Barbarian Primal Path: Path of the Bloodrager

The Bloodrager is a vulgar and violent form of barbarian whose rage stems from eldritch and evil magic. The very scent of blood enters this creature into a horrifying battle trance that corrupts their mind and allows them to exceed their body's usual constraints in exchange for their self-control. Trained Bloodragers can control this trance to some degree and harness the dark magical energies contained in fresh blood to perform incredible and horrifying feats.

Blood Trance

The Bloodrager's style of fighting is relentless, and feeds off of the pain of their enemies. When you choose this path at 3rd level, you begin to embrace your blood trance. When you are raging and deal any amount of damage to an enemy with a melee weapon, you gain 1 blood point. You can have a maximum of 5 blood points at any time. All blood points disappear whenever your rage ends.

Your damage blood points and maximum blood points increase to 2 and 10 at 6th level, 3 and 15 at 10th level, and 4 and 20 at 14th level, respectively.

Blood Points represent the semi-controlled trance that a Bloodrager sinks into once coated with the blood of their slain. You gain benefits based on how many points you possess at any given time, as shown in the Blood Trance Effects table below. These benefits are granted when you have greater than or equal to the stated number of points, and each set of benefits is exclusive, meaning no two act at the same time.

Beyond granting passive benefits for stored points, you can also choose to expend these points to use certain abilities. Each of these abilities can be used in place of one of your attacks on your turn unless otherwise noted. You consume points before the ability's effect occurs. Only one of these abilites can be used on each of your turns.

  • Blood Save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Constitution modifier
Blood Trance Effects
Points Held Effect.
5 +1 to AC, and +1 to damage rolls
10 -1 to Attack rolls, +2 to AC, and +2 to damage rolls
15 -2 to attack rolls, +2 to AC, +2 to damage rolls, and resistance to necrotic damage
20 -3 to attack rolls, +2 to AC, + 3 to damage rolls, and resistance to necrotic damage

Blood Trance Abilities

  • Jump Strike (3 Points) Consumed within your blood-fuelled trance, you extend the limits of your physical form to jump up to half your speed before landing and bringing down a single melee weapon attack on an enemy as part of the same action.
  • Blood Healing (4 Points): You perform a minor ritual on the blood upon your weapon to convert it into a healing solution, allowing you to regain hit points equal to 1d4 + your Constitution modifier.
  • Cripple (6 Points) You launch a brutal but well-aimed strike that allows you to cripple an enemy. Make a single melee weapon attack against a target within range. If you are successful the attack deals half damage and the target gains a -2 modifier on all attack rolls. This effect persists until the target regains hit points by any means.
  • Blackened Blood (10 Points) By performing the Blood Healing Ritual backwards, you rot the blood covering your weapon to an aged and poisoned ooze, causing your weapon to deal an additional 1d6 poison damage with each strike for the next 3 successful attacks. When an enemy is hit by weapon augmented in this way they must succeed on a Constitution saving throw or be poisoned. They may repeat this saving throw at the end of each of their turns, ending the effect on a successful save.
  • Devastating Attack (12 Points) Channeling a large amount of your energy into one large swing, you make a single melee weapon attack. This attack is automatically successful and is a critical hit.

Visceral Attack

The Visceral Attack is a staple of a Bloodrager's fighting style. By 6th level, you have mastered this deadly ability. Whenever you land a critical hit, you may choose to perform a Visceral Attack. This technique plunges a blood-drenched hand into the torso of the victim, piercing their body and channeling wicked blood into the wound. You expend any number of blood points and add that number to the damage of the attack as necrotic damage.

Additionally, you gain double your normal number of blood points for this attack when you use this ability. You gain these points after the attack, and cannot contribute them toward the damage of this ability.

Once used, this feature cannot be used again until you finish a short or long rest.

Blinding Blood

At 6th level, you can accumulate enough blood to use offensively against your enemies. You may spend 10 Blood Points to swing your weapon around, flinging excess blood from its blade into the eyes of your enemies. As an action on your turn, all creatures within your melee range must succeed on a Constitution saving throw versus your blood save DC or be blinded. This save can be repeated at the end of each of their turns, ending the effect on a successful save.

Sanguine Sense

By 10th level, you are a specialist of sorts in the field of vulgar blood magic, and can use that knowledge to nearly communicate with blood itself. You can smell blood within a range of 300 feet from you as long as there is some feasible path along which its scent can travel. You know what direction it originates from, how far it is from you, and if it is the blood of a beast or a humanoid, if it is neither, you cannot tell the exact variety of creature.

If you touch the blood of another creature you can tell how long ago it shed this blood, whether or not it is still alive, and, granted you have seen or heard of it, the kind of creature it was. If the creature is dead, and has been so for less than 7 days, you may perform a 1-minute ritual to summon the conciousness of the creature to the blood for up to 10 minutes. The conciousness will answer 2 questions, and knows only what it knew in life, including the languages it knew. Once this ritual is used, it cannot be used again until you finish a short or long rest.

