#TheGriffonsSaddlebag_BookOne

As new methods of combat are brought into the world, so too are those that seek to perfect them. Fighters are adept at many things and excel at what they set their mind to — all with the express purpose of being the last one standing.

Will you rely on augmenting your martial prowess with magic, or focus on pure athleticism? Do you leap into the fray, axe at the ready, or hold back until only one option remains? Regardless of your chosen style of combat, fighters are always worthy allies on the battlefield.

The Couatl Heralds were, or are, martial warriors whose intention was to neutralize threats without always resorting to deadly force. These combatants were a beloved symbol of peace in the once great city of Hearth, whose terrible destruction has been all but entirely lost to history. Perhaps you come from a long line of sequestered heralds who had escaped the city before its collapse, or maybe you found the age-old journals of one of the city’s training officers. Regardless of how you come across this knowledge, training, and virtue, a true Couatl Herald defends the lives of all: regardless of their transgressions.

3rd-level Couatl Herald Feature
When you choose this archetype at 3rd level, you understand that not every villain needs a bloody ending. You gain three motes of positive magic that can be used to fuel your interactions with other creatures. These motes are called mercy dice, which are d6s. You regain all of your expended mercy dice when you finish a short or long rest, and you regain 1 expended mercy die when you reduce a hostile creature to 0 hit points and choose to knock it out instead of killing it outright.

Whenever you make a Wisdom (Insight) check or Charisma check, you can choose to roll one or more of these dice and add the number rolled to the ability check. You can wait until after you roll the d20 before deciding to use a mercy die, but must decide before the GM says whether the roll succeeds or fails. Alternatively, you can roll a mercy die as a bonus action to gain temporary hit points equal to your Charisma modifier + the number you rolled on the die.

You keep a mercy die until it’s either used or you kill an unconscious creature you had already spared. When you reach 10th level in this class, your mercy dice turn into d8s, and at 15th level, they turn into d10s.
In addition, your carefully placed strikes allow you to knock a creature out with either melee or ranged attacks.

3rd-level Couatl Herald Feature
At 3rd level, you gain proficiency in the Persuasion and Insight skills.

7th-level Couatl Herald Feature
Starting at 7th level, your weapon attacks count as magical for the purpose of overcoming resistance and immunity to nonmagical attacks and damage. In addition, you can use an action to cast the calm emotions spell, without expending a spell slot. The saving throw DC for the spell equals 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Charisma modifier. Once you cast this spell, you can’t cast it again until you finish a short or long rest.

10th-level Couatl Herald Feature
By 10th level, you gain an additional way to regain mercy dice. When you successfully persuade a creature to stand down or deescalate an otherwise violent situation, you regain 1 mercy die. If multiple creatures are persuaded in this way, you regain 1 mercy die for each affected creature.

In addition, your mind is guarded against outside forces that would seek to sway your dedication. You can’t be charmed or frightened.

15th-level Couatl Herald Feature
Starting at 15th level, you can have up to five mercy dice at a time. You’ve also learned how to lead your allies using magical words of empowerment. As a bonus action, you can command a creature you can see within 30 feet of you, spending a mercy die. When you do, roll the die. If the creature can hear you, it gains temporary hit points equal to your Charisma modifier + the number you rolled on the mercy die and can immediately use its reaction to move up to half its speed and make one weapon attack.

If a weapon attack made in this way reduces a creature to 0 hit points, that creature is magically knocked unconscious instead of killed outright by the attack.

18th-level Couatl Herald Feature
At 18th level, your training has taught you to strike with the magic and force of a mighty couatl. Once on each of your turns when you hit a creature with a weapon attack, you can cause the attack to deal an extra 1d10 force damage to the target. When you deal this force damage, you can choose to spend a mercy die to add an additional 1d10 force damage to the attack.

In addition, if you choose to knock a creature out instead of killing it outright when you reduce it to 0 hit points, the target remains unconscious for 8 hours or until a creature friendly to you uses an action to shake it awake, even if the target regains hit points.

#TheGriffonsSaddlebag_BookTwo

Not everyone who can tell you which end of a sword to hold is a fighter: that title is reserved for the trained guards, valiant knights, and masterful veterans of the world, and apart from their shared expertise with weapons, armor, and combat, few two fighters are exactly the same. Fighters are focused on the honing of their skill in combat, adapting to the settings around them and developing new solutions to the challenges they face. Some choose to focus on the mastery of one particular weapon or develop keen tactical skill, whereas others rely on clever magical forces to enhance their martial prowess. Beyond that, weapon and armor preferenceplay a significant part in determining a fighter’s role. When you are a fighter, you’re equipped to face the world’s dangers head-on.

