Malenti
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Malenti are a bizarre subrace of the Sahuagin, the sharklike "sea devils" that plague many of the worlds of Dungeons & Dragons, which resemble Aquatic Elves rather than the usual vaguely shark-like fishfolk. As a result, they are used as spies and subversives in the ancient feud between these races.
The earliest confirmed appearance of malenti is as an addendum at the bottom of the Aquatic Elf entry in the Monstrous Manual for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition. Here, they are simply stated to be randomly occur in 1 out of 100 sahuagin births if the two races are living within a mile or so of each other. This entry notes that malenti are usually killed upon hatching, unless a powerful leader dictates otherwise, in which case they are reared to serve as spies amongst the aquatic elves - a trait aided by the fact that most aquatic elves don't believe or even actively refuse to believe they exist, since this raises some disturbing possibilities about the ultimate origins of the sahuagin. Mechanically, at least according to this entry, malenti are completely identical to aquatic elves in terms of mechanics, save for the fact that they have much shorter lives (only 170 years compared to the centuries of true elf-kind) and they "often" develop the ability to sense the presence and position of any aquatic elves within 120 feet.
These malenti can successfully breed both with each other and with normal sahuagin, with the children always being malenti. This has supposedly sometimes led to entire communities of malenti replacing their sahuagin progenitors, which often come to resemble a bizarre melding of (evil) aquatic elf and sahuagin customs.
Dolphins have a 20% chance to recognize a malenti's true nature, and as a result malenti avoid the creatures.
The next major appearance of malent was, understandably, in the sahuagin splatbook: "Monstrous Arcana: The Sea Devils". Whilst largely a reiteration of the lore from the Monstrous Manual in a slightly wordier format, it does have some unique elements. Malenti are characterized as retaining an inherent sahuagin physicality, making them stronger and tougher than the normal fragile elves they resemble. Their hands and feet sport rectractile claws, and their mouths contain sharp teeth lining powerful jaws; whilst not as formidably as their obviously armed cousins, malenti can still wield these natural weapons to lethal effectiveness. It's actually possible for a sahuagin to be born with both the malenti mutation and the four arms mutation, although these rare freaks are always killed off. The lore from the Monstrous Manual that malenti could eventually "breed out" a sahuagin community is refuted with the statements that a) most sahuagin wouldn't mate with malenti, and b) surplus malenti offspring are swiftly killed. All-malenti communities are stated to descend from runaways who fled after learning the truth of their "status" amongst their kin.
This book also states that there are two in-universe theories behind the existence of malenti - that sahuagin are somehow incredibly mutated descendants of drow that took to the seas in the same way as the ancestors of the aquatic elves did, with malenti being throwbacks to their ultimate elfin heritage, or that malenti are artificially created by priestesses of Sekolah - and a third theory that is presented as the objective truth: that malenti descend from an ancient experiment by wizards in melding elf and shark in an effort to create super-soldiers with which to conquer the seas. These shark-elf hybrids escaped and, somehow, interbred into sahuagin society, with malenti being freakish throwbacks to these shark-elf hybrids... at least, that's the aquatic elf version of the story. A fourth version builds upon this third theory, stating that the wizards experiments weren't in fusing elves and sharks, but elves and sahuagin, so ultimately the malenti are proof of a connection between the two races... albeit a distant, artificial and unwanted one.
Other details expanded upon in this book are that the larger the aquatic elf presence, the greater the radius of their "corruptive" aura - 1 mile for a single aquatic elf, and a further mile for every full 25 elves in the group - precisely how long it takes before this aura fades, that malenti can track unseen creatrues like true sahuagin but to a lesser degree, that they can enter blood frenzy (but only around true sahuagin, for some reason), they can take charater classes as if they were elves (although a malenti wizard would have learned the arts somewhere other than a sahuagin community), they share the aquatic elf ability to survive on land for days at a time, and the malenti tolerance for heat and air means they are often pressed into service as blacksmiths for their communities... not that this wins them any respect.
Following from that, malenti appeared in the article "Heroes of the Sea" in Dragon Magazine #250, where they were updated into a playable race. Here, it's noted that malenti often abandon sahuagin society when they learn the truth of their place in it - as freaks who, whoever useful, will never be accepted as true members of their society and in fact will be killed as soon as they stop being useful. There are even communities descended from these outcast sahuagin, and some sahuagin are miraculously rescued from their sahuagin families whilst they are infants. It's noted that malenti feel they are outcasts from all of the underwater races, and that they believe nobody will ever treat them with dignity or respect. As a result, they tend to be complete loners, neither trusting nor relying on anyone but themselves. Cooperation and team spirit are described as foreign concepts for malent, and the idea of friendship as "impossible to comprehend". As in "The Sea Devils", they are stated to retain the fangs and claws of their sahuagin progenitors, albeit in a diminished and concealed form.
