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Pathfinder Unchained / Background Skills

Monsters and NPCs

Source Pathfinder Unchained pg. 48
Typically, monsters don’t gain access to the background skills system from their racial Hit Dice. The Game Master might decide that certain types of monsters might have extensive lives as workers and crafters (such as storm giants, for example) and therefore gain background skills, but this is optional.

NPCs gain background skills in the same fashion PCs do, but only for PC classes they possess. This also applies to monsters with levels in PC classes. NPCs don’t have to spend their background skill ranks, and these skills rarely affect combat. Characters with only NPC classes—especially aristocrats, commoners, and experts—often spend their adventuring skill ranks on background skills.

Archives of Nethys

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Monsters and NPCs