Homebrew Dylidae Species Details

The Dylidae are humanoid crocodiles that lurk in swamplands. Their tendency to fight can be reflected by their physical appearance. They have a reptilian layer of scales that cover their bodies and a large snout that conceals rows of dangerously sharp teeth. Their hands and feet are also outfitted with sharp claws. They are frequently mistaken as overly-muscular lizardfolk with their thick tails and reptilian appearance. They cite numerous obvious differences, namely their tough bodies, long snouts, and stronger tails.

Creating Your Character

When you create your D&D character, you decide whether your character is a member of the human race or one of the game’s fantastical races. If you create a character using a race option presented here, follow these additional rules during character creation.

Ability Score Increases

When determining your character’s ability scores, increase one of those scores 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’re free to follow those suggestions or to ignore them. Whichever scores you decide to increase, none of the scores can be raised 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 widespread languages to choose from. The DM is free to add or remove languages from that list for a particular campaign.

Creature Type

Every creature in D&D, including every 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 option presented here 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 text of the cure wounds spell specifies that the spell doesn’t work on a creature that has the Construct type. (The autognome is a noteworthy exception because of its Healing Machine trait.)

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—a fact noted in the description of the race in question.

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.

Dylidae Traits

As a Dylidae player character, you have the following traits.

Creature Type

You are a Humanoid.

Size

You are Medium or Small. You choose the size when you select this race.

Speed

Your walking speed is 30 feet. 

You have a swimming speed of 30 ft.

Scaled Carapace

You have tough, scaly skin. When you aren't wearing armor, your AC is equal to 13 + your Constitution modifier. You can use your natural armor to determine your AC if the armor you wear would leave you with a lower AC. A shield's benefits apply as normal while you use your natural armor.

Darkvision

You can see in dim light within 60 feet of yourself 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.

Crushing Bite

You can use your sharp teeth and powerful jaws as a weapon. Your bite is a natural weapon, which you can use to make unarmed strikes. If you hit with them, you deal piercing damage equal to 1d6 + your Strength modifier, instead of the bludgeoning damage normal for an unarmed strike.

Water Dweller.

You are a water-born creature and can hold your breath for up to four hours at a time.

Ambush Hunter.

You are proficient in the Stealth skill. When you make a Dexterity (Stealth) check under water, you may add double your proficiency bonus instead of your normal proficiency bonus.