D&D 5E (2024) The Undead Army Necromancer is not Designable

[FrogReaver]

I'd say not only is it designable, but it is designed. I would take a look at Mage Hand Press's Necromancer Class. The thralls have a combined CR cap, and collectively share one reaction and one bonus action. You can put them in a weird little bag of holding just for thralls. I think it's the closest anyone has gotten...

Necromancer | Base Class - Mage Hand Press

Command a horde of undead with the Necromancer base class for 5E 2024! Bend death to your will and rise to ultimate lichdom!

magehandpress.com

Well they definitely made it thematic and not OP. Seems possibly a bit weak and still has the turns / aoe issues. I don’t view it as a solution to the problem presented. But it is interesting and fun!

 

[FrogReaver]

Who is this thread is "they"?
Let them speak for themselves.

If you want 10 individual skeletons, go ahead and like this post so we can get a count.

I think if there is a necromancer they should be able to control 10ish minions. Thus, I don’t really think there should be a necromancer due to gameplay issues associated with that. But if you want to design one, that’s what I require.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think if there is a necromancer they should be able to control 10ish minions. Thus, I don’t really think there should be a necromancer due to gameplay issues associated with that. But if you want to design one, that’s what I require.

Do you have a level prerequisite for that number? Where do you start? I know several ways you can get close.

 

[Remathilis]

Thinking about this, I think the problem is, not every class can become a minionmancer (or maybe they could, see below). The sheer action economy of having multiple bodies would quickly make some classes irrelevant in many situations.

And it's not like this is a Necromancer only problem. Other kinds of magicians should be able to get in on this as well. Enchanters could have mindslaves or charmed thralls aplenty. Conjurers could be able to have long-term summoned allies. Illusionists can have legions of Simulacra.

Then again, maybe Animal Handling should let you train a pack of guard dogs or wolves? Allow you to befriend animal allies ala Tarzan or Grizzly Adams or Dar the Beastmaster?

Maybe Fighters, I don't know, should have a subclass where you are a leader of men, with a capable lieutenant and men-at-arms following you around?

All of these things sound reasonable in a real world scenario, right? But that would change the game, much as it changed Gygax's AD&D game when his players hired a horde of NPC's to send ahead of them into dungeons. The combat rules as they stand would strain under the weight of so many actions.

The CR system would certainly be unable to handle things- how do you build an encounter with 4 PC's, 4 zombies, one NPC warrior loyal to the Fighter, 6 wolves, a summoned Efreet, and a pair of charmed Duergar? Especially when many of these characters are "free", acquired by abilities, as opposed to monsters, where every combatant takes part of the encounter budget to justify? And do you reduce the xp earned by the party for having minions, even though zombies don't earn xp (and were created via the Necromancer's spells)?

How long will battles take? How quickly will the DM have to start murdering NPC allies wholesale to get their game back in line?

I don't think the Undead Army Necromancer is not designable. But I think the game itself would have to be redesigned to allow for it.

And that's the biggest problem. D&D's action economy works in that large combats can function only if each individual unit is limited. The more options you give an individual unit, the less units you can have. TSR D&D kinda worked for larger battles with minions and followers because your fighter never did anything but attack, your cleric and magic-user had limited spells, your thief was a backstab and run-away, and your monsters had usually only one major type of attack. But every edition added more options to the PCs (skills, feats, class features, defenses, conditional abilities, etc) and made monsters more interesting (well, some monsters more interesting) so the number of combatants had to get smaller if you planned on finishing combat in a reasonable timeframe. And more people are interested in running multifaceted characters against dynamic foes than they are running dozens of simplistic characters against an equally large and simplistic number of foes. So, the biggest losers are archetypes that relied around having substantial amounts of allies to fight for them (summoners, beastmasters, necromancers, warlords).

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

I hate the idea of "summoning" undead.

Maybe summoning shadows or other incorporeal undead but not actual zombies or skeletons. That feels super cheezy. Concentration should only come into it when commanding your undead.

For each undead that the Necromancer has, he can concentrate on a specific ability. Maybe that's "grapple that person" or "fetch that" or other "spell-like" abilities that can be fluffed as undead doing something. Commanding an undead to attack would require the Necromancer's action or bonus action each round. More undead means bigger attacks and eventually become a swarm.

All the undead have a combined HP. More undead = more swarm HP. When it takes damage, the necromancer can choose to lose a single undead (weakening the power of his concentration abilities) or take it off the combined total - risking losing ALL his undead when they are reduced to 0 hp.

The more undead you have, the more powerful the ability because you have more of them working on a task. Once you hit X undead, instead of attacking as a melee/ranged spell, they attack as a swarm.

So, a necromancer with a 'swarm' of undead has to use his concentration to get them to do a coordinated attack, otherwise they just stand there and do nothing but defend themself. But losing concentration doesn't make them disappear.

At a certain level, the necromancer can "promote" one of his undead to be a lieutenant who can control 'x' undead (probably dependant on the level of the necromancer.) All this does is allow the Necromancer to concentrate on two abilities simultaneously fluffed as the lieutenant giving orders. Eventually getting a couple lieutenants.

So, regardless of how many undead you have, the action economy isn't crazy.

 

[FrogReaver]

Do you have a level prerequisite for that number? Where do you start? I know several ways you can get close.

Just so long as the army starts at lower level (1 skeleton/zombie at the least by level 3 at the latest). and increases as I increase in level.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Just so long as the army starts at lower level (1 skeleton/zombie at the least by level 3 at the latest). and increases as I increase in level.

Why can't you do that now? Are you assuming WotC 5.5 only with no wiggle room? Because throwing self-imposed limits on what rules you're willing to use just makes getting what you want harder.

 

[FrogReaver]

Why can't you do that now? Are you assuming WotC 5.5 only with no wiggle room? Because throwing self-imposed limits on what rules you're willing to use just makes getting what you want harder.

You may can. I’ve not really explored it.

But I’m more talking design and homebrew/3pp and how those things still have turn length and aoe issues making for bad gameplay.

 

[Minigiant]

The truth of the matter is.

If you want to control an army of units individually in D&D, you must either become a DM or accept you are being disruptive and probably disrespectful to your tablemates' time.

A sacrifice must be made OR you are being a spotlight hog.

 

[Micah Sweet]

You may can. I’ve not really explored it.

But I’m more talking design and homebrew/3pp and how those things still have turn length and aoe issues making for bad gameplay.

Have you looked at either of the 3pp/alternate 5e examples I've provided?