Getting Animate Dead on a Warlock?

[Nettlekid]

This is more for a thought experiment than anything, but I was wondering about the effectiveness of making a Necromancer Warlock. The big advantage I was imagining is, apart from Warlock spell slots always being max level so any casting of Animate Dead has a wider effect, that because Warlocks regain spell slots with only a short rest they could take a few short rests at the beginning or end of the day and maintain control over a pretty wide pool of Zombies or Skeletons without actually expending their daily resources. Normally a Wizard or Cleric has to lose a spell slot from their daily allotment to keep up their minions, but a Warlock can quite easily recast Animate Dead and then rest to regain that slot.

The big issue with this plan? Warlocks don't get Animate Dead. So. That's a problem. The only solution I can think of is to multiclass to get it with another class, and then cast it using the Warlock spell slots. So what's worth the more-than-a-dip for a Warlock? Six levels of Necromancer Wizard are decent for boosting the minions, but it doesn't really provide any other useful class features. Perhaps five or six levels of Cleric for a useful few Domain abilities? Oathbreaker Paladin is also an option and I know that Warlock/Paladin is a decently respected combo for using those max level spell slots with Divine Smite but that's a whopping 9 levels of Paladin to invest, at which point you're probably more Paladin than Warlock. The option that I only just considered is Lore Bard, which can pick up Animate Dead via Additional Magical Secrets at level 6, and unlike Wizard the Bard is pretty full of useful class features for improving skills and potentially using Bardic Inspiration to help out your undead buddies.

Any thoughts on the subject?

[MrStabby]

The big issue with this plan? Warlocks don't get Animate Dead. So. That's a problem.

Nope. This isn't the big issue.

The big issue is that you will bog down the game, dominate the table time in combat, place restrictions on out of combat stuff if you are going places where corpses wandering around a town is "bad" and generally diminish fun for everyone. I think this is the bigger problem with the plan.

[Nettlekid]

Well, thanks for answering questions I didn't ask. I'll direct you to the first sentence I wrote in that whole piece which is that this is more of a thought experiment than anything. Anyone else?

[Mortis_Elrod]

Nope. This isn't the big issue.

The big issue is that you will bog down the game, dominate the table time in combat, place restrictions on out of combat stuff if you are going places where corpses wandering around a town is "bad" and generally diminish fun for everyone. I think this is the bigger problem with the plan.

Nah the bigger problem is getting enough corpses without murdering villages. Unless you're in that type of campaign. Then i see no problems. Bard is one of the best necromancers because he can support his undead buddies through the music of Rob Zombie.

[Vaz]

Nope. This isn't the big issue.

The big issue is that you will bog down the game, dominate the table time in combat, place restrictions on out of combat stuff if you are going places where corpses wandering around a town is "bad" and generally diminish fun for everyone. I think this is the bigger problem with the plan.

The same issue that a Necromancer has. Care to answer the question though?

[Mortis_Elrod]

I think a few levels into death cleric is alright. 6 levels gets you alot of necromancy options. It's just as good as the bard levels if not better, because you have CLERIC options and more necro-based features.

[MrStabby]

The same issue that a Necromancer has. Care to answer the question though?

There were exactly two question marks in the OP. One I quoted and addressed.

The other question was "Any thoughts on the subject?" - I think I had thoughts and made them clear. Not sure why my thoughts were not answering this question?

[iTreeby]

6 levels of wu gen can get you animate dead, two other spells and psionics.

[JellyPooga]

Necromancer Wizard is probably your best bet if you really want to do the minionmancy thing, but I would highly recommend Lore Bard; Charisma synergy, Expertise and extra skill proficiencies, Bardic Inspiration and Song of Rest are all great, plus there's some very nice spells you can pick up from Bard to cast from your Pact Magic slots; Bane, Enhance Ability, Heat Metal and Bestow Curse all spring to mind and (just my recommendation) Moonbeam is a terrifying spell when upcast and is available as your other Magical Secret choice (among others).

[Citan]

The big issue with this plan? Warlocks don't get Animate Dead. So. That's a problem. The only solution I can think of is to multiclass to get it with another class, and then cast it using the Warlock spell slots. So what's worth the more-than-a-dip for a Warlock? Six levels of Necromancer Wizard are decent for boosting the minions, but it doesn't really provide any other useful class features.
I would't say Wizard brings nothing else. REALLY.
Because while your boosted minions do all the work, you still want to either contribute or just protect yourself. Wizard gives you Shield, Mirror Image, Blur, Haste, Invisibility etc and enough long rest to use them without too much worries.
Also, Necromancer's boost not only damage but also HP: +6 HP may seem measly, but it's still a nearly 50% increase...

