Sure did!

yeah it looks awesome

Yup.
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/13853348
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/13865562
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/13878874

Participation has tapered off somewhat. They've been fluffed out pretty well, and barring the 4e stats posted in part 3, don't have any crunch.

Suptg has all three in the archives

>>13891125
This is the most recent colorjob. Batfag said he'll finish it sometime tonight.

>>13891247
that happens a lot with race-creation threads around here, I've noticed... people seem to enjoy writing fluff more than working-out crunch.

>>13891125
lol @ calling that a sketch

>>13891574
Fluff is better. It is generic. Crunch ties you to a specific system.

>>13891655
True enough, I suppose. And besides, we've established crunch for one system... that's kinda baseline, so adapting the given info/abilities for other systems shouldn't be too hard for whoever wants to do so, with that as a jump-off point..

bumping this just to see the inevitable finished image.

>>13891920
assisting bumpage. Still reading threads.

We could keep adding fluuf in the meantime.

>>13891985
only flaw with that idea is, over three threads, I can't think of too much left un-commented upon.

>>13892032
I COULD, instead of fluffing, do some drawfaggotry.
But my skills aren't even close to the guy who did OP's picture.

>>13892090
doesn't mean you shouldn't do it anyway, if only for practice and self-improvement. After all, even DaVinci once drew stick-men.

>>13892090
more is always better. might throw in my 2 cents as well if I can make it presentable

>>13892090
Well, we need more pictures of them. Anything helps.

Alright then...

What do you want me to do first?
I was thinking about making a female, but I just did a little research and founfd out there isn't a noticeable gender dismorphism.

Should I just for what /tg/ has decided before (slender bodies, and other things I don't remember now)?

>>13892032
I just thought of something. the Kamazotzl, the flightless ogres that live far below on the ground of Kalang caverns, feeling on the discards and refuse (and sometimes unfortunate ka themselves) who fall to the earth below the colonies... nothing's been written about them.

>>13892242
How would you feel about drawing one of their cities? Maybe in layers, so you get some in flight (very rough, not asking for much here mind) on the surface, some in a room in their cave, some bomb makers in back messing with shit. I don't know really?

>sketch

Dude, that is seriously quality work.

>>13892277
All we know about them is they eventually show up beneath a Kalang colony and scavenge on whatever hits the ground from above... but not where they come from, how they get there, or anything.

>>13892278
>bomb makers messing with their shit

Literally?

bump

>>13892278
Uhm...can do, let's see.
I just got asked to improve a internet photo's resolution, so I'm feeling like not even trying to do that and draw some bat-city.

Man-Bat Ninjas.

That is all.

>>13893277
We got monks and rogues, that's close, right?

>>13893310
Don't forget the vampire hunters.

>>13892609
Yup. Bat poop has some interesting qualities. With the right amount of alchemy, it can be used to make explosives.
Of course, due to the Kalang's sensitive hearing, dropping explosives isn't too highly regarded.

OP's pic is well done but ther anatomy of the species is retarded. Why would a species which flies have tool use with it's wings? So you're using a sword ina fight and thereby putting your membrane right in harms way? You realize the bulk of injuries in sword fights happen to your arms, right? Even a little slash and goodbye flight.
Realistically they should have prehensile feet and use weapons from a distance, crossbows or at least spears or something.

Well, I can't really say I didn't warned it would be pretty shitty, but hey.

(I draw slightly better with pencil, but I don't have a scanner right now)

>>13893729
Bat membranes heal pretty quickly. A cut across it, properly attended to, wouldn't impact them any more than a leg injury would us.
However, it's been agreed that they probably wouldn't be hand-to-hand fighters. They're more likely going to be swooping about-notice the curve on the blade? They use hit-and-run tactics, facilitated by specially designed blades that run along the edge of their wing.

>>13893760
That is nifty.

>>13893729
Sorry, you've had three threads before to complain, it's too late now. And besides, they're not in-the-thick-of-it melee meatsheilds anyway, they're high-speed aerial divers - thus the curved wing-blades, to swoop down, slash, and GTFO.

>>13893760
>pretty shitty
Sir, you are the creator of the very first picture of a Kalang city.
The VERY FIRST.
The artistic quality is of little importance (though it is excellent), it's the setting into visual detail of the stuff we've talked about that is the priority.
Also the picture is good and you should feel good about it.

four threads. Four.

Son, I am proud.

>>13893729
Death from above!

4e Anon here. Thinking about reworking the Kalang's racial power. Right now, I'm thinking either keep it as-is, but if you take damage while flying, or the following:

>Bat Flight
You leap in the air and take flight
Encounter
Move Action * Personal
Special: You must be wearing light armor
Effect: You fly your speed. You may make a basic melee attack against all creatures you pass during your movement. You gain a +2 bonus to AC against opportunity attacks made during this movement.

>>13894233
works for me.

The communal homes is the place where the Kalang rest for the day. It usually fits 15-20 of them, but one must be wary that a communal house may be not much bigger than a tavern room (in one's point of view).

There is few "personal" decorations, since a Kalang enjoys sleeping in (or moving to) different Communal House for the company (in example, when a Ka want to sleep early and finds his usual place empty, he or she simply tries to find another house).

Even furniture is few, save for wardrobes where the Kalang keep their belongings and clothing, and for some "Hangers", where the Ka can sleep upside down.

>>13894372
Not bad at all.

Which thread should I look for to see the inevitable rash of Batman references?

