[Necromancy] Necromancy FAQ

[Chandalir]

Necromancer FAQ builder thread!
​

Updating the FAQ and trying to make it fairly comprehensive - anything you wish added to the FAQ, now is the time to do it!
Table of contents:

• Spells
• Spell Descriptions and Effects
• Faster Casting/Faster Cast Recovery
• Spell Damage (will be added later)
• Spirit Speak
• Setting Up (getting skills and scrolls)
• Training
• Templates - not added

Spells:

Spell Descriptions and Effects:

Animate Dead (requires corpse)

• Used on corpses to create a zombie like creature that attacks all monsters.
• If used on a mount it will create a ridable steed.
• Cannot be controlled.

Mana Required: 23
Minimum Skill Required: 40.0
Reagents Required: Deamon Blood and Grave Dust

Blood Oath (requires target)

• When the target of this spell deals damage to you, he receives the damage himself.
• Duration is ((Casters Spirit Speak - targets Magic Resist) / 80 + 8 (skill values are without decimals, meaning GM, or 100.0, is 1000)).

Mana Required: 13
Minimum Skill Required: 20.0
Reagents Required: Deamon Blood

Corpse Skin (requires target)

• Target receives -15 Fire resistance.
• Target receives -15 poison resistance.
• Target receives +10 physical resistance.
• Target receives +10 cold resistance.
• Duration is ((Casters Spirit Speak - targets Magic Resist) / 25 + 40 (skill values are without decimals, meaning GM, or 100.0, is 1000)).

Mana Required: 11
Minimum Skill Required: 20.0
Reagents Required: Bat Wing and Grave Dust

Curse Weapon (requires weapon in hand)

• 50% of melee damage is returned to caster as hitpoints.

• Duration is around 30 seconds at grandmaster spirit speak.

Mana Required: 7
Minimum Skill Required: 0.0
Reagents Required: Pig Iron


Evil Omen (requires target)

• Target receives +25% damage from next damage source, or
• Will be poisoned one level higher by the next poison attack (to a max of level 5 poison), or
• Will only have 50% of the magic resist skill counter in the next attack that uses magic resist as a modifier.
• Duration of 25 seconds.

]Mana Required: 11
Minimum Skill Required: 20.0
Reagents Required: Bat Wing and Nox Crystal

Horrific Beast (transformation)

• Caster receives +2 hitpoints/second (equals 20 "Hit Point Regeneration").
• Caster receives +25% melee/archery damage.
• Caster cannot cast any spells aside from necromancer transformation spells.
• Duration is permanent until death or a transformation spell is cast.

Mana Required: 11
Minimum Skill Required: 40.0
Reagents Required: Bat Wing and Deamon Blood


Lich Form (transformation)

• Caster receives +1.3 mana/second (equals 13 "Mana Regeneration").
• Caster receives +10 cold resist.
• Caster receives +10 poison resist.
• Caster receives immunity to bleed attack (due to being undead).
• Caster receives +25% damage from "Undead Slayers".
• Caster receives -10 fire resist.
• Caster receives -1 hitpoint/2 seconds (equals -0.5 "Hitpoint Regeneration")
• Duration is permanent until death or a transformation spell is cast.

Mana Required: 23
Minimum Skill Required: 70.0
Reagents Required: Deamon Blood, Grave Dust and Nox crystal

Mind Rot (requires target)

• Target's spells become more expensive to cast mana wise.
• Duration is ((Casters Spirit Speak - targets Magic Resist) / 50 + 20 (skill values are without decimals, meaning GM, or 100.0, is 1000)).

Mana Required: 17
Minimum Skill Required: 30.0
Reagents Required: Bat Wing, Deamon Blood and Pig Iron

Pain Spike (requires target: note, this is a curse, not direct damage)

• Damages target by ((Casters Spirit Speak - targets Magic Resist) / 100 + 18 (skill values are without decimals, meaning GM, or 100.0, is 1000)). Requires an update to match todays numbers.
• Duration of 10 seconds in which casting the spell again has minimal effect.

]Mana Required: 5
Minimum Skill Required: 20.0
Reagents Required: Grave Dust and Pig Iron

Poison Strike (requires target; splash damage)

• Damage to be determined.
• Slash damage is (damage / (distance in tiles +1)) in a 2 tile range.

Mana Required: 17
Minimum Skill Required: 50.0
Reagents Required: Nox Crystal

Strangle (requires target)

• Power is (casters Spirit Speak / 10) (minimum of 4).
• Each point of power equals one more tick of damage.
• Damage is (power - 2) to (power + 1) modified by a calculation based on the targets fatigue (3 - (Current stamina / Maximum stamina * 2)).

Mana Required: 29
Minimum Skill Required: 65.0
Reagents Required: Deamon Blood and Nox Crystal

Summon Familiar (summon spell)

• Summons a familiar to fight by your side.

• Horde Minion
  • Picks up items on the ground.
  • Fights for you decently.
  • Requires 30.0 Necromancy and 30.0 Spirit Speak
• Shadow Wisp.
  • Periodically replaces mana on targets in range based on their negative karma level.
  • Is a lousy fighter.
  • Requires 50.0 Necromancy and 50.0 Spirit Speak.
• Dark Wolf.
  • Caster receives +5 "Stamina Regeneration" (1 stamina/2 seconds).
  • Caster receives the ability to tame wolves (not hellhounds).
  • Is a decent fighter.
  • Requires 60.0 Necromancy and 60.0 Spirit Speak.
• Death Adder.
  • Very good figher that has a deadly poison attack.
  • Allows caster to double click snakes and serpents in the area and target what they want them to kill.
  • Requires 80.0 Necromancy and 80.0 Spirit Speak.
• Vampire Bat.
  • Caster receives all the damage the vampire bat deals as hitpoints.
  • Its a decent fighter.
  • Requires 100.0 Necromancy and 100.0 Spirit Speak.