Bloodcurdle

By 10th level, the blood magic fueling you grows to the point that it can curdle the blood of other creatures. As an action on your turn, you may spend 15 Blood Points to force a single creature within 5 feet of you to make a Constitution saving throw versus your blood save DC, becoming paralyzed for up to one minute on a failed save as the blood within their veins conforms to your will and stiffens their body.

The creature can repeat this saving throw at the end of each of its turns and each time it takes damage, ending the effect on a success.

Blood Rage

By 14th level, the true rage of your bloodlust can lie dormant normally, but may rear its ugly head when faced with true danger. When you take damage that would leave you with 0 hit points while raging, you can choose expend all of your current blood points to instead be reduced to 1 hit point and enter a Blood Rage.

The Blood Rage is an almost-uncontrollable state of the blood trance that consumes your body in one final push towards survival. Use of this ability wracks your body and mind for days after its use, but it may ensure that you yet live to see those days.

While in a Blood Rage, your movement speed is increased by 10 feet, you gain a + 4 bonus to damage rolls, but suffer a - 4 modifier to attack rolls. You are also immune to being charmed, and your intelligence score is treated as 1 for the purposes of spell effects, such as those of detect thoughts.

Whenever you would be reduced to 0 hit points while blood-raging, you instead make a DC 15 Constitution saving throw, ignoring the damage on a successful save, but being reduced to 0 hit points and suffering one failed death saving throw on a failure. Each time this Constitution saving throw is made successfully, the DC of the next increases by 1.

A Blood Rage ends only when there are no living hostile creatures visible or audible to you. If a Blood Rage ends in this way, you suffer two levels of exhaustion, but remain conscious.

Once used, this feature cannot be used again until you finish a long rest.

 

Bloodrager v1.0

Apologies for the lack of art, I haven't found any that I'm satisfied with yet. The primary goal of this version of the bloodrager is to gain feedback on the balance of the subclass.

Changes from v0.5

  • Removed redundant BPS resistance from Blood Trance and replaced with Necrotic Resistance
  • Reduced point cost for Jump Strike ability by 1
  • Added a universal saving throw that scales for Blood Trance abilities
  • Removed Tongue of Blood (10th)
  • Added Bloodcurdle (10th)
  • Renamed Ichor Sense to Sanguine Sense
  • Increased the range of the first portion of Sanguine Sense to 300 feet
  • Added to Sanguine Sense the ability to question the dead through their blood
  • Reworked Blood Rage almost entirely. Now lasts until battle ends and requires repeated and scaling saving throws to survive deadly hits, among other things.

Background

This subclass is the result of a homebrew I came up with almost 2 years ago, a campaign setting that ignored the setings, classes, races, and most spells of 5e DnD and instead featured six custom classes and 10 'races' (Taking up over 50 pages in the homebrewery). This was an incredible amount of work for what turned out to be a broken, unbalanced, and overly ambitious setting that I hated to work on, and I stopped working before it was fully finished.

Recently I rediscovered many of my notes regarding that campaign, and looked back at the classes. This Subclass is the result of one of those full classes, and uses its main mechanic, the blood trance. I liked the idea of having points that benefit you when banked and stored, but offered different benefits for spending them. It creates an interesting balance for the player and makes them make choices based on the situation. Expanding on that the abilities you gaian when leveling augment those choices and offer new options, while building on the dark theme of the subclass.

I hope you enjoy this blast from my past as much as I enjoyed writing it!

/u/SubjectiveSloth

Barbarian Primal Path: Path of the Whirlwind

The 'Whirlwind' is an apt name given to those who lost control of their blood trance as bloodragers. These creatures of insane violence feed from the blood of their victims, but indulge too heavily in their trance, becoming consumed by it. The Whirlwind is named as such because of their desire to fight as many possible enemies at once, becoming like a whirlwind of iron and death. They enjoy being outnumbered, because it just means more blood for them, and that is always their desire.

Those who practice the Path of the Bloodrager often find themselves hunting a whirlwind, as they are the bastard sons of their art, and must be dealt with before they cause mass death and destruction. It is not uncommon for a whirlwind to take on up to twenty trained bloodragers before succumbing but this is seen as the best solution to these creatures as, left unchecked, they would carve a brutal path through anything nearby in pursuit of more sweet, precious blood.

Wild Blood Trance

You are a former bloodrager and as such were gifted with the eldritch art of blood magic, however, you have become tainted by it and so has your trance. When you are raging and deal any amount of damage to an enemy with a melee weapon, you gain 1 blood point. You can have a maximum of 5 blood points at any time. Blood points disappear 24 hours after you gain them, or when you become unconscious.

Your damage blood points and maximum blood points increase to 2 and 10 at 6th level, 3 and 15 at 10th level, and 4 and 20 at 14th level, respectively.

