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OldTrees
2009-10-16, 10:13 PM
3.x (Almost any WOTC sources allowed. If I do not have the book[I have too many to list] then I would need an internet source or a detailed enough summery)

I am playing a "Deathless"(actually undead but with high bluff and knowledge religion ...) Dread Necromancer.
(the build is a little complicated[with some DM changes] if anyone asks I will post it)

I am planning on buying some land from a kingdom in order to start my own kingdom.

Resources:
I have spread a rumor of unique bred of Deathless the are indistinguishable from undead that I hope will grow into a solid cover story.
Undead Army that steadily grows. (DM allows me to use Thrallherd with Thrallherd thralls to increase the number of 1-5th level followers at the cost of the 6th level followers and cohorts being of screen thrallherds) At 20th level the army is roughly estimated to be around 160K HD or 80K Flying Zombies (I have special tiny fast zombies with reach weapons)
Undead carved passageways provide free building but require direction.
At 11th level I can scry at will anywhere in my kingdom.
Private Demiplane as a escape route.
I have feats at 3rd,12th,15th and 18th open

Questions:
How can I convincing people to emigrate?
How can I protect this country?
What measures should I take to prevent a Hero slaying me?(I already know about the Evil Overlord's list but probably don't have the power to take all its advice. Citing specifics #s would be useful)
What feats might help me?
What other questions should I be asking?

ocdscale
2009-10-16, 10:27 PM
Depends on the economy and all, but you could always just lend land to peasants in return for a share of their crop. I imagine there's always an underclass who'd be interested in something like that.
Once you have a foundation of farmers, shopkeepers and the like will move in, and the economy will develop further and further.

Crafty Cultist
2009-10-16, 10:34 PM
Your main challenge will be to show that the benifits of living in your fledgling empire outweigh the negative connotations associated with undead. a good strategy would be offering refuge to those who have lost their home to war or poverty. a benevolent necromancer could allow undead workers to be allotted to farmers and the like, increasing productivity. By the time the knights in shining armour come charging in, the commoners will be willing to protect their new undead-freindly lifestyle.

for the long term, make nercomancers the elite of your society. if a child shows talent in the undead arts, they are given formal training to make them skilled necromancers. create a formal exam to qualify as an official necromancer. make official necromancers akin to knights; the protectors of the people. if necromantic skill is considered a blessing, a necromantic ruler is a lot less suspicious

Sir_Elderberry
2009-10-16, 10:44 PM
Depends on the economy and all, but you could always just lend land to peasants in return for a share of their crop. I imagine there's always an underclass who'd be interested in something like that.
Once you have a foundation of farmers, shopkeepers and the like will move in, and the economy will develop further and further.
If I remember correctly, medieval feudalism was like "I have land. You can work on it if you want, and if you work it, you can keep some of the stuff for yourself, and I'll lend you knights to protect you. You'll still be dirt-poor, though."

Best bet? Learn about the neighboring kingdoms, find out their socio-economic structure...and outbid them.

OldTrees
2009-10-16, 10:46 PM
Thank you for the advise.
The lending undead as free labor to farmers and the necros as knights of the realm are great ideas.

Myrmex
2009-10-16, 10:49 PM
Do you have allodial title, or did you just buy the rights to have peasants work the land?

OldTrees
2009-10-16, 10:54 PM
Allodial title (I think). It is land explicitly traded from an older country to make a new country.

Crafty Cultist
2009-10-17, 12:07 AM
Thank you for the advise.
The lending undead as free labor to farmers and the necros as knights of the realm are great ideas.
glad to help. when they peasantry form a mob because a paladin destroyed a zombie, you know you've won their loyalty:smallamused:

gallagher
2009-10-17, 12:20 AM
3.x (Almost any WOTC sources allowed. If I do not have the book[I have too many to list] then I would need an internet source or a detailed enough summery)

I am playing a "Deathless"(actually undead but with high bluff and knowledge religion ...) Dread Necromancer.
(the build is a little complicated[with some DM changes] if anyone asks I will post it)

I am planning on buying some land from a kingdom in order to start my own kingdom.

Resources:
I have spread a rumor of unique bred of Deathless the are indistinguishable from undead that I hope will grow into a solid cover story.
Undead Army that steadily grows. (DM allows me to use Thrallherd with Thrallherd thralls to increase the number of 1-5th level followers at the cost of the 6th level followers and cohorts being of screen thrallherds) At 20th level the army is roughly estimated to be around 160K HD or 80K Flying Zombies (I have special tiny fast zombies with reach weapons)
Undead carved passageways provide free building but require direction.
At 11th level I can scry at will anywhere in my kingdom.
Private Demiplane as a escape route.
I have feats at 3rd,12th,15th and 18th open

Questions:
How can I convincing people to emigrate?
How can I protect this country?
What measures should I take to prevent a Hero slaying me?(I already know about the Evil Overlord's list but probably don't have the power to take all its advice. Citing specifics #s would be useful)
What feats might help me?
What other questions should I be asking?


for questions about your character build, like feats and the suchlike, i suggest libris mortis. there are also feats in there that will allow you personally to use undead traits, and also that will allow trained knight necromancers who take those feats to use them, too.

OldTrees
2009-10-17, 12:28 AM
I looked through Librus Mortis as well as Heroes of Horror and the Tome of Necromancy. However the army enhancing feats (corpse crafter) can be taken by a minion and then coop spelled. So I am at a loss as to what feats would benefit me since I already have both leaderships. I suppose improved cohort is worth it at 12th.

The knights are already stated out.

I do not know what precautions (or feats) I should take to stop meddlesome "good" adventurers.

AirTony7
2009-10-17, 12:59 AM
I looked through Librus Mortis as well as Heroes of Horror and the Tome of Necromancy. However the army enhancing feats (corpse crafter) can be taken by a minion and then coop spelled. So I am at a loss as to what feats would benefit me since I already have both leaderships. I suppose improved cohort is worth it at 12th.

