So, Ki is on hold and I have new stuff for Sooth, Datrik, and Thaedia in the works. Meanwhile, I realized that I'm sick of cleric being made godly powerful because there is no flavor to healing magic. I wanted to fix that, and give healers other cool abilities as well, tied to an interesting mechanic to make playing a healer fun.
Iâ,¬,,¢m just posting thoughts here. Some things I want to accomplish:
1) Creepy tone. These are people who pay for magic with blood â,¬' their own or, for some neutral and evil ones, the blood of others. I want to make it eerie and weird without being gross.
2) Healing with flavor. This is self explanatory
3) Balance: I donâ,¬,,¢t want the cleric problem, with a class being overly powerful just to justify playing one as a healer.
4) Uniqueness: I donâ,¬,,¢t just want to use a modified psionic system, or an altered Vancian magic system. I want something different.
5) Thematic: it should all make sense for blood power. Currently, Iâ,¬,,¢m going with a focus on creation (since blood is life) Healing and Physical Enhancement (obvious), Undead Manipulation (limited, but done in unique ways), and Binding/Control (since blood pacts are an ancient theme.)
For now, all I really have is a bunch of tables for classes, Iâ,¬,,¢ll post more later, I just want to get this posted so I can hear thoughts, ideas, feedback, and also so I can see it, which always helps me.
[spoiler= Sangemancer]
[class=Sangemancer]
[bab=wizard]
[fort=good]
[will=good]
[special]
[1]bloodcasting[/1]
[/special]
[/class]
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Bloodsmith]
[class=Bloodsmith]
[bab=fighter]
[fort=good]
[special]
[1]Bloodcrafting[/1]
[/special]
[special=Bloodblade Damage]
[repeat]
[1]1d6[/1]
[8]1d8[/8]
[15]1d10[/15]
[20]2d6[/20]
[/special]
[special=Bloodblade Enhancement Bonus]
[repeat]
[1]+1[/1]
[6]+2[/6]
[12]+3[/12]
[18]+4[/18]
[/special]
[/class]
[/spoiler]
While looking for a name, Iâ,¬,,¢m going to show you what Iâ,¬,,¢m thinking of by way of spells. These will probably be later organized into Oaths, which will function as domains, with extra abilities. I think all blood casters are going to get the Seal Wounds spell domain and the Open Wound spell domain (which includes hemorrhage) by default, and some other healing/hurting ability would be in flavor.
I think oaths will be modeled after mantles, only made so they have one spell either every level or every other level, and you gain access to all spells in your oaths. This is just a preliminary thought, though. The spells in red are ones I think need the most serious look over.
Blood spells will use points like psionics to cast, only they will use your HP to augment them. Also, I am thinking possessing some of your targets blood (or flesh or hair) will give you a bonus on some spells, or is required to cast them.
[spoiler=Blood â,¬Å"Spellsâ,¬Â]
(B) â,¬' Requires you to be in contact with some of the targets blood OR empowered by contact with blood. (not sure which)
(A) â,¬' Can be augmented, using HP to augment.
Animate Blood Zombie (B)â,¬' Turns recently deceased creature into a blood zombie
Bind the Bloodline (B) â,¬' Creature and direct descendants are bound as by a geas.
Blade of Blood (A) â,¬' Creates sword of blood that floats and fights by your side.
Blood Binding (A) (B) â,¬' Creature required to serve some task for you.
Blood to Acid (A) (B) â,¬' Replaces creatureâ,¬,,¢s blood with acid, dealing damage.
Bloodstorm (A) - Covers an 30 ft radius in a rain of blood, damaging opponents and healing allies. Also imposes a moral penalty.
Boil Blood (A) â,¬' creatures blood is heated, damaging it and slowing it.
Bonds of Blood (B) â,¬' Creates bond between you and ally, granting bonuses.
Create Blood Elemental (A) â,¬' Create a creature by infusing elemental blood with your own.
Deep Binding (B) â,¬' Creature must serve you for a given amount of time
Enslave Though Blood (B) â,¬' As dominate monster, but blood while casting make duration 1 week / level.
