And in the category of "things I'm glad are fictional"....

[Timespike]

...we have the Red Mantises. These guys are the real deal; the Red Mantis Assassin PrC is better than the standard assassin prestige class in a number of ways, which means that non-mantis assassins are less scary than the mantises, which is, I suspect, the point. Nicely done. The background and flavor text also made the little hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

[Gavgoyle]

I feel that way about Skullrippers...

Spoiler:

unless I could have one, but that goes without saying.

[James Jacobs]

Timespike wrote:

...we have the Red Mantises. These guys are the real deal; the Red Mantis Assassin PrC is better than the standard assassin prestige class in a number of ways, which means that non-mantis assassins are less scary than the mantises, which is, I suspect, the point. Nicely done. The background and flavor text also made the little hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

Yup; it absolutely is the point. The Red Mantis is one of the bad guy groups I've had in my campaign for several years now, and while I've never really done MUCH with them, they do tend to creep out the players when they show up. Good to hear that they're doing their job! :)

[Mr. Slaad]

I loved the article until I reached the section about the leaders, and learned that most of them are female, while the leader can only be female. This seems so random.

[Forgottenprince]

Mr. Slaad wrote:

I loved the article until I reached the section about the leaders, and learned that most of them are female, while the leader can only be female. This seems so random.

IIRC, manti (plural mantis?) are one of the species where the female consumes the male mid-coitus. The male keeps at it even as he dies.

Put it into perspective for you?

[Mr. Slaad]

Actually, right after I posted I realized that it was highly likely that mantes (I think this is the plural, cause it is an actual greek word) probably are female dominated like many insect species, but it still seems strange in game.

[James Jacobs]

The red mantises (we use "mantises" as the plural) do indeed model their leadership off of the fact that female mantises have the tendency to rip off the head and eat their mates. They're a matriarchal society, and there is a certain bit of parallelism between them and the drow as a result (who are also a matriarchal society in some part due to the fact that black widow spiders kill their mates). It's not random at all, in other words, but By Design. :)