If you’ve ever felt like traditional magic is a bit too safe and boring, a new Skryim mod introduces the dark art of blood magic to the Bethesda game. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is one of the best RPG games of all time, and the almost uncountable number of incredible Skyrim mods made by fans has only made it better since release. Whether you want to transform into a dragon or simply get a delicious Skyrim hot dog, mods have you covered – and this new addition is one of our favourites in a while.
Skyrim mod Hemomancy: Blood Magic, from creator KataPUMB, introduces a new blood magic system comprising fifteen unique spells that utilise your character’s own life force to cast. Instead of spending mana for these spells, you will drain your health to do so – and, yes, you can absolutely kill yourself if you aren’t careful about balancing your essence.
Blood magic, as KataPUMB explains, is a very potent school of the dark arts, and as such utilising blood spells will cause your health to regenerate slower and reduce the effectiveness of healing spells and potions. It’s not without its benefits however – all blood magic absorbs health from its victims, and you will get 50% of a blood spell’s health cost back on a successful hit. This effect can stack, meaning that clever use against multiple targets can actually lead to a net health gain, making you a fearsome force to reckon with.
Your blood magic repertoire includes 14 regular spells ranging from novice to master rank, as well as a lesser power – blood dash. Blood dash briefly turns you into a bloody mist, rushing forward and avoiding all incoming damage. The spells include various single target and AoE spells, with some of the stronger effects having the potential to draw in, paralyse, or even dramatically evaporate your target in a bloody explosion. There’s lots of variety on offer, so you’ll likely be wreaking havoc for several hours as you get to grips with them all.
To help maximise your bloody brilliance, a selection of special amulets has been added, enabling you to tweak your build for more aggressive or conservative playstyles or even allowing you to transfer all the magicka points in your current build into additional maximum health, for any players who might have already invested in traditional spells. You can even craft yourself a living gargoyle statue companion, which is especially handy as it doesn’t fill up the usual summon or follower slots.
You can download Hemomancy: Blood Magic for Skyrim on Nexus Mods.
Among KataPUMB’s previous creations for Skyrim are the previously mentioned Dragon Avatar transformation and Dark Envoy, a mod giving you vampiric powers. KataPUMB is clear to emphasise that blood magic is treated quite separately from vampirism, however, despite their clear similarities. Regardless, we’re very eager to jump back into one of the best open-world games and sacrifice our very life essence in the vain pursuit of power.
When you’ve had your fill of blood magic, why not try out a Skyrim combat mod that modernises the game’s melee systems? Or you might want to turn every chest into a treasure hunt with the Skyrim key hunt mod. We’ve also got all the Skyrim console commands and cheats you could ever ask for. If you fancy something a bit different, World of Anterra is a pixel-art indie game hoping to be one of the best games like Skyrim, and it looks great from what we’ve seen so far.