Rogue+Necromancer: How do?

[TheifofZ]

Well, here I come again with another odd request.

I'm taking part in a new, loosely battle themed campaign, and I'm at a crossroads.
I want to do a sneaky prankster rogue with a powerful sneak attack for combat [and I do know how to do that], but... well, there's no better campaign for a mindless shambling horde of walking corpses than a battle one.

Does anyone have a way to make the dream of doing both real without crippling myself?:smalltongue:
Or must I grab some kind of leadership and make do with a cohort? :smallyuk:

[A_S]

You can get some mileage out of necromancy just by casting the right spells. Pick up Animate Dead (for zombie hordes and zombie dragon mounts) and Animate Dread Warrior (for more badass minions with class levels), find a way to get access to Desecrate (either cast by a party member, or something cute like Arcane Disciple for the Evil domain), and you're pretty much good to go.

If that level of necromancy is enough for your tastes, then you just need to pick your favorite sneak-attack-based gish build and you're good to go. I can provide suggestions for that, as could lots of other people and/or handbooks, or you could just build your own.

If you want more undead than that, you'll start running into issues with tradeoffs when it comes to how good you want to be at necromancy vs. how good you want to be at sneak attacking.

[gawwy]

do you want sneak attack like a rogue or skills monkey like a rouge or both. what do you want out of the necromancer?

rogue 3 cloistered cleric x with sacred outlaw sounds like a good start but loses more CL than is nice.. how early do you want to rogue?

[TheifofZ]

:smallredface: Sneaking early would be nice; Necromancy can come into the field later on.
I was planning on doing more sneak attack than skill monkey with the rogue; I know one of the other party members was going to do a Batman Arcane/Divine caster to do everything, and with necromancy played right, I can have minions to fill in the other less important but still pretty good to have skills. And really, we all know that Necromancy is about Minions and Debuffs. (IE: Flankers and easy pickings, in order)

I don't mind doing a fun gish build, though I'm likely to Frankenstein the thing to fit with my own ideas a bit more. (Which is only right and proper.)

[TheifofZ]

Whoops; Double post to make the brief point: The game is generally going to be Mid-powered, and it's not an issue to play down from high powered to mid level.
And we're starting at 2nd level, opening up +1 LA Templates/Races

[A_S]

Well, here's a sneak-attack gish build I've played for a jumping-off point:

Human

Stats (28 point buy):
Str: 14
Dex: 15
Con: 14
Int: 15
Wis: 8
Cha: 8

1 - Ranger 1 - Darkstalker, Combat Casting
2 - Human Paragon 1
3 - Wizard 1 - Extend Spell, Two-Weapon Fighting (b)
4 - Human Paragon 2 - Practiced Spellcaster (wizard) (b), Int 16
5 - Human Paragon 3 - Int 18
6 - Fighter 1 - Craven
7 - Wizard 2
8 - Unseen Seer 1 - Dex 16
9 - Unseen Seer 2 - Arcane Strike
10 - Unseen Seer 3
11 - Unseen Seer 4
12 - Abjurant Champion 1 - Staggering Strike, Dex 17
13 - Abjurant Champion 2
14 - Abjurant Champion 3
15 - Abjurant Champion 4 - Improved Two-Weapon Fighting
16 - Abjurant Champion 5 - Int 19
17 - Unseen Seer 5
18 - Unseen Seer 6 - Persistent Spell
19 - Unseen Seer 7
20 - Unseen Seer 8 - Int 20

ACF's: Abrupt Jaunt, Martial Wizard, Skilled City-Dweller (Ride > Tumble, Survival > Sense Motive), Sneak Attack Fighter, Thug, Trap Expert Ranger
9th level Wizard spells, 16 BAB, 4d6 Sneak Attack from class levels, +20 from Craven, and 7d6 more from Persistent Hunter's Eye, and all the stuff you want for a sneaky type (Trapfinding, Darkstalker, plenty of skill points).

You could easily drop Improved Two-Weapon Fighting for something like Undead Leadership if it's allowed, or Arcane Disciple (Evil) if you don't have a Cleric buddy to cast Desecrate for you.

[TheifofZ]

Hmm... I don't know about Trap Expert Ranger (Relevant book/DM#?), but I might sacrifice afew levels of unseen seer to a few more levels in ranger or rogue, and the rest into Pale Master for more flavour. 3/5 for more casting, or 5/3 for more sneaking.

(Huh. I remember Unseen Seer losing casting progression. I guess I'm thinking of something else.)

[A_S]

Unseen Seer doesn't lose any caster levels...

Trap Expert is from Dungeonscape.

[TheifofZ]

Yeah, I just looked over it again.

It's been awhile since I have, to be fair. ... I still think I might go to US 7 instead, and grab 1 into Pale Master for Flavour. We'll see how it goes.

[A_S]

It's been awhile since I have, to be fair. ... I still think I might go to US 7 instead, and grab 1 into Pale Master for Flavour. We'll see how it goes.
Uh...the first level of Pale Master does literally nothing. No class features, doesn't advance casting. Dropping US 8 for it would lose you 1 BAB (losing your 4th iterative), lose 1 caster level (losing access to 9th level spells), and gain absolutely nothing. Pale Master 1 might actually be the worst single level in the game.

[gawwy]

Gonna be honest if your gonna exploit hunters eye for sneak attack you may as well just use an archivist and get it from level 1....

ALSO archivists are awesome as hell,have fun class features, are int based and get a bunch of skills per level.

if starting level 2 take human with able learner and rouge at first level to get class skills and a d6 of sneak attack all the time.

to begin with use the summon undead spells then move on to what ever the **** you please you can grab spells from any divine list.

[TheifofZ]

Uh...the first level of Pale Master does literally nothing. No class features, doesn't advance casting. Dropping US 8 for it would lose you 1 BAB (losing your 4th iterative), lose 1 caster level (losing access to 9th level spells), and gain absolutely nothing. Pale Master 1 might actually be the worst single level in the game.

There goes me, misremembering things again; Thought Pale Master 1 got Animate Dead Spell like, but that's PM 2. Ick. Never mind.