Gods of the Multiverse

Religion is an important part of life in the worlds of the Dungeons and Dragons multiverse. When gods walk the world, clerics channel divine power, evil cults perform dark sacrifices in subterranean lairs, and shining paladins stand like beacons against the darkness, it’s hard to be ambivalent about the deities and deny their existence.

Many people have a favorite among the gods, one whose idea is and teachings they make their own. And a few people dedicate themselves entirely to a single god, usually serving as a priest or champion of that god’s ideals.

From among the gods available, you can choose a single deity for your character to serve, worship, or pay lip service to or you can pick a few that your character prays to most often or just make a mental note of the gods who are revered in your DM’s campaign so you can invoke their names when appropriate. ]If you’re playing a cleric or a character with the Acolyte background, decide which god your deity serves or served, and consider the deity’s suggested domains when selecting your character’s domain.

The Pantheon

In the following pages are showing the different Pantheons that exist in the Campaign.  The Pantheons are represented by several columns of Information:

• Name:  What they are called and worshiped by
• Rank: At what power level is that deity compared to the others: Greater[G], Intermediate[I], Lesser[L], Demigod[D]
• Alignment: What alignment the god/goddess themselves have and will act toward
• Portfolio:  What powers that specific god/goddess is known to have
• Domain:  What domains of power that the god/goddess covers.  These are the divine domains that clerics focus on.
• Worshipers:  Who worships this specific god/goddess.

Pantheons

• Faerunian Pantheon
• Drow (Dark Seldarine) Pantheon
• Dwarven (Morndinsamm) Pantheon
• Elven (Seldarine) Pantheon
• Giant (Ordning) Pantheon
• Gnome (Lords of the Golden Hills) Pantheon
• Halfling (Yondalla’s Children) Pantheon
• Orc Pantheon

Faerunian Pantheon

Drow (Dark Seldarine) Pantheon

Dwarven (Morndinsamm) Pantheon

Elven (Seldarine) Pantheon

Giant (Ordning) Pantheon

Gnome (Lords of the Golden Hills) Pantheon

Halfling (Yondalla’s Children) Pantheon

Orc Pantheon

This bestiary is for storytellers and world-builders. If you have ever thought about running a Dungeons & Dragons game for your friends, either a single night’s adventure or a long-running campaign, this tome contains page after page of inspiration. It’s your one-stop shop for creatures both malevolent and benign.

Some of the creatures that inhabit the worlds of D&D have origins rooted in real-world mythology and fantasy literature. Other creatures are D&D originals. The monsters in this book have been culled from all previous editions of the game. Herein you’ll discover classic critters such as the beholder and the displacer beast next to more recent creations such as the chuul and the twig blight. Common beasts mingle with the weird, the terrifying, and the ridiculous. In collecting monsters from the past, we’ve endeavored to reflect the multifaceted nature of the game, warts and all. D&D monsters come in all shapes and sizes, with stories that not only thrill us but also make us smile

• Furlion’s Shifting Whiskers
• Mobile Consciousness

Monsters and Creatures

Furlion’s Shifting Whiskers

Special Abilities

Keen. This feline has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing sight.

Enhanced Agility: The hairless riding cat has exceptional agility and dexterity, allowing it to navigate treacherous terrains, leap over obstacles effortlessly, and execute swift turns with precision. This mount can ignore all difficult terrain.

Speed of the Wind: Once mounted, the cat can run at incredible speeds, rivaling the wind itself. It swiftly traverses long distances, making it an ideal mode of transportation for adventurers seeking quick travel or escape. While activated it has a movement of 40 feet.

Astral Bond: The hairless riding cat shares a deep connection with its owner. It possesses an innate sense of the rider’s emotions and can offer comfort and companionship during long journeys. This bond also grants the rider a heightened sense of perception while mounted. Rider gains Advantage on Perception rolls while mounted.

Actions

Bite: Melee Weapon Attack: +2 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 1d4 piercing damage.

Claws: Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 1d6+4 slashing damage. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 13 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.

Description

Furlion’s Shifting Whiskers is a cherished and sought-after magic item, as it combines the allure of a fashionable accessory with the convenience and speed of a reliable, hairless riding companion. It has become a symbol of adventure and freedom, captivating the hearts of those who yearn for both magical companionship and swift transportation in the world of fantasy.

These are best used as mounts for small sized creatures.

Mobile Consciousness

Special Abilities

Movement:  The Mobile Consciousness is only able to fly. It can “swim” at the same speed as it’s flying.  It does not need to eat or breath.

Magic Resistance. The Mobile Consciousness has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects due to them being partially immaterial.  While not able to pass through objects, they are also not quite solid.

Spellcasting. The Mobile Consciousness is a 3rd-level spellcaster. Its spellcasting ability is Intelligence (spell save DC 13, +5 to hit with spell attacks). The Mobile Consciousness has the following wizard spells prepared:

• Cantrips (at will): Mage Hand, Mind Sliver
• 1st level (2 slots): Dissonant Whispers
• 2nd level (1 slots): Mind Spike

Familiar. The Mobile Consciousness can enter a contract to serve another creature as a familiar, forming a telepathic bond with its willing master. While the two are bonded, the master can sense what the Mobile Consciousness senses if they are within 1 mile of each other. While the Mobile Consciousness is within 10 feet of its master, the master shares the Mobile Consciousness’s Magic Resistance trait.

The Mobile Consciousness can whisper to the caster’s mind even when it has not been summoned.  If left unsummoned for more than a week, the Mobile Consciousness will start to pester the caster until it has been summoned.  While it pesters the caster, the caster will be at a disadvantage on all spell casting.

The Caster is unable to ever remove or gain a replacement familiar after the Mobile Consciousness has been chosen.  If it is caused to be removed from the Prime Material Plane for any reason, and the caster does not cast another Find Familiar to summon it back, the caster will start to suffer under a disadvantage on all spell casting after a week of the Mobile Consciousness having gone away until it has been re-summoned.

Actions

Invisibility. The Mobile Consciousness may at will turn magically invisible until it attacks, or it willingly ends the invisibility.

Mind Sliver Ranged Magic Attack (60’): +5 to hit, one target. Hit 1d6 (special)

Description

The Mobile Consciousness will resemble a ball of light most of the time, but for limited times each day it may also assume the shape of an older looking person.  That person can be of any humanoid race and gender but will always be the exact same shape for each individual Mobile Consciousness.  Each one will only have one unique spirit form.

All forms of the Mobile Consciousness are semi-independent.  While they will listen to the commands of the caster, it is able to argue, discuss those options as well, and more literally interpret those commands to a result that may not be what the caster intended.  It will never attempt to cause the caster direct harm, but it is perfectly willing to play pranks on the caster and their companions.

Note that the casting if Find Familiar for the Mobile Consciousness is different than the normal casting.  The casting itself will be a form of meditation for the casting time, and the ingredients will be the casters blood itself.  The caster takes 1d4 of damage as well as one level of exhaustion.

Magic Items

Magic items are gleaned from the hordes of conquered monsters or discovered in long-lost vaults. Such items grant capabilities a character could rarely have otherwise, or they complement their owner’s capabilities in wondrous ways.

Rarity

Each magic item has a rarity: common, uncommon, rare, very rare, or legendary. Common magic items, such as a potion of healing, are the most plentiful. Some legendary items, such as the Apparatus of Kwalish, are unique. The game assumes that the secrets of creating the most powerful items arose centuries ago and were then gradually lost because of wars, cataclysms, and mishaps. Even uncommon items can’t be easily created. Thus, many magic items are well-preserved antiquities.

Rarity provides a rough measure of an item’s power relative to other magic items. Each rarity corresponds to character level, as shown in the Magic Item Rarity table. A character doesn’t typically find a rare magic item, for example, until around 5th level. That said, rarity shouldn’t get in the way of your campaign’s story. If you want a ring of invisibility to fall into the hands of a 1st-level character, so be it. No doubt a great story will arise from that event.

If your campaign allows for trade in magic items, rarity can also help you set prices for them. As the DM, you determine the value of an individual magic item based on its rarity. Suggested values are provided in the Magic Item Rarity table. The value of a consumable item, such as a potion or scroll, is typically half the value of a permanent item of the same rarity.

Magic Item Rarity Table

These listed prices and approximate availability are dependent on the Campaign itself.  There is also the possibility of growth magical items that change as specific conditions are met.

Attunement

Some magic items require a creature to form a bond with them before their magical properties can be used. This bond is called attunement, and certain items have a prerequisite for it. If the prerequisite is a class, a creature must be a member of that class to attune to the item. (If the class is a spellcasting class, a monster qualifies if that monster has spell slots and uses that class’s spell list.)

Without becoming attuned to an item that requires attunement, a creature gains only its nonmagical benefits, unless its description states otherwise.

Attuning to an item requires a creature to spend a short rest focused on only that item while being in physical contact with it (this can’t be the same short rest used to learn the item’s properties). This focus can take the form of weapon practice (for a weapon), meditation (for a wondrous item), or some other appropriate activity. If the short rest is interrupted, the attunement attempt fails. Otherwise, at the end of the short rest, the creature gains an intuitive understanding of how to activate any magical properties of the item, including any necessary command words.

An item can be attuned to only one creature at a time and a creature can be attuned to no more than three magic items at a time. Any attempt to attune to a fourth item fails; the creature must end its attunement to an item first. Additionally, a creature can’t attune to more than one copy of an item.

A creature’s attunement to an item ends if the creature no longer satisfies the prerequisites for attunement, if the item has been more than 100 feet away for at least 24 hours, if the creature dies, or if another creature attunes to the item. A creature can also voluntarily end attunement by spending another short rest focused the item unless the item is cursed.

Cursed Items

Some magic items bear curses that bedevil their users sometimes long after a user has stopped using an item. A magic item’s description specifies whether the item is cursed. Most methods of identifying items, including the identify spell, fail to reveal such a curse, although ore might hint at it. A curse should be a surprise to the item’s user when the curse’s effects are revealed.

Attunement to a cursed item can’t be ended voluntarily unless the curse is broken first, such as with the remove curse spell.

There might also be different special circumstances on how a specific cursed item can be removed.  It might require a quest, bath it in the blood of a beast, or any other story related set of actions to end the connection to that cursed item.

Magic Item Categories

Each magic item belongs to a category: armor, potions, rings, rods, scrolls, staffs, wands, weapons, or wonderous items.

Armor

Unless an armor’s description says otherwise, armor must be worn for its magic to function. Some suits of magic armor specify the type of armor they are, such as chain mail or plate.

Potions

Different kinds of magical liquids are grouped in the category of potions: brews made from enchanted herbs, water from magical fountains or sacred springs, and oils that are applied to a creature or object. Most potions consist of one ounce of liquid.

Potions are consumable magic items. Drinking a potion or administering a potion to another character requires an action. Applying an oil might take longer, as specified in its description. Once used, a potion takes effect immediately, and it is used up.

Mixing Potions

A character might drink one potion while still under the effects of another or pour several potions into a single container. The strange ingredients used in creating potions can result in unpredictable interactions.

When a character mixes two potions together, you can roll on the Potion Miscibility table. If more than two are combined, roll again for each subsequent potion, combining the results. Unless the effects are immediately obvious, reveal them only when they become evident.

Potion Miscibility Table

Rings

Magic rings offer an amazing array of powers to those lucky enough to find them. Unless a ring’s description says otherwise, a ring must be worn on a finger, or a similar digit, for the ring’s magic to function.

Rods

A scepter or just a heavy cylinder, a magic rod is typically made of metal, wood, or bone. It’s about 2 or 3 feet long, 1 inch thick, and 2 to 5 pounds.

Scrolls

Most scrolls are spells stored in written form, while a few bears unique incantations that produce potent wards. Whatever its contents, a scroll is a roll of paper, sometimes attached to wooden rods, and typically kept safe in a tube of ivory, jade, leather, metal, or wood. A scroll is a consumable magic item. Whatever the nature of the magic contained in a scroll, unleashing that magic requires using an action to read the scroll. When its magic has been invoked, the scroll can’t be used again. Its words fade, or it crumbles into dust.

Any creature that can understand a written language can read the arcane script on a scroll and attempt to activate it. Scrolls are the most sought-after item for Wizards to allow them to copy that spell into their spell book and expand out their repertoire.  Note that by copying a spell from a scroll to a spell book, that scroll is destroyed in the process.

Scroll Mishaps

A creature who tries and fails to cast a spell from a spell scroll must make a DC 10 Intelligence saving throw. If the saving throw fails, roll on the Scroll Mishap table.

Scroll Mishaps Table

Staffs

A magic staff is about 5 or 6 feet long. Staffs vary widely in appearance: some are of nearly equal diameter throughout and smooth, others are gnarled and twisted, some are made of wood, and others are composed of polished metal or crystal. Depending on the material, a staff weighs between 2 and 7 pounds.

Unless a staff’s description says otherwise, a staff can be used as a quarterstaff.

Wands

A magic wand is about 15 inches long and crafted of metal, bone, or wood. It is tipped with metal, crystal, stone, or some other material.

Weapons

Whether crafted for some fell purpose or forged to serve the highest ideals of chivalry, magic weapons are coveted by many adventurers.

Some magic weapons specify the type of weapon they are in their descriptions, such as a longsword or longbow.

Wondrous Items

Wondrous items include worn items such as boots, belts, capes, gloves, and various pieces of jewelry and decoration, such as amulets, brooches, and circlets. Bags, carpets, crystal balls, figurines, horns, musical instruments, and other objects also fall into this catch- all category.

Wearing and Wielding Items

Using a magic item’s properties might mean wearing or wielding it. A magic item meant to be worn must be donned in the intended fashion: boots go on the feet, gloves on the hands, hats and helmets on the head, and rings on the finger. Magic armor must be donned, a shield strapped to the arm, a cloak fastened about the shoulders. A weapon must be held in hand.

In most cases, a magic item that’s meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build. Many magic garments are made to be easily adjustable, or the: magically adjust themselves to the wearer.

Rare exceptions exist. If the story suggests a good reason for an item to fit only creatures of a certain size or shape, you can rule that it doesn’t adjust.

When a non-humanoid tries to wear an item, use your discretion as to whether the item functions as intended. A ring placed on a tentacle might work, but a yuan-ti with a snakelike tail instead of legs can’t wear boots.

Multiple Items of the Same Kind

Use common sense to determine whether more than one of a given kind of magic item can be worn. A character can’t normally wear more than one pair of footwear, one pair of gloves or gauntlets, one pair of bracers, one suit of armor, one item of headwear, and one cloak. You can make exceptions; a character might be able to wear a circlet under a helmet, for example, or be able to layer two cloaks.

Paired Items

Items that come in pairs – such as boots, bracers, gauntlets, and gloves – impart their benefits only if both items of the pair are worn.

Activating An Item

Activating some magic items requires a user to do something special, such as holding the item and uttering a command word. The description of each item category or individual item details how an item is activated. Certain items use one or more of the following rules for their activation.

If an item requires an action to activate, that action isn’t a function of the Use an Item action, so a feature such as the rogue’s Fast Hands can’t be used to activate the item.

Command Word

A command word is a word or phrase that must be spoken for an item to work. A magic item that requires a command word can’t be activated in an area where sound is prevented, as in the silence spell.

Consumables

Some items are used up when they are activated. A potion or an elixir must be swallowed, or an oil applied to the body. The writing vanishes from a scroll when it is read. Once used, a consumable item loses its magic.

Spells

Some magic items allow the user to cast a spell from the item. The spell is cast at the lowest possible spell level, doesn’t expend any of the user’s spell slots, and requires no components, unless the item’s description says otherwise. The spell uses its normal casting time, range, and duration, and the user of the item must concentrate if the spell requires concentration. Many items, such as potions, bypass the casting of a spell and confer the spell’s effects, with their usual duration. Certain items make exceptions to these rules, changing the casting time, duration, or other parts of a spell.

A magic item, such as certain staffs, may require you to use your own spell casting ability when you cast a spell from the item. If you have more than one spell casting ability, you choose which one to use with the item. If you don’t have a spell casting ability-perhaps you’re a rogue with the Use Magic Device feature – your spell casting ability modifier is +0 for the item, and your proficiency bonus does apply.

Charges

Some magic items have charges that must be expended to activate their properties. The number of charges an item has remaining is revealed when an identify spell is cast on it, as well as when a creature attunes to it. Additionally, when an item regains charges, the creature attuned to it learns how many charges it regained.

Magic Item Resilience

Most magic items are objects of extraordinary artisanship. Thanks to a combination of careful crafting and magical reinforcement, a magic item is at least as durable as a nonmagical item of its kind. Most magic items, other than potions and scrolls, have resistance to all damage. Artifacts are practically indestructible, requiring extraordinary measures to destroy.

Homebrew Magic Items

The following magic items are all ones that can be found in the game, many have already been found, but do exist somewhere.  All these items can also be found in D&D Beyond so any of them can be easily added to the character sheets in D&D Beyond if ever needed.

Amulet of the Monotone Voice

Wonderous Item, Common (requires attunement)

There are many instances where a person is unable to speak, from physical damage, lack of proper vocal cords, or any other reasons.  This amulet will allow the wearer to speak what is on their mind.  The sound of the voice will very clearly emanate from the wearer’s mouth even if they never open it up.  The voice will be in a medium normal speaking volume in a generic genderless voice that is only able to deliver their worded content in a strict monotone.  No matter high excited, angry, or any other emotion that the wearer might be feeling or displaying physically, the voice will never vary in loudness, tone, and delivery.

While wearing this amulet the wearer has an advantage on all roll’s verses Insight checks, or any magic that would cause the user to tell the truth.  In fact, even under a Zone of Truth the user has a 50% chance of being able to tell a lie anyway.

This magic item must be attuned to for it to function for the wearer.

Bag of Bones

Wondrous Item, very rare (requires attunement by a Only usable by Clerics)

This small ordinary-looking leather pouch contains several tiny bones with runes carved into them. The bag contains 50 fingerbones. You can pull out 10 bones and scattering them over the ground. You can then speak the command word which causes 1d8+2 skeletons spring from the ground.

The skeletons last several rounds equal to the characters wisdom modifier + proficiency bonus. Once all the bones have been removed from the bag it becomes a normal bag. The bag can be replenished by taking the fingerbones of any sentient creature and the owner spends one hour carving new runes into the bone. The magic of the bag lasts if there are at least 10 bones left in the bag. If a character attempts to put 10 new bones into the bag after being empty nothing happens. The bag cannot hold more than 50 bones at a time.

Blight Oil

Oil, common

Crafted by: Blight Seed x5 (Alchemist)

This bottle contains enough oil to cover up to 10 square feet of surface area. Once this oil is rubbed into the surface of vegetation, it will soak half a foot into it. Vegetation soaked in this oil becomes as soft and malleable as wet clay and retains any physical manipulation done to it.

