Epic Undead Mastery + Dread Necromancer = Undead Army!!!

[Maerok]

The DN Undead Mastery says a DN can control 4+Cha modifer/class level. But with Undead Mastery [Epic], it says one can control 10 * Character Level. Would it be too much to say that a DN gets to control 10+Cha/class level instead? (I assume that this might be the case with an Epic Dread Necro, if someone at Wizards ever gets to it).

And how would the Rod of Undead Mastery apply to a Dread Necromancer with DN Undead Mastery and/or Undead Mastery [Epic].

My epic feat choice consists of (this is a commander o' death DN build, ECL 30):
(20: 25 Cha +7)
21: Undead Mastery
24: Epic Undead Leadership
(24: 26 Cha +8)
27: Zone of Animation
(28: 27 Cha +8)
30: Legendary Undead Commander

If UM and DNUM work together like I planned:
Undead through Control Undead/Animate Dead/Rebuking: 540 HD
(A working Rod of Undead Mastery would bring this to 1080)
Undead Leadership Score: 30+8+2 bonus from feat->40
Cohort Level: 25
Followers:
1st: 10,000 (How many people must you lead to become a god? )
2nd:1,000
3rd: 500
4th: 250
5th: 130
6th: 70
7th: 40
8th: 20
9th: 10

For a total of: 17180 HD

Now can I make one of my skeletons automatically join as a follower and thereby free up my limits on animate dead/control undead/rebuking? I've heard about this but I'm not sure if it would work.

[TSGames]

Wow, capture a black onyx mine and you may be in business.

[Zincorium]

Wow, capture a black onyx mine and you may be in business.

Two levels of Pale Master. It's the only way to pull this off, there's no way you'll be allowed to purchase that much onyx once people figure out what you're doing with the stuff.

[Jack_Simth]

Can be done pre-epic.

Cleric-20.
Brew Potion.
Leadership.

For a cleric, Animate Dead is a 3rd level spell with a casting time of one standard action; fully legal for an Oil.
When one applies an oil, the oil supplies the caster level, the target is the thing the oil is applied to, and the caster is the one applying the oil.
So if you make a caster level 20 (can get this higher with some PrC's and items, but ignoring that for now...) potion of Animate Dead (you'll want to go whole-hog, and provide MC's for a Desecrated area with Evil Shrine - it's more effecient that way) each of your followers has utter command over 80 HD of mindless undead per market value 5,000 gp oil.

If you push your leadership score a might, you have 163 followers (at leadership 25+; again, this is pre-epic). If each of those has 80 HD of mindless undead under their command, that's 13,040 HD of undead (at a market value in used oil of 815,000 gp, or 62.5 gp per undead HD). Plus the 80 HD you can control directly. Plus the 20 HD you have through your ability to Command. And this is Core, pre-Epic.

At 9th, a Cleric with a Wizard-7 cohort can control a limitless number of Wights. Enervation on a commoner-1 (the only reason for the Wiz-7 cohort) produces a Wight. Cleric Commands the Wight. Capture lots of low-level commoners, and have them slain by the Wight. You control the primary Wight, the primary Wight controls all the "kids". You're the king, it's the general. There's no listed limit to the number of spawn under the control of a given Wight, so your horde is arbitrarily large. Do this in a desecrated area with an evil shrine to your Evil diety, and your servants are a bit stronger (8 extra HP, for a total of 34). Fragile, though; if your general is rendered re-dead, you lose control of the arbitrarily high number of undead under your indirect command. As they are lawful evil, you might be able to give out orders that continue after the death of your general. Maybe.

[Mewtarthio]

17180 - 13140 = 4040 HD = how much more powerful the OP is (though, granted, he's level 30 versus your level 20). Also, Jack, the trouble with your build is that it's too easy to disrupt. All those undead are being indirectly controlled. If a follower dies or decides to betray you, that's 80 HD of mindless undead immediately lost and possibly even used against you.

Your Wights, meanwhile, run into the same problem that prevents a single vampire from taking over the world: They're all linked together. Break but a single link in that massive tree of control, and an entire subtree is lost. If the Wight is fairly high up, then you might end up with a substantial amount of uncontrolled Wights on your hands, which is fine if you're just into random death and destruction but not so good if you're trying to lead your undead hordes across the face of the earth (and even less good if one of those uncontrolled Wights happens to be near you or one of your 80-HD-of-undead followers). The only way to prevent this is by using a highly centralized system in which a very small number of Wights has a very large number of underlings, which is very inefficient.

Lastly, you end up with a rather boring army of zombies and Wights. Furthermore, either your followers are present at every battle (risking death and the loss of their undead) or they just sit back and give their undead the order to "destroy such-and-such town (in which case they will be utterly ineffectual in combat against all be the most mundane of thorps... thorps which, I might add, will quickly be evacuated). Even if your followers do get on the battlefield, the undead must be withing shouting distance, making large-scale coordination difficult at best and utterly suicidal at worst (read: at any sort of intelligent resistance). All in all, Jack, the logistics of your plan are virtually impossible.