Like the title says. But first a little backstory as to why I'm doing separate a necromancer and not choosing to stick with the normal necromancer, if anyone is curious about it. It started with a conversation between one of my players and me about why necromancy was treated as something evil in a lot of fiction, why isn't there good necromancy. Eventually we came up with the idea of coming up with culture of necromancers that splintered off from the same place, from worshiping a neutral goddess of undead and immortality. One is more honoring of the dead, while the other are seeking to unshackle themselves from it.
Anyways, the results where these two alternative necromancers. This is my first time actually diving into the deep end of homebrewing, so I'm aware some of the features might be overpower for their specific levels. There's some that might be unclear in these as well, but I'm aware. I'm hoping maybe we can find a way to keep the basic ideas for them while tuning them. So any help is very much appreciated.
Alt Necromancer 1:
Sentinel of the Dead
Beginning when you select this school at 2nd level, your connection to the spirits of the dead allows you to detect any necromantic magic that may pose a threat to their rest. You can cast the detect magic spell once per short rest or long rest to find necrotic magic. The spirits will guide you to the source of the magic, helping you defend the dead or living from any harm that may come to them.
Soulbound Grasp
Starting at 2nd level, whenever a creature within 30 feet of you dies, you can use your reaction to gain a deep connection with their spirit. This connection allows you to learn about their experiences and memories. You can tap into the knowledge of the departed soul, granting you insight into what the creature knew from the past 24 hours.
Dread Powers
At 6th level, your connection to the spirits of the dead allows you to channel the power of death to protect and empower your magic. As an action, you can create a necrotic aura within a 30-foot radius centered on you. Any creature you see within range must make a Wisdom saving throw (DC 8 + your proficiency bonus + Intelligent modifier). On a failed save, they are affected by the life-draining power of your magic for 1 minute.
Creatures affected take damage equal to your proficiency bonus at the start of their turn. Their movement speed is reduced by half, and they have disadvantage on saving throws against your necromancy spells.
Once you use this feature, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.
Soul Transference
Starting at 10th level, you can transfer the soul of a recently deceased creature into a magical vessel of your choosing, such as a construct or undead you've created. You must be within 10 feet of the deceased creature's body and succeed on a spellcasting ability check (DC 10 + the creature's CR) to transfer the soul.
The soul remains in the vessel until you release it or the vessel is destroyed. If the vessel is destroyed, the soul returns to the afterlife. While the soul is transferred, it is under your control and can aid you in combat or tasks.
Soulweave Ward
At 14th level, you can call forth a protective spectral ward, woven from the essence of spirits, that lasts for 1 minute and provides the following benefits:
You gain a bonus to your AC equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum 1).
You gain resistance to non-magical bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage.
Once during this duration, when you are hit by an attack that would reduce you to 0 hit points, the ward absorbs the attack and leaves you with 1 hit point. The ward then dissipates.
While protected by the Soulweave Ward, you have advantage against spells and other magical effects. This feature doesn’t interfere with your ability to cast spells.
You can use this feature once, regaining the ability to do so after a long rest.
Alt Necromancer 2:
Corpse Harvester
Starting at 2nd level, you gain proficiency in the Medicine skill. You may make a Medicine check on a creature that has died within the last minute, attempting to harvest a portion of their body for future use. The DC of this check is equal to 10 + the creature's Challenge Rating. On a successful check, you may choose to harvest one body part from the selected creature. You may only harvest a number of body parts equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum 1).
If you are already proficient in Wisdom (Medicine), you add double your proficiency bonus to these checks.
Cadaver Library
Beginning at 2nd level, you may store harvested body parts in a pocket dimension. Additionally, you have become skilled in the art of grafting these body parts onto yourself.
By spending a short rest, you can choose to graft any body part up to a number equal to your proficiency bonus from your harvested body parts onto yourself, granting you new abilities until your next short rest. You may replace any of your current grafted body parts with another during a short rest.
Spectral Servants
Starting at 6th level, you can summon a group of ghostly creatures to do your bidding. As an action, you can summon 1d4 specters, which remain for 1 minute or until they are destroyed. The specters follow your commands and can move through walls and other objects as if they were difficult terrain. The specters disappear when they drop to 0 hit points.
