Eldritch Heritage (Draconic) and Dragon Disciple

[Chris Donnangelo]

I had a player ask me this question recently, and I wanted to get the community's feedback.

The player wants to take the feat Eldritch Heritage at 3rd level, so he can begin to use the Claws. Then, at 6th level take the Dragon Disciple prestige class.

Eldritch Heritage says you must choose a bloodline you don't have.

If you later take a level in a class that grants that bloodline (like Dragon Disciple), do you now have a dead feat?
Do you spontaneously switch bloodlines?
Are you prohibited from taking that class if there are no other bloodline options?

Do they have two 'pools' of 3+Cha Mod rounds/day of claws, at different power levels?
Do they gain an additional 3 rounds/day and use the higher powered feature (like a monk/ninja multiclass' ki pool)?
Do the Claws count as the same ability from different sources, meaning the more potent ability would override the other entirely?

My inclination is to the latter, but it feels odd to punish a player for trying to add flavor to his character concept earlier than 6th level.

[Jiggy]

You know, if you're the GM and this isn't organized play, you can just tell the player he can have a new feat.

But anyway, to answer the actual question (all assuming he doesn't have any sorcerer levels):
The dragon disciple never technically says you gain the bloodline; what it says is that you gain "bloodline powers of the draconic bloodline, using his dragon disciple level as his sorcerer level to determine the bonuses gained."

If he were actually gaining the bloodline, he'd also get the Arcana, but he's not: he's just gaining the progression of bloodline powers. Thus, it looks to me like Eldritch Heritage is not invalidated or made into a "dead feat".

That then leaves us with the issue of reconciling the two instances of the Claws power. I'm honestly not sure how this would work, and I don't think there's anything that's going to tell us for sure. So it's probably up to the GM to just pick something.

[Chris Donnangelo]

Unfortunately, this is for PFS Organized Play.
Otherwise I'd work with the player to trade the feat in for something else thematically appropriate, or give them some other bonus.

But for PFS, we'd need a ruling.

[Mojorat]

Eldritch heritage would stop working as soon as you took dragon discipple because you cant have eldritch heritage with a bloodline that you have.

If for some reason Eldritch heritage was not lost(which see my opinion above) the two would not stack because the feats do not actually give you any sorcerer levgels, they just treat your sorcerer level as X for the purposes of the feat.

[Jiggy]

Mojorat wrote:

Eldritch heritage would stop working as soon as you took dragon discipple because you cant have eldritch heritage with a bloodline that you have.

Where does anything say that he has that bloodline?

[PatientWolf]

Jiggy wrote:

Mojorat wrote:

Eldritch heritage would stop working as soon as you took dragon discipple because you cant have eldritch heritage with a bloodline that you have.

Where does anything say that he has that bloodline?

Actually having the Draconic Bloodline is a requirement to become a Dragon Disciple.

Dragon Disciple wrote:

Requirements

To qualify to become a dragon disciple, a character must fulfill all the following criteria.

Race: Any nondragon.

Skills: Knowledge (arcana) 5 ranks.

Languages: Draconic.

Spellcasting: Ability to cast 1st-level arcane spells without preparation. If the character has sorcerer levels, he must have the draconic bloodline. If the character gains levels of sorcerer after taking this class, he must take the draconic bloodline.

[ShadeOfRed]

Jiggy wrote:

Mojorat wrote:

Eldritch heritage would stop working as soon as you took dragon discipple because you cant have eldritch heritage with a bloodline that you have.

Where does anything say that he has that bloodline?

It's to bad he didn't take Eldritch Heritage (Abyssal). Then it would stack as far as I know.

RAW it does not state you gain the bloodline. Just the powers. He doesn't get the Arcana, spells or anything else. Well the feats but I'm pretty sure it says you can pick from the feats granted by Draconic.

[Jiggy]

@PatientWolf: Read more carefully; having the draconic bloodline is only a requirement if you have (or later gain) sorcerer levels.

[Chess Pwn]

So if they don't have sorcerer levels then they should be able to have both. Just because they grant the same thing doesn't mean they overlap or replace. So he'd have two separate pools, one for each.

[PatientWolf]

Jiggy wrote:

@PatientWolf: Read more carefully; having the draconic bloodline is only a requirement if you have (or later gain) sorcerer levels.

You are absolutely right. Totally missed that. So a Bard/DD with Eldritch Heritage should be fine. The only issue would come with ever taking sorcerer levels.

[gnomersy]

Chess Pwn wrote:

So if they don't have sorcerer levels then they should be able to have both. Just because they grant the same thing doesn't mean they overlap or replace. So he'd have two separate pools, one for each.

I think this is how it works since he doesn't technically have the bloodline from either source and isn't a sorcerer you'd use both separately and each would scale independently(one at total levels minus something and one at DD levels) although the NA and resistances wouldn't stack since they're same type/source bonuses of course.

[Quandary]

It should work, and they would have separate pools/scaling effects.
Dragon Disciple Bite would NOT trigger when using Eldritch Heritage Claws,
because you aren't technically using a Bloodline for those, EH doesn't technically count as a bloodline.

It's pretty sad that doing this way is the only way to get a decent number of usages/rounds of Draconic BL Claws, though.

[ShadeOfRed]

Just realized...could he technically choose two different dragon types?

[Quandary]

they're not connected, so sure.

[ShadeOfRed]

Hmm...two different breath weapons, and eventually two sets of claws dealing different elemental damage...kind of interesting.

[bigrig107]

How would you explain that, exactly?

"When a mommy red dragon and a daddy blue dragon love each other very much...."

[gnomersy]

bigrig107 wrote:

How would you explain that, exactly?

"When a mommy red dragon and a daddy blue dragon love each other very much...."

Grand parents on each side or multiple generations of draconic interbreeding or even a half breed dragon interbreeding lots of possibilities.

[ArmouredMonk13]

bigrig107 wrote:

How would you explain that, exactly?

Magic.

[ShadeOfRed]

ArmouredMonk13 wrote:

bigrig107 wrote:

How would you explain that, exactly?

Magic.

Absolutely the best way to explain everything. :)

[bigrig107]

I was kidding, actually.

Though "magic" IS the answer to a lot of questions.