Necromancer: Discussion of the dead

[AceofRains]

So I wanted to further expand this discussion on Necromancer. We all want to see more jobs implemented in the game, and lore-wise Necromancer fits perfectly into Thaumaturge. So how can necromancer be handled and what can give it the right feel?

Here is a concept of Necromancer from my speculations with some additions.

-------------Lore----------------

The Thaumaturges of the Arrzaneth Ossuary dedicate their practices to the guidence of souls to the the realm of thal. Yet their is a clandestine group among them who seek to bring the deceased back into the realm of the living.

The lost art of Necromancy brought the promise to see loved ones again, but the dead do not like their slumber disturbed. Unspeakable horrors unfolded, breaking the barrier between life and death. Ashkin began to roam the nights of Eorzea freely and it was decided the in order to bring balance to the land, Necromancy must be sealed to never be practiced again.

Necromancer - Idealism

Thaumaturge 30 [base class]
Conjurer 15 [To expand into an healer role]
Arcanist [Hopefully to handle pets]

Necromancer is a Pet/Caster/Healer role hybrid. One of the main catches of Necromancer is [and hopefully saying they add job traits or passives] is the ability to perpetually come back to life after dying. This is an homage to undead found is some final fantasy games who are able to come back to life after a few turns.
Necromancer along with White Mage, Paladin, and Bard have the responsibility to ensure people come back to life with Raise.
They are able to dish out Cures via sacrafice, which would function as possibly a Cura or Curaga, and use lesser heals with Cure. However due to their undead nature they Cannot cure themselves with cure.
As with white mages Holy, Necromancer has their own secret technique of Dark Flare, that deals massive umbral damage, and can be modified by your dark and fire potency.
The last component to touch on is the undead minion. The undead minion could possibly be a formor or a skeleton, i don't care as long as its cool. The minion is very low MP cost to summon as it is the bread and butter of your Sacrifice spell. [I wouldn't even mind if it could summon up to 3 at once or somthing, but it depends on how they handle pet jobs.] Using your 15 minute ability will transform this minion into a Zombie dragon that focuses on stronger DPS, and will not disappear with one use of sacrifice.

---------------------Abilities------------------------

-Oath of Nald’thal: Summon fourth an undead fomor. During Zealous Ritual your undead transforms into a fierce zombie dragon.

-Dark Flare: Deal massive umbral damage to enemies in an area of effect. Damage can be modified by fire potency.

-Resurrection: A secondary alternative the the regular Raise, this will bring an ally back to life without weakness the same as how the Conjurer passive enhances your standard raise.

-Sacrifice: Sacrifice your minion restoring HP to an ally.

-Zealous Ritual: Become an undead taking damage from healing spells. HP draining spells heal your HP and damage the attacker. If you die while in undead form you will be gloriously resurrected to full HP without weakness after a few seconds. Also transforms your undead into a Zombie Dragon.

---------------------------------------------

Hi I'd just like to ask that you please keep discussion about the role of necromancer in the party, and not about it's rationale in lore and ethics in implementation. As someone else has pointed out. There are already several other antihero jobs [Dark Knight, Theif, Assassins, ect]. As an adventurer its not about if a job is good or bad, because everyone has their own intentions in the game. Its about having fun being who you are.

[Andrien]

I think THM and Arcanist would work fine since they both deal with forbidden arts like summoning.

Sacrifice worked very well in 1.0. Perhaps it worked to well for a class, and might make a second appearance in a job. I like how it worked in 1.0 as a Cure with HoT that cost mp and hp.

some magics from FF5 Advance can work too.Final Fantasy V Advance - Necromancer Solo Challenge Intro

[Antanias]

Wasn't there a recent thread about this?

[kazaran]

Necro just doesn't fit the game for me.

[Andrien]

Necro just doesn't fit the game for me.

This begs the question whether or not you understand or even read through the THM storyline...

[faris]

This begs the question whether or not you understand or even read through the THM storyline...

You mean the Ul'dah storyline, right.

[yoshikwalla]

...Wow, this escalated rather quickly. I guess I'll throw in my thoughts, then? Though I'm a bit hesitant to give it given the fact that for the last 3 pages you've been ripping each other's heads off. /readies flame shield

...Why not add Necromancy? The ability to turn defeated, non-boss enemies into undead thralls sounds awesome. Yes, they are generally considered as enemy classes, but that doesn't mean players shouldn't play as them. Not all players want to be the goody two-shoes "Teh warrieh oph laiiiighhhttt" generic good guys, and the game shouldn't force them into that role.

Necromancy is bad? Let it be bad. Let the players be bad if they want to. It sure would make for an interesting job questline. It's about time FFXIV embraced the antihero. Necromancers, Thieves, Ninjas, Assassins, Dark Knights, and the like.

Is it Final Fantasy-ish? Not really, but that shouldn't be an excuse not to add something. Yes, this is a Final Fantasy game, but the fact that it is shouldn't limit the game on what should be added. That makes for a creative nightmare. If the same mindset that people are now showing existed around Final Fantasy's infancy, then Cecil wouldn't have been a Dark Knight, the Onion Knight would have never existed, Final Fantasy Tactics would have been less interesting, Lightning wouldn't be a badass L'Cie, Cloud wouldn't be putting Materia onto his gear, Final Fantasy XII wouldn't have badass Star Wars ships, Laguna wouldn't use a gun, Final Fantasy XI would have but a few classes, and the series wouldn't fucking progress. This is a series that's based on putting new things into the Final Fantasy Formula, even pre-FFVII.

