For each Dance, the "Expend" entry lists first how many bardic music uses a use of the Dance takes and then lists the minimum spell slot level the Dance uses. If a Dance has any prerequisites, they are also listed.
Age Draining Waltz
As you and your dancing partner spin about the room you slowly leach life from their body.
Requires: 9 Dance already known, 16 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 4 bardic music use or a level 8 spell slot. This Dance also requires you to expend 50 xp.
Effect: This dance takes 1 minute and requires you to be dancing with a wiling partner (willing in this context means free from magical compulsion of any form). If at any point in the dance, you cease to be in contact with your partner, or if either of you stop dancing, this Dance fails. (Your partner will generally have no idea that they are dancing an Age Draining Waltz). If the partner dances for the full 1 minute with you, they must then make a fortitude save. If they fail, they become fatigued and their aging temporarily quickens, aging 1 year over next 24 hours. Your age is reduced by weeks equal to the victim's total hit die or your total ranks in Perform(Dance), whichever is lower. The victim's additional age can be removed within 24 hours by a wish or miracle which will reverse their additional aging.
If such a wish occurs you do not gain your reduction in age. If they succeed on the fortitude save, the effect is lost, you may continue dancing and try again or do something else. This Dance looks like a casual waltz to untrained observers. This dance fails on any being that has no age limit (such as an elan) but the xp will still be expended.
Animating Jig
As you dance, the corpse below you begins to twitch, finally it rises up, in jerky motions it mimics your movement. It almost seems to be trying to
dance in rhythm with your movements.
Requires: 3 Dance already known, 10 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 2 bardic music use or a level 3 spell slot.
Effect: This Dance takes 3 full rounds. This Dance duplicates animate dead but must target a single corpse that is within 15 feet of you.
Awakening Dance
You dance in front of your undead creation, spinning and twirling around it. At first, the creature stares ahead blankly, but slowly a glimmer appears in its eyes, and it shuffles forward to dance with you.
Requires: 7 Dance already known, 14 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 3 bardic music use or a level 6 spell slot. This Dance also requires you to pay 50 xp.
Effect: Using this dance requires expending 50 xp. This dance takes 1 minute to complete. This dance functions just like the spell Awaken Undead (from Libris Mortis) but targets only a single undead with hit die at most twice your class level. Also, any undead awakened to intelligence using this dance gains a permanent + 2 competence bonus in Perform(Dance).
Call the Dead
Your movement calls out to the dead, and you can feel them answer.
Requires: 6 Dance already known, 13 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 3 bardic music use or a level 7 spell slot.
This Dance takes 1 minute. At the end of this Dance, you make a Perform(Dance) check. Every uncontroled, unintelligent undead within 300 feet * perform check makes its way with all haste until they are within 100 feet of your position at the end of the dance, stopping only if attacked or if something is in the way, and continuing onwards once that has been dealt with. This Dance gives no additional control over the undead other than the call for them to come. Intelligent undead experience the same call but are allowed a will save, and get an additional will save whenever they would be interrupted by an attack. The pull of this effect terminates at the next sunrise, but unintelligent undead will continue their path unless interrupted.
Any undead that makes its save against this effect is still aware of the approximate location of where the call originated, and powerful undead may choose to investigate such calls even if they are not forced to answer them. If this travel contradicts instructions given to undead which are controlled by others, which order takes priority is resolved by opposed charisma checks between the Dancer and the controller.
Dance of the Little Death
Your slow motions attract your foes eyes which then gradually close.
Requires: 3 Dance already known, 10 ranks in Perform(Dance)[/b]
Expend: 2 bardic music use or a level 3 spell slot.
Effect:
Sleep is a precursor to death, a small death for those still alive. As one in control over the forces of life and death, the power of sleep comes easily to you. When you use this dance, any being within 5 feet per 2 ranks in Perfrom(Dance) that sees you dancing must make a will save or be subject to the equivalent of a Sleep spell at caster level equal to your ranks in Perform(Dance). Unlike a Sleep spell there is no maximum number of hit die which this effects. If a creature successfully makes its save then it becomes immune to this Dance from you for 24 hours. This dance takes 1 full-round to complete. This Dance is a mind-affecting supernatural effect. However, because it uses death-magic, anything that would block death effects (such as a Death Ward) blocks this, and any being may apply any bonuses to saves that would apply against death effects to this save.
Dance of Necromantic Countering
As the other mage finishes casting his spell, you laugh in his face as you shake your hips
Requires: 2 Dance already known, 9 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 2 bardic music use or a level 3 spell slot.