With that said, if you don't care that much about minion damage, Bard would probably be the best choice: you can grab Animate Dead and pair it with Crusader's Mantle or an upcast Bless. You can also give Bardic Inspiration to some of your minions to boost their chance to hit.

Imo the best build would be either Warlock 5 / Necromancer 15 or...
Tome Warlock 7 / Oathbreaker 7 / Lore Bard 6: grab nice cantrips from Tome, Rituals invocation, animate all your deads, cast either Fire Shield (Fiend) or Greater Invisibility (Fey) or Crusader's Mantle (Magic Secrets) depending on the fight and you are set. ;)

[Sabeta]

Huh, I didn't even think about this until this thread, but my character build can do this. I somewhat doubt you'll be allowed this build though.

Old Favored Soul Sorcerer of Death. I guess new Favored Soul would work too, but the extra spells known really make the build work.

Then just multiclass Warlock and you're set. I don't think my character will take enough levels to abuse Level 3 Spellslots, but this would have the best synergy most likely.

Either way, in order to reduce the abusability of the build I have my character obsessed with finding "good bones". random skeletons aren't good enough, she needs things like heroic adventurers and things like it. (She also has a disguise kit and will dress them up to fake being alive.)

[RickAllison]

(She also has a disguise kit and will dress them up to fake being alive.)

That's better than the PC skeleton in our IRL party. To "blend in", he skinned and tanned the flesh of a serial killer to wear over his bones. Our DM has NPCs react approprately to such an image and we have heavily discussed burning him...

[Karcharos]

I don't think this was suggested yet, but the easiest way to get it would probably be to create a new patron or invocation.

[Sception]

I find short rest warlock animation helps just a little bit less than you would expect it to. An hour down time to recharge your slots, on top of the usual six to eight hours sleep, means that doing more than one or maybe two extra cycles cuts into the adventuring day to an extent that your party allies aren't likely to put up with, and at that point a regular necromancer is going to be rolling with an undead pool that's as good or better than yours.

And having to multiclass at least five levels, plus five levels of warlock before your recharging slots can be used on animate dead anyway, means that by the time you're making skeletons with this trick, a single classed necromancer (whether wizard, cleric, or otherwise) is near about to the point of making ghouls.

So basically, what I'm saying is that this won't make you an amazing necromancer. It's a nice trick to add to a multiclass warlock/X build that already functions on its own, though, so I would focus on that. Not how to maximize your undead (because the answer to that is to play a single classed wizard necromancer, and convince a paladin friend of yours to break their oath), but rather what deep multiclass with warlock already functions on its own, that just so happens to pick up this trick on the way.

And the answers to that are:

favored soul 5-6 / warlock x. cleric heals or buffs on short rest can be pretty nice.

Oath Breaker 9 / warlock 11. As you said, despite the build having more levels of warlock, you still feel like more of a paladin, especially since you have to front load those oath breaker levels heavily if you want to cast animate dead at all before the absolute end game. Still, it's a very fun and functional build, especially with the new hexblade to let you go pure cha primary. Just a shame that animate dead and life drinker are mutually exclusive in this build...

Lore bard 6 / Warlock 14. I like this build most of all. Good support options, you get a cool dirge singer theme going, really versatile with booklock. If your DM goes with the old lore of a raven queen who didn't care about mindless undead, or even intelligent undead as long as they were being used in her service, then raven queen would be a pretty fun patron for this build, if admittedly not the strongest. undying theoretically fits the theme, but... ugh I just don't like those mechanics.

[MaxWilson]

There were exactly two question marks in the OP. One I quoted and addressed.

The other question was "Any thoughts on the subject?" - I think I had thoughts and made them clear. Not sure why my thoughts were not answering this question?

I count five. :) (1) Getting Animate Dead on a Warlock? (2) "The big issue with this plan?" (3) So what's worth the more-than-a-dip for a Warlock? (4) Perhaps five or six levels of Cleric for a useful few Domain abilities? (4) Perhaps five or six levels of Cleric for a useful few Domain abilities? (5) Any thoughts on the subject?

To the OP: what exactly are you going for anyway? I'm kind of boggled that you say a Necromancer doesn't provide any other useful class abilities, because it actually provides you access to a metric TON of useful abilities, which you can swap out on a daily basis as needed: Absorb Elements, Shield, Hypnotic Pattern, Fly, Fear, etc. Go one more level to Necromancer 7 and it provides Greater Invisibility, Polymorph and Evard's Black Tentacles, any one of which would be worth an invocation. It really relieves a lot of pressure on both your warlock spells known and your warlock slots.

