Necromancer You’ve Raised an Army of Undead. Now What?

[@Nerdarchy]

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[@manofculture4938]

I never raise zombies if I can help it, they are too dumb and they stink. My goto trick was telling all my skeletons to wait under a lake or other body of water. I still took 2 or 3 disguised skeletons with me tho. I always said they were monks who had sworn oaths of silence.

[@Stormeris]

Raise an undead army! Hire them out as cheap manual labor. Farmwork, mining, etc.

[@TheDreamSyndicateArts]

Peasants angrily arriving with torches & pitchforks Necromancer: Are you here to try and punish me for defiling the dead? Peasant: No, we're here to end you because you stole all our jobs, you zombie-raising bastard!

[@Daredhnu]

@@TheDreamSyndicateArts they took yer jerbs?

[@JorneDeSmedt]

@@TheDreamSyndicateArts Well, I guess the Necromancer can always hire them on as more cheap labour.

[@crobert8675309]

Ahh necromancy. I remember my first undead. His name was Tracy. I screwed up a roll somehow and ended up with a skeleton that would talk back and was terrified of everything. But only I could hear him. So I would be having, what looked like, one sided arguments with my minion constantly. Good times.

[@Nerdarchy]

That sounds hilarious. Nerdarchist Dave

[@brooksfaucette296]

You can fit at least 150 undead in a portable hole, depending on how many are skeletons, what weapons they have, and how much you DM likes fun.

[@22thevoice22]

Just make it undead halflings

[@judgecurran7289]

Or gnomes

[@xezzee]

keleton archers. how many would you say? Also what happens if you do not contrpl them? will they brake free or stay in place untill opened attacking everyone?? up to Dm??

[@MegaPokefan97]

Here is an idea: make the world's largest ball of skeletons. Be remembered as that one weird Necromancer who's life goal was to make the world's largest ball of skeletons. Needless to say, it might be a Skele TON of work

[@Gladerunner2113]

"That's a nice undead army you got there. Be a shame if..." _Straightens out holy symbol bowtie_ "... a Channel Divinity: Turn Undead happened to them."

[@Nerdarchy]

Love the idea of a bowtie holy symbol. Nerdarchist Dave

[@conradkorbol]

Nerdarchy yeah but the default channel divinity would work. The bow tie is just a recovered holy symbol necklace

[@conradkorbol]

*reflavored

[@Altyrell]

Yup, Necromancer & Cleric are actually a good XP Mill Combination [for the Campaigns that don't do Milestone].

[@curvilinearcube8716]

My favorite way I've seen someone hide their undead horde was when my uncle's necromancer would stop about a mile outside of town have his zombies all lay down and then cast hallucinatory terrain to make an illusionary hill over them

[@Nerdarchy]

Not a bad idea at all. Nerdarchist Dave

[@johnpayne5590]

When that one merchant "accidentally" runs over your undead

[@thegreatandpowerfulmerlin5476]

One more addition to your army

[@intuitivesean443]

I’ve always wanted to have a necromancer work with assassins the assassins go into the town a head of time and smoke the clerics and then send in the undead

[@xornxenophon3652]

Local Lord: "I demand that you immediately withdraw your army of undead monsters from my border! Necromancer: "My undead minions are merely passing through the area..." Local Lord: "A likely story..."

[@jamesm783]

and that is why you don't dump Charisma. Dump Strength. you have undead to carry your things.

[@noetdalle]

My friend and I played an evil campaign where we used the sewer system in Suzail, to hide and move our undead army. We bought a house, remodeled it and build an hidden entrance/exit from our basement into the sewer. It was all a plot to try and take over the city from underneath. I still remember the DM's face when he realised what we were doing. It was glorious :D

[@Troommate]

Me personally live in constant fear of accidentally not having enough spell slots at the end of the day XD

[@jand.4737]

If you spend all your "maintain my undead army" spell slots directly after the long rest, you can't accidentally spend them on something else.

[@xezzee]

@@jand.4737 until you forget to start long rest at the time. it is safer to cast control and then keep long rest probably...

[@snaker9er]

Sounds like you need to start a cult where your disciples maintain them willingly for you

[@williampearson8328]

The time-keeping is why necromancers should take keen mind

[@Nerdarchy]

Excellent suggestion. Nerdarchist Dave

[@superduperbeans1234]

I'm a DM and have had necromancer's in my game before. In a specific empire in my world, necromancy to a certain degree is normal. When someone dies, they are entitled to 100 years of peace. After that, there remains are exhumed and they are meticulously cleaned into skeletons, then they become guards, janitors, and the like. Zombies and other flesh-bearing undead is not allowed within the city due to their unsanitary nature. It makes for an immersive experience for the players, since it shows customs and history, while also allowing them to do what their class does

[@zeroiscorrect630]

There is a lich in my homebrew setting that resides over a city state sat on a magical valley. The properties of this valley make plants grow at an absurd rate, like plant a seed in the morning and have a pumpkin the size of a man's torso in the evening. So this lich dude took the place over and uses his undead hoard as agricultural equipment.

