Pre-Organlegger Wizard

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Railstar

For various reasons, I need to know what the same character would be doing from around 1920 onward. On one hand, I don't want her to be doing the exact same thing, since I'm not sure the business would make as much sense in an earlier setting with less developed surgery.

Developing the secret of physical immortality. Taking organs and enchanting them to live far, far longer, and gradually using them to replace her body. Once organ transplantation comes along, she uses it as a convenient and easy way to make money, while making sure not to give her secrets away.

[Railstar]

Originally Posted by Varyon

It doesn't even need to be actual rituals - plenty of strange animal body parts are used or consumed by humans for some sort of perceived health benefit.

Or alchemy. I can go through the elixir list and think of things that would be viable to make with human parts.

The necromancer in question wouldn't want to run a scam or a con using body parts. While she's amoral enough to do so, I think it would not hold the same interest to her. While I definitely agree with the answers of studying organs out of scientific curiosity, it is a factor, I think I need to narrow down what makes that line of research interesting.

In the webcomic Dominic Deegan: Oracle for Hire, the titular character's brother is a necromancer who creates a flesh golem so that he can combine the special abilities of a number of powerful people. That's in a fantasy setting where super powers are fairly common amongst various flavors of magic users, and where a sufficiently skilled necromancer can make zombies that retain such abilities, which may not be the case in your setting. Note in the above we aren't just talking about physical abilities either - one of the principal abilities Jacob opts to incorporate into his golem is the "Sight" of seers. Jacob is also able (IIRC, the comic's site is really slow right now so I can't check the archives to confirm) to temporarily use some of the special abilities of character's he is carrying around the organs of, which could be another possibility for your organlegger. I don't know if your organlegger is your PC or in a setting you're making - if the former, you'll want to find out from the GM just what is and isn't fair game in a zombie/golem, if the latter you'll want to figure that out for yourself.

Thanks, this is really useful! The setting does have supers, so I think super-golems could be more viable than super-zombies - I can use that as the justification for the GM allowing more sweeping changes to golems.

The GM's answer on what is or isn't fair game tends to be, "Ask the forums".

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Railstar

The necromancer in question wouldn't want to run a scam or a con using body parts.

She doesn't need to be the one creating the interest in the useless organs to profit off of it - she's not running a scam, she's simply making money off of a high-demand item that she can provide. Someone else may be running a scam to create the demand, or it could just be something in the zeitgeist. Still, that's probably getting a bit close to the eventual organlegger profession, and you did say you didn't want her basically doing the same thing back then as she does now, so this might not be a good option anyway.

Originally Posted by Railstar

Thanks, this is really useful! The setting does have supers, so I think super-golems could be more viable than super-zombies - I can use that as the justification for the GM allowing more sweeping changes to golems.

Indeed. Making a Wolverine-expy, a Spiderman-expy, and a Gambit-expy into Enhanced Zombies is useful. Taking parts from each to create a golem with super reflexes, healing, a danger sense, and the ability to charge up and explode bits of matter gives you a more singularly powerful creature that's easier to maintain than splitting all those abilities into three.

Originally Posted by Railstar

The GM's answer on what is or isn't fair game tends to be, "Ask the forums".

Well, this is really more of a setting question than a rules question, as you're kind of defining part of how superpowers work. Namely, are they something that persists after death? Does the necromancer just need the body, or does he need to enslave (a portion of) the character's soul/whatever to fuel the ability? Are zombies/flesh golems more or less likely to burn out a power with overuse, and does a burn-out heal naturally like for a living super, or does it require repair by the necromancer? All of this is very much a GM question.

[Railstar]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Developing the secret of physical immortality. Taking organs and enchanting them to live far, far longer, and gradually using them to replace her body. Once organ transplantation comes along, she uses it as a convenient and easy way to make money, while making sure not to give her secrets away.