Powerful, nimble soldiers from the mountain city of Heavensteppe, Steel Hawks use explosive bursts of speed to launch themselves great distances in order to reach faraway threats. Despite their often heavy armor, those who follow this archetype leap and strike with the agility of seasoned assassins, becoming every inch the fearsome birds of prey their name would suggest.

3rd-level Steel Hawk feature
When you choose this archetype at 3rd level, you learn to magically launch yourself with a mighty leap. While standing on a solid surface, you can use a bonus action to leap horizontally, vertically, or a combination of both, up to a combined distance that totals no more than 15 feet. For example, you can choose to leap 10 feet horizontally and 5 feet vertically, potentially allowing you to avoid a dangerous trap or barricade blocking your path. When you reach 7th level in this class, the leap’s distance can total up to 30 feet instead.

You can’t use this feature if your speed is 0, and if you leap completely horizontally, you still leap 1 foot off the ground. Leaping in this way doesn’t provoke opportunity attacks, and if you fall immediately after using this feature, you can subtract up to 30 feet from the fall when calculating falling damage.

You can use this feature three times, and you regain all expended uses of it when you finish a short or long rest. Beginning at 7th level, you can use this feature four times between rests, and beginning at 15th level, you can use it five times between rests.

Leaping in this way can also strengthen your strikes by using the force of your momentum. If you make a melee weapon attack immediately after using Launch, you have advantage on the attack roll, and if the attack hits, the target takes an extra 1d8 damage of the weapon’s type. At 10th level, this extra damage becomes 1d10, and at 18th level, it becomes 1d12. The attack can be made immediately after you land at the end of the leap or during the leap’s movement.

3rd-level Steel Hawk feature
Starting at 3rd level, you are remarkably light on your feet and capable of counterbalancing even some of the most awkward of equipment. Lances have the versatile property for you while you’re not mounted, dealing 1d8 piercing damage on a hit when held with one hand and 1d12 piercing damage when wielded with two. When you use your Launch feature and immediately hit with a melee attack using a lance, it counts as if you’re wielding it with two hands.

If you hit a creature within 5 feet of you using a lance, you can immediately move up to 5 feet away from it, without provoking an opportunity attack from the target.
You must be standing and have movement remaining in order to move in this way.

3rd-level Steel Hawk feature
Also at 3rd level, you learn to identify common birds by their calls, and you have advantage on Wisdom (Animal Handling) checks when interacting with any beast that has an innate flying speed. In addition, you gain the ability to cast the animal messenger spell, but only as a ritual and only targeting a beast that has an innate flying speed.

7th-level Steel Hawk feature
Starting at 7th level, wearing armor doesn’t impose disadvantage on your Dexterity (Stealth) checks. In addition, whenever you make a Dexterity saving throw, you can use your Launch feature as a reaction. When you do so, you take no damage if you succeed on the saving throw, and only half damage if you fail.

10th-level Steel Hawk feature
Beginning at 10th level, your attack made immediately after or during your Launch scores a critical hit on a roll of 19 or 20. If you hit a flying creature with this attack, it must also make a Strength saving throw (DC equal to 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Strength modifier). On a failed save, its speed is reduced to 0 feet until the start of its next turn.

In addition, you gain proficiency in the Perception skill if you don’t already have it, and your proficiency bonus is doubled for any Wisdom (Perception) check you make that relies on sight.

15th-level Steel Hawk feature
Starting at 15th level, you have advantage on initiative rolls, and when you roll initiative and have no uses of Launch remaining, you regain one use.

18th-level Steel Hawk feature
Starting at 18th level, when you hit a creature with a melee weapon attack immediately after or during your Launch, it must also succeed on a Strength saving throw (save DC equal to 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Strength modifier) or be knocked prone.

In addition, you can push yourself beyond your normal limits when you use your Launch feature. When you do, your leap can total a maximum of 90 feet, instead of 30, and you don’t suffer any damage from falling until you land again. Once you use this feature, you shouldn’t do so again before you finish a short or long rest. Each time you do, you suffer one level of exhaustion. You can’t use this feature in this way if you’re suffering from two or more levels of exhaustion.

