>necromancy is evil in this game Tons of players going: >"Oh man, I really want to play a good necromancer! Don't you see, there shouldn't be anything inherently evil about raising the dead. It's a classic fantasy trope!"
>necromancy is no more evil than any other magic in this game Tons of players going "meh" at necromancy unless they want to do bullshit like abuse skeleton archers in 5e.
Why does "necromancy is evil" bring out the biggest contrarians who suddenly want to play good necromancers, while "necromancy is okay" makes people ambivalent?
People don't like being told, "No," or, "You can't do [thing]"
If I said, "No, you can't skin is baby alive" someone would push back, then start giving me reasons why they not only can, but absolutely should skin that baby.
One trick I use is to tell my players what's ALLOWED, while not mentioning what's NOT allowed. They focus on what I said Is allowed, and don't even think twice about what I didn't tell them.
Isaac Clark
Well I do not play D&D for any system that enforces alignment, and necromancy usually just means being able to talk to the dead. So personally when I do approach the topic of necromancy it comes down to are you using it for good or evil. Same as any other type of magic really a pyrokinetic individual can be a firefighter or he can be a Serial arsonist.
But like all things it depends on the setting in the rules you're willing to bend
Kevin Russell
Because a lot of people want to be special or powerful. The benevolent necromancer in a world where necromancy is repugnant is special, while having your own small unit of archers in situations meant for a group of 4-6 is powerful. If you take these away, then necromancy (or anything else) just becomes another tool in the shed, to be hauled out as appropriate but not anything worth showing off. It's a bit of a shame, since calling on your dead ancestors to give you their wisdom and then giving them material form to fight your enemies is fun independent of it being powerful or special.
Jonathan Turner
Because some people lack the creativity and imagination to play something within given boundaries.
Jayden Butler
Instead of just saying that it's evil, reinforce it. Make it so every time you cast a necromantic spell, you are either eroding existence, or causing untold suffering to those you bring back, have them constantly beg to be put back to rest. Make every undead brought to life, cost the livelihood of someone that is already living. Just in general, no matter the intentions, the act is evil and cursed.
Parker Thomas
I just want to be a spirit detective and shot spirit guns with a spirit fedora and spirit trench coat.
Gavin Kelly
This.
Also, that's a really good idea and I'm totally going to steal it.
Michael Martinez
>Bonnets on hair buns
Dylan Diaz
>Why does "necromancy is evil" bring out the biggest contrarians who suddenly want to play good necromancers, while "necromancy is okay" makes people ambivalent? Because there are these two types of people:
1) That wants to subvert the trope either because they think it makes them smarter than "everyone else" or because they just genuinely just curious and want to try things they haven't tried before.
2) That are impartial and don't really care for the ideals and morality that 1) is interested about, to them necromancy is not any more or less special than other forms of magic.
The main reason it brings this is out because it is rooted in D&D's dreaded alignment system, which in itself is a source countless problems that plague this game since its conception. This is one of those problems, some people like (1)s consider the alignment and morality of the game to be important and try to apply the alignment system and modern day morality to the games they play. Others like (2)s are aware that this is a can of worms that shouldn't be opened because it adds very little to the game and in worse cases it can easily ruin the game for everyone.
Christopher Williams
They just wanna be the specialest.
William Morales
...
Robert Ross
Maybe "necromancy is inherently evil" is the contrarian stance now.
Ayden Richardson
What if I just want to play a big tittied sorceress that asks local corpses for help every now and again? Does that make me evil?
Joshua Ward
It's cute. CUTE!!
Jacob Lopez
Not in Vanillaware-games.
Xavier Jackson
Mind you in Vanillaware games looking like that is nothing special.
Gabriel Scott
Say that to my face.
William Martin
>When every single nonlore fuck tries to start shit with you on subjects like Evil and necromancy
>What is Taint >What is Vile tain >What is corruption >What is negative energy corruption, it's will, what it does to the soul, what it creates simply by being used, how were the undead made in the first place, >What are necromatic intelligences >What are hauntings >All those tables
I'm sick of low-level stupid niggers thinking they know shit, necromancy is MOSTLY evil, not entirely, Mostly, You don't fucking play with fire and expect to not get burnt you dumb fucks, necromancy is the same in D&D and it has a long history of why it's MOSTLY BAD.
Angel White
for the record, people approve of good necromancers by a fairly wide margin
Carter Evans
Luna a shit.
Oliver Ward
...
Brayden Wright
Everyone likes to feel special, and like they're smart. Very few people actually are, so the second they're told about reasonable limitations an insatiable hunger to ruin everything and prove they're smarter than the rules surges up.
