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TechnOkami
2014-07-02, 02:27 AM
So, before I begin, I'd just like to say that the only real caster class I've played is the Druid, and that I never got far enough into the class to even touch on the idea of metamagic, so while I understand roughly how metamagic works (sack a higher level spell slot to empower a spell of a lower level), I don't really know how much more powerful and cheesy metamagic can make your spells in correlation to the level of spells you can cast. That said, here's my idea.

I've always wanted to play a Blood Mage kind of character, where something is involved with the sacrificing of one's health to do stuff with spells. I tried making a Blood Mage class a while ago, but I didn't really have as good a grasp on the 3.5 system and tried to make some kind of Wizard Psion hybrid class that used HP like Power Points to cast spells. It ended up not working because healing became a huge issue, and there wasn't a good way for me to keep that mechanic in the class without making it hideously under or overpowered.

I've recently had a thought though. What if instead of making my own entire class, I take a stab at making a Blood Magic themed Metamagic Feat or two? So, putting this in the rough perspective I am presenting it, how powerful would this idea be:

Blood Magic: The main shtick of this Metamagic feat is that you would be able to, instead of sacrificing a higher level spell slot to apply Metamagic to a spell, reduce your max HP at the numerical value of whatever the spell level # is. So, say we have a level 4 Wizard who wants to apply Blood Magic to a Fireball. Instead of sacrificing a 4th Level Spell Slot, the Wizard would instead reduce their max HP by four points. I'm not sure how long the HP reduction should last, so let's tentatively say somewhere between a period of 12 to 24 hours or so. After that time period, HP can be restored as normal. You could use a Helpless/Willing target who would incur the HP Reduction in order to apply Blood Magic to a spell in a similar fashion, but at twice the HP normally required.

As far as I understand it, I believe this would be a rather powerful feat, but at the same time not entirely crippling. Perhaps limiting this to only using yourself as a target vs anyone who has blood would make it weak enough to not be overpowering while still being useful. Bluntly though, I don't really know how powerful (or that much more powerful) it would make a caster class become. I'd like to know if this would make Magic act like it it was on crack, more so than it already is.

qwertyu63
2014-07-02, 07:07 AM
So, before I begin, I'd just like to say that the only real caster class I've played is the Druid, and that I never got far enough into the class to even touch on the idea of metamagic, so while I understand roughly how metamagic works (sack a higher level spell slot to empower a spell of a lower level), I don't really know how much more powerful and cheesy metamagic can make your spells in correlation to the level of spells you can cast. That said, here's my idea.

Alright, time to attend Metamagic 101. When a prepared caster with a metamagic feat prepares their spells, they can choose to prepare some of their spells with metamagic added on. Doing so makes it a higher level spell, but only for the spell slot needed to prepare it (unless you are using Heighten Spell, in which case it applies to everything). When a spontaneous caster with a metamagic feat casts a spell, they can add on the metamagic (which makes it a higher level spell, as with the prepared casters); however, doing so makes the spell take a full round action.

Sorry if you knew all that already, your wording just sounded off to me.


I've recently had a thought though. What if instead of making my own entire class, I take a stab at making a Blood Magic themed Metamagic Feat or two? So, putting this in the rough perspective I am presenting it, how powerful would this idea be:

Blood Magic: The main shtick of this Metamagic feat is that you would be able to, instead of sacrificing a higher level spell slot to apply Metamagic to a spell, reduce your max HP at the numerical value of whatever the spell level # is. So, say we have a level 4 Wizard who wants to apply Blood Magic to a Fireball. Instead of sacrificing a 4th Level Spell Slot, the Wizard would instead reduce their max HP by four points. I'm not sure how long the HP reduction should last, so let's tentatively say somewhere between a period of 12 to 24 hours or so. After that time period, HP can be restored as normal. You could use a Helpless/Willing target who would incur the HP Reduction in order to apply Blood Magic to a spell in a similar fashion, but at twice the HP normally required.

