Illumians are contemplative humanoids, driven and ambitious, taught from an early age to master every field of study.
Personality: Illumians tend to be somewhat cautious, choosing to study a situation and develop a plan before acting.
They’re also proud of their heritage as illumians, extolling the virtues of illumians in general and their cabal in particular for anyone who’ll listen.
Physical Description: Illumians look like the humans who first learned the Ritual of Words Made Flesh — pale-skinned and somewhat taller than average. More than half of all illumians are bald, while the rest have blond or red hair. Facial hair is almost unheard of.
Of course, their most significant features are the luminous sigils that float above their heads, endlessly circling. These sigils are described in detail below.
Illumians — even poor ones — favour the most expensive dress they can afford, with fine embroidery, long robes and capes, and multiple layers. Their bulky dress makes illumians look bigger and more muscular than they actually are. Illumians have a great distaste for dirt and take pains to keep their clothes clean, even in a wilderness or dungeon setting.
Elaborate facial makeup is also common among illumians, particularly older ones who have already mated for their cabal. While some humans wear makeup to make themselves appear more attractive, illumians wear it for the opposite reason: to keep others at a distance. The more garish and outlandish an individual’s makeup, the more likely it is that she wishes to be left alone.
Relations: Illumians regard humans as a brother race, but remain somewhat distant — after all, the illumians left pure humanity behind when they undertook the Ritual of the Word Made Flesh. Elves are admired for their long life spans, love of learning, and facility with magic, while dwarves are regarded as consummate craftsfolk but with little else to offer. Illumians confronted with gnomes and halflings sometimes let a bit of paternalism seep through their efforts to be polite, subconsciously treating the small folk like children.
Whenever they can, illumians seek common ground with species that demonstrate a love of learning, such as dragons and outsiders. Conversely, illumians have regarded the githyanki as implacable enemies ever since the githyanki discovered and sacked the illumians’ High Library on the Astral Plane. Except for those of the Gravewhisper cabals, illumians abhor undead.
Alignment: The cabals that form the backbone of illumian society maintain codes of honour they expect members to follow, so illumians have a tendency toward lawful alignments. Gibber cabals seek power in the disorder of invented words, and so have more chaotic tendencies.
Illumian Lands: Illumians usually form a small community far away from civilization, where they are free to make their plans without outside interference. Some cabals (or clusters of allied cabals) occupy buildings or neighbourhoods in major human cities, where eventually their appearance ceases to arouse particular curiosity. Many cabals have access to a magic portal that whisks illumians to the Shadow City of Elirhondas, a teeming metropolis in which illumians make up the overwhelming majority of the population.
Religion: Illumian clerics mainly worship Tarmuid, the First Speaker, who invented the Ritual of the Word Made Flesh and uttered the words that created the illumians centuries ago. Since then, a few other illumians — mostly those who participated in the very first Ritual of the Word Made Flesh — have ascended to godhood by making a final utterance. Tarmuid and these illumian deities are described in The Illumian Pantheon.
Language: Illumians speak the language that Tarmuid discovered (or invented, according to some cabals), the magical language that powered the ritual that created the first illumians. Even infants can speak Illumian — slowly and poorly — within a few days of birth. Non-illumians don’t have an instinctive grasp of the language and find it very hard to learn. Because they aren’t magically infused with the language the way illumians are, other speakers of Illumian receive no power from the hundreds of sigils that form the language’s alphabet.
Names: Illumian personal names are almost always two or three syllables long, chosen from syllables that have a positive connotation (the paragraphs below contain a list of good choices for an illumian PC). Illumians also take the name of their cabal as their own. Because the cabals help define an illumian’s place in the world, illumians give their cabal name first, followed by their personal name. When speaking in Common, illumians usually translate their cabal name but leave their personal name in Illumian because it most likely doesn’t have an exact match in Common.
Male Names: Abthek, Byerek, Duensel, Ghautar, Hautra, Iarmid, Kaulesh, Kyrish, Ooleg, Shelkau, Vyurek, Yeylea.
Female Names: Andrin, Chalaum, Eallie, Fraona, Nuele, Prekish, Querik, Rhealoo, Sreiska, Woothal, Xiroth, Zhaolei.
Cabal Names: Blackpennant, Bloodwing, Driftcloud, Duskwatcher, Frostpeak, Rustdreamer, Stormwind.
Adventurers: Illumians travel to learn more about the surrounding world on behalf of their cabals, occasionally undertaking dangerous missions on behalf of their cabal leaders. A few illumians have been cast out of their cabals, but it’s far more likely that an adventuring illumian left voluntarily, hoping to gain enough knowledge and power to attract other illumians and thereby found a new cabal. Illumians spend a number of their adolescent or young adult years wandering the world, dreaming of being the master at the centre of a powerful illumian cabal.
Humanoid (human): Illumians are humanoid creatures with the human subtype.
Medium: As medium creatures, illumians have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
Illumian base land speed is 30 feet.
Luminous Sigils (Su): The sigils that orbit an illumian’s head glow softly, providing illumination equal to that of a candle. Illumians can make their sigils disappear by concentrating for a moment (a standard action), but they don’t receive the sigils’ benefits and can’t use any special abilities granted by illumian words (see below) while they’re doused. Restoring the sigils to visibility is a free action.
Luminous sigils (including power sigils; see below) are insubstantial and disappear into any matter they touch. An illumian’s sigils remain present and in effect even when the illumian takes another form, unless she would lose her supernatural abilities as a result of the form change. An illumian wizard who casts a polymorph spell on herself retains her sigils, but an illumian who becomes a zombie loses them.
