Mallak (rough draft)

Males

Male and female Mallak don't have many biological differences outside of reproduction; males are taller, wider upper body, and larger muscles, good back and tail muscles. 

Females

Female Mallak have stronger legs, a more attractive focused looks for appeal; bigger neck gills to help them get away from danger, and are lighter with less bone mass and less muscle mass but leaner than the males.

Made by Lunatik Draw, link to the artist; https://twitter.com/lunatik_draw

Racial bonuses

Waterborne - in the water gain +20 ft of movement; on land lose -20 ft of movement; base movement is 30 ft of movement. Mallak don't get movement penalties for wearing armor under water.

Shark teeth - Mallak can regrow their teeth; if they're feeling a tooth ache from tooth pain they can and will rip their teeth out of their mouths and or bite down on something solid such as rocks; the teeth deal a D6 of damage.

Sponge skin - Mallak can hold over a gallon of water in their skin but at the cost of 10 ft of movement being sacrificed.

Echo location - Mallak can communicate via sending a signal out through the water; and in the water is another way of casting spells for them.

Gills - breathe under water

Perfect pitch - can hear others change in pitch in how they speak, and understand the language of music when messages are sent over via music.

Sound of water - channeling magic through their sounds as a form of casting point to perform, and gain a +1 for doing so.

Tone shift - they're able to shift their voice making them better at conversations depending on the person; +2 charisma

Echo Location; they have echolocation, and can only be used in the water.

Ocean poison - Mallak are immune to sea anemone poison

Females only;

Lighter bones; -2 HP modifier but +10 ft of movement in the water.

Wider gills; +1 AP modifier

Magical specimen; +2 MAC

Males only;

Tank body; +2 HP modifier but -1 AP modifier

physical specimen; +2 PAC

Locations

Mallak are often found in places filled with water; oceans, rivers, etc. Most Mallak only travel by water due to poor mobility on land; they're often seen helping ships for a price, and usually have to fight off sea creatures. However they're able to breathe under water and can be found under water in homes. They live in under water caves as well.

However Mallak have been found in niche water areas and do sometimes expand their homes by digging out from land; meaning to build more homes they're sometimes found creating canals, rivers, etc. However these projects do take a long time and often neighboring Mallak help build these homes.

Culture

Mallak culture is bipolar; collective groups and induvial; you see two types of Mallak, those who are the lone wolves out on their own, and then you have the group that shares resources. Mallak culture's share a couple things in common however; their love for sports, more small introverted groups, and cultures full of artist and builders.

A more laid back culture that is less worried about advancement, more on being Intune with nature and the gods, and goddesses of the world; getting along. It's less warrior based and has a more avoid combat mindset with relying on allies to be the fighters as they're the providers.

That being said Mallak culture is the least perverse; less focus on sex and often doesn't think of the body itself as sexual. That being said they're not anti-sex; just more docile, and less worried about said things. That being said when Mallak populations drop too low they do have birth rates spike, causing them to go on fishing hunts, even hunting whales if they're desperate enough.

Mallak have one partner they mate with for life as well; Mallak will have a lot of kids with one partner due to the low survival rate due to sharks, whales, ships, dolphins, and worse of all; sirens!

Mallak also have a spell focus culture; healing magic, golems, etc. They're not a direct line of combatants but are pretty focused on magic, and spell based abilities. They teach their kids magic from a young age as soon as they're able to talk.

Most verbal based magic known as Siren magic actually came from Mallak culture with them learning how to harness the power of their voice to cast magic. However female Mallak still focus more on magic than their male counter parts.

Mallak greet each other with a small song, a short sung phrase, usually something light, brevity, and soft. However in anger will go for something harsh, hard, thrashing, and long. It's not in good manner to go brawling in public, and so most disputes settled with words, not calm rational words but rather harsh burns you dish out in a form of a song, and or poem.

They're not fond of having outsiders live among them whether on land, and or in the water. They're more vain, and often don't get along with many other races but will tolerate them for a price, yeah they're greedy and prideful but mostly harmless.

Even so their enemies get a proper burial, albeit not a respected Mallak burial.

Government

Mallak government relies on a democratic republic like system; it's unlike other systems for government. To explain this into further detail Mallak vote in representatives from their water way district. Those representatives vote in a president; not the citizens. Each district is given one vote. The larger the government the more districts you have and the more parts to the system; some systems have mayors that vote in representatives to the district, so on, and so forth and can get pretty complex the bigger the government goes.

Mallak government is regulated by the lower branches being able to band their power together and regulate the larger branches and vise versa.

That being said the lower branches pay taxes to the higher branches, the higher branches pay to the center branch; the center branch uses those funds. That being said the center branch can't tax it's citizens from the lower branches but rather that's the job of the lower branches where the center branch can request more funding from the lower branches.

Holidays

Pearl day - one day of the year the Mallak celebrate with pearls, and other jewelry.

First day of winter - celebrate the first day of winter

First day of spring - celebrate the first day of spring

Last day of summer - celebrate the last day of summer

First spell - most Mallak being spellcasters they teach their kids their first spell being seen as important.

First child's song - the first song their child sings families often celebrate.

Fun facts!

Mallak are often hired for projects relating to the ocean. Even scooping oil out of the ocean and handing it over to the people on land; due to oil being harmful to them unless born with a rare mutation that allows them to eat oil they're often seen happily handing oil off to other races; for a price of course.

Mallak absorb water through their skin and can holds onto water for a long time, however on land this makes them heavier, having it where they have to drop the water out of their bodies if they wish to be more mobile.

Mallak are the evolved branch off from Sirens! It's weird to think about but they're ancestors murdered people while Mallak became more docile and more art focused; this is believed to be due to the fact that Mallak have plenty of food while in areas Sirens are found in have little to no food but a high amount of sailors and ships. Mallak grew more docile because of it.