Soul Eaters Energy Drain

[Brett Wong]

Can someone explain to me in how this ability works? is it a standard action touch attack usable at will? Does it kick in every time I hit something with my Natural Attack? Is it neither?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

For those who don't know, it's a prestige class in BoVD.

Energy Drain (Su): A soul eater gains the ability to drain energy, bestowing negative levels upon its victims. Beginning at 1st level, the touch of a soul eater bestows one negative level on its target. At 7th level, the soul eater bestows two negative levels with a touch.

The ability is way too vague, how it is used is entirely up to your DM. In 3.5, most similar abilities can only be used once/round, regardless of how many times you touch your opponent. As-written there is no such limit on this ability, but it also doesn't say anything about the ability automatically occurring every time you touch an opponent. It could be ruled that every touch/natural attack you make bestows the negative levels, making it extremely powerful. It could be ruled that it only happens on the first touch/natural attack you make in a round, to make it balanced compared with similar abilities. It could be ruled that you must spend a standard action to activate it as normal with supernatural special attacks, and you get to attempt a touch attack as part of the activation similar to touch spells, which would make it weaker than similar abilities but still powerful on its own. Most people assume that the negative levels automatically occur every time you touch an opponent, making Soul Eaters with multiple natural attacks very dangerous opponents, or very powerful characters.

[Collin152]

Every time you're touched?
Wouldn't that mean that it works on enemies using natural attacks against you, too?

[jcsw]

Every time you're touched?

The honesty's too much.

[Xallace]

Somewhere I got it in my head that the ability activated every time you struck with a natural weapon. It may have had to do with the fact that you need a natural weapon to qualify for the class, but the quote provided by Biffoniacus_Furiou says nothing about that.

Huh. Well that's how I use it anyway, but now I'm not sure what it's supposed to be.

[Collin152]

The honesty's too much.

That's "Sometimes when we touch". I believe "Everytime we touch" is completley differant.

[RTGoodman]

It takes a Standard Action to use your Energy Drain attack. As per the SRD, using a Supernatural Ability (like the Energy Drain) "is a standard action unless noted otherwise."