Mana Required: 17
Minimum Skill Required: 30.0 (as per Horde Minion)
Reagents Required: Bat Wing, Deamon Blood and Grave Dust

Vampiric Embrace (transformation)

• Caster receives 20% life drain on every hit.
• Caster receives immunity to poison levels 1-4.
• Caster receives "Mana Regeneration 2" (?).
• Caster receives "Stamina Regeneration 10" (?).
• Caster receives +25% damage from "Undead Slayers".
• Caster receives -25 fire resist.
• Caster is damage when casting a spell consuming garlic (17-23 damage) and cannot drink garlic based (cure) potions (note: "consuming garlic" means that lower reagent cost will prevent this damage).
• Duration is permanent until death or a transformation spell is cast.

Mana Required: 23
Minimum Skill Required: 99.0
Reagents Required: Bat Wing, Nox Crystal and Pig Iron


Vengeful Spirit (requires target; summon spell)

• Summons a ghost that tracks down your opponent and reveals them.
• Requires 3 control slots.
• Duration is ((Caster Spirit Speak * 80) / 1200 + 10 (skill values are without decimals, meaning GM, or 100.0, is 1000)).

Mana Required: 41
Minimum Skill Required: 80.0
Reagents Required: Bat Wing, Grave Dust and Pig Iron

Wither (area effect damage with no target)

• Deals damage 5 tiles around caster.
• Deals higher damage towards high karma people.
• Damage needs to be figured out.

Mana Required: 23
Minimum Skill Required: 60.0
Reagents Required: Grave Dust, Nox Crystal and Pig Iron

Wraith Form (transformation)

• Caster receives ability to walk through people in Felucca without losing stamina/being revealed.
• Caster receives the ability to truely (unlike weapons with "Hit Mana Leech") leech mana from a target.
• Caster receives immunity to bleed attacks due to being undead.
• Caster receives the ability to cast the magery spell "Recall" 100% of the time if he has reagents.
• Caster receives +15 physical resist.
• Caster receives +25% damage from "Undead Slayers".
• Caster receives -5 fire resist.
• Caster receives -5 energy resist.
• Duration is permanent until death or a transformation spell is cast.

Mana Required: 17
Minimum Skill Required: 20.0
Reagents Required: Nox Crystal and Pig Iron

Faster Casting/Faster Cast Recovery:

This is all thanks to krrios' testing.

The original thread can be found here!

Spell casting time = (3 + Spell level) / 4 (note: no effect from faster casting)

Spell recovery time = (6 - faster cast recovery) / 4

Spell levels are defined as:

1. (1.00 seconds) Wither (needs an update), Curse Weapon and Evil Omen.
2. (1.25 seconds) Pain Spike (needs an update).
3. n/a.
4. (1.75 seconds) Blood Oath, Mind Rot, Animate Dead and Corpse Skin
5. n/a.
6. (2.25 seconds) Horrific Beast, Lich Form, Poison Strike, Strangle, Summon Familiar, Vampirit Embrace, Vengeful Spirit and Wraith Form.

With that in mind, figuring out spell casting times is simple. For instance, spell level 1 would be (3 + 1) / 4 = 1.0 second casting times.

Similarly, the faster cast recovery delay is equally simple to calculate. For instance, FCR3 would be (6 - 3) / 4 = 0.75 second recovery delay. At FCR6 there is no delay whatsoever inbetween spells.

Spirit Speak:

Spirit Speak serves three purposes for a necromancer - healing, damage output and hearing ghosts speak.

Healing with Spirit Speak can be done in one of two ways; either through corpses or through using your own energy.

Using a corpse to heal, you must be within 3 tiles of a corpse that hasn't previously been used for healing with Spirit Speak nor animated through the Animate Dead spell; your healed hitpoints will be:

• Minimum is targets fame/500 + 1 (look at guide.uo.com or the Hunter's Guide for creatures fame rating).
• Maximum is (Spirit Speak / 20) (keep in mind that skills are without decimals, so gm is 1000) (may need an update)
• Healing through corpses requires no mana.

If you channel your own energy (meaning, there's no corpses nearby) your heals will follow this pattern instead:

• Minimum equals your maximum/2 + 1.
• Maximum is (Spirit Speak/100 + 4) (keep in mind that skills are without decimals, so gm is 1000).
• Channeling your own energy requires 10 mana.

When you're at or above grandmaster in Spirit Speak you will always be able to understand ghosts.

Spirit Speak is, as outlined in the spell section above, the single greatest contributer to duration and damage in spells.

Setting Up (getting skills and scrolls):

Where to buy the Necromancy skill:

Necromancers in Umbra (if you don't have access to these, it means you don't have access to Age of Shadows which in turn means you can't use Necromancy either).

Where to buy the Spirit Speak skill:

Healers and Healer Guildmasters (you gain the most through the guildmasters).

Where to get Necromancy scrolls:

You get Necromancer scrolls by looting them off creatures killed/looting chests - there is no other way to get them, i.e., no buying them off of scribes or NPC's (this list may need updating):

Animate Dead:

• Rat Mages.

Blood Oath:

• Rat Mages, Evil Mages, Imps and Nightmares.

Corpse Skin:<

• Unicorns, Rat Mages, Imps and Orc Mages.

Curse Weapon:

• Rat Mages, Evil Mages and Imps.

Evil Omen:

• Rat Mages and Imps.

Horrific Beast:

• Rat Mages, Imps and Nightmares.

Lich Form:

• Messages in bottles and level 3 treasure maps.
• Deamons, Liches, Evil Mage Lords and Imps.

