Memento Mori: Approaches to Necromancy

I've been thinking and reading and watching things recently regarding various aspects of necromancy in RPGs. Specifically there seems to be a lot of debate as to whether it's a good thing having necromancers as PCs and whether or not necromancy constitutes an inherently immoral thing etc etc. You know, the usual stuff. I don't know if it's specifically my own inclination for morbid fascination with bones and skulls, or whether it's something that most people find, if not interesting as such in a way that makes it an enjoyable subject, at least intriguing, at least something which pulls at their imagination, at least something grimly alluring, but the idea of Necromancy is interesting. Let's say that, at least. Interesting.

By 'interesting' I think I mean 'has held an enduring fascination for thinkers and artists since the conception of mortality'.

What's also interesting perhaps is an examination of possible reasons why it is often looked upon as morally reprehensible. So many times I've been reading about this and I come across the same kind of argument. It's the idea that necromancy, as a force is amoral and thus separate from its actual use and application. If someone uses it in an immoral way, then it is immoral, and presumably the converse is also true. If someone uses necromancy in a moral way, or avoids using it in an immoral way, they are fine (if still a little bit kind of creeeeepy or just morbid).

But in regular D&D, a necromancer has very little choice but to use it in these supposedly immoral ways. The only choices they have when it comes to using the most effective and powerful spells is to raise and bind the dead, to leech the breath and life from the living and twist it, to wrench it away and use it for whatever their own purpose may be. To kill. The general kind of thinking, I would imagine, goes along the lines of 'what's the point of being a necromancer if you don't want hordes of undead followers to do your foul bidding? The minions are what it's all about!' See my previous post regarding effectiveness and its incompatibility with roleplaying.

But what if there actually was a real choice? A choice that profoundly affected the way a necromancer approached their interactions with the living as well as the deceased.

In my previous post, I speculated upon how the structure of the universe is very important when dealing with things like magic, the dead, and interactions therewith. So to begin with we have the kind of necromancer bent upon indentured servitude through binding the deceased, or the bodies thereof. The issue of whether this constitutes actual slavery depends upon the sentience of the dead when they are bound, but I think it is far more interesting to suggest that there really are souls or perhaps consciousnesses involved in there somewhere, otherwise it would be too similar to simply animating any kind of inanimate object. No, the significance of raising the dead is that it is far easier when one uses a spirit that used to be alive. Instead of going through the rigmarole of animating say a statue, with all the complexity of giving a kind of effective artificial intelligence (which, as we know, is much easier said than done), one can dip into the ether and hunt for an erstwhile living, breathing thing that knows how to think, knows how to inhabit a body.

I suppose a neat parallel I could draw would be the relationship between mages, demons, and the fade in the Dragon Age series. The power of mages comes from the fade, and the demons therein are often bargained with or contracted to servitude with varying degrees of success by mortal mages. This relationship hinges upon slavery and maintaining a tight control over the spirits in order for them to be used and manipulated as the mage wants. However, this does not really speak of an actual relationship between sentient creatures, only one of pragmatism and efficiency. The main alternative to this, I feel, is presented in Inquisition where Solas (we'll ignore any plot related points on how Solas is .. well, I don't want to give away any spoilers for those who haven't played) and his interactions with the spirits of the fade, which are far more mutual, more along the lines of sentient creatures' understanding each other and, although they are of different kind, different nature, they act towards each other with respect. The taboos regarding interactions with demons and the dangers of possession etc etc are disregarded by him because he understands their motivations and has an empathetic kind of relationship with them. He sticks largely to his world, they stick largely to theirs, but there is a meaningful relationship formed between the two. I suppose it is this which I am trying to suggest can be reflected in the workings of the necromancer.

The key theme we see emerging here is one of imposition. The projection of one's will onto another without their consent leads to the subtraction of agency from the dominated party. When a prospective necromancer binds dead spirits or bodies to his or her service, they are stripping this erstwhile person of their free will, taking away what makes/made them human. This works whether or not one chooses to include the existence of souls in their RPGs. A human's body, whether they are dead or not, if often thought to still essentially be subject to the right of bodily integrity, hence the taboo regarding grave robbing and the sanctity of the corpse. Whether you ascribe active agency or not to a person's dead body and/or soul results in the same issues when one attempts to interfere with them.

