This whimsical Tanuki musician brings a touch of folklore charm to your tabletop. Dressed in a traditional kimono and a large lotus leaf hat, he is captured mid-performance while strumming his shamisen with a joyful expression.
A tanuki minstrel performing a lively dance and song during a festival or at a roadside tavern.
A friendly traveling minstrel, a tavern performer, or a low-level player character bard.
Artist: Villages Hope
Type: HERO
Pose: The figure is in a dynamic dancing stance, balanced on one leg with the other raised. The torso is slightly twisted, and one arm is raised in celebration.
Action: Playing instrument
Mood: joyful
Action Category: Social/Interaction
Genre: Fantasy, Wuxia/Eastern
Suitable Locations: roadside shrine, village festival square, mountain monastery, bustling tavern in an Eastern city, mystical forest grove, Lord's banquet hall, spirit world tea house
Encounter Scenarios: a wandering minstrel providing information, a trickster spirit challenging the party to a dance-off, a local guide through a haunted bamboo forest, a joyful bystander during a lunar festival
Power Level: Easy (score 18/10)
Compatible Game Systems: Dungeons & Dragons (5e / general) (perfect): Excellent for a Bard of a small race like a Halfling or a homebrew Tanuki race.; Legend of the Five Rings (perfect): Fits perfectly as a non-human spirit or folklore character.; Ryuutama (perfect): Matches the 'Natural Fantasy' and cozy aesthetic of the game perfectly.; Pathfinder (1e / 2e) (good): Can represent a Kitsune-adjacent or homebrew small beastkin Bard.; Fabula Ultima (good): Fits the whimsical Eastern-inspired fantasy tropes.
Race: Tanuki, Sex: Indeterminate, Build: Stocky, Size: Small, Age: Adult, Style: Stylized
Also suitable as: Raccoon Dog, Beastkin, Anthros
Distinguishing Features: bushy tail, pointed animal ears, fur texture, raccoon-like snout
Weapons: Shamisen: A traditional Japanese three-stringed instrument with a rectangular sound box and long neck.
Clothing: kimono, lotus leaf hat, rope belt
Equipment: Shamisen
Accessories: Rope Belt, Lotus Hat
Character Classes: Bard (perfect%), Monk (Way of the Drunken Master) (usable%), Traveling NPC / Minstrel (perfect%)
NPC Role: Minstrel / Entertainer
Aesthetic: Cute / Adorable, Comical / Funny, Whimsical / Playful, Classic Fantasy
Cultural Aesthetic: East Asian — Japanese
Hairstyle: None (non-humanoid)
Similar to characters: Tom Nook, K.K. Slider (Tanuki variant), Pompoko Tanuki, Master Shifu-type animal mentor, Rocket Raccoon (Bard variant)
Miniature Dimensions: 24.5mm H x 21.2mm W x 16.7mm D (base: 25.0mm)
Keywords: tanuki bard, raccoon folk musician, shamisen player mini, japanese folklore creature, cute animal adventurer, oriental fantasy npc, traveling minstrel miniature, 28mm tanuki, dnd badger folk, small animal folk hero, furry bard, wuxia animal character, pathfinder kitsune-adjacent, humble traveler mini, leaf hat creature, animal musician tabletop, bipedal raccoon hero, joyful bard mini, feudal japan animal npc, mythical tanuki statuette, folkloric raccoon, musical critter, stringed instrument miniature
