Below are physical, psychological, social, and statistical descriptions of the race, modeled after the format used in the PHB in conjunction with formats I've seen used elsewhere. This race has gone through quite a few iterations, but I think it's finally ready for more rigorous, external feedback and criticism. I'm well aware it might be in an overpowered state currently, but I really wanted to try to integrate multiple traits that sell the idea of a truly alien player character race, as well as drawbacks that offset the advantages. Ideally, I'd like to keep all of the traits listed in some form or another and simply add more drawbacks to balance the race, rather than cutting content, even if that compromises the concision of it. But regardless of that, any feedback at all is very much appreciated!
Luminary WITH THEM TRAVELED A MAN IN ARMOR WHOSE EYES BURNED WITH YELLOW FIRE. WITHOUT a word he took a couple of steps to the side and sat on the ground, hanging his head and appearing to meditate. I thought little of it at the time—some strange curse or enchantment or the like; you see them every now and again, ducking through the crowds and trying to blend in as best as they can. But afterwards, I couldn't shake the feeling that there was something else about him. The subtle differences in the way he moved seemed to belie something much more essential. —Theodore Cavendish, Liar's Folly
Luminaries are, in essence, spells given will. They are creatures composed entirely of self-sustaining, adaptive magic. In many ways they are like animate constructs or magical sentient objects, but luminaries are unbound by the confines of the material. Luminaries can be created deliberately by the efforts of a magically-skilled individual or other luminary, or accidentally as a result of a particularly unstable spell or freak magical event.
Ethereal Anima As creatures of pure magic, luminaries are some of the most bizarre humanoids to exist. Despite their strange fundamentals, they behave in ways that are basically similar to most organic creatures. Though they lack any intrinsic mass, they are still pulled upon by gravity, and they manifest a field of force around their bodies that functions much like an organic creature's skin which allows them to wear clothing and manipulate objects. A luminary can alter the permeability of this field to be able to move through solid objects, but doing so causes a luminary to drop everything it is holding and wearing, rendering its fragile magical shell vulnerable and weak. Stripped of protective armor and clothing, a luminary looks like a humanoid cloud of light surrounding a brighter interior cloud that looks like a minimalistic human skeleton, though this "skeleton" lacks a rib cage and cranium. A luminary's glow is superficial and insufficient to significantly illuminate something more than a few inches away from the body, but nonetheless makes one stand out in a crowd. Luminaries each appear to emit a particular color of light, and though a luminary cannot change the hue of the light it emanates, it can change the intensity of it, making certain areas of the body appear lighter in contrast to the surrounding area. Many luminaries use this ability to visibly emote. Luminaries have the sensory range of humans, but make no distinction between taste and smell. They are able to perceive with these senses, with the exception of sight, from all points on their bodies. A luminary sees through an invisible, horizontally-oriented, marquise-shaped area on the front of its head. This means of sight grants it a field of vision comparable to a human's.
Unlikely Beginnings Though luminaries can be created by wizards and other knowledgeable magic-users, they are nonetheless rare. The creation of a luminary is comparable to that of a conventional construct, but few mages know the way and simultaneously see the merit in creating a free-willed creature as opposed to a perfectly obedient one. A luminary can also result of a botched attempt at the creation of a magical servant like animated armor or a helmed horror. Luminaries can even be created through freak magical accidents, during which the chaotic miasma of arcane energy might coalesce in just the right way that one is formed, though this is exceedingly rare given the frequency of such events. In addition, luminaries instinctively know how to produce more of their own kind, though they feel no innate urge to do so. Whatever the case, a luminary is born with a fully-developed mind, though it knows nothing of the world around it. Willing or merely responsible creators of luminaries find that they are easily taught and attentive to new sources of information, though more unscrupulous types are eager to cast aside their failed attempt at a more obedient servant. Even in this case, or in the case of a luminary that has no creator to look to, luminaries find information wherever they look, and so teach themselves in a fashion over time, even without a mentor to look to. Some have postulated that a luminary's intelligence is too pronounced for the relative ease of synthesizing it, and that it might indeed come from somewhere else, though where that might be none can say for certain. On the occasion that a luminary is formed through the concerted efforts of a dedicated spellcaster or the random chaos of infinity, they don't linger if they can help it. Luminaries have widely varying personalities, but are all possessed of a free spirit and a yearning for new circumstances to adapt to. This may, in turn, explain why luminaries spend little thought on the creation of new individuals of their own kind; luminaries are always looking for the next thing to add to themselves—to learn, overcome, or adapt to—and spend little time considering producing new individuals for the world. As expected, luminaries have no societies of their own. Even the name "luminary" is a term that only a select few use to describe them, and others may have their own names for the strange race. Despite their isolation from others of their kind, they are nonetheless eager to learn, adapt, grow, and give their all to whatever they set their sights on.
