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Clad in a hot-pink skintight bodysuit, an elf closes her eyes to shut out the distractions of the battlefield and taps into her internal memory cache. She forms somatic links to her peripherals, forging hardlight and magnetic fields into white-hot plasma, launching it into the enemy ranks where it explodes like a second sun.
Checking and rechecking his calculations, a human solders another lead in his circuit diagram. When he wires it into his cyberdeck and an external power supply, the whole thing flares to life in a ghastly green glow - a forewarning of the cyberdaemon he's about to negotiate with for knowledge.
Crouching on cracked tiles in an ancient ruin of the Old World, a wukong feeds as much information as he can gather into his predictive algorithm. The program tells him that the left path has a ninety-five percent chance of being clear of traps. Good enough.
Techwizards are masters of reality-bending hyper-technology, defined and united as a class by the techs they can use. Drawing on an array of peripheral implants, external devices, and the massive computing power of their cyberdecks, they can quickly generate explosions, lightning arcs, subtle holographic illusions, and brute-force memetic mind control.
Masters of Technology
Modern technology is a hodgepodge of elegant theory and manic bullshit that was pushed to market long before it was ready to be out of beta. Almost everything that can improve the lives of average people is sold at ridiculous markups, the basic principles behind the product obscured by layers of copyright, trademark protection, end-user agreements, and ruthlessly-enforced intellectual property licenses.
Techwizards are unique in that they understand the principles behind the tech and can combine it in unique ways never intended by the corporations. They live and die by their techs, mastering them through dangerous experimentation, field testing, and constant practice. They learn new techs as they advance in experience, but they can also learn them from other techwizards, trading black market programs and jailbroken peripherals with their peers, or from communing with dangerous synthetic entities that live in the deepest parts of the darkweb.
The Lure of Knowledge
A techwizard may seem like a traditional "geek" or "egghead" due to their interest in technology and programming, but their lives are seldom mundane. The few corporate techwizards work in experimental facilities where they are constantly taking apart factory-built tech and repurposing it to find new applications, or leading raids on rival corporations to perform industrial espionage and sabotage. Independent techwizards are in high demand for their mastery of every aspect of modern technology, but especially for their ability to subvert the tools of the corporations to the benefit of those who live outside the system.
The lure of knowledge and power calls even the least adventurous techwizards out of the safety of their workshops and laboratories into crumbling ruins and hidden bunkers under dead cities. Techwizards know that all modern technology is based on principles that were mastered in the Old World, and that the stranglehold kept on such knowledge by the corporations does not extend to the early prototypes that might yet lie in such places. Discovering those secrets could well unlock the keys to a utopia the corporations would rather never see come around - or simply elevate the techwizard that finds them to veritable godhood.
Proficiency Tricks - Tech Slots per Tech Level -
Level Bonus Features Known 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th
1 +2 Techcasting, Memory Cache 3 2 - - - - - - - -
2 +2 Tech Specialty 3 3 - - - - - - - -
3 +2 - 3 4 2 - - - - - - -
4 +2 Ability Score Improvement 4 4 3 - - - - - - -
5 +3 - 4 4 3 2 - - - - - -
6 +3 Tech Specialty Feature 4 4 3 3 - - - - - -
7 +3 - 4 4 3 3 1 - - - - -
8 +3 Ability Score Improvement 4 4 3 3 2 - - - - -
9 +4 - 4 4 3 3 3 1 - - - -
10 +4 Tech Specialty Feature 5 4 3 3 3 2 - - - -
11 +4 - 5 4 3 3 3 2 1 - - -
12 +4 Ability Score Improvement 5 4 3 3 3 2 1 - - -
13 +5 - 5 4 3 3 3 2 1 1 - -
14 +5 Tech Specialty Feature 5 4 3 3 3 2 1 1 - -
15 +5 - 5 4 3 3 3 2 1 1 1 -
16 +5 Ability Score Improvement 5 4 3 3 3 2 1 1 1 -
17 +6 - 5 4 3 3 3 2 1 1 1 1
18 +6 Tech Mastery 5 4 3 3 3 3 1 1 1 1
19 +6 Ability Score Improvement 5 4 3 3 3 3 2 1 1 1
20 +6 Signature Techs 5 4 3 3 3 3 2 2 1 1
As a techwizard, you gain the following class features.
