Warriors rely on their physical prowess, and spellcasters have all manner of magic, but a savant needs no weapon or armor, only their mind. Brilliant ingenuity, meticulous planning, or keen deductions will win them the day and leave their enemies confused at how they were defeated. Of course, you’d have to be a fool to not use weapons, armor, or magic when they’re available, and savants are no fools. Knowledge is power, but power is also power. A savant is at their most effective when they have an array of tools at their disposal and an assort- ment of allies to enact their cunning schemes.

Consider why your character relies on wits instead of warcraft or wizardry. Were they physically feeble and had to think their way out of challenges? Did they receive a refined education and learn from history and literature how to deal with all manner of unlikely scenarios? Have they just picked up these talents on the job, per- haps working a trade or serving as a guard?

Your highest ability score should be Intelligence, followed by Dex- terity. Get proficiency in Deception, Investigation, and Perception, plus disguise kits. Choose the Vanguard archetype, and choose proficiency with Culture, light armor, blowguns, pistols, scimitars, and whips. Learn the tricks Antagonizing Flourish, Improved Bas- tion Aegis, and Unbalancing Intervention. Learn the clever scheme Impromptu Persona.

Multiclassing Prerequisite: Intelligence 13 Proficiencies Gained: Improvised weapons and one type of tools

As a savant, you gain the following class features.

Hit Dice: 1d8 per savant level
Hit Points at 1st Level: 8 + your Constitution modifier
Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d8 (or 5) + your Constitution modifier per savant level after 1st

Armor: None
Weapons: Simple weapons, improvised weapons
Tools: Choose any one
Saving Throws: Dexterity, Intelligence
Skills: Choose three from Arcana, Culture, Deception, Engineering, Insight, Investigation, Medicine, Perception, Performance, Persuasion, and Sleight of Hand

You begin the game with 125 gp (plus the 30 gp each beginning Zeitgeist character gets, for a total of 155 gp) which you can spend on your character’s starting weapons, armor, and adventuring gear. You can select your own gear or choose one of the following equip- ment packages.
* Bravo’s Set (cost 137 gp): scimitar, 2 daggers, blowgun, pistol, whip, 20 shots (bullets and firedust), explorer’s pack, leather armor, disguise kit.
* Thinker’s Set (cost 146 gp): mace (a cane), 2 daggers, carbine, 20 shots (bullets and firedust), burglar’s pack, leather armor, thieves’ tools.

You constantly analyze combat situations to improve your defen- sive posture, proactively interfering to guide attacks away from yourself. While you are wearing no armor, your AC equals 10 + your Dexterity modifier + your Intelligence modifier. You cannot use a shield and still gain this benefit. The savant is not proficient in armor by default, but might gain those proficiencies through archetypes, feats, or multiclassing. When you are wearing armor you’re proficient in, you can use your Intelligence in place of your Dexterity to determine your AC.

Your Savant archetype defines what your greatest aptitude is. This book presents three types of savant: Steward, Vanguard, and Vox. The steward is expert at protecting and healing allies. The van- guard joins the thick of the fight, looking for tactical opportunities others miss. The vox deeply understands how words can manipu- late people. Your archetype gives you unique features at 1st level and again at 2nd, 6th, 11th, 14th, and 17th level.

Introduced in Level Up, exploration knacks are a variety of abilities that help you deal with non-combat challenges. Each class gets its own collection to choose from, and savants’ are called clever schemes. If you are not playing Level Up, your Narrator might ignore these clever schemes so that a savant doesn’t outshine other characters. You learn one clever scheme of your choice. These schemes are detailed at the end of the class description. The Schemes Known column of the Savant table shows when you learn more clever schemes.

You have developed a small number of clever gambits, deft maneu- vers, and canny guards which help you prevail in battle by using your wits. The number of tricks you know is listed on the Savant table, and you can choose from the list below and from the list of tricks your archetype makes available. To use a trick, you must first prepare it by spending a bonus action. You cannot prepare a trick outside of an encounter, but once a trick is prepared, it remains prepared until you use it, until the encounter ends, or until you spend a bonus action to replace it with a different trick. You can only have one trick prepared at time. Different tricks can be used at different times. Some can be used without requiring any action, in response to some trigger. Others require your action, bonus action, or reaction. Some of your tricks require your target to make a saving throw to resist its effects. The saving throw DC is calculated as follows: Trick save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Intelligence modifier Whenever you gain a level in this class, you can choose to replace a trick you know with a different trick.