As far as I understand it, I believe this would be a rather powerful feat, but at the same time not entirely crippling. Perhaps limiting this to only using yourself as a target vs anyone who has blood would make it weak enough to not be overpowering while still being useful. Bluntly though, I don't really know how powerful (or that much more powerful) it would make a caster class become. I'd like to know if this would make Magic act like it it was on crack, more so than it already is.

Metamagic 201: Anything that removes or reduces the aforementioned "makes it a higher level spell" clause is very powerful.

You have basically just written Divine Metamagic for the Wizard. Divine Metamagic is one of the most powerful feats in the game; it simply allows clerics to spend turn undead uses to get free uses of one metamagic he knows. A wizard, able to do so with his hit points (which are more plentiful than turn undead uses, mind you) on all his metamagic feats (which he would have more of), would use his immense power to thank you for this wonderful gift.

Can this idea work? Yes, in very high power games; but you would need to balance it really well.

UristMcRandom
2014-07-02, 10:45 AM
A wizard, able to do so with his hit points (which are more plentiful than turn undead uses, mind you) on all his metamagic feats (which he would have more of), would use his immense power to thank you for this wonderful gift.

As an idea: What if rather than subtracting the desired Spell Level from your HP for X hours, you make the cost be current HP/Spell Level, so using your example of adding metamagic to a Fireball, if I have 100 HP (just an example number), applying metamagic costs 25 HP (100 HP/Spell Level 4). That would shift the balance, though it may be too overpowered in the other direction.

qwertyu63
2014-07-02, 11:02 AM
As an idea: What if rather than subtracting the desired Spell Level from your HP for X hours, you make the cost be current HP/Spell Level, so using your example of adding metamagic to a Fireball, if I have 100 HP (just an example number), applying metamagic costs 25 HP (100 HP/Spell Level 4). That would shift the balance, though it may be too overpowered in the other direction.

Alright, that is a fair ways weaker (still very strong though); however, it's rather upside down. Higher level spells take less hit points?

Idea: Con damage equal to the level increase of the applied metamagic (if you take this route, be extra sure to note that those immune to Con damage can't use it).

Epsilon Rose
2014-07-02, 11:17 AM
Alright, that is a fair ways weaker (still very strong though); however, it's rather upside down. Higher level spells take less hit points?

Idea: Con damage equal to the level increase of the applied metamagic (if you take this route, be extra sure to note that those immune to Con damage can't use it).

Actually, I think loss of max HP is a better idea then ability damage or normal hp damage. After all, both can be healed relatively easily (see hellfire warlock builds for details).

How about something more along the lines of 10*level-modifier% of your total HP (maybe finagle the multiplier a bit more) and have it last until you recover your spells. The only three problems I can see with that are, 1) it could very quickly make you useless, 2) it encourages using more meta-magic if you've already taken a lot of damage and you know it's near the end of the day, 3) this heavily favors spontaneous casters. (Note, those last two might not actually be problems.)

TechnOkami
2014-07-02, 11:26 AM
Clarification Question: So, with applying Metamagic to a spell, do you need to give up a 4th level spell slot to apply it to a 3rd level spell, or do you just need to give up a spell slot whose level is equal to the spell you're trying to apply metamagic to? I'm just a little lost on how it's applied.

qwertyu63
2014-07-02, 12:05 PM
Clarification Question: So, with applying Metamagic to a spell, do you need to give up a 4th level spell slot to apply it to a 3rd level spell, or do you just need to give up a spell slot whose level is equal to the spell you're trying to apply metamagic to? I'm just a little lost on how it's applied.

You don't "give up" any spell slots when using metamagic. Metamagic increases the level of the spell you are applying it to, thus meaning you need a higher level spell slot to cast it.

For example:
Fireball is a third level spell, therefore you prepare/cast it in a third level spell slot.
Still Spell is a metamagic feat with a +1 spell level adjustment.
Therefore, a Still Fireball is a fourth (base 3+1 for Still spell) level spell prepared/cast from a fourth level slot.

