Apothecary
A D&D 2024 Class for the World of Maerin
Adapted from Sebastian Crow's Guide to Drakkenheim
She kept dried herbs in thirty-seven clay pots above the hearth, and something in a locked chest beneath the floorboards that she would not name. She could set a broken leg, draw out a fever, and brew something that would kill a man three days after he drank it without leaving a trace. The village called her a healer. The lord's men, when they came, called her something else. She had left before they arrived.
Across Maerin, the apothecary takes many shapes. In Asthareth they walk the guild halls and physicking houses, trained in the old texts and the new ones, licensed by the Compact of Hands to sell remedies and offer counsel. In the villages strung along the river valleys they are the herbalists who learned from their grandmothers, who know which bark draws fever and which mushroom stops a heart, who supplement their craft with abilities they cannot quite explain and have long since stopped trying to. On the edges of settlement they are the wise women and wise men, the hedge-workers, the cunning folk, distrusted and indispensable and always the first blamed when something goes wrong. And at the furthest reach, in places where the rift events have made the world strange, they are something harder to name: scholars of life and death who have pushed past every limit that prudence would have set for them.
What all apothecaries share is a knowledge of the body and a willingness to use it. They know what heals and what harms, what sustains life and what quietly ends it. They supplement that knowledge with rift-attuned spells, worked through a physick book that is part reference, part journal, and part formula collection. The difference between a physicker and a poisoner, they will tell you, is mostly a matter of who is paying.
The Craft of Healing
An apothecary begins with remedies: what to reach for when fever sets in, how to clean a wound, which plants ease pain and which provoke it. As their craft deepens they add the occult, drawing on rift crystal energy to work effects that go beyond any herb or poultice. But their magic is never separate from their knowledge of the body. An apothecary understands why a spell works, or believes they do, and writes the theory down to test against the next case they encounter.
They can heal and they can harm. The same understanding that closes a wound can open one. The same knowledge of the humors that eases a fever can provoke one in a healthy enemy. Apothecaries are rarely comfortable allies, but they are almost always useful ones.
Keepers of Hard Knowledge
Apothecaries accumulate knowledge that polite society would rather not acknowledge. They know what it looks like inside a body. They have studied the nature of plague and poison. Some have experimented with the transformative effects of rift crystal essence on living tissue, or pushed into the territory of death and what lies past it. This knowledge is not genteel, and apothecaries are not, as a rule, gentle people.
The rift events of recent decades have given apothecaries new material to work with, and most of them have not been able to resist. The creatures that pour through the rifts, the energies that transform the land around them, the new diseases and corruptions that follow in their wake: all of it is data, and apothecaries collect data the way other scholars collect books.
Creating an Apothecary
The most important question when making an apothecary is what kind you are. Are you guild-trained, with credentials and a fixed address, or self-taught from stolen books and hard experience? Do you see yourself as a healer first, or has the healing always been secondary to the knowing? What did you do that made staying in one place impossible? And what knowledge are you chasing now?
Think too about your physick book. It has been with you long enough to show it. Is it inherited, stolen, or built page by page from your own notes? Does it have sections you never show anyone?
Quick Build
Make Intelligence your highest ability score, followed by Constitution. Choose a background that reflects learning or practical craft. Select poison spray and spare the dying as two of your starting cantrips, and prepare healing word and inflict wounds as your starting 1st-level spells.
The Apothecary Table
| Level | Prof. Bonus | Features | Cantrips Known | Spell Slots | Slot Level | Theories Known |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | +2 | Apothecary Magic, The Physicker's Craft, Esoteric Theory | 3 | 1 | 1st | 1 |
| 2nd | +2 | Esoteric Theory | 3 | 2 | 1st | 2 |
| 3rd | +2 | Occult Discipline | 3 | 2 | 2nd | 2 |
| 4th | +2 | Ability Score Improvement or Feat | 4 | 3 | 2nd | 3 |
| 5th | +3 | — | 4 | 3 | 3rd | 3 |
| 6th | +3 | Occult Discipline Feature | 4 | 4 | 3rd | 4 |
| 7th | +3 | — | 4 | 4 | 4th | 4 |
| 8th | +3 | Ability Score Improvement or Feat | 4 | 4 | 4th | 5 |
| 9th | +4 | — | 4 | 5 | 5th | 5 |
| 10th | +4 | Occult Discipline Feature | 5 | 5 | 5th | 6 |
| 11th | +4 | Greater Formula (6th) | 5 | 5 | 5th | 6 |
| 12th | +4 | Ability Score Improvement or Feat | 5 | 5 | 5th | 7 |
| 13th | +5 | Greater Formula (7th) | 5 | 5 | 5th | 7 |
| 14th | +5 | Occult Discipline Feature | 5 | 6 | 5th | 8 |
| 15th | +5 | Greater Formula (8th) | 5 | 6 | 5th | 8 |
| 16th | +5 | Ability Score Improvement or Feat | 5 | 6 | 5th | 9 |
| 17th | +6 | Greater Formula (9th) | 5 | 6 | 5th | 9 |
| 18th | +6 | Occult Discipline Feature | 5 | 7 | 5th | 10 |
| 19th | +6 | Ability Score Improvement or Feat; Additional Greater Formula (6th) | 5 | 7 | 5th | 10 |
| 20th | +6 | The Long Recovery; Additional Greater Formula (7th) | 5 | 7 | 5th | 11 |
Class Features
Hit Points
Hit Dice: 1d8 per apothecary level Hit Points at 1st Level: 8 + your Constitution modifier Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d8 (or 5) + your Constitution modifier per apothecary level after 1st
Proficiencies
Armor: Light armor, medium armor
Weapons: Simple weapons, shortswords, blowguns, hand crossbows
Tools: Herbalism Kit, plus one of your choice: Poisoner's Kit or Alchemist's Supplies
Saving Throws: Intelligence, Wisdom
Skills: Choose two from Arcana, History, Investigation, Medicine, Nature, and Religion
Starting Equipment
You start with the following equipment, in addition to any equipment provided by your background:
- A light crossbow and 20 bolts, a shortsword, or any simple weapon
- A component pouch or an arcane focus
- A scholar's pack or a dungeoneer's pack
- Hide armor and two daggers
- A healer's kit
Apothecary Magic
Your craft has given you facility with spells. Unlike a sorcerer who carries magic in the blood, or a druid who draws from Maerin's living field, you channel rift energy through an attuned crystal, much as a wizard or cleric does. Most of your spells require a rift crystal on your person when you cast them. Cantrips do not require a crystal.
