Alternate Dread Necromancer familiars

[Diachronos]

Dread Necromancer has become one of my favorite classes to play, but there's one thing that I never really look forward to when rolling one up...

Level 7, when they get their familiar. I like the idea of having a familiar, but there are several problems I have with the choices a Dread Necromancer gets:

There are too few options. You get to pick from a "whopping" 4 of them, compared to pretty much any other familiar/companion class that gets over a dozen to pick from. To make matters worse, two of them (the Quasit and the Imp) are pretty much the same thing.
Your choices are not only limited, but three of them are FIENDS instead of UNDEAD.
From everything I've heard online, the Ghostly Visage is the "only one worth taking" just because of its paralysis ability. And also the one that's the least appealing to me.
My biggest problem: they're all extremely evil. I get that necromancers are usually seen as evil, but come on.... You restricted the Dread Necromancer to "non-good" alignments, not "evil" alignments, the least you could do is give them something that's at least a little bit neutral. Or Undead.


Granted, I could just use one of my feats to get a Stitched Flesh Familiar, but Dread Necromancers shouldn't have to give up a feat just to get a familiar that makes sense for the class.
Are there any other Undead creatures that would fit as a familiar?

[Eldan]

Zombie versions of normal familiars? A zombie raven could be quite nice. Not very imaginative, though.

[Diachronos]

Zombie versions of normal familiars? A zombie raven could be quite nice. Not very imaginative, though.

That's essentially what Stitched-Flesh Familiar gives you

[Zaydos]

Looking at Libris Mortis some ideas I'd consider allowing:
Skin Kite - Problem is its spawn creation ability (Launch Kite); since it doesn't gain control of its spawn it just lets you fill up your Command Undead pool but would probably push me to no because it can make 2.5 undead per Cha 10 creature (and you could control extremely high numbers thanks to the Command Undead spell's duration).

Tomb Mote - No real notes here; Quickness might be abuse-able by a wizard/sorcerer, but is reasonable for a DN.

Looking at Monsters of Faerun there is Bone Bat.

Those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head, I'm sure there are others that could be found.

[Diachronos]

Tomb Mote looks like a fun one. And the way it's formed would actually kind of make sense for how my character would end up obtaining it in this particular campaign.

The fact that I wouldn't even get the thing until around 15th level (prestiging it up from level 6 to level 14ish) might also sway the DM toward allowing something with an ability like Quickness

[LordDavenport]

Just give them a skeletal minion (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/specialistWizardVariants.htm#skeletalMinion)(unear thed arcana)? Because it should be more powerful because of improved familiar, it counts as animated by a necromancy spell you cast and animated in a dececration effect adjacent to a evil shrine.

Suddenly a respectable fighter that you can buff as a minion. Lacks the utillity of an imp/quasit or the parilize of the vissage. Still, it makes a nice death knight, with level d12+2-6 HP and massive str/dex/armor bonuses. Still, you have to kit to characters with one WBL.

[Coidzor]

Perhaps a sort of negative energy powered homunculus or homunculus analogue?

[Dr. Cliché]

Would a Flameskull be any good?

Or is it too strong?

[Silva Stormrage]

Also note that Dread Necromancers already have a really good familiar list so any alternative ones need to be able to compete with ghostly visage and it's near mind blank ability.

Brain in a Jar (Libris Mortis) (Without it's spell like abilities) might be an interesting one. It would give the DN another pool of rebuke undead but it also can't use many of the items that makes rebuke undead strong. This might end badly in a low op campaign though.

Dessicator (Libris Mortis): Would be interesting familiar for a DN going into Walker in the Waste

Necosis Carnex (MMIV): This one is less overpowered as it's main ability (Negative energy touch) is already covered by the DN. But it is another source of healing and it can also debuff enemies so it would be a decent option.

Finally, a classic ghast might also be a decent option. It would have low HP and attack roll's for a melee combatant and I don't think it would be that overpowering.

[Coidzor]

Finally, a classic ghast might also be a decent option. It would have low HP and attack roll's for a melee combatant and I don't think it would be that overpowering.

Now that's an interesting idea. Ok, actually, they all are. XD