Charlatan
Charlatans are masters at manipulating people. Using their high Intelligence and understanding of human nature, Charlatans prey upon the foolish, overconfident, and greedy people around them. Charlatans often seem bold and boisterous, but they always maintain self-control. The profession of swindling others and making them feel good about it is an age-old practice and none are better at it than Charlatans. The Charlatan's profession has its downside, too. When a Charlatan's facade is pierced, he is in grave danger, for no one likes to be conned. Then the Charlatan's quick feet may serve him better than his quick wit.
Specialty: Trickster/Con Artist
As player characters, Charlatans are most useful in town-based campaigns or when traveling across inhabited country. Their talents often support the entire party with food, shelter, and minor luxuries. Unfortunately, many of their talents have little use when exploring ruins or wilderness areas. However, they often pose as wizards, warriors, thieves, and sometimes even priests.
The ability of masquerading requires much study, time, and effort on the part of the Charlatan. This enables a Charlatan to appear to have a specific skill. This is not a disguise, as the proficiency of that name. Rather, it is the ability to appear proficient at the chosen skill. The character picks up the language ('buzz words'), professional mannerisms, and general techniques to help him in his endeavor. Unlike the True Bard, the Charlatan only appears to be a jack-of-all trades. He does not study skills to use them, but for the sake of conning others into believing he has them. The use of this ability is resolved by the DM in much the same manner as an illusion spell. If the performance is not overly suspicious and the characters watching have no reason to disbelieve the bard's ability, then the attempt appears genuine. Otherwise, a saving throw vs. paralyzation is rolled with a -1 penalty per three levels of the Charlatan. Those who succeed realize that the Charlatan is a fraud. A Charlatan can use his masquerade ability to fake any nonweapon proficiency or secondary skill. Furthermore, if the Charlatan rolls a successful Intelligence check with a -10 penalty, he actually functions as if he really knows the skill or proficiency (for this one check only). Thus, a Charlatan can actually succeed just enough to keep skeptics satisfied. For example, if Tiel is masquerading as a cleric, she can claim to know the healing proficiency even though she doesn't really have it. Unless those she heals are suspicious, they will believe that the attempts are genuine (if they are suspicious, roll as described two paragraphs prior to this one). First Tiel's player rolls an Intelligence check with a -10 penalty. If that roll succeeds, she next rolls a healing proficiency check. If this check also succeeds, the patient is healed of 1d3 points of damage. If the Intelligence check fails, everyone watching rolls a saving throw vs. paralyzation (with a -1 penalty per three levels of the Charlatan) to notice that the Charlatan is a fraud. If the Intelligence check succeeds but the healing check fails, the patient and onlookers notice only that a valid attempt was made but it just didn't help. Each time Tiel masquerades as a healer, an Intelligence check is rolled with a -10 penalty. If the check succeeds, a successful healing proficiency check will actually heal 1d3 points of damage.
Detect Fakery: Because Charlatans are so skilled at faking their personalities, lying, and concealing their feelings and reactions, they can see right through false personae and verbal trickery when others attempt them. As the old saying goes, "You can't con a con man." Any time a Charlatan player requests it, he can try to determine if someone is lying, operating under false pretenses (including a masquerade), or swindling him. A Charisma check is rolled. Success means the Charlatan realizes the deception. Furthermore, a Charisma check with a -10 penalty enables the Charlatan to determine a person's alignment. This requires that the Charlatan speak with and observe the individual for 1d10 rounds.
Major cons, such as duping a king into believing that you are a highly respected sage, drawing him into your inner confidence, and then relieving him of the crown jewels, should be done only through role-playing. However, Charlatans hone such skills by constantly performing minor swindles and tricks. These are far too numerous and insignificant to role-play every time. Swindling covers this aspect of a Charlatan's skill repertoire. By performing various cons, sleight-of-hand, and other deceptions, a Charlatan is often able to walk away from a merchant with far more than a fair deal. The same is true of any common outlay of coins, such as buying meals at a tavern, paying for a room at an inn, and purchasing ordinary items. In instances like these, the Charlatan makes a pick pockets roll. If successful, the cost of the item is reduced to the percentage rolled; this is what the Charlatan pays. If the roll fails by more than the Charlatan's Charisma, the con is seen through. Swindle rolls above 95 are always detected by the victim. Swindling rolls should not be used for amounts in excess of 10 gp per level of the Charlatan. Such grand swindles require full role-playing.
For example, Tiel tries to swindle a barkeeper for a 10-gp glass of imported wine (Tiel has only six gold coins left). Tiel's pick pockets roll is a 53 and she has a Charisma of 16. She rolls a 25 and swindles her way into paying only two gold and one electrum for the wine (25% of the original cost). If she had rolled a 54-69 the barkeeper would have noticed the error and politely requested the remainder of the money. On a 70 or above the barkeeper would not only have noticed the error, but he would have realized that Tiel tried to swindle him (with unpleasant consequences for Tiel).
A Charlatan selects the rest of his weapons to fill the needs of various roles. For example, if Charlatan decides to masquerade as a powerful warrior, he arms himself with a heavy combat weapon (a two-handed sword, polearm, long bow, or a Axe) and spends a proficiency slot learning it. This way he can appear to be a skilled and tough fighter. The Charlatan always uses his proficient weapon in dire situations. If an encounter is less threatening, the Charlatan uses one of the other weapons so as to appear to be a well-rounded fighter (the -3 non-proficiency penalty is easier to hide when attacking monsters with poor Armor Classes).
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