NPC motivation: Becoming a necromancer

[hymer]

My players have been fighting a bunch of necromancers, and recently got one over good on their then main foe. So, new people are coming in, and I need to start building some bad guys with a bit of character for the foes that manage to survive the initial encounter.

So can you guys give me some interesting reasons one would become a bad guy spellcaster? Doesn't have to be a necromancer specifically, but that's the sort of stereotype I'm looking for.

Some examples:

Ruthlessly pragmatic and amoral
Wants helpless slaves and possibility for eternal life, and didn't care necromancy is considered repugnant or bad taste.

Afraid of/fascinated with death
Was so scared of death, s/he decied to study it in depth to avoid it. Works towards lichdom. Will be very cautious.

Grew up like that
Offspring of a family that practices the dark arts and just went with it. Is dedicated to the evil group, but possibly not particularly evil.

Mad, mad wizard
Is quite mad, and proud of it. Went for necromancy, as it really seemed to put people on edge, so s/he went with it. Behaves purposefully erratic, probably speaking kindly to the heroes and worrying for their safety and wellbeing.

Evil to the core
Has seen it all in a dream: Immortality, colossal cosmic power and a big-ass castle to live in. Digs it.

[sol_kanar]

Ok, there are a lot of differences between the classical D&D world and ours; but I think you can take some inspiration from the fact that people that are considered "evil" in our world actually do not think of themselves as "evil".

So, an "evil" spellcaster might just believe himself to be a "good person". I know that a detect <whatever> spell could prove him wrong, but...

[Marlowe]

"What the HELL is wrong with this place? We all know the road up to Markettown really needs some proper work, and that the forest needs to be cleared away from Old Man MacGonagal's orchard if he's gonna be able to collect his harvest without being molested by Satyrs. Again. We're all living with a Pelor-Damned ditch and wood curtain wall around the place because we've got no labour to do anything with all the slate and sandstone lying around in the quarry. We're all living in this fantasy cliche of horrors, we get attacked by random bandits and assorted demihuman scumbags on a weekly basis, we can't depend on some wacky bunch of wandering adventurers to turn up and defend us EVERY week and we really need to get some stuff done. And every time I ask who's gonna do it I get told there ain't enough manpower.

Well, I'm sick of it. I'm gonna go down to that there mound where we bury all the dead bandits and orcs and goblins and unsuccessful adventurers and whatnot and damn well raise them up and tell 'em to start fixin' things. Starting with the damn church roof.

What....evil act? How?"

[Bouregard]

"I just wanted to bring my loved ones back from the dead. What's wrong with it?"

Or:

"I granted them life again, it's only just that they serve me now."

[hewhosaysfish]

So, an "evil" spellcaster might just believe himself to be a "good person". I know that a detect <whatever> spell could prove him wrong, but...

1. The Detect Evil spell is designed to detect people who "debase or destroy innocent life, whether for fun or profit" and/or are "hurting, oppressing, and killing others".
2. I, your Friendly Neighbourhood Necromancer, do not debase or destroy anyone nor do I hurt, oppress or kill.
3. Using Detect Evil on me returns a positive result.

Conclusion:
Therefore the implementation of the Detect Evil spell is flawed.

Counter-argument:
A paladin's smite, the Holy Smite spell, Holy weapons, etc also react to me as if I was evil.

Response:
2b. I, your Friendly Neighbourhood Necromancer, still do not debase or destroy anyone nor do I hurt, oppress or kill.

Conclusion:
Therefore, Evil does not mean evil.
The property, the aura, which all these spells react to is not the same as the willingness to debase/destroy/hurt/oppress/kill and any Paladin who regards the results of Detect Evil as definitive proof are ignorant misguided fools who need a lecture on the difference between correlation and causation.

[hymer]

Thanks for the replies so far. :)
Anyone else have some nice motives for getting into the business? Oh, and excuses I don't need so much, just the reasons. :)

[Hazzardevil]

Conclusion:
Therefore, Evil does not mean evil.
The property, the aura, which all these spells react to is not the same as the willingness to debase/destroy/hurt/oppress/kill and any Paladin who regards the results of Detect Evil as definitive proof are ignorant misguided fools who need a lecture on the difference between correlation and causation.

