Sergal (5e Race)
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Sergal[edit]
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Physical Description[edit]
The shape of their head and snout is reminiscent of sharks, with swept-back and pointed ears. The top of their heads is completely flat and smooth. They do not have browlines or curved foreheads. Ear holes cannot normally be seen from the side, because their ear holes always turn to the rear and are completely covered by rear pointing fur. A thick mane covers the back of their long neck from around the midsection of the head down to the area around the shoulder blades. Eye colors are generally gray or grayish-colors. An adult Sergal's eyes face outwards similar to lizards and rabbits, with vertically slitted pupils similar to cats. This gives them good peripheral vision and situational awareness. However, they have a relatively difficult time focusing on a single point or perceiving depth, making the use of projectile weapons such as bows and guns difficult. All sergals are born with forward-facing eyes, which in most sergals gradually turn to the side as they age. Sergals have an avian-style throat structure that gives them high pitched vocalizations. They are able to speak a general language and can also communicate using various animalistic "cries". For example, a sergal may give a high pitched shriek when charging into combat, or make a whimpering or yapping sound when frightened. Due to their mouth and throat structure, prey such as small animals is able to be swallowed whole. When eating the meat of large animals they will cut them into chunks since their jaw structure and lack of molars makes their chewing ineffective. They only have 12 fang-like canine teeth that are replaced several times throughout their life. A sergal's arms, shoulders, chest, abdomen, and waist approximately resemble that of a human. One important distinction is the prominent ">" shaped breastbone, sternum or the keel. Due to the dense mass of chest fur, this bone protrusion is sometimes mistaken as merely a lump of fur. Due to the varying height of this protrusion between individuals, sergal clothing and armor are constructed with a wide raised portion around the breast to accommodate this. Sergals possess three fingers and an opposable thumb on each hand, and four toes on each foot. Their fingers are similar to the fingers of rodents. While their feet have been described as being similar to avians,their original design was based on rabbits and kangaroos. The upper palms and soles of the feet that make contact with the ground are padded and have no fur. Their tail is thick, muscular and elongated, with a tuft of fur at the tip. Sergal fur has a straightforward two-tone color pattern like that of a shark or many earthly mammals. Spots and Stripes are not common. Completely black or white Sergals are rarely seen and those with dark / light color inversion basically don't exist. However, these things are done by means of fur dyeing, which is a common behavior in urban areas(Southern Gold Ring and Eastern Reono lands). Tal has a variety of dyes derived from organisms. There are those who dye their bodies in vivid colors and even those who get tattoos.
In general, a member of a mixed species (Civilized Sergals / Easterners) can theoretically display a wide variation and range in their natural coat color, with a few key differences in mind per subspecies: Northerners will mostly display cold colors on their coats, with a white underbelly color whilst their Southern counterparts will have warm colors on their coats as well as feature white or sandy yellow underbelly shades. Pure Northerners and Southerners are exempt from this rule as their coat colors have been maintained from years of selective breeding/inbreeding Easterners can display a somewhat varied array of coat colors, however heavily darker than most if not all Sergals, due to their mixed gene pool. They have a healthy mix of both white and sandy underbelly colors, however, grey tones will be most prevalent due to the hybridization origins (North + South) resulting in colder tones on average. Westerners are a subspecies of the Northern species, as such their coat color is recessive and can be found sometimes with Northerners as well as the rare few Civilized Southerners, provided their ancestry stems from the scant few Western Sergals lucky enough to reach Gold Ring in times of war as refugees. They are a de facto extinct race subset.
They grow and mature more quickly than Humans, and are considered young adults by the age of 10. They correspond to Human’s 14-16 years old before reaching 10 years old. But this rapid growth brings a short lifespan to them. Their average lifespan is around 60 years. The corresponding appearance change will appear due to aging; the fur of the chin and ear be longer, the cheeks are sunken, the hollows around the eyes are deeper, the wrinkles are made, the skin is sagging, the white fur comes from the face like a dog. Some will have weak legs and will be stooped due to the atrophy of the joints cartilage.
Their gender differences are not obvious, physical strength, behavior, and social role do not depend on gender. They show most "animalistic" natures in their various behaviors and abilities in comparison with other Eltus races, they have fastest running speed and strong leg strength, additionally superior intuition and susceptibility for nature. While possessing individual personalities, their general character is simple-minded and optimistic, also sometimes show an animalistic sensitive nature. Overall, they can be said to be sensuous people. Due to their deeply religious nature and faithful mentality, they can behave with a mob mentality when influenced by a strong-willed or charismatic individual.