The Physick Book
You maintain a physick book: part remedy collection, part arcane formula, part field journal. It holds the diagrams you use to prepare and cast your spells, the theories you have developed through practice and observation, and notes you may not wish others to read. You may use your physick book as a spellcasting focus.
Your physick book can look like whatever suits your character. An Asthareth guild physicker might keep a careful bound ledger with pressed plant samples tucked between the pages. A hedge-worker might have a bundle of bark sheets tied with cord, covered in symbols that mean nothing to anyone else. A wandering wise-woman might keep her notes in a hollowed walking staff, unfurling them to consult them by firelight.
If your physick book is destroyed or lost, you can recreate it during a long rest using materials worth at least 10 gp. You retain enough of your learning to rebuild it, though some notes may take time to recover.
Cantrips
You know three cantrips of your choice from the Apothecary Spell List. You learn additional cantrips as shown in the Cantrips Known column.
The Open Page. Whenever you finish a long rest and consult your physick book, you can replace one apothecary cantrip you know with another from the apothecary spell list.
Preparing and Casting Spells
The Apothecary Table shows how many spell slots you have. All of your spell slots are the same level, as shown in the Slot Level column. To cast a spell of 1st level or higher, you expend one slot. You regain all expended spell slots when you finish a short or long rest. This recovery on a short rest is one of the apothecary's defining strengths: unlike most casters, you can replenish your resources between encounters without waiting for a full night's rest.
You prepare your available spells by consulting your physick book. Choose a number of apothecary spells equal to your Intelligence modifier + your apothecary level (minimum of one). Each spell must be of a level no higher than your current Slot Level. You can change your prepared spells when you finish a long rest.
Spellcasting Ability
Intelligence is your spellcasting ability for your apothecary spells.
Spell Save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Intelligence modifier Spell Attack Modifier = your proficiency bonus + your Intelligence modifier
Ritual Casting
You can cast an apothecary spell as a ritual if that spell has the Ritual tag and you have it prepared.
Spellcasting Focus
You can use an arcane focus or your physick book as a spellcasting focus for your apothecary spells.
The Physicker's Craft
At 1st level, your knowledge of the body's workings sets you apart from the untrained. You gain the following benefits:
- You can use your Intelligence modifier in place of Wisdom for Medicine skill checks.
- When you tend to a creature using a healer's kit (spending one use), that creature regains hit points equal to 1d4 + your Intelligence modifier, in addition to stabilizing if it was dying.
- When you apply a poison using the poisoner's kit or treat a poisoned creature, you can add your Intelligence modifier to the relevant saving throw DC or Medicine check.
Esoteric Theories
You have developed esoteric theories: hard-won fragments of occult and practical knowledge that augment your craft. Some are things you worked out yourself. Some were copied from crumbling texts. Some you learned from practitioners you would rather not name.
At 1st level, you gain one esoteric theory of your choice from the list at the end of this class description. At 2nd level you gain a second. When you gain certain apothecary levels, you gain additional theories, as shown in the Theories Known column. Additionally, when you gain a level in this class, you can replace one theory you know with another from the list.
Some theories have a minimum apothecary level. You cannot take them until you have reached that level. Unless noted otherwise, each theory may be taken only once.
Occult Discipline
At 3rd level, you choose an Occult Discipline, the field of study that defines the most dangerous and distinctive aspects of your practice. Your options are the Alchemist, the Body-Changer, the Plaguewright, the Reanimator, the Rift Warden, and the Thoughtbinder.
Your discipline grants features at 3rd, 6th, 10th, 14th, and 18th level.
Ability Score Improvement or Feat
When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you gain an Ability Score Improvement or a Feat (as described in the 2024 core rules). You cannot increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.
Greater Formula
At 11th level, you have worked out a formula for magic beyond what your standard spell slots can produce. Choose one 6th-level spell from the apothecary spell list. You can cast it once without expending a spell slot. You must finish a long rest before you can do so again.
At higher levels you gain additional formulae: one 7th-level spell at 13th level, one 8th-level spell at 15th level, and one 9th-level spell at 17th level. At 19th level you add one additional 6th-level spell, and at 20th level one additional 7th-level spell.