Mind Rot:

• Rat Mages and Imps.

Pain Spike:

• Rat Mages, Gargoyles, Imps, Ophidian Apprentice Mages and Air Elementals.

Poison Strike:

• Messages in bottles.
• Deamons, Liches, Rat Mages, Imps and Air Elementals.

Strangle:

• Messages in bottles.
• Deamons, Liches, Evil Mages, Imps, Nightmares, Air Elementals and Meer Mages.

Summon Familiar:

• Imps.

Vampiric Embrace:

• Meer Eternals, Harrower of the Tentacles, Dark Father and The True Harrower.

Vengeful Spirit:

• Messages in bottles.
• Deamons, Liches, Air Elementals and Nightmares.

Wither:

• Messages in bottles.
• Deamons, Liches, Imps and Meer Mages.

Wraith Form:

• Rat Mages and Imps.

Where to get Necromancy Reagents:

There are a few options for getting necromancer reagents - you can get them like most mages get their reagents through the NPC vendor system (regular mage NPCs (not faction reagent vendors) and the necromancers in Umbra).

However, you can get masses of necromancer reagents by hunting liches and lich lords as well. Treasure hunting has a fair amount of necromancer reagents as well.

Training:</font color=00008B>

Spirit Speak can be trained either by active using the skill (clicking the blue gem next to Spirit Speak on the skill list or hitting a macro for the skill).

Necromancy is a bit more difficult as it requires you to cast certain spells at certain levels following this pattern (approximately - don't worry too much if you deviate from the list though):

0.0 to 30.x : Buy it in Umbra - its the most cost effective way of doing it.

30.x to 55.x : (20.0 requirement spells) Pain Spike (on self for instance, although be wary of armor damage!), Blood Oath (if you have someone else along with you), Corpse Skin (again, requires someone else), Evil Omen (same) or Wraith Form.

55.x to 75.x : (40.0 requirement spells) Horrific Beast or Animate Dead (requires a corpse though, so only good if you hunt for your gains). Alternatively, mix in a Mind Rot or Summon Familiar (both require 30.0 Necromancy (and Spirit Speak in case of familiar)).

75.x to 90.x : (60.0 requirement spells) Wither is your best bet both for hunting and for 8x8. Mix in the occasional Strangle (65.0 requirement) for healing gains on a boat or for added damage when hunting.

90.x to 105.x : (70.0 requirement spells) Lich Form is your absolute best bet - plus, its a very nice spell that grants you lots of mana /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif Keep up with Strangles and Withers as both will give you gains all the way to 100.0 (in case of Strangle, 105.0 actually).

105.x to 120.0 : (99.0 requirement spells) Vampiric Embrace is definently the fastest way to legendary, although mixing in Revenants (80.0 requirement) works well too.

Things that need to be added:

Krrios' Animate Dead information.

Spell Damage calculations (only to appease Jynx)

Whichever else you people might come up with

Old FAQ thread for reference.

 

[Guest]

Quite solid later I will take time to nitpick through it but instead oif adding the Animate dead info I suggest just toss a link, some people get bored with reading a big faq thats not seperated sadly....
and don't check all the threads.

*thinks to add a Link to Jynx's Necro rez thread*
*thinks very hard hoping to mentally brainwash people into voting*

 

[Chandalir]

Worry not.

If this goes as planned, it will eventually be distributed among several posts (in fact, I think that post is *almost* too long as is). Or post may be saying too much, but it will be divided into smaller sections /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif

For now, its a faq builder thread - no more, no less. I want you people to give me as much input on layout/information as entirely possible, even if it includes one of you writing a template FAQ-a-like.

 

[PhaedrusXY]

A section on how to use some of the trickier spells might be good, also. Such as:

Animate Dead: Some people complain that their animates won't follow them. The solution to this is to immediately cast another necromancy spell after animating them. For some reason this lets the animated dead know who it's "master" is, and it will immediatly begin following you, instead of wandering around randomly.

Animate Dead (mounts): The mounts decay too fast to be useful. The solution to this is to ride your mount through a moongate. This halts its decay and lets you use it until you log out for the day. This may be considered a bug, but hasn't been labeled an exploit to my knowledge, and so it is still legal to use for now.

Blood Oath: This spell isn't particularly useful for fighting most monsters, but is great when being attacked by a mage in PvP.

Corpse Skin: Useful if you have a fire or poison damage neon weapon, or if you use poison or fire based spells alot. Not useful if most of the damage you deal out is physical or cold based.


Etc, etc. These are the ones that came to mind, but others might be able to add more.

 

[Guest]

my suggestion?
one main thread...and subthreads that are let to die down and for viewing purposes only with links to then on the main one....

Kinda like a newspaper...flip to page 6 for the rest of the story.....
like list the spells and have a link saying

Tips and tricks of using all the spells.

 

[Chandalir]

This was going to go into the "spell damage" section (along with Krrios' animate dead) - that way, no spell will be left uncovered in terms of the necromancy/spirit speak relationship (and maybe we'll see a decrease in "do I need spirit speak" posts /php-bin/shared/images/icons/tongue.gif). I may end up renaming it to "Spell Damage and Tactics" instead.

And Jynx - for what its worth, the mage forum FAQ is what I plan on ending up with (or similar). Eventually.

 

[Al'Djinn]

Should also put a REALLY BIG message asking to read before asking any template questions. But I mean BIG . Kind of dumb to explain the same things every 2 or 3 posts. I mean, I'm all about helping people with necromancy but eventually it gets tedious.

