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Is necromancy evil or only as harmless as talking to your dead grandmother?
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<blockquote data-quote="Set" data-source="post: 5190884" data-attributes="member: 41584"><p>Are there any spells or effects in D&D that snuff someone's soul? A Sphere of Annhilation, perhaps?</p><p> </p><p>Magic Jar, Soul Bind and Trap the Soul can *imprison* a soul, but that's not the sort of necromancy this thread seems to be dealing with.</p><p> </p><p>While you haven't said this specific thing, these sorts of threads almost inevitably invite someone coming in to 'explain' how animate dead is so horrible because it traps the souls of the dead in their rotting corpses, even though nothing of the sort actually happens.</p><p> </p><p>The souls of the dead remain in whatever heaven or hell they've earned or their actions in life. This has always been the case, and the rules have always supported this.</p><p> </p><p>Skeletons and zombies remain mindless, despite the fact that souls (defined as 'petitioners') have intelligence scores.</p><p> </p><p>Skeletons and zombies have been neutral, in the previous three editions, and have become evil with the 3.5 and higher editions, *regardless of the alignment of the soul.*</p><p> </p><p>So, evil Necromancer Ray can find out that his annoying brother, Paladin Bob, has just died, fighting the good fight, and, because he hates him so much, go animate his corpse and make it do evil things. And Paladin Bob is *not* ripped out of heaven, *does not* become evil and mindless and lose his Paladin status and become permanantly barred from returning to the Upper Planes, because Necromancer Ray is just mucking around with his body, and cannot touch (or turn evil) his immortal soul.</p><p> </p><p>Zombies don't have the souls of their former owners lurking behind their eyes, helpless prisoners of the fell powers that raised them. They are, and always have been, in D&D, mindless, meaning that they fairly obviously don't have souls tucked away inside of them, screaming silently in eternal horror.</p><p> </p><p>(A creepy thematic idea, but ultimately, kinda pointless. The negative energy does the animation. What possible use is there to go all the way to heaven or hell to grab a soul to ride around uselessly in the body? Seems to be asking for trouble, actually. What if the spirit / soul resisted the control and seized control of it's body and attacked you? Best to just stick to mindless negative energy!)</p><p> </p><p>I could come up with a similar 'explanation' that fireball spells call forth little baby fire elementals or phoenix eggs to the material plane, causing them to explode and die, exposed to what, to them, is unbearable cold. But the games rules don't support that, so it would be kinda silly to post 'casting fireball is evil because it kills baby fire elementals!'</p><p> </p><p>And yet, made up stuff about necromancy is fairly common.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Set, post: 5190884, member: 41584"] Are there any spells or effects in D&D that snuff someone's soul? A Sphere of Annhilation, perhaps? Magic Jar, Soul Bind and Trap the Soul can *imprison* a soul, but that's not the sort of necromancy this thread seems to be dealing with. While you haven't said this specific thing, these sorts of threads almost inevitably invite someone coming in to 'explain' how animate dead is so horrible because it traps the souls of the dead in their rotting corpses, even though nothing of the sort actually happens. The souls of the dead remain in whatever heaven or hell they've earned or their actions in life. This has always been the case, and the rules have always supported this. Skeletons and zombies remain mindless, despite the fact that souls (defined as 'petitioners') have intelligence scores. Skeletons and zombies have been neutral, in the previous three editions, and have become evil with the 3.5 and higher editions, *regardless of the alignment of the soul.* So, evil Necromancer Ray can find out that his annoying brother, Paladin Bob, has just died, fighting the good fight, and, because he hates him so much, go animate his corpse and make it do evil things. And Paladin Bob is *not* ripped out of heaven, *does not* become evil and mindless and lose his Paladin status and become permanantly barred from returning to the Upper Planes, because Necromancer Ray is just mucking around with his body, and cannot touch (or turn evil) his immortal soul. Zombies don't have the souls of their former owners lurking behind their eyes, helpless prisoners of the fell powers that raised them. They are, and always have been, in D&D, mindless, meaning that they fairly obviously don't have souls tucked away inside of them, screaming silently in eternal horror. (A creepy thematic idea, but ultimately, kinda pointless. The negative energy does the animation. What possible use is there to go all the way to heaven or hell to grab a soul to ride around uselessly in the body? Seems to be asking for trouble, actually. What if the spirit / soul resisted the control and seized control of it's body and attacked you? Best to just stick to mindless negative energy!) I could come up with a similar 'explanation' that fireball spells call forth little baby fire elementals or phoenix eggs to the material plane, causing them to explode and die, exposed to what, to them, is unbearable cold. But the games rules don't support that, so it would be kinda silly to post 'casting fireball is evil because it kills baby fire elementals!' And yet, made up stuff about necromancy is fairly common. [/QUOTE]
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