Character class: The Necromancer

[Yosh]

Today I'd like to share with you an idea regarding the necromancer player class. I know a few of you out there are like me and think the Necromancer class is badass. I propose that a cleric/mage multiclass preforms the summoner playstyle much better than the Necromancer mage kit. Heres why:

To really the get that summoner/undead army feel you have to invest a lot of your useful level 5 spell slots to animate dead, which you only get a max of 6 per day(without item bonuses which are rare for spell lvl 5). Along with usual 'wear and tear', summons can't follow you through entrances, so you'l blow through your animate dead spells FAST. You'l probably want to use the death spells too, taking up even more of your precious high level spell slots. The death spells in bg are largely unreliable, and the -2 penatly to save bonus from the Necromancer mage kit isn't very useful. Chill touch is bad. Contagion is bad. Larloc's minor drain is only ok untill lvl 3ish. Death spell, vampiric touch, and power word kill don't benefit from the save bonus. So your really only getting extra mileage for the horror, finger of death, control undead, hold undead, ghoul touch, abi-dalzim's horrid wilting, skull trap, and wail of the banshee spells. Wail of the banshee is not a very good choice in my opinion. There are plenty of other good lvl 9 mage spells, and by the time you can cast wail of the banshee most of the creatures you'l be fighting will have insane saves/magic resistance. You can use the turn undead cleric ability instead of the hold/control undead spells(on normal difficulty or less). The touch spells require you getting into melee with your opponents. On top of all that you have to sacrifice the all too useful illusion spells.

As a cleric/mage you'l get a max total of 14 animate dead uses per rest. Wow! Investing your 9 lvl 3 cleric spell slots to animate dead hurts a lot less than lvl 5 mage spells. On top of that, if your character is of evil alignment (and lets be honest, he should be :P ) you get the insanely cool ability to take control of undead using your turn undead cleric ability. It is so much fun to confidently stroll into a crypt with sanctuary active, and enslave ALL the inhabitants. You can also buff and heal your undead army! What kind of necromancer blesses and heals their undead minions you ask? Haha, I know.. cure light wounds shouldn't even be able to work on a skeleton. But unlike most other games animate dead lasts 24 hours, so its a nice bonus to keep them in prime fighting condition.


Tips

Your undead are magic resistant, and immune to cold and poison. An age old necromancer tactic is to bombard the battlefield with aoe spells that don't affect your minions. Ice storm, stinking cloud, cloudkill, and abi-dalzim's horrid wilting are great choices.

You will likely feel the ill effects of slower exp gain due to your multiclass. Don't get discouraged; try to get the most out of your many low level spells. Command is a great way to stun low level spell casters. Sleep is a great spell early game. You can get a lot of mileage out of the spook, horror, hold person, and silence spells. Whenever you feel like your falling behind the party, just remember the unique advantages you have over a pure mage and buy yourself a wand of fire to spice things up. Listening to your party fighting and dying alongside your undead minions in the next room while you leisurely sip on a healing potion is the best feeling in the world.

Remember as a summoner your largely relying on your summons to get things done. Your using your spells to control the battle.

In larger parties (or harder difficulties)you might not ever get to a high enough cleric level to fully control undead with the turn undead ability.

And don't forget rule #2 of magecraft! A mage who can escape any opponent is a mage who can defeat any opponent.


Advanced Tactics (Spoilers)

You and your skeletons should be able to handle most opponents in the game without using more than two spells. However you'l eventually run into ~something~ tough that needs extra work. These are some tactics for difficult encounters.

Use sanctuary, illusion, and abjuration spells to give yourself time to summon your army when needed. In EE your max summons count is 5. Summon 5 skeletons, buff them with haste, chant and bless, and send them into battle. When your skeletons are engaged, bombard the battlefield with spells that your skeletons are immune to. Stinking cloud, ice storm, cloudkill, and abi-dalzim's horrid wilting will turn the battle in your favor. You can also use hold person, hold monster, emotion:hopelessness, slow, horror, and other aoes to a lesser effect. Interrupt and stun spellcasters. Save a few counter spells like oracle, and pierce magic to get through their defenses. Finger of death difficult opponents. Replace summons as neccesary. Use mass cure if a lot of your minions are wounded. Heal your minions after battle.

In undead heavy areas simply take control of them with turn undead. If you arn't high enough level to do that, use control and hold undead instead. Don't bother using your normal aoe's as they will be immune to them as well. Use more single target damage. Be mindful that turn undead will scare off your guys as well unless you use different summons.

Against opponents that 'de-summon' like beholder's or certain bosses, forget the summoning and use traditional mage tactics instead. Flee and change your spellbook if neccesary. Don't bother casting many buffs either as they will simply dispel them. Focus on dealing as much damage as possible. If your feeling lucky you can try insta killing them with death magic after lowering their resistance. In the case of beholders, spells with short cast times tend to be better.

If you run into anything extra tough, use your summons to keep them busy while you strip away their magic resistance with spells. Once they are fairly vulnerable, unleash you hellish fury upon them.

[fauxpas]

Sounds like it'd have to exploit "rest abuse" in order to work.

[Yosh]

Originally posted by fauxpas:

Sounds like it'd have to exploit "rest abuse" in order to work.

In my personal experience(and playstyle) the summoner build has a higher spell efficiency than other casters(mages especially), except for support or melee centric clerics and shamans. This is more pronounced in solo runs. Any "pure" caster class will have to rest often in ADND compared to warriors though, especially in small parties. In BG:EE I rest about once a map for solo runs. In bigger parties that extends to about once every third map.

