New UA: Spells and Magic Tattoos

[Daphne]

https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/une...-magic-tattoos

This is a surprise, I was expecting subclasses for the Fighter and the Rogue.

[Misterwhisper]

So a ua of new spells.
And
Magical tattoos that give you plate level ac with no proficiency, stealth penalty, or str requirement.

Another that gives:
Champion crit range
4d6 extra crit damage
And gives THP on each crit

And my personal favorite:

One that gives unarmed strikes magical bonuses.

So I can just make ranger with the unarmed fighting style for 1d8 unarmed strikes
Better hit die
Spells for backup
Get a tattoo for magical unarmed strikes
And
One that gives me ac like whatever armor I want
But can still use a shield.

What is the point of monks again.

Also prepare for a lot of casters to just get a tattoo of armor since you don’t need proficiency and their are no drawbacks.


Also, wait, you expected something to come out for martial classes that would be helpful...

[Citadel97501]

New Spells
1) Acid Stream is horrendously powerful for a level 1 spell, and will likely become a staple for people. I do think it would be useful to note that someone shouldn't be able to scrape off acid or put out fires if they are grappled, well that would always be my rule as an ST. That is a horrific 1-2 punch. Just a note for some reason this also doesn't seem to damage objects...

2) Spirit Shroud could be good for Necromancers, but it depends on whether they count as killed by the spell or not if you hit them with a melee attack empowered by the spell.

3) These new summon spells, are a great help to a lot of character concepts but they will slow down play a lot simply due to the extra character on the field, which is likely one of the reasons that the summon spells were removed from so much of 5e. Probably needs some clarification on the multi-attacks if for example the Devil can use his Hurl Flame attack multiple times even though its a spell attack. I assume so, but it is good to note.

Magic Tattoos
1) This seems like an interesting buff to enemies, through magic items the players can't just acquire after the battle.

2) The Coiling Grasp tattoo, is going to be a lot of fun for some characters especially when combined with grease.

[Damon_Tor]

https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/une...-magic-tattoos

This is a surprise, I was expecting subclasses for the Fighter and the Rogue.

No artificer spells. Sad day. Acid Stream would make perfect sense for them.

[Kane0]

The not-summoning spells look okay, the summoning spells laugh at beastmaster and similar but otherwise look reasonable for those seeking a summoner character.

The tattoos are basically magic items and strong ones at that, what immediately strikes me is that any number of tattoos counts towards ONE attunement.

[Zetakya]

The Tattoos are badly thought through, and the armour ones are not useful for the martial classes that canonically don't wear armour, because they don't help with Unarmoured Defense, which seems stupid and broken.

The Spells are more interesting, although I haven't looked into ways to potentially break them yet. Necromancer Wizards will be looking at the 2 Necromancy Spells, and Conjurers at the Conjuration ones with some scrutiny.

[Christew]

Spells: Nice to flesh out summoning options, but going to slow things down at a lot of tables. Acid Stream introduces DOT, though level one seems a bit early. Spirit Shroud seems fine, doesn't really compete with Spirit Guardians for most clerics except melee striking builds.

Tattoos: Strong. Very Strong. Presumably gatekept by the item rarity, but there are some killer effects here. Multiple tattoos for a single attunement slot seems like an odd choice, balance wise.

[JumboWheat01]

The Armor tattoos also wouldn't work for those who take the Defense fighting style since you're not TECHNICALLY wearing armor, you just have equivalent AC. Also if you have magical armor, you could bypass what the tattoos give you. They definitely seem to be more for casters having high AC despite not having armor.

I do kinda like the Spellwrought Tattoo though. Would be interesting and thematic to have on a Four Elements Monk.

[Zetakya]

The Barrier Tattoo is the major flaw; it should really be a +1/+2/+3 to AC. In addition, All of the Tattoos, but especially the AC ones, should have to be visible to function, so you couldn't wear armour over them.

If the Barrier Tattoos don't work with Monk and Barbarian, then that's pretty terrible.

[animewatcha]

Looking at the spells. Acid shroud seems a bit powerful for a level 1. Spirit shroud as a warlock spell. It says any attack which means that eldritch blast + spirit shroud makes for up for 4 blasts per casting at a 1d10 +3d8. you gotta be in 10 range, but combined with eldritch invocation where the last one to hit pushes enemy away 10 feet. Then you complete your move to increase the distance. Ohh and creature can't regain hitpoints until the start of your next turn. Also, the spirit summons spells could have gotten somewhat the cure wounds treatment. 1 spell, but you choose type of spirit and creature. Then follow with statblocks. Not multiple pages of separate spells.

