Non-Crafting Feats for Personal Magic Items

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Everybody knows about the Item Familiar and Ancestral Relic feats, and people who have actually read the book know about the Least, Lesser, and Greater Legacy feats, in Weapons of Legacy (which aren't actually bad, but only so long as you scrap every penalty and all the XP costs in the entire system).

I suppose you might be able to do something via Leadership, Draconic Leadership, Undead Leadership, and so on, if you get yourself a fiend of possession or a haunting presence in an item. How would those work, exactly?

But aside from those five feats above and regular magic item crafting, what other feats are there to give you a personal magic item of your own?

[daremetoidareyo]

levels of kensai or soulknife?

[Necroticplague]

Sculpt Self, while it doesn't make a physical item, has a similar effect.

[Starbuck_II]

Everybody knows about the Item Familiar and Ancestral Relic feats, and people who have actually read the book know about the Least, Lesser, and Greater Legacy feats, in Weapons of Legacy (which aren't actually bad, but only so long as you scrap every penalty and all the XP costs in the entire system).

I suppose you might be able to do something via Leadership, Draconic Leadership, Undead Leadership, and so on, if you get yourself a fiend of possession or a haunting presence in an item. How would those work, exactly?

But aside from those five feats above and regular magic item crafting, what other feats are there to give you a personal magic item of your own?

If you allow taking the feats instead of doing the rituals/cost, weapons of Legacy are fine (the feats are usually given for free for paying those costs so seems a decent trade).

Pathfinder lets a non-caster make a magic item with a feat.

[Kelb_Panthera]

How's about an item?

Races of stone has the forge of thautam which allows its users to craft magic arms and armor as though they had the feat. Still have to provide the other prerequisites for the item through items or a cooperative caster. I suggest lesser schemas from Magic of Eberron.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Just finding ways to enhance my unarmed attacks. The DM says that since monk unarmed strikes count as manufactured weapons, I can use Ancestral Relic and Item Familiar on it. I have a feat left and was wondering what else I could add.

[Troacctid]

Bonded magic items, from DMG2, allow characters to perform a bonding ritual to craft a single magic item that only functions for them. This requires no prerequisites.

[Hiro Quester]

DMG II has bonding rituals (p 232) through which you can enchant items after performing a trial with them.

e.g. The Ritual of Blood. Use a weapon to deliver the killing blow of a monster with a CR 2 higher than yours, then perform a ritual for a hour or so to enchant the item.

You also earn minor extra benefit from the ritual. E.g the Ritual of Blood gives +2 on knowledge checks with thepattype of creature.

You still have to pay the gold and XP to enchant the item, but it does not require the enchanting feat.

However, you get extra benefits from the item if you have the Truebond feat. E.g +4 to damage vs. the type of monster you killed.

Edit: Swordsaged, coz I looked up the detail on the ritual.

Further edit:

Just finding ways to enhance my unarmed attacks. The DM says that since monk unarmed strikes count as manufactured weapons, I can use Ancestral Relic and Item Familiar on it. I have a feat left and was wondering what else I could add.

Oh. In that case consider using a necklace of natural weapons as your item familiar, which enables you to enchant your unarmed strikes with any weapon enchantment.

[unseenmage]

As Bonded Item (DMG2) has already been mentioned, twice, I'll chime in that if your DM agrees with the 'Constructs are Magic Items' rules interpretation you can use the 'combining magic items rules' from Magic Item Compendium to combine magic items with your Constructs. A Dedicated Wright Homunculus familiar is a Construct. Why not combine some basic static magic items with it?

TLDR:
Step 1: have homunculus familiar
Step 2: combine magic items with construct familiar
Step 3: ???*
Step 4: profit
(*Management not responsible for books being thrown at players heads in regards to Step 3.)

More seriously, this is RAW doable but it DOES require DM permission as a rules interpretation (are constructs Magic Items as well as creatures?) is necessary.

[Necroticplague]

More seriously, this is RAW doable but it DOES require DM permission as a rules interpretation (are constructs Magic Items as well as creatures?) is necessary.

Out of curiosity, what text provides any grounds for this interpretation? While some magic items are also constructs (like intelligent magic items), I'm not really seeing any support for the converse being always true.

[unseenmage]

Out of curiosity, what text provides any grounds for this interpretation? While some magic items are also constructs (like intelligent magic items), I'm not really seeing any support for the converse being always true.

The Craft Construct feat is usually the core basis as it is explicitly an Item Creation feat. This is the strongest 'evidence' for the rules interpretation.

Additionally, Intelligent Magic Items are said to be Constructs that just lack physical stats.

And there's an FAQ and/or a Rules of the Game article on the old WotC site that calls out Constructs as being synonymous with Magic Items (and then contradicts itself on the same page so go figure.)


I've had the opportunity to play in a game where infinite wealth and 'Constructs are Magic Items' was allowed. Not surprisingly the worst game breakage that occurs is when Resetting Magic Traps and other normally abusable stuff comes into play. Combining a Construct with a Ring of Feather Fall? No problem. Combining it with a Resetting Magic Trap of True Creation set to create pure gold? Yeah, problematic.

