The Maho-Tsukai's Tainted Handbook

[Ger. Bessa]

The Maho-Tsukai Tainted Handbook

Introduction: The Maho-Tsukai isn’t a new class as it comes from the 3.0 era, from the Oriental Adventures. Originally ported from L5R (and L5R fans will tell you that Shugenjas and Maho have been done dirty by D&D), the class will serve as basis for two other prestige classes trying to make the Taint mechanic playable, the Tainted Sorcerer and the Tainted Scholar. These classes give a power spike from the get go, but make you addicted to their mechanic.

The Maho-Tsukai (also refered to as "Blood Sorcerer" in the Rokugan setting, although the words mean "Magic User" in Japanese. Thanks DMVerdandi) is quite unique in that it supplants your previous casting and turn it into more Maho casting. While most prestige classes progressing casting keep the previous mechanics (a Wizard Archmage still casts like a Wizard, and a Sorcerer Archmage still casts like a Sorcerer), a Maho-Tsukai is first and always a Maho-Tsukai, whether he started as a Wizard, Sorcerer, Adept or Bard.

I stumbled upon this class as I was looking for ways to combine the Spirit Binding spells (normally exclusive to the Wu Jen) with Undead rebuking for fun and harmless (not!) minionmancy. The class felt so unique yet could be combined with virtually any caster, arcane or divine and added quite a few spells to the list of any class. Every class can gain at least some decent spells out of the conversion, be it Spirit Binding, Enervation, Apparition, Desecrate, Magic Jar, the Summon Monster line or a volley of Save-or-Die.

So I had to explore the forbidden depths of blood sorcery, and I had to share my findings.

I The Taint mechanic

1. What is Taint ?
Taint is an optional mechanic first introduced for Dungeons and Dragons 3rd edition in Oriental Adventures, tied to the Shadowlands of the Rokugan setting. It is nearly copy-pasted in Unearthed Arcana stripped of its setting dependency and got a significant overhaul in Heroes of Horror that unfortunately completely broke the tainted spellcasting.



It represents the warping and lasting influence of major evils on places, items and creatures through a Taint score. A score of zero means that you are unaffected, exposure to evil can give you your first point and the higher the score, the more tainted you are. Once sufficiently tainted, you start spreading that taint to what you interact with. If you wear protective items, they absorb the taint in your stead and break down in weeks or days, becoming akin to radioactive waste.


Taint warps your body and your mind and applies handicaps to your character. Of course it is possible to embrace the taint to gain power from it. Each book where it appeared presents two prestige classes for characters willing to do so, a martial one (Maho-Bujin in Oriental Adventures, Tainted Warrior in Unearthed Arcana and Corrupt Avenger in Heroes of Horror) and one for casters (Maho-Tsukai in Oriental Adventures, Tainted Sorcerer in Unearthed Arcana and Tainted Scholar). While they aren’t really made to coexist, the same way the Prestige Paladin shouldn’t be available if the Paladin base class is, they are mechanically distinct enough that one could reasonably ask how they compare.


Moderately tainted characters should be nongood and severely tainted characters should be evil as a rule of thumb (more below).


2. The Old Taint (Oriental Adventures and Unearthed Arcana)



Taint in both Oriental Adventures and Unearthed Arcana is a single score that applies to both your constitution and your wisdom an effective malus, greatly weakening your saves and your maximum health. At 25%, 50% and 75% of your ability score you also get mild, moderate and severe taint symptoms that have no mechanical impact on your character’s abilities, but make hiding his taint from others harder.


In both books, if your taint goes up to 10, you lose control of your character to the DM. The same happens if it equals your constitution (killing you and animating your corpse as an Undead) or your wisdom. Getting rid of taint is hard, and in Oriental Adventures you can never get rid of your last point of Taint. Unearthed Arcana requires the Atonement spell plus a serious quest for that last point. The rest of your score can be controlled with spells like Remove Disease, Remove Curse and Heal (not easily accessible to a low level party) and only slowly. I’ll call this kind of Taint Free Taint (Free as “able to move”).


Creatures that are the origin of Taint usually do not suffer from Taint. They do not apply their Taint score as a malus to any ability score and show no sign of mild, moderate or severe Taint. They cannot become more tainted through exposure to other sources of taint (like spending time in an evil place or casting evil spells). Their Taint score is calculated from their charisma depending on their Type/Subtype. I’ll call this kind of taint Fixed Taint.


In Oriental Adventures, those creatures are


Creatures with the [Shadowlands] subtype, whose Taint score is half their charisma, rounded down.
Undeads, whose Taint score is half their charisma rounded down + 1.
Outsiders with the [Evil] subtype, whose Taint score is half their charisma, rounded down + 2.



No creature in Oriental Adventures in these categories has listed LA. More in the races section.


In Unearthed Arcana those creatures are


Undeads, whose Taint score is half their charisma rounded down + 1.
Outsiders with the [Evil] subtype, whose Taint score is half their charisma, rounded down + 2.


Creatures with the [Evil] subtype who aren’t outsiders or undead should have a taint score but suffer from it.


All in all the Old Taint is a mechanic that cripples characters fast, taxes the party’s ressources and forces downtime recuperation. The lost effective constitution and wisdom eat at the character’s “Point buy” and makes gentle breezes quite lethal. If placed on the party’s path by the DM they have little choice but to stock on jade amulets and prey their saves will do enough. They can “bring it” into the campaign by researching tainted spells (Maho spells) or summoning fiends, if the DM allows it.

3. The New Taint (Heroes of Horror)




In the old system, each point of taint could have a massive impact on a character, so Heroes of Horror seems to have tried to add granularity in the system. Taint is now split in Physical Taint, called Corruption, and Mental Taint called Depravity. The maximum amount you can have is still based on Constitution (for Corruption) and Wisdom (for Depravity) but you can now have far greater amounts of each with decent ability scores, as they do not apply as a malus anymore.