 

[Domin15]

If you channel your own energy (meaning, there's no corpses nearby) your heals will follow this pattern instead:

Minimum equals your maximum/2 + 1.
Maximum is (Spirit Speak/100 + 4) (keep in mind that skills are without decimals, so gm is 1000).
Channeling your own energy requires 10 mana.

This is no longer accurate, using this it would seem you can get max 16hp healed off mana which is not accurate. Could You correct this error in FAQ?

it would seem the reasonable formula for healing with mana is
min = 1 + Spirit Speak/4
max = min + 4

Could someone test this please and post the results?

 

[Raza]

Nicely done, good to see we have an updatable FAQ again.

Only one note really, your colored text can be next to impossible to read in some of the non default forum skins.

 

[Guest]

Greetings all. I fiund the FAQ fairly useful. However I am having one problem maybe someone hear can help with. As the FAQ suggests I use the 8x8 method for gaining Necromancy Skill. My level is about 52, so the FAQ suggest Pain Strike and Wraith Form for soloing. I have tried using Wraith Form and I rarely, maybe once a night, get Necromancy Skill from it. And when I try Pain Strike I do not get Necromacy Skill I get Magic Resistance skill instead. Any suggestions?

 

[Chandalir]

If I were you, I'd move up to the next level in gains to see if that helps.

The "guide" is just that - a guide. It doesn't state that you *must* use this and that spell to gain /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif

Also to note, the spells listed are more effective during 8x8 - normal gameplay doesn't quite drain all the gain spots as 8x8 does, so you're not as likely to get as many gains out of the spells as you are otherwise.

Try to at least mix in Mind Rot and Summon Familiar (summon something like a wolf and try to have it targetted by the mob - it'll die and you can summon a new one for more gains /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif).

And last, but certainly not least, make sure you move around lots.

 

[Otho Stone]

quoting this part
-----------------
If you channel your own energy (meaning, there's no corpses nearby) your heals will follow this pattern instead:

Minimum equals your maximum/2 + 1.
Maximum is (Spirit Speak/100 + 4) (keep in mind that skills are without decimals, so gm is 1000).
Channeling your own energy requires 10 mana.
--------------------------

Ok, so, if i understand this correctly...

at 110 Spirit Speak (1100) I should have a MAXIMUM damage heal of 15?

(1100/100 = 11) + 4 = 15

Why am I doing 27-30 points of healing then?

Can we get some confirmation on this?

 

[EveningKiss]

*Goes through and marks that Mind Rot is also on Nightmares*

 

[Osmo Runefang]

Very nice thread, lots of help for someone that has not been around since 3D. Just have one question &amp; 1 correction to make.

Question:

On the 8x8 skill gain, do you only go North &amp; South, or do you make a square?

Correction:

Not sure how to figure it, but on the Spirit Speak Healing off yourself, at 100.1 I heal back 27-30 points each time with no corpses around.

Again Thanks to ALL who helped with this GREAT post.

 

[Zak-DK]

Is this accurate ?


Chance to Cast Spell: 1% 25% 50% 75% 100%
At skill:
Curse Weapon 0 10 20 30 40
Pain Spike 20 30 40 50 60
Corpse Skin 20 30 40 50 60
Evil Omen 20 30 40 50 60
Blood Oath 20 30 40 50 60
Wraith Form 20 30 40 50 60
Mind Rot 30 40 50 60 70
Summon Familiar 30 40 50 60 70
Horrific Beast 40 50 60 70 80
Animate Dead 40 50 60 70 80
Poison Strike 50 60 70 80 90
Wither 60 70 80 90 100
Strangle 65 75 85 95 105
Lich Form 70 80 90 100 110
Vengeful Spirit 80 90 100 110 120
Vampiric Embrace 99 n/a 100 110 120

 

[Versus]

Hi everyone i've done some testing on TC30 and found that strangle follows a pattern that is different from the one said here and stratics:

Maximum Hits for strangle (120/120) is 11 (supposedly was spiritspeak/100)
the hits take effect in this pattern:
5 seconds
5 seconds
5 seconds
5 seconds
4 seconds
3 seconds
3 seconds
3 seconds
3 seconds
2 seconds
1 seconds

when it's supposedly 5,4,3,2,1,1,1... etc

Hope someone knows if this is a bug or not

 

[bbr]

Lowering your Karma, (FAST)

1. Start with putting on and off an Orc mask
2. very fast, cast provoke on an NPC (blue)
3. Kill blue NPCs
4. Summon Daemons ( alternatives? )

 

[zeroZord]

--------------------------------------------------------------------
Wraith Form (transformation)
Caster receives ability to walk through people in Felucca without losing stamina/being revealed.
Caster receives the ability to truely (unlike weapons with "Hit Mana Leech") leech mana from a target.
Caster receives immunity to bleed attacks due to being undead.
Caster receives the ability to cast the magery spell "Recall" 100% of the time if he has reagents.
Caster receives +15 physical resist.
Caster receives +25% damage from "Undead Slayers".
Caster receives -5 fire resist.
Caster receives -5 energy resist.
Duration is permanent until death or a transformation spell is cast
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mana-leech will work also with ranged damage including spells!
Both Necro and Mage spells will work.

With Slayer-Spellbooks u can leech back more mana than u used.
(corpse skin; evil omen; Flamestrike @ ogerlord with ogerslayerbook for 160+ damage)

Leech will not happen 100% of the time and I still haven't figured out why!
I noticed getting no mana back when nearly at full mana, so i suspect that trying to restore mana to more than 100% wont restore anything.
Ideas about this are welcome

Lady Shera on DF
Legendary Necro/Mage

 

[Dreadlord Galaad]

All those informations are 100% accurate:

First Point About Wraith Form:
The mana leech is determined by that formula:
Spirit Speak / 5
So at Gm its 20% mana leech, and legendary is 24% mana leech.
But this work all the time, except a few bugs so sometimes it doesnt work like against Rotting corpses...

