Beget Bogun as an SLA?

[Zombulian]

So I’ve come across something I think may be interesting. Having Animate Dead as an SLA is obviously nice because it makes undead creation cheap, but you still need to have a corpse to make undead.
I noticed today that Beget Bogun doesn’t actually have a target, the effect of the spell is a created bogun. The little mannequin that you craft to turn into the bogun that takes a whole week and you need to cast control plants and blah blah - that thing is actually a component of the spell, which means that for a SLA it is disregarded.
Am I reading this right? Does Beget Bogun as an SLA let you turn the whole process into a standard action?

[Jowgen]

Well pinch ma bum and call me Sheila. I think you're right. At least for the most part.

The Spell has three lines

Beget bogun allows you to infuse living magic into a small mannequin that you have created from vegetable matter.

This is the main bit. This is what the spell does. The result of the spell, as stated in the effects section is "Effect: Tiny construct".

This is the final spell in the process of creating a bogun. See the bogun’s description for further details.

These two lines are only relevant to when you want to use the spell to create a Bogun, as per the Creation rules in the Bogun's description. Yes the spell is the final step in that process, but the spell itself doesn't actually specify that the ritual created bogun body is the sole kind of mannequin it can be used for until:

Material Component: The mannequin from which the bogun is created.

This is the part that normally limits the spell to only be applicable to mannequins created according to the Bogun construction rules, but we ignore that.

So, with the spell as an SLA, we should be able to create Tiny Constructs out of any mannequin created from vegetable matter (usually wood).

Said constructs may or may not be Boguns. If not, this may open up a lot of possibilities; as this spell may allow for the creation of a variety of Tiny constructs that meet the material requirement but don't have a specific construction process listed (though even that part might be circumventabel depending).

[Jowgen]

Upon further deliberation, I have something to add regarding the kinds of contructs you ought to be able to create with a Beget Bogun SLA.

Animated Objects are likely the default. The statblock for Animated Objects has a clause that they can be created by spells other than Animate Objects. So with this as an SLA, any kind of vegetable based thing in a humanoid shape should be animateable.

For any other kind of tiny construct to be created, I'd say that you need to create the body as per the normal materials & craft check DCs, and it's only applicable to constructs that have some kind of vegetable matter in their ingredient list that can reasonably be thought to make up 51% of the final body (as per the normal special materials rules).

So what this spell as an SLA does is allow you to circumvent the normal ritual/feat/spell prerequesites in the creation process of a a) tiny and b) vegetable matter based construct. You build it the same, but you animate it via a different process than normal. Slight bonus, as the fluff text of the spell mentions the words servant/companion, constructs that wouldn't normally listen to you by default might this way, but YMMV.

The list of constructs that can meet the above requirements I have found.

Animated Objects (if made from vegetable matter)
Bogun (obviously)
Furtive Filcher Homunculus (ECS, Ash is part of the ingredient list)
Carrionette (Dragon 339 p48, made from wood)
Mercurial Spider (Dragon 341 p37, has poison as part of the ingredient list, which can be veg-based)
Spark Guardian (CWar, Wood is part of the ingredient list)
Clockwork Mender (MMIV, dubious as they are naturally spawned rather than created, could go either way)

[Zombulian]

Interesting, I hadn’t considered other types of constructs. Are we sure that you need a mannequin at all? Again, that part of the spell is the component, and it’s not a transmutation spell - it’s Conjuration (Creation). The spell does have a range of touch though, so you’re touching something. Maybe you could just touch a bush that you’ve uprooted and boom now it’s an animated object? Shoot maybe you just touch something made out of vegetable matter and a construct grows out of it.

[Jowgen]

The first and only SLA-relevant line of the spell does still describe infusing life into a self-created vegetable matter mannequin.

As the range is touch, that mannequin is what becomes the "Tiny Construct".

Now technically a mannequin is defined as "A life-size full or partial representation of the human body, used for the fitting or displaying of clothes; a dummy", but considering how the Bogun is depicted in CDiv, there's probably quite some leeway on this...

Depending on how much, the Spark Guardian and Clockwork mender might not qualify. As for the Mercurial spider, it's form is inherently malleable, so that ought to be fine.