Playable Succubus

[Jeivar]

I've thought about going old-fashioned and playing a "vile temptress" as a joke, meaning a female Tiefling Sorcerer with a lot of charm-related spells. Then I thought, why not just a scaled-down Succubus?

The idea is that these are the result of proper succubi abandoning their offspring on the mortal plane. What do you folks think? I'm trying not to go too overpowered, while still getting that evil temptress feel.



+2 Charisma, +1 Dexterity

Proficient with the Persuasion skill

Two forms: A succubus has one natural human form, whose skin, hair and eye colour is derived from her mortal father. Her other form has crimson skin, small horns, wings, and claws. She cannot use the wings or claws in her human form. Switching forms takes a full turn of concentration.

Flight: In her alternate form the succubus can fly at 30 feet per turn. She cannot be wearing medium or heavy armour, and she must remain in motion or fall to the ground.

Claws: The succubus is proficient with her claws, dealing 1d4 slashing damage.

Induce lust: Through a conversation, extended eye contact or physical presence a succubus can make a Persuasion check against the target’s Wisdom saving throw. On a success the target feels overpowering sexual lust for the succubus, and will go to almost any lengths to sate it. The effect lasts for as long as the succubus is in the target’s presence, or until contact has been broken for an hour.

Succubus hunger: A succubus must engage in a sex act at least once a week, or lose 2 points of Constitution each week, eventually resulting in her death. A single sex act restores two points. Her partner suffers 2 levels of the Exhausted condition for each comleted sex act. The succubus can choose to have normal intercourse if she desires.

Charm Person: Once per long rest a succubus may cast the Charm Person spell, using Charisma as her spellcasting ability

Controlled pregnancy: A succubus cannot become pregnant unless she wishes to. Her child will always be a full-blooded succubus, born in her human form. Her succubus form and hunger manifests during puberty.

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Overpowered? Underpowered?

Do you think I should maybe give her some benefit for "feeding" while sated?

[jiriku]

I would make the hunger involuntary, and clarify what is meant by "almost any length" in the Induce Lust description. Also, Induce Lust overlaps pretty heavily with Charm Person, and you may not need both.

[Ninja_Prawn]

My instincts also point to Induce Lust as the problem element here. At first blush, it seems to be very powerful. Granted you've got the 'hunger' drawback, but for me, that's not a serious drawback. Plus you can use it as a weapon to inflict exhaustion on people you don't like.

Also, I'd reconsider the ability score damage, unless that's something that's already a feature of your game for other reasons. Max HP reduction might be neater and more consistent with existing mechanics.

[Anymage]

Induce Lust is both very swingy, and very risky. Swingy, in that one failed save means that you have something very strong over any NPC you chose. Risky, in that "almost any length" has no reason to be concerned with your pleasure or indeed safety. "If I misuse this, rape my character" could conceivably be balanced, but it's not something I'd feel comfortable with at a table.

Losing Con, as mentioned, isn't really a thing 5e does. Losing max HP, losing HD, or unremovable fatigue levels work better. It's also a ribbon drawback; while adventuring, you'll have friends who'll take the occasional exhausted day to keep you fed. If you're in town, the drawback is negligible. And while in theory you could exhaust an enemy to death with this, any enemy who lets their guard down around a hostile PC is basically dead already.

Hunger, Pregnancy, and Two Forms are basically ribbon abilities. Induce Lust, again, is swingy and could really stand to be rewritten. Remove those, you get a skill proficiency, a 1/day spell, flight, and a weak backup weapon. (Although the claws could really use the Light property, since this is 5e.) I'm not a huge fan of flight granting races in general. But when compared to the ones that do exist, it seems okay.

[pygmybatrider]

How do you expect Induce Lust and Succubus Hunger to look at the table? Playing devils advocate for a bit, there seem to be way more ways this could go wrong than go right. Induce Lust doesn’t have any restrictions on humanoids only - does it work on a bear? An ankheg? A skeleton?

“I want to use Induce Lust on the BBEG Wizard”

“He casts Hold Person...give me a Wis save.”

“I failed...”

Yick.

“Induce Lust on the orc champion.”

“He grapples and shoves with Athletics Expertise.”

Yick.

Similarly, Succubus Hunger seems to encourage one of the most maligned caricatures of DnD in all the horror stories. Obviously, all tables are different and there are definitely tables where it could work no problem, but for many, I can see this being a sore point week by week.

“Hey adventuring buddies, I really need to bang somebody tonight or I am going to feel much weaker tomorrow. Who’s up for it?”

“Alright, you all get back to town after clearing out the bandit cove. The mayor thanks you and gives you your reward and sends you on your way. What do you do?”

“Id like to go to the temple of my god and lay an offering.”

“I want to back to the blacksmith - I finally have enough for plate!”

“I want to go gamble at the local thieves guild.”

“I need to go have sex with three people at once to get the devil out of me for the week.”

Outside those two, stat boosts seem appropriate, Charm Person is fine - you might even consider giving them Suggestion too at 3rd or 5th, and fight is flight and carries with it all the issues that other flight races experience.

For me, I’d scrap the two sex-based ribbon features, give them Suggestion to reinforce the charm/seduction theme, and either remove flight or grant it at a later level and/or add the caveat that you need to start and finish your turn on the ground.

[Sariel Vailo]

Looks fun but their is only one way to find out how this acts. Plaaaaaaay test,also as to the succubus hunger gow would it interract with the higher tier classes that no longer need to eat or drink. Also if you are open to suggestion if they can fly limit it to light and medium armors. Give them the option to sate their carnal hunger and not have to eat all day for that 24 hour period since the last act of carnal hunger. If its way more of a necessity make them unable to regain spent hit dice unless CARNAL HUNGER is sated.