Planetouched characters are mortal beings whose bloodlines include immortal ancestry. This might be the direct result of those with mortal heritage mating with fiends or angels, or it can be the consequence of a long buried secret—some people have archdevils lurking in their family trees, while others have been blessed by those they have helped.
Regardless of their cause however, most planetouched share a few physical traits with the source of their supernatural bloodline, such as horns, tails, canine teeth, or sometimes even feathers. Planetouched skin colors range from red to silver.
Characters with planetouched heritage share the following traits.
Age. Planetouched typically mature at the same rate as humans but have slightly longer lifespans. Planetouched born to non-planetouched parents' lifespans tend to mirror that of their parents’ heritage.
Size. Planetouched are usually of similar build and size to humans, though those born to non-human parents more closely resemble the heritage of their parents. Your size is Medium, but can be Small with approval from your Narrator.
Speed. Your base Speed is 30 feet.
Darkvision. Thanks to your supernatural ancestors, your vision is not impeded by darkened 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 color in darkness, only shades of gray.
Immortal Blessing. Your connection with the source of your bloodline allows you to cheat death. When you would ordinarily be reduced to zero hit points, you are instead reduced to one hit point. You cannot use this feature again until you have finished a long rest.
Planetouched can vary wildly from each other depending on their bloodline. In addition to the traits granted by your planetouched heritage, select one of the following heritage gifts to determine the nature of your ancestor.
This heritage of planetouched is created through some sort of divine intervention, or when a bloodline contains celestial blood. These planetouched often have a color scheme that is brighter than those of other heritages, with lots of golds and warm hues being found among them. Their divine blood also twists their features into something frighteningly angelic, resulting in horns that resemble halos or headdresses, and occasionally even planetouched with extra sets of eyes. You have the following traits:
Celestial Legacy. You know the guidance cantrip. In addition, you can use an action to touch a willing creature and restore a number of hit points equal to your level. Once you use this trait, you must finish a long rest before doing so again.
Divine Protection. You have resistance to radiant damage.
Language. You have an innate ability to recognize Celestial, and are able to speak, read, write, and sign it.
Connected to the Elemental Plane of Air, these planetouched may have skin and hair the color of a sky on a sunny day, that of a cluster of stormclouds, or other light, cool tones. Some, on the other hand, may have a more avian aspect, with feathers instead of hair or the eyes of a bird of prey. You have the following traits:
Feather on the Wind. When you fall, you can use your reaction to slow your rate of descent and land from a height of up to 60 feet without taking falling damage; you take half damage if falling from heights higher than that.
Light on Your Feet. You can use a bonus action to make a leap of a distance up to 10 feet without provoking opportunity attacks. This distance increases by 5 feet each time your proficiency bonus increases. Once you have used this feature a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, you can’t use it again until you have finished a long rest. Additionally, when you would be knocked prone, you can use your reaction to instead move 5 feet in a direction you choose. This movement does not provoke an opportunity attack.
These planetouched can trace their lineage to malcubi or to fiends of deception and espionage. They typically are either strikingly attractive or have an utterly forgettable appearance. You have the following traits:
Fiendish Resistance. You are resistant to fire damage.
Legacy of Enticement. You know the friends cantrip. When you reach 3rd level, you know either charm person, which you can cast as a 2nd-level spell, or disguise self, and you can cast once between long rests. When you reach 5th level, you know either detect thoughts or suggestion, and you can cast this spell once between long rests. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
While most fiends kill and destroy through fire, acid, cold, and venom, there are some that bristle with claws, horns, fangs, and spines. These planetouched are descended from those fiends. Their leathery skin is usually dark blue, purple, or brown and is studded with spikes and knobs made of bone and organic metal. They typically have eyes like colored ice and hair like the quills of a porcupine. You have the following traits:
Barbed Hide. At the start of each of your turns, you inflict basic melee damage to any creature grappling you, you are grappling, or are grabbing onto. This is piercing damage, not bludgeoning. Additionally, your skin is incredibly tough and your spikes turn weapons away. When you aren’t wearing armor, your AC is 12 + your Dexterity modifier. You can use a shield and still gain this benefit.
Claws. You have very sharp claws and teeth. These are natural weapons in which you are proficient. If you strike with either of them, you deal piercing or slashing damage (whichever is more appropriate) equal to 1d4 + your Strength modifier instead of the normal damage for an unarmed strike.
While the general image of the lower planes is that of hellish flames, there are many planes that are actually burning cold. Brumalim (pronounced bru-mah-leem) trace their lineages back to the fiends that dwell in these planes. They are usually starkly pale in color. You have the following traits:
Cold Resistance. You have resistance to cold damage.
