All-Might's muscle form (spell that is jump+longstrider+powerful build)

[Greywander]

UPDATE: I just wanted to give some closure to this idea by posted a "finished" version.


Mythical Body
1st level transmutation
Casting Time: 1 bonus action
Range: Self
Components: V, S, M (a chisel)
Duration: 1 minute

Magic courses through your body, causing you to grow up to 1 foot taller and your body takes on an ideal, statuesque form until the spell ends. While under the spell's effect, your speed increases by 10 feet, your jump distance is tripled, and your carrying capacity is doubled.

As a bonus action, you can suppress or resume the effects of this spell, allowing you to return to your normal appearance at the cost of losing all the benefits of this spell until you resume the spell's effects.

At Higher Levels. If you cast this spell using a 2nd level spell slot, the duration increases to 10 minutes. If you cast this spell using a 3rd level spell slot, the duration increases to 1 hour. If you cast this spell using a 4th level spell slot, the duration increases to 8 hours. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 5th level or higher, the duration increases to 24 hours.

For the sake of consistency, I thought it was important to maintain the same bonuses at every spell level, instead of giving a reduced bonus at lower levels. This means it's strictly better than the jump spell, except that it's self-only. To compensate, let's say it's a paladin spell only, or paladin and ranger only.

I also changed the casting time to a bonus action, so that you can use it on the first round of combat with minimal interference with your action economy. Since it's mostly an exploration spell, this should have only a slight impact on the value of the spell. It just struck me that, for thematic reasons, you'd want to bulk up right at the start of combat.

Original post below:

Was thinking about super hero builds, wishing I could get access to Longstrider and/or Jump on a paladin so I could do my superhuman heroic leaps. So then I thought, "Why not just combine the two effects into a single homebrew spell and make it self-cast only?" For good measure, let's also let it double our carry capacity, representing a general buffed physique.


Mythical Body
1st level transmutation
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: Self
Components: V, S, M (a chisel)
Duration: 10 minutes

Magic courses through your body, causing you to grow up to 1 foot taller and your muscles to increase in size as you take on a larger-than-life, statuesque form, until the spell ends. While under the spell's effect, your speed increases by 10 feet, your jump distance is tripled, and your carrying capacity is doubled.

As a bonus action, you can suppress or resume the effects of this spell, allowing you to return to your normal appearance at the cost of losing all the benefits of this spell until you resume the spell's effects.

At Higher Levels. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 2nd level or higher, the duration increases to 1 hour. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, your weapon attacks deal an additional 1d4 damage and you may add 1d4 to any Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution checks you make. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 4th level or higher, the duration increases to 8 hours. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 5th level or higher, the duration increases to 24 hours.

As you can see, I split the difference in the duration of Jump (1 minute) and Longstrider (1 hour) to settle on a duration of 10 minutes (which should balance out combining both effects). I wasn't sure what to call the spell, so if you have a better suggestion then I'm all ears. I was also unsure on the scaling at higher levels, but I think this works well. Upcasting it generally increases the duration, until you can have it active pretty much all day. Casting it at 3rd level or higher instead adds a small damage bump (on par with Divine Favor or Enlarge/Reduce) and a small bonus to physical ability checks (something that made sense to add, but would have been too much for a 1st level spell). Basically 3rd+ level version is the upgraded version, not just a longer duration.

Who should get access to this spell? Well, it only scales up to 5th level, and the build I had in mind for it is a paladin, so maybe put it on the paladin list. Could also be interesting as a warlock spell, particularly because of how pact magic slots work. I think it would also be fitting as a sorcerer spell, particularly something like a Divine Soul to help them pull off the demigod look, though it could just as easily be on the cleric list instead then. Maybe I should add scaling for 6th+ level casting?

Anyway, what do you think of this? Too strong? Too weak? Too... wonky? I think a big part of the inspiration for this idea also came from All-Might's muscle form, from My Hero Academia, hence the change in physical appearance.

[sandmote]

I'd rather have the bonus to Str/Dex/Con checks scale as your level (to d6 at 5th and d8 at 7th, probably) and then remove the damage buff to keep this as a utility spell

Would probably also make the most sense on the Artificer, Cleric, Paladin, and Ranger spell lists. Artificer and Cleric have some existing associations with transformations, and the bonuses are particularly applicable to exploration. Warlocks are typically associated as being either suave or bookish, so I'm not sure how well the spell would fit them.

[Greywander]

Mythical Body
1st level transmutation
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: Self
Components: V, S, M (a chisel)
Duration: 1 minute

Magic courses through your body, causing you to grow up to 1 foot taller and your body takes on an ideal, statuesque form until the spell ends. While under the spell's effect, your speed increases by 10 feet, your jump distance is tripled, and your carrying capacity is doubled.

