Aquatic humanoids with the torsos of humans and the tails of fish, merfolk build societies beneath the waves that few land-dwellers ever encounter. Most merfolk keep to the shallows, where light still filters through the water to mark the passage of time. Others, braver or stranger than their coastal cousins, venture into the ocean’s lightless depths.

Far-Flung Kingdoms. Merfolk kingdoms span the globe, and their citizens are as varied in culture and appearance as other humanoids. Their skin can be as many colors as a tropical fish.

Although they sometimes salvage metal from shipwrecks, merfolk rarely use metal in their clothing, jewelry, or tools. Instead, they clothe themselves in seaweed, fish scales, and shells, and use bones, carved coral, and sand-glass for tools. Similarly, they have little use for the writing implements of land-dwellers, relying instead on a capacious oral tradition that extends farther back than most written histories.

A lycanthrope is a humanoid who transforms into an animal during the full moon. In animal form, a lycanthrope (also called a were) appears to be simply a large, powerful example of its species. Its eyes, however, betray its humanoid intelligence.

Viewed separately as a disease, a curse, a blessing, or a bloodline, lycanthropy is spread through the bites of lycanthropes or from a parent to child at birth. The most common varieties of lycanthropes are werebears , wereboars , wererats , weretigers , and werewolves .

The Curse of Lycanthropy. Any humanoid bitten by a lycanthrope in its animal or hybrid form can contract lycanthropy. Lycanthropy inflicted in this way can be cured with a remove curse spell, but a person born a lycanthrope is one by nature, and only a wish spell can remove the curse.

On the night of the first full moon after being bitten (or, for a natural lycanthrope, upon reaching young adulthood), a person involuntarily changes into an animal. This transformation is painful and draining, leaving the afflicted hungry, unable to speak, and often confused and frightened. During the transformation, a lycanthrope’s thoughts are filled with predatory instincts. Many newly changed lycanthropes attack others out of hunger or fear. Others surrender to their bestial natures, reveling in the hunt and the kill.

Mastering the Affliction. As with any skill, mastering lycanthropy takes practice. A new lycanthrope must first learn to control their actions while in animal form. With work, they eventually develop the ability to transform at will, except during the dark of the new moon. Experienced lycanthropes can take a half-humanoid, half-animal form, and rumors exist of alpha lycanthropes who have developed their talents even further.

Some weres shun their curse rather than seeking to master it. Fearing the harm they may do to others, they lock themselves away or lose themselves in the wilderness, especially during the full moon.

Whether a blessing or a curse, lycanthropy comes to dominate a creature’s life. Even in humanoid form, a lycanthrope’s mind is prey to bestial thoughts. A lycanthrope is defined by whether they resist or succumb to these temptations.

Wolfsbane. Lycanthropes are repelled by the wolfsbane flower. A lycanthrope in hybrid or beast form is poisoned while within 10 feet of a living or dried wolfsbane flower that it can smell. If wolfsbane is applied to a weapon or ammunition, lycanthropes are damaged by the weapon as if it were silver. An application of wolfsbane lasts for 1 hour.

Kobolds are small, reptilian humanoids that blend the features of large dogs and tiny, wingless dragons. While many live in the lairs of the dragons they revere, others dwell in trap-ridden warrens far underground.

Draconic Servitors. Kobolds feel both an awe of and kinship with dragons. Many dragons extend protection to their distant kobold cousins, accepting in return the flattery, adulation, and service they believe all creatures owe them. Kobold servitors resent a dragon’s other minions, fearful of the day the dragon no longer values their devotion.

Kobolds share many characteristics with dragons. They hatch from eggs with an instinct to hoard treasures and trinkets. Like dragons, kobolds enjoy long lifespans. With all the dangers that assail them, though, few kobolds see the natural end of their 100- to 150-year lifespans.

Proud and Territorial. Smaller and weaker than most sentient species, individual kobolds make easy prey for predators. A kobold community without a dragon patron must rely on stealth, traps, and sheer numbers to survive.

