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I like good character concepts. One thing that has always intrigued me is that in 3.5/Pathfinder, almost universally, Necromancy is seen as evil. It isn't hard to understand why: Years of Necromantic villains, Vecna, Tar-Baphon, 99% of undead being evil, etc. However, it isn't the case that Necromancy itself is evil. Casting a spell with the "evil" descriptor is not inherently evil unless the spell requires something (material component, ritual action, etc.) that is an evil act. The spell "Animate Dead" doesn't require anything more than a decently expensive material component, and an availability of suitable corpses (Which, let's be honest, is the easiest resource to come by when being an adventurer, even a Good-aligned one). Also, the variants created for "White Necromancers" have been horrible at best, and downright broken in the worst. The "Life" Necromancy specialization is terribad. I understand where they were trying to go, but they could have at least given them access to the "Cure" spell line... geez.
So, my ideation is thus: I've wanted to play a Lawful Good Necromancer since 3.5: In the Unearthed Arcana book, there was a variant that gave a simple swap of the Necro's familiar for a human skeleton that advanced with the wizard and was cheaper to replace. I never got a chance to put the idea out there, and never got the chance to throw it into one of my campaigns either. Now, I'm playing in a Pathfinder game set in Golarion and have been given the okay to play a LG Necromancer.
I have my own ideas about how to build the character, what relationships they have to organizations like the Whispering Way, how they feel about Vampires, and other things, but I'd like to hear ideas and challenges from the Paizo community, since I get a lot of good ideas from these forums. Mechanical things are not the focus, but are appreciated. So, how would you build Him? How would you play Him? What ways would you have Him explain to people why his chosen school is not "black magic" and "evil" despite the overwhelming tendency to view them as such?
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I would play this character a little like Batman, to be honest. A dark, creepy, terrifying champion of good, who scares the absolute pants off of evildoers. Imagine their horror facing a frightening and powerful necromancer, threatening them with unimaginable torment and waves of fearsome undead minions.
Of course, he's really a good guy after all. He knows that a person's soul isn't harmed when their body is reanimated - that's just superstition. His conscience is clear. He's chosen the path of death and necromancy not because of some desire for power, but because only the fear of death will frighten evil into obeying the laws of the land and redeeming their evil ways.
So I would not have him try to explain to people that his ways are "good." He would be mysterious and frightening, not open and friendly. After all, Good Is Not Nice. He is not there to coddle his foes - he is there to defeat them with necromantic might - in the name of justice and the protection of the innocent.
Perhaps he would even threaten (and follow through on his threat) to reanimate the bodies of his slain foes after death. That might frighten a criminal to surrender, the thought of such a horrible fate.
Well, there are many spells in the Necromancy school that aren't evil. But a key point which you've misunderstood by Golarion cannon and developer commentary (which may not be used at your table) is that a spell with [evil] tag is in fact an evil spell. Now, what this implies varies table to table quite a bit. I would say to a neutral character its almost meaningless. A neutral necromancer would see undead creation as a tool (with the exception of worshipers of Pharasma), but I think a lawful good necromancer would recognize that creation of undead is (probably) against the law of many countries and is definitely not good. As a GM I wouldn't allow a character to stay LG and animate undead everywhere. However, this is me and my opinion. Verify with your GM how he feels about it before you proceed too far with the [evil] spells aren't evil bit and make sure he's kosher with it.
That aside...if you wanted to keep with the above you could be a necromancer who's purpose it to destroy all undead (very Pharasmin of you). Or you could be using necrotic powers like enervate to destroy your foes (without resorting to the use of Undead). Otherwise, just treat undead as mindless neutral tools that you use to accomplish an end. Much in the same way a butcher treats the cleaver.
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Guys, please stay on topic. He's asking for advice on roleplaying/building a Lawful Good Necromancer, not for lectures about how his choice and his GM are wrong and that in your game, it wouldn't be allowed.
Take "this is happening and it is allowed" as the premise here, because he is doing it and his GM is okay with it.
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I would be remiss if I didn't suggest taking a look at The Expanded White Necromancer from Kobold Press
It is perhaps the ideal class to play if you want to be a non-evil necromancer.
The class fully address issues such as necromancy spells with the evil descriptor etc.
