Either I am a crapy Necromancer or Necromancer as a stand alone Skill .....

[EnigmaMaitreya]

Either I am a crapy Necromancer or Necromancer as a stand alone Skill (plus Spirit Speak) basically sucks.

I am having one very hard time seem the tactical value of a Necromancer, as a Necromancer. I suspect there is a large tactical value if your also a melee.

Any light that can be shed will be appreciated.

 

[Arch Magus]

I could never go back to plain old mage.
Necro mage is a terribly powerful PVP template.
And is also awesome when spawning and doing Despise champs.

What exactly are you having trouble with?

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

Damage.

The Revenant is no better than any of the 4 Elemental's.

The pets (Shadow wisp excluded) don't seem to do any better than a Spirit Blade and require the Necromancer to be in more or less melee mode.

The Direct Damage spells seem to have a less Damage to Mana Ration than the Mage + Evalint has.

I have prototyped my Necro on TC1 and quite honestly I am having one very hard time seeing any real "Stand Alone" value here vs Environment. I accept that I am missing something .... so I am asking. I have read over the spell descriptions a 100 times and the TC1 character seems to bear the descriptions out so ....

Do not see this as a slam on necromancers, at most it would be saying that what ever they bring to the table (yeah I can see Revenant vs Player) is not ..... appealing to my play style.

 

[Arch Magus]

Pure Necro mage is a PVP template and a ratman champ solo'ing template.

Also, a variation of them with Music/peacing can solo the Abyss spawn.

Wither is the best spawn killing spell, hands down.
Necros in wraith form withering never run out of mana.

The spells are great in PVP.
For melee character who pvm's with Necro, Vampire form is excellent.

And yes, Revenants are awesome agains players. So is Strangle.

 

[RichDC]

Also, Poison strike, if you have no slayer book works better than fireball + it has a small area hit.

Necro is really designed to accompany another skill, most of the spells are curses. designed to maximise damge of your accompanying skill.

Corpse-skin for example increases fire and poison damage expedentially!

Evil omen, another increase the damage of your next spell

Blood oath another, reflects damage recieved back on its target

Mind rot..yet another, increases the mana cost of your enemies spells making them drain mana faster...making it safer for you to cast.

The direct spells have there advantages, poison strike as i said above, pain spike...dramatically reduces stamina so they dont run at you as fast!

And as mentioned, apart from a level 6 essence of wind in wraith form, there is no better aoe vs mana consumption of wither!

 

[Lord GOD(GOD)]

Damage.
The Revenant is no better than any of the 4 Elemental's.

The revnant is sort of (unoffically) just a PvP stealther chaser. It's not inteded to kill any balrons like EV's can etc.

The pets (Shadow wisp excluded) don't seem to do any better than a Spirit Blade and require the Necromancer to be in more or less melee mode.

They're not really intended to be pets though the ones that do attack do it when you hit something.

The Horde Minion loots stuff off the ground and follows you (fast!). He hits when you hit but is weak anyway.

The Dark Wolf replenishes your stamina, and lets you control wolfs. You can stone taming over and bond a couple of Bake Kitsunes. It hits when you hit but its fairly weak.

The Shadow Wisp replenishes mana and hits when you hit but is weak.

The Death Adder hits when you hit and can poison (not sure what level) and is supposed to control snakes though I've no idea how.

The Vampire Bat hits when you hits and is supposed to restore HP though its so weak that you won't notice any benefit.

The Direct Damage spells seem to have a less Damage to Mana Ration than the Mage + Evalint has.

The majority of Necro Spells are curses that work for Mages/Dexxers.

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

Well, I just got my new character to 110 Necromancer/110 Spirit Speak.

Focus is at 100 and Meditation is at 110,

Magery and EvalInt are being worked on now, they are at 58 for Magery and 37 for Evalint.

I will be doing the SpellWeaving Quest shortly and that will cap the template.

I am not quitting or giving up on the Necromancer, I am clearly going to need to readjust my perception of play style to allow me to understand how to maximize this new characters abilities.

