Falling Icicle
Adventurer
I've been playing a Dread Necromancer for a few weeks, and thought I'd share some of my thoughts about it. Overall I really like the class; it has a ton of flavor and is fun to play. I have had to come to the conclusion that Animate Dead is perhaps the most overpowered spell in the game though. 
The amount of undead you can create, especially as a DN, is simply ridiculous. If my understanding of the rules is correct, my DN right now, at level 9 with a Cha of 20 could have 81 HD of skeletons/zombies under my control. 81 HD! That's like playing an entire party unto myself, and I just can't comprehend how this could have been published as is and considered balanced. Even the normal 4 HD/level limit of Animate Dead seems outrageous at times.
Right now I have two 6 HD Ogre Skeletons, and they are mean enough. They have a +9 to hit and do 2d8+10 with their greatclubs. They each have more HP than I do, easily. I could have animated a hill giant as well, but after seeing how powerful it would be, I refrained from doing so, for the sake of the game. We actually had a mock combat between the party's fighter and the hill giant skeleton, just to see how badass it would be. The skeleton won... And the scary thing is, by the rules, I could have a dozen ogre skeletons or 7 hill giant skeletons under my command. That is just a bit ridiculous. If you think Druids with their animal companions, etc are bad, well, you haven't seen anything.
Fortunately, I manage to get through my turns pretty quickly, but once I get stronger minions that have multiple attacks, it will really start to slow things down, I imagine. We put a limit on Animate Dead that you can't animate anything with more HD than your caster level, which went a long way to balancing it IMO. I also promised my DM not to go overboard on the number of things I animate.
I intend to use my extra HD for things like mounts and servants rather than combatants. Having an undead horse is actually pretty nice, as it never tires. I offered to animate one for each of my companions, which provoked some interesting reactions from my teammates.
And speaking of minions, the Summon Undead and Command Undead spells allow me to exceed even the ridiculous animate dead limit. We agreed to a house rule that if you cast another summon spell, any creature(s) from a previous summon spell go away. This has helped balance things alot. We also house ruled Command Undead to only work on one creature at a time. Right now I can use Summon Undead IV to get 2 ogre zombies, and they can dish out an impressive amount of damage each turn as well as functioning as a rather effective barrier to our enemies.
As for the DN's spells, I really like the options they have available. I love not having to prepare spells. The DN spell list may look small, but it's still more than a Wizard could have prepared at any given time. The DN is notably less effective than Wizards, Sorcerers and Warmages at dishing out damage, since DNs rely mostly on inflict spells and the like. But my minions make up for it. The DN also doesn't have any of the powerful defensive options available to Wizards, like Invisibility, Fly, Dimension Door, Blink, etc etc etc. Fortunately I can wear armor and have DR. And thanks to Tomb-Tainted Soul I can heal myself, which is pretty cool. In all, the DN plays a bit more like an evil cleric than a Wizard, though they get some really nice Wizard Necromancy tricks as well, like spectral hand.
In all, I think it's a great class. I'm very self sufficient and bring alot to the group. I wouldn't recommend it as the party's main arcanist, as they lack in utility, but they certainly are a great 5th member in a party, as long as you don't have any paladins or other such goodie goodies that can't stand the sight of a skeleton. I'd definately advise caution about using it as written, though. A clever player (or anyone with an ounce of reading comprehension, for that matter) could really abuse the animate/command/summon spells and completely steal the show. Having 2 dozen minions might work in Diablo 2, but it sure breaks D&D.
The amount of undead you can create, especially as a DN, is simply ridiculous. If my understanding of the rules is correct, my DN right now, at level 9 with a Cha of 20 could have 81 HD of skeletons/zombies under my control. 81 HD! That's like playing an entire party unto myself, and I just can't comprehend how this could have been published as is and considered balanced. Even the normal 4 HD/level limit of Animate Dead seems outrageous at times.Right now I have two 6 HD Ogre Skeletons, and they are mean enough. They have a +9 to hit and do 2d8+10 with their greatclubs. They each have more HP than I do, easily. I could have animated a hill giant as well, but after seeing how powerful it would be, I refrained from doing so, for the sake of the game. We actually had a mock combat between the party's fighter and the hill giant skeleton, just to see how badass it would be. The skeleton won... And the scary thing is, by the rules, I could have a dozen ogre skeletons or 7 hill giant skeletons under my command. That is just a bit ridiculous. If you think Druids with their animal companions, etc are bad, well, you haven't seen anything.
Fortunately, I manage to get through my turns pretty quickly, but once I get stronger minions that have multiple attacks, it will really start to slow things down, I imagine. We put a limit on Animate Dead that you can't animate anything with more HD than your caster level, which went a long way to balancing it IMO. I also promised my DM not to go overboard on the number of things I animate.
I intend to use my extra HD for things like mounts and servants rather than combatants. Having an undead horse is actually pretty nice, as it never tires. I offered to animate one for each of my companions, which provoked some interesting reactions from my teammates. And speaking of minions, the Summon Undead and Command Undead spells allow me to exceed even the ridiculous animate dead limit. We agreed to a house rule that if you cast another summon spell, any creature(s) from a previous summon spell go away. This has helped balance things alot. We also house ruled Command Undead to only work on one creature at a time. Right now I can use Summon Undead IV to get 2 ogre zombies, and they can dish out an impressive amount of damage each turn as well as functioning as a rather effective barrier to our enemies.
As for the DN's spells, I really like the options they have available. I love not having to prepare spells. The DN spell list may look small, but it's still more than a Wizard could have prepared at any given time. The DN is notably less effective than Wizards, Sorcerers and Warmages at dishing out damage, since DNs rely mostly on inflict spells and the like. But my minions make up for it. The DN also doesn't have any of the powerful defensive options available to Wizards, like Invisibility, Fly, Dimension Door, Blink, etc etc etc. Fortunately I can wear armor and have DR. And thanks to Tomb-Tainted Soul I can heal myself, which is pretty cool. In all, the DN plays a bit more like an evil cleric than a Wizard, though they get some really nice Wizard Necromancy tricks as well, like spectral hand.
In all, I think it's a great class. I'm very self sufficient and bring alot to the group. I wouldn't recommend it as the party's main arcanist, as they lack in utility, but they certainly are a great 5th member in a party, as long as you don't have any paladins or other such goodie goodies that can't stand the sight of a skeleton. I'd definately advise caution about using it as written, though. A clever player (or anyone with an ounce of reading comprehension, for that matter) could really abuse the animate/command/summon spells and completely steal the show. Having 2 dozen minions might work in Diablo 2, but it sure breaks D&D.
