Animate Dead Homebrew Balance help

[Honeyhat]

One of my players is a necromancer and we've been working on a slight change to the Animate Dead spell. Allowing for every two skeletons raised a single bigger/stronger one can be raised instead. I'm not the best or confident at balancing things, so I was wondering if I could get some help regarding the new creature's stats (the re-worked spell is called Withestock's Green initiative btw :P )

The idea that I've got is that they are a bit bulkier and stronger than two standard skellies overall, but the sacrifice in multiple bodies hopefully makes up for it (also the fewer extra minis on the board is easier to run)


BIG SKELLY-

Large undead
Armor Class 14 (Extra Bones)
Hit Points 30
Speed 35 ft.
STR: 16
DEX: 14
CON: 15
INT: 6
WIS: 8
CHA: 5
Vulnerabilities Bludgeoning
Damage Immunities Poison
Condition Immunities Exhaustion, Poisoned
Senses Darkvision 60 Ft., passive Perception 9


ACTIONS-

Multiattack:
The Big Skelly can make two Bone Glaive or Bone-bow attacks

Bone Glaive:
Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: (1d10 + 3) slashing damage.

Bone Bow:
Shortbow. Ranged Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: (1d8 + 2) piercing damage.

[Magicspook]

Idk, not a fan myself. 'Big skeleton' sounds like a very gamey thing, like something you'd summon in an mmo.

Id suggest taking a look at the zombie and skeleton statblocks in de monster manual and working out a template that you can apply to any slain enemy. Then, the palyer can raise them as undead when the total CR of his skellies would match the CR of the new creature. The lack of action economy in the big creature will ensure it remains somehwat balanced.

[Honeyhat]

Idk, not a fan myself. 'Big skeleton' sounds like a very gamey thing, like something you'd summon in an mmo.

Well that's not really relevant to what I was asking about


Id suggest taking a look at the zombie and skeleton statblocks in de monster manual and working out a template that you can apply to any slain enemy. Then, the palyer can raise them as undead when the total CR of his skellies would match the CR of the new creature. The lack of action economy in the big creature will ensure it remains somehwat balanced.

That's seems like it would take a significantly larger amountm of out of game time to manage and balance than just making two skeletons into one moderately bigger one.

The action economy would be a bit smoother, but part of the fun is having a mini army. He never spawns more than 4 of the larger skellies and the player is really good at pre-planning his turn, so the action economy is pretty decent with the 4 of them (with the 8 equivalent though the movement and targetting took a LOT longer, hence the minor rework)

[JackPhoenix]

You can apply skeleton "race" from the DMG to various NPC stat blocks: +2 Dex, -4 Int and Cha, vulnerability to bludgeoning damage, immunity to exhaustion and poison, darkvision and inability to speak. The CR should stay the same, and you can base the spell about how much CR you can keep under control at the same time.

[Valmark]

Note that the action economy is in favor of the BS- it makes as many attacks as the two skeletons, with more reach, better to-hit and damage. It also has more then double the hp, which become enough to resist most of the AoEs I can think of.

Basically, one should always choose the big skeleton unless they need Medium sized minions.

[Joe the Rat]

Someone ought to write out the x_skeleton and x_zombie conversions - there's a couple of stat tweaks, uniform mental stats, relevant traits, done.

What I did for my burgeoning necromancer was use upcasting for steps away from humanoid - going up in size is a level, going non-humanoid is a level (we went back and forth on Giants). It was more quick and dirty, but worked. Mr. Wiggly the Malison Skeleton was quite popular.

I suppose the other way is to establish some basic skel-types and CRs, and parallel the Conjures for conversion. Base skel, beast skel, by sizes, set for equivalent CRs.

[Kane0]

What I generally do is pull up Kobold Fight Club and get the XP value of the zombies or skeletons you could raise then ‘spend’ that XP on a more inpressive undead like a Skeletal Minotaur or whatever.

Works pretty smoothly.

[Honeyhat]

Note that the action economy is in favor of the BS- it makes as many attacks as the two skeletons, with more reach, better to-hit and damage. It also has more then double the hp, which become enough to resist most of the AoEs I can think of.

Basically, one should always choose the big skeleton unless they need Medium sized minions.


So should I pull back on those things (HP, to hits etc.) to make it a closer equivalent of two medium skellies?

I could make it a single attack that would do an equivalent amount of damage, so it would be better single target damage per skelly but less able to split targets

Perhaps something like this:

IG SKELLY-

Large undead
Armor Class 14 (Extra Bones)
Hit Points 26
Speed 30 ft.
STR: 14
DEX: 10
CON: 15
INT: 6
WIS: 8
CHA: 5
Vulnerabilities Bludgeoning
Damage Immunities Poison
Condition Immunities Exhaustion, Poisoned
Senses Darkvision 60 Ft., passive Perception 9


ACTIONS-

Multiatack:
The Big Skelly makes two Bone Mace or two Bone throw attacks

Bone maul:
Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5ft., one target. Hit: (1d6 + 2) slashing damage.

Bone throw:
Ranged Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 5 (1d6 + 2) piercing damage.


-Taking regular skelly stats but swapped the strength and dex scores to make a 'stronger' looking skelly
-Took the HP back to just two medium skelly totals
-Speed dropped to 30 and range of maul back to 5ft (the large size makes up for the lack of manoeuvrability that two skellies would have)
-Bone throw is like throwing a boomerang, so uses strength rather than the dex, keeping it all even

[Frogreaver]

If the goal is to make them roughly the same power as the minor skellies then keep all the stats the same, give them more hp - double seems appropriate, give them 2 attacks and be done. This makes them a little stronger anyways as they are less susceptible to AOE attacks.

However, that's kind of boring. I like the addition of reach alot.

I might see if the player would be cool with something that looks more like this

34 hp
16 AC
movement 40ft
1 attack
+8 @ 1d10+4 damage (reach 10ft)
+8 @ 1d6+4 damage (shortbow range)

I'm thinking let the big skellies get double the benefits of your necromancer bonuses to them.

Essentially you are turning the big ones more into tankier skellies that deal less overall damage.

[Honeyhat]

If the goal is to make them roughly the same power as the minor skellies then keep all the stats the same, give them more hp - double seems appropriate, give them 2 attacks and be done. This makes them a little stronger anyways as they are less susceptible to AOE attacks.

However, that's kind of boring. I like the addition of reach alot.

I might see if the player would be cool with something that looks more like this

34 hp
16 AC
movement 40ft
1 attack
+8 @ 1d10+4 damage (reach 10ft)
+8 @ 1d6+4 damage (shortbow range)

I'm thinking let the big skellies get double the benefits of your necromancer bonuses to them.

Essentially you are turning the big ones more into tankier skellies that deal less overall damage.


Oooo I like that. I've had a hard time wording this change, but in essence "less damage but tankier as a result" is spot on