Base Class: Rogue
As an archetypal Inquisitive, you excel at rooting out secrets and unravelling mysteries.
You rely on your sharp eye for detail, but also on your finely honed ability to read the words and actions of other creatures to determine their true intent. You excel at defeating
creatures that hide among and prey upon ordinary folk, and your mastery of lore and your sharp eye make you well equipped to expose and end hidden evils. When you confront your nefarious foes in combat, your ability to astutely analyse their tactics and patterns of attack in a split-second allows you to avoid harm and to strike back with lethal precision.
Ear for Deceit
When you choose this archetype at 3rd level, you develop a keen ear for picking out lies and half-truths. Whenever you make a Wisdom (Insight) check to determine whether a creature is lying or concealing the truth, treat a roll of 7 or lower on the d20 as an 8.
This feature improves when you acquire the Reliable Talent feature at 11th level, at which point you may instead treat any roll of 11 or lower on the d20 as a 12 when making a check of this nature.
Eye for Detail
Starting at 3rd level, you have advantage on all Wisdom (Perception) and Intelligence (Investigation) checks made outside of combat. Additionally, you can use a bonus action to make a Wisdom (Perception) or Intelligence (Investigation) check whilst engaged in combat.
Furthermore, due to your astute and practiced powers of observation, you are able to search or investigate an object, container, room or small area five times faster than would be necessary for a creature without this feature, and can do so without leaving any traces of your investigation.
Insightful Fighting
At 3rd level, you gain the ability to decipher an opponent's tactics and develop a counter to them.
As a bonus action, you may make a Wisdom (Insight) check against a creature you can see that isn't incapacitated, contested by the target's passive Charisma (Deception) score. If you succeed, you can use Sneak Attack against that creature even if you don’t meet the other criteria for doing so, so long as you do not have disadvantage.
In addition, once per turn, when you hit that creature with a weapon attack, you may deal additional damage equal to your Wisdom modifier. This damage is of the same type dealt by the weapon.
This benefit lasts for 1 minute, or until you successfully use this feature against a different target, or you are incapacitated.
Investigator's Instinct
At 9th level, you gain a bonus to your initiative rolls equal to your Wisdom modifier, as your practiced senses alert you to danger even before it is upon you.
Additionally, any creature that scores lower than you on the initiative roll has disadvantage on the first attack roll it males against you, until the end of its first turn.
You may not benefit from any aspect of this feature if you roll initiative with disadvantage, or if you are surprised.
Sixth Sense
At 13th level, your senses are almost impossible to foil, even with the aid of magic. As an action, you sense the presence of magical illusions, shape-changers not in their original form, invisible or disguised creatures, and other diverse magics designed to deceive or confound the senses, within 60 feet of you, provided you aren't blinded or deafened. You sense that an effect is attempting to trick you and learn its location (if it has one), but you gain no immediate insight into what is hidden, or into its true nature.
You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier (minimum of once), and you regain all expended uses of it when you finish a long rest.
If this feature reveals the presence of an invisible creature or creatures to you, they cannot benefit from being invisible in relation to you for 10 minutes, or until you are incapacitated.
Unrivalled Insight
At 17th level, you learn to fully exploit a creature's strengths and weaknesses by carefully studying its tactics and movement. While your Insightful Fighting feature applies to a creature, your Sneak Attack damage against that creature increases by 3d6, and all of that creature’s attacks against you are made with disadvantage.
Furthermore, if the creature has any resistances, immunities or vulnerabilities to damage types or conditions, you immediately become aware of them.
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Posted Jun 19, 2024Eager for feedback on this! Love the "master detective" archetype, feel the XGTE version of this subclass is underpowered, confusingly-worded and many of its features require specific DM interpretations of rules to be useful.
I hope that this Rogue subclass is difficult to fool or surprise, and offers utility in social, exploration and combat encounters. I also hope they'd be a lot of fun to RP, perhaps in the vein of Guy Ritchie's take on Sherlock Holmes.