Despite the fact that the spell is cast from a higher level slot, the saving throw DC's use the level of the unmodified spell's level (unless noted otherwise).

When a prepared caster wants to use metamagic, they have to apply it when they prepare their spells at the start of the day.
Spontaneous casters apply metamagic when they cast a spell, but it increases the casting time (from 1 standard action to full-round action; or +1 full round action if it is longer than 1 standard action).

TechnOkami
2014-07-02, 12:31 PM
Oooooooooooooooooooh, ok!

So, a Wizard of appropriate level could not apply Metamagic to a fourth level spell simply because they don't have a fifth level spell slot to use, correct?

qwertyu63
2014-07-02, 12:35 PM
Oooooooooooooooooooh, ok!

So, a Wizard of appropriate level could not apply Metamagic to a fourth level spell simply because they don't have a fifth level spell slot to use, correct?

You are (mostly) correct. A 5th level wizard can't prepare Still Fireball, as they don't have a fourth level slot to put it in.

The only error in your statement is that not all metamagic is +1. For example:

Empower Spell increases the spell level by +2, turning fireball into a fifth level spell.

Quicken Spell increases the spell level by +4, turning fireball into a seventh level spell.

TechnOkami
2014-07-02, 12:42 PM
You are (mostly) correct. A 5th level wizard can't prepare Still Fireball, as they don't have a fourth level slot to put it in.

The only error in your statement is that not all metamagic is +1. For example:

Empower Spell increases the spell level by +2, turning fireball into a fifth level spell.

Quicken Spell increases the spell level by +4, turning fireball into a seventh level spell.

Got it, thank you.

Epsilon Rose
2014-07-02, 12:49 PM
It's also worth noting that there are +0 metamagics and feats that don't require you to pay additional spell levels (Divine Metamagic and the Sudden X line are good examples of that). With those feats, you don't need to have hire level slots to use the meta magic.

jiriku
2014-07-02, 12:51 PM
It's very powerful. You'll face a couple of challenges with this.

First, spell level adjustment costs (the standard way) are consistent. Higher-level spell slots are always hard to come by so the cost is always meaningful.

Hit point costs are not consistent. A hit point cost is expensive if you're under attack and have no healer available. It is practically free if you're sitting comfortably in your castle with a cleric standing by.

This means that casting blood magic empowered lightning bolt in combat might be risky, but casting blood magic chain identify to identify 10 magic items at once at the end of the adventure is perfectly safe.

Your second issue is that the cost is highly subject to hit point optimization. It's very expensive for an elf wizard with a d4 hit die and an 8 Constitution (average 1.5 hit points per level). It's less so for a dwarf cleric with a d8 hit die and a Constitution of 20 (average 9.5 hit points per level).

Epsilon Rose
2014-07-02, 12:56 PM
It's very powerful. You'll face a couple of challenges with this.

First, spell level adjustment costs (the standard way) are consistent. Higher-level spell slots are always hard to come by so the cost is always meaningful.

Hit point costs are not consistent. A hit point cost is expensive if you're under attack and have no healer available. It is practically free if you're sitting comfortably in your castle with a cleric standing by.

This means that casting blood magic empowered lightning bolt in combat might be risky, but casting blood magic chain identify to identify 10 magic items at once at the end of the adventure is perfectly safe.

Your second issue is that the cost is highly subject to hit point optimization. It's very expensive for an elf wizard with a d4 hit die and an 8 Constitution (average 1.5 hit points per level). It's less so for a dwarf cleric with a d8 hit die and a Constitution of 20 (average 9.5 hit points per level).

The first version he listed reduces max HP, which I don't think can be healed normally, so that should take care of the first problem (though it could have odd interactions with temp hp and existing damage). The second problem can be helped by using a percentage of max HP, rather than a fixed value. It's still, probably, fairly powerful. Particularly if you only need to take the feat once.

jiriku
2014-07-02, 01:45 PM
The first version he listed reduces max HP, which I don't think can be healed normally, so that should take care of the first problem (though it could have odd interactions with temp hp and existing damage). The second problem can be helped by using a percentage of max HP, rather than a fixed value. It's still, probably, fairly powerful. Particularly if you only need to take the feat once.