Necromancer is in fact so good at being a Necromancer that it also makes me wonder why you want to be a warlock Necromancer. I've seen a Warlock 2/Necromancer in action (used Warlock mostly to fill in as a ranged sniper and do damage when skeletons were not available) and it was pretty good, due to high stat rolls which alleviated the MADness--but a plain Necromancer (which I have also seen) tends to be about as good or better in many situations. The spell slots a Necromancer expends on keeping his minions up and running is basically a non-issue; you'll be limited more by logistics and the patience of the DM and other players than you will be spell slots. That's because a spell slot spent on Animate Dead by a Necromancer is probably the single most efficient use of spell slots in the whole game: it's dozens or hundreds of meat shield HP + lots of damage with no concentration cost and very little action cost (bonus action to change their orders). If you think Animate Objects is a pain to fight, consider that Animate Dead V is very nearly as good in DPR terms, includes ranged attacks which reduce number of rounds spent flying to the target, can be up-armored with heavy crossbows or dual wielded shortswords plus armor and/or shields, cast be pre-cast long before combat, and lasts all day. Thus, a Necromancer who keeps a squad of a dozen or so up-armored animated skeletons on hand (cost: two 4th level spell slots) is extremely capable in a fight yet is STILL capable of all the Wall of Force/Polymorph/Major Illusion/Fear/etc. tricks of a full wizard.

So the fact that you dismiss Necromancer as providing nothing worthwhile leaves me baffled as to what kind of Warlock Necromancer you'd want to be. Are you trying to be some kind of a front-line gish? (Why? Isn't the whole point of having minions to hide behind them?)

I think we need more information.

[Nettlekid]

I count five. :) (1) Getting Animate Dead on a Warlock? (2) "The big issue with this plan?" (3) So what's worth the more-than-a-dip for a Warlock? (4) Perhaps five or six levels of Cleric for a useful few Domain abilities? (4) Perhaps five or six levels of Cleric for a useful few Domain abilities? (5) Any thoughts on the subject?

To the OP: what exactly are you going for anyway? I'm kind of boggled that you say a Necromancer doesn't provide any other useful class abilities, because it actually provides you access to a metric TON of useful abilities, which you can swap out on a daily basis as needed: Absorb Elements, Shield, Hypnotic Pattern, Fly, Fear, etc. Go one more level to Necromancer 7 and it provides Greater Invisibility, Polymorph and Evard's Black Tentacles, any one of which would be worth an invocation. It really relieves a lot of pressure on both your warlock spells known and your warlock slots.

Necromancer is in fact so good at being a Necromancer that it also makes me wonder why you want to be a warlock Necromancer. I've seen a Warlock 2/Necromancer in action (used Warlock mostly to fill in as a ranged sniper and do damage when skeletons were not available) and it was pretty good, due to high stat rolls which alleviated the MADness--but a plain Necromancer (which I have also seen) tends to be about as good or better in many situations. The spell slots a Necromancer expends on keeping his minions up and running is basically a non-issue; you'll be limited more by logistics and the patience of the DM and other players than you will be spell slots. That's because a spell slot spent on Animate Dead by a Necromancer is probably the single most efficient use of spell slots in the whole game: it's dozens or hundreds of meat shield HP + lots of damage with no concentration cost and very little action cost (bonus action to change their orders). If you think Animate Objects is a pain to fight, consider that Animate Dead V is very nearly as good in DPR terms, includes ranged attacks which reduce number of rounds spent flying to the target, can be up-armored with heavy crossbows or dual wielded shortswords plus armor and/or shields, cast be pre-cast long before combat, and lasts all day. Thus, a Necromancer who keeps a squad of a dozen or so up-armored animated skeletons on hand (cost: two 4th level spell slots) is extremely capable in a fight yet is STILL capable of all the Wall of Force/Polymorph/Major Illusion/Fear/etc. tricks of a full wizard.

So the fact that you dismiss Necromancer as providing nothing worthwhile leaves me baffled as to what kind of Warlock Necromancer you'd want to be. Are you trying to be some kind of a front-line gish? (Why? Isn't the whole point of having minions to hide behind them?)

I think we need more information.

Well you kind of explain my rationale for going with Warlock by describing the upsides of the Wizard class. For making an extreme Necromancer, or indeed an extreme anything, the Wizard is the tried-and-true go-to in all of D&D. I'm interested in looking at an option that isn't drowned out by "Be a Wizard to do it better," and using Wizard to make a Necromancer Warlock leads into the question of "Why not just go straight Wizard, because Wizards do it better?" If I'm interested in the flavor of Warlock and I want to be a Warlock, I don't want to add so much Wizard that I use more Wizard abilities than Warlock abilities. Saying to me that I could have a dab of Necromancy and then also all the flight and Walls of Force and such-and-such of a Wizard makes me a Wizard, and I want to play a Warlock.

