Urchin Pigeoneering

Urchins are know to have a connection with small animals, especially those that live and gather in groups like packs, swarms, and flocks. This includes birds, such as the pigeons that flock in cities as well as the homing pigeons used to send messages.

Urchins are highly valued as pigeoneers, homing pigeons handlers, because they can understand them. So instead of attaching a message scroll, they can be told the message, and only another urchin can understand it. This reduces the chances of a message being intercepted.

An urchin pigeoneer can be a great background or starting point for a character. They could be a druid or a bard, but a great fit is a ranger - especially the swarmkeeper subclass.

Urchin Swarmkeeper (Pigeons)

Any type of ranger could work for an urchin who was a pigeoneer, however one is a perfect fit: the Swarmkeeper.

To start with, make sure you pick up Animal Handling from race, background, or class proficiencies.

Then when Swarmkeeper is taken at 3rd level, they get the Gathered Swarm feature. One of the recommended swarm appearances is ‘fluttering birds’ which of course could be described as pigeons. For small sized folk, this can be a helpful subclass and feature. It can add extra damage, but even better, the swarm can move a creature 15 feet - such as away from you - and the check is against your spell save DC instead of your Strength which will probably be low. Later, at 7th level, you can use the swarm (or flock) to lift you up allowing you to fly and hover and eventually you can knock an opponent down. Importantly, the forced move and knock down have no size limits - so you can still do it to not only Large, but Huge or smaller creatures.