The Breath Between Wounds
Soldiers of the old Arevian campaigns told of a field surgeon named Oris Thandrel who could not bear to watch a life slip through her hands after she had already pulled it back once. She commissioned this brooch from a wandering trinket-mage, insisting it be made to catch what ordinary healing could not hold. It passed from battlefield to battlefield long after Oris herself was gone, always finding its way to someone who understood that the hardest moment in any fight is the one after the wound, not during it.
Appearance
A silver brooch shaped like two open hands, one slightly higher than the other.
Mechanics
When you restore hit points to a creature, excess healing is stored and redistributed as a burst of protective vitality on a later turn.
Overflow Reservoir
Whenever you restore hit points to a creature that is already at its hit point maximum, the excess healing that would have been lost is instead stored in the brooch as surplus, up to a maximum of 20 stored points. These points persist until spent or until you finish a long rest. When a creature you can see within 30 feet of you drops to 0 hit points, the brooch automatically expends all stored surplus to grant that creature temporary hit points equal to the amount expended before it falls unconscious, potentially stabilizing its condition at 0 hit points if the temporary hit points absorb any subsequent damage that turn.
Steady the Fallen
Once per long rest, as an action, you touch a creature that is unconscious or incapacitated and speak a word of resolve. That creature regains hit points equal to 3d8 plus your proficiency bonus, and until the end of its next turn it has advantage on Constitution saving throws made to maintain concentration or resist being stunned.
DM Notes
Balance consideration: the Overflow Reservoir requires the party to overheal a target before it activates, which means its trigger is genuinely conditional and the 20-point cap prevents infinite stockpiling. DMs should note that the automatic trigger on a creature dropping to 0 HP fires without any action cost, so it can save a downed ally even when the attuned character has already used their action. In encounters without significant healing or multiple downed allies, the reservoir may sit unused, making the item feel weaker in those sessions. Pair with encounters that have sustained pressure or multiple fronts to let both abilities shine. The Steady the Fallen action provides roughly a 5th-level cure wounds equivalent at high proficiency bonus, keeping it within rare-tier spell ceiling.
Generated with: Level 5 · Healing or support focused · Heroic · Rare