Shardmind

[David Fryer]

I have to admit that I was not impressed with the shardmind at all.

Spoiler:

So they are the living remnents of a gate between the Astral Sea and the Far Beyond?

Of all the races in PHB 3 they are the one that impressed me the least and the only one that I really have no idea what to do with. Anyone else have any thoughts?

[Davi The Eccentric]

Anything more specific about your dislike for them?

Anyway, their main role in the world seems to their relation to psionics like the deva's connection to the divine and wilden to primal powers. Their place in the world's social structure's probably going similar to psionics as a whole; a relative newcomer, everyone's reasonably sure that they mean well, but they're certainly not going to be turning their backs any time soon.

[David Fryer]

I was just browsing so I didn't really read through the whole entry. The initial flavor just struck me as odd. It seemed like there needed to be more to the story.

[Raevhen]

Maybe I just have a fixation, but the first thing I looked at was the back story to see if there was a justification for the females having bewbs because so many people were offended by the idea of non-mammals having them a few months ago.

And yes, there is a justification.

[Davi The Eccentric]

Raevhen wrote:

Maybe I just have a fixation, but the first thing I looked at was the back story to see if there was a justification for the females having bewbs because so many people were offended by the idea of non-mammals having them a few months ago.

And yes, there is a justification.

And that would be?...

(Well? You can't just leave us humble readers waiting.)

[Raevhen]

Sorry,

Shardminds are crystalline creatures made up of hundreds of small shards of crystal assembled into a humanoid form and animated by psionic energy. They choose their forms to mimic the shapes of humanoids.

There is more to the background story but I am never sure how much I can type without infringing upon someone's intellectual property, and more to the point, I'm a lazy typer ;)

[frozenwastes]

I'm still not sure what to make of the Shardminds.

Part of them doesn't fit with my desire to have less monstrous and more traditional PC races.

First thing I'd probably do is chuck out the entire mythology of that gate and leave their origin unexplained or explained by sources that contradict one another.

[Uchawi]

You could make the shardmind some perverse creation of the sorcerer kings to harness the power of resonant memories of powerful beings that have passed away (natural or unnatural). These sentinent beings and/or memories collect in certain physical locations on Athas, to form communities of these alien type creatures.

They can have any hidden agenda or calling you like, that may lead to the destruction of the sorcerer kings, psionics in general, or the return of balance (magic) in the world.

I don't have the PB3 yet, so I don't know how far off base I am in regards to their background/history.

[David Fryer]

One setting I have found where Shardminds would work very well is the Scarred Lands, too bad it hasn't been updated for 4E. On the contenent of Termania they have strange, psionically endoweed crystals. It's not much of a stretch to have had some of those crystals gain sentience and "grow" themselves bodies based on the creatures they sense around them.

[Zexsudel]

One of the more interesting ideas I have read about using Shadminds was using their stats/crunch and calling them Psiforged, the variety for the Warforged race that was presented in Magic of Eberron. I personally like that idea. They already have the living construct trait. Part of me can't help but feel that Shardmind may have been psiforged somewhere in the design process.

[t123]

Why stick to the back story?

I think it'd be fun to play a shardmind character
based on Il Commendatore from Don Giovanni - eg.
a living statue (Avenger perhaps) who hunts down
those who have strayed....

[t123]

t123 wrote:

Why stick to the back story?

I think it'd be fun to play a shardmind character
based on Il Commendatore from Don Giovanni - eg.
a living statue (Avenger perhaps) who hunts down
those who have strayed....

Wouldn't make a bad "Terminator" either ...

[ChaosDomine]

How about changing their name to Fragmental? Does it sound better?

[ChaosDomine]

This is a race full of potential, but used in a very limited way. Looking just at their description and background, the possibilities are astonishing!
They could be shapeshifters, but of a different type, more akin to the mimic kind that transforms into objects. However, shardminds should always maintain their crystalline aspect.
Shardminds should have to eat/absorb some amount of crystal (one that matches their color and texture) at least once a week, or lose a surge. I was thinking about 1 to 5gp a week worth of gems would be enough.
Their telepathy is the only form of communication they have and it's way too short in range... It could be improved like this:
Telepathy range 30 feet. The shardmind can only communicate with one creature for every character level it possess.
Since a shardmind doesn't have any normal sense, we have to consider that it doesn't see or listen either, so all it does is to feel the psychic emanations other creatures produce, which are translated into something very similar to what we feel, see and hear. This concept takes me to a feat called Mindlink, with which a shardmind can connect the minds of other creatures (level limit still applies) and let them talk to each other and not just with the shardmind (like what you do when you create a chat group on Whatsapp).
Another feat should double the shardmind's telepathy range (if dark elves can see 60' in the dark, why can't a shardmind do something similar?

Now this is the kind of shardmind everyone would like to play with, don't you think?
:-)

[Jeremy Mac Donald]

To far off the beaten path for my tastes. One of the many races that are simply not open to the Players in my campaign world.

[Kthulhu]

ChaosDomine - This thread was over 4 years dead when you dug it up.