Eldritch Mastery
Starting at 10th level, your experiments with death and the infusion of harvested body parts have made you more resilient. You gain the following benefits:
Grim Resilience: You gain temporary hit points equal to your proficiency bonus + your intelligence modifier at the start of your turn, even if you currently have temporary hit points. These temporary hit points represent the connection you have established with the harvested souls and the bodies they inhabit.
Deathless Fortitude: You have advantage on saving throws against any effect that would cause you to be incapacitated or killed, as you have honed your ability to resist the forces of death.
Necromantic Warding: You are now immune to necrotic damage, reflecting your deep understanding and control over the forces of decay and death.
Reap the Soul
Starting at 14th level, you gain the ability to harvest the souls of the dead to fuel your magic. When you reduce a creature to 0 hit points, you can choose to harvest its soul. If you do, you regain a number of expended spell slots equal to half the creature's challenge rating (rounded up). You can harvest the soul of a creature in this way once per long rest.
Feedback: Underpowered, Wizards can ritual cast Detect Magic from level 1, which does everything this does and more
Rewrite:
Beginning when you select this school at 2nd level, your connections to the spirits of the dead allow you to sense when undead creatures are nearby. As an action, you can reach out with your magic and sense the precise location of any undead creatures within 30 ft of you that is not behind 1 foot of stone or 1 inch of lead. You can use this ability a number of times equal to your Intelligence bonus, regaining all uses when you finish a long rest.
Soulbound Grasp
Feedback : too vague, what does it mean mechanically to tap into the knowledge of the departed soul? Do you really need to learn how many times the creature used the bathroom in the past 24 hours?
Rewrite:
Starting at 2nd level, you can spend 10 minutes to touch the remains of a creature that has died within 24 hours to draw knowledge from the remaining echoes of its spirit. You receive a vision the important event the creature witnessed or sense most pressing thought that the creature had within the had within 24 hours of its death. Once you use the ability you cannot use it again until you finish a long rest. You can expend a spellslot of 1st level or higher to regain a use of this ability.
Dread Powers
Feedback: Wisdom save + low damage is an inefficient use of player/DM time. Whereas disadvantage on saves is very very powerful. Affecting all creatures in a 30ft radius means you'll probably hit your own party at the same time which is not good. Having a whole class feature be 1/long rest isn't so desirable either as it means 90% of the time you aren't benefitting from your subclass.
Rewrite1 - empowering spellls:
At 6th level, when you cast a spell from the Necromancy school you can channel the power of death to empower your magic. If a target of your spell succeeds on the saving throw against your spell, you can use your reaction to force that creature to reroll the save - they must use the result of the second roll; alternatively if you miss with the attack roll you can use your reaction to reroll the attack - you must use the result of the second roll. When you use this reaction, creatures within 5ft of you take necrotic damage equal to your proficiency bonus.
Rewrite2 - Aura:
At 6th level, when you use an action to cast a spell using a spellslot of 1st level or higher, you can channel that magic to protect yourself. Each creature of your choice within 10ft of you takes necrotic damage equal to your proficiency bonus and has disadvantage on the next attack roll they make.
Soul Transference
Feedback : this is mechanically unclear, what is the statblock of the construct or undead? what is the benefit to transferring a soul into it?
Rewrite:
Starting at 10th level, when a creature that you can see within 10 ft of you dies, you can use your reaction to comfort that soul and convince it to aid you. If the creature was hostile to you it makes a Wisdom saving throw against your spell DC, on a failure it becomes a banshee under your control for 24 hours or until it is reduced to 0 hit points. If the creature was friendly or neutral towards you, it becomes a ghost and retains its alignment and personality, it lasts until it is reduced to 0 hit points, it is magically resurrected or until you release it to the afterlife (no action required).
Once you have used this ability you can't use it again until you finish a long rest. You can expend a spellslot of 4th level or higher to regain a use of this ability.
Soulweave Ward
Feedback : this seems fine.
At 14th level, as an action you can call forth a protective spectral ward, woven from the essence of spirits, that lasts for 1 minute and provides the following benefits:
You gain a bonus to your AC equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum 1).
You gain resistance to non-magical bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage.
Once during this duration, when you are hit by an attack that would reduce you to 0 hit points, the ward absorbs the attack and leaves you with 1 hit point. The ward then dissipates.
While protected by the Soulweave Ward, you have advantage against spells and other magical effects. This feature doesn’t interfere with your ability to cast spells.
You can use this feature once, regaining the ability to do so after a long rest.
