Living mostly in the marshy areas of Faerûn, lizardfolk are large, scaly humanoids who are savage marauders and scavengers. They have no traditions for cultivating food, so they arrange their meals by either hunting prey or raiding the larders of others.
Lizardfolk grow to between 6 and 7 feet tall, and weigh between 200 and 250 pounds. Their scales range in colour from dark green to grey to brown. Their thickly muscled tails run from 3 to 4 feet long. Most non-lizardfolk have a very hard time telling the difference between males and females, but the lizardfolk have no such troubles, of course.
Lizardfolk young are hatched from eggs, which are carefully protected in the tribe’s lair. This is usually hidden deep in a swamp, but about a third of the time it’s an air-filled underwater cave. Hatchlings grow to maturity within about five years. Lizardfolk have been known to live as long as 80 years, although it’s common for the males to die in combat long before they reach such an august age.
In Faerûn, lizardfolk are found anywhere there are temperate or warm marshes and swamps. This includes the Deepwash, the Flooded Forest, the Marsh of Chelimber, the Marsh of Tun and Rethild, the Great Swamp. A large population of lizardfolk is also found in the Lizard Marsh, despite the relatively cold climate of the Sword Coast.
Lizardfolk have the same life expectancy and age categories as humans.
History: Lizardfolk don’t have anything in the way of a written history. They claim that they were among the first of the humanoid races and that all the weaker, more civilized races evolved from lizardfolk who left the swamps millennia ago. The lizardfolk look down on the other races for this reason, seeing them as weaklings who could not endure the rigours of life in the swamp.
In fact, there seems no reason to doubt that lizardfolk are an offshoot of one of the Creator Races, the long-vanished saurians, and that theirs is a very ancient culture. They have lived in much the same fashion they do now for time out of mind, since long before any on the interloper races arrived on Toril.
Outlook: Lizardfolk mostly assess everything in terms of whether or not it is good to eat. They have no use for money or jewels. They fashion their own crude weapons from rocks, trees and plants found in their wetland homes. If something might be worth eating, it immediately captures the interest of the lizardfolk. Otherwise, it is not worth bothering with.
Growing up in a lizardfolk tribe is hard. The young are often hungry, as they are only giving the leavings of the meals the males capture once the adults are done with them. They often subsist on edible plants found nearby the tribe’s lair. Lizardfolk are omnivorous, although they have a strong preference for meat, and they find human flesh to be the tastiest of all.
Most lizardfolk don’t care much about strategy or tactics. They are cunning hunters, but in battle they simply rush their foe and try to overwhelm him with their superior strength or by force of sheer numbers. When the lizardfolk are attacked, however, they use their skill as hunters to lay snares, pitfalls and other traps for those who pursue them. Simple but deadly traps such as these protect many lizardfolk lairs.
Lizardfolk sometimes leave their homes to hunt for larger, more formidable prey. Others wish to learn more about the world beyond the swamps, so that they can report back to the leaders of their tribes. While lizardfolk aren’t evil by nature, they are savage, and they have a difficult time assimilating into Faerûnian society. Most don’t even try. They are there to learn about the softskins and perhaps to teach them a thing or two about how real people — lizardfolk, that is — live.
Characters: Lizardfolk live close to the land, taking all the blessings that nature has to offer them. For this reason, a lizardfolk’s favoured class is druid. They also have many barbarians and fighters in their tribes, and the occasional cleric or two.
Society: The lizardfolk have a patriarchal society. The strongest member of the tribe rules over the others by virtue of his power alone. Most are wise enough to recognize this power, so challenges only happen infrequently. When they do, they entirely disrupt the life of the tribe until either a new leader has been established or the old one has reaffirmed his position.
Lizardfolk females concentrate on hatching eggs and raising the hatchlings. It is also their job to maintain the tribe’s camp. Sometimes this is little more than bits of wet plants the lizardfolk use for beds, but some tribes fashion crude huts and make and use shields and weapons. Some have even learned to use the weapons they have stripped from the bodies of earlier prey.
Mothers watch over their hatchlings closely. In this, they have the help of all female members of the tribe. The hatchlings are often hard to handle, prone to wandering out of the camp and into the wider swamp. At any time, there are half as many hatchlings as there are adults. In a typical camp of 150 lizardfolk, about 50 are adult males, 50 are adult females and 50 are hatchlings.
As lizardfolk age, they slow down. Over the age of 60 or so, they do not care to do much more than lie on a warm rock and bask in the sun. When these creatures die, they are consumed by the rest of the tribe at a ceremonial wake, their flesh becoming part of the tribe both literally and figuratively.
When wandering outside their marshy territories, most lizardfolk work in small groups of two to three. On rare occasions, one can be found travelling alone. Normally, though, lizardfolk feel the need to have at least one other lizardfolk with them to remind them at all times of who they are. Otherwise, they fear that they might be seduced by the civilized ways of the outside world and never return home.
Language: Lizardfolk speak Draconic. The more intelligent ones sometimes pick up Common, the better to frighten potential prey. More rarely, they learn languages like Dwarven, Elven, Goblin, Orc or the language of neighbouring home regions, depending on where they live.
All lizardfolk are illiterate, except for those who have a player character class other than barbarian.
Religion: Lizardfolk worship Semuanya. Their clerics don’t have true shrines or sacred places, or hold regular services. Instead, they function as shamans, bringing the blessings of Semuanya to the god’s people whenever they are called upon. The god of the lizardfolk is a source of great pride for these creatures. This deity works hand in hand with nature, which helps to explain the great number of lizardfolk druids about. Those who grow up worshipping Semuanya find it easy to make the leap to worshipping nature itself.
Relations: The only relation most lizardfolk have with other races is that of hunter to prey. The more civilized lizardfolk realize that the other races may have something to teach them, and they are willing to parley with them — at least as long as their bellies are full. Lizardfolk on empty stomachs are notoriously difficult to reason with.
Equipment: Lizardfolk use a limited number of weapons, preferring to stick to tools of war they can fashion by hand from readily available materials. They do have one weapon unique to their race, however: the barbed dart.
Animals and Pets: Lizardfolk don’t raise animals or keep pets. To them, such creatures are for stealing, slaughtering and eating. On rare occasions, lizardfolk druids use magic to enchant dinosaurs and ride the mighty beasts into battle.
Regions: Surkh
Source: Races of Faerûn (Page 140), Player’s Guide to Faerûn (Page 30)
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 15 years | +1d4 (16—19) years | +1d6 (16—21) years | +2d6 (17—27) 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 35 years | 53 years | 70 years | +2d20 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’ 10" | +2d10 (5’ 0"—6’ 6") | 125 lbs. | ×2d4 (129—285 lbs.) |
| Female | 4’ 5" | +2d10 (4’ 7"—6’ 1") | 90 lbs. | ×2d4 (94—250 lbs.) |
Source: Player’s Handbook (Page 109), Player’s Guide to Faerûn (Page 32)