Second Point About Vampire Form:

It gives Mana regenaration 4 and Stamina regenaration 15 .

 

[Versatile]

The reason leech doesnt work 100% of the time is because it actually steals your apponents mana. ogrelords dont have much mana to begin with so after 3 flamsstrikes (probably only 2 with a slayer) they dont have anymore mana left to leech...

 

[Argyle]

After mulling over many template threads, I felt the need to make an all inclusive post about the topic of the Necro Warrior. From the beginning of AOS my friend Will X and I worked on finding the "ultimate necro warrior template." We were quite successful, and we both settled on variations of the same basic concept.

In this post I will detail:

Template Choices
Required/Helpful Equipment
Symbiosis of the setup

Bear in mind that this is primarily a focus on template choices, as I play on Siege, and ultra equipment is looted faster than Budweiser at a frat party. That being said, the core concept behind our choices remain the foundation of what makes for an extremely solid template.

TEMPLATE~
____________________________________________________________________

Vampire Necro Warrior(720 pts):

120 Melee (preferably fencing, more on this later)
120 Magic Resist
105 Necro
100 Spirit Speak
100 Tactics
94 Healing
81 Anatomy

125 Dex
70 Str
55 Int
____________________________________________________________________

SKILL CHOICES~

120 Fencing:

Although other melee types can work fine, fencing was the #1 choice, as it allowed for the highest rate of swing speed with a dagger or preferably a kryss, and offered a very solid secondary weapon, the warfork (bleed for mages, disarm for warriors).

120 Magic Resist:

We found that a necro warrior MUST use protection as a key component to being a successful pvper. We also encountered plroblems without resist, as the necro warrior has no way to bless, remove curse, or replenish mana rapidly. 85 resist addresses this problem well. Poison wasnt much of an issue, because vampire form prevented the lower level poison from doing much harm.

105 Necro:

The only spell that must never fail is strangle. 105 Necro covers this requirement. Will X eventually went to 120 necro for the ability to cast revenants and toggle out of vampire form against poisoners.

100 Spirit Speak:

As the core of the template is based on dexterity and melee, we found that the base 100 spirit speak was enough to guarantee heals, and make our necro spells do some damage. 120 wound be ideal on any template besides this one, but it is very cramped and the 20 points is better spent elsewhere.

100 Tactics:

The template relies on weapon damage for many reasons. Tactics and damage increase are very important, because at the heart of a necro warrior, the entire offense and defense is based around hitting with your weapon. Offense is obvious, but the ability to gain mana on this template is a mana leeching weapon (and armor if you have insurance). Also, by keeping the opponent on defense from rapid swings (1 swing per second was the goal, anything less than 1.5 wasnt even considered), you gained the advantage, which turned you back on offense. The weapon also leeches life through vamp form, and combined with curse weapon, you can leach 70% of the damage back in life, allowing you to heal through total offense.

94 Healing:

90.1 healing is all that is required to never fail a heal. We balanced healing and anatomy to the minimum requirements to get the job done. With 94 healing, you cure poison reasonably well (had issues with leathal poison on the RARE occassion).

81 Anatomy:

People ALWAYS ask me, why 81 anatomy? Because it is the minimum to ressurect. The added damage increase for going above 81 is much like the arguement for 120 Spirit Speak. It would be nice, but the 19 points is better spent elsewhere. By minimizing healing and anatomy, we can add 25 points to vital scrolled skills. The hitpoints healed is 32-52 hit points vs. 36-60 at GM Healing and Anatomy.

STAT CHOICES:
Dex:

As mentioned above, high dexterity equates to faster swings, which equates to more mana/life leeched over time. Also, your main defense is dexterity based: Healing. With 140 dex (125+ Greater Agility potion), you can heal with a bandage every 4 seconds. With 160 its, 3 seconds, 180 is 2 seconds, 200 is 1 second!!! (bear in mind, stamina is not dexterity. Stamina affects swing speed, not your healing speed)

Str:

70 Str = 85 hit points. With high speed healing (140+ dex), this is plenty of base hit points if you play conservatively coupled with a Greater Strength potion (95 hit points).

Int:

55 int is just enough to keep you in business. If you open with a strangle, and start hitting with a weapon, you can recoup the mana in a few swings, and begin a combo. If you have a +5 AOS stat bonus, use the points in intelligence. The same goes for bonuses on armor…get the mana bonus over anything else.

Vampire Form:

Possibly the coolest form for any warrior, Vampire form gives MR4, and SR 15, coupled with immunity to poison and the ability to gain 20% of the damage you deal back in hit points. The MR/SR helps with the lack of points spent on either meditation or focus. The only drawback is the inability to use garlic, cure potions (quick heals make this easier), and the –25 fire resists.

Equipment:

I am not going to pretend that I have the ideal setup for shards with insurance. On Siege I used faction blessed runic weapons, a Jackal’s Collar, and a Spirit of the Totem. Will X used the same, but a Hunter’s Headdress instead of the Totem. However, there are some core requirements for this template:

JACKAL’S COLLAR – higher dex &amp; huge fire resists. The best item for this template.
30%+ HCI
A fast Mana Leech Weapon with 30%+ Damage Inc (1.5 swings per second minimum)
Dex Bonus on Jewels is a huge bonus
60’s across the board in resists (curse will put you there if you go above, so 60 works)
Potions, potions, some more potions, and some extra potions

For insurance shards:

LMC, MR, Mana Bonus, HCI/Dex/DI jewels. Again, I am not accustomed to using an entire suit crafted and insured, so there is some flexibility here. I would recommend looking at a Rune Beetle Carapace and Dread Pirates Hat in addition to the above items. Being able to add barbed kit armor (I used faction blessed barbed or horned armor) will help immensely.

