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Questions on a couple of subjects

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Hello I'm new to these forums and have a myriad of questions. However these two seem the most appropriate for this section of the boards:

First, from what I have read and understand most if not all constructs need no sleep. Even though they need no sleep can they sleep or at least put themselves in a sleep-like state? How does this affect constructs that take on spellcasting classes that require sleep for spell preparation for example: an ironborn wizard?

Second, I want to roll up a skeleton character for kicks and possibly use it as a center point for a campaign. The back story would go something along these lines: An unknown commoner gets murdered under the most unusual circumstances and under even stranger circumstances comes back as a skeleton. How would I go about doing this? I was hoping for something along the lines of either a race or a template I could add to an existing race as to allow normal character progression as if I had chosen any other race.

Constructs could choose to just stand around -- but wouldn't gain a benefit from doing so. Spellcasters must rest -- which doesn't have to be sleep. As such he'd spend eight hours doing nothing at all recharging his magical energies.

Take the skeleton template and apply it to a character. If you want him to be a bit more buff than normal add in the bloody skeleton template instead, or a bloody skeleton champion. As to gaining power just give him class levels.

Constructs don't sleep, but they normally don't have intelligence is easier which makes them unplayable. There is a skeletal champion template, but you have to get the DM to approve it since it is not a standard selection.

About the undead, while you would need DM approval to use the template, I suggest asking if you can use the template as a race and not a template. It gives you a couple ability boosts and some "Racial" powers which really don't warrant a +1 CR by itself, only when applied to another creature.

I did this in a campaign and it wasn't any stronger then the living races in the party (okay he was but I built him well, had nothing to do with his undead abilities)

As for the constructs I'm mainly refuring to player races that are constructs ie Warforged of Eberon and Ironborn of Questhaven. Sorry this wasn't mentioned before. So with this in mind can a Warforged or Ironborn sleep or put themselves in an equivalent state? I guess this is more of an rp question but could have an impact on rules that deal with moving unconscious or dead characters so on and so fourth.

As for the skeleton pc for now I don't plan on using in actual gameplay or it would be be in the adventuring party for a campaign of my own creation that involves said skeleton so in either case I don't need dm approval.

Would the skeleton champion template be applied during or after character creation?

I'm assuming I can ignore adding the racial hit die?

I'm also assuming when it says BAB 3/4 of hit die it means if I've got a lvl 20 fighter his BAB is that of a lvl 15 Fighter or does that only apply to racial hit die?

I do believe if you re-read page 218-221 on Arcane Spells and Divine Spells. That this will answer your question that you asked.

Firstly, hello and welcome to Paizo's Messageboards :)
I do not own Ironborn of Questhaven nor any material on Warforged, so I cannot comment on those. In regards to the other questions:

andromada369 wrote:


Would the skeleton champion template be applied during or after character creation?

The Skeletal Champion is an acquired template, meaning that it is applied to the 'base creature'. In your case, your 'Base Creature' is a Commoner 1. Your Commoner character is created first, then the Skeletal Champion template is applied.

andromada369 wrote:


I'm assuming I can ignore adding the racial hit die?

If the Skeletal champion is designed to be a challenge for PCs of appropriate levels, I would keep the extra HD. If not, it would be at your discretion.

But, I am guessing that this guy *might* be adventuring alongside other PCs, so -were it me- I would keep the extra in either case. Remember that Undead are destroyed at 0hp, not at -CON, like living PCs are. Not having racial Hit Dice also reduces your total BAB, as explained below.

andromada369 wrote:


I'm also assuming when it says BAB 3/4 of hit die it means if I've got a lvl 20 fighter his BAB is that of a lvl 15 Fighter or does that only apply to racial hit die?

The 3/4 BAB applies to the racial Hit Die only. A Human Skeleton Champion Fighter 20 would have a BAB of +21 (+20 for twenty levels of Fighter at full progression and +1 for 2 racial Hit Dice at 3/4 progression, rounded down). To break it down using another example; the existing Skeletal Champion in the PF Bestiary has a BAB of +2 (+1 for a level of warrior at full progression and +1 for 2 racial Hit Dice at 3/4 progression rounded down). Say I wanted to make the racial Hit Dice 4 instead of 2 just to make the challenge a little tougher. The total BAB becomes +4 (+1 for a level of warrior at full progression and +3 for 4 racial Hit Dice at 3/4 progression).

I imagine that your Skeletal Champion is going to advance as a character class, so all you need to do is use the progression appropriate to the class.

