Necromancer Help!

[Halsemon]

Hello GitP Forumites!

A bit more detailed information to follow, but my primary request is - can I get some guidance in making a necromancer in Pathfinder starting at level 1 and what things I'll be getting as I advance?

I figured I should make a post here since I'm in need of some help. I'm new to Pathfinder though familiar with D&D as a whole and have a pretty lax game in-progress with a GM who's willing to let us make adjustments and changes since it's our group's first game.

Taking inspiration from the story of Bob AndYourName I wanted to go for a necromancer more inclined towards the good. Which is probably a mistake as a first character in an unfamiliar system with what I think is an advanced class, but we've set upon this path nevertheless.

I've used guides for my 4e/5e barbarian which were rather helpful in telling me what I can get and when, what are the options and why they're good and whatnot but trying to find something about a necromancer in Pathfinder seems like there are just general tips and information about the class rather than a more detailed how-to. The few references I have are down below.

Do feel free to ask any questions you might have of me and I'll do my best to answer them!

References since I can't link anything as this is a fresh account... (When and if I hit 10 posts, I'll add hyperlinks to make everything easier)
Bob AndYourName - Top link in Google for "Bob andyourname" in reddit
5e Barbarian Guide - Top link in Google for "barbarian 5e guide I'll never die" in giantitp
4e Barbarian Guide - Top link in Google for "barbarian 4e guide appetite for destruction" in enworld
Pathfinder Necromancer current refs - Top link in Google for "pathfinder the truest necromancer" in reddit, along with "A Brewer's Guide to Undeath" which is linked in the reddit post.

Thanks :)

Edit: Clarifying that we started at level 1, but are currently level 2 and will likely be level 3 by the end of the night. Don't specifically need a levels 1 through 20 guide though it would certainly be useful. For the time being probably 1-3 is good enough with 4 and 5 being helpful to know.

[Kyrell1978]

Damphire has a racial archetype for necro that's ok. Also an archetype in horror adventures called undead master or some such that gets a skeleton instead of the familiar that's decent. You can make new skeletons as you get more powerful.

[Calthropstu]

All you need to be a necromancer is to give your gf/bf hickies. Oh wait... That's a neck romancer.

Kidding aside, all you need to be a necromancer is to have necromancy spells.

What class are you looking to play?

Cleric is widely claimed as the best because they can channel heal their minions.

Next we have the wizard. A wizard specializing in necromancy has the best options for non undead creating necromancy spells.

A sorcerer can spam control undead and get some nice minions.

An oracle has some great undead themed stuff.

Once you have your base class picked out, we can start giving you more.

[Alexvrahr]

I'm guessing that 'necromancer' means a wizard specializing in necromancy? If I'm wrong ignore this.

If you've made your level 1 decisions already and aren't looking past level 5 there's not a huge amount for you to pick. A couple of feats, an arcane discovery (which is probably another feat) and your spells. For the feats you might look at spell specialization (& its prereq spell focus if you don't have that), improved initiative, metamagic feats (persistent spell, crypt spell, fleeting spell and piercing spell might be worth looking at), item creation (craft wondrous item is the best usually) or any of a bunch of odd feats like cypher magic, brilliant spell preparation or avid spellbook reader.

For spells remember you aren't limited to necromancy spells. I don't know which are your opposed schools, but the best spell for the job often isn't in the necromancy school. Command undead & false life are necromancy spells you'll want though. Barrow haze isn't bad either even though you probably don't have hexes.

[brandnewb]

Not necessarily the most powerful but I have always like the flavour of Agent of the Grave (http://https://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/prestige-classes/other-paizo/a-b/agent-of-the-grave/). Your character is on the quest to attaint undeath themselves. Works best with a charisma based caster. But you don't lose much going with a cleric instead.

I have always concidered clerics to be the best necros overall. Undead Lord gets a undead companion that does not count toward your limit. And they heal undead better. However I am not sure the archtype abilities are worth losing your second domain.

[Geddy2112]

Another class option is the witch, specifically the gravewalker witch. In addition to creating your own minions, you can at will spam control undead and gather your army. How much do you want to be like bob? Using a longbow is a martial weapon, hard for most necromancy classes to swing, as is a sword. An elf can use both. It sounds like your race and class is decided though if you are already a level? As others have said, there is more than one way to skin the necromantic cat, and you will find those in wizard/oracle/cleric/sorcerer/gravewalker witch guides. Look up specific guides for your class of choice and you will usually find a section or two for the necromantic arts.

Mechanically, the undead master feat increases the amount of undead you can have under your control by 4 HD, a must have for minion based necromancer. Since undead are healed by negative energy you want some way to hit them with it to heal them. Channeling negative energy and inflict X wounds are the good defaults, but there are other ways. Animating dead is expensive in pathfinder, generally 25gp per hit dice of the creature you are cooking up, 50 for more advanced undead.

As far as being "good" in the good vs evil scheme, necromancy is generally capital E evil but you can still use it for incredibly altruistic purposes. Also, to protect others out of duty would be a hard argument for lawful. Alignment aside, making undead in pathfinder that are soulless undead(zombies, skeletons etc) is seen as a lesser evil than making a ghost, vampire, etc. Some of the undead that can be created at higher level require some seriously macabre grimdark evil actions to make. Avoid making those and just have a skeleton army like Bob and you could argue a grey area. If you are familiar with the 40k universe, it has a good example of grey necromancy with Prince Yriel of Iyanden, who said "the dead must join our ranks, lest we join theirs".

