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CartmanTuttle
2017-02-17, 09:58 AM
So, in the world I am currently running (and may go back to at some point or another), there are two "schools" of magic that are difficult to learn, but reward those who learn with great power. These schools are Chronomancy, and Blood Magic.

In this thread, I'll be asking people to help me figure out what level each Blood Magic spell should go into. I have the idea of what they do already written down, but trying to place them in spell levels is what's difficult, especially considering that this is supposed to be more powerful than regular Arcane Magic (and it is classified as Arcane Magic for mechanical purposes, although much darker)

Here is the list of spells and a basic guideline of what they do:
-Aftershock: Target must make a Fort save. If they fail, they die (Not take damage, but instantly die), and you take damage equal to their Constitution score. If they succeed, you and the target are both stunned for 1 round.
-Awaken Blood: Target takes 10D10 damage, Fort save for half
-Banefire: You lose an amount of HP of your choice upon casting the spell. The target takes double that amount, ignoring all resistances (Including Spell Resistance)
-Blood Armor: For 1 minute, you gain Damage Reduction, and take less damage from spells (of an equivalent amount)
-Blood Bolt: Ranged Touch Attack, deal 1D6 untyped damage/caster level (Maximum will be decided later)
-Blood Corruption: Every round for 1 minute, target must make a Fortitude save or take damage that cuts through all resistances (Damage will be decided later)
-Blood Curse: Target must make a Will save or have all spells and magical effects doubled against them for 1 minute, saving reduces the duration to 1 round
-Blood Draught: Can store spells in your blood to be used whenever (sort of like Contingency, only the trigger must be taking slashing or piercing damage, and you choose whether or not a spell goes off, and which one)
-Blood Fear: Basically Fear, except failing causes targets to immediately flee the battle as fast as they can, going as far away as they can
-Blood Withering: Deal Ability Damage to all around you (Amount will be decided later, but it will probably affect all Physical Ability Scores)
-Bloodfire: Like Blood Corruption, except Fort Save only halves the damage dealt, and should be more damaging.
-Bloodwalk: Can step into the blood of one creature, and try to explode out of the blood of another creature of the same type (Humanoid, Outsider, Animal, etc). Damage will be quite high.
-Bloody Resolve: For 1 minute, you automatically succeed on all Concentration checks, reduce all damage taken from all sources (amount will be decided later), and spells you cast cannot be dispelled or countered.
-Bloody Speed: Like Haste, except you get essentially two turns instead of an additional attack, but take damage every round (damage will be determined later)
-Enfeebled Blood: Like Slow, except you are slowed if you make the save, and paralyzed if you fail the save.
-Health Funnel: Gain back HP by draining the life essence of all around you (Probably will be a lower-level one, doesn't recover much, and requires there to be some kind of life around you)
-Shatter Soul: Target must make a will save or be unable to act. Target can make will saves on consecutive rounds to try to build back to "themselves" again
-Soulstone: Magical stone follows target. If the target dies, the stone shatters, and the target is instantly brought back to life with full HP.

I know I haven't given a lot of information, but I came up with these very recently, and I would like to get the opinions of other people as to how to level these out. I'm freely taking suggestions and advice here.

khadgar567
2017-02-17, 10:38 AM
lets look at the spells shall we

Here is the list of spells and a basic guideline of what they do:
-Aftershock: Target must make a Fort save. If they fail, they die (Not take damage, but instantly die), and you take damage equal to their Constitution score. If they succeed, you and the target are both stunned for 1 round.
nice spell but quite bit of powerful for even low level spell

-Awaken Blood: Target takes 10D10 damage, Fort save for half okay whats the idea for giving higher than 20 level warlock spell

-Banefire: You lose an amount of HP of your choice upon casting the spell. The target takes double that amount, ignoring all resistances (Including Spell Resistance) quite usefull way to kill a mook per turn

-Blood Armor: For 1 minute, you gain Damage Reduction, and take less damage from spells (of an equivalent amount)DR and SR in same package this thing is kinda powerful lets say level 1

-Blood Bolt: Ranged Touch Attack, deal 1D6 untyped damage/caster level (Maximum will be decided later) okay we have the scaling catnrip of this school 0 level