With a score of 13 (or more), your limit is in the fifties, and with a 17, you can nearly reach the seventies. The penalty of taint is now mechanically in the symptoms for mild, moderate and severe corruption and depravity. Each time you reach a new threshold, you roll for a symptom on a table that now has a real impact on your character like reduced movement speed, initiative, or limited combat turns before becoming nauseated for the encounter.


To invite players to play with the mechanic and not just purge the taint at the earliest opportunity, moderate and severe taint also grant you bonus feats, and these feats scale with your level of taint. Some are quite powerful and can be used for qualifications in prestige classes.


Any creature with the [Evil] subtype now uses Fixed Taint, with both Corruption and Depravity equals to half Charisma for non-outsiders, non-undead creature, and no symptom.


There is also now an effect for receiving taint in combat in large amounts. Corruption can sicken or nauseate you, and depravity can stun or daze you. This is more an effect of the monsters that can impart Taint than something that characters who want to use taint should worry about, since those characters should have high constitution and wisdom anyway.


There are now specific templates for creatures succumbing to taint (Tainted Minion for corruption and Tainted Raver for Depravity). They are meant to be how the DM takes control of your character, but if you want to play with those templates, look at the LA assignment thread.


In the end, Fixed Taint remains unchanged from the old system while Free Taint can now go far further than PC ability score should reach at the same levels. Let’s hope this doesn’t break anything…

[Ger. Bessa]

II Tainted Spellcasting

1. The Classes


Comparaison:




Maho-Tsukai
Tainted Sorcerer
Tainted Scholar


Prerequisite
Alignment: Nongood
Base Will save: +4
Concentration 8 ranks
Knowledge (Shadowlands) 4 ranks
Taint score 4 or higher
Ability to cast 1st level spells
Must have learned from a Maho-Tsukai or a Shadowlands Oni.
Alignment: Nongood
Base Will save: +4
Concentration 8 ranks
Knowledge (Arcana) 4 ranks
Taint score 4 or higher
Ability to cast 1st level spells
Must have learned from a Tainted Sorcerer or a Fiend.
Concentration 8 ranks
Knowledge (Arcana) 4 ranks
Mild depravity or higher
Ability to cast 1st level arcane spells.


Progesses
Spell Conversion
Any previous
Any previous Arcane


Classe features
At first level
At first level
Mostly at first level, but no dead level



Common features:

Tainted Spellcasting: The core of these classes, and what makes them tempting for characters with mediocre ability scores. The character replaces his casting stat with taint. They now determines the maximum spell level they can cast and their bonus spells with (10 + their Taint score) or (10 + their Depravity score), and the DC of their spells is now (10 + spell level + their Taint score) or (10 + spell level + their Corruption score). Remember when the new taint system allowed taint scores in the fifties or sixties ? Yeah, that’s where everything breaks with Free Taint characters when at ECL 6 you have better casting stats than epic monsters and divinities. I chose to call it Free Taint because it is beyond cheap. Nowhere near as broken with Fixed Taint characters or the old system.

Blood Component: Any inexpensive component is replaced by a drop of blood. The Tainted caster deals themselves 1 damage as a free action while casting. Additionally, the Maho-Tsukai and the Tainted Sorcerer can deal more damage instead of expensive components. They can also use the blood of a willing or helpless donor. Available at first level for each class.

Maho/Tainted/Blooded Metamagic: Different name but basically the same feature. You can take constitution damage instead of level adjustment for metamagic feats that you have. You can not exceed the maximum level of spells that you can naturally cast. If you can cast 5th level spells, you can empower (+2) a fireball (3rd) with this ability by taking 2 constitution damage and using a 3rd level spell slot, but can’t maximize (+3) that fireball until you’re able to cast 6th level spells. Strong and leverages your low level spell slots, but not as broken as DMM, Incantatrix, Spelldancing and other forms of persistomancy.

Taint Suppression: Only useful for Free Taint Characters. Unfortunately, Free taint characters are still very frail in the old system and completely broken in the new system.

Level Advancement: These classes give a taste of true power to the characters who take them, and it becomes very hard to take levels in other classes once started. Each time they level up, they must succeed a will save based on their Taint (Depravity for the Tainted Scholar) or be forced to take another level in the Tainted prestige class. As a caster, you should have a pretty good will save, but since you probably want your casting stat (which is Taint) pretty high, it might be harder than you think.


[Rant] On why the tainted scholar is the most disappointing class among those three:

This is my personal opinion, but beside the change to Taint in Heroes of Horror that allows characters with Free Taint to get casting stats over fifty, there was a simplicity to the Maho-Tsukai and Tainted Sorcerer who received a power spike at first level and then lost at each subsequent level where they stayed in the class since it had no feature and poor Will save, making escaping from it even harder. You are supposed to dip the class and then take as many other casting prestige classes as possible to boost your Will save.

The Tainted Scholar grants minor benefits on odd levels after the first (including at 9th level an xp free limited wish in exchange of a Geas/Quest for a Fiend 1/day) and strong will saves, and Lorekeeper-style secrets every even level, including the Blooded Metamagic that is the easiest secret to get (but none is hard since it’s based on your depravity, which should at least be around 10). There is also a secret that lets you add your Depravity to a Will save 1/day. That’s right. There is a class feature in the class that lets you ignore the Level Advancement Clause of the class.

So the Tainted Scholar looks like a “modern” Tainted Sorcerer with no empty level and player choices, but misses the Taint patch in the same book and the emergent features of the previous classes. You are never forced to take more than 4 levels (2 if you don’t care about Blooded Metamagic) and it’s Arcane only. And since Maho/Tainted Metamagic are obtained at level 1 and Blood Components got nerfed, it’s weaker than both of it’s predecessor. That’s right, Tainted Scholar is SRICTLY WORSE than two other prestige classes.