Or, the paladin's idea of evil is wrong and when they use it, you simply do what they think is evil and not what evil actually is.

[NikitaDarkstar]

Religious reasons such as not feeling like the good gods care because life is miserable, but maybe Wee-Jas or Nerull will.

Plain and simple curiosity. Might not work great on the divine side of things but it works on the arcane side. (Ran a nercomancer wizard on that basis once.) Some magic students gets fascinated with evocations, others divinations, some abjurations, necromancy is just another school of magic to be studied and understood.

Failure. A commander lost his entire army because he marched them to hard to get somewhere on time and they got attacked before they could rest up. As a result of the army getting wiped out city X was attacked and destroyed. An undead army is far more capable of defending a nations borders than a living one and far cheaper to maintain.

Power/Egoism. I'm the best thing that ever happened to this place. I started a golden age and only I can maintain it. It's my duty to become immortal so the people don't have to deal with the consequences of my death. And lichdom is the easiest way to do it.

Peer pressure. Plain and simple, this guy got dragged into it by his friends and now he's to deep to get out. Also he trusts his friends judgement so might as well go with it since they know what they're doing.

Rebellious teenager. Did it simply because mommy and daddy said I shouldn't. (Bonus points if mommy and daddy are now zombies.)

Wanting a better life. If you're poor and have to beg and steal to stay alive and someone shows up and mentions you can get a comfortable bed, three meals a day, power, friends and get treated with respect if you join a specific group of people? Why not, it's a hell of a lot better than you have, and it's easy to believe in whatever deity the group is following since, well it did plenty of good for you.

[Bastian Weaver]

2. I, your Friendly Neighbourhood Necromancer, do not debase or destroy anyone nor do I hurt, oppress or kill.


Do your zombies get a day off at least once a week? How about dental care? How much do you pay them, anyways?
Hope you're proud of yourself, you... you oppresser!

Back to the point. Searching for knowledge! And that includes breaking into ancient crypts, pyramids, et cetera, using the available material to get past those nasty traps. And what's available in places like that? Oh, right... bones!

[boomwolf]

My best NPC necromancer was actually a Blighter, who has fallen into that after the death on his animal companion, and his attempts to bring him back after seeing his teacher's apparent apathy to the death ("it is just a part of the circle of life, you will find another companion"

He started dabbling into necromancery, became a blighter, learned the true meaning of death with his failing "resurrection" (animate dead) of his only friend he began falling into a state of mind of "death is nececery, only death defines life" and to practically being a mass murderer with plagues and undead armies.

Worst of all he had a "hit and run" style that he just casted some plague spells, raised a few undead, ordered them to kill anything and left, all in the name of survival of the fittest, so it was really, really hard to catch him. by the time the deaths started, he was long gone.

[tahu88810]

Erul smiled over the rim of his glass, and swilled the red wine therein. "Tell me," he asked, affable as ever, "aren't things so much better this way now?"

The man he was speaking to gave no response. "Ah, of course, reticent as ever, I see," Erul replied after a moment, "but you'll come to see it my way eventually. You are free. Free from pain, free from wants and needs. Free from emotion and all the burdens that come with it."

Erul grinned, and rose to his feet, setting his wine glass down upon a dusty tome as he strode towards the window. "But you are alive, are you not? You move, certainly, and what more is there to life but motion? You will see it my way, eventually."

He stepped through the threshold, and snapped his fingers. "Come."
The man rose from the rotten leather sofa, shambling after its new master.

---

Insanity, perhaps tempered by faulty thinking and the belief that, in undeath, one is not only free of the horrors of existence, but given a new, better "life."

[GolemsVoice]

He might simply not be a good people person. Shunned by, and in turn shunning his fellow men, he turned to magic. But not any magic. Magic that could give him power and all the servants he wanted to. It does not matter if he smelled, if he couldn't speak two sentences without stuttering, or if he never had a girlfriend. When the words of power coursed throgh him, he could speak the most twisted syllable without fault, and his servants did not mind his personalitiy at all. Here, finally, he had everything he wanted. And if somebody ever made fun of him again he could make sure they learn their lesson.