-Blood Corruption: Every round for 1 minute, target must make a Fortitude save or take damage that cuts through all resistances (Damage will be decided later) what damage budy you need to give little more info for this one

-Blood Curse: Target must make a Will save or have all spells and magical effects doubled against them for 1 minute, saving reduces the duration to 1 round nice debuff for start of battle

-Blood Draught: Can store spells in your blood to be used whenever (sort of like Contingency, only the trigger must be taking slashing or piercing damage, and you choose whether or not a spell goes off, and which one) kinda useless when you can use the regular one with any reason ( gonna need to pee cast teleport without error)

-Blood Fear: Basically Fear, except failing causes targets to immediately flee the battle as fast as they can, going as far away as they can again useless mate when regular one can be used more readly and has broader topic

-Blood Withering: Deal Ability Damage to all around you (Amount will be decided later, but it will probably affect all Physical Ability Scores) whats the distance mate? with out it its kinda useless

-Bloodfire: Like Blood Corruption, except Fort Save only halves the damage dealt, and should be more damaging.[QUOTE]
-Bloodwalk: Can step into the blood of one creature, and try to explode out of the blood of another creature of the same type (Humanoid, Outsider, Animal, etc). Damage will be quite high. give it fort save to resist and is it kinda what diablo necromancer does in game.

-Bloody Resolve: For 1 minute, you automatically succeed on all Concentration checks, reduce all damage taken from all sources (amount will be decided later), and spells you cast cannot be dispelled or countered. nice buff but needs little more info and you already have spell giving both DR and SR at same time so either rework the second part or ditch it

-Bloody Speed: Like Haste, except you get essentially two turns instead of an additional attack, but take damage every round (damage will be determined later) same level as haste or lone level higher

-Enfeebled Blood: Like Slow, except you are slowed if you make the save, and paralyzed if you fail the save. good control spell

-Health Funnel: Gain back HP by draining the life essence of all around you (Probably will be a lower-level one, doesn't recover much, and requires there to be some kind of life around you) another diablo spell just for the effect lets say 1st level but can be used as good attack catnrip to

-Shatter Soul: Target must make a will save or be unable to act. Target can make will saves on consecutive rounds to try to build back to "themselves" again okay this is powerful but kinda useless when combatting mages

-Soulstone: Magical stone follows target. If the target dies, the stone shatters, and the target is instantly brought back to life with full HP. to good to pass put this puppy on tank and fetch your self a cincinnati cuz cant rank this

CartmanTuttle
2017-02-17, 11:02 AM
So, thanks to some insight from Khadgar567, I think I might be getting somewhere.

-Aftershock: It's supposed to be one of the higher-level spells due to its effects, maybe 7th or 8th.

-Awaken Blood: I took the ability of the same name from the Blood Magus Prestige Class from 3.5, and changed the touch attack requirement to a Fort Save for half damage. Again, I anticipate it to be higher-level.

-Banefire: It can be useful to take out lower-level enemies, I was thinking maybe mid-range for the spell's level.

-Blood Armor: I was thinking closer to 4th or 5th level, giving a decent amount of DR, and making it DR/-.

-Blood Bolt: I can see it being a cantrip, although it'll need to be cut off rather low to be 0-level.

-Blood Corruption: I was thinking maybe 1D6/round, which would make it lower-level.

-Blood Curse: Although the exploitable caveat is that it says ALL spells and magical effects, making for possible hilarity. Maybe lower-to-midrange.

-Blood Draught: Although with the Contingency comparison, don't you need to designate a specific spell, and it has to go off if the trigger is fulfilled?

-Blood Fear: It is sort of the filler here, I'll admit.

-Blood Withering: I imagine this to be the ninth-level spell, so a pretty good area of effect, maybe all within Medium Range? Also, doing quite a bit of ability drain on all three physical ability scores.

-Bloodfire: Maybe this gets increased to 2D4/round, and making it 2 levels higher than Blood Corruption?

-Bloodwalk: Again, I took this off of the 3.5 Blood Magus Prestige Class. Fort save to resist could make it quite funny to deal with.

-Bloody Resolve: While the Concentration buff I feel could be lots of fun, I agree the DR/SR aspect could be removed, and maybe changing that last bit to "Increase the difficulty of others to dispel or counter your spells", maybe by like +4?