>>13894611
none, surprisingly, unless you count the handful of Man-Bat images in the first thread that we used to get the idea of how their arms/wings worked as being "a rash of Batman references".

If they are using ther wings to fly, how do they also fight with weapons at the same time?
Seems silly.

>>13894825
see
>>13893817
There's no swinging, parrying, cutting, etc. that you would normally see in hand-to-hand combat. It's all about conservation of momentum, all their attacks are incorporated into their movements.

>>13894825
Having melee weapons doesn't have to mean "stand there and take the hits". Think of a monk or rogue - they get close, strike fast and hard, then get out of range before the enemy can retaliate.

>>13894796
I guess it's up to the player, then. I sure know that I'm making a Karang NPC that inherited a large sum of money from his dead parents that he uses to the betterment of the caverns, and moonlights as the vigilante "Man-Bat" from his Man-Castle.

>>13894982
Trying not to laugh, but I did anyway. Damn your funny.

>>13894855
>>13894920
No, you are missing the point, think it out.
You use your wings to fly, by flapping. Your wings need to stay extended to stay airborne.
Your hands on ON your wings.
See the problem? fuck, usually /tg/ doesn't need things like simple biomechanics spelled it. it's fucking silly and the anatomy needs to be redone.
Now, so as to not seem trollish, two obvious solutions:
Separate arms for wielding weapons and tools, boring but quick fix.
Prehensile feet, cool and makes the race weird.
but hands on wings and using weapons is just silly. so they have to land to fight at all? Really? come on.

>>13893789
that might work well for air to air combat, but swooping so close to the ground would be fairly dangerous. I'd recommend they use their feet for air to ground. gonna have to add thumbs to their feet for that though. also, i don't understand how they wear shirts with membranes attached to their torsos.

>>13895093
Clothing has holes in it-kind of like ponchos.
The militaristic Kalang get piercings in their membranes to tie armor through.

>>13895081
Maybe they have "hands" on their wings and arm-like legs.

pretty poor, but i figure i'd toss it in anyway.

>>13895122
makes sense. OP pic though has no membrane on the torso though that poor kalang can't fly at all.

>>13895081
>separate arms
No. Bats do not have six limbs, unless this is furtrolling, and it's not. Fuck that.
>they have to land to fight
They can yes, but they don't NEED to - they have clawed boots and such. They're not meant for full-on close-combat melee, more hit-and-run stuff.
Look again at the image - the blade is curved, to follow the curve of the wing. Yes, flapping is needed to get alove, but to dive, the wings stay still, and the blade does too.

All of your complaints, we've already covered elsewhere.
if you had basically even read the previous threads at all, you wouldn't have made that post.

>>13895148
Hot
DAAAAAAAAMMMMMMNNNNN

>>13895148
poor? Nah. Very well done. Nice touch with the stitchwork making aztec-tribal designs.

>>13895208
To dive so close to the ground would not allow them to fly back up. they have to flap down. not that guy but from OP's pic, it doesn't look like they use their feet for more than walking

>>13895148
Absolutely love it! Exactly how I imagined a kalang monk would look like.

>>13895267
>dive so close to the ground
How close do you think they're going, skimming the dandelions? They can jump and start flying, it's not that far up that they need to be.

And they don't walk very often - feet are mostly for perching and sometimes climbing. They can carry stuff on their feet while flying by curling toes around it like they would a perch, but they're no monkey-thumbed creatures, no.

Has there been any talk about possible sub-cultures?

What of individuals who have lost/too badly damaged their wings?

I imagine they would form somekind of ground dwelling colony, or maybe become mercenaries for other races.

Also, how about they greatest punishment saved only for the most wicked of crimals, is not death, but to have their wings cut?

>>13895383
The most prominent sub-culture is that of the vampire hunters. We haven't discussed what happens to the flightless.

Criminals are punished by exile and deafness.

Did these guys ever get statted for 4e?

Maybe a religion requires ritualistic deafening, so those ones develop a preternatural sense of vision.

>>13895413
Yup, last thread.
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/13878874
The racial power got updated in >>13894233

>>13895383
well, being such a hugely social race, we figured that injured members would be cared for by the rest of the colony, not unlike how the children are raised. After all, the Kamazoztl dwell on the cavern grounds, to try life there is only asking for death. And for criminals... exile. When one lives in a society where one is never alone, to be cast out with none but echoes as company is torture enough.

>>13895364
close enough for their wingblades to swipe an average sized opponent of 4-6 feet. considering they themselves are about that size, it seems unlikely they'll be able to keep airborne. jumping off after landing seems a plausible solution, albeit a risky one. also, being a monkey thumbed creature would be a great advantage considering their main mode of locomotion

Daytime, the thief reflected, was an odd time to be carrying out his work. Night suited him better for a number of very practical reasons, but loathe as he was to admit it the spiritual reason put him off the most. He felt as though the Golden-Crowned were gazing down on him, disapproval in the stern eyes beneath his circlet of radiance. The image, he reflected, was eerily similar to that of the judge who had pronounced his sentence, though naturally he had been hanging from his Perch of Equity.

That was, of course, how Whisper-of-Leaves-in-Autumn found himself outside the cheerless old stone building, working his trade upon the strongly-locked doors. His crimes had not been great; a loaf of bread here, a wheel of cheese there (Cheese, what stuff! He’d never figure out how the wingless races had come up with it). But his loot had come from the Dwarves, and as the judge had said, relations between the two races were strained enough without the one exporting thieves to the other. Because his crimes were small (and the Dwarves at large had thankfully not noticed), he had been given the choice to commute his sentence to service. If he’d been told up front that service would be with a vampire hunter, he’d have paid his fines and taken his day in solitude.

