Questioning on Sylph Character


Rules Questions


Hello Folks

Just registered to get help to level 2 Sylph Character (sorcerer):

According to books Sylph Characters belong to outsiders with the native subtype. Bestiary II is stating that "Sylphs are defined by class levels—they do not possess racial Hit Dice."

But what about the other features that come along with outsider characters? Especially the following part:

"The following are class skills for outsiders: Bluff, Craft, Knowledge (planes), Perception, Sense Motive, and Stealth"

I'm well aware that I can not gain the 6+INT skill points but what do you think - are these skills still class skills to my character?

First post so I'm hoping for the best and I'm leaving it up to you experts.

Ian


They're in the Advance Race Guide. Here are the stats: PFSRD Sylph. They're just like any other race.


If they do not have any racial hit die, they do not get the class skills of their type.


MeanMutton wrote:
They're in the Advance Race Guide. Here are the stats: PFSRD Sylph. They're just like any other race.

Fixed it for you :)

The answer is no, all class skills are derived from classes for sylphs, and other similar races, though I don't actually know why...


Arcane Addict wrote:
MeanMutton wrote:
They're in the Advance Race Guide. Here are the stats: PFSRD Sylph. They're just like any other race.

Fixed it for you :)

The answer is no, all class skills are derived from classes for sylphs, and other similar races, though I don't actually know why...

Thank you!


Arcane Addict wrote:
all class skills are derived from classes for sylphs, and other similar races, though I don't actually know why...

They are (primarily) intended as player races. If they would have racial HD, they would be a) stronger than normal races and b) more difficult to customize (not many choices at racial HD). There are approaches to allow races with racial HD as player choices, but they are a bit messy: Other characters can start higher to compensate, but on the long run they profit more from class levels than the racial HD player. It's somewhat like enforced multiclassing...

If you want to add outsider HD to sylphs, Bestiary 1 covers that - see 'Adding racial hit dice' at page 295 and 'Creature Statistics by Type' at page 293. With Unchained the process becomes more guided, but somewhat inaccurate.


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SheepishEidolon wrote:
Arcane Addict wrote:
all class skills are derived from classes for sylphs, and other similar races, though I don't actually know why...

They are (primarily) intended as player races. If they would have racial HD, they would be a) stronger than normal races and b) more difficult to customize (not many choices at racial HD). There are approaches to allow races with racial HD as player choices, but they are a bit messy: Other characters can start higher to compensate, but on the long run they profit more from class levels than the racial HD player. It's somewhat like enforced multiclassing...

If you want to add outsider HD to sylphs, Bestiary 1 covers that - see 'Adding racial hit dice' at page 295 and 'Creature Statistics by Type' at page 293. With Unchained the process becomes more guided, but somewhat inaccurate.

Thanks for clarifying that! I must've skipped over that rule because I sincerely don't remember that these features were connected to racial HD.

I did figure that balance was an issue but, well, that was just a gut feeling, really.


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Wow - never expected to get such good replies within short time. I was unsure about this part but now it's totally clear to me.

Thank you all for your help!


The best way to think about it is like this:
Any "type" (such as Outsiders) gain class skills as part of racial hit dice. If they do not possess any racial hit dice they do not gain the corresponding class skills.

An example of this is the humanoids section.

Bestiary p308 wrote:
Skill points equal to 2 + Int modifier (minimum 1) per Hit Die or by character class. The following are class skills for humanoids without a character class: Climb, Craft, Handle Animal, Heal, Profession, Ride, and Survival. Humanoids with a character class use their class’s skill list instead. Humanoids with both a character class and racial HD add these skills to their list of class skills.

My guess is the Devs didn't initially think of adding the bolded section to the other types as most of them have racial hit dice. However, that is the premise that the Devs appear to be operating under.

The Fetchling(Kayal) with 1 level in Rogue (Bestiary2 p123) confirms this by only having a score of +2 on Knowledge Planes.
The Fetchling has a -1 Int, +2 racial bonus to Knowledge Planes and +1 rank for a total of +2.
If the Fetchling had Knowledge Planes was a class skill (as listed in the Outsider section) then it would have a total of +5 instead.

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