Dunno. If I'm casting during downtime, I really don't care if I have to wait until tonight or tomorrow to get back the hit points I spend this morning. Nothing dangerous is going to happen between now and then, because I'm sitting in my house.

Of course, the DM can always spring ambushes and surprise encounters when you thought you were sitting safely in town on your day off, but casters tend to be mobile and can do a decent job of escaping an unwanted combat, especially at higher levels. Plus, if the DM continually springs ambushes on me just to play "gotcha" to punish me for acting as though safe areas are safe, well, that's a lame DM.

And I'm not a fan of the percentages. Really, it's bad enough that I need a spreadsheet to manage a caster already. Any homebrew that's going to force me to grab a calculator every time I want to use it is not an option that I'm going to consider. I understand that others may not mind, but for some people it's a dealbreaker.

TechnOkami
2014-07-02, 01:52 PM
The first version he listed reduces max HP, which I don't think can be healed normally, so that should take care of the first problem (though it could have odd interactions with temp hp and existing damage). The second problem can be helped by using a percentage of max HP, rather than a fixed value. It's still, probably, fairly powerful. Particularly if you only need to take the feat once.

As far as HP interactions go, not really. All the Max HP Reduction would do is lower your HP total by a few points. You just treat damage and healing as if that new HP total was your normal HP, until you regain the rest of it (after 12 or 24 hours, not sure which time restriction to use). Temp HP isn't the same as healable HP, so you wouldn't be able to pull from it for Metamagic. It would, however, help you not get killed so easily.

I actually like the idea of having to sacrifice a % of hp. Granted it makes the calculation a little annoying, but it isn't too strenuous, considering it effectively becomes decimal based multiplication, rounded up.

New Question: What if there were a clause in the beginning of the feat that stated you had to choose beforehand the kind of magic you wanted to Blood Magic. So, for instance: you pick Blood Magic (Arcane). You could only utilize Blood Magic on Arcane Spells. You could take the feat again then to get another subsection of Magic if you really wanted it. The selection of spells you could use Blood Magic with would probably extend to Arcane, Divine, and Psionic.
I'm fairly sure you can't use Metamagic with Binder Magic or ToB Maneuvers, so they would be no no's.

Epsilon Rose
2014-07-02, 02:11 PM
Dunno. If I'm casting during downtime, I really don't care if I have to wait until tonight or tomorrow to get back the hit points I spend this morning. Nothing dangerous is going to happen between now and then, because I'm sitting in my house.

Of course, the DM can always spring ambushes and surprise encounters when you thought you were sitting safely in town on your day off, but casters tend to be mobile and can do a decent job of escaping an unwanted combat, especially at higher levels. Plus, if the DM continually springs ambushes on me just to play "gotcha" to punish me for acting as though safe areas are safe, well, that's a lame DM.

And I'm not a fan of the percentages. Really, it's bad enough that I need a spreadsheet to manage a caster already. Any homebrew that's going to force me to grab a calculator every time I want to use it is not an option that I'm going to consider. I understand that others may not mind, but for some people it's a dealbreaker.

Ah. I hadn't really considered extended downtimes, just end of the day downtimes when your resources are already depleted.

I also don't think percentages of max hp are that big of an issue, particularly if you can get them onto a fixed multiplier. For example, if everything is a multiple of 10% of your hp, then you can just figure out what that is and subtract accordingly. Even more complex formulas only really need to get figured out once per level.


As far as HP interactions go, not really. All the Max HP Reduction would do is lower your HP total by a few points. You just treat damage and healing as if that new HP total was your normal HP, until you regain the rest of it (after 12 or 24 hours, not sure which time restriction to use). Temp HP isn't the same as healable HP, so you wouldn't be able to pull from it for Metamagic. It would, however, help you not get killed so easily.