As a bonus action, you can suppress or resume the effects of this spell, allowing you to return to your normal appearance at the cost of losing all the benefits of this spell until you resume the spell's effects.

At Higher Levels. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 2nd level or higher, the duration increases to 1 hour. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, you may add 1d4 to any Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution checks you make. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 4th level or higher, the duration increases to 8 hours. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 5th level or higher, the duration increases to 24 hours. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 7th level or higher, you may add 1d4 to any Strength, Dexterity, or Constitution saving throws you make. If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 9th level, the duration increases to permanent (until dispelled).

Reworked the wording so that it allows more than just a muscle form. Reworked how the upcasting works. No more damage bonus; I know I compared it to Divine Favor and Enlarge/Reduce, but those spells use concentration, so it's not really a fair comparison. Personally, I don't know that increasing the die size for the ability check bonus is worth upcasting. Longer durations are worth upcasting, because it saves you from having to recast it. 7th level now adds a similar bonus to saves. 9th level makes it permanent, and should you ever encounter an unusually tall person with ideal physique, then it might not be a bad idea to throw a Dispel Magic at them (unless they're friendly, of course).

Good call on giving it to rangers for exploration. I can see giving it to clerics as a sort of "divine form/manifestation", but part of me also wants to give it to sorcerers. For warlocks, they are the magical girl class, so a transformation spell is on brand. Besides, I can see someone making a deal with a spirit to gain unearthly beauty and physical ability. That said, this is a spell that becomes more interesting the fewer spell lists it's on.

Paladin gets neither Jump nor Longstrider. Neither does the cleric. So these classes would both be a good fit to get this instead. Ranger and artificer get both, so maybe they don't need this. Sorcerer gets Jump, but not Longstrider, so maybe. Warlock also gets neither. Then again, a class that already gets both wouldn't be getting as much of a power boost, so maybe it does make sense to give this to a class that already gets both.

All that said, I think paladin, cleric, and ranger would work the best. It keeps it niche, so it remains interesting.

[Bjarkmundur]

Absolute love the spell, but the upcasting almost feels... Too convenient, if that makes any sense?

It's, like, more of a feeling that I wish all spells where this appropriately upcast, rather than your spell being bad in any way.

If you can you show me an example of a convoluted upcast from official material, I will forever hold my peace (piece?).

[Greywander]

If you can you show me an example of a convoluted upcast from official material, I will forever hold my peace (piece?).
Hex or Bestow Curse, maybe?

[Bjarkmundur]

Both spells have fairly simply upcasts. So yeah, your spell's upcast is examplary for all other spells in 5e. So, shame on you for designing things of too high quality xP

So just to "keep it in line" you should be able to drop the 1d4.

Or add to the spell, "once during the duration you can use a bonus Action to gain advantage on your next str, con or Dex ability checks". But that would replace the "pause" effect.

d4 would work too, if that's too strong, but it definitely doesn't belong in the upcast.

[Kane0]

I know that the three aspects youre combining arent especially good, but i think straight up combining them for only a shorter duration might be overcorrecting.
Perhaps individually lesser effects with a 1st level slot (5'/double jump/50% carry) increasing duration with a 2nd level slot and the full effects with a 3rd level slot.
The fact that it isnt concentration combined with decently long duration at higher levels makes it a good candidate for extend spell, even if something like a ranger uses metamagic adept to do so. So thats a fun idea

[Greywander]

It also occurs to me that this is straight up better than the Jump spell, albeit self-only (which might be fine if the spell itself is hard to get, e.g. a paladin-only spell). Hmm, obviously there's still some room to tweak it. I may need to cut the 1st level duration down to 1 minute, but I'd like to maintain the 24 hour duration for a 5th level slot. A paladin or ranger (or artificer, if it's on their list) sacrificing one of their highest level slots to maintain the effect all day seems like it should be balanced. I think I'll just edit the 1st level duration to be 1 minute instead of 10, and keep the 1 hour duration for the 2nd level slot.

It also occurs to me that a permanent duration with a 9th level slot makes cleric an even better dip if the spell is on the cleric list. Since it's a 1st level spell, you'd only need one level in cleric, and because of how the cleric prepares spells you could never prepare it again after casting it. If we moved it to the sorcerer or bard list, you'd at least have to sacrifice a spell known for it. Also, Bjarkmundur, this could be why vanilla spells upcast so poorly, it might be intentional. :smallwink:

It also occurs to me that we could have an equivalent spell for the mental abilities. But I don't know what benefits it would give. The physical version gives buffs to speed, jump distance, and carry capacity, which is mostly exploration focused with some combat utility. The mental version should likely mirror this; mostly utility, with some combat enhancement. It would also be interesting if different classes got this spell, with maybe only one class having access to both (maybe artificer?). The thing is, I'm not sure what the effects of this spell should be, and there's a lot to choose from. Comprehend languages, telepathy, some kind of detection ability, enhanced vision, etc.

