Mul
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Finally: Half-dwarves!
The Mul (which, at least in 4e, nobody can agree on how to pronounce, but pronouncing it "Mule" is a way to get your face punched in) are half-dwarf and half-human; in other words, half-awesome and half-sucky. They have shown up in various incarnations of the Dark Sun campaign setting, wherein dwarves are primarily a slave race, as the result of some seriously creepy slavedrivers deciding that their slaves deserved to be taller and less awesome. They are as tall as humans but as stocky as dwarves, making them one of the heaviest races in 4th edition. Their racial bonuses are not much to write home about for the powergamers, but like all races with +2 Str and +2 Con, they make good tanks.
They make good tanks and once upon a time when the Darksun setting still existed (2nd Edition represent) they made excellent choices for Gladiators, otherwise known as "Fighters better than all other fighters". The damagae a Mul gladiator with a strength of 20 could inflict with Cahulaks was a beautiful thing to behold.
Muls had some very weird racially specific abilities, such as...work. No really, due to their mix of human and dwarf parentage that was one of their special gifts. The ability to work for literally days at a time. Generally speaking, this had zero practical use campaign wise as there aren't many GMs who are going to feature a campaign where you have to dig a ditch in a hurry. This had happened precisely once in all the campaigns I played where my Mul Gladiator cut down a bunch of trees and trimmed the logs for a palisade, the combat benefits of which while not being negligible, were close to negligible.
Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition Races | |
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Player's Handbook 1 | Dragonborn • Dwarf • Eladrin • Elf • Half-Elf • Halfling • Human • Tiefling |
Player's Handbook 2 | Deva • Gnome • Goliath • Half-Orc • Shifter |
Player's Handbook 3 | Githzerai • Minotaur • Shardmind • Wilden |
Monster Manual 1: | Bugbear • Doppelganger • Githyanki • Goblin • Hobgoblin • Kobold • Orc |
Monster Manual 2 | Bullywug • Duergar • Kenku |
Dragon Magazine | Gnoll • Shadar-kai |
Heroes of Shadow | Revenant • Shade • Vryloka |
Heroes of the Feywild | Hamadryad • Pixie • Satyr |
Eberron's Player's Guide | Changeling • Kalashtar • Warforged |
The Manual of the Planes | Bladeling |
Dark Sun Campaign Setting | Mul • Thri-kreen |
Forgotten Realms Player's Guide | Drow • Genasi |