[Very very vile] The Blood Masks - Help me redesign them

[Anabstercorian]

Remember those creepy guys? That prestige class I designed so long ago? Well, I'm redoing them now that I have more design experience under my belt. I need help determining, however, appropriate thematic abilities for the eight Paths of Mutilation. Yes, eight. I've been evil today.

Tell me what dark powers you imagine being linked to these rituals of unimaginable profanity.

Path of the Grid: At 4th level, you use a razor to incise a grid of thin lines across the entirety of your face to divide it in to squares, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X. At 8th level, you remove half the squares to create a checkerboard pattern, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X.
Path of the Third Eye: At 4th level, you use dark magic to peel back the skin on your forehead to the skull in an eye-like pattern, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X. At 8th level, you remove a 'pupil' from that 'eye' in such a fashion as to expose the brain, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X.
Path of the Predator: At 4th level, you peel away your lips and much of your cheeks so that your teeth and gums are constantly exposed, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X. At 8th level, you use a bone saw and magical rituals to split your jawbone down the middle to turn your mouth in to a set of gnashing mandibles, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X.
Path of the Skull: At 4th level, you strip off the flesh of your nose to expose the bones and give yourself a skull-like visage, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X. At 8th level, you dig out your eyes with your own sharpened fingernails and replace them with magical sensors like those of the undead, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X.
Path of Red Iron: At 4th level, you horribly burn the skin of your face until it's twisted by scars and a horrid reddish color by heating your mask to impossible temperature while you're wearing it, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X. At 8th level, you use a set of branding irons to burn profane symbols of evil in to the skin of your face, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X.
Path of Two Masks: At 4th level, you seal up and unmake your mouth as though it were never there without leaving a trace, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X. At 8th level, you similarly seal up and remove your eyes, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X.
Path of Bloody Teeth: At 4th level, you use a set of clamps to crush your teeth to shards in your mouth, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X. At 8th level, you use a pick to pierce several holes through the bottom of your jaw to your mouth, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X.
Path of Black Tears: At 4th level, you use a red-hot iron to burn away your eyelids and tearducts, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X. At 8th level, you cover your eyes with boiling tar until they melt and merge with the tar in a dark ritual, granting you the feat X, with the penalty X.

 

[rkanodia]

Are you wanting suggestions for existing feats to tie to these paths, original abilities, or both?

 

[Anabstercorian]

Are you wanting suggestions for existing feats to tie to these paths, original abilities, or both?

Both, actually. If there's a feat in the SRD that immediately strikes you as thematically appropriate, then by all means, please say so. Otherwise, non-standard abilities are also perfectly fine.

For example, my personal idea for the Bloody Teeth path isn't a feat, but I'm not going to tell you what it is for fear of infecting the brilliant creative minds of this board.

 

[Anabstercorian]

Okay, here's what I'm thinking for Path of Bloody Teeth. At 4th level, you gain a Breath Weapon composed of a spray of blood and broken teeth, usable once every 1d4+1 rounds, doing 2d6 points of slashing/piercing damage that pierces DR as a magic evil weapon, Reflex DC 10 + 1/2 class level + Con mod for half, but they suffer continuous pain from their teeth, which erodes at their spirit, giving them a -2 to Charisma. At 8th level, your breath weapon increases in potency - It can be used once every 1d3 rounds, and does 8d6 points of acid damage in addition to the slashing damage. However, the continuously oozing wounds eat away at the Blood Mask's health, giving them a -2 to Constitution.

 

[Anabstercorian]

Path of the Third Eye: At 4th level, you use dark magic to peel back the skin on your forehead to the skull in an eye-like pattern, granting you mysterious insight in to the minds of others so that you receive a +3 Insight bonus to AC, saving throws, skill checks, and attack rolls against all creatures vulnerable to mind-affecting effects, with the penalty that your injury leaves your vulnerable to critical hits so that you suffer a -10 penalty to AC on confirmation rolls for critical hits. At 8th level, you remove a 'pupil' from that 'eye' in such a fashion as to expose the brain, increasing the insight bonus to +6, with the penalty that all critical threats against you are automatically confirmed..

 

[rkanodia]

I wrote up an idea, but then I compared it to your example (a 10d6 breath weapon every three rounds!) and found it rather lacking. Let's try this again:

Path of Two Masks:

Hear No Evil: Once you close off your mouth, you may create silence, centered on yourself, at will, as a spell-like ability.
You are permanently muted, and thus may not speak or cast spells with a verbal component.

See No Evil: Once you remove and cover your eyes, you may inflict blindness as a touch or melee attack once per round, except that its duration is one minute per Blood Mask level rather than permanent.
You are permanently blinded, and suffer all the normal penalties for blindness; however, you gain blindsight to 60'.

So this setup would be for an assassin-type character. Sneak into the chambers of your target, throw down silence just before you attack (so that it will take longer to get help), then flee, pausing to blind pursuers. If the odds look good, you can just finish them right there, since they won't be able to call for help as long as you are standing nearby.

 

[Anabstercorian]

Thanks, rkanodia! I like your ideas, especially the second one. However, it bears mentioning that in order to even take the prestige class, you must abandon speech forever - So the penalty of being unable to talk isn't a very big one. I'm honestly unsure of how to manage that one. I do like the idea of casting Silence as a spell like ability.

 

[rkanodia]

Oh. I hadn't seen the original prestige class, and for some reason I can't search the forum for it.

One thing I hadn't thought about is that once you have closed your mouth, you will be unable to consume potions. That's pretty harsh just by itself.

 

[rkanodia]

Path of the Grid

Red Net: The grid on your face may 'catch' incoming spells, giving you spell resistance of 5 + your character level. However, the symbol of the net has its own vulnerability; attacks made using piercing weapons are at +2 to hit you.

Red Mirror: The panels on your face may 'reflect' incoming spells, increasing your spell resistance to 10 + your character level and reflecting any spell that fails the resistance check by 5 or more as though affected by spell turning. However, the symbol of the mirror has its own vulnerability; attacks made using bludgeoning weapons are at +2 to hit you.

 

[Anabstercorian]

Path of the Skull

Blood Scent At 4th level, you strip off the flesh of your nose to expose the bones and give yourself a skull-like visage, granting you Scent that has double the normal range for the purpose of smelling blood. As a side effect, you lose the ability to smell anything else, giving you a -4 penalty to Craft(Alchemy, Cooking) and related skills, as well as making you automatically fail any wisdom check to detect a scent,

Blood Sight At 8th level, you dig out your eyes with your own sharpened fingernails and replace them with magical sensors like those of the undead, granting you Darkvision with a range of 90 feet (or extending your darkvision by 90 feet if you already have Darkvision) as well as the power of Bloodsight. Bloodsight allows you to instantly detect any blood in your line of vision, as well detecting the circulatory systems of creatures with blood as though you had arcane True Seeing, often giving you the eerie sight of humanoid figures composed of pulsing veins and arteries. However, you lose the ability to see normally.