I face myself with the dubious task of making a non-level-adjusted Construct race. I don't want to reskin a Warforged, and I want this race to have the benefits and drawbacks of the creature type.

Background: The world has a race of technology-hating magical beings that do not really care for any sort of crafted tool or object. They have an array of spell-like abilities such as Warp Wood and Rusting Grasp with which to ruin the property of NPCs and the gear of PCs and should be avoided.

The elders have their own version of Animate Objects. When they animate an object, it more-or-less helps them out for the duration of the spell, however, the object remains permanently animated. It retains an animal intelligence and takes a True Neutral alignment and moves off into the wild to emulate some animal that it vaguely resembles. As they don't have needs of food or shelter to survive, they're usually pretty harmless unless they are provoked or are, for some reason, emulating something aggressive.

In rare cases, the object might come away from this with a human-level intelligence. These start out as True Neutral and generally attempt to integrate into the nearest society they can find. If found out, they are usually chased out by the local meat-people, so they need to collect enough bits to fill out a whole shape. Masks are helpful, and animated suits of full plate are highly successful at 'blending in'. They are, largely, as harmless as their animalistic counterparts.

This is to be the construct race I desire. They'd have no Constitution score and would not be affected by Heal spells, but could be healed with Mend spells. They cannot be resurrected, but I'd like to toss in that if a powerful repair spell were cast upon their remains within a day or so of their demise, they would be restored. It's a lot, but I would also want to squeeze in some self-healing, so they will repair over time if left unmolested.

They cannot wear armor but can wear magic items, and can be enchanted in ways appropriate to what they are made of.

They are one race as a basic idea but there are three distinct types:

1) Suit of clothes. This is just regular clothing, generally complete with gloves, a hood, and a mask, or some other means of passing for a whole person. These would not possess any Armor bonus and not much in the way of racial abilities. I would like them to have a Charisma bonus, but I am not sure what else. The only useful feature I see from them is the ability to flatten out and slip through any space their component clothing could be stuffed or slid through. They may also be good at movement, since they're hollow and weigh next to nothing. Their benefit over the others is that they are not treated as wearing armor.

2) Suit of gear. This could be any specialized clothing. It could be a leathery thief outfit with lots of pockets and tools, it could be a full set of cleric robes, it could be a guard uniform with some built-in armor. They are treated as wearing Medium armor and have an Armor bonus, check penalties, spell failure, etc. They should have some player-chosen skill bonus based on what they actually are, and possibly be treated as having some built in tools-of-the-trade. A Dexterity bonus seems to make sense for them.

3) Suit of armor. This is a suit of full plate and the individual gains all the benefits and penalties of said item. In terms of special tricks, I don't think they'd have any - beyond possibly being able to safely store things within their rigid, hollow bodies. A Constitution bonus would work best for them, but they don't have that. Strength seems over-powered. Maybe some extra hit points instead?


I'd love some suggestions on how to stat these out as a non-level-adjusted race. I know it's a tall order, because Construct traits are powerful, but there is plenty of room for some drawbacks to even that out.