Nothing's Like Before
FELYARI
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
- Intent: I saw the Emperor
Darth Empyrean
and the Emperor Emeritus
Mordecai Zambrano
play Monster Hunter. I saw the Palicos and said this must be a thing. I have to have super cute kitties who are super helpful and have plot armor. They are Jawas meet Ewoks, but fuzzier, feline, and artisan-coded. - Image Credit: Chat GPT
- Canon: No
- Permissions: N/A
- Links: Palicos
- Name: Felyari
- First Order/Commonwealth Designation: Species 577-B, Jungle Prowlers
- Designation: Sentient
- Origins: Bestal III
- Average Lifespan: 58–72 galactic standard years
- Estimated Population: Scattered [Within the Commonwealth]
- Description: The Felyari are a small, bipedal feline species native to the lush jungles of Bestal III. Known for their expressive eyes, retractable claws, and preternatural agility, they are fiercely intelligent and adaptive. Felyari are renowned for their craftsmanship, stealth, and deep cultural traditions rooted in environmental harmony. Though they appear charming or even whimsical to outsiders, they are a fiercely loyal people with complex clan structures, hunter-warrior rites, and spiritual bonds to their homeworld. Though scattered through the Commonwealth, they remain tightly knit in their communities, thriving in jungle, tundra, desert, and subterranean environments alike.
- Galactic Nicknames: Starfangs, Whisperclaws, Wyrdkin, Fuzzies (informal originally by First Order Infantry)
- Special Traits: Extreme environmental adaptation, bond-ritual companionship, master craftsmanship
- Protected Species: Under Commonwealth charter rare, valuable, and illegal to clone.
- Breathes: Type I atmosphere (standard oxygen-nitrogen mix)
- Average Height of Adults: 0.95 to 1.2 meters
Average Length of Adults: N/A - Skin Color: Pinkish, tan, or dark grey skin beneath fur; rarely visible except on pads, ears, and inner joints
Hair Color: Fur coloration includes mottled browns, jungle greens, snow white, soot black, desert tan, charcoal grey, and rust orange—often with stripes or spots depending on region. - Distinctions: Digitigrade legs, retractable claws, and wide sensory whiskers grant natural stealth and climbing ability. Large, forward-facing eyes offer night vision and enhanced movement tracking. Flexible tails aid balance and are often used for expression or tool use. Males tend to be broader-shouldered with thicker ruff fur; females more slender with longer tail fur and facial tufts. Aged Felyari display faded or silvered fur, longer whiskers, and may carry ceremonial scarring or clan etchings
- Regional adaptations include:
- Needan/Najarka Felyari: dense winter coats, frost-resistant pads
- Mephout Felyari: shorter fur, reflective eye membranes
- Tholon Felyari: elongated ear tufts, seismic-sensitive paw structures
- Skye Felyari: increased lung capacity, gliding membrane tattoos
- Appearance:
- Bipedal feline-esque species, between 3–4 feet tall.
- Wide variation in fur patterns—striped, spotted, or solid, depending on their planetary biome.
- Tail expressive and often wrapped in ornamentation or clan beads.
- Large, glowing eyes suited for low-light combat and night recon.
- Digitigrade feet for speed, retractable claws, and exceptional agility.
- Many wear patchwork armor or scavenged tech.
- Races:
- Canopy Clans (Bestal III original stock; arboreal, ritualistic)
- Frostpelt Clades (adapted to alpine/tundra environments)
- Sandstride Tribes (desert dwellers with spiritual mirage rites)
- Deepdelve Lineages (subterranean clans with seismic echo language)
- Highwind Kin (mountain dwellers of Skye, known for glider traditions and sky-music)
- Force Sensitivity: Low – Some members show Force sensitivity, but it is uncommon. Their mystics attribute this to an “echo of the stars” rather than the Jedi or Sith traditions. Force-sensitive Felyari are often raised as spiritual keepers or clan-seers.
- Gear:Felyari typically carry their own gear which includes but is not limited to;
- Gizmodex Packs: Back-mounted toolkits for healing sprays, mini-droids, or spark mines.
