Hello! Looking for a bit of guidance from the gurus here on the forum about how to make an idea of mine come together.
One of the things that drew me to Pathfinder was the sheer volume of cool and powerful necromancy spells, ones that aren't restricted to just NPCs and monsters. It's fun to make characters that use dark and dangerous powers instead of rainbow beams of goodness and friendship. My favorite part about it is all the interesting and powerful ways to debilitate opponents with ability score damage and similar effects, so I'm wondering what advice you all can enlighten me with to help me construct a necromancer wizard that focuses on such spells.
Right now I have only a few things set in stone for a build idea, based on what I think is fun.
-I definitely want to take Planar Infusion at level 1 and set it to the Negative Plane so I count as undead for the sake of positive and negative energy. I once got jumped by a bunch of shadows and because their touch specifically states its a negative energy effect, this single-handedly saved my life.
-Deathwine is something I really want to work into the build for fun's sake
-I know Weapon Focus in rays is an obvious choice, as is Spell Focus, but I'm unaware of any other interesting feats or items that might help.
-THE ALLMIGHTY ENERVATION is probably going to be something I take Signature Spell for at level 15, and the end goal is to be able to spam this spell until everything drops dead.
-I have a fun plan involving Shadow Projection and an Amulet of Grasping Souls, leaving my body in a demiplane with my familiar while my shadow goes out and adventures with the party, using the amulet to wear my clothes so that, with a party member's help, I can disguise as a normal human. Incorporeal and immune to nonmagical damage? Check. Undead and immune to all mind-affecting effects? Check. Half damage from all energy types? Check. Fat channel resistance? Check. Basically unkillable and if someone manages to destroy my shadow and set me to -1 hitpoints, my familiar is right there ready to pour a bottle of deathwine down my throat so I can teleport in and blast the idiot who thought they could actually kill me.
This is pretty much all I have in mind at the moment. If anyone who knows a lot more about spellcasting could fill me in on the nuances of ray casters and how to make a debuff-focused necromancer work, I'm all ears! Assume that I don't really know any of the nuances of playing a wizard properly and I've not heard of any of the obscure and cool feats that would make this work.
Seems like you took a deep dive into your options already. Some more ideas:
1) Look at the party composition. The better your fellow adventurers are at instant killing (dedicated Power Attackers / archers / blasters come to my mind), the less helpful is debuffing. It becomes more helpful at tougher battles (which matter more since they are more lethal), but for easy battles probably have a backup plan.
2) Be small sized for +1 AB. It won't reduce your damage, but accuracy is precious when firing rays. In fact, try to become tiny sooner or later. Reduce Person is a first-level spell, and it can be made permanent later.
3) Beware of concealment. Especially total concealment can ruin your day with a 50% miss chance, so consider Blind-Fight or True Seeing.
4) The penalties for shooting into melee or through cover are steep: -4 each, and they stack. Picking up Precise Shot (and its prerequisite Point Blank Shot) might hurt, but is probably worth it. Cover can often be bypassed with moving around (remember you have your move action, opposed to a full-attacking archer), and magic makes you more mobile over the course of levels (Expeditious Retreat, Spider Climb, Fly etc.).
5) At higher levels, Quicken Spell on True Strike can help if you really want to land a hit.
6) If the ray allows a save, Persistent Spell is usually a strong boost. Since ray spells can be useful despite low spell level, adding metamagic on them might be easier than for most other spells.
7) Finally, keep in mind not every creature is affected by your rays. Thanatopic Spell helps against undead, but for constructs no such metamagic is available IIRC. Better have a backup plan here.
An Oracle with the Bones Mystery can take the Bleeding Wounds Revelation, which adds bleed damage to your negative energy attacks.
Gnomes with the Fell Magic alternative racial feature get a +1 to the DC's of their Necromancy spells.
If you already plan on having/wearing the Amulet of Grasping Souls, just drink some Ghost Syrup and fail the saves... now you are incorporeal, without additional shenanigans.
I will dig around and see what else I can find...
The Souldrinker prestige class gets Enervation as an SLA, if that's your jam.
The Souldrinker prestige class gets Enervation as an SLA, if that's your jam.
God, I love souldrinker. Definitely plan on taking it to maximize my number of death rays. That, and a Necromancer's Athame.
For entry into Souldrinker, I would definitely use one of the Horsemen, rather than a daemon harbinger... they have fully fleshed out boons.
