ILikeCommas's page

By RAW you aren't getting a golem in time for it to be more useful than most summons or bindings until the adamantine golem shows up.

On the other hand, a -simulacrum- of a 20 HD stone golem shield guardian costs 5,000 gp, and only loses about 20 hp compared to the real deal, and even makes for good construct armor.

Give it spell-like ability [transmute mud to rock] twice a day and the (entirely RAW to add) energized golem template, and you're sitting in a self-healing, dr 10/adamantine, 115 hp tank with a somewhat useful energy immunity.

Stone to Flesh, Magic Jar, Contingency, etc. to your heart's desire, rinse and repeat as needed.

Or you could whip up a clockwork fiend for a dr 15/adamantine, 113 hp buffer with contingent 100 temp hp once a day, just mind the winding

You can do the same for all kinds of non-armor based constructs (in which case I highly recommend the Commando Construct template with Bolstered Resilience).

Animate objects+blood money+permanency will do for armor in a pinch. (Bare minimum is 31 hp with hardness 10 for 2 Strength damage, not too shabby. Scare up a large-sized adamantine breastplate and you're cooking.)

Some people may balk at the simulacrum idea, but if you have the feats and spells to build the real deal there's no reason you can't make a simulacrum at a (tiny) fraction of the cost.

Might be cool to have few construct limbs or utility buggers about, too:
rune guardians of sloth can summon monster I at will to pop traps, aid another, flank, soak AoOs and whatnot for 3 rounds each;
angelic guardians can deflect one ranged attack/round and occupy a square while you strategically retreat;
clockwork songbirds can pump out minor buffs from your shoulder/arm (take two shaped like parrots);
iron cobras and tupilaq (perception +20) can locate creatures.

Note: Clockwork parasites can reanimate corpses as (self-reanimating, skeleton-shaming) beatsticks, and familiar automatons have some handy spell-likes (plane shift at will anyone?). But you can't build either by RAW, so that's going to be a hard sell.

Some good rules of thumb:
take Craft Construct, you're building constructs;
don't make anything you couldn't build the normal way;
don't let the HD of your bodyguard exceed your caster level;
don't run around with so many tireless minions you slow down combat.

Al, hardboiled big city private investigator. Full name is Aliesius Cantredial, war veteran Elven Hexcrafter Magus who does enough work to keep himself knee-deep in opium every night.

Hates orcs, doesn't much like humans. Dwarves are okay.

O_o
Dear god, it just might be unstoppable.

I have to disagree with the idea of Constitution-based casting. Casting is a function of the mind, not the body.

The bloodrager emphasizes in all its fluff that it casts magic from its blood, even going so far as to have a feature called Blood Casting. Blood being a part of the body, Constitution fits with the flavor of the class just fine.

This also supports the notion of casting during a rage, instead of the current situation where it seems a waste not to use that extra Strength.

Finally, a precedent for Constitution-based casting already exists (with whatever controversy) in the Advanced Race Guide. I wouldn't think it inappropriate to reduce the bloodrager's hit die to a d8 alongside this change.

I also wouldn't extend the same argument to cover Strength or Dexterity without a justifiable mechanic and strong supporting fluff.

I think Bloodrager would benefit from Constitution-based casting and some form of buff to spell save DCs (apologies if this has already been brought up, I didn't find anything relevant using the thread search).

Adding a flat bonus to save DCs (something like 1/4 bloodrager level) would keep it in line with full caster save DCs and could replace one of the 'tacked-on' feeling barbarian carryovers. Could be restricted to evocation spells only to further reinforce the damage role.

Adding Con to spell damage (possibly capped at a maximum bonus no larger than the bloodrager's level) could also replace a barbarian carryover (and be restricted to "only while raging" to keep from outshining dedicated spellcasters) while keeping his spell damage more up to par with weapon damage.

Even with these bonuses, bloodrager's limited spell selection keeps it from overshadowing a dedicated caster, who will have a greater number of spells with a broader range of more potent effects at their disposal.

That's my two cents.