New Invocation: Speed Kills

[gamecat]

Speed Kills
Lesser, 3rd
You greatly accelerate a creature's metabolic rate. The target of Speed Kills acts as if under the effects of the spell Haste for 4 rounds. After the duration expires, the creature must pass a fortitude save or become exhausted for 24 hours. The DC of this saving throw increases by one for each time they have recieved a Speed Kills effect.

 

[Ilium]

Hmm. I don't know if I would ever take this. You don't want to use it on your friends, and you don't want to use it on your enemies.

Unless, of course, you have an easy way to remove the Exhausted condition, in which case it becomes "Haste at will" on a single target.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

How about this variation:

Speed Kills
Lesser, 3rd
You greatly accelerate a creature's metabolic rate. The target of Speed Kills acts as if under the effects of the spell Haste for 4 rounds. The first round, the target suffers 1d6 points of damage, the second 2d6, the third 3d6 and the fourth 4d6. The target may attempt a Fortitude (or Will?) save to end the effect prematurely

This way, the spell actually has the potential to kill (or at least hurt) the victim, and you might actually find a reason to cast it an enemy (especially a spellcaster, who rarely take full attacks)

 

[GreatLemur]

I've gotta say, I do really like the idea of an invocation that can be used as a weapon or a buff. The variant version is probably less exploitable, but it might still be an overly cheap haste effect for characters with a lot of hit points or healing resources.

 

[airwalkrr]

It is decent, but it really needs another name. Sounds too much like a pop culture reference, which it is.

 

[gamecat]

Ilium:
Personally, I'd put an "8-hours bed rest or <i>heal</i> spell only" caveat on the exhaustion.

Mustrum Ridcully:
Your version seems to have too much of a drawback. I hate to rely on the "in my game" logic, but I'm still (PROUDLY) using 3.0 haste, so this is of more use to spellcasters, as well as I want Speed Kills to run right in between a buff and debuff(?).

A quick mental analysis:
Its a 4-round haste effect. When a wizard first picks up haste, it lasts 5 rounds, and escalates with caster level, no exhaustion attached. Run down 7 more levels, and the wizard can make somebody haste for 13 rounds, whereas a warlock would need to repeatedly invoke speed kills (3 times), each time being another spin on the exhaustion roulette.

Airwalkrr:

The game I'm running right now is an odd fusion of fantasy and modern day, so the name is apt to my game.

Perhaps "Dark Frenzy" would fit a little better.

 

[Ilium]

Dark Frenzy is an excellent fantasy/warlock type name. Rocks. I did notice the 4-round limit as well as the single target, which both make it much less powerful than the Haste spell. I suppose, even if it had NO drawback, the warlock would be reduced to hasting everyone else constantly if they wanted to last through the whole combat. Although under the 3.0 rules he would be able to get off 2 per round if he was hasted, right? Never played 3.0 so not sure.

Hmm. Now I'm starting to think your "8 hours or Heal spell" is too harsh.

 

[gamecat]

Under 3.0 Haste, it allows for an extra partial action each round.

The 3.0 PHB defines a partial action as a standard action, without a move.

 

[Ilium]

Ok, so 2 standard actions plus a move action, or a Full Round plus a standard, per round.

So assuming a 5-member party, on round 1 I Haste myself. On rounds 2-3 I haste the rest of the party. On round 4 I can do something useful, and on round 5 I'm exhausted.

An exhausted character moves at half speed and takes a –6 penalty to Strength and Dexterity. After 1 hour of complete rest, an exhausted character becomes fatigued. A fatigued character becomes exhausted by doing something else that would normally cause fatigue.

So nothing here prevents me from doing it over and over again, with no additional penalty. Granted, I'm at -6 Strength and Dex, but with the extra action I'm almost at full move speed. If the warlock has invocations that don't require to-hit rolls he'll probably be running around both Hasted and Exhausted constantly. Interesting image. He'd look like a meth addict.

Edit: Re-reading my post I realize it looks like I don't think the other characters will be exhausted. I understand that they will. Using it on allies would be less common, though other spellcasters might be willing to put up wiht the exhaustion effects to get the haste, and you can just keep throwing it constantly to allow the exhausted characters to keep up with the others while traveling. Not a fun way to spend the day, but PCs do things like that.

 

[Engilbrand]

The Warlock could sneak in and Haste a big evil guy then get out of their fast. After a few rounds, the party comes in and hopes that the big guy has become exausted. During combat, though, there's no way that you'd want to use it on an enemy.