>>13895463
Whisper’s companion was the other thing which unnerved him, though he had the good sense not to voice it. Every Ka had heard tales of the snowy-white avengers, snatched at birth from the talons of the Great Silence that they might destroy Her minions. They were a point of immense pride for his people, but they were…different. They embraced solitude, taking wing on long hunts alone and returning only with the head of some dead-but-walking monster. And they were quiet. The hunter with whom he found himself, Fur-Like-Feathers (a borderline blasphemous name, depending on whom you asked), had barely made any sound but seeing screeches as long as they’d been together. It was disappointing, really. She was oddly attractive, in a morbid sort of way.

Presently she was out of sight, hanging from the underside of the tower balcony he was on. The door leading from it and into the castle was locked damnably tightly. Apparently humans became less sociable after death. Odd, he thought. If you love your life so much that you break the laws of nature to get another, why bother making your second any more horrid than it already is?

“How much longer, thief?” Feathers had barely whispered, but the sound carried around the balcony and straight to his ear. All Ka could perform such tricks, but Whisper had learned that the hunter was particularly good at it.

“Hard to say. Cursed lock’s…damnation, there goes another pick. I’ll have to go to a human city for more, and they overcharge horribly. I’m billing our host once we get inside.”

“He’ll be in no position to pay.” She wouldn’t say any more, Whisper knew. He knew the value of silence, but so much of it set his teeth grinding. When he got home he was hanging up his picks. Canny vulture, that judge.

>>13895482
Finally the lock gave way with a CLUNK that made Whisper flip his ears back. He opened the door as quietly as he could as Feathers swung up onto the balcony. Together they disassembled the hinges and carried the doors one-by-one to the ground below. He had been puzzled when she first explained the idea, but he supposed an easy escape route with guaranteed daylight made sense when hunting something that shriveled and died under the gaze of the Crowned.

Inside was the most unpleasant place Whisper had ever been. It was grey and monotonous, and the air was still. Worse, though, was the silence. Nothing stirred, not even an insect, and he dared not look-listen at anything around him lest their quarry or his servants hear. He shuddered, taking comfort in the fact that at least there were two things alive here.

Eventually they came upon what Whisper took to be a feasting hall. The long table which ran its length was covered in so many cobwebs that it looked like a collapsed tent, and at each place sat a humanoid skeleton. To his alarm, he saw that each one was chained to its chair.

“Sacrifices.” Feathers whispered as he gazed in horror. “If the tales are true, he lured them here while he was still alive and drank the blood of each in turn. The Silence smiled on him for it.”

If the Kalang have a prehensile thumb, then they can carry thing with their wings extended. Not to say they wouldn't use their feet for finer stuff.

Probable weapons are long blades, chains and and possibly feet-shields to bash with.

Then there is Kalangchi, the bat taichi of monks that glide cleanly between enemies while stabbing or tripping them.

>>13895438
Awesome! thank you!

I was actually just getting ready to, next session on Friday, introduce a race of bat people I was going to call the Ropen (after the large cryptid, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ropen ), but I wasnt going to make them a playable race and just stat them at a creature/monster instead.

But this is wayyyyy fucking better. Amazing timing. This is awesome, thanks guys!

>>13895495
“And he just…left them?”

“Trophies. I’d gather he likes to remember his works each day before he sleeps.” She gestured to the dais at the far end of the hall, and the gilded coffin standing upright upon it. Inside was a man dressed in the finery of a great lord. His arms were crossed over his chest, and he clutched a scepter topped with a blood-red crystal in his right hand. Though his eyes were closed, Whisper felt increasingly that the dead man was looking straight at him.

“You remember the plan?”

Whisper nodded, making the sign of the sun and moon over his chest. Slowly, so as not to raise any sound, he pulled two glass vials from a satchel strapped to his vest. He held them between the fingers of one hand, drawing his hand crossbow with the other. As the hunter drew her silvered knives, he spread his wings and flew as quietly as possible to one of the pillars beside the dais, clinging to a small ledge with a good view of the coffin. Slowly, Feathers approached the dais, making no sound that even he could hear. When she was finally standing a scant foot away from the coffin she nodded to Whisper, let out a deep breath, and knocked it over backwards.

>>13895513
Before the coffin had hit the floor its occupant had opened his eyes and shouted in indignant surprise. Whisper gave him no time to act, lobbing the vials and launching a bolt from his bow in one motion. The vampire cursed as the bolt pinned his right arm to his chest, his rage turning to pain as the two bottles of holy water burst against him. Whisper flattened his ears back against his head to block out the dead man’s shriek, and the smell of charred flesh assaulted his nose.

As the creature struggled to rise, Feathers fell on him, her long knives a blur of silver. She drove one through his other arm and into his chest, leaving both pinned. With her second she carved the dead man like a human might a feast day bird. He barely had time to scream again before a stroke took his head off. The thing bounced out of the coffin, rolling to a stop against one of the pillars. Whisper could hear it mouthing words, trying to curse its killers with breath from lungs that weren’t there. Feathers wrenched her knife free from its chest and drove it through the lurid thing, silencing it forever.