Some tricks are called Aegises, which let you defend against some sort of attack. Other tricks are called Flourishes, which you can use when you hit with a melee weapon attack. If a trick offers a saving throw, after you use it against a particu- lar creature, that creature has advantage on saving throws against other uses of that same trick until the end of combat. If the trick doesn’t permit a saving throw, after you use it against a particular creature, you cannot use the same trick against that creature for the rest of the combat.

Attention Diverting Aegis. When a creature within 30 feet that can sense you makes an attack that isn’t targeting you, you can use this trick to distract the attacker. If it fails a Wisdom saving throw, until your next turn it has disadvantage on all attack rolls it makes that aren’t against you.
Canny Dodge Aegis. When an attack would hit you, you can use this trick to roll 1d4 and add it to your AC against that attack. Alter- natively, when you would fail a Dexterity saving throw, you can use this trick to roll 1d4 and add it to your saving throw. In either case, you know how much the roll succeeded or failed by before deciding whether to use this aegis.
Committee Defense Aegis. When a creature attacks you, if it is not the first creature to attack you since the start of your last turn, you find an avenue of opportunity amid the massed assault. You can use this trick to impose disadvantage on that creature’s attack. Then, you gain advantage on the next attack roll you make before the end of your next turn that targets a creature that attacked you this round.
Improvised Bastion Aegis. When a creature’s attack, spell, or ability would damage you, you can use this trick to devise a mo- mentary defense (using a chair as a shield, predicting a safe spot in an explosion, diluting a spray of acid with a solvent, etc). You gain resistance to one type of damage you would take, which protects you only against the triggering hostile act.
Mindful Reason Aegis. When you would fail an Intelligence or Wisdom saving throw, you can use this trick to roll 1d4 and add it to your saving throw. You know how much the roll failed by before deciding whether to use this aegis.
Serpentine Rush Aegis. When you are targeted by a ranged attack, you can use this trick and your reaction to move your speed. Until the end of your next turn, ranged attacks against you have disadvantage. Additionally, your movement might get you to a location where cover makes you hard or impossible to hit. Reduce your speed on your next turn by the distance that you move when using this trick.
Tangled Dance Aegis. When you would be hit with an attack and a creature other than the attacker is adjacent to you, you can use this trick to try to dodge so the attack hits that creature. If the attacker fails an Intelligence saving throw, change the attack’s target to another creature within 5 feet, and the attacker uses the same result of its attack roll.
Undermining Taunt Aegis. When a creature misses with an attack or when a foe succeeds on a saving throw against an effect it created, you can use this trick to capitalize on their failure, warning the creature why another possible course of action will also turn out badly. If that creature can understand you, choose an action, such as Attack or Cast a Spell. The target must make a Charisma saving throw. If it fails, until the end of its next turn it cannot take that action.

Antagonizing Flourish. When you hit a creature with a melee attack, you can try to draw its ire. If it fails a Charisma saving throw, it has disadvantage on attack rolls against creatures other than you until the start of your next turn.
Disarming Flourish. When you hit a creature with a melee attack, you can attempt to disarm it. If it fails a Strength saving throw, its grip is loosened, and the creature cannot make use of the item until it spends a bonus action or attack on its turn to regain a solid hold. If the creature has disadvantage on the save and fails both rolls, it drops the item.
Experimental Flourish. Whenever you miss with an attack, you improvise a follow-up that doesn’t directly attack a foe, such as slicing a rope to pin an enemy with a chandelier, or smashing a pipe to spray blinding steam on an enemy. Circumstances will dictate what the effect is, but some examples include shoving or impos- ing the blinded, deafened, grappled, or prone condition, and may also deal damage equal to your Intelligence modifier. Any condi- tions imposed should seldom last more than one round. Creatures affected can make an Intelligence saving throw to anticipate your trick and avoid the effect.
Guiding Flourish. When you hit a creature with a melee attack, you can try to trick it into moving. If it fails a Dexterity saving throw, it moves up to 10 feet in a direction of your choice. This movement doesn’t provoke opportunity attacks. If this movement would cause it to take damage (such as by falling or entering fire), the creature has advantage on this saving throw.
Menacing Flourish. When you hit a creature with a melee attack, you can spend a bonus action to activate this trick and de- liver a terrifying threat. The target makes a Wisdom saving throw. If it fails, for the next minute it is frightened of you.
Surgical Flourish. When you have advantage on a melee attack and both dice results are high enough to hit, choose one of the creature’s limbs or eyes to debilitate. If the creature succeeds a Constitution saving throw, you debilitate that body part until the end of your next turn. If it fails the saving throw, the body part is debilitated until the creature can take a short rest.

