A class has been reborn from the ashes!
Venturing into the darkest of lairs, where many other adventurers would not dare to go, the Blood Hunter enters without fear. The truly horrific abominations are what Blood Hunters specialize in exterminating. And why do they walk with such confidence? Because they house a bit of those monsters in themselves.
I'd say behind Monk, Blood Hunter is my favorite Class. As edgy as it is, using your blood to power your abilities is just really cool. Plus, being able to take on and use aspects of various monsters, without fully transforming like a Druid just has such incredible potential both in combat and roleplay.
This rewrite includes two Subclasses:
- Order of the Dragon - A Phoenix Quill original that focuses on being an "all-rounder" sort of Subclass for the Blood Hunter, that boasts increased defenses and enemy control. In addition to unique Blood Curses that allow for area effects.
- Order of the Thaumaturge (Formerly Order of the Ghostslayer) - A major change from the original one penned by Matt Mercer, this version of the Subclass allows you to command spirits that cry out for justice, not just destroy them. The unique Blood Curses available to this Subclass allow you to cure creatures of various mental conditions, in addition to other effects that help you take on spectral enemies. (This Subclass went through several revisions, and will likely see more in the future. But, I wanted to get it out to see what everyone thinks. I know what I want it to be, but the execution for this particular theme has admittedly been a bit difficult when Phantom Rogue exists.)
Notable Changes and Design Philosophy
- Blood Curses
- Hunters now get more uses per Short Rest. It felt very odd that Blood Hunters, even high-level ones got extremely limited uses of their key-stone Feature.
- They have been vastly expanded, so that Subclasses are not limited to a single unique Curse.
- Hunter's Bane is now Hunter's Grimoire
- In addition to granting benefits to track and researching Checks, it also grants bonuses to Attack and Damage Rolls. The Advantage on said checks was nice, but ended up feeling very lack luster and easily replicable by other Features and Spells.
- Speak with your DM about treating the Grimoire with the same rules as a Wizard's Spellbook. If they so choose, they can have it be that you lose the benefits if you lose your Grimoire.
- Crimson Rite
- Certain damage types are no longer locked behind high-level play. In my opinion, having damage types like Necrotic and Thunder requiring Level 14 felt unnecessarily limiting. They may be on the more uncommon side, but there wasn't much mechanical reason in practice for them not to be available. Also, Poison not being one of the base damage types available for a Rite was very odd to me.
- Hunter's Persistence
- As compared to my version of The Fighter, which also gets their 3rd Attack at Level 10, the main difference is that the Blood Hunter MUST have an active Crimson Rite to do so.
- I designed the Blood Hunter to get more of their power from the base Class, as opposed to their Subclass like in my version of Fighter.
- As compared to my version of The Fighter, which also gets their 3rd Attack at Level 10, the main difference is that the Blood Hunter MUST have an active Crimson Rite to do so.
- Hardened Soul
- Now grants Immunity to being Charmed and Frightened, as opposed to just Advantage.
- Dark Augmentation
- Moved to Level 14 to be in line with similar Features from other Classes.
- No longer increases Movement Speed.
- Instead of giving flat bonuses to multiple Saving Throws, which is far more powerful, it now just grants Proficiency in Strength and Dexterity Saving Throws.
- Brand of Tethering is now Brand of Condemnation
- Moved to Level 17, as it did quite a lot for Level 13.
- The damage for failing to teleport now uses your Hemocraft Die.
- New 20th Level Feature: Morbid Metamorphosis
- The original Sanguine Mastery Feature was very lacking for a 20th Level Feature, and didn't offer much reason to put all 20 Level into Blood Hunter.
- Its new effect of increasing multiple stats not only falls in line with the precedent set by other official Classes like Barbarian and Monk, but I found it made the most sense narratively. You are constantly evolving with Hemocraft power, and it eventually just pushes you over edge physically and mentally.
You can get the PDF version of the brew HERE
Artists in Order of Appearance (Credit Also Next to Art on the Document)
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