As the vampire crumbled to dust, moans like wind through an empty tunnel came from out of the dark. Both Ka snapped their heads around just as a pair of figures like empty black cloaks came rippling out of a side hall. Then another came, and another, until they veritably filled the feasting hall. The Ka wasted no effort on stealth this time, taking wing in a full on sprint for the exit. They were fast on the wing, but the small hallways made flying difficult, and the wraiths were unnaturally maneuverable, hampered not at all by the strange cross-currents or even by the many obstacles. Once Whisper thought he felt one of them take hold of his leg. He reached up with the other and unhooked the satchel holding his remaining bottles of holy water. The grip released, and behind him he heard breaking glass and shrieking, but he did not look back.

>>13895528
Finally the tower through which they had entered was before them. They flew sideways, wingtips scraping the walls of the spiral staircase as they tried desperately to avoid what would surely have been a fatal crash. It was the most harrowing flight of Whisper’s life, and it seemed an eternity before they finally reached the chamber with the balcony. Together they burst out through the empty doorway and into the bright sunlight, the wraiths shrieking and howling behind them, not daring to follow. They flew all the way to the edge of the forest a full mile from the castle before they finally allowed themselves to land. Feathers landed gracefully and set about looking for the place where they had cached their supplies. Whisper collapsed onto his back and tried to catch his breath.

“Rest if you must,” Feathers said, “but don’t fall asleep. The wraiths will pursue as soon as night falls. We must be past the forest before then.”

Whisper raised his head to say something, but the retort died on his lips, and he collapsed again. He was definitely hanging up his picks. If he lived.

>>13895508
and so the mythos of the kalang spread. awesome. it's like creating and urban legend

>>13895508
4e guy here. Fluff-wise, I'd recommend the initial racial power, with the caveat that if you take damage, you fall prone (and crash). Balance-wise, I'd recommend the second power.
Neither has been tested though, so yeah. Good luck.

Archived.

we have writing, we have archive... now we wait for art dude to come finish his masterpiece.

>>13895534
>>13895528
>>13895513
>>13895495
>>13895482
>>13895463
Goddamn now I wanna play these guys in every campaign

>>13895766
you should go check out our previous threads, then you'll really love 'em. I daresay this might be one of the best races we've created in, well, ages.

>>13895822
It's an aaracokra with a furry reskin, kay?

>>13895899
Nope, sorry, mr. troll, these are nowhere near the arakkoa, and if you'd read the other threads, you'd realize that. But here's a smiley-face sticker for trying.

sup ba/tg/uys, how's this shit coming along?

>>13895822
Are there other race creation threads? Ive been on /tg/ for quite a while and have never really seen anything this in depth. I've seen the "stat me" threads, but this is quite a bit different than that. I couldnt find anything on the archive, either. This is amazing. This should happen far more often.

>>13896041
this is our fourth thread and we're still coming up with stuff, so I'd say we're doing pretty damn good.

>>13896083
There have been a couple threads archived, but a lot got purged from the archives due to space limitations and/or low votes. For example, I recall one we made about a bunch of shark-people who were kinda like underwater coral-dwarves, but can't find it on suptg.

>>13896083
Honestly, even our full setting projects usually peter out by now. I'm not sure what about this project made it stay so strong, aside from the obvious, "Manbats holy shit," angle.

Not that I'm complaining, I love it when we shi/tg/ets done.

>>13896127
Yeah, the Shattered Sun setting we were doing is all on suptg also.

>>13896127
I think this one's lasted so long because it's a geuinely creative idea paired with minimal trolling/complaints/arguing and back up by some truly epic art and writing. All of those elements have never combined before, and may never again.

Face it, this is probably the peak of /tg/. When this project's popularity eventually fades out, it's all downhill.

So we just meta-talking til the drawfag finishes?

>>13896242

Peak of /tg/ was Deep Rot.

But you are right, very rarely do we get all our best elements in one creation thread. Setting threads tend to get more attention than race creation. I think it also has to do with a dedicated core of people who contribute to the threads. I've been in all of these except the last one.

The key is to make a followup thread in a timely manner.

>>13896348
I won't lie - I think the anticipation of seeing his finished product is part of what's kept this going so long.

>>13896355
Fuck year, Deep Rot. I'd actually sort of forgotten about that. I do have a campaign forming though, so that'll be a nice plot hook for later levels.

>>13896359
which reminds me, where IS he, anyway? Pity he's just as Anonymous as the rest of us, or one of us could call him or knock on his dormroom door or whatever and reach him.

bump for kickass thread

Still surprised nobody's tried the offer from earlier, to writefag about the Kamazoztl.

>>13892277
>>13892407

http://www.google.com/recaptcha/api/image?c=03AHJ_VuvqefdwHKiYSmVAbtbZ8LKafcJkC6_VIAob7tXoD9N4LY0vKE
2rvg3ythxn_dHyOKJ-S6gUV_4awd-RVJBiRpQ_1lyPivI1mNqlrxzPuqftxfvwjclki8VTH46F1Ox6jl3O431r2bdQIgIBHdAfsp
UZl53Zlw

BUUUMMMMMMMP

drawguy's usually here by now. Odd.

>>13896124
>>13896124
Ffuuuuuuck yeah I remember the shark people! What the hell were they named again? I forgot. I have their stats somewhere on my other computer... I'll have to dig it out and repost it. That was an awesome thread, too. I dont remember if I saved the whole thread or just some pictures and the actual statting. I was a newb to /tg/ then.

>>13896509
>>13896355
What is Deep Rot and how can I find out more about it? It sounds awesome.