-Bloody Speed: I like that idea. Just need to figure out how much damage the sped-up person will take each round.

-Enfeebled Blood: I imagine this to be 4th or 5th level, given its effect and the level of power Blood Magic operates at.

-Health Funnel: Yeah, it doesn't do nearly as much damage as many other spells, but it's a nice little 1st-level way to gain back the HP you lose from using your own blood to fuel some of your magic

-Shatter Soul: While those with high will saves will find this easy to combat, it devastates those without, so maybe 6th level?

-Soulstone: I imagine this to be 8th level due to how useful it is. It's only limit is how many times per day you prepare it.

See, we're getting somewhere. I find I do my best work bouncing ideas off of other RPG people.

khadgar567
2017-02-17, 11:16 AM
is this thing came with specialist class since if we have a class t work this can be good to evaluate its balance but I will say both blood bolt and health funnel looks like nice cantrips to give the sinister aura this mages can give for blood speed how about stacking 1 damage per round since we speed our blood to get more powerful like luffy in gear second longer we keep deadlier it gets

CartmanTuttle
2017-02-17, 11:33 AM
is this thing came with specialist class since if we have a class t work this can be good to evaluate its balance but I will say both blood bolt and health funnel looks like nice cantrips to give the sinister aura this mages can give for blood speed how about stacking 1 damage per round since we speed our blood to get more powerful like luffy in gear second longer we keep deadlier it gets

Excellent point. For your viewing pleasure, here is my Blood Mage Archetype for Wizards:
-School of Blood Magic: Replaces Arcane School
-1st: Metablood (Su): Whenever you cast a spell, you may apply any metamagic feats you know to the spell as it's being cast by taking 1D6 damage, plus an additional 1D6 per level increase the metamagic would normally give the spell. This damage cannot be mitigated in any way.
-1st: Blood Mage (Su): Instead of casting a prepared spell, you may spontaneously cast any spell you know by taking 1D6 damage per level of the spell (as well as any additional damage if you wish to apply Metamagic to the spell, as per Metablood). This damage cannot be mitigated in any way, and the following turn you cannot be healed by conventional spells or potions. If this damage reduces you to 0 hitpoints, you must make a Will save (DC=25+Your Intelligence Modifier). If you fail, you become possessed by...something, and fall under GM control.
-6th: Infusion: Your own blood remixes in your body to toughen you for the future. Your Constitution score permanently increases by 2. This happens again at level 12, and once again at level 18.

Now, the only problem I can see with Health Funnel being a cantrip is that it can be used infinitely. I suppose I could keep the restoration reasonable, and the damage can be resisted, so if we go with that, we have 2 decent 0-level Blood Magic spells. Also, cumulatively stacking damage on a round-per-round basis for Blood Speed would probably put it at 4th level in my mind, unless you have any objections.

khadgar567
2017-02-17, 11:40 AM
Excellent point. For your viewing pleasure, here is my Blood Mage Archetype for Wizards:
-School of Blood Magic: Replaces Arcane School
-1st: Metablood (Su): Whenever you cast a spell, you may apply any metamagic feats you know to the spell as it's being cast by taking 1D6 damage, plus an additional 1D6 per level increase the metamagic would normally give the spell. This damage cannot be mitigated in any way.
-1st: Blood Mage (Su): Instead of casting a prepared spell, you may spontaneously cast any spell you know by taking 1D6 damage per level of the spell (as well as any additional damage if you wish to apply Metamagic to the spell, as per Metablood). This damage cannot be mitigated in any way, and the following turn you cannot be healed by conventional spells or potions. If this damage reduces you to 0 hitpoints, you must make a Will save (DC=25+Your Intelligence Modifier). If you fail, you become possessed by...something, and fall under GM control.
-6th: Infusion: Your own blood remixes in your body to toughen you for the future. Your Constitution score permanently increases by 2. This happens again at level 12, and once again at level 18.

