My first look at the class, I really do like it, probably won't get an opportunity to see them in play before the playtest ends, so that is a bummer
based on my experience and impressions and what I read in other threads I still feel like sharing thoughts and making suggestions
1) making the class an occult caster slightly surprised me at first, but the more I think about it, the more I like it. Having Int as key attribute seems fitting, but slightly dissonant with the theme of the dirge and the described performance flavor for the spells - maybe we should get an attribute choice? Although I would not tie that to the fascinations, that would only create an artifical barrier for playstyles
2) I really like create thrall, a flexible spell with a lot of utility and great action economy. The thralls are interesting and I love metamagic keying off them - there should be more thrall spellshape feats (more powerful widen spell if you use a thrall at its point of origin, gaining bonus damage per spell rank when sacrificing a thrall next to the enemy, etc)
3) I see the flexibility problem of thralls some people mentioned. The easiest way to adress it would probably be to add a line in create thrall akin to 'instead of creating a thrall, you can order one of your existing thralls to move 15ft'
4) while there are some options to use thalls outside of focus spells, focus spells seem to be the main focus, which especially in the early game where you need 2 actions to recharge a focus point once per combat with consume thrall, causes for periods of not many possibilities of what to do
I think adding another early focus cantrip (and generally adding a cantrip or two) and increasing the starting focus pool point to 2 might both alleviate this problem
5) there are some skills supporting wading into melee and being the worst nightmare of your enemies (weapon familiarity, ostea armaments, draining strike, desperate surge) but those feel a bit like trap options
bind heroic spirit is a good substitute for heroism but comes online rather late
the familiarity is mostly for strength weapons, but the class can only wear light armor
I would suggest giving medium armor proficiency and a way earlier (likely tiered) bind heroic spirit
maybe add a focus cantrip 'undead might - sacrifice up to X thralls to gain +X to attacks until the end of your turn'
5.1) speaking of ostea armaments, starting level 10 the lvl 8 feat scales perfectly to level, but before that it gives you an 'underleveled' weapon? only a minor nitpick but I think the feat should probably come online on level 4 or 6
I know the weapon is not technically underleveled, but for a feat that seems so flexible and potentially important to some builds, lvl 8 seems to be late
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5.1) speaking of ostea armaments, starting level 10 the lvl 8 feat scales perfectly to level, but before that it gives you an 'underleveled' weapon? only a minor nitpick but I think the feat should probably come online on level 4 or 6
I know the weapon is not technically underleveled, but for a feat that seems so flexible and potentially important to some builds, lvl 8 seems to be late
The reason this is a level 8 feat is most likely the ability to add a Decaying rune to the weapon, which is in fact a level 8 rune.
I absolutely think it should be a level 4 feat and simply don't unlock the Decaying option before level 8.