Mapach

Mapach are one of the five "Humblefolk", or Beastfolk, races who are presented as alternatives to the five Birdfolk PC races in the Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition setting of Humblewood.

These beastfolk are a race of anthropomophic raccoons, although they can also resemble any of their myriad relations in the weasel family, including weasels, ferrets, badgers and polecats. Crafty, hearty and tough, mapach are mostly known for their natural curiosity. With deft fingers, an inherent affinity for being sneaky, and a love of trinkets, this somewhat eccentric race has long been stereotyped as a bunch of dirty thieves. And, in fairness, in the bad old days, these inveterate opportunists did tend to be bandits. But in the modern era, mapachs are mostly harmless.

Though they emphasize intuition over book-learning, mapachs are actually quite alert and cunning. This particularly shines in their ability to find a use for just about anything; mapachs are masters of "scroungecraft", the art of taking debris, junk, and whatever else is lying to hand and fashioning functional or useful items out of it. Admittedly, the results can be kind of crude looking, which leads to many outsiders looking down on it and not seeing how much creativity, ingenuity and resourcefulness it actualy takes, but many genius technological ideas began with scroungecraft prototypes. Indeed, such is the importance of scroungecraft to mapachs that they hold loosely-organized fairs to demonstrate their inventions, and those who build interesting or unique creations can become celebrities amongst this otherwise individualistic race.

PC Stats

Ability Score Increase: +2 Wisdom, +1 Constitution

Size: Medium (the average mapach stands between 4ft and 5ft tall, and weighs between 90 to 160 pounds)

Speed: 30 feet

Age: Mapachs mature quickly, reaching adulthood at the age of 8, but live a fairly average lifespan of over 60 years.

Alignment: Mapachs don’t favor good over evil, with most choosing to remain neutral. They also lean towards the freedom of chaotic alignments.

Darkvision: 60 feet

Expert Climbers: You have a Climb speed of 20 feet.

Resilience: You have Resistance to Poison damage and Advantage on saving throws against poison.

Skulker: You have Advantage on Stealth checks made in dim light and darkness.

Scroungecraft: You are proficient with tinker’s tools. Additionally, you have the ability to construct crude but functional versions of common items using materials present in your surroundings. You may spend 10 minutes to craft these materials into any tool or piece of adventuring gear worth 30 gold pieces or less. The item will be completely functional, even capable of passing for a disguise (if you crafted an article of clothing). Tools, along with any other item that would logically break on its first use (caltrops, arrows), will become useless afterward. Scroungecrafted items will otherwise last 1 hour before falling apart.

Depending on the materials available, a Game Master (GM) may rule that you cannot craft an item in this way. For example, a vial of acid might be easy to make if you happen to be near a nest of acidic beetle larvae, or bark can be bound into a makeshift flask, but it would be difficult to create a passable facsimile of silken robes from a pile of leaves.

Should you have access to the proper materials, you can spend 8 hours converting an item you have scroungecrafted in this way into a permanent version, so long as you start this process before the item falls apart. Items crafted in such a way will function exactly as a normal version of the item, and if you have proficiency in the tools used to craft them, they can even look professionally-crafted. Otherwise, they retain a rather rough, cobbled-together appearance. You can also use scroungecraft to repair broken equipment, provided you have the materials on hand. Though, how long your repairs hold together is up to the GM.