I got him a Pendant of the Magi and am Looking to get him the Midnight Bracers. I think I will have enough LRC left over to replace at least one item with more SDI and hopefully RMC. I may forgo the Staff of the Magi in favor of a one of the High End spell books.

 

[Kellgory]

Should be a pretty good spawn char when you have everything finished. Wraith form, essance of wind and wither on the lower levels, EV's, earthquakes, flamestrikes, meteor swarm and wither on the higher end. Might look at changing focus to resist. If you have a good suit with LMC, LRC, mana regen, and towing a shadow wisp, you shouldn't have that many problems with mana with just meditation.

 

[NickyDishes]

Somebody posted wrong....wraith form doesnt leech mana always...if ur withering stuff that has no mana u will leech no mana back....for example level 1 and 2 of arachnid spawn....and level 2 of reptile spawn.....

 

[aoLOLita]

Somebody posted wrong....wraith form doesnt leech mana always...if ur withering stuff that has no mana u will leech no mana back....for example level 1 and 2 of arachnid spawn....and level 2 of reptile spawn.....

Ahhh... thank you, ND, I often noticed that my withers at spawn sometimes didn't regen my mana - now I know

 

[Arch Magus]

Anyone ever find it strange that slimes and rats have mana?

 

[Divster]

they must be using mana to stop u being able to just step over them

 

[Limlight]

Several comments:

Necromancy/SS
1. Can be cast without a spell channeling weapon...meaning a dexer can easily add it to his template.
2. Allows you to see Dead ghosts running around...great for faction rez killers and such.
3. Allows Wither at high damage amounts...while in wraith form...its the most overpowered spawn template.
4. Blood Oath allows you to return most damage a dexer does right back.
5. Strangle can do massive amounts of damage if you take away your opponents Stamina with Pain Spike.
6. Pain Spike....easily the best finishing spell in the game.
7. Evil Omen allows for some of the most gimp things in the game...makes Resist Spells non existant really...EO Para allows you to field in your target.
EO Curse cuts through Resist. EO allows 2 people to solo a champ much faster while the attacker vamps more.
8. Vampiric Embrace allows the Sampire template to be used.
9. SS heals for a decent chunk and doesnt take any mana if a corpse is near by. Best thing is it heals through Poison and Mortal.
10. The summons are amazing:
Wisp...great mana regen
Hordes...can hold 120k in gold after a spawn.

Really, the Necromancer is probably the most abused skills in the game and everything about it is awesome.

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

Ok, how does Spirt Speak heal you?

Never mind I see that Spirit Speak was changed and now I know something I did not know before

"2. Allows you to see Dead ghosts running around...great for faction rez killers and such."

Is that a function of Necromancy?

 

[mr.blackmage]

What I find amusing about this thread is the common consensus that it is overpowered, yet when they added the faster casting to necromancy (untested and unplanned), people said it was still too weak, that the faster casting just "barely" made it worthwhile to pick up.

Is it too late? REMOVE THE GD FASTER CASTING FROM NECROMANCY AND HELP REGAIN BALANCE TO THIS GAME!

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

What I find amusing about this thread is the common consensus that it is overpowered, yet when they added the faster casting to necromancy (untested and unplanned), people said it was still too weak, that the faster casting just "barely" made it worthwhile to pick up.

Is it too late? REMOVE THE GD FASTER CASTING FROM NECROMANCY AND HELP REGAIN BALANCE TO THIS GAME!

*Shrug* I apparently was not around for what ever your referring to .......

My question is far more basic that most have been willing to deal with OR there is enough changes (as the Spirit Speak) that I am unaware of, that would make Necromancy make more sense as a "stand alone" skill.

I look at say if I peeled off all skills except Meditation, Focus, Spirit Speak and Necromancy, how would that character stand in terms of being able to deal with the Environment. To date, it just looks ..... weak to me.

I am not calling for any changes to a Skill I clearly do not completely or even remotely understand how to play effectively.