[@derekmorgan3074]

Dress as a generic cleric, blame the Conjurer

[@ryanbritt4459]

Demiplane is another good spell for that Also played a necromancer cleric the short story is that his family was cursed to have a necromancer in the family after the last one died and the curse came from a priestess of the goddess he was a cleric to. So he would take the spells but through his goddess he would change the spell to be more friendly like animate dead was he would make flowers that he could give people. If the person agreed and made one request they would become an intelligent "undead" under his control with a flower around their neck. It was very entertaining

[@andrewthemaroon8608]

My favorite thing that a necromancer player did in my group was have his army of zombies dig 100s and 100s of tunnels/caves in the world and then just sealed them up. So periodically the new groups will randomly encounter a cave or dungeon with any number of undead. Sometimes its empty sometimes its filled to standing room only. This happened years ago and PC still bump into a "lost" or "forgotten" storage/workshop of Wendal the gnomish Necromancer

[@nytecrow6452]

So I have had several Necromancers in my time as you guys might have noted by me commenting on all Necromancer related ideas xD First off I can confirm that clothing/gearing them works wonders unless your DM is a grump. It tends to lead to more monetary expense but that is cancelled out later on as I'll explain. You can march your army outside the town or city and have a camp built up with an army of undead who appear as Knights or Soldiers. Have them stand guard like the Queens Guard in Britain. Silent, unresponsive statues ready to strike. You can usually Bluff the smell to saying they smell of death due to various battles they were a part of and they have a code to not wash away the blood and Gore of a fallen foe. That they don't bathe. Or that as a tribute to the fallen they smear the remains of their enemies and allies over their bodies. Hiding them in lakes is a bad idea unless they are all skeletons as you poison the lake. Then you have more issues from the village. Burying a large portion of your army can be useful if you command a small unit of your troops to bury\unbury them for you. You can possibly skip the hiding bit altogether by hiring your undead out as a labor force as well. Imagine farmer skeletons who don't eat, sleep, or tire who can plow fields forever. Or zombies able to haul wood and stone for the villagers or yourself without needing to stop for anything. Thus you can earn gold and set villages at ease or build up a reputation with them. Asserting control is a different beast to deal with. One of my old DMs was pretty cool with an idea I had to craft an Item able to store the Control Undead bit of Create Undead, so the Orb of Undeath could cast Create Undead to reassert control 1 time per day as per the spell level that was stored in it. Filled it with a maxed out Create Undead and voila, free daily control

[@shallendor]

My Orc Necromancer usually only had 2 occasionally 4 zombies(killed enemies) in full armor as bodyguards and pack mules. His dead Necromancer grandfather was his weasel familiar.

[@Vaalgrum]

If you have a forge cleric on your side, and a lot of scrap metal, you can kit your skeletons out as a faceless army, disguised under layers of armor and with face masks. Did that in a desert campaign, had them all themed as jackal-headed soldiers of Anubis (I was the forge cleric in this case).

[@michaelmorey3110]

Use the 5th level Seeming spell to "disguise" your undead horde.

[@atomicash2475]

I had my 2 skeleton in fullplate, my wright had a disgue (and herbs and spices for the smell), the wright's zombies were told to burry themselves outside of towns, and the only problem was the ancient white dragon lich.

[@robertbogan225]

Haha that last one is perfect.

[@nathanbrehm1085]

Could also try sending an emissary into towns to let them know you aren't a threat and will March your army around the town if they leave your army alone. Maybe tell them the corpses are from criminals and beasts of the wilds and times of self defense. Maybe negotiate use of a few in town at a time.

[@BattleDragoon]

Sooo... Has anyone had crates filled with undead and did the Trojan horse thing and just keep them in large carts? i mean they cant get out of the crates unless you let them out and then push them in the direction needed when enemies show up.

[@kenscott1082]

With arcane lock

[@theMifyoo]

I remember a scheme I came up with, where I essentially made a pit to put zombies in, with the plan of them becoming uncontrolled. The idea would be I would roll up into town and sell a map and some armor set to some people who are a bit under-qualified to be an adventurer. The armor set is cursed to help prevent the villagers from having a decent chance at killing the undead. They go to this pit and get killed. After which I use a few controlled undead to help me fish out the bodies, which I then take control of and loot for items. Rinse and repeat. Eventually the pit would have an absurd number of zombies where anyone who goes in is essentially a corpse waiting to happen.

[@robertbogan225]

You're going to rob lvl 1s? Itll take for ever to get rich!

[@theMifyoo]

@@robertbogan225 In theory you could eventually move up the levels as long as the zombies are able to do damage, and there are enough then most things could be taken down. The problem is to keep the cave from building infamy to quickly. You might even need to move it from time to time. You could do so by having some controlled zombies dig and fill up the hole.

[@slothfulslime5066]

That sounds amazing.

[@jamert8820]

Hiding in a lake WOULD be a good way to hide an undead horde, but then you’re poisoning the water.

[@delfox1761]

Personally I only raised skeleton's and stuffed them into full platemail head to toe with a shield and longsword so unless someone got real close and looked into the visor I was golden but the penalty to it was I was almost always broke as well as they were not proficient and slowed to like 20ft but ehh 20AC so fear me and my boneshields? as for why skeleton's I don't care for the smell of zombies.

[@robertbogan225]

Hell yeah thats the OG WAY.