The oil dries after 10 minutes, causing the vegetation it was rubbed on to become solid again.

Blinder’s Helm

Wondrous Item, rare (requires attunement)

While wearing this helm, you gain blindsight out to a range of 60 feet and are immune to the blinded and deafened conditions.

Book of Notes

Wonderous Item, Rare (requires attunement)

This old ratty notebook does not look like much, but it is in fact a magical item that will allow two people to share words and drawings daily.  Each user may send up to 25 words in a message or a single uncomplicated drawing.  A full map of something is considered too much to send.

The words are only legible between the two books and the attuned owners.  To anyone else reading the book it looks like badly written love poems in the handwriting of the attuned owner. Once the words have been read, they fade away as if nothing had been written.  Any type of ink can be used to write within the book and does not impact the contents of the writing.

Bracer of Elemental Demise

Wonderous Item, Common (requires attunement)

Created by a loving Djinni mother for her half-breed son.  Knowing that she would not be able to remain in this world and to protect him, she created a magical item to help him survive in the rough world.

When the wearer is reduced to zero hit points their body disintegrates into a warm breeze, leaving behind only equipment they were wearing or carrying.  They reappear a random distance away and in a random direction from where they were reduced to zero hit points.  They are transported a distance equal to 2d6 x 10 in feet.  When they reappear, they are at one hit point and have nothing on them except this bracer.

This function can be used only once per long rest.

Broken Sword of Weal and Woe

Weapon (dagger), Common (requires attunement)

Originally the dagger of a soldier named Benny.  After a disastrous battle with Benny bravely defending all is friends and fellow soldiers, Benny was the last survivor to face the enemy.  He swore that no more of his friends would die, and he dove into the opposing group.  He was able to kill all the enemies but himself had endured numerous wounds, most of which were fatal.  The next day Benny and the rest of the military unit was found by those that had managed to flee the ambush.  There was Benny on top of all the dead bodies, slumped over with nothing but this broken dagger in his hands.

Once per long rest, the owner can freely cast Augury to see what fortunes await them in their endeavors.  This dagger, while broken is still able to function as a normal dagger in combat and gives the user the capability to have advantage in the first strike in a combat if the user has been surprised.

Proficiency with a dagger allows you to add your proficiency bonus to the attack roll for any attack you make with it.

Canteen of Last Resort

Wondrous item, common

Crafted by: Ankheg Stomach x1 (Artificer)

This canteen resembles a gourd in the shape of an “8”, with the bottom sphere smaller than the top, and with two plugged openings on the top and bottom. When fertile soil is left in the top sphere, the canteen slowly extracts usable nutrients from it, which it filters into an edible slime in the bottom sphere.

The top sphere can hold up to three pounds of fertile soil, which if left for at least 16 hours, produces enough slime to provide the nutritional requirements of an average humanoid for a day. This slime has a repugnant taste and expires if not eaten within 24 hours.

Concussive Headache (Maul +1)

Weapon (maul), rare (requires attunement)

Forged in the fires of a volcano and quenched in the blood of giants, this maul was famous over 4000 years ago when wielded by the dwarf Angrboda Gog. It has been lost in time and lost much of its luster and power having sat in a tomb for far too long.  It hungers for the smashing of foes, especially those of the giant kind. It might be possible to repair the weapon and bring it back to its former glory.

This weapon gives a magical +1 to hit and damage against any type of creature, but when faced with against any type of giant, the bonus increases to +2 to hit and damage and when it hits successfully, it does an extra 2d6 of damage to those types of foes. While wielding this maul and facing any giant kind, the wielder is immune to fear and charm spells and effects. To this weapon, “giant” refers to any creature with the giant type, including ettins and trolls.

Enchanted Vial

Wonderous Item, Common

Some creature parts have powerful, yet fleeting, magical energies within them. The motes from elementals for example hold traces of their former essences in them but disperse rapidly upon the destruction of their original form. An enchanted vial is inlaid with several runes designed to keep any magical resource within from dissipating while the lid is closed and is often the only way of transporting certain parts back to a workshop for crafting. Items that require an enchanted vial to be harvested are fragile by nature and must be stored inside an enchanted vial quickly to prevent degradation. Any attempt to harvest a material that has an enchanted vial as a requirement must be initiated within one minute of the death of its creature. These are also used to store essences, and one vial can store up to five of any one specific essence at a time.

This tool can be used a maximum of five times afterwards it disintegrates into powder.  At each attempted use, roll a d20 and if a 1 is rolled, the vial is immediately destroyed.

Green Shield Vault (Shield +1)

Armor (shield), uncommon (requires attunement)

Despite the powerful enchantments upon this shield, it appears somewhat plain; supposedly it will make you more appealing to potential romantic interests.  While you are attuned to this shield you gain the following benefits:

Defense:  You get a magical +1 to AC.

Containment: This item functions as a miniature Bag of Holding with a maximum capacity of 100lbs.

Healing Pill

Wonderous Item, Common

You regain 1d4 hit points when you swallow this pill.  If more than one is swallowed, then all after the first do 1d4 damage instead.

Eye of Elemental Protection (Stage One)

Wondrous Item, unknown rarity (requires attunement by an Item auto attunes to the nearest person once acquired during the first long rest.)

A small golden statue made of what appears to be gold with four different arcane symbols with a vertical oval above them all.  This small magical item comes with five charges that renew up to 1d6 charges every day at dawn.  It has two different functions.  It can allow the user to cast an Absorb Elements for one charge or a Protection from Energy for three charges.

Note that the Absorb Elements can be up cast for the cost of additional charges.  One charge for each level it is being up cast.

Eye of Elemental Protection (Stage Two)

A small golden statue made of what appears to be gold with four different arcane symbols with a vertical oval above them all.  This small magical item comes with seven charges that renew up to 1d6 charges every day at dawn.  It has several different functions and can allow the user to cast a variety of spells. 

• Absorb Elements (1/charge)
• Protection from Energy (3/charges)
• Dancing Wave (2/charges)
• Earth Ripple (2/charges)
• Hurricane Slash (2/charges)
• Unstable Explosion (2/charges)

Note that the spells Absorb Elements, Hurricane Slash, and Unstable Explosion can be up cast for the cost of additional charges.  The charge cost for each one is depends on the specific spell.

Lantern of Equivalent Exchange

Wondrous item, very rare (requires attunement)

This stone lantern is twice as heavy as a normal lantern.  It is carved from a green stone with careful runes and flourishes on its top and sides.  It has a stone shutter that can allow light to project from a single side, or all the way around.

When a gemstone is placed within the lantern, it begins to glow with a radiance equal to a Daylight spell. The light illuminates a cone-shaped area with a range of 60′ of bright light, and another 60′ of dim light. At the far end of the cone of bright light, it illuminates an area 30′ in radius from the center of the cone.

This light will last for one hour per gold piece value of the gem inserted in the spring, but that only counts the time that the shutter system is open. If the shutter is closed, the gem will last indefinitely.  When the duration of the light has passed, and the gemstone has been removed, it will have been changed into a piece of colored glass with no value.

As the gem is consumed, the value of the gem decreases based on the amount of time it has been used.

There are additional effects based on the type of gem that is placed within the lantern.  These are effects on top of the Daylight equivalent light.  The color of the light will match the gem placed in the lantern.  There will also be a specific cost to use any of the abilities which will consume the inserted gem faster.

All the different spell effects come out of the lantern in the direction it is being pointed.  It takes a full action to use any specific effect. 

Lantern of Scintillating Brilliance Gem Effects Table

Lantern of Undeath

Wondrous item, uncommon

This lantern glows an ethereal greenish light when you are within 30 feet of an undead creature.  The light glows brighter the closer you are to the creature.

Long Sword +0 (Ember)

Weapon (long sword), Rare (requires attunement)

While this is only a +0 weapon, it still counts as a magical weapon for overcoming damage resistance.  It has the following powers:

• Sheds light in a 20-foot radius upon command
• On a critical hit, it deals an additional 1d6 fire damage
• Once per long rest, as a bonus action the owner can cast Fire Bolt as the spell for 2d10 fire damage and +6 to hit.

Ember was created over 600 years ago when the time of nobles and barons’ rules over the area.  Little is known of its origin.  A flame symbol is etched along the blade neat the hilt.

Proficiency with a long sword allows you to add your proficiency bonus to the attack roll for any attack you make with it.

Lycan Gas

Poison, common

Crafted by: Lycanthrope Blood x1 (Alchemist)

This vial of silvery white gas reacts strongly with air and expands to a 30-foot radius cloud as soon as the vial is opened. Any creature that starts their turn in the cloud must succeed on a constitution saving throw or be cursed with lycanthropy. The type of lycanthropy and the DC depends on the type of Lycan this gas was created from as outlined in the table below.

The gas cloud remains for 1 minute before dispersing naturally. It may be dispersed early by a strong wind such as that created by the gust of wind spell.

Lycan Gas Save Table

Mask of Painful Faces

Wonderous Item, Common (requires attunement)

This mask has the bearing of a face in pain when in its normal state.  The magic item allows the wearer to create the illusion of them being someone else but only their face changes.  This illusion can be changed only once per short rest.  All the faces that are created will appear to be in some sort of pain or mental struggle.  None of the faces will appear at peace.  It is not able to change the user’s gender, nor will the wearer’s clothing be altered in any way.  The wearer’s voice can be altered, but all the voices will be gravely and sound like the person’s throat has been damaged.

Unlike most illusion spells, if the user is touch in any way, the effect will not be disabled or change at all.  In fact, there is a distinct chance the person touching the user might still be fooled by the illusion.  With a DC 20 to make the determination that there is in fact an illusion on the user.  However, if the wearer is attack and takes any form of physical or magical damage, the image will flicker, but still not revealing the exact features.  Once the user has taken five or more hits, the mask will cease functioning until a short rest is taken.

This item must be attuned to function.  Once attuned the mask will not fall off, or can it be removed until the attunement has been ended by the wearer.  The mask itself has 10 hit points and no armor class, so it is easily destroyed even when worn.

Merrow Amulet

Wondrous item, uncommon (requires attunement)

Crafted by: Merrow Heart x1 (Artificer)

While wearing this amulet you can breathe both air and water and you know the Abyssal and Aquan languages.

Monocle of Verisimilitude

Wonderous Item, Common (requires attunement)

Originally owned by an old hanging judge from hundreds of years ago, this monocle helps the wearer to discern the difference between lies and the truth.  It allows the user to have advantage on all Insight checks when trying to see if the target is telling the truth or not.  This function can be used as many times as the wearer’s proficiency bonus.  This is reset after a short rest.

A side effect of attuning to this object causes the user to grow a long and thin mustache that end in sharp tapered tips, no matter the gender of the wearer.  When using the special function, a single eyebrow is caused to be raised as if pondering some great fact, as well as causing the user to immediately reach to one of their mustaches ends and twirl it.

Moon Muzzle Mixture

Potion, rare

Crafted by: Lycanthrope Blood x1 vial (Alchemist)

Drinking this potion completely cures a creature of lycanthropy if taken before that creature experiences its first full moon as a lycanthrope. If drunk after that, or if drunk by a natural born lycanthrope, a lycanthrope can ignore the usual transformative effects of the full moon for the next 28 days.

Paralyzing Dust

Wondrous item, uncommon

Crafted by: Ghoul Claw x1, or Ghast Claw x1 (Alchemist)

You may spend an action to blow this pouch of grey dust into the face of a non-undead creature within 5 feet of you. That creature must succeed on a DC 10 Constitution saving throw or be paralyzed for 1 minute. That creature may repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turn, ending the effect on a success.

If this dust is dissolved into a liquid first and then drunk by a non-undead creature, they automatically fail the save and all subsequent saves for the next minute.

Petrifying Dagger (Dagger +0)

Weapon (dagger), uncommon (requires attunement)

Crafted by: Cockatrice Beak x1 (Blacksmith)

If this dagger strikes any non-living organic matter that is smaller than half a cubic foot in volume, it is instantly turned to stone for 24 hours.

If a tiny creature is hit by this dagger, they must succeed on a DC 11 Constitution saving throw against being magically petrified. On a failed save, the creature begins to turn to stone and is restrained. It must repeat the saving throw at the end of its next turn. On a success, the effect ends. On a failure, the creature is petrified for 24 hours.

While this is only a +0 weapon, it still counts as a magical weapon for overcoming damage resistance.

Proficiency with a dagger allows you to add your proficiency bonus to the attack roll for any attack you make with it.

Potion of Cure Lycanthropy

Wonderous Item, Uncommon

The encroaching madness, the changes to personality, extra body hair, all of these are possible symptoms of an infection of Lycanthropy.  This potion will cure any lycanthropic infections if it is consumed within a month of the infection being inflicted.

Pressing Longsword (Longsword +1)

Weapon (longsword), uncommon (requires attunement)

The styling of this longsword is ancient and when seen from the corner of your eye it appears to be moving. While you are attuned to this longsword you gain the following benefits:

Minor Properties: while in possession of it, you feel fortunate and optimistic about what the future holds.

Knockback: When you hit with an attack with this longsword you may use a bonus action to push the target up to 5ft. in any direction. You may use this feature as many times per rest equal to your Strength modifier.

Repelling Candle

Wondrous item, common

Crafted by: Ogre Fat x1 vial (Alchemist)

This pale-yellow candle is made from ogre tallow and emits a powerful odor when burned. Any beast that possesses the keen smell trait or similar that starts their turn within 100 feet of this lit candle, must succeed on a DC 12 Constitution saving throw or be forced to spend their turn moving as far away from this candle as safely possible. A creature that succeeds on this saving throw is immune to this effect for 24 hours. This item otherwise acts as a normal candle and will last for a total of 1 hour while lit.

Reszur (Dagger +1)

Wondrous item, rare (requires attunement)

A bloody blade found in the Tomb of the Moving Stones.  Its origins are unknown, but the leather one the handle has had so much blood on it that it is now dyed a dark red and has a continuous iron smell coming from it.

The name “Reszur” is graven on the dagger’s pommel. If the wielder speaks the name, the blade gives off a faint, cold glow, shedding dim light in a 10-foot radius until the wielder speaks the name again.

Once per long rest, as a bonus action you may turn invisible as per the spell.

You have a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls made with this magic weapon.

Finesse: When making an attack with a finesse weapon, you use your choice of your Strength or Dexterity modifier for the attack and damage rolls. You must use the same modifier for both rolls.

Light: A light weapon is small and easy to handle, making it ideal for use when fighting with two weapons.

Thrown: If a weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon to make a ranged attack. If the weapon is a melee weapon, you use the same ability modifier for that attack roll and damage roll that you would use for a melee attack with the weapon. For example, if you throw a hand axe, you use your Strength, but if you throw a dagger, you can use either your Strength or your Dexterity, since the dagger has the finesse property.

As a bonus action, the owner may cause the dagger to fly back to their hand if it is within 60’ of the owner.

Proficiency with a dagger allows you to add your proficiency bonus to the attack roll for any attack you make with it.

Ring of Biting Retort

Ring, Common (requires attunement)

A ring made by someone who has an overabundance of mocking humor.  Resembling a mouth with a set of sharp teeth this ring does not look pleasant in any way.  Made of some sort of silverish metal, it never seems to be tarnished or able to get dirty in any way.

By wearing and attuning to this ring, the wearer can heal an individual 1d4, but takes 1 point of damage every time it is used.  To active the healing action, the wearer must first insult the recipient of the healing as meanly as possible.  Once the insult has been hurled the ring takes a bite of the wearer’s finger doing the damage and then spitting blood onto the healing target.

The ring may heal as many times as the proficiency bonus of the wearer per short rest. The ring cannot be used to heal the wearer of the ring.

Sanngriðr (Greataxe +1)

Weapon (Great Axe), rare (requires attunement)

An ancient Dwarven Great Axe forged over 500 years ago by a skilled weaponsmith, but completely forgotten today.  This axe was his supreme creation, and he never was able to make anything as well after it.

The axe is covered in strange Runes that are not Dwarvish, or any normal known language.  In fact, they are all gibberish and decorative.  The weaponsmith added them because he thought they were cool looking and hid the real magic underneath these fake runes.

This weapon gives the user a +1 to hit and +1 damage.  When the weapon is wielded and used in combat, it will begin to glow with a purplish trailing flame as it is swung.  It has the special ability to absorb damage on behalf of the wielder.

The weapon has four charges. When you are hit by an attack while wielding this weapon, you may expend one charge and use your reaction to reduce the incoming damage by 1d12. This property is suppressed while you are incapacitated, restrained, or otherwise unable to move. The weapon regains 1d4 charges at dawn.

While this weapon is equipped, your voice becomes deeper and booming. Once per short rest, you can use Intimidation with advantage. Proficiency with a great axe allows you to add your proficiency bonus to the attack roll for any attack you make with it.

Shield of Towering Earth (Shield +2)

Armor (shield), rare (requires Strength Score 13)

While holding this shield, you have a +2 bonus to AC. This bonus is in addition to the shield’s normal bonus to AC. While you wear this shield reduce damage from ranged attacks by two. As a bonus action you can plant the shield onto the ground granting you half-cover.

Requires at least a Strength of 13 to wield.

Spirit Paper

Wonderous Item, Common

Spirit paper is a versatile tool that resembles a square of bleached papyrus. The secrets of its production were only recently discovered, and reverse engineered from secrets brought back from distant necromantic cults. By performing a small ritual with the spirit paper shortly after slaying certain creatures, a copy of that creature’s soul is bound to the spirit paper for later use. These copies are not a true soul and are more akin to an echo. These echoes do retain all the memories from its original body, and a few crafting techniques utilize these echoes to grant an item a low level of sentience or to mimic the abilities of their incorporeal reflections.

Using spirit paper is often the only way to harvest anything useful from creatures with incorporeal forms. Any harvesting attempt made for a creature part that has spirit paper as a requirement is done using a Wisdom (Religion) check rather than the usual check and is rolled separately for each item. Once a sheet of spirit paper has been used successfully to harvest an item, it cannot be reused, even if the item it contained is released.

Unlike most harvestable materials, materials that require spirit paper to be harvested dissipate very quickly after the death of its creature. Any attempt to harvest a material that has spirit paper as a requirement must be initiated within 1 minute of the death of the creature and takes 10 minutes to successfully complete.

Each Spirit paper can only be used once. Spirit papers can also be used to gather in essences. Each paper can only hold one essence.

Stick of Fancy Nature Lights

Weapon (club), Common (requires attunement only and only usable by Druids)

Within some deep forest hundreds of years ago, a Great Druid carved out different wooden sticks and clubs to help those newly ordained with their concentration and spell casting.  Some of these objects have spread out as hereditary objects used by Druids ever since that time.  When a Druid uses this object as a focus for any spell casting, the craved head on the object will lean back and belch forth a bright green flame that will remain lit above the object until the spell duration ends.

