Topic: Necromancer Class

[Mordrig]

OK, so I was reviewing the Necromancer, as one of my players thought it would be awesome to have an undead army at his beck and call.  Unfortunately, the Cleric seems to be a better necromancer than the Necromancer.  A Necromancer needs to cast 4 spells to make an undead, and then his Mastery of this created undead only lasts 10 minutes per level.  He must cast a Animate Dead X, Summon Dead X, then a Master Undead X, and finally a Spirit Binding X.  Pray he has enough PP for all of this.
A Cleric using the Evil Cleric Necromancy list on the other hand (1995 Spell Law), gets permanent control at level 3.  Now, the Cleric list also creates an undead of a Class, Class I - Class V, while the Necromancy list creates a Undead of Level 'X'.  So you cast a Create Undead Class X, then a third level spell Master Undead.

As an example a Necromancer makes a Level 9 Undead (Class IV for you Clerics).  17 PP Animate Dead IX, 14 PP Summon Dead X (there is no IX), 18 PP Master Undead IX, 18 PP Dead Spirit Binding IX.  67 PP with 3 Hour Control.  Plus you needed 3 Spell Lists to do this.
An Evil Cleric decides to try his hand at it.  15 PP Create Undead IV, 3 PP Undead Mastery.  So 18 PP and One List.

I know many people do not use the Necromancer, and I see why.  Any plans to fix this or is this a dead class never to be returning from the grave?

[jdale]

Are you using the lists in Rolemaster Companion 2?

I don't think all those spells are necessary. If you kill someone, their spirit is right there (until it departs), so it doesn't need to be summoned. You could then cast Dead Spirit Binding and that will animate the body. You don't also have to cast Animate Dead.

Now you have an uncontrolled undead, so you cast Master Undead on it. Master Undead doesn't require that you first cast Control Undead. So, two spells.

Now if you want to dig up old bodies and use them, first use Summon Dead to get the spirit, then Dead Spirit Binding to animate the body, and lastly Master Undead to control it. It's a little harder if you want to get a lot of bodies without the bother of creating them yourself. (But if you do want to play around in graveyards, perhaps see http://www.guildcompanion.com/scrolls/2014/nov/redefiningarcanemagic03.html for some different types of spells.)

With regards to the Evil Cleric list, the evil lists tend to be more powerful with the assumption that you are getting backed by some kind of evil entity. That may or may not be a good assumption, and for balance purposes it may be preferable for the PCs to stick with regular lists instead.

[Spectre771]

  Any plans to fix this or is this a dead class never to be returning from the grave?

Nah... takes too many spell lists.  Locate Past Author, Animate Past Author, Summon Past Editor, Bind Author to Legal Department, Summon Publisher, Delve in Past Copyrights, etc.   


But on a serious note, we never had anyone play a Necromancer for long.  I can't say why it was never a popular class, maybe for the very reasons you listed.  It does seem to be a bit of disconnect though.  A cleric *should* be opposed to using undead out of ethics or morals at the very least.  A healer shouldn't be tampering with souls and bodies and making them suffer more or live beyond their natural lives, unless you're an evil cleric.  This is pretty interesting.

Thank you jdale for the additional info.  It doesn't seem as unbalanced when compared to the Cleric, but it does feel like the Necromancer should be more handy at reanimation.

Is one possibility that a Cleric has the backing of a deity and therefore is more apt to deal with life/death/souls where a Necromancer is like the hedge wizard experimenting with magic on undead?

[vector]

"A cleric *should* be opposed to using undead out of ethics or morals at the very least."

Well, not if they worship an evil god. I have a player that is playing a cleric of an evil god and he is a necromancer for all intents and purposes. He is doing rather well with just using the Evil Cleric Necromancy list.

Just last night the party was accosted by two wraiths that gave them a bit of trouble until he destroyed one and bound the other to his will.

[Hurin]

I'd love to see the Necromancer return in RMU. The Closed Essence list Gate Mastery gives us one model for how summons might work (in this case on elementals, but it could easily be applied to undead too). Basically, you just need to cast a spell to summon the elemental and then another spell to control it. With undead, you might need an extra spell to bind intelligent undead.