2. On Fixed Taint Characters


If you are Undead or Outsider [Evil] (or just [Evil] as of HoH), you have a Fixed Taint score of half your charisma rounded down, +1 if Undead and +2 if Outsider. Using you Taint (or Depravity) as a casting stat can be better or worse than simply using your normal stat, which could be Charisma. Lets compare the 2 for highest level spell and bonus spells per day:

Without being Undead or Outsider:


Charisma
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17


Taint
5
5
6
6
7
7
8
8


Effective Stat
15
15
16
16
17
17
18
18





Charisma
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25


Taint
9
9
10
10
11
11
12
12


Effective Stat
19
19
20
20
21
21
22
22


We can see that you would be better off using Charisma for your bonus spells per day if you had a charisma above 20. You would still be better off with taint for the DC of your spells though ;D

If you are Undead:


Charisma
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17


Taint
6
6
7
7
8
8
9
9


Effective Stat
16
16
17
17
18
18
19
19





Charisma
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25


Taint
10
10
11
11
12
12
13
13


Effective Stat
20
20
21
21
22
22
23
23


As an Undead, the tipping point is now at 22. Above, you would have better spells per day with charisma.

If you are Outsider [Evil]:


Charisma
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17


Taint
7
7
8
8
9
9
10
10


Effective Stat
17
17
18
18
19
19
20
20





Charisma
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25


Taint
11
11
12
12
13
13
14
14


Effective Stat
21
21
22
22
23
23
24
24


As an Outsider [Evil], the tipping point is at 24. Once more, this is only for spells per day and maximum spell level you can cast (and at the tipping point, you can already cast 9th level spells)

For spell DC, it is always better to use taint over Charisma. If you are non-Undead, non-Outsider [Evil], using Taint always add +5 to your spell DC. As an Undead, Taint always add +6 to your spell DC and as an Outsider [Evil], Taint always add +7 to your spell DC. That’s right. You get the benefice of 3.0 Red Mage or Archmage in one level dip at level 6. Scary good (as in scary and good).


3. Playable races for Fixed Taint

I’ll assume that you don’t want to touch the Free Taint system. That’s a can of worms that Kyuss wouldn’t touch with an 11-feet jade pole. The following races would get Fixed Taint without loosing too many casting levels in Racial Hit Die (HD) or Level Adjustment (LA)

[Shadowlands] Subtype (Oriental Adventures only)

No race with the [Shadowlands] subtype has defined LA. Let’s all raise our hands and give our energy to the valiants participants of the LA assignment thread. Nonetheless, if the [Shadowlands] subtype doesn’t deserve significant LA, the two following races should get LA +0 (or -0).

Bakemono: 1RHD [Shadowlands] Goblin with +4 Str, +2 Con, -8 Int and -4 Cha (Ouch for a caster)
Worse than a water orc for a bruiser, and we’re trying to make a caster. Don’t try this.

Bog Hag: 2RHD [Shadowlands] Shapechanger (So Monstrous Humanoid in 3.5) with +2 Dex, +4 Con, +2 Wis and +2 Cha. Nice modifiers but 2RHD means 2 lost levels of casting progression. Could make an Ur-Priest, but that’s not for the Maho-Tsukai.

Whatever happens, don’t try to enter the class as a Naga or a Nezumi, as they can’t gain Taint at all :)

Undead Type

Necropolitan Template: Probably the easiest way to get Fixed Taint, and the Undead type grants +1 to taint. The downside is that you don’t have a Con score, so you can’t easily use Maho/Tainted/Blooded Metamagic. You also need to plan how you’ll recover the damage you take from your Blood Components, but that’s a minor inconvenience anyway.

Crypt Spawn Template: Nearly the same thing, based in the Forgotten Realms and linked to the Church of Bane. No listed LA.

Curst Template: +3 LA (Ouch) and +2 Str, -4 Int, -6 Wis and -2 Cha (Ouch Ouch Ouch) for being very hard to kill. Avoid if you can.

Vampire Template: The LA is prohibitive. Unless you use the LA Assignment Thread, do not play a vampire. If you want to play a vampire, a 6000G consumable from Ghostwalk can grant you the template.

Lich Template: Get That Lich a Phylactery, Liches love Phylacteries. As with Vampire, that’s a nasty LA. Also, you need to have a high caster level to become one, so keep that one in mind for your endgame, but start with something simpler.

The Undead races from Savage Species (Ghoul, Ghasts, Wights and co): They all have Undead RHD and LA, and thus should be avoided, especially for casters.

Outsider [Evil]

I don’t know many playable Outsiders [Evil]

Quasit and Imp: The low level Fiends with no mental penalty. 3RHD and they deserve LA with their SLAs, but your casting is gonna be late.

Diabolus (Dragon Compendium) + Divine Minion of a Mulhorandi Evil God: That gives you the Outsider + [Evil] for +2 LA (Sebek). With LA Buyoff, it’s the only way I’ve found to have Fixed Taint and constitution for the metamagic abilities of the classes.

[Ger. Bessa]

III The Maho-Tsukai Spell conversion (Or why the class is awesome)

1. What does Spell Conversion do ?

Spell conversion allows a Maho-Tsukai to convert his spellcasting abilities in another class into levels of Maho-Tsukai spellcasting. Contrary to the Tainted Sorcerer and the Tainted Scholar who progress a previous spellcasting, the Maho-Tsukai has his own progression that is basically Sorcerer but better (without the cantrips). When you take your first level of Maho-Tsukai, you turn your previous levels with spellcasting into (+1 level of Maho-Tsukai), as if Maho-Tsukai is now your base class and your base class turns into a casting progressing prestige class. Isn’t that cool ?

The Maho-Tsukai is basically a Sorcerer, but gets access to new spell levels on odd levels (like a Wizard) and has the features of Taint-based spellcasting detailed earlier (Tainted Spellcasting, Blood Component, Maho Metamagic). They can pick their spells among the spells of their former class or the Maho-Tsukai list (a lot of Necromancy, a bit of Conjuring and blasting). All their spells are Arcane (subject to Arcane Failure from armor and shields) and Maho spells (you risk getting taint just by casting them. Are you using Free Taint ? Boo).

