How does the Chameleon's Arcane/Divine focus interact with magic item crafting?

Question

I'm doing more theory crafting / deep dive into the Chameleon prestige class and I could use some help clarifying how the Chameleon interacts with item creation feats.

It is well established that a Chameleon must acquire item creation feats using caster levels or alternate methods that do not rely on the Chameleon's arcane / divine focus feat.

However, can the Chameleon use the caster level from those focuses (Caster level 2x Chameleon level) in order to meet the prerequisites to craft a specific magic item, or are they entirely reliant on the caster level / features acquires from outside the class?

For example - to craft an Iron Golem it is required that the caster MUST be 16th level in addition to the required spells to put one together.

Can the player use 8 levels of Chameleon to meet this prerequisite rather than rely on the usual 1-5 caster levels most Chameleons shoehorn into the build to meet item caster requirements?

Answer 1

So the key question here is, when Races of Destiny says

You can’t use any abilities gained from your aptitude focus […] to qualify for a feat, prestige class, or other options

^{(Races of Destiny, pg. 112)}

does “other options” include the crafting of magic items?

The “Yes” argument is “Yes, because magic items have prerequisites that you have to meet to craft them, and ‘other options’ is deliberately a wide-open specifier that covers everything.” If this is the answer, then you cannot craft items with aptitude focus.

The “No” argument is “No, because nothing in the item creation rules says you need to ‘qualify’ for them, and anyway crafting a magic item is very different from the things explicitly listed—those are game options chosen by the player at a meta level, while crafting is an in-character activity.” If this is the answer, then you can craft items with aptitude focus.

Unfortunately, those are both reasonable answers, and the information we have available is insufficient to objectively determine which of them is the correct one. So you’ll have to talk with your DM, or make a judgment call if you are the DM.

Personally, I houserule that entire clause out of the chameleon class entirely, and let them qualify for whatever they want with these features, accepting that they might “suffer the normal drawbacks for no longer meeting a prerequisite or requitement” if they swap something out that they depended on.