The Xvart is a fantasy monster. This particular creature appears to have been first officially introduced in the
AD&D Fiend Folio tome, although it may have appeared earlier in White Dwarf magazine. It has since been used in many
other places, and these critters are a common enemy in the computer game Baldur's Gate. These are an example of what is
wrong with the Dungeons and Dragons game. There are simply hundreds of humanoid races like this, with very few differences
between them.
Xvarts are small humanoids who are an average of three feet in height. They are smaller than goblins but larger than
kobolds. Most Xvarts will attack Kobolds on sight, as they can defeat them with relative ease. The Xvarts have bright blue skin and orange eyes. Most goblinoid races come in a variety of colors, but not the Xvart, every single one of them is Papa Smurf blue in color.
Xvarts generally dress in loincloths but many of them will go completely naked. They tend towards exaggerated facial features and most of them go bald very early in life. Their favored weapons are small swords, while more powerful Xvarts will usually tend to use heavier maces flails and axes. Xvarts recognize the use of the net and there will be several members of each tribe who have trained long and hard at using them. Xvarts will only attack humans if they greatly outnumber them, as they are intelligent enough to know the consequences of letting surviving humans escape. They are much more likely to prey upon other humanoid species, particularly kobolds and goblins.
Xvarts tend to live in small tribal groups, usually deep in forests or underground. As a race they lean towards evil and chaos, but individual Xvarts are certainly free to choose their own morals (although very few of them do). Most Xvart villages will have a few spellcasters. Xvart spellcasters may be either shamans or witches (religious or non-religious), but they usually only know very basic spells. Xvart villages usually have large populations of women and children, usually over double the number of adult males. This is due to the dangerous lives most Xvart males live. The excess of female Xvarts has doomed them to subservience, with large numbers of them being unable to attract mates at all.
Xvarts love to take prisoners, which they usually proceed to torture, but sometimes they will hold them for ransom. They do not keep slave populations, instead they use the females for that sort of work, as it is a lot safer than keeping slaves around.
My monster nodes are usually based upon material in the various AD&D rulebooks. But they are my own work, as I often expand the information. In some cases I will blatantly disagree with the source material. None of these nodes are cut and paste. You are free to use my descriptions in any material of your own (even commercial material), as long as I am credited as the source.