Skill ideas for Necro generic trees

[shooth]

I agree that Aegis isn't really the best fit for necro, and frankly demonology stuff seems to thematically belong elsewhere... so here are some other ideas for a generic Necro tree.

1) DeadZone - mana sustained - reduces life regen for non-undead (except yourself possibly) in the area of your aura. Varies with level (with bonus for cunning(fun!), or magic (boring), or perhaps even necrotic level, or number of current summons ).

2) Unliving Wall - uses 1 necro - summons "bone wall" creatures... Creates a clump of summoned wall creatures, which cannot move, but which have many hp. Minimal attack on adjacent mobs if anything. Shape is 3 up and 3 across, in a cross shape. Skill level would influence both duration and toughness/resists on wall creatures. They do not count toward your "summons", but as such, you cannot extend their time by hanging out next to them.

3) Wake of Death - mana sustain - Everywhere you walk, you leave bits of your of undead aura. Non-undead creatures may sometimes be affected in adverse ways by this, such as being slowed, confused, or other things. Skill level determines the "length" of the trail and the chances of a malady befalling someone who crosses the wake.

4) Last Breath - ups your mana regen every time a creature dies in your aura. Skill level determines mana regen bonus per creature, like some of the barbarian abilities.

5) Unholy Ground - costs necrotic - The current area of your Aura stays part of your aura for x number of turns after it would normally not be part of your aura. X depends on Skill Level, and could be like (2xSkill)+5

6) BloodFeast - mana cast- Level determines length of spell, and success rate. Success means instead of gaining necrotic when a creature dies in your aura, a new creature is automatically summoned. Might progress like this: Length = (3xSkillLevel)+15, Success%= (10*SkillLevel)+35

7) Through the Void - - mana cast - Only castable while below 0 hp. - transport to any space within your aura, and lose X malady conditions. X is skill level.

8) Bone Gateway - small mana sustain - target a minion... cast the spell and minion dies... However, when you BREAK the sustain, you are transported back to the exact spot where the minion died. Not sure if this should be applied across dungeons, or if it would just fizzle if you left a level.

[Elkan]

There seems to be a lot of emphasis in the current design for "Chance to summon a better class of minion" But there dosn't seem to be anything in place that allows the strength of your minions to scale with your spellpower Although your direct damage spells of course do, it is the minions that define the class. From a quick peek at the talents it seems that an skeleton is a skeleton, whether it was summoned by a level 50 Necromancer wearing the rainments of Sher'tul godslayers, or the same guy in his underwear, dual-wielding toothpick and dental floss. It would be nice to see (advanced) necrotic minions trees, buffed with either some passives or perhaps sustains that allow the necromancer to buff his minions offensive powers and HP as his power grows and his ability to bind his immortal servants to this plane intensifies. yes dark empathy helps somewhat in preventing them from falling over in a stiff breeze but more minion buffy stuff would be nice. (yes, these pittiful unday may be mere tools, but a Craftsman, he takes great pride in the efficacy and keenness of his instruments!)

Also a high cooldown. high mana cost spell that holds a single minion together through force of will long after it would normally have fallen apart would be pretty cool (Gives one minion the blurred mortality effect for 4-10 turns, all other minions crumble as your attention leaves them (Although things like liches might be considered self sustaining) The minion in question could also explode violently in a burst of necrotic energy if it is still destroyed despite the blurred mortailty (Simply crumbling to fine dust if the effect expires naturally)

[Elkan]

Additionally your minions should sometimes compose poems in your honour.

Also would it be possible to have some kind of area check for necrotic aura so that in the same way alchemist explosions get nastier in tight spaces. the aura stretches out further in narrow corridors, so that marching single file around a large vault isn't a death sentance for the slower half of your minions. (The real reason skeletal mages shoot through the heads of their "buddies" is so they don't get left behind, out in the cold!)