[Segev]

The spellwrought tattoo actually looks like it should be adapted into a power for some sort of wizard subclass or maybe cleric domain. Invest your spell slots as an hour long ritual into other people who can cast them using their concentration and your spell attack bonus/save DCs. Possibly with a gp cost for inks. You don't recover the spells until they're used, or if you choose to recover them, the tattoos lose their power.

Alternatively, tattoos overall could be a Pact for Warlocks, though at that point they're basically exclusive invocations.

In any event, as written, most of them that seem like they'd be better as class features than as magic items. They feel...too good.

Though the two Common ones actually look pretty okay, and kinda-cool.

I agree overall on the armor tattoos; they seem like they're meant for casters, and I don't know why they'd do that. Casters do better than the lowest level ones with mage armor, but the others are... weirdly good for them. Again, if it were some sort of (sub)class feature, maybe. A class or subclass focused on tattoos and maybe even able to swap them around based on their skin real estate would be potentially interesting, and could open up this design more. Might even be a 5e version of the kind of stuff Incarnum did.


I don't really like the new spells. Acid stream feels more like a level 2 spell to me. The delay until the start of their turn before taking damage is probably why it's excused down to 1st level, but it's entirely impractical to assume that there will be anybody available to scrape the acid off before the start of their turn.

I could see it as a first level spell if the acid didn't do damage until the END of their turns, but even then it's a really potent choice. How many first level spells can deny more than one creature their action? As written, it can either deny up to 6 (admittedly highly cooperatively-placed) creatures their actions AND do 3d4 to them, or it will do 3d4 to them up to TEN TIMES. With my proposed change, it STILL is either denying up to 6 creatures their action, OR dealing a respectable amount of damage to them. Burning hands hits a comparable number of creatures and only does twice as much damage in return for not denying the targets their action. (Targets who refrain from losing their action instead take at least as much damage, and probably more.)

Burning hands is not a weak spell.

Otherworldly Form strikes me as being...okay. It's a better version of Tenser's transformation, but lacks the clause about a useless armor proficiency. or mabye not better; I'd have to compare more directly. It seems...okay...for a 6th level slot.

Spirit Shroud seems like a weird choice for necromancers, who really shouldn't be that close in combat, but like it is less useful than spirit guardians to clerics. Maybe it's best for Bladepact Warlocks? I don't like it because it seems like a weak copycat of spirit guardians, and I'm not sure why it's needed.

Summon [whatever] spirit is an interesting line because it reminds me strongly of the way that PF developed the concept of summoning as it went along. Generic templates with some customizable aspects and a hint of flavor. Again, not thrilled by them; the philosophy behind the old versions of conjuration spells that call up elementals, fey, fiends, and celestials have issues, but none of them are such that this is a fix for anything. As a matter of taste, I particularly dislike summon undead spirit, because it's shoehorning generic summoning in as a necromancy thing. It's always bugged me when a necromancer is no different than a conjuror. But I know, I'm being picky. At least this time it's classified as Necromancy; in 3.5, the undead-summoning spells were admitting they were Conjuration, which caused all sorts of issues for the necromancer who was willing to settle for them as his bread-and-butter minionmancy source.


If anything? These feel a LOT like testing the waters on mechanics that would feel more natural to a 5e Psion, or set of psionic classes. Tattoos, customizable summons, these sound like psionic tattoos and astral constructs, to me.

[BioAlchemist]

Spirit Shroud seems like it would be really useful for Eldritch Knights. An extra d8 per attack, plus the ability to slow down someone in range sounds like a good use of a 3rd level slot to me.

[Citadel97501]

Acid Stream, has a major limiting factor though as unlike Heat Metal it only takes a single action to get the acid off. So even on a save, it could do 3d4 and then stop in exchange for an action, or keep hurting them for the full 3d4x10, although that is highly unlikely.

[Kane0]

If anything? These feel a LOT like testing the waters on mechanics that would feel more natural to a 5e Psion, or set of psionic classes. Tattoos, customizable summons, these sound like psionic tattoos and astral constructs, to me.