Most kobolds live in underground warrens far from the sunlight. Often, these warrens are extensions of existing structures such as dungeons, sewers, and natural caverns. As skilled miners with a dragon-like fondness for shiny things, kobolds often move into abandoned mines (or chase the miners out of working ones). Kobolds modify their lairs to their advantage, using low ceilings, cunning traps, and narrow passages to hinder the movement of invaders. Kobolds prefer to fight from a distance and with overwhelming numbers.

Bigger and stronger creatures often find kobolds contemptible at best, and raid and slaughter them at worst. When the tables are turned, kobolds rarely forgive those who have bullied them, though sometimes flattering words or glittering offerings appease them. Any slight to their dignity enrages them. Kobolds believe that even the smallest relative of a dragon has royal blood coursing through its veins.

Khalkoi, more commonly known as mind wasps, are parasitic predators that feed on the cosmic principles of good and evil, law and chaos. They conquer reality after reality, leaving behind deserted heavens and dead gods as they rob worlds of divine magic.

A khalkos is humanoid in shape with an inexpressive wasp face. It is able to disguise itself psionically in order to infiltrate sacred or profane places, dooming them to destruction.

Parasitic Life Cycle. Khalkoi implant their larvae into the brains of intelligent creatures. A parasitized victim comes to see every khalkos as an ally to be trusted, and may even help a khalkos implant its eggs in other victims. When khalkos larvae are ready to be born, they burst from the skull of their host. As the headless victim collapses to the ground, the khalkos larvae—now independent khalkos spawn—fly away to search for new victims.

Although khalkos larvae can infect any intelligent creature, they prefer hosts that are cosmically aligned: archpriests and saints, angels and devils, and even gods. Khalkoi spawned from an aligned creature begin growing into adult khalkoi immediately, reaching maturity in a few days. Khalkoi that hatch from unaligned creatures must consume many humanoid victims, over a period of months or years, before they mature.

Existential Threat. A khalkos can sense cosmic power as a spider senses a tremor in its webs. The battles of warring pantheons, or mighty deeds performed by celestial or fiendish champions, can attract their attention to a heretofore-overlooked planar realm.

Usually, only a single khalkos travels to a newly discovered world. With mastermind intelligence and mind-clouding psionic powers, it infiltrates a temple or cult. Finally, it targets a divinely-empowered priest or minor fiend, hijacking its body to serve as the breeding ground for its eggs. Soon, one khalkos becomes a swarm of khalkoi that immediately set their sights on bigger game.

Fight or Flight. A few worlds have successfully fought off a khalkos invasion. To win such a war, powerful cosmic entities must be aided by unaligned heroes: warriors, spellcasters, and other adventurers who don’t inherit their power from cosmic principles but who are willing to fight for them nonetheless.

Other worlds have survived the khalkos threat by avoiding detection. Some dimensions have constructed vast psychic barriers or concluded divine treaties to limit the power of deities and fiends. If these magical protections are violated, such worlds risk unwelcome attention.

The history of hobgoblins is that of the rise and fall of empires. Time and again, hobgoblin armies have ridden forth to subjugate weaker civilizations beyond their borders. Only the collective opposition of rival nations (efforts usually led by elves) has prevented hobgoblins from conquering the world. The ruins of great hobgoblin empires now litter the landscape, with each new generation struggling to reclaim the glory of its predecessors.

Physically, hobgoblins resemble tall, brawny humanoids with pointed ears and fanged teeth. Hobgoblin noses are often more brightly colored than their other features. Hobgoblins with brilliant red or blue noses typically hold positions of authority in hobgoblin society.

Excellence in Everything. Hobgoblins consider excellence the highest virtue. They prize hard-earned experience as much as innate talent, selecting leaders from those who have proven themselves most fit to rule. Because their culture is militaristic, hobgoblins value martial prowess, although aptitude in the arcane arts, religious devotion, or mastery of a trade are also respected to some degree. Even hobgoblins who pursue poetry or music might be admired, but only if their works celebrate the accomplishments of the culture as a whole.

Legion Above All. Hobgoblins divide their society into ancestral clans known as legions. Although superficially similar to military regiments, hobgoblin legions inspire even greater
loyalty from their members. A hobgoblin family might identify with the same legion for a dozen generations or more. Those who betray or fail their legion are either humiliated and exiled or publicly tortured and killed.

