Spells Or A Special Situation That Gives A Yuan-Ti Emotions

[watergal336]

Hey! So before I ask my question, I'll warn you I'm quite new to Dungeons and Dragons, and this forum, so please be gentle if I am completely misinformed on my subject and/or mess up. Just tell me and I'll take it into account, thank you! :smallsmile:

I had the idea for a Yuan-ti Pureblood wizard, studying magic because in her past, something magical changed her and 'unlocked' her emotions. She does not live in her tribe anymore, studying privately away from them, and she wants to figure out what changed her so she can re-unlock emotions for her tribe for their benefit. I'll spare the details as to why she thinks her tribes will want this for the sake of irrelevance to what I'm asking, even though I know that Yuan-ti believed this blending of snake and human is the perfect being and a lack of emotions are a benefit, but I have reasonings for this.

What I don't have is how her emotions were unlocked. I don't necessarily want her born with the defect or changed by a god if I/we can think of another way, because I feel it wouldn't make as much sense for her to be studying magic if that was the case. There are no spells in any Book or Homebrew site that I know of that covers this particular situation, not really to my surprise as it's not exactly a commonly shared trait among races, and I also would love opinions on what school this would come under, as Enchantment is most likely it, but I find it's more meddling and trickery than helping.

Can't wait to hear your ideas for this, it'll really help me out!

Edit: Just looked at a definition of Transmutation saying the school can "change the properties of a creature, object or environment." Do more experienced players think this applies to this situation more?

[Unoriginal]

Things that could have done it:

-magical events/effects found in the environment

-magical experiment gone wrong

-divine or near-divine (demon lord, vestige, etc) messing with the PC's mind

-spirits from the Feywild/Shadowfell messing with the PC's emotional states.

-planar influence from traveling in the Great Wheel.

[Wilko]

No specific spell I can think of but how about having it be a curse which has bound the soul of another creature to the yuan-ti with it's emotions bleeding through, which would give some good role-play options where she isn't sure if the emotions are coming from her or the spirit...

[Eriol]

I'd look into "outsider" (mind flayers, beholders, other non-planar beings) influence. They screw with things. You can "explain" just about anything through that. The Far Lands have that kind of effect of taking "laws" and making them "not anymore." Maybe they were simply born too close to an outsider event? Magical backwash? Something that way.

If you go that way, you can always work in a hatred of warlocks that work with such powers too. Give them a nemesis that way. And have them hate that they hate so much, as it's another emotion.

Rich stuff here IMO.

[TheMoxiousOne]

What I don't have is how her emotions were unlocked. I don't necessarily want her born with the defect or changed by a god if I/we can think of another way, because I feel it wouldn't make as much sense for her to be studying magic if that was the case.

Honestly, I think it would be far more interesting to just sya your character has simply been that way as long as she can remember. Talk to your GM first, and have your character discover how and why she was this way. Not only does this add a plot hook for the gm to exploit, but it also adds an air of uncertainty and mystery in your character the further embellishes her uniqueness, even among her own people. I also remember reading somewhere that all Yuan-Ti Pureblood PCs are supposed to be different from their brethren, but one that they are not born with/don't know why they have it could make for an amazing side quest! :smallsmile:

EDIT: Second thought to this, it is entirely possible that, in a highly well-thought, but amoral decision of your people, your character felt... something. Her becoming a recluse to study and expand her magic knowledge could be dual-purposed to exploring and expanding her emotional knowledge and depth

[Unoriginal]

Something we have to remember is that spells are only the tip of the iceberg that is magic.

[solidork]

A 9th level bestow curse lasts until it's dispelled, and is freeform enough to do something like this. Maybe a powerful hag killed someone close to you and cursed you so that you could be devastated by sadness at their loss, with the side effect of also allowing you to experience other emotions.

[Mjolnirbear]

Of the spells I'm aware of... Bestow Curse fits the bill. A highly variable spell that can do a lot of things. Per RAW it'll need a high-level spell slot to have any kind of duration.

You can have it also be Confusion. While RAW it doesn't explicitly affect the emotions, you can simply have the reason the spell worked in this case be a series of volatile, chaotic, illogical emotion.

Finally I'd look at an illusion like Phantasmal Force. The spell is highly customizable and can still have very real effects.

The problem with these spells is that they're not changes to your physiology nor are they necessarily permanent. You might try a True Polymorph spell to turn into a 'yuan-ti, but with emotions' but as a DM I'd nix that. You can also try Alter Self which can change parts of you (like your brain) but that doesn't have a long enough duration and crucially means you did it to yourself, something that sounds implausible for your purposes.