Frozen Legacy. You know the ray of frost cantrip. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
Shield of Levistus. You can use your action to cause eldritch frost to manifest all over you. You gain 10 temporary hit points, and if a creature hits you with a melee attack while you have these hit points, that creature takes 5 points of cold damage. You can use this ability once, then you can’t do so again until you complete a long rest. At 5th level, the number of temporary hit points you gain and the damage an attacker takes increases to 15.
As diverse as any planeborn people, earthborn elementaari may have eyes the clear purple of a crystal or the deep brown-black of a rich field. Some among them are more obvious in their affinity, chunks of crystalline growths along their arms and skin the color of any soil one can imagine. You have the following traits:
Fists of Stone. Your hands can become hard and rocky, perhaps even jagged and spiked. Causing this change or ending it requires no action. Your hands are hard as rock and serve as natural weapons, which you can use to make unarmed strikes. Each time you use this feature, choose piercing, slashing, or bludgeoning damage. Your natural weapons deal damage of the chosen type equal to 1d6 + your Strength modifier.
Craggy Skin. While you aren’t wearing armor, your AC equals 13 + your Constitution modifier.
A fireborn’s connection to their elemental plane almost always manifests in warm-hued hair and skin, to the point that some are mistaken for comparatively subtle tieflings and aasimar. Those with more flashy manifestations might have hair that undulates like a flame, or eyes the color of shifting embers. You have the following traits:
Fevered Blood. You have resistance to fire damage.
Flame On. When a creature touches you or successfully hits you with a melee attack while within 5 fee
Similar to aasimar, these planetouched have the touch of the divine in them. Unlike the aasimar, the lunaels’ celestial bloodline wasn’t started by true angels—that is, those creatures who stand for absolute goodness and promote the will of the gods. Instead, the lunael are those blessed by or descended from celestial beings who are tied to the moon, who act as muses, or who are “guardian angels.” Where aasimar are warmly colored, lunaels (pronounced loo-nail) tend to have to have coloration reminiscent of dawn or dusk: blues, purples, and roses, with a silvery, golden, or pearly opalescence. Their horns often resemble a moth’s antennae or an owl’s “ears.” You have the following traits:
Lunar Legacy. You know your choice of either the dancing lights or friends cantrip. When you reach 3rd level, you can cast faerie fire once between long rests. You do not have to concentrate on this spell. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
Lunar Resistance. You are resistant to force damage.
Guardian Muse. You can use a bonus action to give an expertise die to a creature you see within 30 feet of you that is making a skill check. Once you do so, you can’t do so again until you complete a short or long rest.
The measured are planetouched with bloodlines from planes of pure law, order, and clockwork precision. Their skin is typically metallic, highlighting their angular, even robotic features, and it’s not uncommon for them to have markings that resemble geometric patterns, gears, or number sequences. Their horns are typically perfectly straight or curved in precise spirals. Measured are rarely the result of mingling between mortals and creatures of order. Instead, many are created by being “blessed” by great powers and gods of Law. Additionally, certain very minor spirits of Law will sometimes try to merge with willing people—they are too weak to possess the unwilling—and in doing so turn the individual into a measured. These spirits believe that this merger will help them in their ultimate quest, which is to find the answer to seemingly unanswerable mathematical equations. These spirits provide the measured with a “little voice in their head” and provides mathematically sound and completely unemotional advice. You have the following traits:
Law of Averages. After you successfully hit a creature with a weapon attack, but before you roll for damage, you may choose to inflict the average amount of damage for the die type you would roll. For instance, if you attack with a long sword (d8) damage, you will always inflict 5 damage, plus any attribute modifiers you would normally add to that roll.
Measured Legacy. You know the calculate cantrip. When you reach 3rd level, you may cast the searing equation spell as a 2nd-level spell once between long rests. You require no material components to cast this spell. Intelligence is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
Ordered Mind. You have resistance to psychic damage.
Some places in the lower planes contain little more than shadowy darkness patched with despair and madness, as the shadows leech all positive emotion, sanity, and eventually, life from the few creatures that journey there. Those few humanoids who managed to escape before the plane fully drained them are the murks. They typically have dull gray skin (or rarely, another color that is highly desaturated), and pure black eyes. Their hair is often darkly iridescent, like a rainbow on an oil-slick, and their ivory horns are prone to chipping and yellowing. You have the following traits:
Numbed Mind. You are resistant to psychic damage and gain an expertise die on saving throws against being frightened.
Shadowsight. Your darkvision extends to 90 feet instead of 60 feet.
