Bard: College of Drug Dealing
"Look, mate, I had to pay my student debts somehow."
Drug dealing – a trade that's fairly ubiquitous across cultures, though rarely in a positive light.
Typically, bards who follow this college are ones making the most out of bad opportunities. It’s not a profession that most people would aspire towards, yet there are always some who fall down to that world. They are work on the shady side of the law and deal with dangerous clientele, yet art of drug dealing is all about knowing your customers' needs.
And the best drug dealers are ones who imbue magic into their narcotics. Illicit magicians can apply literal magic to their products, giving it that arcane kick. Some are merely college students who just want to help their friends relax, while others are criminal magnates that move their products across cities. The dealers fill up a void: they grease the wheels, they run the streets, and they make sure their customers stay satiated.
Destructive Vices
3rd level Drug Dealer feature
A drug dealer learns to exploit a creature’s worst impulses. As a bonus action, you can target a creature within 60 feet and expend a Bardic Inspiration to create a small magical mote. This mote can take whatever form you choose (perhaps a cloud of smoke, a vial of shimmering liquid, or an inconspicuous totem).
Art Credit: De-Prime, Merchant.
Created using GMBinder.
The mote materialises next to its target, and the target must make a Wisdom saving throw against your spell save DC. On a failure, the target consumes the mote and becomes charmed. When charmed, the target becomes non-hostile and indifferent to its surroundings, wasting its actions on its turn as if in a stupor. The target suffers disadvantage on either Dexterity or Intelligence checks (your choice), and it automatically fails checks or saving throws to discern reality against any illusion spells you cast. At the end of each of its turns, the target can repeat the Wisdom saving throw, ending the effect on a success.
If you choose so, a creature that is charmed by you may also suffer poison damage equal to your Bardic Inspiration die at the start of their turns in combat, although they do not register the pain and they do not they realise that you are responsible for harming it. The creature only acknowledges the harmful damage received when the charmed condition ends.
Alternatively, you can also choose for the mote to materialise in your hand and use an action to attempt to persuade a creature to consume it later. An mote disappears if not consumed within 12 hours. If ingested willingly, the target has disadvantage on Wisdom saving throws to resist its effects.
Nose for Narcotics
3rd level Drug Dealer feature
You know dangerous substances. When you spend one minute inspecting an alchemically-brewed concoction (such as a potion), you immediately become aware of the effects of consumption, its beneficial properties and any harmful side effects.
The DM may also inform you of the potion’s key ingredients and a vague suggestion of how to manufacture it.
Substance Abuse
9th level Drug Dealer feature
As your understanding of drugs deepens, you learn how to magically replicate a chemical boost. As a bonus action, you may choose to apply one of the following effects to either yourself or to an ally you can touch:
Social lubricant. The target relaxes, growing confident. When they make a Charisma (Persuasion or Performance) check, they may treat a d20 roll of 9 or lower as a 10.
Adrenalize. The target gains immunity to the frightened and charmed conditions, and temporary hit points equal to your Bard level plus your Charisma modifier. An unconscious ally returns to 1 hp and any exhaustion is temporarily reduced by one level.
Stimulant. The target gains a +5 bonus to Wisdom (Perception) checks, and may take the Disengage action as a bonus action.
The chosen effect lasts for 1 hour, a creature can have only one effect at any time, and multiple effects do not stack. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Charisma modifier, and you regain all expended uses on a long rest.
Addictive Snare
14th level Drug Dealer feature
The craving of a good drug is not an easy thing to escape, and a dealer knows all sorts of tricks to weaken resolve. When you see a creature within 30 feet making a Wisdom saving throw, you can use your reaction to impose disadvantage on that roll.
In addition, a creature that has been charmed by you previously within the last 24 hours suffers a -3 penalty when rolling saving throws to avoid any of your illusion or enchantment spells.
