The Standard Necromancer

The necromancer shares many attributes in common with unspecialized mages as described in the PHB. As with all characters, the DM must first establish the specialist's ability scores, race, experience, spell abilities, and proficiencies. These game statistics provide the most basic "skeletal" outline of the wizard, which will be expanded throughout this book.

Ability Scores

Not all wizards can become necromancers. Masters of the Dark Art must possess utmost self-control and mental stability in order to successfully control the powerful energies at their disposal. Frequent trafficking with the spirits of the dead and more powerful creatures from the Lower Planes can exact a terrible price on the sanity of these mages; weak-willed individuals have little chance of emerging from such encounters with their mental faculties unimpaired. As we shall see in Chapter Three, insanity and madness are of paramount concern, even for the most wise and experienced practitioners of the Dark Art.

Consequently, only wizards with a minimum Wisdom of 16 may specialize in necromancy. As with most mages, they must also have a minimum Intelligence of 9 (their prime requisite). The character’s ability scores may be determined by one of the six methods outlined in the PHB (page 13), though not all procedures are equally likely to generate a character with the requisite high wisdom and intelligence. Methods I and III are least likely to generate a necromancer character (roughly a 2–4% chance, based on random generations of 1000 or more sets of ability scores). The chances improve somewhat for Methods II, IV, and V (roughly 8%, 11%, and 15% chance, respectively). Only Method VI offers about 90–100% certainty.

There are a few different strategies that the DM can use when generating ability scores for an NPC. The quickest method is for the DM to simply make up the ability scores. The DM can also roll up the scores using the same method chosen for the adventurers in the campaign. These approaches are best-suited for low-level henchmen, hirelings, or other individuals of minor importance in the long-term campaign.

However, if a necromancer is going to have a pivotal role during an extended series of adventures, the DM may want to tailor the ability scores to properly complement or challenge the party of player characters. In a heroic campaign, where the adventurers themselves have unusually high ability scores, should not their archnemesis be similarly endowed? One might argue that the party’s archnemesis should have superior ability scores in most respects to those of the typical PC. Where is the challenge in fighting a weak enemy? The party will derive a much greater sense of accomplishment in triumphing over a superior foe than an inferior one.

Given the “superior nemesis makes for better gaming” theory, the DM may use the following alternative dice-rolling methods to generate ability scores for necromancer wizards (in addition to Methods I-VI of the PHB):

Method VII: This method is a quick way to generate standard statistics for an NPC. Each ability score starts with 10, modified by the roll of 1d8 (each score thus varies from 11 to 18, with an average ability score around 14–15). The DM can speedily generate six ability scores and rearrange them to best compliment the particular character. This method insures about a 75% chance for randomly generating a necromancer NPC.

Method VIII: As Method VII, except give the necromancer a +1 bonus on Intelligence and +1 bonus on Wisdom (18 maximum in each score). With these bonuses, the probability increases to roughly the same as Method VI (90–100%).

To avoid overbalancing the campaign with countless “super villains,” the DM should use these last two methods sparingly and only for NPCs (player characters should be restricted to Methods I-VI). For most “average” NPC wizards, the DM should simply make up the scores or use Methods I-VI from the PHB. Examples of ability scores generated using each of these methods are presented in Table 1 (on page 10). The DM is encouraged to use these pregenerated sets to expedite character creation, either by choosing or random die roll (d6). This table may also be used for random player character generation, though only with the DM’s permission (the DM should choose the appropriate Method (I-VI) for the campaign).

Table 1 - Pregenerated Ability Scores for Necromancer Wizards by Methods (I-VI) from the Player's Handbook (page 13).

Method I	Str	Int	Wis	Dex	Con	Cha
1.	13	10	17	11	10	5
2.	10	9	16	10	11	13
3.	5	9	16	14	16	10
4.	7	12	16	13	16	12
5.	15	9	16	6	9	7
6.	7	11	16	13	15	13

Method II	Str	Int	Wis	Dex	Con	Cha
1.	17	12	17	12	11	12
2.	13	10	16	14	12	12
3.	12	16	16	7	13	12
4.	11	14	16	11	12	13
5.	8	10	18	12	8	9
6.	7	17	16	13	10	11

Method III	Str	Int	Wis	Dex	Con	Cha
1.	6	17	16	9	10	6
2.	10	17	16	13	14	10
3.	9	17	16	13	15	11
4.	6	17	16	11	14	9
5.	5	16	16	9	13	6
6.	8	18	16	10	11	13

