Balancing player curse.

[Snig]

Hey guys on creating a new character based off the movie Princess Mononoke and I'd like to implement a similar type of demon curse upon like character. after a little research I came upon this article which thematically seems spot-on but it's possible it may need some tweaking. Does anybody have any ideas input or suggestions?

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qb74VN0dQCPc-jsGe3sM5nRk5WxPwwpP6CXK6MZ4m1U/edit?usp=drivesdk

[Lupine]

Hold up. First, explain the story you want, it a bit better.

[Snig]

The curse upon the forest is caused by humans greed as they destroy and pollute while harvesting natural resources, turning the creatures there into demons. My character is a druid / ranger who lives in the forest, and contracted the disease after defending her village from demonic boar God. she must have said it to find a cure for heart disease and stop the source of corruption an attempt to save the forest.

[Onos]

Having looked at it, I honestly think you're better off brewing something more suited from scratch - it sounds like you want the player's actions to impact the curse and that you want them to be cured in the end, neither of which is brilliantly dealt with here. I'm also extremely leery of adding "insta-kill" to 5e, as that throws encounter balance completely out the window. At the moment, that even bypasses Legendary Resistance.

This works as a thematic guide, but I'd change pretty much all the mechanics to better support what you're after. Just off the top of my head I'd suggest a small resource pool which can be refreshed as a bonus action at risk of increasing severity, allowing the resource to be used either A) as a free action and it purely buffs existing abilities or B) incorporate it like a gestalt class, so you're granting new abilities but they fall in line with class design and action economy.