Pro-tip1: High Dex opponents like rogue-ish types usually have poor Fortitude saves and high Touch AC's, so afflict them with Blindness first before trying to hit them with a ray. Alternatively, see pro-tip3.
Pro-tip2: Empower and Maximize affect the 1d4 levels of Enervation to become 1d4+50% or unrolled 4 negative levels. At level 15, you can get Spell Perfection in Enervation and have Maximized Enervation as a 4th level spell slot, or have Empowered Maximized Enervation as a 6th level slot for unrolled 6 negative levels.
Pro-tip3: Thou shalt prepare Quickened True Strike and melteth the face of thine BBEG with thou favorite Ray, as was foretold by the saints and the prophecies.
Pro-tip4: If you're focusing on Rays, then consider getting Reach Spell Metamagic either as a feat or from a MM Rod, now you can turn any Touch Range spell into a Close, Medium, or Long range Ray for +1, +2, or +3 spell slots. Now Touch Range spells like Touch of Idiocy can be used as Ray.
Pro-tip5: Weapon Focus (Ray) is +1, or +2 on your Spell Perfected Ray of choice.
Pro-tip6: You cannot Cast Defensively with a Ray to avoid being AoO'ed, ranged touch attacks still provoke even if you Cast Defensively. So, Abjuring Step or Quickened Abjuring Step can let you take two 5-foot steps so you can get beyond their reach and not get pulverized with two AoO's, one AoO for casting the spell, the other AoO for making a ranged touch attack. Crank this up a notch by preping spells that create Difficult Terrain and get Feather Step Slippers or Nimble Moves feat to move through your own Difficult Terrain like Kevin McAllister baiting Harry and Marv to chase him through the funhouse in Home Alone.
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My ray specialist is an arcanist (school savant) who took one level of sorcerer (Crossblood Orc & Dragon)
Get yourself a Mage's Crossbow! +2 to ray hits and damage. If the target has SR, that's +3 to hit, +1d6+3 damage, and +3 to deal with the SR.
You could try arguing that the plus to damage includes the amount of negative levels from enervation, as that's the "damage" the spell does.... but that's a really hard sell.
Adding to your metamagic options - Seeking Spell will let you shoot around corners.
If you've got a particular ray you like, the trait Magical Lineage will help with metamagic and Secret of the Impossible Kingdom will help with the spell level.
If you use a spellbook at all, pick up Arrowsong's Spellbook to give your ray targets -2 on concentration checks.
Small size race will get you +1 to hit, but an elf with Arcane Focus gets +2 to concentration, so decide which is more important.
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My ray specialist is an arcanist (school savant) who took one level of sorcerer (Crossblood Orc & Dragon)
Get yourself a Mage's Crossbow! +2 to ray hits and damage. If the target has SR, that's +3 to hit, +1d6+3 damage, and +3 to deal with the SR.
You could try arguing that the plus to damage includes the amount of negative levels from enervation, as that's the "damage" the spell does.... but that's a really hard sell.
Adding to your metamagic options - Seeking Spell will let you shoot around corners.
If you've got a particular ray you like, the trait Magical Lineage will help with metamagic and Secret of the Impossible Kingdom will help with the spell level.
If you use a spellbook at all, pick up Arrowsong's Spellbook to give your ray targets -2 on concentration checks.
Small size race will get you +1 to hit, but an elf with Arcane Focus gets +2 to concentration, so decide which is more important.
I'd do that the opposite way and take magical knack and wayang spellhunter
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Wayang Spellhunter is nice, but ties you to a very remote area. Impossible Kingdom is also very specific, but at least closer to the inner sea.
Magical Knack only helps if you multiclass. I had a boon that lets me pick up a 3rd trait, where I used Bifurcated Magic to the same end. But as the OP didn't look to be multiclassing I didn't bother to list it.
An empowered, maximized spell gains the separate benefits of each feat: the maximum result plus half the normally rolled result.
Ah yeah, forgot about that. Good catch.
As far as traits, I would go with Magical Lineage and Reactionary. +2 Initiative helps you go first all game. You're not a controller or a utility guy, nor a buffer, you're the guy that picks out the biggest baddest most dangerous target your party faces and curbstomps him with a debuffy laser-y death. You're your group's "assassin" of sorts, and you want to be getting those juicy debuffs and damage out before that dangerous target goes.