Basically, a person that is socially awkward but competent in magic. THe undead are ideal "companions" for him.

[hamishspence]

1. The Detect Evil spell is designed to detect people who "debase or destroy innocent life, whether for fun or profit" and/or are "hurting, oppressing, and killing others".
2. I, your Friendly Neighbourhood Necromancer, do not debase or destroy anyone nor do I hurt, oppress or kill.
3. Using Detect Evil on me returns a positive result.

Conclusion:
Therefore the implementation of the Detect Evil spell is flawed.

Counter-argument:
A paladin's smite, the Holy Smite spell, Holy weapons, etc also react to me as if I was evil.

Response:
2b. I, your Friendly Neighbourhood Necromancer, still do not debase or destroy anyone nor do I hurt, oppress or kill.

Conclusion:
Therefore, Evil does not mean evil.
The property, the aura, which all these spells react to is not the same as the willingness to debase/destroy/hurt/oppress/kill and any Paladin who regards the results of Detect Evil as definitive proof are ignorant misguided fools who need a lecture on the difference between correlation and causation.

There's also Heroes of Horror's answer- the Detect Evil spell does not return an Evil result- since the character has successfully "balanced Evil acts with Good intentions" "and thus remains solidly Neutral".

Better examples of how "Detects as Evil does not mean willing to debase/destroy/etc" would include:

Undead. Clerics of Evil gods. Fiends who have redeemed themselves.

[Hyudra]

Tad fell in with a bad crowd. They seemed like okay sorts, if a little wild. Then they offered to initiate him into their group. There was an initiation, he had to do something ugly. He did... only his 'friends' turned out to be anything but. They were cultists of the god of secrets, and they blackmailed him. They plagued him, used him as a tool against their enemies in the cult, to fulfill ambitions and get them what they wanted and needed. The only way to breathe, to fight back in the slightest, seemed to be to get deeper into the cult, to initiate himself, to recruit others the way he was recruited. He wasn't there three years before the web of lies, deceit, double crossing and manipulations was too much to bear.

Undeath was an escape. Cutting ties, a fresh beginning.

[hymer]

Plenty of godd stuff, thanks guys. :)
Not that I would mind seeing more people's ideas, or more ideas in general. ;)

[Need_A_Life]

"What the HELL is wrong with this place? We all know the road up to Markettown really needs some proper work, and that the forest needs to be cleared away from Old Man MacGonagal's orchard if he's gonna be able to collect his harvest without being molested by Satyrs. Again. We're all living with a Pelor-Damned ditch and wood curtain wall around the place because we've got no labour to do anything with all the slate and sandstone lying around in the quarry. We're all living in this fantasy cliche of horrors, we get attacked by random bandits and assorted demihuman scumbags on a weekly basis, we can't depend on some wacky bunch of wandering adventurers to turn up and defend us EVERY week and we really need to get some stuff done. And every time I ask who's gonna do it I get told there ain't enough manpower.

Well, I'm sick of it. I'm gonna go down to that there mound where we bury all the dead bandits and orcs and goblins and unsuccessful adventurers and whatnot and damn well raise them up and tell 'em to start fixin' things. Starting with the damn church roof.

What....evil act? How?"
Heh, I like this one.

I made a character who (unfortunately) never got to do his "zombie apocalypse" thing in the Eberron setting. This guy had seen some horrible things over the course of the War and he was determined that he'd never allow the War to start up again.
So he animated (and controlled) soldiers and had them buried in their respective countries. If those ignorant politicians ever declared War again, wights would start to break out of their coffins in their home countries, forcing them to turn their attention back to home rather than other nations.

I almost regret him averting full-on war via other means, because the alternative would've turned Eberron into a horror-survival war setting. :smallbiggrin:

Good? Hell no.
Evil? Maybe.
Horribly broken individual? Check and check.

[KillianHawkeye]

Tons of great ideas in this thread! :smallsmile:

[Incom]

Heh, I like this one.

I made a character who (unfortunately) never got to do his "zombie apocalypse" thing in the Eberron setting. This guy had seen some horrible things over the course of the War and he was determined that he'd never allow the War to start up again.
So he animated (and controlled) soldiers and had them buried in their respective countries. If those ignorant politicians ever declared War again, wights would start to break out of their coffins in their home countries, forcing them to turn their attention back to home rather than other nations.