In addition to the class itself, The Expanded White Necromancer also has:
- 6 new spells including dance of the dead and wall of bones
- Necrotic Healer and Grave-Bound archetypes
- 2 new necromantic feats
- Rules for undead companions that bind you to a loyal ghost, mummy, vampire, skeleton, shadow or zombie
I have a neutral necromancer whom I play like a scientist who sees nothing wrong with creating/controlling undead. It's science! For a lawful good version, I can see a couple ways to go:
1. Undead Redeemer- You study the undead and know their ways so that you may nuetralize them more effectively. You never create minions of your own, yet may take control of existent ones- especially if you knew them in life. Undead you control aren't hurting anyone, and perhaps you collect them somewhere safely away from the common folk, taking those you may control as needed to assist you. You seek to cure their condition rather than destroy them.
(I may use a bit of this myself!)
2. Undead Destroyer- You study the undead and know their ways so that you may destroy them more effectively. You never create minions of your own, yet may take control of existent ones only to turn them against one another or destroy themselves. They are an abomination, and you do the thankless, dirty work to rid the world of them. You are the left hand of Pharasma, and your advice to her servants in hunting the restless dead is priceless.
I feel that using the unwilling (as far as you know) dead as tools precludes you from being both lawful and good, and would also recommend a neutral aspect. The above two examples make the most sense for a LG necromancer, hope they help!
Mea culpa. I missed thisGuys, please stay on topic. He's asking for advice on roleplaying/building a Lawful Good Necromancer, not for lectures about how his choice and his GM are wrong and that in your game, it wouldn't be allowed.
Take "this is happening and it is allowed" as the premise here, because he is doing it and his GM is okay with it.
and have been given the okay to play a LG Necromancer.
WIthout that I just wanted to give warning that his concept might not fly.
I did also provide a couple of ideas that expanded on how to fit the restricted or unrestricted concept, even if they aren't very fleshed out.
At the end of the day if creating undead isn't evil then I feel the question is similar to "How do I play a lawful good summoner?" And by summoner I mean someone who casts Summon Monster spells, etc. The answer is, in whatever way you and your GM find to be lawful good. You can have you tropes of Good is Not Nice, Good is not Soft, etc.
Rather than take any stoic route, I like the route you take when your just a little eccentric. Good in your heart, always act in peoples best interest, and that you just don't see a single thing wrong with raising the dead as long as no ones harmed.
Another one I had was seemingly insane and was into science and necromancy. He loved augmented undead and political plots. All of his actions were a pileup of plans. He uses obfuscating insanity to commit his plots. All of his plots are for the betterment of the people around him and to create heroes, and he doesn't hurt anyone when he commits them.
Another one was the son of a lich. He was raised to know and learn and use necromancy. He didn't like his father too much though, and was interested in leading a revolt against him and taking over to prevent his father from committing any apocalypse creating plans or world domination plots.
Every time I think I come up with a unique character concept, I see a post with someone else doing the same thing within a few days. I just have to face it, I'm not that creative.
Many concepts and characters sound the same. In this game you will meet 100 barbarians. However they will be 100 different barbarians, for each of them will carry a different story and live a different life.
For either concept, dont forget the metamagic feats Threnodic Spell (you can convert mind-affecting magic to necromantic power capable of controlling undead). and Thanatopic Spell (allows your spells can pierce wards against negative energy and even affect undead targets). For Threnodic spells, make sure Enchantment and Illusion aren't your opposed schools (as they often are with necromancers). I recommend Thanatopic for the Undead Destroyer build, Threnodic for the Undead Redeemer build (which I'm liking more and more!).
Why do people have to equate necromancy with reanimated hordes? Yes, it is one of its aspects, and definitely iconic, but it is not necessary for a necromancer. Necromancy literally means speaking to the dead, not ordering them around.
Personally, if your DM approves the idea of using spells with the evil descriptor without being evil (or heck, neutral), that's his right and you can go wild on it. Alignments are game constructs anyway, and unless the player is a divine caster or otherwise beholden to a higher power are mostly descriptive. However, by the book, spells with the evil descriptor draw on evil powers or conjure creatures that are either innately evil or from evil planes. From a metaphysical perspective, whatever is animating undead is, therefore, an evil power - presumably (in the case of necromancy spells with that descriptor) that is innately more harmful and dangerous than the raw elements of most evocation spells . To be aware of that and still use it is morally challenging and possibly damning - but again, that is metaphysics.