Just to recap on what you want to do:
1. Roll your base creature (you mentioned a Commoner)
2. Apply the Skeletal Champion template
3. Play/GM as normal, when it comes time to progress the Skeletal Champion in a character level, it is the same as multiclassing as described in the Pathfinder Core Rulebook.

NOTE: I do not have my books on hand at the moment and am going from memory, so anyone spotting any glaring inconsistencies, please correct as appropriate :)

Well I've finally decided to start work on campaign centering on said skeleton so I'm going to need start reworking the skeleton champion template because I'll tell you right now s/he was not brought back by any normal spells, forms of necromancy, or rituals.

Sagawork you mentioned multiclassing from a commoner. What I would like to do is start off with a prolog where the skeleton is found somewhere (I'm not sure just yet.) and is a lvl 1 commoner. After the whole back story is told and the skele joins the rest of the party, s/he gets training in his chosen class (chosen at character creation) whether it be from one of the other pc's if applicable or they find someone willing to train them. After said training is done they drop the commoner class along with associated bonuses, skills, etc. and picks up capabilities etc. of chosen class. Would this be possible?
andromada369 wrote:


Sagawork you mentioned multiclassing from a commoner. What I would like to do is start off with a prolog where the skeleton is found somewhere (I'm not sure just yet.) and is a lvl 1 commoner. After the whole back story is told and the skele joins the rest of the party, s/he gets training in his chosen class (chosen at character creation) whether it be from one of the other pc's if applicable or they find someone willing to train them. After said training is done they drop the commoner class along with associated bonuses, skills, etc. and picks up capabilities etc. of chosen class. Would this be possible?

Anything is possible at your own gaming table and I don't think that keeping or removing one level of Commoner will make much difference at higher levels. I figure you are already hand-waving the alignment requirements anyway.

Ultimately, the only way to add new things is to try them out. If you find that your skeletal champion is affecting play in an adverse manner, you need to dial things back or remove it from play.

Oh, one thing to consider when the skeleton champion take a level in something else might be to 'cap' hit points to d8s, in reflection of his/her undead state; that is to say if the skeleton champion take a level in Barbarian, Fighter, Ranger, Cavalier or (Anti-)Paladin, don't use their respective d12 and d10s, but use the d8 instead.
(Of course, any class that has d8 or smaller hit dice, you do not need to cap it.)

Would cure and inflict wounds spells work normally or have an opisite effect ie cure light wounds damages the skele and inflict light wounds heals him?
andromada369 wrote:
Would cure and inflict wounds spells work normally or have an opisite effect ie cure light wounds damages the skele and inflict light wounds heals him?

Yes, in most situations. Positive energy has the opposite effect on undead, so it hurts them. Negative energy also has the opposite effect on undead, so it heals them.

There may be a spell or class feature or subtype that changes this for a particular creature/character, but otherwise, undead like negative energy and dislike positive energy.

Alright if that's the case how would this work: Curitive spells and items ie cure light wounds, have a 75% chance of healing the skeleton instead of damaging him and damage inflicting spells and items ie inflict light wounds have a 75% chance of damaging the skeleton instead of curing.

Keep in mind this is no ordinary skeleton champion as very powerful and strange magics brought him back.
Grand Lodge
andromada369 wrote:
Would cure and inflict wounds spells work normally or have an opisite effect ie cure light wounds damages the skele and inflict light wounds heals him?

Because as an undead creature, you don't breathe, have to eat/drink/sleep, and are immune to mind affects, as well as other benefits, there should be some drawbacks. The issue with healing is one and have difficulty in 'role' playing circumstances is another.

TwilightKnight wrote:
andromada369 wrote:
Would cure and inflict wounds spells work normally or have an opisite effect ie cure light wounds damages the skele and inflict light wounds heals him?
Because as an undead creature, you don't breathe, have to eat/drink/sleep, and are immune to mind affects, as well as other benefits, there should be some drawbacks. The issue with healing is one and have difficulty in 'role' playing circumstances is another.

Well keep in mind if the skeleton is a party of all good or at least positive energy leaning party he's doomed from the start if he doesn't have the unique reaction to such spells because he has no natural health regeneration and might never be on the recieving end of negitive energy spells.

