So I’m Converting the Cosmo-Knights from RIFTs to Pathfinder/Starfinder for my home brew world. I’ve decided a template vs. class is more appropriate to make each knight unique but still the basics. I present the Cosmo-Knight:
Cosmo-Knights are chosen by the Cosmic Forge, which gives it some of its power, turning their bodies into cosmic energy batteries. It makes them powerful enough to go into an all-out battle with a starship. Having such power comes with the responsibility to use it correctly and if they become corrupt, they lose their powers. It's possible for them to redeem themselves and therefore regain their powers, but in all of recorded history only one in a thousand succeed (approximately a dozen succeeded and went on to become heroes of legend).
It's unknown how one can become a Cosmo-Knight as those whom are deemed worthy have come from all backgrounds, from emperors and princes to criminals and beggars. They have come from many races. The only ones not chosen are supernatural beings and creatures (e.g. dragons). When someone is chosen, the Forge contacts them in a dream and how it appears to the chosen individual varies on the person. They are asked to become a Cosmo-Knight and to make sure they know what they are getting into are shown visions of possible futures, even those with personal loss and tragic endings. If they say yes, they are transformed into supernatural beings with incredible powers and the ability to summon a "cosmic armor". They have a strict code of honor to which they must follow. They are told never to seek any public office or seek leadership positions due to the tempatation of power. They can work in law enforcement as well as give aid, support, and advice. Cosmo-Knights are encouraged to hide themselves until needed to prevent veneration and adoration by others, which could also end up corrupting them. Cosmo-knights are sworn enemies of the Dark Tapestry and all Undead; and are required to terminate them on site.
Creating a Cosmo-Knight
“Cosmo-Knight” is an acquired template that can be added to any living creature with 5 or more Hit Dice (referred to hereafter as the base creature). Most Cosmo-Knight were once humanoids. A Cosmo-Knight uses the base creature’s statistics and abilities except as noted here.
CR: Same as base creature +5.
Alignment: Lawful Good.
Type: The Cosmo-Knight type changes to Outsider (augmented). Do not recalculate class Hit Dice, BAB, or saves. Cosmo-knights do not need to breathe air and can survive in the vacuum of space but still require eating and sleeping.
Senses: A Cosmo-Knight gains See in Darkness
Aura: A Cosmo-Knight emanates the following aura.
Cosmic Aura (Su)
A Cosmo-Knight constantly exudes an aura of intense Good and Positive energy in a 30-foot radius. This aura functions as the spell consecrate and uses the Cosmo-Knight’s armor as an altar of sorts to double the effects granted. In addition, this miasma of fell energies hinders the channeling of negative energy. Any creature that attempts to summon negative energy in this area—such as through a cleric’s channel energy ability, a antipaladin’s touch of curruption, or any spell with the necromancy school—must make a concentration check with a DC equal to 10 + 1/2 the Cosmo-Knight’s Hit Dice + the Cosmo-Knight’s Constitution modifier. If the character fails, the effect is expended but does not function.
Armor Class: Natural armor improves by +4.
Hit Dice: Change all racial Hit Dice to d8s. Class Hit Dice are unaffected.
Defensive Abilities: A Cosmo-Knight gains Fast healing equal to their CR; DR 10/magic; and immunity to cold, electricity, and Fire. A Cosmo-Knight also gains spell resistance equal to its augmented CR + 11.
The Cosmo-Knight also gains the following abilitys:
Summon Cosmic Armor (Ex)
The Cosmo-Knight is able to summon a full set of full +3 plate armor made out of a special mixture of Adamantine and Mithral. Granting DR 3/-,Spell Failure chances are decreased by 20%, Weight is ½ as normal, increase the Maximum Dexterity bonus by 2 and reduce the Armor check penalties by 4 (One from Adamantine /three from Mithral). This Special Armor does not reduce movement speed of base creature. Summoning and unsummoning the armor is a standard action. Certain abilities below are only useable while in the armor. If Broken or destroyed in battle the Cosmo-Knight cannot summon the armor again for 24 hours.
Summon Cosmic Weapon (Ex)
The Cosmo-Knight can choose to create a cosmic bound weapon they are proficient in in a ritual that take 1 hour. The weapon is permeant unless destroyed in battle. The Weapon is a +3 Aberration bane/Undead Bane made out of the same material as their Cosmic Armor. Cosmic Weapons ignore hardness less than 20 and is treated as Silver for overcoming Damage reduction.
SPECIAL: If the Cosmo-Knight loses their created Cosmic Weapon, by any means other than destruction they lose access to ALL powers and abilities granted by the template until reunited with their weapon.
Speed: Same as the base creature. If the base Creature does not have a fly speed, the Cosmo-Knight gains a fly speed of 60 (perfect maneuverability) but only while in Cosmic Armor. While in Space only, they gain the Starflight (su) ability of an Outer Dragon, with the exception they can escort one passenger only. Escorting a passenger grants the Cosmo-Knight the Grappled Condition. Prior to using Starflight the Cosmo-knight must meditate for 10 minutes to build up energy.
Attacks: A Cosmo-Knight gains a slam attack if the base creature did not have one. Damage for the slam depends on the Cosmo-Knight’s size. Also gains the kinetic blast Class ability as a Kineticist only the blast is always a cosmic blast dealing half fire/half positive energy. Blast damage scales as if base class was a Kineticist. Cosmic Blasts cannot be modified with Wild talents. Cosmic Blasts hit Touch AC and can only be used while in Armor.
Special Attacks: A Cosmo-Knight gains the following special attacks. Save DCs are equal to 10 + 1/2 the Cosmo-Knight’s HD + the Cosmo-Knight’s Constitution modifier unless otherwise noted.
