D&D 5E 5e Ideas on making a trade/skill for magical tattoos

[Balfore]

Years ago, when I played Runequest, there was a pretty neat mechanic that allowed you to gain or put the powers of a creature/demon etc... into a gem/armor/sword or tattoo.
The process was lengthy, but the outcome was pretty cool.
The game system approached Magic with some thought (as I said, lengthy), but you would first need to create an open matrix in the item with enough spell points to hold the POWer of the creature.
This first required a point to OPEN the enchantment, and one to CLOSE it.
So, a creature with a POW of 20, would require 22 points (I believe) to make the enchantment.
Then, of course, came all the rituals to summon, trap and know the creatures true name. (Still chances for failure).
If all these things succeeded, you now had a...say...demon, that was 'bound' in your item. Which, you gained the benefits of whatever that particular demon could do... (one I remember was a demon that added 3d6 dmg to a sword).

Naturally, I wouldn't want anything that broken in my campaign, but to gain an extra edge, one time a day, based in having something bound, would be a cool new mechanic to the game.

I was thinking, for a tattoo, you would need various ingredients, including the blood (which maintains some of the essence of the creature) of the creature you wanted. Most ingredients would be rare, and you would only gain a single benefit.
There would also have to be an ancient book of the lost art, to learn this type of magic...and it could only be used by one person in the party because it could be a legendary book.

So, what sort of spells, ingredients, skills etc... do you think would make for a fun mechanic to make something like this work?

 

[Leatherhead]

Stuff like this makes me wish Ritual Caster had different power levels for different tiers of play. So that you didn't need a Spell to make magical effects happen.

Anyway, I'm thinking that eating ASI/Feats or maybe even an attunement slot to get magic tattoos would be appropriate.

 

[Lanliss]

Magic item crafting would be your best bet I think. Here are the stages I would have.

1) Find Magic-harnessing-crystal or gem. Anything from Quartz to a Diamond will work, with the bonus being that better gems can hold stronger creatures.

2) Cast a Binding or Domination spell into the gem.

3) Find chosen demon, and attempt said Binding or domination, cast out of the crystal. This will bind the demon into the gem.

4) Get some Dragon/Pheonix/Unicorn blood. At DM discretion these can bring different results and power levels, or not.

5) Powderize crystal (The chosen spell, for story purposes, was designed for this to happen. Crushing the gem will not break the spell binding the demon.)

6) Mix powder with blood.

7) Make some CON and CHA saves, as the blood burns itself into your body, and the demon attempts to overthrow your mind. Stronger demon, higher DC to avoid possession. More volatile blood (Dragon) can mean a higher DC to avoid major damage (I would make it a permanent reduction to max HP).

8) Success? Congratulations, you got the tattoo you wanted, and it has whatever cool powers you wanted.

This can also be scaled back for something weaker, like using a bound Ghost with some Imp blood. Just decide what appropriate CR monsters the player has to fight to achieve the power level they want for the tattoo.

 

[robus]

Have you seen this? The monk in my party is collecting tattoos made from dragons teeth for extra damage. We modded it a bit to suit but it's a great starting point.

https://www.reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/4wjtde/a_guide_to_magical_tattoos_v_10/

 

[Balfore]

Have you seen this? The monk in my party is collecting tattoos made from dragons teeth for extra damage. We modded it a bit to suit but it's a great starting point.

https://www.reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/4wjtde/a_guide_to_magical_tattoos_v_10/

This is really good. I can pull a lot of info from this! Many thanks!

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[Balfore]

Magic item crafting would be your best bet I think. Here are the stages I would have.

1) Find Magic-harnessing-crystal or gem. Anything from Quartz to a Diamond will work, with the bonus being that better gems can hold stronger creatures.

2) Cast a Binding or Domination spell into the gem.

3) Find chosen demon, and attempt said Binding or domination, cast out of the crystal. This will bind the demon into the gem.

4) Get some Dragon/Pheonix/Unicorn blood. At DM discretion these can bring different results and power levels, or not.

5) Powderize crystal (The chosen spell, for story purposes, was designed for this to happen. Crushing the gem will not break the spell binding the demon.)

6) Mix powder with blood.

7) Make some CON and CHA saves, as the blood burns itself into your body, and the demon attempts to overthrow your mind. Stronger demon, higher DC to avoid possession. More volatile blood (Dragon) can mean a higher DC to avoid major damage (I would make it a permanent reduction to max HP).

8) Success? Congratulations, you got the tattoo you wanted, and it has whatever cool powers you wanted.

This can also be scaled back for something weaker, like using a bound Ghost with some Imp blood. Just decide what appropriate CR monsters the player has to fight to achieve the power level they want for the tattoo.

I like this alot. Intermixing this info, with the info from the link below, should yield some neat results!

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[Jester David]

I did a spellscars document that could be magical tattoos:
http://www.dmsguild.com/product/201042/5MWD-Presents-Spellscars

But magic item creation could also work, using the crafting rules in the DMG. The tattoo becomes a magic item that takes an attunement slot (even if the item normally doesn't) but can't be removed or loaned out.
Potentially pretty balanced.