Magic Item Level Help

[DogBackward]

I'm set to start up an online 4e game soon, and one of my players (that I used to know personally before I moved) wants to rework one of his old 3.5 characters. We were talking about one of his favorite magic items, and I decided to remake it for 4e. I don't have any books handy right now to check other items for a comparison, so I'm looking for some help to determine what level it might be.

The Bloodspike Gauntlets originally had a 3/day power that allowed you to take xd6 (up to 1/3 your level) damage and turn that into xd10 damage to nearby enemies, as you sprayed your blood-turned-solid out as razor-sharp spikes. I've changed it a bit; the new Bloody mechanic makes for an interesting twist, and helps the item to scale at higher levels while making it a slightly more worrisome choice; you have to use it at or near the start of a fight for best effect, but that means you'll be fighting at a major loss for the entire battle. But if you use it later on, it's likely to be a lot less powerful, unless you managed to avoid taking any damage.

So, I'm looking for some help as to what level it should be. Also, any ideas for interesting powers to add to it are always welcome.

[sblock=The Bloodspike Gauntlets]When you don these rusted, blood-encrusted iron gauntlets, a series of winding markings travel up your arms and across your body, resembling tattoos of barbed wire. When you activate the Daily power, these "tattoos" become real, digging into your flesh with a spray of blood that crystalizes instantly, spearing out to impale your foes.

Item Slot; Hands (??? gp)
Property; Any time you suffer a melee critical hit, your attacker takes 5 damage.

Power (Daily); Standard, Close Burst 3
You take exactly enough damage to reduce you to your Bloodied HP amount, and you make a Constitution attack with a +2 bonus against the AC of all enemies within the area. On a hit, a target takes damage equal to the amount of HP you lost. Temporary HP lost to this power do not add to the damage. On a miss, a target takes half damage.[/sblock]I'm thinking of adding an Encounter power that allows you to take 1d6 damage per tier and deal that much plus your Con. bonus to a single target as a ranged (5? 10?) Con. +2 vs. AC. attack. How do you guys think that might affect the level?

 

[Andur]

Adding powers? It is already potentially better than every magic item listed.

Suggested changes:

Spoiler

Daily: When bloodied you can take 1d6 points of damage, all enemies within blast 3 Con+2 v AC take same amount of damage, save half.
Increase to 2d6 at level 18
Increase to 3d6 at level 28

Base item would be level 8. I think the property of the item is o.k. and could be combined with the daily use quite effectively.

The way you have it set-up currently a high level fighter could potentially do a total of 8000 hp of damage for a 100 hp loss.

 

[DogBackward]

Uh... how? It deals exactly the same damage as what you lost. So, if you lose 100 HP, you deal 100 damage. Although... I'll add a limitation that temporary HP don't count for the purpose of dealing the damage. Although I don't see how anyone could get 8000 Temporary HP to let them do that, it is something that should be addressed.

Really, how do you see this doing 8000 damage?

 

[ValhallaGH]

Really, how do you see this doing 8000 damage?

By hitting 80 guys in your three square burst.
8 in the first ring.
16 in the second ring.
24 in the third ring.
That's 48 ground-based targets.
Plus whoever is flying in the area above the fighter: up to 49 per layer for two layers.
Maximum possible targets if the character is completely swarmed = 48 + 49 + 49 = 147 targets.

Maximum reasonable targets is about 35.

 

[DogBackward]

Oh, well yeah, if people crowd around you that much, of course it'll do mroe damage overall. But dealing 100 damage to 81 targets (including yourself, remember) is a lot different from jsut dealing 8000 damage. At the levels where you could do that much damage, your foes will have plenty of HP to cover it, unless they're minions.

Although, I think I might need to add something about limiting immediate healing, to avoid a blood-burst then quick heal from the cleric right away...

But yeah, I think the fact that you're taking half the damage needed to kill you is a decent drawback for being able to deal massive damage. And I'm fully aware that it'll be a higher-level item. The thing is, I'm not sure exactly what level, and I still don't have my books back to go off of.

Although, maybe a smaller Burst is in order...