Conclusion:

Will X and I are avid solo’ers. Barring any unforeseen nerfs, I believe this setup will continue to be a contender for a long time. Played correctly, you might not be able to overcome every gank that finds you, but most of them will have fits trying to kill you. I have won many a 5vs1 with this template. Also, this template is capable of relentless offense in a 1vs1 situation with fast healing and the leeching effects of Vampire Form and Curse Weapon. I have played this template for a long time now, and I don’t plan on retiring it for quite a while.

I hope this can help anyone with questions about the Necro Warrior. Happy PvPing!

 

[Chandalir]

Link to necro mage discussion thread.

Argyle's necromancer warrior thread.

Oaks 3 worst/best spells for PvM discussion thread.

All 3 threads are set not to expire, so they'll be there whenever someone gets the desire to build a FAQ

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

<font color=8B0000>Wither (area effect damage with no target)</font color=8B0000><ul>[*]Deals damage 5 tiles around caster.[*]Deals higher damage towards high karma people.[*]Damage needs to be figured out.[/list]Mana Required: 23
Minimum Skill Required: 60.0
Reagents Required: Grave Dust, Nox Crystal and Pig Iron


[/ QUOTE ]

Hello, damage from Wither is actually quite simple. I have found Wither to do between 8 &amp; 15 + SS/3 pre-resist dmg or 1d8+7+SS/3 (all decimals are rounded down). This info. is based off of 20-30 trials at intervals of 20 Spirit Speak on the Test Center vs. an unarmored opponent with 0 level karma.

<blockquote><hr>


*<font color="darkred">
SS Lvl-----|| 20 ||----|| 40 ||----|| 60 ||----|| 80 ||----|| 100 ||----|| 120 ||
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
DMG--|||Min-Max|||Min-Max|||Min-Max|||Min-Max|||Min-Max|||Min-Max|||
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------||13 - 21 |||21 - 28 ||| 28 - 35 ||| 34 - 41 |||41 - 48 |||46 - 54 |||
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Trendline equation: y=.33x+11 </font color=8B0000>
*These damage values are pre-resist on a 0 Karma opponent.

[/ QUOTE ]

Spell damage increases the pre-resist damage by DMG*(%SDI/100).

Dmg example:
Spirit Speak = 90
SDI = %15
Dmg = (Random num between 8 &amp; 15) + 90/3 = 38 to 45
SDI Bonus = (38 * 1.15) to (45 *1.15) = 43.7 to 51.75 (rnd down)

Final pre-resist damage = between 43 &amp; 51


Damage is also affected by the defender's karma. The more karma they have, the more damage they take. The modifier is hardly important for regular use, as you will be fighting whoever you run across, but I've attempted to nail it down anyway.

There are 11 levels of karma. -5 = Most Evil +5 = Most Good 0 = Neutral

I've found Karma fits handily into the equation above as:

Damage = 1d8 +7 + (Opponent's Karma)/2 + (Caster's SS)/3

Example:
A target with a "Good, Honorable, Admirable, Noble" title will have Karma level +3. If the caster is a Legendary Medium the damage will be:

Damage = 1d8 + 7 + 3/2 + 40
= 49 to 56 (Pre-resist)

If the target was "Outcast, Wretched, Nefarious, or Dread" they would have Karma level -5. So:

Damage = 1d8 + 7 - 5/2 + 40
= 46 to 53 (Pre-resist)


(Not a big deal.)



There is no relationship between Necromancy and Wither damage.

There is no relationship between Intelligence and Wither damage (currently).

There is no relationship between distance from caster and damage taken; i.e. if you are in range, you will recieve full damage (minus your cold resist of course).


The End.

P.S. When they overhaul Necromancy here with pub 40, someone else needs to go back and redo all this, because I've given my contribution, so it will be someone elses turn dammit.

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>


<font color=8B0000>Lich Form (transformation)</font color=8B0000><ul>[*]Caster receives +1.3 mana/second (equals 13 "Mana Regeneration").[*]Caster receives +10 cold resist.[*]Caster receives +10 poison resist.[*]Caster receives immunity to bleed attack (due to being undead).[*]Caster receives +25% damage from "Undead Slayers".[*]Caster receives -10 fire resist.[*]Caster receives -1 hitpoint/2 seconds (equals -0.5 "Hitpoint Regeneration")[*]Duration is permanent until death or a transformation spell is cast.[/list]Mana Required: 23
&lt;br&gt;Minimum Skill Required: 70.0
&lt;br&gt;Reagents Required: Deamon Blood, Grave Dust and Nox crystal


[/ QUOTE ]

If a human has an innate HPR 2, and Lich Form is -0.5 HPR at -1 HP every 2 seconds intervals, then why is 1.5 HPR -1 HP every 4 seconds? It seems to me it takes HPR 4 (Human Innate + 2 or just 4 for elves) to balance out the -HPR of Lich Form, as in, to reach a HPR of 0. I'm not sure what HPR is before the human innate bonus--seems to be +1 HP every 3 seconds. Human Innate + HPR 2 = roughly +1 HP every 2 seconds, and that is at least HPR4. Therefore, the Lich -HPR has to be at least HPR -4, if not more, correct?

 

[Evil Tamer]

Here is a link to my FAQ/Build:

http://boards.stratics.com/php-bin/uo/showflat.php?Cat=3&amp;Number=7185556&amp;page=0&amp;view=collapsed&amp;sb=5&amp;o=&amp;fpart=1

 

[Grimnir_Kvinlaug]

I heard that necromancy now benifits from fast cast?
Can I get this confirmed, and if so, can the FAQ be updated to show the fc formula?

