Hi, I really want to play a necromancer but I don't want to have a horde of undead, I just was 2 or 3 strong undead that I can continue to scale up to keep them just as strong as say the 20-30 that can be summoned,
Does anyone have or can anyone help with a homebrew for this?
One idea I thought of was to redo animate dead so that it works like normal but you can only have a Max of 3 undead that have a duration of 24hrs at any one time, and when you cast animate dead to maintain control you can fuse 2 undead of the same challenge rating into a new undead of challenge rating same as their ratings combined.
Unsurprisingly, the Necromancy Wizard can do something of what you want. They get the Undead Thralls 6th-level feature which lets you target an additional corpse/bone-pile with Animate Dead, and the undead you create get extra HP based on your Wizard level and can add your proficiency bonus to their weapon damage rolls. There's some other nice features too.
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Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
I did see that, but that still allows for you the horde and increase numbers, what I'm looking for is to actually restrict size of army, and compensate it for strength
Well, there's the 6th-level Create Undead spell, which lets you create ghouls, and even more powerful creatures when cast at higher levels.
You could probably work with your DM to let you apply that spell to your existing trio of Animated Dead, and maybe homebrew an intermediate spell for the levels in between.
But it seems a bit much to allow "fusing" undead every 24 hours... starting with 2 CR 1/4 zombies and then merging in an extra zombie each recasting, you'd have a CR 1 ghoul after only 4 days.
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Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
Yeh I was concerned about the cr rating that's why I'm asking for help, however my attempt at balancing was that you can never have more than 3 of them at once,
But I'm on this thread to try and get some help creating it
Of these, Summon undead is closest to what you want. Since you can upcast it at higher levels, you can increase the creature's power, exactly as you want.
Applying limitations to spells like "they only last 24 hours" and "you can merge two together" doesn't really help with this, because you're upping the combat potency of the undead minion without applying any real weaknesses to it. "Only lasts 24 hours" is essentially irrelevant if you expect a dungeon to take less time than that. A merged creature is just a better creature, presumably.
It seems that you don't want to concentrate on it, but minions summoned with spells are either weak, or require concentration.
A good option might be to simply reskin spells like conjure elemental or summon fiend to create undead creatures instead. Keep the stats largely the same. An example would be this:
You call forth an undead revenant servant. A revenant of challenge rating 5 is created from the corpse. If the corpse is wearing armour or has weapons, they replace those in the statistics. The revenant can use magical items it was attuned to in life. It hates you for raising it from the dead, but is bound by your will.
The revenant is under your control for the duration. Roll initiative for the revenant, which has its own turns. It obeys any verbal commands that you issue to it (no action required by you). If you don't issue any commands to the revenant, it defends itself from hostile creatures but otherwise takes no actions.
If your concentration is broken, the revenant doesn't disappear. Instead, you lose control of the revenant, it becomes hostile toward you and your companions, and it might attack. An uncontrolled revenant can't be dismissed by you, and it disappears 1 hour after you summoned it.
The GM has the revenant's statistics.
* - (The corpse of a humanoid creature, slain within the last day)
There are many types of Artificer. Some work their experiments with mediums of wood and steel. Others apply their talents to the manipulation of chemicals and reagents. Your materials of choice are flesh and bone.
Tools of the Trade
3rd Level Feature
You gain proficiency with Leatherworker's Tools. If you already have this proficiency, you gain proficiency with one other type of artisan's tools of your choice.
To better herd your creations of flesh and bone you gain proficiency with Whips if you do not already have it.
Stitcher Spells
3rd Level Feature
You always have certain spells prepared after you reach particular levels in this class, as shown in the Stitcher Spells table. These spells count as artificer spells for you, but they don't count against the number of artificer spells you prepare.
In addition, the Chill Touch and Sapping Sting cantrips are added to your list of Artificer Spells.
Your work has borne you a loyal servant, a flesh servant. It is friendly to you and your companions, and it obeys your commands. See this creature's game statistics in the flesh servant stat block. You determine the creature's appearance and number of limbs (if any); your choice has no effect on its game statistics.
In combat the flesh servant shares your initiative count, but it takes its turn immediately after yours. It can move and use its reaction on its own, but the only action it takes on its turn is the Dodge action, unless you take a bonus action on your turn to command it to take one of the actions in its stat block or sone other action. If you are Incapacitated, the servant can take any action of its choice, not just Dodge.
If the Mending spell is cast on it, it regains 2d6 hit points. If it has died within the last hour, you can use your Leatherworker's Tools as an action to revive it, provided you are within 5 feet of it and you expend a spell slot of 1st level or higher. The flesh servant returns to life after 1 minute with all its hit points restored.
