Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Dravda 11-01-07, 01:00 AM	I've had a great idea for a character, who will be a dread necromancer. Before I roll the necromancer up, however, I just want to get everyone's opinion on this: is the class unbalanced? Has anyone played it and found it overpowered/underpowered/just right? I'm wondering because they have offensive necromancy (pretty cool stuff) that they cast like a sorcerer, know like a cleric, they get a d6, cool class features, light armor proficiency, and a single martial weapon proficiency. They're pretty elite, so what do you guys think? Should I go for it, or just not bother for the sake of my fellow players and my DM? -Count Dravda
Kryptonite27 11-01-07, 01:30 AM	As a DM, I've had one of these in my campaign before. The only thing about it that I didn't like was that the party would set up a bevy of defenses, let undead do all the work, then bring damaged ones back for a few rounds of charnel touch. But as long as you have a decent DM, he'll keep the pressure on (like I did). That said, I wouldn't call it overpowered.
Count Arioch the 28th 11-01-07, 02:07 AM	I'd say that it's weak for what it does, and a cleric makes for a better necromancer than the dread necromancer.
NordicBirch 11-01-07, 06:36 AM	http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=599129 It'll explain the basics of different classroutes to necromancy and give lots of effective advise. Think a bit before applying all ideas as some might not please your DM even if the guide thinks them great. All in all, I think you'll do fine if you optimise a bit (Dread necro is a bit weak) and avoid undead armies and various cheese tricks. Think about keeping one or two strong undead as guards but no more, unless your DM decides that undead hordes are fun for the PC's to have.
Axiomatic_vampire 11-01-07, 07:32 AM	Thing about Dread Necro is that what it does best, being hordes of skeletons, is an annoying way to play. If you cart around your undead in a bag of holding or whatever, set them up, and then let them tank for you...well....it's a lot of time rolling all your minions, and not much spotlight for the other people. Make sure your party doesn't mind that kind of game, make sure your DM doesn't mind. If that's not going to be your style, the dread necro doesn't offer as much as a cleric or wizard.
NordicBirch 11-01-07, 07:43 AM	Thing about Dread Necro is that what it does best, being hordes of skeletons, is an annoying way to play. If you cart around your undead in a bag of holding or whatever, set them up, and then let them tank for you...well....it's a lot of time rolling all your minions, and not much spotlight for the other people. Make sure your party doesn't mind that kind of game, make sure your DM doesn't mind. If that's not going to be your style, the dread necro doesn't offer as much as a cleric or wizard. Even with minimal undead usage (which, I agree, is DN's main strength) the class gives you easy to use necrocasting from divine and arcane spells and ready made flavor. Depends on what you're looking for, DN isn't the optimised choice for much of anything besides hordes of undead but it can be fun and easy for all kinds of necromancer hopes.
Axiomatic_vampire 11-01-07, 11:04 AM	I was leaving out the free lich part, if it's going to be a high level campaign. That alone is pretty cool.
Doodle 11-01-07, 01:22 PM	The only overpowering bit about the DN is his familiar - in an "average" party, having an imp as your familiar can really steal the show. Me.
RobbyPants 11-01-07, 01:40 PM	Two things: First of all, look at the Dread Necromancer Handbook (http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=759515), which has a lot of info pertaining to the class. Second, take Tomb Tainted Soul (Libris Mortis). It allows you unlimited healing outside of battle. Not taking this feat at 1st level is unnacceptable.
Axiomatic_vampire 11-01-07, 02:52 PM	Or, alternately, having free unlimited out of battle healing at level 1 is unacceptable. DM call.
RobbyPants 11-01-07, 03:03 PM	Or, alternately, having free unlimited out of battle healing at level 1 is unacceptable. DM call. Assuming your DM doesn't bar it, then there's no reason not to. Saying that the DM might bar something because it's good can apply to anything. I've seen threads where DMs ban monks because they think they're overpowered. Point being, if it's game, then do it.
SokenzanMarauder 11-01-07, 03:51 PM	I'd say that it's weak for what it does, and a cleric makes for a better necromancer than the dread necromancer.I agree. I asked my DM about allowing me to cast all arcane Necromancy spells and I was lucky enough to get a 'yes' out of him. While it did make me a bit more powerful, I was still outshone by the party Wizard and Swordsage quite often (I was the fifth character but I still enjoyed the game).
