Magic Tattoos?

[Hawkflight]

Among the almost infinite material available in D&D, is there anything resembling magic tattoos? I'm trying to make a swordsage set in a modern setting, who uses gun fu, and I thought that magic tattoos would make for a very flavorful effect. Bonus points is said tattoos glow upon use.

[kamikasei]

Tattoos (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/items/psionicTattoos.htm) are a whole class of psionic "item". Effectively they act like potions. There are other psionic items (e.g. psychoactive skins, third eyes) which attach to the body and could be treated as tattoos rather than separate items.

Complete Arcane (I think) also has a discussion of different forms of standard magic items, guidelines on how to reflavour the same mechanics which point out the important limitations to preserve. One example was healing tiles in place of potions, which have to be broken to activate them, thus preserving the single-use anyone-can-use properties of potions. You could look that up and devise tattoos which act as magic items with the appropriate limitations.

You might also reflavour Incarnum. If you only want certain specific tattoos with specific applications rather than a whole category of effects, you could pick soulmelds that are readily described as patterns on the skin rather than ethereal manifestations over it.

[Amiria]

Create Magic Tattoo spell (Sor/Wiz 2). Player's Guide to Faerûn and also reprinted in the Spell Compendium. Casting time 10 minutes, lasts for 24 hours, 100 gp material component. You'll probably need/want Permanency.

[Yora]

Or you could use a house rule that allows for the effects of rings and amulets to be permanently fixed to the character.
The standard magic item creation rules even have rules for items that don't take up body slots. Though I think such magic items should be a bit cheaper, since you can't sell them when you later find something more powerful. (Maybe make item creation costs 1/3 of the base price rather than 1/2.)

[Ravens_cry]

There is an assassin spell that allows you to hide a weapon as tattoo in the Spell Compendium.
One of the ways the DMG recommends bending the rules for rule of fun is tattoos that do magical effects at twice cost, basically the same as slotless items I believe.

[Toofey]

Already touched on, but in the forgotten realms the thayans have magic tatoos (+1 to ****, sometimes bonus spells...) The info for them is in the 2nd ed book "Spellbound"

[Aergoth]

Tattooed Monk from the complete series.

[Hawkflight]

Hey, thanks for the ideas. If it's relevant, here's my planned class levels:

Unarmed Swordsage 4 / Fighter 2 / Kensai 3

Going for a dex-based monk-like character who eschews the use of guns in favor of pure punch-you-in-the-face power. Obviously, his signature weapons will be his unarmed strikes, which is basically his entire body. And since I feel the overwhelming need to make special weapons look special, I figure the best way to do that with his body is to give him tattoos with nifty effects.

[slaydemons]

Tattooed Monk from the complete series.

+1 to this was about to say it then realized someone did

[Hawkflight]

Problem is ... Tattooed Monk just isn't what I'm looking for.

[IthroZada]

Also consider fluffing slot-less magical items as tattoos. Making a Cape of Flight into an elaborate tattoo of wings on your back would be nice.

[Cog]

Tattoos are not merely slotless, they're unremoveable. While hopefully your DM isn't in the habit of ganking your gear too often, that's still something that'd probably be worth at least a small price increase.

[Hawkflight]

Tattoos are not merely slotless, they're unremoveable. While hopefully your DM isn't in the habit of ganking your gear too often, that's still something that'd probably be worth at least a small price increase.

I don't know. Considering the setting, it's not inconceivable the corrupt government came up with some way to remove such tattoos from such threats as ourselves. And considering it would be practically impossible to get them back without buying them again, that should at least negate some of the upsides.

[Zaq]

I do know that there's a Wu Jen spell in Complete Arcane that has you shoot two snake tattoos off of your body (I think they have to be on your forearms) and poison your enemy. You have take an action to swallow them again before they can be reused, which makes the spell go down from "weird, but interesting" to "crap."

Not relevant for a DEX-based monk-type, of course. Just interesting.

[Ravens_cry]

Tattoos are not merely slotless, they're unremoveable. While hopefully your DM isn't in the habit of ganking your gear too often, that's still something that'd probably be worth at least a small price increase.
Oh, I am sure suitably creative DM could think of something.:smallamused:

[Thurbane]

Yep, to recap above, the main sources of "magic" tattos in 3.5 are psionics, and FR. From memory, CArc also has rules for tattoing your spellbook onto your body.

[IthroZada]

Also throwing this out here, and it's not really relevant since the OP wants to be a Swordsage, but the Weirbrand homebrew class on the Pathfinder database is a gish base class that specializes in magical tattoos.

[McSmack]

Long ago, so long in fact that it was probably during the 3.0 days there was a little blurb in one of the rule books about letting characters get their magic items as tattoos. They would be permanent but can't be removed, but would still use up the same slot. I want to say they suggested a 20% markup. It was a long long time ago and I was drinking heavily during those years (college).