Interest and Devotion Luminaries have widely varying personalities, but they tend to come off as oddballs due to their strange arcane minds. Despite this, luminaries tend to have good reasons for the things they do, and meaningful relationships can easily be formed by those willing to put in the effort. Luminaries are interested by a wide variety of things, and other individuals are no exception. Luminaries typically show a great deal of respect and courtesy to those who fascinate them for whatever reason, and if those individuals are amenable to a luminary's strange behavior, they will undoubtedly develop a friendship that lasts a lifetime. Luminaries who meet with one another tend to become friends or lovers, since it is so rare for two individuals to meet, and when they do they invariably have a lot to share with one another.
Luminary Names Luminaries take their names from anywhere they can find them, but they tend to be picky about given ones. One may adopt a name given to it by its creator, but may also discard such a name later on in favor of one it picks itself. Likewise, a luminary that is discovered by intelligent creatures may at first take on the name they call it by, but may later reject the name if it realizes the name is unsavory or unbefitting.
Luminary Traits Your magical nature manifests itself in these traits, which you share with other luminaries. Ability Score Increase. Your Intelligence score increases by 2. Age. Luminaries are born with fully-developed minds and learn quickly. They gain the ability to function normally in society by about four years. They do not die unless killed, and so can be any age, though they are rarely ancient. Alignment. Luminaries are most often good. They tend to have few selfish desires because they need so little to survive, and so have a tendency to focus on helping others or furthering a selfless cause. Size. Luminaries tend to be about the same size as humans, but with somewhat more unpredictable heights and builds. Your size is medium. Speed. Your base walking speed is 30 feet. Arcane Psychology. Luminaries necessarily have an innate understanding of magic, which they use to voluntarily regulate their bodily processes. As a result, you have proficiency in Arcana. Incorporeal Movement. You can move through other creatures and objects as if they were difficult terrain. Anything you are wearing or carrying is dropped when you use this feature. You take 1d10 force damage if you end your turn inside an object. Exposure Susceptibility. Your temperamental body requires protection from the elements during strenuous activity. While wearing neither clothing nor armor, you are incapacitated. In this state, if you end your turn in the space of clothing or armor that isn't being worn or carried, you may don it on the start of your next turn without expending your action as long as you are still in its space. Antimagic Susceptibility. You temporarily wink out of existence within the area of an antimagic field. You instantly reappear once the space you occupied is no longer within the area of an antimagic field. If targeted by dispel magic, you must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against the caster's spell save DC or temporarily wink out of existence, reappearing after 1 minute. Damage Immunities. You are immune to nonmagical acid and nonmagical poison damage. Condition Immunities. You are immune to nonmagical disease, nonmagical paralysis, and nonmagical poisons. Ethereal Nature. You have two creature types: humanoid and construct. You can be affected by a game effect if it works on either of your creature types. You don't require air, food, drink, or sleep. You can still benefit from the effects of consumable spells and magic items, such as potions. Languages. You can speak, read, and write common and a language of your choice.
Using your Incorporeal Movement immediately incapacitates you. You should probably include a footnote about how you can still move while incapacitated.
The rules for donning armor don't require you to use an action (except for shields), they just cost an amount of time, so I don't think you need to give luminaries the ability to don armor as a free action. This does more or less prevent them from using this ability during combat, but I think that's reasonable - and you could have a racial feat that grants the ability to use up your movement to don armor more quickly. Perhaps something like 5 feet for clothing or light armor, 15 feet for medium armor, and 30 feet for heavy armor? Maybe also allow picking up your dropped weapons.
Antimagic Susceptibility
What happens to your items when you stop existing? Do they vanish with you, or do they stay behind?
