Investigator

A collage of diagrams, maps, and small items litters the wall, pinned with nails and connected by a spiderweb of colorful strings. An Iosan stands nearby, contemplating the mystery splayed out in front of her and readying her crossbow for work.

A Ogrun wearing a wide-brimmed hat leafs through a thick tome, double-checking the preparations: a sturdy net trap, holy symbols on the doors, cloves of garlic, and several dozen wooden stakes. The preparations made, the Ogrun slinks into the shadows and readies himself for the bloodshed.

Blood dripping from its drool and claws, a monstrously fat demon bears down on a Human, who busies herself marking a tavern’s door frame with a few chalkmark runes. She takes a long step back and waits. As the demon lunges for its next meal, an invisible force lashes forth from the doorway, lopping off its hand and raking its stomach. The fiend howls with rage, and the inquisitor breathes a sigh of relief. Supernatural detectives and monster slayers,

investigators are always on the hunt for malevolent outsiders. Whenever evil seeps into the world—be it fiends, undead, or strange abominations from beyond the stars—investigators will be the first to locate them and banish their foul corruption from the mortal plane.

Paranormal Investigators

There are forces more ancient than time, foes more sinister than the foulest men, and beings more titanic than gods. The world stands at a precipice of woe and terror, being threatened nightly by dark agents and hordes of monsters. At risk to their own lives and sanities, investigators penetrate the evil that creeps in the shadows and banish it from the world. Their battles are never-ending, for victory only delays doomsday another night.

Investigators track supernatural threats ranging from incorporeal spirits, to nefarious vampires and lycanthropes, to incursions of demons and devils. Often in their investigations, they uncover secret cults and maligned individuals who bring these supernatural threats to bear. It is always their goal to impede these evildoers by any means necessary, resorting to trickery, guile, magic, and bloodshed when necessary. To an investigator, no tactic is unthinkable when the world is at stake.

Exorcists and Occultists

Even as they strive to contain its influence from the world at large, investigators dabble in forbidden magic to give themselves an edge against supernatural threats. Prepared investigators keep a well-stocked grimoire of magical secrets, containing rituals, incantations, notes on monsters’ powers and weaknesses, recipes for poisons, and arcane diagrams—everything needed to confront their foes on an even footing. Even so, an investigator’s occupation is perilous. A grimoire might spell out a vampire’s fear of sunlight and aversion to silver, but it does little to hinder their fangs.

Creating an Investigator

As you build your investigator, consider what sort of supernatural threat first drove you to investigating and combating the occult. Did one of your family members strike a bargain with a fiend? Were you kidnapped by a cabal of vampires or a pack of lycanthropes? Did you stumble across evidence of an eldritch abomination, such as a Great Old One? The type of creature you first did battle with likely shaped your tools and methods later on.

Did you apprentice under a seasoned monster hunter, learning the ropes of tracking a threat, uncovering its weaknesses, and setting a trap for it? Or did you strike out on your own, compiling your own grimoire from hard-earned research? Perhaps you learned everything about monster hunting from someone else’s grimoire, a masterwork containing an abridged library of occult knowledge and a lifetime of experience. It’s even possible that you signed a contract with a minor fiend and turned to supernatural investigation in a last-ditch effort to save your soul

Occult Specializations (subclasses)

Name	Descriptio
Antiquarian	Festooned with powerful magical trinkets of all shapes and sizes
Archivist	A scholar who collects scraps of ancient lore
Detective	Chases down clues and unravels crimes with their impressive intellect
Exterminator	Hunts down vampires, lycanthropes, and beasts that stalk the night
Inquisitor	An agent of the church that performs exorcisms and roots out heresy
Medium	Foretells events of the future using a magical connection to the dead
Occultist	A magician borrowing spells from wizards and warlock
Spy	Infiltrates with perfect disguises and unmatched charm