TENGU custom classes!

UPDATED with correct XP math and more flavorful names for the classes - now named Nestkeeper, Aerie Guardian, and Syrinx (for bladedancer, assassin, and bard analogues, respectively). Also, I switched out Illusion Resistance for BARGAINING to make the syrinx more like the venturer.

Here’s my homebrew flavor for the Tengu as a race:

Tengu are crow-like humanoids covered in soft black feathers, with long beaks and clawed fingers. They were once, like goblins, nomadic scavengers with a large diaspora in the cities of other races. However, tengu culture is currently nowhere near as stigmatized as goblin culture, for a number of reasons, and tengu are often comfortable in their lives as city-dwellers.

Part of the reason for the relatively high social status of the tengu diaspora is their natural affinity for learning and speaking a wide variety of languages. During the era when most tengu were still nomads, their language acquisition skills allowed them to serve as diplomats, emissaries, and spreaders of culture, and as they came to abandon a nomadic lifestyle, most tengu took to adapting to life in other cultures rather than building their own cities. The few permanent tengu settlements that exist are generally small agricultural villages.

Tengu do, however, retain many elements of their own unique culture, and usually form “tengu districts” within the cities of other races. Tengu districts are stereotypically known for the cuisine of large insects which can be found there, beloved by travelers with a taste for the exotic, as well as offices where services of translation and transcription are offered. Prejudices against tengus often focus around stereotypes of them as conniving or backhanded, able and willing to manipulate every side or a conflict for their own gain, but these are words spoken behind closed doors, outside of “polite society,” unlike racism against goblins, which is often openly vicious and hateful.

Most tengu recognize no specific deity and instead follow an animist religion based on air spirits. Some city-dwelling tengus who achieve high social station convert to the religion of their adopted culture, however. Tengu religious rites often involve elaborately painting the feathers of a priest and several dancers in a wild variety of colors, and the yearly spring festivals put on by tengu temples draw a great number of spectators from all races.


And here are some ACKS writeup words:

Tengu + Fighting 4 - 2200xp
Tengu + Fighting 3 - 1700xp
Tengu + Fighting 2 - 1200xp
Tengu + Fighting 1b - 700xp
Tengu 0 - 200xp

Beak and Claws: Tengu have a sharp beak and clawed hands, giving them a claw/claw/bite unarmed attack routine. The claws deal 1d2-1 damage each, and the beak deals 1d4-1. (2 custom powers)

Mimicry: Tengu receive the mimicry proficiency for free. They can imitate animal calls and foreign language accents. With a proficiency throw of 11+, the character’s mimicry (e.g. imitating the screech of a hoot owl or a noise from some other animal) is so authentic as to fool listeners into believing they have heard the actual animal. (1 custom power)

Vestigial Wings: Tengu have vestigial wings which allow them to glide to earth when falling. They treat all falls as 10’ shorter when calculating falling damage. (1 custom power)

Linguistics: Tengu know 4 bonus languages of their choice at character creation. (1 custom power)


Tengu Nestkeeper
HD 1 (500xp)
Divine 2 (500xp)
Thievery 1 (200xp)
Tengu 1 (400xp)

Prime Req: Wis and Dex
HD: d6
Cleave: 1 per 2 levels.
Fighting Styles: Two weapons, two-handed weapons.
Armor: Leather, hide, or none. No shields.
Max Level: 12.

Level Experience AC 1 2 3 4 5
1 0 +1 - - - - -
2 1,900 +1 1 - - - -
3 3,800 +1 2 - - - -
4 7,600 +1 2 1 - - -
5 15,000 +1 2 2 - - -
6 30,000 +1 2 2 1 1 -
7 60,000 +2 2 2 2 1 1
8 120,000 +2 3 3 2 2 1
9 160,200 +2 3 3 3 2 2
10 200,000 +2 4 4 3 3 2
11 240,000 +2 4 4 4 3 3
12 280,000 +2 5 5 4 4 3

Level Petrif. Poison Blast Staffs Spells Attack
1-2 11+ 8+ 14+ 11+ 13+ 10+
3-4 10+ 7+ 13+ 10+ 12+ 9+
5-6 9+ 6+ 12+ 9+ 11+ 8+
7-8 8+ 5+ 11+ 8+ 10+ 7+
9-10 7+ 4+ 10+ 7+ 9+ 6+
11-12 6+ 3+ 9+ 6+ 8+ 5+

Beak and Claws: Tengu have a sharp beak and clawed hands, giving them a claw/claw/bite unarmed attack routine. The claws deal 1d2-1 damage each, and the beak deals 1d4-1.