- Holo-Cloaks: Limited stealth tech, often faulty but endearing.
- Force Sensitives: A rare few are rumored to have precognitive “battle sense,” aligning them more with shamanic traditions or Force mystics.
- Custom Armor: Can be themed to match their bonded hunter—mandalorian plating, clone trooper motifs, or First Order salvaged parts.
- Exceptional Adaptability: The Felyari have successfully evolved to survive in diverse environments, from jungle canopy cities to frozen tundras, arid deserts, subterranean caverns, and urban centers—making them extremely versatile in narrative and gameplay roles.
- Creative Tech-Artisanship: Their unique hybrid technology blends organic materials, environmental mimicry, and scavenged galactic tech. This makes them valuable allies for stealth missions, sabotage, environmental engineering, or unconventional field medicine.
- Small Stature and Physical Fragility: At under 1.2 meters tall and with lightweight frames, Felyari are not suited for direct melee combat against most humanoid species or large predators. They rely on speed, stealth, or tools rather than brute force.
- Cultural Selectiveness and Non-Expansionist Mindset: Many Felyari are hesitant to leave their native traditions or engage in militaristic campaigns. Their strong clan loyalty and seasonal rites can create diplomatic friction in high-command or rapid-deployment situations.
Native Habitat: Nestled within the tangled emerald jungles of Bestal Three, the Felyari make their homes in suspended net-villages within the canopy of vortal trees—massive bioluminescent giants known for their electrical discharge bark and medicinal sap.
These villages are nearly invisible from orbit due to dense overgrowth and ion-scattering fungi.
They share territory with volatile fauna, and have developed unique bonding rituals with arboreal predators like the shreecats or vorclaws.
Roles: Roles that are common for the Felyari.
- Tech-Savvy Scouts or Tinkerers: Exceptional mechanics, slicers, and trapmakers. The Commonwealth often uses them in recon or sabotage roles.
- Mini-Beastmasters: They ride tiny kybuck or genetically engineered critters. They train fauna for defense or hunting missions.
- Combat Companions: Armed with energy slings, plasma claws, or sonic screechers. Some wear jet packs or stealth field generators.
- Lore Keepers: In isolated cultures, they’re oral historians, remembering lost galactic knowledge in musical, coded stories.
- Experts in hit-and-fade jungle warfare and environmental sabotage.
- Felyari serve as trackers, demolition experts, or medics in Commonwealth special forces, especially in recon units on forested or asteroid-adjacent worlds.
- They are often bonded to a single Commonwealth partner (officer, scout, Jedi, etc.), a connection that is lifelong and partially telepathic through chemical and ultrasonic resonance.
- Combat Tools:
- Plasma Thorns – retractable vibro-daggers with venom-tipped edges.
- Echo Mines – sound-based disorientation tools mimicking jungle predators.
- Jungle Cloaks – vine-grown, biologically reactive stealth gear.[Each clan or ‘regional’ Felyari clan has a variation of this cloak.]
- Carry modded datapads with gesture-activated glyph interfaces.
- Love modifying and “decorating” gear with organic and metallic fusion, expect vines growing out of rifle stocks and flowerpots on helmets.
- Felyari engineers are behind the Whisker Protocol, a remote-detonation mine system hidden in fruit pods and leaf clusters.
- Have an odd fixation with holodramas from Corellia and Coruscant, many speak Basic with dramatic flair.
Craftsmanship and Technology: The Felyari are known throughout the Commonwealth for their inventive design and meticulous craftsmanship:
- Weaponsmiths:
- Plasma-spined knives
- Modular blowguns with alchemical payloads
- Compact vibro-tools concealed in jewelry or tail rings
- Healers & Bio-artificers:
- Use salves and pastes infused with fungal cultures and pheromone-saturated herbs
- Have created emergency scent-code medkits that deliver care instructions via smell to illiterate or panicked species
- Engineers:
- Pioneered vinespun circuit weave used in cloaking devices and field stabilizers
- Build small walker mechs designed for jungle or canyon traversal, often piloted in pairs
Diet Type: Omnivore with a plant-heavy, adaptive diet
Cultural Preference: Forager-traditionalist with strong regional diversity
Digestive Notes: Felyari have sensitive lipid-processing systems and rely on high-fiber, low-saturated-fat diets. Their gut flora is optimized for fungi, leafage, and slow protein digestion. Felyari love tea, and have... mixed opinions on Caf, especially as they are a 'low-stim' species and culture. They love noodles, it's a comfort food.