[Boggartbae]

Are you allowed any 3.5 material? The Revised Necromancer Handbook is really extensive and has a lot of cool options, a lot of which still work in pathfinder.

There are also a lot of strong choices in Pathfinder for a necromancer. Oracle is probably best for what you want to do, since the Juju mystery allows them to make neutral aligned zombies. You can then get a wand of inflict critical wounds to heal them between fights, and you also get 50% more zombies per caster level than the standard caster, and they all have max HP. In all honesty though, animate dead plays the same regardless of which class you are: reanimate a few high HD corpses and you instantly become the premier melee threat of the party. It's a broken spell.

In terms of in game strategy, don't worry about having to spend money on onyx gems. They aren't that expensive and as long as you're even a little frugal then you should be fine. if you want though a wand/item of blood money could be a real cost saver in the long run, and I would get one if you're ok with a little cheese. Never cast animate dead without casting desecrate, and building an altar to some death god first if your DM will let you, since it massively powers up your undead. A voidstick gives you unlimited desecrate for only 2.5k. finally, deathwine is a good spell to pair with create undead to try and reanimate powerful creatures with class levels higher than your caster level.

I feel obligated to mention again that animate dead is really strong, so be prepared to reign it back a little. I prefer creating zombies because they last longer but deal less damage, so I get a good return on my investment and get to see high numbers in HP, but I don't overshadow the rest of the party by being a full caster who also gets to play with a bunch of melee creeps.

EDIT: another thing pathfinder has that 3.5 really didn't are variant skeletons and zombies. The SRD has rules for creating them, and some are really good.

[Halsemon]

@Kyrell1978 - I'm probably going to be going for the human archetype, probably a decent all-rounder race. I'm also trying to go for a more good character rather than evil so going for Dhampir conflicts with that a bit. But then again so does being a necromancer in the first place :P

@Calthropstu - Lol how dare you bring such a pun in here :P I'm leaning towards the Cleric as my GM recommended it to begin with. Essentially, what I like about Bob is the concept of having a mini-army of various types of undead. End-game goal kind of thoughts are to get some kind of pocket dimension where the bulk of my army can be stored and summoned when really needed while I'd have a few elite bodyguards around me at all times. That or just have my army with me at all times is fine too though my transportation costs may go through the roof!

@Alexvahr - I'm open to class suggestions for building an undead army. In terms of my likely set-in-stone characteristics... he's probably going to remain a human... and that's it. We're given a good amount of leeway with adjustments since we're really going off the typical trail as we're playing as a golem and a necromancer for our first game... in which we TPKed in the first encounter and resurrected in the future. That said, from what I've seen, Cleric is seemingly the way to go for an army-building necromancer.

@brandnewb - We sorta have that already as our party got killed and the next thing we know our souls are dragged back into their bodies and we're alive again. Though everyone who has previously died is now undead (zombie or skeleton) with varying levels of decay and intelligence. In terms of the Undead Lord, I do recall reading it as unrecommended in that 'Brewers Guide to Undeath' for the reasons you've mentioned along with a couple others. Thoughts as to what they've stated?

@Geddy2112 - As I'm currently looking at a necromancer cleric, I can easily and readily find guides for a cleric, but once I throw necromancer into the mix there's a sudden lack of leveling guides and I'd assume there's also a lack of undead summoning in normal cleric builds that tend to focus on healing/buffing/tanking. I'll certainly keep in mind the Undead Master feat as something to pick up as far as a leveling guide goes, and I'd be rather content in just going for a skeleton army like Bob has, along with skeletal mounts for enhanced epic-ness so looks like we'll be good there. Sadly not familiar with that part of 40k but I do like that saying!

@Boggartbae - I haven't asked, we've stuck to just Pathfinder stuff so far but I could inquire with my GM. I'll check out that handbook if I get the thumbs up. Animate Dead + Desecrate, with a quick altar if I can manage it, and get a voidstick asap. While I wouldn't complain about minmaxing, overshadowing shouldn't be a problem. My 'group' simply consists of one other player who's more of a story and face kind of player even if they've been the one heavily influencing combat cause I can't seem to roll more than a 7 for those kind of important rolls while I can get 18's and up on things like "Roll perception to see what's up in the tavern when you enter it" :| The other player is also a bard, so them handling most world-interactions and buffing any of my skeletons while I handle combat works out well for us.

After looking through the spells in the PHB, it seems that the necromancer actually starts to get some use when I can animate dead... at level 5 :| Looks like I'll be undead-less for a couple more sessions since my GM has us leveling every session which is about 6 hours. But nevertheless, I would still appreciate some guidance on how to build my character from the ground up as I make my way there.
Also - level 5, as mentioned in the first post, is not intended to be the limiter for guidance. We'll likely be playing this through many more levels, possibly even beyond 20 if we keep levelling at the end of every session. It's just easier to request a level guide from 1-5 rather than 1-20 from the good people of GitP :P

[Alexvrahr]

Actually making undead is always evil in PF. Which would be a problem for a cleric of a good deity since those can't cast [evil] spells, including animate dead. I guess you could be a good cleric of a neutral deity and try to do enough good to balance out the evil animating.

