Is Dread Necromancer a good choice for an Eldritch Theurge?

I'm contemplating an eldritch theurge build that will include either levels in wizard (specialized in necromancy) or dread necromancer. I'm having a difficult time chosing between them, and wanted some opinions.

The main thing discouraging me from picking dread necromancer is that I'd need 4 levels in it to qualify for eldritch theurge (they don't get 2nd level spells until 4th level), whearas I'd only need 3 levels of wizard. Dread Necros do have some advantages though. They use charisma for spellcasting, as do warlocks, so I wouldn't need to focus on 2 attributes. They also can wear light armor while casting, just as warlocks can. As a wizard, I would have to forsake armor entirely. They also get more spells per day than wizards and don't need to prepare their spells. But their spell list is really small and narrowly focused. They don't have the versatility that wizards do, even when it comes to necromancy spells. They also don't seem to have very many aoe spells, which would make spellblast much less useful.

I'm interested in what people think. Which would you chose and why?

No.

I'd go for wizard. As a mystic theurge you'll get plenty of spells no matter what classes you use, so the dread necros advantage of having more spells/day isn't anything special.

I will point out that Dread Necros get Rebuke Undead. There's bound to be a few divine feats that would be helpful in this build.

I'd go for Dread Necromancer because I prefer to play spontaneous spellcasters, but I suspect a Wizard could be more effective.

-Stuart

I was going to come in and say "Dread Necromancer is a good choice for no one," but then realized I was thinking of the True Necromancer PrC. In any event, I'd go with wizard. The real main benefit of the Dread Necro, as I understand it, is that it becomes progressively more undead. I understand its spell options to be somewhat sub-par. You would advance with the spellcasting, true, but you would not advance toward your class features. Thus, problem.

Some people will malign specialist wizards for sacrificing useful spells for a marginal benefit. I'm not one of them, but I can see where they're coming from. If you go the specialized necromancer route, see if you can get your DM to allow you to use the specialist wizard variants from Unearthed Arcana. Below are the choices for necromancers:

SRD said:

Necromancer Variants

Wrapped in mystery and burdened by reputations of evil, necromancers control dangerous energies that rob the living of strength and grant unlife to the dead. The most powerful necromancers command dangerous undead minions and threaten towns, cities, and sometimes even entire kingdoms with their power. Although necromancers make excellent villains and nemeses for a group of adventurers, neutral- and good-aligned necromancers who view themselves as the shepherds of the living and guardians of the dead can also prove valuable allies.

Campaigns that include evil necromancers or groups of undead as antagonists can benefit from the inclusion of variant necromancers. Rival groups of necromancers might view certain types of undead as the only true or "pure" undead and all others as evils that must be destroyed, with each group disagreeing on which types are which. Other factions or groups might have an innate loathing for undead raised by any but themselves.

Skeletal Minion

A 1st-level necromancer using this variant can begin play with an undead minion (a human warrior skeleton). Obtaining this minion takes 24 hours and uses up magical materials that cost 100 gp.

This creature is a loyal servant that follows the necromancer's commands and accompanies her on adventures if desired. If the skeletal minion is destroyed, the necromancer suffers no ill effects and may replace it by performing a ceremony identical to the one that allowed her to obtain her first servant.

At 1st level, the skeleton is completely typical, but it gains power as the necromancer gains levels. The skeleton has a number of Hit Dice equal to the necromancer's class level. Add one-half the necromancer's class level to the skeleton's natural armor bonus. Add one-third of the necromancer's class level to the skeleton's Strength and Dexterity scores.

A necromancer using this variant permanently gives up the ability to obtain a familiar.

Undead Apotheosis (Ex)

As a necromancer using this variant progresses in levels, she gains some of the qualities that typify undead creatures.

At 5th level, the necromancer gains a +2 bonus on all saving throws made to resist sleep, stun, paralysis, poison, or disease. This bonus increases to +4 at 15th level.

At 10th level, the necromancer gains a +4 bonus on saving throws made to resist ability damage, ability drain, or energy drain.

At 20th level, the necromancer gains 25% resistance to critical hits, as the light fortification armor special ability.

A necromancer using this variant does not gain bonus feats for advancing as a wizard.

Enhanced Undead (Ex)

Any time a necromancer using this variant creates an undead creature (such as with animate dead, create undead, or create greater undead), all undead creatures created gain a +4 enhancement bonus to Strength and Dexterity, and two additional hit points per Hit Die. This ability does not affect the number or Hit Dice of animated creatures that the necromancer can create or control.

