


"Ice" Air Genasi
Cold creatures of white and blue, touched by the frosty wind and blown snow, these "Frost Dukes" are creatures born of hardship, epitomizing the harsh and uncaring nature of winter itself.

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Constitution, +2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. Brutish and jumpy, frost dukes are amazingly resilient and still quit mentally agile.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air and Cold effects. Frost dukes can resist their own elements well.
* The ability to cast Icy Arrow once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice. This works exactly like Acid Arrow except that it deals cold damage instead of acid damage.
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Barbarian. Just below the crisp exterior is a blizzard waiting to be unleashed.


"Lighting" Air Genasi
Hyperactive and desensitized, these "Bolt Dukes," descended from creatures of pure electrical energy, and show it in their quick actions, their flickering eyes, and their constant static buildup.

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Dexterity, -2 Intelligence, +2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. As distant, blank, and agile as most genasi, bolt dukes also suffer from a constantly agitated mind that increases their perception, though it decreases their retention.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air and Electricity effects. Bolt dukes are hard to harm with their own being.
* The ability to cast Shocking Arrow once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice. This is just like Acid Arrow, except it deals electricity damage instead of acid damage.
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Monk. Liberating themselves from flesh and channeling their speed, bolt dukes are attracted to the rigors of monastic life like lightning to a rod.


"Windy" Air Genasi
Whereas most air genasi have the breeze and the cloud, these "Windstorm Dukes" have pure tornadic energy ripping through them at all times. They usually have gray skin, faraway looks, and move with a singleminded determination.

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Dexterity, -2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. Windstorm dukes are agile, but are savage, single-minded, and quite unable to relate to petty fleshy concerns.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air effects. What does a zephyr do to the hurricane?
* The ability to cast Gust of Wind once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice. When they wish, their storm flies from their own flesh.
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Fighter. The spinning dance of whirlwind attacks are the prefered style of the windstorm dukes.


"Vaporous" Air Genasi
Creatures of the mist and morning dew, "Cloud Dukes" are more concerned with nimbus, cumulous, and cirrus than with gusts and blusters. They are pale white to deep gray or blue, and are often slightly damp to the touch.

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Dexterity, -2 Intelligence, +2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. Though often airheaded and emotionally distant, cloud dukes are perceptive and very fluid.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air effects. They can drift and move with the stirring winds.
* The ability to cast Fog Cloud once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice. They can ooze with their very substance, if needed.
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Rogue. Cloud dukes enjoy versatility and manipulation.


"Solar" Air Genasi
Of sunlight and radience, "bright dukes" shimmer with a radience that discloses the sky and all in it. They are often yellow, golden, or pink in color, with calm demeanors.

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Constitution, -2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, +2 Charisma. Brilliant with radience, and with the durability of a desert day, bright dukes are still open to suggestion, and rarely think things through.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air effects. Bright dukes are not subject to weather.
* The ability to cast Daylight once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice. Their inner radience shimmers forth.
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Fighter. Bright dukes prefer big metal weapons that catch the glint of the sunlight when they strike.


"Airy" Air Genasi
As invisible as the hand of an autumn gust through the falling leaves, these "unseen dukes" are nearly transparent, with extreme calmness but a stubtle stirring of air around them at all times.

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Dexterity, +2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. Unseen dukes have the graze of a zephyr, and miraculous mental agility to match, but are slightly absentminded and throughly alien.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air effects. Unseen dukes are of the very same thing.
* The ability to cast Invisibility once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice. At once, they can become like air itself.
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Rogue. Unseen dukes enjoy being unnoticed, until they choose to be.


"Feathered" Air Genasi
Creatures of the residents of the air, the birds, these "plumed dukes" are less of the air itself, and more of the masters of the air, with brilliant feathers of all shades and elongated fingers.

* Medium Sized. Base speed 30.
* Outsider (Air, Native). This grants them darkvision with a 60 ft. range.
* +2 Dexterity, -2 Constitution, +2 Charisma. Beautiful and agile, plumed dukes are nonetheless quite fragile, due to hollow bones.
* Racial save bonus of +1/5 levels against Air effects. Plumed dukes ride the wind, and dominate it.
* The ability to cast Animal Friendship once per day as a sorcerer of their hit dice. This only affects avian creatures (birds and bird-like animals).
* Level Adjustment +1
* Breathless. Air Genasi need not breathe.
* Favored class: Bard. Plumed dukes may take up dance and whistling as their artform of choice.