Now, the only problem I can see with Health Funnel being a cantrip is that it can be used infinitely. I suppose I could keep the restoration reasonable, and the damage can be resisted, so if we go with that, we have 2 decent 0-level Blood Magic spells. Also, cumulatively stacking damage on a round-per-round basis for Blood Speed would probably put it at 4th level in my mind, unless you have any objections.
ah now we know were we going. you are creating this for i think 5th edition which i dont have any expertise but blood speed feels good as 4th level spell and health funnel atleast needs to heal 1d8 so you can keep your self in battle and please make it scale like eldricth blast so wizard cant run dry in important battles

CartmanTuttle
2017-02-17, 11:42 AM
ah now we know were we going. you are creating this for i think 5th edition which i dont have any expertise but blood speed feels good as 4th level spell and health funnel atleast needs to heal 1d8 so you can keep your self in battle and please make it scale like eldricth blast so wizard cant run dry in important battles

It's for Pathfinder. Health Funnel can scale if we need it to, especially considering the enormous tax Blood Mages pay for their power.

khadgar567
2017-02-17, 11:57 AM
If its gonna scale than its good because it feels like wizard is on the daggers edge with out good way to save himself from himself and i think healer has enough on his plate with out constantly bleeding wizard any idea for lets say spell that temporarily transform wizard in to martial gish (aka giving close combat ability to use that blood armor( which needs good scaling as well like your class level plus your inteligence mod))

I think blood walk can be used as teleport like diablo 3 necromancer class single direction 30 ft movement as swift or immediate action ( as regular one looks like 5th level spell

CartmanTuttle
2017-02-17, 12:02 PM
If its gonna scale than its good because it feels like wizard is on the daggers edge with out good way to save himself from himself and i think healer has enough on his plate with out constantly bleeding wizard any idea for lets say spell that temporarily transform wizard in to martial gish (aka giving close combat ability to use that blood armor( which needs good scaling as well like your class level plus your inteligence mod))

I think blood walk can be used as teleport like diablo 3 necromancer class single direction 30 ft movement as swift or immediate action ( as regular one looks like 5th level spell

So, Bloodwalk can be a 5th-level, and Blood Armor will give a massive bonus.

Although I have thought about lowering the damage tax from Metablood and Blood Mage from D6s to D4s, and maybe allowing them to be cut down by resistances, and/or allowing healing.

aimlessPolymath
2017-02-17, 12:10 PM
Spell notes spoilered- work on it aborted because I saw that archetype

In no particular order:

Aftershock Comparable spell is Finger of Death. Damage downside is pretty irrelevant except against the strongest opponents. Stun secondary effect means it's a powerful stunlock, especially if you can grab immunity to stunning from somewhere. 7th or 8th level spell.

Awaken Blood Not that impressive, as they go. Touch range? Non-scaling is strange- would be easier to measure if it scaled with level.

Banefire I see Quickened False Life -> Kill the BBEG, no save -> Cleric casts Heal, recharging all your hit points. Needs to indicate how many hit points you can sac at once, then balance from there.

Blood Armor: Too many variables to balance.

Blood Bolt Comparable spell is Snowball (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/s/snowball/). 1st level spell, max 5d6 damage.

Blood Corruption Needs numbers to balance.

Blood Curse "Doubled" is somewhat undefined. Presumably, affects penalties and damage? Note that Quickened(This) is a way to guarantee getting one spell doubled. Unsure of how to balance.

Blood Draught...Interesting. I'm not entirely sure how to balance this. It's worth roughly one extra spell prepared (of some level), you can only have one prepared at once, as per Permanency, but the usage case is different, due to the restricted trigger- you can use it to cast a defensive spell, or cut yourself (which also takes a standard action). Needs wording restriction to standard-action-only spells. Also, this gives you limited spontaneous spellcasting. Closest apparent equivalent is Contingency, but I would call it closer to a mix between that and Imbue with Spell Ability, but spell-level unlimited... It's good. Level depends on what spells you can store, and how many.

Blood Fear: Filler, as already noted.

Blood WitheringAmount could vary between "Debuff spell" and "Kill spell". Pick one to aim for, then balance accordingly.

Bloodfire: See Blood Corruption. This is just Greater Blood Corruption- doesn't need its own name.

Bloodwalk: Cross between Teleport w/o error and a Scry-and-Die combo, depending on targetting. Notably, you can Bloodwalk to someone, then Quickened Teleport away (costs a 9th level spell slot there, unless you use that stupid good archetype) for near-invincible scry-and-die-.

Bloody Resolve: This is pretty strong, just off "no dispel/counter" and "auto-concentration checks". Practical immunity to 2/3 of the ways to deal with spellcasters, right there.