Their animalistic natures and abilities appear on both their strong points and shortcomings; as strong points, it would turn as bravery and physical strength. Thereby, they are suitable for jobs which require exercise capacity and work extensively outdoors such as soldiers, hunters, and explorers. As shortcomings, they are unsuitable for jobs which require logical thinking, concentration, and very accurate stereopsis such as crafting and engineering above a certain level. - Supplement: Sergals are generally unsuitable for technical jobs like mechanical engineering, but they can perform simple crafting or smith: Make basic armor or weapon from a material. But more complex work like carving, joining, and rasping is definitely not their line of work. Meanwhile, they have strong intuition close to six sense and superior susceptibility for the natural environment. Due to this, they have the strongest capacity to deal with things which cannot be elucidated by logic and science such as supernatural phenomenon and shamanism.
History[edit]
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Sergal originate from the harsh deserts and toxic forests of Tal in the realm of Vilous. Though not actually native to the realm, like the so called Talyxians, Sergals were once foreigners, or Eltus as they are known natively, that were mutated by the strange energies that permeate the lands of Tal. Sergals were once human, immigrants that settled the lands of Tal long, long ago. Generations of mutation have almost scrubbed them of their humanity entirely, all that remains is the word, which is no longer to them a pronoun for the species, but an adjective describing all sapient life.
Sergals are generally weak in combat without their weapons (details are written in next section). Before developing these weapons even the northerners were unable to hunt large prey, so in prehistoric times they had to simply run from larger creatures, catch smaller animals with their own feet, and subsist on protein-rich plants for sustenance. This history of being at the mercy of their natural surroundings has led to the fear and respect towards nature that defined Northern sergal culture in their earlier years.
However, once they possessed these weapons, they were able to hunt larger creatures for their meat and consumption of plants became obsolete. Some Northern sergals were able to escape their primordial surroundings, expanding to the east and interbreeding with Southern Sergals giving rise to their eastern cousins. As these Eastern sergals mingled with Southern sergals and the agudners, their technique and technology were further improved. Their hunting abilities continued to be refined, and their fear and religious faith in their surroundings weakened in response. Still, to this day many Northern sergals still consider the primitive beasts of the north to be of special significance as a source of both fear and food.
Society[edit]
While sergals view strength as a virtue, they do not require it in leadership. Sergals prefer to cooperate in groups without hierarchy, unlike wolves who will fight for dominance in their pack.
This is especially apparent with Northern sergals. Having shared their environment with dangerous wildlife, they formed their society with fear and respect for their natural surroundings and its inhabitants. To them, nature plays both a maternal and adversarial role, and they lack a strong leader among themselves. They sometimes assign roles modeled after the talyxian-associater social structure.
Having lost much of their dependence on and reverence for nature, Southern and Eastern sergals are more likely to want to test their strength amongst themselves. However, this is usually done in the form of sports or hunting contests, preferring not to dominate one another through strength.
In the Northern lands, the role of leader and high ranking individuals is usually handed over by elders or trusted people within their respective groups. Northern sergals can naturally understand what job another should have. Like wolves, their system has no concept of "moving up in the world" and roles are determined naturally. They do not have written words and while very few actually speak, their communication is mostly accomplished with cries.
In the Eastern lands, they hold martial arts matches and various games to determine a potential leader's strength. Due to their more developed culture and language, there are some other, less physical decisions and recommendations made for positions.
In the Southern lands, physically fighting for things rarely happened, instead of having people who had more experience get into favorable positions. It's similar to a cooperate boss rather than a combatant leader. There are not many civilized languages in the Northern lands. They mainly communicate with cries and body language and sometimes use very simple and primitive words but there are not many of these words. In modern times, the Northern people are able to use and speak the common language. In Eastern lands, most people can use spoken language, having strong, animal-like accents. This is due to their close relationship with Gold Ring though there aren't many that can read and write, usually being traders who come from Gold Ring. In Southern lands, most people can use spoken language fluently without an animal-like accent like Easterners. They can't read and write without learning, but thanks to their society their literacy rate around 40%. In modern times, it is embedded in education, so many people are able to read and write.
Older sergal concepts and more recent Northern sergal designs have made it difficult to determine differences between sexes from outward appearance and behavior. However, Southern and Eastern sergals have begun to show noticeable differences due to the influence of their interaction with the female agudners. For example, most Southern and Eastern females wear feminine clothing.
Southern sergal females, in particular, have fostered their own feminine identity; "They look graceful and pretty, but they have a strong sense of justice and a stubborn, single-minded side."