If the class is open and you'd like to make undead ASAP though the fastest way is to be an oracle with the bones mystery, and take the raise the dead revelation. You can do this at first level. The same character could pick up lesser animate dead for a longer lasting skeleton/zombie from 4th level, and the full version of animate dead at 6th level, probably choosing to learn a different spell in place of lesser animate dead then.

An oracle might look at the lich curse and casting inflict spells. Unlike the cleric spontaneous casting, an oracle who chooses to get all the inflict wounds spells for free isn't restricted by alignment in doing so. Feats for someone who wishes to create undead will still include those which raise caster level (varisian tattoo and/or spell specialization). If you plan to use darkness spells due to undead having darkvision, eclipsed spell & tenebrous spell are worth looking at, and note the existence of the night blindness spell. The main buff applied to undead will be desecrate which doesn't benefit from feats much. For feats beyond those you might look at the usual defensive ones, improved initiative, or those which use charisma - noble scion, amateur swashbuckler (dodging panache), osyluth guile, assorted social feats.

[Leo_0210]

I'll start with what alignment for a couple of reasons. Necromantic magic is always evil according to RAW in Pathfinder, (however this is a point of major contention between even the developers,) as you are forcefully ripping a soul form the afterlife and cramming it into a decomposing corpse--and that is best case scenario.

Now, Regarding Good and Evil. Lets start by tossing the unnecessary dichotomy out the window. Good and Evil are not black and white or right and wrong. It is a sliding scale, even within each pole of the scale lie infinite shades of gray. Performing Evil magic does not make your character a bad guy, though some may see him that way (as is their purview). For example, no matter what option you use to play this necromancer, you will always butt heads with Clerics of Pharasma, and every Paladin you come across. And those are just two examples of the forces that will always see your action in that Dichotomy above. However, is it possible to do an evil act in an attempt to serve the "Greater Good?" Absolutely; Poison the wine to kill the evil king, (sorry other folks that drank from the barrel). Now we are playing with ethics at the table, one of my favorite things.

Regarding classes. your best option for keeping them alive is a cleric, as you can burst-channel-heal them all at the same time, the downside (upside?) is you will almost certainly kill your living companions (though you can now add them to your ranks (positive?)). the best class is which ever flavor of necromancer you prefer. I don't view them as one better than the other, just that they have different abilities with the dead. I would compare when each of the classes receives the more powerful spells, (control undead, without which your amassed forces would surely turn upon you; as well as Turn undead, for when you forgot to control them, or someone used Break Enchantment, or Dispel Magic.) without rich your necromancer and all their living friends will quickly wind up amongst the undead.



Yawning back through the Aeons of time, I stumbled upon this old post on here from 2012 that might interest you, giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?248633-Pathfinder-How-to-play-a-Necromancer
as well as this one from the Paizo Forums (hopefully they behave for you when you go to read it) paizo.com/threads/rzs2pr11?Best-Necromancer

There doesn't seem to be consensus (there hardly ever is) regarding the "Best Necromancer." but hopefully there is enough info in some of these to help you make brave and heroic decisions.

[Boggartbae]

Oracles with the old Juju mystery can animate undead and be good aligned. Paizo errata'd them because they want all undead magic to be evil, but the old juju still exists on the SRD with the Spirit Vessels revelations, so it's probably your best bet.

You're never going to have an army though, because even at level 20 you still only have 20*6=140 HD of undead, which is only 140 medium skeletons maximum. There's a 3.5 spell called general of undeath that can do it, along with the 3.5 item rod of undead mastery that helps, but there's nothing in Pathfinder that will let you do what Bob Andyourname did.

Also, there's no levelling guide that can be written about necromancers in pathfinder. They play exactly like normal oracles/clerics/anti-paladins, except they get a bunch of zombies to play with. There's not a lot of optimisation that can be put into it beyond remembering to use desecrate. The Revised Necromancer Handbook covers a level-by-level guide a little bit, but without corpscrafter feats there's not a lot that can be done, so maybe just pick a different build guide and staple skeletons onto it.

[grarrrg]

Regarding classes. your best option for keeping them alive is a cleric, as you can burst-channel-heal them all at the same time, the downside (upside?) is you will almost certainly kill your living companions (though you can now add them to your ranks (positive?)).

Selective Channel feat let's you exclude targets. So you don't have to hurt living targets unnecessarily.

If you're a neutral Cleric you can also take Versatile Channeler and get access to both positive and negative.

[umbergod]

You're never going to have an army though, because even at level 20 you still only have 20*6=140 HD of undead, which is only 140 medium skeletons maximum. There's a 3.5 spell called general of undeath that can do it, along with the 3.5 item rod of undead mastery that helps, but there's nothing in Pathfinder that will let you do what Bob Andyourname did.

Isn't 20×6, 120?

[Kyrell1978]

Oracles with the old Juju mystery can animate undead and be good aligned. Paizo errata'd them because they want all undead magic to be evil, but the old juju still exists on the SRD with the Spirit Vessels revelations, so it's probably your best bet.