Edit: Additionally, the above rules interpretation isn't necessary in PF as they have an explicit allowance for adding weapons and armors to your construct for a fee.
3.x constructs that have weapons built into them (the Brass Golem's ax, that Caryatid's greatsword etc) have language that includes the price of the weapon in the price of creating the construct even if the weapon is of a special material or magic.

One of my favorite construct builds was a caryatid with the feats mentioned in this thread, Legacy Weapon etc, all applied to her one sword. Felt less scummy than making my homunculus an Ancestral Relic and seemed more thematic that the construct with a built in sword had a GOOD built in sword. :smallsmile:

[atemu1234]

The Craft Construct feat is usually the core basis as it is explicitly an Item Creation feat. This is the strongest 'evidence' for the rules interpretation.

Additionally, Intelligent Magic Items are said to be Constructs that just lack physical stats.

And there's an FAQ and/or a Rules of the Game article on the old WotC site that calls out Constructs as being synonymous with Magic Items (and then contradicts itself on the same page so go figure.)


I've had the opportunity to play in a game where infinite wealth and 'Constructs are Magic Items' was allowed. Not surprisingly the worst game breakage that occurs is when Resetting Magic Traps and other normally abusable stuff comes into play. Combining a Construct with a Ring of Feather Fall? No problem. Combining it with a Resetting Magic Trap of True Creation set to create pure gold? Yeah, problematic.

Interesting... so with the right selection of feats, I could theoretically make Iron Golems that can use Disjunction 1/day, right? I mean, if we follow the pricing guidelines from DMG I.

[unseenmage]

Interesting... so with the right selection of feats, I could theoretically make Iron Golems that can use Disjunction 1/day, right? I mean, if we follow the pricing guidelines from DMG I.

Yeah, but again be sure to check with your DM because this is a rules interpretation.

Also be warned that a lot of folks who answer questions about RAW consider the RAI of this rules interpretation to go the other way. They will tell you that Constructs are creatures and that creatures can never be items despite there being no rule that says so and the fact that a lot of items become creatures and vice versa.

[atemu1234]

Yeah, but again be sure to check with your DM because this is a rules interpretation.

Also be warned that a lot of folks who answer questions about RAW consider the RAI of this rules interpretation to go the other way. They will tell you that Constructs are creatures and that creatures can never be items despite there being no rule that says so and the fact that a lot of items become creatures and vice versa.

See, here's the fun thing - I not only DM, but I've taught most of my players how to play, and they tend to mimic my (extremely open) DMing style, if and when they ever DM.

[Necroticplague]

The Craft Construct feat is usually the core basis as it is explicitly an Item Creation feat. This is the strongest 'evidence' for the rules interpretation.

Additionally, Intelligent Magic Items are said to be Constructs that just lack physical stats.

1.Graft Flesh is also an item creation feat, despite the fact that grafts explicitly are not magic items. Similarly, constructs are explicitly creatures (thorough being given stats as creatures), despite being made with an item creation feat.

2.That shows that there is some overlap in categories of "magic item" and "construct". It definitely does not show that "constructs" is a subset of "magic items", especially considering there are constructs without rules for crafting them (clockwork horrors, off the top of my head).

It looks like, at best, you might have RAI that vaguely points in that direction. And as a point against the RAI, the Rudimentary Intelligence feat exists, whereas if Constructs could be built with extra features as magic items, you could simply use Intelligent Magic Item rules to make them intelligent.

[unseenmage]

1.Graft Flesh is also an item creation feat, despite the fact that grafts explicitly are not magic items. Similarly, constructs are explicitly creatures (thorough being given stats as creatures), despite being made with an item creation feat.

2.That shows that there is some overlap in categories of "magic item" and "construct". It definitely does not show that "constructs" is a subset of "magic items", especially considering there are constructs without rules for crafting them (clockwork horrors, off the top of my head).

It looks like, at best, you might have RAI that vaguely points in that direction. And as a point against the RAI, the Rudimentary Intelligence feat exists, whereas if Constructs could be built with extra features as magic items, you could simply use Intelligent Magic Item rules to make them intelligent.

The bit of supporting evidence is that it is mentioned several times in several sources that Constructs 'are like' Magic Items. This one's harder to find. Me and Tygune (spelling?) hashed this out once in the RAW Q&A a good long while ago and when I finally got around to making myself an extended sig I'd graduated to PF by then and had forgotten where all the back and forth was. We had citations and page numbers and everything and we agreed that it could be RAW which is where i started calling it a rules interpretation.

I do apologize for not having more specific info. It has just been a long time and a lot of new info has overwritten that space in my skull since then.

[Vogie]

A single level in Ancestor Oracle will give you a weapon that appears only when you want use it, then vanishes. If you get to level 3, it becomes masterwork-level. It's not magical, per se, but you don't have to worry about space, sheaths, shrinking enchantments, et cetera

[MaxiDuRaritry]

I suppose since the thread seems to be migrating to other ways to get special items beyond just feats, there's always the soulknife, the soulbow, the soulbound psychic warrior, the pyrokineticist (and its variants), and the psychic weapon master.

[Aleolus]

Given that soulmelds are basically temporary magic items, taking either the Shape Soulmeld feat or a couple levels in any Incarnum class will let you do this. And the class levels will actually let you change what they are day-by-day

[unseenmage]

Craft Contingent Spell may be an Item Creation Feat but one can get almost identical effects from simply casting the Contingency spell.