Hello! Thanks for taking the time and giving me some feedback.
Sentinel of the Dead
Feedback: Underpowered, Wizards can ritual cast Detect Magic from level 1, which does everything this does and more
Thanks for the advice. I'm fully aware that Wizards that it was underpowered. My thinking behind it was because that's something I always heard when creating homebrew, is if there's something already there that does the thing I want, then I should just adjust it to make it fit more to what I wanted to. The original idea was that this specific alternative necromancer was more based off exorcists and using spirits to help them was their main gimmick. Which is why I like how you rewrote it, I was just going for something more flavorful in the way I wrote it.
Soulbound Grasp
Feedback : too vague, what does it mean mechanically to tap into the knowledge of the departed soul? Do you really need to learn how many times the creature used the bathroom in the past 24 hours?
Yeah, I was having a hard time figuring out what exactly I wanted to give the player in terms of intel. The idea was that they'd learn something important from enemies like boss layers or secrets. The 24 hours limit was there as a fail-safe to keep myself from being wrote in a corner.
Dread Powers
Feedback: Wisdom save + low damage is an inefficient use of player/DM time. Whereas disadvantage on saves is very very powerful. Affecting all creatures in a 30ft radius means you'll probably hit your own party at the same time which is not good. Having a whole class feature be 1/long rest isn't so desirable either as it means 90% of the time you aren't benefitting from your subclass.
The reference I used came mostly from the Fallen Aasimar's Necrotic Shroud, beefed up a bit. Looking back now, it does mention any creature other than your allies. I wasn't sure how strong it was, so I limited to just 1/long rest. But I like your reworks.
Soul Transference
Feedback : this is mechanically unclear, what is the statblock of the construct or undead? what is the benefit to transferring a soul into it?
The construct and undead were examples. The idea was that the user can only transfer a soul to vessels they've created with magic. I can see now that I should have been clearer. And the benefit was that like the other feature before it, mostly intel. Like having a spirit charmed, having it do what you told it as long as you have it trapped. Goes back to the lore that I wrote for these necromancers, in my homebrew world. Essentially it's more to do with RPing purposes.
Feedback: this would be good, if the benefit gained from harvested parts scaled with the enemy CR, however I think having the benefit gained scale with enemy CR is going to be really hard to balance (because wizards already increase in power based on their level via spells and class features) and would make the other features of this class hard to balance. So I would suggest making it a flat DC as that means the necromancer will succeed more often as they level up, whereas currently they will succeed less often as they level up because enemy CR increases faster than a character's proficiency bonus.
Also you need to reword the double proficiency bonus to be a general "If you already had proficiency in medicine before choosing gaining this feature, you add double your proficiency to checks with the Medicine skill."
Cadaver Library
Feedback: Too vague, how much can you store in the pocket dimension? why can you only store body parts in there? what abilities to you gain from grafting them onto yourself?
Rewrite:
Beginning at 2nd level, you learn to use magic to preserve body parts you harvest indefinitely by creating a pocket dimension inside one bag or other container you touch. As an action you can place a body part that is no larger than yourself in this pocket dimension or retrieve any body part stored within the pocket dimension. Storing any object or creature other than your harvested body parts contaminates all body parts stored within the pocket dimension, making them unusable to you. You can have a maximum number of body parts stored equal to your proficiency bonus.
You can spend 1 hour, which may be part of a short rest, to graft one body part that is no larger than yourself, onto your body gaining one of the benefits below depending on the type of body part. Engrafted body parts wither and die when you begin a short or long rest. You cannot have more than one body part engrafted onto yourself at a time.
Heart : you gain the endurance and resiliency of the enemy, your maximum hp increases by 1 for each Wizard level you have, and you gain the same number of hit points.
Pair of Legs : your walking speed increases by 10 ft, if the creature the legs came from had a climbing or burrowing speed you gain a 10 ft climbing or burrowing speed respectively.
Arm : you can use this additional arm to grapple, shove or hold one item including weapons or a shield. You can use a bonus action to use this arm to use a non-magical item or make an attack with a weapon it is holding.
Pair of Wings : If you fall, you can flap your wings to soften your landing. You can use a reaction to reduce any falling damage you take to 0.
Brain : you gain proficiency in one skill that the creature the brain originates from had proficiency in.
Muscles : you have advantage on Strength checks and Strength saving throws, and your jump distance is doubled.