[@davidthomas2870]

Best thing to with Zombies: peasant rail gun. Enemy has castle? Not any more

[@Praegressus1]

So I've been playing a Yuan-ti necromancer pirate in a recent campaign, and he runs a scroll wagon in town. He uses phantom steed to pull the wagon (no concentration and can ritual cast, plus can supplement army with 5 horses if done right ;) ) and has been selling scrolls of find familiar (Nobles love the idea of a bound personal spirit) and he has compartments in the bottom of his wagon that can hold a number of skeleton archers, I think about 4. When he gets higher level he plans to go with vow of silence monks with orante masks. He also has arcane lock (Infinite duration, unless dispelled) to lock his skeleton compartment door.

[@Gregfrac]

In one D&D campaign I was in my friend was a necromancer with 55 skeletons he named “The Sleepless Guard”, and every time we tried to enter a village or town all the towns people grabbed their pitch forks and shovels and tried to fight us, so we had to kill everyone every time, 9 villages completely whipped out

[@lordk.gaimiz6881]

This is only for high level necromancers and it's quite slow, but finger of death creates undead that are permanently under your control, but it will take time (and you also need to kill people which may be a problem)

[@godsamongmen8003]

For me, the most obvious idea is the demiplane spell. But we may be talking about mid-level characters who don't have 8th level spells. What about a train of covered wagons meant to appear as a merchant caravan? At a lower level, Gaulder's Tower would also be a pretty good way to house an undead army. I bet you could get at least a couple hundred undead stuffed into a pair of empty 10' rooms.

[@Sophia-vk5bq]

Well, create demiplane gives you a 30ft by 30ft dimensional space, or enough for 6*6=36 creatures of medium or small size. The spell doesn't mention enlarging a previous plane but you can divide your minions into groups of 36 and reuse the spell to allow continuous travel for one hour, and said plane won't collapse inbetween castings so its safe unless another caster locates your demiplane. I miss being able to build my own custom demiplane in 3.5 and Pathfinder. :-(

[@sasivasebas]

How about the Rod of Security? i remember you could do something with it but i'm too sleepy to search it now xD

[@haseoyamazaki8897]

I rewrote soul coins and created a "Shadow Monarch" wizard subclass which tends to fix the "pop up army out of nowhere" issue.

[@haseoyamazaki8897]

The subclass can be found in DnD Beyond's Homebrew section.

[@AbrokennoseOUCH]

Pretty neat subclass of wizard but, its definitely for an NPC wizard. Unless the rest of the party are this wizard's minons.

[@haseoyamazaki8897]

@@AbrokennoseOUCH actually I've made it work in 7 campaigns and one shots just fine so far. I only unleash the army when I'm separated from the party, other wise I'm spell slinging aoe and pot shotting when needed. The subclass is a party buffer, not just a one-man army.

[@BLT_Plays]

maybe 5 E is different, but in other RPGs usually by the time hiding my horde becomes a problem, I am usually powerful enough to create semi intelligent undead that keep class levels. After that I swich from having my minions as a normal army, and I instead have a swarm of stealthy rogue zombies who act as my personal assassin's guild.

[@styxdragoncharon4003]

I clothed them all in gambeson and full helms, then built relationships with the select towns that supplied the gambeson to make me seem a benefit to their communities... who tended to look the other way and have only good things to say about my evergrowing force. When you pass through town and all the bandits disappear to never be seen again, you are a hero... never mind that all my solders have taken on a vow of silence and smell a bit "off" The king knew of these bandits and did nothing, I, however, keep the towns safe and better your economy :D

[@rufussprague6407]

Demiplane is a great storage spell that provides a 30 foot cube also accessible via gate.

[@Altyrell]

Depending on Campaigns & the level of "weapons", you can easily have said Undead carrying a "bomb" into a horde of baddies and "BOOM" explosions & you don't have to really risk your party members. Not just that, if said "bombs" are on a timer, have them lay down with the Ranger covering them using "Hide in Plain Sight" Ability [I know that HiPS is mainly for the Ranger, but I'm sure that most DM's [outside of possibly AL] would be okay with allowing the Ranger to use it on others; or even using Seeming on them to have the undead look like cows, sheep, trees, etc, or possibly Hallucinatory Terrain to have them look like stuff other then undead. Horde of Baddies wonder through and "BOOM".

[@Altyrell]

A good example of using the Undead as "Bomb Carriers" would be from Critical Role's 1st Campaign & Chris Hardwick's Character "Gern Blanston", a blue Dragonborn Necromancer. Gern claimed to be a simple candlemaker, who makes enchanted candles with different effects. Some simply produce light, while others "create tragedy for people". Examples of his "Candles" Icestorm Candle: Contains the shards of a White Dragon scale. Action, the bearer can crack it in half, destroying the candle & engulfing everything in 10' in freezing cold. Dex ST (DC 12), pass for 1/2. 4d6 Cold Damage Thunder Candle: Contains the muscle tissue of a Cloud Giant. Action, everything within 15' must pass a Str ST (DC 12) or be knocked prone. Blink Candle: Contains concentrated extract of blink dog brain matter. Action, everything within 10' must pass a Dex ST (DC 12) or be teleported 30' in a random direction. Flash Candle: Contains the dust of willow wisps. Action, everything within 15' must pass a Con ST (DC 12) or be blinded until the end of their next turn.