Mimicry: Tengu receive the mimicry proficiency for free. They can imitate animal calls and people they know well. With a proficiency throw of 11+, the tengu’s mimicry is so authentic as to fool listeners into believing they have heard the actual animal or person.

Vestigial Wings: Tengu have vestigial wings which allow them to glide to earth when falling. They treat all falls as 10’ shorter when calculating falling damage.

Linguistics: Tengu know 4 bonus languages of their choice at character creation.

Turn Undead: As cleric.

AC Bonus: Tengu nestkeepers receive the listed bonus to armor class when they wear leather or lighter armor.

Divine Blessing: Tengu nestkeepers receive a +2 bonus to all saves.

Lay On Hands: Tengu nestkeepers can heal a touched creature of 2hp per level damage once per day.

Divine Spells: Tengu nestkeepers cast divine spells as bladedancers.


Tengu Aerie Defender
Tengu 1 (400xp)
HD 2 (1000xp)
Thievery 1 (200xp)
Fighting 1 (500xp)
1 trade-off at Fighting 2 (150xp)

Prime Req: Str and Dex
HD: d8
Cleave: 1 per level.
Fighting Styles: Two weapons, two-handed weapons, two weapons.
Armor/Weapons: Any.
Max Level: 12.

Level Experience Move Silently Backstab Damage Bonus
1 2,500 17+ x2 +1
2 5,000 16+ x2 +1
3 10,000 15+ x2 +2
4 20,000 14+ x2 +2
5 40,000 13+ x3 +2
6 80,200 12+ x3 +3
7 160,000 11+ x3 +3
8 320,000 10+ x3 +3
9 360,000 9+ x4 +4
10 400,000 8+ x4 +4
11 440,000 7+ x4 +4
12 480,000 6+ x4 +5

Level Petrification Poison Blast Staffs Spells Attack
1 15+ 14+ 16+ 16+ 17+ 10+
2-3 14+ 13+ 15+ 15+ 16+ 9+
4 13+ 12+ 14+ 14+ 15+ 8+
5-6 12+ 11+ 13+ 13+ 14+ 7+
7 11+ 10+ 12+ 12+ 13+ 6+
8-9 10+ 9+ 11+ 11+ 12+ 5+
10 9+ 8+ 10+ 10+ 11+ 4+
11-12 8+ 7+ 9+ 9+ 10+ 3+

Beak and Claws: Tengu have a sharp beak and clawed hands, giving them a claw/claw/bite unarmed attack routine. The claws deal 1d2-1 damage each, and the beak deals 1d4-1. (2 custom powers)

Mimicry: Tengu receive the mimicry proficiency for free. They can imitate animal calls and foreign language accents. With a proficiency throw of 11+, the character’s mimicry (e.g. imitating the screech of a hoot owl or a noise from some other animal) is so authentic as to fool listeners into believing they have heard the actual animal.

Vestigial Wings: Tengu have vestigial wings which allow them to glide to earth when falling. They treat all falls as 10’ shorter when calculating falling damage.

Linguistics: Tengu know 4 bonus languages of their choice at character creation.

Sword Mastery: When wielding a sword, tengu aerie defenders deal double damage on an unmodified attack throw of 20.

Move Silently: Tengu aerie defenders may move silently as a thief of their level.

Backstab: Tengu aerie defenders may backstab as a thief of their level.


Tengu Syrinx
HD 1 (500xp)
Thief 2 (400xp)
Mage 1 (625xp)
Tengu 1 (400xp)

Prime Req: Str and Dex
HD: d6
Cleave: 1 per 2 levels.
Fighting Styles: Two weapons, two-handed weapons.
Armor: Leather, hide, or none. No shields.
Max Level: 12

Level XP 1 2 3 Loremastery
1 2,300 - - - 18+
2 4,600 - - - 17+
3 9,000 1 - - 16+
4 18,000 1 - - 15+
5 36,000 1 1 - 14+
6 72,000 1 1 - 13+
7 144,000 1 1 1 12+
8 288,000 1 1 1 11+
9 328,000 1 1 1 10+
10 368,000 1 1 1 9+
11 408,000 2 1 1 8+
12 448,000 2 2 1 7+

Level Petrification Poison Blast Staffs Spells Attack Throw
1-2 13+ 13+ 16+ 14+ 15+ 10+
3-4 12+ 12+ 15+ 13+ 14+ 9+
5-6 11+ 11+ 14+ 12+ 13+ 8+
7-8 10+ 10+ 13+ 11+ 12+ 7+
9-10 9+ 9+ 12+ 10+ 11+ 6+
11-12 8+ 8+ 11+ 9+ 10+ 5+
11-12 8+ 8+ 11+ 9+ 10+ 5+

Beak and Claws: Tengu have a sharp beak and clawed hands, giving them a claw/claw/bite unarmed attack routine. The claws deal 1d2-1 damage each, and the beak deals 1d4-1.

