Homebrew Frillneck Lizardman Species Details

 Appearance: Frillneck males stand an average of 10ft tall, although some very well fed individuals can reach well beyond that. Their size is directly proportional to how successful they are in acquiring food and defeating rivals. A male who defeats many rivals and eats a lot will be very large because the reward for winning is a rush of dopamine, growth hormone, and testosterone. Frillneck females are much smaller, standing an average of 8ft and rarely deviating from that. Both sexes have frills, horns, and various spiny protrusions, with the males' being much larger. Only males have dewlaps, and the jaw muscles of the males are extremely pronounced; forming large jowls behind the jaw. The coloration of males is aposomatic in nature, favoring dark colors on the sunward facing scales and bright, vibrant warning colors on their necks, dewlaps, frills, and bellies. The females tend to be more drab in color, blending in with their surroundings. In both sexes, one's physical size is a sign of good health and is thus considered beautiful. In males a larger, more colorful frill and dewlap are desirable, while in females the better one blends in with her surroundings, the more beautiful she is and females will often cover themselves in mud and flora to accentuate their natural camouflage.

Unique Physiology: Unlike the more evolved Lizardfolk, Frillnecks are not bipeds, although they may walk on two legs through "tripodding" which is the act of using their long, muscular tails as a third leg. Proportionally, Frillnecks resemble large monitor lizards, with their legs and necks being roughly 1/4 of their total height each, and their body being 2/4. If your Frillneck stands 8ft tall, she will have a leg and arm length of 2ft, a neck length of 2ft, a torso length of 4ft, and a tail length of 6ft. From tail tip to snout, your Frillneck will measure approximately 2x your chosen height. Frillnecks have plantigrade limbs, like a monitor lizard rather than the digitigrade limbs of draconic creatures. Frillneck "hands" are only semi-articulate and cannot perform fine movements like the fingers and opposable thumbs of humanoids. As such, they most often use simple weapons, or none at all, preferring to use their long fangs, razor-sharp claws, and whip-like tails. The base of their tails has a large ventral scale covering and protecting their reproductive organs when not in use so there is no need for them to wear clothing. Instead of clothing, male frillnecks will tie trophies to their bodies and females will cover themselves in interesting items they'd found by their nesting site as a display of how good their nesting ground is.

Culture: Frillneck culture.. if you can call it that.. is based on three things: Domination, Food, and Reproduction. They have no written language, no machines or moving tools, no agriculture, no animal husbandry.. they live as animals, eating what they kill raw and fighting over territory and mates. What little culture they have takes the form of stories and songs which entire families share in. What tools they do build are crude and often single-use, built in the moment for a specific purpose and then discarded. Property is limited to items of personal significance, such as trophies, shiny things, and gifts. These personal items are rarely left lying around and are instead tied to the individual with reeds, scraps of hide, or even rope made from their own shed skin.

Society: Males will take and guard large swathes of land upon which their mates will build their nests. The male roams this territory, marking it with his scent glands and warning totems declaring that he is master of this domain. Like a feudal lord traveling between fiefs, he travels between the nesting places of his mates. While visiting, he may mate with the female present if she is receptive, often bringing shiny rocks and meat as gifts. If there are hatchlings present, he will sing to them; as frillnecks have no written language, their stories are carried on in songs and displays of interpretive dance. If there is a danger to his family present, he will kill it or die trying. Should this male encounter other males on his journey, he will either kill them or drive them off. There is some room for peaceful interaction if the two males are closely related, such as in the case of brothers from the same clutch. But it is incredibly rare for a male to tolerate unrelated males on his land. This cycle of patrolling, hunting, reproducing, and instructing the young is repeated until the male is unable to continue, either from age or some other malady. At which point his sons will bicker over his land until it is carved up anew to repeat the cycle. The role of the female is less aggressive, but no less important. Should a male have only one female, she may accompany him for a time, assisting in hunts and the creation of territorial totems. Once gravid, however, she will seek out a nesting place and the two of them will build a mound together - the entrance of which is just big enough for one of them to completely block by placing their back against it so that any dangers attempting to get in would have to go through the one blocking the hole. If the male is present, he performs this self-sacrificial duty, if only the female is in the nest, she does. Frillnecks will lay between 15 and 20 eggs. Some will naturally be duds and not hatch, yet others will hatch deformed or weak; the mother will instinctively end the lives of these crippled offspring and consume them to recoup some of the energy spent in their creation. The surviving hatchlings are born knowing everything they need in order to survive. The female will guard these hatchlings fiercely until they are large enough that they do not have to worry about predators. At which point the males will hunt for their mother and sisters in place of the father, and will join the father in patrolling territory and fighting off rivals.

