[DF] Necromantic Talent from Pyramid 3-50

[Dammann]

In the article "Dark Summonings", the Death Knight Template includes an advantage called Necromantic Talent. It is also listed as a prerequisite for the Animate Dead advantge earlier in the same article, as an alternative to Deathliness.

What is this Necromantic Talent, and what is its page reference? I cannot seem to find it. I sort of assume it is intended to be analogous to Bard-Song Talent or something.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Dammann

In the article "Dark Summonings", the Death Knight Template includes an advantage called Necromantic Talent. It is also listed as a prerequisite for the Animate Dead advantge earlier in the same article, as an alternative to Deathliness.

What is this Necromantic Talent, and what is its page reference? I cannot seem to find it. I sort of assume it is intended to be analogous to Bard-Song Talent or something.

Check out DF 9's Necromancer template. It's listed there.

[Dammann]

I have searched DF 9 manually and electronically, to no avail. Are you talking about Deathliness? I am talking about something distinct from Deathliness, priced at 5 per level, listed on page 10 of Pyramid 3-50, among the prerequisites for Animate Dead, and again on page 13 as part of the Death Knight template.

I suspect that this might be a new trait whose write up was somehow omitted. It is not in DF 9, DF 11, or the Pyramid article that prompted this question.

[Blind Mapmaker]

Are you sure it's not 6 points a level? It sounds pretty close to Magery (One College: Necromantic Spells, -40%) [6/level] on top of a regular level of Magery 0. I don't have the Pyramid issue in question, so I can't help you there, but I can confirm that Necromantic Talent isn't in DF 9, Thaumatology or Thaumatology: Magical Styles (which does feature a necromantic style).

[Dammann]

I am sure of what I am seeing, but I am not at all sure if it is correct or what it means.

[Dammann]

This (Death Knight) is a 50 point template meant to be applied with a 250 template for a multi-profession character. It lists Necromantic Talent 1 [5] among the advantages it includes.

The Animate Dead ability includes the prerequisites Deathliness or Necromantic Talent 2+.

[Blind Mapmaker]

As chance has it the Death Knight template is part of the free preview and there are some tell-tale signs that somebody confused Deathliness with something, which resulted in Necromantic Talent.

It says "they [the lenses] can be included with any template other than the onefrom which their powers are derived – a necromancer doesn’t need to take the death-knight lens, because he already has access to everything in the lens."

The Death Knight lens gives "Close to the Grave 1* [5]; Necromantic Talent
1 [5]; Night Vision 5 [5]; Spirit Empathy (Specialized, Undead, -50%) [5]" under advantages, while the Necromancer template has "Deathliness 3 [24]; Night Vision 5 [5]; and Spirit Empathy (Specialized, Ghosts, -50%) [5]". Judging from the lenses given in DF 3, they should at least share the advantage that enables their primary spells.

The fact that the Death Knight has Close to the Grave can be ignored. That one didn't feature in either the original Necromancer template or the power-ups in DF 11. It's probably in this Pyramid issue to avoid giving the Death Knight extra IQ.

I would just replace Close to the Grave and Necromantic Talent with Deathliness 1 or 2 and redistribute the points to/from Special Abilities accordingly.

[Dammann]

That seems sensible. The reason I asked is that I am doing work on a data file for GCA, covering the issues of Pyramid devoted to Dungeon Fantasy. The substitution (Deathliness for Necromantic Talent + Close to the Grave) would satisfy me, but I did want to keep things as "RAW" as possible, so that someone using the GCA data file would be able to directly use what is written. Any interpretation I perform requires some explanation for others.

I suspect that Necromantic Talent is intended to be similar to Holiness for a Holy Warrior; a "talent" that aids in rolls to use Necromantic abilities. Bards and Unholy Wariors have analogous traits. I just cannot find any source on the ability. Maybe it got cut from the article? Maybe the author assumed its existence? Maybe I just haven't looked in the right place yet?

If it is errata, I hope that it will be corrected, but I hold out hope that I am just not seeing something.

[Blind Mapmaker]

Right, Holiness actually seems like a better fit. I didn't realise that these lenses don't seem to have any spells. If it's really not mentioned in any other place in the pdf, I would report it as an erratum. It can't hurt, even if it doesn't do much good.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Dammann

That seems sensible. The reason I asked is that I am doing work on a data file for GCA, covering the issues of Pyramid devoted to Dungeon Fantasy. The substitution (Deathliness for Necromantic Talent + Close to the Grave) would satisfy me, but I did want to keep things as "RAW" as possible, so that someone using the GCA data file would be able to directly use what is written. Any interpretation I perform requires some explanation for others.

I suspect that Necromantic Talent is intended to be similar to Holiness for a Holy Warrior; a "talent" that aids in rolls to use Necromantic abilities. Bards and Unholy Wariors have analogous traits. I just cannot find any source on the ability. Maybe it got cut from the article? Maybe the author assumed its existence? Maybe I just haven't looked in the right place yet?

If it is errata, I hope that it will be corrected, but I hold out hope that I am just not seeing something.

It looks to me like they meant "Necromantic" talent to allow Necromantic abilities but not access to the Deathliness spells. That is what I would go with if I were you.