At the end of a long rest, you can create a new flesh servant if you have your Leatherworker's Tools with you. If you already have a flesh servant from this feature, the first one immediately perishes.
FLESH SERVANT
Medium construct, neutral
Armor Class 13 plus 1/2 PB, rounded up (natural armor)
Hit Points The servant has a number of Hit Dice [d8s] equal to your artificer level. It’s maximum HP equal it’s number of Hit Dice × (5 + it’s Con mod) plus your Intelligence modifier.
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 10 plus PB
Languages Understands the languages you speak.
Challenge — Proficiency Bonus (PB) equals your bonus
Berserk. Whenever the flesh servant starts its turn with fewer fewer than 1/3 of its HP, roll a d6. On a 6, the servant goes berserk. While berserk, the servant has advantage on melee weapon attacks and Strength checks. On each of its turns while berserk, the servant attacks the nearest creature it can see. If no creature is near enough to move to and attack, the servant attacks an object, with preference for an object smaller than itself. Once the servant goes berserk, it continues to do so until it is destroyed or it has at least 1/3 of its hit points again.
If you are within 60 feet of the berserk servant you can try to calm it by speaking firmly and persuasively. The servant must be able to hear you, and you must take an action to make a DC 15 Charisma (Persuasion) check. If the check succeeds, the servant ceases being berserk. If it takes damage while still below 1/3 of its hit points, the servant might go berserk again.
Aversion to Fire. If the servant takes fire damage, it has disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks until the end of its next turn.
Magic Weapons. The servant's weapon attacks are magical.
Actions
Slam.Melee Weapon Attack: your spell attack modifier to hit, reach 5 ft., one target you can see. Hit: 2d6 + 4 (Str mod) plus PB force damage.
Serve. You command the servant to interact with an object. The servant can perform simple tasks that a human servant could do, such as fetching things, cleaning, mending, folding clothes, lighting fires, serving food, and pouring wine. Once you give the command, the servant performs the task to the best of its ability until it completes the task, then waits for your next command.
Protect. Choose a creature you can see within 5 feet of the servant other than itself. Until the beginning of the servant’s next turn, it imposes disadvantage on attack rolls made against that creature.
Reactions
Shrug it Off (half PB times/day). Whenever the servant takes damage, it can use its reaction to reduce that damage by 3d6 + 4 (Con mod) plus PB.
Spark of Unlife
5th Level Feature
You gain the ability to animate flesh and bone in but a moment. You gain a Spark of Unlife, you gain additional Sparks at 9th, 15th level.
While holding your Leatherworker's Tools you can spend 1 minute to expend 1 or more of your Sparks of Unlife to reproduce the effects of the Animate Dead spell. For 1 Spark of Unlife, you reproduce the effects of the 3rd-level version of the spell. You can increase the equivalent spell slot level by one for each additional Spark of Unlife you expend. You regain all expended Sparks of Unlife whenever you finish a Long Rest.
Improve Upon the Flesh
9th Level Feature
You have learned ways to make... improvements upon tissue, both living and unliving. You gain resistance to necrotic damage, and your flesh servant gains the following bonuses and additional features:
Damage Resistances All damage from nonmagical sources.
Oafish Might. Your flesh servant counts as one size larger for Grapple checks, and when determining its carrying capacity and the weight it can push, drag, or lift. It’s melee weapons gain an additional 5 ft. reach (included in the attack).
Actions
Multiattack. The flesh servant makes two attacks.
Slam.Melee Weapon Attack: your spell attack modifier to hit, reach 10 ft., one target you can see. Hit: 2d6 + 4 (Str mod) plus PB force damage.
Reactions
Counter Attack. If the creature the servant is Protecting is attacked by another creature within reach, the servant can use its reaction to make a single attack against that creature.
Flesh Maestro
15th Level Feature
Your extensive work with reanimated flesh has garnered you special insights into your craft. You can cast Create Homunculus or Create Undead without expending a spell slot, without preparing the spell, and without material components, provided you use Leatherworker's Tools as the spellcasting focus. Once you cast either spell with this feature, you can't use this feature again until you finish a long rest.
In addition, your flesh servant gains the following feature:
Soak. Your flesh servant can shrug off some of the most devastating effects. Whenever it is subjected to an effect that allows it to make a Constitution saving throw to take only half damage, it instead take no damage if it succeeds on the saving throw, and only half damage if it fails.
It gives ya a biggun and the potential for a small hoard if you want one, or several tiny blobs.
