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Player > Races > Phentomite
Starfinder Alien Archive 2 p.97
Phentomites are Medium humanoids with the phentomite subtype.
Phentomites are acclimated to thin atmospheres and high altitudes (Core Rulebook 396–397), and they count as Small creatures for the purpose of slow suffocation (Core Rulebook 404).
Phentomites have darkvision with a range of 60 feet.
As a full action, a phentomite can alter her vision to detect the latent heat trails left by passing creatures. This allows the phentomite to use the Perception skill to perform the follow tracks task of the Survival skill and also functions as the tracking universal creature rule. While this ability is active, the phentomite takes a –1 penalty to Reflex saving throws. The phentomite can deactivate this ability as a move action.
Phentomites gain a +3 racial bonus to Athletics checks to climb or jump.
Phentomites are native inhabitants
of Orry, an unusual cluster of
landmasses floating in regular orbits
around a gravitational anomaly in Near
Space. Thousands of years ago, the planet
Orry was a technomagical utopia, but a
massive industrial accident caused much
of the world’s mass to explode into space.
However, mystical gravitational forces
created in this disaster allowed the land
that survived to remain inhabitable, albeit
with a thin atmosphere. Orry now consists
of 10 country-sized landmasses, along
with several dozen smaller formations,
that slowly rotate around a central
point—sometimes coming within mere feet of one another
but never colliding.
Orry’s surviving population continued on in the subsequent
centuries, though the society lost much of the scientific and
magical advancement of its forebears. The phentomites of
today live in nations engaged in relatively low-tech artisanship,
farming, and trading. They adapted to the low-oxygen
environment much as creatures who live their whole lives at
high altitudes do. Their eyes have adjusted to be able to see in
the dark, and they’ve developed specialized nerves that grant
limited thermographic vision; the latter might be a mutation
caused by arcane fallout from Orry’s planet-breaking accident.
The typical phentomite is 7 feet tall and weighs 175
pounds. Though mostly blue, a phentomite’s skin is striated
with other colors, especially across the chest and arms.
These streaks vary in coloration between phentomites from
different areas of the planet; some have green and yellow
bands, while others have red and purple lines of color. Their
backward-bending legs give them a natural ability to jump
farther than most humanoids, and their ungual feet grant
them purchase on rocky slopes. Phentomites often decorate
their large forehead ridges with dangling charms of religious
or personal significance.
The farmlands of Orry provide the phentomites with the
majority of that world’s important resources, food and natural
fibers, while the largest landmasses each contain at least a
few mines. Phentomite cities range from the idyllic Niyriki,
an artists’ enclave on the shores of
Lake Eclipse, to the industrious Qabu,
full of bustling factories. Roads of an
unknown material crisscross each land
formation; these remnants of Orry’s past
have withstood the test of time and are now used
by travelers on foot and by wagons pulled by hefty
six-legged draft animals.
Travel between the floating islands is made
possible by an elite class of phentomites called bridgers,
who use death-defying acrobatics to cross the gaps between
landmasses and erect temporary rope-and-wood structures.
Even with the assistance of bridgers, these trips can take
several months to complete, and the largest, slowest-moving
islands come close to one another for only a short time each
year. Such a journey is incredibly hazardous, as a single slip
can send an unfortunate traveler plummeting toward Orry’s
gravitational anomaly—a certain death.
The Pact Worlds only recently made contact with
phentomites. AbadarCorp has constructed a small space station
named Harmony-One that orbits Orry. Due to the gravitational
anomaly at the heart of the cluster, landing starships on any of
the Orry’s surfaces is incredibly hazardous. Orry’s trade partners
have agreed to land offworld vessels only in a phentomitedesignated
area outside of Zisfahani, Orry’s largest city. Travel
to other landmasses must then proceed along terrestrial routes,
with the aid of local phentomite bridgers.
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