Antimagic Susceptibility (as seen on constructs) normally just incapacitates a creature that has it, which still allows them to move out of the field on their own. You can't leave the field by yourself if you don't exist though, so you're stuck until the field moves or ends.
If you enter a static antimagic field, for all intents and purposes you die instantly with no save. That's bad, even if antimagic fields not generated by creatures your allies can kill are rare. Maybe allow a dex save to not enter the field?
I'd suggest changing this so that you're incorporeal (as per your incorporeal movement trait) while within the area of an antimagic field instead.
Alternatively, you could have them be forced into the Ethereal Plane while in the area of an antimagic field (ref: Etherealness), and instantly return to the Material Plane when you leave the area of the field or the field vanishes. Similarly, failing a con save vs. Dispel Magic could also simply force you into the Ethereal Plane for 1 minute instead of making you entirely cease to exist.
The info about how they're free spirits yearning for new experiences make me think that they should be inclined towards the chaotic alignments.
They don't sleep, so I feel like they should also be immune to magical sleep.
In the Ethereal Anima section, you say that luminaries glow softly, but this isn't reflected anywhere in their mechanical traits. Maybe have them shed dim light in a 5 foot radius?
Detect Balance: Goal = ~26 points, values I'm less certain of in (brackets).
8 = ASI +2
2 = Skill Proficiency (Arcana)
(4) = Incapacitated Incorporeal Movement
4 = Don armor as a free action (dropping this)
(-6) = Antimagic Susceptibility (Ethereal plane version - the ability of some monsters or traps to easily remove you until the rest of your party deals with them could make the race unplayable at higher levels; the ability to flee the field under your own power reduces this to a big drawback instead of a dealbreaker)
6 = Medium damage immunity (acid)
8 = Common damage immunity (poison)
1 = disease immunity (from nonmagical sources)
(1) = paralyze immunity (from nonmagical sources)
(1) = poison immunity (from nonmagical sources)
1 = sleep immunity (from nonmagical sources)
4 = don't need to breath
1 = don't need to eat/drink
4 = don't need to sleep (drop this to 2 if you require 4 hours of inactivity like an elf's trance or a warforge's living construct trait)
(-8) = both humanoid and construct (you don't benefit from magical healing)
0 = Illumination: Shed dim light in a 5 foot radius. (Sneaking penalties are eliminated with sufficient clothing)
Total = 27! They seem pretty well balanced to me, good job!
Hey SirBlackAxe, thanks a ton for your input! Before I make revisions (and I absolutely have plenty to revise now, thanks to your reply), I wanted to ask some questions and also clarify a few things. I'll respond to your points with my own bullets in sequence:
When I added this trait, I had it in my mind that any task that requires a certain amount of time to do requires an action, whether it's in combat or out of combat, though reading up on it again, it seems like actions are only a thing in combat, and out of combat a creature simply spends the time doing what it wanted to do. In other words, I thought that without the stipulation that you could just stay in the same space as armor or clothing in order to don it once more, you would never be able to put armor or clothing on yourself again, since to do so would require a sequence of actions over the course of between 1 and 10 minutes. Realizing that I was mistaken, this seems like a great idea, and the idea for the racial feat is also something I'll definitely make a note of!
Should I make a note that it immediately incapacitates the character, or is that clear? I didn't add in the detail that you are still able to move while incapacitated because, to my knowledge, any creature that has the ability to move at all is still able to move when the only condition that affects it is incapacitated, since it only deprives a creature of its ability to take actions, and moving isn't an action. Do you think it would be redundant to add that again, or is it such a common misconception that it's worth adding anyway?
Antimagic Susceptibility
The design intent is that you are the only thing that stops existing, since you're made entirely out of magic, but that quality doesn't extend to your mundane armor, weapons, and equipment. I'll be sure to clarify in a future revision!
Upon further review, you're absolutely right that other constructs simply become incapacitated while in the area of an antimagic field, and it was always the intent for luminaries to work like other constructs in that regard, so that's another thing I'll be changing.
This is definitely something I didn't catch, and you're right in saying that walking into a static antimagic field and simply ceasing to exist forever with no save is a really boring way to die. I suppose in most cases you could probably dispel the effect, but it might be a quest in and of itself to find someone who can do so if you don't have a wizard in the party. This definitely warrants revision.