Bloody Speed: No. WoTC learned their lesson about the action economy after 3.0 Haste. You don't go back.

Enfeebled Blood: No. Slow is already a nasty save-or-suck which shuts down full-attacking martials. Paralysis on top of that is nasty- compare with Mass Hold Person, which is a 7th level spell, and allows a new save each round.

Health Funnel: Arcane casters don't get healing outside of temporary hit points (vampiric touch, false life).

Shatter Soul: Refluffed Hold Person.

Soulstone: See my notes on Health Funnel. Also, this is incredibly strong. Also, it lets you bypass most of the normal limits of blood magic by just regaining all the hitpoints over again. Also, you can cast it ahead of time, so it doesn't even take up your action. Closest equivalent is 3.5 Death Pact (http://alcyius.com/dndtools/spells/complete-divine--56/death-pact--720/index.html), which is a cleric-only spell- look at it and compare.


Holy jeez that archetype is incredibly strong.
-Metablood lets you bypass the normal spell level limits on metamagic, letting you toss out freely Quickened spells for 5d6~=17 hit points, doubling your spell output at high levels. Maximize Spell for 13 hit points? Empower for 10? Don't mind if I do! Double Finger of Death? Sure!
-Blood mage means the normal spell preparation system gets tossed out the window. Remember, wizards can add any number of spells to their spellbook. Preventing healing does help, except that you forgot to exclude supernatural abilities like Channel Energy or Lay on Hands (and I can pick Lay on Hands up with a feat). Also, I can just prepare False Life or Greater False Life-normally not that great a spell- for 15-30 temporary hit points, soaking most of that damage. I would actually take Spell Perfection(False Life) or (Greater False Life) just for the free Maximize or Quicken.
What's more, you give permanent ability score bonuses for taking the school, bonuses which are larger than the bonuses given by the Transmutation school, and what's more, stack with magic items (unlike that school). The extra hit points would make this archetype very valuable on their own- I can sit on a 22 Con with a single magic item and literally no investment in the ability score, giving me somewhere in the region of 160 hit points at 20th level.

CartmanTuttle
2017-02-17, 12:39 PM
Spell notes spoilered- work on it aborted because I saw that archetype

In no particular order:
Comparable spell is Finger of Death. Damage downside is pretty irrelevant except against the strongest opponents. Stun secondary effect means it's a powerful stunlock, especially if you can grab immunity to stunning from somewhere. 7th or 8th level spell.
Comparable spell is Snowball (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/s/snowball/). 1st level spell, max 5d6 damage.


Holy jeez that archetype is incredibly strong.
-Metablood lets you bypass the normal spell level limits on metamagic, letting you toss out freely Quickened spells for 5d6~=17 hit points, doubling your spell output at high levels. Maximize Spell for 13 hit points? Empower for 10? Don't mind if I do! Double Finger of Death? Sure!
-Blood mage means the normal spell preparation system gets tossed out the window. Remember, wizards can add any number of spells to their spellbook. Preventing healing does help, except that you forgot to exclude supernatural abilities like Channel Energy or Lay on Hands (and I can pick Lay on Hands up with a feat). Also, I can just prepare False Life or Greater False Life-normally not that great a spell- for 15-30 temporary hit points, soaking most of that damage. I would actually take Spell Perfection(False Life) or (Greater False Life) just for the free Maximize or Quicken.
What's more, you give permanent ability score bonuses for taking the school, bonuses which are larger than the bonuses given by the Transmutation school, and what's more, stack with magic items (unlike that school). The extra hit points would make this archetype very valuable on their own- I can sit on a 22 Con with a single magic item and literally no investment in the ability score, giving me somewhere in the region of 160 hit points at 20th level.

The Archetype is to show how powerful Blood Mages can become. Your reaction is exactly the reaction I intend to get from my players when they see that power in use. Granted, Blood Mages have the potential to kill themselves faster than their enemies, but careful ones are the most devastating opponents one can face.

Although I would like you to finish your notes, please. The more thoughts the better.

aimlessPolymath
2017-02-17, 01:15 PM
The issue is that it's so, so, much better than any other option. Wizards are already much more flexible and powerful at high levels than other classes. They don't need more magic, bypassing the already tenuous options available to them. Players with access to this would become much, much more powerful than other wizards, on top of their power from just being wizards.