While wielding this object, a Druid will gain advantage on all concentration checks when taking damage.  When this object is used as the component for the Shillelagh spell, the caster will have advantage on their first attack using this object.  This is available every time that spell has been cast using this object as a component. 

Proficiency with a club allows you to add your proficiency bonus to the attack roll for any attack you make with it.

Magic permeates the worlds of Dungeons and Dragons and most often appears in the form of a spell. This chapter provides the rules for casting spells. Different character classes have distinctive ways of learning and preparing their spells, and monsters use spells in unique ways. Regardless of its source, a spell follows the rules in the Player’s Handbook.

What is a Spell?

A spell is a discrete magical effect, a single shaping of the magical energies that suffuse the multiverse into a specific, limited expression. In casting a spell, a character carefully plucks at the invisible strands of raw magic suffusing the world, pins them in place in a particular pattern, sets them vibrating in a specific way, and then releases them to unleash the desired effect-in most cases, all in the span of seconds.

Spells can be versatile tools, weapons, or protective wards. They can deal damage or undo it, impose, or remove conditions, drain life energy away, and restore life to the dead.

Uncounted thousands of spells have been created over the course of the multiverse’s history, and many of them are long forgotten. Some might yet lie recorded in crumbling spell books hidden in ancient ruins or trapped in the minds of dead gods. Or they might someday be reinvented by a character who has amassed enough power and wisdom to do so.

Components

A spell’s components are the physical requirements you must meet to cast it. Each spell’s description indicates whether it requires verbal (V), somatic (S), or material (M) components. If you can’t provide one or more of a spell’s components, you are unable to cast the spell.

Verbal (V)

Most spells require the chanting of mystic words. The words themselves aren’t the source of the spell’s power; rather, the combination of sounds, with specific pitch and resonance, sets the threads of magic in motion. Thus, a character who is gagged or in an area of silence, such as one created by the silence spell, can’t cast a spell with a verbal component.  These chants and words are all done in a loud forceful voice, and not conducive to a stealthy mission.

Somatic (S)

Spellcasting gestures might include a forceful gesticulation or an intricate set of gestures. If a spell requires a somatic component, the caster must have free use of at least one hand to perform these gestures.

Material (M)

Casting some spells requires objects, specified in parentheses in the component entry. A character can use a component pouch or a spellcasting focus (found in chapter 5 of the Player’s Handbook) in place of the components specified for a spell. But if a cost is indicated for a component, a character must have that specific component before he or she can cast the spell.

If a spell states that a material component is consumed by the spell, the caster must provide this component for each casting of the spell.

A spellcaster must have a hand free to access these components, but it can be the same hand that he or she uses to perform somatic components.

Concentration

Some spells require you to maintain concentration to keep their magic active. If you lose concentration, such a spell ends.

If a spell must be maintained with concentration, that fact appears in its Duration entry, and the spell specific show long you can concentrate on it. You can end concentration at any time (no action required).

Normal activity, such as moving and attacking, doesn’t interfere with concentration. The following factors can break concentration:

Casting another spell that requires concentration. You lose concentration on a spell if you cast another spell that requires concentration. You can’t concentrate on two spells at once.

Taking damage. Whenever you take damage while you are concentrating on a spell, you must make a constitution saving throw to maintain your concentration. The DC equals 10 or half the damage you take, whichever number is higher. If you take damage from multiple sources, such as an arrow and a dragon’s breath, you make a separate saving throw for each source of damage.

Being incapacitated or killed. You lose concentration on a spell if you are incapacitated or if you die.

The DM might also decide that certain environmental phenomena, such as a wave crashing over you while you’re on a storm – tossed ship, require you to succeed on a DC 10 Constitution saving throw to maintain concentration on a spell.

The Schools of Magic

Academies of magic group spells into eight categories called schools of magic. Scholars, particularly wizards, apply these categories to all spells, believing that all magic functions in essentially the same way, whether it derives from rigorous study or is bestowed by a deity.

The schools of magic help describe spells; they have no rules of their own, although some rules refer to the schools.

Abjuration (blue): spells are protective in nature, though some of them have aggressive uses. They create magical barriers, negate harmful effects, harm trespassers, or banish creatures to other planes of existence.

Conjuration (yellow): spells involve the transportation of objects and creatures from one location to another. Some spells summon creatures or objects to the caster’s side, whereas others allow the caster to teleport to another location. Some conjurations create objects or effects out of nothing.

Divine (white):  spells that involve healing or specific types of protections.

Divination (grey): spells reveal information, whether in the form of secrets long forgotten, glimpses of the future, the locations of hidden things, the truth behind illusions, or visions of distant people or places.

Enchantment (pink): spells affect the minds of others, influencing or controlling their behavior. Such spells can make enemies see the caster as a friend, force creatures to lake a course of action, or even control another creature like a puppet.

Evocation (red): spells manipulate magical energy lo produce a desired effect. Some call up blasts of fire or lightning. Others channel positive energy to heal wounds.

Illusion (purple): spells deceive the senses or minds of others. They cause people to see things that are not there, to miss things that are there, to hear phantom noises, or to remember things that never happened. Some illusions create phantom images that any creature can see, but the most insidious illusions plant an image directly in the mind of a creature.

Necromancy (green): spells manipulate the energies of life and death. Such spells can grant an extra reserve of life force, drain the life energy from another creature, create the undead, or even bring the dead back to life.

Creating the undead using necromancy spells such as animate dead is not a good act, and only evil casters use such spells frequently.

Transmutation (orange): spells change the properties of a creature, object, or environment. They might turn an enemy into a harmless creature. bolster the strength of an ally, make an object move at the caster’s command, or enhance a creature’s innate healing abilities lo rapidly recover from injury.

Combining Magical Effects

The effects of different spells add together while the duration of those spells overlap. The effects of the same spell cast multi pie times don’t combine, however. instead, the most potent effect-such as the highest bonus-from those castings applies while their duration overlap.

For example:

If two clerics cast bless on the same target, that character gains the spell’s benefit only once; he or she doesn’t get to roll two bonus dice.

Crafting Spells

Details related on how to create your own spells are detailed in the Downtime Activity pages.

Homebrew Spells

As the campaign continues and the knowledge that the characters gather in from utilizing magic items, getting attacked by opponents, or just their own research will increase the available pool of spells that they are able to access and use. These spells are either new to the campaign and available to the characters, or they might be replacements, or new spells that could be available if they are researched by the characters.

• REPLACEMENT – These replace existing spells of the same name.
• R – These spells can be made available in special situations, but in all cases can be researched by the characters.

Animal Messenger (REPLACEMENT)

• 2^nd-Level Enchantment
• Classes: Bard, Druid, Ranger
• Casting Time: 1 Action (Ritual)
• Range: 30 feet
• Components: V, S, M*
• Duration: 24 Hours
• Attack/Save: None
• Damage/Effect: Communication

By means of this spell, you use an animal to deliver a message. Choose a Tiny beast you can see within range, such as a squirrel, a blue jay, or a bat. You specify a location, which you must have visited, and a recipient who matches a general description, such as “a man or woman dressed in the uniform of the town guard” or “a red-haired dwarf wearing a pointed hat.” You also speak a message of up to twenty-five words. The target beast travels for the duration of the spell toward the specified location, covering about 50 miles per 24 hours for a flying messenger, or 25 miles for other animals.

When the messenger arrives, it delivers your message to the creature that you described, replicating the sound of your voice. The messenger speaks only to a creature matching the description you gave. If the messenger doesn’t reach its destination before the spell ends, the message is lost, and the beast makes its way back to where you cast this spell.

To determine the chance of a tiny beast being within 30 feet of the caster when the spell is cast, the caster must first make either a Nature or Survival roll for any beast within range of the spell.  This check is completed before the spell is cast so that the caster knows for certain that there is a target within range before casting the spell. A d20 is then rolled to determine if it is flying or ground creature.  Each subsequent search increases the DC by the amount shown in the table unless the caster has changed locations by at least an hour of travel. The difficulty increases for each attempt made in the same area.

At Higher Levels: If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the duration of the spell increases by 48 hours for each slot level above 2nd.

* – (a morsel of food)

Conjure Animals (REPLACEMENT)

• 3^rd-level conjuration
• Classes: Druid, Ranger
• Casting Time: 1 minute
• Range: 60 feet
• Components: V, S
• Duration: 1 hour (concentration)
• Attack/Save: None
• Damage/Effect: Summoning

You summon fey spirits that take the form of beasts and appear in unoccupied spaces that you can see within range. Choose one of the following options for what appears:

• One beast of challenge rating 2 or lower
• Two beasts of challenge rating 1 or lower
• Four beasts of challenge rating 1/2 or lower
• Eight beasts of challenge rating 1/4 or lower

Each beast is also considered fey, and it disappears when it drops to 0 hit points or when the spell ends.

The summoned creatures are friendly to you and your companions. Roll initiative for the summoned creatures as a group, which has its own turns. They obey any verbal commands that you issue to them (no action required by you). If you don’t issue any commands to them, they defend themselves from hostile creatures, but otherwise take no actions.

The creatures summoned take the form as required by the caster.  There are three basic templates at each of the different CR levels.  The caster must choose a single template for each summoning and all spirits summoned will be the same template and form.  Within each template are specific types that must also be chosen.  The form chosen must match the type selected as well as some form of beast that the caster has seen previously.  The form must be of a beast and not any other type of creature.

CR ¼ Spirit

Special Abilities

Choose One movement type:

• Burrowing: Add in 10 feet of burrowing speed
• Climbing: Add in 30 feet of climbing speed
• Flying:  Add in 40 feet of flying speed
• Running: Increase walking speed by ten feet
• Swimming: Add in 30 feet of swimming speed

Actions

Bite (or Claw): Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 5 (1d6+2) piercing or slashing damage

CR ½ Spirit

Special Abilities

Choose one movement type:

• Burrowing: Add in 10 feet of burrowing speed
• Climbing: Add in 30 feet of climbing speed
• Flying:  Add in 40 feet of flying speed
• Running: Increase walking speed by ten feet
• Swimming: Add in 30 feet of swimming speed

Choose one upgrade to the type:

• Charge: If the spirit moves at least 20 feet straight toward a target and then hits it with a ram attack on the same turn, the target takes an extra 3 (1d6) damage. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 11 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.
• Keen Sense: The spirit has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely one type of sense (hearing, sight, or smell).
• Multiattack: two attacks
• Pack Tactics: Advantage on attack rolls against a creature if at least one of the creature’s allies is within five feet of the creature and the ally isn’t incapacitated.
• Poison: Add poison to attacks, the target must succeed on a DC 11 Constitution saving throw or take 3 (1d6) poison damage. If the poison damage reduces the target to 0 hit points, the target is stable but poisoned for 1 hour, even after regaining hit points, and is paralyzed while poisoned in this way.
• Pounce: If the spirit moves at least 20 feet straight toward a creature and then hits it with a melee attack on the same turn, that target must succeed on a DC 11 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone. If the target is prone, the spirit can make one melee attack against it as a bonus action.

Actions

Bite (or Claw): Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 6 (1d8+2) piercing or slashing damage (Note that large creatures have reach of 10 ft)

CR 1 Spirit

Special Abilities

Choose one movement type:

• Burrowing: Add in 10 feet of burrowing speed
• Climbing: Add in 30 feet of climbing speed
• Flying:  Add in 60 feet of flying speed
• Running: Increase walking speed by 20 feet
• Swimming: Add in 40 feet of swimming speed

Choose one upgrade to the type:

• Charge: If the spirit moves at least 20 feet straight toward a target and then hits it with a ram attack on the same turn, the target takes an extra 7 (2d6) damage. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 13 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.
• Keen Sense: The spirit has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely one type of sense (hearing, sight, or smell).
• Multiattack: two attacks
• Pack Tactics: Advantage on attack rolls against a creature if at least one of the creature’s allies is within five feet of the creature and the ally isn’t incapacitated.
• Poison: Add poison to attacks, the target must succeed on a DC 11 Constitution saving throw or take 7 (2d6) poison damage. If the poison damage reduces the target to 0 hit points, the target is stable but poisoned for 1 hour, even after regaining hit points, and is paralyzed while poisoned in this way.
• Pounce: If the spirit moves at least 20 feet straight toward a creature and then hits it with a melee attack on the same turn, that target must succeed on a DC 13 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone. If the target is prone, the spirit can make one melee attack against it as a bonus action.
• Rampage: When the spirit reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack on its turn, the spirit can take a bonus action to move up to half its speed and make a melee attack.

Actions

Bite (or Claw): Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 10 ft., one creature. Hit: 10 (2d6+3) piercing or slashing damage

CR 2 Spirit

Special Abilities

Choose one movement type:

• Burrowing: Add in 10 feet of burrowing speed
• Climbing: Add in 30 feet of climbing speed
• Flying:  Add in 60 feet of flying speed
• Running: Increase walking speed by 20 feet
• Swimming: Add in 40 feet of swimming speed

Choose one upgrade to the type:

• Charge: If the spirit moves at least 20 feet straight toward a target and then hits it with a ram attack on the same turn, the target takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 13 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.
• Keen Sense: The spirit has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely one type of sense (hearing, sight, or smell).
• Multiattack: two attacks
• Pack Tactics: Advantage on attack rolls against a creature if at least one of the creature’s allies is within five feet of the creature and the ally isn’t incapacitated.
• Poison: Add poison to attacks, the target must succeed on a DC 11 Constitution saving throw or take 10 (3d6) poison damage. If the poison damage reduces the target to 0 hit points, the target is stable but poisoned for 1 hour, even after regaining hit points, and is paralyzed while poisoned in this way.
• Pounce: If the spirit moves at least 20 feet straight toward a creature and then hits it with a melee attack on the same turn, that target must succeed on a DC 13 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone. If the target is prone, the spirit can make one melee attack against it as a bonus action.
• Rampage: When the spirit reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack on its turn, the spirit can take a bonus action to move up to half its speed and make a melee attack.

Actions

Bite (or Claw): Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 10 ft., one creature. Hit: 13 (2d8+4) piercing or slashing damage

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using certain higher-level spell slots, you choose one of the summoning options above, and more creatures appear: twice as many with a 5th-level slot, three times as many with a 7th-level slot, and four times as many with a 9th-level slot.

Dancing Wave [R]

• 2^nd-level conjuration
• Classes: Druid, Sorcerer, Wizard
• Casting Time: 1 action
• Range: 30 feet (5-foot cube)
• Components: V, S
• Duration: 1 Minute (concentration)
• Attack/Save: STR Save
• Damage/Effect: Combat

You summon a surging mass of water into existence at a point on the ground within range. The mass of water remains cohesive filling a 5-foot radius, though only rises 3 feet from the ground. The area is difficult terrain for any creature without a swimming speed.

For the duration of the spell, as a bonus action you can move the wave of water up to 30 feet along a surface in any direction. The first time the wave enters any creature’s space during your turn, they must make a Strength saving throw or take 2d6 bludgeoning damage and be knocked prone. A creature automatically fails this saving throw if they are prone.

Earth Ripple [R]

• 2^nd-level transmutation
• Classes: Druid, Sorcerer, Wizard
• Casting Time: 1 action
• Range: 60 feet
• Components: V, S
• Duration: Instantaneous
• Attack/Save: DEX Save
• Damage/Effect: Bludgeoning/Piercing

You cause the earth to deform and ripple, a target creature must make a Dexterity saving throw or suffer one of the following effects (your choice):

Find Traps (REPLACEMENT)

• 2^nd-level divination
• Classes: Cleric, Druid, Ranger
• Casting Time: 1 action
• Range: 60 feet
• Components: V, S
• Duration: Instantaneous
• Attack/Save: None
• Damage/Effect: Detection

This spell highlights to the caster any trap within range that is within their line of sight. It highlights the object that is trapped but not the triggering mechanism.  As an example, if there is a pit that is triggered by a pressure plate somewhere before the pit.  The pit would be highlighted but not the pressure plate. A trap, for the purpose of this spell, includes anything that would inflict a sudden or unexpected effect you consider harmful or undesirable, which was specifically intended as such by its creator. Thus, the spell would sense an area affected by the alarm spell, a glyph of warding, or a mechanical pit trap, but it would not reveal a natural weakness in the floor, an unstable ceiling, or a hidden sinkhole. In all cases, the spell only detects traps that are there by design and purpose and not by some accident of nature.

Because the caster is aware of where the trap is located, they will have advantage on any rolls to disarm the trap or will be allowed to render aid to someone else attempting to disarm the trap.

Hurricane Slash [R]

• 2^nd-level evocation
• Classes: Druid, Ranger, Sorcerer, Wizard
• Casting Time: 1 action
• Range: 30 feet (30-foot-long line)
• Components: V, S
• Duration: Instantaneous
• Attack/Save: DEX Save
• Damage/Effect: Slashing

You condense wind into a razor-sharp blast that shreds a 30-foot-long 5-foot-wide line. Creatures in the area must make a Dexterity saving throw. A creature takes 3d8 slashing damage on a failed save or half as much on a success.

At Higher Levels: When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 5 level or higher, you can create an additional line of effect for every two levels. A creature around more than one slash is affected only once.

Ray of Stone [R]

• Transmutation cantrip
• Classes: Artificer, Sorcerer, Wizard
• Casting Time: 1 Action
• Range: 60 feet
• Components: V, S
• Duration: Instantaneous
• Attack/Save: Ranged
• Damage/Effect: Necrotic

A beam of amber light streaks toward the target, make of ranged attack against the target.  One a hit, it takes 1d8 necrotic damage.  If the target is immune to petrification the ray does not damage the target.

The spell’s damage increases by 1d8 when you reach 5th level (2d8), 11th level (3d8), and 17th level (4d8).

Summon Familiar

• 1st-level conjuration
• Classes: Wizard
• Casting Time: 1 hour (ritual)
• Range: 10 feet
• Components: V, S, M (50gp worth of clay, straw, charcoal, and incense)
• Duration: Instantaneous
• Attack/Save: None
• Damage/Effect:

You gain the service of a familiar, a spirit that takes the form of a non-humanoid creature of your choice. It must be in the shape of a creature you have seen before. It’s an Aberration, Celestial, Fey, Fiend, or Undead (choose one) instead of its usual type, uses the Familiar stat block below, and has a three Familiar Points worth of features of your choosing (see Familiar Features). It gains additional Familiar Points to spend when you reach wizard character levels 5, 9, 13, and 17. Whenever the familiar gains an additional Familiar Point, you can replace a Familiar Feature it has with another one of your choices by spending the appropriate number of Familiar Points.

It is possible to receive additional Familiar Points from heroic or some other spectacular action.  The exact amount and timing are up to the game master. You can’t have more than one familiar at a time.

