How to build a Necromancer in Dungeons and Dragons 5e

Playing with the forces of life and death like a childs play thing, Necromancers are without a doubt one of the most controversial playstyles in all of D&D. Loved by players and universally hated by DMs, everyone has an opinion on them. But today, were taking all opinions, alongside our better judgement, and throwing them both out the window because today I am going to teach you The MOST POWERFUL Necromancer build in Dungeons and Dragons 5e.

How to build a Necromancer in Dungeons and Dragons 5e

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(0:00) The Best Necromancer
(0:28) Build Goals
(0:54) The Classes
(1:16) Warlock
(2:39) Wizard
(3:58) Sorcerer
(5:07) Race
(5:56) Feats
(6:59) Necromancer Spells
(8:05) Summoning Spells
(9:06) How Many Undead?
(11:32) All done...wait what?
(11:58) The Coffeemancer
(13:11) How does it work?
(13:39) The Coffeemancer Build
(14:09) Unlimited Undead
(14:47) The Process
(16:15) The Promise
(16:51) Questions? Comments?

#DungeonsAndDragons #dnd #5e

[MrBracey]

Just remember, the more undead you make, the more you have to cast Animate Dead to maintain control over them.

[AliceEverglade]

if you want to be truly evil (lvl 17 wizard), gather a group of kobolds (which are humanoids) and cast finger of death on them whenever you can. upon them turning into an undead permanently under your control, you cast true polymorph on them to have unlimited dragons as your pets. *atlast, the kobold has achieved their dream of becoming a real dragon*

[andrewwang]

Not needing to eat, breathe, or sleep sounds like a lich! I've always wanted to be a lich.

[hambonejones]

While you get a 6th lvl spell slot, you can't learn any wizard spells over 3rd lvl. Your max spell lvl for a class is dependent on the lvls in that class, even though you can up cast it to be any spell slot.

[j.d.]

My favorite self-help and beauty regiment video.

[mylesdrake]

That seems like a lot of work to just get a bunch of zombies and skeletons. Being level 12ish before your main thing comes online is rough. My build is simply a necromancer wizard Reborn. Once you hit 17th level you can start building an army of wights using 8th level create undead and 9th level geas to maintain permeant control. Then after building them up you send them out while staying in contact with rary's telepathic bond, sending and use scrying to get eyes on the battlefield and maintain order with a simulacrum true polymorphed into a death knight at the head of the host once you hit 18th level. Once these wights kill some humanoids with their life drain that's up to 12 zombies per wight. The wights themselves are sitting at a hefty 65 hp, with 1d8+8 dmg. So if you spend a year doing this that's 365 wights, 730 if you take meta magic adept twin spell. They march out and they kill 12 a piece that's 4, 380 zombies with 365 wights or 8, 760 zombies with 730 wights all being led by a death knight that will turn into a weaker version of you if reduced to 0hp.

[glarak]

For the Coffeemancer. You should befriend a creation bard to make your material component to not go bankrupt. For 100 gp a 5th level bard is enough

[troygrossman]

As a DM I'd force a player to keep track of how many bodies you've actually come across and were able to raise.

[Pyrocaster]

This is fine and dandy, but it's a lot of work for just a few zombies AND you need to constantly use spell slots to keep them. Here is a build I told a DM I'd like to use at some point if I got the chance (and was strictly told no way in hell) to basically become an undead overlord:

* 20 levels of Necromancy Wizard
* Make sure you have the spells Simulacrum, True Polymorph, Feeblemind, and (preferably) Finger of Death
* Create Undead is a possible avenue, but leaves some room to be desired as the ways to keep what you make through this spell in the long term tends to be awkward. Depending on how your DM rules undead interaction, in which weaker undead gravitate and listen to stronger ones, it may still work to your benefit. But that's a house rule, as I don't believe there is anything in vanilla D&D which states that.

You can start your venture into becoming an undead overlord at level 15, which is the lowest possible level you can get Feeblemind.

First, you and your party must locate and burn through a Greater Death Dragon's legendary resistances so you can cast Feeblemind on it. The party gives whatever debuffs it can to make sure it sticks. Next, use the Command Undead feature from the reaching 14th level of necromancer wizard to bind it to you. It'll automatically fail barring divine intervention from the D&D Gods as it won't be able to make the save.

Congrats, you now have the first of three major undead that will make this army! The Greater Death Dragon is going to become the marshal of your cannon fodder as it's breath weapon doesn't have a limit to how many undead it can have under it's control. Thus, as long as it has a graveyard, a village of peasents, or anything else that is high in numbers it can keep creating zombies without limit. Those zombies are also under the GDD's control at all times, so even if they are across the planet they are still able to be wrangled in if need be.

Next, you need to have access to both Simulacrum and True Polymorph, which can be accomplished at level 17. This one is a lot more straight forward and not nearly as much of a pain in the ass as step one. Create a Simulacrum of yourself, either have yourself or it use True Polymorph, and turn that sucker into whatever undead you think you might need. Feel like you need more chaff? Another GDD would be perfect. Maybe you want some more brawn? An Adult Red Dracolich, Death Knight, or Ghost Dragon are great choices. Need an informant into a nearby kingdom you are planning to invade? Make it into either an Atropal for as many wraiths as you could ever want, a Shadow Assassin for stealth/disruption, or a vampire to start creating a nest of bloodsuckers for when the time is right.