>>13895583
>>13895583
I will test it, thank you so much for statting them. I think I like the fluff angle better, too, but I will try both. None of my players are creating a new character any time soon, so I will test it out a bit on my end, but I usually go for fluff over balance, mostly because the players that I play with tend to pick their race based on RP decisions and less about powergaming or trying to break the game, thankfully.

>>13898321
Deep Rot:
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/12936417/

this lasted overnight?

Astounding.

BUMPED

somebody casted revive...

As the Eye of the Gold-crowned wanes, the Embrace-of-Night's rises, may this hall of echoes begin once more with stories and image-sounds.

any more or are we tapped out?

I apologize for the no-show, yesterday, I was delayed by loads of work and other crap I had to deal with.

Anyway, more progress. Tones are pretty much done, now I'm just adding color. If you have color suggestions, please feel free to tell me.

>>13895444
A kalang who can no longer fly due to injury might assist the farmers in cultivating both edible fruits and flowers that attract particularly delicious insects. Also in farming certain insects that don't take to the air as often, like crickets.

Those portions of a kalang cavern immediately around the entrance and beneath the city are likely to be fairly livable; they would be the cultivated zones and the water source for the colony (think a cenote at the heart of the city with a waterfall pouring from the surface down into the depths).

It's when you move away from the areas the kalang use that you run into the unpleasantness; the kamazotzl, the dire flame beetles, the abnormal fungi. And an abandoned kalang city is the sort of place you might find a colony of those high-level insect monsters that look like a race of Scythers (bladewings or something?), to say nothing of the stuff growing in the rich fields no longer patrolled by vigilant kalang farmers.

>>13905271
And drawbat out of fucking nowhere!

Kick ass, dude.

>>13905271

>>13905402

Thanks, man. Isn't the Drawbat some drawfag that does shit for /co/? >_>

>>13905271
Go crazy with them colors, Anon.
Kalang have little color sense!

(or you could use shades of brown and white)

>>13905271
daaaaayuum that's awesome. sorry if it's already been addressed but do you have a site where you post your art?

>>13905543

http://oulfr.deviantart.com

>>13905522

Brown and white. Got it.

There's another thread if anybody was wondering
>>13904026
>>13904026

>>13893760
Bloody hell, we have some talented drawfags in these 'ere board.

>>13905590
Why? This one's still active.

"Come on, Thief" Fur-Like-Feathers hissed to him. Her odd-colored eyes were slits that squinted at him against the daylight. She she jostled him brusquely.

"We must keep moving. Put more wingbeats between them and us."

Whisper-of-Leaves-in-Autumn felt his wings creak, the pangs of fatigue and fear lingering through the webbing like a cold updraft. His stomach gurgled loudly, protesting his sudden increase in physical exertion.

Feathers nose wrinkled at him. She gave an exasperated grunt as she turned her attnetion to her own equipment, most of it still intact.

Whisper bit his tongue, cursing the loss of his satchel to that wraith which nearly claimed his life. He rubbed the sore ankle ruefully with his other foot.

A bony scrap of beechbark like her might sustain herself on thoughts of vengeance and stray moonbeams, but she'd do well to remember that not everyone who volunteered for these sorts of jobs bore the personal talonmarks of Great-Silence!

A whistling of air made his ears twitch, and before he had registered what was ongoing, Whisper had caught half a mummified boarbeetle carcass in his teeth.

"We'll need to keep our strength." Feathers hissed matter-of-factly as she gnawed her ration. "We're done over if we're not past the forest by sundown."

Without another word, she took to the wing, crunching the last remnants of her half of the insect. At once grateful and profoundly annoyed, Whisper followed as his jaws worked on the stale and meager thing between his gritted teeth

>>13905780
ooh, a continuation of the earlier writing. Nice.

Drawbat's great work continues...

>>13905927
BTW, I'm not him, and it's not really the final image, I'm just passing it along from the other thread.

>>13905856
Figured it might not hurt. THing is, I don't wanna usurp that guy's original good shit.

I'm tempted to do the Kamazotzl, but don't know enough about their culture (and am too tired to dredge the archive - gonna rest now soon).

What are the Kamazotzl like, anyhow? Ground-dwelling, yeah. Orgre-ish, yeah. but sapient? ith a tribal strucutre? Are they to most Kalang as orcs are to humans? Any ideas?

>>13905856
Original Whisperfag here. Not the same author, but I have no objection, as I just got a trial copy of Maya and will be busy dicking with it for at least the next week.

Carry on, good lore-chanter.

>>13906151
Yeah, the archives aren't helping, what you said is pretty much what /tg/ has covered until now.

what about you spin a tale, and we play along with that?

>>13906151
Kamazotl are strange monsters - they're not exactly sapient, and some ka question if they're really more than just slightly-clever pack-animals like wolves or the great cats. Large, brutish, flightless, a bit like ogres in build, they are scavengers, eating whatever (or whoever) falls to the cavern floor from the Kalang colonies overhead. They, alongside the giant beetles, parasites, and other vermin roaming the depths, are the primary danger within a Kalang cavern, and why walking is rare in their colonies except over special pathways made for such travel.

None are too sure where they came from, or how they find their way into the caverns, but eventually, given time, they will be found dwelling there so long as the Kalang themselves do, and should the colony move or be sliminated, the Kamazotzl eventually leave as well, once things cease to drop into their realm from overhead.

In a word, they are the bogeymen of the Kalang, except they are not myth, but real.