Murky Legacy. You know the chill touch cantrip. When you reach 3rd level, you may cast calm emotions once between long rests. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
The nergalan have in their ancestry a fiend not of hellfire or burning ice, but of disease, famine, and corruption. Some in fact were once humans or from another ancestry but were infected and changed by a disease of fiendish origins. Nergalan typically look rotted and diseased, with drawn features and corpse-pale skin and dead white eyes. While many nergalans revel in their inherent corruption, many others fight against it by becoming healers and caretakers. You have the following traits:
Fiendish Resistance. You are resistant to poison damage and gain an expertise die on saving throws against the poisoned condition. Additionally, you have advantage on saving throws against contracting diseases.
Diseased Legacy. You know the pestilence cantrip. Once you reach 3rd level, you can cast false life as a 2nd-level spell once between long rests. Once you reach 5th level, you can cast ray of enfeeblement once between long rests. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
Some planetouched trace their ancestry not to a demon or devil but to a fallen angel; these planetouched are called ouranel (pronounced oh-RAN-ell). Some ouranel were once aasimar or lunael but fell—or were dragged—into fiendish darkness that changed them. And others were the children of celestial and fiendish planetouched. Many ouranel lean into their heritage, actively embracing or rejecting their fiendish side in favor of their angelic one, or vice versa. These planetouched look much like aasimar, but have dark, rich coloring instead of the aasimars’ brighter tones. You have the following traits:
Cruel Truths. The darkness within you causes you to have an unpleasantly sharp tongue. You know the vicious mockery cantrip. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
Fallen Resistance. You have resistance to necrotic damage.
Language. You have an innate ability to recognize both Celestial and your choice of Abyssal or Infernal. You can speak, read, write, and sign these languages.
In the lower planes, destruction is everywhere. Lakes and oceans filled with corrosive liquids dissolve or burn any mortal who mistakes them for water. Acid rains eat away at even the toughest structures, and corpses begin to putrefy almost immediately upon dying. Of course, there are many fiends who are perfectly at home in the acid, and the phithizim (pronounced fie-thih-ZEEM) are planetouched descended from such creatures. These planetouched often have mottled, pitted skin of brownish orange to sickly yellow green. You have the following traits:
Acid Resistance. You have resistance to acid damage.
Corrosive Legacy. You know the acid splash cantrip. When you reach 3rd level, you can cast corpse explosion once between long rests. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
Touch of Decay. You can use your action to cause your hands to become coated with a acrid, corrosive substance. For 1 minute, or until you use a bonus action to end the effect, you inflict 1d6 acid damage when you make an unarmed attack. If you touch a nonliving, inanimate object, you inflict 2d4 acid damage to it. If you reduce an object to 0 hit points, it crumbles into sticky dust. Once you use this ability, you can’t do so again until you complete a short or long rest.
The most common reason for planetouched born to nonmagical parents is having an archdevil somewhere in the family tree. Tieflings can be spotted by the horns growing from their skulls and they often have skin colored like their fiendish ancestors, some also smelling faintly of sulfur or brimstone. You have the following traits:
Hellish Resistance. You have resistance to fire damage.
Infernal Legacy. You know the produce flame cantrip. Once you reach 3rd level, you can cast arcane riposte (fire damage only) once per long rest. At 5th level, you can cast heat metal without material components once per long rest. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for these spells.
The waterborn planetouched, true to their nature, often have aquatic features, though these can be as subtle as bright blue eyes or small patches of scales to needle-like teeth, prominent fins, and colorful skin in tones of blue, green, or even those of tropical fish. You have the following traits:
Gentle Ministrations. Leveraging water’s power as a natural healing agent, you can use an action to touch a willing creature and restore a number of hit points equal to your level. Once you use this trait, you must finish a long rest before doing so again.
Liquid Undulation. Your fluid movement grants you an expertise die to resist attempts to grapple you and to escape grapples.
Piscine Aspect. You have a swimming speed of 30 feet and you can hold your breath for up to 15 minutes at a time.
A xaocite (pronounced KAY-oh-site) is the spawn of Chaos itself. There are as many xaocites that were created by being washed in chaotic planar energies as there are xaocites who are the result of an ancestor’s reproductive partner. While these planetouched have the typical planetouched body plan—that of a humanoid with horns and a tail—everything else about them changes slowly but inexorably…and without their control. Typically, only one change occurs at a time: an individual might wake up one morning to discover their hair has changed color or texture, or that they have a spattering of rainbow freckles over their cheeks, or that they have six eyes on one side of their face, or that their horns now resemble leaf-covered branches. Sometimes more radical changes occur—a xaocite might wake up with the face of a dragonborn, or of a different sex. However, as they are not fully creatures of Chaos, something about them always remains the same. This is often an eye color or a particular and prominent birthmark. You have the following traits:
Chaotic Legacy. You know the minor illusion cantrip. When you reach 3rd level, you can cast alter self once per long rest. When you reach 5th level, you can cast this spell twice between long rests. Intelligence or Charisma is your spellcasting ability for this trait.