A necromancer using this variant does not gain additional spells per day for being a specialist wizard.

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The main problem I see with a dread necromancer/warlock build is the lack of versatility. Normally, a theurge is sacrificing power (his highest level spells) for versatility (two different spell lists to choose from. However, since dread necromancer and warlock are both so heavily specialized, you don't really get the benefit of the versatility. Warlocks do get neat abilities relating to Use Magic Device to make up for the specialization, but a theurge won't see them.

Wizard is probably still the best choice for a theurge build. If you really want to avoid the split casting stat, I'd go for battle sorcerer (UA). You can cast in light armor, get a d8 HD, and can pick your spells carefully to cover the gaps in the warlock's invocations.

Winding Road said:

Wizard is probably still the best choice for a theurge build. If you really want to avoid the split casting stat, I'd go for battle sorcerer (UA). You can cast in light armor, get a d8 HD, and can pick your spells carefully to cover the gaps in the warlock's invocations.

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I would have to agree, the best classes for any kind of Theurge is one that gets only spells, or useless class abilities. Yes, wizards get spells, but the whole other kind of magic is worth it.

A battle sorceror cold be good, but it is 4 levels, plus it has sharply limited spells know. I would still recommend wizards, but BAttle sorc could be fun.

Thanks for all of the replies. In all honesty, I don't really find the sorcerer option very appealing. Even the limited spell list of a dread necromancer is more than double the number of spells a sorcerer can know. And as I recall, a battle sorcerer is even more limited in this regard. As a dread necromancer you have the choices made for you, but I don't see that as being much of a problem, personally.

A good point was made about the dread necromancer's lack of versatility, but I do see how these two classes could be a good compliment to each other. Dread Necromancers rely on alot of touch spells, and greatreach blast would greatly expand their combat options. They also have few combat options against constructs and the like, and eldritch blast helps there as well. The warlock's invocations can also help fill in the gaps in the dread necromancer's spell selection, providing things like darkvision, see invisibility, flight, planar travel, different types of damage (fire, acid, etc), and so on.

Another thing I'm curious about, does an eldritch theurge get to add spells every 4 levels to his spell list for his dread necromancer spells, or is advanced learning considered a class feature that is not included in spellcasting progression? Losing advanced learning would definately be a big hit.

I've been compiling a list of pros and cons for the dread necromancer to help me decide if I want to take that as my arcane class.

Pros:

- Can wear light armor without arcane spell failure.
- Uses charisma as primary stat, which warlocks also use.
- Casts spells spontaneously, without preparation, with as many spells per day as a sorcerer but more than twice the number of spells known. Also has access to many nasty touch spells like harm and slay living that sorcerers and wizards can't learn. These spells would be great to use with greatreach blast. Other spells from the cleric list, such as speak with dead, hide from undead, etc offer some cool options not normally available to other arcanists.
- Has charnel touch, a negative energy touch attack usable at will. With the tomb-tainted soul feat, I can have infinite self-healing. I could also harm myself to heal. While wizards can also make use of this feat, they lack the really powerful negative energy spells that dread necromancers get, like harm.
- Has rebuke undead, although this feature won't advance with eldritch theurge levels, making it much less useful. It could still open some interesting options with divine metamagic, I suppose.
- The +2 bonus against many debilitating effects is a pretty nice boon. The 2 dr/bludgeoning and magic could also come in handy if my attackers are armed with cold iron weapons.

Cons:

- Have to have 4 levels in it to qualify for eldritch theurge, putting me a level behind in progression. Also gains access to higher level spells a level later than wizards do.
- Has a set spell list, narrowly focused on necromantic type effects. Has little versatility in spell selection. The spell list also has inflict spells as its primary offensive option, which are really crappy compared to sorcerer/wizard damaging spells of the same level. Still, when used with greatreach blast, these spells could be more viable. The spell list also contains few area effect spells, making spellblast less useful.
- Doesn't progress in many of its class features, such as rebuke undead, damage reduction, etc. I'm not sure if this is really that much of a drawback, however, since wizards and sorcerers don't get these class features either, and eldritch theurge offers damage reduction of its own. If I so chose, I could just become a lich and get most of the class feature a dread necromancer gets in 20 levels.
- Also, since rebuke undead does not improve with eldritch theurge levels, the create undead and create greater undead spells are much less useful since they are not automatically under the caster's control when created. I'd have to resort to the command undead spell to put these minions in their place.

This is all I have been able to think of so far. Let me know what you think and if you have any other pros or cons to add.

You can't use DMM unless you take southern magician, to convert your spells into divine spells.