The idea behind a luminary ceasing to exist due to dispel magic or an antimagic field is that without a suitable magical medium to exist upon, a luminary is reduced to magical underpinnings that cannot manifest any perceptible or measurable effect. To that end, simply saying that the creature temporarily winks out of existence is a lot less wordy than saying that it's incorporeal, invisible, and immune to all damage, but I suppose I may have to come up with a compromise so that luminaries aren't out there getting one-shotted by their own inability to see static antimagic fields...
This is definitely along the lines of what I would want to functionally happen when a luminary enters an antimagic field, but the problem is that I'm not sure that antimagic fields don't extend into the border ethereal, so I'm actually in the process of figuring it out right now. If it's true that a single antimagic field can only ever exist in one plane, then your proposition works great. If it's not true, then I've got some brainstorming to do...
This is totally a fair point that I actually included in an earlier iteration of the design, but then left it out later for some reason. Seeing it as a suggestion from an unbiased individual makes me think I really shouldn't have ever removed it, so I'll probably be putting that back in (even in my head, a lawful luminary seems like an oddity, so that seems like proof of concept).
This one I'm iffy on. On one hand, I understand that a creature that doesn't sleep probably shouldn't be able to be put to sleep, but... A big part of the idea behind luminaries is that they are always affected by magic because they are magic. That's why magical acids, poisons, and diseases affect them—because the inherent magic of such things affects a luminary directly, regardless of any physical effect the magic produces. Because they are affected by magic in this way, it seems like they should have to be put into a state indistinguishable from sleep, despite not actually being able to go to sleep normally.
In an earlier iteration I actually had luminaries be much brighter, shedding 5 feet of bright light followed by 5 feet of dim light, but I axed that because it meant that 1) a creature couldn't ever be hidden in darkness from a luminary in melee range, and (more importantly) 2) luminaries would always make terrible rogues and other sneaky types. My initial response was just to get rid of it entirely and mention it in the description as something more-or-less inconsequential, but giving them 5 feet of dim light back seems like a better compromise (and adds to the theme of the race).
One last note here, my original design intent was for luminaries to be able to be healed by magical healing (going along with the theme that they can be affected by anything magical). The way I read the hybrid nature trait in Unearthed Arcana (which is what the first part of the Ethereal Nature trait was directly taken from), I thought that it meant anything that could actively affect one of the two creature types could affect the creature itself, and anything that specifically did not affect only one of the creature types would still be able to affect the creature itself, because the other creature type would be affected. In that way, if a luminary was struck by a construct-destroying warhammer, it would be affected as any construct would, but if it was struck by an anything-but-humanoid-destroying warhammer, it would not be affected as if it was just a construct. Sorry if that example is a little obtuse, but hopefully it gets the point of my dubiousness across. That being said, it doesn't change that the balance, taking that into consideration, would make them far too powerful. But, I couldn't help but notice another trait that adds exactly as much as this trait would have subtracted, and that that trait isn't so thematic and important that I couldn't cut it...
Updated Luminary traits! I'll go over details about the changes below—reasons why I changed what I did, how I did.
Luminary Traits Your magical nature manifests itself in these traits, which you share with other luminaries. Ability Score Increase. Your Intelligence score increases by 1. Age. Luminaries are born with fully-developed minds and learn quickly. They learn to function normally in society by about four years. They do not die unless killed, and so can be any age, though they are rarely ancient. Alignment. Luminaries are most often good. They generally have few selfish desires since they need so little to survive, and so have a tendency to focus on helping others or furthering a selfless cause. They are also somewhat unpredictable, and they hate to be tied down for reasons outside of their control, so they tend to be mildly chaotic. Size. Luminaries tend to be about the same size as humans, but with somewhat more unpredictable heights and builds. Your size is medium. Speed. Your base walking speed is 30 feet. Arcane Psychology. Luminaries necessarily have an innate understanding of magic which they use to voluntarily regulate their bodily processes. As a result, you have proficiency in Arcana. Incorporeal Movement. You can move through other creatures and objects as if they were difficult terrain. Anything you are wearing or carrying is dropped when you use this ability. You take 1d10 force damage if you end your turn inside an object. Exposure Susceptibility. Your temperamental body requires protection from the elements during strenuous activity. While wearing neither clothing nor armor, you are incapacitated. Antimagic Susceptibility. You are incapacitated within the area of an antimagic field. If targeted by dispel magic, you must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against the caster's spell save DC or fall unconscious for one minute. At the end of each of your turns, you can make another Constitution saving throw. On a success, you regain consciousness early. Light Emission. You shed dim light in a 5-foot radius. Completely covering your body with something opaque blocks the light. Damage Vulnerability. You have vulnerability to force damage. Damage Immunities. You are immune to nonmagical acid and nonmagical poison damage. Condition Immunities. You are immune to nonmagical disease and nonmagical poisons. Ethereal Nature. You don't require air, food, drink, or sleep. You can still benefit from the effects of consumable spells and magic items, such as potions. You must still refrain from strenuous activity during short and long rests in order to gain their benefits. Languages. You can speak, read, and write common and a language of your choice.