Blood Points represent the deep, black pool of bloodlust that you are consumed by when fighting. You gain negative traits based on how deeply you sink into the trance, as shown in the Wild Blood Trance Effects table below. These traits are gained when you have greater than or equal to the stated number of points, and each set of traits is exclusive, meaning no two act at the same time.

In order to keep conscious in your wild blood trance, you must expend your blood points to combat the trance by burning off your rage with powerful attacks. These abilities consume the energy of the blood and allow you to exceed your body's physical limitations to decimate your enemies. Each of these abilities can be used in place of one of your attacks on your turn unless otherwise noted. You consume points before the ability's effect occurs. Only one of these abilites can be used on your turn.

  • Blood Save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Constitution modifier
Blood Trance Effects
Points Effect.
5 -2 to attack rolls
10 -4 to attack rolls
15 -6 to attack rolls, you recieve 1d6 psychic damage at the end of each of your turns.
20 You immediately become unconscious 1d6 minutes

Wild Blood Trance Abilities

  • Cleave (3 Points) You swing wildly between foes, striking many with a single swing. Two creatures within your melee range make Dexterity saving throws versus your blood save DC, taking damage equal to your melee weapon damage on a failed save. You can spend 4 additional blood points to target 3 creatures instead. This ability requires an action.
  • Bloodletting (8 Points): You strike for the veins of your opponent with a blade coated in evil blood, hoping to bleed them dry. Make a single melee weapon attack. If the attack hits, the creature gains a wound. At the start of each of the wounded creature’s turns, it takes 1d4 necrotic damage for each wound you have applied. At the end of each of the wounded creature's turns, they can make a Constitution saving throw, removing all wounds on a successful save.
  • Boneshatter (10 Points) You launch a brutal strike towards a limb, hoping to splinter the bones of your target. Make a single melee weapon attack against a target within range. If you are successful choose one of the following options, this effect persists until the target regains at least 10 hit points by any means:
    • Arm: The target gains a -2 modifier on all attack rolls.
    • Leg: The target's speed decreases by half
    • Torso: The target gains disadvantage on Constitution saving throws
  • Whirlwind (15 Points) Whipping your body around in a vigorous display of primal rage, you make a single melee weapon attack on all creatures within your melee range.

Outnumbered

at 3rd level when you choose this path you fight more viciously at a disadvantage. While raging, You gain a +1 bonus to attack rolls for each creature after the first within your melee range when you begin your turn.

For example, if there are 5 hostile creatures within your melee range when you begin your turn, you gain a +4 bonus to all attack rolls made this turn

Goading Roar

At 6th level, Drawing upon a pure, inhuman, blood-fuelled rage, you may let out a shattering battle cry, attracting the attention of your opponents to you. As an action while raging on your turn, you can spend 10 blood points to force all hostile creatures within 60 feet of you to make a Wisdom saving throw, becoming taunted until the end of their next turn on a failed save. Taunted enemies will use their full movement to get as close to you as possible and make a melee attack if at all possible. They will not move into obviously hazardous terrain such as traps.

Once used, you must finish a short rest before this feature can be used again.

A Note on PC Whirlwinds

The Path of the Whirlwind is meant as an insane, feral bloodrager, and as such playing a character such as this in a party may be difficult. This subclass tends to fit NPC's better than PC's, but with proper contextualization and role-playing it could probably be made a fun character and part of the party.

Brutal Cleave

At 10th level, your cleave is more effective at dealing with hordes of enemies. When you use the cleave ability, you can choose to spend 10 blood points instead of the original cost in order to affect up to four targets.

Cull the Weak

At 14th level, you become a true whirlwind of rage, and can act countless times in the blink of an eye to decimate your opponents. As an action on your turn when you are raging, you can make a single weapon attack. If this attack reduces the target to 0 hit points, you can take this action again. You may continue to use this ability until you make an attack that does not reduce the target to 0 hit points or you end your turn.

Once used, you must finish a long rest before this feature can be used again.

Whirlwind v0.6

Apologies for the lack of art, I haven't found any that I'm satisfied with yet. The primary goal of this version of the Whirlwind is to gain feedback on the balance of the subclass.

Changes from v0.5

  • Clarified Blood Trance Effects wording for 20 Blood Points tier
  • Added damage over time to 15 Blood Points tier

Background

This subclass, similarly to the bloodrager above, is the result of a homebrew I came up with almost 2 years ago. This subclass was initially a subclass of the full class the gave birth to the bloodrager, and had very similar backstory and flavor to what it has now. This path is primarily focused on fighting off hordes of enemies by oneself, and little else.

This subclass is by far less developed than the one above, with less flavor and weaker mechanical development, but I'm looking for feedback on its balance for now. Currently it feels very strong, so many of the abilities will probably have to be toned down.

Thanks!

/u/SubjectiveSloth
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