And as far as role playing here's one for ya: lets say the party walks into a town battered by the days encounters and are out of curitive items and spells so they go to the local church for healing at least assuming the skeleton as managed to disguise himself. When the local cleric casts mass cure surious wounds and the skeleton FAILS his check and is killed by the spell instead of being healed by it. Not only would this make for an interesting role playing encounter as the rest of the group would have to explain or at least try to it also could introduce a plot hook to try and figure out how to bring him back.
andromada369 wrote:

Well keep in mind if the skeleton is a party of all good or at least positive energy leaning party he's doomed from the start if he doesn't have the unique reaction to such spells because he has no natural health regeneration and might never be on the recieving end of negitive energy spells.

And as far as role playing here's one for ya: lets say the party walks into a town battered by the days encounters and are out of curitive items and spells so they go to the local church for healing at least assuming the skeleton as managed to disguise himself. When the local cleric casts mass cure surious wounds and the skeleton FAILS his check and is killed by the spell instead of being healed by it. Not only would this make for an interesting role playing encounter as the rest of the group would have to explain or at least try to it also could introduce a plot hook to try and figure out how to bring him back.

Changing how positive/negative energy affects undead would be outside the rules and up to your DM. The DM can bend or even break the rules, but I feel like this should be used more for elements that are controlled by the DM... like introducing a ghoul that has somehow redeemed itself via a dangerous & righteous quest and was awarded the inverse affects of positive/negative energy by a deity (or other uber powerful being), and in return, this good ghoul watches over a graveyard that is sacred to the deity. Then, the PCs have to do some investigating in this graveyard for whatever reason...maybe even take something from a grave... so this good ghoul sees them as trespassers and thieves, so a conflict arises...and the PCs may think it is just a ghoul trying to eat them, but maybe they find out it this ghoul is actually a good protector...and when the cleric channels positive energy to harm the ghoul, and the ghoul is healed, that could be a clue.

Also, the 75% chance houserule idea sounds like it will lead to this character dying pretty quickly, especially since undead are destroyed at 0 hp, so they don't they the "dying buffer" of living creatures. If this skeletal champion is down to 2 hp, a cure light wounds or inflict light wounds could destroy it even if it rolls the minimum of 1d8+1 for 2 points.

EDIT: And a skeletal champion does heal naturally, just like any other undead with an Int score. Mindless undead such as zombies and other skeletons do not.

It's good to know that the skeleton champion regains health like normal.

I like the idea of the percentages as it represents some higher power (uber powerful mage, deity) toying with him or a some type of ritual (either one that's gone awry or one whose research was incomplete.) I probably need to think of a more resonable percentage. 25% seems a little high.

As for the no "death buffer" I'd probably give it to them just only half the charisma score instead of full.

And if the skeleton does die and the party does bring him back (I'm thinking along the lines of re-binding the soul to the skeleton) he would loose these abilites for an amount of time (I haven't decided how long yet.)
Scarab Sages

Your table, your rules :P Just be wary of changing rules that might have long-reaching consequences.

Normal healing damages undead as a sort of balancing factor for all their immunities. In fact, if you can get past that healing problem, the undead template is one of the most desirable from a min/max position.

Class levels are a good way to continually improve a creature. If you want something more in line with awakening racial powers and abilities, I would suggest taking a peak at the savage species book from 3.5 for racial levels.

Generally speaking, pick a *type* for the creature, of melee, ranged, spellcaster, skill monkey, and compare the template to the core classes for power of spells, damage done, that sort of thing. It'll help to create a balanced creature.

Really, the hard part is going to be in restraining the goodies you might feel that a creature brought back in an *unusual* way *should* get to things that are in par with what the other races/classes get.

Well one way I could deal with this is take the percentages to the other end and say a healing spell has a 10% of actually healing instead of causing damage and keep this information from the players and if they stumble upon the ability and figure it out tell them the specifics and give the option of spending a lot of time and money improve that percentage possible to the point of 100% chance of cure. The "inflict" line of spells would be tied directly to their curitive cusouns in that of the party increases the % chance a healing spell heals they also inedvertently increase the % chance a inflict wounds spell would damage.
Scarab Sages

Honestly, if you don't nail the clerics down for casting cure and inflict wounds, they'll just memorize some inflicts to keep the undead guy alive.

Sounds like a lot of effort going from 10% to 100% for something that they don't really need to do. If they have a cleric, living and undead can both get healed. If they don't have a cleric, the intelligent undead will heal the same as the intelligent living.

Are you really set on this mechanic? Or were you looking for a mechanic that just brought out how different this creature was from normal undead?

I just want some mechanics that bring out how unique this skeleton champion is.
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