Assess Vulnerability. When you attack a creature, you can use your Intelligence bonus in place of another ability score bonus for the attack roll and damage roll. This applies to all attacks you make against it before the start of your next turn, but not to attacks you make against other creatures.
Choreographed Disappearance. On your turn, you say some- thing to turn a foe’s attention away from you or an ally. You or an ally of your choice who can understand you can move up to their speed. This movement does not provoke opportunity attacks from one creature of your choice that can understand you. If they end up having obscurement or cover relative to the distracted foe, they can Hide without spending an action.
Direct Ally. You identify an opening an ally can take advantage of. You can spend an action and choose an ally that can understand you, then choose a target. If that ally hits that target with an attack before the start of your next turn, their attack deals an extra 1d8 damage. The bonus dice increase to 2d8 at 5th level, 3d8 at 11th level, and 4d8 at 17th level. After you use this trick, you can choose the same ally again, but cannot choose the same target for the rest of the encounter.
Frightful Suppression. When you make an attack that causes loud noises—a firearm or grenade, or also items and spells that deal thunder damage—you can use this trick to force the attack’s target (or creatures in the attack’s area) to make a Wisdom saving throw to gauge when it is safe to move, and thus avoid being pinned down. A creature that fails cannot move until the start of your next turn unless it spends an action.
Rallying Word. You know just what to say to inspire an ally’s flagging stamina. You can spend a bonus action to let an ally within 30 feet who can understand you spend a hit die. If it does, it rolls that hit die (adding its Constitution bonus) plus 1d8 and heals hit points equal to the total. The bonus dice increase to 2d8 at 5th level, 3d8 at 11th level, and 4d8 at 17th level. After you use this ability, the same ally cannot benefit from it again until you complete a short rest.
Saving Advice. Spend a bonus action to advise an ally who can understand you. Choose a saving throw. One time before the end of this encounter, that ally can gain an expertise die on one saving throw of that type, used at the time of their choice. An expertise die is 1d4 they roll and add.
Sweeping Stride. When you stand up, or when you move at least 10 feet and enter a space adjacent to a creature no more than one size larger than you, you can try to trip it. If the creature fails a Dexterity saving throw, it falls prone. If it succeeds, instead your movement ends in the space you entered to use this ability. If you used this ability while standing up, you remain prone.
Timely Tool. Spend a bonus action to use an item that normally can be used as an action. This cannot cause damage or require an attack roll. Examples include administering an antitoxin, potion, or other easy-to-swallow item to a willing creature within reach; lighting a torch; tossing out caltrops, or barring a door.
Unbalancing Intervention. When a creature within your reach makes a Strength or Dexterity ability check or saving throw, you can use your reaction to perform a series of pulls, shoves, and strikes that put a creature off-balance. The creature has disadvan- tage on its ability check or saving throw.

Some savants are prepared to bloody their knuckles in a fight, while others make a point of staying out of the scrum. At 2nd level, you choose one of the following poises.

You have a deft ability to predict your opponents’ responses and interfere with them. Whenever a creature within your reach that you are aware of attempts to take a reaction, you can expend your reaction for the round to try to disrupt them. That creature must make an Intelligence saving throw against your trick DC. If they fail, their reaction is wasted.

