Need some quick help making a lower level Necromancer NPC

[Trum4n1208]

Good morning all,

Due to circumstances beyond my control, my usual game prep time last night was taken up, and I'm nowhere near as prepared as I'd like to be for tonight's game. Basically, I need help coming up with a Necromancer. I've come up with a character and a backstory and a motivation, all that good stuff. I basically just need a spell selection of appropriately dark, evil magic (especially dark since this is a world where magic is viewed like we view chemical weapons usage today (Paladins/Clerics being the exception)), something that would make him (and some minions) challenging to a group of 2nd levels without being "I snap my fingers and kill you" kind of powerful.

Any help would be hugely appreciated. Thanks for your time regardless.

[Ninja_Prawn]

Are you open to homebrew (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?481810-Low-Level-Necromancy)? :smallwink: A beginner evil genius with an 'undead army' composed of the various animated parts from the one corpse they've been able to get their hands on could be a hilarious encounter!

[Gastronomie]

You don't necessarily have to stick to the stuff in the original Player's Handbook (you could create original abilities, or you could abuse a particular spell to give it a different effect).

For instance, outside combat, you could have him (or more likely, his minions, since the necromancer himself doing it will look really, really stupid) fire Poison Spray into a river all day and night, poisoning the river and all villages in the area. Or you could just make it that he cursed a river, or unleashed a plague, or a swarm of locusts, or whatever.

Inside combat, apart from unleashing a horde of zombies, you could do things such as:
-Making zombies hold explosives and have them kamikaze into the party
-Use Glyph of Warding to turn several places in the map into trap zones
-Use Bestow Curse to give him the "evil"-ish feel (instead of just saying your character has "these disadvantages in this combat", explain in detail about how the curse is inflicing pain to the character both mentally and physically - perhaps deformations or illusions, voices in your head, blood loss, etc.)

Spells such as Hex are thematically good but probably too much for a Level 2 party. Speaking of which, I actually think a necromancer is not the best boss for a level 2 party - better if the party is at least level 5 or something, because then it's easier to unleash a real horde. The whole point of necromancy is having a personal army, and I doubt you can really do that sort of thing against a level 2 party. Perhaps have the party stop the necromancer's vile animating ritual or something, so that you can create a reason why the necromancer has only several zombies by his side when the battle starts? And if you like the character you could just give him a way to flee, such as a teleportation scroll or a flying zombie (like, a zombie manticore or something) coming to the rescue.

[Specter]

8th-level High Elf Necromancer
ST8, DX16, CO15, IN18, WI12, CH8
HP50, AC13 (16 with Mage Armor)

SAVES: INT, WIS, CON +3

CLASS FEATURES
Arcane Recovery
Grim Harvest
+2 INT
Undead Thralls
Feat: Resilient (CON)

SPELLS
Cantrips: Chill Touch, Ray of Frost, Minor Illusion + 2
1 (IIII): Ray of Sickness, Mage Armor, Absorb Elements, Shield
2 (III): Mirror Image, Ray of Enfeeblement, Misty Step
3 (III): Animate Dead, Counterspell, Lightning Bolt
4 (II): Blight, Greater Invisibility

Skeletons and zombies this dude creates would have +8HP, and +3 damage in all attacks.
If you're afraid he might TPK, drop him to level 6.
Good luck.

[Gastronomie]

If you're afraid he might TPK, drop him to level 6.
Good luck.Well, the party is level 2. Lightning Bolt inflicts 28 damage average, and that alone can kill most characters of that level by just itself. I don't think giving the necromancer himself damage spells is a very good idea. And I don't think a necromancer NPC needs the Undead Thrall ability, especially if the party is low-level. You don't really have to care about the number-of-spell-slots-left-after-casting-Animate-Dead thing since NPCs rarely make sense with those sorts of stuff.
Stuff like Mirror Image (perhaps re-fluffed to create illusions of the people the characters love, for instance), Rays of Sickness and Enfeeblement, Shield, Misty Step, Counterspell, Greater Invisibility - I love all that, tho'. Otherwise spellcasters are prone to die easily. You could even give him a legendary action, allowing him to cast 2 spells in the same round.

