Help building undead army!

[GrinningDemon]

I'm starting a Necromancer but can't figure out the best way to make the most amount of dead and control them really well...I know dread Necromancer is the start point but I really wanna raise an army! muhahahahaha! please help.

[Doresain]

raising an army isnt the best route to go in most situations...better to raise a few really good ones than a large number of relatively weak ones...also, you wont boil combat down with like 30+ actions per round

not saying the undead army isnt a fun concept(im the party necromancer for a reason after all), its just time consuming and potentially boring

[GrinningDemon]

Okay so what would you say would be the best build then, because I know I'm liking the Dread Necromancer to 10, but I don't know if taking it all the way to 20 is going to help me make the strongest Necromancer.

[Halae]

Dread Necro 20 isn't bad, and prestige classing cuts down how many undead HD you can get I believe (by taking away the undead master bonus for levels not taken as a DR).

Anyways, as far as the army goes, the army I like to go with is relatively simple

Team 1: The brutes
Pick 2-5 of the biggest, toughest monsters you can find. Going grave robbing in giant town is a good choice, but Hydras make by far the best zombies. these guys are your tank/DPS. Often, a well built team of brutes will outclass the entire part working together. You know what to do with them.

Team 2: The strikers
Incorporeal undead are amazing for several reasons; First, below level 15 only about 1/3 monsters can even damage them. Second, they can pass through solid objects, meaning you can have them lie in wait under ground if your setting up the field, then get them to rise once the battle commences, giving your brutes excellent flanking. finally, and my favorite, they take up no space - you can fit as many shadows as you want into a bag of holding, or even one pouch from a belt of many pockets. The negotiations go south? Suddenly, shadows!

Team 3: The Ranged
My suggestion for these guys is a bunch of orc zombies that you give slings to. now, that may not seem like much, but if there's twenty of them (40 HD) the law of probability states that you will hit at least once every round, and they do a surprising amount of damage with those slings (as they gain str bonus damage). half-ogres work even better for this, as they still require the same HD, but are bigger and have more strength. on top of that, standing in the middle of them means if one gets hit with a ranged attack you can pop over and heal it. Or area heal from within and, if you've taken tomb-tainted soul (you will, trust me) then you'll benefit too.

Team 4: The Miniboss
You should always have the undead lieutenant or general spell active, to increase your undead HD limit. bonus points if it's a spellcaster too, though it would likely be weak in CL comparred to you. maybe a better bet is to have it among the random ranged mooks?

Team 5: The Mount
Using the Zonbie Dragon Template from the Draconomicon, having a dragon zombie for a mount is not only a good investment, but good transport as well. sure, it can only take one move in a round, but when that one move is higher than your run speed, and flying, it's worth it. and you can get the breath weapon, albeit at half damage

played well tactically, that can be a gamestopper and challenge the DM like he's never been challeneged before, outside of munchkinism. And remember, your brutes and mount take priority.

[Kaww]

You should go with one or two minions as tough as you can get them.
Especially if you are playing with a good cleric...
Zombie dragon is a VERY good investment here, as noted by Harnel.

[DaragosKitsune]

Also, if you want a really effective army, look into the Undead Leadership feat for more minions (check that your DM will allow it, first). The Corpsecrafter feat tree is pretty good overall, and if you don't plan to take all 20 levels of Dread Necromancer, get turned into a Necropolitan so that you can get spell-stitched for spells like Animate Dread Warrior from Unapproachable East with no XP cost. Also, a Rod of Undead Mastery is also useful, as it doubles your 4+Charisma modifier HD of undead from DN. You may want to consider investing in an item that gives free castings of Awaken Undead to make your basic skellys and zombies the added power of feats and sentience without reducing the number of them you can control thanks to Animate Dead. Also, get Animate Dead as an SLA ASAP, because the costs for the spell mount quickly. If you ever gain the permanent loyalty of a ghost, make it become a haunting presence in, say, a cart or a repeating crossbow. Haunting presences can manipulate moving parts of the object they possess and don't count as creatures for purposes of undead controlled. In fact, one abuse of this is that you can get an infinite number of haunting presences by recruiting ghost cohorts with unreachable goals using feats that grant just cohorts or Undead Leadership.