Still sailing on the open waters of the Shining Sea, we had made a stop at the port of Urbeth
on the independent island nation of Tharsult, and more specifically into Shou-town, where
we had offloaded the big square bundles of furs onboard and replacing that cargo with
hundreds of crates and loads of fresh vegetables with bales of hay.
We then set sail with the tide heading directly for the City of Saffron, also known as Ormpar,
now in proper southwestern faerun at least, or the outskirts of it at the border of the
land of lapaliiya, but the City of Saffron is an independent city-state anyway, one of
the so-called Cities of the Seabreeze.
We made port in the evening at the eastern tip of the Shining Sea, at the head of Ormpur
Bay at the northern foot of the Sheir Peninsula with the shadow of the Wormbones mountains
bringing an early reprieve from the southern heat.
Ormpar has a long stone jetty that bustles with activity, mostly well-guarded cargo of
spices and travellers going any one of five different directions from there.
We were met by a very unusual seeming trio of mages, wrapped in some flamboyant and fashionable
wizard robes, who filled all of the cages onboard the ship with Almiraj.
When I saw the size of them, I worried we had not brought enough food for them all.
These creatures were my ticket into the nation of Halruaa, as I had been hired to travel
with them, guarding them and a few of the crew as they made the overland trek into the
land of mages.
An almiraj (pronounced AWL-meer-ahj) is a large, timid hare with a 1-foot-long spiral
horn emerging from its forehead, they have a ruff of longer fur, like a mane, around
the sides and back of the head and generally thick body fur of a distinctly yellow color.
They have no mystical powers, they are just animals.
But, they are much more common further south in faerun and very common in far off lands
of Zakhara and Kara-tur, and of course, they are found throughout the feywild.
Originally and still found commonly within the Feywild, they came to the planet Toril
and established wild breeding populations in the lands of Zakhara, they travelled with
traders and genies from there along the southern coast of Faerun and made their way into Kara-Tur
via sea trade mostly.
Typically those who take the effort or opportunity to run trade between the prime material plane
and the feywild can benefit from the Almiraj from there being of more vibrant colour, larger
size and general excellent health, an almiraj buck can reach twice the size of a buck from
Faerun and have a horn that is fully two feet long, of course, Almiraj of that size either
live in parts of the feywild that are quite seriously dangerous, or they have been raised
or influenced by the presence of an intelligent feywild resident who may react quite aggressively
to having their pets or livestock stolen.
There are also specific efforts in the feywild to breed special riding Almiraj for the use
of fey folk who either are or can transform into a tiny size.
Almiraj naturally tend to take off in mad dashes of speed, so training them as riding
mounts is challenging, stopping them from diving into holes or into the underbrush and
knocking off, probably injuring their rider is also a job for animal handlers with a lot
of patience, empathy and time, so riding Almiraj are rarely young animals.
The most southern population of them in the wild on Toril is located in the land of Chult,
they seem to thrive in quite tropical and hostile jungles.
Skilled at evading predators, these creatures have flourished throughout the tropical peninsula.
They live in earthen burrows called warrens with many branching chambers that form individual
females' nests.
They are not formidable creatures and can be captured and domesticated.
In the wild the female nests in a depression on the surface of the ground rather than in
a burrow and the young are active as soon as they are born.
Litters may consist of three or four young and a female can bear three litters a year,
with the average almiraj living for up to twelve years.
The breeding season lasts from January to August.
An Almiraj has an armor class of 13, 1d6 hit points, they are fast, moving at 50 feet per
round, they can dash 100 feet and hide, with +5 to stealth checks, they then freeze and
wait for any sign of pursuit with a +4 with advantage on their perception checks involving
their hearing and sight, also, they have 30 foot darkvision.
They don't normally attack predators with their horn, but when goaded, driven into a
corner or protecting their young.
The male, or buck Almiraj has a one foot long, usually golden brown and spiral curled horn
similar to a unicorn horn, the female, or doe almiraj has a slightly more slender horn
that grows up to one foot and is usually cream or pearl colored, growing from the peak of
it's skull, so above the eyes, not between them, this makes them good at charging into
things with that horn, but not great for seeing where they are going when they make a charge,
otherwise, they run with their eyes up, not their head lowered, and you don't accidentally
get skewered by a running Almiraj, even a panic fuelled herd of almiraj all racing around
madly.
The does will sometimes charge to protect their nest and their litter of kits, the bucks
are more aggressive and charge to protect their does and the warren in general, but
otherwise their role is to run into the warren last and turn back with their horn facing
out to ward off any nimble predator small enough to chase after them down the hole.
They are born fairly well developed, they already have hair, their eyes are open and
they can move around on their own, which makes them more similar to Hares than Rabbits, they
are not born with a fully grown horn, its not made of bone, it can regrow if broken.
