Egyptian Beast Races

AndreiChekov · Post by **AndreiChekov** » Sat Sep 17, 2016 8:05 pm

One time when I was drinking I hashed out a bunch of stupidly over/underpowered beast races based on egyptian mythology. I don't think I posted it here ever.

I am planning to do a write up of a not stupid version, and I'm thinking of limiting the actual number of different animals to 5 or 6.

I was thinking something like
Jackal
Crocodile
Cat
Some bird thing involving ibis, eagles and/or vultures
Snake
and maybe cat/lion

What would you expect in a collection of beast forms from Egyptian mythology?

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sat Sep 17, 2016 9:55 pm

Sphinx, Set animal, and Ammit, mostly.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sat Sep 17, 2016 10:37 pm

Did they not also have the wise monkey?

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 2:03 am

Every creature that lives along the Nile is an Egyptian god; b/c all of their gods were anthropomorphized after the cities with the human gods began to exert influence over their neighbours.

You're better off doing something more specific; the deserts on the East of the Nile; the deserts on the West; the delta; the lower nile; the upper nile; migrant species. Then placing 5-10 species of a certain type.

AndreiChekov · Post by **AndreiChekov** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 3:10 am

Judging__Eagle wrote:Every creature that lives along the Nile is an Egyptian god; b/c all of their gods were anthropomorphized after the cities with the human gods began to exert influence over their neighbours.

You're better off doing something more specific; the deserts on the East of the Nile; the deserts on the West; the delta; the lower nile; the upper nile; migrant species. Then placing 5-10 species of a certain type.

Thats what I did the first time, and it was a giant mess of shit with little inspiration and distinction beteen the different beasts. I want to just whittle it down to a few that people would expect in an Egyptian myth game, not cover every base.

@Prak thanks. Jackal covers anubis, and crocodile basically covers ammit. Hadn't thought of the sphinx.

@stahlseele I've never heard of a "wise monkey" in Egyptian stuff, and I've recently read everything the first 4 or so pages of google has on it. (Does that make me an expert?)

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 3:20 am

Thoth has a Baboon or Ibis head and is god of smart stuff

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 3:22 am

Set != Anubis

AndreiChekov · Post by **AndreiChekov** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 3:41 am

Prak wrote:Set != Anubis

I missed a line in what I was saying, or I was drunk or something. Set was often portrayed with a jackal head. Like all of the Egyptian gods, he has a bajillion forms, but I'm just sticking with the main ones. So, the anubis and set animal would end up the same.

@Ogrebattle Again, I intend to use the most common form of each god, or in some cases most well known, so Ibis head for thoth.

JonSetanta · Post by **JonSetanta** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 3:50 am

Prak wrote:Set != Anubis

This. I know my Egyptian lore too, and the "Set beast" is an unknown animal, possibly extinct but probably fictional.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 3:55 am

Well, not exactly, no.

Set had the head of what appears to be some mythical chimeric creature. There was some gross similarity to a jackal, so white archaeologists in the bad old days of Pharaoh Duraflame called it a jackal, but there's a reason that the term "set animal" exists.

Edit: ninja'd

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 9:26 am

Scarab?

Leress · Post by **Leress** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 3:52 pm

Hippopotamus, falcon, scorpion, snake, cow, goose, donkey, bull.

AndreiChekov · Post by **AndreiChekov** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 5:51 pm

So, It looks like my animal list should be something like

Jackal, Scarab, Ibis, Falcon/Hawk, Crocodile, Hippo, Cat/lion, a set animal thing, snake, and scorpion

I do like how hathor is a goddess of fertility and war, so cows could be in there with spell-like vigour, and rage

I can't see anyone wanting to play a goose thing.

I'm thinking to have them all one race, but share pretty much nothing except interbreeding, where whatever animal your mother has is what you are. I don't have to right much about culture or whatever, I can just steal things from egypt. Maybe add things to everyday life that are just stereotypes from myths.

Each of these "races" will be able to transform into their animal, and I'm thinking of giving them feats to take to improve them, say, if you are a beastman of baast, you start off being able to turn into a cat, and can take a feat to make that a lion and at later levels a dire lion

Jackals aren't statted up in the MM, so I'll just use dog stats for those. Maybe wolf, not sure yet.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sun Sep 18, 2016 5:58 pm

So, sort of hengeyokai with less clothes?

Nebuchadnezzar · Post by **Nebuchadnezzar** » Mon Sep 19, 2016 3:35 pm

It's likely worth it to shoot for nine forms total just to snag an Ennead reference. I could see one including a nod to the Ogdoad with a sexually dimorphic frog/snake race. A small-sized scarab-person with a swarmform feat would also be fun.

AndreiChekov · Post by **AndreiChekov** » Thu Sep 29, 2016 1:28 am

So, between working, I've done some things

Transformation works like wildshape except for duration, and is at-will. Since I can't be bothered to actually read wild shape right now, I'll just mention these thigns. You can't cast spells, unless you take that one feat. You also can't use class abilities. You do get to keep your feats.
Everyone has scent, is medium monstrous humanoid, and move speed of 30 feet.

Baast
Everything from your typical cat girls to nyanta from log horizon. Except Egyptian.

+2 dex or wis

Whenever you deal fire damage, you deal 1 extra damage per die of damage rolled.

Once per day you can cast Alarm as a spell like ability. This functions the same way as the spell, your caster level is equal to hit die. You don't need any ability score to cast this. Regular rats cannot pass through the border of this spell.

Transform into a house cat

lowlight vision

+2 listen and spot

Feat thingy Prereq: Baast and level 3. You can turn into a lion with your transformation.

Hathor
Same above but like a cow. (Or bull.) You can do the full minotaur thing, or just have horns and a tail. Nobody cares.

+2 con or cha

Transform into a "Cow/Bull" at will. Use heavy horse stats, but you get +2 str and -2 dex.

Rage(sp): A number of times per day, equal to your level + your highest metal stat, you can cast rage as a spell like ability with a caster level equal to your level

Vigour (Sp): A number of times per day, equal to your level + your highest metal stat, you can cast vigour as a spell like ability with a caster level equal to your level.

You count as if you have a STR score 4 higher for everything that isn't combat.

+2 perform and diplomacy checks