Ability Score Increase. I dropped the Intelligence score increase from a +2 to a +1 after some deliberation. Originally, I had meant to just get rid of it entirely, but then I realized it was thematically important for luminaries to be at least a little bit more intelligent than the baseline.
Alignment. In earlier iterations of the race, luminaries had a tendency towards chaos because of their free-spiritedness, and I'm bringing that back!
Antimagic Susceptibility. This one was quite the balancing act. Thanks to some helpful feedback, I realized that the possibility of encountering a static undispellable antimagic field and just walking into it would make for a pretty unpleasant death-state for the player. One idea was to banish the luminary to the ethereal plane while in the vicinity of an antimagic field or during the duration of dispel magic's effect, but this posed several problems. First, there would be no accounting for the rare event of an antimagic field on the ethereal plane overlapping the one on the material plane, or for dispel magic being cast on a luminary already in the ethereal plane. I could have explained some complicated contingency for such cases, but it certainly wouldn't have helped the concision of an already-somewhat-overdeveloped race. Second, the ethereal plane banishment effect of the antimagic field or dispel magic would have caused the luminary to drop whatever it was holding, which is fine, but also whatever it was wearing, which would cause it to be incapacitated (as per Exposure Susceptibility) for the duration of the fight (if applicable) upon reappearing. This could have been solved by making the equipment be transferred to the ethereal plane with the luminary, but it wouldn't make any sense, because a luminary's equipment is not part of it. Finally, the border ethereal does not connect to all other planes. This means that if a luminary found itself dispelled on an outer plane, it would have nowhere to go, and simply cease to exist for the duration of the spell or forever while within a static, undispellable antimagic field (which is exactly what I've been trying to solve)! After several attempts, I settled on taking a page out of the animated armor's stat block. The only difference between how a luminary functions is that it can repeat the saving throw on dispel magic. This way, a luminary can't just be taken out of a fight forever due to failing one saving throw or getting caught in an antimagic field. The drawback that comes with being able to fight on is that the luminary stays within the material plane for the duration of either effect, making it vulnerable to attacks. This also makes dispel magic something of an alternate hold person (which doesn't require concentration) against a luminary, and that gives certain spellcasters that option of dealing with them if they lack the spell or suspect that the luminary's Constitution score is lower than its Wisdom score. Forcibly holding a luminary within an antimagic field also becomes possible, since the luminary retains tangibility in this revision of the trait.
Light Emission. This was something I toyed with in a much earlier state of the race, but in a more powerful (and more debilitating, due to stealth) form. In its current form, it doesn't do a great deal to make the race more powerful, but does contribute to the theme of an alien being made of magic.
Damage Vulnerability. Without reducing the luminary's ability score increase to nil, the race was still too powerful to be considered balanced. Instead, I opted to include this vulnerability to force damage. While it's true that force is a rare damage type, it means that certain spellcasters will pose an extreme danger to luminaries, and that in such cases a luminary will have to be extremely cautious. The disintegrate spell could be particularly devastating for a luminary. The rarity of the damage means this won't be totally crippling for a luminary, while still being a kind of silver bullet for those attempting to deal with a troublesome luminary.
Ethereal Nature. Nothing too spectacular here, just added that your short and long rests still last as long as usual, for clarity.