Religion: Frillnecks have no formal religion and venerate no gods in particular, although they may honor visible celestial objects or natural phenomenon, and by extent, accidentally honor the gods associated with those things.

Death and Rebirth: Frillnecks believe in reincarnation and venerate "The Ancestors", an animistic representation of the instincts which they are born with and which they believe to be fragments of their past lives which they retain from one life to the next. All Frillnecks believe that one reincarnates after death, taking on the form of whatever ate them after they died. As such they practice ritual cannibalism, believing that the surest way to rejoin your family after death and retain what you learned in life is for your remains to be devoured by your kin. It is considered shameful to be left to rot after dying, and not eating the dead is a sign of disrespect. Should a male kill another male whom he is related to, and whose family he is on good terms with, he may consume only part of the corpse and present the rest to the eldest surviving male of the victim's family so that the slain may rejoin its family immediately.

The Ancestors' Song: When under duress, or in great physical need, Frillnecks experience an altered state of consciousness wherein their instincts take over and their bodies act without their conscious input. During this state, which they may refer to as "Dancing to the Song of the Ancestors", they experience a mental fogue in which outside stimuli become muted and they begin to hallucinate that they smell blood, taste egg yolk, hear distant bellowing or drumbeats, see the eyes of predators, or feel sensations of being touched. The exact nature of this fogue varies depending on what triggered it. Fear and danger may have an individual seeing predators everywhere and hearing voices urging them to flee, while a hungry frillneck may smell blood and go into a frenzy. Frillnecks who enter this state have trouble remembering what they did while they danced to the ancestors' song. A Frillneck nearing the end of its life will hear bellowing, taste egg-yolk, and smell nesting-dirt as its next life calls to it. This experience is the most intense of the ancestors' songs and any Frillneck who somehow comes back from this state will be forever changed, as it is a profound religious experience. (You may, if you desire, choose to bend an instinct associated with the circumstances of the Frillneck's survival to better RP the aftermath of such an experience and set the stage for character development. Such as your Frillneck becoming extremely protective of the one who resurrected them, viewing them as too useful to let any harm come to them. Or perhaps a price was paid for their return, and now they are obsessed hoarding the items used in their revival, going so far as steal from or kill people in order to obtain them.)

Magic: Frillnecks do not use magic actively but may be imbued with primal magic as a result of being so closely tied with nature. It is up to you what class you play, but you would not be getting the genuine screeching savage ragemonster experience if you made your reptilian primitive a wizard or artificer. Some good choices would be Beast, Totem, or Ancestral Barbarians as they have magic-like abilities tied to primal energies and ritual spells to commune with nature or the ancestors.

Among other races: Frillnecks view all other races the same way they view any other prey. They are food. And they are beneath the Frillneck. Frillnecks tend lawful among their own kind, but will seem highly chaotic to more civilized races as many of their behaviors are hard-wired into their biology and thus are impossible to condition away completely. This makes them utterly incapable of caring about the laws of others, the lives of others, the property of others, or the beliefs of others unless these things are immediately useful to them. And then once they are no longer useful, they are discarded like any other tool. Should a Frillneck, for whatever reason, be forced by some circumstance to care about the lives of other races, his primary means of doing so will be to treat them as he would a fellow Frillneck, often to catastrophic, violent, and amusing effect. Understandably, an elven noble or human merchant may not appreciate the Frillneck's sincere, heartfelt desire to apologize for accidentally killing their servant by presenting a half-eaten corpse to them and insisting they partake in "The Kin Flesh'. A civilized person, so apologized to, may call the guard.. or a monster hunter. And that's if that person sticks around long enough for the Frillneck to even come close enough to present its gift; (You wouldn't just stand there while a 12ft tall prehistoric monster jankily sidled up to you carrying a bloody bag and screeching at you would you?)

