Life Drain spellcaster (D&d 3.5)

[Wazirak1]

Hello everybody.
I have a request, I'd like to make a spellcasting character, no real class requirement, who focuses on life steal, vampiric touch is nifty, but are there more spells with a like effect- I believe I saw a spell like it, uhh....healing sting or something- anyway, I'd love ideas as to how to make a caster using those goals. no it doesn't -have- to be optimized, or super effective at lvl one, making the char at lvl 9. All books but ToB, ToM ,and complete psionics allowed, thank you.

[Psyren]

No Pathfinder? The Soulthief Vitalist (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/classes/vitalist) is totally designed around this concept.

[Wazirak1]

Pathfinder could probably be worked with, from which book can that content be viewed?

[Psyren]

Psionics Unleashed. Do note that it's technically 3rd-party but DSP has a good reputation around here.

Alternatively, you can build a Psion (most likely a Telepath, Egoist, or Erudite) to mimic most of what it can do via powers like Hostile Empathic Transfer and Forced Share Pain, but the Vitalist definitely has the most love built-in for this concept.

[Silva Stormrage]

If you can somehow gain an energy drain (Su) ability you can get the Life Drain feat from Libris Mortis. It allows you to add your charisma modifier to the damage you deal with all negative levels. In addition your gain temporary HP equal to the damage dealt by the negative levels. Be a sorcerer and have charisma be your casting stat then start metamagicing enervation or a similar negative energy spell. Its very effective just watch out for death ward.

[Wazirak1]

I see, I see. thanks for the source- by the way, could I not also use that one enchantment that lets me channel my energy drain through my weapon?

[Silva Stormrage]

Yes but you said spell caster so I assumed you didn't want melee abilities as much. If you take Soul Eater from BOVD you can gain an easy supernatural energy drain attack for your natural weapons. (Warning it has some weird prerequisites)

[Kelb_Panthera]

No specific build advice, but I thought I'd point out the penultimate iteration of this concept, steal life. It's an 8th level sorc/wiz necromancy spell in BoVD that allows you to literally drain the life out of a target and add it to your own. The typical human commoner will give you back over a year of life.

[Iskajir]

Channeled Lifetheft (sorc/wiz 5, Complete Mage, I think) works nicely. Chill touch and ennervation both have a good feel for that concept.

Overall Dread Necromancer or Wizard (maybe UA domain variant) will give you the most punch I think. Cleric has some nifty options too. By level 9, Wizard will have noticeably more power and flexibility, but Dread Necromancer's spontaneous casting and tanky feel work better for some players or parties.

Evil skeezy, evil-ish clerics can use healing wands, or cast raise dead, and would be welcome in nearly any adventuring group.

What's the rest of the party like? What kind of adventures will you be having? What kind of characters do you like to play?

[Wazirak1]

Well, It's an odd party composition, We've got a monk-rogue based on reptile from Mortal Kombat, and a graft using marilith knight (using the monster class from this very site), as for what kind of adventures, that is indeterminate at this point.

[prufock]

Hello everybody.
I have a request, I'd like to make a spellcasting character, no real class requirement, who focuses on life steal, vampiric touch is nifty, but are there more spells with a like effect- I believe I saw a spell like it, uhh....healing sting or something- anyway, I'd love ideas as to how to make a caster using those goals. no it doesn't -have- to be optimized, or super effective at lvl one, making the char at lvl 9. All books but ToB, ToM ,and complete psionics allowed, thank you.

Does this require that you gain temporary hit points as in Vampiric Touch, or are you looking at general ability damage/drain/penalties and energy drain?

If you're thinking more general, I'd recommend one of the following:
Soul Eater (BoVD): You can enter as a Warforged, but you need to be evil. It doesn't progress spellcasting, but you can dip just for the touch energy drain.
Dread Necromancer gets most of the good draining spells if I remember correctly, and fits thematically. You can also get draining touch attacks at level 12 if you're planning to progress that far.

You'll want the Fell Drain metamagic feat, which deals -1 level any time a spell damages a target. Maybe Fell Weaken too, if you like, for a Str penalty. Pick up some metamagic reducers like Easy Metamagic and you can basically pop Fell Drain on all your damage-dealing spells.

Beyond that, I'd say just stick to mostly necromancy spells that put the hurt on through ability damage/drain/penalties and energy drain.
0 - nothing really, but you can apply Fell Drain to Acid Splash or Ray of Frost.
1 - Chill Touch (possible 1 Str damage), Ray of Enfeeblement (1d6 + 1/2 levels Str penalty)
2 - Ray of Stupidity (Int damage, a ray so it can be Split, Twinned, etc)
3 - Dunno. This is where Vampiric Touch comes in, but that's actually HP damage, so slightly different.
4 - Enervation. This is your first spell that really screams "life stealing." 1d4 negative levels, and it's a ray so you can twin it, split it, and if you want maximize and empower it - bearing in mind all the spell level increases that will cost you. If you can pile on metamagic reducers, and get some way to make this spell deal HP damage as well, you can pretty much one-shot anything not immune to negative energy... but that's tough to do.

Of course there are lots of thematically similar effects. The Fatigue and Exhaustion spells make sense here, as do many other status effect spells.

Hope this helps.

[Wazirak1]

It does indeed help, thank you very much! As for what I was aiming for, it is mostly life steal- I don't enjoy energy drain so much, nor do others I play with, it feels dirty, like playing the swords of haxitude in magic (body and mind and their ilk)