Effect:
This Dance requires you use either an immediate action or a readied action.
You can use this Dance whenever are subject to a necromancy spell that allows spell resistance and targets you (thus for example, this does not include spells with area effect). You make a Perform(Dance) check opposed by a caster level check by the caster. If your check equal or exceeds the caster level check, then spell is countered as if it had been subject to a counterspell effect, and if the effect in question was a spell then you may recover an extra spell slot in a spontaneous arcane casting class or may recover a prepared arcane necromancy spell that you have used in the last 24 hours. The recovered spell or spell slot must be of level strictly lower than that of the spell countered. If your check fails, then the spell proceeds normally.
Dance of Undeath
You spin about, and the undead about you turn, eager to hear the commands of their new master.
Requires: 6 Dance already known, 13 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 3 bardic music use or a level 6 spell slot.
Effect: When you use this dance, every round you continue to dance, every undead in close range is subject to the an effect similar to that of a command undead spell. Undead who are not intelligent do not get any save while intelligent undead get a save. Those who fail the save are subject to an effect identical to a command undead spell with the following modifications:
You may send commands to undead you control through this ability using telepathy rather than just voice commands. Undead who had the effect broken due to threats from you or your allies must still make a new save in their next round. Undead which succeed on their saves get a -2 penalty to any attack role to harm you for the duration of the dance.
Undead who have made at least one save do not need to make subsequent saves from the same use of this Dance. If you stop the Dance and start the Dance again, all undead make a new save. Finally, while you use this dance any undead already controlled by you at the start of the Dance within 30 feet get a +2 bonus to fortitude saves and +2 turn resistance.
Desecrating Jig
With a lively tap of your feet, you send out waves of negative energy.
Requires: 2 Dance already known, 9 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 2 bardic music use or a level 3 spell slot.
Effect:This dance requires a 1 round to perform. This dance duplicates the Desecrate spell centered around the caster. Unlike the Desecrate spell, this dance gives no additional benefit if an area has a fixture associated with your patron deity unless you have some form of direct magical connection
to that entity already by some other means such as also having levels in a cleric or another class that gets magical power directly from the deity.
Graveyard Communing
As you dance, the faint voices of the spirits grow into insistent whispers, and the dim lighting grows brighter, at least to your eyes.
Expend: 1 bardic music use or a level 1 spell slot.
This is the first Dance that any Dancer learns, a simple Dance that teaches a Dancer has how to commune and sense the spiritual residue left at gravesites.You gain this as a bonus dance at first level.
This dance takes 3 full rounds to complete and must occur at night in a graveyard, catacomb or similar resting place for the dead. At the end of these rounds, you find out the approximate age of the graveyard (to the nearest year if under a decade, nearest decade if under a century, nearest century if under a thousand years, or nearest thousand years otherwise). You also find out if there are any undead currently using the graveyard as an abode (such as a vampire using a coffin). You make a Perform(Dance) check also. For every 5 per your check, you get to learn some information about the next most powerful undead residing in the graveyard (you learn approximate strength of each as if had been subject to Detect Undead and you learn if each is intelligent or not).
When you use this dance, until sunrise, you gain a deep connection to the spirits and necromantic energy that permeates the graveyard, giving you an intuitive feel for much of the graveyard. As a result, while in the graveyard, you get a +4 insight bonus to the following:
Spoiler
Show
1) spot, search, listen, move silently checks
2) hide checks using a normal feature of the graveyard (such as a statue, tree or gravestone) or a shadow produced by a normal feature
3) decipher script checks made to decipher writing that is on a gravestone, monument or other object in the graveyard that is a feature of the graveyard.
4) Balance and climb checks on regular features of the graveyard such of gravestones, monuments or other regular features in the graveyard (the usual DC for balancing on a gravestone is 15, see pg. 74 of Heroes of Horror for related balance and climb check rules).
5) knowledge(religion) and knowledge(arcana) checks to identify undead creatures residing in the graveyard, other denizens residing there that normally reside in graveyards, or to identify religious or arcane imagery in the graveyard such as symbols on gravestones.
6) Spellcraft checks to recognize any spell that is being used to protect part of the graveyard such as a consecrate or hallow effect.)
Additionally, while in the graveyard,
if the Dancer passes within 5 feet of a secret or concealed door they are entitled to a Search check to notice it as if they were actively looking for it
You may make listen checks to hear the movement of undead beings in the graveyard that would otherwise be able to not require it (such as incorporeal beings).
