Necromancer's alignments

[Myrddin L'argenton]

Right, this question is just asked out of interest because of the requirements in SoA. For a Necromancer would they be good, neutral or evil alignment. Would they be good because they try to understand the past. Neutral because they are trying to understand the balance and keep the balance of life or death. Or Evil because they are liches and try to use their powers over death to futher their life. Remeber, for those that have played IWD, liches ain't just evil, remember the undead elvin mage that helps you in the chapters. Another question. If you were a gnome illustionist/cleric would that mean that you could not raise dead or resurrect party members? People that have played this character or had Quayle in your party answer this.

[ 01-13-2003, 08:07 AM: Message edited by: Myrddin L'argenton ]

[Butterfingers]

In role playing terms, a Necromancer is usually either partially chaotic, or, partially neutral. They seek to preserve balance, much like a druid. It's the way they go about doing it some times that leaves folks worried. The chaotic part is there because of the breakdown of the natural order that the Necromancer is forced to deal with, and or, facing the consequences of his own power. Many Necromantic spells could potentially damage the caster's mind, like spells like Speak with Undead or Control Undead. But this is not implemented in game.

Mages have no consequences for their power in BG at all.

[Luvian]

Originally posted by Butterfingers: In role playing terms, a Necromancer is usually either partially chaotic, or, partially neutral. They seek to preserve balance, much like a druid. It's the way they go about doing it some times that leaves folks worried. The chaotic part is there because of the breakdown of the natural order that the Necromancer is forced to deal with, and or, facing the consequences of his own power. Many Necromantic spells could potentially damage the caster's mind, like spells like Speak with Undead or Control Undead. But this is not implemented in game. Mages have no consequences for their power in BG at all.

Nice, but that is not how it work in dungeon and dragons. Necromancer are just mage specialised innecromantic magic. There is no side effect to it.

There could be good necromancers, even Lawfull good one. Necromancer are people specialised on the magic relating to life, and death. A necromancer could be a hundead hunter, he could be researching this for academic reaons, by learning about death, one can learn about life. Or maybe he specialised in necromancy for the power it give him.

Just like illusion, necromancy is not evil, it's what you do with it.

[Butterfingers]

Actually, that is taken from D&D. A long long time ago before the game got dumbed down, the reason a specialist mage needed a secondary stat was for various checks. Concentration to cast on the battlefield, or, should something go wrong. Spell failure was a real pain, because if the spell fizzled, or worse, was miscasted, you had better believe there were consequences. All spells, even, let's say, Featherfall, could have undesired effects. If something went wrong, well, any range of bad things could happen. You could summon a giant pile of chicken feathers (Much like Fizban did in the Dragonlance novels) or you could make your self as light as a chicken feather for a very long time, meaning you would blow away at the slightest breeze. Spell componates played a large part in this as well, as you always wanted the best quality in ingredients.

And yes, there were alignments based on mage schools. These were not concrete, there are always exceptions.

Abjurers, Conjurers, and Diviners tended toward Law. All of these demand a careful steady regimented life of dedication.

Transmuters, Enchanters, and Necromancers tended toward Chaos. All of these spells are of the fabric of chaos. All of them tend to break down the natural order in some way, turning something from one state to another.

With various shades of neutrality, good, or evil, in between both sides, there were many options for an aspiring mage.

[Myrddin L'argenton]

Originally posted by Butterfingers: Actually, that is taken from D&D. A long long time ago before the game got dumbed down, the reason a specialist mage needed a secondary stat was for various checks. Concentration to cast on the battlefield, or, should something go wrong. Spell failure was a real pain, because if the spell fizzled, or worse, was miscasted, you had better believe there were consequences. All spells, even, let's say, Featherfall, could have undesired effects. If something went wrong, well, any range of bad things could happen. You could summon a giant pile of chicken feathers (Much like Fizban did in the Dragonlance novels) or you could make your self as light as a chicken feather for a very long time, meaning you would blow away at the slightest breeze. Spell componates played a large part in this as well, as you always wanted the best quality in ingredients. And yes, there were alignments based on mage schools. These were not concrete, there are always exceptions. Abjurers, Conjurers, and Diviners tended toward Law. All of these demand a careful steady regimented life of dedication. Transmuters, Enchanters, and Necromancers tended toward Chaos. All of these spells are of the fabric of chaos. All of them tend to break down the natural order in some way, turning something from one state to another. With various shades of neutrality, good, or evil, in between both sides, there were many options for an aspiring mage.

Interesting point Butterfingers. The point I'm trying to make however is what Butterfingers is applying and would the class require certain limits. I agree that it depends on the user of the magic but you tend to find that they are shown as evil liches or like Xzar.
Oh yeah no-ones answered whether a illustionist/cleric could cast Raise Dead.

[Morgeruat]

in the case of an illusionist cleric, the spell restrictions only affect what they cannot cast in the mage side of their class, they still couldn't cast the mage raise dead spells (ie reincarnation) but their clerical prowess has none of the hindrances of the mage side (unless the god the cleric worships is an illusionist as well and unable to bestow healing/necromantic magic on their followers)

as far as good or lawful necromancers, I'll deal with the good first, while they may follow what they believe to be a pure path and help orphans cross the street, they are still tampering with forces that easily lead to corruption, very few necromancers are able to retain a good alignment past a very high level (good clerics need a VERY good reason to cast animate dead, mages need the same) and once you've immersed yourself in arts typically very dark then the line between right and wrong becomes blurred. ie if the spell to banish a plague of evil vampires requires the sacrifice of 100 baby unicorns by ritualistic clubbing which end is worse, they necromancer likely doesn't even see the slide into evil, as most people don't see themselves as evil, they just think their methods justify the end result.

for lawful it's harder to say, while it is definitely against the law in most countries to go digging up corpses for a chat, let alone to make them join your army, many necromancers have strict discipline and a strong sense of honor (essentially the same % as in any other mage class).

[Butterfingers]

It's not so much a matter of becoming evil for a Necromancer, it was the fear of going mad.

If a Necromancer wanted to cast the spell, Speak With Undead, as an example, he had to make a roll to see if the spell was successful, and, the moment he started talking, depending of course to what he was talking to, he had to make a wisdom check. There were both positive and negative multipliers, which depended on the type of undead, how many times he had done this, and, his level. If he failed a roll, there was a good chance he would go stark raving mad, shifting his aligment to chaotic neutral, perhaps for a short time, perhaps for a long time, perhaps forever.

Just about the only leftovers we see of this system in BG is when mages conjure elementals. The momentary mental battle of wits. In PnP, this was actually a check of both your constitution (Hence a Conjurer's need of) and a check of your wisdom. Failure of either of these rolls meant that the conjured elemental would come and smash you. A Necromancer summoning skeletons or other undead had to do the same thing. Fight a mental battle to gain control. A cleric has no need of this, his magic being of a divine orgin, he just gave a command and bam, undead army. A Necromancer taps into darker arcane powers, and, there was always a chance that something did not go just right. There was a chance you could lose control of the summoned dead, or worse, go utterly loony and lose your mind.

BG would be a lot more fun if some of these old rules were brought back.