Gambler

''A gambler lives by his luck. He doesn’t worry about much of anything, including where his next meal comes from and trusts to luck—perhaps more than he should. In the end, no matter how much skill one might have to their name, a little fortune or misfortune can go a long way at shifting the balance of power. For those who take risks and live life on the edge, having luck on your side can mean the difference between becoming a legend, or being an unmarked grave. But then, there lies the joy of taking the risk…''

Role: Being a gambler is a life of making the right choices. It also helps to have a good hand, and the gambler’s friends are his cards. Gamblers work best when their compatriots are really good at what they do.

Alignment: Any

Hit Die: d8

Starting Wealth: 4d6 × 10 gold (average 140 gold.) In addition, each character begins play with an outfit worth 10 gold or less.

Class Skills

The gambler’s class skills are Acrobatics (Dex), Appraise (Int), Bluff (Cha), Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Disguise (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Intimidate (Cha), Knowledge (local) (Int), Linguistics (Int), Perception (Wis), Perform (Cha), Profession (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), Sleight of Hand (Dex), Stealth (Dex), Swim (Str), and Use Magic Device (Cha).

Skill Points Per Level: 6+ Int modifier

Class Features
All of the following are class features of the gambler.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency
A gambler is proficient with all simple weapons, plus the sap, throwing cards, and sword canes. Gamblers are proficient with light armor but not with any shields.

Throwing Cards (Ex)
At 1st level, a gambler begins play with a deck of durable playing cards. Durable playing cards don’t break due to normal use, whether or not they hit their target; unless the playing card goes missing, a gambler can retrieve and reuse a durable playing card again and again. Durable playing cards can be broken in other ways (such as deliberate snapping, hitting a fire elemental, and so on). In the hands of a gambler, this deck of cards is deadly. With a range increment of 10 feet, it deals 1d4 points of slashing or piercing damage and is treated as a light thrown weapon like shurikens. In addition, a gambler does not provoke attacks of opportunity when throwing within melee range. The gambler can also upgrade this deck of cards. It costs 300 gil and 1 day of work to upgrade it to a masterwork.

Luck Pool (Su)
At 1st level, the gambler gains a reservoir of luck points that he can draw upon to fuel his powers. This luck pool has a number of points equal to half his gambler level + his Charisma modifier. This is not affected by temporary increases to Charisma, such as Eagle’s Splendor. The pool refreshes once per day when the gambler rests for a full 8 hours. With these luck points, he can spend them to reroll any single roll for himself with 1 luck point as an immediate action.

Gold Toss (Su)
At 1st level, a gambler places his material fortunes on the line to make an attack. A gambler may spontaneously spend 10 gold per gambler level, and make a ranged touch attack against any opponent within 30 feet. Money used in Gold toss is lost, vanishing after use. He deals 1d6 points of physical damage (piercing, slashing, or bludgeoning, his choice).

As part of this ability, he may also roll 1d4 to increase the risk. Rolling less than half the total of the die (1 or 2 on a d4, for example) reduces his damage by –2d6 and –1d6 respectively. Rolling higher (3 or 4 on a d4, for example) increases it by the appropriate amount (+1d6, +2d6). Taking a higher risk die may increase the results by much more damage, or much less (even negating the gambler’s damage entirely if he has lost more die than he had).

At 5th level, the gambler upgrades the risk die to a 1d6 and can make two gold toss attacks with a -2 penalty. At 10th level, the gambler can roll two risk dice, upgrades the risk die to a 1d8, and can make three gold toss attacks with a -4 penalty. At 20th level, the gambler can roll three risk dice, upgrades the risk die to a 1d10, and can make four gold toss attacks with a -6 penalty. The gambler must spend gold for each additional attack as normal.

Beginner’s Luck (Ex)
A gambler knows which end of a sword to hold. Poking it in the enemy’s direction works unreasonably well for them. At 1st level, the gambler may use his Charisma modifier in place of his Strength and/or Dexterity modifiers to attack  rolls only with the sap, throwing cards, and sword canes.

At level 3 the gambler may use his Charisma modifier in place of his Strength and/or Dexterity modifiers to damage only with the sap, throwing cards, and sword canes.

Gambler Gambits (Su)
At 2nd level, a gambler gains one gambler gambit. He gains an additional gambler gambit every even level thereafter. A gambler cannot select an individual gambler gambit more than once. Gambler gambits require a gambler to spend luck points.
 * A complete list of gambler gambits can be found below

Fortune’s Favor (Su)
At 3rd level, a gambler can gain a +1 luck bonus to AC so long as he has one luck point. This luck bonus increases by +1 for every four levels thereafter, but can’t exceed the gambler’s current total of luck points. Multiple luck bonuses do not stack with each other. Anything that causes the gambler to lose her Dexterity bonus to AC also causes the gambler to lose this dodge bonus.