Most fights the skeletons can take care of w.e it is without assistance.

Don't forget that you get a lot more spells as a mage/cleric multiclass compared to ANY single class.

[Julius Borisov]

This thread is a treasure for all necromancer fans: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/40810/complete-pure-necromancer-solo-challenge-restricted-to-using-only-necromancy-spells/p1

[Yosh]

Originally posted by Julius Borisov:

This thread is a treasure for all necromancer fans: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/40810/complete-pure-necromancer-solo-challenge-restricted-to-using-only-necromancy-spells/p1

Lol love iiiit. Thanks dude. That guy is something else.

They should make his logs into an audiobook.

[wendigo211]

Playing through on LoB I got a new appreciation for some of the Necromancy spells. I've always used Sppok and Horror, though sparingly because I don't like chasing down the enemies after they go running off. Spook in particular is really good because enemies eventually get a -6 penalty to save against it. One a Necromancer with Greater Malison, that save penalty gets down to -12.

I found Turn Undead useless on LoB, the inflated hit dice generally mean anything you're fighting is considered too high level to turn (that might change for BG2, but at least for SoD and BG your Cleric can't get a really high level). But Hold Undead and Control Undead are useful.

Ghoul Touch is also surprisingly useful. Prior to getting Hold Monster, it was the best way I had available for immobilizing Ogres and Ankhegs. Without Illusion, you have be bit more careful getting your Necromancer into melee range, but once you get stoneskin, it's possible without too much risk. However, it's probably a better spell for a Fighter/Mage than a Necromancer.

I'm not sure how I feel about Animate Dead. I don't like that summons got a boost in LoB, it kind of defeats the purpose of playing on a higher difficulty setting if you're going to boost the player's tools as well. I went through all of BG without using a single summon, In SoD the enemy groups were so large I just needed something to occupy some of the enemies. I also don't like that the HP boost was larger than the enemy's damage boost. It makes summons better meat shields on LoB than they are on Insane or Core Rules. But those animated skeletons are really good, probably too good compared to the other summoning options at the same level. They were way better than Minsc, and about as good as Khalid (with Gauntlets of Ogre Power and grand mastery in long swords).

Regarding death magic, even though it's the second worst death spell, I found Chromatic Orb (evocation) really useful on LoB. Any enemy I could kill without having to cut through that monstrous HP pool was well worth it. Dynaheir had the most kills in the party in chapter 9 with all the trolls. Granted in BG2, where you get your necromancy death spells, death spell immunity is more common and petrification is the more useful approach. But it's still nice to have to -2 to save vs. those spells for when you can use them.

Having said that, I do agree that Illusion is just too good a school to give up to make a Necromancer. But it is a viable option.

[Yosh]

Originally posted by wendigo211:

Playing through on LoB I got a new appreciation for some of the Necromancy spells. I've always used Sppok and Horror, though sparingly because I don't like chasing down the enemies after they go running off. Spook in particular is really good because enemies eventually get a -6 penalty to save against it. One a Necromancer with Greater Malison, that save penalty gets down to -12.

Spook is an illusion spell :s

[wendigo211]

Damn, I thought Horror's little brother was in the same school.

[Yosh]

Originally posted by wendigo211:

Damn, I thought Horror's little brother was in the same school.

Hehe its ok I did the same thing once. I never tried LoB. The information you posted is very useful!

[Yosh]

Originally posted by wendigo211:

Ghoul Touch is also surprisingly useful. Prior to getting Hold Monster, it was the best way I had available for immobilizing Ogres and Ankhegs.

I agree. Ghoul touch isn't bad especially with a -2 save penatly, but in most cases I think horror is simply better. As a cleric/mage I would opt to use command, sleep, horror, hold person, or web at a distance instead. Theres a lvl 1 spell called Chill Touch that is really bad compared to most other lvl 1 spells.

[wendigo211]

I suppose the idea with Chill Touch is the -2 THAC0 penalty, but for a debuff in the same spell level with Blindness it is a dud. It would probably be better if it was either 2d8 with no debuff, or -4 to THAC0 with no damage.

[Yosh]

Originally posted by wendigo211:

I suppose the idea with Chill Touch is the -2 THAC0 penalty, but for a debuff in the same spell level with Blindness it is a dud. It would probably be better if it was either 2d8 with no debuff, or -4 to THAC0 with no damage.

I agree. Maybe if it slowed their movement for 1 turn along with a little cold damage? Magic missile, spook, blindness, and chromatic orb are so much better.

[Yosh]

My first character was a necromancer actually and the -2 save bonus was really fun as a lover of necromancy but I constantly felt like I didn't have enough animate dead or finger of death. I remember blowing through all of my remaining spells so that I could rest to recover those lvl 5 and lvl 7 spell slots. I agree, the skeletons scale really well and they are waaaay better than more or less all the summons in the game with summon deva, summon planetar, and mordenkainen's sword as the only exceptions. The wizards of the coast Finger of Death spell has been my favorite since I was a kid throughout all of its renditions. It hurts to lose the save bonus for it switching to a cleric/mage, but having all those skeletons, buffs, and spell slots feels so good. Finger of death still does damage even if it doesn't one shot them anyway. Being able to take over 30 zombies with turn undead is just too cool to pass up as an undead fan.