- Well-Tolerated / Preferred Foods
- Vegetables: All terrestrial and most alien greens; they especially favor leafy herbs, root vegetables, and bio-luminescent cave crops
- Fruits: Berries, vortal fruit, tree-gourd, and tangroot (a slightly spicy, hydrating tuber)
- Nuts and Seeds: Widely consumed across clans, often ground into paste or baked into travel cakes
- Insects & Grubs: High in protein and often served roasted or in paste form
- Shellfish & Crustaceans: Tolerated and considered a delicacy among coastal or aquifer-based clans
- Seafood: Generally well-processed in moderation—Felyari often sun-dry or brine fish for use in mixed-forage stews
- Dairy / Milk Analogues: Some Felyari are lactose-tolerant, especially in urban clans (due to generations of exposure). Others use fermented or plant-derived alternatives like mossmilk or nutcreams
- Toxic / Poorly Tolerated
- High-Fat Mammalian Meats: Can cause hepatic lipid toxicity and neurological stress
- Certain Cooking Oils: Especially hydrogenated or synthetic oils from galactic-standard fryers
- Processed Salts & Preservatives: Upset electrolyte balance, especially in Deepdelve and Frostpelt groups
- Synth-Meats: Often cause anaphylaxis or dermal eruptions due to incompatible proteins or chemical stabilizers
In mixed-species kitchens, Felyari-safe markers are used: usually a green leaf-glyph or spiral symbol indicating no refined salt or oil has been used.
Salts
- Tolerated: Raw, unrefined salts such as sea salt, mineral salt, or crystallized salt scraped from cave deposits or sun-dried tidal flats.
- Felyari often infuse salt with herbs or fungal powders, both to soften the mineral harshness and to add ritual significance (e.g., mourning blends or travel salts).
- Some regions use "bark salt", derived from salt-licking trees with naturally occurring saline saps.
- Poorly Tolerated / Toxic in Quantity:
- Processed or iodized salts (common in galactic-standard preservatives, synth-foods, or long-life rations).
- Salts with chemical binders or stabilizers (e.g., anti-caking agents) cause electrolyte destabilization, especially in Deepdelve and Sandstride Felyari.
- Symptoms: Skin irritation, muscle spasms, sensory hallucinations in extreme cases.
- Tolerated: Cold-pressed, unrefined plant oils like:
- Glowvine seed oil (used in cold climates for added energy)
- Mossnut oil (mild, grassy flavor, favored in Seoul and Dyspeth)
- Pressed fungal oils (used for binding spices in tea or moss cakes)
- Animal-derived oils (like ghee or rendered fats) are tolerated only in trace ceremonial doses in some highland tribes otherwise avoided.
- Poorly Tolerated / Toxic: Refined cooking oils from galactic-standard sources (canola, fry oil, synth-oils, etc.).
- Oils subjected to hydrogenation, high-temp flash processing, or flavor-stabilization chemicals disrupt liver and neural pathways.
- Symptoms: Lethargy, loss of smell/taste, fur loss, and hepatic swelling.
- Communication: Vortalk (with regional dialects and mimic codes)
- A creole of chirps, mewls, glottal stops, and echo-mimicry.
- Technologically Hybrid (Bio-tech + Galactic scavenging + Indigenous innovation):
- While the Felyari do not produce starships or mass-scale industry, they are master craftsmen, merging organic and salvaged materials into compact, effective tools.
