Urskan - An Updated Player Race for Bear Lovers

"This hulking white bearlike creature wears a suit of heavy, halfplate armor. Its formidable claws are tipped with deadly steel blades, and its blue eyes gleam with intelligence. It seems to move equally well on two legs or four."

– Wolfgang Baur, James Jacobs, and George Strayton
Frostburn: Mastering the Perils of Ice and Snow (2004)

Coming from wild lands and often believed to be beasts, most try to stay away from these hulking bears, fearing the wild animal. Many urskans want to prove their ability to be civil, while some embrace the animal, and become more dangerous and feared than any simple-minded beast.

BIG AND BEARLIKE
Urskans are large, bearlike humanoids that look similar to werebears, but do not have different forms.  There are five different subraces of urskans.

  •  Black urskans are small (5'-6') and similar to black bears. they often are active at night, and are more timid than the other Urskan types.
  •  Grizzly urskans are larger (6'-7') and have a natural fury about them, being able to enter a barbarian like rage once a day.
  •  Kodiak urskans are even larger (7'-8') and are semi-resistant to the cold of their homelands.  They also live in small communities.
  •  Panda urskans are similar in sixe with black urskans, but are less timid.  They are the only urskan that ever seems to fit in at civilized lands, and are naturally good with communicating.
  •  Polar urskans are usually a few inches bigger than a kodiak urskan, and are immune to the cold temperatures of where they live.

APPENDIX: URSKAN NPCS

     DIRE URSKANS (CR 5) are an updated D&D 5e version of the original Urshan Creatures from the D&D 3.5 Book Frostburn.

     BEARSERKERS (CR 12) are grizzly urskan born with lycanthropy, who use their werebear powers to bring great destruction to anything that dares to tick them off.

NOTICE: This is a conversion of the D&D 3.5 Urskan creature race into a D&D 5e Player Race.  In order to convert this incredible race into a player race, I have weakened it considerably to make it more in line with the D&D 5e player races.