Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sir Brennen" data-source="post: 2188509" data-attributes="member: 553">For some reason, the idea of "tattoo magic", whatever the actual base mechanic, has always been an intriguing idea to me.  There's several feats and prestige classes using the idea from various publications, and I plan on sifting through them to see which I think are suitable for my campaign.Something else struck me recently about the concept - this would be an excellent "fluff" rationale behind the fire-and-forget method of spellcasting.  Instead of wizards actually memorizing spells each day, (and inexplicably "forgetting" them), what if they actually scribe their spells on their skin each day as a tattoo? When each spell is cast, it disappears from their body.  Daily spells would actually function more like scrolls this way, and would be the reason why wizards get Scribe Scroll as an automatic feat at first level.I'm picturing something like Indian Henna body art, mostly on the face and hands.  I'm not really going for a lot of mechanical changes with this idea, more for flavor. So can anyone see any pitfalls to the idea?Some of the things I can see that need to be taken into account:Erase:: The description says "Erase removes writings of either magical or mundane nature from a scroll or from one or two pages of paper, parchment, or similar surfaces."  Writings on the skin could be assumed to be excluded, so no change there.  (Or, Erase could still work as described, requiring a touch attack, and a caster-level check vs. the spell tattoo's DC.)Sorcerers:: The fact that sorcerer's wouldn't require these tattoos is one of the reasons they are viewed with suspicion (already the case in my world), as they are not as easily identifiable.Divine Casters: Continue to function as described, as they aren't "forgetting" spells, they are using up what was granted to them for the day.  This helps distinguish them from arcane casters further.Metamagic Feats: These now require a permanent tattoo when the feat is taken, regardless of the spellcaster's class.  Meta-magic tattoos are normally placed on the chest or back.  Some casters go shirtless to show these tattoos off, while others keep them hidden.Spellcraft: The same uses of this skill with regard to scrolls apply to spell tattoos, but since tattoos are more unique to each wizard, add +5 to the DCs. This allows PCs the possibility to learn spells from fallen foes without having to find a spell book, but only those not already cast.Oh, and of course the tattoos would be water-proof  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />Any other ideas/comments are welcome.</blockquote>

Verification