[@cj-tv8kc]

Magnificent mansion + gate. Not only will you be able to rest after summoning all of your minions, if you cast this within say a tavern and at the end everything gets jettisoned out... you wouldn't even have to be there for it. A veritable death bomb in a major metropolitan area.

[@Suthek]

"You've raised an army of Undead. Now what?" Sweatshops!

[@jeffreyanderson667]

Remember the Zombie Master from the Xanth novels? It would be a great template for a non-evil necromancer.

[@Words-er5ez]

We had a level 1 ritual (1 hour long per HD of the mob) to preserve a body so if a player dies you can preserve the corpse then take them back to town and get them rezed but the Necromancer can also use it to keep a corpse fresh locking it into a human-like appearance when you reanimate it. We also had a rule where you can waste a healing potion on a corpse to restore the corpse to life-like status but you have to use a potion or healing spell for every 24 hours they have been dead. The goal of the rule was to make fresh corpses more valuable than old ones.

[@the_metamancer]

I’d make my own cave with mold earth cantrip to store the hordes. At the high end of the spectrum: Demiplane

[@Soriichi]

You actually made this video before and I still remember some of the good tips. You can put them into a pocket dimension through dimensional door or you can dress them in armor to disguise them.

[@robertbogan225]

Id atleast give them some gear. Skeletons are so weak. At least crossbows or longbows.

[@Soriichi]

@@robertbogan225 they would be too incompetent to fire them. I recommend you give them nasty rusted swords, or poisoned blades and just have them flail away at enemies, or have them desperately grab at assailants to hinder them. Weak servants like that are only good as distractions.

[@neighborlyfiend1484]

I cast seeming on my undead horde, making them appear as townsfolk. then send them into town to spread out and mingle with the crowds. I walk to the town square and call out the evil town mayor. As soon as he and his henchmen come out, my horde has them surrounded. I am now the town mayor.

[@GallowglassAxe]

I've never played a necromancer but I would certainly take the mold earth cantrip at first level. You can unbury fresh bodies to resurrect and later rebury them when you need them to hide. Makes for a thematic ambush when the enemies moves in and then suddenly being surrounded by zombies and skeletons climbing out of the ground.

[@Ryan_Silver_Fang]

A Necromancer in my dnd game had a massive army (Wish scroll all summon/controll permanent at cost of all offensive/Defense/Healing magic) He would use his pernament spells for his army + creation + Fabrication + selling Creation stuff for more common armor etc He would then use a embold of his Noble house (yes they chose that background) to disguise them as just normal Knight bodyguards while explaining that they were very loyal and focused on their Young Masters Safety while silently commanding them to Nod. Plus he loved skeleton based undead far more than Zombie so the smell didn't bother him much. This got even better at around lvl 16 where he made Wights who where intelligent enough to talk albeit a bit muffled due to the helmet

[@nickm9102]

Dress them in simmilar hooded cloaks and clothing they are now a "living" army. Though I do like the idea of putting a portable hole on a wall and watching Skeletons step out like Battle droids from a drop ship. When the town complains about there presents remind them that the dead fight so thr living can go on living.

[@JesseNightingale]

If I may shout out someone All things dnd has a few videos telling the story of a very clever Necromancer called Astoshan the grey Necromancer. Id highly suggest watching those videos because the way he hides his undead is cool and his story is just very cool in general Id put a link to the playlist but I hear if you put links in a comment it gets tagged as spam.

[@Nerdarchy]

Not always but a lot of times they do. Not sure how it works. Nerdarchist Dave

[@melvixen1943]

To borrow an idea from bay12Games Dwarf Fortress: Use the undead for menial labour/Zombie industrial complex. Depending on they intelligence you can have them build towers, Mine ores etc. if they are Stupid you always could have them plow fields, turn wheels etc. By dangling chickens in front of them. Undead creatures do not need to be people though. Creatures work well too. In my own campaign i have a Homebrewed a version of the Find steed spell that is a level lower but needs a corpse. A few undead but controlled horses could always pull wagons that are filled with uncontroled Zombies. If you need control ummm Geas some vamps to do it for you.

[@Spiceodog]

a high level adventuring party is looking to hire some lower level adventurers to help them out party leader: " next!" a young necromancer walks in party leader: " so why do you want to become a necromancer?" necromancer: " you know, someday I just want to settle down and raise a family" party leader: .........I don't think that means what you think that means........ necromancer : soooooooo, anyway, before I do that, Im going to need to* make a living*

[@yappingdog2759]

Capture a few kobolds, (if willing to work with you great. If not,well that's what animate dead is for.) Have the kobolds dig tunnels into the local graveyard and possibly natural cave systems for storage. Keep track of when someone dies and where they are buried, then send in the kobolds for some inconspicuous grave robbing from below. You can slowly, and more importantly, quietly rise a army with a renewable source of corpses. And you can use said army to protect your investment by finding and purging bandit camps. Which serves to both supplement your forces, and give another place to keep them, if they have a wall.