Combat: Your familiar acts independently of you, but it always obeys your commands. In combat, you both act on the same turn and can alternate between Actions and movement as if being performed by the same creature. A familiar can’t Attack (unless it has the Combat Familiar feature) but can take other Actions as normal. A familiar can only take the Help Action to assist with a Check if it has proficiency in the Skill used to make the Check.

Spell Delivery: When you cast a spell with a range of touch, your familiar can deliver the spell as if it had cast the spell. Your familiar must be within 100 feet of you, and it must use its Reaction to deliver the spell when you cast it. If the spell requires an Attack or Save, it uses your Attack Modifier and Spell Save DC.

Shared Telepathy: While you’re familiar is within 100 feet of you, you can communicate with it telepathically. Additionally, as an Action, you can see through your familiar’s eyes and hear what it hears until the start of your next turn, gaining the benefits of any special senses that the familiar has. During this time, you are Deafened and Blinded regarding your own senses.

Pocket Dimension: As an Action, you can temporarily dismiss your familiar. It disappears into a pocket dimension where it awaits your summons. As an Action while it’s dismissed, you can cause it to reappear in any unoccupied space you can see within 30 feet of you. Whenever the familiar disappears into its pocket dimension, it leaves behind in its space anything it was wearing or carrying.

Death: When the familiar dies, it leaves behind a corpse of the form it took, and the caster that summoned it gains one Death Save failure that persists until they complete a Long Rest. If the summoner ever reaches three Death Save failures, they instantly die.

Resurrection: If the familiar has been dead for less than 24 hours, you can cast this spell again while within 10 feet of the familiar’s corpse to return it to life with one hit point. If the familiar has been dead longer than 24 hours or you are unable to retrieve its corpse, then you can summon your familiar into a new body by casting the spell again requiring double the amount of gold pieces worth of diamonds or gems (100gp) as a material component which is consumed in the casting of the spell.

A familiar resurrected in this way suffers a d4 penalty to all Checks and Saves until their next Long Rest and retains all their accumulated Familiar Points.

Familiar Stat Block

Special Abilities

• Telepathic Communication: The familiar can communicate telepathically with its caster while within 100ft of it.
• Magical Being: The familiar doesn’t require food, water, or air, and gives off a faint magical aura.

Repeatable Feature

Each of these features can be selected multiple times.

One Point Features

• Defensive: The familiar gains proficiency in one Save.
• Hardy: The familiar’s HP maximum increases by five.
• Keen Sense: The familiar has advantage on Perception Checks that rely on either sight, smell, or hearing (choose one).
• Linguist: The familiar learns one language of your choice that you know.
• Resilient: The familiar has advantage on Checks and Saves made to avoid or end one Condition on itself.
• Resistant: The familiar gains resistance to one damage type.
• Skillful: The familiar gains proficiency in one Skill.
• Swift: The familiar’s ground speed is increased by 10 feet.
• Talented: The familiar gains +1 to an Ability Modifier.

Two Point features

• Immune: The familiar gains immunity to one damage type or Condition.

Unique Features

Each of these features can only be selected once.

One Point Features

• Aquatic: The familiar gains a Swimming Speed of 40ft and can breathe underwater. If it already has a Swimming Speed, it increases by 20ft.
• Arboreal: The familiar gains a Climbing Speed of 30 feet and can use its Reaction when falling to take half damage from the fall. If it already has a Climbing Speed, it increases by 15 feet.
• Avian: The familiar gains a Flying Speed of 30 feet. If it already has a Flying Speed, it increases by 15 feet.
• Concealed Aura: As an Action, the familiar can hide, or reveal, its magical aura.
• Contagion Sense: The familiar is aware of all poisons and diseases within 5 feet of it.
• Darkvision: The familiar gains Darkvision 60 feet.
• Distant Link: Increase the range of your telepathic communication from 100 feet to 1,000 feet. Your connection is so strong that you always know the exact location of your familiar and precisely how far it is from you.
• Empath: As an Action, the familiar touches a creature and magically knows the creature’s surface level emotional state. The familiar can use an Action to dig deeper into the creature’s true emotional state. The target makes a Charisma Save against your Spell Save DC. Failure: It knows the creature’s true emotions and feelings.
• Friendly Fire: The familiar has advantage on Checks and Saves against your spells and effects.
• Lanky: The familiar is unusually long-limbed and flexible. Its reach for Melee Attacks is increased by 5 feet. It can also interact with objects and creatures from 10 feet away.
• Limited Telepathy: The familiar can magically communicate simple ideas, emotions, and images telepathically with a creature that it can see within 60 feet of it that can understand a language.
• Magically Inclined: The familiar knows one cantrip from the Wizard spell list that doesn’t deal damage, and can cast it at will using Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma as its spellcasting ability (your choice when this feature is chosen).
• Mimicry: The familiar can mimic simple sounds it has heard, such as a person whispering, a baby crying, or an animal chittering. A creature that hears the sounds can tell they are imitations with a successful Insight Check against your Spell Save DC.
• Nimble: The familiar doesn’t provoke Opportunity Attacks when it leaves an enemy’s reach.
• Predator: The familiar has advantage on Attacks against any creature under half its hit point maximum. It also has advantage on Survival Checks to track down targets it has been around for more than one minute.
• Prey: The familiar has advantage on Stealth Checks and can attempt to Hide even when it’s only lightly obscured.
• Quiet as a Mouse: The familiar makes no sound, leaves no noticeable trail, and can’t be tracked by mundane means while moving at half speed. It also has advantage on Checks made to Hide.
• Sacrificial: When a creature you can see is hit by an Attack while within 5 feet of your familiar, you can use a Reaction to cause the familiar to become the target instead.
• Shapeshifter: As an Action, the familiar can take on the appearance of a Tiny or Small Beast of its choice at will. Its statistics remain unchanged regardless of the form it takes. It reverts to its true form early if it uses an Action to do so, or if it dies.
• Stinging Blood: As an Action, one creature of the familiar’s choice within 20 feet must make a Constitution Save against your Spell Save DC. Failure: The creature takes 1d6 Poison damage and is Poisoned for one minute. The creature can repeat this Save at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on a success. Once a creature fails its Save against this feature, the familiar can’t use this again until it finishes a Long Rest.
• Strong Willed: The familiar has advantage on Saves to avoid being Charmed or Frightened.
• Subterranean: The familiar gains a Burrowing Speed of 20 feet and leaves a 5 feet wide tunnel behind it. If it already has a Burrowing Speed, it increases by 20 feet.
• Terrifying: As an Action, one creature of the familiar’s choice within 20 feet must make a Wisdom Save against your Spell Save DC. Failure: The creature is Frightened of the familiar for one minute. The target can repeat this Save at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on a success. Once a creature fails its Save against this feature, the familiar can’t use it again until it finishes a Long Rest.
• Too Freakin’ Cute: If the familiar is present for, or involved in, a Persuasion or Performance Check made by you, you can add a 1d4 to the result.
• Tough: The familiar’s HP maximum increases by an amount equal to your level (or twice its CR).
• Watchful: The familiar doesn’t require sleep.

Two Point Features

• Bulwark: The familiar now adds twice your Prof. Bonus to its AC.
• Chameleon: As an Action, the familiar can choose to become Invisible. The effect ends if the familiar moves or uses any Action other than Hide or Dodge.
• Combat Familiar: The familiar gains one of the following Attacks, which it can use when it acts:
• Melee: Melee Attack, 3 + Caster’s proficiency bonus to hit, 1d4 + Caster’s proficiency bonus Bludgeoning, Piercing, or Slashing damage.
• Ranged: Ranged Attack 30 feet, 3 + Caster’s proficiency bonus to hit, 1d4 damage. The damage type depends on the flavor of the Attack and game master’s approval.
• Distraction: When you are targeted with an Attack within 5 feet of your familiar, you can use your Reaction to have the familiar distract the attacker and impose disadvantage on the Attack. You can use this feature several times equal to your Prof. Bonus per Long Rest.
• Echolocation: The familiar gains Blindsight 30 feet while not Deafened, and advantage on Perception Checks that rely on hearing.
• Evasion: If the familiar is subjected to an effect that allows it to make a Dexterity Save to take only half damage, it instead takes no damage if it succeeds on the Save.
• Healer: As an Action, the familiar touches a creature and causes it to regain hit points equal to twice your Proficiency Bonus. Once it uses this feature, it can’t do so again until the next dawn.
• Invisibility: Once per Long Rest, the familiar can use an Action to become Invisible for one minute or until it makes an Attack or casts a spell.
• Malleable: The familiar can move through a space as narrow as one inch wide without squeezing.
• Relentless: When the familiar is reduced to 0 HP, it can choose to drop to one HP instead.
• Speech: The familiar gains the ability to speak and learns 1 language of your choice.
• Spider Climb: The familiar can climb difficult surfaces, including upside down on ceilings, without needing to make a Check. In addition, it ignores movement restrictions caused by webbing.
• Third Eye: When you use an Action to see and hear using your familiar’s senses, you are no longer Blinded and Deafened to your own. You can see and hear using your own senses, but Perception Checks that rely on these senses are made with disadvantage.
• Tracking: The familiar gains the ability to cast Locate Creature. If the familiar is provided with the blood of the creature, some other piece of its being, or an object that smells strongly of it, the familiar can cast this spell without needing to have seen the creature or know it beforehand. Once this feature is used, it can’t be used again until the next dawn.

Three Point Features

• Combat Familiar: The familiar gains both of the following Attacks, which it can use when it acts:
• Melee: Melee Attack, 3 + Caster’s proficiency bonus to hit, 1d4 + Caster’s proficiency bonus Bludgeoning, Piercing, or Slashing damage.
• Ranged: Ranged Attack 30 feet, 3 + Caster’s proficiency bonus to hit, 1d4 damage. The damage type depends on the flavor of the Attack and game master’s approval.
• Magic Resistance: The familiar has advantage on Saves against spells and other magical effects.

Unstable Explosion [R]

• 2^nd-level evocation
• Classes: Sorcerer, Warlock, Wizard
• Casting Time: 1 action
• Range: 60 feet (10 diameter sphere)
• Components: V, S
• Duration: Instantaneous
• Attack/Save: DEX Save
• Damage/Effect: Fire

You cause an unstable explosion to erupt at a point of your choice within range effecting a five-foot radius, rolling 3d6. For each die that rolls a 6, roll an additional d6 and the radius of the spell expands by 5 feet. Each creature within the final range of the spell must make a Dexterity saving throw. On a failed save, they take fire damage equal to the total value of the rolled dice. On a success the target takes half as much damage.

At Higher Levels: When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3 level or higher, the damage increases by 1d6 foreach slot level above 2.

The clatter of a sword striking against a shield. The terrible rending sound as monstrous claws tear through armor. A brilliant flash of light as a ball of f1ame blossoms from a wizard’s spell. The sharp tang of blood in the air, cutting through the stench of vile monsters. Roars of fury, shouts of triumph, cries of pain. Combat in Dungeons and Dragons can be chaotic, deadly, and thrilling.

This chapter provides the rules you need for your characters and monsters to engage in combat, whether it is a brief skirmish or an extended conflict in a dungeon or on a field of battle. Throughout this chapter, the rules address you, the player, or Dungeon Master. The Dungeon Master controls all the monsters and nonplayer characters involved in combat, and each other player controls an adventurer. “You” can also mean the character or monster that you control.

The Order of Combat

A typical combat encounter is a clash between two sides, a flurry of weapon swings, feints, parries, footwork, and spellcasting. The game organizes the chaos of combat into a cycle of rounds and turns. A round represents about six seconds in the game world. During a round, each participant in a battle takes a turn. The order of turns is determined at the beginning of a combat encounter when everyone rolls initiative. Once everyone has taken a turn, the fight continues to the next round if neither side has defeated the other.

Combat Step by Step

• Determine surprise. The DM determines whether anyone involved in the combat encounter is surprised.
• Establish positions. The DM decides where all the characters and monsters are located. Given the adventurers’ marching order or their stated positions in the roam or other locations, The DM figures out where the adversaries are – how far away and in what direction.
• Roll initiative. Everyone involved in the combat encounter rolls initiative, determining the order of combatants turns.
• Take turns. Each participant in the battle takes a turn in initiative order.
• Begin the next round. When everyone involved in the combat has had a turn, the round ends. Repeat step 4 until the fighting stops.

Initiative

Each individual character will have their own initiative with any creatures they control acting immediately after them. Any opponents’ initiative will be broken up by type of creature or grouped into smaller units. This breaks up the actions of the characters and foes so that it is not just all the characters taking action, then the opponents, instead there is a spread of action throughout the initiative order.

It is always possible to lower your initiative during combat so that the character goes later, but never move it up the initiative except via specific skills or magic. This is different from a readied action which only prepares an action for a specific trigger.

Interacting with Objects Around You

Here are a few examples of the sorts of thing you can do in tandem with your movement and or action.  Only one of these can be accomplished per round:

• Draw or sheathe a sword.
• Open or close a door.
• Pick up a dropped axe.
• Take a bauble from a table.
• Remove a ring from your finger.
• Stuff some food into your mouth
• Plant a banner in the ground.
• Fish a few coins from your belt pouch
• Drink all the ale in a flagon.
• Throw a lever or a switch.
• Pull a torch from a sconce.
• Take a book from a shelf you can reach.
• Extinguish a small flame.
• Don a mask
• Pull the hood of your cloak up and over your head.
• Put your ear to a door.
• Kick a small stone.
• Turn a key in a lock.
• Tap the floor with a 10-foot pole.
• Hand an item to another character.

Bonus Action Options

Besides the stated rules for Bonus Actions that are available to characters the following are also allowed:

• Drink a potion that was in your hand, pouch or on a belt.

Full Action Options

• Feed an unconscious person a potion.
• Withdraw a potion from your backpack.

Size Diagram

Creature Size

Each creature takes up a different amount of space. The Size Categories table shows how much space a creature of a particular size controls in combat. Objects sometimes use the same size categories.

Size Categories Table

Space

A creature’s space is the area in feet that it effectively controls in combat, not an expression of its physical dimensions. A typical medium creature isn’t 5 feet wide, for example, but it does control a space that wide. If a Medium hobgoblin stands in a 5-foot-wide doorway, other creatures can’t get through unless the hobgoblin lets them.

A creature’s space also reflects the area it needs to tight effectively. For that reason, there’s a limit to the number of creatures that can surround another creature in combat. Assuming Medium combatants, eight creatures can fit in a 5-foot radius around another one.

Because larger creatures take up more space, fewer of them can surround a creature. If five large creatures crowd around a Medium or smaller one, there’s little room for anyone else. In contrast, as many as twenty medium creatures can surround a Gargantuan one.

Size Diagram (Squares vs Hexes)

Squeezing Into a Smaller Space

A creature can squeeze through a space that is large enough for a creature one size smaller than it. Thus, a large creature can squeeze through a passage that’s only 5 feet wide. While squeezing through a space, a creature must spend 1 extra foot for every foot it moves there, and it has disadvantage on attack rolls and dexterity saving throws. Attack rolls against the creature have advantage while it’s in the smaller space.

Playing on a Grid

Squares. Each square on the grid represents 5 feet.

Speed. Rather than moving foot by foot, move square by square on the grid. This means you use your speed in 5-foot segments. This is particularly easy if you translate your speed into squares by dividing the speed by 5.

Entering a Square. To enter a square, you must have ai least 1 square of movement left, even if the square is diagonally adjacent to the square, you’re in. (The rule for diagonal movement sacrifices realism for the sake of smooth play.

If a square costs extra movement, as a square of difficult terrain does, you must have enough movement left lo pay for entering it.

Corners. Diagonal movement cannot cross the comer of a wall, large tree, or other terrain feature that fills its space.

Ranges. To determine the range on a grid between two things – whether creatures or objects – start counting squares from a square adjacent to one of them and stop counting in the space of the other one. Count by the shortest route.

Cover

To determine whether a target has cover against an attack or other effect on a grid, choose a corner of the attacker’s space or the point of origin of an area of effect. Then trace imaginary lines from that corner to every corner of any one square the target occupies. If one or two of those lines are blocked by an obstacle (including another creature), the target has half cover. If three or four of those lines are blocked but the attack can still reach the target (such as when the target is behind an arrow slit), the target has three-quarters cover.

On hexes, use the same procedure as a grid, drawing lines between the corners of the hexagons. The target has half cover it up to three lines are blocked by an obstacle, and three-quarters cover if four or more lines are blocked but the attack can still reach the target.

Flanking

A creature can’t flank an enemy that it can’t see. A creature also can’t flank while it is incapacitated. A Large or larger creature is flanking if at least one square or hex of its space qualifies for flanking.

You cannot flank a creature more than two sizes larger than yourself.  Some creatures are immune from flanking as well as some abilities might allow for that.  Large creatures only need two opponents to be flanked, while Huge require at least three and Gargantuan four.  These numbers are assuming those doing the flanking are smaller than the target creature.  If all the creatures are the same size, then flanking always only requires two attackers to flank properly.

Flanking and Cover Diagram (Squares)

Flanking on Squares. When a creature and at least one of its allies are adjacent to an enemy and on opposite sides or corners of the enemy’s space, they flank that enemy, and each of them has advantage on melee attack rolls against that enemy.

When in doubt about whether two creatures flank an enemy on a grid, trace an imaginary line between the centers of the creatures’ spaces. If the line passes through opposite sides or corners of the enemy’s space, the enemy is flanked.

Flanking on Hexes. When a creature and at least one of its allies are adjacent to an enemy and on opposite sides of the enemy’s space, they flank that enemy, and each of them has advantage on attack rolls against that enemy. On hexes, count around the enemy from one creature to its ally. Against a Medium or smaller creature, the allies flank if there are two hexes between them. Against a Large creature, the allies flank if there are four hexes between them. Against a Huge creature, they must have five hexes between them. Against a Gargantuan creature, they must have at least 6 hexes between them.

Flanking and Cover Diagram (Hexes)

Opportunity Attacks

In a fight, everyone is constantly watching for a chance to strike an enemy who is fleeing or passing by. Such a strike is called an opportunity attack.

You can make an opportunity attack when a hostile creature that you can see moves out of your reach. To make the opportunity attack, you use your reaction to make one melee attack against the provoking creature. The attack occurs right before the creature leaves your reach.

You can avoid provoking an opportunity attack by taking the Disengage action. You also don’t provoke an opportunity attack when you teleport or when someone or something moves you without using your movement, action, or reaction.

Facing

Combat is a dynamic set of actions.  It is assumed that all creatures unless otherwise specified are moving around within their entire space as well as looking around attempting to be alert for danger.  This means that there is not any specific facing for characters or creatures.  Everyone is assumed to have full vision around them and able to see anything that would normally be visible.