In general, sergals consider their community to be one large "family". They will raise their children communally regardless of blood relationship if they are part of the same social group. It is common for females to bear the young of males other than their partner, who never mind the mating with others in the group. It is not unusual for there to be a few homosexuals among the group as well.
As it is common for both partners to work, couples will usually entrust their offspring to communal child care facilities for their safety. Educational facilities like schools also exist.
Sergal Names[edit]
Sergals get a name from birth usually coming from the races around them, so this is the name they use to contact other races. After they reach adulthood they choose another name but this names come from tradition. Traditional names of their race are savage sounding and have roots on other words refering nature, although by general rule male names end in consonant and female end in a vowel. This adulthood name is only used between Sergals for identification. They can receive more names during their lifetime, sometimes reaching strings of 20 or more.
Male: Blodter, Cester, Desteor, Fiordon, Hornes, Sungrün, Tergid, Winfren
Female: Bedfhu, Fledha, Kaobna, Linilee, Milinea, Silgyea, Ursila, Vilheo
Sergal Traits[edit]
Evolved humans that accepted their wild side
Ability Score Increase. This increases depend on the subrace. Please check every subrace for more information.
Age. Sergals reach maturity at 10 years old and live to around 60 years of age.
Alignment. Sergals are usually on the neutral good spectrum and tend to be lawful, but have been known to also be chaotic and, though rarely, evil.
Size. Sergal vary widely in height and build, most of this variation coming from ethnic deviations. Wherever you fall in this variations, your size is Medium.
Speed. Your base walking speed is 35 feet.
Susceptive. You are easily influenced by forces that affect the mind as well as the words of charismatic individuals. You are vulnerable to psychic damage and have disadvantage in Charisma saving throws and all ability checks involving Charisma.
Simple Mind. Though you can learn much and can think tactically if have trained to do so, you can not completely comprehend advanced and complex ideas. You have advantage in Intelligence (Investigation) checks involving natural ambiances or primitive cultures and disadvantage in Intelligence (Investigation) checks involving constructs or magic.
Languages. You can speak, read, and write Common and Primitive Sergal. Primitive sergal is a combination of rudimentary and rude-sounding animal sounds and howls. It uses the Terran Script.
Subrace. Choose one between Northern, Western, Eastern or Southern Sergal
Northern Sergal[edit]
Cowardly and easily led in general, brutal when it is necessary and with a strong awe for natural surroundings. This subrace has cold and grayish colors on their fur, and ones who are strongly influenced by miasma would show forward-facing eyes.
Unlike those sergals living in the more developed regions to the South and East, Northern sergals have lived their lives in close proximity to the dangerous primitive beasts of Tal. Their way of life of hunting and religion has changed little over time with many of them following a nomadic lifestyle. A sort of "insanity" has developed among Northern sergals due to their fear of their environment and the creatures that inhabit it. They have nonetheless learned to live with this at least somewhat successfully.
There is little variation in facial appearance between individual Northern sergals, with males and females being outwardly indistinguishable. They wear a permanently wary expression due to their fear of their natural surroundings. Specifically, eyes turn to the front, and ears lie down. Their ears are slightly shorter and their fur thicker than their southern cousins. Their fur is thicker around the mane and heels. Their overall physique is larger though they are still not as muscular as the hybrid Eastern sergals. Their fur colors are bright shades and patterns of colors ranging from black through to gray, blue and purple. The "purest" of Northern sergals have kept their original gray and white color scheme.
Northern sergals have long lived in superstitious awe of their forest surroundings and the dangerous primitive creatures that inhabit them. This reverence has formed the basis for their spirituality and animistic belief system, as well as their hunting and gathering lifestyle. Individually cowardly, they can nonetheless behave courageously as a group when confronted by a sufficiently terrible threat and guided by suitably fearless individual. They grieve just little when their friend dies by menace of nature. They consider that "It is scary, but there is no help for it. Because it is rule of nature."
Ability Score Increase. Your Strength, Dexterity and Constitution scores increase by 1.
Primal. Northern Sergals tend to live in tribal societies with primitive views. They are incredibly superstitious and hostile towards the unknown. When you fail a Investigation, Arcana or History check that involves nature, you can choose to succeed instead. You can't use this trait again until you finish a short or long rest.
Bestial. Northern sergals have an explosive temper. When you fail a Charisma or Wisdom saving throw, you can use your reaction to roll a d12. You can add the result of that die to the failed saving throw, potentially turning it into a success. After you use this trait, you have disadvantage in your next saving throw or attack roll. You use this trait a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, regaining use after you finish a long rest.
