College of Investigation

Use Knowledge to Gain the Upperhand

Bards pick up all sorts of information as they travel the land. Some bards focus on a certain type of information, like epic poetry, love ballads, or bawdy drinking songs. Others, however, turn to the shadowy occupation of investigating crimes. These bards use their knack for gathering information to learn about criminals and vigilantes, their tactics, and their weaknesses. Some work with agents of the law to catch criminals, but shadier members of this college use their dark knowledge to emulate the malefactors they have studied for so long.

Level 3: Bonus Proficiencies

When you join the College of Investigation at 3rd level, you gain proficiency in the Insight skill and in two of the following skills of your choice: Acrobatics, Deception, Investigation, Performance, Sleight of Hand, or Stealth.

Level 3: Quick Read

Your knowledge of underhanded tactics allows you to gain insight into your foes’ strategies. As a bonus action, you can expend one use of Bardic Inspiration to make a Wisdom (Insight) check against one creature you can see within 30 feet contested by the creature’s Charisma (Deception) check. Add the number you roll on the Bardic Inspiration die to the result of your check. You have disadvantage on this check if the target is not a humanoid, and the check automatically fails against creatures with an Intelligence score of 3 or lower. On a success, you gain one of the following benefits:

• The target has disadvantage on attack rolls against you for 1 minute.

• You have advantage on saving throws against the target’s spells and magical effects for 1 minute.

• You have advantage on attack rolls against the target for 1 minute.

Level 6: Bardic Instinct

You can extend your knowledge of criminal behavior to your companions. When a creature that has a Bardic Inspiration die from you is damaged by a hostile creature’s attack, it can use its reaction to roll that die and reduce the damage by twice the number rolled. If this reduces the damage of the attack to 0, the creature you inspired can make one melee attack against its attacker as part of the same reaction.

Level 14: Hot Pursuit

When a creature fails a saving throw against one of your bard spells, you can designate it as your mark for 24 hours. You know the direction to your mark at all times unless it is within an antimagic field, it is protected by an effect that prevents scrying such as nondetection, or there is a barrier of lead at least 1 inch thick between you.

In addition, whenever your mark makes an attack roll, you can expend one use of Bardic Inspiration to subtract the number rolled from the mark’s attack roll. Alternatively, whenever you make a saving throw against a spell or magical effect from your mark, you can expend one use of Bardic Inspiration to add the number rolled to your saving throw. You can choose to expend the Bardic Inspiration after the attack or saving throw is rolled but before the outcome is determined.

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