The knights are already stated out.

I do not know what precautions (or feats) I should take to stop meddlesome "good" adventurers.

A precaution to protect your precious undead from meddlesome good clerics and other "good" adventurers would be to Unhallow as much area in your country as you possibly can. The castings will be costly but the benefit should boost your undead, and u can attach some other spells to it to help the general populous which will make them more likely to take up arms to protect the land.

bosssmiley
2009-10-17, 10:21 AM
First off, you don't *buy* land in a typical D&D-verse. There is usually a frontier/wilderness area that needs law brought to it, Wild West-style. You go there, kick out/conquer/over-awe the locals with your tame army and/or magical might, set yourself up as local potentate, and reach out the hand of friendship to surrounding big-wigs.

Sometimes it might be worth making yourself vassal of a larger kingdom (they recognise you as rightful ruler in return for homage and bribes). Other times you might want to remain an independent kinglet in glorious isolation.


How can I convincing people to emigrate?

Rule of law (no arbitrary judgements, expropriations or killings)
Generous tax breaks/homesteading laws for settlers
Secure land tenure
Low and simple taxes
Active protection of your tax-base against incursions by Team Monster


How can I protect this country?

What was that about a high-level Dread Necromancer and an army of undead again? :smallwink:


What measures should I take to prevent a Hero slaying me? (I already know about the Evil Overlord's list but probably don't have the power to take all its advice. Citing specifics #s would be useful)

A despot is not a despot if the people actually support him against any would-be liberators who come along.

Be more use to your people alive than you would be dead.
Be the guarantee of stability in your realm.
Be respected rather than loved or feared.

Machiavelli (literally) wrote the book on this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Prince)


What feats might help me?

By this point in play what's on your character sheet will be largely irrelevant to your position as ruler. You will be able to hire in all the help you'll ever need (court wizards, spymasters, mercenary generals, etc.) from tax revenues, or through negotiated deals with your neighbours. You did remember to stay on good terms with the neighbours, right? :smallwink:


What other questions should I be asking?

"What is this Birthright setting I keep hearing about anyway?"
"How much delicious necromantic goodness relevant to my interests is there in the Tome of Necromancy (http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=34248)?"

Gamerlord
2009-10-17, 10:51 AM
Maybe "accidentally" have a few undead burn down nearby towns, the refugees will flee to your land, create a story about a evil necromancer using undead as bandits, kill anyone who attempts to flee in a direction opposite of your town using these "Bandit undead".

Have them serve you in exchange for land and undead workers to assist and protect their new farms.

Jayabalard
2009-10-17, 10:57 AM
I am planning on buying some land from a kingdom in order to start my own kingdom. Generally that doesn't work; kingdoms shouldn't be willing it sell you land free and clear. They might be willing to sell you the land as long as you were becoming a vassal of the king.

Yahzi
2009-10-17, 11:20 AM
Generally that doesn't work; kingdoms shouldn't be willing it sell you land free and clear. They might be willing to sell you the land as long as you were becoming a vassal of the king.
To quote a famous author: "Land is the foundation of the State."

No one will sell you land. You have to take it by force, discover new land (and take it by force from whoever's there), or become a feudal vassal.

You might find some useful numbers in my Worldbook and Ye Olde Shoppe (see my sig). Basically, at least 3/4 of your people are dirt poor farmers. They usually work as share-croppers, meaning they farm the land and the landlord takes half of the crop. If you do this, then you can afford to feed the rest of your society, which means they can do things other than grow food (like mine, build, and craft). Keep in mind they will spend at least half of their time making stuff for farming.

If you don't share-crop, then your peasants will have a better life. They will have food left over to invest in animals, and spend more time doing things other than farming. However, this reduces the excess, which reduces the number of people who can be full-time non-farmers. Viking society was 95% agricultural.

As a landlord, you have control over tons and tons of food. All you can do with this is trade it to townsmen for crafts. You might be able to trade a tiny fraction of that craft output to somebody else for gold.

The political aspects are much less important than they were in RL. You have class levels, everybody knows it, nobody is going to be having "peasant revolts" (which were pretty rare in history anyway). Your only danger are your neighbors.

Triaxx
2009-10-17, 11:34 AM
Why spend money to buy land when it's easier to work your way through the ranks and become the chosen heir.

Now as to the rest, first you want a standing army, with a special, Dreadwatch detachment. Use those as a border guard, which is a boring position for a human sentry, but a mindless undead skeleton won't get bored. Use more powerful undead as a backing force for your human army. Remind them that even the dead of the land itself fight with them to protect their homeland.

Then provoke the neighbors into fighting and use it as an excuse to conquer. Remember to kick someone into a pit every so often.

OldTrees
2009-10-17, 12:12 PM
Thank you everyone for the advise so far.

To summarize the advice along with my DMs responses to prior questions:
There is a down on its luck country that is willing to sell a small portion of land to me.
If I offer lower taxes/tax breaks along with free zombie labor and protection then I can get people to emigrate.
If I am a benevolent leader then the populace won't attack me.
If I make necromancers the knights of the realm then I will get a steady supply of necromancers every generation and the populace will defend the undead.
I will be buying the territory at level 10 with a pitiful army of 150 2HD Flying Tiny Fast Zombies with 5ft reach and 28 regular 1HD Skeletons
Use undead as border guards when army is big enough.

So my major concern is at level 10 when I am starting up the nation how do I defend it against a standing army (one nation hates undead). As my army will grow exponentially from 150 at 10th to ~80K at 19th. Once my army is big enough I will have no problem.

My second concern is the self righteous Paladins and other "good" aligned adventurers from neighboring countries of decent strength attempting to assassinate me.

What precautions can I take against these threats

Gamerlord
2009-10-17, 12:24 PM
For one, it is not just undeadist and paladins you have to deal with, bandits, orcs, and kobolds will be the least of your worries, what you really need to worry about is DRAGONS!

