D&D 4E 4e Necromancer speculation

[Marauder_POV]

So one of the guys in our gaming group is into Necromancers(eg like the ones in Diablo 2, with summoning skeletons, corpse related magic) that sort of thing. When we started playing D&D he was very dissapointed that there were no necros and went instead for a tiefling warlock which he considers "the closest thing".
As soon as i said that there are going to be necros in D&D he was very eager to retcon/ story modify his PC, which we all agreed was fine.
Interesting point to note is that they didn't really say what a necro did in 4e.
I'm guessing it will be much like a mage(eg necromantic school in 3e), but the fact that it is powered by Shadow, not Arcane makes it a bit different.
So any ideas as to the direction of this class? Any chance of Summoning Skeletons?

 

[mkill]

I can only suggest to preorder Heroes of Shadow and wait.

Any speculation at this point will probably turn out wrong anyway.

 

[Jhaelen]

I doubt they'll be able to summon hordes of undead. They'll probably get conjuration-style spells to control a single (or very small number) of conjurations and area of effect spells (most likely zones) that have fluff describing them as hordes of undead.

But maybe we'll be surprised and they actually get to summon large numbers of minion-style creatures.

 

[Pour]

I'd say there is definitely enough player demand for necromancers to warrant a class, and enough interpretations of what a necromancer can do to warrant different builds (minion master definitely being one).

At least I hope. A wizardly necromancer, as in a school specialist, is a sort of classic motif in its own right, but I would prefer they push the envelope further by making it part of a line of Shadow classes.