[Trum4n1208]

8th-level High Elf Necromancer
ST8, DX16, CO15, IN18, WI12, CH8
HP50, AC13 (16 with Mage Armor)

SAVES: INT, WIS, CON +3

CLASS FEATURES
Arcane Recovery
Grim Harvest
+2 INT
Undead Thralls
Feat: Resilient (CON)

SPELLS
Cantrips: Chill Touch, Ray of Frost, Minor Illusion + 2
1 (IIII): Ray of Sickness, Mage Armor, Absorb Elements, Shield
2 (III): Mirror Image, Ray of Enfeeblement, Misty Step
3 (III): Animate Dead, Counterspell, Lightning Bolt
4 (II): Blight, Greater Invisibility

Skeletons and zombies this dude creates would have +8HP, and +3 damage in all attacks.
If you're afraid he might TPK, drop him to level 6.
Good luck.

Thank you, thats a great place to start. The help is greatly appreciated.

As for everyone else's concerns, I plan on having him be the 'big bad' for the first little story arc we're doing, so I wanted an NPC that would make an impression and really make the group feel like they took out a legitimate threat. I do agree, I think I'll reduce some of his damage dealing spells, make him a bit more support towards his minions.

As for him doing a TPK, we should be oaky. We've got a super beefy party (Half Elf Paladin, Human STR Fighter, Dragonborn DEX Fighter, Wood Elf Ranger, Halfling Rogue, Hill Dwarf Monk, High-Elf Warlock, and Dark Elf Druid) and they've taken out most threats I've thrown at them handily, so barring some bad rolls, we should be okay.

Thank you everyone for the help, you all are life savers. Cheers!

[Addaran]

There's a necromancer in Princes of the Apocalypse, you can find the stats in the free mini-version of the book.

http://media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/DDEN_PrincesoftheApocalypse.pdf

Just check the last page. The players are supposed to be lvl 1-2 when they see him. (only very dangerous thing is the wand of magic missile)

[MrStabby]

Maybe not what you want, but another option is to have the boss be a necromancer's creation. Kind of Frankenstein and the Monster style.

As a special zombie you can add additional abilities as you see fit to make the fight interesting. This then leaves the necromancer at large for later adventures whilst allowing the PCs the success of dispatching a major threat.

So as a rough start take a zombie, give it +2 con and +2 Str and a couple of extra hit dice (including con bonus). That should give it a solid enough core.

Give it advantage on saves it could make to go to 1 hp instead of 0 - adds a sense of risk to the encounter.

Maybe a lair action to summon 2 crawling claws and a lair action to cast Armour of agathys as a 2nd level spell. Hopefully that should be managable by a party of level 2 characters - the toughness and AoA should help it stick arround so the fight seems like a challenge and players should take enough damage that healing seems like a good idea.

[Gastronomie]

Rather than making the Crawling Claw summoning a lair action, how about making its hands become Crawling Claws when cut off by attacks? Perhaps even give it troll-esque regeneration to make it even a bigger threat. That will be a pretty darn scary "powerful zombie".

[Trum4n1208]

Maybe not what you want, but another option is to have the boss be a necromancer's creation. Kind of Frankenstein and the Monster style.

As a special zombie you can add additional abilities as you see fit to make the fight interesting. This then leaves the necromancer at large for later adventures whilst allowing the PCs the success of dispatching a major threat.

So as a rough start take a zombie, give it +2 con and +2 Str and a couple of extra hit dice (including con bonus). That should give it a solid enough core.

Give it advantage on saves it could make to go to 1 hp instead of 0 - adds a sense of risk to the encounter.

Maybe a lair action to summon 2 crawling claws and a lair action to cast Armour of agathys as a 2nd level spell. Hopefully that should be managable by a party of level 2 characters - the toughness and AoA should help it stick arround so the fight seems like a challenge and players should take enough damage that healing seems like a good idea.

Ohh, that would be good. This particular Necromancer is trying to transform himself, and make himself more powerful already, so maybe the player's actions up to this point have forced him to speed up his experiments, they went wrong, and turned him into some kind of monster? Give him resistance against non-silver/non-magical attacks (took a page out of 'The Witcher' series for this world, silver is particularly potent against mages and creatures created by magic), make him beefy, have his lopped off limbs operate independently of him (great idea, Gastronomie), and maybe have limbs cut off with normal weapons regenerate after a few turns?