Triaxx
2009-10-17, 12:26 PM
As soon as you buy the land, set the the skeletons to digging a moat around the kingdom. As you level up you'll be able to set more minions to work on it. Tap into a natural river and on the inside run irrigation from the moat. Not only will this increase the productivity of the farms, but will make it harder for any adventurers to get in without being seen since they'll have to cross the moat. As soon as you can, offer alliance with the kingdom selling you the land, and now you have an ally against the undead haters. Don't be afraid to offer sanctuary to other races as well. Orcs or giants looking for a homeland are always welcome provided they respect the rules, which is don't kill any of my peasants or those of my allies. Adventurers that aren't your party are fair game though. Also stops banditry as well.

Now also start a necromancer's school and begin training the first groups yourself. This way when the adventurer's arrive you have considerable support. One necromancer isn't much to deal with, but six or seven? Even if most of them are just newbies, is a lot for one paladin or party to handle. And if nothing else, the summons exhaust his Turn Undead and Holy Smite abilities. Don't forget to Unhallow certain choke points within your castle. Particularly around the entrances, and just outside your own chamber. Use illusions on human guards to make them look like zombies. Turn Undead doesn't work, and neither should Smite Evil, and that should seriously shake the Paladin's. Most other adventurer's won't be fazed.

LibraryOgre
2009-10-17, 12:29 PM
First of all, aside from yourself, are your undead mindless? While having mindless undead as workhorses isn't a flawless method of defense, it DOES provide you a measure of "I'm not perverting the natural order; I'm recycling."

You might also steal a line from the Dustmen of Planescape... offer people contracts on their bodies. "I'll give you 30gp now if, after death, you allow us to animate your corpse." It gives you a good supply of corpses, and makes you popular. I'd turn most of those folks into skeletons instead of zombies... most people get upset when their dead relatives are being used to plow fields.

I'd also look for religious sanction... find a religion that will support your use of corpses to further the needs of the living.

These things help to insulate you, socially, for those who are prejudiced against the undead.

SurlySeraph
2009-10-17, 12:30 PM
Maybe "accidentally" have a few undead burn down nearby towns, the refugees will flee to your land, create a story about a evil necromancer using undead as bandits, kill anyone who attempts to flee in a direction opposite of your town using these "Bandit undead".

Have them serve you in exchange for land and undead workers to assist and protect their new farms.

You've got good Bluff, so you could do this if you need people to emigrate. But make sure to set up an actual evil necromancer - perhaps one of your followers - as the fall guy, and kill him with overwhelming force to do justice for your people. You want to show that you will fight to protect them.

To protect against invasion before you have a huge army, try to make your citizens love you as much as possible as quickly as possible. If they've got peasants who detect as good throwing themselves at their feet begging them not to attack, many paladins will reconsider attacking. And if they've got peasant guerillas attacking them at night and armies of undead by day, they're going to have some problems.

To protect against assassination attempts, have a few intelligent undead bodyguards around you at all times; they don't need to sleep and won't get distracted. Ones with high Spot and Listen would be good. There's a spell called Animate Dread Warrior that lets you animate a skeleton that keeps all its class levels; do that on a few mid-level Rangers. Alternately, have your cohort be your bodyguard. There are numerous spells that you can have wizards cast to make assassinations more difficult; Anticipate Teleport, Prying Eyes, Explosive Runes, Symbol of (whatever), etc. are good.


I'd also look for religious sanction... find a religion that will support your use of corpses to further the needs of the living.

EDIT: The church of Wee Jas uses undead and is Lawful Neutral. Paladins aren't going to want to dispute with them too much.

loopy
2009-10-17, 12:38 PM
My second concern is the self righteous Paladins and other "good" aligned adventurers from neighboring countries of decent strength attempting to assassinate me.

What precautions can I take against these threats

The powers of diplomacy and political clout. Anyone violating state borders and attempting to assassinate officials can be tried and executed as a terrorist.

Interrogate the new criminals, find out the country or order they come from, then find their rivals and cause a stink. The rivals will see the benefits of championing your cause to further their own goals. Make a big enough stir, and the conflict will escalate far beyond your little country, and no one will remember you until... Holy crap, where did 80 000 skeletons come from?

Hurray for international politics. :smallsmile:

Kulture
2009-10-17, 12:41 PM
If you want to avoid the undead issue, use a hat of disguise to make yourself look less undead, or work via magic jar.

Also, you can use Magic Jar on neighbouring kingdom contingent leaders, sergeants or tacticians (anything with low level/will save) and wreack absolute havoc upon their country so all the commoners come scurrying over the border.

Kylarra
2009-10-17, 12:59 PM
Call yourself "Dr. Doom".

Crafty Cultist
2009-10-17, 01:02 PM
For the defense of your country, round up orcish tribes and "draft" them into service. in war, use the natural terrain to your advantage. skeletons and zombies have damage reduction against peircing wepons so in a ranged battle your soldiers will be at an advantage. use choke points and fight from the clifftops. the fact that every failed invasion adds to your army will make attacks less likely as time goes on

graymachine
2009-10-17, 01:22 PM
A couple of things:

For feat selection, I would take Eschew Materials. While not a strong feat mechanically, it could go a long way for your image; it seems reasonable to me that the feat would do away with the traditional disturbing clutter associated with necromancers. Insist that your Necromantic College teaches the feat to all 1st level students. Also, for expanding your vassals, see if you can take the Mastermind feat out of Orential Adventures. While it is 3.0, it is also a great way to represent vassals mechanically; the feat causing your cohort to take leadership when he reaches 6th level, then his cohort takes leadership at 6th level, and so on. The entry for the Emperor should have it; he's the only one in the setting that has it.

