IRAXXI
Towering insectoids with hardened carapaces and elegant, twitching limbs, the Iraxxi look every bit the hivemind monstrosities that haunted early spacefarer nightmares. And yet, they are deeply social, fiercely individual, and remarkably compassionate. Iraxxi societal structure resembles a chorus, not a hive. Each Iraxxi hums a unique vibrational tone used in communication. Their advanced bio-tech, which they grow rather than build, is coveted across the stars. To harm an Iraxxi in their home is to awaken a nation of avengers bound by sound and memory.
"Calling an Iraxxi by any identifier other than their harmonic name signals you have not bothered to listen to them."
— Iraxxi Cultural Exchange Brief
Overview
Towering insectoids with hardened carapaces and elegant, twitching limbs, the Iraxxi look every bit the hivemind monstrosities that haunted early spacefarer nightmares. They are not. They are deeply social, fiercely individual, and among the most intentional species in the galaxy when it comes to questions of identity, belonging, and what it means to choose your people.
The Chorus
Iraxxi society is organised around choruses — not families, not tribes, not hives. Voluntary groupings of adopted kin, selected by compatibility and mutual recognition. A chorus is a declaration: these are the people I am accountable to.
Outsiders can be admitted to a chorus. It is rare. The ceremony Iraxxi call the root exchange involves grafting small amounts of cultivated bio-tech between all members, creating a persistent biological connection. For species who cannot accept the graft, symbolic alternatives exist and are offered in good faith. Both parties understand these to be approximate. The root is the real thing.
To harm a chorus member is to harm every individual in that group simultaneously. Iraxxi do not mean this metaphorically.
The Harmonic Tone
Each Iraxxi produces a unique low-frequency harmonic tone — a continuous, near-subsonic hum specific to their neural architecture. This tone functions simultaneously as name, emotional register, and personal history. It shifts over a lifetime. Iraxxi who have lived through significant events carry that history in their sound in ways they cannot fully suppress and would not want to.
Being admitted to a chorus involves receiving a tone from the group — a name assigned by those who have chosen you. Iraxxi call this being named into existence for the second time. The assigned tone is not the visitor's own; it is something the chorus has decided fits.
Calling an Iraxxi by any identifier other than their harmonic name — or worse, reducing them to a visual description — is a notable social failure. It is not considered offensive so much as revealing: it signals you have not bothered to listen to them.
Bio-Architecture
Iraxxi grow their technology rather than manufacture it. Tools, armour, weapons, structures — all cultivated through biological processes their scientists have refined over millennia. Given enough time, an Iraxxi settlement becomes indistinguishable from a living ecosystem: buildings that heal, walls that breathe, weapons attuned to their user's stress chemistry.
This makes their technology deeply personal and largely non-transferable. A weapon grown for one Iraxxi's physiology will not function correctly for another species. Their cities cannot be effectively repurposed by occupiers. Their armour cannot be meaningfully looted. This is not an accident.
Their bio-tech is among the most coveted in the galaxy. Almost none of it can be reverse-engineered. The Iraxxi have not explained why, and have not been asked in a way they consider worth answering.
The Tone
Every Iraxxi hums a unique vibrational frequency that functions as identity, emotional communication, and instinctive truth-reading. When you first interact with someone, you read their harmonic. The GM tells you one true thing about their emotional state, intent, or disposition — not what they're showing, but what's underneath it. You cannot choose not to hear this. Lying to you requires more effort than most people realise.
Grown Not Built
Your bio-tech doesn't behave like manufactured equipment — it adapts. At the start of each session, choose one piece of bio-tech you're carrying. The GM adds one minor new function to it — something small, situational, and real. The adaptation reflects what the previous session asked of it. Your equipment is paying attention.
Add someone to your chorus through genuine connection — not convenience, not strategy, but because you chose them. OR defend someone in your chorus at real personal cost, without guarantee of success.
CHOOSE YOUR PATH
Path of the Song
Resonance StrikeOnce per rest, attune your tone to a single target's frequency. For the next 3 rounds, whenever you hit them they must pass Resilience (TN12) or be Staggered — not from the impact, but from their own internal structures resonating against themselves. If they fail this save three times, they are Stunned for one round. They can hear you tuning in during every round of this. They know exactly what you're building toward.
Path of the Chorus
Name ThemDeclare someone part of your chorus — a genuine, in-character moment, stated clearly at the table. While they live: whenever they are targeted by an attack within your line of sight, you may spend your Quick Action to impose Disadvantage on that attack. When someone in your chorus dies, you gain Advantage on all checks for the rest of the encounter and a free attack against whatever killed them. The chorus remembers. So do you.
- Path of the Song: Use sound — your tone, a resonance, a specific frequency — as the primary solution to a significant problem, with no backup plan.
- Path of the Chorus: Lose a member of your chorus and choose to continue rather than stop.
Silencing Frequency
Path of the SongOnce per long rest, find the precise counter-harmonic of a target and emit it for three seconds. They are Silenced and Stunned for one full round. No attack roll. No save. This bypasses Damage Reduction, cover, and shields. You cancelled them at the frequency level. Everything else they have still works. Just not that.
The Swarm Memory
Path of the SongOnce per session, emit a tone at the upper limit of your range — every Iraxxi within one mile hears it as a summons. Any Iraxxi who receives it will come to your location as soon as they reasonably can. They won't know why, only that something is calling. The GM determines who answers, how many, and when. You cannot control this. Some of them may be strangers. Some may be complicated. They will come.
What You Protect
Path of the ChorusOnce per long rest, name the worst thing that could happen to your chorus right now. State it aloud at the table. For the rest of the session, you cannot be reduced below 1 HP while that thing has not yet happened. Every time you would drop further, you hit 1 instead. When the session ends — or if the thing you named comes to pass — the protection ends. Fate listens to specifics.
Nation of Avengers
Path of the ChorusWhen a member of your chorus is killed, significantly harmed, or deeply wronged, the rest of your chorus knows. You do not have to tell them. For the rest of that session and the next: you deal +3 damage to whoever is responsible and cannot be Panicked, Disoriented, or Silenced. The GM determines when this knowledge reaches your chorus and what they do with it. You aren't the only one who loved them.