>>13892277
>>13892407
Posts related

>>13906197
So, they're ground-dwelling scavengers, right? Do they have racial memories of flight? Do they envy their airborne cousins? Admire them? Are they friendly towards them (Oh dear, a fallen glideborn. e shall nurse you back to health!)? Aggressive (A fallen glideborn? Crush the pompous shit and eat their flesh!)? Ambivalent (Oh dear, a fallen glideborn. Poor thing won't survive long down here. We should put it out of its misery, then our tribe will feast well tonight!)

How does the Gold Crowned fit into their mythology? Do they revere the same gods as their flying kin? Do they have their own myths? I have ideas in which there are cults which believe the Gold Crowned will grant them the gift of flight one day, others corn him for abandoning them to the ground while their kin can soar. I doubt they have utter hatred for him (he DOES give them light, so that they might warm themselves and see more clearly). but more an extremely grudging attitude.

Would they need echolocation as much, as ground dwellers? Would they have better vision than their glideborn kin? Reduced hearing but enhanced visual acuity (+2 to spot checks)?

Hey guys! Check out how legit we are on /tg/ now.

>>13906219

>>13906277
>>13906307
Okay, I guess I gave them a bit too much depth. Still: add or remove as much as necessary.

Perhaps they work in a weird symbiosis with their glideborn cousins: their movements prevent nasty fungi from forming in the refuse heaps far below and so keep virulent spores from harming entire populations?

>>13906307
well, like I said, its questionable if they're even intelligent, or just vaguely-clever animals like dogs or apes, so whether they envy Kalang or have religious notions is a mystery.

However, it is known they they hold the Kalang no special regard - if it falls, it's food, whether it's a rotten fruit, a pile of refuse, or some unfortunate ka who stumbled and couldn't straighten his wings in time.

This is one reason why the walkways are there - for even in a high-dwelling race like the Kalang, one is not born knowing to fly.

May the Gold-crowned protect us all, should those wretched brutes ever become clever enough to discover how to climb walls...

>>13906371
This is a possibility, though I doubt it would be an intentional matter on their part, just coincidence.

>>13906423
Or should they ally themselves with those fucking drow and their drider minions, who already do.

Fortunately, as far as we've been able to determine, there's not much chance of that. In what passes for language amongst the kamazotzl, "drider" and "delicious" appear to be synonyms.

>>13906433

See >>13905383 for my take on what lies beneath a kalang city.

>>13906467
then again, if their random shrieks and grunts can even be called a language, based on what has been observed, it seems they consider anything that isn't one of themselves food or a rival for obtaining food - the latter being the giant beetles and such that roam the caverns with them.

Odd how they try to avoid packs of beetles, or sometimes "bribe" solitary beetles with scraps of food to keep them away, rather than attack the vermin. Fear, perhaps? If so, why? Theyre too unintelligent to be trying to domesticate the insects, so why treat them with such wariness?

>>13906542
You ever seen the kind of beetles that chill out in guano heaps? They're like leggy piranha. If you're anything near their size, they'll chop you up into tiny bits and serve you with jam before you know what the fuck. I imagine the giant-ass ones that eat Kalang guano and shit fire are a tad more dangeorus.

>>13906631
Likely the Kamazotzl don't know the difference, and just avoid the large beetles as a general precaution, since either variety means trouble.

>>13906631
Saw a kamazotzl try to ride one of the big ones once. It was funny as hell, especially the explosion at the end.

Second or third time I saw one try it, not so funny. Especially when I realized that the ones that survive gain a distinctive new pattern of scars within a night or two.

They might not be anywhere close to civilized, but they aren't quite unthinking beasts either.

>>13906697
Even animals can learn. Doesn't mean they are anything but animals.

>Remember, a race designs it's weapons based on the idea of fighting other members of that race at first. Kalang having short stabbing weapons with long slashing weapons that serve as wing protection make logical and biological sense to a race with wings designed like this. You would have the multiple pronged stabbignweapon to catch and twist the long slashing wapon and to lock up your opponent's weapon. I could see such a race makign judo and aikido as their basic form of hand to hand combat - grappling, falling, and avoiding damage to wings and limbs while doing so.

Oddly, I got this brilliant notion from the "hater" thread.

>>13906797
The hilarious thing about the hater thread is that it's churning out more advice on how to make the Kalang practical than the idea threads.

/tg/: We meta-get shit done.

>>13906834
Except for the greentext I quoted, most of it seems to be general whining about how "unrealistic" they are.

Yeah, unrealistic, taking into account they're made for a setting full of elves, wizards, and dragons.

They jelly.

>>13906876
Well, some of it is valid. The complaint about the wings, for example, overlooks the fact that, while no slack is pictured, slack in the wing membrane does exist. The comment pointing out that bipedal locomotion would be ridiculous is also correct; however, I think we've assumed that Kalang mimic normal bat walking, and employ their arms to facilitate movement on the ground.

>>13906896
Yes, but walking of any sort is a rarity anyway, so how they do it doesn't seem to be worth worrying about. It'd be like complaining human arms weren't long enough to properly swing from tree to tree with.

Any work on that kamazotzl story idea from earlier?

>>13906697
I'm picturing that, and it's funny as fuck.

"Gwargh!" *LEAP!*
"Skreee!"*skitterskitterskitterskitterBLAM!*

Living among the Bat-folk, Chapter 2 – The Kalang territories and its possible dangers. Page 57.

One creature that haunt the Kalang the most is their distant biological relatives, which they have called the Kamazotzl, which in a crude translation is “Dead People”, or as it would be more appropriate for those outside their society, “Dead Bats”.

