Players really want the Necromancer? (Forked: Non-published concepts you want)

[ProfessorCirno]

Necromancers can be awesomely fun without being evil. Heck, they can be awesomely fun BECAUSE they aren't evil. I had a Lawful Neutral Dread Necromancer for awhile - he was a blast!

Besides, what is this. Tieflings are allowed to have dark and haunted demonic pasts, as they struggle against their dark nature...but having someone who takes those perfectly good corpses that people are just THROWING AWAY and putting them to good use is somehow horrible?

 

[Rechan]

I will say this. After seeing the gameplay video for Diablo 3, I want a necromancer to throw around Wall of Zombies.

(Hey, that's not a bad idea for an NPC. Just grab Wall of Fire, convert damage... mahahaha!)

 

[Ruin Explorer]

There's no rule that says Necromancers have to be "bad" or "evil". The Diablo 2 Necromancer, for example is one of the most good people in Diablo 2, here's his story:

http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/classes/necromancerhistory.shtml

You're talking about a game (4E) where you can be a good person even though you have a pact with either Satan's bestest bud or the most utterly ruinous powers from outside the bloody universe! If you don't have a problem with that, I have no clue why you would have a problem with a good Necromancer, especially if he summoned undead beings "out of thin air" or from defeated enemies, rather than defiling friendly bodies.

As a DM I've seen three Necromancers played, two were NG, one was NN, back in 2E. All of them were great characters with atypical ethics (I've never gone with this "making mindless undead out of corpses is inherently evil" stupidity - and I was encouraged by source books like The Complete Book of Necromancers that I was right not to).

In short, yes, I expect to be able to play a Necromancer, and I sure as hell don't expect them to automagically be regarded as "evil", any more than a Pally or Cleric is automagically "good" because they work with healing and protecting. 3E had a lot of dumb stuff with "Evil" and "Good" descriptors. 4E has no mechanical alignment idiocy, THANK GOD, so I don't see what the problem is, quite frankly.

The only real issue to resolve is economy of actions, I think, and if they can do that for other summoners, they can damn well do that for Necromancers. If they can't then they probably need to look at Diablo 2 and other games for cool Necromantic abilities which don't directly involve summoning, or involve very temporary summons.

Note that for a PC Necromancer to be a Necromancer, I don't need him to have permanent animated corpses hanging out with him. That's cool but if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. Summoning undead-type being and so on, though, and scary death/undeath-related effects is AWESOME so should be in.

 

[Shroomy]

I think we will see the necromancer some time in the future, but probably not until after the conjurer/summoner class first appears. However, if someone wants some official necromancer-type powers for wizards, they need to start proposing some articles to Dragon, because this will be the likely place you'll find them in the near future.

 

[Ahglock]

I will say this. After seeing the gameplay video for Diablo 3, I want a necromancer to throw around Wall of Zombies.

(Hey, that's not a bad idea for an NPC. Just grab Wall of Fire, convert damage... mahahaha!)

Whiskey Tango?

what hole was i in when I missed the Diablo 3 news?

Time to start googling, though if someone has a link I'd apreciate it.

.but having someone who takes those perfectly good corpses that people are just THROWING AWAY and putting them to good use is somehow horrible?

this = post full of win

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The only real issue to resolve is economy of actions, I think, and if they can do that for other summoners, they can damn well do that for Necromancers. If they can't then they probably need to look at Diablo 2 and other games for cool Necromantic abilities which don't directly involve summoning, or involve very temporary summons.

.

I never had an economy of actions issue, and I don't want to get into a big debate about it like I did in another thread.

But if you limited the actions summons can take to move/basic attack and made them minions I don't think it would be much worse if at all worse than some of the larger AoE spells.

And no its not just because summons being minions simulates shadow clone jutsu really well, honest.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

Whiskey Tango?

what hole was i in when I missed the Diablo 3 news?

Time to start googling, though if someone has a link I'd apreciate it.

Spoiler: LEONARD BOYARSKY is head of world design. Oh god I'm going to buy like four copies of this game.

 

[Barastrondo]

The Necromancer that WotC would put out is for PCs. And honestly. most DMs wouldn't let me play a necromancer.

I let players play necromancers without thinking twice.

A corpse defiling, soul-taunting, undead making user of the black arts.

Unless that's the attitude they bring to the concept.

Like Ruin Explorer, we do heroic, or at least ambiguous, necromancers all the time. The wife plays one in a fantasy Champions game (though she swapped out her skelemooks for a grave guardian before long). Heck, I even pitched and got published a d20 book about heroic/ambiguous necromancers for Scarred Lands (from which I take my ENWorld handle). The concept of the "necromancer" can include mediums who lay the tormented dead to rest, and though some believe that animating an empty corpse is more intrinsically evil an act than dissolving an enemy's flesh with a wave of acid, there's no logical reason it has to be. We've got literary precedent for heroic necromancers in Garth Nix's Abhorsen trilogy, even. In all cases you also find evil necromancers, of course, so you don't even have to give up the nasty villains you like.

Bring on the heroic necromancers, says me.

 

[Mallus]

Do the people that want them expect to be able to play them

Sure.

I've had the idea for a while for a dapper, debonair necromancer, sort of Nick Charles in a cowl, who'd always have a chilled martini in hand. The martini would have tiny skulls in it instead of olives. He'd insist they were baby skulls, but they'd be far too small, unless, of course, they had been shrunken using magic. I think I was calling him Camber Darkling. I'd play him in a heartbeat.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

Sure.

I've had the idea for a while for a dapper, debonair necromancer, sort of Nick Charles in a cowl, who'd always have a chilled martini in hand. The martini would have tiny skulls in it instead of olives. He'd insist they were baby skulls, but they'd be far too small, unless, of course, they had been shrunken using magic. I think I was calling him Camber Darkling. I'd play him in a heartbeat.

Ahh, putting the "romancer" back into "necromancer," I see

 

[Rechan]

Okay. Just checking.

I've had a Dread necromancer player in one of my Eberron games that was short lived, and I'd enjoy playing one.

Note: Dr Orpheous IIIIIS A NEEECROMANCER! And yes, when speaking as Dr. Orpheous, you must use all caps. [ame=http://youtube.com/watch?v=ioEgPlxjDok]See what I mean?[/ame][ame="http://youtube.com/watch?v=ioEgPlxjDok"][/ame] (not the best clip).