Probably not done with the race just yet—I look forward to any additional feedback to keep smoothing out the kinks!
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Below are physical, psychological, social, and statistical descriptions of the race, modeled after the format used in the PHB in conjunction with formats I've seen used elsewhere. This race has gone through quite a few iterations, but I think it's finally ready for more rigorous, external feedback and criticism. I'm well aware it might be in an overpowered state currently, but I really wanted to try to integrate multiple traits that sell the idea of a truly alien player character race, as well as drawbacks that offset the advantages. Ideally, I'd like to keep all of the traits listed in some form or another and simply add more drawbacks to balance the race, rather than cutting content, even if that compromises the concision of it. But regardless of that, any feedback at all is very much appreciated!
Luminary
WITH THEM TRAVELED A MAN IN ARMOR WHOSE EYES BURNED WITH YELLOW FIRE. WITHOUT a word he took a couple of steps to the side and sat on the ground, hanging his head and appearing to meditate. I thought little of it at the time—some strange curse or enchantment or the like; you see them every now and again, ducking through the crowds and trying to blend in as best as they can. But afterwards, I couldn't shake the feeling that there was something else about him. The subtle differences in the way he moved seemed to belie something much more essential.
—Theodore Cavendish, Liar's Folly
Luminaries are, in essence, spells given will. They are creatures composed entirely of self-sustaining, adaptive magic. In many ways they are like animate constructs or magical sentient objects, but luminaries are unbound by the confines of the material. Luminaries can be created deliberately by the efforts of a magically-skilled individual or other luminary, or accidentally as a result of a particularly unstable spell or freak magical event.
Ethereal Anima
As creatures of pure magic, luminaries are some of the most bizarre humanoids to exist. Despite their strange fundamentals, they behave in ways that are basically similar to most organic creatures. Though they lack any intrinsic mass, they are still pulled upon by gravity, and they manifest a field of force around their bodies that functions much like an organic creature's skin which allows them to wear clothing and manipulate objects. A luminary can alter the permeability of this field to be able to move through solid objects, but doing so causes a luminary to drop everything it is holding and wearing, rendering its fragile magical shell vulnerable and weak.
Stripped of protective armor and clothing, a luminary looks like a humanoid cloud of light surrounding a brighter interior cloud that looks like a minimalistic human skeleton, though this "skeleton" lacks a rib cage and cranium. A luminary's glow is superficial and insufficient to significantly illuminate something more than a few inches away from the body, but nonetheless makes one stand out in a crowd. Luminaries each appear to emit a particular color of light, and though a luminary cannot change the hue of the light it emanates, it can change the intensity of it, making certain areas of the body appear lighter in contrast to the surrounding area. Many luminaries use this ability to visibly emote.
Luminaries have the sensory range of humans, but make no distinction between taste and smell. They are able to perceive with these senses, with the exception of sight, from all points on their bodies. A luminary sees through an invisible, horizontally-oriented, marquise-shaped area on the front of its head. This means of sight grants it a field of vision comparable to a human's.
Unlikely Beginnings
Though luminaries can be created by wizards and other knowledgeable magic-users, they are nonetheless rare. The creation of a luminary is comparable to that of a conventional construct, but few mages know the way and simultaneously see the merit in creating a free-willed creature as opposed to a perfectly obedient one. A luminary can also result of a botched attempt at the creation of a magical servant like animated armor or a helmed horror. Luminaries can even be created through freak magical accidents, during which the chaotic miasma of arcane energy might coalesce in just the right way that one is formed, though this is exceedingly rare given the frequency of such events. In addition, luminaries instinctively know how to produce more of their own kind, though they feel no innate urge to do so.
Whatever the case, a luminary is born with a fully-developed mind, though it knows nothing of the world around it. Willing or merely responsible creators of luminaries find that they are easily taught and attentive to new sources of information, though more unscrupulous types are eager to cast aside their failed attempt at a more obedient servant. Even in this case, or in the case of a luminary that has no creator to look to, luminaries find information wherever they look, and so teach themselves in a fashion over time, even without a mentor to look to. Some have postulated that a luminary's intelligence is too pronounced for the relative ease of synthesizing it, and that it might indeed come from somewhere else, though where that might be none can say for certain.