Also, don't forget that Tippy has taught us that Magic Fixes Everything Forever (tm). Look into constructing magical "traps" out of the DMG, which are very cheap and perminant, for spells such as Create Food and Water. Someone triggers the "trap", it creates food and water. It also has infinite charges. Look to all the spells that can be used to create infinite electrical and/or mechanical energy. Spam these things. It shouldn't take you long to create a paradise on earth. I'd recommend going through the PhB Spells section spell by spell and thinking over how each one can be exploited for infrastructure, political manipulation, or massed war.

If you are wanting to focus on the necromancy, then I would recommend the following policy: all citizens are entitled to free food, health care, etc. In exchange, when the citizen dies the state claims the body. The body is animated and added to the ever increasing undead workforce. It is this workforce that farms the land, labors to produce goods, etc. Press the issue of a life of leasure to the populace and people will being killing over who gets into your country.

Lastly, you are going to need many raw materials, most importantly among them the obsidian used to animate the dead. Have your land surveyed and set up shop near the most optimum area to get you going. Eventually, if you are using Magic Fixes Everything Forever (tm), you are going to eat up resources at an amazing rate. Around this point you want to start looking to getting into the big game; establishing perminant portals to the Elemental Plane of Earth for massive mining expeditions, setting up trade agreements with the Azer so that you can move toward everything in your society being masterwork and eventually magical, etc.

OldTrees
2009-10-17, 01:30 PM
Good point about ecshew materials.

What are the prerequisites of mastermind and does it get around Thrallherds not being allowed to have leadership?

Thanks for the idea about magical traps.

Fell Animate metamagic is taught to all students that reach 5th (animate without gemstones)

graymachine
2009-10-17, 01:43 PM
Good point about ecshew materials.

What are the prerequisites of mastermind and does it get around Thrallherds not being allowed to have leadership?

Thanks for the idea about magical traps.

Fell Animate metamagic is taught to all students that reach 5th (animate without gemstones)

Well, your going to have to think about your image to other kingdoms pretty throughly, since most will start off with a negative opinion of you. I'd keep the undead in the background as much as possible and fix up the worst of your bodily decay.

I don't remember much about it aside from what it does; perhaps some helpful playgrounder out there has the Orential Adventures book on hand. As for getting around you undead problem, I'd say that the feat modifies all leadership feats (including your Undead Leadership) without being a leadership feat itself. Something that is up to your DM.

The obsidian was only mentioned as an example; building up the infrastructure needed to win D&D with magic is resource-heavy; invest heavily in your mining operations. If helps that the mindless undead can mine and never get tired. Also, with no need for farming you will have a burgeoning middle-class of tradesmen; they will need material to work with. Since all of the other kingdoms still need to spend most of their time farming, this makes your exporting a great source of wealth and political power.

EDIT: For protection, set up a Purple Worm farm. Every student from your Necromantic School goes there when they gain the ability to caster Animate Dead (at enough HD), kill the subdued creature, then animate it. Eventually, you'll have an ever moving circle of patrolling Zombie Purple Worms guarding your kingdom, conveniently out of sight.

Nightson
2009-10-17, 01:47 PM
Let the village children paint your skeletons, that should significantly decrease their intimidation towards your populace.

OldTrees
2009-10-17, 01:52 PM
Would mastermind give both undead leadership and leadership to each of my 2 cohorts?

I definably need a trap of gentle repose so the Zombie fairies don't look horrifying or spread disease. Having the children paint them is a good idea.

Crafty Cultist
2009-10-17, 02:33 PM
Allowing your subjects to become necropolitans would allow them to support their families even without worrying about old age and would also help to make necromancy more accessable to the common folk.

if your kingdom is built on necromancy, you should make it something understandable and familiar rather than ancient and mystical

Zaydos
2009-10-17, 02:42 PM
I'd point out that you might have some trouble with Fell Animate since the target to be revived must be killed by the spell. If you're buying dead bodies then you can't use it and if you're using it then you are going to have unhappy villagers. Of course it's still very useful for your Knights of the Realm to have since it can always be used to kill invaders.

Rhydeble
2009-10-17, 02:54 PM
If you have spare undead that aren't doing anything, try using them to improve your country's infrastructure.
When choosing where to start, try to find a country that isn't very nice to its commoners, if you start pampering them with free workforce and better roads (easyer trading) you can get all those silly little peasants to your side.
If you take the worst country you can get and transform it into a paradise for peasants, you have a nice "evil for a greater good" excuse to give to the invading paladins.

alternatively, recruit them as blackguards xD.

Mojo_Rat
2009-10-17, 03:32 PM
If your looking for long term information on ruling a Kingdom while it isnt a Wotc source its a TSR one (which is technicalyy a Wotc sourcenow i suppose)

Look up the companion rules for the old Basic game The way the Game was designed once youve made it to level 10 Alot of the game concept was arond ruling Kingdom. I havent looked at them in a number of years but you should find alot of good ideas there if yuou can find a Copy.

Gamerlord
2009-10-17, 04:09 PM
Does you DM have access to the Complete warrior? Because if so you could have a squad of occult slayers coming after you. That means trouble.

OldTrees
2009-10-17, 04:21 PM
You can see my concern.

That and scry & die.

Gamerlord
2009-10-17, 04:57 PM
You can see my concern.

That and scry & die.

I know, 1 occult Slayer has an improved save vs. any magic, can reflect a spell back at you, Gets extra-damage vs. spellcasters, can deal double damage with a readied attack vs. a spellcaster, They can detect-magic at-will, Is more difficult to use divination spells on, and make themselves immune to any mind-effecting spell .

That and they can be of any alignment, are usually good at hiding and sneaking, are very skilled at killing people like your character, and you are a very public figure, so you will have extreme difficulty hiding.

OldTrees
2009-10-17, 06:54 PM
So
What precautions can I take vs a Occult Slayer?
What precautions can I take vs a Scry & Die court wizard?

