Description
Quintessence is energy that makes up the soul of an individual, powers their magic, and protects them against arcane curses.
Quintessense Points
A character's Quintessence score represents the maximum amount of Quintessence points a person is capable of possessing at a given time and is equal to the following:
Racial Base Score + Spellcasting Modifer. If a character does not have a Spellcasting modifier, they do not gain any bonus. Rare or particularly devastating magical effects may be capable of increasing or decreasing the amount of a player's score.
Certain effects and actions may lower or raise a character's Quintessence points. A character's Quintessence points can never go above their Score.
Lowering Quintessence
Sources
- Rolling a 1 on a saving throw against a spell or magical effect.
- Casting a spell of 5th level or greater.
Rules
Rolling a 1. When a character rolls a 1 saving throw against a spell or magical effect, it represents a failure in their Quintessence to protect them from the raw magical energy of the spell or effect. As a result, they lower their points by 1 and must roll on the
Arcane Afflictions Table.
Dropping to 0 hitpoints. When a character nearly dies, there are spiritual consequences in addition to physical ones. A character's Quintessence points are lowered by 1 when they fall unconscious as a result of having 0 hitpoints. If they reach a second death save failure, they lose an additional point.
Taking force damage. Force damage represents a direct attack on a creature's quintessence. A character's points are lowered by 1 for every 10 points of force damage they take in a turn.
Casting a spell of 5th level or greater. Spells of 5th level and beyond require exponentially more energy and it can take a toll on a caster. A character's points are lowered by 1 for casting a 5th-level spell. It is lowered by an additional point for each level above 5th.
Curses. Attuning to a cursed item or being affected by a magical curse can have varying effects on a person's Quintessence points. Removal of curses is also dependent on Quintessence. See
Arcane Afflictions for rules.
Attunement. See rules for allocating points to magical items in
Attunement
Raising Quintessence
Sources
- Lesser Restoration Spell.
- Greater Restoration Spell.
- Spell slots during long rest.
Rules
Restoration Spells. The lesser restoration spell can restore 1 quintessence point as one of the options. A greater restoration spell can restore 3 points as one of the options. This choice still requires a
resotration roll.
Quint-a-booze Some
quinticals sell "Quint-a-booze" to customers willing to pay and wait for the custom distillation. Named for the fact the Quintessence within is delivered to the body via alcohol, this item can be drunk like a potion as an action by the individual it was created for and will restore some amount of quintessence points (dependent on the quality). Drinking quint-a-booze made for someone else has the inverse effect and lowers one's points by the same amount in addition to potential other side effects.
Consuming spell slots on long rest. A character with the quintisentiallist feat may choose to forgo the normal benefits of a long rest to instead spend the time to repair their quintessence. They may expend any number of available spell slots and add them together. They regain half (rounded down) of slots sacrificed as quintessence points. They may expend hit dice to recover hit points as well, but otherwise gain no benefits of a long rest (this means they also gain a point of exhaustion).
Time. A character's quintessence will slowly heal itself over time without any intervention. A creature may roll a d100 at the end of each long rest they complete. If the number rolled is less or equal to twice their quintessence score, they regain a point. Otherwise, nothing happens.
Restorative Magic
Quintessence naturally resists magic that would tamper with a person from the inside; it operates as a sort of magical immune system. Healing magic gets around this by simply overwhelming one's Quintessence and forcing the body to repair itself. However, in the case where a magical source is actively causing harm, such as a curse or arcane poison, magic tends to have to fight the quintessence before it can heal the individual in question.
Restoring Spells. For a character receiving restoration magic from a spell source, the caster of the spell must make
restoration roll with a DC equal to the target's Quintessence points. The caster may add their spell attack modifier and the level of the spell to the roll. On a success, the spell works as normal. On a failure, the restoration effects of the spell fail. A character casting on themselves is an exception; this is always successful. If a restoration spell targets multiple creatures, the caster rolls once and success or failure is determined on a per-target basis.
The following spells are considered restoration spells and follow these rules:
Other Restoration Magic. For a character receiving restorative magic from a magical but non-spell source (such as a paladin's lay on hands or a mercy monk's hands of healing), a restoration roll must be made and instead of adding the level of the spell and attack spellcasting modifier, the character creating the magic instead adds their proficiency bonus (in addition to any spell attack modifier if they have one).
Death & Quintessence
Death in a physical sense--the body ceasing to function--is related to death in a spiritual sense--all Quintessence being destroyed in a person.
Rules
Intant Death. If a creature dies from some means other than death save failures (such as from Power Word: Kill), they lose 1d4 - 1 Quintessence points.
Instant Obliteration. If a creature's Quintessence points or score ever reaches 0, it immediately dies and its soul is obliterated. There is no afterlife or hope of resurrection, the person ceases to exist.
Resurrection. If a creature is restored to life, it returns with whatever Quintessence it had in life before its death. Then, their Quintessence Score is lowered by 1 plus an additional 1 for every previous time they have died. If this would lower their maximum to 0 or below, they may not be resurrected. This represents the toil of the soul in constantly shifting between the realms of life and death.
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