DelNoric [Plasmoid]

Unlike their soupy cousins, delNorics like a short, thick body on two or more legs, with arms and legs that match, mittenlike hands, round stumpy feet and no neck. They place two eye ganglia and two hearing ganglia where a biped's would be, form a mouth, and sometimes even a little nub of a nose, though they cannot smell. Basic plasmoid traits are described under Plasmoid Overview.

Their signature is a hide: a mesh of body fibers left to dry into stiff leather half an inch thick, gray to brown. It cracks wherever the body flexes, so most delNorics seem draped in hanging strips of leather. Several lip-shaped slits on the body open into leather-lined pouches for belongings.

They have far less plasma than other plasmoids and change slowly; growing a typical limb takes a full turn of concentration. Wearing the hide, they cannot flow, so they walk on legs, and no appendage can be thinner than 5 inches; bare, they can form one an inch thick. Fingers require ripping holes in the hide and pushing out unprotected tissue. The brain cannot be squeezed below 5 inches across.

Inside its hide a delNoric can support 12,000 pounds for hours, and it can carry 1,000 pounds of goods, though the volume limit means only very dense loads come close. Small ones stretch up to 10 feet, man-sized ones 15 and large ones 20. The hide also keeps them from drying out, letting them travel deserts, and lets them sleep without losing much of their shape.

They use 1d3 limbs for attack and defense without penalty; each extra limb adds the usual cumulative -2 on attack rolls. Being sluggish, they owe their AC to the hide and drop to AC 8 without it.

After a round of doing nothing but drawing in air, a delNoric can force it out through a narrow opening, usually its mock mouth, sustaining the noise for 1d4 rounds. The shriek deals 1d4 to everyone within 20 feet who hears it and fails a save vs. paralyzation, other delNorics included.

All its digestive acid sits in a single internal sac. With full concentration, once per hour, it grows a nozzle and fires it: either a 20-foot stream at one target (attack roll, 2d10 damage) or a mist in a cone 10 feet long and 5 feet wide at the end (3d4 to each, save vs. breath weapon for half).

Piercing and slashing weapons do half damage, bludgeoning full. With its hide, fire does half; without it, double. Cold slows it by 1 per 20 points (per 10 points bare), and acid of any amount does nothing.

DelNorics loathe the deGleash, calling that race the Soft Ones, but get along well with dwarves and share the dwarven hunger for gold.

They eat anything, yet they are oddly fond of meat, a preference no one can explain since they neither taste nor smell. Their hides are prized for leather shields and breastplates as tough as metal armor at half the weight.