Channel Cosmic Might (Su)
Any weapon a Cosmo-Knight wields seethes with energy, and deals an additional 1d6 points of damage for every 4 Hit Dice the Cosmo-Knight has. This additional damage is half fire and half positive energy. This ability is only useable while in Armor.
Cosmic Composite Blast (Su)
Three times per day, the Cosmo-Knight may unleash a 60-foot cone of energy as a standard action. This blast deals damage as a Maximized Kineticist Composite Blast at X 4 using the class level as the Kineticist Level (Reflex for half ). This damage is half fire and half positive energy. This Attack is meant to take down Starships and Greater EVIL and no Cosmo-Knight will EVER use this ability without the Threat being adequate or considering collateral damage. If a Cosmo-Knight uses all three Blasts in a 24 hours they must make a Fortitude Save at the DC of their Blast or become unconscious, if they succeed they gain the exhausted condition until they rest for 8 hours. This ability is only usable while in Armor.
Special Qualities: A Cosmo-Knight gains the following.
Ability Scores: Str +6, Dex +4, Con +6, Wis +4. The Physical Ability increases only apply while wearing the Cosmic Armor.
Skills: Cosmo-Knight gain a +8 racial bonus on Intimidate, Perception, and Fly checks.
Feats: Cosmo-Knight gain Diehard, Endurance, intimidating Prowess, Improved Initiative, Hover, Fly-By Attack, and Toughness as bonus feats.
I based it off of the graveknight and took the flavor from the source material. While this is homebrew in your opinion is a CR5 too high or is that appropriate?
So, the stronger a template is, the wonkier it becomes with game balance- once the template is pulling more weight than the base creature, the monster's strength varies wildly depending on how well it synergizes with the template. I'd recommend, as a general philosophy, redesigning the Cosmo-Knight template as a +2 or maybe +3, and attaching it to creatures that are stronger in the first place to compensate.
However, given that you're trying to make it a +5 template, this needs a few fixes to work better. Its AC is going to be massively too high; between the Dex increases, the natural armor, and the +3 full plate, on a monster that wasn't intended to be wearing armor in the first place, its AC could be eighteen points higher than the base monster. By comparison, the Monster Creation Rules say that AC should increase by 5-7 points when CR goes up by 5. A character who hits a normal monster of that CR half the time couldn't hit a Cosmo-Knight at all.
By contrast, its saves are somewhat too low. Saves should increase by 3-5 when CR goes up by 5, but this Cosmo-Knight only gets +3 Fort, +2 Ref, and +2 Will, all from its attribute increases. You've created a monster that forces opponents to brainwash or save-or-suck it, and then CDG it until it dies. Not very exciting.
Its damage-dealing abilities simply don't work. Positive energy heals living creatures, so against anything with a pulse, "half fire damage and half positive energy damage" cancels out to zero damage (or heals them, if they resist fire)!
Adamantine lowers ACP by 1 not because of its properties, but because it's always Masterwork, and Masterwork armor reduces ACP by 1. This is also true of Mithral; Mithral inherently reduces ACP by 2, and reduces it by 1 further for being Masterwork. Therefore, a blend of Adamantine and Mithral would at best reduce ACP by 3, since it can't be "double-Masterwork".
The Cosmic Weapon bypassing DR as silver is redundant, because +3 weapons already bypass DR/silver. Also, the weapon and armor are enormously valuable pieces of treasure; killing a Cosmo-Knight at mid-levels could easily increase the party's wealth far beyond what level guidelines suggest.
Lastly, you should probably make sure the template is lost if the creature stops being Lawful Good or otherwise "falls". You say that Cosmo-Knights would never do certain things, but don't put any teeth into the enforcement.
The postive energy per the Kin blast says it doesn’t heal living creatures though.
That's a rule specific to the Positive Blast ability, which you're not using- you're using a special blast which deals half fire and half positive energy. That rule doesn't apply here unless you specifically say it does in the description of the template, which you haven't. It certainly doesn't apply to Channel Cosmic Might, which bears no resemblance to any kind of Kineticist ability.
ok thank you for the feedback. Now to address the issues you pointed out:
1) The blast I intended to treat as fire and positive blast with the intention of a fire blast that deals full damage to ghosts and haunts.
2) I’ll drop it to a +3 as the template used by comparison is a +2 and Graveknight is a powerful template at a +2. The channel cosmic might is a reskin of the ability to have melee weapons channel the energy of their creation. I took the graveknight and removed all the necromancy stuff, converted it to postive and good and added abilities to meet The flavor from RIFTS class (blast and a mega blast, summon armor, ritual summon weapon, space flight, etc)
3) Great point on AC. Dropping dex bonus as well as lowering armor to a +2. In the graveknight section on how to become one it says a would be knight crafts their own armor and enhances it to a +2 so using that as basis. The minor bonus is an easy fix to a 3 from a 4. I used the adamantine write up and Mithral write up to get that number not even taking into effect the masterwork number.
4) For saves maybe give it the Paladin ability to add it base ability mod to all saves while in amor. The flavor of the class is it isn’t supposed to be as formable outside of armor this way they blend in better.
5) The armor is not lootable. If a Cosmo Knight dies it vanishes like all summoned gear. The weapon however is lootable. However fellow knights will hunt down the weapon of a fallen brothers or sister to have it rest at their space tomb.
6) Speaking of weapon. Im reducing it to a +1 aberration and Undead bane. If a knight chooses to have it further enchanted they do it normally.
7) The code which is not converted yet will explain the strict code they follow or lose powers. Being LG is part of code. Losing weapon is one way they can lose their abilities though.