Death Master villain

[TrulyLyra]

I know this may seem a bit edgy bc yk death master but i do wnat to know ideas to properly write a death master as a villain and how to built one.

[holbita]

You mean death master the class from Dragon Compendium? Or a "death master" kind of character?

Because if it's the class just take the corpse crafter line of feats and you are golden.

[Troacctid]

Lean into the Orcus lore and do Orcus-themed things.

[H_H_F_F]

Lean into the Orcus lore and do Orcus-themed things.

If that's what you're going for, there's a Death Master 10 / Thrall of Orcus 10 back in the Thrall of Orcus round of Iron Chef. I haven't examined it myself, but if you're going for this theme you might want to give it a glance.

[Battlechaser]

What would be his/her reason to dive into necromancy? Revenge? Resurrecting a lost love? A doctor with a fascination to animate body parts?

[Zombulian]

If that's what you're going for, there's a Death Master 10 / Thrall of Orcus 10 back in the Thrall of Orcus round of Iron Chef. I haven't examined it myself, but if you're going for this theme you might want to give it a glance.

Not sure I would recommend that - it is at most a 4/10 casting progression PrC. The winner of that round was a Hexblade build, which kinda tells you the vibe of that PrC.

There are very few prestige classes worth considering for a necromancy focused full caster unfortunately. Pale Master 2 for Animate Dead as an SLA isn't terrible, or you could drop a level in (Cloistered) Cleric and go into Dweomerkeeper for the Supernatural Spell ability. But otherwise it feels like you may as well just keep putting levels in Death Master to improve your undead minion.

Seeing as it's a villain you may not feel the need to explain within the rules why they have followers, but if you do feel so inclined you could always take the Undead Leadership feat.

[Glimbur]

Honestly having a terrible class can be good for a villain. Similar to extra HD adding bulk to monsters without adding more nasty abilities, extra HD give the villain more saves and hp. Using a bad class can help you balance against the party, you will also want minions around because of how combat tends to go and the class naturally gives an excuse for those.

[Chronos]

A Death Master villain isn't edgy. The class is designed for villains. A standard villainous death master is so far over the edge that they can't even see the edge over the horizon any more. "Edgy" only comes in when you try for "I'm struggling to maintain my humanity in the face of the dark power I wield", like a PC.

Now, cliche? Sure, it's that. But the cliches of the game keep getting used for a reason. They work.

[Zombulian]

Honestly having a terrible class can be good for a villain. Similar to extra HD adding bulk to monsters without adding more nasty abilities, extra HD give the villain more saves and hp. Using a bad class can help you balance against the party, you will also want minions around because of how combat tends to go and the class naturally gives an excuse for those.

Death Master is not a terrible class. It’s not a wizard, but it’s darn close. If you look on the tier ratings thread on here it’s still in T1 (even if you personally disagree with T1, it’s far from terrible).


A Death Master villain isn't edgy. The class is designed for villains. A standard villainous death master is so far over the edge that they can't even see the edge over the horizon any more. "Edgy" only comes in when you try for "I'm struggling to maintain my humanity in the face of the dark power I wield", like a PC.

Now, cliche? Sure, it's that. But the cliches of the game keep getting used for a reason. They work.

If you want to really lean into the cliche, looking into Taint and Vile feats is a cool way to go. Really get freaky with it.

[H_H_F_F]

Death Master is not a terrible class. It’s not a wizard, but it’s darn close. If you look on the tier ratings thread on here it’s still in T1 (even if you personally disagree with T1, it’s far from terrible).

I think that was a response to Thrall of Orcus, and it made exactly the point I wanted to make: "watering down" villain casters with weak-but-thematic HD is a very good way to create a better balanced encounter.

[Zombulian]

I think that was a response to Thrall of Orcus, and it made exactly the point I wanted to make: "watering down" villain casters with weak-but-thematic HD is a very good way to create a better balanced encounter.


Ahhh yes makes sense.

[Chronos]

Certainly the weaknesses of a Death Master compared to a standard wizard are much less relevant on a villain NPC than on a PC. The great power of a wizard is the ability to radically change which spells you're packing each day, depending on the situation. But for an NPC villain, the only situation you care about is "the villain is fighting the PCs", and so they only need the loadout they'd be using for that. And the Death Master already has the spells they'd be using for that.