[sandmote]

To be honest, I don't think its a good idea to make the spell permanent. At least not with a spell slot; I do want to replace the Champion Fighter's 7th level feature with this as a permanent effect. At an absolute minimum +1d4 to checks using these ability scores is worth more than "half proficiency."

[Greywander]

To be honest, I don't think its a good idea to make the spell permanent. At least not with a spell slot; I do want to replace the Champion Fighter's 7th level feature with this as a permanent effect. At an absolute minimum +1d4 to checks using these ability scores is worth more than "half proficiency."
I get what you're saying, but I don't know that you can really compare a 7th level feature with a 17th level feature (9th level slots). Though I think this could be a good argument for restricting this spell to half casters and spells known full casters. A prepared caster with this on their list can prepare it once, cast it, and never prepare it again (unless it gets dispelled), but a spells known caster is still giving up one of their valuable spells known to get this as a permanent effect.

Do you have a suggestion for an alternate 9th level effect? I'm having trouble seeing why you'd burn a 9th level slot on this spell, unless you just make it really powerful. I mean, it's nice, but not 9th level nice. It doesn't compare to something like Foresight, and it shouldn't since it's just an upcast 1st level spell.

[Kane0]

It doesn't need to scale perfectly into every spell level. By the time you get access to Haste, Flight, Teleportation and Telekinesis how much would this come into play anyways? I would have it cap at its full usefulness at 3rd or 5th level when upcast, to match the partial and half casters that would thematically be using it.

[Greywander]

It doesn't need to scale perfectly into every spell level. By the time you get access to Haste, Flight, Teleportation and Telekinesis how much would this come into play anyways? I would have it cap at its full usefulness at 3rd or 5th level when upcast, to match the partial and half casters that would thematically be using it.
That's true. The version in the OP only scaled up to 5th level, I might revert it to that. For a full caster, giving up a 5th level slot every day is a lot easier than it is for a half caster.

It also occurs to me that perhaps this should be at least a 2nd level spell, considering it's combining the effects of two 1st level spells, with the extra carry capacity on top. It's probably fine as a 1st level spell, particularly if it's only on a couple spell lists, but it might work better as a 2nd level spell.

I think the main reason I made it 1st level is so I could get access to it as soon as possible, should I ever get to play that superhero concept. As a half caster, I'd have to wait until 5th level to get it if it were a 2nd level spell. But that might make more sense from a narrative standpoint anyway.

[Kane0]

You could pull out the underused 'invested spell slot' concept that Animate Dead operates on, or similar enough to it. Have the spell duration be permanent and specify that while the spell it active you can't regain the use of the spell slot used to cast it (coincidentally this works really well with Find Familiar and Find Steed). You can of course choose to end the spell yourself, have it be dispelled on you, etc.

Otherwise this seems fine to me:
1st level: +5' speed, 2x jump, +50% carry capacity
2nd level: 1 hour duration
3rd level: +10' speed, 3x jump, 2x carry
4th level: 8 hours duration
5th level: 24 hours duration

[sandmote]

I get what you're saying, but I don't know that you can really compare a 7th level feature with a 17th level feature (9th level slots). Though I think this could be a good argument for restricting this spell to half casters and spells known full casters. A prepared caster with this on their list can prepare it once, cast it, and never prepare it again (unless it gets dispelled), but a spells known caster is still giving up one of their valuable spells known to get this as a permanent effect..You actually connected two thoughts that I didn't intent to be taken together.

I don't like the idea of a spell being permanent, pretty much for the reasons it would be a bit much for a cleric. See your own notes about the spell making good dip bait, but also I just don't like letting casters pile on the indefinite effects vie their class features. Plus every cleric would likely use it on an off day, making it functionally a class feature for one of the higher tier classes.

Bumping up to 2nd level might work fine, and then you might be able to bring back the 10 minute duration.

I would, however, like to give this as a passive, permanent version of this effect (as the 3rd level upcast of the second version) instead of the Champion Fighter's honestly disappointing 7th level feature. This is unrelated to how the spell actually should be upcast or the spell's availability: I just noticed it was similar and would likely be a good fix for this other thing.

