Merfolk

/tg/ has had a spattering of threads dedicated to merfolk over the years. Many people have wished to use merfolk players or merfolk cities in their campaign. Unfortunately most settings have rules that are not conducive to using merfolk as player characters, and fluff that does not include merfolk as a major power. This page serves as a hub to organize and advertise all the merfolk content that the community has created to solve this problem. It is an attempt to create rules and fluff for PC races of merfolk that can be used in any campaign. Feel free to join the community and create your own fluff! Create anything you want and make a link for it on this page. However, please respect the creations of other people.

Merfolk Races

The Merfolk are the mysterious and secretive people who have populated the world’s waters, and they are as widespread as humans are on land. Communities exist in mountain lakes, coastal reefs, kelp forests, rivers, and even inside polar ice shelves. They are an ancient species with many subraces, some of which remain undiscovered today.

• Coastal Merfolk - standard merfolk
• Coral Merfolk - tropical merfolk
• Abyssal Merfolk - deep sea scary monstrous merfolk and octopus/squid merfolk (octofolk?)
• Arctic Merfolk - Live under ice sheets and in glacial lakes and rivers. large size? dolphin/whale?
• River Merfolk - Fresh water
• Selkie - half seal, halfing size
• Crustacea Sapiens - Crab People
• legged merfolk (what are they called? Merrows? someone wanted them on the list feel free to fluff them out)
• Opean Ocean merfolk - nomadic warrior race, cleric, druids, rangers, fighters. fast +str +wis?
• sharkfolk

Merfolk Locations, Kingdoms and Cities

Merfolk settlements are as as varied and widespread as the merfolk themselves.

• Ataropolis
• Glacial Lake - arctic mer town
• Barony of Dagobus - religious abyssal mer empire. ocean canyon extends into continental crust, serves as raider outpost.

Merfolk Culture & Technology

The unique environment that merfolk live in has created the need for different solutions to social and technical problems.

• Bronze - a poor quality but inexpensive metal that resists corrosion
• Stellite - a common type of metal that resists corrosion and is similar in strength to steel
• Pearlite - a mysterious and very rare type of metal that is found in some oysters and clams. A merfolk version of the dwarves' adamantite and elves' mithril

Merfolk Magic

The Merfolk have a divergent tradition in the magical arts. Some marine spells accomplish the same objectives as their land counterparts, but in a different way.

• Merfolk Blood - Merfolk blood has vague magical properties, and some evil races wish to kill merfolk to acquire it.
• Spells
  • Crush - creates magical water pressure in an area that crushes creatures in its area effect

Merfolk Artifacts

Ancient and legendary items in the underwater world.

• Pearl Trident
• Bubble Band - This magical headband creates a bubble of breathable air around the head of the user. Merfolk use these bands to allow non water breathing individuals to freely travel underwater. The magic used to create these bands is a closely guarded secret.

Merfolk Religion

The merfolk worship their own pantheon of gods

demigods

many gods in the merfolk pantheon physically exist or have avatars which wander the unfathomable depths.

• Dagobus - deep sea demigod, patron of abyssal mer
• malron
• Nesoi - Primordial Demigods of islands. each island is said to have its own personification.

Creatures

• Carcharodon - 4 legged beast with huge shark head running around eating people

Merfolk Characters and NPCs

• Aramis Corselle & Ishka Amosa
• Slithice