Interesting if true!

[Darc_Vader]

Shadowfell Brand Tattoo interestingly doesn’t give you resistance, so it can stack with resistance. It's basically limited use Uncanny Dodge.

[animewatcha]

Eldritch claw tattoo can definately see on a monk. Especially the astral self one with it's large number of attacks. Even the blood fury one.

Heck, with the right combination of tattoos, we could have the subclass of Tattoo'ed monk.

[Segev]

Acid Stream, has a major limiting factor though as unlike Heat Metal it only takes a single action to get the acid off. So even on a save, it could do 3d4 and then stop in exchange for an action, or keep hurting them for the full 3d4x10, although that is highly unlikely.

3d4+lose your action to up to 6 creatures still seems like a bit much for a 1st level spell. Heat metal is a 2nd level spell. And single-target. If acid stream were 2nd level, the trade-off of the ease of ditching the damage for the extra creatures targeted would probably be about right.

[Citadel97501]

3d4+lose your action to up to 6 creatures still seems like a bit much for a 1st level spell. Heat metal is a 2nd level spell. And single-target. If acid stream were 2nd level, the trade-off of the ease of ditching the damage for the extra creatures targeted would probably be about right.

Heat Metal is also a save or die spell, due to being unable to get armor off fast enough...
I would also note that your almost never going to hit more than 2 enemies with Acid Stream, and even if you get 3 at least 1 should make their save, acid is also highly resisted.

[Damon_Tor]

The tattoos have the same "bug" as prosthetic limbs and wand sheathes where they allow an artificer to have a larger than expected number of attuned items giving them a bonus to saves. In fact, these are worse because at least you were limited to four prosthetic limbs for most races (though simic and centaur artificers are an... interesting idea) but the common tattoos only take up 6 inches on your body.

[king_steve]

3d4+lose your action to up to 6 creatures still seems like a bit much for a 1st level spell. Heat metal is a 2nd level spell. And single-target. If acid stream were 2nd level, the trade-off of the ease of ditching the damage for the extra creatures targeted would probably be about right.

Heat metal also requires the caster to use their bonus action to do damage after the first round.

Acid Stream does feel like it should be at least 2nd level and maybe it should also require a bonus action to do damage. Right now, it's pretty powerful for a level 1 spell.

[Damon_Tor]

Heat Metal is also a save or die spell

Incorrect. The save for Heat Metal does nothing on armor you're wearing. It's not save or die, it's just die.

[Darc_Vader]

The tattoos have the same "bug" as prosthetic limbs and wand sheathes where they allow an artificer to have a larger than expected number of attuned items giving them a bonus to saves. In fact, these are worse because at least you were limited to four prosthetic limbs for most races (though simic and centaur artificers are an... interesting idea) but the common tattoos only take up 6 inches on your body.

Having multiple tattoos still only counts as one attunement slot, so an Artificer would still only get +1 to their saves from any number of them.

[Amechra]

I like the spells, honestly - Acid Stream is a bit strong, but hey - it's a spell option for people who want to make Acid-based casters, who are kinda... lacking at the moment.

The tattoos are a bad idea. They break the attunement rules for no good reason, and have the (secret) buff that they can't be taken away from you. It's... yeah.

[Dork_Forge]

Still reading through, but the unarmed tattoo is only uncommon and provides a HUGE boost to Monks and other unarmed builds.

[Amechra]

Still reading through, but the unarmed tattoo is only uncommon and provides a HUGE boost to Monks and other unarmed builds.

I was actually just going to come back and comment on how hilariously strong that tattoo is. Seriously, Eldritch Maul would be really strong on anyone with Extra Attack, but Monks can reliably toss out 3-4 attacks a round by the time this is available. They put a lot of effort into preventing Monks from getting easy bonus damage, and then this exists.

[Dork_Forge]

I was actually just going to come back and comment on how hilariously strong that tattoo is. Seriously, Eldritch Maul would be really strong on anyone with Extra Attack, but Monks can reliably toss out 3-4 attacks a round by the time this is available. They put a lot of effort into preventing Monks from getting easy bonus damage, and then this exists.

I don't understand the logic at all, a regular uncommon weapon would be traditionally +1, but they felt the need to go beyond that for no real reason, at least make the tattoo rare.

