D&D 5E The Ego Whip

[zicar]

Hi All,

I am thinking about giving this magic item to one of my baddies. The party has recently leveled to 4 so if they defeat him they get the weapon:

EGO WHIP (requires attunement)

This whip is considered to be a magic weapon and it inflicts psychic damage in lieu of slashing damage. It is otherwise identical to mundane whip. If attuned to it, the whip gains a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls and inflicts 1 point of Charisma damage on a successful hit, in addition to the normal damage.

If a creature has its Charisma reduced to zero as a result of this damage, it is stunned. Greater restoration will restore all lost Charisma points. A long rest will restore half of the lost charisma points and magical healing or a short rest restore 1 point of charisma damage.

Thoughts?

 

[Merchant of Shadows]

I don't really like the unresistable Charisma damage on hit... what does it represent?

 

[Noctem]

I would make the charisma loss effect be an attack vs Will defense instead of automatic loss.

 

[Bolares]

I would give a charisma test to resist, with the CD being the targest charisma too, so it would be harder to loose charisma everytime

 

[BoldItalic]

If the PCs recover the weapon, would any of them actually want to use it?

If a PC uses it to fight a monster, the Charisma damage is going to be irrelevant. It would take 10 hits to stun the average monster and if you are still fighting a monster after hitting it 10 times, which on average would take 20 rounds, you are doing something wrong anyway. 5e combats are not 20-round affairs, or shouldn't be.

So that leaves us with a +1 whip that does psychic rather than slashing damage, which only matters if the monster is resistant to slashing damage. There are plenty of monsters that are resistant to slashing damage from non-magical weapons but I can't off-hand think of any that are resistant to slashing from magical ones, such as a +1 whip. So it's effectively just an 'ordinary' +1 whip, which wouldn't normally need attunement, whereas yours does.

Following that line of reasoning, from the PCs point of view, it's less good than a conventional +1 whip.

 

[zicar]

I don't really like the unresistable Charisma damage on hit... what does it represent?

The idea was that if Charisma represents sense of self, esteem, force of personality etc. this whip would strip those layers away lash by lash. It sounded really cool in concept.

 

[Noctem]

Oh it is cool. I'm just trying to make the concept more fun in practice. No save ability score lowering can be fun, but it's much easier to have it work via an attack or save or check.

 

[Blue]

Maybe on a hit the target needs to make a Chr save (DC 12) or be stunned for one round. If you are hit after being hit last round, make the save with disadvantage. (Which is why the DC is moderately low.)

This way it's always has a chance to do something cool, even on the first hit. Plus no tracking or bookkeeping, and no screwing over Chr-based casters and not really anyone else.

 

[Valmarius]

You could also make it an either/or choice for the attacker. Make a regular attack, as a +1 weapon, or crack the whip at an enemy to make them save VS CHR damage.
One option would be more useful for combat and the other for (somewhat violent) social interactions.

 

[zicar]

Thanks for all the good ideas, guys. In retrospect the auto ability damage doesn't really mesh with the rest of the 5E system.