You're never going to have an army though, because even at level 20 you still only have 20*6=140 HD of undead, which is only 140 medium skeletons maximum. There's a 3.5 spell called general of undeath that can do it, along with the 3.5 item rod of undead mastery that helps, but there's nothing in Pathfinder that will let you do what Bob Andyourname did.

Also, there's no levelling guide that can be written about necromancers in pathfinder. They play exactly like normal oracles/clerics/anti-paladins, except they get a bunch of zombies to play with. There's not a lot of optimisation that can be put into it beyond remembering to use desecrate. The Revised Necromancer Handbook covers a level-by-level guide a little bit, but without corpscrafter feats there's not a lot that can be done, so maybe just pick a different build guide and staple skeletons onto it.

I'd go with this then for the good aligned thing.

[Calthropstu]

I found this (https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder_RPG/comments/4ljktd/guide_minmax_the_truest_necromancer_a_guide_to/) which may help.

[Boggartbae]

Isn't 20×6, 120?

No.

I did find one way to optimize your toon; the Charnel Soldiers feat gives your undead all of your teamwork feats, so that's cool. Not sure exactly what to do with it though.

[umbergod]

No.

I did find one way to optimize your toon; the Charnel Soldiers feat gives your undead all of your teamwork feats, so that's cool. Not sure exactly what to do with it though.

6 multiplied by 2 is 12. 12 multiplied by 10 is 120. Ergo, 6 multplied by 20 is indeed 120. To come to your 140 total youd need a base multiplier of 7, not 6.

[Ashiel]

I'm quite fond of the Mystic Theurge class if animation is the route you wish to take. Theurges are usually considered underpowered compared to core casters since they have a slightly stunted caster level, but I think they make ideal necromancers for the following reasons.


The loss in CL won't hurt much because your shtick is overwhelming stuff with undead.
They get a good mixture of priest and mage spells (many of which don't care much about your caster level, such as command undead and cloudkill).
You advance two caster levels at the same time, so you get an enormous amount of undead control HD.


Pick your favorite route (for a necromancer I usually go cleric 5 / wizard 3 / theurge 10) to be your primary specialization. This way you'll only be about one level behind the curve in spellcasting and will reach 9th level casting at 20th level, barring early-access silliness.

That'll give you a base HD limit of 30 (17+13) x 4 = 120 HD.

Having cleric in the mix means you can get +1 CL from death knell (sacrifice a rat before animating) and a +4 CL from prayer bead: karma, and a +1 CL from an ioun stone; and because the CL boost is not specific to a class it applies to all your caster levels, giving you an effective +12 caster levels for the purpose of HD animation (or 168 HD). If traits are allowed, or your GM will allow the Extra Traits feat to pick them up, you can also get +2 CL to a given class (such as cleric or wizard) and there's some traits that give +X caster level with specific spells (such as animate dead), which can let you soar even higher.

You can do pretty much whatever you want from there. Pre-5th level, a CL 5 scroll of animate dead with 10 HD worth of material components is 625 gp, which means it can be purchased in quite a few communities within the GP limit. Since the DC to cast the scroll is only 6 (1 + CL), it's very likely that you can get an undead minion very early in the game by spending some cash and just rolling it (with a moderate Wisdom, the chances you will both fail to cast the scroll and also suffer a mishap is negligible).

Creating bloody skeletons is a good way to ensure your undead don't get wasted on your way to 5th level (they regenerate after 1 hour if destroyed, barring specific methods of killing them). For the record, oxen use the same stats as aurochs, so for 15 gp, you can get a very nice meat shield for use with your animation. The auroch would use 6 HD worth of your 10 animation, which leaves you 4 HD for something else (I'd recommend a heavy warhorse, as they're advanced horses with a good selection of natural attacks and 4 HD equivalent when turned into bloody skeletons).

With a minion or two like that, you're pretty much set until 5th+ level when you can begin casting animate dead yourself. Once you can cast animate dead on your own (such as Cleric 5), then that's when I usually start building into the other route for the theurge (because animate dead is more than enough to keep you useful for another 3-4 levels even without 4th level spells).

[Calthropstu]

I'm quite fond of the Mystic Theurge class if animation is the route you wish to take. Theurges are usually considered underpowered compared to core casters since they have a slightly stunted caster level, but I think they make ideal necromancers for the following reasons.


The loss in CL won't hurt much because your shtick is overwhelming stuff with undead.
They get a good mixture of priest and mage spells (many of which don't care much about your caster level, such as command undead and cloudkill).
You advance two caster levels at the same time, so you get an enormous amount of undead control HD.


Pick your favorite route (for a necromancer I usually go cleric 5 / wizard 3 / theurge 10) to be your primary specialization. This way you'll only be about one level behind the curve in spellcasting and will reach 9th level casting at 20th level, barring early-access silliness.

That'll give you a base HD limit of 30 (17+13) x 4 = 120 HD.

Having cleric in the mix means you can get +1 CL from death knell (sacrifice a rat before animating) and a +4 CL from prayer bead: karma, and a +1 CL from an ioun stone; and because the CL boost is not specific to a class it applies to all your caster levels, giving you an effective +12 caster levels for the purpose of HD animation (or 168 HD). If traits are allowed, or your GM will allow the Extra Traits feat to pick them up, you can also get +2 CL to a given class (such as cleric or wizard) and there's some traits that give +X caster level with specific spells (such as animate dead), which can let you soar even higher.

