Death Master conversion... any ideas?


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In 3.5 I loved the idea of the Death Master class. If you don't know, the death master was an arcane necromancer class from the Dragon Compendium, which is a 3.5 supplement by Paizo themselves which updates old Dragon Magazine classes to 3.5. The death master was everything an Arcane Necromancer should have been. Rebuking, lichdom at 20th level and unlike the Dread Necromancer which was a great class concept with a botched spell list, the Death Master got desecrate and animate dead at lower levels.(unlike the DN who could not animate anything until higher levels, just like a wizard or sorcerer...not to mention the DN had Planar binding spells but no magic circle.)

Anyway, while the Death Master got some nice abilities, I am wondering if it needs anything else(save skill revision) to be pathfinder ready? Since it's a full caster, my original thoughts was just to change the skills, have it's level 0 spells/cantraps be updated to being at-will like the wizards and changing it's rebuking to negative energy channeling, which would increase like a cleric's channeling but at a slower pace(since they get a small number of other special abilities as they level up).

I was also thinking of giving them Command Undead as a bonus feat at first level, but I don't want them to have wizard/oracle style control undead where they can only control undead and that's all. The reason being I want them to be able to bolster undead and do other things relating to undead with their channeling. However, rather then give them full channeling I could always just make it so they are in fact eligible for any channeling feats that deal with undead as well as those that bolster their controlling of undead and their channeling can be used for any undead related channeling feats rather then just command undead. The death master should, ideally, be better then or equal to a cleric at necromancy, something I have always sought in a arcane class but never found until the Death Master, hence why I want them to be able to take other undead related channeling feats besides command undead.

So, do any of you here have any ideas or tips on how to make the Death Master pathfinder worthy?

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