Duergar [Dwarf]

Duergar resemble starved, sour-faced dwarves with gray skin and hair, from medium to near charcoal. They wear drab garb meant to disappear against stone, and any jewelry they wear at home is kept dull on purpose. They have 120-foot infravision and speak a duergar form of dwarvish, the underground trade tongue called undercommon, and the silent sign language of certain deep races; clever ones know more.

Duergar may be fighters, priests or thieves, or fighter/priests, fighter/thieves or priest/thieves; thieves are skilled with poison. Chance of a magical item is 5% per level, and a multiclass duergar uses its higher level plus half its lower one, rounded up. Outside a lair, each four 1 HD duergar come with one of 2+4 HD, and nine are always led by a tenth of 3+6 or 4+8 HD. Children numbering a tenth of the fighters may tag along.

Their stealth gives foes -2 to surprise, and they themselves are surprised only on a 1 in 10. They save at +4 against magic, ignore paralysis and illusion/phantasm spells, and are unaffected by poison. All can innately turn invisible and use enlargement, either growing or shrinking along with their gear, cast at a wizard level equal to the duergar's hit points.

Daylight cancels their surprise edge, costs them 2 Dexterity, gives -2 to their attack rolls, and grants their targets +2 on saves. If they lurk in shadow while foes stand in bright light, they keep normal Dexterity and surprise but attack at -1 while foes save at +1. Torchlight, lanterns, glowing weapons, light and faerie fire do not bother them. One group in ten rides 2d4 steeders.

Life in the depths has made duergar society a harsher echo of other dwarven cultures. They come up only at night or on the gloomiest days, usually raiding or on some errand, and they live 400 years or longer. A lair is a complex of chambers, tunnels and hidden rooms with a 25% chance of a captive monster guarding an entrance or the treasure vault, a 75% chance of 1d4x10 slaves, and a cavern-corral of 20d10 steeders. Duergar are poorer than their cousins: each might hide a little gold or platinum, useful gear is shared out immediately, and magic and the main hoard sit in a guarded vault far inside.

They have the dwarven senses for grades, traps, shifting walls, fresh stonework and depth, and the dwarven fighting edge against giants, titans, ogres, ogre magi and trolls, but none against goblins, hobgoblins, orcs or half-orcs, toward whom they feel no special hostility. They farm giant mushrooms in fungus caverns, brew a strong ale from them, and round out their diet with insects and cave creatures.

Duergar despise other dwarves as pampered weaklings. They occasionally partner with evil dwarves, even sharing homes, but their nastiness keeps such alliances rare. Any intruder is an invader. Visitors who prove peaceful may still pay a steep toll, and even then the duergar might trail them in secret to steal whatever treasure they find.

These enormous tarantulas are ridden in leather saddles and steered with straps and prods; only those with 20 or more hit points serve as mounts. They have no venom and bite with their mandibles. Sticky pads let a steeder cling anywhere, so it cannot fall while even one foot touches a surface, and it crawls across walls and ceilings at half speed with its rider.

Half the time it tries to glue itself to prey, hitting as if the target were AC 10 adjusted only for Dexterity or magical armor. A stuck victim is bitten automatically for 1d8 each round, suffers -2 to attack and damage, and escapes only with a Strength or Dexterity check (player's choice) at -10. Every third round a steeder can bound 240 feet in any direction even while ridden, a charge that grants spider and rider the normal charge bonuses; leaping onto a braced spear or pike, though, doubles the damage it takes.