[3.5] Ideas for an evil Character

[Dorna]

Hi!
We'll start an evil campaign in a few days. Our DM told us, that we should take Drow as race and that we distrust everybody including our own party. So it should not be to obvious what our character is up to. (Entering a town secretly with 24 undead minions will not work I guess)
I like to be a necromancer nonetheless. First I thought about building a Wizard / Pale Master (we start at level 14) Lord of the Uttercold - Character. Focussing on one minion (ist it possible to equip a skeleton?) to save through the time and use all other minions as cannon fodder.
Another Idea was building a Death Master since he got one single stronger undead as company. But his spelllist doesn't work that well with the Uttercold-Thing.
Any ideas of how to create such a character? Or should I stick with my attempts since they'll work somehow? :)

[BooNL]

I'd suggest a Dread Necromancer and focus on one or two big monsters. A zombie dragon or something comes to mind.

You can always make it invisible if you need it to disappear...

[Ducklord]

I think that warlocs can animate undead with the dead walk for free with a standard action. They are destroyed after a few minutes though, so you don't have to worry about taking them around.

[Crossblade]

If everyone is inclined to be a Drow, be a female, it will put you at the societal advantage about your group as per fluff. :p

As for an undead parade... you could have them rest outside a city. Order them to just lay down in some bushes and wait for your return. Hurt nobody, don't move, don't fight back if attacked. No one will randomly destroy a randomly found dead body in the woods. (Unless they detect magic on it, and figure out it's a zombie and not a rotting corpse or animated skeleton, but who does that? I've NEVER, NEVER heard of even paranoid adventures do that, it'd be a waste of a detect magic spell)

[BooNL]

If everyone is inclined to be a Drow, be a female, it will put you at the societal advantage about your group as per fluff. :p

As for an undead parade... you could have them rest outside a city. Order them to just lay down in some bushes and wait for your return. Hurt nobody, don't move, don't fight back if attacked. No one will randomly destroy a randomly found dead body in the woods. (Unless they detect magic on it, and figure out it's a zombie and not a rotting corpse or animated skeleton, but who does that? I've NEVER, NEVER heard of even paranoid adventures do that, it'd be a waste of a detect magic spell)

On the other hand, adventurers are notorious for looting any corpse they find. Best not equip your skeletons with your best gear if you go with this route.

Also, a small army of corpses outside the town gates might raise some suspicion if found....

[Crossblade]

On the other hand, adventurers are notorious for looting any corpse they find. Best not equip your skeletons with your best gear if you go with this route.

Also, a small army of corpses outside the town gates might raise some suspicion if found....

True. Weapons can be held in a bag of holding. The small army could bury themselves, that would avoid immediate attention. They could disperse; spread out, they're less likely to be found. Same with hiding.

Most likely threat would be wild life taking off with body parts, over anything else.

[Sinfonian]

Depending on campaign tone, personal style, and character type, you could do something over-the-top awesome with that same army of undead. Perhaps, rather than hide your army of undead, you could bring them openly up to the outskirts of the town and have your zombie minions put on a show for the people,
http://www.nickcannon.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/jackson-lays-down-some-moves-in-the-zombie-dance-scene-from-his-1982-thriller-music-video-ct.jpg

Why hide when you can potentially impress, intimidate, and entertain at the same time?:smallcool:

[Maho-Tsukai]

Dread Necromancer is definitely better then a wizard at the whole undead army thing. Necro wizards are not bad, they just don't get hordes of undead the way a cleric or DN dose. They are more the "enervator" type necromancers who focus on draining the life from others and manipulation of the soul rather then animating the dead. For an arcane Necromancer who actually has a lot of minions, Dread Necromancer is really the best choice. Also, while this is a shameless plug, see if you can convince your DM to let you use this fix (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=162358) to the DN spell list. While the DN dose function well as is, it's spell list is rather poorly made in places and that spell list fixes the issues with the DN's spell list in a rather fair way, only adding one spell.(technically 2, but one of the added spells replaces a spot occupied by death ward, which appeared at two different levels on the DN spell list...one of the major flaws/typos that my version of their spell list fixed.)

As for your undead legions, if your worried about hiding them find a way to get disguise as a class skill which you can abuse with your naturally high cha as a DN....disguising zombies could make for some very lolzworthy times and with your high cha you will actually disguise them good enough to pass them off provided you chose the right disguise. Perhaps pump bluff as well so you can say they are all plaguestricken/lepers and they are in need of healing at a local temple..or use intimidate...DNs are great fear mongers after all.....but yeah, social skill abuse and disguise can be a great way to get your undead into cities/towns without having to fight guards and such and DNs have cha as a casting stat meaning they are good at social skills.

[Worlok]

For hiding undead, I'd recommend Vampire Spawn - Fluff-wise, they don't look too obviously undead and can even talk. Get them equipped with some conceiling clothes - or make-up, or whatever - and some shovels, then (have them) pose as a traveling squad of freelance undertakers. That way, you only have to scout out burial sites beforehand and then let them dig in (please excuse the pun) there, coffins and all, to avoid suspicion. As a necro-wizard, you should have no trouble using your familiar (bats, rats, owls or ravens preferable) to spread some plague or other in your wake, giving the spawn an alibi for freelance undertaking in the vicinity and yourself the perfect gothic-horror-type bad guy disguise. A friend of mine put that strategy to good use in an evil campaign and assures me that it can be roleplaying gold in a campaign whose tone allows for at least some borderline-morbid silliness. It would, however, almost necessitate your character being a vampire, if only for playing the part effectively, and thereby seriously nerf your casting potential.

As a drow, you should really think about playing a female cleric, though, Death domain included, as it would put you in charge of the average drow, assuming the world you will be playing in uses the standard fluff, and give you some options in terms of undead use - that way, you could even end up having the rest of the party digging down and up your undead before long.

[hamishspence]

Of Drow death deities- Kiaransalee (called Kiaransali in Greyhawk) is probably a good choice.

[Maho-Tsukai]

Yeah. Death Clerics can be fun. However, Drow don't get a wisdom bonus as far as I remember. Now that's not a bad thing, but if you want to have a casting stat that you actually get a bonus in DN is really your class. However, If you want a bonus to your casting stat and still want to play a cleric, ask your DM if he will allow you to take (Shameless plug # 2) this feat (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=177245) IF you promises to NEVER take DMM(Divine Meta Magic). That way your a cleric with a bonus to your casting stat. However, if the lack of a racial Wis modifier dose not bother you then ignore that advice.

[BenTheJester]

Alternatively, a burrowing undead(skeleton remorhaz is really good) can hide very well and pop up as soon as you need help.

[Psyren]

Drow Warlock could be fun, going into Demonbinder (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20070430a&page=3) and Hellfire Warlock. A Binder dip will take care of the Con damage and get you into HFW faster.

[Randel]

Explosive Runes + Fell Animate


Use Fell animate on explosive runes so that anyone killed by the runes is animated as a zombie under your control. The neat thing is that you don't have to be present to activate it, just use up your level 7 (or whatever) slots to make the marks at the end of the day and then mail all the bits of paper with marks on them to random people. They explode and you've got undead in some random place.

[Dr.Epic]

Hi!
We'll start an evil campaign in a few days. Our DM told us, that we should take Drow as race and that we distrust everybody including our own party.

Okay, anyone else think this campaign won't last long when the DM tells you to distrust the party. I envision a PvP pretty soon and disinterest in it.