Zaydos
2009-10-17, 07:00 PM
Anticipate Teleport and Greater Anticipate Teleport. They're from the Spell Compendium, last 24 hours, extends 5-ft/level out from the target, and gives you 1 or 3 rounds of warning when something teleports in. They're from Spell Compendium and Lv 3 and 6 respectively. That should help with scry or die, as will Nondetection, Mind Blank, and other spells that prevent scrying.

Nightson
2009-10-17, 07:18 PM
Forbiddance will seal off an area from teleportation. Just make sure the password is widely known so no one fries themselves on it by accident.

Eldariel
2009-10-17, 07:27 PM
I suggest you leave some heavily warded Teleport Chamber for when you need to teleport and just Forbiddance all the remaining areas of the castle. Alternatively, Permanencied (not legal by RAW, but should be pretty trivial, if expensive, to make) Anti-Magic Fields. This should obviously be used to protect your keep, only; it's way too expensive to cover the rest of the world. When traveling or such, make sure you've got Anticipate Teleportations and such up; that's standard precaution. That's really the best you can do.

In the keep though, you should easily be able to regulate who are allowed in and who aren't and with Forbiddance, you can cut off basically all the unwanted visitors (just Anticipate Teleport wouldn't prevent Teleporting to some hallways you aren't in and moving in the oldschool way).


Occult Slayers...they're just Fighters. They don't matter much as long as you have mundane means of detection available. They are unlike to have anything against hordes of Undead or trapping spells or such.

Gamerlord
2009-10-18, 02:33 PM
Occult Slayers...they're just Fighters. They don't matter much as long as you have mundane means of detection available. They are unlike to have anything against hordes of Undead or trapping spells or such.
What about Paladins/Occult slayers? Hunters of "Corrupt Magic"? They would get turn Undead. And anyway, they will no doubt be waiting for him to maintain good PR by appearing publicly, then they start the attack, altogether now Squad of Occult Slayers?

"DIE,SPELLCASTER!"

His Undead are low-HD enough that a Paladin/Occult Slayer will make mincemeat out of them.

Lysander
2009-10-18, 07:14 PM
Make a bunch of undead that look like you. All human skeletons look pretty much the same right? Just put them in royal clothes. Those decoys will throw off potential assassins.

Another important thing. Good PR. Don't go for the undead skull motif. Go with angel statues, stained glass windows, marble columns. Make everything look holy. Call your undead "returned" instead. Act pious.

As for the nation that hates undead, make it politically difficult for them to attack you. Make favorable trading deals with powerful merchant guilds, clerics, or royals of that nation. With a huge undead workforce you should be able to have a surplus of crops or simple crafted goods to trade.

Randel
2009-10-19, 01:11 AM
A few things:

1. Life first, death second - Make sure to get plenty of health-care for your citizens. Maybe a trap of cure minor wounds set up in the major temple (since most people would only have a few hit points then it would just take them a few rounds to get healed up). Have schools to teach them about magic and various craft skills. Every baby who doesn't die due to disease is a baby who will grow up to make a lovely corpse some day.

Have the cities cleaned up (In other kingdoms, they tell who the king is because he doesn't have sh-- all over him. In your kingdom, everybody is cleaned up which should confuse the heck out of anyone trying to track you down.) maybe get a huge water heater thats heated by a permanant Wall of Fire, have a river diverted into it and then it sends hot water into the cities 'hot springs' or whatever so that people can take hot baths regularly.

Get somebody to research nutrition and medicine to make your place really nice with everyone keeping their original teeth throughout their lives. Oh, and have everyone wear bright festive clothing especially the necromancers.

Make sure there is plenty of food... in fact, make sure that there is too much food (if most people start dying from heart failure and obesity, you're on the right track!). Traps of Create Food and Water, Plant Growth spells on farmland, invest in farmers so that they have plenty of farm animals (more on them later), and maybe set up some sort of fish ponds along your moat (have a little pond off to the side of the moat with a net seperating the two bodies of water, raise fish in the fishing ponds by dumping scraps in there with them and let the running water wash away the waste).

If everyone is safe and happy then have parties and holidays regulary, have taxes but be sure to have money sent to support families or single mothers (you want your population to increase out-of control) remove disease traps will elimnate any STDs that your incredibly happy population might get.


2. Get plenty of corpses - As a necromancer, you'll need corpses to raise your undead army. (don't rely entirely on undead though, remember that having living soldiers means you don't have to use magic to make them... and if they die then congratulations you get a new recruit for zombie squad). Have a tough but fair judicial system whos punishments are either Death or fines (if a murderer finds that they owe 6000 gp for the resurrection of their victim then they can go to one of your work camps to pay off their debt... you now have a farm laborer who isn't undead unless he tries escaping). Get your corpses from crimminals, elderly or suicidal who want to leave money for their family, or farm animals.

Yes, you can make zombies out of farm animals. Fell animate and destruction retribution (makes a zombie explode with negative energy when slain) combined with an area of attack spell and a few cages full of chickens jammed into a small area means you can send exploding chicken suicide bombers that both hurt your opponents and heal your undead. Also, if a farmer slaughters a cow or pig, they can send the skeleton to your necromancer workshop to make an undead animal that can pull plows or turn mills forever without food!

Plus, all those goblins and orcs and stuff that might try attacking your kingdom leave corpses when slain... if you can set up a market for undead workers then suddenly everyone knows that dead goblins or orcs are valuable! Your horribly overpopulated conuntry will be full of strapping young men and women wanting to make some money to get better houses... and since all the grunt labor is done by undead then violent labor is in demand. They can either join your army or become freelance killers and go fetch some monster corpses for your necromancers.

3. Undead aren't the only option - Have human soldiers on the field (since they can't be turned, are intelligent, and if they die they can become undead), if the orcs and monsterous humanoids agree to play nice then you can recruit them to your side and send them after your opponents (since you have lots of food you can pay them in food or booze, and if they betray you then you can kill them and reanimate them. Heck, the trick is to treat them slightly better than the neighboring kingdoms treat them).

