Character Idea: Necromancer who wants to convince slaving cultures undead are more effecient

[Jfdlsjfd]

I agree with you, but this depends on how the culture view the soul. If it is clearly defined to be something distinct from the body, the dynamic could be different with regard to the recycling of the corpse: after all, some real world culture (unless it's an urban legend) dispose of the corpse by exposure. Would we grieve this much if we knew for certain that the relative is elsewhere and is happy and OK to be in the afterlife (because he declines to be resurrected, for example)?

I could see better acceptance for skeletons than for well-preserved corpses, for example.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

There are certain tasks better suited to undead than others. For example, tying the undying to a grinding mill could be an OK bargain.

 

[Zhaleskra]

We're Conaning the zombies?

 

[Bohandas]

Yeah. And that brings up a real question. You turn up telling slave owners, "Hey, you don't need slaves! You don't need to give food or decent housing to undead!"

What keeps them from going... "You know, you are right!" and slaughtering all their slaves to turn them into undead?

Maybe the necromancer has premade undead that he's selling.

 

[Bohandas]

Admittedly, I was assuming one of the more basic tropes of fantasy RPGs - the rules of magic, and the state of the world are eerily static. Sure, the rulers of nations, and national boundaries, change, but the fundamentals of magic and economics are pretty much unchanging. And, in such a scenario, if the scheme could work, by the rules, there are so many chances over the decades and centuries for someone to think of it that... it should have been thought of several times over.

And, like the assembly line - you only need one to make it work for it to rather quickly become the way business is done. It starts to stretch credulity that over the generations, it didn't become commonplace. If the rules actually allow it, "Why did the several hundred other people fail" becomes harder to answer than, "Why did nobody else think of this before?"

D&D has a canon Illuminati-type organization called the Regulators. I'd blame it on them if I were the DM.

 

[Jd Smith1]

This wouldn't eliminate slavery, it would eliminate free folk.

Food production is the weak link in this time period; over half the population is devoted to producing food. Campaign seasons are limited because the army has to be on hand to help plant & harvest.

So the smart move would be to keep slaves, and start killing serfs. The bulk of your population (70-80%) are uneducated, low-skill peasants devoted to food production, most of which is needed simply to feed the peasants.

You systematically, over time, convert your free labor force into Undead, thus creating a group who produce food but do not consume it. Besides the nobility you keep skilled artisans, infrastructure administration, and trained military alive (their children continue to maintain the living section of the work force). A certain number of slaves are kept in camps to produce fresh bodies, while the rest join the labor corps.

In the slave camps the physically attractive are slated for harems, brothels, and house slaves (you don't want a zombie smelling up the place). The rest are, when having grown to a suitable size, are converted to Undead to replace those which are worn out, damaged, or lost in battle.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

For a game I'm running I've done up a culture that is basically Ancient Egypt but with necromancy. Gangs of skeletons (no zombies, stripped bare bones is much less of a public health risk) work on community projects and carry out the dangerous and/or truly onerous jobs that living people will want to avoid.

I don't see necromancy being a problem for people at large. If it's been a tradition for long enough (and it has been for several thousand years) then everyone has grown up with it. They know no different and have no reason to dislike the system.

The back story for my world is that Isis created the art of necromancy when she resurrected her husband. Later her priests began using the art in the mortal realm. Fast forward a few thousand years and it's all just business as usual.

Some settings describe necromancy as inherently evil. But I think whether or not necromancy is inherently evil depends on how necromancy works in your game setting.

In mine it requires that part of the soul, the Ba, remains with the animated body. But the Ka goes on to the Field of Reeds and its just reward. This is not so dissimilar to the way the ancient Egyptians believed things worked in any case.

The Ba, and for that matter the corpse it helps direct and animate, are not poorly treated. Quite the contrary, they are revered members of the community. Indeed, each village looks after its own extended family of undead. Children are able to visit their departed grand parents. I envision festivals celebrating the "Old Family" in which they are feted, libations are poured for them, music is played, etc. And after a suitable time the Ba is sent on to rejoin the Ka in the Field of Reeds. (Probably during one of those aforementioned festivals.)

So all up, there's no reason why necromancy should be evil. It depends on how its applied to society at large. The particular scenario as presented in the OP has plenty of room for abuse by evil people.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

Of course there's other interpretations of necromancy - for instance the classic DnD one in which undead are animated by Negative Energy. This could have all sorts of terrible impacts on the world if you treat negative energy as some sort of industrial pollutant. You get the equivalent of toxic spills and poisoned land and sea. Deformed animals and magical cancer.

 

[Bohandas]

Of course there's other interpretations of necromancy - for instance the classic DnD one in which undead are animated by Negative Energy. This could have all sorts of terrible impacts on the world if you treat negative energy as some sort of industrial pollutant. You get the equivalent of toxic spills and poisoned land and sea. Deformed animals and magical cancer.

Logically, it would make more sense for cancer to be associated with positive energy. Growth and all.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

Logically, it would make more sense for cancer to be associated with positive energy. Growth and all.

Maybe. But since we're discussing poorly defined magical stuff that does...stuff, logic may not be the right word.