Trade Secrets

Accurate Strike
Prerequisite: Bard 7

Benefit: You may make a single attack against an opponent's touch AC with any weapon to which you add your Dexterity to your attack rolls (all ranged weapon attacks, and melee weapon attacks made with Weapon Finesse). You may do this a number of times per day equal to 1/2 your bard level + you Intellegence modifier.

Alchemical Simulacrum
Prerequisite: Bard 10

Benefit: The bard gains the ability to create a lesser simulacrum. This works like the lesser simulacrum spell, except it costs 100 gp in alchemical materials per Hit Die of the simulacrum, requires 24 hours to grow, and decays into inert flesh rather than dust if killed. The created simulacrum is a creature, not a supernatural effect.

Alchemical Zombie
Prerequisite: Bard 10

Benefit: The bard gains the ability to animate a relatively complete corpse as an alchemy-powered zombie. This process takes 1 hour and costs 100 gp in alchemical reagents per HD of the corpse being animated; the dead creature gains the zombie template. Zombies that are created in this manner count as undead created by animate dead for the purposes of determining how many undead the bard can control. The created zombie is a creature, not a supernatural effect.

Alchemy Dealer
Benefit: Pay one-quarter of the market price for materials needed to craft alchemical items. Additionally, the cost to brew potions is reduced to only 10 Cp x the level of the spell x the level of the bard.

Black Market Connections
Benefit: A bard with this talent gains better access to magic and psionic items from black market connections. He treats every settlement as one size greater for the purpose of determining the Cp limit of the base value of items for sale, as well as the number of minor, medium, and major magic items for sale in the settlement. If the settlement is already a metropolis, all minor and medium magic items are for sale, as well as 3d8 major magic items.

With a successful Diplomacy check, the bard can treat the settlement as two sizes larger. If the settlement is already a metropolis and she succeeds at the check, all psionic items are for sale. If the settlement is already a large city and she succeeds at the check, all minor and medium magic items are for sale, as well as 3d8 major magic items. With a successful check, the bard can also sell stolen items on the black market. If the check fails by 5 or more, the bard does something to spook the market, and treats the city as normal for 1 week. Furthermore, those in control of the black market may alert the templars to the bard's presence in an act of reprisal for spooking the market or to divert attention away from their illicit activities. The DCs of the checks are by settlement size and are given in the table.

Bottled Ooze
Prerequisite: Bard 7

Benefit: The bard has learned how to preserve a sample of oozes in a sealed bottle, which he can prepare for use as an extract. When the bard activates the extract, he actually throws the bottle at a square within 30 feet, releasing the ooze, which reconstitutes and attacks the closest creature. The ooze is not under the bard's control, but is otherwise treated as a summoned creature. The ooze remains for 1 round per bard level, and decays into powder when the duration expires. If the bard knows the infusion secret, another character can use the infused specimen. Creating a bottled ooze requires an extract with a level equal to the ooze’s CR (so a CR 4 gray ooze requires a 4th-level extract).

Combine Extracts
Prerequisite: Bard 10

Benefit: When the bard creates an extract, he can place two formulae into one extract. When the extract is consumed, both formulae take effect. This extract has a level two levels higher than the highest-level formulae placed in the extract.

Concentrate Poison
Benefit: The bard can combine two doses of the same poison to increase their effects. This requires two doses of the poison and 1 minute of concentration. When completed, the bard has one dose of poison. The poison's frequency is extended by 50% and the save DC increases by +2. This poison must be used within 1 hour of its creation or it is ruined.

Dilution
Prerequisite: Bard 13

Benefit: Once per day, the bard can dilute any one potion or elixir, creating two doses of the same potion from one. Diluting a potion costs a number of Cp equal to one-quarter of the potion's market value. A potion that has been diluted cannot be diluted again. This secret cannot be used to dilute extracts.

Doppelganger Simulacrum
Prerequisite: Bard 10, alchemical simulacrum secret

Benefit: The bard learns how to create a simulacrum, a soulless duplicate of his body, into which he can project his consciousness. As a full-round action, he may shift his consciousness from his current body to any one of his available doppelganger simulacra, which must be on the same plane as the bard. If killed in a simulacrum, he transfers to his own body automatically; if killed in his own body, he is dead. Unused simulacra (including his abandoned original body) appear to be lifeless corpses, though they do not decay. Creating a duplicate costs 1,000 Cp in alchemical materials and requires 1 week to grow. The created simulacrum is a creature, not a supernatural effect.

Elixir of Life
Prerequisite: Bard 16

Benefit: Once per day, the bard can brew an elixir of life. This special concoction costs 25,000 Cp to create and takes 1 hour of work. An elixir of life, when administered by the bard who brewed it, restores life to a dead creature as per the spell true resurrection. Alternatively, the bard himself may drink the elixir of life, after which point he is immediately targeted with a resurrection spell the next time he is killed. Used in this manner, the effects of an elixir of life persist only for a number of days equal to the bard's Intelligence modifier; if he does not die before that time expires, the effects of the elixir of life end.

Elusion
Benefit: Gain Dodge as a bonus feat.

Enhance Potion
Benefit: A number of times per day equal to his Intelligence modifier, the bard can cause any potion he consumes to function at a caster level equal to his class level.

Eternal Potion
Prerequisite: Bard 16, extend potion secret

Benefit: If an bard consumes a potion that he extends, the effects of that potion become permanent until he chooses to make another potion effect permanent.

