[Necromancy] Item - Skinmeld Balloon Kit

With a low barrier to entry, the skinmeld is perfect for a beginner necromancer seeking to raise their first undead. With a simple stitch of skin and gas from the kit's canister, even a child can summon a skinmeld - and it's a flying one too for added fun!

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Skinmeld Balloon Kit
Wondrous item, rare (requires attunement by a character that knows at least one necromancy spell)

This kit can also be used as weaver's tools.

Animate Skinmeld. Over the course of 1 minute, you can cast animate dead from this kit, targeting the skin of a dead humanoid instead of corpses or bones. The skin can be in a loose pile or still on a fresh corpse. The target skin becomes a skinmeld (the GM has the statistics) with the following changes:

- The skinmeld has a fly speed of 20 feet.
- The skinmeld is proficient with shortbows and light crossbows, and it can use them to make attacks.

Once cast, you can't cast this spell from the kit again until the next dusk. Only an animate dead spell cast from this kit allows you to reassert control over any skinmelds you created this way. If you end your attunement while you still control any skinmelds, your control over them ends.

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If you are a Rare+ Patron, follow this masterpost link for this item's item card.

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Design Commentary

As far as the effectiveness goes, it's basically a once-per-day cast of a 3rd-level spell, with a couple bonuses. Most rare items allow 1/day casts of 3rd to 4th level spells, so the attunement requirement cost bumps it up slightly, allowing for some power trade-off. Since the kit's spell can't be upcast, characters can't create more than one skinmeld at a time.

The items presented in this kit were drawn from medieval kits. Visually that's a little boring, so I tried to add some creepy bits, like the pieces of skin and the overflowing canister (of helium? idk). Functionally, a necromancer would close the leather flaps and carry it by the leather thread; the loops at the bottom of the kit allow the canister and bellows to dangle.