- Signature Tech Practices:
- Bioluminescent glyph-weaving and vine-based circuitry
- Jungle-grown camo-fabric with scent-masking properties
- Compact slicing tools disguised as jewelry or walking sticks
- Modular hover-gliders, grown from fungi + grafted scrap parts
- “Wyrdcoding” — a hybrid of mimicry, pheromones, and ultrasonic chirps used in stealth infiltration
- Signature Tech Practices:
- Felyari regularly scavenge and modify galactic tech rather than produce it from scratch, much like Jawa tinkers—but with more artistry.
- Religion/Beliefs: Animist-Spiritualist with Star-Myth Elements
- Felyari believe all living things have echoes—imprints of memory and purpose. Their faith is clan-based, not institutional, and rituals vary by region.
- Core Beliefs:
- The stars are ancestral spirits watching from beyond
- Trees and stone hold memory; rivers carry prophecy
- Tools must be treated with reverence—especially those passed down
- Some believe they “fell from the stars” during a great migration (often tied to the Kadal Asteroid Field)
- Ceremonial Traditions:
- Star Howl: festival during planetary alignment when clans tell sky-faring myths
- Echo Rites: performed before crafting tools or weapons
- Bond Oaths: spiritual ritual of companionship with other beings, including off-worlders
- Force-sensitive Felyari are often regarded as "Echo-Touched"—revered, but not worshipped.
- Core Beliefs:
- General Behavior: Family Structure: Matrilineal clans with shared child-rearing; “kits” are raised communally
- Courtship: Involves collaborative craftwork (if you can co-build, you can co-parent)
- Education: Knowledge is passed via apprenticeship, oral storytelling, and mimic games. Some attend Commonwealth academies as ambassadors or engineers.
- Behavioral Traits:
- Inquisitive and intensely tactile—touching, sniffing, and observing are part of how they learn
- Highly social, even with non-Felyari, once trust is earned
- Nocturnal-preferential, though some desert or tundra tribes are crepuscular
- Builders, foragers, and scouts by instinct; extremely creative problem-solvers
- Not territorial, but clan boundaries and rites of passage are sacred
- Known to "gift" objects to offworlders as signs of respect—often mistaken for theft
- Naming:Felyari names are fluid, often made of multiple elements that denote clan, role, personality trait, or achievement. Names can be poetic, practical, or humorous—and often evolve over a Felyari’s life. They usually follow a [Personal Name] + [Clan or Spirit Affiliation] structure, with nicknames or shortened forms for outsiders.
- Traditional Examples (Forest/Jungle Clans):
- Tikka-of-Stonebranch – A healer from the Stonebranch clan
- Meelari Driftspore – A glider and wind-singer
- Shaal Vinebreaker – A scout known for clearing paths in vortal trees
- Yavo Sunfang – A sun-hunter with bright fur and bright ego
- Nirr Whisperroot – A diplomat known for calming conflict
- Frostpelt Clades (Needan, Najarka):
- Ikka Snowbound
- Tarn of the Glintshade
- Rusk Icetwine
- Vevra Hollowflame
- Murn Frostjaw
- These names emphasize survival, winter phenomenon, or resilience.
- Sandstride Tribes (Mephout):
- Zeel Dustsinger
- Kari Duneclimb
- Shaffa Mirageglint
- Noom Suncrawler
- Tarn of the Drygift
- Desert Felyari names focus on mirage, light, and endurance.
- Deepdelve Lineages (Tholon):
- Nirr Echochime
- Grax Flintcoil
- Tova of the Dripline
- Hush Scrimwhistle
- Varn Burrowgift
- These often incorporate stone, resonance, and subterranean imagery.
- Urban Felyari Naming Tendencies (e.g., Dosuun, Seoul, Dyspeth, Salteract):
- Often keep a shortened first name, clan-name as a surname (e.g. Tikka Stonebranch)
- Adopt middle names or nicknames from Basic/Common tongues:
- Shaal “Kiki” Vinebreaker
- Meeko Tan (born Meekoa Star-Under-Water)
- Others use callsigns, especially in military or technical roles:
- "Patch", "Ghostpaw", "Circuit", "Loom", "Fizz"
- Urban-born or long-integrated Felyari may even rename themselves after fictional characters, machines, or local legends—especially in places like Dyspeth or Seoul where cross-cultural aesthetics flourish.