#RyokosGuideToTheYokaiRealms

Folklore tells of a caste of downtrodden serfs, forbidden to carry weapons, gifted the power to wield their own skeletons as lethal instruments of battle by a sympathetic yokai. With carapaces of dense bone and vicious, osseous claws bursting from their flesh, the serfs overthrew their masters, winning freedom and a bloodsoaked notoriety. Today, practitioners of this devastating technique are known as Skeletal Blades. Often finding work as mercenaries, bodyguards, and spies, they charge into battle clad in an ever-adapting armour of gleaming skeletal white.

3rd-Level Skeletal Blade Feature
You have the power to manipulate your skeleton, shifting your proportions, height, and appearance. As an action, you can alter your form, becoming up to 1 foot taller or shorter and changing your facial features by altering the shape of your skull.
You must remain in a form that has the same basic arrangement of limbs, and you can’t change the colour of your eyes, hair, or skin. Otherwise, the extent of the transformation is up to you.
To discern that you are disguised, a creature can use its action to inspect your appearance and must succeed on an Intelligence (Investigation) check (DC equals 8 + your Constitution modifier + your proficiency bonus).
This transformation persists until you use your action to end it or until you begin a long rest. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Constitution modifier (minimum of once), regaining all expended uses when you finish a short or long rest.

3rd-Level Skeletal Blade Feature
While in your Skeletal Form, you sprout a vicious, jagged weapon through your flesh; this weapon is considered a simple melee weapon with the Finesse property that deals 1d8 slashing or piercing damage on a hit (you choose when you make the attack). It is magical for the sake of overcoming resistances and immunities. You can’t be disarmed of this weapon, which has the Skewer superior strike* option. You also gain one benefit of your choice from the list below:

7th-Level Skeletal Blade Feature
You have learned to simultaneously maintain multiple boney extrusions. When you enter your Skeletal Form, you can choose one additional benefit, and you can choose one of the following weapon properties and superior strike* combinations for your extruded weapon: Impact & Reeling Blow; Light & Hamstring; or Heavy & Shockwave.

10th-Level Skeletal Blade Feature
Your mastery of your skeleton allows you to focus it into more powerful forms. You gain a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls made with your skeletal blade. This bonus increases to +2 when you reach 18th level. Furthermore, when you enter your Skeletal Form, you can enhance yourself with one of the following additional benefits:

15th-Level Skeletal Blade Feature
Your skeleton is empowered with regenerative magic. If you are reduced to 0 hit points while in your Skeletal Form, your transformation ends, and you are reduced to 1 hit point instead.
Once you use this feature, you can’t do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

18th-Level Skeletal Blade Feature
When you enter your Skeletal Form, you gain two additional benefits for the duration of your transformation, which can be chosen from either the Skeletal Form or Skeletal Knight features.

*See Advanced Weapon Masteries, page 83

#LArsenesLedger
The taste of ale-soaked floorboards is a familiar flavour to Tavern Brawlers. Whether they’ve been thrown to the ground in a glorious takedown, blocked an improvised weapon with their teeth, or tackled a foe into a pile of flailing limbs, Tavern Brawlers cherish the memory of every scuffle that hasn’t been knocked out of their brains.

Though most inns and pubs decry barroom brawls as unnecessarily damaging and expensive affairs, celebrated carpenter and philosopher Lottaw Ood proposed that without the constant kerfuffles, woodworkers and the entire lumber industry might collapse. In fact, more shrewd carpentry guilds have opened “Brawl-Inns”; taverns with dedicated brawling areas and a microtransaction economy that encourages fighters to purchase chairs with which to clout their fellow patrons.

3rd-level Tavern Brawler feature

You’ve learned techniques that are fueled by special dice called Brawler dice, which are d4s. You have a number of these dice equal to twice your proficiency bonus. You regain all your expended Brawler dice when you finish a long rest.
When you reach certain levels in this class, the size of your Brawler dice increases: at 5th level (d6), 11th level (d8), and 17th level (d10).

Some of your techniques require your target to make a saving throw to resist the technique’s effects. The saving throw DC is calculated as follows:
Technique save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Strength modifier

The techniques below use your Brawler dice. Creatures more than one size larger than you automatically succeed on any saving throws or contested checks against these techniques’ effects.

Prerequisite: target grappled.
When you make an unarmed strike with a free hand against a creature you are grappling, you can expend one Brawler die to force an additional contested grappling check instead of an attack roll. On a success, you deal the strike’s normal damage plus extra damage equal to one roll of your Brawler die, and the creature is restrained until the grapple ends or you use one of the hands you have grappling the target for something else.

