In today's session, my 4th level Human Fighter picked up the Skeletal Champion template.
For the most part, this is fairly straightforward, but I do have some questions.
Type:
What is my new type? I'm guessing that the Human subtype counts as indicating a "kind", so I'm simply Undead.
Assuming I no longer have the Human subtype, do I keep all of my Human racial traits? If I lose them, is that retroactive, or only going forward?
Racial Hit Dice:
I'm fairly sure I gain the save and BAB increases from the hit dice. Is that correct?
Do I gain another feat, in addition to the bonus feat granted by the template?
Do future ability point increases come based on my total hit dice, rather than only class levels?
Assuming that I keep my Human racial traits, does Skilled count toward skill points gained from my racial hit dice?
Do I count my racial hit dice when qualifying for feats such as Leadership, which requires Character Level 7th?
Thanks!
Your old saves go *poof* and you gain new saves based on your HD. Your Will and Reflex are likely to be better, but your Fort will likely suffer (no Con score). You gain a 3/4 racial BaB but I think your Class BaB overwrites that.
You would gain no extra Feats you would not normally get, except Improved Initiative. If you've already got it...well you've already got it.
You gain Ability Score increases based on Character Level, not Hit Dice, according to the page on that.
Character Level is distinct from total Hit Dice. So no, you can't qualify for Feats early unless they have a different prerequisite your template may qualify you for.
I'm not entirely sure on all of these though. Pretty sure you keep your racial traits (Skilled, primarily) since they're all mental based ones, much like Reincarnate lets you keep those.
Bump, still have questions that have not been answered.
As I read it:
Alignment changes to NE. In some groups this in and of itself can be a major issue.
Gain 2 undead racial HD with its own set of base saves, base attack bonus, skill ranks, etc unless the GM determined otherwise. These are added to your base attack bonus and base save bonuses derived from character's class levels.
Feats and ability score advancement are both gained from total hit dice, not class level. Class-specific bonus feats are gained from class level. Remember, monsters gain these from their hit dice as they don't have class levels.
The bonus feat from 1st level human you keep. The 4 bonus skill ranks from having been human you keep - I can see that you might keep this though, as it isn't a terribly big deal.
Turin is correct.
That is not correct Kazaan. They keep whatever they had from being human even though they become undead. Nothing in the template says they lose the benefits of the base race, and the example give also has the extra human feat.
Type:
What is my new type?
Undead.
Assuming I no longer have the Human subtype, do I keep all of my Human racial traits?
You keep everything--nothing you get from the human race requires that you maintain the type Humanoid (Human).
Racial Hit Dice:
I'm fairly sure I gain the save and BAB increases from the hit dice. Is that correct?
Yes.
Do I gain another feat, in addition to the bonus feat granted by the template?
Yes, you get a feat at ever odd character level.
Do future ability point increases come based on my total hit dice, rather than only class levels?
Every non-class based increase is based on total HD.
Assuming that I keep my Human racial traits, does Skilled count toward skill points gained from my racial hit dice?
Yes.
Do I count my racial hit dice when qualifying for feats such as Leadership, which requires Character Level 7th?
Yes.
I would agree you lose feats based on being human, but you don't lose your other racial benefits, and like I said the book version keeps the feat. Templates also tell you, what you gain and lost.
Feats: A skeleton loses all feats possessed by the base creature and gains Improved Initiative as a bonus feat.
Feats: A skeletal champion gains Improved Initiative as a bonus feat.
As you can see the skeletal champion does not lose any feats.
Now as for the human racial skill point I am not sure. I would have to reverse engineer the build in the book to know that
Now as for the human racial skill point I am not sure. I would have to reverse engineer the build in the book to know that
Looking more closely at the various examples in the book, it looks like I do not get the benefits of Skilled for racial hit dice, but I do not lose it for class levels that I had prior to becoming a Skeletal Champion. It is less clear if further class levels taken still benefit from it, and I could see an argument either way. Though I'm inclined to say that I still receive the benefits, since I didn't lose them retroactively and, being a mental trait, I would not lose it from reincarnation.
Do I count my racial hit dice when qualifying for feats such as Leadership, which requires Character Level 7th?Yes.
I was rather hoping this is the case, but for my DM's benefit, is there anywhere that calls this out specifically, or an example in the Bestiary to reference? I'm fairly sure that this is one of those cases where the wording expects a core race PC with nothing out of the ordinary going on, much like Alter Self seems to expect that you are a medium or small creature. Something explicitly showing that, however, would be brilliant.
Feats are accrued on the combination of race/monster hit dice and class levels. When you hit your 7th HD, you are eligible for Leadership.
However, I am unsure that your GM is aware of the edge you're getting in gaining 2 undead racial hit dice. Is your GM planning to implement something to reflect that added benefit?
Character level is the sum of all of the levels possessed by a character in all of his classes
That means leadership goes by class levels.
There is also this.
Hit Dice (HD):..... As a creature gains levels, it gains additional Hit Dice. Monsters, on the other hand, gain racial Hit Dice, which represent the monster's general prowess and ability.
That shows racial HD not the same as character levels.
However, I am unsure that your GM is aware of the edge you're getting in gaining 2 undead racial hit dice. Is your GM planning to implement something to reflect that added benefit?
Yes, our whole group has talked about exactly what I'm gaining. I think the main benefit with hit dice would be gaining Leadership early (if that is correct). I'm breaking even on HP (and will have a net loss as I continue to level). Of course, undead traits are pretty important, especially since they cover most of the weaknesses of a Fighter.
I expect our DM will increase the CR of our encounters to match our new effective APL, and the events leading to this state clearly come with some pretty heavy RP debt. In essence, our party has made a deal with what is essentially a lesser devil, and we are fully aware that that may bite us later. Either way, it's still up in the air whether or not the character will stay in the party for more than another session or two. There are lots of potential breaking points due to his backstory; his 7 Int will protect him somewhat, but not entirely. It may work out, but I've already written up a replacement character to cover the possibility of him becoming an NPC.
I agree that no future skill points will be gained, and I also agreed on the lost of use of feats that require someone to be a human.
I wouldn't know why you would lose the skilled ability, you wouldn't get it for racial HD but for any level you achieve you get skillpoints as normal, none of it is tied to your type being human. Some subtypes do carry abilities with them but humanoid(human) doesn't, just like an half-orc counts as an orc but virtually gets none of the orc's abilities.
Now that I think about it someone who gained the template at level 10 should not have different skill points than someone who gained it at level 7 so either points from being a human stay for all the levels or they should not.
Good point AO.
I'm fairly sure I gain the save and BAB increases from the hit dice. Is that correct?
Yes; treat it as if you had just multi-classed two levels with "undead". This provides:
* medium attack bonus* d8 hit dice
* high will saves
* 4+int skill ranks per level
* class skills: climb, disguise, fly, intimidate, knowledge (arcana), knowledge (religion), perception, sense motive, spellcraft, and stealth.
Unless specifically stated otherwise, you keep all the benefits you had from your race, feats, and class levels before gaining this template. The only thing that changes retroactively are your hit points, which use your charisma bonus rather than your constitution bonus.
Assuming that I keep my Human racial traits, does Skilled count toward skill points gained from my racial hit dice?
Nope. Although I personally think the rules indicate that you should get them, the example in bestiary 1 shows that you do not get them.
Do I count my racial hit dice when qualifying for feats such as Leadership, which requires Character Level 7th?
This is unclear; it's never explicitly stated whether racial hit dice count towards "character level". The closest section to being conclusive on this matter is "monsters as PC's", but that's explicitly described as a guideline. A guideline, I might add, that doesn't actually work in the case of skeleton champions.