Elan
Elans are a race of artificially engineered humanoids from the world of Dungeons & Dragons; formerly human, Elans have been reforged through powerful psionics-based rituals, transmuting their bodies and minds into a "perfected" form that has superior physical and mental abilities, an innate affinity for psionics, and increased longevity - an elan can easily live for a thousand years, and they may be functionally immortal. It's unclear if elans are sterile, or if their offspring simply do not inherit the transformation; either way, elans must continually induct new human recruits into their ranks to propagate, unlike the similar illumians - just another way in which magic is superior to psionics in D&D.
Because of this, elans don't have a lot of really unique lore; they're portrayed as just "humans with an added level of secrecy" - after all, humanity is kind of likely to take a dim view to secret cabals of psionicists ascending to practically immortal new forms walking amongst them. Of course, hiding is a little tricky because, whilst elans retain their old memories, their body's "newborn" status means that they have to readjust to it from scratch, so a human turned into an elan becomes a level 1 character again, no matter how strong they were before. The most unique aspect of elan culture is their use of personal titles amongst themselves; Freshly transformed elans have the title of Newmade; those who have lived at least a few decades after transformation have the title of Made; and those over a century old have the title of Eternal. Those who belong to the council that chooses new elans have the title of Culler.
Elans were introduced in the "Expanded Psionics Handbook" for Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition.
PC Stats
- -2 Charisma
- Aberration
- Medium
- Base land speed 30 feet
- Normal vision
- Naturally Psionic: 2 bonus psionic power points at 1st level.
- Trance: An elan completes a 4-hour long meditative trance instead of sleeping for 8 hours to perform its daily rest, like an elf.
- Resistance (Su): Elans can use psionic energy to increase their resistance to various forms of attack. As an immediate action, an elan can spend 1 power point to gain a +4 racial bonus on saving throws until the beginning of her next action.
- Resilience (Su): When an elan takes damage, she can spend power points to reduce its severity. As an immediate action, she can reduce the damage she is about to take by 2 hit points for every 1 power point she spends.
- Repletion (Su): An elan can sustain her body without need of food or water. If she spends 1 power point, an elan does not need to eat or drink for 24 hours.
- Automatic Language: Common. Bonus Languages: Any (other than secret languages, such as Druidic). Elans’ past lives expose them to wide ranges of language.
- Favored Class: Psion.
- Level Adjustment: +0.
Athasian Elans
When a 3.5 edition update for Dark Sun manifested in the pages of Dragon Magazine #319, elans were added to the world of Athas. On this world, they were creations by "The Order", a mysterious secret sect of psionicists who seek to preserve the status quo. Unfortunately for the Order, the first Elans were not inherently loyal to them, and the majority of them have since struck out to make their own way into the world. At the time in which the Dragon version of Dark Sun was set, elans have only existed on Athas for 25 years, having first been created in Gulg.
Mechanically, Athasian Elans are all but identical to the standard elan above, except they gain a +2 Wisdom ability score modifier and, consequently, suffer a Level Adjustment of +1.
Nentir Vale Elans
Amazingly, elans appeared in the Nentir Vale setting as well, introduced in the Psionic Power splatbook for Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition. Here, they are created from any race, rather than just humans, and belong to an ancient, secret order that seeks to oppose the machinations of the Far Realm. Elans were created as a way to psionically transcend former weaknesses, creating a stronger being that could more readily battle the aberration menace. Through powerful and dangerous psionic rituals, an elan's physical matter is stripped away, leaving only the mind and soul, which are then assisted in building a new body from ectoplasm; thus, elans appear as idealized versions of their original form, free of body hair (unless they were from a naturally hairy race, presumably) and disturbingly cool to the touch.
Mechanically, being an elan is handled as a Bloodline Feat chain, a set of feats stemming from a single race-modifying feat called "Elan Heritage". This changes the character's origin to Immortal and grants them Telepathy to a range of 5 squares (25 feet) and the racial encounter power "Elan Resilience", an immediate interrupt that lets them reduce damage taken from an attack by their Intelligence modifier (increasing by +3 at 11th level and +6 at 21st level). This feat unlocks access to a wide array of other feats, and to a racial Paragon Path called the Psionic Incarnate.