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Message: <blockquote data-quote="MechaPilot" data-source="post: 6763199" data-attributes="member: 82779">Several classes are designed to be fairly generic, and they often have little meaning to the game world without something like a kit or theme to tie them more strongly to the game world.One of the classic examples of this is the Fighter.  The Fighter is pretty darn generic, and is used by different DMs to represent generic military men, experienced veterans, or masters with a broad range of battle-experience.  I personally just use non-classed NPCs for most of those generic military people, but other DMs do use low-level fighters for that purpose.One example of applying a kit or theme to a generic class to bind it to my game world is that of the Darve knife-fighter.  Darve is the name for the dark elves in my homebrew world.  They differ in several respects from the Drow of most D&D worlds, but the pertinent difference for this discussion is that they have a special type of warrior among their ranks who fights with poisoned knives.  Given that they live underground and often have to fight in caves, a warrior that uses small, fast, and light weapons seems appropriate.A Darve knife-fighter character is a fighter, usually with proficiency in stealth skills (which have varied across different editions), who has a pared-down weapon list but is such a master at using those weapons that they do more damage with them than normal (all small, fast, and light weapons have the damage die increased by one step, so knives, the characters' namesake, do 1d6 instead of 1d4 damage), who can proficiently use poisons, and who replaces their armor proficiencies with a version of unarmored defense.In the game world, Darve knife-fighters are especially feared because the Darve have mastered the art of working Naricium, a very soft and rare metal that grows in crystal formations and is deadly poisonous.  In 5e, Naricium has the following stats:NariciumWhen a living creature takes damage from a weapon made from naricium, they must attempt a Constitution save to avoid being poisoned by the naricium.  The DC of the save is equal to either 10, or half the damage dealt, whichever is greater.  If the creature fails the save, then it is also considered to have failed a death saving throw.  The poisoned creature must attempt a DC 20 Constitution save against poison each round until it accrues either three failed death saves or three successful saves.  Three failures means the creature succumbs to the poison and dies.  Three successes removes all successes and failures, wiping the slate clean.  However, the character must suffer a DC 20 poison save each day for the rest of the character's life.  Failing any of these saves counts as failing a death save.  There is NO cure for naricium poisoning (apart from dying).Most Darve knife-fighters do not wield naricium blades.  Naricium is rare, hard to work properly (it's brittle enough that any character with a 15 Str can crush it in her hand without having to make a Str check, and it emits a toxic fume when properly worked into other metals), and having a naricium weapon is a status symbol denoting one's importance.  Being matriarchial, the Darve do not allow males to wield naricium weapons.</blockquote>

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