School of Necromancy (Improved)

An improved version of the necromancy subclass for wizards.

Necromancy Savant

Beginning when you select this school at 2nd level, the gold and time you must spend to copy a necromancy spell into your spellbook is halved.

Imperfect Vitality

At 2nd level, you gain the ability to reap life energy from creatures you kill with your spells. Once per turn when you kill one or more creatures with a spell, you gain temporary hit points equal to twice the spell’s level (cantrips count as level 0), or three times its level if the spell belongs to the School of Necromancy, plus your Constitution Modifier. You don’t gain this benefit for killing constructs or undead.

Soulless Servants

At 6th level, you add the animate dead spell to your spellbook if it is not there already. When you cast animate dead, you can target a number of additional corpses or piles of bones equal to your proficiency bonus, creating more zombies or skeletons, as appropriate.

Whenever you create an undead using a necromancy spell, it has additional benefits:

• The creature gains temporary hit points equal to your wizard level.
• The creature regains it's temporary hit points when you complete a short or long rest.
• The creature adds your proficiency bonus to its weapon damage rolls.

Gift of the Final Grave

Beginning at 10th level, you have resistance to necrotic damage, and your hit point maximum can’t be reduced. Additionally, when an undead you have summoned is reduced to 0 hit points you gain temporary hit points equal to its CR. These temporary hit points are in addition to any temporary hit points gained by Imperfect Vitality. You have spent so much time dealing with undead and the forces that animate them that you have become inured to some of their worst effects.

Dominate Undeath

Starting at 14th level, you can use magic to force a dying creature into undead servitude. As a reaction to a creature dying within 60 feet, you can attempt to capture the essence of a creature. The creature must be of a CR or Level less than your total wizard level. The creature must make a Charisma Saving Throw against your wizard spell save DC. If it succeeds, it dies. If it fails it becomes friendly to you, its creature type becomes undead, it is restored to full health, its speed is reduced by 10 feet, and gains resistance to non-magical weapons if it didn't already, it loses any abilities tied to its mental ability such as innate spellcasting or class features, and it loses physical abilities related to its insides such as a Swallow or Breath attack. The creature retains all speeds, languages, and basic attacks that it knew in life. A creature raised in this manner loses any Legendary Actions, Legendary Resistances, and Mythic Actions it had.

Intelligent creatures are more complicated to control. If the target has an Intelligence of 8 or higher, it has advantage on the saving throw. If it fails the saving throw and has an Intelligence of 12 or higher, it can repeat the saving throw at the end of every hour until it succeeds and breaks free.

If the creature is Huge or larger, it becomes unstable and begins to decay into dust after 1 hour.