Skin / Shell / Scales : you gain a +1 bonus to your AC.
Notes: limiting the number of body parts stored requires them to keep collecting fresh body parts rather than e.g. after one huge battle collecting 50 body parts and never needing to collect them again.
Spectral Servants
Feedback: This is very OP at 6th level, you could make this 1 specter at a time and then it would be still powerful but balanced (right now it is unlimited so the necromancer could use this ability every round for 10d4 specters at all times), however it doesn't see very thematic for the subclass. Isn't this one supposed to be the avoiding death one? What does summoning specters have to do with that?
Rewrite:
Starting at 6th level, you can summon a ghostly creature to do your bidding. As an action, you can summon a specter, which remains for 1 hour or until it is reduced to 0 hit points or you use this feature again. On your turn you can mentally command the specter which follows your commands on its turn. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Intelligence modifier and regain all uses when you finish a long rest.
Alternative option:
Absorb Life: When a creature within 10 ft of you dies, you can absorb the last of it's life energy to bolster yourself. As a reaction, you regain hit points equal to 1d4+your Intelligence modifier, and the next time you cast a spell that deals damage to a creature before the end of your next turn, that spell deals an additional 1d8 necrotic damage.
Eldritch Mastery
Feedback: Forcing them to gain a small amount of temporary hit points could actually be detrimental if they are e.g. currently benefitting from Inspiring Leader which would give them 15 thp that would be forced to be replaced by 9-10 thp by this feature. Also 10 thp per turn adds up to a lot of hit points over the course of a day (50-150 would be normal based on games I have played). It's powerful but probably not game breaking.
Small Fix:
Starting at 10th level, your experiments with death and the infusion of harvested body parts have made you more resilient. You gain the following benefits:
Grim Resilience: You gain temporary hit points equal to your proficiency bonus + your intelligence modifier at the start of your turn, unless you already have more temporary hit points than this., even if you currently have temporary hit points. These temporary hit points represent the connection you have established with the harvested souls and the bodies they inhabit.
Deathless Fortitude: You have advantage on saving throws against any effect that would cause you to be incapacitated or killed, as you have honed your ability to resist the forces of death.
Necromantic Warding: You are now immune to necrotic damage, reflecting your deep understanding and control over the forces of decay and death.
Reap the Soul
Feedback: This again feels kind of out-of-place in a subclass that's supposed to be about avoiding death. The main issue here would be allowing the Wizard to regain spell slots of 6th level or higher which is a big no-no for game balance reasons - no class or subclass can do this.
Rewrite:
Starting at 14th level, you gain the ability to harvest the souls of the dead to fuel your magic. When you reduce a creature to 0 hit points, you can choose to harvest its soul, and regain expended spell slots that have a combined level that is equal to or less than half of the creature's CR (rounded up). None of the slots recovered in this way can be 6th level or higher. Once you use this feature you cannot use it again until you finish a long rest.
Thank you for taking the time to do the other one, I’ll be honest, I thought I’d only get advice for the first one.
Corpse Harvester
Feedback: this would be good, if the benefit gained from harvested parts scaled with the enemy CR, however I think having the benefit gained scale with enemy CR is going to be really hard to balance (because wizards already increase in power based on their level via spells and class features) and would make the other features of this class hard to balance. So I would suggest making it a flat DC as that means the necromancer will succeed more often as they level up, whereas currently they will succeed less often as they level up because enemy CR increases faster than a character's proficiency bonus.
Also you need to reword the double proficiency bonus to be a general "If you already had proficiency in medicine before choosing gaining this feature, you add double your proficiency to checks with the Medicine skill."
Yeah, I thought about how exactly I should do this, but then I thought about how I’d balance with the body parts they’d harvest with stronger enemies. Which is why I went with this DC, making it harder for them to harvest stronger enemies. It’s also why the next feature is so vague, which I’ll explain. Yeah, I was so focused with the first part that I overlooked the Medicine Proficiency thing, instead of just saying you gain Expertise on it.
Cadaver Library
Feedback: Too vague, how much can you store in the pocket dimension? why can you only store body parts in there? what abilities to you gain from grafting them onto yourself?