You regain all uses of this feature when you finish a long rest.
The Revised Page. Whenever you finish a long rest and consult your physick book, you can replace one Greater Formula with another spell of the same level from the apothecary spell list.
The Long Recovery
At 20th level, you can spend 5 minutes tending to a number of creatures (including yourself) equal to your Intelligence modifier. You must be within 5 feet of each creature and must expend at least one healer's kit use. Each target recovers as if they had completed a long rest. A creature can benefit from this feature only once in a 24-hour period. Once you use it, you cannot do so again until you finish a long rest.
Epic Boon Option. With your Dungeon Master's agreement, you may take an Epic Boon feat at 20th level in place of or alongside The Long Recovery.
Multiclassing
Prerequisite: Intelligence 13 or higher.
Proficiencies Gained: If apothecary is not your first class, you gain proficiency in light armor and one tool proficiency of your choice when you take your first apothecary level.
Spell Slots: If you have both the Spellcasting feature and Apothecary Magic, you may use apothecary spell slots to cast spells from other classes, and your other class's spell slots to cast apothecary spells.
Esoteric Theories: Prerequisites for theories are based on total apothecary levels, not overall character level. The Precise Blade theory does not grant additional attacks if you already have the Extra Attack class feature.
Esoteric Theories
What follows are the theories an apothecary may develop over the course of a career. Some reflect hard experience in healing work. Others reflect a willingness to go where most practitioners stop.
Acquired Tolerance You have advantage on saving throws against poison, and you have resistance to poison damage. You automatically succeed on saving throws against your own apothecary spells and never take damage from them.
The Adder's Touch Prerequisite: 10th-level apothecary When you hit a creature with a weapon attack, that creature takes extra poison damage equal to your Intelligence modifier.
Battle-Trained You gain proficiency with martial weapons and shields.
The Biting Mixture Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary When you deal poison damage with your apothecary spells, you can choose to deal half as acid damage and half as poison damage instead.
Bitter Blood Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary When a creature within 5 feet of you hits you with a melee attack, it takes poison damage equal to 1d6 + your Constitution modifier.
The Bound Familiar You learn the find familiar spell, and always have it prepared. It does not count against the number of apothecary spells you can prepare.
Borrowed Lore Prerequisite: 10th-level apothecary You learn one spell from any class's spell list, of a level for which you have apothecary spell slots or lower. The spell is treated as an apothecary spell for you and does not count against your prepared spell count.
The Changing Hands You can spend 8 hours working on a willing creature, permanently altering its outward appearance. You determine the result, including facial features, voice, hair, and coloration, but game statistics do not change, the creature's basic shape remains the same, and you cannot change its size. The transformation is not magical, but greater restoration or similar magic can undo it.
The Common Remedy Prerequisite: 10th-level apothecary You can cast lesser restoration at will without expending a spell slot.
The Contingency Working Prerequisite: 14th-level apothecary You can cast contingency once on yourself without material components. You cannot do so again until you finish a long rest.
The Corrosive Admixture Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary Once per turn when you deal damage with an apothecary spell, you can expend an apothecary spell slot to deal 2d4 extra acid damage to the target, plus another 2d4 per level of the spell slot.
Crisis Vigor Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary A creature at 0 hit points who regains hit points from a spell you cast using an apothecary spell slot gains resistance to all damage and has advantage on saving throws until the end of its next turn. It also has advantage on the first attack roll it makes on its next turn.
The Fatal Opening Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary When a creature rolls a natural 1 on a saving throw against one of your apothecary spells that deals damage, roll all of the spell's damage dice twice and add them together, then add relevant modifiers.
The Gentle Tongue You gain proficiency in the Insight and Persuasion skills. Your proficiency bonus is doubled for any ability check you make using either of these skills.
Hardened Practice Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary You gain proficiency in Constitution saving throws.
The Herb-Wise Hand When you cast a spell using an apothecary spell slot or your Greater Formula feature that restores hit points to a creature, that creature regains additional hit points equal to your Intelligence modifier.
The Knowing Touch When you make a weapon attack, you can use your Intelligence modifier instead of Strength or Dexterity for the attack and damage rolls.
The Last Chance Prerequisite: 10th-level apothecary When you cast a spell whose sole effect is to restore a creature to life (such as raise dead), you do not need material components if the creature has died within the past hour.
The Long Stillness Prerequisite: 14th-level apothecary You can cast hold person without expending a spell slot or requiring material components. You must finish a long rest before you can use this theory on the same creature again.
Many Tongues You learn six languages of your choice. You can cast detect poison and disease at will.
The Mind's Poison Prerequisite: 14th-level apothecary When you deal poison damage with your apothecary spells, you can choose to deal psychic damage instead.
The Mercy Cantrip You learn the spare the dying cantrip if you do not already know it. When you cast it, it has a range of 60 feet.
The Physicker's Eye If you spend at least 1 minute observing or interacting with a creature outside of combat, you can learn two of the following characteristics of your choice: any one ability score, Armor Class, current hit points, resistances (if any), immunities (if any), or vulnerabilities (if any).
Alternatively, you can spend 1 minute examining a corpse to determine its cause of death.
The Physicker's Learning You gain proficiency in the Medicine and Nature skills. Your proficiency bonus is doubled for any ability check you make using either of these skills.