An alternative take on "renegade" malenti appeared in the AD&D Forgotten Realms splatbook "Sea of Fallen Stars". Here, we are introduced to the Noble Malenti; a small community of malenti who have broken away from their sahuagin parents and turned their backs on sahuagin culture entirely, seeking to become something more. Though they accept that other races hate them, resulting in their being evasive and highly secretive about their true natures until an outsider proves trustworthy, the noble malenti shun the endless warfare of sahuagin and seek a peaceful existence. It helps that they are amongst the few races in the undersea community who can work metal, thanks to their tolerance for heat and air. One of the biggest cultural changes is their embrace of magic, compared to the magic-shunning sahuagin; this had yet to allow them to become wizards at the time of the book's printing, but it had allowed them to become clerics, and even clerics of Mystra, the Faerunian goddess of magic. Physically, it's noted that these "noble" malenti can be distinguished from true elves by vestigial cartilaginous ridges above and behind their ears, and the presence of sahuagin nictating membranes. No mention is made of the subdued fangs or retractile claws of "The Sea Devils" or "Heroes of the Sea".
The last confirmed appearance of malenti thus far has been as an addendum in the 3.5 Monster Manual, where the sahuagin paragraph on "Sahuagin Mutants" states that they have the appearance of an Aquatic Elf and the stats of a sahuagin, save for the following changes:
- Swim Speed 40 feet
- No natural attacks
- Can remain out of water for 1 hour per point of Constitution, instead of 1 houer per 2 points
- Have Light Sensitivity instead of Light Blindness
Malenti PCs
The only depictions of malenti as a playable race have been in the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons era, with Heroes of the Sea and Sea of Fallen Stars offering very different takes.
In Heroes of the Sea, they have the following stats:
- Ability Score Minimum/Maximum: Strength 3/18, Dexterity 6/19, Constitution 7/17, Intelligence 8/18, Wisdom 3/18, Charisma 7/18
- Ability Score Adjustments: +1 Dexterity, -1 Constitution
- Racial Class & Level Limits: Fighter 12, Ranger 15, Cleric 8
- +2 hit points at 1st level
- Natural Armor Class: 6
- Special Advantages:
- Swim at movement rate 18.
- Can breathe underwater.
- Suffer no movement or attack penalties underwater.
- When underwater, can detect invisible creatures within 15' radius and attack with only a -2 penalty.
- Vision range underwater is triple that of a human's.
- Malenti retain their sahuagin ancestor's claws (retractile) and powerful, fang-lined jaws. They can may 5 natural attacks per round; two 1d2 hand claw attacks, two 1d4 foot claw attacks, and a 1d3 bite attack.
- Can enter a blood frenzy when fighting alongside sahuagin.
- Special Disadvantages: Malenti can only survive out of the water for days equal to their constitution score; every 2 days out of water inflicts a -2 penalty to ability and proficiency scores, and death comes upon hitting 0 Str, Dex or Con.
- Weapon Proficiencies: Trident, Net, Spear, Dart, Javelin, Crossbow
- Nonweapon Proficiencies: Acting, Alertnesss, Ancient History (Sahuagin), Animal Handling (Sharks), Animal Lore, Animal Training (Sharks), Blind-Fighting, Close-Quarter Fighting, Danger Sense, Direction Sense, Eating, Endurance, Etiquette, Fast-Talking, Hiding, Hunting, Intimidation, Languages, Local History, Natural Fighting, Observation, Religion, Sea-Based Riding, Survival (Aquatic), Voice Mimicry, Wild Fighting
Two odd things about this version; despite saying that the malenti can take the ranger class, it later says that it cant take that class, and instead is only allowed to take the Wilderness Protector "pseudo-ranger" kit for fighters; malenti wilderness protector's don't gain the normal Tracking proficiency and replace Survival (Forest) with Survival (Aquatic). Also, despite all the lore about malenti being trained as spies, saboteurs and assassins, they can't take the rogue class at all!
The Sea of Fallen Stars version is very cut down in comparison, and consists solely of the following details, although the book implies that malenti otherwise have all the traits of aquatic elves except where noted:
Malenti appeared as a background for Eberron player characters in Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition in the semi-official Exploring Eberron, by setting-creator Keith Baker. In Eberron, Malenti are sahuagin who have been permanently transformed into the shape of a surface-dwelling humanoid and imbued with its memories through powerful fleshcrafting before being dispatched as spies.