College of the Kitsune

The College of the Kitsune is inspired by legends of fox spirits who walked unseen among mortals, leaving behind mystery and subtle influence. To these bards, performance is transformation itself. A well-timed step or carefully placed illusion can decide a battle. A blade guided by deception is as potent as any spell. Kitsune bards fight as skirmishers and duelists, moving fluidly through combat with deceptive footwork, flashes of light, and sudden feints that mislead enemies. Their magic bends perception, turning allies invisible at the right moment or causing foes to doubt their senses long enough for a decisive strike. Bardic Inspiration is a personal resource of clever tricks, quick escapes, and misdirecting flourishes. Each use is a choice: a sidestep to avoid a blow, a flash of foxfire to distract, or a whispered charm that turns hostility into hesitation.

Outside combat, Kitsune bards are skilled infiltrators and social manipulators. They excel at assuming false identities, navigating courts or criminal dens, and shaping encounters before a single sword is drawn. Their magic enables disguise and understanding, allowing them to read moods and redirect conversations. Despite their trickster reputation, Kitsune bards are not inherently malicious. Many use deception to prevent greater harm or reveal hidden truths. In adventuring parties, they fill the space between warrior and spellcaster, pressuring enemies, protecting allies, and ensuring encounters unfold unpredictably. To face a Kitsune bard is to face uncertainty itself, and to travel with one is to learn that cleverness with grace and magic is a powerful tool.

Spellcasting

Beginning at 3rd level, your studies grant you access to magic associated with kitsune legend. You always have the following spells prepared, and they do not count against the number of Bard spells you can prepare.

3rd Level disguise self, faerie fire

5th Level mirror image, suggestion

9th Level hypnotic pattern, major image

13th Level greater invisibility, hallucinatory terrain

17th Level mislead, seeming

If a spell on this list is not normally on the Bard spell list, it nonetheless counts as a Bard spell for you.

Kitsune Armaments

You gain proficiency with medium armor and martial weapons with the finesse property. When you wield a finesse weapon, it counts as a Bard weapon for you.

Once on each of your turns when you expend a use of Bardic Inspiration, you may immediately move up to 5 feet without provoking opportunity attacks. This movement represents subtle footwork and cannot be combined with other movement granted by this subclass on the same turn.

Foxfire Techniques

When you hit a creature with a weapon attack or deal damage to a creature with a Bard spell, you may expend one use of Bardic Inspiration to apply one Foxfire Technique (no action required). You can use only one technique per turn.

Veiled Step: You move up to 15ft without provoking opportunity attacks. Until the start of your next turn, the first attack made against you has disadvantage.

Gleaming Feint: Roll your Bardic Inspiration die and subtract the result from the target’s next attack roll or saving throw before the end of its next turn.

Phantasmal Spark: The target takes extra psychic damage equal to your Bardic Inspiration die + your Charisma modifier.

These techniques count as Bardic Inspiration effects for features that reference them.

Trickster's Defense

Your instincts for misdirection protect you from damage. When a creature hits you with an attack, you can use your reaction to spend one Bardic Inspiration die and roll it. Reduce the damage by the number rolled plus your Charisma modifier plus your proficiency bonus. If this reduces the damage to zero, you may teleport up to 15ft to an unoccupied space you can see.

Beguiling Strike

Once per turn when you hit a creature with a weapon attack, you deal extra psychic damage equal to your Charisma modifier, minimum of one. If the target is charmed, frightened, or affected by an illusion spell you cast, you instead deal extra psychic damage equal to your Charisma modifier plus half your proficiency bonus rounded down.

Many-Face Performer

You can cast disguise self without using a spell slot and it does not require concentration. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus per long rest. You gain expertise in Deception or Stealth. When you make a Charisma check using Deception, Performance, or Persuasion, you may use a Bardic Inspiration die and add it to the roll after seeing the d20 result.

Deception

You gain expertise in Deception

Stealth

You gain Expertise in Stealth

Thousand Mask Ascendance

As a bonus action, you enter a heightened illusory state for one minute.

While in this state, you benefit from the effects of blur, and the first attack made against you each round has disadvantage. Once per turn when you hit a creature with a weapon attack or Bard spell, you may force the target to make a Wisdom saving throw against your spell save DC. On a failure, it is charmed or frightened by you until the end of its next turn. Once per turn after you deal damage, you may move up to ten feet without provoking opportunity attacks.

When this feature ends, you regain one use of Bardic Inspiration. You cannot use this feature again until you finish a long rest unless you spend a fifth level or higher spell slot to use it again.