Nightmare Invoker

For most people, sleep isn't generally something worth much thought. Each day, they retire to some comfortable place and lapse into unconsciousness, only occasionally visited by the spark of a dream, and even more seldom by a bad one.

Nightmare Invokers aren't nearly as lucky.

An Invoker exists in a near-constant awareness of their own nightmares, as they are not only near-constant during sleep but concerningly consistent across multiple nights. The monstrous forms that manifest in their dreams in fact belong to a singular entity, their own personal Phantasm--a being of simultaneous illusion and reality, which Nightmare Invokers have learned to call into the waking world to plague their foes as it plagues their sleep.

Manifest Phantasm

At 3rd level, you have learned to draw out the essence of the monster inside your head, and give it shape. As an action, you can summon your Phantasm, which appears in your space or an unoccupied space of your choice within 5 feet and lasts for 1 minute, until you use an action to dismiss it, or until its Hit Points reach 0. The phantasm shares your initiative count, takes its turn immediately after yours, and acts on its own unless you use your bonus action to issue it a telepathic command. If you issue a command to the phantasm, make a Charisma check with a DC equal to 17 minus your Proficiency Bonus. If you succeed, the phantasm obeys your commands. Otherwise, it acts on its own.

 You can summon your phantasm twice, and regain all expended uses when you finish a short or long rest. Once you reach 9th level, you can summon your phantasm three times between rests.

Nightmare Host

Your innate nature as the host of a Phantasm means you have a unique ability to function without sleep for significant periods. You can go a number of days without sleep equal to your Constitution modifier (minimum 1 day), during which sleep is not required to gain the benefits of a long rest. Whenever you fall asleep--be it from magic, as part of a long rest, or otherwise--if you went without sleep for at least one long rest before falling asleep, you immediately summon your Phantasm, which manifests in a translucent, spectral form. While spectral, the phantasm cannot take damage and is treated as intangible by all objects and creatures other than you and objects you are in contact with. Until you wake, it will prowl curiously around the nearby area, and may inflict minor damage to your clothing, nonmagical equipment, and skin, in the form of small rips, tears, scratches, and shallow pricking from its teeth or claws. If you are threatened by any hostile force while sleeping, the Phantasm will immediately use its connection to your psyche to force you awake.

After you wake, the Phantasm remains summoned and spectral for a number of hours equal to twice the number of long rests you finished without sleeping, and continues to generally ignore your commands while occasionally investigating your environment or harrassing you. If you use your Manifest Phantasm feature, it transitions to its normal form, and at the end of the ability's duration, transitions back to its spectral state for the remaining hours before discorporating.

Once the Phantasm summons itself in this way, it can't do so again until you finish at least one long rest without sleeping.

Form of a Thousand Fears

At 7th level, your phantasm begins to draw on the subconscious fears of those around you to empower itself. When you use your Manifest Phantasm feature, each creature other than you that can see the phantasm must make a Wisdom saving throw against your spell save DC. You must make a Wisdom saving throw with a DC equal to 16 minus your Proficiency Bonus. A creature can choose to fail this save. Each creature that fails the save is frightened of the phantasm for the next minute, and can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success.

You and friendly creatures that are frightened of the phantasm don’t suffer disadvantage on attack rolls while you can see it.

As long as at least one creature is frightened of the phantasm, it can attack an additional time each turn.

As long as at least three creatures are frightened of the phantasm, it deals an additional 1d6 psychic damage on each of its attacks.

If no creatures are frightened of the phantasm, whenever it uses its Instill Panic reaction on a creature, that creature must succeed a Wisdom saving throw against your spell save DC or become frightened of the phantasm. That creature can repeat the save at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success.

Waking Sleep

Starting at 11th level, when you summon your phantasm, you can choose to spend a spell slot as part of the same action. If you do, the phantasm is empowered by your magic, and gains the following ability:

Lullabye of Horror. Whenever a hostile creature starts its turn within 10 feet of the phantasm, that creature must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw against your spell save DC. On a failure, the creature is inflicted with acute drowsiness until the start of its next turn. While drowsy, its movement speed is halved, and attack rolls it makes have disadvantage. Creatures that are frightened of the phantasm have disadvantage on this save. The phantasm has advantage on attack rolls against drowsy creatures.

If the slot you spent was 3rd level or higher, drowsy creatures instead slip into a half-sleep, falling prone and becoming incapacitated and restrained until the start of their next turn.

Fear's Embrace

When you reach 15th level, you have learned how to live in near-harmony with your nightmares, much to the horror of your enemies. You no longer need to use a bonus action to issue commands to your phantasm, and it can make an additional attack on each of its turns. If you are frightened of the phantasm at the start of your turn, you can use your bonus action to channel your fear into your attacks, getting a +2 bonus to weapon attack rolls made this turn and becoming no longer frightened of the phantasm.

Additionally, as an action, you can spend a spell slot to amplify the instinctive terror your phantasm inspires in your foes. When you do, each hostile creature within 30 feet of your phantasm must make a Charisma saving throw against your spell save DC. On a failure, that creature is paralyzed until the end of your next turn, and can repeat the save at the end of its turn to end this effect on itself on a success. On a success, that creature suffers a penalty to attack rolls made against you or the phantasm before the end of your next turn. The penalty is equal to your Wisdom modifier.

Once you use this action, you can’t use it again until you next summon your phantasm.