You might want to add a note about temp hp not counting. I can definitely see some players trying to argue that max HP includes temp HP.

When I said hp reduction and existing damage can interact oddly, I meant that if you already have damage and aren't planning on getting into another fight then you, effectively, get some free metamagic. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it should be kept in mind. Also, you might want to add a note regarding whether or not losing max HP adjusts your current HP accordingly, like con damage would.




New Question: What if there were a clause in the beginning of the feat that stated you had to choose beforehand the kind of magic you wanted to Blood Magic. So, for instance: you pick Blood Magic (Arcane). You could only utilize Blood Magic on Arcane Spells. You could take the feat again then to get another subsection of Magic if you really wanted it. The selection of spells you could use Blood Magic with would probably extend to Arcane, Divine, and Psionic.
I'm fairly sure you can't use Metamagic with Binder Magic or ToB Maneuvers, so they would be no no's.

Eh. I don't think it would matter too much. Most casters are only going to have 1 type of casting. A few might spring for more, but they're probably doing it for a reason and have ways around most things. What you might want to consider, instead, is having a blood magic feat for each type of meta magic (so bloody quicken, bloody maximize, ect) which could significantly decrease the power of the feat, both because it would be harder to qualify for metamagic reducers and because you couldn't just take it once and have access to both normal and blood verstions of meta magic.

Also, having a version that works with ToB and other systems that don't normally have meta-magic could be interesting precisely because they don't normally have metamagic or have to take it in a different form.

Oh, one last note, when preparing a spell with blood magic, would the HP reduction kick in when you prepare the spell or when you cast it?

Zaydos
2014-07-02, 02:26 PM
I'd suggest Con burn (1 per level the metamagic would normally cost) over anything directly affecting Hit Points. It prevents Persistent Spell abuse by taking 6 days to heal off completely (3 with a healer or complete bed rest, 1.5 with complete bed rest and a healer). The Mind Over Body feat is the best way to heal it (adds your Con mod to amount healed) but with 20 Con that becomes 3/day (6 with complete bed rest).

It equates to 1 hp/level per 2 levels of metamagic cost negated and a -1 to Fort saves for the same amount so it becomes rather dangerous and might end up costing too much, but I can see allowing it.

Then again I just love ability burn because it was underutilized and can actually work as a limiter unlike ability damage (which is easily worked around for a few k of gold).

TechnOkami
2014-07-02, 03:20 PM
I'd suggest Con burn (1 per level the metamagic would normally cost) over anything directly affecting Hit Points. It prevents Persistent Spell abuse by taking 6 days to heal off completely (3 with a healer or complete bed rest, 1.5 with complete bed rest and a healer). The Mind Over Body feat is the best way to heal it (adds your Con mod to amount healed) but with 20 Con that becomes 3/day (6 with complete bed rest).

It equates to 1 hp/level per 2 levels of metamagic cost negated and a -1 to Fort saves for the same amount so it becomes rather dangerous and might end up costing too much, but I can see allowing it.

Then again I just love ability burn because it was underutilized and can actually work as a limiter unlike ability damage (which is easily worked around for a few k of gold).

I'll be bluntly honest, I don't like this idea. Con to me is much more of a headache than % based health reduction, and I'd really rather not go that route.


Eh. I don't think it would matter too much. Most casters are only going to have 1 type of casting. A few might spring for more, but they're probably doing it for a reason and have ways around most things. What you might want to consider, instead, is having a blood magic feat for each type of meta magic (so bloody quicken, bloody maximize, ect) which could significantly decrease the power of the feat, both because it would be harder to qualify for metamagic reducers and because you couldn't just take it once and have access to both normal and blood verstions of meta magic.

Also, having a version that works with ToB and other systems that don't normally have meta-magic could be interesting precisely because they don't normally have metamagic or have to take it in a different form.

Oh, one last note, when preparing a spell with blood magic, would the HP reduction kick in when you prepare the spell or when you cast it?

