Refining a Magic Flail

[Phoenix042]

So my group is doing a rework of an old 3.5 game into 5E. That group had a lot of custom designed magic items, and I'm trying to redesign them all in 5E with fewer finicky pluses and more satisfying and fun powers and features.

On that note, here's one of the items, a Flail meant for a melee THF barbarian-fighter character:



Blood Flail
Weapon (Flail), Very Rare (Requires Attunement by a Worshiper of the God of Sacrifice)

This unique flail is attached to its handle by an abnormally long chain. The pommel is spiked, and the entire flail is made of the same black metal. When you attune to the weapon, the chain pulses with a subtle red hue, in time to the beating of your heart. When you draw blood with this weapon, you can feel a sense of eagerness from it, as if it thirsts for more.
This Flail has the Heavy and Versatile (2d6) properties.

Indomitable Ferocity
While attuned to the Blood Flail, you can use Constitution instead of Charisma for intimidation checks. When you make an intimidation check, you can use a bonus action to deal 3 points of damage to yourself in a display of brutal devotion to the god of Sacrifice, gaining advantage on your check.

Blood Scent
If you have dealt damage to a creature with this weapon within the last 24 hours, you can automatically track that creature without making wisdom (survival) checks.

Mortal Harvest
When you score a critical hit with this weapon or reduce a creature to 0 hit points with it, you gain a number of temporary hit points equal to twice your proficiency bonus.



I'd like to add a feature that allows the wielder to trade HP directly for some kind of relevant offensive power, but I'm not sure what yet. I hesitate to just stack damage on top of the character's already superb damage dealing capability...

I also worry that Mortal Harvest might be a bit much combined with a new power on top of everything else.

Help? Thoughts?

EDIT: Ideas so far.

1) 19-20 crit.
2) 3 charges, on a hit take damage to smite foe
3) Issue a command, but with a save against your intimidate check result (possibly as a bonus action? Limited by charges?)
4) Extended-reach whirlwind attack (hit all foes within 10ft).

[Gastronomie]

Indomitable Ferocity and Blood Scent are flavor abilities that are occasionally useful, but not very important during actual combat. (Also, by RAW a player may ask the DM if he can make CON or STR Intimidation checks from the start, so it's sorta irrelevant.)

Mortal Harvest is more or less similar to the Fiend Patron Warlock's level 1 ability, except weaker at higher levels (does get better when Raging, though).

Given the Flame Tongue is Rare, if you want to make it Very Rare, I'll add stuff like:
Has 3 charges. When you hit, you can expend 1 charge to take 1d6 damage and increase the damage of the attack by 3d8.
Crits on a roll of 19 or 20.

Or possibly even more, if it's to be Very Rare - then again, if your other players are not so very powerful compared to the Barbarian, even above could be over-the-top. How powerful are your other players? Maintaining balance between players is much more important than balancing a single custom magical weapon.

[Phoenix042]

How powerful are your other players? Maintaining balance between players is much more important than balancing a single custom magical weapon.

Thanks for your quick and thoughtful response! I really appreciate it.

The PC's are all fairly optimized; one is a Warlock 2 / Sorc 3 / Bard 5 favoring blasting and social powers, plus buffing the others. The other is a UA Deepstalker 5 / Assassin 3 / War Cleric 2, using Crossbow Expert. They both have magic weapons too, and I'm working on those as well.

The barbarian in question has the best consistent damage and lots of resources for spiking it, but the ranger/rogue does more damage with surprise (and still great damage otherwise) plus has lots of stealth and utility skills and powers, while the sorlock has decent blasting power, AoE damage (fireball), and excellent social skills, plus some buffing abilities and lots of situational powers (cantrips and 1st level rituals).



Of your suggestions, I really like the expanded crit range because it synergizes with GWM and with Mortal Harvest. The 3/day mini-smites are basically the default I was considering, and obviously ALSO synergize with the expanded crit range (I see what you did there), plus since it's limited per day instead of per short rest, it spreads the extra damage out a little more.

I'm just new to this level of play (10th level characters) and I don't really know what to expect for damage output. Obviously this is a character that built for pretty much JUST damage and mobility, so...

Oh, and the sorlock went fiend pact, so the temporary HP thing would be on both of them.

[Gastronomie]

You're welcome. :3

I see - quite an optimized party, it seems (though it's hard to actually make a weak character in 5e). Based on given information, I'm pretty well sure that my original proposal wouldn't break the game at all. As for my suggestion, I'll stick with my original idea in my first post.

And yeah, I certainly did put build synergy into account when designing the weapon. Its effects are probably closer to Rare than Very Rare, but given how synergetic the Barbarian's abilities are with it (including constant advantage), it's just as strong as a normal Very Rare weapon when equipped by that particular character.

Personally I'd be careful about Whirlwind Attack. It can possibly step on the toes of AoE Blasters, and with constant advantage via Barbarian it's brutal. Add the fact it's normally a level 11 Ranger (Hunter) ability. Maybe 1/day, or require expending a charge? At least unlimited Whirlwind Attack is too much IMO.