- Traditional Examples (Forest/Jungle Clans):
- Misc:
- Clan-oriented with strong oral traditions, each clan is named after natural phenomena: Storm-Eaters, Shadow-Binders, Moon-Walkers, etc.
- Believe the Kadal Asteroid Field is sacred; debris from it is used in ceremonial blades and spirit totems.
- Their Star Myth claims they once rode “shards of night” (asteroids) across the void. Some clans still launch glider-ships into orbit during “Sky Howl” festivals.
- Felyari kits (children) are given small starmetal shards at birth, worn as charms. Losing them is considered an omen of exile.
- Fiercely loyal to their bonded human or near-human companion.
- Speak a mix of trilled meows, whistles, and partial Basic—some are fluent, others stick to high-pitched creole.
- Extremely social with one another, with clan structures, tribal marks, and seasonal festivals.
- Love shiny things. A Felyari will absolutely stop mid-battle to steal a lightsaber crystal if it’s unattended.
- Urban Environments: Felyari thrive in urban environments when given space to practice community, craftsmanship, and creative autonomy. They tend to form microclans or urban enclaves within larger cities. These are just a few examples, and is not an exhaustive list of the Felyari within the Commonwealth.
- Dosuun:
- Felyari often work in maintenance tunnels, vertical gardens, and covert courier services
- Some serve as underground cultural archivists, preserving traditions banned during First Order rule
- Others work as techsmiths modifying salvaged FO equipment into functional devices or art
- Microclans live in retrofitted ventilation nodes or converted atrium gardens, often mistaken for "overgrown maintenance areas" by outsiders
- Seoul
- Home to a prominent Felyari artisan guild, known for textile work, scent-based perfume language, and kinetic art
- Several serve as sound engineers, slicers, or biohackers at Commonwealth research hubs
- Known to participate in urban rooftop glider sports and night-market storytelling circuits
- Dyspeth
- Felyari are fully integrated with indigenous human/near-human groups, often serving as rangers, herbalists, or forest diplomats
- Deeply involved in climate restoration, weaving their ancestral knowledge with Commonwealth tech
- “Dyspethan Felyari” often wear symbolic shoulder cloaks and maintain vinebound tech scrolls for fieldwork
- Salteract
- High presence in xenobotany labs, environmental engineering, and artifact recovery
- Tend to be more formal, taking on long, academic Basic names in addition to their native ones (e.g. “Professor Nirr Echochime of the Kaldwin Ethnological Society”)
- Salteract microclans host public education days, blending storytelling, scientific demos, and food tasting
- The Bonding Ritual: A Felyari chooses a bond-companion (called a Taliir, or "soul-thread") through a ritual known as "Whisker-Kin", which may be sparked by:
- Acts of mutual trust in dangerous situations
- Prolonged companionship and emotional synchronicity
- Shared healing or rescue
- Completion of a joint task during a clan seasonal rite
- The ritual may involve shared food, scents, blood or fur samples, and storytelling. Afterward, the Felyari will often gift a personal totem or wear a charm tied to their companion’s scent or name.
- Meaning of the Bond: A bonded Felyari and their companion are lifelinked in trust and memory. While not telepathic, bonded pairs develop heightened nonverbal understanding, synced circadian rhythms, and a deep sense of spatial awareness around one another. Felyari will often unconsciously mirror their companion’s emotions or rest cycles.
- In many cases, this bond is so strong that:
- The Felyari will refuse reassignment or separation, even during war
- The companion may be adopted into the Felyari’s clan as an honorary kin
- Felyari may follow their Taliir into retirement, exile, or dangerous missions without hesitation
- Death, Betrayal, and Loss: If a Felyari’s bonded companion dies, the Felyari will undergo a grieving rite known as "Echo Silence", where they:
- Remove or burn their fur charms and shared tokens
- Cease speaking for a full lunar cycle
- Tattoo or scar themselves with a memory-glyph of the deceased
- Some Felyari never bond again after such a loss. Others choose to become Talehuskers—wandering memory-keepers who carry the stories of fallen Taliir into new generations.