[Greywander]

You could pull out the underused 'invested spell slot' concept that Animate Dead operates on, or similar enough to it. Have the spell duration be permanent and specify that while the spell it active you can't regain the use of the spell slot used to cast it (coincidentally this works really well with Find Familiar and Find Steed). You can of course choose to end the spell yourself, have it be dispelled on you, etc.
I don't think I've heard of a mechanic like this being used in 5e. Though it does make bookkeeping a bit easier. Honestly, they should probably just make this a variant/optional rule for any spell with a 24 hour duration, possibly with the caveat that sometime during a long rest you have to be within range to reapply the spell's effect to the target (so that you can't cast the spell on someone then go your separate ways, with the spell permanently affecting them despite being hundreds of miles apart). For a self-only spell, this would be a non-issue.


Otherwise this seems fine to me:
1st level: +5' speed, 2x jump, +50% carry capacity
2nd level: 1 hour duration
3rd level: +10' speed, 3x jump, 2x carry
4th level: 8 hours duration
5th level: 24 hours duration
Yeah, this sounds fine. What about the 1d4 bonus to checks? Do you think that should be dropped? It just feels kind of weird to have a spell that gives you perfect physique but doesn't affect your physical checks.


You actually connected two thoughts that I didn't intent to be taken together.

I don't like the idea of a spell being permanent, pretty much for the reasons it would be a bit much for a cleric. See your own notes about the spell making good dip bait, but also I just don't like letting casters pile on the indefinite effects vie their class features. Plus every cleric would likely use it on an off day, making it functionally a class feature for one of the higher tier classes.

Bumping up to 2nd level might work fine, and then you might be able to bring back the 10 minute duration.
It should also work if the spell just stops scaling past 5th level. I suppose we could bump up the duration more, but it doesn't make a lot of sense to use any duration in between 24 hours and permanent, since you also (usually) get your spell slots back on a 24 hour cycle. For example, a week duration is functionally similar to permanent, so long as each adventure takes less than a week. For some reason, I feel like a week duration would feel less satisfying than a 24 hour duration, since you'd feel unfairly penalized if the spell ran out and required recasting, whereas with a 24 hour duration you would expect to need to burn a spell slot to maintain it.


I would, however, like to give this as a passive, permanent version of this effect (as the 3rd level upcast of the second version) instead of the Champion Fighter's honestly disappointing 7th level feature. This is unrelated to how the spell actually should be upcast or the spell's availability: I just noticed it was similar and would likely be a good fix for this other thing.
Yeah, I hear you. Champion gets a bad rap. I don't know that it's as bad as some people think it is, but it's definitely not the strongest fighter subclass. Remarkable Athlete is underwhelming, as well. Replacing it with a feature like this would make it much more appealing. Even the weaker 1st level version Kane0 posted, where you'd just get a 5 foot speed increase, double jump distance, and 50% increased carry weight would feel a lot nicer than what we got.

[Kane0]

Yeah, this sounds fine. What about the 1d4 bonus to checks? Do you think that should be dropped? It just feels kind of weird to have a spell that gives you perfect physique but doesn't affect your physical checks.


Id probably replace the 5th level upcasting duration with the 1d4, since that follows the pattern and is the greatest effect considering its basically passive (especially since it stacks with guidance and such)

[Greywander]

Long overdue, but I updated the OP with a "finished" version of this spell.

[Kane0]

I approve!

[JNAProductions]

Long overdue, but I updated the OP with a "finished" version of this spell.

Looks good to me. If a player requested it at my table for a class that'd reasonably get it (Paladin, Sorcerer, Eldritch Knight are ones who'd get it for sure) they'd get it.

What classes would you assign this spell to?

[Greywander]

Paladin for sure, probably ranger as well. I'd shy away from giving it to full caster classes, in part because you could then pick it up with a 1 level dip, and in part because the spell becomes much less costly on a full caster. A 4th or 5th level slot is a lot for a half caster, but most full casters could easily part with one in exchange for a long duration mobility upgrade. Another reason is because the spell is strictly better than Jump (though self-only), so I'd prefer to have it not be as accessible as the Jump spell. If you did give it to full casters, then sorcerer and/or cleric would make the most sense to me. I could also see a warlock using this, taking advantage of their automatic slot scaling. I could see a bard using this, if only for the cosmetic effects, but they can get it via Magical Secrets anyway.

If we give this out too freely, though, then we kind of have to admit that Jump isn't a very good spell, or that it's specifically for buffing others, not yourself. How often have you actually cast Jump? How often have you cast it on someone else?

[Kane0]

Paladin, Ranger, EK, Warlock under a Patron, Cleric under a Domain, Sorcerer under a Bloodline.