Okay, so for this feature, this was going to be the main gimmick for these guys. A big reason why I was so vague with it was that as I thought about it, I decided to keep it short just for my players, since I’m not really planning on releasing these out in any form. So I'm okay with how complex it can be and only me, as the DM, has to worry about it. I put a lot of thought into what abilities they gain, but in the end I wanted to really make it diverse for my players. Otherwise why would they bother to harvest any new corpse, if they all just give you similar abilities. But as you can tell I ran into other issues. There’s a 3rd party book I have that is all about harvesting, and gives a list of parts you can harvest for each creature in 5e, that I thought about using for this subclass. Another thought that I had was giving them a feature from the monster they harvested from.
The rewrite and list you provided is very close to another version I had for this feature, so I’m glad at least I was on the right path at some point, lol.
Spectral Servants
Feedback: This is very OP at 6th level, you could make this 1 specter at a time and then it would be still powerful but balanced (right now it is unlimited so the necromancer could use this ability every round for 10d4 specters at all times), however it doesn't see very thematic for the subclass. Isn't this one supposed to be the avoiding death one? What does summoning specters have to do with that?
Yeah, I’ll admit this was probably one of the last features I added so there wasn’t much thought put into this one. I didn't have many new ideas on how you can play with bodies and defaulted to ghosts again. Because this class isn't just trying to avoid death, it's using and abusing it. So using the dead as weapons is what I went with to justify the feature.
But now actually getting feedback from someone who isn't my player, perhaps for the 6th and 14th feature I can make this more interesting with a flesh golem you can make from the parts that you harvest. To continue that corpse theme instead of trying to do two things with them. Thank you for the input regardless what I do with this level.
Eldritch Mastery
Feedback: Forcing them to gain a small amount of temporary hit points could actually be detrimental if they are e.g. currently benefitting from Inspiring Leader which would give them 15 thp that would be forced to be replaced by 9-10 thp by this feature. Also 10 thp per turn adds up to a lot of hit points over the course of a day (50-150 would be normal based on games I have played). It's powerful but probably not game breaking.
Huh, okay. I did think about how strong giving them stacking Temporary Hit points would be, I wasn't sure much of an issue it would be at this level. So thanks for the adjustment.
Reap the Soul
Feedback: This again feels kind of out-of-place in a subclass that's supposed to be about avoiding death. The main issue here would be allowing the Wizard to regain spell slots of 6th level or higher which is a big no-no for game balance reasons - no class or subclass can do this.
This again is another, and only other, feature that I added last. Thanks for the rewrite, but getting this new insight from this feedback I think I'll lean on the golem idea I had, to redo this level's feature and the 6th level feature.
Thanks so much for help again.
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Like the title says. But first a little backstory as to why I'm doing separate a necromancer and not choosing to stick with the normal necromancer, if anyone is curious about it. It started with a conversation between one of my players and me about why necromancy was treated as something evil in a lot of fiction, why isn't there good necromancy. Eventually we came up with the idea of coming up with culture of necromancers that splintered off from the same place, from worshiping a neutral goddess of undead and immortality. One is more honoring of the dead, while the other are seeking to unshackle themselves from it.
Anyways, the results where these two alternative necromancers. This is my first time actually diving into the deep end of homebrewing, so I'm aware some of the features might be overpower for their specific levels. There's some that might be unclear in these as well, but I'm aware. I'm hoping maybe we can find a way to keep the basic ideas for them while tuning them. So any help is very much appreciated.
Alt Necromancer 1:
Sentinel of the Dead
Beginning when you select this school at 2nd level, your connection to the spirits of the dead allows you to detect any necromantic magic that may pose a threat to their rest. You can cast the detect magic spell once per short rest or long rest to find necrotic magic.
The spirits will guide you to the source of the magic, helping you defend the dead or living from any harm that may come to them.
Soulbound Grasp
Starting at 2nd level, whenever a creature within 30 feet of you dies, you can use your reaction to gain a deep connection with their spirit. This connection allows you to learn about their experiences and memories. You can tap into the knowledge of the departed soul, granting you insight into what the creature knew from the past 24 hours.
Dread Powers
At 6th level, your connection to the spirits of the dead allows you to channel the power of death to protect and empower your magic. As an action, you can create a necrotic aura within a 30-foot radius centered on you. Any creature you see within range must make a Wisdom saving throw (DC 8 + your proficiency bonus + Intelligent modifier). On a failed save, they are affected by the life-draining power of your magic for 1 minute.
Creatures affected take damage equal to your proficiency bonus at the start of their turn. Their movement speed is reduced by half, and they have disadvantage on saving throws against your necromancy spells.
