Homebrew Ferretfolk Species Details

Ferrets are tiny, energetic critters from the family Mustelidae. While they may be carnivorous they are by no means dangerous and are a very popular household pet due to their sociable natures and extreme curiosity. 

Though there are theories, such as, a group of ferrets finding their way into the potion bag of a great wizard or accidentally burrowing into a source of wild magic power, no one actually knows how the Ferretfolk came to be.

Ferretfolk, unlike their tiny beast counterparts are tall and wiry humanoids that range between 6-8 foot tall. Don’t be fooled, however, as these lively folk tend to be deceptively nimble, able to bounce and flip around to their hearts content or squeeze into holes much smaller than themselves.

Many Ferretfolk don’t care much for violence, due to their intense sense of smell which makes some scents like fresh blood often deeply disturbing for them. When frightened or disturbed, the Ferretfolk often tend to burrow into the ground if it’s loose enough to warrant it, if not they’ll find any small gap or container to squeeze into and wait until they feel better.

Creating Your Character

At 1st level, you choose whether your character is a member of the human race or of a fantastical race. If you select a fantastical race, follow these additional rules during character creation.

Ability Score Increases

When determining your character’s ability scores, increase one score by 2 and increase a different score by 1, or increase three different scores by 1. Follow this rule regardless of the method you use to determine the scores, such as rolling or point buy. The “Quick Build” section for your character’s class offers suggestions on which scores to increase. You can follow those suggestions or ignore them, but you can’t raise any of your scores above 20.

Languages

Your character can speak, read, and write Common and one other language that you and your DM agree is appropriate for the character. The Player’s Handbook offers a list of languages to choose from. The DM is free to modify that list for a campaign.

Creature Type

Every creature in D&D, including each player character, has a special tag in the rules that identifies the type of creature they are. Most player characters are of the Humanoid type. A race tells you what your character’s creature type is.

Here’s a list of the game’s creature types in alphabetical order: Aberration, Beast, Celestial, Construct, Dragon, Elemental, Fey, Fiend, Giant, Humanoid, Monstrosity, Ooze, Plant, Undead. These types don’t have rules themselves, but some rules in the game affect creatures of certain types in different ways. For example, the cure wounds spell doesn’t work on a Construct or an Undead.

Life Span

The typical life span of a player character in the D&D multiverse is about a century, assuming the character doesn’t meet a violent end on an adventure. Members of some races, such as dwarves and elves, can live for centuries. If typical members of a race can live longer than a century, that fact is mentioned in the race’s description.

Height and Weight

Player characters, regardless of race, typically fall into the same ranges of height and weight that humans have in our world. If you’d like to determine your character’s height or weight randomly, consult the Random Height and Weight table in the Player’s Handbook, and choose the row in the table that best represents the build you imagine for your character.

Ferretfolk Traits

Ferretfolk have the following traits:

Creature Type

You are a Humanoid.

Size

You are Medium.

Speed

Your walking speed is 35 ft.

Ferret Paws

You can use your claws to make unarmed strikes. When you hit with them, the strike deals 1d4 + your Strength modifier slashing damage, instead of the bludgeoning damage normal for an unarmed strike. In addition you gain a burrowing speed of 10 feet.

Mustelid Tumbling

You have proficiency in the Acrobatics skill.

Darkvision

You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light and in darkness as if it were dim light. You discern colors in that darkness only as shades of gray.

Lean Build

Due to your strangely thin limber body is adept at manoeuvring around though tight areas or out of the way of attacks. You count as one size smaller for the purposes of moving through areas, additionally, when attacked by an attack of opportunity, you may use your reaction to impose disadvantage on that attack.

Sharp Smell

You have advantage on Wisdom (Perception) and Wisdom (Survival) checks that rely on smell.