This... is actually a pretty good idea for a setting. High level necromancer holds politicians hostage with this method, with similar good intentions, and eventually sinks into greater and greater tyranny. I like it. Saving this for the future-DM pile.

Anyway, for a much more mundane necromancer, they purchase corpses and use them as training dummies for the local guards/soldiers. Simple mass-inflict-whatever-wounds spells from local clerics keep them in good shape, and in an emergency they can be used as reserve forces. The soldiers learn not to cower at the undead, the clerics and necromancer get some practice, the town is more secure, everyone wins!

Until, of course, the necromancer goes bad, but then, the soldiers know how to fight off the undead so they aren't as badly screwed as one might think (especially when PCs get involved). Maybe everyone mistrusted him, and he couldn't take it any more (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ThenLetMeBeEvil), or something.

[TheDarkSaint]

An overwhelming need for control. The dead don't talk back, they do as they are told, when they are told to do it. For someone who has issues with either authority or with self esteem, this could be a powerful draw.

[AgentofHellfire]

Racism: The necromancer wouldn't dream of defiling the bodies of human beings, or elves, or whatever. That would be wrong. But really, why lose the value of a perfectly good servant/cannon fodder/what have you just because they died? Ridiculous. It's not like the mud people deserved respect beforehand, anyway...
Knowledge: The necromancer realizes something few do: some of the now dead know things, or knew them while alive. Thus, he/she dedicated his/her life to finding a way to coax that knowledge out of them, and, well...the undead soldiers are a perk.

[nedz]

Duty
They failed me in life, but they shall not fail me again ! Death is no excuse for avoiding your Duty !

Honour
You all swore an oath, and I will hold you to that ! Your spirits will not be relased until your honour is clensed !

Utilitarian
Undead are not sentient creatures, they are just machines I've made out of convieniently shaped components. Look: the arms are even interchangable, as are the heads.

[SowZ]

Thanks for the replies so far. :)
Anyone else have some nice motives for getting into the business? Oh, and excuses I don't need so much, just the reasons. :)

If you still want a selfish guy, someone who wants servants and power, a necromancer could have looked at the ways to achieve such power and settled on necromancy as the best route. Even morally speaking, the necromancer may have concluded that he KNEW he wanted servants and power and pledged to get it. With necromancy, he achieved his desires without really hurting anyone since undead are mindless. Win win.

[SowZ]

There's also Heroes of Horror's answer- the Detect Evil spell does not return an Evil result- since the character has successfully "balanced Evil acts with Good intentions" "and thus remains solidly Neutral".

Better examples of how "Detects as Evil does not mean willing to debase/destroy/etc" would include:

Undead. Clerics of Evil gods. Fiends who have redeemed themselves.

Its slightly odd language, though, isn't it? Even if it is what is usually used Fiends who have redeemed themselves, I mean. If they chose to be good, redeemed themselves from what? Being fiends?

[Communard]

How about this one:
A mage who was part of an army battalion during a brutal war fought by his home nation was involved in a raid on an enemy village. To hear the official story, it was a secret base for enemy forces intent on destroying the nation. But he knows better, because he was there. The screams of the women and children butchered that day haunt his dreams, and he becomes obsessed with the guilt. Eventually, he can bear it no more, he must atone for what he has done, he must make things right, he must stop the screaming: he must bring them back.

[J-H]

Bob started off as a mercenary wizard, but had several close calls as a result of the melee/Fighter components of the groups he participated in were very un-reliable at screening him from attack. He learned to animate basic undead somewhere along the way, and a timely group of Skeletons saved his butt in a battle that went bad.

More is better.
Bigger is better.
More powerful is better.

They are his guards, his shields, and his swordarms.

Besides, golems are a lot more expensive.

[hymer]

More great ideas, thanks guys! Great to come back to this thread and find it's grown. :)
Maybe I should mention that in this particular campaign world, we want none of that 'bringing the dead back might not be so evil', so even mindless undead are kept animate by the bound spirits of the dead. Thus, the undead are in agony until rendered inanimate, when the spirit finally escapes to its final resting place. So animate dead is both <Evil> by descriptor and evil by most moral definitions, not merely by standards and aesthetics.

