See, this is why I found this concept silly.
Uber, you don't actually know the rules. Not even a little tiny bit. In this case, what you don't know is that Item Familiar's invested points still count as ranks for you, the only downside is that loss of the familiar makes you lose those points (which is why it's adamantine and a weapon that can be slieght of handed onto the body to keep it safe). The Factotum in question has, for his first 7 levels, 11 skill points per level, and then for the last 3 he has 12 skill points per level, because he's human. Look at the ranks given, and you can see that it's correct. But at always, you just yell and bawl and argue from ignorance.
Though it amuses me to learn what I suspected all along... the reason you couldn't get how Factotums work is you don't know them, you just heard what Frank told you and repeated it as your own. Parroting, again?
Meanwhile, we're getting to see a little Rogue vs Factotum thing on the other forums, and what did we get? A Rogue who was completely illegal and can't even compete. We'll see if he can fix it up to actually being legal.
And what objections do I get here? Whining about using Craft Wonderous Item, despite the fact that not only is it legal, it's an example of a feat you can take if you only have spell like abilities (Complete Arcane, page 72). It's not only RAW, it's actually stated RAI. And as for the exp used? Surely you know that if you ever get lower than your party in exp, you get more, which corrects for it... plus the Item Familiar gives me an extra 10% exp since level 3, which pays for the exp used. And yes, according to the rules of the challenge, Item Familiars are legal. In the end, it all just looks like a bunch of "hey wait, Rogues can't do that and I want to prove Factotums are weaker than Rogues. Not allowed!"
But hey, I do love that you decide for democracy to vote in a clearly biased group. Yeesh.
JaronK