Plasmoid Overview

Plasmoids are races without a fixed shape. Scholars who study spacefaring peoples suspect the common amoeba was magically pushed up the ladder into oozes, slimes and jellies, and those in turn gave rise to the plasmoid species. Every plasmoid can reshape itself at will.

A plasmoid commands each fiber of its body. It can build interior pouches to carry things, legs, arms, tails or heads as needed, and air bladders it squeezes to make sound. It has no organs in the usual sense, only fibers that can act as muscle, generic cells that become linings, skins and cavities, a plasma-like ooze that moves fluid and energy, tiny excretion sacs that turn food into acid and fuel, and nerves. Cavities hold gear, food, drink, attack and digestive acid, fluid for stiffness, and air for breathing and talking, which it does by pushing air through narrowing tubes. Its single permanent organ is the brain, an enormous knot of nerves.

Nerves gather in clusters called ganglia that can be tuned to light, heat, touch, sound, pain or vibration. By exposing them it can hear a butterfly 100 yards away, or seal them and go deaf. Lacking an ear's natural protective reflexes, a ganglion tuned that fine can be injured by a sound as loud as normal speech, so plasmoids usually keep their senses at human levels.

It breathes through bare plasma, so some oozy patch must stay open to the air, and its stored air lets it hold its breath for an hour. Its resistance to toxins makes any air quality count as one category better. It eats by engulfing food like an amoeba, though many form a mouth to put other races at ease and shield their plasma. Most species can grow a protective coating of some kind, which differs by race. Waste oozes from pores constantly, leaving a slime trail that plasmoids, unable to smell, cannot see why anyone minds.

Asleep or unconscious, a plasmoid goes limp and runs to fill its surroundings, so it picks sleeping places carefully. Two plasmoids reproduce by joining and swapping genetic material; at any later time, instantly or years on, each simply splits in half, the copy starting with whatever basic knowledge the parent could spare. It grows by eating and drinking heavily and building new tissue, which takes time, but shrinks almost instantly by shedding a blob of unwanted matter. A big one can go months without food but must take in liquid daily or suffer 1d8 damage per day from drying. Concentrating every fiber into one muscle lets it lift enormous weights. All are very heavy for their size.

Every known plasmoid is immune to all disease and poison. Acid hurts only in massive amounts, a barrel or more. Cold merely slows them unless extreme. Heat is deadly because it dries them, and without a protective covering a dry place such as a desert costs 1d8 hit points a day. Piercing weapons do little or nothing, slashing somewhat more, and bludgeoning full damage.

They can attack with the number of limbs listed for their species without penalty, wielding weapons if they like; every limb beyond that adds a cumulative -2 to the attack rolls of all limbs. A limb holding a shield counts as an attacking limb, each shield improves AC by 1, and legs and other limbs that do not attack never count. They favor bludgeoning weapons, which work best on rival plasmoids, scorn piercing ones, and avoid armor because it hampers shape-changing, though shields are popular.

Most plasmoids live in loose clans with a hierarchy that is seldom enforced. Bonds within a species are strong, and enemy clans rarely fight each other directly, perhaps because every member descends from one ancestor and they are all near-clones. They love treasure and power, which draws them to adventure and especially to the open void between worlds. They enjoy philosophy and storytelling and are often hired for politics because they can talk at length about nothing without tiring.

They are easily amused, easily fascinated, and their childlike curiosity often lands them in trouble. Worse, they absorb things at random, sometimes things others value. Their loyalty is famous, and travelers say that the friend who will follow you into the void is a plasmoid, though that does not make them incapable of lying.

With no taste or smell and immunity to most toxins and acids, plasmoids eat almost anything and expel the indigestible later. Their acids dissolve everything except metal, stone and glass. Their first voyage into space failed because the ship was wood and the bored crew nibbled it apart, and elves have banned them from their living ships. Their one natural enemy is the dreaded burbur, and they dislike most fire-breathing creatures.