Black feathers cover this crow-headed Humanoid, and its hands and legs end in powerful talons.

Tengus are a race of avian humanoids that resemble crows or ravens, and often bear much of the same stigma. Though they frequently choose to live among other races in densely populated cities, their society is tight and closed, and they rarely allow others to see its inner workings. Tengus often band together in small groups to create roosts in vacant warehouses or condemned buildings, and these raucous gathering places are generally assumed to be thieves' guilds by outsiders—an assumption that's correct roughly half the time.

Like the crows they share physical traits with, tengus are naturally covetous, especially of shiny or colorful items, and prone to bouts of good-natured kleptomania if they don't carefully keep themselves in check. Vain and prideful creatures, they are easily persuaded with flattery.

Tengu Characters

Tengus are defined by their class levels—they do not possess racial Hit Dice. All tengus have the following racial traits.

+2 Dexterity, –2 Constitution, +2 Wisdom: Tengus are fast and observant, but relatively fragile and delicate.

Senses: Tengus have low-light Vision.

Sneaky: Tengus gain a +2 racial bonus on Perception and Stealth.

Gifted Linguist: See above.

Swordtrained: See above.

Natural Weapon: Tengus possess a bite natural attack that inflicts 1d3 points of Damage on a hit. This is a primary attack, or a secondary attack if the tengu wields a manufactured weapon.

Languages: Tengus begin play speaking Common and their own dialect of Tengu. Tengus with high Intelligence scores can choose any language as a bonus language.

Special Abilities

Gifted Linguist (Ex) Tengus gain a +4 racial bonus on Linguistics Checks, and learn 2 languages each time they gain a rank in Linguistics Rather than 1 language.

Swordtrained (Ex) Tengus are trained from birth in swordplay, and as a result are automatically proficient with sword-like Weapons (including bastard swords, daggers, elven curve blades, falchions, greatswords, kukris, longswords, punching daggers, rapiers, scimitars, short swords, and two-bladed swords).