The spell conversion can allow weird builds (and that’s why you’re reading this) and make other nearly unplayable prestige classes semi-half-not-too-terrible. More in the build section. We’ll also use the most strict reading of the ability from now on, that is:
→ The Spell Conversion only allows the conversion of one previous spellcasting into Maho-Tsukai spellcasting. Otherwise, a theurge could get 17th level spellcasting by level 11 (Necropolitan with sanctum spell Wizard 1 Archivist (or Cleric) 2 Mystic theurge 7 Maho-Tsukai 1 could convert both his Wizard 8 and Archivist 9 into Maho 18 (with the 1 level of Maho-Tsukai).
→ Levels with no spellcasting in spellcasting classes (notably Paladin, Ranger, Hexblade, Spellthief, Sohei, Savant…) do not advance Maho-Tsukai spellcasting. It wouldn’t do too many broken things, but we already boosted our DC by 5-7. It’s still very good on most of those but we shouldn’t let martials have nice things or they would start threads about wanting to be in the high Tiers.

With that done, let’s look at possible base classes


2. Which class to convert ?


Basically, it’s a good idea to apply Maho-Tsukai to a class if accelerated Sorcerer casting would be an improvement. Let’s start with the bad:

Wizard: Wizard casting is awesome, and you lose a lot by converting it into Maho. Your biggest loss is that you now have a limited amount of spells known. You also lose your cantrips (Meh) and now need Charisma. (you use Fixed Taint, right?) On the plus side, you could use the blood of your familiar to cast spells, and you get access to the awesome Spirit Binding Line and Animate Dead at level 3.

Wu Jen: Like the wizard but you don’t even add Spirit Binding since you already have it. You get Magic Jar, I guess…

Cleric: Like the Wizard, limiting yourself in spells known is awful for a cleric, as they have a lot of downtime utility that is terrible on limited spells known (like the Remove Curse spell that can lower your taint, but why would you ever need that?)

Druid: And again. Not much to say here that hasn’t been said for the cleric, except maybe that the druid has class features and thus the loss is worse. Also Charisma was probably a dump stat for you. Still, look at the build section for an attempt to save a terrible prestige class.

Shaman (OA): Like the cleric and the druid, you lose access to prepared divine magic and that’s harsh. Maybe less harsh since your spell list never received any love, but it’s still a downgrade, and you could get your hand on most of the added spells through domains anyway.

Archivist: The class introduced in Heroes of Horror thrives when he can learn all the spells. When he’s limited to 3 or 4 by spell level, he cries. Only exception is if you can pick exotic divine spells as spells known by leveling after conversion, but if your DM would let you do that, he would probably let you find the spell as a pure archivist.

Spirit Shaman: First spontaneous caster in this section, and unfortunately, the Spirit Shaman casting is superior to the Sorcerer and Maho casting in so many ways. Keep your huge list and find another way to cast Spirit Binding

Dread Necromancer: The other Heroes of Horror base class and the first fixed list caster. You were already going to go Undead (Necropolitan early, maybe Lich later) and have a great charisma. Going Maho-Tsukai bars you from a lot of spells known and negates your advanced learning as is still goes into your Dread Necromancer spells known. You also lose the ability to cast in armor as Maho spells aren’t Dread Necromancer spells. Getting Animate Dead as a level 3 spell and desecrate isn’t worth it.

Death Master (Dragon Compendium): As a wizard variant, you lose the access of your large spell list even if it’s a way smaller list than Wiz/Sor. You don’t care about Animate Dead at level 3 (you get it at level 2) but Spirit Binding might tempt you. You also have charisma for the fixed Taint and you can bottle blood for your spells, so if the flavor is what you want, go for it.

Beguiler (the class): Second fixed list caster, and like the dread necromancer you don’t want to lose the utility provided by your large list. It’s a way to get offensive options and ways to deal with undeads, and you want those, and you wouldn’t mind getting your spells one level earlier, but I still think that you’re better of without. You also lose the ability to cast in light armor as Maho spells aren’t Beguiler spells.

Paladin (All variants): First (and only) non-full caster (Savant doesn’t count) in the “should avoid” category, Maho is obviously incompatible with goody-two-shoes paladins. It’s also Arcane and thus doesn’t work with armor very well. Since Maho spells are Maho spells, they aren’t Paladin spells and you can’t use Battle Blessing, or Sword of the Arcane Order. It’s still doable on the evil versions, but nothing that you couldn’t do with things like Ur-Priest and co.

Savant (Dragon Compendium): Savant is just bad. You don’t have casting until level 5, so Spell Conversion won’t get you anything. The double casting is just weird and I don’t feel like parsing the class just to see what happens when you go Maho on Savant. Don’t play Savant. I didn't even want to put the Savant in the Handbook.

Factotum: Factotums don’t have spellcasting. For that one, they must stay on the bench with the invocation users (Warlock and Dragonfire Adepts)

For all the classes (but the last 3) above, the Tainted Sorcerer (or Tainted Scholar for the arcane ones) is a better choice if you want tainted spellcasting.

Slight improvement:

Sorcerer: If you’re not a Kobold (or one of those white dragonspawns), you gain the same benefit as the Greater Draconic Rite of Passage, as you now get new spell levels on odd levels. You add a few cool spells to your list (Apparition, Spirit Binding) and can still select the sorcerer only spells (Wings of cover/flurry, Arcane Fusion). You’ll get less bonus spells for high charisma, but +5 to +7 to your DC is probably worth it. Probably.

Favored Soul: What was bad for the cleric is awesome for you. The spells become arcane, so be careful with your armor, but you’ll have a strong list to chose from by adding powerful arcane necromancy to the cleric list (I.e. spells with greater range than touch). The only sad part is that other classes will still do better with the same build, and your god might not be happy with what you did to your gift.