On the other hand if Necromancy is designed to augment other skills then things tend to make more sense

 

[mr.blackmage]

To answer your basic question, necromancy, and chivalry, were not designed as stand alone skills, only as supplementary. Hence the small range of spells, and the benefits to melee and magery.

Trying to make a necromancer would be meditation, resist, necromancy, and spirit speak? If you're doing it for RP purposes (which is the only point of making a character that is solely dependant upon necromancy), then I would pick up fencing and use a dagger, since I guess that's necromancyish.

Again, when AoS was released, they even said that the skills were designed to be used in conjunction with skills already present in the game. If you were not around for the release of AoS, that is when they implemented necromancy and chivalry.

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

*Shrug*

I played on Great Lakes from the day UO went live to about 8 months after Trammel went live. I returned about 16 months ago.

Just when I feel I have a better understanding of THIS version of UO (vs the original) I do something totally .... what ever and find out just how profoundly the game changed.

I kind of intuited that Chivalry was never meant to be a base class, rather a supportive/augmenting class.

Yah the Dagger, Kryss and Fencing would fit in, I think those hand looking claws are fencing as well. I assume for those to fill all the way out, then I would need to add on Anatomy and Tactics.

I am going to probably pick up a 110 Necromancy and Spirit Speak scroll and store these two skills on a Skill Bot until I can figure out how best to use them.

 

[mr.blackmage]

necromancy and spirit speak added to a magery template or to a warrior template fits in very nicely in both cases. As others have mentioned, it's actually really powerful when used with either.

 

[Limlight]

"2. Allows you to see Dead ghosts running around...great for faction rez killers and such."

Is that a function of Necromancy?

Its a function of SS.

100 SS allows you to:

1. See dead ghosts running around regardless of war/peace mode.
2. To see everything a dead ghost is saying.
3. Using the skill heals life at the cost of mana....unless there is a dead body near by...which means in a spawn..its invaluable as you can heal yourself using 0 mana.

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

Its a function of SS.

100 SS allows you to:

1. See dead ghosts running around regardless of war/peace mode.
2. To see everything a dead ghost is saying.
3. Using the skill heals life at the cost of mana....unless there is a dead body near by...which means in a spawn..its invaluable as you can heal yourself using 0 mana.

Thanks for the clarification.

 

[Limlight]

I should also add that the spirit speak skill is unique also because it heals through poison and mortal.

 

[Lynk]

I'd like to reiterate that anyone that runs protection by default and is set up to not chug pots in group pvp should not be listened to for anything other than PvM Mage advice.

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

I played with the Necromancer stuff last night and the Spirit Speak Heals do make a difference. I darn near killed myself casting GH's on my Ogre Lord before I noticed I was in Vampire Form. So now I know how to balance that out.

I played with the Wither and have got a better understanding of it now,

I need to use the Pain Spike on tougher mobs to get a good handle on how much it affects them.

I have not seen much of the Poison Spike(?) yet, but I may not be using it appropriately.

I found out that the Ogre Lord did not like me casting Corpse Skin on him .... I mean I still had about 25% of my life ....

 

[Limlight]

I'd like to reiterate that anyone that runs protection by default and is set up to not chug pots in group pvp should not be listened to for anything other than PvM Mage advice.

lol...you do know that there are macros to unequip weapons/shields and chug and re-equip right?

 

[Stormy_Winters]

The Death Adder hits when you hit and can poison (not sure what level) and is supposed to control snakes though I've no idea how.

When you have your Death adder up, just double click the snake you wish to control then click on what you want it to attack. You cannot give it commands and it doesn't always listen, but it does work on giant snakes as well as smaller ones. Just dont try it on Silver serpents. They will still try to eat you.

 

[5% Luck]

When you have your Death adder up, just double click the snake you wish to control then click on what you want it to attack. You cannot give it commands and it doesn't always listen, but it does work on giant snakes as well as smaller ones. Just dont try it on Silver serpents. They will still try to eat you.

a few years back I was pulling coil around the blighted grove. IDK if that still works but was ALOT of fun in fel