The Physicker's Mark Prerequisite: 10th-level apothecary When you hit a creature with a melee weapon attack, that creature has disadvantage on the next saving throw it makes against an apothecary spell you cast before the end of your next turn.
The Potent Draught When you roll a 1 on a damage die for an apothecary spell that deals poison damage, you can reroll that die and must use the new result.
Precise Blade Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary You can attack twice instead of once when you take the Attack action on your turn. This theory does not grant additional attacks if you already have the Extra Attack class feature.
Putrefaction Your apothecary spells and abilities ignore undead creatures' resistance or immunity to poison damage and immunity to the poisoned condition.
Swift Feet When you cast an apothecary spell that restores hit points to a creature, you can move up to your speed before or after casting the spell without provoking opportunity attacks.
The Swift Assessment You can take the Help action as a bonus action on your turn.
The Steady Hand Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary When you fail a Constitution saving throw to maintain concentration on an apothecary spell, you can choose to succeed instead. Once you use this feature, you cannot do so again until you finish a short or long rest.
The Twin Remedy Prerequisite: 10th-level apothecary When you cast an apothecary spell using a spell slot that targets a single creature and restores hit points to it, you can target one additional creature within range with the same effect.
The Unseeing Sense You have Blindsight with a range of 10 feet.
The Venom-Keeper's Art Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary You add your Intelligence modifier to the damage rolls of spells that deal poison damage.
The Vigilant Eye When a creature you can see within 30 feet of you fails a saving throw or a death saving throw, you can use your reaction to add your Intelligence modifier to the roll, potentially turning a failure into a success. You must finish a short rest before using this theory on the same creature again.
The Warded Blood You have resistance to necrotic damage, and your hit point maximum cannot be reduced. You are also immune to diseases.
The Warrior-Physicker's Art Prerequisite: 14th-level apothecary When you use your action to cast a spell, you can make one weapon attack as a bonus action.
Wandering Study You learn two additional cantrips of your choice from any class's spell list. These cantrips count as apothecary cantrips for you.
Vivisection Prerequisite: 6th-level apothecary Your weapon attacks score a critical hit on a 19 or 20.
Apothecary Spell List
Spells marked with an asterisk (*) are custom homebrew spells not found in the standard 2024 rules. Dungeon Masters should either include them from their source material or substitute comparable spells. Any contamination-specific language in those spells should simply be removed.
Cantrips: Acid Splash, Chill Touch, Guidance, Light, Mending, Message, Poison Spray, Resistance, Shocking Grasp, Spare the Dying, Thaumaturgy
1st Level: Alarm (R), Comprehend Languages (R), Create or Destroy Water, Cure Wounds, Detect Evil and Good, Detect Magic (R), Detect Poison and Disease (R), False Life, Feather Fall, Fog Cloud, Grease, Healing Word, Hideous Laughter, Identify (R), Illusory Script (R), Jump, Purify Food and Drink (R), Sleep, Unseen Servant (R)
2nd Level: Aid, Blindness/Deafness, Enhance Ability, Enlarge/Reduce, Gentle Repose (R), Hold Person, Lesser Restoration, Protection from Poison, Ray of Enfeeblement, See Invisibility, Silence (R), Spider Climb, Web
3rd Level: Bestow Curse, Dispel Magic, Fear, Gaseous Form, Glyph of Warding, Haste, Hypnotic Pattern, Magic Circle, Mass Healing Word, Protection from Energy, Remove Curse, Revivify, Sending, Slow, Speak with Dead, Stinking Cloud, Vampiric Touch
4th Level: Black Tentacles, Blight, Death Ward, Freedom of Movement, Polymorph, Stoneskin
5th Level: Antilife Shell, Cloudkill, Contact Other Plane (R), Greater Restoration, Hold Monster, Mass Cure Wounds, Raise Dead, Scrying, Telepathic Bond (R), Teleportation Circle
6th Level: Chain Lightning, Circle of Death, Create Undead, Disintegrate, Eyebite, Flesh to Stone, Globe of Invulnerability, Harm, Heal, True Seeing
7th Level: Etherealness, Finger of Death, Forcecage, Plane Shift, Prismatic Spray, Regenerate, Resurrection
8th Level: Antimagic Field, Antipathy/Sympathy, Clone, Dominate Monster, Feeblemind, Mind Blank, Power Word Stun
9th Level: Astral Projection, Foresight, Mass Heal, Power Word Kill, Time Stop, True Polymorph, True Resurrection
Occult Disciplines
The Alchemist
The alchemist holds that the material world is governed by rules that can be learned, and that rift crystal energy is simply one more substance subject to those rules, albeit a powerful and unstable one. They combine physical compounds, prepared reagents, and carefully channeled planar energy to produce effects that other practitioners call magic and they call applied philosophy.
Alchemists find a natural home in The Undergarden Commonwealth, where the Gris have elevated practical chemistry to an art form, and in the port cities of Copper Bay where the demand for explosive and corrosive field applications is reliable. In more conservative communities they are viewed with suspicion. Exploding things on purpose tends to have that effect.
3rd-Level Alchemist Features
The Alchemist's Eye. You gain proficiency in Alchemist's Supplies if you do not already have it. You learn the fire bolt cantrip and one additional evocation cantrip of your choice from the wizard spell list. These count as apothecary cantrips for you but do not count against your cantrips known.