You can do pretty much whatever you want from there. Pre-5th level, a CL 5 scroll of animate dead with 10 HD worth of material components is 625 gp, which means it can be purchased in quite a few communities within the GP limit. Since the DC to cast the scroll is only 6 (1 + CL), it's very likely that you can get an undead minion very early in the game by spending some cash and just rolling it (with a moderate Wisdom, the chances you will both fail to cast the scroll and also suffer a mishap is negligible).

Creating bloody skeletons is a good way to ensure your undead don't get wasted on your way to 5th level (they regenerate after 1 hour if destroyed, barring specific methods of killing them). For the record, oxen use the same stats as aurochs, so for 15 gp, you can get a very nice meat shield for use with your animation. The auroch would use 6 HD worth of your 10 animation, which leaves you 4 HD for something else (I'd recommend a heavy warhorse, as they're advanced horses with a good selection of natural attacks and 4 HD equivalent when turned into bloody skeletons).

With a minion or two like that, you're pretty much set until 5th+ level when you can begin casting animate dead yourself. Once you can cast animate dead on your own (such as Cleric 5), then that's when I usually start building into the other route for the theurge (because animate dead is more than enough to keep you useful for another 3-4 levels even without 4th level spells).

The link I provided uses mystic theurge but uses juju oracle instead of cleric.
It also gets quite impressive numbers of hd available.

[Malphegor]

you can even be a necromancer of sorts even if necromancy is prohibited to you. Summon Undead is a weird Conjuration spell, in my current game we’ve decided it steals undead from secret evil necropolisi of the world, hidden away.

[Kyrell1978]

you can even be a necromancer of sorts even if necromancy is prohibited to you. Summon Undead is a weird Conjuration spell, in my current game we’ve decided it steals undead from secret evil necropolisi of the world, hidden away.

Praise be for the loop hole. :smallwink:

[grarrrg]

(disclaimer: do not actually do the following. Unless you like crazy awesome nonsense, in which case totally do the following)

Cleric? Oracle? Wizard?
All garbage.
Druid, what you want is Druid.
Blight Druid archetype gives access to the Death Domain, which gives Animate Dead as it's 3rd level spell (it also helps will the whole 'Necro-Druids aren't a thing' thing).

Additionally, Samsaran race with Mystic Past Life can give you a good chunk of Necromancy spells as well.

Agent of the Grave PrC can also patch some holes in your spell list, and increases your minion limit.

While we're at it, throw Shade of the Uskwood feat on there for extra evil Druidy evilness.

[Ashiel]

The link I provided uses mystic theurge but uses juju oracle instead of cleric.
It also gets quite impressive numbers of hd available.
Sounds good to me. I love classic juju oracles, but these days I tend to offer advice that's closer to the baseline whenever possible so it'll be useful across multiple tables. Seems like the same sort of concept.

Also, humorously there's nothing in the CORE Pathfinder that makes casting a spell with an alignment subtype the same as committing an act of that alignment, only in splat material. As such, if you're using the core alignment rules, you can actually make a Lawful Good Paladin necromancer using Unsanctioned Knowledge to pick up animate dead from the cleric spell list. Because Paladins do not have any restrictions on what spells they can cast based on their alignment or their deity's, you can cast it without issues (and that friends is why such knowledge is unsanctioned :P).

[Halsemon]

Hello all! Thanks for the replies! I've been given the OK to draft up a remake for my character, but will need to have the final version approved by my GM by Friday when we game.

Just wanted to give a bit of an update that I'm working on drafting up what he would look like as a first level. So far I've been going off of the link Calthropstu mentioned which I've scanned before, but didn't think all too much of it in the past.

Currently I'm looking at a STR 9, DEX 12, CON 10, INT 14, WIS 10, CHA 14 in terms of my base scores along with a +2 to CHA which will bring it up to 16 as I'm playing a "human". For feats, I'm going for Spell Focus - Necromancy and will get Spell Specialization - Animate Dead when able to. Command Undead will also be an obtained feat from the Juju Oracle's first Revelation. I'm still thinking about what skills to give ranks to, and I've got 6 to give out from the base 4 of oracle and my +2 from my INT Mod, but I've so far decided to go for Sense Motive and Knowledge Nature. With Necromancy likely being an expensive venture to afford my spells, I'm thinking a Craft would be good to get but am unsure of which Craft I should go for.

So far it seems like I'm not limited to the Core Rulebook in terms of classes since there has been no pushback at the mention of my character being an oracle, so @Ashiel, if you were to make a first level, what might it be? I do like what you've written in your previous post in terms of how many of what classes I can take (I'll certainly want to have a bloody skeleton heavy warhorse cause who wouldn't want a kickass steed?), but it does mean I'd go for a cleric. I would be rather interested in discussing what you'd have in mind for a 'classic juju oracle' you so love!

For the time being I'm going up to Level 3 since that's what we'll be at by my game session on Friday, but I certainly will be looking forwards as well. Is there a particular order I should get the various classes? I'm thinking Oracle in its entirety would be first, followed by some Wizard, then everything else being Mystic Theurge, though the exact numbers are an uncertainty to me at the moment.

Will give a proper response to everything/everyone when I wake up in about 7 hours!