Do note that in the "natural order" as exemplified by the world and the gods, reanimation effectively contradicts how life and death work in the setting. In most places on Golarion, this means the user of such effects shows that he puts his/her own judgement over, say, natural or divine law (as exemplified by the Pharasmin dogma) and everything else society has to say on the topic. That might not in itself be evil, but it shows an unhealthy amount of hubris and disregard for any traditions or conventions.
None of this means this character HAS to be evil, or even non-good. It does, however, mean that in the setting, reanimating necromancy spells have some implications most just and good characters should find disturbing at best.
Perhaps the op can make it work. I would definitely be very careful and sparing in any undead created, though, and a skeletal companion seems a bit too flippant a disregard of mores and ethics for a LG character.
In terms of how to play the character, my RotRL character has been delving into Necromantic spells and research as the Adventure Path has gone on. Here's how I've played it, and sort of the "why" as well, hope it helps a bit...
Character: Elven Conjuration School (Teleportation sub-school) Wizard, currently level 7, nearly 8.
I have played the character as Forlorn. He has watched friends and associates from his youth grow up, grow old and die. He has seen lovers age and fade away while his own longevity has kept him very much the same in his outwardly youthful and handsome appearance. He has grown caustic, bitter, aloof and withdrawn because of these losses.
All this has changed, however, during the course of his RotRL adventures. What at first started as a job that necessitated associating with a handful of other adventurers has turned into sharing a titanic struggle alongside valued companions that he cares deeply about.
While he has gone to great lengths to keep up his outwardly prickly and aloof demeanor, he is growing increasingly protective of his companions and savagely vindictive to anyone that causes them harm.
After a few close calls in which some among his companions have nearly died, he has grown increasingly desperate to make sure that his companions stay safe...and that they won't ever have to leave him...ever.
So, he studies through the night, collecting spell after spell, researching items and artifacts, potions and elixirs, anything to stave off the (what he feels are the) inevitable deaths of his friends.
Soon...he'll have everything he needs, to make sure that even death won't stop him and his friends as they desperately try to make it through their perilous tasks.
So...my character is absolutely, unequivocally non-evil. He may be selfish, deluded and vastly misguided, but his primary motivations for delving into necromancy are to protect his friends and companions from dying forever.
This is a character who is desperately trying to stop and change events that are far larger than life, far more terrifying than anyone should have to bear. He's cracking under the fear and pressure, already delving into the bottle most nights and self-medicating with any drugs he can procure.
He's not good, per-say, like you're looking to do, but he is most definitely not evil.
Do note that in the "natural order" as exemplified by the world and the gods, reanimation effectively contradicts how life and death work in the setting. In most places on Golarion, this means the user of such effects shows that he puts his/her own judgement over, say, natural or divine law (as exemplified by the Pharasmin dogma) and everything else society has to say on the topic. That might not in itself be evil, but it shows an unhealthy amount of hubris and disregard for any traditions or conventions.
That sounds like something a Pharasmin would say. I'm sure the other gods have different opinions. I'm sure Kabiri, Yhidothrus, Sifkesh, and Urgothoa have a much different idea on what undeath means.
Your biased view is biased.
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Thanks for the ideas, everyone! I'm going to spill some of my ideas because Flintas is also having the idea, so he might like some of the bits I've come up with.
Vayne Anubane comes from a long line of necromancers. His family originated from what is now Ustalav, where they were gravediggers and morticians. During these times, the Whispering Tyrant, Tar-Baphon, was ravaging the world; The Anubane family dusted off ancient tomes and learned the arts of necromancy to combat the Whispering Way, earning the ire of both the necromancers under The Tyrant's command, as well as the priesthood of Pharasma. When opposition to their earnest fight became too great, they fled to the deserts of Osiron, both to escape persecution, and to study the magics those people used in preserving their corpses and creating their guardians.
Vayne sees the body as sacred only so long as a soul resides within it. As soon as the soul has left it, the body is an object: It is no different to animate a corpse than to animate a statue. The methods he and his family use to obtain their corpses is a very tame and open one: Some of them own graveyards and tombs, others buy them legally from whomever 'owns' the corpse after burial or funeral, and those who are adventurers typically use their painstakingly researched "Speak with Dead" spell to obtain permission directly from the soul the corpse once belonged to, usually initiating a verbal contract. When they are done with the corpse, they ritually destroy the undead they create, as they have only been created for a specific purpose, and when that purpose is completed, it would be wrong of him to keep them around, and in some cases, a violation of a contract.