[AdalKar]

^ I found something like that in "The Complete Book of Eldritch Might" published by Sword and Sorcery and it is compatible with DnD 3.5 (well at least that's what it says on the cover :smallbiggrin: ).

It is the feat Item Image (p.22). Some information on it:

The feat has the (Eldritch) tag not (General) or something like that -> that just means that it is treated as a SLA according to the book

You need to have 17 Int and a caster level of 7 to take it and then you can make permanent images of magic items (which have to be around while you make the tattoo).
The character who has gained the tattoo can store and call this item as a free action (effectively shrunk like a glove of storing) and gains one of the following benefits:

+1 damage if the Item is a weapon
+2 DC if the item has an ability offering a save
+2 CL
Item does 1d6 fire dmg to anyone who wants to use it except the tattooed char


Inscribing the tattoo takes 8 hours and costs one tenth of the market value of the item.

[gomipile]

Tattoos are not merely slotless, they're unremoveable. While hopefully your DM isn't in the habit of ganking your gear too often, that's still something that'd probably be worth at least a small price increase.

If you are talking about the ones from the Create Magic Tattoo spell, it says right in the description that the spells Erase and Dispel Magic can remove them if cast successfully.

[Firechanter]

Create Magic Tattoo spell (Sor/Wiz 2). Player's Guide to Faerûn and also reprinted in the Spell Compendium. Casting time 10 minutes, lasts for 24 hours, 100 gp material component. You'll probably need/want Permanency.

I suppose Permanency would have to be houseruled, since the spell makes no mention of it. What would be an appropriate XP cost?

[Amiria]

I suppose Permanency would have to be houseruled, since the spell makes no mention of it. What would be an appropriate XP cost?

Good question. Comparing it with other 2nd level spells it would be 1.000 xp. That might seem low but I'm not sure. Many of the bonuses are very common (deflection, enhancement, resistance) so you can't stack them with the most common spells and magic items.

But the luck and competence bonuses to attack rolls and the caster level bonus are uncommon or untyped. Maybe 1.500 xp for the +1 luck bonus to attack rolls, 2.000 for the +2 competence bonus to attack rolls and 3.000 xp for the +1 to effective caster level bonus.

The danger of Dispel Magic effects always remains, so one shouldn't be too extreme with the xp costs.

[Ravens_cry]

I suppose Permanency would have to be houseruled, since the spell makes no mention of it. What would be an appropriate XP cost?
Technically, it's not a houserule as Permanency allows other spells to be Permanencied at the DM's discretion.

[Greenish]

Dragonmarks from Eberron are much like magic tattoos, and could easily be reflavoured as such.

[Slipperychicken]

Runescarred Berserker, from Unapproachable East may be what you want... Scribe some awesome spells off a list onto non-dispellable "runescars" which you activate as standard actions. Also, no per-day limit. Scribing takes 1 hour, whenever you want. Also, you can activate them in a rage, I think.

The fluff is that you're a barbarian who cuts himself to cast AMF, (Greater?) Invisibility, Heal, and some others. But honestly, if you're shelling out 100s of gold and some XP to cut your skin, deal 1d4 damage and use Magic, it had might as well be a tattoo.

[FelixG]

Tattoos are not merely slotless, they're unremoveable. While hopefully your DM isn't in the habit of ganking your gear too often, that's still something that'd probably be worth at least a small price increase.

Well you could swallow a slotless magic item and still gain the effects of it...plus you could tear the persons skin off to remove it or even sunder it by cutting deeply enough and "breaking" the tattoo

[Seharvepernfan]

in my campaigns, i have magic tattoos in a few different forms.

First, there are first level feat tattoos, like the thayan tattoos and the ones from the early pathfinder products (some country that started with a V?).

Second, there are permanent tattoos that are basically wondrous items that take up no space but cost twice as much (so a tattoo of armor +1 would cost twice what a pair of bracers of armor +1 would cost). This is a variant rule from the DMG. Creation of tattoos like these takes a feat of its own.
Shortbow Attack: 1d20+2
Damage: 1d6+2
Third, there are expendable tattoos, which function as scrolls, potions, wands, and staves, and as above, cannot be stolen or disarmed, but they cost the same as their item counterparts. These kind require their own create tattoo feat (but that one covers all types - potions, wands, scrolls and staves). I, personally, am in favor of these types being vulnerable to dispel.

[Urpriest]

If the Swordsage is set in a modern setting, why not use the d20 Modern rules for magical tattoos? I'm pretty sure they're in the core book, and if not they're certainly in Urban Arcana.

[Hawkflight]

If the Swordsage is set in a modern setting, why not use the d20 Modern rules for magical tattoos? I'm pretty sure they're in the core book, and if not they're certainly in Urban Arcana.

Because mixing two different game systems is already annoying enough as it is, which is why I'm sticking mostly to items from the D&D books. That's the great thing about monk-like characters, like swordsages, is that they fit in well in any setting.

Also, my DM just managed to come up with some rather generous rules for custom tattoos, so ... yeah.