Witch - Valda's

Three old crones stoop over a boiling cauldron filled with all manner of bizarre filth, churning and bubbling with a noxious fume. In the smoke and vapor above the pot, the trio can make out shapes and figures of great import, and one cackles loudly at what she sees.

A young girl sits underneath a tree, far from where the other children play. She glances about to make sure no one is watching, and snaps her fingers once to the empty air. After a moment of silence, a black cat appears around the tree’s bend and locks eyes with the girl, staring with a strange intelligence for a long moment. She gestures at one of the playing children, a heavyset boy with a permanently affixed scowl; the cat understands. It wanders close to the boy, stretches its claws, and gets very low, ready to pounce for the boy’s eyes.

A young elf intently mutters something under his breath each time he exhales. Visible only to him, a string of the foulest magic winds out from him and seizes a charging orc, which drops to its knees in agony.

Witches are stricken by magic so dark it imprints a lasting shadow upon their essence. Through force of personality alone, they can spin this darkness outward, hexing creatures, casting manipulative spells, and even commanding a familiar with their thoughts.

Cursed

While others are blessed with magic, witches are cursed by it. Afflicted by some hateful arcana, whether accidentally or intentionally, witches are twisted inside and out by its daily tortures. With grueling effort, they can warp this power into spells to wrack others with the same torture that plagues them.

Pariahs and Outcasts

Almost without exception, witches are feared and hated. They are victim to a number of misconceptions, usually relating them to hags and other evil creatures of the night. As a result, known witches are in great personal danger and can usually be found dwelling on the outskirts of civilization where townsfolk seldom tread. This does little to stop witch hunting and burnings, but provides some measure of safety from them.

In reality, very few choose to become witches, and many of them can hide adeptly in society, using their magic to fill a number of roles, from seer, to healer, to apothecary. Being accused as a witch carries grave consequences, no matter the validity of the claim, so wise witches relocate frequently, never residing in one place for too long.

Familiar Masters

It is rare to find a witch without his or her constant companion, the familiar. Though familiars might be conjured by other spellcasters as well, a witch’s familiar is ubiquitous to common folk for good reason. Witches command intuitive magic, and have a deep link to their familiars. As a result, they can conjure more exotic familiars, and command them more swiftly than other spellcasters.

Creating a Witch

Creating a witch necessarily involves a powerful, malicious curse in your backstory. Who cast it? Did you take a curse upon yourself for power? Was your entire lineage cursed generations ago, leading to a bloodline of witches, or did another spellcaster use sinister, forbidden magic to curse you for life? Decide on the nature of your witch’s curse and think about how you relate to it. Do you feel like the curse was secretly a blessing, or does the desire for vengeance burn in your heart?

What negative effects does the curse leverage on your personality and mind? Are you haunted by spirits, or is your mind plagued by destructive thoughts? How do you feel manipulating the power of this curse outwards into hexes and spells?

Work with your GM to determine how witches are perceived in the world. Are they feared, burned, and persecuted? Are you an openly known witch? Do the other characters in your party know of your witchhood? Some witches keep the source of their magic a secret, or claim to be wizards or sorcerers to conceal the true darkness of their magic.

Witch Class Features

As a Witch, you gain the following class features when you reach the specified Witch levels.

Level 1: Spellcasting

You have learned to mold and reshape the magic that curses you into spells.

Cantrips

You know four cantrips of your choice from the witch spell list. You learn additional witch cantrips of your choice at higher levels, as shown in the Cantrips Known column of the Witch table.

Spell Slots

The Witch table shows how many spell slots you have to cast your witch spells of 1st level and higher. To cast one of these spells, you must expend a slot of the spell’s level or higher. You regain all expended spell slots when you finish a long rest.

For example, if you know the 1st-level spell bane and have a 1st-level and a 2nd-level spell slot available, you can cast bane using either slot.

Spells Known of 1st Level and Higher

You know two 1st-level spells of your choice from the witch spell list. The Spells Known column of the Witch table shows when you learn more witch spells of your choice.

Each of these spells must be of a level for which you have spell slots, as shown on the table. For instance, when you reach 3rd level in this class, you can learn one new spell of 1st or 2nd level.

Additionally, when you gain a level in this class, you can choose one of the witch spells you know and replace it with another spell from the witch spell list, which also must be of a level for which you have spell slots.

Spellcasting Ability

Charisma is your spellcasting ability for your witch spells. Your magic originates deep within yourself, where your insidious curse stirs restlessly. You use your Charisma whenever a spell refers to your spellcasting ability. In addition, you use your Charisma modifier when setting the saving throw DC for a witch spell you cast and when making an attack roll with one.

Spell save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Charisma modifier

Spell attack modifier = your proficiency bonus + your Charisma modifier

Ritual Casting

You can cast any witch spell you know as a ritual if that spell has the ritual tag.

Spellcasting Focus

You can use an arcane focus as a spellcasting focus for your witch spells.

Level 1: Witch’s Curse

You are wracked by a terrible curse, which infects your body and soul. At 1st level, choose the form that this curse takes from the options below.

Burned. Almost all of your body has been scorched by arcane flames, leaving you with striking black scars and embers of magic that burn under the skin. As a result, you have resistance to fire damage, and you know the produce flame cantrip, which doesn’t count against your number of cantrips known.

Drowned. Water fills your lungs, and yet you do not die. You can breathe air and water. Additionally, you have a swimming speed equal to your walking speed.

Feral. Through your curse, you have forgotten the manners and customs of civilized men and gone to live among beasts in the wild. You have proficiency in the Survival skill. Additionally, while you are wearing no armor and not wielding a shield, your AC equals 12 + your Dexterity modifier.

Hideous. Your appearance is ghastly to behold. You have proficiency in the Intimidation skill. When you roll initiative, you can choose one Humanoid you can see to scare. That creature must make a Wisdom saving throw against your spell save DC or be frightened of you until the end of your next turn.

Hollow. Your soul has been divorced from your body, trapping you in a limbo between life and death. When you or your familiar reduces a hostile creature to 0 hit points, you drain some of its life force, gaining temporary hit points equal to your Charisma modifier + your witch level (minimum of 1).

Infested. You are constantly followed by vermin, like insects and rats, which crawl on your skin and swarm in your wake. As a result, you are immune to disease.

Additionally, you can command these pests as your own. Starting at 2nd level, you can choose the form of a swarm of rats for your familiar. Starting at 7th level, you can choose a swarm of insects.

Loveless. You are cursed to never find true love. Jaded and disaffected, not even magic can turn your heart; as a result, you are immune to being charmed.

Possessed. Your soul is occupied by a foreign spirit that sometimes tries to wrest away your consciousness. However, while you sleep, the spirit whispers magical secrets to you. You learn an additional witch spell at a level for which you have spell slots at 1st level, and again at 4th level, 8th level, and 12th level. These spells don’t count against your total number of spells known.

Starving. No matter how much you eat, food turns to ash in your mouth. Your curse nourishes you, but only at the edge of starvation, and you are constantly wracked by pangs of hunger. You don’t need to eat or drink, but can still imbibe and benefit from potions. Additionally, you are immune to being poisoned.

Visions. You are cursed to have terrible visions of the future, presaging the death of your friends, family, and yourself. Though many of these visions are cruel deceptions, they are sometimes grimly accurate. You can give yourself a bonus to your initiative rolls equal to your Charisma modifier.

Whispers. Unseen voices murmur in your ears at all times. As such, you can telepathically speak to any creature you can see within 30 feet of you. You don’t need to share a language with the creature for it to understand your telepathy, but the creature must be able to understand at least one language.

Level 1: Hexes

You can learn a number of powerful incantations, known as hexes, derived from the same insidious magic that cursed you.

At 1st level, you gain two hexes of your choice. Your hex options are detailed at the end of the class description. When you reach certain levels in this class, you gain additional hexes of your choice, as shown in the Hexes Known column of the Witch table. Additionally, when you gain a level in this class, you can choose one of the hexes you know and replace it with another hex.

HEXES AND MAGIC
A witch casts their terrible hexes as an extension of their curse. As their curses are magical in nature, their hexes are considered 0th-level spells for the purposes of feature and spells, such as Counterspell or Dispel Magic, that interact with magic. Furthermore, all hexes cease while in the area of an antimagic field or similar effect.

Unless otherwise stated, if a hex requires an attack roll or saving throw, it uses your spell attack bonus and spell save DC. All hexes require either verbal or somatic components (your choice at the time of casting the hex).

Unless otherwise noted, if a hex lasts for a duration, you concentrate on it as you would a spell. You lose your concentration on a hex if you cast another hex; however, you can concentrate on a hex and a spell at the same time, making only one Constitution saving throw to maintain your concentration on both.

Level 2: Cackle

You can use your bonus action to cackle. The duration of a hex on which you are concentrating extends by 1 round. If the hex has one or more target, a target must be within 60 feet of you for the hex’s duration to extend for it.

Not all witches laugh maniacally when they cackle, but all cackles require a verbal component, as if casting a spell. These range from mundane curses and insults, to the murmuring of dead languages and speaking backwards.

Level 2: Familiar

You learn the find familiar spell and can cast it as a ritual without using material components. This spell doesn’t count against your number of spells known. The spell is improved in the following ways:

Your familiar takes its turn immediately before or after your turn each round (your choice).
Once on each of your turns as an action or a bonus action, you can mentally command your familiar to use its reaction to make one attack.
You can use the find familiar spell to deliver spells that have ranges other than touch through your familiar.
When you cast the spell, you can choose one of the normal forms for your familiar or one of the following special forms: death snail, flying book, homunculus, mock, moon jelly, pet rock, pseudodragon, rag doll, sprite, tin soldier, winter wolf pup, and yarn golem.

Witch Familiar

As a witch, familiars you summon are imbued with your insidious magic, granting them the following benefits:

Your familiar can use your spell attack bonus for its attack rolls.

Your familiar adds your proficiency bonus to its Armor Class, saving throws, and damage rolls.

You add twice your witch level to your familiar’s hit point maximum.

Level 3: Witch’s Craft

Your skill in magic has culminated in learning a craft, an innate variety of magic that exists apart from the schools of magic. When you reach 3rd level, choose one Witch’s Craft. Your choice grants you features at 3rd level, and again at 6th, 10th, and 14th level.

If your craft grants you a hex at any level, it doesn’t count against your total number of hexes known.

Craf t Spells

Each craft is associated with a branch of arcana, represented by a number of spells that you learn. The levels of these spells are noted in the craft description. These spells count as witch spells for you but don’t count against your number of spells known.

Level 4: Ability Score Improvement

When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, and 16th, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can’t increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.

Level 5: Insidious Spell

When you cast a witch spell that affects a creature that is under the effect of your hex, that creature has disadvantage on its first saving throw against the spell. This feature only applies to a hostile creature that is the sole target of your hex.

Level 7: Improved Familiar

Your familiar’s attacks count as magical for the purpose of overcoming damage resistance and immunity to nonmagical attacks and damage. Additionally, you can choose the following forms for your familiar: brass dragon wyrmling (can’t use its breath weapon), fright, grep, imp, or quasit.

Level 9: Dying Curse

When a creature reduces you to 0 hit points but doesn’t kill you outright, you can lay a nefarious curse upon it. The creature is cursed for up to 24 hours. While cursed, the creature has disadvantage on attack rolls, ability checks, and saving throws. If you regain consciousness or the creature is targeted by the Remove Curse spell, the curse ends at the end of the creature’s next turn.

Once you use this feature, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

Level 11: Grand Hex

You have perfected deeply malevolent forms of magic. You learn one grand hex, and you learn another at 13th, 15th, and 18th level. Grand hexes are detailed at the end of the class description.