Alchemist's Spells. You always have the following spells prepared. They count as apothecary spells but do not count against the number you can prepare.
| Apothecary Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| 3rd | burning hands, grease |
| 5th | acid arrow, flaming sphere |
| 7th | fireball, stinking cloud |
| 9th | ice storm, wall of fire |
| 11th | cloudkill, cone of cold |
The Measured Pour. When you cast a spell that deals acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison damage, you can choose a number of targets within range equal to your Intelligence modifier. The chosen targets automatically succeed on their saving throws against the spell and take no damage if they would normally take half on a success.
6th-Level Alchemist Features
The Spreading Flame. When you cast an apothecary cantrip that normally targets only one creature and deals acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison damage, the spell can instead target two creatures within range.
Ward of Humors. As an action, you grant one creature you touch (including yourself) resistance to one of the following damage types for 1 hour: acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison. You choose the type when you use this feature. This benefit ends immediately if you use this feature again.
10th-Level Alchemist Feature
The Sealed Flask. You can store a spell from your Alchemist's Spells list as a liquid in a small vial or bottle you touch when you cast it. The spell has no effect other than to be stored. It remains inside until a creature opens the bottle. Once you use this feature, any previously bottled spell becomes inert, and you cannot bottle another until you finish a short rest. Any creature holding the bottle can spend an action to open it and release the spell, using your spell attack bonus and save DC. The spell treats that creature as its caster in all other respects.
14th-Level Alchemist Feature
The Turning Humor. When you cast a spell using an apothecary spell slot that deals a damage type from the following list, you can change that type to another from the same list: acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison.
18th-Level Alchemist Feature
The Grand Working. When you cast a spell that deals acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison damage using an apothecary spell slot, it is treated as if cast using a 7th-level spell slot.
The Body-Changer
The Body-Changer uses a serum refined over years of careful and dangerous self-experimentation, derived from distilled rift crystal essence combined with botanical and mineral reagents. The transformation it induces is grotesque. It is also, by any measure, effective. Most apothecaries view this path with deep unease. Body-Changers view that unease as a failure of imagination.
Body-Changers are rare, widely distrusted, and sometimes actively hunted. Their research overlaps uncomfortably with the changes that rift exposure can produce in living tissue, and explaining that distinction to an angry village is rarely worth the attempt.
3rd-Level Body-Changer Features
The Body-Changer's Learning. You gain proficiency in Alchemist's Supplies and either the Herbalism Kit or Poisoner's Kit. You also gain proficiency in two additional languages and the Nature skill. If you already have Nature proficiency, you gain proficiency in another skill of your choice.
Body-Changer's Spells. You always have the following spells prepared. They count as apothecary spells but do not count against the number you can prepare.
| Apothecary Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| 3rd | jump, false life |
| 5th | alter self, enhance ability |
| 7th | haste, water breathing |
| 9th | polymorph, stoneskin |
| 11th | reincarnate, hold monster |
The Changing Draught. As a bonus action, you can expend a spell slot to undergo a transformation. It ends after 1 minute, or if you are reduced to 0 hit points or incapacitated. While transformed:
- Your Strength and Intelligence ability scores are swapped.
- Your size becomes Large, your jump distance is doubled, and you count as one size larger for carrying capacity and pushing, dragging, and lifting weight.
- Each hand transforms into a large fist. You can make melee weapon attacks with your fists, treating them as simple weapons that deal 1d10 + your Strength modifier + your apothecary level bludgeoning damage.
- You cannot cast or concentrate on spells.
- You have Darkvision with a range of 120 feet.
- You gain temporary hit points equal to five times your apothecary level.
The serum scales with the slot used. Your speed increases by 5 feet per spell slot level. Your AC is 13 + the spell slot level. At the start of each of your turns, while you have at least 1 hit point, you regain hit points equal to the spell slot level.
6th-Level Body-Changer Features
The Beast's Fury. While in your transformed form, you attack twice instead of once when you take the Attack action on your turn.
The Iron Form. While transformed, your fist attacks count as magical for overcoming resistance and immunity. When you hit with a fist, you can expend a spell slot to deal additional force damage equal to 1d8 per level of the spell slot.
10th-Level Body-Changer Feature
The Shifting Self. When you are reduced to 0 hit points in either your natural or transformed state, the other self is ready to take over.
- In natural form: You can immediately transform using The Changing Draught, expending a spell slot. You regain hit points equal to your apothecary level when you do, in addition to the temporary hit points from the transformation.
- While transformed: When reduced to 0 hit points, you revert to your natural form with 1 hit point. You cannot transform again until you finish a short or long rest.
14th-Level Body-Changer Feature
The Greater Draught. You can use your Greater Formulae feature to transform as if expending a spell slot of that level. When you transform this way, you gain one of the following mutations:
- Draconic Form. You grow wings and gain a flying speed equal to your walking speed. As an action, you can exhale bile in a 30-foot cone. Creatures in the area must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against your spell save DC or take 8d6 acid damage, or half on a success. You cannot use the breath again until you finish a short rest.
- Giant Form. Your size becomes Huge, and all damage you deal to objects and structures is doubled. As an action, you can expend a spell slot to slam the ground. Creatures in a 30-foot radius must succeed on a Dexterity saving throw against your spell save DC or take 8d6 bludgeoning damage and fall prone. Success halves the damage and avoids prone.