You gain the ability to use combat maneuvers. (Combat maneuvers are detailed in the Level Up Adventurer’s Guide.) You gain an exertion point pool equal to your proficiency bonus. Choose two martial traditions. (Most savants learn maneuvers of the traditions Biting Zephyr, Mist and Shade, Rapid Current, or Sanguine Knot.) Whenever you gain a savant trick, you can instead choose a maneuver from any of your chosen martial traditions. You can initially learn maneuvers of the 1st degree. At 7th level you gain access to 2nd degree maneuvers, then at 13th level you can access 3rd degree maneuvers, and finally at 19th level you can access 4th degree maneuvers.

You can adapt your mind for whatever challenges you expect. Start- ing at 3rd level, when you complete a short or long rest you can choose a skill. Until you complete another rest, whenever you make an ability check using that skill, you use Intelligence instead of the ability score it normally uses.

At 3rd level, and again at 7th, 11th, 15th, and 19th, choose a skill you are proficient with. You gain an expertise die on checks with that skill. (An expertise die is 1d4 you roll and add to your check result.)

When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can’t increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.

At 4th level, choose one savant trick you know. You are considered to always have that trick prepared, and it does not count against the limit of the number of tricks you can have prepared. When you use that trick, it does not stop being prepared. Whenever you gain a level, you can change your signature move.

At 5th level, you refine your combat poise. Choose one of the follow- ing, or one of the combat poise options available at 2nd level.

Extra Attack. When you use the Attack action on your turn, you can make two attacks.
Rational Maneuvers. You can use your Intelligence bonus to cal- culate the DCs of your basic maneuvers and combat maneuvers.

At 7th level, whenever you complete a long rest you may choose one ability score and gain proficiency in saving throws of that type until you use this ability again.

Also at 7th level, on your turn you can prepare a trick without spending an action. You can do this a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus. Thereafter, preparing tricks requires the usual bonus action until you complete a short rest.

At 9th level, you can use the confusion of a large battle to protect you. If there are at least two enemies within 30 feet, you can use a bonus action to choose one of them. Until the end of your next turn, that creature has disadvantage on attack rolls against you.

At 10th level, you can hold two tricks in reserve, in addition to your signature trick. Whenever you prepare a trick, you can fill both trick slots (or keep one that is prepared and replace another).

At 13th level, your combat poise can achieve remarkable things. Choose one of the following, or one of the combat poise options available at 2nd or 5th level.

Confounding Defense. The first time each round that you use an aegis, you can immediately prepare another aegis trick.
The Opportune Moment. On your turn, you can take one addition- al action. You cannot use this ability on the first round of combat. After you use this feature, you cannot use it again until you com- plete a short or long rest.

At 15th level, your mental capabilities transcend the normal limita- tions mortal minds face. You gain an expertise die on all Intelligence checks and saving throws.

At 18th level, you can overcome obstacles with ease. When you or another creature that can understand you starts its turn you can grant it the ability to ignore all sources of disadvantage until the start of its next turn. After you use this feature, you cannot use it again until you complete a short or long rest.

At 20th level, you’re clever enough to accomplish anything. When- ever you complete a long rest, choose an effect that could be accomplished by a spell of level 8 or lower. You can have that effect occur immediately, or keep it in reserve for the day, and cause it to occur at any point by spending an action. This can be because you acquired a magic item or spellcaster willing to perform the magic, or have a device or hirelings capable of matching the feat.

Some savants see themselves as guides, mentors, or helpers, using their knowledge to help their allies and generally eschewing a direct role in any physical altercation. It often falls to them to repair the wounds of battle—physical, mental, and spiritual—and they may find themselves repairing dented armor, coordinating watches, or preparing equipment for the day’s adventures. Stewards serve as physicians, military officers, constables of the law, academic faculty, and all manner of other roles throughout society.

When you choose this archetype at 1st level, you gain proficiency with Culture and one language. You also gain proficiency in one of the following: light armor, Animal Handling, Insight, Medicine, Perception, or Survival.

At 1st level, when you prepare an aegis trick, you can communicate the idea to an ally that can understand you within 10 feet. Until the end of your next turn, that ally can use that trick as if they had pre- pared it; the trick uses your trick DC. If either of you use the trick, it expends it for both of you. If the ally doesn’t use the trick before the end of your next turn, it remains available for you until you use it. At 6th level, the range of this ability increases to 30 feet.