Monster Tamers. Hobgoblins believe that discipline sharpens passion into unwavering purpose. Nowhere is this conviction more evident than in the hobgoblin tradition of taming wild beasts. Hobgoblin beast-masters raise wolves, messenger birds, and even more exotic creatures, like mammoths or dinosaurs , to support their legions on the battlefield. Hobgoblins armies also incorporate bugbears and goblins into their ranks. These “lesser” goblinoids are often treated as only slightly cleverer than beasts. Nevertheless, a hobgoblin warlord can mold a mob of squabbling goblinoids into a cohesive fighting force.

When draconic blood flows through the veins of a non-dragon, that creature comes to exhibit dragonlike characteristics. A half-dragon has a dragon’s snout, fangs, and scaly hide, and possesses a breath weapon as devastating as that of a true dragon. Some half-dragons even grow wings. The lifespan of a half-dragon is far longer than that of most humanoids, with some half-dragons living 300 or 400 years.

Burning Blood. Mad wizards—or anyone in need of powerful minions—can infuse a creature with dragon blood. This painful process burns away much of a creature’s former nature, producing a servant loyal to its creator but perpetually tortured by the blood burning in its veins. Chromatic and gem dragons frequently employ this technique to create dependable servants.

Shape Changers. Metallic dragons that take humanoid form sometimes fall in love, mate, and even marry in that form. The product of such unions is a half-dragon. A metallic half-dragon is often nurtured by both its parents, though a humanoid parent may die of old age long before their half-dragon child is fully grown.

Dragonborn Champions. A child of dragonborn parents sometimes exhibits half-dragon characteristics. Often, a half-dragon dragonborn is expected to take on the role of chieftain or champion. Those halfdragons unwilling to take on the mantle of leadership often leave dragonborn society altogether.

Dragonborn champions are particularly common among dragonborn tribes that serve essence dragons.

Three old crones cackle over a bubbling cauldron on a secluded isle. Inside their pot are the bones of misbehaving children. These fey creatures are called hags.

Wicked Witches. Although hags appear humanoid, they are in fact fey creatures that prey upon humanoid and faerie folk alike. Hags pay fealty to the archfey Baba Yaga. To better emulate their terrifying mistress, hags often take the form of withered women with exaggerated features, such as extremely long noses, stringy gray hair, and loose skin draped over skeletal frames, although they sometimes appear as decrepit old men.

Boons and Bargains. Like all fey creatures, hags follow strict rules. They never prey on a victim without gaining some form of power over it first. Being impolite to a hag incurs a minor obligation, while stealing from a hag or trespassing in its home may put a mortal entirely at the hag’s mercy.

A hag’s favorite form of power, however, is the bargain. Hags have many gifts to offer—writs of safe passage, healing balms and love potions, or curses placed on one’s enemies—and desperate people sometimes pay terrible prices in exchange for such help. A hag always makes good on a bargain but often twists the petitioner’s true desires. A mortal may become rich at the expense of a loved one, marry their beloved only to find the union plagued with conflict, or give birth to a longed-for child that turns out to be a mischievous hedgehog. In any case, once a bargain is sealed, the bargainer is in the hag’s power.

Maternal Monsters. Many hags are driven by a perverse instinct to adopt mortal children. They develop over-protective, yet loving, relationships with their children, and sometimes even pass on their powers to their wards. As fey creatures, however, hags enforce rigid, arbitrary rules, and have been known to kill and eat poorly behaved children. For this reason, mortal mothers sometimes use the threat of a hag’s visit to frighten their children into obedience.

Cruel Covens. Hags that practice together are called covens, and usually consist of three hags that are closely related. Though hags in the same coven are fiercely loyal to each other, feuds between covens are common. Covens may compete over the number and cruelty of their bargains, the comfort of their lairs, or who makes the better human pancreas stew.

A hag in a coven is more powerful than one alone. It gains new abilities that persist even if the others in its coven are killed. Only banishment from a coven can rob a hag of its enhanced might.

