Martial Master

A swordsman settles into a fighting stance as his foes surround him, he extends his senses to keep track of all of them, ready to strike at the first sign of movement. A second warrior pulls her spear from the rack on the other side of the room with her focused will while using her mental power to push a charging combatant back to the line of its allies. An elf in the back of the room draws back their bow allowing their battle-focused mind to guide the arrow. A heavily armored dwarf hammers at the shield of an orc with an intuitive set of rapid strikes.

A halfling speaks to their bonded weapon seeking its guidance on which foe to attack first. Their ally, a heavily armored orc grabs his foe and delivers a resounding palm strike before tossing them to the ground.

All of these heroes are martial masters, versatile warriors that use their focused mind and battle meditation to enhance their prowess. Traveling swordsmen, focused knights, or pinnacles of calm and fluid combat in the chaos of battle, as martial masters, They have a unique mastery of combat in all of its forms.

Focused Specialists

Martial masters are more focused than their more mundane fighter counterparts. They focus on a few fighting styles, learning them until the forms and movements become innate to their being. This focus allows them to more easily center their mind to turn the chaos of battle into an expected set of movements.

Masters of their Craft

Not every traveling weapon master or skilled warrior is a martial master. Martial masters are marked by their dedication to a particular fighting style, their calm demeanor in combat and their preternatural movements while fighting.

Some martial masters are drawn to adventuring to hone their skills. The dangerous combats and locales are incidental to the ability to test themselves and improve their techniques. That is not to say that martial masters feel no moral or selfing impetus for adventuring. Many martial masters are arbiters of good and law while others seek power and to crush as many enemies as possible.

Battle Meditation

In battle, you center your mind, feeling the flow of your allies and enemies. On your turn, you can enter a battle meditation as a bonus action.

While in your battle meditation, you gain the following benefits:

• You have advantage on Wisdom checks and Wisdom saving throws.
• When making an attack with a weapon for which you are proficient, you may use your Wisdom modifier in lieu of your Dexterity or Strength for attack and damage rolls.
• The damage dealt by the weapon you are wielding is the greater of the normal damage dice of the weapon or the damage dice listed on the following table based upon your level.

If you are able to cast spells, you can’t cast them or concentrate on them during your battle meditation because your mind is centered and focused on the combat and your battle form.

Your battle meditation lasts for 1 minute. It ends early if you are knocked unconscious or if you are subject to the charmed, frightened or stunned conditions. If your battle meditation is ended early in such a manner, you do not lose your use of a battle meditation for the day. You may, however, end your battle meditation early as a bonus action that does expend the use of the battle meditation for the day.

Once you have used battle meditations a number of times shown for your martial master level in the Meditations column of the Martial Master table, you must finish a long rest before you may use your battle meditation again.

Combat Awareness

At 2nd level, if the martial master is in a state of battle meditation, they know the current hit point total of each adjacent opponent and ally. This ability does not work if the creature is invisible until 7th level or later. At 7th level, while in battle meditation, the martial master gains blindsight out to 5 ft. At 17th level the radius for this ability increases to 10 feet.

Level	Damage Dice
1st	1d4
2nd	1d4
3rd	1d4
4th	1d4
5th	1d6
6th	1d6
7th	1d6
8th	1d6
9th	1d6
10th	1d6
11th	1d8
12th	1d8
13th	1d8
14th	1d8
15th	1d8
16th	1d8
17th	1d10
18th	1d10
19th	1d10
20th	1d10

Danger Sense

At 2nd level, you gain an uncanny sense of when things nearby aren’t as they should be, giving you an edge when you dodge away from danger. You have advantage on Dexterity saving throws against effects that you can see, such as traps and spells. To gain this benefit, you can’t be blinded, deafened, or incapacitated.

Focus Technique

At 3rd level, you choose a focus technique that demonstrates how your skills and training manifest while in your battle meditation. The focus technique you choose grants you features at 3rd level and again at 6th, 10th, 14th, and 18th level.

Ability Score Improvement

When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can’t increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.

Extra Attack

Beginning at 5th level, you can attack twice, instead of once, whenever you take the Attack action on your turn.

The number of attacks increases to three when you reach 20th level.

Evasion

At 7th level, your instinctive agility lets you dodge out of the way of certain area effects, such as a red dragon’s fire breath or a cone of cold spell. When you are subject to an effect that allows you to make a Dexterity saving throw to take only half damage, you instead take no damage if you succeed on the saving throw, and only half damage if you fail.

Recenter the Mind

Beginning at 9th level, you have developed techniques to mentally prepare on short notice. Any time you take a short rest, you regain one use of your battle meditation.

Focused Meditation

Beginning at 11th level, your mind is so focused in your battle meditation that it ends only if you fall unconscious or if you choose to end it.

Focused Wrestlin

For some, wrestling is a feat of strength, for others it is being nimble and hard to pin down, for yet others it can be performance. For the adherents of the focused wrestling technique, wrestling is a part of them and intuitive to their movements.

Strike-to-Grab

Beginning at 3rd level, when you successfully hit with an unarmed melee attack while in your battle meditation, you may make an automatic grapple attempt in addition to dealing your normal unarmed damage.

Kip-up

Beginning at 6th level, you may drop to prone or jump to standing as a bonus action.

Additionally, while in battle meditation you may use your Wisdom in lieu of your Strength or Dexterity for any Athletics or Acrobatics checks made for movement.