- The Sharpened Mind. You retain enough clarity to concentrate on spells while transformed. Your concentration cannot be broken by taking damage while transformed.
18th-Level Body-Changer Feature
The Perfected Form. You gain the following benefits while transformed:
- As long as you have 1 or more hit points, you can use a bonus action and expend a spell slot to regain hit points equal to ten times the slot's level.
- If you fail a saving throw, you can use your reaction and expend a spell slot to succeed instead.
- Your Strength score becomes equal to your Intelligence score while transformed. You can also cast spells while in your transformed form.
The Plaguewright
The Plaguewright studies sickness as a craft: its causes, its character, the way it spreads and changes and defeats the body's defences. They understand what kills, why it kills, and how to make it worse. This knowledge is not comfortable to possess and it is not comfortable to be near. Playwrights are universally viewed with deep suspicion, particularly in the years since the rift events have introduced new diseases and corruptions to Maerin. Their work overlaps significantly with the domain of Moruen, whether they acknowledge that or not.
3rd-Level Plaguewright Features
Sickness-Lore. You learn the chill touch cantrip. You gain proficiency with the Herbalism Kit. If you already have it, you gain proficiency with another artisan's tool of your choice.
Plaguewright's Spells. You always have the following spells prepared. They count as apothecary spells but do not count against the number you can prepare.
| Apothecary Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| 3rd | inflict wounds, ray of sickness |
| 5th | blindness/deafness, ray of enfeeblement |
| 7th | bestow curse, stinking cloud |
| 9th | blight, black tentacles |
| 11th | contagion, insect plague |
The Stubborn Sickness. Whenever a creature casts a spell or uses a trait that would cure or remove one of your diseases, that creature must first succeed on an ability check using its spellcasting ability (or Charisma if it has none), with a DC equal to your spell save DC. On a failure, the spell, trait, or feature fails entirely. Any spell slot expended and any material components used are wasted.
The Changed Sickness. You have begun evolving your diseases to produce new symptoms. You learn two mutant strains of your choice from the list below. Each time you gain a level in this class, you can replace one strain you know with another. You learn additional strains at 9th and 15th apothecary level, as shown:
| Apothecary Level | Strains Known |
|---|---|
| 3rd | 2 |
| 9th | 3 |
| 15th | 4 |
Whenever you cast a spell that inflicts disease, you can apply one effect from your known strains to one target, lasting for the duration of the disease.
Available Strains:
- Dizziness. The target cannot take reactions.
- Fatigue. Each time the target fails a saving throw against your disease, its speed is reduced to 5 feet until the start of its next turn.
- Coughing Fits. At the start of each of the target's turns, it must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against your spell save DC or be unable to speak until the start of its next turn.
- Shivers. At the start of each of the target's turns, it drops whatever it is holding.
- Weakness (9th level). The target deals half damage with melee weapon attacks.
- Clouded Eyes (9th level). Each time the target fails a saving throw against your disease, it becomes Blinded until the start of its next turn.
- Raging Fever (9th level). The target cannot regain hit points.
- Lesions (9th level). The target loses any damage resistances it has.
- Nausea (15th level). Each time the target fails a saving throw against your disease, it becomes Incapacitated until the start of its next turn.
- Wasting (15th level). The target becomes Vulnerable to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage.
6th-Level Plaguewright Features
The Inescapable Contagion. When you cast a spell using an apothecary spell slot or your Greater Formula that causes disease, that spell ignores any creature's immunity to disease. Such creatures instead make saving throws against your diseases with advantage.
The Spreading Doom. When a creature infected by one of your diseases dies, you can use your reaction to spread the disease to a different creature you can see within 30 feet of the dead creature.
10th-Level Plaguewright Feature
The Patient Sickness. When you begin casting contagion or a similar disease-inflicting spell, you can modify it so that it does not require concentration. If you do, its duration becomes 1 minute for that casting. You must finish a short or long rest before using this feature again.
14th-Level Plaguewright Feature
The Weakened Blood. A creature infected by one of your diseases has disadvantage on saving throws against your apothecary spells.
18th-Level Plaguewright Feature
The Shifting Plague. Whenever you cast a spell that inflicts disease, you can apply two effects from your known strains to one target instead of one.
The Reanimator
The Reanimator approaches the oldest question, what separates a living body from a dead one, and what it would take to close that distance again, with tools and method rather than prayer. They stitch, preserve, and experiment. They construct companions from salvaged remains and animate them with carefully channeled occult energy. They keep the heads of interesting creatures in varying states of preservation for consultation. Most people find this unsettling. Reanimators find the reaction difficult to understand.
The ethical territory here is well past contested. Reanimators typically know this and have made their peace with it, or have stopped thinking about it, which is not quite the same thing.
3rd-Level Reanimator Features
Spark of Life. You learn the shocking grasp and spare the dying cantrips. These count as apothecary spells for you and do not count against your cantrips known.
Reanimator's Spells. You always have the following spells prepared. They count as apothecary spells but do not count against the number you can prepare.
| Apothecary Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| 3rd | false life, inflict wounds |
| 5th | gentle repose, enhance ability |
| 7th | lightning bolt, revivify |
| 9th | death ward, blight |
| 11th | raise dead, hold monster |
The Stitched Companion. You have built a companion from salvaged parts and animated it with your craft. The Stitched Companion is friendly to you and your companions and obeys your commands. You determine its appearance.