At 2nd level, you can use your reaction to let an ally re-roll a failed saving throw or ability check. Once you use this feature, you must complete a short rest before you can use it again.

Also at 2nd level, you can optimize your group’s resources to aid in resting. Whenever you take a short rest, you and any allied crea- tures regain additional hit points equal to your proficiency bonus. Additionally, you can choose one creature resting with you and give it extra care, perhaps involving emotional counsel, massage, or herbal medicine. That creature can remove a level of strife. (Strife is a mental and emotional version of fatigue in the Level Up rules.)

At 6th level, you can use the Help action as a bonus action. Addi- tionally, when you use the Help action to aid an ally in attacking a creature, the target of that attack can be within 30 feet of you, rather than 5 feet of you, if the target can understand you.

At 11th level, with a mix of planning and motivation you can help someone maximize their efforts at one type of task. Spend an action and choose a creature within 30 feet that can understand you, and choose one ability score. For the next hour, that creature gains the benefits of enhance ability for the chosen ability score. This is not a magical effect, and you do not need to concentrate to maintain it. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.

At 14th level, you can spend an action and use a mix of soothing remedies and confident bedside manner to help an ally overcome some ailment. This can make the creature suffer no effects from one disease for ten minutes, or can let it ignore one of the following conditions: blinded, deafened, paralyzed, or poisoned. If you use this technique too often, you lose the necessary confi- dence for the placebo to work. Once you use this feature, you must complete a short or long rest before you can use it again.

At 17th level, your presence is enough to help allies cling to life a little longer, confident that you have a plan to save them. If one of your allies that you’re aware died in the past round, you can use your action to entreat them to hold on. If you do, they briefly return to life at 0 hit points, are stable, and for the next minute cannot be required to make death saving throws from taking damage. If they remain at 0 hit points at the end of one minute, they actually die. At the narrator’s discretion, some actions can kill a helpless crea- ture despite this ability, such as decapitation or falling in lava. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.

Vanguard savants have the training to engage in a fight directly. They employ tactics to disrupt their enemies’ normal strategies, forcing foes to battle on their back foot. And by knowing their ally’s talents, they can set up the perfect opening for a teammate to shine.

When you choose this archetype at 1st level, you gain proficiency with light armor and four martial weapons. You also gain profi- ciency with one of the following: medium armor, shields, Arcana, Culture, Engineering, Investigation, Nature, or Religion.

At 1st level, your ingenuity in combat spans the whole battlefield. You can use flourish tricks on ranged attacks you make against creatures within 30 feet. At 6th level, you can use flourish tricks on attacks at any range.

At 2nd level, when you take the Attack action on your turn, you may forego one of your attacks. If you do, one ally within 30 feet can use its reaction to make one weapon attack.

Also at 2nd level, when an attack you make is a critical hit, you can immediately prepare a trick without needing to spend a bonus action. If you already have a trick prepared, you can replace it. If you have a flourish prepared, you may use it on this critical hit, before choosing to prepare a new trick.

At 6th level, when you hit a creature with a melee attack, you dis- tract that foe through a mix of repartee and positioning, causing them to move in the direction you want. If they fail a Wisdom saving throw against your trick DC, until the end of your turn when you move, you can move them an equal distance, keeping them within your melee reach the whole time. Their movement doesn’t provoke opportunity attacks, and if you would move them into a space that would cause them damage, they can choose to stop outside it. After you use this ability, you cannot use it against the same crea- ture again until you complete a short rest.

At 11th level, you can read your enemies like a book. You can use a bonus action to make an Intelligence (Investigation) check against the Maneuver DC of a creature you have spent at least one round observing in combat. If you succeed, choose three of the follow- ing items to learn about the creature: Armor Class, vulnerabilities, resistances, immunities, weakest saving throw, or highest ability score. At the narrator’s discretion, you might learn other pertinent details of its combat abilities. After you use this ability on a creature, you cannot attempt it against the same creature until you complete a short or long rest.