Allternatively giving necrotic aura the ability to "mass teleport" your minions with teleport and phase door would allow you to sidestep this issue to a degree but the former is cooler, I think

Also Also Also Can we have a very slow increase to the necrotic energy cap over time? Say an extra point every 8-10 willpower, or every 5 levels or something similar?

[martinuzz]

Here's an idea for a necromancer generic tree from the murky depths of my imagination
Keywords: Horrors. Summon Buff using spellpower, as requested in above post

Necrotic: Soulbinding

1) Soul Trap (sustain)
cost: special
activation: instant
- whenever you kill a non-undead while this sustain is active, you will trap a soul (NB: souls are not necrotic energy)
- up to a maximum of 2/4/6/8/10 souls may be trapped
- every soul trapped increases your spellpower
- every soul trapped decreases your max necrotic energy by 1
- for every soul trapped, the sustain's cost will increase by 20 mana
- trapped souls are lost when the sustain de-activates
(the soul trap mechanic would look like the Combo points mechanic for Brawlers. So not a rescource, but a counter)

2) Bind Soul
cost: 1 soul
activation: 1 turn
cooldown: shortish
- binds a soul to target friendly undead summon (not bone giant, this is a construct, not a summon)
- target gains 'soulbound' status effect for 2/4/6/8/10 turns
- soulbound creatures have their 3 primary stats increased (as with heroism infusion)
- when a soulbound creature dies, it has chance to resurrect as a random friendly horror
- stat increase scales with your spellpower
- chance to resurrect as horror scales with talent level

3) Animate Armor
cost: all souls
activation: 1 turn
cooldown: medium to long
- uses all your souls, and a piece of body armor (any material) to summon an animated armor
- the armor spawns with Curse of Hate, causing enemies to attack it
- enemies attacking the armor in melee are damaged by arcane energies
- higher tier armor does more damage
- more souls invested increase animated armor damage and duration significantly
- higher talent level allows use of higher tier armors
- higher talent level increases animated armor HP and duration
- the armor is not an undead (you can't use Bind Soul on it)

4) Soul Magnet
cost: all souls
activation: 1 turn
- targets friendly undead (Bone Giant allowed here)
- non-undead NPC in a radius of 2/3/4/5/6 around target summon are drawn towards it (reverse knockback) at a speed of 2 tiles per turn
- non undead creatures killed by target creature have a chance of resurrecting as a random friendly horror
- target creature dies when spell ends
- chance for horrors increases with talent level
- spell lasts 5 turns, plus 1 turn per soul spent
- you can exceed your summon max this way. Horrors do count as summons though, so you won't be able to summon more undead until your total number of summons drops below your max again.

[Elkan]

Interesting creative ideas there, The whole necrotic energy being traded for souls thing gave me an idea.

Necrotic overflow

You have learned to better harness and channel the necrotic energies given off by the deaths of those around you.

Whenever you would gain a point of necrotic energy that would be wasted due to exceeding the cap, it is instead channeled to reinforce one of your necrotic minions, healing it for 3/6/9/12/15% of its total HP and boosting its damage by 3/6/9/12/15% for X turns. the duration will scale with your magic, the most damaged minion will be healed, if none are damage one will be chosen at random.

[edge2054]

There's some interesting ideas here but they all seem to suffer from the same problem I was having when I sat down to type up a similar thread (one that got deleted instead of posted). They either assume the character has minions or assume he has a necrotic aura. These could work as supplemental class trees but they're not very generic honestly.

[Grey]

How about an "Alteration" tree - a spell tree that modifies your own flesh, with generally gruesome results? Would fit thematically with the class, whilst offering generic enough benefits to others (though those pathetic cowards of Angolwen are too weak to touch it, the fools! But I'll show them, I'll SHOW THEM ALL! MwahahahaHAHAHA!!! *ahem*)

Alterations would have drawbacks as well as positives, and could even be forced upon the player from certain game events like the cursed items tree in the graveyard.