Shugenja: The main caster of Rokugan, who can do many different things, but can never do all the things. You probably don’t get back your forbidden element, but you can pick your spells however you want, and that’s already a huge plus. Getting spells one level earlier and putting to use that Charisma shows that a good Shugenja is a corrupted Shugenja.

Sha’ir (Dragon Compendium): I could have put the Sha’ir in the first category, but some will find the spell retrieval mechanic too contrived and will want to make it simpler. Compared to a Sorcerer Maho, you lose the Sorcerer exclusive spells (Wings of Cover/Flurry, Arcane Fusion) and gain domain spells, among them Miracle (Luck 9). Maho might not be a big upgrade on Sha’ir, but Sha’ir is a great base for Maho. Also, if you want do go Arcane Hierophant with a Sha’ir, That’s the way to go.

Warmage: Compared to Dread Necromancer or Beguiler(the class), the warmage doesn’t lose a lot of utility. A Sorcerer wouldn’t fill his spells known with only blasting, but that’s all a warmage can do. Maho removes Warmage’s Edge, Armored Casting and Advanced Learning and that’s most of the warmage class features. In exchange, you get spells one level earlier and can pick utility from the Maho list (Apparition for Will SoL, Spirit Binding, Magic Jar…)

Strong to Huge improvement


Bard: Get level nine spells without Sublime Chord! Just for that, it’s good to have. You lose the casting in light armor, but you’ll always win on the spells known and you can combine Maho offense with Bard utility. Since you’re evil, Word of Creation isn’t an option, and Lyric Thaumaturge doesn’t work anymore as your spells are Maho.

Jester (Dragon Compendium): The same as bard since it’s a bard variant. Jester has no support outside of Dragon Compendium (and none inside either :) so you lose even less.

Adept: The NPC class gains a lot by going Maho, like the Shugenja. You lose access to Hexer though…

Ranger: Easy gish with Ranger 19/Maho-Tsukai 1 (Take that level at ECL6). 19 BAB, 9th level spells. Put those Ranger only spells in all those spell slots and if you want, you can take Abjurant Champion. You risk ASF, but rangers aren’t that high on armor to begin with. The Mystic Ranger variant gets you 3 more levels of casting, which is great!

Hexblade: Easy gish, but not as good as the ranger since the Hexblade spell list didn’t get much love. You also lose the armored casting.

Duskblade: Another gish in a can. Since you have casting from level 1, you make an even better Maho-Tsukai than Ranger or Hexblade, and the Maho spells are nasty to channel. You lose the armored casting but you can still wear the armor and just dump your high level spell slots into Arcane Strike. The biggest “regret” is that you’d love to use your high level spell slots for metamagics on your damaging spells, but as a spontaneous arcane caster, it’s a bit harder to do than with the Sorcerer list and ACFs.

Sohei (OA): Sohei is bad, but at least they have minor spellcasting from level 4 onward, so that can be salvaged. You won’t do (or get) miracles (not without Arcane Disciple at least) but from Sohei, that’s, like, really good.

Spellthief: Not that great, but you can get back the armored casting with Master Spellthief (the feat) and benefit from those sneak-attack dices on your nasty Maho spells.

Trickster Spellthief: Ding Ding Ding we have a winner! Your spell list is every Wiz/Sor Abj, Div, Tra, Enc, Ill, plus every Bard spell, plus the Maho spells. No lost casting, spellthief progression with Master Spellthief, Sneak attack before entering Unseen Seer, lotsa skill points…

Prestige classes with casting

Ur-Priest, Sublime Chord, Divine Crusader, Apostle of Peace (OoO): Don’t go Maho with those classes, you lose the accelerated progression. Use Tainted Sorcerer instead if you want Tainted Spellcasting. Except for AoP.

Nar Demonbinder: Don’t convert Nar Demonbinder, but Summon Monster is on the Maho list (with a limited selection of monsters) so you can qualify for Nar Demonbinder by Maho-Tsukai. You can’t really theurge them as they are both spontaneous and arcane though.

Demonologist: Don’t convert into Maho, as you would restrict your Summon Monster spells to a weaker selection of monsters.

Teflammar Shadowlord: You can do it on TFSL casting, and select the juicy TFSL spells as spells known, but at that point you’re not really a caster anymore. Adds extra oriental flavor and edginess for it being even less personnel, kiddo…


3. What to do with your other levels


Casting: If you went Base Caster 5/Maho-Tsukai 1, you now have 14 levels of spell progressing prestige classes to fill. You can fit a lot in those. Generally, what’s good for a sorcerer is good for you. You’ll want more spells known, feats, metamagic cost reducers, good passive abilities and action economy.

Mage of the Arcane Order: I don’t really know if converting wizard-like casting into Maho casting after taking this class disqualifies you (but Arcane Preparation or Corrupt Arcana gets you back in). Spell pool access is awesome and you want in. That plus bonus feats is gravy.

Fiendblooded: Very thematic, and the first 9 levels do not lose you any spellcasting. You get ability boosts and extra spells known, plus goodies.

Incantatrix: Can’t argue with the Queen. Probably the best arcane progressing prestige class in 3.5. Metamagic feats, Metamagic cost reduction, Metamagic effects, free Metamagic… If you aren’t a Kobold, even a Mailman may benefit from Maho conversion.

Halruaan Elder: Metamagic cost reduction, and Circle Magic. Borkedly stronk. Mentioned because you have 14 levels of prestige classes to fill and both 1 and 4 levels are very good.

Blood Magus: More for the theme than the power, but since you use Blood Component on every spell, you get +1CL at first level, and exotic magic item creation feats. 4 levels don’t lose you any casting, so you can take 4 levels of Blood Magus and the full 10 in another prestige class. Ugly feat taxes though.

Fatespinner: Another class with the magic number of 4 levels that don’t loose casting. Your spells’ DC are already crazy strong though, so you can probably do better.

Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil: And we’re back with the ultra powerful. The prerequisites might seem a big tax on your spells known, but you aren’t forced to take it at level 8 so you can wait to have the classics (Greater Dispel Magic as 6th level) before jumping in.

Archmage: Classic Endgame prestige class. You don’t really have spells that want to become SLAs on the Maho list but you might have some on your previous list and you have many spells with range: Touch that want the Arcane Reach. You can then Chain them with your Maho Metamagics :)

Master Specialist and Red Wizard (of Thay): The wizard-only prestige classes are still open after conversion to Maho as you still have the wizard levels. Converting wizard casting is usually a downgrade, but if you want the juicy class features on a spontaneous caster, that’s one way to do it.

Shadowcraft Mage: Too bad the Chaos Gnome doesn’t have the [Chaos] subtype, or we could convert it to [Evil] with Divine Minion and keep that constitution for Maho Metamagic and heightening every spell to your max spell level. Sprinkle a bit of Anima Mage for binding Naberius and you’d have one heck of a gnome. Conversion also loses your cantrip slots, so you can’t really do THE THING anymore. Still ultra strong.

Dweomerkeeper: This one isn’t great as you can’t get divine casting without class levels. You could convert cleric casting (with Heretic of the Faith, maybe) and keep the magic domain, but you’d still lack divine casting for entry. Let this one to the base cleric.

Skypledged: Another stinky one, as your divine casting is converted into arcane Maho. You’d need a divine dip (Cleric) and either a Dragon Feat (Alternative spell source) or a FR one (Southern Magician) to repay the spellpool debt. If you want it, you can get it, but it might not be worth the effort (and yet spellpool is awesome).

Theurgy: If you have THE URGE, you can do wonky builds especially by converting a divine class into Maho. Here are a few wacky builds :

→ Cleric into Maho-Tsukai, Ur-Priest, True Necromancer. Convert your Cleric casting into Maho and replace it with Ur-Priest casting, then combine the two with True Necro. Not good, but fun.

→ Druid into Maho-Tsukai, Ur-Priest, Arcane Hierophant. Pick the Obtain Familiar feat to get an Uber-Familiar.

→ Druid into Maho-Tsukai, Blighter, Arcane Hierophant. Yep, Blighter. Converting Druid casting into Maho makes you “formerly able to cast 3rd level druid spells” without setting a fourth of your build on fire. If you use partial BAB/Saves, you can literally go Maho-Tsukai 1 after five levels of druid, which gives you BAB 4.25, so your next level can start Blighter and you can enter Arcane Hierophant two levels later.

Gish builds (Martial + Casting)

You can already make a descent Gish by dipping Maho-Tsukai on full BAB casters (Ranger, Hexblade, Duskblade) and can access many classic Gish prestige classes. Also, remind yourself that by converting a divine class into Maho, you can get Divine Power on your spell list, opening a lot of possibilities. Notable prestige classes :

→ Abjurant Champion: The best one, about as hard to enter as for classic builds from Arcane base classes, and really easy to enter by converting a divine class into Maho as every divine class has a ton of low level abjurations to chose from.

→ Eldritch knight, Phantom Knight: You might do without the lost caster level of these classes.

→ Spellsword, Dragonslayer: As always, only one level of each to not delay your progression.

→ Sacred Exorcist: This one won’t be available as you’re evil. You can’t use DMM either.

→ Unseen seer: Not really a gish class, but use it to grab Hunter’s Eye for bonus sneak attack damage. You will have the high level slots to simply persist it at high level.

→ Arcane Archer: Two levels for Imbue Arrow. You probably won’t have the really crazy spells to combine with that ability (AMF among them) unless you come from one of the T1 classes (or Favored Soul) but you have lots of Save or Die with crazy high DC. Go nuts, or even nuttier.

Adding more systems: Tome of Battle maneuvers, Incarnum, Psionics, Binding…

→ Anima Mage and binding Naberius is the easiest way to use Maho Metamagics. You’ll still need a constitution for that (but you can Magic Jar into a living being and cast with his constitution :)

→ Convert your Cleric or Archivist spellcasting into Maho and enter Soulcaster, a far better class than Saphire Hierarch (mainly for the chakras) and still get access to Incarnum Apotheosis. Find a way to persist that spell and go to town (or wherever you want).

[Ger. Bessa]

Reserved post 4/6

[Ger. Bessa]

Reserved Post 5/6

[Ger. Bessa]

Reserved post 6/6 - should be enough

Please give your feedback, suggestions and anything you think of that I might have missed.

I might take time to learn how to put links and goodies in the posts, so please be patient ;)

To do :

Feats, especially tainted feats, discuss how those feats (HoH) are meant to be granted in junction with taint symptoms.

Items (mainly Spellstaves as you have a huge list but limited spells known)

How to boost your will save for Advancing.

Change the green to a darker one and the Cyan to gold-ish, add the color code.

Add more on the Divine->Maho benefits, and precise that a Cleric Maho is way stronger than a Warmage Maho, and that the color code is about how a Cleric Maho is worse than a pure cleric.

Done :

Changed the Maho-Tsukai is Japanese for Blood Sorcerer blunder. Thx again DMVerdandi

Added the Mystic Ranger to the Ranger entry. Thx Kalkra

[JeenLeen]

A starting comment I'll make on Taint. Only post 1/6 had contents when I wrote this.

I think almost if not every system I've seen try to implement a Taint or Taint-like mechanics has done so poorly. This is mainly because it seems to fall into one of two extremes
1) the downsides are so severe, no player would choose them
2) the downsides are no minimal or easy to circumvent, the mechanic might as well not exist
Taint-like mechanics exist (or seem to exist) to balance power gained in response to evil stuff.
With error 1, the mechanic might as well not exist, since it's not in use. Note that error 1 can happen if A) the power gained is not worth the downside and/or B) the downside makes the player almost unplayable
With error 2, the mechanic might as well not exist, since any drawbacks are nullified.

