Now that`s the spirit! Of course, for my character, it`s a step too far. H
e undertsands that killing in itself is evil, but won`t go so far as to raise from the dead (which is considered bad anyway) if they appear to be actually aware to some extent as to what is going on.


We should be so lucky? what? So if you died, you`d be quite happy to be resurrected and paraded around for someone else`s will, possibly under some kind of mental and spiritual pain?

Well it`s easy to talk like that when it`s just a game. I think you would believe differently if it was real.

In my opinion in order for a true hero to play with reanimation a few prerequisite are needed first (but this is more for general killing you will see what I mean in a bit)...

1. The NPC you reanimate must be evil in nature i.e. a rapist, murderer or necromancer et cetera.
2. If they are none of the above they must have attacked you first.

Reanimation is different to Necromancy for one reason... reanimation merely uses the shell of the body. In TES Universe the soul is the person; without the soul the body is empty flesh, it cannot feel or think. Reanimation is merely using the empty shell to follow the player and strike at others, there is nothing of the original NPC in there. Necromancy would be evil as the actual soul (thus the person with it) are bound with their corpse once again and must follow their masters commands.

But it`s not different to necromancy because it is not just reanimation which is what i thought it was at first. The fact that the body said `thankyou` on death shows that it was sentient and aware. This means a spirit was within the body or at the least the brain KNEW what was happening to it and that what was happening to it it did not like, which suggested it knew a time when things were nicer, which suggests that it was GLAD when it was `killed` again. This means it was NOT just a reanimation, but the waking up of an actual self-aware being.

I don`t know how many times I am going to have to repeat this for some people to understand.

See, I like this, because it shows you've put thought into it. Much better than someone who says, "It's not evil," just because they want to do it and don't want to think about it.

I agree BW.

There's a couple of npc's in the game who really highlight the most base side of necromancy.

Personally, very very few of my characters do it...they are more tuned into making people dead, not making dead people live....

It's called roleplaying.


Yea, I was interested in the arc, because I've always been fascinated by "good" characters that turn "bad" (I.E.: Anakin Skywalker / Darth Vader, Jean Grey / Phoenix), so I always kinda liked the idea of the opposite of that, a character who would, by all rights be considered "evil", but is actually the good guy.


Thanks.

The character is actually based on a character of my own fiction. My Oblivion character was essentially the same build, but a totally different roleplay. The character in Oblivion is the villain from my story, the character who becomes corrupted by the power and consumed by it. There were a lot of Oblivion mechanics that I used to feed the roleplay, like The Atronach birthsign and an "addiction" to Welkynd Stones.

In Skyrim, my character is the hero, the character who fights against the struggle to become consumed with the power, but instead learns to embrace it, and use his powers for the greater good. Something of a twisted fate that he accepts because he understands that the stakes are bigger than him.

Meh, it's just a game. More help in a fight is always good.

Do you have a ' key on your keyboard? I'm just curious. ` =/= '

No, not outlawed at all. Not technically or otherwise. 200 years ago, yes, by the Mage's Guild (who were a bunch of pansies that couldn't solve the Mannimarco problem when he dies in 2 whacks of a sword), who has since disbanded on order of the Aldmeri Dominion.

Necromancy is perfectly legal, although frowned upon. Like mastvrbating on a plane

In cyrodiil. It isnt outlawed in skyrim.

are you serious? did you ever think raising the dead would be good?

that's so wrong...

Don't you think the "thank you" could have been a glitch? I have never heard it before, you said you have heard it only once... has anyone else heard them talk post-reanimation?

I could quite believe it. Post 1.4 I've overheard and been part of a lot of new conversations...really 'immersive' type stuff.

I don't think it's evil per se, but it is disrespectful of the dead. Then again, in TES when we kill someone we can just strip everything off their corpse, drop it down a hole and be on our merry way so...who can say?

Necromancy itself has never been illegal, only the mages guild in the day banned its members from practicing it. (I'm no lore buff but as far as I understand)

Yes in the game all necromancers will attack the player, and are categorised as evil, but this is in relation to our (Earths) morality system.

Nirn's is different, necromancy is just another area of Magic that is used by practicing mages as part of conjuration due to the principles of conjuring a atronarch is the same as raising a body.

I do not see this as evil, just a tool to use in my quest for knowledge.

If a sword is swung and decapitate someone, I'm pretty sure you do not call the noble knight evil.

So why label my mage evil for using a tool to keep himself alive.

I believe it's just one dungeon where are the ressurected bodies thank you for killing you, they also say things like ''forgive me, I don't want to do this to you''. There is a reason necromancy was banned by magic colleges all over Tamriel, same with the use of dark souls.

Nope, raised folks from random encounters with random necromancers always say something similar when killed again, like 'free at last!' etc.

There's nothing wrong with roleplaying an evil character in a game, so long as the player is aware of it. I mean, game designers maybe could have placed more prominent hints on what exactly is necromancy and humanoid soul trapping in black soul gems, so that average player could make a moral choice for his character rather than only lore freaks. Merging Conjuration school with Necromancy and throwing in ranger/druid ability to call a wolf on top of that does the job verrrry verrrrry poorly. As well as simply making black soul gems relatively rare to come accross, yet a random loot nonetheless.

I'm not patronizing you, so there's no need patronize me back. I was joking.

The fact that the mages guild did take measures against once shows it's not entirely considered benign. It seems to be just as much a mixed bag on Nirn as it is among various players' minds.

It's viewed differently, for example, the whole Dunmer Ancestor "good" necromancy thing.

Also, looting tombs is disrespect to dead, animating an aware being to do your bidding against his/her will is far more than simply disrespect.

Yeah, the looting of tombs actually is one of those I question too (I still do it though. But I guess I could play a character that doesn't. Not a big loss anyways... I think).

My otherwise rather good-aligned Argonian who grew up among travelling Khajiit merchants doesn't give a damn about Nord ancestors, so she loots every burial urn, out of sheer curiosity. If she were a Nord or a Dunmer, she wouldn't loot burial sites unless there is a serious excuse for that.

Really? Well that proves my point even more then. I never heard any of this before; I wonder if the 1.4 Patch fixed this so npcs speak more?


Yes, it`s unthought out game design and possibly a part of `streamlining` that has wrongly put Necromancy in with Conjuration. Big mistake as it screws up the whole magic thing logic.

AS for me I only ever raised a body once (since my caharcter is really against magic) but it never said anything when it died and I assumed it just a basic animation. Then I gave the staff to my Follower and let her do it.

But now, after my character has heard an undead say `Thankyou` illustrating it knows what`s going on (and is probably the same person with memories of being alive) and obviously not liking it and other examples from forum adventurers above,, he will never use them and now has a renewed mission to bring all undead to merciful peace- and punish the caster.

Yeah, that's what I first thought of when I read your original post.

You should be able to hear a lot of them say that at the Jurgen Windcaller quest. There's a few necromancers controlling bandits. Usually vampire thralls say it as well.

Another cool dungeon near whiterun is surrounded by ethereal ghosts.. all bandits and hunter types. They're not zombies, but there's a necromancer within the dungeon controlling them. When you get near the place, they try to warn you off, saying "Get away. I can't help it. I'm sorry!" and then they attack. When you kill them, they express the same relief as thralls.

That's weird. This morning I killed a bandit a mage had reanimated and it said something like "free again". And I'd never heard that before.