Magmin
Who knew the Elemental Plane of Fire had so many inhabitants? With the recent release of The Traveler’s Guide to the Elemental Plane of Fire, we gave you player races and classes for playing as azer, efreeti, fire elementals, and salamanders, and even after spending last week on fire and magma mephits, there was still a notable exclusion, in the form of the magmin! So this week, we conclude our census of the Plane of Fire, as well as our year in articles, with a week devoted to everyone’s favorite pudgy little lava babies, the magmin.
Magmin
Among the most feral and savage of the intelligent races on the Elemental Plane of Fire, the mysterious and isolationist magmins rarely wander far from their beloved magma pools, which form the center of magmin life and culture. Curious and innocent in their own strange pyromaniac way, magmins radiate heat with a strength that is rivaled only by fire elementals themselves.
Physical Description: Short and stout, magmins could almost be said to resemble cherubic, hairless gnomes, if not for the fact that their orange-red skin glowed with an inner heat, giving their entire body the appearance of being sculpted from molten metal. An adult magmin stands roughly 4 feet tall, and weighs around 300 pounds, and while some of this is due to the somewhat portly build that most magmins take on, most of it is due to the fact that their molten bodies are actually incredibly dense and heavy.
Magmins’ searing skin ranges in color from intense white with just a hint of red through a variety of oranges and yellows and reds. Some magmins have skin that is slightly metallic in shade, generally golds, coppers, and bronzes. Magmins’ eyes are bright yellow pinpricks of flame set in their heads.
Their pudgy builds, high-pitched voices, and mischievous natures give them an almost childlike appearance, with the illusion ruined primarily by the molten nature of their bodies, which gives them an almost demonic quality in the eyes of many races from the Material Plane. Many find this contrast unsettling, even without the dangers that the magmins’ incredible body temperature provides.
Society: Magmins tend to congregate into tribes and clans, generally consisting of between 3–12 extended families. They live fairly primitive lives by the standards of most other races on the Elemental Plane of Fire, and their settlements lack anything resembling structures in the traditional sense, instead featuring an assortment of magma pools of varying shapes, sizes, and consistencies. The magmins use each of these pools for one of a number of different purposes, such as bathing for pleasure, bathing for hygiene, cooking, religious rituals, storage (of those rare items that can withstand extended contact with lava or the magmins themselves, for that matter), romantic liaisons, and more. Magmins divide their time fairly evenly between hunting and gathering, sleeping, and leisure time, which is mostly spent bathing in molten lava, either in large communal pools, where they splash and frolic with one another amongst the scalding liquid rock and metal, or in individual pools, which they guard with a vicious territorialism.
Magmins typically wear little, if anything, in the way of clothing, in part because there are few materials that could withstand physical contact with a magmin’s searing body for very long. As a result, magmins have little concept of modesty, or, for that matter, privacy.
Relations: A small and relatively unassuming race on their home plane, the Elemental Plane of Fire, magmins have learned the hard way that in order to survive in that harsh landscape they must be very wary of outsiders. Highly territorial and protective of their precious magma pools, magmins regard any visitors to their tribes with great suspicion, always wary for signs that a stranger might be an agent of the efreet or salamanders, or simply a mortal wizard come to enslave them into servitude on the frigid (by their standards) and primitive (on account of the relative lack of magma pools) Material Plane. Outsiders that seem likely to be up to no good are generally burned alive in one of the magmins’ magma pools (typically either ones for cooking or for religious sacrifices), or drowned in the pool, if the creature is immune to fire. Some magmin tribes lean more towards evil alignment, and have developed a taste for the flesh of humanoid creatures, actively hunting such visitors to the Elemental Plane of Fire in order to consume them.
The rare magmins that venture out of magmin society and into the societies of other races tend to be incredibly curious about each new race and culture they encounter, viewing such novelties as cities, buildings, water, and so forth with a childlike wonder and amazement, albeit one tempered with a certain amount of mischief. Travelling magmins often bemoan the lack of magma pools, and take every opportunity to make use of any that they encounter in their travels.