[Icedaemon]

"What the HELL is wrong with this place? We all know the road up to Markettown really needs some proper work, and that the forest needs to be cleared away from Old Man MacGonagal's orchard if he's gonna be able to collect his harvest without being molested by Satyrs. Again. We're all living with a Pelor-Damned ditch and wood curtain wall around the place because we've got no labour to do anything with all the slate and sandstone lying around in the quarry. We're all living in this fantasy cliche of horrors, we get attacked by random bandits and assorted demihuman scumbags on a weekly basis, we can't depend on some wacky bunch of wandering adventurers to turn up and defend us EVERY week and we really need to get some stuff done. And every time I ask who's gonna do it I get told there ain't enough manpower.

Well, I'm sick of it. I'm gonna go down to that there mound where we bury all the dead bandits and orcs and goblins and unsuccessful adventurers and whatnot and damn well raise them up and tell 'em to start fixin' things. Starting with the damn church roof.

What....evil act? How?"

Yes! This is great.

[hamishspence]

redeemed themselves from what? Being fiends?

I was thinking more "the evil acts they've committed since their reincarnation as fiends" (in the cases of fiends that are mortal souls transformed into fiends after death).

Some fiends were never mortal in the first place (obyriths, many erinyes devils)- but it's not completely improbable that such a being might realise how evil its past lifestyle was, and seek to atone for it.

And yet, even after changing alignment, still detect as Evil thanks to the rules governing the Evil subtype.

[SowZ]

I was thinking more "the evil acts they've committed since their reincarnation as fiends" (in the cases of fiends that are mortal souls transformed into fiends after death).

Some fiends were never mortal in the first place (obyriths, many erinyes devils)- but it's not completely improbable that such a being might realise how evil its past lifestyle was, and seek to atone for it.

And yet, even after changing alignment, still detect as Evil thanks to the rules governing the Evil subtype.

Oh, interesting, I always thought Fiends where just created as fiends, like demons or something. Are celestials the same way? And I assume souls are reincarnated as fiends because of a particularly nasty life they lead?

[hamishspence]

Strongly Chaotic Evil mortal souls that go to the Abyss become manes, manes become dretches, and those that distinguish themselves somehow continue to get promoted.

The demon prince, Orcus for example, started off as a mortal soul.

For devils, it's soul shell, then lemure, then the promotion process continues depending on how well they do.

Similarly, strongly Lawful Good mortal souls become lantern archons, which may end up being further promoted.

Demonomicon (dragon magazine) suggests that some demons are associated with specific sins- so mortals that were especially lustful might be the seed material for succubi, if envious, for glabrezu, if slothful, for alkiliths, and so on.

But more normal CE souls just become manes (the least of demons) or nothing at all. (According to Complete Divine, most souls don't become Outsiders at all, but simply float around on the plane until it absorbs them.) "Petitioners" like manes, lantern archons, soul shells, and the like tend to have been moderately exceptional in life.

There are exceptions- fiends that are "born directly of their plane"- but it does seem common for mortal souls to become Outsiders.

[QuidEst]

Revenge (two flavors): The obvious one is for power to get back at somebody for whatever injustice they've done to them. Pretty common.

I kind of prefer the other flavor- they hate somebody so much that lichdom is a means for them to watch their enemy slowly age and die, and necromancy is a way to prolong that process once they're too weak to do anything about it, and then to bring them back when it's over. On a larger scale, it could be to watch the nation they hate fall apart over centuries thanks to steady pressure you initiate from its neighbors.

Sense of destiny: Perhaps they're unusually gifted at necromancy, and think that this signifies something. This plays a little more along the sorcerer line of things (or Oracle for all you Pathfinder fans).

Anti-destiny: Just the opposite of the above- using it as a means to take control of one's destiny. Everybody dies eventually- except for the exceptions. Being one of the exceptions means taking out the one thing normally guaranteed in life.

[hymer]

Ah yes, vengeance hadn't been covered. Nice! :)