[AnimusBane]

What about an invocation that allows a warlock to cast the spell twice per long rest? Requires level 5 of course.
The reason for twice is because of the way you create and maintain control a single casting per day doesn't work too well. Casting at higher levels does give you more but you can't make full use of it if you can only cast it once per day.

[Steampunkette]

I think the current animating and controlling of the dead spells are, on their face, flawed. I would never give a Warlock access to those spells.

Instead, I'd use a more "Dragon's Teeth" approach to undead, where one uses a bone, tooth, or claw to create a skeleton rather than needing the whole body. I'd also limit the spell with a duration, have the undead collapse at the end of it, and probably have the skeletons created by the spell work under a separate system of attacking and moving that made them less of a "Here's a bunch of NPCs I control!" situation into more of a "These are the squares they occupy, and thus threaten, allowing them to harass and hit creatures near them."

Then create a bunch of spells that interact with such undead so you could do Corpse Explosions or form a Wall of Bones or whatever fanciful idea one has for their skeletons.

For actual permanent undead? I'd make those spells into a Ritual that requires a full skeleton and creates a free-willed undead, then have a control undead spell that you can cast to control unintelligent undead for a set duration or attempt to take over intelligent undead in a very limited form of a Domination spell.

But... they didn't hire me onto the WotC team. C'est la Vie.

[Zanthy1]

What about an invocation that allows a warlock to cast the spell twice per long rest? Requires level 5 of course.
The reason for twice is because of the way you create and maintain control a single casting per day doesn't work too well. Casting at higher levels does give you more but you can't make full use of it if you can only cast it once per day.

Something like this would be ideal if you're allowed to homebrew an invocation. I would tweak it even, saying you can cast it once per day and can also cast it as a ritual to maintain your minions. (Note that the ritual could ONLY be used to maintain minions).

[Talionis]

I think it's important to remember or know that Warlocks in 3.5 Edition had a version of animate dead. It's very on theme for a Warlock to have access to that kind of Necromancy even if they have changed some things in this edition. Minions no matter how weak are far more usable in 5th edition because the power level is lower. So it might be a balance reason that Warlock wasn't given access to Animate Dead effects.

I think if I was going to homebrew an invocation I'd shoot for something that was an upgradeanle invocation by level like the weapon invocation and like alter self that replaces disguise self. I would only allow one or two minions at a time but I'd allow them to keep them relevant.

I also agree as a thought experiment there is a limit to how often in a day you can adventure and take short resta before a long rest. I'm not sure if there are any other spells like animate dead that you want to cast multiple times at the end of the day on a series of quick short rests.

I think it's helpful to point out that regular characters focused on animate dead so come into higher level spells and those upgrades can create their own minions. So comparing a 17 Neco to a 11 Warlock/ 6 Cleric of Death is helpful so let's my as it's not condesnding to the original thought experiment.

Interesting thread.

[rollingForInit]

Personally I'd rather go bard. It has the stat syngergy, and all those extra skills will be useful out of combat. Getting expertise in deception and persuasion might be necessary to convince people to accept your undead army :P Also, Bardic Inspiration should not be underestimated.

[Kane0]

In our group we just added in an invocation for it. It's literally the same as Sign of Ill Omen one except it provides Animate Dead, though sometimes whatever DM at the time will change the prerequisite from level 5 to level 7.

[Sigreid]

That's better than the PC skeleton in our IRL party. To "blend in", he skinned and tanned the flesh of a serial killer to wear over his bones. Our DM has NPCs react approprately to such an image and we have heavily discussed burning him...

I find that full length robes with deep hoods and gloves is the best way to do it. "Oh them? They're monks that have taken a vow of silence and anonymity. Some nonsense about fading into the universe to be one with it."

[RickAllison]

I find that full length robes with deep hoods and gloves is the best way to do it. "Oh them? They're monks that have taken a vow of silence and anonymity. Some nonsense about fading into the universe to be one with it."

Doesn't work so well when the skeleton is a Bard who is very vocal about undead rights and who loves his trumpet. And no, nobody knows how the skeleton actually produces sound with a trumpet. Yes, the skeleton is the PC... (doot doot)

My anti-undead Cleric has been very tactful so far, and has yet to bring down holy fire onto the heresy. He has only called him an abomination twice!

[Kane0]

Does he prefer the term 'Mortally Challenged'?

[Sigreid]

Doesn't work so well when the skeleton is a Bard who is very vocal about undead rights and who loves his trumpet. And no, nobody knows how the skeleton actually produces sound with a trumpet. Yes, the skeleton is the PC... (doot doot)

My anti-undead Cleric has been very tactful so far, and has yet to bring down holy fire onto the heresy. He has only called him an abomination twice!

But that is a different coffin of maggots.