Do artificers have a caster level?

[Trekkin]

Specifically, can artificers cast Animate Dead from a scroll and retain control over the animated undead, given that it's based on caster level and artificers only have an effective caster level and a caster level for the purposes of infusions?

[Drynwyn]

That's a tough one. If I was DM for this, I would say their caster level for that would be half their artificer level. Maybe a quarter.

[hydraa]

I think Caster level is use magic device check -20

[lesser_minion]

Scrolls have their own caster level which is used for determining the effect -- so in this case, the number of undead animated would depend on the scroll.

The rules do distinguish between 'personal' CL and 'per-spell' CL, so you'd be justified in ruling that the resulting undead aren't under the control of the caster.

Personally, I think the correct ruling would be to place all of the undead under the control of the caster, however -- to get the scroll to work, you have to have an effective CL from UMD that's at least as high as the scroll's CL.

You can count left over undead from a previous casting against the control limit for a later casting, and I'd consider either leaving it at that or imposing a hard cap (e.g. you can't have a higher CL than your number of hit dice for the purposes of controlling undead).

[Trekkin]

I think Caster level is use magic device check -20

That is correct as a rearrangement of the emulation expression. However, this expression functions solely in regard to faking spells for making magic items; I was wondering if anywhere it is listed that the artificer has a genuine caster level.

[sonofzeal]

Artificer Infusions are neither Arcane nor Divine, but seem to count as spells. This would give Artificers a "Caster Level" equal to their level, but only for those schoolless spells. If an Artificer crafted the scroll, it should work as for a Wizard of his level. But if a Wizard or Cleric crafted the scroll, the Artificer would have to UMD it.

[Trekkin]

Right; for its infusions and only its infusions it has a caster level. However, it is specifically stated that they aren't spellcasters--so how does that interact with abilities like the undead control cap (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/animatedead.htm) that work off of caster level?

Everywhere that they're given a caster level that i can find, it's for a specific purpose; I was wondering if, by RAW, they actually have one.

[Bayar]

Right; for its infusions and only its infusions it has a caster level. However, it is specifically stated that they aren't spellcasters--so how does that interact with abilities like the undead control cap (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/animatedead.htm) that work off of caster level?

Everywhere that they're given a caster level that i can find, it's for a specific purpose; I was wondering if, by RAW, they actually have one.

Their caster level for making magic items is their artificer level + 2. The items actual caster level is equal to their artificer level.

[Aquillion]

I'm not sure what the confusion is here. When anyone uses a scroll, you use the scroll's CL for everything in the spell's description that mentions a CL. In this case that would include the control limits.

What if someone uses multiple Animate Dead spells with different CLs? (This is unlikely to actually happen -- remember that it defaults to the lowest CL possible while still knowing the spell.) If this does happen, just track the CL used for each animation separately.

When the total number of controlled undead (across all castings) exceeds the limit used for a specific undead, that undead goes uncontrolled, or at least a number of undead that fit that criteria go uncontrolled until you're back under the limit.

Example: I use a few scrolls of CL 5 and CL 7 to create some undead. This could happen if I purchased both Wizard and Cleric-made scrolls of that spell, since they get it at different levels.

When I have more than 10 HD of undead total, some (or all) of the undead I created with CL 5 scrolls start to go uncontrolled, until I'm either out of CL 5 undead or I'm back at 10 controlled HD or less. If I go above 14 HD of undead, the CL 7 undead might start to slip my control, too (but not before.) Does that make sense?

Technically, this is true even if a Wizard or Cleric used a scroll of Animate Dead.

[Trekkin]

I'm not sure what the confusion is here. When anyone uses a scroll, you use the scroll's CL for everything in the spell's description that mentions a CL. In this case that would include the control limits.

What if someone uses multiple Animate Dead spells with different CLs? (This is unlikely to actually happen -- remember that it defaults to the lowest CL possible while still knowing the spell.) If this does happen, just track the CL used for each animation separately.

When the total number of controlled undead (across all castings) exceeds the limit used for a specific undead, that undead goes uncontrolled, or at least a number of undead that fit that criteria go uncontrolled until you're back under the limit.

Example: I use a few scrolls of CL 5 and CL 7 to create some undead. This could happen if I purchased both Wizard and Cleric-made scrolls of that spell, since they get it at different levels.

When I have more than 10 HD of undead total, some (or all) of the undead I created with CL 5 scrolls start to go uncontrolled, until I'm either out of CL 5 undead or I'm back at 10 controlled HD or less. If I go above 14 HD of undead, the CL 7 undead might start to slip my control, too (but not before.) Does that make sense?

Technically, this is true even if a Wizard or Cleric used a scroll of Animate Dead.

Thank you! For some reason the wording of Animate Dead made it sound like it was a different effect.