Finally, you have yourself! The best part is that, what you just did to the Simulacrum you could also do to yourself if you wanted to! However, I would recommend getting to max level to either become a Demilich or Nightwalker if you plan to do it to yourself. The Demilich lets you keep your spellcasting to a degree, so I would recommend that over the Nightwalker (especially since the Nighwalker's AOE field of damage is indiscriminate of allies and enemies. All that work just to wipe out your army by taking an afternoon stroll) but it's up to you.

Alternatively, you could stay as you and use Finger of Death to start making psuedo-Death Knights.
Problem is that these zombies still suck at higher levels. The stats of a zombie made by a level 20 Necromancer Wizard are:
Base AC - 8
HP - 42
Slam - 1d6 + 7

This isn't all that impressive.

HOWEVER, if you decide to add magic equipment to these undead it can be a little bit better. Like ourselves, we can give them 3 magic items that they can attune to along with whatever regular equipment we'd like. Keeping it rather simple (nothing above uncommon grade), we can easily bump up what we are working with.

For magic items, I'd recommend using a +1 shield (adds +3 to AC), a +1 longsword, and one more item that is up to your personal preference. Could be a cloak of protection (additional +1 if you want a tank), criclet of blasting (to give them some range), or an additional weapon so they have seperate damage types (slashing from a longsword, bludgeoning from a hammer as an example).

After that, we only really need to grab maybe one or two non-magical items to make them workable in a higher level setting. As their strength is rather low, as well as their overall AC, we can grab them mithril plate armor so their AC becomes a base of 18 and the strength requirement becomes an afterthought as mithril negates the usual need of a 15 in strength to properly wear plate armor. Finally, maybe keep a cloak on them with a large hood so they can't be easily recognizable in a city if the need arises to enter one without killing the populace.

So, with that all in mind, our main new stat blocks are as follows:
Base AC - 18 (21 - 22 depending on items)
HP - 42
Slam - 1d6 + 7
Longsword - 1d8 + 7 (1d10 +7 if using both hands)
Plus whatever you add as your third magic item.

These enhancements bring them in the CR 5 range, so a kill-squad of around 10 of these beefed up zombies would be no laughing matter. Additionally, if you give them better gear they will obviously be better than CR 5. Plus, they are permanent and don't require any additional spell slots to keep around unlike the undead made from create undead and similar such spells or any additional gimmicks to keep them around.

So, following the above guideline, you could easily amass a large undead army and conqure a kingdom with relative ease. The main drawback is that a majoirty of your undead will come from either only your Greater Death Dragon or your Simulacrum. Which means that, if either of them are either destroyed or break free of Command Undead (which would require something akin to a wish spell after it has been hooked), you'd lose your army in the blink of an eye.

Now, as a final note, IF your DM uses the "Undead naturally follow the strongest undead in the room" mentality, you'd still be fine even if the zombies are no longer under your direct control. Using True Polymorph, you become a Demilich and just wrangle them all back in order. It'd also make Create Undead worth it as the smarter undead made from the spell could be used more effectively than regular zombies, even after you 'lose control' of them. But, again, that's all dependent on the DM's house rules.

Overall, I prefer this build over the one in your video simply because it adds the potential for more undead with less micromanaging. Additionally, you also get access to higher tier undead which is a nice plus. Let me know what you think!

[jacobyspurnger]

I'd like to see more about the strategy with poisoner feat and minions.

[Razdasoldier]

To ba a little stronger only go 2 wizard for evocation and the rest of the wizard levels put into cleric this allows you to have twilight aura and aoe without killing your undead.

[benschwab]

Hi DM here. I'm allowing a necromancer as an enemy npc. My group will fight her in a graveyard/her lair. However she is a recurring npc that will get stronger over the campaign. There is no way for the group to win as she will flee or something. I wanted something like she was trying to create a beholder with magic and science, it's not quite done but she is trying to activate it, I am unsure how to do something like this. It would be a combat situation as she will have summoned lots of undead, but I wanted something else they would have to do so she has time to flee.

[zimattack]

So would an good strategy be out of 43 undead 4 zombies and 6 skeleton with bows and 1 ghoul split in 3 groups with the last group of zombies and skeletons holding back as a last line of defense

[arcanerecovery]

Sorcery Points

You have 2 sorcery points, and you gain more as you reach higher levels, as shown in the Sorcery Points column of the Sorcerer table. **You can never have more sorcery points than shown on the table for your level.** You regain all spent sorcery points when you finish a long rest.

[tristangama]

In what order or when should I put levels into undead warlock, necromancy wizard, and aberrant mind sorcerer?

[mysisterfanny]

would have been nice if you had a lvl by lvl guide in what to pick. I'm making a Necromancer for my Christmas one shot and I am stuck with what to choose as we are starting at lv10.

[itzybitzyspyder]

If there's a rampant necromancer with an army of undead, a cleric will be dispatched.

[Dragonkingomega]

sorry for the question but what stat array would you recommend

[elskaalfhollr]

Fun fact, no rule specifies that you cant buy equipment for your undead, give them skeletons longswords, shields, longbows and armor, expensive? Yes useful? Absolutely

[ViperTCG]

What would you recommend for early game? This is a nice end game goal but I was just wondering how to get the most out of my character while building towards the first build.