Extend Potion
Benefit: A number of times per day equal to his Intelligence modifier, the bard can cause any potion he consumes that does not have an instantaneous duration to function at twice its normal duration. This does not apply to extracts.

Face in the Crowd
Benefit: A bard who knows this secret can blend into groups easily. Opposed Perception and Sense Motive checks take a –2 penalty when made against the bard's Bluff, Disguise, Sleight of Hand, or Stealth checks if he's within 30 feet of at least two non-hostile characters of his apparent creature type. This penalty increases to –4 if he's within 30 feet of at least eight such creatures or is currently in a square occupied by a crowd.

Greater Alchemical Simulacrum
Prerequisite: Bard 13, alchemical simulacrum secret

Benefit: The bard gains the ability to create a simulacrum. This works like the simulacrum spell, except it costs 100 gp in alchemical materials per Hit Die of the simulacrum, requires 24 hours to grow, and decays into inert flesh rather than dust if killed. The created simulacrum is a creature, not a supernatural effect.

Healing Touch
Prerequisite: Bard 7, spontaneous healing secret or spontaneous healing class ability

Benefit: The bard gains the ability to heal other creatures. As a standard action, he may touch a creature and apply 1 round's effect of his spontaneous healing secret to that creature; this counts toward his spontaneous healing limit for the day. The bard's daily limit for hit points healed by spontaneous healing increases to 5 × his bard level. This ability only functions if the target is the same type of creature (humanoid, undead, and so on) as the bard.

Hidden Weapons
Prerequisite: Bard 7

Benefit: You become a master at hiding weapons on your body. Add your bard level to all Sleight of Hand skill checks made when conceling weapons to prevent others from noticing them.

Improvised Materials
Benefit: You can craft poisons from the raw materials at hand instead of relying on specific ingredients. Doing so increases the Craft (alchemy) check DC by 5 but otherwise has no effect on the poison's potency.

Infusion
Benefit: When the bard creates an extract, he can infuse it with an extra bit of his own life-force. The extract created now persists even after the bard sets it down. As long as the extract exists, it continues to occupy one of the bard's daily extract slots. An infused extract can be imbibed by a non-bard to gain its effects.

Lingering Spirit
Benefit: The bard is familiar enough with the ties between his body and spirit that he lingers at death’s door far longer than a normal person. He treats his Constitution as 10 points higher than normal for the purpose of determining when hit point damage kills him (so a bard with a Constitution of 10 and this secret dies at –20 hit points instead of –10). Reducing him to 0 Constitution or its equivalent (from ability damage, ability drain, Constitution penalties, and so on) makes him unconscious and comatose, but he is only killed after taking an additional 5 points of Constitution damage, drain, or penalty (in effect, the bard must be brought to –5 Constitution in order to be killed by these attacks).

Mummification
Prerequisite: Bard 10, preserve organs secret

Benefit: The bard has mastered preserving flesh and applied this knowledge to his own body, turning himself into an undead-like creature. After learning this secret, the bard must perform a 30-day regimen of a special diet, rigorous exercise, and drinking a mildly poisonous alchemical tea. At the end of this regimen, he falls unconscious for 24 hours, then awakens as a “living mummy”. The bard's type does not change, but he becomes immune to cold, nonlethal damage, paralysis, and sleep.

Nauseating Flesh
Prerequisite: Bard 13

Benefit: The bard's body is suffused with poison. Any creature that bites, engulfs, or swallows the bard must make a Fortitude saving throw or be nauseated for 1d4 rounds. The bard who knows this secret does not suffer the effect of the poison of his own nauseating flesh.

Poison Conversion
Prerequisite: Bard 7

Benefit: By spending 1 minute, the bard can convert 1 dose of poison from its current type (contact, ingested, inhaled, or injury) to another type. For example, the bard can convert a dose of Small centipede poison (an injury poison) to an inhaled poison. This process requires an alchemy lab.

Poisonbane
Benefit: You receive a +4 insight bonus to Craft (alchemy) checks when creating antitoxin and poison antidotes.

Preserve Organs
Benefit: The bard learns how to preserve and protect his vital organs, reducing the chance of a mortal wound. When a critical hit or sneak attack is scored on the bard, there is a 25% chance that the critical hit or sneak attack is negated and damage is instead rolled normally.

Special: This does not stack with similar abilities that negate critical hits and sneak attacks (such as fortification armor). A bard can learn this secret up to three times; the effects stack, increasing this chance to 50% and then 75%.

Scorpion's Touch
Benefit: Whenever the bard applies poison to a weapon, he may add +2 to the save DC.

Smokestick Application
Prerequisite: Bard 7

Benefit: You can combine inhaled poisons with smokesticks. All creatures within the area the smokestick covers (10-ft. cube) are affected by the poison you applied to the smokestick.

Spontaneous Healing
Benefit: The bard gains the ability to heal from wounds rapidly. As a free action once per round, he can heal 5 hit points as if he had the fast healing ability. He can heal 5 hit points per day in this manner for every 2 bard levels he possesses. If the bard falls unconscious because of hit point damage and he still has healing available from this ability, the ability activates automatically each round until he is conscious again or the ability is depleted for the day.

Sticky Poison
Prerequisite: Bard 7

Benefit: Any poison the bard creates is sticky - when the bard applies it to a weapon, the weapon remains poisoned for a number of strikes equal to the bard's Intelligence modifier.