My DM came up with this to represent the warped (and playable!) offspring of creatures taken as familiars. I've edited it a bit for clarity, but he's in the process of tweaking it, too. I want to see where/how/if it breaks so any trouble can be headed off at the pass, without having the scrap the template altogether. He'll be reading this later, so if you think it's a
really bad idea please try to keep the insults reasonable.
Maganimal"Maganimal" is an inherited template that can be applied to any animal or vermin of one hit die or less that can be chosen as a familiar at first level. A maganimal uses the base creature's statistics and abilities except as listed here.
Size and Type: The creature's type changes to magical beast. Size is unchanged. Do not recalculate Hit Dice, base attack bonus, or saves; the maganimal replaces its racial hit die with its first class level.
Armor Class: Natural armor improves by +2.
Special Qualities: A maganimal gains evasion and the ability to speak with animals of its kind, as the familiar abilities. It also gains spell resistance equal to 5 + 1/2 its hit dice, and the Open Bond and Equipment Deficiency abilities.
Open Bond (Su): A maganimal who spends at least one week in close contact with another intelligent creature can form a special bond with it. While within 20 feet of that creature, the maganimal gains a +1 bonus on all skill and ability checks. While more than 20 feet away but still within sight, these bonuses do not apply. If out of sight, the maganimal instead takes a -1 penalty on all skill and ability checks. This same penalty applies to a maganimal without a bond.
Equipment Deficiency (Ex): Maganimals have a hard time using armor and weapons that humanoids have no trouble with. Armor for a maganimal follows the rules for barding. Maganimals do not automatically gain proficiency with weapons from any class, and take an additional -4 penalty to attack rolls when using them because they lack opposable thumbs. Maganimals with no normal limbs, such as snakes, instead take a -8 penalty. The same penalty also applies to Disable Device, Open Lock, and Sleight of Hand checks. Maganimals with hands or hand-like forelimbs (rats, raccoons, monkeys, etc), as well as maganimals using magically-supplied hands (Gloves of Man, Arms of the Naga, etc) do not suffer this penalty to either attack rolls or skill checks.
Abilities: Racial intelligence norm changes to 10 (ability modifier +0), otherwise, as base creature.
Skills: Maganimals have a +4 racial bonus on Sense Motive checks, as they retain some of the empathic qualities of their familiar ancestors. Otherwise, as base creature.
Feats: Maganimals gain Surrogate Spellcasting as a bonus feat.
Automatic Languages: Common. Bonus Languages: None. A maganimal can also speak with familiars as if they shared a common language.
Favored Class: Wizard.
Level Adjustment: +0