The Anubanes have various views on intelligent undead, but Vayne is of a more liberal cast: If the soul desires to return in his service, it should be allowed to, but otherwise, it is evil and vile to force a soul back into a corpse against it's soul's will. He views the Whispering Way as abhorrent and worthy of destruction. In fact, the Anubanes have made it their duty and goal to seek out and destroy the Whispering Way and all of it's adherents. They see their desire to destroy all life and force all beings into unwilling servitude as the most disgusting of goals, and that only those who want undeath should obtain it.
He doesn't explain himself to those who do not want to understand. He holds no ill will against Pharasma or Sarenrae, nor their clergy, as he well knows what he is doing is profane in their sight, but the best way to destroy the Tyrant and his servants is to use their own resources against them, and to uphold justice and righteousness in any way that one can, even a way that must necessarily dip into the realm of "evil" to bring about what is good for all.
The Morphling has a good grasp on what I was going for, as well. Hope this gives some people ideas, as well as something to think about! Thanks again for the responses.
I will also be attempting to create new spells via Ultimate Campaign guidelines such that he will essentially be "converting" Divine spells into Arcane ones: The Cure Line, several of the resurrection spells, and speak with dead, to be sure.
There is a neutral good necromancer NPC in my campaign. The inspiration for the character is a guy I know in real life: an entomologist that's a mosquito expert. I once asked him why he studies mosquitoes, and he said, "When I was a child, my little sister caught malaria and died. I want to learn everything there is to know about mosquitoes because I want to kill them... kill them all. My greatest professional success would be to make disease-carrying mosquitoes extinct."
As an aside, I have the same attitude toward undead as Golarion camon: even mindless undead are inherently evil and thirst for the blood of the living. (Nonevil undead do exist, but are extremely rare; all nonevil undead are named NPCs that are somehow tied to the plot.)
So, my good necromancer is a guy who absolutely abhors unlife and wants to destroy them. He sees undead as an abomination against the natural cycle of life and death-- a foul corruption of nature that needs to be undone. To that end, he devoted his life to the study of life and unlife to learn more and better ways to rid the world of the undead menace.
While he knows the undead creation spells (i.e. they're in his spellbook), he never actually casts them. (Well, he's cast animate dead once or twice in his career, mainly to fully understand necromantic magic. He always destroyed the undead he created almost immediately.) He does use his Command Undead ability, but only to further the destruction of such creatures.
He has researched a few spells that use necromantic energies to transfer life energy from one creature to another-- kind of like vampiric touch. For example, he has a "healing" spell that allows the caster to take the wounds of the subject. (Like the Star Trek TOS episode, "The Empath.")
So, that's one way to reconcile a good necromancer with Golarion canon of undead being intrinsically evil.
The only advice i can think of is to make sure that your GM and you is on the same page when it comes to what good and evil meens and how that connects with desecrating the bodies of the dead.
If you 2 agree then i think you are flying. And if you dont then the concept will never work.
And be prepared to accept that not all GMs will accept that a personal belif in that somthing evil is not will save the day.
Good luck.
On a only sligtly related side note i had a Good necromancer planned. He was a necromancy super talent with feats to back up his dark powers but all he really wanted was to hurl balls of fire at the bad guys.
So he would never make undeads unless the Story really called for it.
He would control or turn undead as nessesary and generally try to be a stand up guy.
But he would be sickly and pale and all the cliches.
I may still use him if my Barbarian turned Magus dies:)
That sounds like something a Pharasmin would say. I'm sure the other gods have different opinions. I'm sure Kabiri, Yhidothrus, Sifkesh, and Urgothoa have a much different idea on what undeath means.
Your biased view is biased.
I spoke of the natural order of the setting, and none of these is the deity of death and the dead or have any legitimate authority over such matters, which can be important to a lawful character. Sure, many necromancers follow their way of thinking, but they aren´t exactly great role models for a LG character.
@ Adun: I guess a big question is whether animating magic call the original soul of the body or just something the necromancer controls. Sure, putting the original soul back with its express permission is probably ok, but I am not sure that is how those spells actually work.