[Castilonium]

Doesn't look like Words of Power (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/variant-magic-rules/words-of-power/) has been mentioned yet. You get the Undeath word, which gives you a permanent undead minion with a 2nd level slot, a range of close, and no material component. Someone named Brewer wrote an entire guide around the concept for an oracle build: Right here! (https://onedrive.live.com/?cid=CF830C0FA4CEE8DE&id=CF830C0FA4CEE8DE%21481&parId=CF830C0FA4CEE8DE%21432&o=OneUp)

[Halsemon]

@Alexvahr, unfortunately so, necromancy being an evil practice... Good thing oracles don't need to be aligned with a particular deity! Certainly helps things! When it comes to their spell list though, I have a question: It seems like an oracle's spells are all known and you can pick and choose whichever you want in the moment as opposed to readying specific spells beforehand for usage. Does swapping out a spell not take up the capacity of a learned spell? Slightly different from your example since I'm going for the Juju Mystery instead of the Bones one, I'd specifically choose to learn animate dead. Does swapping lesser animate dead for something else reduce the number of spells I'd be able to learn? If not, is there a limit to how many spells I can swap?

In terms of spells and feats I'm certainly looking more into support/utility spells now than before, maybe some damaging spells in the earlier levels since I wouldn't have any minions and probably have comparatively little money (not being able to buy a scroll of animate dead or many onyx gems yet since we only have 285 gp) since our GM is accelerating us rather quickly in levels. In previous groups, he usually plays that every session you attend, you gain a level, encouraging people to not miss out by choice. Since we do weekly games, have a small group of 2 players, and the three of us are always there when we run a campaign, whatever progress we make encounter- or story-wise doesn't really matter in terms of experience.

@Leo_0210, talking with a couple friends, it seems that a Juju Oracle is most heavily inclined for quantity of HD for necromancy. Which is good when our group is a half-group of 2 players and a GM, with the other player being a bard. We've already been TPK'd for the story, then revived in a zombie uprising kinda thing. My partner is a brass golem and I'm a skeleton now, but we're building our races for what we were. So I might fortunately not have to worry about killing my companions with burst-channel-heal. Is there a feat or something in particular one has to take for the burst channel heal, I'm assuming AoE? I'll go through those threads a little later on but it looks like there's a bunch of good things to keep in mind as I'm making my way through the levels.

@Boggartbae, though it would indeed be difficult to be exactly what Bob Andyourname is, since he's a proficient longbowman as well as necromancer, I'm primarily aiming for being a good necromancer who can command lots of minions. I suppose their optimization comes down to preference for buffs but with enough dedication I'm sure a similar level-by-level guide can be made some day! I'm likely going to post up what I'll be going for but it definitely won't be a guide or show what would be bad, moderate or good options, just things I'm going to go for in my campaign.

It was indeed mentioned in the link Calthropstu posted and what I've seen before, I just need to look into teamwork feats. Though I do think I won't be getting many of them due to relying on Mystic Theurge to boost CL by 2 instead of 1 every level to get more HD of control for animate dead. As far as I'm aware, Mystic Theurge only counts as bonus spellcaster levels and I wouldn't be getting anything else from the classes like revelations from the oracle.

@grarrrg, Will keep in mind Selective Channel as a feat for the exclusion of targets, if my GM says that negative channeling would affect the construct PC. Though I'm thinking I'm going to be limited on my character's improvement due to primarily taking Mystic Theurge which just raises the Oracle and maybe the Wizard's CL.

I believe all the classes that are necromantically-inclined are able to get Animate Dead as a 3rd level spell. Unless you meant that they get it at their third level instead. Though that seems more a shorter term benefit than longer term with Oracles getting 150% of the HD of normal casters for Animate Dead. If a scroll is purchaseable along with the onyx gems it might be better for the earlier game as previously mentioned. Though that may just be because the GM I'm playing with has us leveling rather quickly.

@Malphegor, Lol, I'm just imagining you summon the skeletons when needed, and if it dies, it returns as a pile of bones XD

@Castilonium, I'll have a look-see into Words of Power, but that guide you've posted unfortunately doesn't work for me :( I know of a guide they wrote for clerics and concepts but I don't recall them giving anything in particular for an oracle build. Hopefully we're not talking about the same thing? docs.google .com/file/d/0B5kvBvq2DEHjRWFhSWc1ZzAzaDg/edit Hopefully that works since I can't post links yet.

[grarrrg]

It seems like an oracle's spells are all known and you can pick and choose whichever you want in the moment as opposed to readying specific spells beforehand for usage. Does swapping out a spell not take up the capacity of a learned spell? Slightly different from your example since I'm going for the Juju Mystery instead of the Bones one, I'd specifically choose to learn animate dead. Does swapping lesser animate dead for something else reduce the number of spells I'd be able to learn? If not, is there a limit to how many spells I can swap?

(short version)
Oracles automatically get:
*Either all "Cure" spells, or all "Inflict" Spells (you are free to add more, but it will count against your Spells Known).
*All of their Mystery's Bonus Spells, at the Class level indicated. (If the spell is one an Oracle wouldn't normally get (or would get, but at a different level) then it is treated as if it were at the equivalent level you got it (e.g. The 1st bonus spell is a 1st level spell, the 2nd bonus spell is a 2nd level spell, etc...)).