[@patrickhandley627]

Demi plains are good skeleton storage but I’m thinking you just have a chest that they occupy when you’re traveling, like in a small cart or wagon. Or on tensors disc and when you need them they pop out and suddenly you have reinforcements. Or you glue a portable hole to your cloak and they pop out as needed or fire cross bows from under your arms.

[@peterterry7918]

I have always wanted a non evil necromancer who would work on diseased corpses by first talking with them about their symptoms and then dissections and then write up medical text books and get money from residuals and lecture fees.

[@SmEiF-]

doing a good necro build now,, dr frankenstein basically but im a high elf who hate all elfs so i only turn elfs or evil people of all other races into my undead army. elfs good or bad can get these hands tho. my name is Biir in my peoples name they hate me as much as i hate them.

[@22thevoice22]

0:47 say what?

[@nevyns9285]

Necromancer is one of my favorite archetypes. In 5e though I have no urge to play one using existing rules/spells. Biggest issue is that, like summoning, you require many to be effective. In 3rd I had a skeleton companion (UA) and would walk around with 1 or 2 big undead, like having a bulette or hydra skeleton. In 5e you get a ton of cr1/4 creatures that bog down the game and are a hassel.

[@DForSpiD]

I got away with sending a zombie army ahead through small towns then charging the townsfolk to drive them out for a while, until a pesky holy order started investigating. Had to stick to lakes and caves for a while after that

[@00784865]

Open up a rental service, private army,..the posibilities are endless.

[@martinpat94]

Well I think it depends on the setting cause in Eberron there is basically a country of undead so there wouldn’t be any issue. Still though maybe gather of them in one location and before a big fight open maybe a portal to that place and boom instant army

[@robertvlacich9934]

Conversation between my character and our paladin of Tyr. John "The Whistler" Takrov- Cast Animate dead. John "The Whistler" Takrov-"Hey, mother always said to make new friends." Paladin-......... That was definitely taken out of context. John- .......Really?(Confused look) Best roleplay sequence I've had the pleasure of being apart of. LOL

[@Words-er5ez]

Undead can dig tirelessly so usually when I head into town I just order them to dig a cave in the side of a hill or a tunnel underground then hide the entrance.

[@michaelball2529]

The way I got the around time keeping is simulacrum. This way I could send them away on much longer missions that lasted longer than a day and maintain more than one army if I wanted to.

[@jessecalliham6974]

I travel around as an undead circus.

[@ErokowXiyze]

You guys have your 'go to spells for each class'. Can you start 'Go to magic items for each class'?

[@robertbogan225]

YESSSS

[@Nerdarchy]

Putting it on the list. Nerdarchist Dave

[@mrjames6222]

@Nerdarchy have you guys ever touched on the finger of death skill that puts humanoid creatures killed by it permanently under your control with no need to reassert dominance and the role playing that can come out of that? i mean they would still be considered evil and the populace would still hate you for committing this atrocity, but it would be a small army you could use for actual good (or evil) without the worry that they would turn on you without outside intervention.

[@Nerdarchy]

We've definitely mentioned it in past videos. It hasn't been a topic of a video though. Nerdarchist Dave

[@freman007]

Be a Gnome Necromancer. Everyone thinks that gnomes are cute.

[@snowness110]

I once told the DM that we are the traveling bodies expo and I rolled high enough to convince the town guards. It became a great source of income.

[@bar0nger]

Never go in against a necromancer when death is in the line.

[@jonathanmorphew6786]

Inconceivable

[@iridadene4344]

