Vril

Vril (the name is both plural and singular) are a species of goblinoid engineered from goblin base-stock by drow wizards to create superior slaves in the realms of Dungeons & Dragons.

Vril resemble nothing so much as a goblin crossed with a bat. Their faces have a distinctly bat-like cast, with large, flat noses, wide mouths full of sharp fangs, and massively enlarged, back-sweeping ears. They are more gangly than their ancestors, and this is emphasized by their stoped posture and unnaturally enlongated arms. They are also strikingly colored, with dark violent skin sporting tiger-like stripes of black.

This bat-like appearance hints at the devastating secret weapon that vril possess; a bone-shattering sonic scream that can send much larger foes reeling. Perhaps more dangerous in the long run is their ability to "skinshift", altering the consistency of their flesh to better resist physical damage. This makes vril inordinately tough compared to other goblinoids.

The result of many long years of constant experimentation, vril have few traits in common with their ancestors and relatives; the drow sought to expunge as many of the traditional goblin weaknesses as possible from them. Though they do share the goblin maliciousness, they are ferocious, bold, daring, possess a strong sense of stubborn resolve, and are very well-organized. They consider themselves superior to goblins and look down on them, but a side-effect of their indoctrination as drow slaves is that they feel an instinctive cautious respect for all humanoids bigger than themselves, including non-evil ones like humans and elves.

To protect themselves against betrayal - having learned from their mistakes with the chitine - the drow have sought to not only indoctrinate the vril to instinctively fear and obey them, but also included a deliberate weakness in their creation; making them unnaturally susceptible to both the narcotic "drow sleeping poison" and the spider-based toxins that drow favor smearing on their weapons.

This has... not entirely worked out as they expected. Whilst the vast bulk of vril are slaves and rarely think to do more than grumble about their lot in life, some exceptional individuals have arisen in the past and rebelled against their creators. This has led to the foundation of colonies of free vril throughout the Underdark, which zealously defend their independence. Worse still, some of these free vril have managed to actually throw off their poison vulnerability through strength of will and careful applications of their skinshifting ability.

Introduced in the "Drow of the Underdark" sourcebook for D&D 3e, vril are the subject of one of WoTC's most infamous cock-ups: they forgot to include the standard monster statblock for vril, and instead it now lies on their online archives: http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/20070504a

Vril PCs

Like virtually every other (non-setting specific) goblinoid, vrils have PC stats, which were included in "Drow of the Underdark":

+2 Constitution, -2 Intelligence, -2 Charisma

Small

Humanoid (Goblinoid)

Base land speed 30 feet

Darkvision 60 feet

Resistance to Sonic Damage: 5 points

Light Blindness: Sudden exposure to bright light blinds a vril for 1 round, and they take a -1 circumstance penalty on attack rolls, saves and checks when in bright light.

Vulnerability to Drow Toxin: Vril suffer a -4 penalty on Fortitude saves against Drow Sleep Poison and Spiderkind Venom.

Skinshift: Once per day, as a move action, a vril can alter the consistency of its flesh for 3 + Con modifier rounds. For the duration of the effect, it gains Damage Reduction 5 against either Bludgeoning, Piercing or Slashing damage, chosen when the Skinshift is used. This ability can be used an extra time per day per 4 character levels (2/day at 4th level, 3/day at 8th level, 4/day at 12th level, etc).

Shriek: Once per day, as a standard action, a vril can unleash a horrible shriek that inflicts 1d6 Sonic damage (Reflex Save DC 10 + 1/2 vril's character level + vril's Con modifier to halve the damage). A shriek can be unleashed as either a 15ft burst centered on the vril or as a 30ft cone. The shriek's damage increases by +1d6 at every 3rd level (3, 6, 9, 12, etc). A vril barbarian can shriek whilst Raging.

+4 racial bonus on Climb checks

+2 racial bonus on Balance and Jump checks

Favored Class: Barbarian

There are also a smattering of vril racial feats:

• Sudden Shriek (requires BAB +2) lets a vril shriek as a swift action.
• Dazing Shriek (requires BAB +3) means that creatures that take damage from the vril's shriek must then make a Fortitude save (same DC as the Vril Shriek's Reflex save) or be Dazed for 1 round.
• Vril Drow Slayer (requires BAB +4) negates the Vulnerability to Drow Toxin racial weakness, and grants the vril +1 to attack rolls and +4 dodge bonus to AC when fighting drow, drow-related creatures like driders, szarkai & scorrow, and spiderkind.
• Great Shriek (requires Dazing Shriek and BAB +9) means that the vril's shriek now Dazes for 1d4 rounds and Deafens for 1 minute if a creature fails its Fortitude save.
• Improved Skinshift (minimum character level 5) increases the Damage Reduction of skinshift to 10 points.