She’s already immortal, so she wouldn’t need it for herself – and I think being able to transfer them to other people should be a later development (since it’s basically full organlegging), but I could see her enchanting disembodied organs and keeping them alive.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Indeed. Making a Wolverine-expy, a Spiderman-expy, and a Gambit-expy into Enhanced Zombies is useful. Taking parts from each to create a golem with super reflexes, healing, a danger sense, and the ability to charge up and explode bits of matter gives you a more singularly powerful creature that's easier to maintain than splitting all those abilities into three.

Well, this is really more of a setting question than a rules question, as you're kind of defining part of how superpowers work. Namely, are they something that persists after death? Does the necromancer just need the body, or does he need to enslave (a portion of) the character's soul/whatever to fuel the ability? Are zombies/flesh golems more or less likely to burn out a power with overuse, and does a burn-out heal naturally like for a living super, or does it require repair by the necromancer? All of this is very much a GM question.

For this one I can get you an answer at least. Normally the Super power modifier doesn’t involve souls, anything that changes the core structure would be fine (so Mr. Fantastic, Spiderman, Thing, Hulk’s ST & DR, and so on). Regeneration powers are probably lost since the creature has Unhealing. Danger Sense would probably be disabled by Slave Mentality (it might sense the danger, but not do anything about it). Energy powers typically would work for someone altered by something (Cole from Infamous, Human Torch) but not for inborn powers (like Gambit), since being born with it implies it relies more on biology. Golems with animal parts can also work.

[starslayer]

The power output of a zombie/skeleton is actually quite substantial (being that they can exert their full ST 24/7 and a single horse is actually more than a single unit of horse power)

The power->weight ratio of a small but strong species is actually greater than many powerplants up until the about the 80's, possibly later.

So almost literally a bunch of gerble wheels with gerble skeletons could be powering her car from the 20s to the 80s and have superior performance compared to regular cars and no gas requirements.

[Railstar]

Originally Posted by starslayer

The power output of a zombie/skeleton is actually quite substantial (being that they can exert their full ST 24/7 and a single horse is actually more than a single unit of horse power)

The power->weight ratio of a small but strong species is actually greater than many powerplants up until the about the 80's, possibly later.

So almost literally a bunch of gerble wheels with gerble skeletons could be powering her car from the 20s to the 80s and have superior performance compared to regular cars and no gas requirements.

Now we know how the generators are powered. I love that idea!

[William]

Originally Posted by Railstar

I can absolutely see her keeping an organ library, I definitely like the idea. She's definitely the type to keep the organs to find a use with, perhaps even animate them just to see how they work. On a somewhat macabre note, would an animated heart be viable as an autonomous pump of some kind? I like the idea of a semi-organic laboratory.

Creepy and cool. Undying hearts pumping mysterious fluids through preserved guts into translucent bladders where glands treated with noisome compounds seep strange drops of secretions into whatever necrobiological alchemy she is performing.

[(E)]

The "monster blood tattoo" books have organs transplanted from monsters into humans that act almost as bio implants(electrical powers in the case of one character). It also featured the people with the implants taking alchemical potions to prevent organ rejection.

Aside from organs, limbs and hands might be another avenue to explore.

[jeff_wilson]

Originally Posted by starslayer

The power output of a zombie/skeleton is actually quite substantial (being that they can exert their full ST 24/7 and a single horse is actually more than a single unit of horse power)

The power->weight ratio of a small but strong species is actually greater than many powerplants up until the about the 80's, possibly later.

So almost literally a bunch of gerble wheels with gerble skeletons could be powering her car from the 20s to the 80s and have superior performance compared to regular cars and no gas requirements.

You can't expect unliving bits to function at peak output in perpetuity without wear and tear. There would have to be some healing magic or perhaps a 5,000-mile blood change involved.

[Culture20]

Whatever she was doing needs to be uninteresting, not lucrative (any more), or just didn’t pan out (if research), otherwise, why be an organlegger now?
Is there any type of technology or new magic that might have replaced a necromancer doing simple spells?