Homebrew Derro Species Details

Playing A Derro

Derro are unpredictable, fanciful, and prone to delusions, confusions, and manias. So how can they function in groups more accustomed to the stability of humans, dwarves, and elves? In truth, the derro are less violent and more peculiar in a quieter way than their common portrayal as rabid maniacs.

They are as likely to be brooding, depressed, or sullen as crazed and violent. Your derro character could have a tendency to talk to themselves, might address an invisible friend before undertaking any major step, or might simply consider all the other members of the party as “imaginary friends” and thus not subject to harassment.

Treat the derro’s madness as an occasional bit of flavor for the character, rather than an excuse to cripple the party with chaotic and self-defeating actions. A derro character won’t be as predictable as a dwarf paladin or a half-elf bard, but the derro might occasionally talk to rocks and interrogate mushrooms. Review the Minor Madnesses section on page 22 for examples of playable and flavorful maladies that afflict your character. Choose an appropriate minor madness or roll percentile dice to randomly determine it. Your character should have at least one minor madness, but check with your GM to confirm how many and which minor madnesses are most appropriate in your campaign.

To avoid derailing the party constantly, your character can have long lucid periods and might even regret actions taken when “turned to the dark void” or “ridden by the bat spirits” or a similar explanation. A derro in this lucid state could be a tragic character, always wondering when something will set off another bout of irrational raving. Keep in mind, derro are often awed by beings they see as powerful, though each derro defines what they deem as “powerful.” Your derro character could view another member of the group as the group’s “witch queen” (regardless of that character’s gender) and follow that character almost zealously. The instability of the derro could also lead your character to choose a different member of the group each day or each week as the current “witch queen.” Playing a derro character involves making a fantasy form of otherworldly madness both playable and plausible. Find a way to make your character memorable without bogging down play or spoiling everyone else’s game.

Pale and Stunted

The derro are stunted, dwarflike humanoids, small of stature with wide shoulders and stubby limbs.

They stand between 3 and 4 feet tall, with males only slighter taller than females on average. Their slender builds rarely weigh more than 40 pounds. Their pale skin is nearly translucent, revealing a ghostly web of blue veins. Their large, pure white staring eyes gleam in the dark.

Shorter than surface dwarves, derro are quick and erratic in their movements. Their elaborately braided or styled hair ranges from white to a pale straw color.

Males take great pride in their prodigious mustaches, which are often braided and waxed.

History of Madness

The true history of the derro is an incomprehensible tangle. The entire race embraced insanity long ago. Even when they keep records, their accounts conflict with each other and with observable reality.

The various cults and clans of the derro embrace a wide variety of myths, mostly passed along by oral tradition and mind-bending artwork. Every new teller of a given tale twists or rewrites portions of the story to fit their own warped view of the world.

The derro have existed for ages, perhaps thriving even before the spread of humans across the surface.

The more reliable histories of other races agree the derro were once allied with the drow. The drow regard them with a strange type of favor, almost like dim-witted children. The aboleths and duergar have historically used and abused the derro. The derro know no actual friends, but they are overawed by power and dominance. They serve beings whose assumed superiority impresses them, and, when led in this way, their insanity clears enough to keep them moving toward the leader’s goals.

Culture and Rule

Love, as other races know it, is unheard of in the bizarre core family unit of the derro. Derro children are born sane, but they are deliberately driven mad by their relatives, usually by age four. Parents feed, clothe, and protect their children not out of a sense of love or tenderness, but because they know that every derro awakened to the mind-bending truth of their race brings them glory. The horrific rituals that break a young derro’s sanity vary by tribe and even year to year. Details are sparse, but known ritual names include Staring into the Void, Enduring the Heartless Fire, and the First Drink of True Knowledge.

Derro are paranoid, unstable, and jittery, and many suffer powerful delusions of grandeur as well.

Madness compels them to commit acts of cruelty against their companions or pets, and these acts ignite constant infighting among them. A few, however, muster enough restraint and control to keep the entirety of derro society from crumbling.