I'm conflicted somewhat on making a feat tree for Blood Magic. While I like the idea of it, another part of my brain goes "Why don't we just make it something like an Alternate Option to Metamagic vs A Really Feat-Taxing Feat Tree?" That's the best way I can phrase it.

Also, yes, somehow applying this kind of Metamagic to systems that don't normally have Metamagic IS interesting to me, but the only system I know well enough to even consider homebrewing on would be ToB, and even then I don't really know how powerful I would suddenly make a melee ToB person if they suddenly could apply HP taxing Metamagic onto their Maneuvers and Stances.

Also: I'm not going to do it right now because I'm going to be a tad busy with something else entirely, but I'm going to try and write this up and then potentially post Blood Magic Metamagic in its own thread if people want me to.

Veklim
2014-07-02, 05:13 PM
I'd be wary of doing blood magic like this and just using hp as a cost, even if you're subtracting from max hp. The issues interacting with temporary hp don't just stem from the intial cost, temporary hp also allow a character (under certain circumstances at least) to cover their 10% remaining hp with a nice big buffer and thus sticking around to fight for plenty of time after the hp has been paid. The Con burn idea is a rather more effective limiter, but then again I usually find myself agreeing with Zaydos for some reason. O_o

I wondered why you say it causes too many issues, not disagreeing but certainly curious as to your reasoning. Truth be told I'd be even harsher if offering this sorta thing, I would make the sacrifice be a negative level per spell level increase, since it allows a caster to meta their highest level spells AT LEAST a couple of times in a single encounter, and wizards already get enough toys!

Regardless, I shall keep looking in on this because I've liked the literary concept of blood magic for a long time, and honestly haven't seen/noticed anything in 3.5 which does it justice (both the pros and the cons in good balance). If anyone wants to link me something though....this is the playground after all...:smallwink:

TechnOkami
2014-07-02, 05:35 PM
I'd be wary of doing blood magic like this and just using hp as a cost, even if you're subtracting from max hp. The issues interacting with temporary hp don't just stem from the intial cost, temporary hp also allow a character (under certain circumstances at least) to cover their 10% remaining hp with a nice big buffer and thus sticking around to fight for plenty of time after the hp has been paid. The Con burn idea is a rather more effective limiter, but then again I usually find myself agreeing with Zaydos for some reason. O_o

I wondered why you say it causes too many issues, not disagreeing but certainly curious as to your reasoning. Truth be told I'd be even harsher if offering this sorta thing, I would make the sacrifice be a negative level per spell level increase, since it allows a caster to meta their highest level spells AT LEAST a couple of times in a single encounter, and wizards already get enough toys!

Regardless, I shall keep looking in on this because I've liked the literary concept of blood magic for a long time, and honestly haven't seen/noticed anything in 3.5 which does it justice (both the pros and the cons in good balance). If anyone wants to link me something though....this is the playground after all...:smallwink:

So how would Con Burn work mechanically? I don't really know how to "Burn my Con", if you get my meaning.

Zaydos
2014-07-02, 06:25 PM
So how would Con Burn work mechanically? I don't really know how to "Burn my Con", if you get my meaning.

Ability burn is an effect from the Expanded Psionics Handbook it is simply Ability Damage which, well here's the SRD quote


Ability Burn

This is a special form of ability damage that cannot be magically or psionically healed. It is caused by the use of certain psionic feats and powers. It returns only through natural healing.

Found here (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/psionicPowersOverview.htm) though you'll need to search ability burn to find it easily.

It would mean if I wanted to Persist a spell for free I'd take 6 Constitution damage (losing 3 hp per level and -3 to Fort save and Constitution based checks) but because it's burn instead of regular damage you can't just use a wand of Lesser Restoration to remove it.

This gets painful quick which is the problem and puts a strict limit on usage (even if you have the hp for it persisting 3 spells will likely kill you) but leaves it able to be used to Quicken a spell you really need Quickened, Maximize that emergency blasting spell, or Still or Silence something. It would push it more towards a sorcerer option than a wizard one with using blood being an emergency option when you need a spell that metamagic would push above your maximum spell level, but without a maximum hit point cost that is roughly commensurate (~1 hp per 2 class levels per level you shave) you're going to be running into problems already.