[B Hanson]

Some of this is setting specific..right? There are several ways to create undead under standard fantasy tropes:

1. Imbue a corpse with a spirit. (this is probably a cleric ability)
2. Summon a non-corporeal entity or tie a spirit post death. (this is probably a cleric ability or curse or cause of death issue)
3. Animate a corpse with "magic". (this could be a essence, channeling or mentalism ability)
4. Imbue/animate a corpse with the "Unlife". (this is a SW setting aspect and not really dependent on realm).
5. Imbue a corpse with the will of a sentient being. (Demon, extraplanar, evil god etc).

Some, or all of this really comes down to the setting, the pantheons, the moral universe and the metaphysical underpinnings of the setting. So, one argument is that Spell Law should be even more universal: setting "classes" that transcend creature type (undead, demons, extra planar, divine etc) rather than having separate mechanisms that still cling to D&D DNA. OR.....RMU could embrace a setting or setting archetype and walk away from the need to be a bolt on product for an existing game system (ahem...).

Or you could eliminate the whole concept of "classes" or "types" and just allow for RR's vs level rather than some odd system that is derived from D&D's TURNING mechanism.

Just a few thoughts.

[Hurin]

Or you could eliminate the whole concept of "classes" or "types" and just allow for RR's vs level rather than some odd system that is derived from D&D's TURNING mechanism.

I think I understand what you're saying. So are you suggesting RMU do away with types altogether, so that summoning spells just say 'summons a demon of up to level x' rather than 'summons a Type I demon'?

[B Hanson]

correct, or maybe half that. from a summoning perspective it might make sense to allow classes to model the unpredictable nature of the process. However, from a "turning", "exorcism" or "repulsion" simply make the spell effective against X number of targets and the RR is simply spell attack lvl vs the target  lvl. I think I already did this in BASiL.

As an example--Cleric casts "Repulsions I" which targets 1 Demon. Repulsion II targets 2 Demons. It works the same way as every other spell in Spell Law without the complicated "Class" provisions that are obvious "hanging chads" from DnD.

[Hurin]

Interesting. It would enable even a level 1 priest to have a chance of banishing an ordainer or greater demon (since even the lowest level banishing spell could now banish the highest level of demon), but the chances would be so remote that I don't think it would be much of a problem. Maybe the priest got lucky, or his god/goddess was really shining on him that day!

[jdale]

Banishing an ordainer with a 1st level spell seems somehow dissatisfying. An alternative way to approach it would be that you are banishing X levels of demons. That could be one demon, or many low level demons. You could even allow the banishment to be cumulative over multiple castings if you can't banish enough levels to get the demon in one shot, and a demon who has been only partway banished might be unstable, rifts in and out of reality forming around it, it's only semi corporeal, etc.

Functionally, banishing up to class X is very similar to banishing up to level X, since each class usually corresponds to a range of levels. Classes also express hierarchy without necessarily linking it to level or requiring every demon to recognize the level of every demon.

[Druss_the_Legend]

"A cleric *should* be opposed to using undead out of ethics or morals at the very least."

Well, not if they worship an evil god. I have a player that is playing a cleric of an evil god and he is a necromancer for all intents and purposes. He is doing rather well with just using the Evil Cleric Necromancy list.

Just last night the party was accosted by two wraiths that gave them a bit of trouble until he destroyed one and bound the other to his will.

evil god eh? cool. pretty sweet deal to have undead bound to your will. im thinking ill do something similar with demons in my campain, except ot iwll be the npcs that are in the drivers seat.

[vector]

evil god eh? cool. pretty sweet deal to have undead bound to your will. im thinking ill do something similar with demons in my campain, except ot iwll be the npcs that are in the drivers seat.

I'll admit it gets tricky sometimes. When preparing for this campaign, I initially thought the players were going to go for a roguish, outlaw group - not the evil bastards they quickly morphed into! I had spent a lot of time translating a typical DnD style Evil dungeon (Rappan Athuk if anyone's interested) into RMSS. This was to be the go to dungeon when the party wasn't bounty hunting and advancing their criminal careers.

Now I have weird situations were the party has the opportunity to negotiate safe passage and other deals with some dungeon denizens. Since they are evil, they don't mind dealing with a clan of wererats or retrieving an item for a powerful skeleton lord, for example.

Not that there aren't plenty of encounters with things that don't care if they are evil or not, just that they look tasty. Many of the lower level undead they encounter end up destroyed, but a few always end up serving the evil cleric. Very handy now that the party has lost their rogue trap detector.

"Ghoul servant, go open that door! - Blamo! - Whew, glad that wasn't us!"