Glyphic Resonance (Ex): Illumians are the physical embodiment of a magical language, so they interact strangely with symbol-based spells. This group includes all spells whose names contain the word glyph, rune, sigil or symbol (such spells in the Player’s Handbook include explosive runes, glyph of warding, greater glyph of warding, sepia snake sigil and the various symbol spells). When an illumian encounters such magic, one of two things happens: Either the illumian’s resonance overpowers the spell, or the foreign magic corrupts the mystical language that defines the illumian. Illumians have a -4 racial penalty on saving throws against these effects if their level is less than the caster level of the spell. If an illumian’s level equals or exceeds the spell’s caster level, she is immune to the effect.
Power Sigils (Su): In addition to the array of dimly glowing luminous sigils that orbits her head, a 1st-level illumian has a single brightly glowing power sigil that grants her certain bonuses (see below). A power sigil can be discerned from other sigils surrounding an illumian with a DC 10 Spot check, and identified with a DC 15 *Knowledge (Arcana) check.
On attaining 2nd level in any class, an illumian gains a second different power sigil, and the bonus granted by each power sigil increases to +2. Depending on the combination of power sigils she chooses, an illumian gains one or more extra special abilities (see Illumian Words, below). The benefit of each power sigil is given below, along with the Common translation of each sigil’s Illumian name.
Illumian Words (Su): Each combination of two power sigils’ names makes an Illumian word of great power, and thus grants extra abilities to a character who possesses those two power sigils. The benefit of each word of power
is described below.
Final Utterance (Ex): When an illumian dies, her body releases the stored Illumian language within it. For 1 round per Hit Die of the illumian, anyone within earshot hears ululating Illumian syllables — usually gibberish, but occasionally a prophetic phrase or a final curse on the illumian’s enemies. The illumian’s body need not remain intact for the final utterance to occur. Even if an illumian succumbs to a disintegrate spell, her disembodied voice still utters strange gibberish for several rounds.
+2 racial bonus on saves against spells with the shadow descriptor: The illumians’ magical heritage is tied to the Plane of Shadow.
Superior Literacy: Illumians are always literate, regardless of their character class. Speak Language is always a class skill for illumians, regardless of class.
Automatic Languages: Common and Illumian.
Bonus Languages: Any except for secret languages (such as Druidic). Illumians love languages and travel far and wide to learn new languages from other races.
Favoured Class: Any. When determining whether a multiclass illumian takes an experience point penalty, her highest-level class does not count. Illumians hold versatility in high esteem, and most members of the race are multiclass characters. Furthermore, illumian paladins and monks can leave those classes and return to them without penalty.
Source: Races of Destiny (Page 52)
Your character can be either male or female.
Every player character starts as an adult. You can choose or randomly generate your character’s age. If you choose it, it must be at least the minimum age for the character’s race and class (see Table: Starting Ages). Your character’s minimum starting age is the adulthood age of his or her race plus the number of dice indicated in the entry corresponding to the character’s race and class on Table: Starting Ages.
Alternatively, refer to Table: Starting Ages and roll dice to determine how old your character is.
| Adulthood | Intuitive1 | Self-Taught2 | Trained3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20 years | +2d4 (22—28) years | +3d6 (23—38) years | +4d6 (24—44) years |
1 This category includes barbarians, rogues and sorcerers.
2 This category includes bards, fighters, paladins and rangers.
3 This category includes clerics, druids, monks and wizards.
With age, a character’s physical ability scores decrease and his or her mental ability scores increase (see Table: Aging Effects). The effects of each aging step are cumulative. However, none of a character’s ability scores can be reduced below 1 in this way.
| Middle Age1 | Old Age2 | Venerable3 | Maximum Age |
|---|---|---|---|
| 50 years | 75 years | 100 years | +4d20 years |
1 -1 to Strength, Dexterity and Constitution; +1 to Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma.
2 -2 to Strength, Dexterity and Constitution; +1 to Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma.
3 -3 to Strength, Dexterity and Constitution; +1 to Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma.
When a character reaches venerable age, the DM secretly rolls his or her maximum age, which is the number from the Venerable column on Table: Aging Effects plus the result of the dice roll indicated on the Maximum Age column on that table, and records the result, which the player does not know. A character who reaches his or her maximum age dies of old age at some time during the following year, as determined by the DM.
The maximum ages are for player characters. Most people in the world at large die from pestilence, accidents, infections or violence before getting to venerable age.
Choose your character’s height and weight from the ranges mentioned in the appropriate race description or from the ranges found on Table: Height and Weight. Think about what your character’s abilities might say about his or her height and weight. A weak but agile character may be thin. A strong and tough character may be tall or just heavy.
Alternatively, roll randomly for your character’s height and weight on Table: Height and Weight. The dice roll given in the Height Modifier column determines the character’s extra height beyond the base height. That same number multiplied by the dice roll or quantity given in the Weight Modifier column determines the character’s extra weight beyond the base weight.
| Gender | Base Height | Height Modifier | Base Weight | Weight Modifier |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Male | 4’ 11" | +2d10 (5’ 1"—6’ 7") | 110 lbs. | ×2d4 (114—270 lbs.) |
| Female | 4’ 6" | +2d10 (4’ 8"—6’ 2") | 80 lbs. | ×2d4 (84—240 lbs.) |
Source: Races of Destiny (Page 55)