Deep Sea Elf [Dragonlance]

Deep elves are slim, their long fingers and toes joined by webbing. Their skin is a dark ocean blue, their hair the green-brown of kelp, and their eyes large and violet. They dress in sheer, floating gowns and decorate themselves with shell jewelry. They breathe air and water equally well.

War disgusts them, and they fight only when there is no other choice. Three times a day a deep elf can take the form of a dolphin, a change that takes one round. In dolphin form it cannot cast spells but gains a dolphin's speed and special abilities, and the elves use this shape both to scout trouble and to escape it.

Spellcasters open a fight by blinding, confusing or weakening the enemy before closing in. On reaching 10th level, every deep elf gains two 1st-level wizard spells and one 2nd-level wizard spell as innate powers rather than memorized spells, on top of any a wizard already knows. Mirror image, blur, color spray, dancing lights and darkness 15' radius are the usual picks. For armor they wear a leathery material that does not slow their swimming, and they favor tridents, lances and daggers.

Though courteous, deep elves stay guarded, and they avoid other races, whom they consider coarse and brutal. Anyone who wins their friendship finds them steadfast companions.

They descend from elven sailors whose love of the sea eventually drew them beneath it. Much as the western elves left the elder elves over a rigid social order, the deep elves split from their shoal elf cousins to found a society of their own, and they have since severed every link with the surface world. Their homes are underwater caverns, drowned cities and great citadels shaped like seashells. They are few, and most live with their families rather than in large communities.

A group of 20 contains assorted classes and levels, roughly half of them women and children, with at least one fighter of 5th level or higher and two fighters of 2nd to 4th level. Clans decide matters by consensus. A single ruler of all the clans, the Voice of the Moon, is supposed to exist, but none has yet stepped forward to take the title.

Deep elves are friendly with nearly every sea creature except sharks and sahuagin, which they hunt down at every opportunity. Their attitude toward shoal elves is cool.