How does an alchemist make a homunculus familiar? RAW, as far as I can see, with the exception of the poppet, the aeon wyrd, and the druid's leshy familiar, almost all familiars are animals, and "homunculus" isn't on the list. The homunculus is a construct. There's an entry for it in the Bestiary which starts by saying "A homunculus is a tiny servitor construct created by a crafter to serve as a spy, scout, messenger, or assistant. When a crafter first begins to study the art of creating constructs, she often crafts a homunculus first, since the creation process is simple and inexpensive due to a magical shortcut: the use of the creator’s own blood. This forges a link between the homunculus and its master, causing the homunculus to gain a spark of the creator’s intellect, as well as the same moral values and some of the creator’s basic personality traits. Homunculi left to their own devices never stray far from their masters." Yet there's no "Crafting" entry.
The Alchemical Familiar feat says "You have used alchemy to create life, a simple creature formed from alchemical materials, reagents, and a bit of your own blood. This alchemical familiar appears to be a small creature of flesh and blood, though it might have some unusual or distinguishing aspects depending on your creative process. Like other familiars, your alchemical familiar assists you in your laboratory and on adventures. The familiar uses your Intelligence modifier to determine its Perception, Acrobatics, and Stealth modifiers (see Familiars for more information)." Looking at the Familiars entry doesn't help. Also, Herolab doesn't seem to have a possibility for a homunculus familiar. :-(
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Since the Alchemical Familiar features don't stipulate that it is a different creature type than the default it is by nature quite simply an animal. The "flavor text" description does very much imply that you craft the Familiar but it doesn't alter the creature type or traits at all.
That being said the issue with Hero Lab is one that I actually know how to help with as I had to fiddle with some NPCs to massage them into a shape I needed for a game. To accomplish what you're trying to do ala making it a construct first add the Familiar as the "Other" Ancestry so you can fully tweak the movement/senses as you desire and then go to the Adjustments Tab and add two new Permanent Adjustments: Add Trait & Remove Trait. Configure Add to provide the Construct Trait and the Remove to take away Animal and Blam-o, you've got it output as a Construct that you can build up using the rest of the Familiar rules as normal
Aha! Thanks for that hint! Still not happy with the RAW problem though.
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Things are not really clear on that, as the Familiar Ability Poison Reservoir specifies: Your homunculus familiar has a reservoir for poison, allowing it to apply an injury poison to an adjacent ally's exposed weapon with a single Interact action. You must supply the poison and instill it into this reservoir using two consecutive Interact actions. You must have a homunculus familiar to select this ability.
Considering that Poison Reservoir is definitely for the Alchemist, I personally consider Alchemist's Familiars to be Homunculuses. That's not really RAW, but there's a clear issue with Poison Reservoir otherwise.
Still, I don't consider them to be Constructs, but Animals when it comes to interactions with spells and such (there are very few such interactions so it has never been raised).
Homunuli in fiction are often living beings
They might be artificially created, but are usually living creatures (If weird ones) in the end
Things are not really clear on that, as the Familiar Ability Poison Reservoir specifies: Your homunculus familiar has a reservoir for poison, allowing it to apply an injury poison to an adjacent ally's exposed weapon with a single Interact action. You must supply the poison and instill it into this reservoir using two consecutive Interact actions. You must have a homunculus familiar to select this ability.
Considering that Poison Reservoir is definitely for the Alchemist, I personally consider Alchemist's Familiars to be Homunculuses. That's not really RAW, but there's a clear issue with Poison Reservoir otherwise.
Still, I don't consider them to be Constructs, but Animals when it comes to interactions with spells and such (there are very few such interactions so it has never been raised).
Agree on both points.
Making the Alch Familiar a construct has a number of issues, and Homunculus bestiary entry getting the construct label is a serious miss by Paizo, IMO.
Not only thematically, but "Constructs are not living creatures, nor are they undead. When reduced to 0 Hit Points, a construct creature is destroyed."
That completely clashes with the entire concept of a homunculus being artificial, ya know, life.
The Homunculus entry even reveals that in pf2e, they explicitly do not have a soul, as the death of their creator *might* cause a small piece of the creator's to implant inside the homunculus.
I'm guessing someone caught that construct issue at the last minute, but they lacked the time to think of a clean solution, hence you get that Feat flavor text and Poison Reservoir discussing a homunculus.
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At my table, it has been RPed that my familiar is an incomplete/imperfect homunculus, hence the lack of the proper version's features.