Classes > Civilians

Archeologist - Artisan - Healer - Merchant

Not all heroes remembered by history are trained fighters or savants. Not all those who enact great change in their homes and safeguard their loved ones from horrible fates are soldiers and archmagi. Sometimes, one can crave the thrill of adventure without the illustrious pedigree or supernatural gifts usually gambled with.

Civilians come from all walks of life, but some can say that they come woefully unprepared for the tasks ahead. Though not as frail as mages, they lack the strength of all the other classes, the intellect needed for any kind of magery or the natural deftness needed for subterfuge. They survive through their incredible luck; any civilian who survives an adventure past a certain level must be blessed with some kind of freak fortune from the skies.

Archeologists, Artisans, Healers and Merchants can be referred to as Civilians.

They get to choose 1 new talent at levels 4, 8, 12, 16, and 19, but may not exceed 18 in any stat this way until after level 20. They cannot wear any kind of armor, and do not gain CON bonuses to maximum health. Characters with less than 10 INT are functionally too dumb to have any kind of profession and cannot be Civilians.

Civilians are a categorically unviable class archetype designed to border on being a joke. They only survive long if protected by a party or more capable adventurers willing to keep them around in exchange for services, such as cooking meals, fetching firewood or analyzing the values of items. Civilians are a liability who must be occasionally reminded to hide behind rocks, wait outside or drink their invisibility potions before fights break out. A civilian could be following a party of adventurers because they have it out against the main antagonist, because they're traveling in the direction of where the party's going, to meet their deceased son in the outer plane... or a variety of other reasons.

Level 1: The shrinking pacifist aura of a Civilian makes them seem like a bystander in any kind of combat engagement. This means all non-evil creatures will ignore them if they have bigger targets to aim for, unless the Civilian attacks. In contrast, evil creatures will actively target Civilians over others for their defenseless appearance. Due to their lack of conditioning, they roll any kind of accuracy roll with disadvantage. They can, however, expend effort to bypass this disadvantage once per day for every 4 levels.

Level 5: Civilians can gather themselves past the panic of combat to try to flee any attacker. When moving away from any creature of their choice, they can run at twice their normal running speed, and cannot run in its general direction for the rest of the round.

Level 10: Civilians are appreciative of their friends, despite their own lack of martial prowess. When any other party member performs any kind of modifiable dice roll, the Civilian may use one charge of expend effort to add their own stat modifier or skill to their friend's roll.

Level 15: A Civilian must be favored by some kind of divine power to have made it this far. They may change the outcome of 1 personal roll per week.