Once you use this feature, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.
Soul Transference
Starting at 10th level, you can transfer the soul of a recently deceased creature into a magical vessel of your choosing, such as a construct or undead you've created. You must be within 10 feet of the deceased creature's body and succeed on a spellcasting ability check (DC 10 + the creature's CR) to transfer the soul.
The soul remains in the vessel until you release it or the vessel is destroyed. If the vessel is destroyed, the soul returns to the afterlife. While the soul is transferred, it is under your control and can aid you in combat or tasks.
Soulweave Ward
At 14th level, you can call forth a protective spectral ward, woven from the essence of spirits, that lasts for 1 minute and provides the following benefits:
You can use this feature once, regaining the ability to do so after a long rest.
Alt Necromancer 2:
Corpse Harvester
Starting at 2nd level, you gain proficiency in the Medicine skill. You may make a Medicine check on a creature that has died within the last minute, attempting to harvest a portion of their body for future use. The DC of this check is equal to 10 + the creature's Challenge Rating. On a successful check, you may choose to harvest one body part from the selected creature. You may only harvest a number of body parts equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum 1).
If you are already proficient in Wisdom (Medicine), you add double your proficiency bonus to these checks.
Cadaver Library
Beginning at 2nd level, you may store harvested body parts in a pocket dimension. Additionally, you have become skilled in the art of grafting these body parts onto yourself.
By spending a short rest, you can choose to graft any body part up to a number equal to your proficiency bonus from your harvested body parts onto yourself, granting you new abilities until your next short rest. You may replace any of your current grafted body parts with another during a short rest.
Spectral Servants
Starting at 6th level, you can summon a group of ghostly creatures to do your bidding. As an action, you can summon 1d4 specters, which remain for 1 minute or until they are destroyed. The specters follow your commands and can move through walls and other objects as if they were difficult terrain. The specters disappear when they drop to 0 hit points.
Eldritch Mastery
Starting at 10th level, your experiments with death and the infusion of harvested body parts have made you more resilient. You gain the following benefits:
Reap the Soul
Starting at 14th level, you gain the ability to harvest the souls of the dead to fuel your magic. When you reduce a creature to 0 hit points, you can choose to harvest its soul. If you do, you regain a number of expended spell slots equal to half the creature's challenge rating (rounded up). You can harvest the soul of a creature in this way once per long rest.
Thank you for taking the time to read.
Neat Idea but they could use some tweaking
Alt Necromancer 1:
Sentinel of the Dead
Feedback: Underpowered, Wizards can ritual cast Detect Magic from level 1, which does everything this does and more
Rewrite:
Beginning when you select this school at 2nd level, your connections to the spirits of the dead allow you to sense when undead creatures are nearby. As an action, you can reach out with your magic and sense the precise location of any undead creatures within 30 ft of you that is not behind 1 foot of stone or 1 inch of lead. You can use this ability a number of times equal to your Intelligence bonus, regaining all uses when you finish a long rest.
Soulbound Grasp
Feedback : too vague, what does it mean mechanically to tap into the knowledge of the departed soul? Do you really need to learn how many times the creature used the bathroom in the past 24 hours?
Rewrite:
Starting at 2nd level, you can spend 10 minutes to touch the remains of a creature that has died within 24 hours to draw knowledge from the remaining echoes of its spirit. You receive a vision the important event the creature witnessed or sense most pressing thought that the creature had within the had within 24 hours of its death. Once you use the ability you cannot use it again until you finish a long rest. You can expend a spellslot of 1st level or higher to regain a use of this ability.
Dread Powers
Feedback: Wisdom save + low damage is an inefficient use of player/DM time. Whereas disadvantage on saves is very very powerful. Affecting all creatures in a 30ft radius means you'll probably hit your own party at the same time which is not good. Having a whole class feature be 1/long rest isn't so desirable either as it means 90% of the time you aren't benefitting from your subclass.
Rewrite1 - empowering spellls:
At 6th level, when you cast a spell from the Necromancy school you can channel the power of death to empower your magic. If a target of your spell succeeds on the saving throw against your spell, you can use your reaction to force that creature to reroll the save - they must use the result of the second roll; alternatively if you miss with the attack roll you can use your reaction to reroll the attack - you must use the result of the second roll. When you use this reaction, creatures within 5ft of you take necrotic damage equal to your proficiency bonus.
