Bard: College of the Last Breath
The moment between life and death holds great knowledge and power for those that can touch it and return. Bards of this College harness the strange effects of near death to gain new abilities and insight, even guiding others to and from either side of the mortal veil.
Death Rattle
At 3rd level, as you get closer to death, you become more powerful. As you become more injured, you gain more powers based on your hit points. The hit point thresholds are: Bruised (less than maximum), Bloodied (half your maximum), or Last Breath (hit points equal to your Bard level).
At Bruised, Bloodied, and Last Breath you may choose 1, 2, and 3, respectively, of the following powers to gain:
Armor From Nothingness. You have resistance to non-magical and necrotic damage.
Mortality. Once on each of your turns, you may add a roll of your Bardic Inspiration die to the amount of damage or healing you deal to one creature you can see.
Returned Breath. When a creature you can see drops to 0 hit points, you may expend a Bardic Inspiration die as a reaction to immediately stabilize that creature.
Spiritually Empowered. You may use your Charisma modifier when making weapon attacks and Constitution saving throws.
You hold on to these powers until you either have hit points above your current threshold or you finish a long rest.
Drop Dead
Also at 3rd level, a number of times per long rest equal to your proficiency bonus, you may offer up your life force to come within a breath of your own death. At any time, you may drop to 0 hit points, with no visible harm to your body. When you use this feature, you have advantage on death saving throws and you are able to continue concentrating on any spell or ability unless you suffer a death saving throw failure.
If you stabilize, you heal hit points equal to your Bard level and regain 1 use of your Bardic Inspiration if you had none.
Shroud of Shades
At 6th level, spirits surround you, adding an aura of spiritual energy to your steps. You learn the spells pass without trace, revivify, and spirit shroud, which count as Bard spells and do not count against the number of spells known.
Knowledge From Beyond the Veil
Additionally at 6th level, twice per long rest while at your Last Breath threshold, you may learn a divination spell that takes less than a minute to cast off any spell list of a level that you have Bard spell slots for; you may cast that spell as an action by expending an amount of Bardic Inspiration die equal to the spell level instead of a spell slot.
At 11th level in this class, you may use this ability an additional time per long rest and you may either learn a divination or necromancy spell instead of just a divination spell.
Dread Power
At 14th level, at the end of a long rest, you may choose one Death Rattle trait to start with until you finish your next long rest.