Readied Action

Sometimes you want to get the jump on a foe or wait for a particular circumstance before you act. To do so, you can take the Ready action on your turn so that you can act later in the round using your reaction. First, you decide what perceivable circumstance will trigger your reaction. Then, you choose the action you will take in response to that trigger, or you choose to move up to your speed in response to it.

When the trigger occurs, you can either take your reaction right after the trigger finishes or ignore the trigger. Remember that you can take only one reaction per round. When you ready a spell, you cast it as normal but hold its energy, which you release with your reaction when the trigger occurs. To be readied, a spell must’ have a casting time of one action and holding onto the spell’s magic requires concentration (explained in chapter 10 of the Player’s Handbook). If your concentration is broken, the spell dissipates without taking effect.

A readied action will only last until your turn comes again, then a new readied action would have to be put into place.

Cover

Walls, trees, creatures, and other obstacles can provide cover during combat, making a target more difficult to harm. A target can benefit from cover only when an attack or other effect originates on the opposite side of the cover.

There are three degrees of cover. If a target is behind multiple sources of cover, only the most protective degree of cover applies; the degrees aren’t added together.

Half Cover

A target with half cover has a +2 bonus to AC and Dexterity saving throws. A target has half cover if an obstacle blocks at least half of its body. The obstacle might be a low wall, a large piece of furniture, a narrow tree trunk, or a creature, whether that creature is an enemy or a friend.

Three-Quarters Cover

A target with three-quarters cover has a +5 bonus to AC and Dexterity saving throws. A target has three-quarters cover if about three-quarters of it is covered by an obstacle. The obstacle might be a portcullis, an arrow slit, or a thick tree trunk.

Total Cover

A target with total cover can’t be targeted directly by an attack or a spell, although some spells can reach such a target by including it in an area of effect. A target has total cover if it is completely concealed by an obstacle.

Critical Hits and Misses

All critical hits and misses still follow the original 5e rules of rolling another set of the attacks damage dice. This includes rolling extra dice for abilities that are a part of the attack such as damage from sneak attack, hex, or the initial strike of green flame blade.

These tables simply contain a list of additional effects that take place on top of the existing critical roll rules. There are individual tables below for both weapon attacks and spell attacks because let’s be honest, there is a difference between missing with a bow and missing with a scorching ray.

Use the Critical Hit Tables below for all natural 20 rolls and the Critical Fumble Tables for any natural 1 roll.

Weapon Attacks: Critical Hits Table

Weapon Attacks: Critical Fumbles Table

Spell Attacks: Critical Hits Table

Spell Attacks: Critical Fumbles Table

Damage and Death

Dropping to 0 Hit Points

When you drop to 0 hit points, you either die outright or fall unconscious, as explained in the following sections.

Instant Death

Massive damage can kill you instantly. When damage reduces you to 0 hit points and there is damage remaining, you die if the remaining damage equals or exceeds twice your hit point maximum.

Falling Unconscious

If damage reduces you to 0 hit points and fails to kill you, you fall unconscious (see appendix A in the Player’s Handbook). This unconsciousness ends if you regain any hit points.

Death Saving Throws

Whenever you start your tum with 0 hit points, you must make a special saving throw, called a death saving throw, to determine whether you creep closer to death or hang onto life. Unlike other saving throws, this one isn’t tied to any ability score. You are in the hands of fate now, aided only by spells and features that improve your chances of succeeding on a saving throw.

Roll a d20. If the roll is 10 or higher, you succeed. Otherwise, you fail. A success or failure has no effect by itself. On your third success. you become stable (see below). On your third failure, you die. The successes and failures don’t need to be consecutive; keep track of both until you collect three of a kind. The number of both is reset to zero when you regain any hit points or become stable.

Rolling 1 or 20. When you make a death saving throw and roll a 1 on the d20, it counts as two failures. If you roll a 20 on the d20, you regain 1 hit point.

Damage at 0 Hit Points. If you take any damage while you have 0 hit points, you suffer a death saving throw failure. If the damage is from a critical hit, you suffer two failures instead. If the damage equals or exceeds your hit point maximum, you suffer instant death.

Stabilizing a Creature

The best way to save a creature with 0 hit points is to heal it. If healing is unavailable, the creature can at least be stabilized so that it isn’t killed by a failed death saving throw.

You can use your action to administer first aid to an unconscious creature and attempt to stabilize it, which requires a successful DC 10 Wisdom (Medicine) check.

A stable creature doesn’t make death saving throws, even though it has 0 hit points, but it does remain unconscious. The creature stops being stable, and must start making death saving throws again, if it takes any damage. A stable creature that isn’t healed regains I hit point after Id4 hours.

Monsters and Death

Most DMs have a monster die the instant it drops to 0 hit points, rather than having it fall unconscious and make death saving throws.

Mighty villains and special nonplayer characters are common exceptions; the DM might have them fall unconscious and follow the same rules as player characters.

Knocking a Creature Out

Sometimes an attacker wants to incapacitate a foe, rather than deal a killing blow. When an attacker reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack, the attacker can knock the creature out. The attacker can make this choice the instant the damage is dealt. The creature falls unconscious and is stable.

Adventuring

Delving into the ancient tomb of horrors. slipping through the back alleys of Waterdeep, hacking a fresh trail through the thick jungles on the Isle of Dread-these are the things that Dungeons and Dragons adventures are made of. Your character in the game might explore forgotten ruins and uncharted lands, uncover dark secrets and sinister plots, and slay foul monsters. And if all goes well, your character will survive to claim rich rewards before embarking on a new adventure.

This chapter covers the basics of the adventuring life, from the mechanics of movement to the complexities of social interaction. The rules for resting are also in this chapter, along with a discussion of the activities your character might pursue between adventures.

Whether adventurers are exploring a dusty dungeon or the complex relationships of a royal court, the game follows a natural rhythm, as outlined in the book’s introduction:

• The DM describes the environment.
• The players describe what they want to do.
• The DM narrates the results of their actions.

Typically, the DM uses a map as an outline of the adventure, tracking the characters’ progress as they explore dungeon corridors or wilderness regions.

The DM’s notes, including a key to the map, describe what the adventurers find as they enter each new area. Sometimes, the passage of time and the adventurers’ actions determine what happens, so the DM might use a timeline or a flowchart to track their progress instead of a map.

Details on Time, speed, and movement can all be found in Chapter 8 of the Player’s Handbook as well as different activities that are important for the players and characters.

• Movement
• Environment
• Social Interaction
• Monster Harvesting
• Drunkenness
• Lockpicking

Death and Resurrection

Death comes to all characters, most of the time violently with blood, guts, and body parts flying in the wind.  A character death can be traumatic to the player and the group they adventure with.  Luckily with magic most things can be fixed, but death is still death.  It is not as easy as everyone hopes it will be.

Any death is difficult, especially for the recovery.  Any character that is brought back after death will possibly develop issues, mental or otherwise.  Side effects after being on the other side should be considered the norm and those issues will have to be dealt with and possibly resolved.

Resurrection Spells

Revivify

This is the cheapest of the resurrection spells in terms of both money and spell level cost. It is a level 3 spell and costs only 300 gold worth of precious gems, however its scope is very limited, as it must be used upon a creature within a minute of its death. Creature returns to life with 1 hit point. This spell can’t return life to a creature that died of old age, and it can’t restore missing body parts.

The chance of success is a DC10 for the caster to overcome, only their spell casting modifier is allowed as a modifier to the casting roll, spells such as Guidance will not work.

Raise Dead

This is more expensive than revivify, costing a gemstone worth at least 500 gold and a 5th level spell slot, however the time frame for use is much larger. Touch a creature dead for no longer than 10 days. A resurrection ritual is required and, if its soul is both willing and at liberty to rejoin the body, the creature returns to life with 1 hit point. This spell has no effect on undead. This spell neutralizes poisons and cures nonmagical diseases. This spell doesn’t remove magical effects. If they aren’t removed prior to casting, they return when the creature comes back to life. This spell closes all mortal wounds but doesn’t restore missing body parts. If the creature doesn’t have body parts or organs necessary for survival, the spell fails.

Coming back from the dead is an ordeal. The target takes a -4 penalty to all attacks, saves, and ability checks. Every time it finishes a long rest, the penalty is reduced by 1 until it disappears.

The chance of success is controlled by the Resurrection Ritual.

Resurrection

The resurrection spell requires an hour of preparation and a gem worth at least 1000 gold. You touch a creature that has been dead for no more than a century, didn’t die of old age, and isn’t undead. A resurrection ritual is required and, if its soul is willing, the target returns to life with all its hit points. This spell neutralizes any poisons and cures normal diseases. It doesn’t, however, remove magical diseases, curses, and the like. This spell closes all mortal wounds and restores any missing body parts.

Coming back from the dead is an ordeal. The target takes a -4 penalty to all attack rolls, saving throws, and ability checks. Every time the target finishes a long rest, the penalty is reduced by 1 until it disappears.

If you use this spell on a creature that has been dead for one year or longer, you can’t cast spells, and have disadvantage on all attacks, ability checks, and saves until you finish a long rest.

The chance of success is controlled by the Resurrection Ritual.

Forced Resurrection

The resurrect spell above, but more forceful in that this version of the ritual forces a spirit to return to its body. For this to be successful, a blood sacrifice is required, as is an object that the deceased greatly favored in life. The object must be bathed in the blood of the sacrificed individual before the resurrection ritual is performed.

The chance of success is controlled by the Resurrection Ritual.

True Resurrect and Wish

The resurrection spell requires an hour of preparation and a gem worth at least 25,000 gold. You touch a creature that has been dead for no longer than 200 years and that died for any reason except old age. A resurrection ritual is required and, if the creature’s soul is free and willing, it’s restored to life with all its hit points.

This spell closes all wounds, neutralizes any poison, cures all diseases, and lifts any curses. The spell replaces damaged or missing organs and limbs. If the creature was undead, it is restored to its non-undead form.

The spell can provide a new body if the original no longer exists, in which case you must speak the creature’s name. The creature appears in an unoccupied space you choose within 10 feet of you.

The chance of success is controlled by the Resurrection Ritual.

Reincarnation

If no material matter remains of the individual that one wishes to bring back from the dead, or an individual with a regular resurrection spell is not available, the Reincarnate spell may be used. Requires 1000 gold worth of oils. Touch a dead humanoid, or a piece of one, that’s died in the last 10 days. The spell makes a new adult body for its soul. A resurrection ritual is required and, if the target’s soul isn’t free or willing to come back to life, the spell fails.

The game master picks the new body by rolling 1d100 that determines the character’s new race and gender. The number rolled determines the new body for the soul, which may not be the same race as the old body. The creature remembers its old life and retains its capabilities save for its racial traits, which must be changed if it’s given a new race. See the Reincarnation page for a list of races that your character could become if brought back to life from the Reincarnation spell.

The chance of success is controlled by the Resurrection Ritual.

The Resurrection Ritual

Resurrection Challenge

If a character is dead, and a resurrection is attempted by a spell or spell effect with longer than a 1 action casting time, a Resurrection Challenge is initiated. Up to 3 individuals who knew the deceased can offer to contribute to the ritual via a Contribution Skill Check. The DM asks them each to make a skill check based on their form of contribution, with the DC of the check adjusting to how helpful/impactful the DM feels the contribution would be.

For example, praying to the god of the devout, fallen character may require an Intelligence (Religion) check at an easy to medium difficulty, where loudly demanding the soul of the fallen to return from the aether may require a Charisma (Intimidation) check at a very hard or nearly impossible difficulty. Advantage and disadvantage can apply here based on how perfect, or off base, the contribution offered is which is, again, decided by the game master it is an NPC. If the ritual is being used to restore a character, the game master will confer with the player of the dead character to gauge whether the contributions are effective.

After all contributions are completed, the game master then rolls a single, final resurrection success check with no modifier. The base DC for the final resurrection check is 10, increasing by 1 for each previous successful resurrection the character has undergone (signifying the slow erosion of the soul’s connection to this world). For each successful contribution skill check, this DC is decreased by 3, whereas each failed contribution skill check increases the DC by 1.

Upon a successful resurrection check, the character’s soul (should it be willing) will be returned to the body, and the ritual succeeded. On a failed check, the soul does not return, and the character is lost.

Only the strongest of magical incantations can bypass this resurrection challenge, in the form of the True Resurrection or Wish spells. These spells can also restore a character to life who was lost due to a failed resurrection ritual.

Examples of Contributions

When a resurrection ritual has begun and the other characters and/or available NPCs are seeking to return the deceased to their body (or new body via reincarnation), the contributions they provide are to have emotional or sentimental meaning and usually involves the contributor’s relationship with the deceased. Other than telling the deceased what they meant to the living, some examples of contributions to serve as inspiration are…

• Barbarian: Trophies of their conquests, their weapon, tales of their victories, music featuring war drums, firm and to the point speeches, personal belongings.
• Bard: Inspiring poems or songs about them, performances befitting of their personality, stories of their adventures, their musical instrument(s), personal belongings.
• Cleric: A prayer to the cleric’s deity, cleric’s holy symbol, candles and incense, an expression of what they meant to everyone, personal belongings.
• Druid: A beloved animal companion, beseeching you goddess for assistance, soil of the earth, personal belongings.
• Fighter: Their armor or weapons, trophies, firm and to the point speeches, personal belongings.
• Knight: Their sword or shield, pieces of their riding gear, or any signets or other objects showing their status.
• Monk: Display of their martial arts, meditation in deceased’s memory, candles and incense, personal belongings.
• Paladin: Reminding the deceased of their oath, paladin’s holy symbol, stories of how they have changed the world, their weapon, personal belongings.
• Ranger: Their animal companion, their bow and/or quiver, a preferred type of arrow, trophy from their preferred foe, personal belongings.
• Rogue: Expensive jewelry or gold coins, preferred weapons, tales of their exploits, personal belongings.
• Sorcerer: Magic items of significance, sign of their ancestry, their familiar, personal belongings.
• Warlock: The warlock’s weapon, beseeching their patron for assistance, their familiar, personal belongings.
• Wizard: The wizard’s quarterstaff or spell book, their familiar, magic scrolls and tomes, personal belongings.

Movement

Swimming across a rushing river, sneaking down a dungeon corridor, scaling a treacherous mountain slope — all sorts of movement play a key role in fantasy gaming adventures.

The game master can summarize the adventurers’ movement without calculating exact distances or travel times:

Sometimes it’s important, though, to know how long it takes to get from one spot to another, whether the answer is in days, hours, or minutes. The rules for determining travel time depend on two factors: the speed and travel pace of the creatures moving and the terrain they’re moving over.

Speed

Every character and monster have a speed, which is the distance in feet that the character or monster can walk in 1 round. This number assumes short bursts of energetic movement during a life-threatening situation.

The following rules determine how far a character or monster can move in a minute, an hour, or a day.

Travel Pace

While traveling, a group of adventurers can move at a normal, fast, or slow pace, as shown on the Travel Pace table. The table states how far the party can move in a period and whether the pace has any effect. A fast pace makes characters less perceptive, while a slow pace makes it possible to sneak around and to search an area more carefully (see the “Activity While Traveling” section later in the Player’s Handbook for more information).

Forced March. The Travel Pace table assumes that character’s travel for eight hours in day. They can push on beyond that limit, at the risk of exhaustion.

For each additional hour of travel beyond eight hours, the characters cover the distance shown in the Hour column for their pace, and each character must make a constitution saving throw at the end of the hour. The DC is 10 + 1 for each hour past the first eight hours of travel. On a failed saving throw, a character suffers one level of exhaustion (see Appendix A).

Mounts and Vehicles. For short spans of time (up to an hour), many animals move much faster than humanoids. A mounted character can ride at a gallop for about an hour, covering twice the usual distance for a fast pace. If fresh mounts are available every 8 to 10 miles, characters can cover larger distances at this pace, but this is very rare except in densely populated areas.

Characters in wagons, carriages, or other land vehicles choose a pace as normal. Characters in a waterborne vessel are limited to the speed of the vessel (see chapter 5, “Equipment” in the Player’s Handbook), and they don’t suffer penalties for a fast pace or gain benefits from a slow pace. Depending on the vessel and the size of the crew, ships might be able to travel for up to 24 hours per day.

Certain special mounts, such as a pegasus or griffon, or special vehicles, such as a carpet of flying, allow you to travel more swiftly. The Dungeon Master’s Guide contains more information on special methods of travel.

Overland Movement Table (One Hour of Travel)

Overland Movement Table (Eight Hours of Travel)

Difficult Terrain

The travel speeds given in the Travel Pace table assume relatively simple terrain: roads, open plains, or clear dungeon corridors. But adventurers often face dense forests, deep swamps, rubble-filled ruins, steep mountains, and ice-covered ground — all considered difficult terrain. You move at half speed or slower in difficult terrain.

Hampered Movement Table

Different terrains will cause different movement speeds.  This is true for Combat movement or Overland travel.

Terrain and Overland Movement Table

Quadrupeds, such as horses, can carry heavier loads than characters can.

Mounts Movement Table

Rafts, barges, keelboats, and rowboats are used on lakes and rivers.

If going downstream, add the speed of the current (typically 3 miles per hour) to the speed of the vehicle. In addition to 10 hours of being rowed, the vehicle can also float an additional 14 hours, if someone can guide it, so add an additional 42 miles to the daily distance traveled. These vehicles can’t be rowed against any significant current, but they can be pulled upstream by draft animals on the shores.

Vehicle Movement Table

Special Types of Movement

Movement through dangerous dungeons or wilderness areas often involves more than simply walking. Adventurers might have to climb, crawl, swim, or jump to get where they need to go.

Climbing, Swimming, and Crawling

Each foot of movement costs 1 extra foot (2 extra feet in difficult terrain) when you’re climbing, swimming, or crawling. You ignore this extra cost if you have a climbing speed and use it to climb, or a swimming speed and use it to swim. At the DM’s option, climbing a slippery vertical surface or one with few handholds requires a successful Strength (Athletics) check. Similarly, gaining any distance in rough water might require a successful Strength (Athletics) check.

Jumping

Your Strength determines how far you can jump.

Long Jump. When you make a long jump, you cover several feet up to your Strength score if you move at least 10 feet on foot immediately before the jump. When you make a standing long jump, you can leap only half that distance. Either way, each foot you clear on the jump costs a foot of movement.

This rule assumes that the height of your jump doesn’t matter, such as a jump across a stream or chasm. At your DM’s option, you must succeed on a DC 10 Strength (Athletics) check to clear a low obstacle (no taller than a quarter of the jump’s distance), such as a hedge or low wall. Otherwise, you hit it.

When you land in difficult terrain, you must succeed on a DC 10 Dexterity (Acrobatics) check to land on your feet. Otherwise, you land prone.