Guardians, sometimes called golems, are animated constructs made from various materials: moldable clay, rigid stone, mighty iron, and even stitched flesh. They are singular in purpose, carrying out their creator’s commands with the commitment of a force of nature.

Constructed Form. Crafting a guardian’s body requires the skill of an expert sculptor—or surgeon, in the case of flesh guardians. Once the guardian’s body has been constructed, a spellcaster must use secret formulae to breathe life into the creature. A guardian never ages and can endure centuries after its creator’s death.

Command Dependence. A guardian can’t think for itself and acts only on commands from its creator. When its creator is present to oversee it, a guardian will perform its tasks very well. If its creator is absent, a guardian will carry out its orders to the best of its ability but can’t make corrections using its own reasoning. A guardian that is prevented from fulfilling its purpose, or one that is severely damaged, is unpredictable. It could simply become inert, or it may fly into a violent frenzy. Given these limitations, a guardian is suitable for only simple tasks, such as guarding a specific location or acting as its creator’s bodyguard.

Mysterious Origins. Some scholars believe that a guardian is an animate, but lifeless, being. Others claim that a guardian’s creator imbues it with an elemental spirit—or a bit of the creator’s spirit—during the guardian’s creation. Whatever the truth, constructing a guardian requires instructions found in a rare magical tome called a manual of guardians .

Constructed Nature. Guardians don’t require air, sustenance, or sleep.

From the wildest forests to the most sprawling metropolises, there’s no place in the world you won’t find goblins. For these small, individually weak creatures, survival is the greatest virtue.

It’s A Living. Life is unfair to goblins. It’s the one thing they can count on. Goblins are rarely granted mercy or kindness by larger folk, and in return they rarely extend it to others.

Goblins are often found in the service of more powerful creatures, particularly larger goblinoids such as hobgoblins. When faced with impossible tasks or unfair expectations, goblins grumble and complain, plot petty revenge, then roll up their sleeves and get to work. Where other creatures might turn up their noses at disgusting, cramped environments, goblins see opportunity. They will carve out space where none exists, flourishing in the cracks of civilization or in the unforgiving wilderness.

Expert Opportunists. Goblins often lurk in civilization’s liminal spaces: in abandoned mines within raiding distance of a village, or in a sprawling sewer beneath a city. Goblins can find a use for almost anything, from broken or discarded gear to abandoned tunnels to the rotting husks of long-dead trees. Goblin equipment is frequently scavenged or crafted out of unlikely materials. Goblins rarely risk combat, except when they are certain they have the upper hand. They will gladly take your discarded food, however—and, if you’re not careful, whatever else is on your table and in the bag you left unattended, as well.

Feral Glee. Goblins take their joy wherever they can find it. An unsupervised moment to play is a prize they cherish more than food or treasure. It may not last long, but goblins can make a game out of anything, and they respond well to anyone who plays along.

Giants tower over other mortals, standing between 15 and 30 feet tall. While they may look like large humanoids, they are in actuality beings with close ties to other planes.

Elemental Power. Giants left their mark on the world long before the rise of the empires of humans, elves, dwarves, and orcs. Some say giants are the descendants of elemental gods, and thus are the inheritors of divine power. Others believe giants were created at the dawn of the world, hewn from the same primal elemental matter that gave birth to the Material Plane. Whatever their origin, giants are powerful forces of nature.

Ancestral Homes. Giants claim their empires once spanned the world. Indeed, many giant clans still habit ancient palaces of imperial grandeur. These palaces invariably have close ties to elemental and other planes and contain ancient treasures that can draw the attention of adventurer and dragon alike.

Towering Achievements. Giantkind has produced some of the world’s greatest warriors, finest craftspeople, and most powerful spellcasters. Giants value competition, from the frost giants’ contests of strength to the hill giants’ eating contests. Most giants do not concern themselves with the affairs of humanoids, while the worst among them exploit small folk for their own ends. History is filled with stories of giants raiding farms or kidnapping people, but also of wise giants passing knowledge down to the small folk or giant heroes slaying rampaging beasts.