They have everything that makes a young Ka tremble in fear: They are eyeless, furless and bear white, leathery skin, some characteristics normally associated with evil entities; they are uncultured and irrational; they prey on Kalangs; and they are unable to fly, having only vestigial wings.

Kalang culture preaches that the Dead People are actually either spawn of the Ghost-Who-Shrieks (who is a god associated with madness and betrayal) or evil Kalang who pledged loyalty to him and reshaped themselves with their god’s ”blessing”.

I like the travelogue style you've got there.

dude... this thread was made two days ago. this is the longest any of our Kalang threads have lasted so far - awesome!!

>>13907281
Their children since a very young age are told never to leave their guardians’ side, for the Kamazotzl can snatch them away. Even the mere sight of one can be an ominous sign: a pregnant female cannot see a Dead One, or it is said she may risk miscarriage or bear deformed children. Many of them fear becoming like them, and carrying lucky charms (like the symbol of the Gold-Crowned, their main deity) to avoid such fate is common-place.

The Kalang despise the Kamazotzl with so much passion that they even hold a festival dedicated to a full day of slaying their kind. (see Chapter 5) But they don’t dedicate their lives in such task. It is near impossible, as is searching for anything in a dark cave (their echolocation is mostly useless since the Kamazotzl live and hide one the ground), so the Ka normally only carefully patrol their cities (in case one of them climbs its way there – not as rare as it seems), treating the Dead Ones living off-limits (and under-limits, so to say) with disregard.

It is interesting to note that even though the Kalang hate the Kamazotzl, the last thrive the best around Kalang cities. They steal insects from the Breeding farms, eat the mushroom that lives off the guano they dump, and sometimes eat the Kalang who accidentally fall upon them.

>>13907478
The enterprising adventurer or the curious visitor should never confuse both species. The first reason is safety: a Kalang usually wear clothing and don’t immediately attack strangers. The second one is politeness: being called a Kamazotzl is quite possible one the worst things you could call a Kalang. So this knowledge literally saves lives!

>>13907570
I kinda doubt, once one has encounters one of them, that it would be at all easy to mistake it for the other, no more than one could mistake a dwarf for an elf.

>>13907628
Who knows? And at the worst case scenario, one just learned how to piss a Ka.

If you mistake a Kalang for a Kamazotzl, you learn all too swftly what differences there are between the former and the latter... by being introduced to the latter.

bump

Still here.

Morning bump!

3.5:
+2 Dex, -2 Con
60 ft Fly Speed (Good Maneuverability)
15 ft Ground Speed
+4 Listen
Blindsight 120 ft
Low-Light Vision
Light Sensitivity
Ventriloquism (ex): Kalang can replicate the effects of Ghost Sound and Message at will as an extraordinary ability with an effective caster level equal to their character level.
Favored Class: Rogue, Ranger
Languages: Common, Kahautl. Bonus languages: Dwarven, Elven, Undercommon, Terran, Auran.

Pathfinder:
+2 Dex, +2 Cha, -2 Con
60 ft Fly Speed (Good Maneuverability)
15 ft Ground Speed
+4 Perception
Blindsight 120 ft
Low-Light Vision
Light Sensitivity
Ventriloquism (ex): Kalang can replicate the effects of Ghost Sound and Message at will as an extraordinary ability with an effective caster level equal to their character level.
Languages: Common, Kahautl. Bonus languages: Dwarven, Elven, Undercommon, Terran, Auran.

Yeah, the formatting's shit and they could probably use a few more skill bonuses, but there's the foundation. Enjoy, /tg/.

I imagine first contact between the kalang and thri-kreen went poorly.

>>13911882
And by 'poorly', I presume you mean 'OMNOMNOMNOMNOM'.

What if a Kalang player ended up in the same group as a Thri-kreen player by surprise......it would be like when you're stranded on a deserted island with another guy and after a few days he starts to look like a hamburger, except it's not after a few days of starvation, it's every bloody time you look at him!

>>13911954
Most bats eat fruit, not insects, actually.

>>13912016
.....do you mean that as in most species eat fruit? Because I'm sure that the number of individual bug eaters outnumber the number of individual fruit eaters.....

>>13910207
All that stuff is too good.
Where is their LA? They should have somewhere around +1 or +2.

Earlier today I noticed that the wings of that bat man don't work, and the legs are hardly suitable for walking so the creature wouldn't really be great at surviving from the predators. Those finger joints cannot possibly bear the weight of a flying creature. Here's a quick sketch. OP's is a fruit eater, this is a vampire bat.
Notice how feasible wings don't allow for clothing, this idea is doomed.

>>13912183
If that thing is the size of a man, then those wings are a fraction of the size they need to be for flight.
This is really the problem here: something that weighs as much as a person isn't going to be able to flap its limbs and fly around.
Also: membrane wings are extremely delicate and do not effectively heal. These bat people are going to be a fragile race.

>>13912219
IIRC the earlier discussions on batwings concluded that they aren't as fragile as you think they are.

>>13912183
>>13912219
You mean like how dragons shouldn't be able to fly because there's no way their wings could produce enough lift for their mass OH WAIT NEVER MIND

What part of IT'S MAGIC I DON'T GOTTA EXPLAIN SHIT did you not comprehend about a race meant for D&D/Pathfinder?

