Hear ye, hear ye!

One thing I inexplicably love is animal-people. I don’t know why. I’m not even a furry! But I love them. Animal-people. Not furries. Though I don’t know any furries personally so maybe I’d love them too!

But I digress.

My point is that I love the instant mythic resonance of animal-people. In past editions of D&D when I wanted to mechanically represent animal people I would make dozens of races based around different animals, each one taking into account the physical capabilities of those animals and supernatural abilities or legends typically associated with them. The problem with that tact is that it can clutter the setting with unused options and and players might end up wanting to play a kind of animal you haven’t made up yet anyway.

So, with 5e, I decided to create a single race that’s meant to comprehensively cover all possible beastfolk. This design decision led me to create a more modular race than the ones presented in the Player’s Handbook as I wanted to provide options for everything from bats to lions to eels. I hope you’ll find the Beastfolk’s features comprehensive enough to capture any creature you might want to play as but not so exhaustive that the options leave you paralyzed.

the Beastfolk

EDIT: The most up to date version of the Beastfolk is now available on the DM’s Guild linked above.