High Jump. When you make a high jump, you leap into the air several feet equal to 3 + your Strength modifier (minimum of 0 feet) if you move at least 10 feet on foot immediately before the jump. When you make a standing high jump, you can jump only half that distance. Either way, each foot you clear on the jump costs a foot of movement. In some circumstances, your DM might allow you to make a Strength (Athletics) check to jump higher than you normally can.

You can extend your arms half your height above yourself during the jump. Thus, you can reach above you a distance equal to the height of the jump plus 1 1/2 times your height.

Traveling in Darkness

Unless you can see where you are going, getting anywhere will be difficult.  There are several different types of sight that will allow you to move at normal speed, but unless you can see your movement will be impacted.

Blindsight: You will be able to move up to the distance of your Blindsight and not incur any penalties.  Any attempt to move at full speed, you must make an Acrobatics or Dexterity save that has a DC of 10 + 2 for every five feet moved.

Darkvision: While total darkness is still dim light, moving around is not that difficult and you are able to move at your full speed without any difficulties.

Normal Vision: You speed is limited to ten feet per round and any attempt to move faster requires an Acrobatics or Dexterity check with a DC of 15 + 2 for every five feet moved.

Tremorsense: Much like Blindsense, this ability allows you to see where you cannot see.  You can move up to the distance of your Tremorsense senses without a problem.

Truesight: There is no darkness that can stop you.  You can move normally without any issues.

The Environment

By its nature, adventuring involves delving into places that are dark, dangerous, and full of mysteries to be explored. The rules in this section cover some of the most important ways in which adventurers interact with the environment in such places. The Dungeon Master’s Guide has rules covering more unusual situations.  There are also a lot more details in Chapter 8 of the Player’s Handbook.

Vision and Light

The most fundamental tasks of adventuring-noticing danger, finding hidden objects, hitting an enemy in combat, and targeting a spell, to name just a few- rely heavily on a character’s ability to see. Darkness and other effects that obscure vision can prove a significant hinderance.

A given area might be lightly or heavily obscured. In a lightly obscured area, such as dim light, patchy fog, or moderate foliage, creatures have disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

A heavily obscured area – such as darkness, opaque fog, or dense foliage – blocks vision entirely. A creature in a heavily obscured area effectively suffers from the blinded condition.

The presence or absence of light in an environment creates three categories of illumination: bright light, dim light, and darkness.

Bright light: lets most creatures see normally. Even gloomy days provide bright light, as do torches, lanterns, fires, and other sources of illumination within a specific radius.

Dim light: also called shadows, creates a lightly obscured area. An area of dim light is usually a boundary between a source of bright light such as a torch, and surrounding darkness. The soft light of twilight and dawn also counts as dim light. A particularly brilliant full moon might bathe the land in dim light.

Darkness: creates a heavily obscured area. Characters face darkness outdoors at night (even most moonlit nights). within the confines of an unlit dungeon or a subterranean vault, or in an area of magical darkness.

Blindsight: A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within a specific radius. Creatures without eyes, sue h as oozes, and creatures with echolocation or heightened senses, such as bats and true dragons, have this sense. Note that the range of blindsight is measured from the creature that has that vision as the origin point. There are not any special environmental situations that extend this range.

Darkvision: Many creatures in the worlds of Dungeons and Dragons, especially those that dwell underground. have darkvision. Within a specified range, a creature with darkvision can see in darkness as if the darkness were dim light, so areas of darkness are only lightly obscured as far as that creature is concerned. However, the creature can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray. Note that the range of darkvision is measured from the creature that has that vision as the origin point. There are not any special environmental situations that extend this range.

Truesight: A creature with truesight can, out to a specific range, see in normal and magical darkness, see invisible creatures and objects, automatically detect visual illusions, and succeed on saving throws against them, and perceives the original form of a shape changer or a creature that is transformed by magic. Furthermore, the creature can see into the Ethereal Plane. Note that the range of truesight is measured from the creature that has that vision as the origin point. There are not any special environmental situations that extend this range.

Additional Vision Clarification

One of the common traits of the titular dungeons in Dungeons & Dragons is that they tend to be dark. In Fifth Edition, many races and classes give features that allow players to see such conditions, such as Darkvision, but this trait is not infallible. It has drawbacks and limitations that many players and Dungeon Master’s are not aware of.

When it comes to exploration in various types of lighting, many things need to be considered, including the nature of darkness, distances, and obscurement. Bearing these in mind is important for any player or DM to preserve D&D’s mood and balance. It should be noted that the rules of vision are based upon obscurement. While there are three kinds of lighting, including bright, dim and darkness, it is obscurement that governs them. This is where having or lacking Darkvision comes into play.

For characters without Darkvision, darkness is considered heavily obscured, meaning they cannot see in it at all. Perception checks that rely on sight automatically fail. Dim light, including candles and starlight, is lightly obscured. Creatures without Darkvision can see in it, but it is difficult. This means Perception checks that rely on sight have disadvantage. This applies to Passive Perception as well, which grants a -5 to the value when the player would have disadvantage. Lastly, bright light grants full vision. It does not count as having any obscurement at all. However, if the light is from direct sunlight, characters with Sunlight Sensitivity are penalized.

As for characters with Darkvision, the obscurement is moved down a stage based on their distance of vision. For example, a character with a Darkvision of 60 feet treats darkness within that range as dim light, and dim light is treated as bright light. However, outside of that range, darkness is still heavily obscured. In it, the character is still unable to see. What’s more, a creature with Darkvision still has disadvantage on Perception checks in darkness.

It should also be noted that this only pertains to obscurement from sources of light. Darkvision does nothing to protect from other effects of obscurement. For example, the Fog Cloud spell creates an area that is heavily obscured; creatures cannot see inside of it or through it at all. Because Fog Cloud is not a spell that solely affects lighting, Darkvision provides no benefits to sight inside of the area.

Another important distinction to make is the difference between magical darkness and non-magical darkness. The Darkness spell inhibits Darkvision within its area. This spell is notoriously dangerous because even the caster is unable to see within its range. What’s more, it consumes forms of non-magical light, so lighting a torch does nothing to help.

The only way a character can see within the Darkness spell is by using a spell that is third level or higher to create light or the Warlock Invocation Devil’s Sight. This Invocation is very different from Darkvision. Primarily, Devil’s Sight allows the user to see in darkness (including magic darkness) normally, as if it were bright light. What’s more, Darkvision removes a player’s ability to see things in color while in darkness; Devil’s Sight has no such caveat.

Vision, however, interacts differently with invisibility. Creatures with the Invisible condition can hide anywhere, as they are considered heavily obscured for that purpose. However, they still must use the Hide action to benefit from this ability. Note that this doesn’t help against creatures with vision that doesn’t rely on sight, such as Blindvision. Otherwise, they must use their sense of hearing or watch for any traces left by the creature, like footprints in the snow or ripples in shallow water.

If an Invisible creature is not hiding, however, they can be detected. Creatures who try to attack them have disadvantage, and an Invisible creature has advantage on their attacks. However, the best use of invisibility is to Hide to prevent from being targeted. While D&D’s vision system is a little complex, using it properly can really elevate the immersion the game. After all, the only thing scarier than a dungeon is a dungeon cloaked in darkness’ embrace.

Note that in all cases the range of any special vision type is measured from the creature that has that vision as the origin point. There are not any special environmental situations that extend this range.

Summary

Normal Vision Table

Darkvision within Range Table

Darkvision Outside of Range Table

Conditions

Darkness – Darkness creates a heavily obscured area. Night, even most moonlit nights, are considered to cast full darkness as do any areas with a lack of bright light sources.

Dim Light – Dim light creates a lightly obscured area. This is often used to describe the hazy area between bright light (as caused by a torch or other light source) and darkness. Twilight, dawn, and even the light of a full moon are all considered dim light.

Bright Light – Most creatures can see normally in bright light. This is a well-lit room, a sunny day, the area closest to a light source, etc.

Heavily Obscured – Darkness, as well as things such as thick fog or dense foliage, cause an area to be heavily obscured. In these areas, creatures suffer from the blinded condition.

Lightly Obscured – Areas that are lightly obscured cause a creature to have disadvantage on perception checks that require sight.

Blinded – A blinded creature can’t see and automatically fails any ability check that requires sight. Attack rolls against the creature have advantage, and the creature’s Attack rolls.

Passive Perception – If a creature has disadvantage on perception checks, that creature takes a -5 penalty to their passive perception score. (We’ll discuss passive perception and how it relates to darkness but check out our full article for more info.)

Magical Darkness – Magical darkness is any darkness created by a spell or other magical effect.

Social Interaction

Exploring dungeons, overcoming obstacles, and slaying monsters are key parts of D&D adventures. No less important, though, are the social interactions that adventurers have with other inhabitants of the world.

Interaction takes on many forms. You might need to convince an unscrupulous thief to confess to some malfeasance, or you might try to flatter a dragon so that it will spare your life. The DM assumes the roles of any characters who are participating in the interaction that don’t belong to another player at the table. Any such character is called a nonplayer character (NPC).

In general terms, an NPC’s altitude toward you is described as friendly, indifferent, or hostile. Friendly NPCs are predisposed to help you, and hostile ones are inclined to get in your way. It’s easier to get what you want from a friendly NPC, of course.

Social interactions have two primary aspects: roleplaying and ability checks.

Roleplaying

Roleplaying is literally the act of playing out a role. In this case, it’s you as a player determining how your character thinks, acts, and talks.

Roleplaying is a part of every aspect of the game, and it comes to the fore during social interactions. Your character’s quirks, mannerisms, and personality influence how interactions resolve.

There are two styles you can use when roleplaying your character: the descriptive approach and the active approach. Most players use a combination of the two styles. Use whichever mix of the two works best for you.

Descriptive Approach to Roleplaying

With this approach, you describe your character’s words and actions to the DM and the other players. Drawing on your mental image of your character, you tell everyone what your character does and how he or she does it.

When using descriptive roleplaying, keep the following things in mind:

• Describe your character’s emotions and altitude. Focus on your character’s intent and how others might perceive it.
• Provide as much embellishment as you feel comfortable with.
• Don’t worry about getting things exactly right. Just focus on thinking about what your character would do and describing what you see in your mind.

Active Approach to Roleplaying

If descriptive roleplaying tells your DM and your fellow players what your character thinks and does, active roleplaying shows them.

When you use active roleplaying, you speak with your character’s voice, like an actor taking on a role. You might even echo your character’s movements and body language. This approach is more immersive than descriptive roleplaying, though you still need to describe things that can’t be reasonably acted out.

Going back to the example of Chris roleplaying Tordek above, here’s how the scene might play out if Chris used active roleplaying:

Results of Roleplaying

The DM uses your character’s actions and attitudes to determine how an NPC reacts. A cowardly NPC buckles under threats of violence. A stubborn dwarf refuses to let anyone badger her. A vain dragon laps up flattery.

When interacting with an NPC, pay close attention to the DM’s portrayal of the NPC’s mood, dialogue, and personality. Vou might be able to determine an NPC’s personality traits, ideals, flaws, and bonds, then play on them to influence the NPC’s attitude.

Interactions in Dungeons and Dragons are much like interactions in real life. If you can offer NPCs something they want, threaten them with something they fear, or play on their sympathies and goals, you can use words to get almost anything you want. On the other hand, if you insult a proud warrior or speak ill of a noble’s allies, your efforts to convince or deceive will fall short.

Monster Harvesting

The act of removing useful body parts from a creature is referred to as harvesting.

Anything that can be harvested from a creature is referred to as a harvesting material or simply material. In general, only creatures that have died may be harvested, but there may be some exceptions based on context.

Appraising

Before a player begins hacking and butchering their hunt, they may instead choose to take a moment first and appraise the creature to be harvested. To do this, they must spend 1 minute examining the creature to be harvested and then roll an Intelligence check, adding their proficiency bonus if they are proficient in the skill corresponding to that creature (see table below).

The DC of the check is equal to 8 + the Harvested Creature’s CR (treating any CR less than 1 as 0). Success on this check grants the player full knowledge of any useful harvesting materials on the creature, the DC requirement to harvest those materials, any special requirements to harvest them, and any potential risks in doing so. In addition, any harvesting check made on that creature by that player is rolled at advantage. A character may only attempt one appraisal check per creature.

Monster Type / Skill Check Table

Splitting Up the Responsibilities

Some party members may prefer to let one character handle the appraisal of materials, while another more dexterous character handles the actual harvesting. In this scenario, all benefits of appraising a creature are conferred to the player doing the harvesting, so long as the player that performed the appraising assists the harvesting player through the whole duration of the harvest.

This section details the steps associated with performing a harvest, and any factors that may influence it.

Harvesting

To harvest a creature, a character must make a Dexterity ability check using the same skill proficiency as listed in the above appraising table.

This check reflects a character’s ability to not only properly remove the intended item without damaging it, but it also involves any ancillary requirements of the harvest such as proper preservation and storage techniques.

Each individual item in a creature’s harvesting table is listed with a DC next to it. Any roll that a player makes that equals or exceeds this DC grants that player that item. Rewards are cumulative, and a player receives every item with a DC equal to or below their ability check result.

Only one harvesting attempt may be made on a creature. Failure to meet a certain item’s DC threshold assumes that the item was made unsalvageable due to the harvester’s incompetence.

For most creatures, the time it takes to harvest a material is counted in minutes and is equal to the DC of that material divided by 5. For huge creatures however, it is equal in DC of that material, while for gargantuan creatures, it is equal to the DC of that material multiplied by 2.

Violent Deaths

This guide assumes that most creatures you attempt to harvest died in direct combat and thus already accounts for the idea that you are harvesting creatures that are not in pristine condition. However, some deaths are more violent than others and can make harvesting useful materials either extremely difficult or downright impossible. Such examples include burning by fire, dissolving from acid, or being completely crushed under a pillar of stone. In these cases, raise the DC for harvesting any of that creature’s materials by 5. Alternatively, the DM may decide that well- orchestrated hunts result in a carcass that is prime for harvesting, such as creatures killed mostly through psychic damage, or those killed in one clean attack. In these cases, the DM should lower the DC for harvesting any of that creature’s materials by 5.

Furthermore, the DM may adjudicate whether some of a creature’s individual materials have been made useless due to effects imposed by them during their death. Examples may include blood being tainted from poisoning, or their pelt being worthless due to excessive slashing/piercing damage.

Expiration

Many harvested goods will start to rot and decay. Below is a quick overview of how we determined expiration dates.

Meat

It is possible to harvest the meat of many creatures, although uncooked meat spoils quickly and often attract other predators. Some creature types have meat that is inedible (i.e., undead), while others carry some sort of stigma (cannibalism, distasteful, unholy). For example, eating a celestial may be considered a vile, unholy act; while eating a monstrosity may be considered disgusting and distasteful; and giants are too like most medium-sized humanoids and is often considered in line with cannibalism. Of course, while buying stigma associated meats is forbidden and possibly illegal in most places, there are always people willing to buy illegal goods (although they may be hard to find).

      * Some monstrosities have meat that is edible (DM Discretion)

The amount of meat is dependent on the beast’s size. The weight of a raw piece of meat is one pound heavier than a ration (one slab of meat, 3 lb. is needed to produce 1 dried ration, 2 lb.).

Eating Meat: Cooked meat can be eaten safely. Cooking meat requires a campfire or oven. Eating raw meat requires a DC 10 Constitution Check. A successful check results in a filling meal. A failure results in debilitating stomach cramps, causing 1 level of exhaustion (disadvantage on ability checks).

Drying Meat: The meat can be dried using salt, spices, heat, and time.

Drunkenness

A pint of ale is never very far away in the world of Faerun. A drink to accompany a fine meal a bit of liquid courage to head into battle, or a celebration after long and arduous journey. A great way for anyone to enjoy themselves, but alcohol itself is a double-edged sword It can make you feel invincible, but it can also make you think you’re seeing double, be careful when consuming for dangerous effects are never tar behind.

Intoxication

For many, alcohol can affect you differently that is where intoxication levels come into effect. Your characters intoxication level is equal to your constitution modifier plus your proficiency bonus and there are different stages to being drunk.

Tipsy

when the alcohol is flowing, and good times are being had by all you start to feel a tingle in your fingers. You gain the sense that you could do just about anything, you are tipsy.

“Tipsy” is when you are 1/4 of the way to being intoxicated rounded down. Therefore, at this stage you have advantage on a charisma-based skill checks and wisdom saves for being frightened At this stage you also gain disadvantage on ranged attacks

Drunk

As the night continues so does your drinking. You’re having a fun night, why stop? Once you’ve reached 1/2 of your intoxication level you reached the point where you are drunk.

At this stage your speech is slurred, you’re seeing double, and your limbs are a little numb. If you are drunk, you gain five temporary hit points and maintain your advantage against fright. You lose your charisma-based advantage and gain disadvantage on ALL attack rolls and intelligence checks.

Wasted

At this point in the night. you are one of the last people in the bar. You’ve ignored that voice in the back of your head saying you should stop and now you’re wasted.

When you are 3/4 of the way to full intoxication you are wasted. You gain another five temporary hit points and cannot be rightened or charmed, but you have disadvantage on all attack rolls and ability checks.

Blackout

Now you have drank too much. You have past the point of no return. You may not be able to form coherent thoughts or even be able to say your own name. You have reached the Blackout stage.

This is the point where you have reached your intoxication level You are at disadvantage for any attack rolls, ability checks and saves aside from Constitution. At this point you must make a constitution save (D.C. equals 10 + 1/2 the number of drinks consumed) every hour or be rendered unconscious.

A Simple Drink

There are many types of drinks that one could imbibe, and those drinks have different levels of intoxication.

Drink Strength Table

Racial Bonus

Dwarves, Half-Ores, and Goliaths have stronger constitutions than most. Therefore, their intoxication level is twice their Constitution modifier plus their proficiency bonus.

Lockpicking

Insert cool intro here. I mean. it’s just a homebrew on lockpicking, what kind of intro does it need? It anything, I’ll just say I think it’s cooler than your usual Dexterity (thieves’ tools) single roll. but that’s just my opinion.

Study the Lock

When faced with some kind of mechanical lock, you can use your Action to Study the Lock. You handle, analyze, and test the lock looking for weak spots and trying to figure out the best plan of attack. Make an Intelligence (thieves’ tools) check against the DC of the lock. If you succeed, you find the mechanism’s weak spots and how to exploit them giving your future attempts at picking the lock advantage.

Additionally, if you take a subtle approach when unlocking the lock, the jam the lock result becomes minor setback and the break the lock result becomes jam the lock. It you fail, you don’t gain any additional information on the lock. Future attempts at studying the lock can only be made after a short rest.

Pick the Lock

You use your Action to try to, you know, pick the lock. You must choose a subtle or a non-subtle approach and then make a Dexterity (thieves’ tools) against the lock’s DC. Creatures without proficiency in thieves’ tools can’t opt for a subtle attempt and creatures using improvised tools make the check with disadvantage.

