Guado

A people living in the land of Spira. Tall and thinly built, with long limbs, large hands with prominent fingernails, and narrow, angular faces. Their skin is pale and somewhat translucent, and their features are often framed by a collection of thin blue veins that pulse underneath their skin. They have soft, melodious voices and are disinclined to be harsh. They are known for their brightly colored and wildly styled hair, often floral or tree-like. They are a somber and astute people, inclined towards traditionalism. Guados are most known for their connections to the forces of death and their links to the afterlife, often tasking themselves with protecting places with strong ties to other realms and planes of existence, especially those where souls are confirmed to reside after their death. Guados take well to the life of the faithful, and are often found as priests in places where they are not known to commonly reside, performing embalming services, funeral rites, and other rituals associated with death. However, their association with death has a habit of making them a bit alien or unnerving to other races, and Guados, as a result, tend to form their own communities outside of the settlements of other races, rather than intermingle freely.

## Standard Racial Traits

* **Ability Score Racial Traits:** Guados are both preternaturally cunning and attuned to the world around them, but their slim figures are not known for their sturdiness. They gain +2 Intelligence, +2 Wisdom, and -2 Constitution.
* **Size:** Guados are Medium creatures and thus receive no bonuses or penalties due to their size.
* **Type:** Guados are Humanoids with the guado subtype.
* **Base Speed:** Guados have a base speed of 30 feet.
* **Languages:** Guados begin play speaking Common and Guado. Guados with high Intelligence scores can choose from the following for their bonus languages: Al Bhed, Draconic, Elvaan, Lalafell, Numish, Ronsaur, or Vieran.

### Defense Racial Traits

* **Deathless Spirit:** Guados are creatures that are attuned to the bridges between life and death, being sensitive to their ebbs and flows, yet resistant to their negative effects. Being living creatures, the forces of death and undeath have less sway over them than other mortals. They gain Shadow Resistance 5. In addition, they do not lose hit points when they gain a negative level, and they gain a +2 racial bonus on saving throws against death effects, energy drain, and spells or spell-like abilities of the necromancy or dark spell varieties.

### Feat and Skill Racial Traits

* **Skill Bonuses:** Being associated with the powers of life and death makes one hard to read, and by extension hard to fool. This is only further exacerbated by the sometimes lyrical, poetic, or unsettling ways guados tend to speak. Guados gain a +2 racial bonus to Bluff and Sense Motive skills.
* **Skill Training:** Knowledge of the ways of life and death, bridges between the two, and the aspects of undeath are core to the beliefs and the traditions of the guado. Guados always treat Knowledge (Planes) and Knowledge (Religion) as class skills.

### Magical Racial Traits

* **Detect Undead (Sp):** Once per day, a guado can cast *detect undead* as a spell-like ability (caster level equal to the guado’s class level).
* **Elemental Summoner:** Choose one of the following elemental subtypes—earth, fire, ice, lightning, water, wind. When summoning a creature with the chosen subtype with a summon spell, increase the duration of that spell by 2 rounds. This choice is made at character creation, and can only be changed with retraining.

### Movement Racial Traits

* **Moderate Fleetness:** Guados’ long limbs allow them to walk and run faster than what others expect of them, but their slender frames only make these advantages go so far. So long as a guado has no more than a medium load, and is not fatigued, exhausted, or suffering any ability damage to its Strength, Dexterity, or Constitution, its base land speed is increased by 5 feet. Guados who have attained a Swim speed may apply this bonus to it as well, but not to any Climb, Fly, or Burrow speeds.

## Alternate Racial Traits

The following alternate racial traits may be selected in place of one or more of the standard racial traits above.

##### Replaces Moderate Fleetness, Skill Bonuses

* **Fast Movement:** Some guados, especially those of a more athletic bend, have refined their longer stride to boost their speed even further. Guados with this racial trait increase their base land speed by 10 feet. This racial trait replaces moderate fleetness, and skill bonuses.

##### Replaces Deathless Spirit

* **Deep Magic:** Guados tend to live underground when they can, as a means to remain undisturbed, and also as most gates to other planes of existence are found in underground locations, accessed through caves. Particularly rude or unscrupulous non-guados will often make the snide connection between this habit and the practice of burial. Guados with this racial trait gain a +2 racial bonus on caster level checks made to overcome spell resistance and a +2 racial bonus when dispelling magic. This racial trait replaces deathless spirit.

##### Replaces Elemental Summoner

* **Unsent Summoner**: Guados who are so in touch with the afterlife learn more advanced techniques to control or create them. When casting spells to summon or create undead, guados treat their caster level as if it were 2 higher, this does not give them earlier access to spells. This racial trait replaces elemental summoner.

##### Replaces Skill Training

* **Carrion Sense:** Some guados are more attuned to deathlike energies than others of their kind, having the disturbing ability to track creatures by the scent of their lifeblood. This functions like the scent ability, but only for corpses and badly wounded creatures (creatures with 25% or fewer hit points). This racial trait replaces skill training.

## Age, Height and Weight

Table: Guado Starting Ages:

 16

Table: Aging Effects:

 32 years

Table: Height and Weight

 Guado, Male
(5ft. 1in.-6ft. 11in.)
 Guado, Female
(4ft. 10in.-6ft. 8in.)
(84 - 128 lbs.)

## Racial Archetypes

The following racial archetypes are available to guados:

* Exorcist (Cleric; Guado)
* Fiend Trainer (Beastmaster; Guado)

## Favored Class Options

The following favored class options are available to all characters of this race who have the listed favored class, and unless otherwise stated, the bonus applies each time you select the favored class reward.

* **Astrologian:** The astrologian gains +1/6th of an astrology secret.
* **Beastmaster:** Add +1 hit point or +1 skill rank to the beastmaster’s animal companion. If the beastmaster ever replaces his companion, the new companion gains these bonus hit points or skill ranks.
* **Black Mage:** The black mage gains +1/6th of a mage talent.
* **Cleric:** The cleric inflicts or restores +1 damage/hit point on undead targets when using channel energy.
* **Dark Knight:** The dark knight restores +1 hit point on undead targets when using harm touch.
* **Freelancer:** Add +1/4 to the number of rounds the freelancer may remain in arcane focus. This has no effect if arcane is not set as the freelancer’s primary focus.
* **Holy Knight:** The holy knight inflicts +1 damage to undead creatures when using lay on hands.
* **Illusionist:** The illusionist gains +1/6th of a veil power.
* **Necromancer:** The necromancer restores +1 hit point on undead targets when using harm touch.
* **Scholar:** The scholar gains +1/6th of a scholar exploit.
* **Summoner:** Reduce damage dealt to summoner as a result of life link by 1. Maximum of 6.
* **Time Mage:** Add 1/6 of a temporal talent. (One additional temporal talent for every six times you select this option.)
* **White Mage:** The white mage inflicts +1 damage to undead creatures when using lay on hands.