Method IV	Str	Int	Wis	Dex	Con	Cha
1.	12	16	17	14	14	12
2.	14	17	16	14	15	14
3.	10	17	16	14	14	12
4.	11	16	16	12	12	12
5.	13	18	16	13	15	13
6.	11	16	17	15	13	11

Method V	Str	Int	Wis	Dex	Con	Cha
1.	9	17	16	11	14	11
2.	10	17	16	15	16	13
3.	10	18	16	11	13	10
4.	12	16	16	14	15	14
5.	12	17	16	14	14	13
6.	11	17	17	13	15	12

Method VI	Str	Int	Wis	Dex	Con	Cha
1.	8	17	16	10	16	8
2.	8	18	16	17	8	8
3.	9	13	16	11	12	10
4.	8	14	16	16	11	8
5.	9	14	16	15	10	11
6.	10	15	17	8	15	9

Race

As noted in the PHB, of those races open to player characters, only humans may normally specialize in the Dark Art. Compared with other demihuman races, humans have by far the shortest life span and are hence more likely to be concerned (or in the case of necromancers, obsessed) with death. Indeed, many human societies have revolved around a preoccupation with death and the afterlife, and one might argue that the study of necromancy was instigated by certain humans to help prolong their own lives. Other demihuman races, such as the elves and dwarves, have such long lives that death (of natural causes, at least) is usually a much less pressing concern. However, as we shall see in Chapter Two, this rule can be relaxed for some of the monster races when creating powerful NPCs to challenge a high-level party.

Experience Level Advancement

Necromancers advance in levels like most specialists, as outlined in the PHB. While most player characters could spend their entire careers reaching 20th level, NPC wizards created by the DM can be far more powerful. Unlike many other character classes, the spell abilities of mages continue to progress beyond 20th level, and wizards continue to gain 1 hp per level advanced after 20th.

An expanded level advancement table is provided in Table 2 (on page 11). As with most wizards, necromancers with an intelligence of 16 or greater gain a 10% bonus on experience points, though this is normally not of much concern for the NPC, whose experience is designated by the DM.

Spells

As will be closely explored in Chapter Four, the greatest powers of the necromancer arise from spellcasting. Like all specialists, they gain an additional spell for each available spell level, when compared with generalist mages.

This bonus spell is reflected in Table 2 (which appears on page 11) and must be devoted to memorizing a spell from the school of Necromancy (listed in Appendix 2 at the end of the book), or else it is forfeit. Thus, at 1st level, a necromancer could memorize two 1st-level spells (whereas general mages can memorize only one), provided that the bonus spell was from the school of Necromancy.

Spell Restrictions

Necromancers do pay a price for their devotion to the Art. Because of the concentration in necromancy, they forgo all training in the schools of Illusion and Enchantment/Charm. As a result, they cannot cast spells from these neglected schools, unless the spell also falls under the jurisdiction of the six permissible schools. Consider the 6th-level spell enchant an item, for example. Although it belongs to

Enchantment/Charm school, the spell may be learned by a necromancer since it is also taught in the school of Invocation.

Of course, necromancers do have a more difficult time with studying spells outside the Art for the first time (–15% chance to learn spells from permissible schools except necromancy). However, despite all these restrictions, the necromancer has a huge potential repertoire of spells at hand, limited only by the character’s intelligence and diligence at spell research. Appendix 1 lists many spells available to necromancers, arranged by level and application.

Magic Item Restrictions

In addition to spell restrictions, the necromancer is slightly limited in the choice of magical items. Since this specialist lacks a formal background in the schools of Enchantment/Charm and Illusion, the Necromancer cannot employ the few specialized magical items based exclusively on these spells. As a general rule, if the magical item can only be employed by a wizard and it involves either spells or spell-like effects from the Enchantment/Charm or Illusion school, then this device could not normally be employed by a necromancer. Thus only a few items from the DMG and TOM are forbidden: all wizard scrolls with spells exclusively from Enchantment/ Charm or Illusion schools, rod of beguiling, staff of command, wands of fear and illusion, robe of scintillating colours, and eyes of charming.

