Does a ring of sustenance alleviate undead hunger cravings, such as a vampire's need for blood, a ghoul's craving for flesh, or a lich's desire for knowledge?
I think it's very GM dependent.
I would allow it for pure sustenance, but with a long term effect on the Undead psyche (and even health) if they expect to never eat again.
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That's an interesting question... narratively, I'm inclined to say that undead don't technically need sustenance, their craving is much more psychological with a side of something akin to chemical addiction. On the other hand, while I'm accustomed to the idea that the ring of sustenance only keeps you sustained without ever satiating your cravings, this isn't actually written anywhere in the item's text.
Considering that undead hunger cravings are a way to make undead deal with a kind of resource requirement that doesn't involve actual food, and the ring of sustenance is a solve for such requirements, I'm inclined to say it does. It doesn't seem that different for a ring of sustenance to summon nutrients for the body and mind of a living being than to summon bone shards for a skeleton. If you want to keep the horror hunger aspect, perhaps the ring merely takes the edge off the addiction cravings, so that the character is able to control themselves better without actually removing the hunger.
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Personally, I say no.
The ring fulfills a need for food and drink, but I don't consider the cravings of undead to be as simple as food and drink.
Personally, I say no.
The ring fulfills a need for food and drink, but I don't consider the cravings of undead to be as simple as food and drink.
Seems awefully convenient that you're ignoring the "constantly replenishes the body and mind" part of the ring's rules, no?
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And why, exactly, are you playing an Undead character again?
If you are wanting to handwave away one of the biggest RP hooks of the character, work it out with the GM to just handwave it away.
The RAI statement of the Ring of Sustenance is not nearly clear enough about how it interacts with Undead player characters and their Undead hunger to be definitive proof that it would work. Also the Ring was written in the CRB - long before any of the Undead player options were created.
So if the GM and the rest of the table is wanting to remove Undead cravings from the character, the Ring of Sustenance would be a reasonable way of doing that. Though it seems a bit overkill at that point.
But if you are trying to coerce your GM into allowing this, I seriously doubt that it is going to work.
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I would like to point out that undead PCs won't die without fulfilling their hunger, they just go feral. Meanwhile living creatures will literally die if they don't eat.
I say no. The ring is created with the intent of sustaining living beings, therefore it likely has an aspect of positive energy to it. Undead creatures putting it on would likely experience a mild discomfort.
Remember the item was written well before undead PCs were a thing. If they had been around then, I'm sure they would have specified if it helps undead creatures or not.
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The first sentence is flavorful description of the effect of the ring. The mechanical description of the effect follows : "You don’t need to eat or drink while wearing it, and you need only 2 hours of sleep per day to gain the benefits of 8 hours of sleep."
So, that's it and it does nothing as far as Undead Cravings are concerned (they are not mentioned in what the ring actually does).
Now, if you are the GM, then it's your game. If you're a player trying to bash the GM into submission with the RAW, remember that PF2 was designed to prevent this. As the nice Uncommon tag reminds us BTW.
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I could certainly imagine a lich or vampire going to a great deal of effort to create a ring of undead sustenance, however... or perhaps you'd need a different kid of ring for each kind of undead?
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Seems awefully convenient that you're ignoring the "constantly replenishes the body and mind" part of the ring's rules, no?Personally, I say no.
The ring fulfills a need for food and drink, but I don't consider the cravings of undead to be as simple as food and drink.
No, I'm not. I simply don' think it applies.
Look RD, if you want a magic item to get of the problems of being Undead than talk to your GM about it. If I was your GM, well you probably wouldn't get to play undead in the first place, but if we were playing that kind of game I definitely wouldn't let anyone ignore the plights of their Undead condition via a cheap magic item.
Thank you everyone for your input.
Now I'm off to browbeat some must-play-by-the-RAW Society GMs with this new knowledge.
Looking on AoN I do see an indication that at least the Vampire archetype is allowed in PFS. Is that true? Do players really have access to Undead archetypes in society play?
I find that very hard to understand.
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As far as I know, you can only play a skeleton in PFS.
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The only undead you can play in PFS is a Skeleton (at 206 ACP), and their undead hunger is collecting bones. Not even humanoid bones, just bones.
I have a skeleton PC, and I play it off as my PC always asking for leftover bones from inns, or taking bones of long dead humanoids found in crypts. I don't kill humanoids exclusively to take their bones or anything.
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No. Not unless specifically built for an undead craving. It is designed to work with beings that consume food and drink for sustenance.
A ring will not ruin my fun as DM making the undead PC feed.
Not to hijack the thread but what about for leshies or ghoran? Would a ring of sustenance work there? Not sure where to draw the line
Edit: for the record I don't think there's a definitive RAW answer just curious how people would rule it
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Not to hijack the thread but what about for leshies or ghoran? Would a ring of sustenance work there? Not sure where to draw the line
Edit: for the record I don't think there's a definitive RAW answer just curious how people would rule it
I would certainly allow it to sustain such creatures.
Not to hijack the thread but what about for leshies or ghoran? Would a ring of sustenance work there? Not sure where to draw the line
Draw the line with what the players are planning to have fun with.
A lot of the time, bringing provisions along on an adventure is not considered much fun. It is just bookkeeping and often gets handwaved away along with mundane ammunition.
So I would have no problems with allowing Leshy or Ghoran or other such characters use a Ring of Sustenance as the mechanism for handwaving away needing to count up how many weeks of rations they purchased and have used already - same as all of the other more normal character ancestries.
In fact, the only reason I question it for Undead characters is because that Undead Hunger is a much more valuable role-play hook than, 'so what's for dinner tonight?' 'Trail rations, same as every other night.'
But if the people at the table aren't planning on doing anything with that Undead Hunger role-play opportunity, then there is no reason not to just handwave that one away too. Either by letting the Ring of Sustenance work, or homebrewing a Ring of Undead Hunger Abation item that is equivalent.
The ring says that you specifically don't need to eat or drink. If your plant-people previously needed to eat or drink, and they're wearing the ring, they don't need to eat or drink anymore. By my read, it does nothing for weirder requirements like sunlight.
At the same time... yeah, "What would be fun for your campaign?" really ought to be trump, here.
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Looking on AoN I do see an indication that at least the Vampire archetype is allowed in PFS. Is that true? Do players really have access to Undead archetypes in society play?
I find that very hard to understand.
You are reading AoN wrong. That green symbol doesn't mean "this is available". It means "the same rarity and access conditions in the book are used. If it is Uncommon or Rare, something must grant you Access (whether an Access condition, a feat granting access, a boon saying you get access, rewards from some adventure saying you get access, etc) or you can't use it."
There is nothing giving Access to those undead archetypes.
Looking on AoN I do see an indication that at least the Vampire archetype is allowed in PFS. Is that true? Do players really have access to Undead archetypes in society play?
I find that very hard to understand.
You are reading AoN wrong. That green symbol doesn't mean "this is available". It means "the same rarity and access conditions in the book are used. If it is Uncommon or Rare, something must grant you Access (whether an Access condition, a feat granting access, a boon saying you get access, rewards from some adventure saying you get access, etc) or you can't use it."
There is nothing giving Access to those undead archetypes.
Thanks, that makes more sense. I've never played and have no intention of playing PFS so I've never really paid attention to it before.