Also the percentage version you were currently considering has a major flaw as written out.


As an idea: What if rather than subtracting the desired Spell Level from your HP for X hours, you make the cost be current HP/Spell Level, so using your example of adding metamagic to a Fireball, if I have 100 HP (just an example number), applying metamagic costs 25 HP (100 HP/Spell Level 4). That would shift the balance, though it may be too overpowered in the other direction.

Notably that if I use Maximize on the Fireball (Spell level 6) I take only 15 or 16 hp (100/6) and if I try to Empower it as well I take 12 or 13 damage (100/8). You'd need a different method, possibly something like damage equal to 10% of your maximum time spell level increase (this would mean if you had 100 hp and wanted a free quicken it would deal... 40 damage), this is big in combat, too big without easy healing (which really is a playstyle thing, I've had games with almost no healing, games where everyone assumed someone else would provide the healing, games where the party could be assumed to start every fight at half health, games where they had multiple wands of CLWs and started burning through 10 charges in a combat, games where everyone had suped up Cure spells as a cleric of their level and they could heal to half health without expending those resources*, games where most of the party started things at half health except the one dude who could fully heal out of combat, never one where the whole party could but I know several ways starting at ~6th level to do that), but meaningless if they're using it to Extend and PERSIST spells. The easy solution is to not allow it to be applied to apply Extend or Persist to spells**, but that's a little unflavorful in my opinion as I associate blood magic with giving permanency to the spell not just power, it makes it more real, more anchored. 5% might work for a max hp reduction per spell level but that makes it quite limited and it might be better to just take Sudden X except Sudden Quicken has an insane list of prereqs and there is no Sudden Persist and 30% of your max hp might be worth a free persisted spell.

Another thing you need to consider is whether this can be used to push the effective level above what you'd normally be able to cast. For example I'm a 5th level wizard (minimum to cast Fireball) could I use Blood Magic to Silence it? Normally this would use a 4th level spell slot (I have none) now it'd use a 3rd and X resource. I personally want to lean towards "yes you could" but it is a lot harder to balance with yes you could (at 17th level I persist Shapechange), with a no it means sure you can persist a level 1 spell without using a 7th level slot at 13th level and the balance gets a lot looser.

>.> May have contemplated blood magic before
<.<


I'd be wary of doing blood magic like this and just using hp as a cost, even if you're subtracting from max hp. The issues interacting with temporary hp don't just stem from the intial cost, temporary hp also allow a character (under certain circumstances at least) to cover their 10% remaining hp with a nice big buffer and thus sticking around to fight for plenty of time after the hp has been paid. The Con burn idea is a rather more effective limiter, but then again I usually find myself agreeing with Zaydos for some reason. O_o

I wondered why you say it causes too many issues, not disagreeing but certainly curious as to your reasoning. Truth be told I'd be even harsher if offering this sorta thing, I would make the sacrifice be a negative level per spell level increase, since it allows a caster to meta their highest level spells AT LEAST a couple of times in a single encounter, and wizards already get enough toys!

Regardless, I shall keep looking in on this because I've liked the literary concept of blood magic for a long time, and honestly haven't seen/noticed anything in 3.5 which does it justice (both the pros and the cons in good balance). If anyone wants to link me something though....this is the playground after all...:smallwink:

I don't know any. I will note that it's not really worth it to take negative levels ever unless pushing the spell level above your max and even then it's really questionable because... I take 4 negative levels to Quicken my 7th level spell, at Lv 13 I lose 4 of my highest level spell slots. Negative levels start stripping you of spell slots and while they won't eat all of them they eat them fast and if I use it on anything other than my highest currently available slot (say to Silence a Fireball at Lv 7) I lose a slot of my highest level in addition.

That said negative levels are a potentially interesting limiter for this type of thing I haven't toyed with (I typically go to ability burn). It can be healed but restoration is expensive. Might work for a class built around it. I don't have time for a Blood Mage base class right now.

