Hmm...

[baby-eater]

So, I was messing around with my necromancer in the blue dragon caverns (post normal-ending completion) and was pretty much just beating everything down, till I ran into a greater titan, and due to my lack of attention, got killed. Fortunately, the necromantic class ability brought me back to life, at half toughness and health. And, like I said, I was paying little attention and it happened again, and again, and again, and again...suddenly my health was 1 and my toughness was still at 10 (the minimum for the resurrection ability). By the time I looked back at what I was doing, I was amazed to find I had been killed so many times and still came back. But I couldn't do much at 1hp so I determined to kill my necro for good. Ramming repeatedly into the greater titan resulted in me getting killed several dozen more times, but after a while my max hp popped up from 1 to 296 and stayed there, eventually I took out the greater titan, and was still alive. So I grabbed my wand of wishing and wished for the emperor moloch. I spent the next 20 minutes beating greater molochs with my bare hands, and getting killed hundreds of times in the process. Eventually I found out it was because of the gear I have on (Robes of resistance {To +5}) is keeping my toughness above 10, thus keeping me alive indefinitely...
tl;dr: I am immortal.

[Siriah]

That's awesome. You really weren't paying attention if your HP managed to get halved all the way to 1. Now only old age and toughness drains will kill you :P

[Silfir]

Man. He achieved immortality without even knowing it. That's stupid and totally awesome at the same time.

[baby-eater]

I was watching louis black on tv and holding down '4'. like I said, really not paying attention.

[Shadow_2014]

Louis Black is great. At what level is a Necro granted that particular Class Ability? Because with enough buffing of your To, you could still have a pretty durable character.

[Silfir]

Level 50. And it's not "pretty durable", it's "fucking immortal". Except for the whole old age and dungeon collapsing thing.

[Laukku]

This isn't new: I had found the same thing reported in the newsgroup some years ago, too. Search for immortal necromancer or something. It's even in the old bug database.

[Subconscious]

I have known this since I heard first time about necro class ability.
It has been kinda dream to achieve, too bad necros are so weak otherwise.

[Ars]

Level 50. And it's not "pretty durable", it's "fucking immortal". Except for the whole old age and dungeon collapsing thing.And corruption.

EDIT: and apparently from overcasting. (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.roguelike.adom/browse_thread/thread/b2875f3e2376751c/f127fe2f8863dc11?lnk=gst)

[Soirana]

necros are so weak otherwise.

since when? I mean since when guys who start with offensive spell, concentration, pick spells with ease and find spellbooks at wizard rate are a problem?

[Subconscious]

Yes they are comparedly weak.
They start without healing and have poor stats, their first class powers are useless at early levels.

When I say they are weak I mean that other classes are tougher. Of course this is just my view, newbies would say that every class is very weak and pros would say that every class is outpowered.

[Silfir]

Necros are extremely frail, that's why most beginners have problems. Advanced players know how to stay out of melee at all times...

[Soirana]

compared to which class? Merchants who never got reasonable powers? Farmers who start naked with two handed weapon and hopes for true berserk bonus?

more than a half classes start without healing and going to vd4 killing healer with frost bolt and gettinmgh healing at 60 is damn easy anyway.
Class St Le Wi Dx To Ch Ap Ma Pe
Necomancer -1 +2 +2 0 +1 -4 -3 +3 0
Wizard -2 +3 +3 +1 -1 +2 0 +3 +1

Let me think necro vs wizard stats +1ST, -1LE, -1Wi, -1Dx, +2To!
Where do you see poor stats?

What melee? They get +2To compared to wizards and frost bolt to start with. With no penaltries to mana (i am not that sure about PP).

[gut]

A necromancer doesn't have a wizard's class power of reducing
spell cost, this increases the chance of melee. They never start
with two offensive books, this also increases the probability of
melee. They do have the 'find weakness' skill, which applies to
archery, but that doesn't really compliment a caster.

[Silfir]

Maybe the view of necromancers being extremely weak started when people compared them to wizards and found them to be inferior spellcasters. Beginners seldom know how to get Healing in the early game - once you do, necros lack of Healing is hardly an issue, that much is true.

In the end, necromancers ARE inferior to wizard apart from the coolness factor of undead slaves and potential immortality at level 50.

[Soirana]

Well, yes, Necros are worser than wizards but who is not?