If you succeed on the check, the lock is picked and opens. If you fail by less than 5, the lock isn’t picked but nothing else happens. If you fail 5 or more, but less than 10, you jam the lock. If you fail by 10 or more, you break the lock on the spot. Hard to visualize? Here’s a handy-dandy table.

DC15 Lock Example Table

Break the Lock

The lock is broken and can’t be picked or used. Sorry, dude.

Jam the Lock

Your attempt at picking the lock caused something to break, catch, jam, or otherwise damage the mechanism momentarily. Future attempts at picking the lock have the DC cumulatively increased by five until the lock is successful picked or properly opened by its designed opening method of the lock’s DC is increased by 15, you break the lock.

Minor Setback

Same as jamming the lock except the DC is only increased by two.

Subtle Approach

You focus on decreasing your chances of leaving visible marks of you forced entry by using subtler, gentler, and less aggressive methods. Your attempts at picking the lock are hard to see to most people. If someone tries to analyze the lock looking for marks, they must make an Intelligence (Investigation) check against a DC equal to 10 plus your Dexterity (thieves’ tools) bonus. seeing nothing out of the ordinary on a failure and signs of your picking on a success.

Non-Subtle Approach

You just want to get the job done, no fuss, no subtlety. You use more aggressive methods and whatever tools your nave in your arsenal to open the lock, like using a piece of metal for leverage. creating dents on specific places to weaken the mechanism, etc., which leaves clearly perceivable marks on the lock or on the area it was placed. Any creature that looks at the lock can see that it was the target of a breaking and entering attempt.

Changing the DC

Some locks can be more susceptible to a specific type of approach. A rusty lock is considerably harder to pick using delicate tools and trying not to leave marks than it is to simply grab a hammer or plyers and try to make the mechanism unlock by force. At the same time, some locks might be too heavy or reinforced to be reasonably made to open without the use of small tools and delicate technique. For that reason, the DM might assign different DCs for the same lock based on what approach is taken. A successful study the lock check tells the character whether one of the approaches is easier than the other or it both have the

Magical Locks

If the lock has a magical component to it. the DM might allow the study the lock check to be an Intelligence (Arcana) check instead of the usual Intelligence (Thieves Tools) check.

Using Ability Scores

Six abilities provide a quick description of every creature’s physical and mental characteristics:

• Strength, measuring physical power.
• Dexterity, measuring agility.
• Constitution, measuring endurance.
• Intelligence, measuring reasoning and memory.
• Wisdom, measuring perception and insight.
• Charisma, measuring force of personality.

Is a character muscle-bound and insightful? Brilliant and charming? Nimble and hardy? Ability scores define these qualities-a creature’s assets as well as weaknesses.

The three main rolls of the game-the ability check, the saving throw, and the attack roll-rely on the six ability scores. The book’s introduction describes the basic rule behind these rolls: roll a d20, add an ability modifier derived from one of the six ability scores, and compare the total to a target number.

D&D Ability Score Descriptions

Strength

Strength Description Table

Dexterity

Dexterity Description Table

Constitution

Constitution Description Table

Intelligence

Intelligence Description Table

Wisdom

Wisdom Description Table

Charisma

Charisma Description Table

This chapter focuses on how to use ability checks and saving throws, covering the fundamental activities that creatures attempt in the game. Rules for attack rolls appear in chapter 9 of the Player’s Handbook.

Advantage and Disadvantage

Sometimes a special ability or spell tells you that you have advantage or disadvantage on an ability check, a saving throw, or an attack roll. When that happens, you roll a second d20 when you make the roll. Use the higher of the two rolls if you have advantage and use the lower roll if you have disadvantage.

If multiple situations affect a roll and each one grants advantage or imposes disadvantage on it, you don’t roll more than one additional d20. If two favorable situations grant advantage, for example, you still roll only one additional d20.

If circumstances cause a roll to have both advantage and disadvantage, you are considered to have neither of them, nor you roll one d20. This is true even if multi pie circumstances impose disadvantage and only one grants advantage or vice versa. In such a situation, you have neither advantage nor disadvantage.

When you have advantage or disadvantage and something in the game, such as the halfling’s Lucky trait, lets you reroll the d20, you can reroll only one of the dice. You choose which one.

You usually gain advantage or disadvantage using special abilities, actions, or spells. Inspiration (see chapter 4 of the Player’s Handbook) can also give a character advantage on checks related to the character’s personality, ideals, or bonds. The DM can also decide that circumstances influence a roll in one direction or the other and grant advantage or impose disadvantage as a result.

Proficiency Bonus

Characters have a proficiency bonus determined by level, as detailed in chapter 1 of the Player’s Handbook. Monsters also have this bonus, which is incorporated in their stat blocks. The bonus is used in the rules on ability checks, saving throws, and attack rolls.

Your proficiency bonus can’t be added to a single die roll or other number more than once.

Occasionally, your proficiency bonus might be multiplied or divided (doubled or halved, for example) before you apply it. For example, the rogue’s Expertise feature doubles the proficiency bonus for certain ability checks. If a circumstance suggests that your proficiency bonus applies more than once to the same roll, you still add it only once and multiply or divide it only once.

By the same token, if a feature or effect allows you to multiply your proficiency bonus when making an ability check that wouldn’t normally benefit from your proficiency bonus, you still don’t add the bonus to the check. For that check your proficiency bonus is 0, given the fact that multiplying 0 by any number is still 0. For instance, if you lack proficiency in the History skill, you gain no benefit from a feature that lets you double your proficiency bonus when you make Intelligence (History) checks.

In general, you don’t multiply your proficiency bonus for attack rolls or saving throws. If a feature or effect allows you to do so, these same rules apply.

Ability Checks

An ability check tests a character’s or monster’s innate talent and training to overcome a challenge. The DM calls for an ability check when a character or monster attempts an action (other than an attack) that has a chance of failure. When the outcome is uncertain, the dice determine the results.

For every ability check, the DM decides which of the six abilities is relevant to the task at hand and the difficulty of the task, represented by a Difficulty Class. The more difficult a task, the higher its DC. The Typical Difficulty Classes table shows the most common DCs.

Typical Difficulty Class Table

To make an ability check, roll a d20 and add the relevant ability modifier. As with other d20 rolls, apply bonuses and penalties, and compare the total to the De. If the total equals or exceeds the DC, the ability check is a success – the creature overcomes the challenge at hand. Otherwise, it’s a failure, which means the character or monster makes no progress toward the objective or makes progress combined with a setback determined by the DM.

Contests

Sometimes one character’s or monster’s efforts are directly opposed to another’s. This can occur when both are trying to do the same thing and only one can succeed, such as attempting to snatch up a magic ring that has fallen on the floor. This situation also applies when one of them is trying to prevent the other one from accomplishing a goal-for example, when a monster tries to force open a door that an adventurer is holding dosed. In situations like these, the outcome is determined by a special form of ability check, called a contest.

Both participants in a contest make ability checks appropriate to their efforts. They apply all appropriate bonuses and penalties, but instead of comparing the total to a DC, they compare the totals of their two checks. The participant with the higher check total wins the contest. That character or monster either succeeds at the action or prevents the other one from succeeding.

If the contest results in a tie, the situation remains the same as it was before the contest. Thus, one contestant might win the contest by default. If two characters tie in a contest to snatch a ring off the floor, neither character grabs it. In a contest between a monster trying to open a door and an adventurer trying to keep the door dosed, a tie means that the door remains shut.

Skills

Each ability covers a broad range of capabilities, including skills that a character or a monster can be proficient in. A skill represents a specific aspect of an ability score, and an individual’s proficiency in a skill demonstrates a focus on that aspect. (A character’s starting skill proficiencies are determined at character creation, and a monster’s skill proficiencies appear in the monster’s stat block.)

Skills and Attributes

The skills related to each ability score are shown in the following list. (No skills are related to Constitution.) See an ability’s description in the later sections of this chapter for examples of how to use a skill associated with an ability.

• Strength: Athletics
• Dexterity: Acrobatics, Sleight of Hand, Stealth
• Intelligence: Arcana, History, Investigation, Nature, Religion
• Wisdom: Animal Handling, Insight, Medicine, Perception, Survival
• Charisma: Deception, Intimidation, Performance, Persuasion

Tools, Kits, and Attributes

There are also many different tools and kits that also use different attributes for their proficiency.  In some cases, there is a choice for which attribute might be used for a tool or kit.

• Strength: Mason’s Tools, Smith’s Tools
• Dexterity: Calligrapher’s Tools, Carpenter’s Tools, Cobbler’s Tools, Cook’s Utensils, Disguise Kit, Forgery Kit, Harvester’s Kit, Jeweler’s Tools, Leatherworker’s Tools, Luck Gaming Sets, Potter’s Tools, Thieves’ Tools, Tinker’s Tools, Weaver’s Tools, Woodcarver’s Tools
• Constitution: Poisoner’s Kit
• Intelligence: Alchemy Kit, Brewer’s Tools, Cartographer’s Tools, Cook’s Utensils, Herbalism Kit, Navigator’s Tools, Poisoner’s Kit, Strategic Gaming Sets
• Wisdom: Glassblower’s Tools, Navigator’s Tools, Vehicle (Land), Vehicle (Water)
• Charisma: Musical Instruments, Painter’s Tools

Sometimes, the DM might ask for an ability check using a specific skill – for example, “Make a Wisdom (Perception) check.” At other times, a player might ask the DM if proficiency in a particular skill applies to a check. In either case, proficiency in a skill means an individual can add his or her proficiency bonus to ability checks that involve that skill. Without proficiency in the skill, the individual makes a normal ability check.

Passive Checks

A passive check is a special kind of ability check that doesn’t involve any die rolls. Such a check can represent the average result for a task done repeatedly, such as searching for secret doors repeatedly. or can be used when the DM wants lo secretly determine whether the characters succeed at something without rolling dice, such as noticing a hidden monster.

Here’s how to determine a character’s total for a passive check:

• 10 + all modifiers that normally apply to the check.

If the character has advantage on the check, add 5. For disadvantage, subtract 5. The game refers to a passive check total as a score.

The rules on hiding in the “Dexterity” section below rely on passive checks, as do the exploration rules in chapter 8 in the Player’s Handbook.

Working Together

Sometimes two or more characters team up to attempt a task. The character who’s leading the effort – or the one with the highest ability modifier-can make an ability check with advantage, reflecting the help provided by the other characters. In combat, this requires the Help action (see chapter 9 in the Player’s Handbook).

A character can only provide help if the task is one that he or she could attempt alone. For example,, trying to open a lock requires proficiency with Thieves’ Tools, so a character who lacks that proficiency can’t help another character in that task. Moreover, a character can help only when two or more individuals working together would be productive. Some tasks, such as threading a needle. are no easier with help.

Group Checks

When several individuals are trying to accomplish something as a group, the DM might ask for a group ability check. In such a situation, the characters who are skilled in a particular task help cover those who aren’t.

To make a group ability check. everyone in the group makes the ability check. If at least half the group succeeds, the whole group succeeds. Otherwise, the group fails. Group checks don’t come up very often. and they’re most useful when all the characters succeed or fail as a group.

Hiding

When you try to hide, make a Dexterity (Stealth) check. Until you are discovered, or you stop hiding, that check’s total is contested by the Wisdom (Perception) check of any creature that actively searches for signs of your presence.

You can’t hide from a creature that can see you. and if you make noise (such as shouting a warning or knocking over a vase), you give away your position. An invisible creature can’t be seen, 50 it can always try to hide. Signs of its passage might still be noticed, however, and it still must stay quiet.

In combat, most creatures stay alert for signs of danger, so if you come out of hiding and approach a creature, it usually sees you. However, under certain circumstances, the Dungeon Master might allow you to stay hidden as you approach a creature that is distracted, allowing you to gain advantage on an attack before you are seen.

Passive Perception. When you hide, there’s a chance someone will notice you even if they aren’t searching. To determine whether such a creature notices you, the DM compares your Dexterity (Stealth) check with that creature’s passive Wisdom (Perception) score, which equals 10 + the creature’s Wisdom modifier, as well as any other bonuses or penalties. If the creature has advantage, add 5. For disadvantage, subtract 5.

What Can You See? One of the main factors in determining whether you can find a hidden creature or object is how well you can see in an area, which might be lightly or heavily obscured, as explained in chapter 8 in the Player’s Handbook.

Customization Options

The combination of ability scores, race, class, and background define your character’s capabilities in the game, and the personal details you create set your character apart from every other character. Even within your class and race, you have options to fine-tune what your character can do. But this chapter is for players who-with the DM’s permission – want to go a step further.

This chapter defines two sets of rules for customizing your character: multiclassing and feats. Multiclassing lets you combine classes together, and feats are special options you can choose instead of increasing your ability scores as you gain levels.

Multiclassing

Multiclassing allows you to gain levels in multi pie classes. Doing so lets you mix the abilities of those classes to realize a character concept that might not be reflected in one of the standard class options.

With this role, you have the option of gaining a level in a new class whenever you advance in level, instead of gaining a level in your current class. Your levels in all your classes are added together to determine your character level.

Further details are in Chapter 6 of the Player’s Handbook.

Feats

A feat represents a talent or an area of expertise that gives a character special capability. It embodies training, experience, and abilities beyond what a class provides.

At certain levels, your class gives you the Ability Score Improvement feature. Using the optional feats rule, you can forgo taking that feature to take a feat of your choice instead. Vou can take each feat only once unless the feat’s description says otherwise.

You must meet any prerequisite specified in a feat to take that feat. If you ever lose a feat’s prerequisite, you can’t use that feat until you regain the prerequisite.

All the possible Feats are available for Players to choose for their characters except the Lucky Feat.

Homebrew Feats

As the Campaign progresses more Homebrew feats will be discovered and made available to the characters.

Blindfighting

Extensive and continuous training in complete darkness or in some cases with the aid of blindfolds, have allowed you to hone your remaining senses to a razor’s edge. This specialized combat training has granted you the ability to perceive your surroundings in ways others couldn’t begin imagining. Must have proficiency in Perception.

• You develop blindsight up to a range of 20 feet.
• Your blindsight can only work in a setting where your character can use his other senses, like hearing and smell.
• You gain advantage on Perception checks relying on hearing and scent.

Eldritch Empowerment

You learn two Eldritch Invocation option of your choice from the warlock class. If the invocation has a prerequisite of any kind, you can choose that invocation only if you’re a warlock who meets the prerequisite.

End Him Rightly

You have mastered a little-known sword technique. As an action, you can unscrew the pommel from your sword and throw it at a creature within 20 feet of you. When you do so, you make a ranged weapon attack against it using your Strength modifier (you are proficient in this attack). On a hit, the target takes bludgeoning damage equal to 1d4 + your Strength modifier and must make an Intelligence saving throw with a DC of 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Strength modifier or be stunned by the impracticality of your tactics until the end of your next turn. The pommel lands within 5 feet of the target, and you have disadvantage on all attack rolls made with the sword whose pommel you unscrewed (due to it being imbalanced) until you pick it up and use an action to screw it back on.

Requires proficiency in at least one kind of sword.

Gastronomy

You have taken the art of cooking to a new art level.  No longer will you look at ingredients like a normal person.  You now have new eyes and a mind that always churns thinking of what could be turned into a recipe and a meal.  This path is not one followed by mere chefs, but those whose life of adventure and search of new and unique food allows you to excel beyond “just cooking a meal”.

You immediately gain the following abilities:

• Increase your Constitution or Wisdom score by 1, to a maximum of 20.
• You gain proficiency with cook’s utensils if you don’t already have it.
• As part of a short rest, you can cook special food, provided you have ingredients and cook’s utensils on hand. You can prepare enough of this food for several creatures equal to four + your proficiency bonus. At the end of the short rest, any creature who eats the food and spends one or more Hit Dice to regain hit points regains an extra 1d8 hit points.
• With one hour of work or when you finish a long rest, you can cook several treats equal to your proficiency bonus. These special treats last eight hours after being made. A creature can use a bonus action to eat one of those treats to gain temporary hit points or heal equal to your proficiency bonus.
• You can cook what would normally be poisonous dishes and make the editable.  The DC for success is eight + the CR of the creature to be eaten.  Success means the specific meat or vegetable is no longer poisonous and can be eaten safely.  Failure means that eat consumer of the food takes the CR in 1d6 damage.  Once the meal is cooked, no one knows if it is poisonous or not until eaten.  Upon a successful meal, the consumer of these meals gains a resistance to poison for as many hours of the CR of the creature eaten hours.  Only one attempt can be made per long rest.
• Much like an alchemist you can craft wondrous creations, but yours are made of meals.  Given at least two hours and the proper ingredients you can craft many different, delicious, and powerful dishes. Some recipes might take longer to accomplish.

Resourceful

You’ve always hated leaving anything to waste and have always made sure you get the most out of any situation.

• You gain proficiency in the harvesting kit and the herbalism kit.
• You ignore any penalties for harvesting a creature that died a particularly violent death.
• Both appraising and harvesting a creature take half the time than it normally would.

Tool Expert

You have honed your proficiency with particular tools, granting you the following benefits:

• Increase one ability score of your choice by 1, to a maximum of 20.
• You gain proficiency in one tool kit of your choice.
• Choose one tool kit in which you have proficiency. You gain expertise with that tool kit, which means your proficiency bonus is doubled for any ability check you make with it. The skill you choose must be one that isn’t already benefiting from a feature, such as Expertise, that doubles your proficiency bonus.

Town Drunk

You have been drinking for years and have gotten used to the effect of alcohol.

Once you have this feat you gain the following benefits:

• Tipsy and Drunk are now the same level (1/2 your intoxication level)
• You no longer have disadvantages until you reach Wasted.
• You gain a +2 to reach the “Blackout” stage.
• You won’t get hungover if you don’t pass Drunk.

Upgrade Familiar One

Minimum Level: 8

As a wizard you have explored and developed new techniques on how to best train and increase the usefulness of your familiar.  This feat gives you three more familiar points to spend on your summoned familiar.

Upgrade Familiar Two

Minimum Level: 16

Continuing where you left off, you have been able to calculate the exact amount of spirit and magical energy it takes to upgrade your familiar again. You can spend another three extra points on your familiar.

Upgrade Pact of the Chain Familiar One

Minimum Level: 8

Much like the wizard spells of upgrading their familiar, the warlock can do the exact thing, but using different methodologies.  Communing with their patron and instead of requesting additional power for themselves, they request it for their familiar, which will convert their current familiar with a Stage Two version.