Also look into constructs or oozes. You could probably get an ochre ooze or something that dissolves flesh but not bones to help make skeletons and get rid of leftover food from the create food trap. Also if the homunculi from the Eberron setting are okay then the expeditious messenger could let you spy on anything going on in a mile radius.

4. Undead are your friends - Have your undead all cleaned up, if they are skeletons then just polish the bones and paint them up. If they are zombies than put bags over their bodies and faces to prevent uncanny valley from setting it... the walking corpse of grandma can really freak people out. Even if your citizens get used to it, and their children get used to it, then visitors would probably freak out. So, put some clothing and stuff on the undead and call them 'bag men' or something.

Also, if you have undead soldiers, maybe design them so that they are good at dealing nonlethal damage. If your undead go berserk or mistake their target then they only knock people out who can then get healed up cheaply. Besides, a knocked out enemy can then be brought back and interrogated (technically, a corpse can have Speak with Dead used on it so it can go either way), but then again fell animate can make zombies cheaper by killing the target with a spell so alive is cheaper than dead.

5. Trade and Communication are good - set up a network of Clack towers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clacks_(Discworld)) to rapidly send messages across your kingdom and to other kingdoms who agree to ally themselves with you (actually, invent clacks and everyone will put them up and you've pretty much created the precursor to the internet). This way, messages can be sent from one side of your lands to the other in hours instead of days or weeks, and without expensive magic to do so!

Set up trade with other kingdoms (with your clacks you could do all sorts of marketing shenanigans, like invent Wall Street or the stock market) and get trade caravans and mercants coming through your kingdom. Make sure the roads are safe from monsters and bandits (using aformentioned undead armies, large military population, and rapid communication clack network) so everyone loves how safe you made the place. If paladins or adventurers try to overthrow you... watch as the general population tries to rip them apart.

Oh, also have a democracy so that people can vote and have their voices heard (make sure you have the final say in everything though, you are an Overlord even if you do make sure to keep people safe and prosperous).

6. Have heavy walls and other barriers to handle large armies and attackers - Undead labor can help build walls, along with generous use of Wall of Stone. Have the walls set up along the moats you built and have plenty of space for archers to fire down from. If you expand the place then just add more walls for the new land.

Remember that modern tactics involves the ability to quickly deploy powerful troops to wherever they are needed, so the walls would just be there as a last line of defense against attack (second to last would probably involve swarms of exploding chickens, using control wind to make tornados, letting the grass around your castle grow really tall and when the army gets near using entangle to trap lots of them before setting fire to it... or other stuff).


Ummm... thats all I can think of off the bat. Oh, and of course there is the evil overlord list to prevent other adventurers from trying to stop you.

Myrmex
2009-10-19, 01:29 AM
Make a bunch of undead that look like you. All human skeletons look pretty much the same right? Just put them in royal clothes. Those decoys will throw off potential assassins.

Another important thing. Good PR. Don't go for the undead skull motif. Go with angel statues, stained glass windows, marble columns. Make everything look holy. Call your undead "returned" instead. Act pious.

As for the nation that hates undead, make it politically difficult for them to attack you. Make favorable trading deals with powerful merchant guilds, clerics, or royals of that nation. With a huge undead workforce you should be able to have a surplus of crops or simple crafted goods to trade.

Technically, a skeleton auto-fails a disguise check because it is a mindless, skillless undead.

Shademan
2009-10-19, 02:10 AM
you'll need deadknights. template from mm2 i think

Crafty Cultist
2009-10-19, 04:40 AM
Consider state-run orphanages. they're a great source of young minds you can easily mould into fanatic soldiers. It's a classic

Prime32
2009-10-19, 04:58 AM
You have large amounts of free, tireless labour. Do you know what that means? You can make communism work! With enough undead farmers and their ploughs pulled by undead oxen no-one has to be a serf, they can just get free stuff from the state. You can make the finest minds in the country immortal and give everyone free education. Now everyone in your country is at least a 1st-level necromancer, and has an advantage against other countries' armies of commoners.

Shademan
2009-10-19, 05:08 AM
Grand comrade necromaner stalin?
powerfull lich with a mustache...
this...might be the most awesome thing since facial hair

Dixieboy
2009-10-19, 05:54 AM
Call yourself "Dr. Doom".

y'know, in atleast one continuity Dr. Doom is a pretty nice guy who only has the best intentions for his people.

Blacky the Blackball
2009-10-19, 06:47 AM
Let the village children paint your skeletons

...as clowns.

Dixieboy
2009-10-19, 06:50 AM
Forbiddance will seal off an area from teleportation. Just make sure the password is widely known so no one fries themselves on it by accident.

Kinda defeats the purpose.

Ozymandias9
2009-10-19, 08:21 AM
Technically, a skeleton auto-fails a disguise check because it is a mindless, skillless undead.

Illusions are your friend.

Kulture
2009-10-19, 11:20 AM
Army should include zombie great rust wyrms for enemy pacification/economic warfare as they try to use non-metallic weaponry such as ironwood.
A steal at CR 13.
You could always start minting your own coinage, then distribute as you see fit.
Enchant (if possible) all standards to cast plague of undeath when the last of a living squad dies. Bang. Instant undead unit.
Assign each squad a trained dread necromancer or cleric that can blend into the group inconspicously, and as troops die they're quickly raised as undead.

Perhaps sow contingency desecrations into key structures, so that if war arises or the border is otherwise breeched, they are suitbaly fortified, without causing disruption of everyday life or the "Court house chill" effect.

You could always create a subtle Necrocracy, in which many top positions are staffed by long-lived undead that have a few centuries under their belt.

Raven777
2009-10-19, 01:00 PM
Not from me:


As the predominant military order.... I could see a way they could maintain control and keep moral high.