Want to make necromancy evil? Make zombies horrific flesh sacks that require despicable rituals. Let's see them justify a good necromancer who needs to haven't vital organs from good characters in order to summon unholy gibbering monsters. Show them it's evil and have them learn the hard way, don't tell them it's evil because then you have to put up with their bitching.
Brandon Bailey
__ ____ _ ____ _________?
Hudson Robinson
>claims necromancy is bad because it's unethical and evil >recommends fucking golems as a replacement
Jayden Garcia
what if you raise corpses to quarry and shape the stone for your golems?
Zachary Hughes
Don't forget to send them to your elemental plane of choice to kidnap living, sentient elementals so you can cram them into your rock robots to make them work in the first place.
Carson Cooper
new campaign, players are elementals trying to save their families from a wizard that stole them and is going to magically lobotomize them and cram them into a moving rock
Jackson Harris
These are the exact same kind of people who hear 'evil game' and immediately want to play a paladin, or hear the group has a paladin and immediately want to play an evil character, or who hear 'game of courtly intrigue' and immediately want to play a bugbear barbarian.
It's not about what they really want to play, it's about wanting to break your game's theme intentionally.
TL;DR - people are assholes.
Levi Cooper
I guess I can consider myself lucky, I will run a "only evil" characters and my players just rolled evil or morally ambiguous characters.
Asher Price
That is the goal. It is nice to play with people who actually want to get into the story as opposed to just dick around and make the DM's job harder.
Robert Barnes
Most cultures have very strong traditions regarding burial and the treatment of the dead, except white people, who like to dig up ancient graves and parade old pharaohs around the world. Imagine you invade the palace of the necromancer, and find your grandmothers corpse being used as a zombie maid, complete with fetishistic frilly dress. Best case scenario. Worst case scenario, the bodies of the dead are being used as test subjects and cannon fodder, your uncles zombie being stretched on a rack to test the limits of the bodys endurance, your ancestors stitched together as a flesh golem, bound spirits being used to power enchanted equipment.
Its a breaking of taboos, flipping the bird at the natural order of things. For gods sake, necromancy is one of the three forms of magic expressly forbidden in the Bible, so it has a long reputation as being used by shit people. (The other two are witchcraft and divination, if you were curious)
Brody Jones
Nothing inherently wrong with good necromancers, though I wouldn't make one without seeing what the "rules" on necromancy are in the DM's setting.
Bit easier with more and more methods of getting rid of the Evil spell type on Raise Dead.
Henry Green
Well, it's also true that the setting allows them to have some fantasy for the character (my plan was to make them play their "dream" character) so they just went a little overboard. For example a paid assassin who is able to regenerate. (totally not wolverine) and a being completely composed of shapeshifting nanomachines. But I will rape them anyways.
Alexander Lee
Because questioning taboos is fun And questioning taboos that don't apply to our own society can be fun even to the most spooked of individuals.
Kevin Baker
Oh look, christfag is mad >Muh morals >Muh feelings >Muh taboos Just like back in the day, when religion halted scientific progress.
Zachary Stewart
I just want to raise my family and be with them.
Wyatt Howard
Really, that's your take-away? That I'm one of those guys who left Chick Tracts in hobby shops in the 80's? Look, every single society on Earth has different practices regarding the treatment of the dead, from leaving them on towers to be eaten by vultures, to burying them with a coin on their tongue. A necromancer just shits all over it, and treats the remains of a once-living creature as tools, or toys.
If you're going to allow someone to be a good necromancer, they'd better have a better justification than "they're dead, they're not using it anymore." That's sociopathic. Might I suggest someone who has no choice in the matter of their magic, or someone from a shamanistic tradition? Instead of using the bodies of some random whozit, they use their own ancestors? It would make it more personal, too.
Jace Turner
Which is more annoying, people who insist on playing good necromancers or people who insist of playing Gray Jedi?
Elijah Phillips
Now THAT is a good question.
Jayden Gomez
Some sort of ancestor-worshiping culture might consider reanimating their mummified remains yearly to take part in a feast could work in a fantasy setting. The idea of deceased ancestors joining in the living for celebrations is global, after all.
Nicholas Hughes
This is why I waited until I found a campaign where necromancy is just as "viable" as any other magic, then had my character be am asshole necromancer that hates the guild of necromancers. The reason they're a necromancer in the first place is to try to figure out how to revive their dead family, who died in an unnecessary skirmish. But they got made homeless orphan because the necrodudes repo'd her house, so now they're street. Character gets to be evil/"misguided", use necromancy, and have a thin motivation for being a murderhobo. Everyone wins!