Mimicry: Tengu receive the mimicry proficiency for free. They can imitate animal calls and foreign language accents. With a proficiency throw of 11+, the character’s mimicry (e.g. imitating the screech of a hoot owl or a noise from some other animal) is so authentic as to fool listeners into believing they have heard the actual animal.

Vestigial Wings: Tengu have vestigial wings which allow them to glide to earth when falling. They treat all falls as 10’ shorter when calculating falling damage.

Linguistics: Tengu know 4 bonus languages of their choice at character creation.

Loremastery: As a bard.

Magical Music: As the proficiency.

Read Languages: Decipher written languages and codes on 5+.

Avoid Getting Lost: +4 to navigation throws to avoid getting lost.

Bargaining: Items sell for 10% more, cost 10% less (as the proficiency).


Thanks!!

I love this! An avian race!

I don’t believe your XP math is right; specifically, the cost for points in tengu seems off.

Based off the process Alex posted here ( http://www.autarch.co/comment/6770#comment-6770 ):

Racial powers: Tengu have 5 custom racial powers. Subtracting one for max level gives us a value of 4. Plus one for powers not available to humans brings us back to 5; multiplied by 40 is 200. So far so good.

Each point of Fighting value costs 500 XP, however. We can see in the Thrassian writeup that this is simply added in. It is also simply added in in the Nobirus and Zaharan values; Elf is the exception because Elves reduce the cost of Arcane value by 125. So in summary, everyone but elves pays full XP cost for points included in their race.

This means that the Tengu race points should cost:
Tengu 0: 200 xp
Tengu 1: 700 xp
Tengu 2: 1200 xp
Tengu 3: 1700 xp
Tengu 4: 2200 xp

A very nice race!
I would maybe give them Survival instead of Illusion Resistance to emphasize the traveling aspect.

THANK YOU for the correction on math; I knew how to do the point system based on that post (how i got 200 xp) but I totally spaced on adding the fighting value. Am I right that they have +44,000xp after 8th lvl?

Also thanks for the other comments! Survival is best I think!

I get 41,902 (round to 42k or 40k as you prefer; I would round to 40k myself).

It would be 44k with your original 2300 cost, but my numbers for cost bring the cost for Tengu 4 down to 2200 :wink:

Nice! Thank you! I’ll update the first post pretty soon.

Also, here’s a Tengu thief for ya.

Tengu Nestraider
Thief 3 (700xp)
HD 1 (500xp)
Tengu 1 (700xp)

HD: d6
Armor/Weapons: Light, leather, or none; no shields; any one-handed melee or missile weapon.
Fighting Styles: Dual or two-handed wield.

Level Experience
1 0
2 1,900
3 3,800
4 7,600
5 15,000
6 30,000
7 60,000
8 120,000
9 160,200
10 200,000
11 240,000
12 280,000

Level Petrification Poison Blast Staffs Spells Attack Throw
1-2 13+ 13+ 16+ 14+ 15+ 10+
3-4 12+ 12+ 15+ 13+ 14+ 9+
5-6 11+ 11+ 14+ 12+ 13+ 8+
7-8 10+ 10+ 13+ 11+ 12+ 7+
9-10 9+ 9+ 12+ 10+ 11+ 6+
11-12 8+ 8+ 11+ 9+ 10+ 5+

Beak and Claws: Tengu have a sharp beak and clawed hands, giving them a claw/claw/bite unarmed attack routine. The claws deal 1d2-1 damage each, and the beak deals 1d4-1. (2 custom powers)

Mimicry: Tengu receive the mimicry proficiency for free. They can imitate animal calls and foreign language accents. With a proficiency throw of 11+, the character’s mimicry (e.g. imitating the screech of a hoot owl or a noise from some other animal) is so authentic as to fool listeners into believing they have heard the actual animal.

Vestigial Wings: Tengu have vestigial wings which allow them to glide to earth when falling. They treat all falls as 10’ shorter when calculating falling damage.

Linguistics: Tengu know 4 bonus languages of their choice at character creation.

Thief skills exactly as Thief, including Read Language at 5+ at 4th level and Arcane Dabbling at 3+ 10th level.