1. Death is not the end. All citizens who die, will be reanimated to protect their families and friends who still live.
2. No body left behind. The fallen are not left behind. Their bones shall not be used by the enemy. They will be reconstituted into new undead.
3. The living are the backbone of our society. The Necromancer is sworn to protect them, guiding the dead to best facilitate this. They are your saviors, and will save you when the enemy try to take you.
4. The fallen enemy. Those who once sought to kill us, will be reanimated and added to our ranks. In this way they attone for their crimes and serve our society.
5. The living are not required to serve in the military. Their duty is to live life. To work, socialize and propegate. Without the children, there can be no new soldiers in the future. As such, civilians are above all else to be protected.
6. Necromancers are serving the greatest duty of our society, and deserve the respect of such individuals. Praise them, for they have given up the joys of life, in order to serve our society as its unblinking eye and tireless arms. Their swords will never faulter in your defense.

These codes should lead to a point where the civilians live much like the romans did. However, as the undead armies need not food and water, the resource drain is much lower.

I would also suggest that within the culture, it would be encouraged to celebrate undeath. Families might add new ribbons to their undead family members who serve in the military. In this way, more heavily "decorated" undead would denote those who are vetrans of many battles.

Possibly, the families might even make special masks and such for their honored undead. To make them more visually pleasing to the masses.

Kylarra
2009-10-19, 01:02 PM
y'know, in atleast one continuity Dr. Doom is a pretty nice guy who only has the best intentions for his people.
Probably, but my point was that you need to make your people like you or at least respect you, even if everyone else hates your guts.

OldTrees
2009-10-19, 07:37 PM
Thanks for all the great advice. I really liked the mass undead farming method.

I have a new problem. I will be 10th level (casting as 8th level)
Fortunatly I miscalulated the size of my army. I have 1,500 2HD undead
However my DM has seen fit to have the army that is attacking me be 110,000.

What strategies and tactics could I use to overcome a 100:1 disadvantage.
Resources:
1. 1,500 Flying Fast(full round of actions) Tiny Undead
2. I can use http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/clairaudienceClairvoyance.htm at will inside my country
3. I can create a few cheap hidden portals.

Crafty Cultist
2009-10-19, 08:18 PM
Cut off their supply routes. if they cant get food and equipment it will impact on their morale and pretty soon they'll be additions to your undead army.

Take advantage of undead traits. drowning is not a problem in swamps or rivers and extreme temperatures have no effect. they can also march without sleep and if you bury them in a thin layer of death you have an instant ambush. Also, skeletons and zombies damage reduction makes them resistant to arrows

In short, guerilla strikes as the army advances should be used to great effect, and when they time comes for the desicive battle, choose your battlefeild wisely(a canyon or valley would do well, wait until they've entered, then rain down arrows from all sides)

thats all i can think of without knowing the terrain layout of your kingdom hope I've helped

OldTrees
2009-10-19, 08:36 PM
Thank you. I think that I will succeed against the 100:1 odds but any additional advice like the hiding among the dead is still appreciated. (I hope the war doesn't last more than a year. I have a steady stream of undead without having to rely on the invader corpses.)

tyckspoon
2009-10-19, 08:40 PM
However my DM has seen fit to have the army that is attacking me be 110,000.


Seriously? Either you're fighting a Tippy country that feeds its armies on Create Food traps or your DM has no sense of scale or verisimilitude for a semi-medieval world. That is a ludicrously large army for anybody who has to feed them with actual grown food.. who's farming for the nation that's sending this horde? Who's doing any other work? The entire economic output of that nation is apparently aimed at crushing you right now. (It could be an alliance force, of course, which would make a little more sense, but it's still an absurd number of troops. If it *is* an alliance, you have some political lines of attack to explore.)

You're going to have to practice severely asymmetric warfare. If you engage your opponents directly in any kind of set battle, you have lost. With your known resources (being a Dread Necro casting at 8th level) there are two things I can see working for you- you can use the Contagion spell to perform biological war, or you can try to set off a Wightocalypse in the enemy army. Neither one is going to win you any friends, and you'll have significant cleanup to do should you happen to survive, but they're the only real effective means I can see for you to deal with that many enemies. Unless you're friends with or can hire a sufficiently high-level Druid to blow them away with Control Winds.

root9125
2009-10-19, 08:55 PM
This:
Wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_warfare)

should show your DM why he's being absurd. It is impossible to support > 7 % of your population in a standing army for even a year. 2% is reasonable for sustainability. Given that, the country attacking would have to have at least 1.57 MILLION people, and for a sustainable army that size, the nation would have to be 5.5 million.

You know what? Exploit that. Counterattack. Demolish their civilization. Once the invading armies hear news from home, or get attacked from behind by all their old sisters' and daughters' and grandmothers' corpses... :smallbiggrin:

jiriku
2009-10-19, 09:07 PM
Have the skeletons in your elite guard lacquered in gold paint. They'll actually look quite spiffy as an honor guard and in parades and such.

Devote some effort to creating incorporeal undead for use as spies. Shadows, wraiths, spectres, and ghosts make marvelous scouts and spies. Also, they're entirely immune to non-magic weapons, which is a handy military advantage.

Once you have incorporeal spies, spy on your enemies. Determine who their leaders are, what their troop strengths are, what their plans are. It doesn't matter if a few of your spies get discovered and destroyed, because you WANT to provoke an attack. Getting attacked (and successfully destroying your invaders) is good, because it will:

a) provide you with a large volume of corpses for animation.
b) encourage your peasants to see you as their defender.
c) deplete and discourage your enemies.
d) provide you with a large collection of undead fallen paladins for use in creating an elite guard of undead blackguards.

Crafty Cultist
2009-10-19, 09:19 PM
Ah yes almost forgot. level one soldiers against energy draining undead(wight, spectre, ect) will lead to a whole lot of spawn. the army will fall fast(especialy against incorporeal undead) though cleanup will take a fair bit of work.