Hit Points
Hit Dice: 1d6 per techwizard level
Hit Points at 1st Level: 6 + your Constitution modifier
Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d6 (or 4) + your Constitution modifier per techwizard level after 1st
Proficiencies
Armor: None
Weapons: Knife, slingshot, quarterstaff, baton, revolver
Tools: None
Saving Throws: Intelligence, Wisdom
Skills: Choose two from Culture, History, Insight, Investigation, Medicine, and Technology
Equipment
You start with the following equipment, in addition to the equipment granted by your background:
- (a) a revolver and 10 bullets or (b) a knife and a slingshot with 20 pellets
- (a) a component pouch or (b) a tech focus
- (a) a hacker's pack or (b) a hobo's pack
- A cyberdeck
Techcasting
As a student of reality-warping technology, you have a cyberdeck containing techs that show the first glimmerings of your true power.
Tricks
At 1st level, you know three tricks of your choice from the techwizard tech list. You learn additional techwizard tricks of your choice at higher levels, as shown in the Tricks Known column of the Techwizard table.
Cyberdeck
At 1st level, you have a cyberdeck containing six 1st-level techwizard techs of your choice.
The techs that you add to your cyberdeck as you gain levels reflect the research you conduct on your own, as well as intellectual breakthroughs you have had about the nature of technology. You might find other techs during your adventures. You could discover a tech recorded on a cyberdeck in an enemy techwizard's lab, for example, or in a dusty archive in a forgotten datacenter.
Copying a Tech into the Deck. When you find a techwizard tech of 1st level or higher, you can add it to your cyberdeck if it is of a level for which you have tech slots and if you can spare the time to decipher and copy it.
Copying a tech into your cyberdeck involves reproducing the basic form of the tech, then deciphering the unique system of notation used by the techwizard who wrote it. You must practice the tech until you understand the thoughtforms and peripherals required, then transcribe it into your cyberdeck using your own notation.
For each level of the tech, the process takes 2 hours and costs $$5000. The cost represents consumables you expend as you experiment with the tech to master it, as well as the memory upgrade chips needed to record it. Once you have spent this time and money, you can prepare the tech just like your other techs.
Replacing the Deck. You can copy a tech from your own cyberdeck into another deck - for example, if you want to make a backup copy of your cyberdeck. This is just like copying a new tech into your cyberdeck, but faster and easier, since you understand your own notation and already know how to cast the tech. You need spend only 1 hour and $$1000 for each level of the copied tech.
If you lose your cyberdeck, you can use the same procedure to transcribe the techs that you have prepared into a new cyberdeck. Filling out the remainder of your cyberdeck requires you to find new techs to do so, as normal. For this reason, many techwizards keep backup cyberdecks in a safe place.
The Cyberdeck's Appearance. A cyberdeck is an external memory unit outfitted with various peripheral devices, such as a tiny 3D printer, a hardlight projector, a holographic display, and so on. Some techwizards take the time and expense to miniaturize their deck so that they can store it as an implant instead, moving around their organs to maximize space for their tech storage. Cyberdecks can have any number of appearances, from the traditional "black slab" that looks rather like an alien monolith the size of a person's forearm to a crystalline dataslate filled with floating script-runes.
Preparing and Casting Techs
The Techwizard table shows how many tech slots you have to cast your techs of 1st-level and higher. To cast one of these techs, you must expend a slot of the tech's level or higher. You regain all expended tech slots when you finish a long rest.
You prepare the list of techwizard techs that are available for you to cast. To do so, choose a number of techwizard techs from your cyberdeck equal to your Intelligence modifier + your techwizard level (minimum of one tech). The techs must be of a level for which you have tech slots.