I would have liked to have seen some more novel common tattoos as well, the writing one is eh even for roleplaying a magical scribe/forger. Like seriously none of these tattoos at least glow and give off useable light?

[jaappleton]

That’s right, Spirit Shroud works on all attacks you make so long as the target is within 10ft.

So, that’s means Spiritual Weapon, Fire Bolt, Eldritch Blast, Starry Form - Archer vía Stars Druid, any sort of spell with an Attack Roll qualifies.

Spiritual Weapon is the only spell attack that’s natively a bonus action.

Now, Ravnica introduced a magic item called Illusionist Bracers; if you used your Action to cast a cantrip, you can do it again as a bonus action. (very rare)

So let’s take an 11th level Warlock with Eldritch Blast and Spirit Shroud, and now you’re doing 6d8+6d10+30 per turn. WITH A CANTRIP.

[Telwar]

Hrm, I wonder what these theoretically are previewing?

I don't understand the logic at all, a regular uncommon weapon would be traditionally +1, but they felt the need to go beyond that for no real reason, at least make the tattoo rare.

I would have liked to have seen some more novel common tattoos as well, the writing one is eh even for roleplaying a magical scribe/forger. Like seriously none of these tattoos at least glow and give off useable light?

Remember, it's usable 1x/day: "Once used, this bonus action can’t be used again until the next dawn."

So you get 10 rounds of +1d6 damage on your hits, and that's it for the adventuring day. Most fights don't go that long. You spend one bonus action on that, so that cuts out martial arts or flurry of blows that round, so that's two attacks the first round, and then maybe four per round until the end of the fight, assuming the monk doesn't have anything else to spend their bonus action on.

TBH, I don't really think it should be an issue, or compares to a fighter or barbarian with GWM or a paladin chain-smiting. And if the DM doesn't like it, they don't have to give it out.

And they've been trying to give monks more damage for a while, as I've heard here. And in the absence of a revision or publishing more traditional magic items as support, this is fine.

The ranged bit feels a little weird, though. Specifically, 30 feet feels really weird for that. However, that's a purely personal thing.

[47Ace]

I really like the new summoning spells, it seems like they are doing a rewrite of all minimization abilities starting with the Ranger rewrite and the beasts of land and beast of air. Instead of the current system cast this spell and choose one of these not necessarily balanced creatures (with some limitations) from this large book (the MM) and anything that has been added since this was written. Where you have lots of choices with some clear winners and losers and your ideal thematic choice may be one of the losers. To a new system with summon something with these stats, flavour it as you wish. There are some minor appropriate mechanical changes depending on how you flavour it. I have no idea how the power of the new spells compares to the current ones but, I love the concept. The tattoos seem like a swing, and a miss. Seriously, there not even permanent you can just attune from them whenever. I get not making them 100% permanent but getting ride of one should be a serious process, maybe even one that means you can't put any other tattoos on that part of your body (with the ability to upgrade existing tattoos so you don't get screwed over for getting a low level one.) I do like the idea of having a RAW was to give humanoid enemies non-lootable magic items so they can be a meaningful and interesting challenge without just making them all spellcasters. That would be nice for running a humanoid heavy campaign without showering your players in magic items from every encounter.

[SociopathFriend]

Looking at the spells. Acid shroud seems a bit powerful for a level 1. Spirit shroud as a warlock spell. It says any attack which means that eldritch blast + spirit shroud makes for up for 4 blasts per casting at a 1d10 +3d8. you gotta be in 10 range, but combined with eldritch invocation where the last one to hit pushes enemy away 10 feet. Then you complete your move to increase the distance. Ohh and creature can't regain hitpoints until the start of your next turn. Also, the spirit summons spells could have gotten somewhat the cure wounds treatment. 1 spell, but you choose type of spirit and creature. Then follow with statblocks. Not multiple pages of separate spells.

Alternatively go full-on in the other direction. Take the version that pulls enemies in. You're literally a walking swarm of spirits that reaches out to drag someone, kicking and screaming, back inside the cloud of death to kill them.

Personally I want it for my Necromancer Wizard purely because he's absurdly sturdy thanks to his equipment and a level of Cleric. I've got 71 hp, advantage on spell saves, and a minimal AC of 19 with the ability to amp it up with a Shield spell.
Go ahead, step into my range and let the Undead Horde devour you.