Base Class: Artificer
Mercurial Savants are artificers who don’t invent so much as improvise with extreme confidence. Where others measure twice, the Savant throws glitter in the air and sees what sticks. Their minds race faster than safety standards allow, bouncing between half-finished thoughts, improvised solutions, and sudden breakthroughs that somehow work.
Their minds jump tracks mid-thought, latching onto new ideas with dangerous enthusiasm—and somewhere in that chaos, genius sparks. One moment they’re affectionate and protective, the next they’re gleefully destructive, and somehow both states produce genius. They pace while thinking, talk to their tools like coworkers, and name their explosives after emotions. They don’t carry weapons; they carry ideas. Loud ones.
To watch a Mercurial Savant at work is to witness chaos given form: hands constantly fidgeting, conversations splintering into tangents, and inventions treated like trusted friends. They name their bombs, argue with their tools, and when things explode, the Savant is always surprised—even if they’re the one who lit the fuse.
To outsiders, a Mercurial Savant seems distracted, reckless, and one bad decision away from disaster. To their allies, they’re a lovable menace whose worst ideas somehow work.
Despite (or because of) their instability, Mercurial Savants are terrifyingly effective. In battle, they move constantly, laughing, skipping, hurling volatile “ideas,” and reacting to danger before anyone else has finished thinking. When plans collapse, the Savant thrives.
Level 3: Tool Proficiency
When you adopt this specialization, you gain proficiency with alchemist’s supplies and tinker’s tools. If you already have proficiency with either tool, you gain expertise with that tool instead.
Level 3: Kinetic Energy
Your restless energy sharpens your awareness and fuels your creations. Thoughts race faster than most people can follow, colliding and recombining in unpredictable ways. This constant mental motion allows you to notice details others miss, anticipate changes in your environment, and react with clever improvisation. Even when chaos surrounds you, your mind remains active, calculating, and ready to seize opportunity.
You gain proficiency in either the Acrobatics or Performance skill (your choice). Your body mirrors your mind: it never fully settles, always tapping, pacing, twirling tools, or performing small, precise movements. These actions are not mere distractions—they are extensions of your intellect, channels that turn excess energy into bursts of speed, finesse, and precision. By embracing motion, you convert restlessness into capability, allowing subtle adjustments and fluid improvisation that can turn the tide of any encounter.
While you are not restrained or incapacitated, you add your Intelligence modifier to your initiative rolls. In addition, on each of your turns, you can use a bonus action to fidget, channeling your excess energy. When you do so, choose one of the following benefits, which lasts until the start of your next turn:
Your walking speed increases by 10 feet, carrying your restless energy into movement.
You gain advantage on the next Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) check or Intelligence ability check you make.
You gain advantage on the next saving throw you make against being charmed or frightened, as your mind flickers beyond the control of others.
You can use this bonus action once per turn, representing the constant, kinetic focus that drives both your creativity and your combat reflexes.
Bonus Action
In addition, on each of your turns, you can use a bonus action to fidget, channeling your excess energy. When you do so, choose one of the following benefits, which lasts until the start of your next turn:
Your walking speed increases by 10 feet.
You gain advantage on the next Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) check or Intelligence ability check you make.
You gain advantage on the next saving throw you make against being charmed or frightened.
You can use this bonus action once per turn.
Intelligence Modifier
While you are not restrained or incapacitated, you add your Intelligence modifier to your initiative rolls.
Too Many Thoughts
Your brain is loud, but productive.
You gain advantage on Intelligence checks until the end of your next turn.
You also gain disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks during that time.
Unstable Ideas
You create unstable devices and concoctions you refer to as ideas.
As a bonus action, you can expend a spell slot to create and immediately use a Volatile Idea, choosing one of the following effects. The saving throw DC equals your artificer spell save DC.
Boom Idea. A creature or point you can see within 30 feet erupts in chaotic energy. Creatures within 5 feet must make a Dexterity saving throw, taking 2d6 + your Intelligence modifier fire, lightning, or force damage (your choice) on a failure, or half as much on a success.
Flashy Idea. Glittering light, smoke, or alchemical sparks burst outward. Creatures of your choice within 10 feet must succeed on a Constitution saving throw or be blinded until the end of their next turn.
Feel-Good Idea. A creature you can see within 30 feet gains temporary hit points equal to 1d8 + your Intelligence modifier and has advantage on its next attack roll or saving throw before the end of its next turn.
Whenever you use a Unstable Idea, roll a d6:
On a 1, the idea produces a harmless but distracting side effect (loud noises, bright colors, strange smells). You have disadvantage on your next Dexterity (Stealth) check.
On a 6, the idea is a breakthrough. You gain advantage on your next roll of any kind.
Level 5: Whiplash Reflexes
Your reactions change as fast as your mood.
When a creature you can see within 30 feet takes damage, you can use your reaction to do one of the following:
Move up to half your speed without provoking opportunity attacks.
Immediately use an Emotional Idea without expending a spell slot (damage dice reduced to 1d6 if applicable).
You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum of once), and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.
Level 9: Impulsive Brilliance
Your best ideas strike mid-spiral.
When you fail an attack roll, ability check, or saving throw, you can reroll the die and must use the new result. Once you use this feature, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.
After rerolling, roll a d4 and apply the corresponding effect:
You gain advantage on your next roll.
You immediately move up to 15 feet in a direction of your choice.
A harmless but dramatic alchemical effect erupts, granting you advantage on Charisma checks until the end of your next turn.
You take psychic damage equal to your proficiency bonus, but gain temporary hit points equal to twice that amount.
Tunnel Vision
You fixate so hard it hurts.
Choose a creature within 30 feet.
You have advantage on attack rolls against that creature until the end of your next turn.
Attacks against you from other creatures have advantage until that time.
Level 15: Beautiful Disaster
You are at your most dangerous when everything is going wrong.
While you are below half your hit point maximum or affected by a condition (such as blinded, frightened, poisoned, or restrained), you gain the following benefits:
You have advantage on Intelligence-based attack rolls, checks, and saving throws.
Your movement does not provoke opportunity attacks.
At the start of each of your turns, choose acid, fire, lightning, or force damage. You gain resistance to that damage type until the start of your next turn.
To you, chaos is clarity.
Oops!
You did not mean to do that.
Triggered when you roll a natural 1.
You immediately gain advantage on your next roll, and a harmless alchemical effect occurs (sparks, bubbles, laughter, etc.).