The animation magic recalls the soul from the dark plane they goto after they pass (Hell, Ghenna, the Abyss). The LG Necromancer makes an alliance himself with those dark souls, and in reanimating them, gives them a chance to fight for justice or defend the weak. These good acts can/will help the dead beings soul migrate to a higher alignment. Even mindless undead like zombies and skeletons can have the screaming essence of dead murderers, brigands, or lawyers who repent their evil life now that they have experienced their afterlife. I imagine huge punitive social repercussions also for raising the dead.
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Necromancy has a ton of different things strapped together, some totally unrelated (like using contagion to *create life!*).
A necromancer who focuses on spirits and souls is going to be much different than one who is interested in anatomy and physiology and different still from one who focuses on the 'ecology' (necrology?) of the negative energy-empowered creature or negative-energy infused environment.
If one is focused on finding, communicating with and 'unbinding' ghosts and spirits and haunts, helping the less harmful ones to find their peace and resolve whatever issues cause them to remain stuck and unable to transition (or, temporarily unwilling to transition, because of an oath or debt or sense of responsibility or love or whatever), and also using their powers and training to dismantle mindless haunts or banish malevolent spiritual undead, such as wraiths and specters, that's a very valid 'good' reason to focus on necromantic studies.
If one is focused on life energy *and* the transition to mortal death, to better fight disease and infection and injury, and preserve and engender and support the living, that's yet another reason to consider the school of life and death as an area of focus, although you may find yourself having to make use of the Spell Research guidelines to whip up some more 'life friendly' spells for the 'school of life and death,' since the decision to yank healing spells out of necromancy and focus it so heavily on evil stuff kind of hinders that potential, and makes the school less useful for a good necromancer (which is arse-backwards, since the game seems to discourage evil play, or even outright ban it, in official Organized Play, and yet includes that crap in the core book).
Negative energy is a totally *natural* part of the fantasy world, just as is positive energy (that other alien extradimensional energy that animates meat and makes it lurch around for a time, and when expended, the meat falls down and becomes inanimate). Souls, which everyone has, are 'unnatural' to the material plane, as, when they leave the meat, they become evil undead. So, Mr. Paladin, your meat is unclean and unnatural *and* your soul is automatically evil. Good luck remaining Lawful Good. Unless... It doesn't actually work that way, and the 'corpses are evil' and 'souls are evil' propaganda is just that, propaganda that utterly falls apart into a sobbing hysterical mass of internal contradictions in the face of the themes *and* the mechanics of the setting and the game.
It's even more explicit in Golarion, where the goddess of death is neither good, nor lawful, so doing stuff that she hates cannot by any stretch of the imagination be evil or chaotic just because she doesn't like it, any more than damming a river or burning a spellbook is evil, because those acts piss off non-good Gozreh or non-good Nethys. (Such an act might be evil *for other reasons*, but not because Pharasma says so. She's not good and she has *zero* say in what's evil, and, at the end of the day, her not liking it doesn't make it 'badwrongfun' any more than Urgathoa *loving it* makes it totally fine and cool.) And even if Pharasma was Lawful Good, it still wouldn't make her pet peeves, or her practices, automatically alignment-specific, just as Cayden Cailean being Good doesn't automatically make getting plastered a 'good act.' It's never worked that way, and it shouldn't work that way for Pharasma either.
Even if one wants to make use of animate dead, dead bodies are not only not 'sacred' in many cultures, they are actually *unclean* in some cultures, and even the cultures that insult their own gods by calling corpses (or flags) 'sacred' (since that which is not divine, by definition, cannot be sacred) don't tend to extend that sacredness to the corpses of other creatures, such as the animals they eat, or make clothing out of, or the long-dead dinosaurs that fuel their SUVs, so a fantasy version of our modern world, which is totally fine with raising chickens in cages too small to stand up, and cutting their beaks off so that they can't peck each other, would probably be fine-dandy with the animation of cow skeletons (which would be far more practical for manual labor than human skeletons anyway), and even *more* okay with the animation of the skeletons of *monsters* like hydras or whatever.