Upgrade Pact of the Chain Familiar Two

Minimum Level: 16

Requirement: Upgrade Pact of the Chain Familiar One

Continuing the tradition and power allotment, the warlock begs their patron for yet more power for their familiar creating something that is far more than a familiar and something short of a real monster.  Some of these would give dragons a pause.  This feat allows the Chain of the Pact to grow into a Stage Three familiar.  Note that Upgrade Pact of the Chain Familiar One must have already been chosen.

Perks

Perks are like feats, but in a lessor sense.  They can alter how a character does something, but the low-level Perks will mostly add in a new flavor to the play.  These are rewarded to the characters at specific points of the campaign, such as when a new major chapter has been completed.  They are awarded to the party by the gamemaster at the appropriate time they decide.

Adored

Minimum Level: 6

Class Requirement: Bard

Adoration. When a creature using one of your bardic inspirations dies, you can, as a reaction if you are not restrained, begin a standing ovation. Illusory roses, confetti, and underwear appear around the creature as if thrown from an adoring crowd whose rapturous applause can be faintly heard. The creature rolls the bardic inspiration die with advantage (it rolls two dice and chooses the highest result).

Once you use this perk, you may not do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

Attunement

Minimum Level: 3

Through the thorough understanding of yourself and the attunement of magic items, you can attune to one additional item than normal.

Avoidance

Minimum Level: 3

If you hit a creature with a melee attack on your turn, you do not provoke opportunity attacks from that creature until the end of your turn. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a short or long rest.

Beneficent

Minimum Level: 6

Class Requirement: Paladin

You instinctively know where a patient’s tension is being held. The divine touch of your hand can temporarily relieve these pressure points, bringing a welcome bliss.

Massage. When you expend at least 5 points of your Lay on Hands, you can give a brief, gentle, but expert massage. The recipient has advantage on its next attack roll, ability check, or saving throw. Once you use this perk, you cannot do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

Cantrip Sage

Minimum Level: 3

Choose one cantrip you know that deals damage. When you cast that cantrip, you can forego the damage roll and deal maximum damage instead of rolling. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

Chemist

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Acid damage.

Cloakmaster

Minimum Level: 3

When you roll a Dexterity (Stealth) check made to hide and you have disadvantage on the roll because of the armor you wear, you can choose to remove the disadvantage and make a straight roll instead. You can’t use this perk to gain advantage on your Dexterity (Stealth) roll in any way. Once you use this perk. You can’t use it again until you finish a short or long rest.

Climber

Minimum Level: 3, Prerequisite: No climbing speed

You gain a climbing speed of 20 feet.

Cunning Movement

Minimum Level: 3

You razzle-dazzle an opponent that is adjacent to you sufficiently such that one ally of yours who is adjacent to you and the opponent gain an additional attack against that opponent at the cost of your action. Once you have used this Perk, you cannot use it again until you finish a long rest.

Deft

Minimum Level: 3

You catch yourself instinctively finding the center of gravity of items you hold, often balancing them on a single finger.

Centre of Gravity. Choose any weapon with which you are proficient. Until the end of your next turn, that weapon gains the thrown property (range 20/60) and gains a +1 bonus to attack, and damage rolls you make when you throw that weapon. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a short or long rest.

Dodge

Minimum Level: 6

As a reaction, turn any Critical Hit against you into a normal Hit. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

Empath

Minimum Level: 3

You may add 1d4 to any Insight checks or Charisma saving throws. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

Escape Artist

Minimum Level: 3

Your pursuers swear you bathe in grease; no one can keep their hands on you.

• If you add your proficiency bonus to an ability check made to end the grappled or restrained condition on yourself, you can instead add twice your proficiency bonus.
• When you escape a creature’s grapple on your turn, you can immediately use your bonus action to attack the creature you escaped.

Once you use this perk, you may not do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

Firebrand

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Fire damage.

Fit

Minimum Level: 3

You can ignore 1 level of Exhaustion (you will not die until 7th level).

Fleet-Footed

Minimum Level: 6

Class Requirement: Rogue

For short bursts your movement is so quick it leaves a blurred after-image.

Quickstep. When you use your Cunning Action, you can take the Dodge action. A blurry after-image of your movement is left in your wake until the start of your next turn.

Once you use this perk, you cannot do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

Fleetness

Minimum Level: 3

Your walking speed increases permanently by 5 feet.

Full of Life

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Necrotic damage.

Gorilla Technique

Minimum Level: 6

Class Requirement: Monk

For fleeting moments, you find yourself able to interact with objects just beyond your physical reach. Your aura visibly glows when you channel ki and seems to extend far beyond the reach of your arm.

Long Strike. Until the start of your next turn, the reach of all your unarmed strikes is increased by 10 feet.

Once you use this perk, you cannot do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

Gourmet

Minimum Level: 3

You gain the instinctive knowledge of how to properly season, prepare, and cook food. Any dish you make is guaranteed to be delicious and filling regardless of whatever foul ingredients went into it.  Add an additional 1d6 to any cooking rolls you make.

Hard of Hearing

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Thunder damage.

Hardheaded

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Psychic damage.

Hardy

Minimum Level: 6

You have Advantage on all Death Saves.

Healer

Minimum Level: 3

Choose one 1st-level spell you know or have prepared that regains hit points, such as cure wounds or healing word. When you cast that spell at its base level, you can forego the healing roll and cause the target to regain the maximum number of hit points possible from that spell. Once you use this perk. you cannot use it again until you finish a long rest.

Healthy

Minimum Level: 3

When you roll Hit Dice for healing you may re-roll any 1’s or 2’s rolled. You must keep the new result. This effect is retroactive to previous rolls.

Impalement Arts

Minimum Level: 3

When you attack with any thrown weapon, you can treat a roll of 19 or 20 on the d20 as a critical hit. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

In the Darkness

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Radiant damage.

Interfere

Minimum Level: 6

As a reaction, you may give an attack against you Disadvantage. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

Marksman

Minimum Level: 3

When you attack with a short bow, longbow, light crossbow, heavy crossbow, or hand crossbow, you can treat a roll of 19 or 20 on the d20 as a critical hit. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

Master Swordsman

Minimum Level: 6

Your expertise with the blade is unmatched and few rival your skill.

• While wielding a sword, when you take the dodge action, you can use your bonus action to make a single melee attack at disadvantage.
• While wielding a sword and attacking at disadvantage, you can choose to ignore the disadvantage and instead attack with advantage. Once you use this feature you must complete a long rest before you can use it again.
• When attacking with a sword, you can choose to deal bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage, rather than the normal damage type. You must choose the damage type of the attack before making the attack roll.

Material Caster

Minimum Level: 3

Whenever you cast a spell that has a material component that is consumed by the spell, and the material component has a gold piece cost, such as revivify or arcane lock, the material cost for the spell is reduced by 25%. For example, revivify would require diamonds worth 225 gold pieces, rather than 300 gold pieces.

Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

Pious

Minimum Level: 6

Class Requirement: Cleric

Endow Grace. As a bonus action you can cause a beam of light to shine down on a target you can see within 60 feet. For the next minute, it gains a +1 bonus to all attack rolls, skill checks, and saving throws.

Divest Finesse (Evil-aligned variant). As a bonus action you can cause a beam of darkness to shine down on a target you can see within 60 feet. For the next minute, it gains a -1 penalty to all attack rolls, skill checks, and saving throws.

Once you use this perk, you may not do so again until you finish a long rest.

Polar Bear

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Cold damage.

Polyglot

Minimum Level: 3

You learn one additional language of your choice. You can choose this perk multiple times.

Preservationist

Minimum Level: 3

Using materials available in your harvester’s kit, you can extend the life of harvested items. Choose one harvested item and double it’s time to expire.  Only the remaining time left for the expiration is doubled.  Once a material has been preserved, it can no longer be affected by additional preservation efforts.  

Only one material’s expiration can be extended per long rest.

Prowess

Minimum Level: 3

You gain proficiency with one skill of your choice. This perk cannot be used to gain expertise with any skill. You can choose these perk multiple times if you choose a different skill each time.

Rite Master

Minimum Level: 3

Whenever you cast a spell as a ritual, the spell’s casting time is increased by 5 minutes instead of 10. All other requirements for ritual casting still apply.

Ritualist

Minimum Level: 6

Class Requirement: Wizard

When you prepare your spells for the day, you can spend ten minutes preparing one ritual spell you know.  It appears as arcane script on your forearm.  Before you finish you next long rest, you can cast that spell using only its casting time, and without expending a spell slot.  When you do so, the script fades away, and you cannot cast it again using this feature until the next long rest.

Rod

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Lightning damage.

Scavenger

Minimum Level: 3

You find twice as much food from plants and dead animals upon a successful Survival check.

Shield Bearer

Minimum Level: 3

Sometimes others can benefit from your skill with a shield more than you could.

• Your Strength or Constitution score increases by 1, to a maximum of 20.
• You can choose to impose disadvantage on any attack of opportunity made against a creature within 5 feet of you.

Once you use this perk, you may not do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

Shield Use

Minimum Level: 3

When you are hit with a melee attack, you can use your reaction to add a +2 bonus to your AC, possibly turning the hit into a miss. You must be wielding a shield and you must be able to see the attacker to gain this benefit. The increase lasts until the end of the attacker’s next turn. Once you use this perk you cannot use it again until you finish a long rest.

Stalwart

Minimum Level: 3

When you hold position, your defenses become near impenetrable.

• At the start of your turn, you can reduce your speed to zero and impose disadvantage on the next melee attack made against you before the start of your next turn.
• When an effect causes you to move without expending your movement, you can choose to move half of the distance instead. Round down to the nearest 5-foot interval.

Once you use this perk, you may not do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

Stout

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Force damage.

Swimmer

Minimum Level: 3, Prerequisite: No swimming speed

You gain a swimming speed of 20 feet.

Tactician

Minimum Level: 3

When a creature within 30 feet of you that you can see makes an attack roll, you can use your reaction to grant advantage on that roll. Once you use this perk, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

Tracker

Minimum Level: 6

Class Requirement: Ranger

You find yourself able to hone your senses on families of creatures and gain additional insights into the creature as you track it.

Tracker. You meditate for 10 minutes, focusing on one type of creature: aberrations, beasts, celestials, constructs, dragons, elementals, fey, fiends, giants, monstrosities, oozes, plants, or undead. For the next 8 hours, you have advantage on Wisdom (Survival) checks made to track creatures of that type.

On a successful check, you learn the following:

• The direction the creature headed.
• If the creature is aware of your presence.
• The creatures approximate speed (in mph).
• How long since the creature was last in this place.
• If the creature is healthy, bruised, bloodied. or wounded (> 75%, 50-75%, 25-50%, or <25% of hit points respectively).

Once you use this perk, you cannot do so again until you finish a long rest.

Tradesman

Minimum Level: 3

You gain proficiency with one tool, instrument, gaming set or kit of your choice. This perk cannot be used to gain expertise with any tool, instrument, gaming set or kit. You can choose these perk multiple times if you choose a different tool instrument, gaming set or kit each time.

Vile

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Poison damage.

Weathervane

Minimum Level: 6

You have Resistance to Air or Wind damage. You have advantage to remain standing against any attacks that might cause you to fall prone.

Whip Master

Minimum Level: 3

A whip in your hands becomes a deadly weapon.

• When you hit a large or smaller creature with a whip, the creature’s speed is reduced by 10 feet until the start of your next turn.
• Whips you wield gain the light property.
• The damage die of whips you wield increases from 1d4 to 1d6.
• You gain a +5 bonus to BDSM.

Equipment

The Marketplace of a large city teems with buyers and sellers of many sorts: dwarf smiths and elf woodcarvers, halfling farmers and gnome jewelers, not to mention humans of every shape, size, and color drawn from a spectrum of nations and cultures. In the largest cities, almost anything imaginable is offered for sale, from exotic spices and luxurious clothing to wicker baskets and practical swords.

For an adventurer, the availability of armor, weapons, backpacks, rape, and similar goods is of paramount importance since proper equipment can mean the difference between life and death in a dungeon or the unclaimed wilds. This chapter details the mundane and exotic merchandise that adventurers commonly find useful in the face of the threats that the world of Dungeons and Dragons present.

Starting Equipment

When you create your character, you receive equipment based on a combination of your class and background. In this campaign your character will always start with the given set of equipment that your background and class might give you.

You decide how your character came by this starting equipment. It might have been an inheritance, or goods that the character purchased during his or her upbringing. You might have been equipped with a weapon, armor, and a backpack as part of military service. You might even have stolen your gear. A weapon could be a family heirloom, passed down from generation to generation until your character finally look up the mantle and followed in an ancestor’s adventurous footsteps.

In the Campaign we will be using the Equipment option instead of gold.  If there is something additional you believe that your character would have then bring that to the DM.  Swapping some of the packs or kits is also an option if it makes sense for your character.

Selling Treasure

Opportunities abound to find treasure, equipment, weapons, armor, and more in the dungeons you explore. Normally, you can sell your treasures and trinkets when you return to a town or other settlement if you can find buyers and merchants interested in your loot.

Arms, Armor, and Other Equipment. As a rule, undamaged weapons, armor, and other equipment fetch half their cost when sold in a market. Weapons and armor used by monsters are rarely in good enough condition to sell.

Magic Items. Selling magic items is problematic. Finding someone to buy a potion or a scroll isn’t too hard, but other items are out of the realm of most but the wealthiest nobles. Likewise, aside from a few common magic items, you won’t normally come across magic items or spells to purchase. The value of magic is far beyond simple gold and should always be treated as such.

Gems, jewelry, and Art Objects. These items retain their full value in the marketplace, and you can trade them in for coin or use them as currency for other transactions. For exceptionally valuable treasures, the DM might require you to find a buyer in a large town or larger community first.

Trade Goods. On the borderlands, many people conduct transactions through barter. Like gems and art objects, trade goods – bars of iron, bags of salt, livestock, and so on – retain their full value in the market and can be used as currency.

Monster Part Harvesting. Harvesting is the act of salvaging useful parts of a dead creature for personal use and profit.  It can be time consuming, dirty, messy, and weigh a lot depending on the creature.  But it can also be as lucrative as pillaging a small ruin.  See the section under Adventuring for more details.

Armor and Shields

In most campaigns, you can use or wear any equipment that you find on your adventures, within the bounds of common sense.

Using this variant, when adventurers find armor, clothing. and similar items that are made to be worn, they might need to visit an armor smith, tailor, leatherworker, or similar expert to make the item wearable. The cost for such work varies from 10 to 40 percent of the market price of the item. The DM can either roll d4 x 10 or determine the increase in cost based on the extent of the alterations required.

Common Material Components Costs

Casting some spells requires objects, specified in parentheses in the component entry. A character can use a component pouch or a spellcasting focus (found in “Equipment” in the Player’s Handbook) in place of the components specified for a spell. But if a cost is indicated for a component, a character must have that specific component before he or she can cast the spell.

If a spell states that a material component is consumed by the spell, the caster must provide this component for each casting of the spell. A spellcaster must have a hand free to access a spell’s material components — or to hold a spellcasting focus — but it can be the same hand that he or she uses to perform somatic components.

The Campaign rule is that the component pouch or arcane focus will only replace components up to a 10gp value.  Any exotic material will have to always be purchased or manually collected.

An example of an exotic material would be Dragon Scales, or Umber Hulk blood.

When the spell gives the specific cost, then that is the cost that will be used, otherwise the characters will need to collect the proper components.

Component Cost Table

Poor Quality of Equipment

When equipment is found either lying in a dusty tomb or off the warm body of a dead bandit, there is also an assumed condition, but there can be variances.  If not magical, that sword in the tomb will probably not last long unless store properly, and that leather armor that the bandit wore is most likely ratty.  Most of the time, we do not care the actual condition unless it is in a less than good shape.

Armor: When armor is in poor condition, its usability is limited, and will not usually survive the next combat.  The armor will start off with a lower AC than it would have if in good shape.  That AC will be one or more less than normal. The exact amount will be determined by the DM based off the condition.  Any hit on the armor that is a natural 20 causes the armor to have a complete failure.  The wearer of that armor still is burdened by the weight and disadvantages, but it no longer provided any defense.

Missiles: Arrows and bolts get shared around regularly, but not all are made equal.  The limitations of a poorly made missile is that it only can be fired in the normal range and automatically misses at long range.  Missiles also critical miss on a one or two and are in capable of critical hits.

Weapons: Handling a poor weapon against a competent opponent is a recipe for disaster.  Any roll of a natural one two, or 20 causes the weapon to break and be useless. On a 20, the critical hit is still valid, but it breaks immediately on impact.

Homebrew Equipment

While the Player’s Handbook is complete in what it makes available, there is always the need for a few other things that would be good to have.

Enchanted Vial

Some creature parts have powerful, yet fleeting, magical energies within them. The motes from elementals for example hold traces of their former essences in them but disperse rapidly upon the destruction of their original form.

An enchanted vial is inlaid with several runes designed to keep any magical resource within from dissipating while the lid is closed and is often the only way of transporting certain parts back to a workshop for crafting.

Items that require an enchanted vial to be harvested are fragile by nature and must be stored inside an enchanted vial quickly to prevent degradation. Any attempt to harvest a material that has an enchanted vial as a requirement must be initiated within one minute of the death of its creature.

This tool can be used a maximum of five times afterwards it disintegrates into powder.  At each attempted use, roll a d20 and if a 1 is rolled, the vial is immediately destroyed.

Harvesting Kit

This kit contains everything the average harvester needs to prepare and harvest a carcass for usable parts including a skinning knife, a bone saw, two glass vials, punches of salt, and tweezers.  Proficiency with this kit allows you to add your proficiency bonus to nay check made to harvest a creature.

Healing Pill

You regain 1d4 hit points when you swallow this pill.  If more than one is swallowed, then all after the first do 1d4 damage instead.

Spirit Paper

Spirit paper is a versatile tool that resembles a square of bleached papyrus. The secrets of its production were only recently discovered, and reverse engineered from secrets brought back from distant necromantic cults. By performing a small ritual with the spirit paper shortly after slaying certain creatures, a copy of that creature’s soul is bound to the spirit paper for later use. These copies are not a true soul and are more akin to an echo. These echoes do retain all the memories from its original body, and a few crafting techniques utilize these echoes to grant an item a low level of sentience or to mimic the abilities of their incorporeal reflections.

Using spirit paper is often the only way to harvest anything useful from creatures with incorporeal forms. Any harvesting attempt made for a creature part that has spirit paper as a requirement is done

using a Wisdom (Religion) check rather than the usual check and is rolled separately for each item. Once a sheet of spirit paper has been used successfully to harvest an item, it cannot be reused, even if the item it contained is released.

Unlike most harvestable materials, materials that require spirit paper to be harvested dissipate very quickly after the death of its creature. Any attempt to harvest a material that has spirit paper as a requirement must be initiated within 1 minute of the death of the creature and takes 10 minutes to successfully complete.

Each Spirit paper can only be used once.

Special Tools Price Table