Hi, I really want to play a necromancer but I don't want to have a horde of undead, I just was 2 or 3 strong undead that I can continue to scale up to keep them just as strong as say the 20-30 that can be summoned,
Does anyone have or can anyone help with a homebrew for this?
One idea I thought of was to redo animate dead so that it works like normal but you can only have a Max of 3 undead that have a duration of 24hrs at any one time, and when you cast animate dead to maintain control you can fuse 2 undead of the same challenge rating into a new undead of challenge rating same as their ratings combined.
Unsurprisingly, the Necromancy Wizard can do something of what you want. They get the Undead Thralls 6th-level feature which lets you target an additional corpse/bone-pile with Animate Dead, and the undead you create get extra HP based on your Wizard level and can add your proficiency bonus to their weapon damage rolls. There's some other nice features too.
Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
I did see that, but that still allows for you the horde and increase numbers, what I'm looking for is to actually restrict size of army, and compensate it for strength
Well, there's the 6th-level Create Undead spell, which lets you create ghouls, and even more powerful creatures when cast at higher levels.
You could probably work with your DM to let you apply that spell to your existing trio of Animated Dead, and maybe homebrew an intermediate spell for the levels in between.
But it seems a bit much to allow "fusing" undead every 24 hours... starting with 2 CR 1/4 zombies and then merging in an extra zombie each recasting, you'd have a CR 1 ghoul after only 4 days.
Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
Yeh I was concerned about the cr rating that's why I'm asking for help, however my attempt at balancing was that you can never have more than 3 of them at once,
But I'm on this thread to try and get some help creating it
All of the spells that you need already exist in the game:
Of these, Summon undead is closest to what you want. Since you can upcast it at higher levels, you can increase the creature's power, exactly as you want.
Applying limitations to spells like "they only last 24 hours" and "you can merge two together" doesn't really help with this, because you're upping the combat potency of the undead minion without applying any real weaknesses to it. "Only lasts 24 hours" is essentially irrelevant if you expect a dungeon to take less time than that. A merged creature is just a better creature, presumably.
It seems that you don't want to concentrate on it, but minions summoned with spells are either weak, or require concentration.
A good option might be to simply reskin spells like conjure elemental or summon fiend to create undead creatures instead. Keep the stats largely the same. An example would be this:
I have done this with Raise Revenant, a 5th level spell that mimics conjure elemental.
I have this:
Stitcher (Anatomist)
There are many types of Artificer. Some work their experiments with mediums of wood and steel. Others apply their talents to the manipulation of chemicals and reagents. Your materials of choice are flesh and bone.
Tools of the Trade
3rd Level Feature
You gain proficiency with Leatherworker's Tools. If you already have this proficiency, you gain proficiency with one other type of artisan's tools of your choice.
To better herd your creations of flesh and bone you gain proficiency with Whips if you do not already have it.
Stitcher Spells
3rd Level Feature
You always have certain spells prepared after you reach particular levels in this class, as shown in the Stitcher Spells table. These spells count as artificer spells for you, but they don't count against the number of artificer spells you prepare.
In addition, the Chill Touch and Sapping Sting cantrips are added to your list of Artificer Spells.
Stitcher Spells
3rd
cause fear, inflict wounds
5th
gentle repose, ray of enfeeblement
9th
life transference, vampiric touch
13th
aura of life, sickening radiance
17th
danse macabre, raise dead
Flesh Servant
3rd Level Feature
Your work has borne you a loyal servant, a flesh servant. It is friendly to you and your companions, and it obeys your commands. See this creature's game statistics in the flesh servant stat block. You determine the creature's appearance and number of limbs (if any); your choice has no effect on its game statistics.
In combat the flesh servant shares your initiative count, but it takes its turn immediately after yours. It can move and use its reaction on its own, but the only action it takes on its turn is the Dodge action, unless you take a bonus action on your turn to command it to take one of the actions in its stat block or sone other action. If you are Incapacitated, the servant can take any action of its choice, not just Dodge.
If the Mending spell is cast on it, it regains 2d6 hit points. If it has died within the last hour, you can use your Leatherworker's Tools as an action to revive it, provided you are within 5 feet of it and you expend a spell slot of 1st level or higher. The flesh servant returns to life after 1 minute with all its hit points restored.
At the end of a long rest, you can create a new flesh servant if you have your Leatherworker's Tools with you. If you already have a flesh servant from this feature, the first one immediately perishes.
FLESH SERVANT
Medium construct, neutral
Armor Class 13 plus 1/2 PB, rounded up (natural armor)
Hit Points The servant has a number of Hit Dice [d8s] equal to your artificer level. It’s maximum HP equal it’s number of Hit Dice × (5 + it’s Con mod) plus your Intelligence modifier.