Depending on the edition(I primarily enjoy 3.5 of d&d), would be necromancers have been figuring out ways to 'cheese the system', so to speak. Between becoming the sole 'host' of an undead spawn ability by polymorph, gaining control of the dead through supernatural/spell like means like Mother Cyst, leading (sentient) undead with undead leadership, and what not in order to preserve spell slots for themselves. A very valid point is that Necromancers sort of have a vibe that they can't be killed without dealing with their armies first, since in killing the necromancer(As unlikely as that is) just unleashes a plague unrestrained upon the world. Congratulations, you may of assassinated the necromancer in the center of his army, but now the army of far less tactically caring (read as: I can't make humans reproduce if they're dead, vs I just want all the wraiths that can be made NOW) mass of pure evil has gained its own free will again. This means all sentient undead that were bound to the necromancer are likely going to try and do either the lawful evil thing and take advantage of the situation to form several dozen new cults and cabals, or the chaotic evil thing and wreak havoc to the local country side uncaring for the collateral damage. Meanwhile all the non-sentient undead just starts swinging wildly out the gate at whatever is a living creature in line of sight, or wandering blindly until they find one. Should a Necromancer reach the state of being able to become a lich or, worse, a demi-lich even bringing the necromancer down won't do the trick other than freeing it up to raise a new army while its old one wrecks havoc again. This gets significantly worse as you realize that in the event of the demilich, you need to hunt down an absurd amount of phylacteries that it can replace depending on how much money it has lying around as well. Necromancy of course, tends to be expensive without finding cheesy solutions(such as being the Spawn trait progenitor of an undead, or acquiring create undead/create greater undead as a spell like either through classes, templates, or perma-items), and maximizing the benefits of raising said undead to make them worth their cost(For 3.5, Corpse Crafting tree line, Necromancer specialist wizards, Dread necromancers, raising them on desecrated grounds, filling their armor with black sand(negative energy sand), come to mind, alongside the costly xp component of Spell Stitching, and other templates for undead like Evolved Undead), and even with costs in mind, very few necromancers can really start 'raising the dead' rather than just controlling them or summoning them till at a point where most people would be local heroes at the minimum (around 7-9 when the average peasant is 1, knight 2, and Famous legend throughout the country typically being level 12). So being a 'necromancer' is a difficult process to begin with. There are a few shortcuts, at least for 3.0/3.5, such as the whistle carved from a tree that made plant-zombie things in Sunless Citadel, but items made for a necromancer specifically tend to be far and few in between without homebrew due to the game not really being built around the player having a ton of minions(Despite Leadership), as no one really expected anyone but the BBEG of a DM's campaign to be able to pull half the stuff they actually allow. Be it for ethnic choices(Despite Dread Necromancers being able to be Lawful neutral/good in some cases), or that there is little enough material on hand for them they might as well be d&d's other long suffering lack of items class, the Bard(which really has like, 5 items, and a set of magical instruments that the majority of which, are only useful outside of combat, such as the lyre of building being a broken thing when your realize how many peasants worth of work its actually getting done, or the lyre of healing (probably the best bardic instrument in the game of 3.5 for combat 9.5 times out of 10, being a really cheap item). This lack of magical item variety means the Dm can only give Onyx to the Necromancer, as well as can't use necromancy themselves without flooding said necromancer with related items over and over. Since any clever tricks they come up with for their own necromancer will likely be exploited by a player one as well. I do not mean to 'devalue' a necromancer player here, on the contrary I ADORE having a legion of the damned, but the logistical issues start to become a major problem when you start to collect a menagerie, suddenly you have to go from managing 1-4 characters (Considering summoned monster a 'normal pick spell' to managing anywhere between 3(considering normal unaltered wizard keeping two max hd pets with no items to boost control cap) to (At 20th level Dread Necromancer, if you're an insane psychopath for spread sheets, with good gear) several thousand individual undead.(even with standard stat blocks, you have to keep track of the individual races and likely class differences between who you take, since an elf warrior zombie is gonna have different stats than a human monk zombie). The Paperwork of keeping all this in check for a gm, as not to burden your gm with this, is something that should be asked for consent beforehand, and I certainly request any necromancer worth their salt to keep a simple hand out of what gets provided to the undead that they raise in both a shorthand version (just raw +'s to whats) and a source originator copy(Separating things like Desecrated grounds, Feats, Class features, etc.).

[@iridadene4344]

(part two) As for actually playing a one man-army collector, I would also recommend a few additional things to any would be aspiring necromancers to make their lives easier. -Binds: Binding outsiders with deals, subsuming control over sentient undead with spawn creation abilities(as a lich, turning into a vampire lord, or shadow can grant you free control over the undead you create through their spawn ability even when you shift back with no maintain or Gold cost by polymorph), feats like undead leadership(cohorts are useful as heck), and constructs(not built by you, but paid for the building of by others in your employ) can beef up your army with spy masters(Succubai and Incubai are excellent at this), heavy hitters (See a cleric, wizard, or sorcerer, or even another necromancer fight an iron golem, it'll be hilarious 9 times out of 10), and make your life significantly easier with control capacities (If you lead an army of necromancers, your own spell slots can be freed up with a chain of command. Albeit this makes your army slowly lose cohesion if your 'squad leaders' start to get targetted with the release of their commanded undead) -Freebies: Mother Cyst is a decent substitute at levels of play when you're not an undead yourself, as people killed and turned into necrotic cyst undeads stay under your control forever through the spell involved, but otherwise Spawn abilities of undead is far more useful for this. -Unusual creation methods: Two such easy methods of undead procreation exist. The First, more readily known as 'I handed a commoner a stick, and they died and became a wraith' is to have a quiver of unholy arrows(that bestow negative levels to non-evil creatures when held/carried), those who die by level loss tend to rise up as an uncontrolled wraith a few days later. This tactic can also be repeated with the infamous metamagic chain known as 'Locate City Bomb' which most people know for throwing everyone in a city violently OUT of said city, but can also be used to apply Fell Drain (2 levels of level loss) and turn an entire city commoner and guard population with the exception of the elite of the elite into an undead army if the clerics are not quick enough/strong enough to both survive and bless the entire city. Another Unusual creation methods is a method is the use of magical eugenics on willing or captive subjects. By keeping a creature polymorphed into another race that can breed, (such as a troll), and... Well. breeding them, you can create a normal member of that species, Raise them, kill them, and re-raise them and you have a genetically perfect brood of undead bound and raised to your service, heck do it right and they might think its 'honorable to die for you' (The king of the dead in A Practical Guide To Evil did this for his constantly growing undead army). -Deal with Clerics: be it getting them converted religiously or by force, or killing them off, have a team specifically tailored to say 'buzz off divine powers' and prevent the destruction of your armies wholesale by using non-undead and non-outsider forces(Since banishment and turning are pains to deal with with religious folk), for this I recommend either turning to an evil druid companion, or an artificer who actually knows how to properly hordefice without level loss(Hint: Ambrosia/Liquid Pain generators), and constructing a zone eitiher specifically tailored to rip out their advantages (Flooding a room with water in an anti-magic sealed chamber of magically repairing (just outside the radius of said anti-magic fields) walls/floors/roofs for an example), or finding ways to get the god themselves to call off crusades against you(Be it divine blackmail, or ownership of a world ending device that you can use before anyone can stop you. You are a BBEG player, after all). My favorite task force example was a group of trolls that a necromancer had raised since birth to be barbarians of the frenzy beserking type that he would just sit and laugh as regeneration would revive them long after the battle had ended after their brutal 'death' murdering entire holy hit squads by themselves. While fire and acid are effective weapons, trying to kill a barbarian with 1d6 fire/acid damage with the rest beign converted to non-lethal is a hillariously sad state of affairs for most churches. By keeping them living, as well, it also had the unintentional effect of turning any vows of pacifism oriented holy clergy members into useless healers who can only either heal people who didn't have the vow, or die. -Leadership and supply are your greatest allies: Making a giant undead army requires supplies, and unless you're willing to keep all your undead in the basic bandit/civilian gear, getting undead kitted out is a must. Some things to consider are the lyre of building for building lairs, digging mine shafts, and forming fortifications during war in a rush, as well as that your undead population is TIRELESS. Meaning you could have thousands of mindless undead doing manual labor, like tilling/farming fields, mining, constructing(with sentient supervision/instruction), and the like of hunting, etc. Leadership provides a supply of skilled craftsmen then, that can do all the 'skilled work' then in your stead, be it as a necromancer lieutanant or as a level 2 blacksmithing focused experts crafting some basic arms/armor for your legion of the damned. All In All, Necromancy can just be a simulator in kingdom/army building, logistics(albeit simpler than living armies food/water supply trains)... Or as simple as the bodyguard and mount you ride being oddly quiet for such a massive warrior/fine beast.

