Bones Shaman - 11th Level Touch of the Grave

[Aerovenax]

I'm currently building a Chaotic Good Shaman with the Bones spirit, and am hoping someone can clarify an issue with the Spirit Ability. At 11th level, the Bones Spirit ability Touch of the Grave gains "any weapon that the shaman wields is treated as an Unholy weapon."

The Unholy magic weapon ability includes the clause "It bestows one permanent negative level on any good creature attempting to wield it."

This reads as though a Good-aligned Bones Shaman would be punished for his alignment, which seems very poorly designed. Bones Shamans deal in negative energy and necromancy, yes, but they are not by nature Evil.

Additionally, this would create a paradox at 11th level where my Bones Shaman would pick up a weapon, rendering it Unholy, thereby inflicting a negative level upon himself, dropping back to 10, and causing the weapon to no longer be Unholy, causing his level to rise back to 11, etc. etc.

Can anyone share some insight on this?

[Paladin of Baha-who?]

A negative level doesn't work like that. It applies penalties to skill checks, saves, attack rolls, and hp, but doesn't stop your class features from working.

That said, I don't know if it was intended that a good-aligned bones shaman would be hurt by this ability. It looks like it would be as written.

[Archaeik]

Energy Drain and Negative Levels wrote:

For each negative level a creature has, it takes a cumulative –1 penalty on all ability checks, attack rolls, combat maneuver checks, Combat Maneuver Defense, saving throws, and skill checks. In addition, the creature reduces its current and total hit points by 5 for each negative level it possesses. The creature is also treated as one level lower for the purpose of level-dependent variables (such as spellcasting) for each negative level possessed. Spellcasters do not lose any prepared spells or slots as a result of negative levels. If a creature's negative levels equal or exceed its total Hit Dice, it dies.

Not every class ability is equally good for all creatures, this appears to be such a case.

However, disallowing use relies on interpreting that part class feature as "a level dependent variable", which I don't think it is, even if it is level-dependent.