You also get a permanent +2 untyped bonus on any knowledge check related to anyone whose remains are interred at the graveyard. This ability also applies to bardic lore checks and similar abilities.
This Dance does not give you the ability to make trained checks that you would not otherwise be able to make.
Younger Dancers sometimes frequent graveyards or catacombs at night. They perform this Dance and then walk among the graves, feeling the ebb of flow of necromantic energy and the whispers of the spirits.
Life's Defiance
You will one day die. Your compatriots will as well. Your name will be forgotten. You and all you know will enter oblivion. Your knowledge of necromancy makes these facts all the more apparent. Yet you dance with a frenzy for life, compelled by the transience of existence to enjoy it while you can, and you spread that joy and determination to those around you.
Requires: 4 Dance already known, 11 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 2 bardic music use or a level 4 spell slot.
Effect: This dance takes one full round round to complete. Any ally who sees you perform this Dance gets an extra saving throw to throw off any [mind-affecting] effect they are currently under. Additional uses of this dance do not allow additional saves on the same effect, even if it is performed by another Dancers.
Additionally, you make a Perform(Dance) check, and apply the following bonuses: If the check is at at least 20: You and your Allies get a +1 morale bonus for the next saving throw they make against a death or fear effect.
If the check is at least 25: The bonus becomes +2, and you get an identical morale bonus to the next strength or constitution based skill check you make. These bonuses last 1 hour. For every additional 5 you beat this check by the bonuses goes up by 1.
If any intelligent undead or deathless sees this dance they must make a will save or be overcome with despair at their lack of life. They take a -2 morale penalty on all skill checks, saves, and attack roles. This penalty lasts for 1 minute per your charisma modifier + dex modifier (min 1).
Life to Undeath:
The fools surrounding you stare at you in a trance, as their skin slowly goes to the gray color of the newly risen dead.
Requires: 6 Dance already known, 13 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 3 bardic music use or a level 6 spell slot.
Effect: When you use this Dance, any intelligent (int at least 3) living being within close range who sees you must make a will save. If they fail the save, they become fascinated by your dancing. This ability works similarly to the bardic fascinate ability but with the save DC equal to the usual save DC for a Dance.
For each round that you continue dancing, any creature must make another will save each round to terminate the influence. Whenever they fail such a will save and have already failed at least one such will save to stop watching you dance, they must make a fortitude save. If they fail the fortitude save, they die immediately and become animated as a zombie under your control. Zombies animated this way are allocated to the same pool as Animating Dance and you are subject to the same restrictions on how many undead you may have in that pool. Once a being succeeds on their will save, they do not need to make any will saves against any uses of this dance by you for 24 hours. This is a necromantic, mind-affecting, death effect.
Masque of the Vampire
As you complete this dance, you become pale and gaunt, and a strange red glow appears in your eyes.
Requires: 8 Dance already known, 15 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 3 bardic music use or a level 6 spell slot. This Dance also requires you to pay 50 xp.
Effect: This dance takes 1 full round. After using this dance, for minutes equal to your ranks Perform(Dance), you get DR 5/ silver or magic, darkvision for 30 feet, are subject to the equivalent of a spider climb spell, and get a +2 bonus on all checks dealing with bats and wolves (such as wild empathy or handle animal checks). You also get the ability to use of Vampiric Touch as a spell-like ability (DC 15 + your charisma modifier). Each time you use your Vampiric Touch ability, the remaining duration of the other effects is reduced by 1 minute. For the duration of this effect you can be turned like an undead of your hit die, but the effect of such turning is simply for the benefits of this dance to terminate. If you would otherwise be vulnerable to turning then those effects also occur.
Memory of Those Who Have Died a A Greater Death
As you Dance you reach out those who are not just dead, but gone beyond all mortal ken, and as you Dance you entreat them to grant you some of their power.
Requires: 7 Dance already known, 14 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 3 bardic music use or a level 6 spell slot.
Effect:
This Dance allows you to bind a vestige. This Dance takes one minute. As you dance, the movements of your feet inscribe in the ground below you the form of the seal of a vestige. Thus you must dance on a medium that would allow such inscription such as dirt, or you may use some substance on your feet to accomplish this. Your effective binder for this Dance level is equal to your ranks in Perform(Dance)-3 and it must be high enough to bind that vestige for this Dance to succeed.
As you inscribe the seal, you make a Perform(Dance) check. If this Perform(Dance) check is at least equal to the binding DC + twice the vestige level then you successfully bind that vestige and fail otherwise. You must still meet any special requirements of the vestige unless you have the Ignore Special Requirements feat. If you fail this check you may not use this ability to bind that vestige for 24 hours.
Pacts made this way are automatically bad. If you have other ability to bind vestiges (such as levels in Binder), a vestige bound this way does not count towards your usual limit on number of vestiges bound. You may not have more than one vestige bound this way at a time. The ability to bind a vestige this way also does not count as a prerequisite for any feat or prestige class that would require binding a vestige. In all other ways this Dance functions exactly like normal binding.
Mustering of the Undead Army
The crypts around you burst open and decaying hands crawl out of the shallow graves.
Requires: 9 Dance already known, 16 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 3 bardic music use or a level 7 spell slot.
Effect:
This dance takes 1 full minute to perform. This Dance acts like like the spell Plague of Undead with a few differences: All corpses within range of the caster are animated with closer corpses taking priority for purposes of the animation limit.
Immediately before animation commences if your number of ranks in Perform(Dance) level is higher than caster level of any hallow, consecrate, or similar effects in the area they are dispelled. You are immediately aware of undead created by this dance and their approximate locations.
If performed in a graveyard, catacomb, or similar enviroment which the Dancer is attuned to by means of Graveyard Communing then this Dance also will penetrate, effecting any body less than 10 feet underground, and will include nearby beings in mausoleums and similar structures. In general, for undead buried under earth it takes about 1d6 rounds for each undead to claw their way to the surface (which they attempt to do automatically) unless there are barriers such as being buried in a metal coffin or under rock.
Also, if one is so attuned, then at the end of the Dance you make a Perform(Dance) check and any lock on a mausoleum or similar structure in range is subject an Open Lock check equal to this result, and a strength check at this same result -10.
Necromantic Allemande
Your partner raises their hand to yours and necromantic energy flows between you.
Requires: 3 Dance already known, 10 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 2 bardic music use or a level 4 spell slot.
Effect: This dance takes 3 full rounds and a willing partner. When you begin the Dance, the magic instinctively gives your partner the knowledge of how to complete it. The effect of this Dance is similar to the "Imbue with Spell Ability" with the following differences. The Dance may only be used to transfer necromancy spells. You may transfer necromancy spells that you are capable of casting spontaneously rather than prepared spells but for each transferred must sacrifice a spell slot of the corresponding level.
The sum of the level of spells you transfer may not exceed the targets hit die or half your ranks in Perform(Dance) (this replaces the usual restriction for how many spells may be transferred for Imbue Spell Like ability). Additionally, when one performs this Dance with another Dancer even if they do not know the Dance they may choose to transfer spells back to you just as if they had performed the Dance themselves. This functions in all other ways like the spell Imbue Spell Like ability.
Rapture of Pain:
As you dance, those who see you feel their insides twist in searing pain.
Requires: 1 Dance already known, 8 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 1 bardic music use or a level 1 spell slot.
Effect: This dance takes 1 standard action to initiate, and the requires a standard action in each subsequent round to continue using. Every round you continue this dance, every creature within in radius 5 of feet for every 2 Perform(Dance) ranks of you with line-of-sight takes 2d6 damage. The first time, someone is subject to the Dance they get a fortitude save to half the damage. If one restarts the Dance(expending an additional bardic music use or spell slot), all creature make a new save. When you start this Dance you may choose to have the damage dealt by it be non-lethal.
Rebuking Stomp
You stomp the ground hard and the undead in front of you turn their sunken decaying eyes to you with new respect.
Requires: 1 Dance already known, 8 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 1 bardic music use or a level 1 spell slot.
Effect: This dance is identical to the Dance of Turning but instead allows you to rebuke or bolster (but not command) undead. This Dance does not count as the ability to rebuke undead for any prerequisite that requires the ability to rebuke undead.
Soulshard Dance
As you lead, you break off a fraction of your own soul and graft into onto theirs.
Requires: 5 Dance already known, 12 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 2 bardic music use or a level 4 spell slot. This Dance also requires the expenditure of XP, see below.
Effect:
This Dance allows you to imbue into an intelligent being some of your artistic skill by permanently molding a small fragment of your soul into that being. To use this ability, you must dance with a willing being for 10 rounds. At the end of the Dance, the being gains 1 additional rank in a Perform skill that you
than it currently has, if it has fewer than your total ranks -5. You cannot use this ability to give a being more ranks in a Perform skill than a being of its hit die may normally have. Additionally, if the being was undead, you get a permanent +2 bonus on Diplomacy checks and Sense Motive checks related to that undead from the influence from your soul fragment, and you may treat its hit die as 4 less for purposes of turning or rebuking undead. Whether or not the being is undead, it takes a permanent -4 penalty on all saves against scrying effects by you and saves against spells to control it (such as command undead or control undead).
Using this Dance costs you 200 xp and an additional 200 per a rank in the Perform skill that the being already had. No being may benefit more than once from this Dance.
Soul Stealing Tango
At first, they smile. As the dance progresses, they keep smiling and dance faster, even as they are screaming inside.
Requires: 9 Dance already known, 16 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 4 bardic music use or a level 8 spell slot. This Dance also requires you to expend 200 xp.
Effect:
This dance, like an Age Draining Waltz, requires a willing partner to start. However, once the dance begins, the partner will immediately realize that something is drastically wrong as they feel their soul being torn from them. Each round they they make a will save. If they succeed on the first such check, then they may stop dancing (and may at their option enter a grapple with you as a free action). However, after the first round, they must succeed on two such will saves in a row (over two rounds) in order to stop the effect. If in the third round, the Dance is still ongoing, then every round they do not make the will save they they must make a fortitude save at the same DC or die instantly as their soul is torn from their body. The Dancer has the option of making this resemble simple heart failure or can instead have the body immediately shrivel up in an obviously supernatural and horrifying fashion.
The fortitude save DC increases by 1 for every such fortitude save they have needed to make from the Dance. Even if they make a fortitude save they must still make two successive will saves to stop the dance.
Beings killed this way permanently lose 1 level and 2 points of constitution in addition to any normal effects of resurrection. The Dancer absorbs a portion of the soul of the victim. As a result, the Dancer gains 1 rank in a single Perform skill or Knowledge skill that the victim had more ranks in than the Dancer (you cannot use this to gain more ranks than you are allowed for any given skill). The Dancer also becomes flush with their life force, getting a +1 bonus on the next save they make and a +2 bonus on the next charisma or constitution based check they make (these benefits go away in 24 hours).
Anyone may attempt a Sense Motive check against a Perform Dance(check) each round while you are using this Dance to realize that the other individual who is dancing is under magical control. This Dance is a necromantic, death effect.
Spirit Dance
As you dance, the spirits of long-dead sages whisper appear before you and whisper their secrets.
Requires: 4 Dance already known, 11 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 1 bardic music use or a level 2 spell slot.
Effect: You may use this dance when you have failed a knowledge check of any form to know some piece of information (or simply did not succeed as well as you might like).This dance takes 3 full rounds. At the end of which you make a Perform(Dance) check which is substituted as the relevant knowledge check roll, to determine what you learn, if anything. You may not repeat using this dance for the same knowledge check unless you have increased your ranks in Perform(Dance) since the previous use.
Summoning Dance
You make a sweeping gesture and a skeleton appears in front of you.
Requires: 2 Dance already known, 9 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 2 bardic music use or a level 1 spell slot.
Effect: This dance takes a full round action. This Dance duplicates the spell Summon Undead I. However, one may choose to sacrifice both a bardic music slot and a higher level spell slot the dance instead duplicates the corresponding Summon Undead spell of the spell slot sacrificed. So for example if one sacrificed a third level spell slot, the spell would duplicate Summon Undead III.
Turning Step:
You make a quick movement with your feet, and the undead monster in front of you falls back, injured by the flood of life force flowing out from you.
Requires: 1 Dance already known, 8 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 1 bardic music use or a level 1 spell slot.
Effect: This dance is a quick step, You make a turn undead attempt with your ranks in Perform(Dance) as your effective cleric level. This Dance does not count as the ability to turn undead for any prerequisite that requires the ability to turn undead.
True Peace
As you dance, the undead hordes around you crumble. You see a glimpse of gratitude on their faces as they turn to dust.
Requires: 6 Dance already known, 13 ranks in Perform(Dance)
Expend: 3 bardic music use or a level 7 spell slot.
This Dance takes 1 full round to use. It functions similarly to the spell Undeath to Death. However, there are thee differences: First, the effect is centered at the performer. Second, the effect does not have a maximum of 20d4, but continues to scale with effective caster level. Third, creatures with more than 9 hit dice can still be effected, but they get a +4 bonus on their fortitude save, and do not fail their save on a natural 1.
