Homebrew Dryad Species Details
Travellers entering a forest might catch a glimpse of a feminine form flitting through the trees. Warm laughter hangs on the air, drawing those who hear it deeper into the emerald shadows.
Treebound. Powerful fey will sometimes bind lesser fey spirits to trees, transforming them into dryads. This is sometimes done as a punishment when the fey spirit falls in love with a mortal and that love is forbidden.
Reclusive Fey. Dryads act as guardians of their woodland demesnes. Shy and reclusive, they watch interlopers from the trees. A dryad struck by the beauty of a stranger might investigate more closely, perhaps even try to lure the individual away to be charmed.
Dryads work with other sylvan creatures to defend their forests. Unicorns, Treants, and Satyrs live alongside them, in addition to druids that share the dryads’ devotion to the woods they call home.
Woodland Magic. Dryads can speak with plants and animals. They can teleport from one tree to another, luring interlopers away from their groves. If pressed, a dryad can beguile humanoids with her enchantments, turning enemies into friends. They also know a couple of useful cantrips.
Dryad Traits
Travelers entering a forest might catch a glimpse of a feminine form flitting through the trees. Warm laughter hangs on the air, drawing those who hear it deeper into the emerald shadows.Ability Score Increase
Your Charisma and Wisdom scores each increase by 1.
Age
You age just like a tree, potentially living anywhere from a few hundred to a few thousand years.
Alignment
Dryads tend towards lawfulness, protecting the ‘law’ of the forest. They will often do whatever they can to protect it despite moral boundaries, resulting in many neutral aligned Dryads.
Size
Despite being tree-like, your physique is still that of a humanoid. Your size is medium.
Speed
Your base walking speed is 30 feet.
Darkvision
Your fey origins grant you superior vision in dark and dim conditions. 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 cannot discern colour in darkness, only shades of grey.
Barkskin
You are covered head to toe in tough bark, granting you additional protections. When not wearing medium or heavy armour, you gain a +2 bonus to your AC.
Walking Plant
Your body is entirely comprised of wood, leaves, and other vegetation. Brought to life by nature magic, you are considered both fey and humanoid, however you are also susceptible to burning, giving you vulnerability to fire damage.
One With Nature
Your magical connection to nature allows you some control over it, granting you the Druidcraft cantrip. It also allows you to communicate fluently with your fellow plants, awakened or not, as well as the beasts of the lands.
Furthermore, you can cast Thorn Whip by shaping your own body, spawning vines from your mass of vegetation. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this spell and it requires no material components.
Tree Stride
Your nature magic and plant physiology grant you the ability to use trees as a type of transportation. As a bonus action, you can spend 10 feet of movement to step magically into one living tree within your reach and emerge from a second living tree within 60 feet of the first tree, appearing in an unoccupied space within 5 feet of the second tree. Both trees must be Large or bigger.
You can perform this special movement a number of times equal to your character level, regaining all expended uses on a long rest.
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