Valda's Spire of Secrets
hit dice:
1d6
hit points at 1st level:
6 + your Constitution modifier
hit points at higher levels:
1d6 (or 4) + your Constitution modifier per necromancer level after 1st
armor proficiencies:
None
weapon proficiencies:
Simple weapons
tools:
None
saving throws:
Constitution, Intelligence
skills:
Choose two from Arcana, Deception, History, Intimidation, Investigation, Medicine, Persuasion, and Religion
starting equipment:
You start with the following equipment, in addition
to the equipment granted by your background:
- A dagger and any simple weapon
- (a) a component pouch or (b) an arcane focus
- A shovel and (a) a dungeoneer’s pack or (b) a scholar’s pack
spellcasting:
Your connection to the realm of negative energy
allows you to cast powerful necromantic spells.
Cantrips
At 1st level, you know four cantrips of your choice
from the necromancer spell list. You learn additional necromancer cantrips of your choice at higher levels,
as shown in the Cantrips Known column of the
Necromancer table.
Spell Slots
The Necromancer table shows how many spell slots
you have to cast spells of the 1st level and higher. To
cast one of these spells, you must expend a slot of the
spell’s level or higher. You regain all spell slots when
you finish a long rest.
Spells Known Of 1st Level And Higher
You know two 1st-level spells of your choice from
the necromancer spell list.
You learn an additional necromancer spell of
your choice at each level except 12th, 14th, 16th,
18th, 19th, and 20th. Each of these spells must be of
a level for which you have spell slots. For instance,
when you reach 3rd level in this class, you can learn
one new spell of 1st or 2nd level.
Additionally, when you gain a level in this class,
you can choose one of the necromancer spells you
know and replace it with another spell from the
necromancer spell list, which also must be of a level
for which you have spell slots.
Spellcasting Ability
Intelligence is your spellcasting ability for your
necromancer spells, since your power is rooted in the
fine manipulation of negative energy and research
into magical secrets. You use your Intelligence
whenever a spell refers to your spellcasting ability. In
addition, you use your Intelligence modifier when
setting the saving throw DC for a necromancer spell
you cast and when making an attack roll with one.
Spell save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus
+ your Intelligence modifier
Spell attack modifier = your proficiency
bonus + your Intelligence modifier
Ritual Casting
You can cast a necromancer spell you know as a
ritual if that spell has the ritual tag.
Spellcasting Focus
You can use an arcane focus as a spellcasting focus
for your necromancer spells. For a necromancer,
these are typically objects with sentimental value,
such as a locket, childhood toy, prison shackle,
or wedding ring, that are altered with magically
conductive materials.
class features:
Charnel Touch
Your connection to the negative energy realm grants
you an inner nexus of dangerous power, ready to be
unleashed at a moment’s notice. Starting at 1st level,
you have a pool of Charnel Touch points equal to
your necromancer level × 5 that replenishes when
you finish a long rest.
As an action, declare the number of points
you wish to expend, up to a maximum of 5 × your
proficiency bonus, and make a melee spell attack
against one target within your reach. On a hit, you
expend the declared amount of points and deal
necrotic damage equal to the points expended. If
you miss the attack, you don’t expend any points.
The damage dealt by your Charnel Touch is
doubled when you score a critical hit, expending no
additional points.
This attack deals no damage to constructs
and instead heals undead for the amount of points
expended. You can target a willing creature with this
ability without making a spell attack roll.
Thralls
While lesser spellcasters can only animate flesh and
bone in a rudimentary fashion, and must expend
valuable energy to maintain their undead’s loyalty,
true necromancers can provide their undead with a
portion of their own life force, ensuring long-term
obedience. Beginning at 2nd level, you learn an
ancient and powerful ritual that allows you to raise
and command your own army of the undead.
Animate Thralls
By spending 10 uninterrupted minutes performing
this ritual with a spellcasting focus or component
pouch,you can raise the remains of one or more
Small or Medium humanoids within 30 feet of you
into undead creatures. Undead created in this way
become your thralls. You maintain control over your
thralls indefinitely. Stat blocks for skeletons, zombies,
and other thralls can be found in the Undead Thralls
section at the end of the class description.
Commanding Thralls
If you are conscious, you can mentally control all of
your thralls, without using any actions. If you are
unconscious, your thralls will move to protect your
body from harm, but will not attack.
In combat, your thralls take their turns
immediately before or after your turn each round
(your choice) All thralls collectively share one
reaction and bonus action, which a single thrall can
use each round.
Thralls use your spell attack bonus to make their
attacks.
Maximum Thralls
You can animate and control one thrall of challenge
rating (CR) 1/4. As you gain levels in this class, you
can animate more thralls. The combined CR of all
your thralls can’t exceed the number shown in the
Thrall CR Total column of the Necromancer table,
and the total number of thralls under your control
can never exceed your proficiency bonus.