Geas (A) (B) â,¬' as the spell
Hemorrhage (A) â,¬' Save or die. If save, deals 5d6 damage.
Infuse With Blood (A) â,¬' Target undead creature becomes alive again for 1 round/level, loosing its undead qualities and traits but regaining all qualities it had in life.
Open Deep Wounds (A) â,¬' Inflict more hp damage
Open Mortal Wounds (A) â,¬' Inflict tons of hp damage
Open Surface Wounds (A) â,¬' inflict low hp damage
Purge â,¬' Subject takes damage, but is cured of all non-magical poisons and diseases.
Quicken Blood (A) â,¬' Creature bleeds, taking damage every round once wounded.
Rapid Clotting (A) â,¬' Subject gains fast healing
Sanguine Bladestorm (A) â,¬' Deals slashing damage in cone or line.
Seal Deep Wounds (A) â,¬' Heal more hp
Seal Fatal Wounds (A) â,¬' Restores recently deceased corpse to life with 1 hp.
Seal Mortal Wounds (A) â,¬' Heal tons of hp
Seal Surface Wounds (A) â,¬' heal low hp
[/spoiler]
reserve2
reserve3
Ok, so some questions
What should I call blood magic spells? One thought was voodoos, but that doesn't fit quite right. Plus, I just had an idea for a Voodoo Priest class, lol. I can't think of a good term for blood magic spells, or what they do with them (Wizards cast spells, psions manifest powers, Sangemancers X Y. I need names for X and Y)
What can I do to differentiate from normal magic mechanically, and mechanically give it a more eery feel. I allready looked at shadowcasting, which I found too limiting. One thought I have is "Pacts" which need to be renamed, which would work like domains - you make a pact, you gain access to all the "spells" of that pact as long as you are of high enough level to cast them.
Oops. Double post.
Sanguine magic. They could... oxidize plasma?
If you want a vaguely historical alchemical term, you could say that sangemancers manipulate humours, with 'manipulate' being the verb and 'manipulations (of humours)' being the sangemancers 'spells'. Of course, "humour" is rarely used to mean "vital fluid" these days, so it sounds rather silly.
Invoke incantations? Perform rituals? What verbs or nouns you have depends highly on what sort of casting system you want.
Hmm...some good ideas. Not sure which ones I'm going to use yet. BTW, check out the 'spells' and info I posted in the second post, I'd love to see thoughts on them, and ways to increase flavor - I really, really want to avoid making them bland.
After reading through your list of 'spells', I'm not sure you need to invent a new kind of casting at all. It sounds like the ordinary psionics system would work fine. Using hp to augment powers could be a function of individual psionic powers (or the sangemancer class), not necessarily a function of an entirely new magic system.
(But then again, I'm odd like that. I looked at the Tome of Magic and decided that 90% of the book could have been perfectly imitated using simple variations of Vancian magic and/or the warlock class. In my mind, most of those new mechanics were just a bunch of hand-waving to accomplish things that existing mechanics could already do with the addition of a few new classes and spell lists.)
You could give them the powers to tell blood types...? As far as blood magic goes, look up the Tremere Thaumaturgy in the V:tM rulebooks from WW.
Quote from: Epic_MeepoAfter reading through your list of 'spells', I'm not sure you need to invent a new kind of casting at all. It sounds like the ordinary psionics system would work fine. Using hp to augment powers could be a function of individual psionic powers (or the sangemancer class), not necessarily a function of an entirely new magic system.
(But then again, I'm odd like that. I looked at the Tome of Magic and decided that 90% of the book could have been perfectly imitated using simple variations of Vancian magic and/or the warlock class. In my mind, most of those new mechanics were just a bunch of hand-waving to accomplish things that existing mechanics could already do with the addition of a few new classes and spell lists.)
Hmmm....yeah, I just realized I'm not doing anything original. The seal spells are just cure, open are inflict...I'm going back to the drawing board on this. I want a new system, I don't want to just modifiy psionics or vancian magic.