Magical items available to all classes, which operate without specialized knowledge in the restricted schools, are generally allowed to specialists (including the necromancer). For instance, a potion of invisibility will work whether it is imbibed by a necromancer, an invoker, or even a troll. Similarly, the necromancer can easily employ rings of human influence and invisibility, rods of splendour and terror, cloaks of displacement, and all other items without class restrictions.

Proficiencies

To round out the necromancer’s skills, the DM should choose weapon and nonweapon proficiencies for the character. These should depend on the necromancer’s kit, as detailed later. The DM should also refer to the new nonweapon proficiencies discussed in this chapter. In this section, we describe only how to determine the total number of proficiency slots available to the wizard.

The base number of weapon and nonweapon proficiencies depends on the character’s experience level. These are summarized on Table 2. It is suggested that the DM employ the optional rule that transfers the number of languages to proficiency slots (page 16, PHB). Note that these bonus slots may be applied to either weapon or nonweapon proficiencies, as desired.

Table 2 - Extended Necromancer (Wizard) Advancement, Spells, and Level Improvements

Level	Experience	Hit Dice (d4)	THAC0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	NW	W	PPDM	RSW	PP	BW	S
1	0	1	20	2	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4	1	14	11	13	15	12
2	2,500	2	20	3	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4	1	14	11	13	15	12
3	5,000	3	20	3	2	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	5	1	14	11	13	15	12
4	10,000	4	19	4	3	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	5	1	14	11	13	15	12
5	20,000	5	19	5	3	2	-	-	-	-	-	-	5	1	14	11	13	15	12
6	40,000	6	19	5	3	3	-	-	-	-	-	-	6	2	13	9	11	13	10
7	60,000	7	18	5	4	3	2	-	-	-	-	-	6	2	13	9	11	13	10
8	90,000	8	18	5	4	4	3	-	-	-	-	-	6	2	13	9	11	13	10
9	135,000	9	18	5	4	4	3	2	-	-	-	-	7	2	13	9	11	13	10
10	250,000	10	17	5	5	4	3	3	-	-	-	-	7	2	13	9	11	13	10
11	375,000	10+1	17	5	5	5	4	4	-	-	-	-	7	2	11	7	9	11	8
12	750,000	10+2	17	5	5	5	5	5	2	-	-	-	8	3	11	7	9	11	8
13	1,125,000	10+3	16	6	6	6	5	5	3	-	-	-	8	3	11	7	9	11	8
14	1,500,000	10+4	16	6	6	6	5	5	3	2	-	-	8	3	11	7	9	11	8
15	1,875,000	10+5	16	6	6	6	6	6	3	2	-	-	9	3	11	7	9	11	8
16	2,250,000	10+6	15	6	6	6	6	6	4	3	2	-	9	3	10	5	7	9	6
17	2,625,000	10+7	15	6	6	6	6	6	4	4	3	-	9	3	10	5	7	9	6
18	3,000,000	10+8	15	6	6	6	6	6	4	4	3	2	10	4	10	5	7	9	6
19	3,375,000	10+9	14	6	6	6	6	6	4	4	4	2	10	4	10	5	7	9	6
20	3,750,000	10+10	14	6	6	6	6	6	5	4	4	3	10	4	10	5	7	9	6
21	4,125,000	10+11	14	6	6	6	6	6	5	5	5	3	11	4	8	3	5	7	4
22	4,500,000	10+12	14	6	6	6	6	6	6	5	5	4	11	4	8	3	5	7	4
23	4,875,000	10+13	14	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	4	11	4	8	3	5	7	4
24	5,250,000	10+14	14	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	5	12	5	8	3	5	7	4
25	5,625,000	10+15	14	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	12	5	8	3	5	7	4
26	6,000,000	10+16	14	7	7	7	7	6	6	6	6	6	12	5	7	3	5	7	4
27	6,375,000	10+17	14	7	7	7	7	7	7	7	6	6	13	5	7	3	5	7	4
28	6,750,000	10+18	14	7	7	7	7	7	7	7	7	7	13	5	7	3	5	7	4
29	7,125,000	10+19	14	8	8	8	8	7	7	7	7	7	13	5	7	3	5	7	4
30	7,500,000	10+20	14	8	8	8	8	8	8	8	7	7	14	6	7	3	5	7	4

NW: Nonweapon Proficiency slots; W: Weapon Proficiency slots; PPDM: Paralyzation, Poison, or Death Magic; RSW: Rod, Staff, or Wand; PP: Petrification or Polymorph; BW: Breath Weapon; S: Spells.