At any time, you can use your action to sever
your connection to one or more thralls, releasing
them. Corporeal undead crumple into a heap and
incorporeal undead flee to the Ethereal Plane.
Animate Dead
Beginning at 5th level, a necromancer can learn
the animate dead spell, a staple of the school of
necromancy. Necromancers can cast this spell as an
action, instead of over the course of 1 minute. All
undead created by the animate dead spell (as well as
any other magic, such as the create undead spell, that
allows you to control undead) count as your thralls
and can be commanded as such. If your new thralls
granted to you by a spell cause you to exceed your
total CR or number of thralls, you can immediately
sever your connection to any of your existing thralls
so as to stay within these limits. Your thralls can
never command or create other undead.
As always, you can’t reanimate your undead that
have been reduced to 0 hit points. Your Animate
Thralls ritual, the animate dead spell, and similar
magic only affects humanoid corpses, whereas your
thralls are undead creatures.
Bag of Bones
Also at 2nd level, you learn how to create a
necromantic magic item, a bag of bones. The bag
connects to a vast extradimensional space that can
only hold Medium or smaller corpses, bones, and
undead creatures; it violently expels anything else
placed within it. You can use an action to place a
corpse or willing undead creature into the bag, up to
a maximum of 10 corpses or undead creatures, or use
your action to dump the contents of the bag, which
land in spaces within 5 feet of you.
You can transform any container you can carry
into a bag of bones by performing a special ritual over
the course of 1 hour while you hold it. This container
ceases to be magical if you perform this ritual again
to create a new bag of bones. The container always
connects to the same extradimensional space. If the
bag is placed inside an extradimensional space, such
as that created by a bag of holding, it is destroyed. Its
contents remain in the same extradimensional space
until you create a new bag.
Grave Ambition
When you reach 3rd level, you decide on a proper
path of research into the dark arts in order to carve
a path leading toward your ultimate goal. Choose a
Grave Ambition, detailed at the end of the class. Your
choice grants you features at 3rd level, and again at
6th, 10th, and 20th level.
Black Arcana
Also beginning at 3rd level, as a bonus action, you
can expend a spell slot to replenish your Charnel
Touch pool. Your pool regains 1d8 expended points,
plus 1d8 for each level of the spell slot expended, up
to a maximum of your pool’s total.
Ability Score Improvement
When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th,
16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability
score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two
ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you
can’t increase an ability score above 20 using this
feature.
Critical Spellcasting
At 5th level, your potent necrotic powers punish
your enemy at the first sign of weakness. When a
creature rolls a 1 on a saving throw against one of
your spells, it automatically fails the save, and you
can roll all the spell’s damage dice a second time,
adding the total to the spell’s damage against that
creature. The additional damage only applies to the
creature that rolled a 1.
Additionally, your spell attacks score a critical
hit on a roll of 19 or 20.
Starting at 14th level, a creature automatically
fails its saving throw against your spells and
takes additional damage when it rolls a 1 or a 2.
Additionally, your spell attacks score a critical hit on
a roll of 18–20.
Enthralling Presence
At 7th level, the negative energy that flows through
you reinforces your thralls against those who would
seek to destroy or control your servants. Your thralls
and other undead you control are immune to effects
that turn undead and can’t be forcefully controlled by
another creature while you are conscious.
Undying Servitude
When you reach 18th level, your connection to
your thralls can pull them back from the brink of
destruction. When a thrall under your control is
reduced to 0 hit points but not destroyed outright,
you can use your reaction to restore it to half of its
maximum hit points. Once you use this feature, you
can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.
Lichdom
By 20th level, you have unlocked the pinnacle of
necromantic prowess, through which you will
conquer death itself: The Rite of Lichdom. When you
reach this level, you have completed your phylactery
and are ready to undergo the rite. To do so, you shut
yourself away for 30 days in an isolated location
of your choice, and emerge as an immortal lich,
an undead of unsurpassed power. Once the rite is
complete, you gain the following benefits as well as
those dictated by your choice of Grave Ambition.
Phylactery
A phylactery is a small object that houses a lich’s
soul, safeguarding its immortality. If you drop to 0
hit points, your body crumbles to dust, but your will
and mind escape to the phylactery. After 1d4 + 1
days, a new body coalesces as near to your phylactery
as possible and you return to life (or rather, unlife).
When your body reforms, you gain the benefits of a
long rest. The new body is identical in every way to
the one that was destroyed.
Undead Resilience
You gain immunity to necrotic and poison damage.
Undead Traits
You are immune to the effects of exhaustion and you
don’t need to eat, drink, sleep, or breathe. You must
still rest for 4 hours a day to gain the benefits of a
long rest. Though your type is humanoid, spells and
effects that specifically affect undead affect you as
well. You are immune to any effect that turns undead.
Phylactery
A lich’s phylactery is as much a memento as it
is their anchor to immortality, and as such, no
two are alike. Phylacteries are often constructed
from objects with sentimental value, such as
family heirlooms or prized possessions, but can
be fashioned from swords, pieces of armor, or
even entire castles.
