Difference between revisions of "Dridders"

Revision as of 12:07, 8 April 2008

A huge dridder gorging herself from unfortunate captured elves in her underground cave.

Dridders are half human, half spider people. Their size varies a lot. Some measure 3 feet while others easily reach 100 feet. Little is known about them but dridders in general carry a grim and dark reputation.

Many of them display a cruel and sadistic behavior in combat which has gotten their whole war-like race labeled as evil. They are fierce fighters and they enjoy extracting every ounce of agony out of their enemies.

Their natural weapons are their claws and their venom which is often lethal, even at small doses. They actually possess a wide variety of poisons, some of them which will only make the bitten creature sleepy. Dridders also love to forge weapons and armor, and you will often see their legs reinforced by spiked plates.

Dridders love to ambush travelers and, when in a group, they don't hesitate to assault human towns. They have two methods of feeding. Like most felaryan predators, they swallow bite-sized prey whole, but if the prey is their size, they immobilize their victims and slowly liquefy their internal organs, sucking them out much like a normal spider. Needless to say this last fact contributes a lot to their sinister reputation.

Dridders hate nagas, seeing them as inferior. A long standing feud exists between the two species and shows no signs of abating. Legend foretells that one day Sineria, Queen of the dridders, will return and destroy the nagas once and for all. All nagas take a vow to destroy any dridders they find, as well as to search for clues to the location of Sineria’s tomb. So far little has been found.

Known Dridders

Eshka

Garideb

Violet

Gerridi

Gerridi's don't actually have the lower half of an arachnid, but in spite of this everyone classifies them as dridders anyway, which annoys them to no end. Gerridi do not get along well with their half arachnid cousins, as they are far more interested in music, dancing, and arts than honing their fighting skills. They always avoid fighting whenever possible, as their body is not well suited to it. Gerridi possess a slender and fragile frame, with delicate features that are closer to fairy's than a dridder's. They are generally about twelve feet high.

They have six very long and thin legs, each of which is covered in a liquid that allows them to walk on the surface of water, much like a water strider. They are extremely fast and agile when on the water, able to silently travel over large expanses of still water faster than a jet ski. These thin legs are obviously weak points as well, but a gerridi is able grow back severed legs in a few hours, though this is very taxing on them.

Gerridi live in swamp zones and use blow darts as weapons, often coating their darts with various types of venoms. Their preferred venom is a shrinking one, effective against small animal and sometimes humans. Some gerridi are known for their excellent mastery of water magic as well, and the leader of a gerridi pack will often be a shaman.

Trapdoor Dridders

Sometimes referred to as leaper dridders, they are a secretive species who hide in the dark corners of Bulvon wood and dridder forest. They have a particular way of hunting that consist in digging burrows and concealing themselves behind a thin wall of sort, usually silk with dirt, leaves, and plants glued to it. Then leaping to snatch a prey when close enough. They also possess excellent hearing to help them locate their prey from underground and the ability to recognise each prey item by their distinctive sound and vibrations.

Trapdoors dridders are often reclusives, solitary, and rather grumpy too. They don't share the hatred for nagas the rest of their kind has though.

they have extremely strong legs

Much like sand lurkers, they can leap to incredible heights with almost no momentum needed

So if you avoid their trap, you are not out of the hook yet.

Bolas Dridders

This particualr species of dridders can mostly be found in Bulvon wood. They are a giant species, about 80 feet high, but unless the rest of their kind, their venom is rather weak and rarely lethal. This makes Bolas dridders more cautious in general, less boasting and less prone to seeking confrontation than their cousins. They are not fierce warriors and prefer stealth and guile over might.

Bolas dridders have an easy going reputation and befriending them is not too hard, as long as you are not a prey. They live mostly in the canopy of great trees where they jump from one branch to another with an amazing agility. They are very skilled with their silk, that they can use as a sticky lasso or a bungie rope. It's as natural as breathing for them , and most of the time, a bolas dridder will use it without even noticing.

Bolas Dridders have an original way of hunting. They stalk travellers from high above, and “fish” for them with long lines of silk with sticky globules on the end. It’s not uncommon for a Bolas to successfully decimate a party of travellers one by one without them ever seeing their companions disappear.

Known Bolas Dridders

Alestor

Naxyla Dridders

While not native to Felarya, due to their habit of inter-dimensional exploring they frequently find themselves passing through this world or residing here for short periods of time. Naxyla driders are not a natural species. They were artificially created by an advanced civilization thousands years ago on the world of Naxyla as a means of information extraction and for use in covert ops. However, with the sudden end of that civilization, the Naxyla driders came into their own and became the planet's dominant lifeform. Despite thir new role on the planet, their growth is still restricted by the genetic shackles placed on them countless eons ago.

Only one male is born per hundred females, considerably slowing population growth. Furthermore, female Naxyla driders are actually created from a "Host Mother" and not born naturally. This is a humanoid prey who, rather then being consumed, is instinctively deemed to be worthy of transformation and is converted into a Drider through a semi-lengthy process. This means that while the drider's lower half is like a spider, the upper half is the same type as the host species. For example, if the host mother was an elf, the resulting drider will have an upper half that is also elf. If the host mother was a catgirl, then the upper half of the resulting drider will be a catgirl, and likewise for all humanoid species.

Naxyla dridders also have unique feeding needs. While they need sustenance for their bodies, they also need sustenance for their minds.

Naxyla dridders, when consuming their prey whole (this is achieved via a special shrinking venom), also absorb the memories and thoughts of their victim. This allows the drider, in theory, to know everything the ingested prey knows... however to get all of the information involves a much slower digestion phase and potentially opens up the Naxyla drider to what is know as Personality Imprint... in other words, a risk that the absorbed thoughts and memories could overwrite or merge with the existing personality. This can be avoided with training, but still this method is generally avoided by most Naxyla driders.

Naxyla driders usually display much less cruelty than their Felaryan counterpart and turn themselves more toward arts and studies than war.

Full description

Known Naxyla Dridders

Artemia

• Credits goes to Veeshan123 for all the design and the idea of Naxyla dridders, to Zoekin for the Trapdoor and Bolas dridders and to MukatKiKaarn for the base idea of Gerridi.