Southern Sergal[edit]
Living a more cultured and civilized lifestyle. Have warm and brownish colors on their fur, and are smaller and more slender in stature. They show more "human-like" proportions. Gender differences don't differ on the biological feature, but are more culturally apparent, with females often having a more "feminine" fashion and behavior.
Their ears are long compared to northerners and the overall thickness of their fur is less. Their mane and heel fur is also shorter in comparison to northerners. Their average height is shorter and their physique slimmer, their legs and arms are also somewhat more slender. Their primary fur colors are warmer shades such as brown, beige, blonde and orange. In addition, they may also choose to dye their fur in flashy, vivid, exotic colors like red, pink, and so on. Thus, there are multifarious color patterns via postnatal fur-dyeing.
Southern Sergal culture is almost the antithesis of the primitive northerners. They place far greater value on culture and technology, as well as their social integration with other Eltus races. The pursuit of culture and fashion is popular, unlike northern sergals, female southerners are more likely to express their femininity in their choice of clothing thanks to the influence of the Agudners. Also there are fur-dyeing as popular fashion to get more various color patterns.
Those who wish to consider themselves especially cultured will favor cooked cuisine whenever possible, and attempt to eat using utensils like knives because swallowing food whole is considered by them to be "uncivilized". They may attempt to chew their food, but their jaw structure and lack of molars makes this ineffective.
Ability Score Increase. Your Strength, Intelligence and Charisma each scores increase by 1.
Cultured. Southern sergals have a strong desire to fit into the society of which they are born. They tend to consider and view those outside of said society as uncivilized. You don't have disadvantage in Investigation, Deception, or Performance checks from your Susceptive trait while you are in a city or town.
Instinct containment. Southern sergals consider themselves the pinnacle of their race, becoming experts in controlling their instincts. You have advantage on saving throws against being charmed or frightened. This supersedes the disadvantages imposed on you by your Susceptive trait.
Eastern Sergal[edit]
A genetic mix of their Northern and Southern relatives. Have deep colors on their fur, and are the largest and most heavily muscled of sergals. Culturally similar to the Southerners, they do not share the Northerners fear of their natural environment due to their superior hunting techniques.
Their ears appear relatively small in comparison due to the rugged build of their skeletons. Deep, darker, heavy colors such as black, deep gray, deep brown, and deep green are common fur colors. Since their popular culture is inspired by their Southern neighbors, they may often dye their fur with vivid and exotic colors. Thus, there are multifarious color patterns via postnatal fur-dyeing.
They share strong cultural similarities to the Southerners. Having developed advanced hunting techniques that leave them with fewer natural enemies, they do not share their Northern ancestors' fear of their natural surroundings. They enjoy competitions of strength among themselves but are rarely violent. Sporting events are also popular among Eastern Sergals.
Ability Score Increase. Your Strength score increases by 1 and your Dexterity score increases by 2.
Speed. You have a base walking speed of 30 feet instead of 35.
Hybrid Vigor. Being of mixed blood between Northern and Southern Sergals has lead to heterosis. Eastern Sergals tend to be much larger and muscular than either and is less susceptible to mental influences. You do not suffer the disadvantages imposed by your Susceptive trait.
Western Sergal[edit]
A subspecies of the Northern sergals. Have intermediate colored fur based on Northerner's color pallet and slender body. Intermediate colors based on a cold color pallet such as blue-green, purple, and pale gray are common fur colors. At first, there were no apparent height differences between Northern and Western Sergals, given that they were the closest set of subspecies living separate from each other. That means they only differed in fur coloration, location, and cultural traditions, sharing common traits in everything else.
Ability Score Increase. Your Charisma score increases by 2 and your Dexterity score increases by 1.
Speed. Your base walking speed increases to 40 feet.
Culture of Love. Western sergals love performing and experiencing music and dance. They seek out the performing arts of other cultures and will try to introduce their own if there is none. You are proficient in the Acrobatics skill. You do not suffer the disadvantages imposed by your Susceptive trait for Performance checks.
Random Height and Weight[edit]
Northern/Western
| Base Height |
Height Modifier* |
Base Weight |
Weight Modifier** |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5′ 9'' | +1d12 | 125 lb. | × (1d4) lb. |
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*Height = base height + height modifier | |||
Eastern
| Base Height |
Height Modifier* |
Base Weight |
Weight Modifier** |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6′ 5'' | +3d4 | 140 lb. | × 1 lb. |
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*Height = base height + height modifier | |||
Southern
| Base Height |
Height Modifier* |
Base Weight |
Weight Modifier** |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5′ 2'' | +1d20 | 110 lb. | × 1 lb. |
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*Height = base height + height modifier | |||
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