[@vechcron]

I loved the device called The Hold of Holding these held Space Tons worth of undead all u need is a door to place the device

[@smutsmat]

I replaced an entire city we decimated in an evil campaign with undead. Then we did permanent illusion spells on them to look human as they wandered around.

[@slothfulslime5066]

I wonder what would a bag of devouring do to undead if they were to be placed within it?

[@donald9377]

This was back in 3.5 when i played a necromancer. This was a high level game and with gm permission. To limit the amount of undead paperwork on my end i limit my self to 1 powerful undead only. Through template's and spells i resurrect a dragon skeleton as a minion using all of my hit die to ave a tough minion beside for utility minion through spell use. During the day i use spells to make it appear as sentient dragon and pretend to be a dragon rider. Most gm's i seen if undead minion allow they allow a few only for mechanical use in game and the other as background minion's .

[@FrozenHawkHunter]

Just a follow up question. Does magic work on normal insects?

[@patchclient3861]

I'm currently playing a necromancer and fortunately I was able get myself a portable hole though it can only fit 12 undead.

[@johnpayne5590]

To disguise an undead army if they are zombies cover their rotten corpses in a weak ice spell to slow down decomposition and stop the smell and then put them in armor Also you could ask your dm to get a magic item or spell that constantly retakes the undead

[@ccarter1988]

Does anyone know where they have calculated how many skeletons you can keep in a bag of holding already animated?

[@Felinius]

Tired of being a necromancer? Don’t you like making friends?

[@floweroflifecollective1247]

Seeming spell is good for disguising your skeleton army. Bags of holding and Secret Chest to store the bones.

[@adromea5628]

Also, if you don't care about keeping control you can just stuff all of them into a bag of holding or two if your dm is cool

[@storyspren]

Just because undead are evil, I wouldn't call making them an evil deed. A risky one, certainly, but not evil. It would only be evil if the act would necessarily lead to evil things being unleashed, and with creating undead it's not a certainty, just a possibility. So it's not evil per se, but it is VERY risky. If you plan to do evil things with them or plan to just release them, then yeah that's evil as hell (heh).

[@Fektthis]

the risk affects other people. the act is thus selfish and evil. don't see how a necromancer can get away with being a good alignment. neutral at best.

[@storyspren]

@@Fektthis Anyone singularly raising an undead with no measures in place to keep it contained is certainly selfish, but risks can be mitigated, like if there are systematic controls in place to make undead breaking out a rarer occurrence than, say, car crashes in our world. And sometimes the good of the ends might outweigh the risks from the means, like if it's done to fight a greater evil or if it's a last-ditch effort to carry out a good deed.

[@goose6752]

The creation of undead is a desecration of burial rites, whether that's natural decay or funereal ceremony and interment. The primary reason for creating undead is to have a slave labor force / army. Desecration and slavery are both inarguably evil. Even if you manage to circumvent these hurdles, i.e. in the subjects religion being raised undead is the proper funereal rite, then your acting as the tool of an otherworldly entity who has decreed the creation of an inherently evil slave labor force / army. Additionally, during the creation process, your wielding necromancy, the power of pure evil. To believe that you can channel the power of evil and not be changed by it is the height of hubris. Doing good deeds does not undo or balance the doing of bad deeds (making babies doesn't justify murder). The reasons a necromancer might do good deeds are either as a sop to whatever vestiges of conscious they might still have, or more likely follow the sociopaths reasonings of trying to convince other people that they're not really evil.

[@karpmageddon4155]

@@goose6752 You are assuming a fair bit to define a necromancers evil. Also necromancy magic isn't by default evil, otherwise divine classes would be considered evil since they employ those kind of spells as frequent (if not more so) as necromancers.

[@goose6752]

@@karpmageddon4155 They're extrapolations more so than assumptions. Those aside though, what it all eventually comes down to is sophistry. It is a failing of human beings that we all lie to ourselves because we don't want to think of ourselves as bad people (its ok to torture suspected terrorists because it'll save american lives, if evil walks free because I used a loop hole to keep a criminal out of prison its not my fault I was just doing my job, It ok that I cut in line at the grocery store because I've got somewhere important to be and I'm running late). Necromancy is patently, obviously evil for a plethora of reasons. Anyone making up excuses to claim otherwise, is making up excuses otherwise. They want the mechanical advantages (undead slaves, good damage at a good range that targets a typically poor stat for saves (toll the dead), etc.) so badly that they will make up reasons why its ok for them to delve into dark and evil magics. Or because edge lords are cool; anti - heroes who do evil things to to proactively evil people and perhaps some good will come of it, but they themselves aren't good (the punisher is not a good person).

[@shaundenehy4681]

Bags of holding are 2 feet wide and 4 feet deep, so are the skeletons in peices?

[@thevoidcritter]

...this is why I made necromancy legal (and culturally tolerated) in my homebrew setting. It's still taboo to dig up a grave and rob it of its corpse, but people donate their bodies to necromancy all the time. Also, in the campaign I'm a player in, my necromancer cleric was raised by the necromancy church and had a skeleton babysitter, apparently.

[@adriandread3484]

Gaes on a couple wights (or any other creature) at 7-9th level works wonders

[@CryptkeyprVT]

I use mine to promote my clothing line and act as runway models. Best part is they don't give me any lip.

[@mattrickard3716]

also require less laxatives and cocaine than real runway models👍

[@siegfried1422]

As far as controlling an undead army goes, sometimes it's more of a "I have this spell for free, and I have this class feature. I might as well use them."

[@ACarpenter89]

If you sell merch that space hoodie with the nerdarchy logo would be sweet

[@Nerdarchy]

We do link on the about page as well as on our website. Nerdarchist Dave

[@ACarpenter89]

@@Nerdarchy thanks

[@johannesdolch]

Pitchforks? "That's discrimination against the otherwise animated."

[@shaynecarter-murray3127]

I've handled it in a few ways. I offer improved skellies/zombies to reduce the size of the horse and make them turn resistant. A lot of skellies can fit into a bag of holding. Illusions to conceal the undead. And my primary homebrew world has a neutral necro kingdom so controlled undead are not super rare and don't automatically draw hostility in allied kingdoms.

[@shaynecarter-murray3127]

Also a cart full of crates. Skellies fit in crates and dont stink. Clothes with lots of padding.

[@DayLightNinja]

Necro/Bard hybrid, one "man" traveling show. I would have them entertain the commoners as I went about my business in the town/village/city. Disguised in masks like a circus 🎪 or theater show 🤔 Any thoughts? I know this is a year old but still lol.

[@brickencounter3352]

I recently discovered Nerdarchy for myself and I must say that I love this channel. Along with the content, I equally enjoy the theme song cues. I see in the description that the artist is Zero Flux, but the song isn't listed. Anyone know the exact song before I start diving into each song?

[@crabshroom4121]

I once had a player in a campaign who was a LG Necromancer, he had a permit from the king to raise the worst villains in the area as undead so that they may pay back some of their debt to society.

[@larvenkarlsson440]

So. My pastor is a necromancer who reassert dominance every week?!

[@kittn831]

Now, i want to see a pub ran by a necromancer and the servers be zombies. The town accepts them because..plot. i played a necromancer that only reanimated animals. Mostly because we were on a boat with a seasick wererat that was deadly afraid of water. So to stop him from killing all the chickens, i would just reanimate the ones whose necks he had already broke. Good campaign. That poor Paladin.

[@jimwolford7294]

Instead of Gate, you could use Demiplane.

[@northeastoperations]

I love the idea of working out the logistics dealing with hiding the undead army. As a necro, I would dress like a farmer and have several carts full of soil and flowers. The soil would conceal the minions and the flowers ans fertilizer would disguise the smell. Just need a couple ponies to pull the carts.

[@nickte2609]

Is demiplane a bad option to hide your undead?

[@FloppeyPyro]

Do you think you guys could do a really niche video to possibly help someone like me out? I wanted to do a "Heratic Healer," meaning a warlock/cleric who kills with spells to heal with spells

[@priestly8164]

With Tasha's rules on customizing magic, you can make the zombies and skeletons into basically whatever you want to look like. Want clowns? You got clowns. You want a bunch of poorly made ghost costume? You can do that. You want an army of twisted horrors and nightmares that the world has never seen before? You can do that.