Prerequisite: target restrained.
While you have a humanoid restrained (for example, by your Bind technique), you can use an action to expend one Brawler die and attempt to cut off the creature’s blood supply. The creature must make a Constitution saving throw. On a failure, it takes bludgeoning damage equal to your Strength modifier plus two rolls of your Brawler die and immediately begins to be strangled until it is no longer restrained by you. On a success, it takes half as much damage and doesn’t begin to be strangled. A creature that is being strangled remains conscious for a number of rounds equal to its Constitution modifier (minimum 1), and falls unconscious at the start of its next turn. A creature that is made unconscious in this manner regains consciousness if it takes any damage. If you continue to choke a creature beyond this point, it begins suffocating. If you release the creature, it remains unconscious for 1d20 + 10 minutes.

Prerequisite: hit with improvised weapon melee weapon attack.
When you hit a creature with a melee weapon attack using an improvised weapon, you can expend one Brawler die to deal extra bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage (GM’s decision) equal to one roll of your Brawler die. The object takes an equal amount of damage, possibly destroying it.

Prerequisite: target grappled.
When you make an unarmed strike against a creature you are grappling, you can expend one Brawler die to force an additional contested grappling check instead of an attack roll. On a success, you deal the strike’s normal damage plus extra damage equal to one roll of your Brawler die as you throw the target to the ground where it lands prone.

3rd-level Tavern Brawler feature
Your familiarity with patrons of bars and inns has left you adept at sensing their motives. You have advantage on Insight, Intimidation, and Persuasion checks against creatures that have been drinking.

3rd-level Tavern Brawler feature
You’ve learned to use whatever weapons might be close at hand, often surprising foes with your ingenuity. You are proficient with improvised weapons and your unarmed strikes and improvised weapon attacks can deal damage equal to 1d4 + your Strength modifier on a hit. This damage die increases when you reach 5th level (1d6), 11th level (1d8), and 17th level (1d10) in this class.

You can pick up an object within your reach as part of the attack you make with that object. In addition, the first time you make an attack with an improvised weapon you picked up on that same turn, that attack scores a critical hit on a roll of 19 or 20.

7th-level Tavern Brawler feature
You can attempt to grapple a creature as a bonus action on your turn, and you have advantage on attack rolls you make against creatures you are grappling. In addition, when you successfully apply the grappled condition to a creature, you can choose to painfully twist, dealing bludgeoning damage to the creature equal to a roll of your unarmed strike die plus your Strength modifier.

10th-level Tavern Brawler feature
You can add double your proficiency bonus to contested Strength (Athletics) checks you make. When you make an ability check to grapple a creature or to escape a grapple, you can treat a d20 roll of 9 or lower as a 10.

15th-level Tavern Brawler feature
Years spent anticipating conflict in inns and taverns has given you a preternatural danger sense. You have advantage on initiative rolls, and you gain proficiency in the Insight skill. If you have this proficiency from another source, you can add twice your proficiency bonus to checks you make using that skill. As a bonus action on your turn, you can make a Wisdom (Insight) check against the passive Deception of a creature you can see. On a success, you learn the creature’s disposition towards you, such as whether it means you harm, views you as a friend, or wants something from you.

18th-level Tavern Brawler feature
When you roll initiative and have no Brawler dice remaining, you regain two Brawler dice. You learn new techniques that use your Brawler dice.

Prerequisite: target restrained.
When you have a creature restrained (for example, by your Bind technique) and take the Attack action, you can forgo two of your attacks to expend one Brawler die in a complex crushing manoeuvre. The creature must make a Dexterity saving throw. On a failure, it takes bludgeoning damage equal to your Strength modifier plus two rolls of your Brawler die and is stunned until the end of your next turn. On a success, it takes half as much damage and isn’t stunned.

Prerequisite: target grappled.
When you have a creature grappled and take the Attack action, you can forgo one of your attacks to expend one Brawler die and force the creature to make a Strength saving throw as you attempt to launch it. On a failure, you throw the creature horizontally away from you in a straight line up to 30 feet if it is a smaller size category than you, 20 feet if it is the same size as you, or 10 feet if it is one size category larger than you. The creature collides with the first solid object or creature in its path, causing both targets to take bludgeoning damage equal to one roll of your Brawler die plus your Strength modifier.

When you move at least 10 feet directly towards a creature immediately before making an attack as part of the Attack action, you can forgo the attack to expend one Brawler die as you throw your entire body at your target. Make a Strength (Athletics) check contested by the target’s Dexterity (Acrobatics) or Strength (Athletics) check (its choice). If you succeed, the target takes bludgeoning damage equal to your Strength modifier plus two rolls of your Brawler die, and you both land prone.