Black Lord

“Embrace the darkness.”

The dark nemesis of light, a black lord is both a knight and an eldritch wielder of dark magic and necromancy, wrapped in shadowy armor and cloaked in black robes, lurking in the darkness. They are deadly combatants, steeped in the knowledge of the black arts, striding forth from the shadows to strike without warning. They can conjure and bend the very darkness to their will, summon forth terrible creatures of the void, and tap into the essence of death. Black lords tend to be cold, ruthless, unfeeling, and villainous, always searching to fulfill their own mad designs and lust for power.

Hit Die: d10

Requirements

To qualify to become a black lord, a character must fulfill all of the following criteria:

Class Skills

The class skills for this class (and the key ability for each skill) are Acrobatics (Dex), Appraise (Int), Bluff (Cha), Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Fly (Dex), Handle Animal (Cha), Intimidate (Cha), Knowledge (all skills, taken individually) (Int), Linguistics (Int), Profession (Wis), Ride (Dex), Spellcraft (Int), Stealth (Dex), Survival (Wis), Swim (Str), and Use Magic Device (Cha).

Skill Ranks at Each Level: 3 + Int modifier

Table: The Black Lord
Class Level BAB Fort Save Ref Save Will Save Special Spells per Day
1st +1 +1 +1 +1 Darkvision, bonus spell +1 level of existing class
2nd +2 +1 +2 +1 Power of the dark 1/day  
3rd +3 +2 +3 +2 Command the darkness, bonus spell +1 level of existing class
4th +3 +2 +3 +2 Shadow Armor  
5th +4 +3 +4 +3 Bonus spell +1 level of existing class
6th +5 +3 +5 +3 Power of the dark 2/day, shadow armor improvement  
7th +6 +4 +6 +4 Bonus spell +1 level of existing class
8th +6 +4 +6 +4 Impenetrable darkness  
9th +7 +5 +7 +5 Bonus spell +1 level of existing class
10th +8 +5 +8 +5 Power of the dark 3/day  

Class Features

All of the following are class features of the black lord prestige class.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency

Black lords gain no new weapon or armor proficiencies.

Bonus Spell

At every even level, the black lord learns a bonus spell of any level he can cast, chosen from the black lord spell list.

Darkvision (Su)

At 1st level, the black lord gains darkvision 60 ft. If he already has darkvision, its range increases to 90 ft.

Power of the Dark (Su)

At 2nd level, the black lord gains supernatural darkness-related magic powers. Once per day, he may cast blindness, remove blindness, or deeper darkness as a supernatural ability. At 6th and 10th level, the number of times per day he may use the ability increases.

In addition, the black lord now casts any spell with the [darkness] descriptor or that causes darkness or blindness as if he were two levels higher.

Command the Darkness (Sp)

At 3rd level, the black lord gains the ability to command the dark magic lurking within the shadows and certain creatures affiliated with darkness. This ability allows him to temporarily command undead shadows or any non-good creature that can create darkness as an innate spell-like or supernatural ability (such as dark creeper or shadow demon), or to manipulate the very darkness, causing it to come alive and attack those within it. The ability to command creatures of darkness works like the command undead spell, but only against creatures of darkness (undead or not), as described above. However, the duration of this command is only 10 minutes per black lord prestige class level. A black lord may use this ability three times per day.

The ability to manipulate darkness enables the black lord to coalesce some of the shadows within a darkness or deeper darkness spell, forming them into a nightmarish monster equivalent to a gibbering mouther. The mouther acts like a summoned monster, but cannot leave the area of the darkness or deeper darkness spell. The mouther remains for one round per two caster levels, then vanishes. Creatures engulfed by the mouther when it vanishes reappear in the mouther’s former space. When the mouther vanishes or is destroyed, the darkness vanishes, as well. This ability can be used three times per day.

Shadow Armor (Su)

At 4th level the black lord gains the supernatural ability to conjure shadow armor around himself or a willing, touched target. The ability is identical to the mage armor spell, but also provides blindsense up to 15ft. and gives a +4 competence bonus on Stealth checks. The ability may be used once per day. At 6th level the power of the shadow armor improves, providing blindsight instead of blindsense. Additionally, twice per day the black lord may cause shadow armor conjured on himself to emit bone-chilling cold that inflicts 2d6 points of damage per three caster levels to anything within a 5 ft. radius (Fort DC 10 + black lord level + Int or Cha bonus for half damage). The cold effect lasts for one round per black lord level, and moves with the black lord.

Impenetrable Darkness (Ex)

At 8th level, the black lord adds +2 to the Difficulty Class of all saving throws against his spells that cause darkness or blindness. This bonus stacks with the Spell Focus or Greater Spell Focus feats when casting such spells. He also gains a +2 enhancement bonus when attempting to bypass spell resistance when casting such spells.

Spellcasting

At every other black lord level, the character gains new spells per day as if he had also gained a level in a spellcasting class he belonged to before adding the prestige class (either sorcerer or wizard). He does not, however, gain any other benefit a character of that class would have gained, except for an increased effective level of spellcasting. If a character had levels of both sorcerer and wizard before becoming an black lord, he must decide to which class he adds the new level for purposes of determining spells per day. Note that even though a black lord has armor proficiency due to his fighter levels, he still suffers a chance of spell failure when wearing armor.

When a black lord gains new spells, he must choose them from the black lord spell list. If he already knows all the spells of a given level on the list, he may choose any spell from the wizard/sorcerer list, but is barred from selecting spells with the Light or Good descriptors.

Black Lord Spell List
Level Spell(s)
0 (Cantrips) all level 0 arcane spells, except light-related spells.
1st all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, magic weapon, mount, protection from chaos/evil/good/law, summon monster I (fiendish monsters only)
2nd all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, blindness, blur, darkvision, summon monster II (fiendish monsters only), trident of the helldukes*
3rd all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, blink, deeper darkness, dispel magic, displacement, greater magic weapon, magic circle against chaos/evil/good/law, remove blindness, summon monster III (fiendish monsters only)
4th all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, black tentacles, phantasmal killer, phantom steed, phantom warhorse*, summon monster IV (fiendish monsters only)
5th all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, lesser planar binding, permanency, summon monster V (fiendish monsters only)
6th all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, planar binding, transformation, true seeing, summon monster VI (fiendish monsters only)
7th all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, power word blind, instant summons, summon monster VII (fiendish monsters only)
8th all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, greater planar binding, summon monster VIII (fiendish monsters only)
9th all sorcerer/wizard necromancy and [darkness] spells, gate, summon monster IX (fiendish monsters only), weird
Section 15: Copyright Notice

Grimoire Viperian: A Tome of Exotic Lore Copyright 2021 Magic Skull Games Author: Steven F. Johnson

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