Space Dryads - (hopefully) final version

This is hopefully the final version of the (Space) Dryad spec,
before the 3E rules get done for it (my first forey into 3rd
Ed!). Playtesting continues! There may also be a 2E write-up of
dryad priests as 'space druids', at some point.

The spell write-up should now be complete, and the notes on Wood
Space and Wood Weave should be a lot clearer. There is a new
section on Altering Dryads, with enchantment costings. Various
bits of text throughout have be tweaked in an attempt to make
them clearer.

Employ a Space Dryad on your spelljamming ship, today! [grin]

The spec is 89k of HTML, at the moment, so I just include a
snippet:


Dryad Raider History

Elberan Moongaze, an elven necromancer and spelljamming
researcher, was concerned about people using the plant nature of
elven spelljamming ships against them, via Plant Control, Plant
Growth, Warp Wood and other such spells. So, he decided the way
to deal with this was to have a dryad in each ship, so not only
would they be living, but also have a controlling mind.

Unfortunately, the way he did his researches was to 'rescue' some
dryads from woodlands on scro worlds. He separated them from
their native trees by making them various 'jewelry' (such as a
bracelet, an anklet, a ring or an earring) from the living heart
wood of their tree, and using necromantic enchantments. Which as
he was an elf, he of course ensured did not kill, or even in the
long term harm, the tree. However, for the dryad it was as
painful a process as giving birth can be for a human mother.

Elberan now had dryads which could go anywhere, and merge with
any large plant that was not itself intelligent. Even several per
one (large enough) plant. He also had a number of elven craft to
experiment on. As an extra boost to elven spelljamming he found
that a few of the dryads could be trained to run the spelljamming
helm, while merged with the ship, and did not get tired from the
strain of spelljamming, in large enough ships, as they could draw
on the living strength of the ship itself to sustain them. He was
so pleased by this that he sent his elven assistants off on other
urgent researches, saying he preferred to finish off the research
on his ship dryad project alone.

Unfortunately for Elberan, in teaching the dryads to spelljam, he
had not realised they might acquire other magical abilities. One
became a priest of an earth goddess, and another secretly became
a necromancer! The dryads did not like the way they had been
treated, and while initially timid and shocked, for tens of years
just doing what they were told, eventually revolted. In exchange
for the help of the earth goddess in binding Elberan within a
lifeless rock, they agreed to flee that sphere, and never return
(while the goddess had taken pity on them, and granted them help,
she considered them to be necromantic abominations).

The Dryad Raiders, as they call themselves, have little time for
elves, except to acquire more ships from them, for their slowly
growing dryad population. Though they hide quite how they do it
(whether they are breeding, or just 'rescuing' new dryads), their
numbers are slowly growing. Their necromancers (who have
Elberan's spell books, and his research notes) know how to sever
dryads from trees, typically large oaks grown on isolated
planetary bodies, so they can join the raiders. The oaks can even
be recycled, after a century or so, for another new-born dryad.

Several Dryad Raiders have attempted to return to living on
planets, in woodlands, but while they can live in any
sufficiently large unoccupied tree, not just oaks, almost all
have returned to space, as they don't feel they really fit in on
planets, any more.

Elberan's spell books contains non-standard spells which will:
locate (tree-bound) dryads at considerable range (points to the
nearest, even from low orbit) (5th), protect an elf from dryad
charm magic (totally, with a good duration) (3rd), block dryad
Dimension Door (into or out of a significant volume, with a good
duration) (5th), detect 'his' dryads by their Life Jewelry
(points to the nearest, with a range of several miles) (5th), and
detect if there is a dryad within a (pseudo) living ship (with a
range of at least a mile) (3rd). DMs are at liberty to include
other non-standard spells (such as all the arcane spells in the
basic SJ rules), which suit a powerful elven necromancer
interested in improving the elven art of Spelljamming.


The above is extracted from the spec at:

http://www.romsys.demon.co.uk/frpg/dnd/race/dryad.htm

-- 
Dreamer
dreamer@??????.?????.??.uk
http://www.romsys.demon.co.uk/