Masgai

Masgai are tall and gangly, walking upright on thin legs, with arms so long their hands nearly reach their knees. A dark chitinous shell covers them head to foot as natural armor. Their faces are long and narrow, with widely spaced eyes, a jutting jaw and sharp teeth. They have no wings; a distant kinship with air elementals lets them fly at will. Their mass-produced clothing is well made but almost identical, giving any group of masgai an oddly uniform look.

Masgai society produces superb soldiers. Every attack has a clear objective and a chain of command. Rather than form rigid lines, they advance in a loose, adaptable order and probe for weak spots. Leading ranks carry 12-foot spears for thrusting at grounded enemies, and those behind carry bows and short swords. Meeting stiff resistance, they deliberately fall back to tempt foes into breaking formation, then converge on isolated pockets, committing to melee only when the fight clearly favors them.

A masgai can rise to any level as a warrior. The race has no priestly magic, and its wizards top out at 4th level.

Their huge cities depend on magic tamed for everyday use. Because they fly, they build on sites that are easy to defend and nearly worthless to anyone who cannot. Advanced farming and long supply networks feed each city. The capital lies on a remote world whose location they guard by mundane and magical means alike.

Conquest follows a method. First come trading posts in a world's strongest cities, buying money and political leverage. Later a small frontier settlement appears, offering to help the locals hold back humanoids, giants and monsters. Once accepted, it grows steadily until it can contest for economic, political and military control. The masgai will wait centuries for this and prefer to win without open war, but they fight without hesitation when they must, and they are ruthless and frightening when they do.

The military runs the economy and the government, and every citizen serves at least two years in a city's standing army. Constant campaigning has bred a fierce honor code that puts service to the state first, and membership in one of the many military orders born from that code fixes a masgai's social rank. War is simply a tool of policy; they spend nothing without expecting a return.

Masgai cities drain the surrounding lands, and because the race is short-lived and must keep growing, it ranges ever farther for food and materials. The greatest empires draw on many worlds linked by sophisticated teleportation portals. Their magic favors the group over the individual, and they guard it closely.

Beneath the discipline most masgai are individualists: success abroad is the quickest road to high rank at home, while failure there costs a masgai its place forever. They make allies easily yet treat friendships as temporary, rarely take risks without a real payoff, obey local law, and expect total obedience when in charge. Other peoples tend to distrust them, and officials often watch masgai travelers as possible scouts for invasion.

Signature items include earth arrows, +2 to attack and damage; any creature flying by natural rather than magical means that is hit must save vs. spell or be unable to fly for three hours. They appear only in lots of 1-3 (XP 250, GP 750). The cloak of the masgai grants flight once per day for one turn and, if a flying wearer falls unconscious, levitates him and lowers him gently; it radiates no magic until one of these functions activates (XP 700, GP 1,500). The ring of the swift wing doubles any flying speed once per day for up to ten turns and improves AC by 3 while active, but costs the wearer 3 hit points per turn of use (XP 1,500, GP 3,000).