They also get:
*Spells picked from the Cleric/Oracle list according to the "Oracle Spells Known" table.
*At every even Class level (except 2nd), you can 'swap out' ONE known spell for a different Oracle spell of same level. You cannot swap out the mandatory Cure/Inflict or Mystery Bonus spells.

As for actually casting, as long as you have an unused spell slot you can cast any spell you Know of equal or lesser level, no 'preparation' required.


My partner is a brass golem and I'm a skeleton now, but we're building our races for what we were. So I might fortunately not have to worry about killing my companions with burst-channel-heal. Is there a feat or something in particular one has to take for the burst channel heal, I'm assuming AoE?
...
Will keep in mind Selective Channel as a feat for the exclusion of targets, if my GM says that negative channeling would affect the construct PC.

Selective Channel may not be needed for you.
Oracles get Negative Channel "but only to use Command Undead (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/command-undead-final/)".
And the ability prevents you from altering the ability, so your Channels will never damage/heal anyway.


As far as I'm aware, Mystic Theurge only counts as bonus spellcaster levels and I wouldn't be getting anything else from the classes like revelations from the oracle.

Pretty much yes.


I believe all the classes that are necromantically-inclined are able to get Animate Dead as a 3rd level spell. Unless you meant that they get it at their third level instead.
Wizard/Sorcerer normally get it as a 4th level spell.

Druids do not normally get it, or any Undead-Summon at all, as Necromancy and Nature flavor-fully don't mix well. There are very few Necromancy-School spells on the Druid list.

[Halsemon]

Apologies for the lack of response, just been busy with studies and looking up spells and feats and whatnot for the future.

@grarrrg, Thanks for reminding of getting all Cure of Inflict spells, I was going to have to choose it to be a spell learned if I wasn't reminded. Unfortunately that's not a lot of levels when it comes to using the Mystic Theurge. At most it's just a couple times at Oracle 4 and 6 since Mystic Theurge takes up 10 levels and Wizard takes up 3, leaving 7 total Oracle levels if going for the long term, level 20 goal.


Huzzah for not needing to get an extra feat! Saves the slot for something else!

Cool, thanks.

Wizard/Sorcerer gets Animate Dead as a 4th level spell, true, but Clerics/Oracles can choose it as a 3rd level spell as well, with Clerics getting it at the same time as Druids at level 5 while I have to unfortunately wait for level 6 as an Oracle...

However, I have a couple notes... in reddit.com /r/Pathfinder_RPG/comments/4ljktd/guide_minmax_the_truest_necromancer_a_guide_to/ Unless I'm missing something or things have changed in two years, though I doubt it, they say to go for Juju Oracle 4, then you'd have to get Wizard 3 in order to get even 1 rank of Mystic Theurge which fulfills the requirements of being able to cast 2nd level Divine and Arcane magic. However, this would require you to be level 4 + 3 + 2 = 9 in order to get to a point where the Oracle can actually cast Animate Dead which is a third level spell (received at Oracle Level 6) as opposed to... just... getting Oracle Level 6 first so you can start casting that sweet, sweet Animate Dead. A little over a quarter of all levels, but better than a little under half of all levels. Am I missing out on something with the exclusion of this being intended to be used as a start-at-level-9+ campaign for minmaxing?
As a good character, I do believe the evil alignment isn't a prerequisite I can meet for Agent of the Grave, correct?

[Ashiel]

So far it seems like I'm not limited to the Core Rulebook in terms of classes since there has been no pushback at the mention of my character being an oracle, so @Ashiel, if you were to make a first level, what might it be? I do like what you've written in your previous post in terms of how many of what classes I can take (I'll certainly want to have a bloody skeleton heavy warhorse cause who wouldn't want a kickass steed?), but it does mean I'd go for a cleric. I would be rather interested in discussing what you'd have in mind for a 'classic juju oracle' you so love!


Sure. I'll post some stuff when I get home from work. I would have yesterday but I had a bunch of stuff to do that kept me away from the boards, sadly. :smallredface:

[Halsemon]

Wall of text incoming... Since we're gaming tonight I threw something together. Hopefully it's not too messy. As a note, my GM is willing to let me save my feat choices until later, but if it comes down to needing to choose something, I've written some options that looked interesting to me at the bottom.

Level 1
Oracle 1
Str – 9 [-1], Con – 10 [0], Dex – 12 [+1], Int – 14 [+2], Wis – 10 [0], Cha – 14 + 2 (Human bonus) [+3]
30 speed, 8 Health, Initiative = 1 Dex Mod
AC = 10 + 1 Dex Mod = 11, Touch AC = 1 Dex Mod, Flat-Footed AC = 0
Fort = 0, Ref = 1 Dex Mod, Will = 2 Base
BAB = 0, CMB = 1 BAB – 1 Str Mod = 0, CMD = 10 + 1 BAB – 1 Str Mod + 1 Dex Mod = 11
Trained Skills...