[Reika]

...Wow, this escalated rather quickly. I guess I'll throw in my thoughts, then? Though I'm a bit hesitant to give it given the fact that for the last 3 pages you've been ripping each other's heads off. /readies flame shield

...Why not add Necromancy? The ability to turn defeated, non-boss enemies into undead thralls sounds awesome. Yes, they are generally considered as enemy classes, but that doesn't mean players shouldn't play as them. Not all players want to be the goody two-shoes "Teh warrieh oph laiiiighhhttt" generic good guys, and the game shouldn't force them into that role.

Necromancy is bad? Let it be bad. Let the players be bad if they want to. It sure would make for an interesting job questline. It's about time FFXIV embraced the antihero. Necromancers, Thieves, Ninjas, Assassins, Dark Knights, and the like.

Is it Final Fantasy-ish? Not really, but that shouldn't be an excuse not to add something. Yes, this is a Final Fantasy game, but the fact that it is shouldn't limit the game on what should be added. That makes for a creative nightmare. If the same mindset that people are now showing existed around Final Fantasy's infancy, then Cecil wouldn't have been a Dark Knight, the Onion Knight would have never existed, Final Fantasy Tactics would have been less interesting, Lightning wouldn't be a badass L'Cie, Cloud wouldn't be putting Materia onto his gear, Final Fantasy XII wouldn't have badass Star Wars ships, Laguna wouldn't use a gun, Final Fantasy XI would have but a few classes, and the series wouldn't fucking progress. This is a series that's based on putting new things into the Final Fantasy Formula, even pre-FFVII.

That is something important to put into the brain too. Every FF game since the first one has had something Different about it than the last. Even XI had jobs that didn't exsist in other FF games. Thats how FF games Have always been. Something new every time. Systems you weren't use to. Enemies you've never seen before. Final Fantasy is whatever the hell they can think of, not X or Y. Its everything. PLD is FF, WHM is FF, NEC is FF.

[Laume]

...Wow, this escalated rather quickly. I guess I'll throw in my thoughts, then? Though I'm a bit hesitant to give it given the fact that for the last 3 pages you've been ripping each other's heads off. /readies flame shield

...Why not add Necromancy? The ability to turn defeated, non-boss enemies into undead thralls sounds awesome. Yes, they are generally considered as enemy classes, but that doesn't mean players shouldn't play as them. Not all players want to be the goody two-shoes "Teh warrieh oph laiiiighhhttt" generic good guys, and the game shouldn't force them into that role.

Necromancy is bad? Let it be bad. Let the players be bad if they want to. It sure would make for an interesting job questline. It's about time FFXIV embraced the antihero. Necromancers, Thieves, Ninjas, Assassins, Dark Knights, and the like.

Is it Final Fantasy-ish? Not really, but that shouldn't be an excuse not to add something. Yes, this is a Final Fantasy game, but the fact that it is shouldn't limit the game on what should be added. That makes for a creative nightmare. If the same mindset that people are now showing existed around Final Fantasy's infancy, then Cecil wouldn't have been a Dark Knight, the Onion Knight would have never existed, Final Fantasy Tactics would have been less interesting, Lightning wouldn't be a badass L'Cie, Cloud wouldn't be putting Materia onto his gear, Final Fantasy XII wouldn't have badass Star Wars ships, Laguna wouldn't use a gun, Final Fantasy XI would have but a few classes, and the series wouldn't fucking progress. This is a series that's based on putting new things into the Final Fantasy Formula, even pre-FFVII.

I'll put in my 2 cents to. IMHO (and this is just an opinion, not a fact in any way shape or form.) the lack of necormancy and/or the approach to jobs that FF has had is what separates FF from all the other rpg's in made in the western hemisphere. All the other rpg's have had this feeling like... it's hard to quantify... like power and greed is what works and what is good. Save only whom you care for, screw everyone else. Play a hero that can be the scum of the earth. While that's fine for some people, for me, final fantasy has always been a series where it highlights the best in humanity and friendship. Where I can take a break from all the doom and gloom of regular life. So I personally wouldn't like to see a necromancer (unless they find a REALLY good way to doing it. Pretty much redefining the necromancer that we all know of.)

With that said, Yoshiwalla is right in some aspects. Well, a lot of aspects. I would say that Cecil being a dark knight was required because he was the embodiment of rebirth (from dark knight to paladin). With that said, final fantasy did redefine Shiva (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiva), Odin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odin), Ifrit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ifrit), Bahamut, Leviathan, etc, etc, etc. Heck, what was blue mage before FF made it up? I mean, who here thought bards used arrows like bad-@ss before ff14? I was stuck using daggers, staves and singing in ff11. So, ultimately, I'll leave it up to the fans and the devs to decide about necromancer. I only ask that dark knight be done before necromancer does. And yes, I do want to see all the 1.0 original thm spells back in the game.

[valetarkus]

I think it's pretty cool idea! And it does fit in with the story. I read someone said it should only be for an enemy...c'mon. It's a video game. The programmers and creators make the rules. Limitations kill creativity.