Alignment and Religion: Magmins are said to be as untrustworthy and fickle as the flames that they embody, and it is certainly true that most magmins lean towards chaotic alignments. Although the mere presence of magmins can be harmful to many creatures from the Material Plane and elsewhere, due to their extreme body temperatures, most magmins are not inherently evil. The majority of magmins practice a simplistic and primitive worship of elemental spirits, and believe in a complex pantheon of quasi-deities associated with different aspects of fire and magma, such as He-Who-Makes-Coals-Glow, Liquefier-of-Metals, and Crackle-of-Burning-Paper.
Adventurers: Few magmins choose to become adventurers, and the most common reason for a magmin to do so is because she has been displaced from her community, typically because she was enslaved and later broke free or otherwise earned her freedom. Since most magmins rarely wander more than a day’s travel from their beloved magma pools, it can be difficult for a magmin to find her way back to her home, and she may wind up embarking on many adventures simply trying to get back to where she came from. Others are curious about the wide world around them, especially all of the different lovely things that they can burn and melt, and the different consistencies, tastes, and properties of lava on other planes, and set out specifically to experience such things.
Male Names: Burazor, Chaaxor, Daronach, Duebal, Famobahn, Kohsbun, Madal, Pazrolahr, Spaasihr, Vasural
Female Names: Caelur, Chausar, Draamohra, Fhamlach, Fruebara, Fuaxal, Maruza, Molxihr, Perezal, Sceelar
Standard Racial Traits
Ability Score Racial Traits: Magmins are surprisingly strong and sturdy for their size, but are slow learners. They gain +2 Strength, +2 Constitution, and –2 Intellience.
Type: Magmins are outsiders. However, their Hit Dice, base attack bonus, saving throws, and skills are determined by their class, instead of their creature type.
Size: Magmins are Small creatures and gain a +1 size bonus to their AC, a +1 size bonus on attack rolls, a −1 penalty to their CMB and CMD, and a +4 size bonus on Stealth checks.
Base Speed: Magmins are fast for their size, and have a base speed of 30 feet.
Languages: Magmins begin play speaking Common and Ignan. Magmins with high Intelligence scores can choose from the following: Abyssal, Aquan, Auran, Celestial, Infernal, or Terran.
Offensive Racial Traits
Lesser Burning Body: Magmins gain the Lesser Burning Body feat as a bonus feat.
Pyromania: Fire damage inflicted by a magmin is never halved before applying the hardness of objects.
Defensive Racial Traits
Fire Subtype: Magmins have the fire subtype. They are immune to fire damage, but suffer half again as much damage (+50%) from sources that deal cold damage.
Heated Flesh: Once per day, when a magmin is damaged by a melee attack made with a manufactured weapon, the magmin can attempt to use its body heat to reduce the weapon to slag. The weapon must succeed on a Fortitude save (DC = 10 + 1/2 the magmin’s Hit Dice + the magmin’s Constitution modifier) or gain the broken condition. If the weapon already has the broken condition, or is made primarily of wood, it is destroyed, instead.
Senses Racial Traits
Darkvision: Magmins see perfectly in the dark up to 60 feet.
Other Racial Traits
Lava Swimmer: Magmins gain a +4 racial bonus on Swim checks made to swim in lava, magma, or similar conditions, and can see through such substances as though they were water.
Mortal Body: Unlike most outsiders, magmins need to eat and sleep, and can be resurrected as though they were not outsiders.
Wondering where to find the Lesser Burning Body feat, mentioned above? Curious why anyone would want to play something from the Elemental Plane of Fire? The answers to these questions (and more) can be found in The Traveller's Guide to the Elemental Plane of Fire, but before you buy it, you may want to take a look at our free Tourist's Guide to the Elemental Plane of Fire, which shows off some of the content from that book, including Lesser Burning Body.