Pestilence Domain

Pestilence clerics often take up a life of deception, traveling under the auspices of any number of other gods over their lifetime, embedding themselves in temples, and hiding their true nature from those who would call them friend.

They then go to great lengths to pose as a particularly pious clergy, undertaking the humblest of tasks of the order, such as distributing food to or caring for the sick and the poor, all while abusing the trust of needy people while secretly defiling their bodies, crops,
or water supply. Ambitious clerics might become a parasite, feeding upon a wealthy family for generations, causing and healing various infirmities.

Some clerics of pestilence make theater of healing the very diseases they cause, ensuring need of their services for years, while others simply do their god’s work and move on, never witnessing the lasting scars the contagions they have borne leave in their wake.

 

 

Spells in this Domain used:

 

Cleric Level Spells
1st false life, ray of sickness
3rd blur, ray of enfeeblement
5th gaseous form, stinking cloud
7th blight, hallucinatory terrain
9th contagion, cloudkill

An Itch to Scratch

You learn the infestation cantrip. It is a cleric spell for you, and doesn’t count against your number of cleric cantrips known.

When you cast the spell, it can target two creatures within range and within 5 feet of each other.

Faithful’s Inoculation

Also at 1st level, you can use your bonus action to touch a willing creature and remove one disease or neutralize one poison affecting it.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom Modifier, and regain expended uses of it when you finish a short or long rests.

Channel Divinity: Tide of Affliction

Starting at 2nd level, you can use your Channel Divinity to emit a wave of affliction. As an action, you present your holy symbol and invoke the name of your deity.

Designate a number of living creatures that you can see within 30 feet of you equal to your Wisdom modifier to afflict (minimum: 1). Your targets make a Constitution saving throw.

Creatures immune to disease succeed their saving throw automatically. If they fail, they take poison damage equal to your cleric level, and are poisoned for 1 minute. Poisoned creatures can repeat their saving throw at the end of their turns, and ending the effect early on a success.

Withering Affliction

Starting at 6th level, your ability to channel pestilence becomes more potent. Poison damage dealt your cleric spells and Tide of Affliction ignores resistance to poison damage.

Potent Spellcasting

Starting at 8th level, you add your Wisdom modifier to the damage you deal with any cleric cantrip.

Befoulment

At 17th level, your ability to cause outbreaks among a populace is reaches epidemic proportions. As an action, you can touch a creature and befoul it, or befoul 25 cubic feet of food or drink. The target creature (or anyone who consumes the befouled food or drink within a number of hours equal to your cleric level) must succeed a Constitution saving throw or be infected. Creatures immune to disease succeed their saving throw automatically. Your disease is contagious, and can infect a number of creatures equal to five times your cleric level. Each time you use this feature, you can choose one of following four befoulments:

• Tell-Tale Cough. After 1d12 hours, infected creatures begin to cough and become exhausted. Resting with the nagging cough is impossible. The next day and each day after, infected creatures repeat their saving throw or take an additional level of exhaustion. If they succeed, they lose one level of exhaustion, and end their infection if their exhaustion level reaches zero. If they succeed in this manner, they are immune to your Tell-Tale cough for one year. Coughing creatures can infect other breathing creatures within 10 feet, who must succeed a Constitution saving throw or become infected.

• Fleshrot. After 3d12 hours, the extremities of an infected creature’s body such as their toes, fingers or ears begin to harden and turn a waxy-looking green, yellow, purple or black. Creatures repeat their saving throw at the start of each day, and if they fail, their movement speed is reduced by 5 feet. If they fail, they take necrotic damage equal to your cleric level to a random extremity, and the disease spreads closer to their heart and organs. The disease can be cured by amputation. If the creature’s speed becomes 0, they die. Creatures that come into direct contact with the infected flesh must succeed a Constitution saving throw or contract
the disease.

• Maddening Fever. After 2d12 hours, an infected creature descends into a feverish delirium, making all Wisdom (Insight, Perception) checks with disadvantage. They repeat their saving throw the following day. If they fail, they are also under the effects of the confusion spell, and their maximum hit point total is reduced by half your cleric level for each day they have had the disease. If their maximum hit point total reaches 0, they die. If they succeed, the fever begins to subside and they regain their faculties after 24 hours.
 

• Weeping Sores. After 4d12 hours, boils and pustules rise to the surface of the infected creature’s skin, eventually exploding in a shower of blood and pus, dealing poison damage equal to your cleric level to the infected creature. Creatures may repeat their saving throw each day, but do so at disadvantage unless bound in clean bandages. Otherwise, the creature’s sores rise again and burst again, dealing an additional 1d6 slashing damage for each day since they contracted the disease. A creature whose skin comes into contact with an infected creature’s bodily fluids must succeed a Constitution saving throw or become infected.

Your befoulment is curable only by the greater restoration spell or by a paladin’s Lay on Hands ability. When an infected creature succeeds its saving throw against or is otherwise cured of one of your diseases, they become immune to it for one year. Additionally, when a creature fails a Constitution saving throw against one of your domain spells or your Tide of Affliction, you can apply your Befoulment upon them as a bonus action. The disease’s symptoms manifest immediately. You can use this ability a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier, and regain expended uses of it when you finish a long rest.