Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 lord_zzyzx Aug 21, 2008 15:01:28	A member of my group wants to continue playing a necromancer. I haven't been able to find anything in 4E that allows players to have followers, minions, or undead servants (aside from a sparcely-detailed necromancer found in the DMG.) I turn to you. If any of you have stats for minions, followers, or undead servants that could be used to make a necromancer, please let me know.
#2 Nived Aug 21, 2008 16:24:06	There was a similar question I heard posed at one of the 4e Q&A sessions at Gen Con, though it had more to do with summoning than necromancy. Still I think the answer may help you. One of the design philosophies of 4e is that every player's turn should take about the same amount of time. In in 3rd edition especially at high level you might have one guy cast a spell, or move and attack, simple quick turn, usually one roll of the dice... but other players might use a full attack action and have five or more attack and damage rolls to resolve, then another player, lets say a druid with an animal companion summons 1d4 nature's ally's then suddenly has to resolve his own multiple attacks, then his animal companions, then each of his summons... The person who took the singular action is going to get bored waiting for the inititive to get back to them... 4e wants to avoid that... That's not to say Summoning is out (take a look on the cover of the PHBII and notice the two spectral ghostie looking big cats flanking that primal looking Shifterish character), but rather the way they wanted to do it, was to not have it overwhelm the table or put more emphisis on your pet than your character. To focus on Ash instead of Pikachu... if you will. So what the designers and developers said is take a good long look at flaming sphere, there you can see a template or early form of how summoning should work in 4th edition, to attack with it you must direct it, it still uses your actions, so by summoning you don't gain exponentially more spotlight and tabletime. So what does this have to do with the price of undead in Karrnath? What I'm saying is you should apply the same philosophy to necromancy. If you create a wizard power that allows the creation of some sort of zombie or skeleton that'll be there and attack when the wizard uses a standard action to attack with it. It'll give the player the flavor he wants, and it'll work within the 4th edition rules. Will this let him walk around with an army of undead? No, but really if he had an army of undead why would he need a party?
#3 Gilo Aug 21, 2008 17:59:10	A similar example to the wizard's flaming sphere will be the Artificer's Dancing Weapon (5th level daily power in the test play pdf). also you can define that the skeleton/zombie is a swarm type monster - then it can be described as a group but game-mechanic wise played as one monster (/one standard action)
#4 JohnLynch Aug 21, 2008 20:30:07	Martial Power will have stats on companions for Rangers. I'd say you could switch out those to use for your necromancer. Alternatively you could use this onyx dog as your basis as well.
#5 mystrich Aug 21, 2008 21:17:49	Martial Power will have stats on companions for Rangers. I'd say you could switch out those to use for your necromancer. Alternatively you could use this onyx dog as your basis as well. He beat me to it, I was about to suggest this as well. While 4e took out things like familiars, homunculi, and undead servants for PCs, if you want to have them, then you could work it like the above magic item.
#6 lord_zzyzx Aug 22, 2008 15:39:27	Thank you all, very much. I think these suggestions will give him enough direction to make the conversion. It will not be exact, but it will be playable in 4E.
#7 need_a_life Aug 22, 2008 16:09:33	http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=1055706 Here's a homebrew class made just for that :P