Savants are powerful sorcerers who hold their madness at bay long enough to cobble together coherent plans, though even they are dangerously unpredictable. The derro’s antipaladins are terrifying engines of crazed destruction who have looked deep into the void between stars and survived—and even the savants respect them for that. Clans that stick together long enough inadvertently create a witch queen among their ranks, a collective spirit of the clan. These derro become the leaders and central focuses of their clans, driving the clan to inscrutable ends. When one witch queen dies, her spirit transfers to another derro in the clan, transforming that derro into the next witch queen and perpetuating the clan.

Gods of the Derro

The derro worship a horde of bizarre and terrible beings, including demon lords. Perhaps the most disturbing of their deities are the Great Old Ones whose mere symbolic presence melts minds and corrupts the world. Derro worshipers venerate Nyarlathotep and Shub-Niggurath, the Black Goat of the Woods, in particular. There is no pattern or reason that governs which dark being will catch a given derro’s fancy, and devotees are violently hostile to worshipers of other entities.

Derro consider themselves the most exalted servants of the blasphemous figures they venerate; the only beings in the entire multiverse who can truly understand their deity’s glory. Specific rituals vary from cult to cult, but the unifying thread of derro faith asserts that their racial madness is a gift that makes communion with these deities possible.

Further, the derro believe they are the harbingers of the end of time and that they alone will inherit the shattered husk of creation.

 

Derro Names

Names are thrust upon derro children haphazardly and with no clear general customs. Derro who worship an ancestor god might give their children a variation on the exalted figure’s name or title, or a child might grow almost to maturity before any adult bothers to call them by the same jumble of sounds twice. Clan, tribe, and family names also lack any discernable pattern, though occasionally they form a coherent description.

Male Names: Akrath, Avrik, Brosh’Kal, Byrgryg, Crok’Til, Cyzyk, Daagrath, Durvin, Farq’shul, Folvig, Gaargrth, Grolesh, Haaskrin, Hvorig, Korzh, Lormaq, Orvuld, Ostvyrk, Perk’rasz, Pulver’Kash, Quirth, Qvaalak, Saasqar, Vorqaar.

Female Names: Aazha, Artriss, Bruen, Bylir, Dal’lyn, Drussil, Ealla, Erkytl, Grunhaas, Gvarla, Heldraag, Hylala, Muerna, Mzish, Ophella, Ortys, Rushal, Synder, Thryka, Tonlix, Ulga, Veraka, Vilya, Wulfada, Xanka

Tribe Names: Aardsyn, Blackreach, Balerock, Crystaaq, Daash’Void, Guundhold, Hellsreach, Iirdvank, Laash’Kath, Moldheim, Nyar’Ryk, Ovildhaash, Rylstaaq, Slys’Kath, Xaalyf.

Derro Traits

Your derro character has certain characteristics in common with all other derro.

Ability Score Increase. Your Dexterity score increases by 2.

Age. Derro reach maturity by the age of 15 and live to be around 75.

Size. Derro stand between 3 and 4 feet tall with slender limbs and wide shoulders. Your size is Small.

Alignment. The derro’s naturally unhinged minds are nearly always chaotic, and many, but not all, are evil.

Speed. Derro are fast for their size. Your base walking speed is 30 feet.

Superior Darkvision. Accustomed to life underground, you can see in dim light within 120 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.

Eldritch Resilience. You have advantage on saving throws against spells.

Sunlight Sensitivity. You have disadvantage on attack rolls and on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight when you, the target of your attack, or whatever you are trying to perceive is in direct sunlight.

Languages. You can speak, read, and write Dwarvish and your choice of Common or Undercommon.

Derro Traits

Your derro character has certain characteristics in common with all other derro.

Ability Score Increase

One ability score increases by 2.
One ability score increases by 1.

Superior Darkvision.

Accustomed to life underground, you can see in dim light within 120 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.

Eldritch Resilience.

You have advantage on saving throws against spells

Age.

Derro reach maturity by the age of 15 and live to be around 150.

Size.

Derro stand between 3 and 4 feet tall with slender limbs and wide shoulders. Your size is Small.

Alignment.

The derro’s naturally unhinged minds are nearly always chaotic, and many, but not all, are evil.

Speed.

Derro are fast for their size. Your base walking speed is 30 feet.

Sunlight Sensitivity.

You have disadvantage on attack rolls and on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight when you, the target of your attack, or whatever you are trying to perceive is in direct sunlight.

Languages.

You can speak, read, and write Dwarvish, Common, and Undercommon.