- Sever all social ties with that person and any associated groups
- Publicly renounce the bond through a ritual known as "Tail-Cut", a painful process involving cutting or branding part of their tail
- May even place a Clan Ban, preventing other Felyari from bonding with that individual ever again
- Such broken bonds are shameful to the Felyari and seen as a spiritual wound, both to the betrayer and the betrayed.
HISTORICAL INFORMATION
The Felyari are an ancient, sapient species native to the jungle world of Bestal III, nestled near the Kadal Asteroid Field within the Commonwealth’s Kaldwin Sector. Fossil and cave etching records indicate the species developed naturally, evolving from arboreal, nocturnal felinoids over tens of thousands of years, with early societies centered on canopy-living and semi-nomadic foraging. Despite their small stature, the Felyari quickly developed complex social structures, tool use, and spiritual beliefs tied to the cycles of the stars and the living memory of the forest.
Pre-Contact and Isolation
Bestal III’s location within the Varada sector and its proximity to the volatile Kadal Field left it largely uncharted for millennia. While ancient traders may have passed through, few survived its orbital hazards or the dense planetary flora, leaving the Felyari undisturbed through both the Old Republic and Sith Empire eras.
This isolation allowed the species to develop advanced biological and environmental technologies not in the galactic sense of hyperdrives and blasters, but in fungal circuitry, echo-based communication, and naturally grown structures.
They had no recorded planetary unification event; instead, various clans and regional lineages developed independently, connected by seasonal festivals and traveling lorekeepers known as Talebinders.
First Order Era and Resistance Contact
During the First Order’s expansionist push into the Unknown Regions and Outer Rim, Bestal III was briefly catalogued as a low-value “bio-rich” world by a First Order prospecting scout team. Several drone-based mining operations were launched near the edge of the Kadal Field, but the missions failed under unclear circumstances. (Surviving logs contain garbled sensor data, auditory hallucinations, and mentions of "screaming forests.")
Bestal III was never formally annexed by the First Order. The planet was instead flagged as “high-risk, low-reward” due to the hostile biome, unpredictable orbital debris, and the disruption of sensor equipment by the vortal tree ecosystem and magnetic spores.
However, it was during this period that Resistance scouts, searching for unmonitored hyperspace routes, made first meaningful contact with Felyari clans.
Commonwealth Integration
Following the fall of the First Order, the emerging Imperial Commonwealth recognized Bestal III as a strategic ecological and cultural preserve, granting the Felyari Protected Species status under Charter Code 7-A.
Rather than force integration, the Commonwealth offered a clan-to-clan diplomatic model, allowing Felyari to migrate voluntarily into Commonwealth service as scouts, engineers, medics, and cultural advisors. Many who left Bestal did so on the condition they could return seasonally for rites, or that offworld “urban clanhalls” be established in cities like Dosuun, Salteract, and Dyspeth Prime.
Notably, a Felyari glider-scout named Shaal Vinebreaker was among the first to map Commonwealth drop routes through the Kadal debris and served in several eco-sabotage operations during the localized Ash Conflicts (861–865 ABY).
Current Era and Legacy
Today, the Felyari remain culturally distinct yet politically aligned with the Commonwealth. Their environmental technology, non-linear data storage techniques, and adaptive engineering are in high demand.
Felyari populations remain scattered, but wherever they settle, they build small pockets of kinship and creativity. Their unique worldview, one that perceives the Force as "echoes" and "resonance" has intrigued mystics, and technologists alike.
Despite pressure from certain factions in the Techno-Legacy Bloc to extract more resources from Bestal III or standardize the species’ presence, the Felyari’s protected status, strong diplomatic ties, and strategic value have ensured their autonomy.
Their role in the galaxy, as quiet builders, gentle medics, sharp-eyed scouts, and enigmatic storytellers, has only just begun to be understood.