Hell, I'm not a hunter, and even *I* have a stuffed animal. (A jackalope, an unnatural abomination stitched together from multiple desecrated corpses! Ooh! So horrible! I use it as a bookend, in callous disregard for how the rabbits soul must be trapped in it's defiled corpse, barred from bunny heaven by this cruel mockery. The pronghorn antlers were shed, so it probably wasn't spiritually troubled by this use of it's horns in life, it is now also long dead, and parts of its body being stitched to the corpse of another creature to make a grotesque mockery of life in such a macabre and evil practice may be ruining it's antelope afterlife as well, if one believes in such nonsense.)
This place must be the haunt of all haunts. Along with any of the ogre infested places in Rise of the Runelords. Apparently *nothing* a bad guy can do to the corpses of *hundreds* of people can actually result in desecration...
Why a PC necromancer animating a cow to carry his gear is more spiritually risky than ogres making furniture out of *people* (after torturing and raping them to death, and then eating the meaty bits), I have no idea, other than to say, 'Oh, look, the game is terribly inconsistent about this. What a friggin' shock.' :/
So, TL;DR, there's a *ton* of ways to play a non-evil or even good necromancer, starting with avoiding evil descriptor spells, and flirting with danger by using *certain* evil descriptor spells very sparingly and for good reasons and avoiding animating commoners grandmothers (because that's just stupid, the stats are horrible!).
As with playing a specialist abjurer or diviner, Spell Research is your friend, to fill all the many varied and cool niches that the school has, but have been neglected in core, as some schools tend to get pigeonholed and ignored, while the conjuration and transmutation lists bloat and swell like puss-filled cankers, expanding to fill entire volumes.
Just avoid the Evil spells, and you're fine. Frag, back in 3.5, I played an EXALTED Necromancer with no troubles. He was also one of the friendliest folks around, and used his knowledge of necromancy to research anti-undead necro-spells. IIRC, there are about six evil spells in the basic CRB list, and most of them are pretty bad anyway. Avoiding them is a snap.
May also want to avoid things like Boneshatter if your GM is really keeping an eye on what your doing. Its not evil, but... I've met a few guys who give people a hard time if they use it even though the barbarian is already cutting guys in half.
May also want to avoid things like Boneshatter if your GM is really keeping an eye on what your doing. Its not evil, but... I've met a few guys who give people a hard time if they use it even though the barbarian is already cutting guys in half.
I think you hit it on the head. If the barb can dismember people and not be evil, you should be able to shatter people's bones with your mind.
This is an idea I have been considering too. Like a state mandated sort of necromancy. Like a cultured, benevolent witch doctor.
Well me personally I can't see spell as being evil unless in order to use it you need to do an evil act, use materials that come from evil acts or alter some cosmic balance, etc.
Necromancy on the other hand... raising dead might not be evil, but doing so on corpse that you do not know and has given you no permission might be seen as evil act, no matter how you look at it. Things would be different if said necromancer would only raise bodies of those who in life gave him permission to do so. This might actually make an interesting character if he does not believe in after life and offering his "help" to transcend death, now how to do that in most setting where gods are every where and having active part in mortal lives might not be feasible.
How to play a LG Necromancer? Easy - You're Dr. Frankenstein. You're obsessed with life and death and medical knowledge and convinced that with enough study, with enough experimentation, you can "cure" death. You purchase your research subjects and materials from legitimate sources and reputable dealers, you're a member of all the appropriate guilds and professional organizations, and you don't let the fact that some poor, uneducated souls believe what you do is wrong prevent you from changing the world.
Of course, you never actually hurt people* for your studies and you would be appalled by any compatriot that inflicted pain - either deliberately or through negligence. You don't lie**, cheat, or steal and you certainly don't murder in pursuit of knowledge - but there's a whole big world out full of danger out there and after you've defeated the goblin horde that threatened your village, you should be entitled to one or two corpses for experimentation purposes. You don't believe animating corpses (especially animals or beasts) as mindless undead such as skeletons or zombies is evil, since you believe mindless equals 'no soul trapped inside a rotting husk'. Pharasman clergy of course tell you differently, but clearly they're the mistaken ones. You would never create a ghoul, or wight or other, more powerful undead since that clearly does involving trapping the soul of an intelligent creature in endless torment.
*People, of course, refers those beings intelligent enough to have a conversation with and not currently trying to kill you or your race.
**You lie about your necromancy to those small-minded individuals who would condemn you out of fear or superstition, but even then you try to keep it to lies of omission.
