Melee attackers hexed with Empathy can quickly find themselves causing more damage to themselves than their target. Human enemies will usually cease attacking, while NPCs will ignore the hex and attack through it. Attacks that can target more than one foe or hit more than once will have the effect multiply, causing even more damage (with exclusion to the Scythe's inherent AoE property).
The hexed foe's attacks do not have to hit to trigger Empathy.
NPCs hexed with Empathy will attack even if the next attack is suicidal (unlike NPCs hexed with Backfire).