Heroes of Horror has an oddness in that some of the mild Taint things are actually good. When I was looking over the book, I noticed some of the Corruption/Depravity 'paths' were cripplingly bad, some seemed negliglbe (at least early on), and some seemed even okay. Like, I'd like low Taint for some of my characters if I could choose the path instead of it being random. (Exalted 2nd edition Wyrd mutations are similar.)

I don't know this blood sorcery class, but I reckon a large bit of it being useful would be how it avoids (if it avoids) those errors.

NOTE: I admit this only really matters if viewed from an optimization standpoint. If you don't care about that, well, yeah, stuff like Heroes of Horror taint works fine. It also assumes Taint isn't a punishment inflicted but something can be chosen... but, even if it is inflicted by the environment (as in HoH sometimes), it still needs to not make the PC unplayable/unfun (error 1) and to have an impact (error 2); it's hard to avoid both errors.

EDIT: also, I don't have a good solution to those errors. I've tried to think of one, and it hasn't worked well. A mod on Riddle of Steel was the closest I've seen to something working well. So I'm not really offering a solution, but stating this as something to look into while considering the worth of Blood Sorcery.

[Kalkra]

Looking forward to reading the rest of this.

[Ger. Bessa]

@JeenLeen

Yeah, I acknowledge your point in the first post. I also split Tainted Characters with a floating score (Free Taint) from Tainted Characters with an inherent score (Fixed Taint). Free Taint is nearly never playable and I kinda don't even talk about such characters as they can SoL gods before ECL 10 (HoH) or die to a pixie whispering too loud (OA/UA).

Fixed Taint + Tainted Spellcasting is ultra-strong and deserve it's place among Ur-Priest, Incantatrix and Dweomerkeeper. It's basically +6 to your DCs for a dip.

Free Taint + Tainted Spellcasting is broken, and stands between Illithid Savant and Beholder Mage.

I made this guide for the Maho-Tsukai, but the strongest of the 3 is the Tainted Sorcerer, as it can be a Wizard, a Cleric, a Druid or an Archivist. The Maho-Tsukai can be applied to Ranger, Bard or Trickster Spellthief, and do wacky things to spell lists. I decided to write the Handbook when I thought of the Blighter build.

[AsuraKyoko]

A starting comment I'll make on Taint. Only post 1/6 had contents when I wrote this.

I think almost if not every system I've seen try to implement a Taint or Taint-like mechanics has done so poorly. This is mainly because it seems to fall into one of two extremes
1) the downsides are so severe, no player would choose them
2) the downsides are no minimal or easy to circumvent, the mechanic might as well not exist
Taint-like mechanics exist (or seem to exist) to balance power gained in response to evil stuff.
With error 1, the mechanic might as well not exist, since it's not in use. Note that error 1 can happen if A) the power gained is not worth the downside and/or B) the downside makes the player almost unplayable
With error 2, the mechanic might as well not exist, since any drawbacks are nullified.

EDIT: also, I don't have a good solution to those errors. I've tried to think of one, and it hasn't worked well. A mod on Riddle of Steel was the closest I've seen to something working well. So I'm not really offering a solution, but stating this as something to look into while considering the worth of Blood Sorcery.

I personally like the way that the L5R RPG handles it, where Taint is usually just downside, but you gain it as a cost to doing some pretty powerful stuff (namely, Maho/blood magic). Maho is also super illegal in setting, and Taint carries a very, very heavy social stigma, shich is doubly important in the setting due to the strong focus on both personal and familial honor. Additionally, once you gain any amount of taint, you will be tainted forever, though the level of taint can be managed in various ways, and the lowest levels have no detectable signs.

Basically, using Taint gets you great power, be it through access to powerful magic or through powerful mutations (or both), but it comes at the cost of being able to operate in society, unless you are very, very careful. Even being careful means that you cannot go too deep into Taint, or it becomes impossible to hide.

[Ronin Duelist]

I personally like the way that the L5R RPG handles it, where Taint is usually just downside, but you gain it as a cost to doing some pretty powerful stuff (namely, Maho/blood magic). Maho is also super illegal in setting, and Taint carries a very, very heavy social stigma, shich is doubly important in the setting due to the strong focus on both personal and familial honor. Additionally, once you gain any amount of taint, you will be tainted forever, though the level of taint can be managed in various ways, and the lowest levels have no detectable signs.

Basically, using Taint gets you great power, be it through access to powerful magic or through powerful mutations (or both), but it comes at the cost of being able to operate in society, unless you are very, very careful. Even being careful means that you cannot go too deep into Taint, or it becomes impossible to hide.

As someone who loves the L5R RPG, yeah, I do like how they handle it as well. Depends on the edition, though. In some editions it's too severe, and in others, if you're willing to be a horrible Maho-Tsukai, maybe a bit too easy to manage. But that comes at the cost of your Honor and soul and what-not.

Looking forward to this thread. I've never used the Oriental Adventures stuff much at all.

[Anthrowhale]

W.r.t. builds,


Accessing Unseen Seer from a divine base can be useful for a skill-monkey/divine theurge.
You can do something interest with Wizard + <divine class> + Mystic Theurge + Maho-Tsukai + Ultimate Magus. Wizard 2/Favored Soul 1/Mystic Theurge 10/Maho-Tsukai 1/Ultimate Magus 6 could end up with wizard 17 spell and Maho-Tsukai(cleric) 17 spell access.
On the gish side, Ordained Champion + Abjurant Champion is pretty solid. There's also an interesting interaction between Divine Power (which could be persisted via Incantatrix) and the "Martial Arcanist" AC ability.

[Maat Mons]

I don't think that allowing conversion of multiple classes does interact favorably with theurges. You're trading in "levels in another spellcasting class." Theurge classes don't actually give you more levels in the base classes. You gain some of the same benefits as if you had those levels. But you don't actually have the levels, so you can't trade them in.