Some ideas:

1. Manablood
-50% healing factor
+(0.2 - 1.0) mana regen
-(1-3) cooldown on manasurge runes

2. ??? (ideas welcome)


3. Brain Tampering
Lose the headgear equipment slot permanently
+(2-10) Willpower and +(1-5) Cunning
+(3-15) mental saves
+(2-10)% spellcasting speed

4. Flesh Beyond Control
1 in 20 chance each turn that you cannot control yourself (AI takes over)
(1-4)% chance each turn that a friendly rat or swarm of insects will sprout from your body
Gain a random boost to spellpower and physpower each turn of between 1 and (12-60)
At talent level 3 your size factor increases by 1.
At talent level 5 you grow an additional limb, giving you an extra weapon slot and ring slot.

[edge2054]

The alterations tree sounds neat

I don't like the healing modifier on mageblood though because of the overlap with the cursed talent. What if it reduced regeneration to 0 instead (and capped it there) but converted a percentage of mana regen into life regen (20% * tl or there about)?

The second talent could empower runes. Could even be an active empowerment that lasted X turns (free action to activate).

Something like..

Runic Skin - You've etched arcane symbols into your own skin. As a free action you may activate these symbols to boost the effects of any rune you use over the next %d turns by %d%% but will cause your infusions to burn you, inflicting %0.2f fire damage each turn.

*actually between mageblood and the above talent an entire runic alterations tree could probably be written, something I think an aspiring lich might be into*

[shooth]

Not sure what's wrong with assuming you phave either minions or an aura... If topic chose to play minionless, then I would assume you put points elsewhere. And having played some with and without minions, its the minions side of befriend that could use the boost.

[Grey]

I don't like the healing modifier on mageblood though because of the overlap with the cursed talent. What if it reduced regeneration to 0 instead (and capped it there) but converted a percentage of mana regen into life regen (20% * tl or there about)?

That would be interesting, but would make the talent far more powerful as it would cause manasurge runes to heal significantly as well.

[edge2054]

Not sure what's wrong with assuming you phave either minions or an aura... If topic chose to play minionless, then I would assume you put points elsewhere. And having played some with and without minions, its the minions side of befriend that could use the boost.

There's nothing wrong with it for class talents. But for generic talents it goes deeply against the grain of what a generic talent *is*. If the talent isn't at least partially beneficial to other classes it's not really generic.

[shooth]

There's nothing wrong with it for class talents. But for generic talents it goes deeply against the grain of what a generic talent *is*. If the talent isn't at least partially beneficial to other classes it's not really generic.

Ahh, well in that light, I see your point. Is there any precedent for generic trees being given only to a particular class? Could it be that gaining the tree meant you gained the minimal aura, and thus accrued necrotic points? Where else would a tree like this exist? Archmage, Doomed or Corruptor? I dont see sun paladins, anathoril, or alchemists being thematically in line with something like this. I just noted as a player that the generic trees available to necros seemed kinda bland.

Also, fear automatic spelling corrections on smartphones.

[edge2054]

I agree that necromancers could use a generic tree that thematically fits them, the options they have are pretty limited and very mageish.

As to the precedent. Every talent teaches you the appropriate pool when it's learned. So learning the necrotic aura sustain when you learn an appropriate generic talent wouldn't be out of the question, the generic tree would just have to do a lot with it to justify it and I think any generic necromancer tree that has to do with minions is pretty much a no go.

[Zonk]

Grey's alteration tree sounds promising, although I do agree the first talent needs some work to not be too Cursed-like. Perhaps if your blood is really that magical, then you could deal some arcane damage when wounded in melee?
(not just struck, like most 'on hit' effects, but when actually damaged)

Also, 4 should probably only apply with hostiles in sight, otherwise it's going to make exploration VERY annoying.

[edge2054]

Four could have a chance to trigger when you take a hit (in the actor code where damage shields are checked).