 

[Li Shenron]

Your ideas are very nice to read, so forgive me if I dare to ask you...

Why instead of having so many different planetouched you don't just gather all the specials you think they would suit for example the Good planetouched, and create a pool of them? Then the DM should just roll on a few tables to determine how the NPC planetouched looks like, while a player could have the permission to choose what he wants instead of rolling.

Just as an example... all your Good planetouched (except the "high" one) have the following:

1) a net +2 or +4 in abilities (in one of the following forms: +2 in one / +4 in one / +2 in two / +2 in two and -2 in one); the +2 appears in all 6, the -2 only in Str and Cha

2) energy resistance 5 in up to 4 different energy types

3) one spell-like ability 1/day

4) a couple of +2 or a single +4 racial skill bonuses

What about replacing, or better "generalizing" all your single templates into something like this (ok, this is extremely draft! you figure out what you feel it would be appropriate for your planetouched):

-------------------------------------------
All Good planetouched get the following:
- a +2 to one ability or a +2 to two abilities and a -2 to another
- two energy resitances 5
- a spell-like ability 1/day equivalent to a Cleric spell of up to 1st level
- two +2 racial bonus to skills or +4 to one
- Outsider type (Good) with darkvision etc...
- an extra bonus rolled on the following table:

Table 0 - Extra bonus
---------------------
25% a further +2 in one ability
50% two extra energy resistances
25% the spell-like ability could be up to level 3rd

Then use the following tables to determine the specific bonuses:

Table 1a - Ability bonus (if you roll twice, stack the bonus)
----------------------
20% Strength
5% Dexterity
10% Constitution
5% Intelligence
40% Wisdom
20% Charisma

Table 1b - Ability penalty
------------------------
50% Strength
50% Charisma

Table 2 - Energy Resistances (reroll duplicates)
------------------------
30% Acid
30% Electricity
20% Cold
15% Fire
5% Sonic

Table 3 - Spell-like ability
------------------------
80% Light
20% Cure Light Wounds
------------------------
20% Shield Other
30% Daylight
20% Zone of Truth
10% Searing Light
10% Clairaudience/Clairvoyance
10% Suggestion

Table 4 - Skill bonuses
----------------------
30% Listen +2, Spot +2
30% Diplomacy +2, Intimidate +2
10% Craft (any) +2, Perform (any) +2
20% Sense Motive +4
10% Heal +4


Obviously the above are terrible examples, but it is just to show you what I mean, ok? You could then write different tables for every type of planetouched you want, for example the spell-like abilities for Tiefling could include Darkness, Inlight Light Wounds, Tasha's Hideous Laughter and so on... while the ability tables may let you have the bonus in everything but the penalty only in Charisma, Wisdom and Strength for example...

Clearly, it would be quite impossible to cover all your variants, and then you also have to check the balance for that ECL.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Biggest reason is because I think they go better in themed collections that relate somehow to history and form better than in random tables. Though the tables would have that certain Planewalker's Handbook Tiefling Tables feel. Still, I'd rather have the player choose a specific type, with a descent and personality and such already ingrained (and as a player, that'd be better than just randomly assigning abilities).

There's no real problem with the tables, since the variants presented basically work under the same basic formula for everything. But with nine examples, plus high and low and template, I think that a good feel for how to make your own variants is presented. So if someone really got inspired by a certain type of celestial, say, in Anger of Angels, they could design a planetouched to reflect an affinity with that kind of celestial, with a bunch of good equals to weigh it's powers and abilities against.

Personally, if I'd roll for anything, it'd be the minor physical and mental quirks, since those are a bit more fun to randomly generate, and won't impact the effectiveness of my character at all, and can come from the concept first.

Your way gets the thumbs-up from me, though.

 

[Li Shenron]

Yes I meant that the tables must be rolled by the DM in case he wants to quickly create an encountered planetouched, but NOT by the players or if the DM has specific idea! As a DM, I even rarely use the DMG tables by rolling, I look at them only to get how common or rare an option is and then choose by myself.

The idea of tables was just to try and give a general pattern for all your specific templates, to make it easy to create new ones. If all was rolled, you would probably end up often with creatures whose features may make little sense together...