Intuitive Grappling

Beginning at 10th level, while in battle meditation you may use your Wisdom modifier in lieu of your Strength or Dexterity modifier for the Athletics or Acrobatics checks involved in initiating or disengaging from a grapple. You also gain advantage on attempts to initiate a grapple.

Use their Momentum

Beginning at 14th level, anytime you are grappling a creature, you may drag or carry a creature with no penalty to your speed. Additionally, you may use an attack action to throw your target to the ground. The target must make a saving throw (DC 8 + your Wisdom modifier + your proficiency bonus) or be prone. You continue the grapple while the creature is prone.

Sleeper Hold

Beginning at 18th level, if you have a creature grappled you may use a sleeper hold to knock them unconscious with an attack action. The target must make a Constitution saving throw (DC 8 + your Wisdom modifier + your proficiency bonus). If the target is also prone, they have disadvantage on this saving throw. On a failed save, the target is knocked unconscious.

Weapon Bondin

Most martial masters spend their time training and making their movements and forms an innate part of their being. Others forge a supernatural bond with a particular weapon, instilling part of them and their will into it and using it as a focus for their meditation.

Awakened Weapon

Beginning at 3rd level, you forge a bond with a specific weapon. The weapon is instilled with a portion of your soul and will giving it magic properties and a form of sentience. The weapon itself gains a Wisdom, Intelligence and Charisma bonus equal to your own and it is proficient in any skill that uses those ability scores that you are also proficient in. The weapon uses your proficiency bonus.

The weapon is aware of everything around it as any creature that can see or hear. The weapon cannot speak or communicate but it can communicate telepathically with you as long as you are within 30 feet. That said, the weapon can speak to you in and understand any languages you know. If you are holding your bonded weapon in your hand, you gain advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks as your senses sync together.

At 8th level, the weapon is considered a +1 weapon. At 13th it is +2 and at 18th it is +3. If another creature uses your bonded weapon it reverts to a mundane weapon of that type in their hands.

If the bonded weapon is destroyed it can be reforged 1 week later through a special ritual that costs 100 gp per martial master level. The ritual takes 24 hours.

Energetic Focus

Beginning at 6th level, you can use your will and bond with the weapon to shift the composition and form of the weapon. You can expend a use of your battle meditation to have the weapon be considered a silver weapon.

At 10th level, you can change the damage type of the weapon to be acid, cold, fire, or lightning. This elemental damage is in lieu of the normal slashing, bludgeoning or piercing damage the weapon deals.

At 16th level, you can also shift the weapon damage type to force, thunder, necrotic, psychic or radiant. In all cases, the shift in form lasts for 1 minute or until you chose to have it revert.

Teleport Weapon

Beginning at 10th level, as an action you can call your weapon to your hand, teleporting it instantly to your hand from up to 1 mile away.

Unbreakable Weapon

Beginning at 14th level, as long as you are alive, your weapon cannot be destroyed and is constantly considered to be both silvered and composed of adamantine.

Resonance

Beginning at 18th level, as long as you hold your bonded weapon and are in battle meditation, you gain advantage on all saving throws against spells. Additionally, if you are ever subject to an effect that has a Wisdom, Intelligence or Charisma saving throw while in battle meditation and you fail the saving throw, your bonded weapon may attempt the same saving throw with advantage on the next round. If they succeed, the effect ends.

Will Projecting

Some martial master practitioners take their mental focus and skill to another level using their sheer force of will to manipulate the world around them.

Force of Will

Beginning at 3rd level, when in your battle meditation you may make a shove attack against any target within 30 feet. The shove attack may originate from any direction. Unlike a normal shove attack, you make a Wisdom check with your proficiency bonus instead of a Strength (Athletics) check. Also if you choose to move the target, for every 5 by which you surpass their opposed roll, you may move them an additional 5 feet. You may choose to end your battle meditation early to give yourself advantage on your Wisdom check.

Lightness of Being

Beginning at 6th level, while in your battle meditation, you can use your reaction to reduce any falling damage you take by an amount equal to 5 times your martial master level. Additionally, you have advantage on any Dexterity (Acrobatics) checks made to jump or balance.

Extension of the Arm

Beginning at 10th level, while in battle meditation, you may make a melee attack with a weapon that you are holding for which you are proficient against any target within 30 feet. You may only make this special melee attack once per round regardless of the number of attacks you possess.

Meditative Restoration

Beginning at 14th level, you gain a pool of healing similar to a paladin’s lay on hands ability that recharges after a long rest. The pool heals a number of hit points equal to your martial master level x 5 plus your Wisdom modifier.

As an action, you can touch a creature and draw upon the pool of healing to restore a number of hit points to that creature, up to a maximum of the amount remaining in your pool.

Unlike a paladin’s lay on hands, this ability does not cure diseases or neutralize poisons. Also, this ability can heal undead and constructs as you are using your will to repair damage, not channeled deific energy.

Will over Magic

Beginning at 18th level, you can use your force of will to protect you from magic. When targeted or within the area of a spell, you can end your battle meditation early to deflect and redirect the spell. You make a Wisdom saving throw, regardless of whether the spell called for one and instead of the saving throw called for by the effect. If the Wisdom saving throw surpasses the spell attack roll or normal saving throw DC of the spell, you are unaffected by the spell as if you had an immunity to magic. If you succeed, you may expend a use of your battle meditation to attempt to redirect the spell to a target or area of your choosing. You make a contested Wisdom check (including your proficiency bonus) against a roll with their spellcasting ability modifier and bonus. If you succeed in this contest, you select a new target or area for the spell. You may expend two uses of battle meditation (if available) to grant yourself advantage on this roll.