On the occasion that a luminary is formed through the concerted efforts of a dedicated spellcaster or the random chaos of infinity, they don't linger if they can help it. Luminaries have widely varying personalities, but are all possessed of a free spirit and a yearning for new circumstances to adapt to. This may, in turn, explain why luminaries spend little thought on the creation of new individuals of their own kind; luminaries are always looking for the next thing to add to themselves—to learn, overcome, or adapt to—and spend little time considering producing new individuals for the world.
As expected, luminaries have no societies of their own. Even the name "luminary" is a term that only a select few use to describe them, and others may have their own names for the strange race. Despite their isolation from others of their kind, they are nonetheless eager to learn, adapt, grow, and give their all to whatever they set their sights on.
Interest and Devotion
Luminaries have widely varying personalities, but they tend to come off as oddballs due to their strange arcane minds. Despite this, luminaries tend to have good reasons for the things they do, and meaningful relationships can easily be formed by those willing to put in the effort.
Luminaries are interested by a wide variety of things, and other individuals are no exception. Luminaries typically show a great deal of respect and courtesy to those who fascinate them for whatever reason, and if those individuals are amenable to a luminary's strange behavior, they will undoubtedly develop a friendship that lasts a lifetime.
Luminaries who meet with one another tend to become friends or lovers, since it is so rare for two individuals to meet, and when they do they invariably have a lot to share with one another.
Luminary Names
Luminaries take their names from anywhere they can find them, but they tend to be picky about given ones. One may adopt a name given to it by its creator, but may also discard such a name later on in favor of one it picks itself. Likewise, a luminary that is discovered by intelligent creatures may at first take on the name they call it by, but may later reject the name if it realizes the name is unsavory or unbefitting.
Given Names: Brighteyes, Fireman, Lightwalker, Sunspear, Lightning, Blinder, Starchild, Gleaming One, Darkshine, Sparky, Outsider
Chosen Names: Arc, Windfall, Silence, Blindless, Neverstill, Overcast, Snow, Ideal, Purpose, Constant, Freedom, Summit, Bluestrike
Luminary Traits
Your magical nature manifests itself in these traits, which you share with other luminaries.
Ability Score Increase. Your Intelligence score increases by 2.
Age. Luminaries are born with fully-developed minds and learn quickly. They gain the ability to function normally in society by about four years. They do not die unless killed, and so can be any age, though they are rarely ancient.
Alignment. Luminaries are most often good. They tend to have few selfish desires because they need so little to survive, and so have a tendency to focus on helping others or furthering a selfless cause.
Size. Luminaries tend to be about the same size as humans, but with somewhat more unpredictable heights and builds. Your size is medium.
Speed. Your base walking speed is 30 feet.
Arcane Psychology. Luminaries necessarily have an innate understanding of magic, which they use to voluntarily regulate their bodily processes. As a result, you have proficiency in Arcana.
Incorporeal Movement. You can move through other creatures and objects as if they were difficult terrain. Anything you are wearing or carrying is dropped when you use this feature. You take 1d10 force damage if you end your turn inside an object.
Exposure Susceptibility. Your temperamental body requires protection from the elements during strenuous activity. While wearing neither clothing nor armor, you are incapacitated. In this state, if you end your turn in the space of clothing or armor that isn't being worn or carried, you may don it on the start of your next turn without expending your action as long as you are still in its space.
Antimagic Susceptibility. You temporarily wink out of existence within the area of an antimagic field. You instantly reappear once the space you occupied is no longer within the area of an antimagic field. If targeted by dispel magic, you must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against the caster's spell save DC or temporarily wink out of existence, reappearing after 1 minute.
Damage Immunities. You are immune to nonmagical acid and nonmagical poison damage.
Condition Immunities. You are immune to nonmagical disease, nonmagical paralysis, and nonmagical poisons.
Ethereal Nature. You have two creature types: humanoid and construct. You can be affected by a game effect if it works on either of your creature types. You don't require air, food, drink, or sleep. You can still benefit from the effects of consumable spells and magic items, such as potions.
Languages. You can speak, read, and write common and a language of your choice.
Thoughts:
Detect Balance:
Goal = ~26 points, values I'm less certain of in (brackets).
4 = Don armor as a free action (dropping this)Total = 27! They seem pretty well balanced to me, good job!