 

[Konge]

i'm not sure if it's been mentioned before but vamps mana regain is 4-5mr, atleast when i timed it it took 1.5-2.5 seconds without any mr but vamp to go up 1 mana 2mr would mean 5 seconds to go up 1, and no i wasn't human,

 

[Konge]

Oh and i didn't see it till now but for lowering your karma very quickly, i found using an lrc suit, wearing the ossian grimiore, and spaming wither to be very effective, hit dread lord quickly that way

 

[Harvest Moon]

I just killed like 10 imps and no necro scrolls. I think they no longer provide them.

 

[imperterritus]

If your necro skill is not 50 yet, the easiest way to get a full necro book is to do the necro skill quest in New Haven. The reward for completing the quest (getting your necro skill to 50) is a full book.

Just for completeness sake, doing the Spirit Speak skill quest nets you a bag of necro regs, I think 100 of each.

 

[Mr Mischief]

<blockquote><hr>

Anyone go any suggestions as the best places to do the 8x8 in a boat?

[/ QUOTE ]

8x8 is no longer necessary is Blizzard removed the anti-macro code. You can feasibly gain 1-120 in a single spot, for any skill.

However, if you insist, the server line easy of Magincia/Ice Isle would be best.

 

[imported_Jimmy Pop]

From Five on Friday: <blockquote><hr>

"What is the actual duration of Cursed Weapon?"

The duration is your Spirit Speak skill (real skill, not counting jewelry) divided by 34, plus one. (actually, that's skill x 100 - so legendary is 1200 rather than 120. Makes the math cleaner ) That works out to 30 seconds at GM, or about 36 seconds at Legendary.

[/ QUOTE ]

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

<blockquote><hr>

Anyone go any suggestions as the best places to do the 8x8 in a boat?

[/ QUOTE ]

8x8 is no longer necessary is Blizzard removed the anti-macro code. You can feasibly gain 1-120 in a single spot, for any skill.

However, if you insist, the server line easy of Magincia/Ice Isle would be best.

[/ QUOTE ]

 

[Phaen Grey]

Cloak of Corruption is an excellent tool for lowering karma, took mine all the way down to dread.

 

[¥§hàdòw¥]

I didn't see this posted, but you don't actually need spirit speak to use the summon familiar spell. I'm just raising Necro enough to use it on my scribe.

What is the Cloak of Corruption? Forgive my newbness, but I just came back after a very long break.

 

[Boogieman]

Inspired by a thread over on the warriors forum I went and did some testing of spirit speak and healing. I beleive I have figured out the formula that determines the amount of healed hitpoints when using spirit speak.

Here are the links to the two relevant posts, for those who want a longer story:

http://vboards.stratics.com/showpost.php?p=1001541&postcount=12

http://vboards.stratics.com/showpost.php?p=1002306&postcount=15

For those of you who just want the essentials:

Healing with spirit speak using your own mana:

Minimum amount of hitpoints healed = (spirit speak skill/4)

Maximum amount of hitpoints healed = (spirit speak skill/4)+4

Healing with spirit speak by draining corpses:

My observations does not suggest there should be a separate formula to calculate this.
In other words the same two formulas apply. The only difference is that you don't spend mana.

Mind you - I have yet to test this for higher levels of fame, than 'prominent' (fame step 2).

 

[Boogieman]

I went and did the last part of the testing on spirit speak.

I drained corpses at fame levels 'renowned' (step 3) and 'Lord' (step 4) at the spirit speak levels of 40, 60 and 120.
Furthermore I also went to lowest karma, to see if perhaps karma has any effect. Just in case...

The conclusion is: Fame has no influence on the amount of hit points you heal through spirit speak draining. Karma has no influence either. The single determining factor is spirit speak skill as expressed in the above formulas.

Btw - some people might prefer to express the formulas as:

Minimum damage healed = SS/40

Maximum damage healed = (SS/40)+4

Writing the skill without decimals - like you do on Test Shard. So for instance 80.6 skill becomes '806'.

 

[Jaimes]

It's been a while since I played but back when I did, Evil Omen allowed the possibility of lethal poison for a nox mage casting within 2 tiles, or with the use of a dp shuriken. The FAQ lists it as being capped at 5. IIRC it always bumps the level up by 1, it isn't capped.

 

[saankai]

Lo m8s,

im new with necromancy.
Could someone pls tell me how the summoned familiars fight ?
They just stand next to me, watching me go down

 

[Stupid Miner]

Both Poison Strike and Wither do 38-45 damage at GM Necro and GM SS (cant believe it took 5 years for someone to just go out and kill sheep)

 

[Lefty]

Both Poison Strike and Wither do 38-45 damage at GM Necro and GM SS (cant believe it took 5 years for someone to just go out and kill sheep)

Maybe for sheep . Both those spells are effected by SDI Items as well as the benefit of sdi from Int (each 10 points of int = 1 sdi)

Also damage is dependent to targets resists. Poison and cold respective to the spells mentioned above.

I would like to know if inscribe would effect those 2 spells since with magery it is calculated in the sdi formula. I know there is no room for it, but still I would like to know.

 

[[JD]]

Spirit Speak to heal through poison/mortal seems too cool...

Is there any way to "speed up" the heal, or be interrupted less? Does it take dex, fc, fcr, or protection into account?

 

[Urin]

This is something I copied from the old boards, its now-dead link was http://boards.stratics.com/php-bin/...4392668&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1 . It's a very thorough explanation of the mechanics behind animate dead. It appears to still be largely, if not entirely, accurate, so it should benefit the FAQ.