At 14th level, when you use Coordinate Attack, your ally does not need to use their reaction in order to make an attack.

At 17th level, you can predict an enemy’s tactics with enough preci- sion to thwart them with ease. When you use Combat Deduction and succeed the Investigation check, until the end of your next turn you have advantage on attack rolls against that creature, it has disadvantage on attack rolls against you, the creature has dis- advantage on saving throws against your abilities, and you have advantage on saving throws against its abilities.

A savant with the vox aptitude manipulates people with their voice, using appeals to reason or emotion as well as outright castigation, intimidation, or prevarication. They are common among the non-spellcasting ideologues in Crisllyir’s shadow war between the Meliskans and Ottoplismists, with the earliest masters of this art having learned it in the hereti- cal vault that once held prison the great temptress, Ashima-Shimtu, known as the Lady of the Forked Tongue and Seneschal of the Demonocracy. The term vox means “voice” in the Infernal language, but these savants can influence people with any form of linguistic communi- cation, including text and signing, though enemies may find these methods easier to ignore.

When you choose this archetype at 1st level, you gain proficiency with Insight and one language. You also gain proficiency in one of the following: light armor, Deception, Intimidation, Performance, or Persuasion.

At 1st level, you can manipulate people with words as easily as a warrior can with physical force. You can spend an action to affect a creature within 30 feet that can understand you with any flourish trick that you have prepared other than Surgical Flourish, without making an attack. At 6th level, the range you can affect a creature increases to 60 feet. Additionally, you gain the ability to use flourish tricks other than Surgical Flourish whenever you deal damage to a creature with your Weapon of Choice ability (see below).

At 2nd level you train your mind to pick up languages as needed. By spending a short or long rest in the presence of a speaker of any language, you can acquire a rudimentary understanding of that language, enough to have a basic conversation. Any abilities you have that rely on sharing a common language and require a saving throw can work, but the target has advantage on their save. The cognitive effort to decode the unfamiliar tongue means that if you use this ability again, you lose access to any other language you learned through it.

Also at 2nd level, you can guide a foe to ruin with your words. You can use an action to insult a creature within 60 feet that can un- derstand you, or undermine its confidence, goad it into exhausting itself, amuse it into giving up the fight, or similar verbal gambits. If the creature fails a Wisdom saving throw against your trick DC, it takes 1d6 psychic damage and its hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the damage taken. The reduction lasts until the creature completes a short rest. A creature reduced to 0 hit points this way is not dying, but rather is conscious and incapacitated. The damage increases to 2d6 and 5th level, 3d6 at 11th level, and 4d6 at 17th level.

At 6th level, you are able to keep people and creatures’ attention focused on you. Spend an action to cause creatures of your choice that can perceive you to make a Wisdom saving throw against your trick save DC. Creatures that don’t understand your language have advantage on the saving throw. Creatures that cannot be charmed automatically succeed their saving throws, and if you or your com- panions are fighting a creature, it makes its saving throw with advantage. On a failure, a creature is charmed by you for as long as you continue talking (with reasonable pauses, perhaps even conversa- tion back and forth) and for the next hour after. While charmed by you, the creature has disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks made to perceive creatures other than you. The focus required for this mesmerism is mentally taxing. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.

At 11th level, as an action you can suggest an activity (limited to a sentence or two) to a creature that can hear and understand you. A creature that can’t be charmed is immune to this feature. The course of action must sound reasonable, as with the suggestion spell. If the target fails a Wisdom saving throw, it pursues the course of action you described to the best of its ability for as long as you are present, and for up to 10 minutes after. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.

At 14th level you know all languages, and cannot be magically si- lenced. If you would be affected by a language-dependent effect, you may choose to ignore that effect, as if you didn’t understand the language. Additionally, so deft is your understanding of language that when you make an ability check to influence someone with words, you gain an expertise die. An expertise die is 1d4 you roll and add.

At 17th level, you can spend an action to so utterly cut to the core of a person’s identity that for a moment they might lose the will to live. One creature that can understand you is stunned. At the end of each of its turns it must make a Charisma saving throw against your trick DC or else it gains a level of strife. The effect ends when it succeeds one of these saving throws, or when it has six levels of strife. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.