In combat, the companion shares your initiative and takes its turn immediately after yours. It can move and use its reaction on its own, but the only action it takes on its turn is the Dodge action unless you use a bonus action to command it otherwise. If you are incapacitated, it can take any action it chooses.
If your Stitched Companion has died within the past hour, you can revive it as an action while within 5 feet of it by expending a healer's kit use and an apothecary spell slot. It returns to life after 1 minute with all hit points restored.
At the end of a long rest, you can build a new Stitched Companion if you have a healer's kit and access to suitable materials. Any previous companion perishes. The companion also perishes if you die.
Stitched Companion Statistics:
Medium Construct
Armor Class: 14 + PB Hit Points: 5 + five times your apothecary level (Hit Dice: d12, number equal to your apothecary level) Speed: 30 feet
| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18 (+4) | 10 (+0) | 16 (+3) | 8 (−1) | 12 (+1) | 8 (−1) |
Saving Throws: Con +3 + PB, Wis +1 + PB Skills: Athletics +4 + PB Damage Immunities: Poison, lightning Condition Immunities: Poisoned Senses: Darkvision 60 ft., Passive Perception 11 Languages: Understands the languages of its creator but cannot speak Proficiency Bonus: Equals your proficiency bonus
Lightning Absorption. Whenever the companion is subjected to lightning damage, it takes no damage and regains hit points equal to the lightning damage dealt.
Actions Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 + PB to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 1d8 + 4 bludgeoning damage.
6th-Level Reanimator Features
The Loyal Construct. When a creature within 5 feet of your Stitched Companion attacks you, the companion can use its reaction to make a melee weapon attack against the attacker. Its Slam attack counts as magical for overcoming resistance and immunity.
You can also cast animate dead once using an apothecary spell slot. You cannot cast it this way again until you finish a long rest.
The Speaking Head. You have preserved a head from a creature whose knowledge interests you, maintaining it in a state between death and something else. You may use it as a spellcasting focus.
The head speaks Common and one other language of your choice. Whenever you make an Intelligence ability check that lets you add your proficiency bonus, you can treat a d20 roll of 9 or lower as a 10. You gain proficiency in the Arcana and Investigation skills.
You can use the head to cast speak with dead without expending a spell slot. Once you do, you cannot do so again until you finish a short or long rest.
10th-Level Reanimator Feature
Behold My Creation. Your Stitched Companion's size increases to Large and its speed increases to 40 feet. When it hits a creature with a melee attack, it can immediately attempt to grapple the target. The DC to escape is 8 + the companion's Strength modifier (+4) + your proficiency bonus.
14th-Level Reanimator Feature
Berserk Fury. When you command your Stitched Companion to take the Attack action, it can make two attacks.
18th-Level Reanimator Feature
I Cannot Stop the Monster I Created. Your Stitched Companion becomes Huge, gains a reach of 10 feet, and its speed increases to 50 feet. Its Slam attack deals an additional 1d8 bludgeoning damage. The weight it can push or lift is doubled.
The Rift Warden
Where a cleric relies on a Thera's intercession, a Rift Warden relies on knowledge. They have studied the nature of the rift-born, the undead, and the other consequences of Harbinger events with the same systematic attention an apothecary gives to a body, and they have armed themselves accordingly. Whether that distinction from a cleric is spiritually meaningful is a long-running argument between Rift Wardens and most of the temples in Maerin. Both sides have continued having it regardless.
Rift Wardens are employed by temples across Maerin's pantheon and by civic institutions like the Lampkeepers and the Compact of Hands, anywhere a congregation or guild has decided that practical expertise complements or sometimes supersedes divine authority when the rifts open something that should be shut.
3rd-Level Rift Warden Features
The Warden's Learning. You gain proficiency in heavy armor and the Religion skill. If you already have Religion proficiency, you gain proficiency in another skill of your choice. You can use a holy symbol as an arcane focus for your apothecary spells. You gain one cantrip of your choice from any divine class's spell list; it counts as an apothecary cantrip for you.
Rift Warden's Spells. You always have the following spells prepared. They count as apothecary spells but do not count against the number you can prepare.
| Apothecary Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| 3rd | bless, protection from evil and good |
| 5th | spiritual weapon, zone of truth |
| 7th | counterspell, spirit guardians |
| 9th | banishment, death ward |
| 11th | dispel evil and good, flame strike |
Warding Rites. You have learned to channel occult knowledge through a holy symbol to confront rift-born entities. You can use this feature a number of times equal to half your proficiency bonus (rounded down), and you regain all expended uses on a short or long rest. When a Warding Rite effect requires a saving throw, the DC equals your Apothecary spell save DC.
Starting at 5th level, when an undead or fiend fails its saving throw against Expel Rift Entity, it suffers an additional 4d8 radiant damage.
You choose which effect to create when you use this feature:
Expel Rift Entity. As an action, you present your holy symbol and speak a warding formula. Each undead, celestial, fey, or fiend that can see or hear you within 30 feet must make a Wisdom saving throw. A creature that fails is Turned for 1 minute or until it takes damage.
A Turned creature must use its turns to move as far from you as possible. It cannot willingly move within 30 feet of you, cannot take reactions, and can only Dash or attempt to escape effects preventing movement. If it cannot move, it can Dodge.
Purge Corruption. You touch a creature or object and end one condition affecting it: Blinded, Charmed, Deafened, Frightened, Paralyzed, or Poisoned.