Today on the Pub20 Test Center I've collected a lot of sample data for animate dead. Looking it over I could see the general algorithm but there were some cases which didn't match up. After a bit more testing, it turned out to be quite simple. Here's how it works:

As noted on the Necromancer spell details page, there are 5 different 'groups' of animates which are based on corpse type. Each animate has a 'requirement' level, which I'll explain after the list.


Group 1 (default):
18000: Lich Lord
10000: Flesh Golem
5000: Lich
3000: Skeletal Knight, Bone Knight
2000: Mummy
1000: Skeletal Mage, Bone Mage
0: Patchwork Skeleton

Group 2 (dragons):
18000: Skeletal Dragon
10000: Flesh Golem
5000: Lich
3000: Skeletal Knight, Bone Knight
2000: Mummy
1000: Skeletal Mage, Bone Mage
0: Patchwork Skeleton

Group 3 (insects, terathans -are- included):
0: Mound of Maggots (always)

Group 4 (elementals):
5000: Wailing Banshee
0: Wraith

Group 5 (horses, nightmares, firesteeds, ki-rins, unicorns):
10000: Hellsteed
0: Skeletal Steed



The value next to each animate determines if it's chosen. Let's see how it works:

First, a value which I'll call 'casterAbility' is calculated:


casterAbility = ((30% of necroSkill) + (70% of spiritSkill)) * 180


For example, let's plug in some numbers:


Necro Spirit Ability
120.0 120.0 21,600
100.0 100.0 18,000
60.0 60.0 10,800
40.0 0.0 2,430


As you might have guessed, this number is then referenced into the lists above. There is, however, one more step. This 'casterAbility' value may never exceed the dead creatures fame. Put another way, you cannot animate higher than the corpse is powerful.


if ( casterAbility > corpseFame )
casterAbility = corpseFame;


An example of this:

A necromancer at 100 necromancy and 100 spirit speak (casterAbility = 18,000) raises a Wisp corpse. Wisps have 4,000 fame, so casterAbility becomes 4,000. That value is then referenced into the animates table and we see it'll turn into a skeletal knight.

Often it's easier to understand by example, so let's see what would happen when a 100nec, 80ss necromancer tried to animate a balron corpse:

Step 1: Compute caster ability:


casterAbility = ((30% of 100.0) + (70% of 80.0)) * 180
casterAbility = ((30) + (56)) * 180
casterAbility = (86) * 180 = 15,480


Step 2: Make sure casterAbility does not exceed corpseFame.


casterAbility = 15,480
corpseFame = 24,000
Is casterAbility > corpseFame? No, so continue on to step 3


Step 3: Look up casterAbility in the animates table:


casterAbility = 15,480
Is casterAbility >= 18,000? No. Skip Lich Lord, check next
Is casterAbility >= 10,000? Yes. Pick Flesh Golem


That's all there is to it. Also, a complete and accurate list of creature fame values can be found here: http://guide.uo.com/bestiary.html



How long do animates last?

It depends on the animate. Every 1.65 seconds the animate loses a single hit point. When it reaches 0 it dies. As such, the stronger the animate is (more HP) the longer it will last. A byproduct of this is that when two equal creatures--one animated and one not--are fighting, the one that's not animated will win.

Here's a table of the approximate min and max durations for each animate:


Animate Name Min Max
Skeletal Dragon 18:34 19:55
Lich Lord 8:19 10:04
Mummy 6:55 7:23
Hellsteed 6:41 7:19
Bone Knight 3:55 4:59
Flesh Golem 3:31 3:59
Lich 3:25 3:59
Wailing Banshee 2:31 2:59
Mound of Maggots 2:01 2:19
Patchwork Skeleton 1:55 2:23
Bone Mage 1:31 1:59
Wraith 1:31 1:59
Skeletal Steed 1:21 1:39

 

[Stupid Miner]

Is there any way to "speed up" the heal, or be interrupted less? Does it take dex, fc, fcr, or protection into account?

Nope

 

[Poo]

just a quick FYI for you Necros out there.
the max neg karma you can get is -32,000
just took my guy there with a cloak of corruption.
cheers!

 

[xhodan]

Does poison effect your necro spell damage? Also, how effective is doing purely poison damage for spawning and against peerless bosses?

 

[Skrylox]

Are there any effective spells to use with 0 SS? What is the duration of corpse for example at 0 SS?

 

[Nero]

@xhodan: poison strike benefits from poisoning but the chance to trigger poison (9% at GM poisoning) is far too low to justify the skill points imo.
@Skrylox: I sometimes soulstone spirit spirit and run with 120 necromancy/mysticism/magery/eval/focus/meditation. I use wraith form, leeching 8% mana at 0 spirit speak (actually, you leech 8% mana from 0 to 40 spirit speak, so the 20 JOAT spirit speak bonus of humans doens't factor in).This is very useful when the mob got a lot of mana or high mana regeneration. With death ray and SDI/slayer spellbooks hitting for 100-300 damage every 3 seconds, I can often sustain the spell without running out of mana. Rising colossus and 3 animate dead (up to flesh golems with 120 necromancy and 20 JOAT spirit speak) give me 4 heavy tanks making sure that I do not get interrupted. I found this most useful when camping a spawn.
Of note, one of my dexxers even uses wraith form with just 20 necromancy from human's JOAT bonus. E.g. I hit for 200 damage and get back 16 mana points per swing at 8% mana leech in wraith form without any spirit speak. This is enough to maintain special moves (as long as your opponent got mana). Note that you can successfully cast wraith form with JOAT, though the chance is only 1% at 20 necromancy (real or not). So i usually equip necro skill items (28% necro = 1 in 5 attempts, 30% necro = 1 in 4 attempts) to get into wraith form, usually after resurrecting, which I then unequip, as I can stay in form with JOAT.