Rewrite2 - Aura:
At 6th level, when you use an action to cast a spell using a spellslot of 1st level or higher, you can channel that magic to protect yourself. Each creature of your choice within 10ft of you takes necrotic damage equal to your proficiency bonus and has disadvantage on the next attack roll they make.
Soul Transference
Feedback : this is mechanically unclear, what is the statblock of the construct or undead? what is the benefit to transferring a soul into it?
Rewrite:
Starting at 10th level, when a creature that you can see within 10 ft of you dies, you can use your reaction to comfort that soul and convince it to aid you. If the creature was hostile to you it makes a Wisdom saving throw against your spell DC, on a failure it becomes a banshee under your control for 24 hours or until it is reduced to 0 hit points. If the creature was friendly or neutral towards you, it becomes a ghost and retains its alignment and personality, it lasts until it is reduced to 0 hit points, it is magically resurrected or until you release it to the afterlife (no action required).
Once you have used this ability you can't use it again until you finish a long rest. You can expend a spellslot of 4th level or higher to regain a use of this ability.
Soulweave Ward
Feedback : this seems fine.
At 14th level, as an action you can call forth a protective spectral ward, woven from the essence of spirits, that lasts for 1 minute and provides the following benefits:
You can use this feature once, regaining the ability to do so after a long rest.
Hello! Thanks for taking the time and giving me some feedback.
Thanks for the advice. I'm fully aware that Wizards that it was underpowered. My thinking behind it was because that's something I always heard when creating homebrew, is if there's something already there that does the thing I want, then I should just adjust it to make it fit more to what I wanted to. The original idea was that this specific alternative necromancer was more based off exorcists and using spirits to help them was their main gimmick. Which is why I like how you rewrote it, I was just going for something more flavorful in the way I wrote it.
Yeah, I was having a hard time figuring out what exactly I wanted to give the player in terms of intel. The idea was that they'd learn something important from enemies like boss layers or secrets. The 24 hours limit was there as a fail-safe to keep myself from being wrote in a corner.
The reference I used came mostly from the Fallen Aasimar's Necrotic Shroud, beefed up a bit. Looking back now, it does mention any creature other than your allies. I wasn't sure how strong it was, so I limited to just 1/long rest. But I like your reworks.
The construct and undead were examples. The idea was that the user can only transfer a soul to vessels they've created with magic. I can see now that I should have been clearer. And the benefit was that like the other feature before it, mostly intel. Like having a spirit charmed, having it do what you told it as long as you have it trapped. Goes back to the lore that I wrote for these necromancers, in my homebrew world. Essentially it's more to do with RPing purposes.
Thanks again for taking the time!
Alt Necromancer 2:
Corpse Harvester
Feedback: this would be good, if the benefit gained from harvested parts scaled with the enemy CR, however I think having the benefit gained scale with enemy CR is going to be really hard to balance (because wizards already increase in power based on their level via spells and class features) and would make the other features of this class hard to balance. So I would suggest making it a flat DC as that means the necromancer will succeed more often as they level up, whereas currently they will succeed less often as they level up because enemy CR increases faster than a character's proficiency bonus.
Also you need to reword the double proficiency bonus to be a general "If you already had proficiency in medicine before choosing gaining this feature, you add double your proficiency to checks with the Medicine skill."
Cadaver Library
Feedback: Too vague, how much can you store in the pocket dimension? why can you only store body parts in there? what abilities to you gain from grafting them onto yourself?
Rewrite:
Beginning at 2nd level, you learn to use magic to preserve body parts you harvest indefinitely by creating a pocket dimension inside one bag or other container you touch. As an action you can place a body part that is no larger than yourself in this pocket dimension or retrieve any body part stored within the pocket dimension. Storing any object or creature other than your harvested body parts contaminates all body parts stored within the pocket dimension, making them unusable to you. You can have a maximum number of body parts stored equal to your proficiency bonus.
You can spend 1 hour, which may be part of a short rest, to graft one body part that is no larger than yourself, onto your body gaining one of the benefits below depending on the type of body part. Engrafted body parts wither and die when you begin a short or long rest. You cannot have more than one body part engrafted onto yourself at a time.
Notes: limiting the number of body parts stored requires them to keep collecting fresh body parts rather than e.g. after one huge battle collecting 50 body parts and never needing to collect them again.