 

[I'm A Banana]

Works well for me!

 

[I'm A Banana]

Ain't this thread a blast from the past, eh?

This is just to announce that if you combine this thread with the stuff I posed in my new Planescape 3.5 Section, in Stuff, Etc., you have my complete collection of Planetouched Madness.

So....you won't be seeing another update (from me) in this thread, but keep an eye on that site for the Aasimar, Tiefling, Zenythri, Chaond, and Nil updates to 3.5 (they're minor), and for anything else pretaining to planar folk that may pop up there.

 

[the Lorax]

Combined Planetouched

I had been working on this a bit for my homebrew campaign, and was thinking about getting feedback from here, much to my chagrin, there was already a thread dedicated to it, so I thought I'd add in the work that I had done. I am encourageing feed back on this one, its still a bit of a work in progress, I can tell you I haven't looked over it for balance issues, heck, that's why I'm posting it, so I can get some balance feedback. Part of my goal was to create a template Template, a base upon which to build a Template factory for planetouched.

PLANETOUCHED, Template
Planetouched is a general term used to describe someone who can trace his bloodline back to an outsider, often a creature with an elemental background, a fiend or a celestial. The effects of having a supernatural being in one’s heritage last for many generations.

Although not as dramatically altered as a half-celestial or a half-fiend, planetouched still retain some special qualities. The planetouched varieties described below are variants and ment to exixt along with Aasimars, tieflings and the like. The base template will be provided, then the variations will be presented.

Planetouched
Planetouched is a template that can be added to any corporeal creature with an Intelligence score of 4 or more,(referred to hereafter as the "base creature"). It uses all the base creature’s statistics and special abilities except as noted here.

Special Attacks: A planetouched retains all the special attacks of the base creature and also gains the supernatural ability to use one first level spell from a clerical domain that relates to the planetouched (alignment- or element-based) once per day as the spell.
Special Qualities: A planetouched has all the special qualities of the base creature, plus low-light vision.
Base Saves: Same as the base creature.
Abilities: Increase from the base creature as listed under each type.
Skills: A planetouched has 8 skill points, plus its Intelligence modifier, per Hit Die. Treat skills from the base creature’s list as class skills and other skills as cross-class. If the creature has a class, it gains skills for class levels normally.
Feats: Same as the base creature, planetouched have one feat for every four levels as normal.
Climate/Terrain: Same as either the base creature or planar locations.
Organization: Same as the base creature.
Challenge Rating: Same as the base creature +1
Alignment: Any, often same as the base creature.
Treasure: Same as the base creature.
Advancement: Same as the base creature.
Level Adjustment: +1

Sub-types include:

Good
Special Qualities: Resistance to resistance to acid 5, cold 5, +1 to all saves vs. spells and abilities with the [evil] descriptor
Abilities: +2 Wisdom, +2 Charisma.

Lawful
Special Qualities: Resistance to resistance to acid 5, fire 5, +1 to all saves vs. spells and abilities with the [Chaotic] descriptor
Abilities: +2 Constitution, +2 Charisma.

Evil
Special Qualities: Resistance to resistance to fire 5, electricity 5, +1 to all saves vs. spells and abilities with the [good] descriptor
Abilities: +2 Dexterity, +2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom.

Chaotic
Special Qualities: Resistance to resistance to sonic 5, electricity 5, +1 to all saves vs. spells and abilities with the [lawful] descriptor
Abilities: +2 Strength, +2 Charisma, -2 Wisdom.

Fire
Special Qualities: Resistance to resistance to fire 10, +1 to all saves vs. spells and abilities with the [fire] descriptor
Abilities: +2 Dexterity, +2 Charisma.

Water
Special Qualities: Resistance to resistance to cold 10, +1 to all saves vs. spells and abilities with the [water or cold] descriptor
Abilities: +2 Constitution, +2 Wisdom.

Air
Special Qualities: Resistance to resistance to electricity 10, +1 to all saves vs. spells and abilities with the [air or electricity] descriptor
Abilities: +2 Dexterity, +2 Intellegence, -2 Wisdom.

Earth
Special Qualities: Resistance to resistance to acid 10, +1 to all saves vs. spells and abilities with the [acid or earth] descriptor
Abilities: +2 Strength.