Sprite

Sprites are reclusive faeries, kin to brownies and leprechauns, with elven features and usually small, see-through wings. Ordinary sprites live in meadows and forest glens; at a distance humans, and probably most animals, take them for butterflies. Most land sprites never age and die only by violence, though their tiny size and perilous homes keep numbers low. They speak their own tongue, Common and elven, yet somehow understand forest animals anyway.

Sprites despise evil and ugliness and will fight hard if orcs or worse invade. They wield slim swords that hit like a dagger and bows with half a short bow's range that deal 1d3. Their arrows carry a sleep ointment: every creature struck must save vs. poison regardless of level, race or magic resistance, or sleep for 1d6 hours. Sleepers are usually carried far off, often minus their weapons, though evil ones may be killed. At will, sprites can vanish from sight and sense good or evil within 50 yards, gaining +2 to hit while invisible as foes suffer -4 against them.

Sprites gather on most moonlit nights to sing and dance. Even elves seem too solemn to them, and only druids, whose love of nature matches their own, deal with them often; some druids train partly among them, and a few rangers are welcome. Tribes elect their best warrior, male or female, as spokesperson to bargain with elves and druids, though sprites seldom wait for orders before attacking evil. They track one another closely to plan gatherings, and an abandoned glen is resettled within ten years.

The sleep ointment is brewed from forest mushrooms, cured in sunlight for seven days and stored in hollowed stumps.

Sea sprites are wingless, with round cheerful faces, wide fishy eyes, seaweed hair, neck gills, slick light blue skin and webbed hands and feet; they dress in bright eelskin and sea treasures. Half carry crossbows that work as light crossbows in and out of water, loaded with sleep bolts. They kill sahuagin they put to sleep but leave air breathers on a beach if they spared the reef. Like sprites they turn invisible and detect good and evil; they can also cast slow by touch three times a day at 5th level and airy water once a day at 10th. There is a 45% chance of 1d6 large predatory fish, such as barracuda, guarding them. They live in reef caves or wrecks in groups of four or five families, led by the eldest male though often ruled by his mate, eat fish, crustaceans and seaweed without overfishing, live for centuries, and trade with sea elves without socializing.

Pixies are about 2 1/2 feet tall, long-eared, with silver moth wings, gaudy clothes, caps and curl-toed shoes, and speak their tongue, Common and sprite. They are naturally invisible, giving foes -4 to hit while attacking unhindered; a dispel magic against 8th level reveals them for one round. They shoot at +4 with sleep arrows, war arrows for 1d4+1, and memory arrows that erase all memory unless the target saves vs. spell, curable only by heal or limited wish. Once a day each, as 8th-level mages, they use dispel magic, ESP, dancing lights, polymorph self and know alignment, and also once a day can become visible, cast lasting audio-visual illusions needing no concentration, and confuse by touch (save vs. spell, lasting until remove curse). One in ten knows irresistible dance once daily. They live in deep forest caves, love leading travelers astray (being 'pixie-led'), scaring maidens, rapping walls and snuffing candles, and bait misers with hoards, rewarding a humorous, ungreedy victim with one item. Families have surnames, loyalty is vital, and they live about 300 years on fruit and nectar. Grinding fifty pixie wings yields a single dose of dust of disappearance, a practice they detest.

Nixies are slim, scaly and pale green, with dark green hair, webbed digits, wide silver eyes and pointed ears, dressed in seaweed wraps or loincloths. They breathe air or water, speak their tongue and Common, and seldom leave their lakes. When humans come within 30 feet, every ten nixies can pool a charm (save vs. spell at -2); dispel magic breaks it 75% of the time before the victim enters the water and only 10% after. Slaves serve a year under a water breathing spell, which nixies can cast or end once a day (lasting a day). Males use daggers and javelins, and ten together can net one man-sized foe (AC 10, -2 AC per extra target up to five at AC 0). Despite 25% magic resistance they fear fire and bright light, crowding fish around a continual light to dim it. Seaweed homes are almost invisible (5% within 20 feet). They keep 1-2 gar or 2-5 pike as guards, trick-trained pet fish and food herds, and can summon 10-100 small fish in 1-3 rounds. Tribes of 20-80 hold 3-5 miles under a hereditary water mother, a chosen warlord and an elder council led by a lorekeeper; treasure is shared equally, men take 2-3 wives, and lakes stay clean, often thanks to slave labor. Their crafts include shell, pearl and opal jewelry, water-spider silk and potions of water breathing.

Atomies, under a foot tall with four dragonfly wings and pale, greenish skin, are the swiftest sprites. They buzz in high voices, speak with plants and animals, hear twice as well as humans, have 90-foot infravision and fight as 3rd-level fighters. A fifth carry tiny crossbows (3-foot range, 1d3) and spears; the rest carry spears or sprite swords (40% each), and diving spear attacks deal double damage (2d4). At 5th level, once per round, they can blink, pass plant, go invisible, summon insects and speak with animals. Only a 1 surprises them, and foes suffer -6 to surprise; shooing intruders with false lights and insects before shooting, attacking at once if foes are orcs. Villages of 3d4x10 adults and 4d6 children fill old oaks with tiny furnished rooms and rope bridges. They eat nuts and honey, fall prey to worgs and the like, collect magic items and give mundane treasure away, sometimes help lost children, and keep company with grigs 20% of the time.

Grigs combine a sprite's upper body with a cricket's legs, wings and antennae. Blue-skinned and green-haired, they wear gem-buttoned vests, leap far, hear twice as well as humans and have 180-foot infravision. Each carries a sprite sword and six darts (+2 to hit); both deal normal damage for grigs but 1 point for anyone else. At 6th level, once per round, they use change self, ventriloquism, entangle, trip, pyrotechnics and invisibility, move silently, and like atomies are surprised only on a 1 while imposing -6 on foes. A fiddler always plays irresistible dance, forcing every non-sprite in a 30-foot radius to save vs. spell or dance as long as it plays, for hours. Homeless bands sleep in treants or near unicorns who guard them, prank big folk mercilessly and then apologize at the forest edge with a 1d6x100 gp gem (25%) or fresh honey (75%).