Barbarian Subclass

## Way of the Keshig Barbarians of the way of the Keshig are those who follow the teachings of the ancient bodyguards of the great kings of the steppes. While widely known as horse-archers, it is their possession of the royal fury that truly sets them apart from other soldiers. ### Mounted Archery 3rd Level When you take this path at 3rd level, you learn the secret riding and bow techniques of the keshig. You gain proficiency with Animal Handling and learn to rest and sleep while mounted. Your mount gains the benefits of your Danger Sense when you use it. When you make a ranged attack with a longbow, shortbow, or sling against a creature within 15 feet of you, you can treat the attack as if it were a melee attack, using your Strength instead of Dexterity for the attack and damage rolls, reversing the benefits of being prone, and adding your Rage damage if you are raging. ### Parting Shot 3rd Level Also at 3rd level, you begin to channel your fury into the fluid dance of range and cover tactics. Whenever you Reckless Attack while raging, you can move 5 feet without provoking opportunity attacks against you or your mount and make an additional attack against a creature within 15 feet of you at disadvantage (once per turn). Starting at 10th level, you deal an additional 1d8 damage with this Parting Shot and you no longer make it at disadvantage. ### Saddle Commander 6th Level Starting at 6th level, your rage enhances your command of your mount, allowing it to perform great feats under your direction. It benefits from your Fast Movement and doubles its jump height and distance. Whenever you rage, your mount also gains your damage resistances. You are immune to being knocked prone or being dismounted while you are mounted and conscious.

**Citation.** This subclass is based on the [Path of the Sky Splitter](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VTAV-Dx0leA-dvYOy3MpfPszPLb9X2se/view?usp=sharing) by u/Rain-Junkie, modified to include elements of mounted combat as well as ranged. It was made for the /r/dndnext's Secret Santa in May 2022.

### Felling Shots 10th Level At 10th level, your blows fall like stones from on high. Whenever you have advantage on a melee attack roll you make with a weapon and hit, you can knock the target prone if the lower of the two d20 rolls would also hit the target. ### Great Khan's Own 14th Level When you reach 14th level, you perfect the ancient arts of the keshig. The range for the benefits of your attacks for Mounted Archery increases to 60 feet. Also, on initiative count 20 at the start of combat, and initiative count 0 each subsequent round, you can make one free ranged attack against a creature you can see.

##### Mounted Combat Since most games don't involve significant amounts of mounted combat, it is worth noting that a single mounted player character, especially one with the **Mounted Combatant** Feat and a combination of lance and longbow has the potential of being absurdly powerful compared to the rest of the party, especially if the DM allows the mount to take actions independently of the player. I recommend giving most of the party mounts or other movement sources and using the following Mounted Combat tweak below:

### Mounted Combat Mounts generally require training and specialized equipment and harnesses to be ridden. They follow the direction and instruction of a character that has mounted them, nearly to a fault. They are not capable of offensive actions while being ridden, nor independent direction unless the player explicitly uses their action to give them the freedom to do so. For example, commanding a mount to Dash or perform an Attack or Ability Check would require the player's action to interact with the mount and potentially require an Animal Handling check to convery the command successfully. The mount will otherwise instictually perform the Dodge action.

Tested by [

](https://discord.gg/domt). Crafted by /u/ImFromNASA 2022.

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