Catastrophic Origin (5e Subclass)

AI generated image of a Catastrophe Mage, scarred by his origin.

Catastrophic Origin

Sorcerer Subclass

Not all magic goes to plan, or even has a plan. Intentionally or accidentally, sometimes magic makes terrible things happen. Death, destruction, devastation, suffering... Sometimes these catastrophes have survivors. And sometimes – rarely, but not never – the magic from those catastrophes seeps into the souls of those survivors and alters them, empowers them. Perhaps a hero emerges from these terrible magical happenings. Or perhaps, what they spawn is a catastrophe in itself.

Catastrophic Sorcerers – sometimes called “Fallouts” or “Trophy Mages” (short for "Catastrophe Mages") – develop powers tied to their unfortunate origins. They might acquire divination spells to warn of future tragedy, or abjuration spells to shelter against the unthinkable, or evocation spells to make their enemies pay, or summoning spells because it's their turn to wreak havoc. Their castings are urgent, their well of power runs deep, and they can take a beating and come back swinging.

Catastrophic Magic

When you reach certain levels in this class, your magic develops spells on its own, like a defense mechanism against the calamity that fostered that power in the first place. Some of the spells come from your desire to stop tragedies while others grow from your thirst for vengeance. You pick one spell at each level from the table below. These spells count as sorcerer spells for you but do not count against the number of spells you know.

The way these spells draw from your past trauma makes them more difficult to replace than your normal spells. However, when you gain a level in this class, you may replace one of your Catastrophic spells with another spell of the same level and school from the sorcerer, warlock, or wizard spell list.

Level	Spell Option 1		Spell Option 2
1st	Dissonant Whispers (enchantment)	or	Mage Armor (abjuration)
3rd	Phantasmal Force (illusion)	or	Augury (divination)
5th	Life Transference (necromancy)	or	Fireball (evocation)
7th	Polymorph (transmutation)	or	Summon Construct (conjuration)
9th	Destructive Wave (evocation)	or	Hold Monster (enchantment)

Flurry of Spells

Starting at 1st level, tapping into the magic within you triggers adrenaline and urgency, inspiring you to lash out with your spells at a furious pace. If you use your action to cast a sorcerer cantrip, you can use a bonus action to cast a different sorcerer cantrip that normally takes an action. You can do this a number of times equal to your Charisma modifier. You regain all uses of this feature at the end of a long rest.

Starting at level 2, you can expend a sorcery point to use this ability after you have exhausted regular uses.

From the Ashes

At 6th level, your power refuses to quit even when your resources are drained. If you begin a turn with no available spell slots, you can use your turn to dig deep within and rekindle your magic. This requires your entire turn, meaning no action, bonus action, or movement is possible without disrupting the process and spoiling the attempt. At the end of that turn, you regain half your sorcerer level in spell slot levels, rounded down. This means that a level seven sorcerer that begins a turn with no spell slots can use this feature to regain one 3rd level slot or three 1st level slots or a 2nd and a 1st.

This ability is fueled by adrenaline, so it can only be used while in initiative. Slots regained this way can never be above 5th level. This feature can be used once and is replenished when you finish a long rest.

Eldritch Survivor

Also at 6th level, when damage other than slashing, piercing, or bludgeoning would drop you to zero hit points, you can expend two sorcery points to drop to one hit point instead (no action needed). You can spend one more sorcery point to use your reaction to teleport to an unoccupied space you can see within 60 feet. Once you've used this ability, each subsequent use of it costs one extra sorcery point. You cannot use this feature if you ended your last turn with one hit point or if the damage would have killed you outright (without death saving throws).

What Does Not Kill You

Beginning at 14th level, when you take damage that would not reduce you to zero hit points, you can use your reaction to expend two sorcery points to take half as much damage. If the creature that caused the damage is within 60 feet of you, you can spend two more sorcery point to force them to take the same amount of damage you took. A successful Charisma saving throw means they take half that much damage. Their damage type will be psychic or necrotic (your choice).

Once you’ve reduced damage this way, you can’t do so again until you finish a short or long rest.

Makes You Stronger

Also at 14th level, you can add your Charisma modifier to the damage from your sorcerer cantrips.

Perpetuate the Cycle

Too often, we become the very thing that hurt us. It's an instinct, a need to repeat, to be on the other side of things even if we don't understand what was happening to us. So it is with the Catastrophic Sorcerer

Starting at 18th level, immediately after a creature casts a spell that targets you or includes you in its area of effect, you can use your reaction to expend 2 sorcery points to temporarily learn the spell. Within the next minute, you can use your action to expend a number of sorcery points equal to the spell’s level to cast that spell without material components or a spell slot. You may apply metamagic to this casting even if it is not on the sorcerer spell list. A spell imitated in this way must have a casting time of no more than one action.

You can learn spells this way as often as you like, but once you cast one with this feature, you can't use it again until you finish a long rest.

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