Its not suitable for making a drinking horn, but makes for a decorative handle, and in
the swamps of the Zakharan coast is common to see them traded as fishing spear tips,
you can get a good price for them, particularly if they are carved with local tribal patterns
and have some history behind who they were owned by, the spear tip of a famous leader
or shaman can fetch a good price at a museum, ironically the further away from Zakhara you
are, the better the price for the increasingly exotic item becomes.
That's just generally true for all artifacts though.
If you’re lucky enough to capture an almiraj while they’re young, they are surprisingly
open to domestication and training and can become a decent pet or adventuring companion.
Almiraj are more active at night in the wild, and when facing a threat, an adult thumps
its front feet; the hind feet are used to warn others of a predator.
It squeals when hurt or scared, and a female makes "guttural" calls to attract her young.
Most of their communication among themselves, or with some spell caster who has formed a
magical bond with one, consists of reading the position of the head, tail, ears and feet,
with occasional vocal sounds or foot thumps.
In Second edition D&D the Almiraj could suddenly teleport short distances like some sort of
blink-bunny, they became immune to all poisons and they lost their timid nature, rather they
would leap to defend themselves from dangerous humanoids.
Most of this was dropped in the third edition, the animals do gain a burrowing speed and
are liable to just dig their way out of any danger.
Now in 5th edition, they are back to being cute, fairly large bunnies that make for good
pets, erratic riding mounts, and pretty good eating, with one Almiraj of Fey origin rendering
up the same sort of meat load as a thanksgiving turkey, which is perfect for a famished, hard-working
adventuring group.
A similar species, but much more common in the Shaar grasslands and the Endless Wastes
of the Tuigan Hordelands, the Jackalope is a creature with most of the qualities of an
ordinary hare, a similar breeding rate to the almiraj and a fairly huge population,
spread out across vast grasslands, rolling hills and forest edges, the Jackalope handles
arid environments a lot better than the almiraj does, they can also eat more thorny, dry and
nutrient-poor plants than the almiraj and thrive.
Prices vary hugely for the exotic horned rabbits, the most impressive prices are the prized
purebred Almiraj bred and raised to simply be beautiful and affectionate pets, they are
shown in tournaments in the cities of Halruaa, along with even more exotic creatures.
The cheapest would be street food vendors in the feywild cities, hawking spit-roasted
Almiraj drumsticks with sticky fruit chutney glaze, which are highly delicious and usually
quite cheap.
A good snack for an adventurer on the move and a safe bet, as street vendors don't usually
drug their food, just some enchantments to keep it hot and fresh.
Thank you for that lore request, remember, if you have any special requests for a topic
I have not covered yet, let me know in the comments down below, and as always, thanks
for listening and I will be back with more for you, very soon.
So how can you use the Almiraj in a tactical, dynamic encounter?
Let's say we make it to Halruaa and we just happen to be raiding the demiplane family
vault of a halruaan gnomish wizard.
We find a 40 ft circular room made of closely fitted natural stone of a purple hue with
portraits lining the walls, in the centre of the room is a wheel like that on a sailing
ship with a lever at the right-hand side of it.
There are six short pillars of purple stone with squares of metal on top of them, bordering
a square hole in the centre of each stone pillar.
Directly opposite from the entrance, across the far side of the round room, a pair of
large, cogwheel doors form an airlock chamber protecting and sealing the treasure vault.
Spinning the steering wheel clockwise will raise up the metal cages and reveal their
metal bars are all independently mobile, like flying blades more than prison bars.
Inside each cage, an almiraj rises up from inside the pillar and sits in the cage, then,
from the roof, two orbs, one blue, the other green, flash enchantments at the almiraj's
horns, the first turns the horns into magically guided weapons, the second enlarges the creatures
to twice their normal size, the cages all smoothly break apart and the blades spin to
collect protectively around the magic orbs, raising the armor class or each orb from 11
to 15.
As long as the magically enraged almiraj are alive, or the two orbs are intact, the magic
continues.
If the orbs are broken by having their 40 hit points reduced to zero, or all the almiraj
are killed, the orb and cage blade magic explodes, sending a hail of cage blades randomly all
over the room, a DC 15 Dexterity save is required or a victim takes 1d6 damage, if they roll
a 6, they roll an additional 1d6, and so on.
Hmmm, what treasures would a gnomish halruaan wizard keep in such a vault?
Why a prized almiraj buck, fresh from a prizewinning breeder in a more cosmopolitan fey realm.
Plus spell books, very old wine, rare spell components, precious stones, unusual and rare,
well-preserved specimens, very nice leather furniture, tasteful marble statues and a fine
collection of various exotic pipe weeds.
There may be a secret compartment in one of the almiraj
pillars, or each of the different pillars could be accessed by coded locks, you might
find collections of wands, potions, wondrous items, rare books, belts, gloves, rings, boots,
daggers and so on, perhaps even a collection of old treasure maps.