On that note I think there was a blood mage base class for the first MUHA contest on these forums http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?246322-Mixed-Ultimate-Homebrew-Arts-Contest-I-Power-has-a-Price&p=13606660 I don't remember much about it, though.

Veklim
2014-07-02, 06:58 PM
The spell slot losses were intentional, and part of the limiting factor I'd personally impose. Yes, I'm that harsh when we're talking about a 13th level wizard putting metas on 7th level spells... I can live with con burn, because it imposes a reasonable limit , but there are still plenty of ways to ensure your con is nice and high, which is why my prefence still lies with level itself, because that will be STRICTLY limited.

I've considered tackling blood magic with this in mind for a while, but I fear a bit of collaboration would be needed if I were to make it solid.

TechnOkami
2014-07-03, 12:56 AM
So after comparing Con Burn vs HP Reduction, I feel that Con Burn would surprisingly be the better of the two. I was originally going to say that 6 Con Burn felt a box excessive, but Persist Spell is a +6 Metamagic feat, so this is actually a very sound method to have a "Blood Mage" kind of character.

Hanuman
2014-07-03, 05:27 AM
Ozodrin uses HP to cast spells, but with some major restrictions and it has multiple ways of regaining HP.

TechnOkami
2014-07-03, 08:51 AM
Ozodrin uses HP to cast spells, but with some major restrictions and it has multiple ways of regaining HP.

I thought Ozodrin just had like, Eldritch Horror hair and waved it at people.

Syne
2014-07-03, 11:45 AM
Some years ago I saw a class that I think was called bio-something (e.g. biomage, biomancer). You had a limited number of points you could spend on casting spells and/or using abilities and when you ran out you died. You couldn't regain them in any way, as far as I recall. The idea seemed crazy to me, but it seemed to be well presented, and it might interest you. I tried to find it, but couldn't. Maybe someone else knows what I'm talking about.

I totally agree with Zaydos about the Constitution burn. You may want to restrict multiple applications of the feat, because a player might surprise you with a particularly nasty combo that might actually cause narrative problems (e.g. one-shotting the BBEG before he gets a chance to say 'hi').

Don't count on the character regaining 1 point of ability burn per day. Taking Mind Over Body (XPH) means that even Constitution burn will only take a few days to heal, without resting*. In addition, a day of bed rest can let you recover 4 burn points, if you have a nurse. The feat Faster Healing doubles this, but the prerequisites are difficult for arcane casters.

Players that invest in this will probably be capaable of safely burning 2 to 8 points and recovering them all the next day, depending on their level and Constitution score, or burning twice that and recovering it after a day of rest. However, all of this costs feats and gold, so it's not really cheap. I think it's balanced, overall.

Finally, dump the idea of shoveling the cost onto someone else. The problem with this is that it's either too powerful outright (if the cost is too low), and that if you increase the cost (such as doubling the Constitution burn) it would only be useful if you intended to abuse it, such as by shoveling the ability burn onto followers. There really is no sweet spot here. It's unlikely anyone else will be built for regaining ability burn, and other party members probably need hit points and Constitution to do their jobs.

* Actually, the people who wrote that feat don't seem to know how natural healing works in D&D, so I'm not really sure.

Epsilon Rose
2014-07-03, 12:46 PM
I'm not such a big fan of ability burn, mainly because of how long it takes to restore and how many things it dings. It basically puts bloodmagic on a per adventure resource that you really don't want to spend, so it can be hard to use it effectively in the middle of a multi-day dungeon or quest without lots of down time. I think giving someone a really shiny toy and then, effectively, saying "you can't use this" isn't a particularly good design choice. Especially when considering the extremely limited build resource they're giving up to get it.

Hanuman
2014-07-03, 02:51 PM
I thought Ozodrin just had like, Eldritch Horror hair and waved it at people.
Well, click the link and check the Organ feature in 3.0 and Organ Casting in 8.0.