Spectral Servants
Feedback: This is very OP at 6th level, you could make this 1 specter at a time and then it would be still powerful but balanced (right now it is unlimited so the necromancer could use this ability every round for 10d4 specters at all times), however it doesn't see very thematic for the subclass. Isn't this one supposed to be the avoiding death one? What does summoning specters have to do with that?
Rewrite:
Starting at 6th level, you can summon a ghostly creature to do your bidding. As an action, you can summon a specter, which remains for 1 hour or until it is reduced to 0 hit points or you use this feature again. On your turn you can mentally command the specter which follows your commands on its turn. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Intelligence modifier and regain all uses when you finish a long rest.
Alternative option:
Absorb Life: When a creature within 10 ft of you dies, you can absorb the last of it's life energy to bolster yourself. As a reaction, you regain hit points equal to 1d4+your Intelligence modifier, and the next time you cast a spell that deals damage to a creature before the end of your next turn, that spell deals an additional 1d8 necrotic damage.
Eldritch Mastery
Feedback: Forcing them to gain a small amount of temporary hit points could actually be detrimental if they are e.g. currently benefitting from Inspiring Leader which would give them 15 thp that would be forced to be replaced by 9-10 thp by this feature. Also 10 thp per turn adds up to a lot of hit points over the course of a day (50-150 would be normal based on games I have played). It's powerful but probably not game breaking.
Small Fix:
Starting at 10th level, your experiments with death and the infusion of harvested body parts have made you more resilient. You gain the following benefits:
, even if you currently have temporary hit points. These temporary hit points represent the connection you have established with the harvested souls and the bodies they inhabit.Reap the Soul
Feedback: This again feels kind of out-of-place in a subclass that's supposed to be about avoiding death. The main issue here would be allowing the Wizard to regain spell slots of 6th level or higher which is a big no-no for game balance reasons - no class or subclass can do this.
Rewrite:
Starting at 14th level, you gain the ability to harvest the souls of the dead to fuel your magic. When you reduce a creature to 0 hit points, you can choose to harvest its soul, and regain expended spell slots that have a combined level that is equal to or less than half of the creature's CR (rounded up). None of the slots recovered in this way can be 6th level or higher. Once you use this feature you cannot use it again until you finish a long rest.
Thank you for taking the time to do the other one, I’ll be honest, I thought I’d only get advice for the first one.
Yeah, I thought about how exactly I should do this, but then I thought about how I’d balance with the body parts they’d harvest with stronger enemies. Which is why I went with this DC, making it harder for them to harvest stronger enemies. It’s also why the next feature is so vague, which I’ll explain.
Yeah, I was so focused with the first part that I overlooked the Medicine Proficiency thing, instead of just saying you gain Expertise on it.
Okay, so for this feature, this was going to be the main gimmick for these guys. A big reason why I was so vague with it was that as I thought about it, I decided to keep it short just for my players, since I’m not really planning on releasing these out in any form. So I'm okay with how complex it can be and only me, as the DM, has to worry about it.
I put a lot of thought into what abilities they gain, but in the end I wanted to really make it diverse for my players. Otherwise why would they bother to harvest any new corpse, if they all just give you similar abilities. But as you can tell I ran into other issues. There’s a 3rd party book I have that is all about harvesting, and gives a list of parts you can harvest for each creature in 5e, that I thought about using for this subclass. Another thought that I had was giving them a feature from the monster they harvested from.
The rewrite and list you provided is very close to another version I had for this feature, so I’m glad at least I was on the right path at some point, lol.
Yeah, I’ll admit this was probably one of the last features I added so there wasn’t much thought put into this one. I didn't have many new ideas on how you can play with bodies and defaulted to ghosts again. Because this class isn't just trying to avoid death, it's using and abusing it. So using the dead as weapons is what I went with to justify the feature.
But now actually getting feedback from someone who isn't my player, perhaps for the 6th and 14th feature I can make this more interesting with a flesh golem you can make from the parts that you harvest. To continue that corpse theme instead of trying to do two things with them. Thank you for the input regardless what I do with this level.
Huh, okay. I did think about how strong giving them stacking Temporary Hit points would be, I wasn't sure much of an issue it would be at this level. So thanks for the adjustment.
This again is another, and only other, feature that I added last. Thanks for the rewrite, but getting this new insight from this feedback I think I'll lean on the golem idea I had, to redo this level's feature and the 6th level feature.
Thanks so much for help again.