D&D General For a setting that emphasizes the five power sources

[Yaarel]

MODAL THEMES OF POWER SOURCES

Psionic Themes			Arcane Themes			Primal Themes		Divine Themes
PSION	BARD	SORCERER	WARLOCK	WIZARD	ARTIFICER	RANGER	DRUID	CLERIC	PALADIN
SPACETIME	SPACETIME	SPACETIME	.	Spacetime	.	Spacetime	Spacetime	Spacetime	Spacetime
MIND	MIND	MIND	Mind	.	.	.	.	.	Mind
Fear	Fear	.	Fear	.	.	.	.	.	Fear
.	Illusion	Illusion	ILLUSION	ILLUSION	ILLUSION	Illusion	.	.	.
Ethereal	.	.	ETHEREAL	ETHEREAL	ETHEREAL	Ethereal	.	.	.
.	.	Fire	.	Fire	Fire	.	Fire	Fire	Fire
.	.	Elemental	.	Elemental	Elemental	ELEMENTAL	ELEMENTAL	Elemental	.
Fey	Fey	.	Fey	.	Fey	FEY	FEY	.	.
.	.	.	.	.	.	.	Shadow	Shadow	.
Healing	Healing	.	.	.	Healing	Healing	Healing	HEALING	HEALING
.	.	Astral	Astral	Astral	.	.	.	ASTRAL	ASTRAL

Looking at the themes -- the central narrative tropes of the official classes -- can identify the niches that still have thematic room for new class concepts.

It seems worthwhile to create a Necromancer class. Its six salient themes are: Spacetime, Fear, Illusion, Ethereal, Shadow, and Astral. It works out to be an Arcane class as it shares the Illusion-Ethereal thematic pair with the other arcane classes.

. Spacetime. The original meaning of necromancy, being seances to consult the dead of the collective grave of the underworld. But it extends to include the remote presence of haunted objects, places, and people, and even teleportation traveling immaterially at the speed of thought.

. Fear. The otherworldly spookiness and sometimes the echoing trauma of a death or an unfinished life, can frighten the living, and even induce subjective hallucinatory phantasms.

. Illusion. Ghosts sometimes manifest lifelike apparitions of themselves personally or of experiences they had during life.

. Ethereal. The soul comprises various levels, ranging from transcendent cosmic to the lifeforce of a particular body. The spirit of a soul is made out of ether. It is the soul of an artist or a mage relating to selfidentity, that can grow, evolve, and influence the world. It can be a telekinetic force. This spirit of a person can disembody and travel the Border Ethereal. It is an immaterial force. A strong mind can even manipulate matter and manifest poltergeist activity. Ghosts travel outofbody from their underworld location, being partial shadows of their former lives.

. Shadow. Of course, the Necromancer masters the magic of the underworld, death, and the necrosis of corpses.

. Astral. There is interest in the levels of the soul elsewhere, including the afterlives beyond the spacetime fabric and among the realm of ideals. However, the Necromancer lacks the Healing theme of resurrection and restoration. The lifeforce of necromancy is vampiric theft and its immortality is Undead.

 

[Brendan Byrd]

If one views an Artificer as sculpting inorganic matter into constructs, it could be argued that a Necromancer sculpts organic matter into constructs. (Animate Dead, Create Undead...)
-Elemental (body?) instead of Illusion?

There is some ambiguity between shadow/illusion vs. shadow/undead (& the dead) to be wary of.

Playing with the ancient Egyptian concept that everyone has five bodies (which I've interpereted as physical, magical, spiritual, reflection and shadow)...
A creature (intelligent or otherwise) that is missing one or more of its' bodies is exhibiting symptoms of undeath*.

So there is the contrast of a mundane shadow cast by light, a spirit of the dead (shades & the ancient Greek underworld), and the undead shadows of D&D...


*characters slain by a shadow (undead) and later raised from the dead, cast no shadow (mundane) until they...kill their own undead shadow.

 

[Yaarel]

When looking at the prevailing themes of each class, I am leaning toward Necromancer meriting its own separate base class.

The Cleric has necromancy especially turning Undead, but its Healing and Celestial Fire aspects feel incongruous and distract from the necromantic concept. Meanwhile the all-over-the-place-ness of the Wizard gets in the way, and prevents the class design space that is necessary to articulate the features for solid necromancy flavor. So, the Necromancer class steals all of the Wizard Necromancy flavor and traditions from earlier editions, leaving the Wizard none of it. The sculpting away of what the Wizard can do actually polishes what the Wizard class is making it more vividly flavorful with a tighter concept. Meanwhile it is fine if the Cleric continues its dabbling into necromancy.

If one views an Artificer as sculpting inorganic matter into constructs, it could be argued that a Necromancer sculpts organic matter into constructs. (Animate Dead, Create Undead...)
-Elemental (body?) instead of Illusion?

I view the Artificer (alchemy, elementalism, daoism) as too life oriented. Even when doing "alchemistry" the Artificer is adding the attention of ones own conscious soul as the "ethereal" "quintessential" ingredient to catalyze the formulas. Appropriately, the Alchemist involves Healing magic to keep a living body alive, even immortally.

There is some ambiguity between shadow/illusion vs. shadow/undead (& the dead) to be wary of.

4e merged the Illusion Shadow Plane and the Ethereal Plane into a remix forming Feywild and Shadowfell instead. Both Fey and Shadow strongly associate with Illusion magic. 5e 2014 kept Fey and Shadow but returned Ethereal. 5e 2024 made Feywild and Shadow strictly material, nonethereal. But the prevalence of Illusion magic seems to remain.

Since 2024, I view the Ethereal Plane as a bridge between the Material and the Feywild-or-Shadowfell. So depending on the "energy frequency" of the ether, one might be in the Border Ethereal of the positive Feywild, of the mixed Material Plane, or of the negative Shadowfell.

Thus the souls of Fey creatures can travel outofbody thru the Ethereal Plane, and likewise the souls of Shadow. The Shadow Ghosts are these disembodied minds that bring with them the Negative void that pervades the Shadowfell.

Illusion magic itself impresses a mental visualization into the physical but immaterial force of ether. The techniques can involve ones own personal soul (psionic, primal) or impersonal weave (arcane, divine). The four elements of matter are all made out of ether (like atoms are made out of forces). And the Astral thoughtstuff can emanate force. So ether and Illususion magic can happen effectively anywhere in the universe.

Playing with the ancient Egyptian concept that everyone has five bodies (which I've interpereted as physical, magical, spiritual, reflection and shadow)...
A creature (intelligent or otherwise) that is missing one or more of its' bodies is exhibiting symptoms of undeath*.

Huh. If these different parts of ones own soul arent in tune with each other, there is a sense of restlessness.

So there is the contrast of a mundane shadow cast by light, a spirit of the dead (shades & the ancient Greek underworld), and the undead shadows of D&D...

A view the Greek-Egyptian-etcetera underworld of the dead as literally underground in the sense of a collective grave, where the souls of the corpses can interact with each other in lifelike ways. Hence there is an upsidedown mirror image of the living world.

In many cultures (including Greek and Egyptian), the underworld includes both painful regions of punishment and pleasureful regions of reward. For D&D, these are the Shadowfell and Feywild respectively. Note, for these cultures, the Fey is conceptually underground, inside caves and mounds, or so on.