If a creature is possessed or mind-controlled by an external entity, you can use this feature to remove traits or features related to the possession. The possessing entity is expelled to an unoccupied space within 5 feet and takes psychic damage equal to 2d8 + your apothecary level.
6th-Level Rift Warden Features
The Warded Self. You are immune to the Frightened condition and cannot be possessed or cursed. You have advantage on saving throws against being Charmed.
10th-Level Rift Warden Feature
The Counter-Ward. As a reaction when a hostile creature you can see targets an ally with an attack, spell, or other effect, you can expend an apothecary spell slot to force it to make a Charisma saving throw against your spell save DC. On a failure, the action fails. Any spell slot and material components used are wasted.
14th-Level Rift Warden Feature
The Blessed Remedy. Whenever you cast a spell that heals a creature, that spell deals its maximum healing, and the creature immediately gains temporary hit points equal to your apothecary level.
18th-Level Rift Warden Feature
The Walking Ward. Sending back what should not be here has become second nature.
- Creatures that fail their saving throws against your Warding Rites: Expel Rift Entity take an additional 4d8 radiant damage.
- Creatures aided by your Warding Rites: Purge Corruption gain 4d8 temporary hit points.
The Thoughtbinder
The Thoughtbinder believes that the mind is a place, one that can be entered, observed, and changed by someone with the right knowledge. They have developed this knowledge over years of careful study, working with pressed herbs, deep observation, and methods they do not always care to explain in public. The abilities they develop border on what other practitioners call magic and they call something more difficult to name.
Thoughtbinders are unsettling company. They tend to know things they were not told. They have a quality of attention that most people find uncomfortable after a while. Some serve as advisors to nobles or institutions. Others operate quietly, using their abilities in ways that the people around them never notice or cannot prove.
3rd-Level Thoughtbinder Features
The Studied Mind. You learn the eldritch blast cantrip. You gain proficiency in the Arcana skill. If you already have it, you gain proficiency in another skill of your choice.
Thoughtbinder's Spells. You always have the following spells prepared. They count as apothecary spells but do not count against the number you can prepare.
| Apothecary Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| 3rd | charm person, hideous laughter |
| 5th | detect thoughts, suggestion |
| 7th | hypnotic pattern, major image |
| 9th | arcane eye, dimension door |
| 11th | animate objects, modify memory |
The Unlocked Mind. You have unlocked latent psychic potential, represented by a pool of Psychic Points. You have 4 Psychic Points. You gain 2 more at 6th level, 2 more at 10th level, and 2 more at 14th level. You regain all expended Psychic Points when you finish a short or long rest.
You can expend Psychic Points to use the following:
- The Sharpened Cast. When you cast an apothecary spell that deals damage, you can expend a Psychic Point to reroll any number of damage dice. You must use the new rolls.
- The Warded Mind. Whenever you take damage, you can use your reaction and expend a Psychic Point to reduce the damage by an amount equal to your apothecary level.
- The Silent Working. When you cast an apothecary spell that does not deal damage, you can expend a Psychic Point to cast it without somatic or verbal components.
The Thought-Cord. As an action, you can touch a willing creature to create a psychic link with it lasting a number of hours equal to your apothecary level, or until you end it (no action required). The maximum number of active links you can maintain equals your proficiency bonus. All tethered creatures can communicate telepathically with one another while within 100 feet of each other.
6th-Level Thoughtbinder Feature
The Mind's Wing. As a bonus action, you can expend a Psychic Point to gain a flying speed equal to your walking speed for 1 minute, during which you can hover.
10th-Level Thoughtbinder Feature
The Deep Working. You gain three new ways to spend Psychic Points:
- The Unwanted Thought. Once per turn when a target you can see within 30 feet succeeds on an Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma saving throw against a spell you cast, you can expend a Psychic Point to force it to reroll the d20 and use the lower result.
- The Steadying Word. Once per turn when a target you can see within 30 feet fails an Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma saving throw, you can expend a Psychic Point to add your Intelligence modifier to the creature's roll, potentially turning the failure into a success.
- The Slipped Step. As a bonus action, you can expend a Psychic Point to teleport up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space you can see. You immediately gain temporary hit points equal to twice your Intelligence modifier.
14th-Level Thoughtbinder Feature
The Inward Eye. If you have no Psychic Points remaining, you can use a bonus action and expend a spell slot to regain 1d4 Psychic Points.
You also gain two additional features:
- The Careful Hand. Whenever you cast a spell that restores hit points, you can expend a Psychic Point to cause all targets to regain additional hit points equal to twice your Intelligence modifier.
- The Long Reach. When you cast any spell of 1st level or higher from your Thoughtbinder's Spells list, you can cast it by expending a spell slot as normal, or by spending Psychic Points equal to the spell's level.
18th-Level Thoughtbinder Feature
The Sealed Mind. You have resistance to psychic damage and immunity to being charmed or frightened. Magic cannot put you to sleep, and you have advantage on saving throws against spells that attempt to read your thoughts or control your mind. When you use The Inward Eye to regain Psychic Points by expending a spell slot, you regain Psychic Points equal to the spell's level instead of 1d4.
Maerin Campaign Document | Apothecary Class | D&D 2024 Compatible Mechanically adapted from Sebastian Crow's Guide to Drakkenheim. Setting content original.
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