>>13912263
I didn't see that discussion.
I just learned a while back that bats are pathetically fragile.
Their wings can take the more or less evenly distributed forces that they are subjected to during flight. They are like wet tissue paper when it comes to being torn or punctured. And they basically don't heal.

>>13912112
I say LA +1. Enough to to balanced, but not enough to seriously hurt the more min/max-y types

>>13912016
Figure that the kalang are omnivorous. It's advantageous to a sapient critter anyway, and allows aspects of their appearance and behavior to be drawn from both varieties. Figure that the degree to which a given kalang prefers fruit vs. insects is a matter of culture more than biology.

As a minor note, figure that kalang can't process milk. There aren't any animals they could reasonably have domesticated that would produce it.

>>13912264
The part about you trying to shout everyone down who doesn't agree with your "vision" of fantasy.

>>13912754
Not the anon you're responding to, but can't you just homebrew it for your setting that such flight mechanics are defunct and leave the flight mechanic for everyone else?

Unless you're a troll.

>>13912754
It's a race for D&D/Pathfinder and similar settings, which have certain assumptions about flight and the effect of real-world physics thereon built in as soon as you say "there are flying dragons here".

This isn't meant to be a species for a hard-science campaign. If you think it is, then your criticisms might have some value. But then, if you think it is, you're obviously a retarded assgoblin who didn't bother to read the other threads. Which seems likely.

In conclusion: quiet dear, the adults are speaking.

On the "how realistic are we going?" front, here's a point to consider.

True vampire bats, the ones that actually DO drink blood, have to drink massive amounts to sustain themselves. It's a panda/bamboo situation, except if the panda was about the size of a dog and the bamboo requirement was unchanged. Blood is really inefficient as foodstuffs go. You don't get a lot of energy out of it.

They literally have to gorge themselves beyond their stomach's capacity. Why don't they burst?

Because they pee like crazy while feeding to make up the difference. Just latch on, start suckin, then start sprayin.

Make of that what you will for your vampire man-bats.

>>13913349
Kamazotzl are somewhat less... wasteful in regard to their prey than real-world vampire bats. They'll drain it of blood, but they'll also crack it open for its delicious meats. Brains, liver, reproductive organs, bone marrow, heart, lungs, spleen... the way you know a kamazotzl kill is by finding a pile of skin and meat torn free from a shattered skeleton, with the bones all cracked open for marrow and all of the organs and fat missing.

If you're lucky, they were more thirsty than hungry, so they just drained your blood and cached your corpse for later. If you're unlucky, they butcher you while you're still alive. And given that this is D&D we're talking about, where magic can be used to ignore physics and biology, some of the kamazotzl can keep you alive for a long time while they feed.

We do not know where they come from. We know only that, from time immemorial, they have skittered beneath our societies, feeding off the by-products of our successes and failures alike. The religious Kalang call them the spirits of the damned, robbed of sight and deaf to our songs, screeching the discordant melodies of Ghost-Who-Shrieks that echo in their heads. Our scholars claim that they are merely opportunistic scavengers, drawn to the easy pickings that fall from our great heights.

>>13914849
A favorite pastime among the more reckless youth is Wind-Past-the-Snapping-Jaws, an absurd game that involves dive-bombing the dumb Kamazotzl, pulling up at the last few moments. More than a few have been surprised by the Kamazotzl's impressive motivation when confronted with prey; what the beasts lack in intelligence, they make up for in determination and numbers. A Kalang that finds itself on the ground in Kamazotzl territory will quickly find itself swarmed by a hungry pack of the creatures.

I love you guys. This is awesome.

Here's a question: what sort of things would kalang be likely to trade for, and what would they offer in return? And who would they trade with?

Spider silk might be one commodity; it would make sense for them to have domesticated at least one variety of spider for that purpose, as well as using spiders as hunting animals akin to our dogs, and since the only other source of spider silk in large quantities is the drow I think the kalang would quickly take control of that market. They might also be able to provide certain dyes from captive insect populations (mainly shades of red, although they might also be able to get blue if they branched out to snails), as well as lacquer. Any other major insect derivatives I'm missing, either real-world or that would be plausible in fantasy?

>>13918157
Bugs could also be used for food and medicine: things that are a must for any aventurer, and are hard to find in big underground places like the Underdark.

A group would probably be happier if they met a dwarven camp, but a Kalang settlement is just as welcome (so long they don't think too hard about what goes in the food or their potions)

>>13918157
We were also talking about they selling their guano for farmers.

I think that what they probably need/want are wood, ivory, textiles, and fruits mainly. Possibly metalworks, like armor, weapons, and tools... Intalling a forge on the ceiling of a cavern isn't the most bright idea a person could ever have.

>>13918639
Squeamish adventurers might be advised to stick to the fruit and fungi. Weird shit in potions, well, that's a given no matter where they buy them.

A crazy thought I just had: some kalang might actually hunt cave fish. Some would skim the surface, while more daring ones would dive at speed. It would help add some variety to their protein sources.

>>13918721
Yeah, metals are something that would be popular. Lighter stuff especially; mithril would be even more highly prized than among the surface-bound. They'd probably have a decent idea of working veins of native metals (copper, gold, silver, platinum, palladium, iridium, osmium, rhodium, ruthenium, and other stuff in smaller quantities) as well as gemstones (which would probably be faceted to reflect/refract sound in interesting ways), and some alloying might be known. Smelting seems less likely, at least before they find dwarven colonies; after that, most kalang cities would eventually have full smelters and foundries somewhere beneath the city, or alternatively in caverns above the city that vent to the surface.