Speed 25 ft.
Saving Throws Str +4 plus PB, Con +4 plus PB
Skills Athletics +4 (Str mod) plus PB, Perception +0 (Wis mod) plus PB.
Damage Resistances Damage from from Nonmagical Attacks.
Damage Immunities poison
Condition Immunities charmed, exhaustion, frightened, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 10 plus PB
Languages Understands the languages you speak.
Challenge — Proficiency Bonus (PB) equals your bonus
Berserk. Whenever the flesh servant starts its turn with fewer fewer than 1/3 of its HP, roll a d6. On a 6, the servant goes berserk. While berserk, the servant has advantage on melee weapon attacks and Strength checks. On each of its turns while berserk, the servant attacks the nearest creature it can see. If no creature is near enough to move to and attack, the servant attacks an object, with preference for an object smaller than itself. Once the servant goes berserk, it continues to do so until it is destroyed or it has at least 1/3 of its hit points again.
If you are within 60 feet of the berserk servant you can try to calm it by speaking firmly and persuasively. The servant must be able to hear you, and you must take an action to make a DC 15 Charisma (Persuasion) check. If the check succeeds, the servant ceases being berserk. If it takes damage while still below 1/3 of its hit points, the servant might go berserk again.
Aversion to Fire. If the servant takes fire damage, it has disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks until the end of its next turn.
Magic Weapons. The servant's weapon attacks are magical.
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: your spell attack modifier to hit, reach 5 ft., one target you can see. Hit: 2d6 + 4 (Str mod) plus PB force damage.
Serve. You command the servant to interact with an object. The servant can perform simple tasks that a human servant could do, such as fetching things, cleaning, mending, folding clothes, lighting fires, serving food, and pouring wine. Once you give the command, the servant performs the task to the best of its ability until it completes the task, then waits for your next command.
Protect. Choose a creature you can see within 5 feet of the servant other than itself. Until the beginning of the servant’s next turn, it imposes disadvantage on attack rolls made against that creature.
Shrug it Off (half PB times/day). Whenever the servant takes damage, it can use its reaction to reduce that damage by 3d6 + 4 (Con mod) plus PB.
Spark of Unlife
5th Level Feature
You gain the ability to animate flesh and bone in but a moment. You gain a Spark of Unlife, you gain additional Sparks at 9th, 15th level.
While holding your Leatherworker's Tools you can spend 1 minute to expend 1 or more of your Sparks of Unlife to reproduce the effects of the Animate Dead spell. For 1 Spark of Unlife, you reproduce the effects of the 3rd-level version of the spell. You can increase the equivalent spell slot level by one for each additional Spark of Unlife you expend. You regain all expended Sparks of Unlife whenever you finish a Long Rest.
Improve Upon the Flesh
9th Level Feature
You have learned ways to make... improvements upon tissue, both living and unliving. You gain resistance to necrotic damage, and your flesh servant gains the following bonuses and additional features:
Skills Athletics +4 (Str mod) plus PB × 2
Damage Resistances All damage from nonmagical sources.
Oafish Might. Your flesh servant counts as one size larger for Grapple checks, and when determining its carrying capacity and the weight it can push, drag, or lift. It’s melee weapons gain an additional 5 ft. reach (included in the attack).
Multiattack. The flesh servant makes two attacks.
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: your spell attack modifier to hit, reach 10 ft., one target you can see. Hit: 2d6 + 4 (Str mod) plus PB force damage.
Counter Attack. If the creature the servant is Protecting is attacked by another creature within reach, the servant can use its reaction to make a single attack against that creature.
Flesh Maestro
15th Level Feature
Your extensive work with reanimated flesh has garnered you special insights into your craft. You can cast Create Homunculus or Create Undead without expending a spell slot, without preparing the spell, and without material components, provided you use Leatherworker's Tools as the spellcasting focus. Once you cast either spell with this feature, you can't use this feature again until you finish a long rest.
In addition, your flesh servant gains the following feature:
Soak. Your flesh servant can shrug off some of the most devastating effects. Whenever it is subjected to an effect that allows it to make a Constitution saving throw to take only half damage, it instead take no damage if it succeeds on the saving throw, and only half damage if it fails.
It gives ya a biggun and the potential for a small hoard if you want one, or several tiny blobs.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Thank you for your suggestions 😁 I'll take them on board while trying to figure it out, I love the stitcher subclass though
If you like it, send me a link to a private 1-on-1 campaign and I’ll send you the link.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting