Blood Hunter - A Martial Class for 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons

Often feared or misunderstood, and driven by an unending drive to destroy the wicked, blood hunters are clever, arcane warriors who have bound their essence to the dark creatures they hunt to better stalk and survive their prey. Armed with the rites of forbidden blood magic and a willingness to sacrifice their own vitality and humanity for the cause, they protect the realms from the shadows, ever vigilant to avoid becoming the same monsters they choose to hunt.

Harnessing the dark abilities granted by the use of hemocraft blood magic to enhance their combat prowess, these warriors hunt the wicked with blade and curse, sacrificing their own vitality to gain the upper hand and bring their quarry down.

This includes the Order of the Ghostslayer, Order of the Profane Soul, Order of the Mutant, and Order of the Lycan archetypes for the Blood Hunter class.



Author's Note: This was my first homebrew class waaaaay back before DMs Guild first started, and I had a LOT to learn. Originally spawned as a handful of variant abilities I designed for Vin Diesel guesting on my D&Diesel one-shot to promote his film "The Last Witch Hunter" (in which I was given no context for his character other than the trailer), the internet was loudly requesting me to release what class he played. Needing to heavily expand upon those small features, I cobbled together my first attempt at this class with meager design experience and tossed it to the internet with a wince. A handful of years of iterations, and incredible amounts of very well-thought out feedback from the web later, I've learned so much more about fun design and balance... and I wanted to take a crack at redesigning this class from the ground up.

Deep consideration brought me to shift the secondary ability score focus from Wisdom to Intelligence, as the hemocraft magic was more arcane in nature, and there was little representation for an Intelligence-based martial class. Along with this came many changes to improve the ease of tracking abilities like the Crimson Rite, while adding some new features and utility to the class and its Orders (including the Brand of Castigation). Massive rebalancing has been applied throughout the class, and each Order eventually receives its own unique Blood Curse, as well as a unique modification to their Brand.

While the first release of any new design will have its problems, I feel much more confident about the direction of this class and its place in my games and world. I hope you enjoy this newly fashioned, improved release of the Blood Hunter!

-Matthew Mercer





(P.S. If you would still prefer to use the older version, you are certainly welcome to do so! You can find it HERE)