Sharpened Cards (Su)
At 4th level, a gambler gains a +1 bonus on attack and damage rolls with throwing cards. This bonus increases by +1 for every four gambler levels beyond 4th.

Professional Gambler (Ex)
At 5th level, the gambler adds half his gambler level to all Profession (gambling), Sense Motive, and Bluff skill checks.

Breaking Even (Su)
At 5th level, as a swift action, the gambler chooses one creature he can see. For the next minute, whenever he hits the target with an attack, he regains hit points equal to his Charisma modifier (minimum of 1). However, whenever he misses the target, he takes damage equal to the same amount. The gambler can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + his Charisma modifier. This ability can only be used once per round.

Double or Nothing (Su)
At 7th level, after the gambler hits with a weapon attack, he may use this ability as a free action to choose odds or evens. If the total number on his damage dice matches his choice, he can apply double the damage rolled. However, on an incorrect result, his damage is halved (rounded down).

Know When to Run (Ex)
A gambler that has learned to cheat, quickly learns to run. A 7th level gambler may move at twice his normal speed. If he does so, he loses his Dexterity bonus to AC for one round and automatically fails any check to avoid being tripped.

High Roller (Su)
At 9th level, when the gambler hits a creature with a weapon attack, but does not score a critical hit, he can try to attempt to turn it into one. Starting with the number shown on the triggering attack roll, as an immediate action, the gambler chooses higher or lower and rolls the dice again. If he successfully guesses the outcome three times in a row, the original attack becomes a critical hit. The gambler can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + his Charisma modifier.

Know When to Walk Away (Ex)
By 9th level, a gambler has learned that sometimes the only way to break even is to not play. He does not provoke an attack of opportunity when using the withdraw action.

Gold Rain (Su)
At 10th level, a gambler can use his gold toss ability to hit any number of creatures within 30 feet by spending gold and making a ranged touch attack for each creature. However, he cannot make multiple attacks with his gold toss ability through the gold rain ability.

Opportunist (Ex)
At 10th level, once per round, a gambler can make a melee attack of opportunity against an opponent who has just been struck for damage in melee by another creature. This attack counts as the gambler’s attack of opportunity for that round. Even a gambler with the Combat Reflexes feat cannot use the opportunist ability more than once per round. The gambler must be threatening his opponent to use this ability.

Check (Ex)
At 14th level, a gambler learns to use inaction to his advantage. When an opponent within 100 feet does nothing except move on his turn, a gambler may check as an immediate action. He may not take a standard or full-round action on his next turn. He gains a +1 bonus to attack, damage, saves, and AC versus this opponent. He may check multiple times against the same opponent, each time increasing his bonuses by one.

Lucky Seven (Su)
At 15th level, the gambler’s weapon attacks can score a critical hit on a natural roll of 7 or 20. Effects like Improved critical or keen only affect the Nat 20 making it 19-20(meaning the gambler can crit on a 7,19-20). This only works with the Sap, Throwing Cards, and the Sword Cane

Jackpot (Ex)
They’ll have to invent a new lucky star just for the gambler. At 17th level, any luck bonuses the gambler benefits from have their numerical value increased by one

Cheat (Ex)
An experienced gambler knows that sometimes the best odds are outside the game. Beginning at 17th level, a gambler may attempt a feint as a swift action, using his Sleight of Hand skill rather than his Bluff skill, and opposed by his opponent’s Perception skill, rather than his Sense Motive. If he fails, he provokes an attack of opportunity from this opponent.

Skew Favor (Su)
At 18th level, a gambler learns how to twist the odds of fate more into his favor. He gains a +1 bonus to all gold toss and gold rain die rolls. In addition, up to 3 times per day, he can maximize the damage dealt from these abilities.

Tempting Fate (Ex)
At 19th level, the gambler is very hard to kill. As an immediate action, if the gambler has at least 1 hit point remaining and would be dealt enough damage to kill him, he can spend a luck point to take only enough damage to reduce him to –1 hit points and he automatically stabilizes.

Even the Odds (Ex)
An experienced gambler always seems to know the best line of play. Rather than a victim of bad luck, the gambler employs random probability to his advantage. At the start of each day, a 20th level gambler may roll a number of dice equal to his Charisma modifier of any die type. Instead of making a random roll, as an immediate action, the character can instead substitute one of these pre-rolled dice for a die of the same size for himself or any opponent targeting him (including area effects).

Gambler Gambits
At 2nd level, a gambler gains one gambler gambit. He gains an additional gambler gambit every even level thereafter. A gambler cannot select an individual gambler gambit more than once. Gambler gambits require a gambler to spend luck points on gambler gambits.