New weapon ability: Bloodletting

[ChimericDream]

I know there's already something like this, but I don't want to look for it, and I'm sure it isn't OGC anyways, so here is my variation on the theme. Opinions?

Bloodletting

A bloodletting weapon deals 1 additional point of damage per round. Each successful hit on an enemy increases this damage by an additional point. Creatures immune to critical hits (such as plants and constructs) are immune to the damage dealt by this weapon.

Magical healing of the same amount or more than the current amount of bleeding damage will stem the bleeding and prevent further damage. This type of healing does not prevent the creature from taking bleeding damage from subsequent hits, however.

For example, a fighter with a Bloodletting greatsword who hits his opponent a total of 5 times in 3 rounds causes his enemy to take 5 points of bleeding damage per round. Magical healing of 5 or more points will stop this bleeding, but healing of less than 5 points will not.

Special: This weapon enhancement can only be added to slashing or piercing weapons.

Moderate evocation; CL 10th; Craft Magic Arms and Armor, mage’s sword; Price +2 bonus.

I based it off the wounding enhancement, so I think the balance is fairly decent. As it stands, though, I'm not sure if it should be a +2 or +3. I think it's a bit better than wounding, since the damage keeps going, and if I remember right, the original version of this only required 1 point of magical healing to stem the bleeding.

Thanks in advance.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

actually aside from the increase in pts of magical healing required this reads almost identical to the original 3e wounding mechanic which was changed at least twice by 3.5e.

The first version of wounding was 1pt per round per strike with a wounding weapon, then got nerfed.
The second version of wounding was 1pt of hp damage per strike with a wounding weapon non-repeating.
Final Version from 3.5e of wounding is 1pt of constitution damage and doesn't stack.

This reads so similar to the original wounding it's really just a slight tweak in requiring magical healing equal to wounding damage to close the wounds.

 

[ChimericDream]

Should I change it more, then? I don't recall the 3.0 wounding ability, and never owned the 3.0 books, but I remembered seeing something like this. I just like the concept of continuous bloodflow doing actual damage to the enemy. However, it may need a bit more tweaking to get quite right and not something that crosses any legal "lines".

I'm still unsure as to whether this needs to be a +3 or not, but that's something I'll think about as well. Perhaps having some sort of cap on the damage done each round by bleeding.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

The 3.0 wounding was considered a +2 bonus for almost the same benefit. they kept the +2 bonus when they nerfed it in 3.5e so if you want to keep it as a seperate effect with the existing wounding +3 sounds about right. As for a cap to how many hp could be lost per turn with this ability I figure that counteracted by the extra cost over and above wounding in the current edition.

 

[comrade raoul]

To balance this, try to figure out a plausible number of rounds, on average, between the time a character hits a typical opponent with a bloodletting weapon and the time that opponent either dies or receives suitable magical healing. That's the added damage a bloodletting weapon should be understood as yielding per attack. I don't think, typically, the amount of time adds up to more than three or four rounds; less for subsequent hits from the weapon. Accordingly, it seems generous to say that a hit from a bloodletting weapon deals 3 or 4 points of extra damage overall. That puts it squarely in the +1 range (compare to the energy enhancement's +3.5 points of energy damage): the weapons are arguably more effective against a broader range of targets, but it's better to deal all your damage up front rather than stretching it out. I'd say a price modifier of +1 works great.