Umbral Archivist

Umbral Archivists are investigators who walk the border between life and death, unraveling truth through the memories of the fallen. Where others see corpses, they see stories — fragments of emotion and sight preserved in the veil. By channeling these echoes, they expose hidden motives, relive final moments, and strike with surgical precision born of remembrance.

Trained within secret orders such as The Hand, Umbral Archivists serve as record-keepers and confessors to the dead. They believe that no death is meaningless, and no truth should fade into silence.

Umbral Inquiry

You gain the following features when you choose this archetype at 3rd level:

Silent Analysis: You can use a bonus action to make a Perception check to locate hidden creatures or objects, or an investigation check to analyze evidence, including blood traces, psychic residue or any other clues. 

Foresight of the Departed: As a bonus action, you can make an Insight check contested by a creature's Deception Check. On a success, you can discern the creature's combat rhythm and emotional intent. For the next minute, you can apply your Sneak Attack to the creature even if you don't have advantage on the attack roll, as long as you don't have disadvantage on the attack. This insight ends early if you use it on another creature. 

Echo Recall

Once per long rest, when a creature has died within the last day  and is within 5 feet of you, you can use an action to extract fragments of its lingering memory.

For 1 minute, you and your allies glimpse spectral projections of the creature’s final moments through your senses.

• You gain advantage on Investigation and Insight checks related to what you perceive in the vision.

• You uncover one hidden truth or secret about the death or the creature’s final thoughts (DM’s discretion).

• The vision is silent, shadowy, and visible only to you and those you permit to see it.

You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

Veil Tracer

Your connection to the echo realm deepens, allowing you to sense spiritual residue and faint disturbances in the veil between life and death.

As an action, you open your senses to the veil for 1 minute, gaining the following benefits:

• You can see invisible or ethereal creatures within 30 feet as faint translucent silhouettes.

• You can detect corpses or items tied to recent deaths (within the last 24 hours) within 120 feet.

• You can cast Speak with Dead once, without expending a spell slot or material components. Your Intelligence is your spellcasting ability for this feature.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum of 1) and regain all expend uses when finishing a long rest.

Cognitive Echo

Your mind becomes a living archive of perception and truth. You can recall fragments of the past or glimpse multiple possible outcomes, granting heightened mental defense and insight.

• When you or an ally within 30 feet fails an ability check or saving throw, you can use your reaction to allow them to reroll with advantage drawing upon an echo of prior success. You can use this reaction a number of times equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum of 1) per long rest.

• Additionally, whenever you make an Investigation, Insight, or Perception check, you can treat a roll of 9 or lower on the d20 as 10.

Mirror-Tomb Vault

By 17th level, you have become the warden of countless echoes — fragments of souls stored within your psychic archive, known as your Mirror-Tomb.

Storing Echoes

When a creature you have personally slain or used Echo Recall on dies within 30 feet, you can capture its lingering memory and store it as an echo. You can hold a number of echoes equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum 1). When you finish a short or long rest, you can meditate upon your  weapons to restore one expended echo on a short rest or two after a long rest.

Echo Expenditure

You can expend a stored echo to draw upon its residual knowledge or pain;

Mnemonic Precision.
When you hit a creature with an attack that qualifies for Sneak Attack, you can expend one echo to deal extra psychic damage equal to your Intelligence Modifier (minimum +1d6). The attack ignores resistance to psychic and necrotic damage. If the target is undead, it has disadvantage on its next attack roll before the start of your next turn.

Echo of the Fallen.
As a bonus action, expend one echo to gain advantage on one ability check, attack roll, or saving throw you make before the end of your next turn — guided by the whispers of a stored soul.

Veiled Resilience

You have become permanently attuned to the echo realm. You gain resistance to necrotic and psychic damage.