building a character

[azura13000]

im creating a 3.5 gestalt character and im planning on using the wizard variants to start with a human warrior skeleton instead of a familiar and enhanced undead so the undead i have are stronger. any suggestions for what classes of spells i should count as restricted for being a specialist wizard would be a lot of help as i havent played a specialist wizard before.


im not looking at creating an unstoppable army of undead as my character will mostly be there for support as i will be running the campaign. however i am looking at creating a powerful build so i can try to stop them getting wiped out very easily. im mostly looking at large amounts of damage from necromancy spells and ways to boost the few undead i will have with me.
as always i will be tking the standard buff spells like mage armour and stuff to help the party in general circumstances as all wizards should

i curently have the core books, unearthed arcana, libris mortis, heroes of horror, expanded psionics handbook, complete mage, complete arcane, monster manual 5, magic item compendium and races of the dragon available in the house. however i can find any info i need online if i havent got it in books atm

any help and suggestions would be greatly appreciated along with any builds people have used in the past

 

[BENINHB]

What level??

 

[azura13000]

starting at first and working up
but i like to plan ahead where possible

 

[Wyvernhand]

Wizards don't really do the whole "army of the dead" concept very well. They don't even get access to Animate Dead until 9th level. Thats...half your career without being able to make your own stuff. Contrast with clerics (who can rebuke from day 1) and Dread Necros (Heroes of Horror), Wizards kinda get the shaft. If you want to nuke though, Lord of Uttercold is pretty decent. Converts half of the damage from your frost spells to negative energy damage. Since skele's are immune to cold, they would ignore that half, and be healed by the negative energy, which is a good thing. You just sit in the back and lob Uttercold Energy Sub Frostballs at things and heal your minions while damaging your foes.

Getting and replacing those minions, however, is tough as a wizard.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

If you want to nuke though, Lord of Uttercold is pretty decent. Converts half of the damage from your frost spells to negative energy damage. Since skele's are immune to cold, they would ignore that half, and be healed by the negative energy, which is a good thing. You just sit in the back and lob Uttercold Energy Sub Frostballs at things and heal your minions while damaging your foes.

Getting and replacing those minions, however, is tough as a wizard.

Well, adding Fell Animate to that plan, as your Uttercold E-Sub Frostballs rain down upon foes engaged with your skeletons, any foes killed by the spells will rise as zombies...YOUR zombies.

 

[Dandu]

Yo dawg, I heard you liked undead...

 

[Submission]

heros of horror dread necromancer x rod of undead master x dead walker ring.

Pure undead goodness

edit:

Also clerics make better undead if not the best undead necromancers because they have the rebuke turn what not. as well as pretty damn hard to kill and not so squishy and access to a better array of nercomonger spells.

 

[azura13000]

yeah i know cleric would be better for creating hordes of them. but im aiming more at high damage necromancy spells and only a few undead as backup if i need them. also my familiar would instead be an undead human skeleton that i am planning to equip as an undead bodyguard.

ive seen the dread necromancer but it kinda limits a lot of what you can do in that it can only use evil and necromancy spells. where by playing a wizard i have access to most of the spells a wizard can use and will only lose out on some by becoming a specialist wizard.

and yes dandu i like undead when im not having to destroy entire cities of them and if we leave our DM refills the entire city cos time there passes quicker than the rest of the world and the lich can cast loads of spells before weve even healed up

im looking for feats and spells that work well mostly ive loked at fell animate and it looks good. which book is lord of uttercold in? cos that looks really useful

 

[Dandu]

Which high damage necromancy spells?

 

[azura13000]

Which high damage necromancy spells?

thats part of what im looking for lol
ive only really looked through the core books but im happy to get any books i need to just to make this work