Infinite HPS?

[Force0]

No, planesdragon, in the spell description it says specificlly that you keep your HPs regardless of new con score.
And AuraSeer got it figured out, Yeah, that could work with the CON boosting item, but what about if it's a psion with Body Fuel? (and you gain HPs by "healing" the new body with a body adjustment or something? There is no magic in effect, but the end result is the same: More HPs (not for free, but not with levels..).

There is one other thing to consider, while one is gaining HPs, the other one is losing some, and may very well die with the CON item.

 

[Planesdragon]

No, planesdragon, in the spell description it says specificlly that you keep your HPs regardless of new con score.

Then the power's badly written, and should be eratted by now. Either that "no con adjustment" line should be tossed out, or a note should be made that modifiers to your host body's CON sore don't change your HP.

(You could infer this, btw, from how the power's worded. Since the CON of the victim's body doesn't affect your HP when you move it, spells cast on the new body shouldn't effect YOUR hp. OTOH, spells cast on YOUR body would effect your hp...)

Now, all that said...

I don't see a problem, in game balance or theory, with allowing a few hp extra from killing bodies. (I'd prefer it to be a specific feat, spell, or power, but I'm ornery.) You'd never be yourself again, and your alignment would certainly be evil--but evil people should be able to gain some power from nefarious acts, or else it doesn't make any sense for them to do the nefarious act.

Remember to adjust the character's ECL / CR for an extraordinary ammount of hp. I'd suggest +1 per 20 hp gained this way.

And if that doesn't balance the ultra-HP character, just have those that the psion kills this way automatically come back as Revenants or Ghosts.

 

[DanMcS]

I don't think you can have it both ways. If you transfer from an 18 con guy to a 12 con guy, and don't lose hps, then raising the 12 con guy to a 14 shouldn't gain you any.

 

[Planesdragon]

One more bit...

There is one other thing to consider, while one is gaining HPs, the other one is losing some, and may very well die with the CON item.

Mind Switch ends when you return to your body, or when you kill your body and stay in the new one.

If you don't want to kill your self, and want to exploit this loophole in true rules-lawyering fashion (don't be offended--it's a time-honored tradition), you can only get a double benefit from the item, at the cost of having to use this power.

Fer example:

Phil the Psion (10th level) and Fred the Fighter (1st level) agree to try this out. Phil puts on a +6 Con item, gaining 30 hp, and then Mind-switches to Fred. Phil then takes off the +6 Con item, causing Fred to lose 3 hp, and puts it on himself, gaining another 30 hp.

The bad part about this is that, now, anyone with a beef against Phil will either attack Fred-in-Phil's body, easily killing him and causing Phil to earn a great bit guilt trip, or they'll target Phil-in-Fred's body, and either kill Fred (causing Phil to suffer that same guit trip) or run away, and then come back and kill Fred later (same guilt trip.)

So, yeah, if you don't care about killing the other folk and you can convince your DM to allow a broken power to work as badly written, you can get free HP this way--but that'll turn you evil quick, and not the tame-lawyer kind of evil, either.

(And, like I said, your Character Level would go up from all the freebie hps--making you face harder and harder foes without the powers or abilities to face them.)

 

[Plane Sailing]

Anything I'm missing?

The con raising magic item is the problem.

extra hps from a magic item are basically temporary hp... if you take the item off they go away. Either your old body wears the item, or the new body wears the item, but only the one which has the item at that time has the hp.

Thus you can't switch bodies again and again and multiply up the bonus you think your getting from the con boosting magic item.

Cheers

 

[Force0]

Yeah, it stops the magic item switching, but what about a psion with body fuel? There is no item to remove. Oh, and there is not a time duration as previously mentioned, thus this new body is now yours. If you don't want to give it back (perhaps it has a better DEX or STR score?), and you don't want to kill it (your not evil), but you also want to benifit from it (C-neutral ok with this?) then you go away, and then (after a while adventuring and all) he finds a belt of constitution, he now gains some HPs (he didn't do it for the HPs gain but the end result is the same.). There also the problem that he runs with Animal affinity(CON) on him most of the time, and he likes to mess with the heads of the others (switching bodies often). And now I don't know what to do, giving him a ECL seems a bit harch (as he's just doing this for fun).

Keep the ideas coming!:

 

[AuraSeer]

Yeah, it stops the magic item switching, but what about a psion with body fuel?

Body fuel just lets you convert ability points to power points. I don't see how that would lead into infinite hp.

When you use a Con-raising spell or power on yourself, the effect will either stay with the body or travel with your soul. If it stays with the body, you lose its benefit when you swap; if it travels with you, you get no benefit from multiple castings. Either way, there's a low limit on your hit point increase.

 

[Force0]

If you use body fuel to burn up your CON (not the one doing the switching), and the switching guy heals the body (Via body adjustement or restoration) the loop come back, without any magical effect.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Body Fuel has been capped - max of 60 ability points can be burned per day.

 

[Camarath]

If you use body fuel to burn up your CON (not the one doing the switching), and the switching guy heals the body (Via body adjustement or restoration) the loop come back, without any magical effect.

You could do this with out Mind Switch. Has Mind Switch been a problem in your campaign other than this "loop hole"?