Edit: Notes complete.

CartmanTuttle
2017-02-17, 09:46 PM
The issue is that it's so, so, much better than any other option. Wizards are already much more flexible and powerful at high levels than other classes. They don't need more magic, bypassing the already tenuous options available to them. Players with access to this would become much, much more powerful than other wizards, on top of their power from just being wizards.

Edit: Notes complete.

I made this as a BBEG option, although I can see your point. The thing is, I don't know how to make it more "balanced" and still show how powerful they are in comparison.

aimlessPolymath
2017-02-18, 01:39 AM
Making them more powerful is sorta opposite to the principle of making them balanced. In the OP, you mentioned that these arts are "difficult to learn"- do you represent this by penalizing learning and access to these spells, applying penalties to the casters not mentioned here, or do you represent this by barring the spells to PCs? In the first case, the power of these spells might be justified. In the second case, it isn't, not really.

If you want a strong caster BBEG, the easiest way to do so is to let them prepare.
They start the encounter invisible, with multiple summoned minions (metamagic rod: Extend Spell) on which they've already cast haste (note that a Least Quicken Metamagic Rod works on this), mass bull's strength, or mass bear's endurance, then they open the fight with extended mass daze to probably lock down half the party for two rounds while the minions beat on them, maybe followed with a Quickened (rod again) slow to try to catch the others. Augment Summoning is just a cherry on top if you want- all this for the low, low cost of ~4 rounds preparing for the fight.

Example minion off the Summon Monster 3 list for level 7 caster: Fiendish Wolverine. It's sitting on a +4 to Str and Con from Augment Summoning on top of its normal stats thanks to Augument Summoning, then +4 more to each from Rage, giving it 34 effective hit points. That + Haste means it can swing at a +9 attack roll four times per round, dealing around 1d6+6 points per attack. A 4th level spell slot gives 1d3 of them.

Note that this is all without the crazy crap that they could pull if they had access to practically free metamagic, uses no spells above 4th level, and strictly requires nothing more than a Least Rod of Extend Spell.

CartmanTuttle
2017-02-18, 03:50 AM
The problem there is that my party could easily decimate that caster. They keep outsmarting me, and devastating everything I throw at them, even when they fought a caster who was ready for them, they managed to lock him down in ways I couldn't deal with, and he became just another slaughter. This was supposed to be an attempt to give them a fight they might not actually be able to just lock down and coup-de-gras.

aimlessPolymath
2017-02-18, 04:15 PM
This is somewhat more appropriate for the 3.5e forum, but keep in mind that the CR of the fight doesn't have to be the party level (https://sites.google.com/site/pathfinderogc/gamemastering#Designing-Encounters). An encounter of CR = APL is "average", but CR = APL+2 is "Hard". I don't know exactly how the fights you've had have gone, but you are allowed to make fights above the party's level!

Also notable is that wizards can be somewhere between the easiest and the hardest encounters, depending on whether the players can get to him before someone fails a save against dominate person or flesh to stone. The easiest way to slow them down is putting minions in their way- I did this with summoned wolverines in my example, but other summons are available. Hired fighters are another good option.

Also keep in mind that you can tailor their spells prepared to the weaknesses of the party. Are they melee oriented? Fly spell! Do they rely on stunlock or similar effects to stop him? Protection from Good + Heroism or Greater Heroism is a +4 to +6 bonus to saving throws, and Greater Stunning Barrier is a hilariously good spell which, in addition to another +2 to saving throws, forces anyone who hits the caster to save or be stunned for a round. Each time they attack. Keep getting hit by attacks? Mirror Image and Displacement. Players with high saving throws are harder to deal with, but minions with Pernicious Poison, followed by inhaled or contact poison, is pretty effective at reducing them in many cases. Forcing them to save every round (Stinking Cloud) is another way. Stealthy characters? Alarm spells all over.

I'm not entirely sure how they lock him down usually, so I can't give more specific answers, but increasing the CR of the fight is one easy way to make it harder, and countering the character's builds is another way (if possible).

Digitalfruitz
2017-02-18, 04:40 PM
I'm sorry but could you post a link to your chronomancy details?