Axiomatic_vampire 11-01-07, 04:39 PM	Assuming your DM doesn't bar it, then there's no reason not to. Saying that the DM might bar something because it's good can apply to anything. I've seen threads where DMs ban monks because they think they're overpowered. Point being, if it's game, then do it. That's the kind of attitude that makes for natural spell abusing, persistent metamagic tweaking, planar binding goofery. Some people go out of their way to avoid shenanigans like that (this is a tame one by comparison, not denying that). The "make my DM cry" attitude doesn't always make for a fun game.
RobbyPants 11-01-07, 05:50 PM	That's the kind of attitude that makes for natural spell abusing, persistent metamagic tweaking, planar binding goofery. Some people go out of their way to avoid shenanigans like that (this is a tame one by comparison, not denying that). The "make my DM cry" attitude doesn't always make for a fun game. First of all, how is being at full HP every fight that abusing? It's not like you're immune to damage. You can still die in a fight, and with d6 hit dice, it's not that unlikely. Secondly, it doesn't come anywhere close to some of the other stuff you mentioned.
Axiomatic_vampire 11-01-07, 06:29 PM	It's in the ballpark of allowing infinite orisons for clerics, which pretty much everyone agrees is a bad idea, specifically because of cure minor wounds. 3.5 is largely a game of resource management. Free healing screws that up. And nope, like I said (and you pointed out), it's not the same league as massive gamebusters. It's just the same sport. Not everybody wants to minmax, and not everybody goes by the "if the rules allow it, do it" mentality. It's one of those in the gray area that's worth thinking about.
Cifer 11-01-07, 07:36 PM	It's in the ballpark of allowing infinite orisons for clerics, which pretty much everyone agrees is a bad idea, specifically because of cure minor wounds. 3.5 is largely a game of resource management. Free healing screws that up. The major difference is that while a cleric with unlimited orisons could heal everyone in the party, a dread necro can only heal himself (unless everyone goes for TTS). He's also squishy enough that he usually doesn't want to stand at the front line even with full HP. Further, healing hitpoints between combats is really easy, especially at higher levels - wands of Lesser Vigor or Cure Light Wounds take care of that...
Bopple 11-01-07, 08:32 PM	It's pretty decent, though it's not on par with wizard or cleric. Certainly not overpowered. The thing is, it consumes so much time that it slows down the whole game and annoys dm.
-Winter- 11-02-07, 12:16 AM	Not all Dread Necro's are undead launching platforms and nothing else. You can just go for a save or die dread necromancer, pump those save DC's (star elf is good for this, bonus charisma!) to the max, you're vast array of necro spells makes even spell focus a good choice, and shadow weave magic is even better or even a Melee dread necromancer (strongheart halfing is good for this, small and a bonus feat!), all those lovely touch attacks... As far as survivability in combat you should be somewhere between a bard and cleric, so you're not a very squishy caster. After all, light armour, nice DR, unlimited out of combat healing, good in combat healing (inflicts all the way up to harm) masses of temp hp (false life, vampiric touch et al.) add tho that the fact you can savagely crush your oponents combat skills before clashing with them (ray of enfeeblement, ray of exhaustion all the way up to waves of fatigue.) and you shouldn't be too scared of melee. don't let your party know that, "I'm a squishy arcanist" gets you looked after. When summoning or having animated dead, make sure you have all the stats handy before the game and you are fast when running them. ask your DM if he doesn't mind if you pre-roll your minions attacks before your turn comes around. The same cautions to summoning apply to any summoning focused character, don't slow the game down. Even asking if you can take average damage (rounding down of course) is worth it. Running summons well is good practice for when you DM one day. If its slowing the game down much your doing something wrong. My vote for familiar goes to Ghostly visage if you have access to fiend folio. Immunity to mind effecting stuff (this is the entire enchantment school and a good proportion of illusion) is just too awesome. plus a brutal paralysis gaze and a familiar tat can go through walls is nice choose your advanced learning wisely, some choices are quite good. like chill of the grave, shivering touch, heart ripper, delay death, clone. Compared to other classes, a dread necro is on par with the other full casters for raw power. And fairly resilient for an arcanist. but severely lacking in versatility (even compared to a sorcerer) Maxing out use magic device can help get rid of versatility issues. But so very much fun to play. Bone-crushingly powerful necromancy for the win! ...and run from golems. Just Run
Cifer 11-02-07, 10:24 PM	...and run from golems. Just Run Why run when you can leisurely walk away while the golem is busy tearing through your speedbumps aka zombies?
Count Arioch the 28th 11-02-07, 10:57 PM	Or invest in some ranks in hide and move silently and just avoid the golems, they don't have any skill points, therefore no ranks in listen and spot.
Aryxbez 11-02-07, 11:00 PM	Good to hear that the Dread Necro is pretty good, now when I'm defending him, he won't always need me to defend him, if ever need be. Also as far as Infinite healing goes, you have essential of that up to 1/2 for clerics. As the feat Healing touch? from Complete Champion allows that as long as you're packing a healing spell.
Count Arioch the 28th 11-02-07, 11:23 PM	Infinite healing is irrelevant anyway, it's called "Having everyone in the party buy a wand of Cure Light Wounds and giving it to the cleric". Every party has full HP at the beginning of every encounter.
stone_thecrows 11-03-07, 07:17 AM	The healing ability isn't really an issue for me as the DM can attack the party after only a short number of rounds, before the Dread Nec can heal up to full health. Exactly the same way as can be done before the Cleric Vigors all the PC's. Then you have fast healing possibilities from Template etc. What's the big deal? Dread Necro's are balanced and fun to play. Sure, not as strong as Wiz, Cleric or Druid but that goes for every other class!!
runestar 11-03-07, 07:44 AM	What niche is the dread necro supposed to fill? For example, I surmise that the warmage is an archer, while the beguiler is a rogue/party face type of role. But I can't seem to decide on a single established role that seems to suit the dread necro. Thus, I have nothing to compare it with, much less make a meaningful comparison. Anyone have any ideas?:confused:
Dravda 11-03-07, 11:06 PM	What niche is the dread necro supposed to fill? For example, I surmise that the warmage is an archer, while the beguiler is a rogue/party face type of role. But I can't seem to decide on a single established role that seems to suit the dread necro. Thus, I have nothing to compare it with, much less make a meaningful comparison. Anyone have any ideas?:confused: From looking at it, I have an idea of its role: "Warlord" type with lots of troops, and vicious killer. I made a necromancer lich before (he was a lot of fun to play) and his driving theory was basically, "Necromancy is just as devastating as Evocation, only subtler. If I permanently blind an opponent, I might as well have just fireballed him into oblivion." It worked pretty well. He was a party favorite. -Count Dravda
-Winter- 11-03-07, 11:34 PM	What niche is the dread necro supposed to fill? 'niche' hey... Although I'm of the opinion that requiring everyone to fill a designated role isn't as fun as everyone making what they'd really like and the party working with their strengths and weaknesses (like the no divine caster party, good times :D) I'll have a crack at some dread necro classification... At low levels: Same as a bard, except in reverse. Make everyone you fight suck at it. And a bit of ranged (or mellee) support from touch attacks with spectral hand. And we have a couple of save or lose spells (blindness deafness is awesome) When spells run dry we can mix it up like no full arcane caster can. (thats right warmage! *you* don't get an at will touch attack and DR do ya, you MAD person you. :P) At mid levels: Add in Tanking Via summons/animated dead, and we start to get a lil' bit of battlefield control creeping in. The Familiar at this stage is an added bonus as we get one lovely scout that can fly, and has added abilities which may include: incorporeality, paralysis gaze, poision, alternate form, invisiblily and more! individual results may vary At high levels: Making things die, Kill spells at range and melee. As well as the start of some nice area spells. You are now more then worthy to pick up the title of 'party mage.' Spontaneous dispels, summons, de-buffs, battlefield control, direct damage and kill spells. And while we're here we'll call some nice outsiders to upgrade our Zombies. Also we can play vampire and send people crying all the way back to level one with actually real negative levels. It takes a well prepared Wizo or Cleric to make you look weak. (and Druids are just smelly selfish animals that can turn into humanoids so they don't count one bit ;)) And spontaneous casting - Magic Jar. I cannot stress how much i love this spell. And at Very High Levels: We get some deadly top end spells, but sadly are a bit out-gunned by other top end casters. Thats ok, We'll be a lich soon (if we want and havn't PrC'd out) We're still 'party mage' (with an army of undead) but our job has become harder compared to the other full casting classes. And the quality of our undead is falling behind also. Not that every other class isn't struggling to keep up at this stage either. Aside from all that, PrC, skill and feat choices can drastically shape the role you play in a party, thats the beauty of dnd, you can take almost any class and customize it to do almost whatever you like. Your Hot charisma makes you a candidate for party face, show that Int based beguiler what you're made of. (and leadership rocks) It would not be too difficult to make a more scout focused Dread Necro. And I'm convinced that a Melee Dread Necro could go bezerk. While i like the save-or-die dread necro's personally, I kinda like the thought of a Rogue/Dreadnecro/Arcane trickster type. slay living sneak attack :D And by Vecna's black bones get some UMD ranks.
Count Arioch the 28th 11-03-07, 11:52 PM	Here's a good summation of the Dread NEcromancer. Dread Necromancer First Level: This is where you have to make the big decisions in build priorities. You have to choose your skills. One of these skills is going to be Intimidate (more on that later), and if you ever want a prestige class you'll have to start working on it now (You could do worse than working towards Divine Oracle by taking Knowledge: Religion, Wild Mage by taking Spellcraft, or Mind Bender by taking social skills). Otherwise you can get pretty much anything you want. Unless you're human or a human with glowing blue eyes, you're only going to have one feat. That feat is going to be Tomb Tainted Soul, because not having that feat is unacceptable. Finally, you get to choose a martial weapon - and in all deference to the really hot Asian necromancer picture, that weapon is under no circumstances going to be an axe. You are going to have proficiency with the composite longbow. Combat at first level for a Dread Necromancer is nasty and brutish, much like it is for a Rogue. You'll try to keep things at range as much as possible because you're soft and squishy. When it does come to melee, you're going to dish out big damage. Your Charnel Touch is a touch attack, so it is substantially more likely to land than a sword attack from a ranger of your level (they have +1 BAB on you, but how many creatures have less than a point of armor and natural armor?), and depending on your DM's reading of the ability - may do more damage. The key is whether Charnel Touch is an attack action or a standard action, it is heavily implied to be an attack action but this is unclear in the text. You can combine a Charnel Touch with a touch spell such as Chill Touch (making you do as much damage in melee as a Rogue's Sneak Attack with a longsword), but your DM may rule that you have to spend a round "powering up," so ask before you get into combat. You're still running in there with the crappy light armor you can afford (studded leather), and 6 + Con HP, so even your high damage output shouldn't trick you into getting into melee much. Of course, any combat you survive causes you no damage, as you'll just Charnel Touch yourself back to full life during even a minute of down time. Touching yourself is a standard action, after all. Level 2: There are no choices to make at all once you hit level 2. All of your skills advance, and you don't have any feats or proficiencies to select. But combat is a whole new world for you, as you now have DR 2/ Bludgeoning and Magic. By this point you've probably gotten your hands on a masterwork chain shirt, and you're what passes for a decently resilient melee combatant. Your rebuking is now powerful enough to command basic skeletons, and your BAB is still only a point behind the fighters. So you still dish out the pain like a Rogue, but now you're survivable - so run in there and start slapping people. Level 3: There is a very large choice at this level: your new feat. The obvious choice is to just take Arcane Disciple every feat from now until you've exhausted all the domains of your favorite god. I won't fault you for doing that, but you can also get some good effect out of Weapon Finesse (as it modifies touch attacks), and if you're thinking long term you might want to go for Mounted Combat as you will eventually be able to pull some tricks with undead warbeasts that are alarming. Combat is pretty similar at 3rd level to 2nd, but the monsters are tougher. You won't have gotten noticeably better at melee (unless you took Weapon Finesse), but you now have the ability to pull a combat muligan - you are within 5 feet of yourself by definition, so if melee is turning against you a burst of negative energy will heal you and hurt them - that's all good. Level 4: Level 4 is where you start being a halfway decent caster, and your big character choice reflects that. You can dumpster dive throughout the whole of D&D and find any Necromancy spell off the Cleric or Wizard list from any book. Good choices include Lesser Shivering Touch (which can again be combined with Charnel Touch) from Frost Burn, and Faerun has a number of nice offerings such as Stone Bones, Spirit Worm, Death Armor, and Shroud of Undeath can all be pretty useful. The Spell Compendium is a good place to go shopping, but this is a very personal choice. We're not even going to pretend that your "Mental Bastion" makes a difference, so combat is going to be livened up by your increased BAB and your second level spells. False Life is key, remember that your DR is applied before you lose temporary hit points, so you're pretty much the tank at this point. Special Note: Once you attain 4th level, you will continue to accrue new spells known every 4 levels even if you take a +1 caster level PrC. Gaining new levels for the purpose of learning new spells is awesome for a Dread Necromancer. Level 5: There are no choices at 5th level, but this is where your intimidate finally pays off. A character with max ranks of Intimidate usually succeeds at intimidating things, and anything that gets into melee with you has to make a Will save or become Shaken (as written, you can jolly well just use the fear aura again and again, stacking up fear effects until your opponent becomes panicked or makes a Will Save, but we'll assume for the moment that your DM will limit you to one booga-booga a round), and if it works you can spend your action intimidating them, which stacks their Fear up to Frightened, so they lose their action running out of melee while you slap them in the back of the head. It's quite an effective "juggle" to use fighting game lingo. Level 6: This is a level where you get a feat, and that means that you have a lot of choices again. You could get Leadership, or Skill Focus: Knowledge Religion, or Death Blow (see below), or anything else you need to get into a PrC at level 9. Combat doesn't change for you much from your new "ability". Scabrous Touch is pretty much crap, so it's not important that you have it (though you can combine it with your basic attack so it doesn't cost you anything). You can't use it to generate any of the good diseases like Ghoul Fever or Festering Hate unless you have a very generous DM. You're gonna throw in Blinding Sickness unless you want to try to kill an animal with Mindfire, but don't get your hopes up. Once again, your life revolves around the spells you just got. With Vampiric Touch and Death Ward, your tanking expertise is way up there. Special Note: You can cast spells while using a Mithril Breastplate, so by now you should own one and wear it all the time. Level 7: You have only one choice at this level: your familiar. There are two good choices: Quasit and Ghostly Visage. The Ghostly Visage is the combat choice, because it makes you immune to mind affecting effects and uses your level as its Hit Dice to generate a save DC for a gaze attack that paralyzes your enemies. Quasit is the less-combat choice because it gives you Commune, unlimited Detect Magic, and can still hand out quite sizeable amounts of Dex damage and its 1/day fear stacks with your fear aura. Combat has changed for you utterly. Your DR has become bigger and you have a familiar that accentuates your combat strategy greatly (either making enemies helpless as the Ghostly Visage is wont to do, or by adding Dex damage to the pile as the Quasit can). Level 8: Once again, you are stuck with choices. You select a new spell to go with your shiny 4th level spells. Shivering Touch is a dragon killer - 3d6 Dex damage will drop many enemies. But you're also going to probably want to de-emphasize your melee role now that you can make high quality flying mounts. Undead Mastery is high quality, because it makes your Control Undead ginormous. You also get a second Negative Energy Burst each day, but this is more for emergency healing than it is for harming enemies. Level 9: You now prestige class out, because there are no more good Dread Necromancer abilities for a long time.
KillerVole 11-04-07, 12:48 AM	I found this class unbalancing to one of my campaigns, but I suspect it had to do with optimization levels. It was a two person party, and the other guy was a soulknife... I've never seen it used since. I generally don't allow it, but that's mostly due to flavor concerns.
Wind of Darkness 11-04-07, 05:47 PM	I found this class unbalancing to one of my campaigns, but I suspect it had to do with optimization levels. It was a two person party, and the other guy was a soulknife... I've never seen it used since. I generally don't allow it, but that's mostly due to flavor concerns. Yeah, well, just about everything will outshine a Soulknife, and the Dread Necro is a spellcaster, after all. Pity, too, I like the Soulknife's flavor. -Winter- brought up my biggest concern over the Dread Necromancer. Specifically, that having an undead army can slow things down. My second concern is group dynamics. Especially if you plan on carting around a bunch of undead minions, you might run into IC conflict with the other PCs. As long as you handle those issues properly, though, it's a decent class.