You can choose from among the following talents that help with exploration.

Whenever you take a short or long rest, you can use your medical knowledge to treat one creature. That creature can heal as if it had one extra 1d4 hit die during this rest, or it can ignore one level of fatigue for the next four hours.

After observing a creature, however briefly, you make a deduction that gives you an edge when pursuing it. After you spend at least 1 minute observing a creature, you gain an expertise die on checks made to track that specific creature.

Following the path trod by Drakran naturalist Karl Evol, author of A Theory of Noetic Field Adaptation Toward Terrifyingness Among Malice Ecologies, you have studied the many perils of wild flora and fauna. You gain an expertise die on checks to avoid, locate, or understand the abilities of aberrations, beasts, and monstrosities.

You do not need preparation to come up with a convincing fake persona, background, and excuse to cover anything suspicious you are doing. You can gain advantage on Deception checks to pretend to be someone else. However, the ruse won’t hold up to prolonged scrutiny. If you spend more than a few minutes in someone’s pres- ence, you must make a new Deception check with disadvantage to maintain the ruse.

When you are ambushed, you gain an expertise die on your initia- tive check. When you trigger a trap, you gain an expertise die on the first saving throw you need to make, or to your AC against the first attack the trap makes against you. After you use this ability, you cannot use it again until you complete a short rest.

When a creature makes a melee attack against you or otherwise touches you, you can make a Sleight of Hand check against them as a reaction. Additionally, when you spend at least a minute interact- ing with someone within arm’s reach, you gain an expertise die on Sleight of Hand checks involving them until the interaction ends.

You quickly can locate people willing to share information. If you spend an hour reaching out to local residents or simply perusing a recent periodical or newspaper, for the next day you gain an ex- pertise die on Culture and Investigation checks related to the area.

You gain an expertise die on Charisma checks with Arcana, History, Nature, or Religion when trying to interact with someone who is trained in the same skill.

You make sure you’re always prepared. Once per short rest you can produce a non-magical item that you could have purchased or prepared at some point, small enough to fit in whatever storage you have available. This could range from a forged passport in your pocket to a glider stowed in the hold of a ship you’re traveling on. Pay the appropriate price for it. Limits of causality apply.

Once per hour, when you succeed on an Acrobatics or Athletics check to climb, swim, or jump you can offer advice and encourage- ment to your allies. For the next minute, each ally who attempts a check to traverse the same area gains an expertise die.

You can spend an action to make an Arcana check against the save DC of a creature’s spell. If you succeed, you deduce from their de- meanor, fashion, and accoutrements what cantrips they know and the last non-cantrip spell it cast, if any.

Apotropaics (page 82) are specific items that can repel or harm certain creatures, like bells driving away fiends. You can spend an action to reinforce an apotropaic you are touching for one day. If you brandish a reinforced apotropaic to repel a creature, add an expertise die to your opposed Charisma check. If a creature tries to bypass the repellent effect of a reinforced apotropaic bar- rier (like an undead crossing a line of salt), add an expertise die to the flat DC the creature must overcome. If a reinforced item is used to harm a creature (like jade dust against an aberration), you can also make an opposed Charisma check to repel that creature without needing to spend a separate action (and you add an exper- tise die to your check).

You have forethought of when and where you might need to be places. If you knew you would be in a given area, once per day you can call upon this forethought to have a vehicle or mount waiting for you and your companions, or to have a reservation available at a venue. You pay any appropriate costs. For exceptional requests, you may need to make a Persuasion check or owe someone a favor.

Once per hour, when you succeed on a Stealth check you can discreetly direct your allies. For the next minute, each ally who at- tempts a check to traverse the same area gains an expertise die. When moving through an area you’re familiar with or have had time to study maps of, you gain an expertise die on Stealth checks.

You instead gain an expertise die on Engineering checks and when using tools to build, repair, or understand a technological device. Unstable Poison You gain an expertise die on checks made with the poisoner’s kit. You learn the recipe for creating basic poison. During a short or long rest, you can brew one poison for which you have the recipe without spending gold or using ingredients. This version of the poison lasts until your next short or long rest.