## Shifter Awakened Beast When a lycanthrope mates with a non-cursed being, usually a human or fey, an offspring can be born from that relationship. This new creature is part humanoid and part beast, capable of changing form to assume some of its most animal characteristics. A shifter. With both lycanthropes and other humanoids among their distant ancestors, shifters posses just a small portion of their forefathers' shape-shifting abilities. They cannot transform wholly into an animal but can instead shift parts of their body to become animal-like for short periods of time. That is, until one awakens the beast that runs in their blood to also run wild in the world. It's very rare for a shifter to ever reach such state, and even rarer for one to do so by itself. When a shifter awakens its feral beast, it usually means it has a very powerful lycanthrope as an ancestor, or that a Primal Spirit have broken the chains of the creature. Once a shifter becomes closer to its lycanthropic blood, it also inherits some advanced shapeshifting traits. Unlike the full fledged lycanthopes, who are bestowed with a curse, a shifter's capabilities come from its blood. So, the shifter awakened beast is not cursed and holds full control over itself.
>This race uses the shifter from Eberron UA as base. The lycanthropic traits are added as a subclass that is intentionally stronger than the options on that very old UA.
### Shifter Traits As a shifter, you have the following racial traits. ***Ability Score Increase.*** Your Dexterity score
increases by 1. ***Size.*** Shifters are about the same size as humans. Your size is Medium. ***Speed.*** Your base walking speed is 30 feet. ***Darkvision.*** Your lycanthropic heritage grants you the ability to see in dark conditions. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray. ***Languages.*** You can speak, read, and write Common and Sylvan. #### Awakened Beast Inheriting the boons and flaws of your lycanthropic blood, you gain the following traits. ***Ability Score Increase.*** Your Wisdom or Strength score increases by 1. ***Beasthide.*** Your animal-like skin is tough and covered in fur. When you aren't wearing armor, your AC is 12 + your Dexterity modifier. You can use your natural armor to determine your AC if the armor you wear would leave you with a lower AC. A shield's benefits apply as normal while you use your natural armor. ***Natural Weapon.*** You are proficient with your natural weapon, which can be either a bite or claw attack (your choice). You can make unarmed strikes with your natural weapon, which deals 1d4 piercing or slashing damage on a hit (for bite or claw, respectively). ***Wild Hunt.*** You have advantage on Wisdom (Survival) checks related to tracking and hunting. ***Immediate Regeneration.*** If you take damage other than psychic while you have at least 1 hit point, you regain 2 hit points at the start of your next turn. The hit points regained by this feature increases to 4 at 6th level, to 6 at 11th level and to 8 at 16th level. ***Poisoned by Silver.*** Once per turn, if you take damage from a silvered weapon, you gain one point of silver poison. While you have any of these points, you are poisoned and can't regain hit points from your Immediate Regeneration trait. Additionally, when you start your turn, you take 1d6 poison damage for each point of silver poison you have stacked. At the end of each of your turns, you can make a DC 14 Constitution saving throw to remove all points of silver poison you carry on a success. ***Shapeshift.*** As an action, you can change your form to one of a medium beast. The beast form resembles a feral creature of your choice based on your lycanthropic lineage, it may even be a combination of animals. You remain in beast form until you transform back to your shifter form as an action. While in this form, your game statistics are the same, but the following rules apply. - Your type changes to beast. - You have advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks. - You can't speak or take any complex action that requires hands. - You can't make weapon attacks other than with your natural weapon, which damage increases to 1d8 and gains the finesse property. - You can't cast spells. Transforming doesn't break your concentration on a spell you've already cast, however, or prevent you from taking actions that are part of a spell. - Your shifter appearance isn't recognizable in the beast form, but others can usually tell you from an ordinary animal. - Your equipment isn't transformed with you. You choose whether your equipment falls to the ground in your space or is worn by your beast form. Worn equipment functions as normal, but the DM decides whether it is practical for the beast form to wear a piece of equipment. Your equipment doesn't change size or shape to match the beast form, and any equipment that the beast form can't wear must fall to the ground. - You revert back to your shifter form if you fall unconscious or die. \page

> ##### Detecting Balance > To estimate the race/subrace balance, I passed this homebrew through Detect Balance spreadsheet. The calculation resulted as follow. > > | Integer | Decimal | Feature | |:----:|:----:|:----| | 4 | 1 | ASI + 1 | | 5 | 1.25 | ASI Choice + 1 | | 3 | 0.75 | Darkvision 60 ft. | | 8 | 2 | Advantage on set of common skills | | 4 | 1 | Immediate Regeneration (heavy armor master, but once/round) | | 6 | 1.5 | Shapeshifting (change self; drop items, can't speak) | | 2 | 0.5 | Natural Weapon 1d4 + finesse (1d8 in beast form) | | 2 | 0.5 | Natural armor 12 + Dex | | -8 | -2 | Silver Poison (rare; disables other trait) | | **34** | **8.5** | **Total without penalties** | | **26** | **6.5** | **Total** |

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