Among other races additional note: Expect and even encourage discrimination against your Frillneck. Half the fun of being a monster is being banned from reputable establishments or being forced to sleep in the stables if the innkeeper is particularly progressive. Remember you are playing an instinct-driven, dominance-obsessed obligatory carnivore that is covered in weapons, doesn't wear clothes and has no concept of personal property, hygiene, etiquette, bartering, or the value of other peoples' lives. You are not playing some weirdo's scale-sona self-insert that is gonna go on to open a tavern and grow an herb garden. You're playing Gustav the Man-Eating Crocodile, but it can kinda-sorta talk. The realistic townsfolk response to such a creature is to be frightened of it and assume it is some dangerous beast that has gotten loose in town, so expect that from NPCs if your DM isn't a pushover. If this sort of character would make a module or campaign impossible, then save both yourself and the DM the headache and play a human fighter.

Frillneck Lizardman Traits

Frillneck males may be medium 8-12ft or large 12-16ft and may benefit from the effects of being one size category larger at the DM's discretion. Female Frillnecks are always medium.

Ability Scores

You have three (3) Ability Score points at character creation which you may distribute among Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, or Wisdom.

Additionally you may, at your DM's discretion, take the Behemoth option which additionally grants Large size and +2 Strength Score at the cost of -4 Intelligence and the detriments of being a large creature.

Languages

The Frillneck language is similar to Draconic, but lacks any sort of writing and many of the more complex meanings are conveyed through body language. This language is spoken with the throat rather than the mouth and any languages the Frillneck possesses may be spoken without the use of the mouth or tongue so long as the Frillneck can breath.

You are proficient in Frillneck Draconic and Common. However you are illiterate in both and in any other language you choose.

A Frillneck may not choose to become literate regardless of their Intelligence score or any language proficiencies they may obtain as their brains simply lack the capacity to understand symbolic script. However, if a written language involves runes which depict an actual picture of what they are meant to describe, such as a pictogram of a tree to represent a tree, the Frillneck may understand only the literal interpretation of the rune. That picture of a tree may have multiple symbolic meanings which one literate in that language would be able to decipher, however all the Frillneck sees is "TREE!!!".

Semi-Aquatic

Frillnecks are primarily land-based predators, but their slow metabolism and powerful tails also provide them an edge when moving through water.

You have a Swim Speed equal to your Walk Speed and you may hold your breath for a number of minutes equal to 15 plus your Constitution Modifier.

Effects which must be inhaled in order to take effect, such as poisonous gas, do not effect you while you are holding your breath.

COVERED IN WEAPONS!!!

You were a killing machine from the instant you hatched, gifted by The Ancestors with all the weapons you could ever need.

Your Claws, Fangs, and Tail become natural weapons in which you are Proficient and deal 1d6+Strength Modifier Slashing (Claws), Piercing (Bite), or Bludgeoning. (Tail-Slap)

These attacks replace the typical unarmed attack profile and may be used as a bonus action as if they were an off-hand weapon even if you are wielding a shield or two-handed weapon.

HUNGRY JAWS!!!

You can throw yourself into a feeding frenzy. As a bonus action, you can make a special attack with your Bite. If the attack hits, it deals its normal damage, and you gain temporary hit points equal to your proficiency bonus. You can use this trait a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

Natural Armor

You have tough, scaly skin. When you aren't wearing armor, your base AC is 13 + Dexterity modifier.

You can use your natural armor to determine your AC if the armor you wear would leave you with a lower AC.

When unarmored, unclothed, and not wielding any form of shield, The Barbarian Feature: Unarmored Defense will not be overridden by this feature and will instead stack with it provided you chose Barbarian as your class at first level. When these conditions are met, your AC becomes 13(base) + DEX + CON.

Obligate Carnivore

Frillnecks are obligatory carnivores and so must eat fresh meat to survive. The following benefits and handicaps apply to your character:

You gain Proficiency in Perception and Stealth to better aid you in hunting down prey. Your long, forked tongue may be used to track your quarry as a perception roll in place of nature or survival.

You may eat raw meat of almost any kind without becoming diseased or poisoned. You may also eat a creature in its entirety, skin, bones, and all. However cooked and spiced foods will potentially make you sick as if you were a human who had eaten raw meat. And non-meat food not only can make you sick, but also provides no benefit to you at all and cannot be used as rations.

Frillnecks are evolved to go long periods of time without food and capitalize when they do manage to land a kill, able to consume their weight in meat in a single meal. You do not need to carry rations. Instead you may eat up to 30 days worth of fresh meat and use that as your ration counter instead.