Furthermore, every phylactery has a weakness,
a critical flaw by which it can be destroyed,
allowing its lich to be slain permanently. These
weaknesses, too, are unique to each phylactery.
One phylactery might require a ritual to be
performed around it for 24 hours, while another
might call for the phylactery to be dipped in
the lava of an active volcano. Discuss with your
GM the form your phylactery takes and what
weakness it possesses.
subclass options:
Grave Ambitions
Becoming a necromancer is seldom an accident.
Almost all who dive into the secrets of life and
death do so with a purpose, a method to the
madness. This ambition is what drives them into
the tenebrous corners of forgotten libraries, longabandoned tombs, and the graveyards of simple
commoners. Ambition drives them further into
the dark, where only the light of their end goal can
lead them through the all-consuming shadows. A
necromancer’s grave ambition represents the path
to their ultimate goal, to what lengths they’ll go to
achieve it, and serves to validate their actions, if only
to themselves.
Blood Ascendant
Necromantic might comes in many forms, but
a singular, ancient source is the blood curse of
vampirism. Though it promises much—immortality,
agility, charm—it comes paired with insidious
drawbacks, from the stinging burn of sunlight to
a perpetual thirst for blood. Necromancers that
wish to capture a measure of this power without
suffering its myriad weaknesses perform a special
ritual with vampiric blood in order to become
Blood Ascendants. In doing so, they fall deathly pale
and lose their reflection within mirrors, but learn
to slowly pry out vampiric powers without fully
succumbing to the all-devouring curse.
Death Knight
Some necromancers are content to sit in dusty tombs
with moldering tomes, occasionally picking apart a
battlefield for fresh ingredients and new company.
By contrast, death knights are a predators among
scavengers, seizing their goals through a melding
of magic and traditional combat. Bolstered with
dark energies and sturdy armor, the death knight
wields a weapons edged with death itself. They are
simultaneously the vanguard and general of their
undead forces, unafraid of getting their hands dirty
when necessary.
Overlord
There are few ambitions the common man fantasizes
about more than the power to rule. From the
ignoble peasant to the haughty nobility, many
dream of a world in which they are in charge. Some
necromancers, known as overlords, see their magic
as an opportunity to accomplish this common
dream. Overlords seek control both on and off the
battlefield, using dark magics to bolster their allies as
well as manipulate their enemies.
Pale Master
Some necromancers wish to conquer, and others to
control, but all utilize their necromantic powers as
a means to an end, a way to pave the way to their
true ambitions. Pale masters are no different, but few
have grand plans to compete with the overlords nor
dedicate themselves to the art of war as the death
knights do. Rather, pale masters dedicate themselves
to self-improvement and the growth of their powers.
Pale masters range from the curious mage’s college
student to the power-hungry spellcaster harassing
the local hamlets. With the ability to embolden their
spells, communicate with the undead, reduce the
bravest souls to quibbling cowards, and effortlessly
command their thralls in the thick of battle, these
seemingly aimless spellcasters are no less a threat
than any other necromancer.
Pharaoh
The god-kings of ancient kingdoms practiced a
unique style of necromancy, forgotten to time.
Through the extraction of organs, the desiccation of
flesh, and innumerable enchantments, those ancient
kings were able to rule their subjects as divine,
undead beings, long past their mortal deaths. While
those kingdoms have been lost to the shifting sands
and wild jungles of the world, their methods have
been preserved in the carvings of colossal temples
and revived by modern necromancers, who take on
the guise of the erstwhile pharaohs. Their magic is a
hybrid of divine and arcane influences, the legacy of
god-kings from a forgotten age.
Plague Lord
The power of plagues can’t be denied. A single
disease can single-handedly overwhelm a nation,
or even an empire. Necromancers that realize the
potential within sickness will often seek to wield
that power themselves. These are known as plague
lords, commanders of vermin and disease alike.
A plague lord’s touch is toxic, and vermin protect
them from harm, can transfer their spells through
unconventional means, and spread their filth to their
thralls.
Reanimator
Through bubbling test tubes and sparking electrodes,
you have discovered the true heart of necromancy:
mad science. You’ve experimented in far-reaching
disciplines of surgery, alchemy, and physics, using
your animated minions as gruesome test subjects and
walking surgical dummies. Most crucially, you have
discovered that lightning can imbue almost anything
with a semblance of life, from the smallest severed
muscle to the most towering and soulless golems.
Reaper
The oblivion of death is the sure wellspring
of all necromancy, a dark abyss into which all
necromancers stare, and which sometimes stares
back. Those rare necromancers that gamble
with their own souls might become intertwined
with death, becoming reapers, figures of shadow
and demise that beckon others to the afterlife.
For performing this deed, they strengthen their
connection to the distant oblivion, until they are but
tenebrous shadows: harbingers of an inevitable end.
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