Speaking about spellcasters -- there are three pure spellcaster classes (at least from weapon mark point)

wizards, necros and elementalists. I would choose necro over elementalist on any given day.

The only real problem i do see is Necromancy per se sucks. Most of my necros never ever used it.
p.s. i always fought getting food preservation is one best necro bonusses.

[baby-eater]

Yeah if you start em off right necro's can be like wizards who get buddies to fight for em.
especially once you get the 'dreaded shadow touch.' Too bad I was trying to stay neutral for the whole game, so i was limited to the class abilities I could use.

[Molach]

When I was playing in MUDs, like DURIS and stuff, Necros were one of the coolest classes. They could build up and control undeads, Zombies and skeletons that were mindless warriors, Spectres that were assassins and could hide and backstab and were hard to hit, wraiths that could be ordered to unleash magic, vampires with bad attitude and a paralyzing neckbite, and liches that were masters of magic, could be used to cast wizard-type spells on the necromancer. And then, the mighty Dracolich with area breath and tailsweep on other players. Evil fun. That is where the name "Molach" originated, nothing to do with "Moloch" in this game. Loosely inspired on "Moloch" or "Molok", ancient evil god of course.

Sadly, in ADOM undead slaves (companions general, I think) are too weak at the time you can make them, so they are just for utility use. They are not worthless, I would use them for tasks that might be bad for alignment. And with skillful use they might save you when running from something, by standing dumb in the way a few turns.

Still, when I started out I figured elementalists were the easiest class, because they get spells innate. Then I suddenly noticed how many books drop for wizards and went on to rule with them. At this time I could not keep a necromancer alive. Lastly, I have come to try a few necros and find them easy enough.

I've not played elementalist for ages. Wonder if they have low probability on showing up when I randomly generate a character.

EDIT: Just tried a necro to prove how great they are. And ...he started with a tract of chaos. High elf necro wasn't too hot, don't like weaklings without magic.

[baby-eater]

That is where the name "Molach" originated, nothing to do with "Moloch" in this game. Loosely inspired on "Moloch" or "Molok", ancient evil god of course.
Moloch, or Molech, or Molok, biblically is a demon that is characterized by sacrifices of children by their parents, the eater of children. Thus the name baby-eater, a spin off my gamer tag, which happens to be...Moloch!

[Grey]

In particular children are meant to be sacrificed by burning, which is why I had the emperor moloch summoned thusly in my tale of the red rooster. Someone suggested once that JADE could use the likes of Hebrew letters for demons - that'd be especially appropriate for molochs I think.

[LFk]

From my experience, Necromancers run into the problem early where they cannot be as liberal with their spells as wizards. I'm still not sure what what determines how many points you get per reading of a spellbook. If one is to assume its some function of Le, Wi, Literacy, Concentration, difficulty of spell, whether you are a casting/semicasting/fighter class and B/U/C status of the book, there's no reason that Necromancers should gain any fewer points per reading than wizards.

However, in my experience, Necros just don't learn spells as well as wizards, and are forced to use physical methods of combat much more often.

This makes them far difficult to keep alive, as they are really not significantly tougher than wizards.



I'd like to try this immortality thing. I think it would be really cool, except i've never even gotten a Necro to level 25 never mind 50...

[gut]

> I would choose necro over elementalist on any given day.

Agreed there, elementalists have such horrible skill modifiers,
that getting even the concentration skill to 100 is a pain.

> The only real problem i do see is Necromancy per se sucks.

It's useful for the early game, if you combine it with an early
visit to the BUGWIL. Pick up a few hobgoblin (leader!) corpses
on the way, and turn them into ghuls when it only costs 1 Ma
point. Since you level fast in the BUGWIL, you can actually gain
a few Ma points this way.

Quickly reaching higher exp. levels, like ~12 will cause your
slaves to 'adjust in power', making them very powerful, even if
your necro is still weak. I think a few exp. level ~12-hobgoblin-
leader-ghul-slaves are a great help for the early game.

> i always fought getting food preservation is one best necro

If it would ever rise above 50, so would I : )

I think maybe the single best advantage necros have over wizards,
is the 'find weakness' skill. Not for melee of course, but it helps a
lot for missile attacks. I loved in ADOM 1.0.0 that wizards also
started with that skill... as if they weren't powerful enough already : )

[baby-eater]

> The only real problem i do see is Necromancy per se sucks.

There's nothing sucky about a quickling queen lich.