For example, if you're a 3rd-level techwizard, you have four 1st-level and two 2nd-level tech slots. With an Intelligence of 16, your list of prepared techs can include six techs of 1st or 2nd level, in any combination, chosen from your cyberdeck. If you prepare the 1st-level tech micro seeker, you can cast it using a 1st-level or a 2nd-level slot. Casting the tech doesn't remove it from your list of prepared techs.
You can change your list of prepared techs when you finish a long rest. Preparing a new list of techwizard techs requires time spent studying your cyberdeck and downloading the complex equations needed to cast the tech into your personal memory cache: at least 1 minute per tech level for each tech on your list.
Techcasting Ability
Intelligence is your techcasting ability for your techwizard techs, since you learn your techs through dedicated study and theorizing. You use your Intelligence whenever a tech refers to your techcasting ability. In addition, you use your Intelligence modifier when setting the saving throw DC for a techwizard tech you cast and when making an attack roll with one.
- Tech save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Intelligence modifier
- Tech attack modifier = your proficiency bonus + your Intelligence modifier
Script Casting
You can cast a techwizard tech as a script if that tech has the script tag and you have the tech in your cyberdeck. You don't need to have the tech prepared.
Techcasting Focus
You can use a peripheral focus as a techcasting focus for your techwizard techs. Peripherals you can use as a focus include hardlight projectors, miniaturized 3D printers, AI assistants, smart jewelry, and similar objects that are either worn or held in a hand.
Learning Techs of 1st Level and Higher
Each time you gain a techwizard level, you can add two techwizard techs of your choice to your cyberdeck. Each of these techs must be of a level for which you have tech slots, as shown on the Techwizard table. On your adventures, you might find other techs that you can add to your cyberdeck.
Memory Cache
You have learned to refresh some of your techs by studying your cyberdeck. Once per day when you finish a short rest, you can choose expended tech slots to recover. The tech slots can have a combined level that is equal to or less than half your techwizard level (rounded up), and none of the slots can be 6th level or higher.
For example, if you're a 4th-level techwizard, you can recover up to two levels worth of tech slots. You can recover either a 2nd-level tech slot or two 1st-level tech slots.
Tech Specialty
When you reach 2nd level, you choose a tech specialty, focusing your knowledge and practice of hyper-technology along one of many paths. Your choice grants you features at 2nd level and again at 6th, 10th, and 14th level.
Trick Formulas
At 3rd level, you have formulated a universal theory that allows you to rapidly alter your knowledge of tech-based tricks. Whenever you finish a long rest and consult those formulas in your cyberdeck, you can replace one techwizard trick you know with another trick from the techwizard tech list.
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.
You can forgo taking this feature to take a feat of your choice instead.
Tech Mastery
At 18th level, you have achieved such mastery over certain techs that you can cast them at will. Choose a 1st-level techwizard tech and a 2nd-level techwizard tech that are in your cyberdeck. You can cast those techs at their lowest level without expending a tech slot when you have them prepared. If you want to cast either tech at a higher level, you must expend a tech slot as normal.
By spending 8 hours in study, you can exchange one or both of the techs you chose for different techs of the same levels.
Signature Techs
When you reach 20th level, you gain mastery over two powerful techs and can cast them with little effort. Choose two 3rd-level techwizard techs in your cyberdeck as your signature techs. You always have these techs prepared, they don't count against the number of techs you have prepared, and you can cast each of them once at 3rd level without expending a tech slot. When you do so, you can't do so again until you finish a short or long rest.
If you want to cast either tech at a higher level, you must expend a tech slot as normal.
Though all techwizards are highly proficient with the use of modern technology, each of them eventually develops an affinity for a particular sort of technical application. These tech specialties reflect the sort of highly specialized training necessary to master the most potent forms of tech, as well as unique methods of utilizing common techs in highly divergent ways.
Specialties
- Insurance Adjustor [Abjuration]
- Marketing Campaigner [Illusion]
- Nanotechnician [Transmutation]
- Nexus Modder [Order of Scribes]
- Sentai Saviour [Bladesinger]
- Singularity Technician [Graviturgy]
- Stasis Technician [Chronurgy]