Confusing Doubletalk. You can use a bonus action to say something incredibly random to a creature you can see within 30 feet of you who can hear you. That creature must make a Wisdom saving throw, using the spellcasting attribute you chose for your Chaotic Legacy trait. On a failure, it is confused until the end of its next turn. Once you use this ability, you can’t use it again until you complete a short or long rest.
A xaocites’ appearance continuously over time and they can’t control their appearance…that is, the character can’t control their appearance without resorting to makeup or magic, no more than a person of any other heritage can control their appearance. However, as the player, you have full control over your xaocite character’s day-to-day natural appearance. Use the following examples as inspiration, and the Narrator should decide what changes, if any, occur to your character’s traits.
Face: One or both eyes change color or size. You have one eye in the middle of your forehead, grow extra eyes, or have both eyes migrate to one side of your face. Your nose turns into a trunk or piggish snout. Your mouth becomes a circular, jawless maw. One or more sensory organs vanish, leaving your face partially or completely blank.
Skin: Your skin changes to a different human-normal skin tone. Your skin takes on a neon or pastel color. Your skin changes to two or more colors and is striped, spotted, or splotched. You grow fur, scales, or feathers. Your skin takes on the color, texture, and temperature of wood, metal, ice, rubber, or chitin. Your skin disappears entirely, leaving you with apparently raw musculature.
Hair: Your hair shortens or lengthens or changes color, possibly dramatically. Your hair styles itself, resisting any attempt you make to change it. Your hair animates, moving on its own and possibly even grabbing things; it may even gain a personality and voice. Your hair turns into fire, crystals, leafy vines, glowing light, or a literal bird’s nest that remains perched on your head.
Limbs: Your limbs become unusually short or long. Your limbs gain extra joints or turn into tentacles. Your hands or feet become paws, hooves, or wings. You grow extra limbs which mimic the movements of your primary limbs or act uncontrollably. Your arms and legs switch places.
When you reach 10th level, you are an exemplar of the planetouched, and you gain one of the following features.
Your bloodline makes you immune to a single damage type.
Aasimar: You gain immunity to radiant damage.
Beguilier: You gain immunity to fire damage.
Brumalim: You gain immunity to cold damage.
Lunael: You gain immunity to force damage.
Measured: You gain immunity to psychic damage.
Murk: You gain immunity to psychic damage and the frightened condition.
Nergalan: You gain immunity to poison damage and the poisoned condition.
Ouranel: You gain immunity to necrotic damage.
Phithizim: You gain immunity to acid damage.
Tiefling: You gain immunity to fire damage.
All fire damage you deal ignores resistance. If a creature is immune to fire damage, it instead takes half damage.
All radiant damage you deal ignores resistance. If a creature is immune to radiant damage, it instead takes half damage.
You gain a climb speed equal to your Speed. Additionally, if the surface you are climbing is unworked stone, you can walk on walls and upside down on ceilings. You also gain a burrowing speed equal to your Speed. You can use your burrowing speed to move through nonmagical unworked earth and stone without disturbing it. Finally, your natural weapon attacks deal double damage to objects and structures.
You gain immunity to fire damage.
You gain a flying speed of 30 feet. To use this speed, you can’t be wearing medium or heavy armor or using a heavy shield unless these items have the lightweight property and you can’t be encumbered. If your movement speed is reduced to 0, you fall but take half as much falling damage as normal. While using this speed, your carrying capacity is reduced to twice your Strength score, and flying for more than a minute may require a Constitution saving throw for a forced march.
Additionally, you gain an expertise die to your maneuver DC attempting the Grapple and Knockdown maneuvers against flying creatures.
Between long rests you gain the following ability a number of times equal to the sum of your Charisma and Constitution modifiers (minimum 1). As an action, you can take on an even more prominent piscine aspect, growing fins, gills, and perhaps even changing the color or texture of your skin. Your swim speed increases by 30 feet, you can breathe underwater normally, and while underwater you gain darkvision to a distance of 120 feet and can take the Dodge and Hide actions as a bonus action. This is not a magical effect and does not change what clothes you are wearing or their appearance. You may end these changes as a bonus action.
Planetouched are a rare heritage and many of their kind find themselves in a culture with very few people quite like them. This is particularly the case for planetouched with infernal bloodlines. Still, planetouched have organized to form cultures of their own—in fact on some worlds there are entire human cultures that became planetouched en masse.
As the origins of planetouched are diverse so too are their lifestyles. Planetouched are much more likely than any other heritage to adopt another culture, since planetouched are often diaspora communities. Integration and assimilation into another culture is not always easy for planetouched, and they typically opt to form enclaves so they can define themselves on their own terms.
While you can choose any culture for your planetouched character, the following cultures are linked closely with this heritage: circusfolk, forsaken, lone wanderer, steamforged.