Hey SirBlackAxe, thanks a ton for your input! Before I make revisions (and I absolutely have plenty to revise now, thanks to your reply), I wanted to ask some questions and also clarify a few things. I'll respond to your points with my own bullets in sequence:
Updated Luminary traits! I'll go over details about the changes below—reasons why I changed what I did, how I did.
Luminary Traits
Your magical nature manifests itself in these traits, which you share with other luminaries.
Ability Score Increase. Your Intelligence score increases by 1.
Age. Luminaries are born with fully-developed minds and learn quickly. They learn to function normally in society by about four years. They do not die unless killed, and so can be any age, though they are rarely ancient.
Alignment. Luminaries are most often good. They generally have few selfish desires since they need so little to survive, and so have a tendency to focus on helping others or furthering a selfless cause. They are also somewhat unpredictable, and they hate to be tied down for reasons outside of their control, so they tend to be mildly chaotic.
Size. Luminaries tend to be about the same size as humans, but with somewhat more unpredictable heights and builds. Your size is medium.
Speed. Your base walking speed is 30 feet.
Arcane Psychology. Luminaries necessarily have an innate understanding of magic which they use to voluntarily regulate their bodily processes. As a result, you have proficiency in Arcana.
Incorporeal Movement. You can move through other creatures and objects as if they were difficult terrain. Anything you are wearing or carrying is dropped when you use this ability. You take 1d10 force damage if you end your turn inside an object.
Exposure Susceptibility. Your temperamental body requires protection from the elements during strenuous activity. While wearing neither clothing nor armor, you are incapacitated.
Antimagic Susceptibility. You are incapacitated within the area of an antimagic field. If targeted by dispel magic, you must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against the caster's spell save DC or fall unconscious for one minute. At the end of each of your turns, you can make another Constitution saving throw. On a success, you regain consciousness early.
Light Emission. You shed dim light in a 5-foot radius. Completely covering your body with something opaque blocks the light.
Damage Vulnerability. You have vulnerability to force damage.
Damage Immunities. You are immune to nonmagical acid and nonmagical poison damage.
Condition Immunities. You are immune to nonmagical disease and nonmagical poisons.
Ethereal Nature. You don't require air, food, drink, or sleep. You can still benefit from the effects of consumable spells and magic items, such as potions. You must still refrain from strenuous activity during short and long rests in order to gain their benefits.
Languages. You can speak, read, and write common and a language of your choice.
First, there would be no accounting for the rare event of an antimagic field on the ethereal plane overlapping the one on the material plane, or for dispel magic being cast on a luminary already in the ethereal plane. I could have explained some complicated contingency for such cases, but it certainly wouldn't have helped the concision of an already-somewhat-overdeveloped race.
Second, the ethereal plane banishment effect of the antimagic field or dispel magic would have caused the luminary to drop whatever it was holding, which is fine, but also whatever it was wearing, which would cause it to be incapacitated (as per Exposure Susceptibility) for the duration of the fight (if applicable) upon reappearing. This could have been solved by making the equipment be transferred to the ethereal plane with the luminary, but it wouldn't make any sense, because a luminary's equipment is not part of it.
Finally, the border ethereal does not connect to all other planes. This means that if a luminary found itself dispelled on an outer plane, it would have nowhere to go, and simply cease to exist for the duration of the spell or forever while within a static, undispellable antimagic field (which is exactly what I've been trying to solve)!
After several attempts, I settled on taking a page out of the animated armor's stat block. The only difference between how a luminary functions is that it can repeat the saving throw on dispel magic. This way, a luminary can't just be taken out of a fight forever due to failing one saving throw or getting caught in an antimagic field. The drawback that comes with being able to fight on is that the luminary stays within the material plane for the duration of either effect, making it vulnerable to attacks. This also makes dispel magic something of an alternate hold person (which doesn't require concentration) against a luminary, and that gives certain spellcasters that option of dealing with them if they lack the spell or suspect that the luminary's Constitution score is lower than its Wisdom score. Forcibly holding a luminary within an antimagic field also becomes possible, since the luminary retains tangibility in this revision of the trait.
Probably not done with the race just yet—I look forward to any additional feedback to keep smoothing out the kinks!