Also where can I find dread necromencer stats? they sound decent

Kylarra
2009-10-19, 09:21 PM
Also where can I find dread necromencer stats? they sound decentheroes of horror

OldTrees
2009-10-19, 10:07 PM
My current plan:
My entire nation is some 5 miles underground (the hostile nation does not know this)

On the surface I will send 1 tornado per day (as per control winds [gust of wind {from apprentice wiz} + minimum level control winds 1/day item])
Once per ~12 hours I will send a full army of 1500 undead (I will have a massive storage dating back to 5th level)
Once per day I will taint their supplies with Contagion.
At the end of a few months I will have enough rotting corpses that disease will become prevalent enough to overwhelm the enemy's cleric's and paladin's resources.
During this time I will have sent messages to the good king of the enemy nation arguing for peace.

Hopefully this works one way or the other until I have the power to wipe out that discriminating nation (hopefully peacefully).

(My DM has a problem of under CRing things even when using the broken CR rules. The size of the enemy army is not entirely unexpected. I had guessed France form 100 years 60K or so. After discussing it with him he gave an excuse that the enemy nation has some state secret that lets them have such a big army [prior to hearing about tippyverse])

OldTrees
2009-10-19, 10:30 PM
Also where can I find dread necromancer stats? they sound decent

If you are referring to the undead army then you will be slightly disappointed.
The majority of the army comes from followers.
followers 1-4 Deathwalker (Wizard Variant see crystalkeep)
followers 5+ Deathwalker 1 / Dread Necromancer 4 with Precocious Apprentice (Wizard side), Sanctum spell and Fell Animate

At levels 5+ there precocious slot becomes a real Wiz slot due to having 2nd level Dread Necromancer spells

They then cast "Fell Animate Sanctum Acid Splash" in their 2nd level slots for both classes and thus gain an early boost in Undead Controlled (Cl 2 pool and Cl 5 pool)

The only reason to have Dread Necro for your followers instead of Sorcerer is DN gets Rebuke Undead.

However if you combine Dread Necromancer with Red Wizard (requires a 1st level wizard "dip") Then through circle magic you can boost your caster level for Animate Dead (or Fell Animate Sanctum Acid Splash) to a max of cl 40 at 14th level. This amounts to (4+cha(5)) per cl (40) or 360HD of undead animated by you personally.

Xenogears
2009-10-19, 11:16 PM
Also, for expanding your vassals, see if you can take the Mastermind feat out of Orential Adventures. While it is 3.0, it is also a great way to represent vassals mechanically; the feat causing your cohort to take leadership when he reaches 6th level, then his cohort takes leadership at 6th level, and so on. The entry for the Emperor should have it; he's the only one in the setting that has it.


I am fairly sure that you are confused. Not only can I not find that feat anywhere in my copy of Oriental Adventures but the Emperor is not, to my knowledge and after several thorough readings of, even statted out in the book.

Yukitsu
2009-10-19, 11:53 PM
If you can attack day after day with unrelenting forces, I suggest winter campaigns, when living armies can't move. Sieging church cities is necessary during this time of year, when they can't find relief. Charnel carts moved in rings around the city, and assaults of 1500 skeletons every day for months will see those cities fall. Capture as many clerics alive as you possibly can. During the summer campaign months, where the enemy will be more active, you'll need to be on the defensive, using fortifications, delay and counter attacks.

What you'll want to do is try to get a truly loyal vampire thrall, who is to infect as many clerics as he can with true vampirism. These will be night time shock troops, leading cavalry brigades of personally controlled undead. Since they can each control their own troops, you can inflate your numbers in this way. (personally, I would have gotten vampirism for this purpose myself, were it not for the level adjustment of 8.) This will only happen if you can manage this before the year that you get attacked, though the winter counteroffensive if you survive, it's a legitimate method afterwards.

Eventually, you'll want to take and hold above ground bases, as if you cannot defend the aboveground, you can't defend living citizens. To this end, you'll need to destroy the clerical places within a year to expand your army by a vast amount with powerful shock troops.

Against that army of 110 000, you will absolutely require defense in depth. They will find your underground base eventually, and if they can get in there, have a good chance of wiping you out within a day. However, every fortification you make and force them to take will result in casualties and time. Half your army should be stuck into a stronghold, while the other half sets up pallisades in another point threatening their borders, their flanks, or protecting your own in routes. If they don't attack these fortifications, they should be used as staging points for strong attacks during the night, preventing them from resting, which will crumble their morale, especially if your troops raid and destroy supplies. Your troops will be replenished, so these attacks may as well be fought to the last skeleton.

I expect your army will only be able to delay a force of that size for about 5 days really. If they make the mistake of taking long periods of time to make heavy siege, you will delay them for months, but if they assault with rams and scaling ladders, 5 days tops. After that, they'll have mapped out the kingdom and likely have found the underways. By then however, you'll have reduced their numbers by enough that with traps in the caves, ambushes through the cave complexes, and heavily defended choke points, you should manage breaking the enemies morale completely. Don't trap the enemy, as if they don't have an escape route, you face destroying yourself or the enemy completely. Given their numbers, a bit of a risk, as it may not be you emerging the victor.

Crafty Cultist
2009-10-20, 12:35 AM
If your nations undergound then burrowing undead could cause cave-ins around enemy soldiers. make use of choke points and use fire to hold of the opponents soldiers so your archers can turn them into pincusions

Prime32
2009-10-20, 04:23 AM
See if you can get some ghosts to possess the enemy commanders and lead them into ambushes.

graymachine
2009-10-27, 11:45 AM
I am fairly sure that you are confused. Not only can I not find that feat anywhere in my copy of Oriental Adventures but the Emperor is not, to my knowledge and after several thorough readings of, even statted out in the book.

I discussed it with the guy that told me about it; apparently it is a PrC, not a feat. Sorry.

graymachine
2009-10-27, 12:00 PM
As was mentioned above, create spawning undead in all the colors of the rainbow to strike their winter camps on a daily basis.The demoralizing effects would be horrendous.