Adept

Adepts are medium armored trained users of hand to hand combat and other specific forms of martial arts using staves, fist weapons, and some throwing weapons. Practitioners of this combative profession come from many walks of life, from a religious or spiritual person who trains as an adept as their way to dedicating themselves to their ideals and god, to criminal thugs who needed to learn effective ways to fight even when disarmed, to self trained militia who lacked the proper means to effectively arm themselves. They hone both their body and mind in order to be swift, but strong in fights.

Adept

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Hit Points

Hit Dice: d8 per Adept level

Hit Points at first Level: 7 + Your Constituion Modifier

Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d8 + Your Constituion Modifier

Proficiences

Armor: Padded Armor, Leather Armor

Weapons: Simple Melee Weapons, Blunt Knuckles, Bladed Knuckles, Darts, Shortbows, Slings, Flails, Glaives, Halberds, Lances, Pikes, Rapiers, Shortswords, Scimitars, Tridents, Whips, Blowguns, Spear-throwers, Longbows, and Nets

Tools: Brewer's supplies, Calligrapher's supplies, Leatherworker's tools, Painter's supplies, Potter's tools, Weaver's tools, and Woodcarver's tools

Saving Throws: Dexterity, Strength

Skills: Choose three from Acrobatics, Athletics, Deception, History, Insight, Intimidation, Perception, Performance, Religion, Slight of Hand, and Stealth.

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Overview & Creation

Adepts are martial artists that specialize in fluid and dexterous use of their weapons as well as using their own body as a weapon. Many adepts chose their path for spiritual reasons, or as a way for self improvement and discipline. Many Adepts train for a purpose, while others may be aimless with only a vague goal in mind. They train for years to hone their mind and body and attempt to become one with themselves, their weapon, and their environment. Each adept specializes in some form of martial arts- some may focus on purely hand to hand such as a wrestling, capoeira, boxing, karate, judo, or so on; while others may focus on mixing hand to hand with weaponry- such as kendo, kalari, kyūdō, Bataireacht, and many more. Many individual Adepts chose a style that comes from their culture, while others travel far to learn a martial art style that comes from another land's people. But what unites all Adepts at the end of the day is a need to improve mind and body for whatever goals they pursue.
(DM's note: This is a flavored & modified version of D&D's Monk class, altered to better fit into the world of Nielea.)

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Class Features

Martial Artist

At 1st level, you have taken on a martial art of your choosing to practice and master. Whatever style you have taken on, you have learned to use your chosen weapon-if any- with your preferred style of combat. You gain the following benefits if you fight unarmed or with a fist-load weapon:

• You may chose to use either Dexterity or Strength for your attack and damage rolls of your unarmed strikes or fist-load weapon.
• You are able to do another attack as a bonus action on your turn using an unarmed strike or a fist-load weapon.
• Your unarmed strikes do 1d4 damage + Your Strength or Dex modifier. This increased by 1 dice at the 5th, 10th, 15th, and 20th levels.
• You gain proficiency bonuses on unarmed strikes.

You gain the following benefits if you fight with a non-fist-load weapon:

• You may chose to use Dexterity instead of Strength for the attack roll of your weapon's attack.
• As a bonus action on your turn, you may perform an unarmed strike with either a Dexterity or Strength roll.
• As a bonus action, you may perform a feinting attack either with your equipped weapon or with an unarmed strike. The defender must perform a dexterity saving throw and, if they fail, they gain a disadvantage on your next attack before your turn ends.

Fluid Defenses

Your practice has taught you to use your body not only as a weapon, but also as a form of defense. If you are wearing armor, you may add 1 + your Dexterity modifier to your AC. If you are not wearing armor, your AC equals 10 + your Dexterity modifier + your Constitution modifier. You also do not gain stealth disadvantages from light armor.
Unarmored Movement Starting at 2nd level, you gain an additional 5 feet of movement speed while you are not wearing armor or wielding a shield. This bonus increases at different Adept levels.
Starting at 9th levlel, you gain the ability to move across liquids without falling through without falling through.
Nimbleness Starting at 3rd level, you become more agile. Thrice per combat, you may use a bonus action to do one of the following:

• You do two additional unarmed strikes
• You perform the Dodge, Disengage, Dash or Grapple action as a bonus action

Additionally, you are able to use your reaction in combat to catch or dodge a thrown or fired projectile aimed at you. The damage taken from this projectile is reduced by 10 + Your dexterity + your Adept level. If the projectile is spear sized or smaller, you catch it. If the damage taken from the caught projectile is 0, you may spend the bonus action of your next turn to throw the projectile back at your attacker. This is treated as attacking at range with the weapon and it is done with your proficiency, regardless of your proficiency.

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Starting Equipment

Equipment You start with the following equipment, in addition to the equipment granted by your background:

• a single weapon you are proficient in
• (a) a dungeoneer’s pack or (b) an explorer’s pack
• either no ranged weapon or: (a) 15 darts, (b) 20 arrows with a shortbow, (c) 20 arrows with a longbow, (c) 20 sling bullets with a sling, (d) (25) blowgun needles with a blowgun, (e) 10 javelins with a Spear-thrower, or (f) a net

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Level	Proficiency Bonus	Martist Artist Increase	Features
1	+2	Martial Artist, Fluid Defenses
2	+2		C
3	+2		C
4	+3		C
5	+3	2d4 Unarmed Strike	C
6	+3		C
7	+3		C
8	+3		C
9	+4		C
10	+4	3d4	C
11	+4		C
12	+4		C
13	+5		C
14	+5		C
15	+5	3d4 Unarmed Strike	C
16	+5		C
17	+6		C
18	+6		C
19	+6		C
20	+6	4d4 Unarmed Strike	C