09-16-2018, 09:48 PM | #51 | |
Join Date: Feb 2005
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
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In past DnD games casting Resurrection on undead destroyed the undead... so resurrecting an undead would require two castings of Resurrection... one to make the undead simply dead, and another to resurrect the now re-dead corpse. |
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09-17-2018, 12:00 AM | #52 |
Banned
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: 100 hurricane swamp
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
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09-17-2018, 12:14 AM | #53 |
Join Date: Feb 2005
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
Well, sure but I wasn't sure of the rules he was talking about.
Fair bet Kromm has played other systems besides GURPS. ...and it depends on the "philosophy" of your campaign and rules system. In most DnD settings undead are touched by evil, or negative energy.... in others less so... and in GURPS magic that doesn't seem to enter into it by rule... but it probably would still be a consideration in any campaign I ran. |
09-17-2018, 12:27 AM | #54 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: God's Own Country
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
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Easy to fix: kill the undead first, making sure not to dismember it. Although some GMs would allow Make Whole to work on the parts of a corpse. Nice necromancer. :)
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Paul May | MIB 1138 (on hiatus) |
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09-17-2018, 12:29 AM | #55 | |
Join Date: Dec 2007
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
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09-17-2018, 07:43 AM | #56 | |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
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The "Kromm" you're remembering me tell of wasn't really an RPG character but a one-off combatant in a series of Man to Man + GURPS Fantasy combats I played through with some friends in the age of GURPS First Edition. I just wanted to see whether it was possible to raise zombies effortlessly in combat time. It was, just barely, under the First Edition rules. It wasn't actually useful, though, because the character in question was 100% squishy and had to hang back, avoid all action, and wait for somebody to die. Since that strategy left my side down one fighter, the dying happened on our side first, and turning my dead ally into a zombie didn't prove very useful.
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
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09-17-2018, 07:44 AM | #57 |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
__________________
Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
10-24-2018, 01:06 PM | #58 | |
Join Date: Nov 2012
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
Quote:
As society becomes more complex, people within that society become more specialized. Where once the average person could be expected to know how to quern grain, slaughter, butcher, and cook an animal, or tell an engaging story around the fire at night, most of us have specialized in very tight niches that have left us without those skills--and, by and large, without the time to engage those skills, if we have them. Therefore, we out-source them. I do have the knowledge to kill, skin, hang, age, and butcher a lamb, and then how to french the ribs to give me what my daughter cheerfully refers to as "lamb-pops". But that process would take me a week or so; so I subcontract all that labour to my local butcher and just purchase frenched lamb ribs from him. This provides me with the time to pursue my own specialized skillset, and provides him with an income. And he is able to pursue his niche, knowing that someone out there can make a sign, or design advertising, for his business, and he will not have to do it himself. The game designer provides a similar service as a butcher, in this analogy. The average person could, likely, sit down and come up with a structure to hang a story upon; but for most, this would e a time-consuming effort that would be inferior to the effort(s) of someone who has deliberately honed their storytelling skillset in order to fill this niche in society. My communal storytelling efforts will be better (more enjoyable entertainment) because they have your better framework to rest on, just as my frenched lamb ribs will be more appealing because someone else did a better job of butchering & cleaning them than I would have, and in less time. The butcher, the baker--and the game designer--take on roles that have been basically abandoned, or set aside, by most members of a complexly-specialized society in order to pursue their own specialized skillset. By definition, this is for the betterment of society, because it allows a far greater amount of work to be undertaken by an expert in that work, which inherently means the work is done more efficiently, which inherently creates economic growth. I know for a fact, as a reader of these boards, that there are military and police members who use GURPS, and, specifically your work. Your specialization in the art of communal storytelling allows them to better enjoy that experience while still allowing them the time to specialize in their chosen fields. So, thank you for your service to the common good. You are, in fact, making the world a safer place by making games. If you look at it in the right way, of course. |
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10-24-2018, 03:00 PM | #59 |
Banned
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: 100 hurricane swamp
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
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10-26-2018, 09:02 AM | #60 |
Join Date: Aug 2018
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Re: Kindly Necromancers
I could see a nice necromancer being open about their abilities and offering stuff like "for a modest fee in advance, upon your death I will reanimate your corpse to help your children carry buckets of well water, harvest crops, and plant seeds, for the next 20 years!".
It could function like a cheap form of life insurance. It's also a lot less suspicious than "pay me and upon your death (which hopefully won't happen for a long time, wink wink) your body will become my servant" which seems too much like incentive for a necromancer to murder you. Instead it's the usual suspicion of family members trying to murder you for inheritance. |
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necromancer |
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