From Oracle - Craft, Diplomacy, Heal, Knowledge (History), Knowledge (Planes), Knowledge (Religion), Profession, Sense Motive and Spellcraft
From Juju Mystery - Bluff, Intimidate, Knowledge (Nature), Perform (Oratory) and Survival
Skill Ranks = 4 + 2 Int Mod + 1 Favored Class Bonus + 1 Human Bonus = 8
Skills Taken…

Appraise 3 (2 Int Mod + 1 Rank)
Diplomacy 6 (2 Trained + 3 Cha Mod + 1 Rank)
Heal 3 (2 Trained + 1 Rank)
Knowledge Nature 5 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 1 Rank)
Knowledge Religion 5 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 1 Ranks)
Perception 1 (1 Rank)
Sense Motive 3 (2 Trained + 1 Rank)
Spellcraft 5 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 1 Rank)
Mystery: Juju
Revelation: Undead Servitude
Curse: Haunted
Spells Known: 4 + 1 Cha Bonus 0th, 2 + 1 Cha Bonus 1st
Spells Cast-able: 3 1st
Spells List…

Level 0: Askew Balance, Detect Magic, Guidance, Read Magic, Sign of Discovery
Level 1: Inflict Light Wounds (Oracle bonus), Animate Skeleton, Murderous Command, Sanctuary
Feats: Command Undead (Bonus from Revelation), Spell Focus – Necromancy, Save bonus for Spell Specialization – Animate Dead

Level 2
BAB = 1 Base, Will = 3 Base
Skill Ranks = 4 + 2 Int Mod + 1 Favored Class Bonus + 1 Human Bonus = 8
Skills Taken…

Appraise 4 (2 Int Mod + 2 Ranks)
Diplomacy 7 (2 Trained + 3 Cha Mod + 2 Ranks)
Heal 4 (2 Trained + 2 Ranks)
Knowledge Nature 6 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 2 Ranks)
Knowledge Religion 6 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 2 Ranks)
Perception 2 (2 Ranks)
Sense Motive 4 (2 Trained + 2 Ranks)
Spellcraft 6 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 2 Ranks)
Spells Known: 5 + 1 Cha Bonus 0th, 2 + 1 Cha Bonus 1st
Spells Castable: 4 1st
Spells List…

Level 0: Create Water, Detect Magic, Eyes of the Augur, Guidance, Read Magic, Sign of Discovery
Level 1: Inflict Light Wounds (Oracle bonus), Animate Skeleton, Murderous Command, Sanctuary, Speak With Animals (Juju Mystery Bonus)

Level 3
BAB = 2 Base, Fort = 1 Base, Ref = 1 Base + 1 Dex Mod = 2, Will = 3 Base
Skill Ranks = 4 + 2 Int Mod + 1 Favored Class Bonus + 1 Human Bonus = 8
Skills Taken…

Appraise 5 (2 Int Mod + 3 Ranks)
Diplomacy 8 (2 Trained + 3 Cha Mod + 3 Ranks)
Heal 5 (2 Trained + 3 Ranks)
Knowledge Nature 7 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 3 Ranks)
Knowledge Religion 7 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 3 Ranks)
Perception 3 (3 Ranks)
Sense Motive 5 (2 Trained + 3 Ranks)
Spellcraft 7 (2 Trained + 2 Int Mod + 3 Ranks)
Spells Known: 5 + 1 Cha Bonus 0th, 3 + 1 Cha Bonus 1st
Spells Castable: 5 1st
Spells List…

Level 1: Inflict Light Wounds (Oracle bonus), Animate Skeleton, Murderous Command, Sanctuary, Speak With Animals (Juju Mystery Bonus), Comprehend Languages
Revelation: Spirit Vessels
Feats: Saved because don’t know what to choose

I've also looked up some spells, revelations and feats of interest and noted them down with things in bold seemingly being really good things to get. 3rd party spells marked as I'm going to confirm their acceptance tonight.

Spells
0 Level: Create Water, Detect Magic, Guidance, Read Magic
0 Level (3rd Party): Animate Tools, Askew Balance, Eyes of the Augur, Sign of Discovery

1 Level: Comprehend Languages, Inflict Light Wounds, Murderous Command, Ray of Sickening, Sanctuary
1 Level (3rd Party): Animate Skeleton, Hesitation

2 Level: Lesser Animate Dead, Calm Emotions, Death Knell, Desecrate, Inflict Moderate Wounds, Weapon of Awe,
Edit note: Removed Aboleth's Lung, Boneshaker, Deathwine and Divine Trident as their pages in the d20pfsrd doesn't say cleric/oracle but just cleric, so I assume that as an oracle I am unable to take them. Wanted to add Detect Magic - Greater, but that for some reason also doesn't have oracle listed.
2 Level (3rd Party): Hex of Chaos, Retribution

3 Level: Animate Dead

Revelations
Beast Tongue, Craft Juju Fetish, Natural Divination, Path of the Snake (Needs level 11), Spirit Vessels, Undead Servitude

Feats
Spell Focus - Necromancy, Spell Specialization - Animate Dead, Spell Perfect - Animate Dead (Needs 15 spell craft & 3 metamagic feats), Charnal Soldiers (Needs at least 1 teamwork feat), At least 3 Metamagic Feats, 3 Extra feat slots for other stuff
Teamwork Feats
Bonded Mind, Distracting Charge, Outflank (Needs BAB +4),
Metamagic Feats
Echoing Spell, Empower Spell, Heighten Spell, Maximize Spell, Reach Spell

[Ashiel]

Actually that looks pretty good to me. :smallamused: