Necromancer Wizard advice

[The Skeptical Gnome]

So, I was looking to build a necromancer wizard, and need some advice. To clarify, when I say necromancer, I mean a wizard who controls undead in combat. I want avoid him just being debuff heavy, without any of the raise dead type spells. Some debuff spells are fine, but I want him to use undead often. That said, I'm namely looking for advice on:

-What feats to take (Assuming I'm taking command undead, since it seems like a given)

-Some good familiar choices (Factoring in both functionality and thematic appropriateness)

-General advice on how I should build my spell list (I plan to prioritize the necromancy school, but I'm going to have to use other types of magic)

-Good deific obedience options (I was considering demonic obediences, but they don't really seem built for PCs, so I decided to count them out)

Advice on other aspects of playing a wizard necromancer are also appreciated. Thanks in advance for any advice provided.

[Metux]

what you want is the Undead Master archetype for wizard :)

You get command undead feat without the need to pick Necromancer as your arcane school, you just can't choose necromancy as opposed school but it uses more charges to be fueled.

Otherwise you go necromancy school and get a free Improved Channel feat with the undead master

[avr]

I assume you'd be taking the necromancy/undead subschool? It gives you command undead as a bonus feat. It's compatible with the spirit binder archetype which would be useful if you want to concentrate on your familiar.

As well as the command undead feat you're going to want the command undead spell. The undead master feat will also be useful.

The next question is whether you're going to be evil. Partly this would depend on your GM's opinion of creating undead of course. This would limit your deific obedience options and improved familiar choices. Urgathoa would be the obvious defiic obedience choice for the +1 CL to necromancy in this case. A water or ooze mephit could drop a stinking cloud spell, which undead are immune to, and be within the one-step alignment rule. You might find a shadow drake to be more thematically appropriate though.

Aside from not making conjuration or transmutation an opposition school (cloud spells which don't affect undead, and haste seem like they'll be useful) you'd need to provide more info on what you plan to do to advise on your spell list. Just taking the necromancy school doesn't prevent you being a blaster, or a god wizard, or anything else.

[Ascalaphus]

• Where are your undead going to come from? Are you making them yourself? Make sure to get OK from your GM about the special skeletons and zombies; without those animation isn't nearly as interesting.

• Do you have a plan for hiding them when you have to go into town? Or a PR strategy if NPC farmers see you trooping around the countryside and alert the local paladins?
  
• Make sure you do as much prep work as possible before the game so that you can run your undead efficiently. Nobody wants to be waiting on you to resolve a dozen bloody skeletons if you don't have their stats handy. Playing a minion-heavy build means you need to do a lot of bookkeeping.
  

Apart from that, don't discount blasting a it, Boneshaker and Boneshatter are beautiful spells.

[.seth]

undead master archetype IS amazing. another good one is dhampir cruoromancer. it gets +1 caster level to necromancy spells per 4 levels and animates 3x caster level instead of x2. undead master lets you keep the item familiar option so you can pick up a necromancer's athame later, but with cruoromancer you'll have to burn feats on skill focus and eldritch heritage arcane to get it back if you want to rock one.

undead master is a must have feat. double the duration on command undead spell and +4 caster levels on animate undead are amazing.

you'll want deific obedience urgathoa for +1 caster level to necromancy from the obedience and +5 temporary hp for undead that pray at the altar. the first boon gives desecrate 2/day which is CRUCIAL for animate dead builds, but at 12th its fairly late. the cruoroomancer gets a watered down version at 10th but you might be better off picking up an early magic item like a void stick.

take spell specialization feat for +2 caster levels to a spell of your choice that updates for free every even level when you learn new spells.

pumping caster level for stronger animate dead spells, and later stronger create undead spells is never a bad plan.

[Shikaku Kyouryuu]

Darkskulls will be your best friends, once you have the money.

[Dastis]

Ju Ju zombies are the best. Bigger undead > little undead as they do more and annoy party members less. Similar to a diabolist you might want to offer your party members an ally or 2 to keep them happy as minion play styles slow things down a lot.

I recommend building a god wizard with the rest of your options that you don't put towards necromancy. You have great debuff potential with necromancy as your school of magic. One of my favorite options is to become an enervation spammer with the rest of your feats. IE Empower spell, quicken spell, spell perfection, weapon focus(ray) and a rod of maximize. Other than that you will want the typical god wizard control spells(glitter dust, dimension door, create pit, grease, etc). Your minions will have a ton of dps so let them handle damage.

Make freinds with a neutral cleric is the easiest way to get desecrate. All the other options come on to late sadly. Leadership if available. RP if not

Bags of holding are great for extra bodies. Also can hold any animated dead that aren't covered in spikes. I personally teach my undead how to play dead. Anyone whos suspicous and stabs them will be reported and hopefully arrested for descration of corpse. A good idea for collecting bodies is to get the cleric robes of a good aligned cleric

Brewer's guide to undeath has a lot of information and is worth looking up

[The Skeptical Gnome]

Ascalaphus wrote:

• Where are your undead going to come from? Are you making them yourself? Make sure to get OK from your GM about the special skeletons and zombies; without those animation isn't nearly as interesting.

• Do you have a plan for hiding them when you have to go into town? Or a PR strategy if NPC farmers see you trooping around the countryside and alert the local paladins?
  
• Make sure you do as much prep work as possible before the game so that you can run your undead efficiently. Nobody wants to be waiting on you to resolve a dozen bloody skeletons if you don't have their stats handy. Playing a minion-heavy build means you need to do a lot of bookkeeping.
  

Apart from that, don't discount blasting a it, Boneshaker and Boneshatter are beautiful spells.

1) I do indeed plan to make them myself, mostly through the use of the lesser animate dead, and then normal animate dead spell. Yes, I do have GM approval to make template undead.

2) I don't have a exact plan yet for concealing them around others, but this character is intended for a long running "A bunch of small adventures with the same characters" type campaign, so we've been told we'll be able to acquire a base of operations where I intend to leave most of my skeletons. I figured if I brough all of them everywhere, it'd bog down combat and travel.
3) I have a chart and everything planned out to keep track of my undead and, like I said, I only intend to bring a few of my undead with me at any given time.

Thanks for suggesting boneshaker and boneshatter. I wasn't aware they existed, and they look quite fun.

[The Skeptical Gnome]

Thanks to everyone who suggested undead master, it looks like a very useful archetype for this type of build. Darkskulls also seem like a very useful magic item for a necromancer, as does a void stick, and as far as deific obediences go, I'm thinking either Orcus or Urgathoa seem like the best options. Working towards mainly control and debuff spells also seems like a good plan, since my undead can deal much of the damage.