At best, the theurge class itself counts as a spellcasting class. That would allow you to trade, say, one level of Mystic Theurge casting for one level oh Maho-Tsukai casting. This is a screwy interpretation though, and would allow a Green Star Adept 10 to trade in 10 levels of Green Star Adept casting for 10 levels of Maho-Tsukai casting.

But here's what I think actually happens. A Wizard 3 / Cleric 3 / Mystic Theurge 10 takes one level of Maho-Tsukai. He has 3 levels in Wizard, which is "another spellcasting class," and thus eligible for trade-in. He also has 3 levels in Cleric, which is also "another spellcasting class," and thus also eligible for trade-in. He has 10 levels in Mystic Theurge, but that class doesn't count as a spellcasting class, so it's not eligible for trade-in.

If this character trades in the levels in both Wizard and Cleric, he now no longer meets the prerequisites for Mystic Theurge. Even if he only trades in the Wizard levels, Wizard spellcasting is still what he designated those Mystic Theurge levels to advancing. Since he no longer has any Wizard casting, Mystic Theurge can't progress it, so it turns into a colossal waste. But a nice DM might allow him to "retrain" the designation of casting class advanced by Mystic Theurge and pick Mao-Tsukai instead. That's definitely not RAW though, since he didn't have Maho-Tsukai casting at the time he took the Mystic Theurge levels.

[DMVerdandi]

Just a funny thing, maho-tsukai doesn't mean blood sorcerer AT ALL.

Maho=Magic
Tsukai=User

A blood sorcerer in japanese colloquially, since we see people who use blood-arts[Chi no waza] would be Chi-tsukai, or chi no majutsushi for [blood sorcerer]

Alternatively Majou[witch] and Majin[warlock] are used for more devilish users, but things like heretical onmyoji also exist there. and then curse users [Jujutsushi (curse art users)].



Just always irked the hell outta me. OA has some weird stuff in it, but yea.



>>>


Thoughts on spell point casting from UA being used on this?

[Quertus]

So glad to see this handbook - the various Taint users have always had a warm place in my heart.


Thoughts on spell point casting from UA being used on this?

When you've got 5/5/5/5/4/4/4/4/3 bonus spells, spell points almost seems pointless. And arguably a downgrade for the most "balanced" use of Taint: making Evocation great again.

[Kalkra]

I'll mention that even without theurgy, if you could convert a level of Wizard and a level of Cleric, you could then learn from both lists.

Also, Mystic Ranger would probably be better than straight ranger.

It's kinda unclear to me what you're assuming that you keep and what you lose with Spell Conversion. Specifically, you seem to assume that you lose all of your class features, but keep your BAB and saves. By RAW it looks to me (from an admittedly quick reading) that you either keep all of your class features, or you only get spellcasting and literally nothing else, possibly including hit dice. Since that would be weird, I would assume that you trade spellcasting for spellcasting, rather than everything for just spellcasting.

Also, you keep your cantrips. I don't know why, but it says that you do.

Also, Sand Shaper. It's good for Sorcerers, and it's good for Maho-Tsukais. Actaully, what's the plural of Maho-Tsukai?

[Malphegor]

Hm. It looks like on reading it the maho converts just the Spellcasting ability of prior classes. Not all their former class abilities, so it’s less harsh than I think you’ve written.

As a side note though if you went into this with a prepared caster that prepares their spells externally, you probably don’t lose the spells in your spellbook as that’s a physical item that’s not a part of your class features even though it was grown by them, as you become a weird sorcerer type. Kinda interesting way to convert a wizard into a sorcerer though, one level dip and bam you can choose to have your wizard spells be maho.

Arcane Preparation may be useful as a feat to regain the use of your spellbook’s spells as you optionally ‘prepare spells as a wizard does’ with that as a spontaneous arcane caster.

[Endarire]

Witch Hunter PrC would be wonderful but it requires non-evil alignment.

X to Y (http://minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=4369.0): Focus on CHA!

[Ger. Bessa]

Hey everyone, sorry about the big time lapse. This guide was the first thing I was able to produce out of work by myself in years, and it was nearly impossible to come back to the boards just with the anxiety I felt.

As you may see, I've started editing, notably fixing two of the things suggested by the replies. It's not much yet, but breaking the ice and finding the determination to come back was the hardest part.

I acknowledge that I assumed a few things in how the taint mechanic and conversion should work, and I've already seen posts on how theurges/Dual casters could be broken by the class. I chose these rulings not because I felt they were objectively the best ones possible, but because I wanted them to work as well as possible with frequently used mechanics while not breaking new forms of fast progression. Basically, I think a Wizard 3/Master Specialist 3/Maho 1 should have Maho 7 casting, but a Wizard 2/Cleric 1/Mystic Theurge 5/ Maho 1 (ECL 9) shouldn't have Maho 14 casting.

The class already has strong points (Upgrade to Sorcerer+ progression, Huge DC boosts) and weaknesses (downgrade to Sorcerer+ casting, diminishing return on charisma at high level), it shouldn't be considered broken because it turns Hexblade into a 20/20 caster (while a 17/20 is already nice and not as broken).

I'd also love to hear what you would think of Maho Conversion outside the class. How much would you pay in prerequisites for a prestige class with only the conversion of a previous casting to Sorcerer+ (or just Sorcerer-like) casting, without Taint or Blood Metamagics and have it remotely balanced. Not a "Put on Every Half-Caster" good, but "Yeah, that's a cool option".

[QuadraticGish]

I don't think I saw it mentioned, but one thing to note is that in Savage Species you can at the cost of a will save, 56k gp, and 2,240 XP under go the Rite of Alignment to gain the evil subtype, protecting you from the downsides of taint. Finding the cash and the cleric required to do so makes it unlikely unless you start at a high enough level though.

[Sunforger42]

Eeek.....

Alright, so in the Theurgy builds, the druid and the blighter are used as ways into Arcane Hierophant..... but how do you keep Trackless Step to qualify for AH, when ex-druids lose all druid abilities?