This feels like a complex issue, but the crux that I am getting at is that there appears to be two opposing approaches to interaction with the dead.

Two different strands of Necromancy. Neither one inherently good or bad. I think we can do away with the notion of inherent good and evil and instead look at these approaches as able to justify themselves in their own ways. Because each one considers the other to be foolish and/or dangerous is simply a product of their differing philosophies.

One seeks to reach an equilibrium with the other side of life, to put to rest any misgivings or misinterpretations about what it means to pass over, to join the choir invisible, or otherwise shuffle off this mortal coil. If one were to D&D-ify this approach, a place to start might be the dubious profession of the medium. One who channels the spirits of the dead in an empathetic and mutual way, seeking to communicate and to understand rather than to dominate. Perhaps this approach seeks the dissolution of the barriers that separate life and death. How can one die in the traditional sense if the boundaries are so blurred? Perhaps this path is about seeking a way to live forever, or to radically change the structure of the world so that death no longer means such and abrupt and definite end to life.

The other is about control and harnessing the potential of the well of souls to which we all go when we die. There's a lot of gravity in that well. It is heavy with the weight of the dead. It's about tapping the power of the billions of souls that have lived and died, for the benefit of those that live. Its about preserving the order of the world. Embracing the ephemeral nature of life and holding the structure of the universe bound in an iron grip to keep it turning, keep it working as it should. The fabric of life and death are such that each cannot exist without the other. If death is rendered meaningless, if the wold is tampered with on such a fundamental level, it is impossible to determine whether life can still exist.

I think I shall compile some more ideas and create some non-competitive D&D classes based around these ideas. Thanks for reading, if indeed you did.

Non-competitive classes

Balance. I'm not a huge fan.

It's been sort of narking me recently that all D&D classes seem to be for is making characters as good as each other. They aren't there to make a character into an interesting or nuanced person as much as they are to make the character relevant in combat. Classes make characters excel at something, make it so that they have a niche and their skills are combat-useful.

Case in Point

When a wizard runs out of spells things get very undignified

Take wizards for example- a staple of D&D, practically the sine qua non of fantasy games. There's always a wizard in there somewhere. In D&D, wizards rely on their spells to be effective, and this is partly where the problem lies. I fully anticipate that this might sound like an absolutely ridiculous statement but I make it because in D&D, mechanically speaking, other than cast spells wizards are good for nothing. When they run out they're basically a peasant with a stick and a large vocabulary.

In order for there to be some kind of balance within the game, class wise, fighters should be balanced with wizards when it comes to efficacy within combat. Combat is the crucible in which all the classes are tried and tested for that thing called balance. But I don't like that. When aiming for a fantasy that is somewhat interesting, balance is something to be avoided like the plague. A person who has trained every day of their life with a sword should be able to come up against someone who has never swung anything sharper than a spoon in all their days and instead spent their waking hours engrossed in books, and completely wipe the floor with them.

The idea is that all classes should be roughly equatable in combat for the sake of balance, right? Alright, maybe not quite... I suppose it's more that each has a kind of niche within the fight- each has a combat role, be it healing, defense, damage, stealth, or what have you. But my point is that none of the classes are objectively not useful when it comes to combat.

I do understand this. D&D is a team-focused game that relies upon people working together, especially in combat. But I would find it odd that someone would devote their lives to reading and delving into the secrets of the universe just so that they could pop a spell at some goblins or bandits or whatever. Yet a wizard in combat is regarded as a somewhat poor show if they haven't memorised a fireball or two and can't keep up with the fighter in terms of damage output.

The key term here is efficacy. The default model is efficacy measured on a numeric scale. But what I'm aiming for is wizards, in fact all spellcasters, that are less powerful in terms of immediate effect. In my opinion, what these classes do within a story is function as the catalyst for inserting magic, for making the adventure magical in the first place.

What makes a wizard an interesting class to me is the concept of their power possibly being measured on a narrative scale. One that is relevant to the storytelling within a game. Their ability to know things and to go places that other's wouldn't otherwise is the interesting part. Their power to apprehend forces beyond the scope of the untrained, their capacity to pull snippets of forbidden lore from dark parts of the universe and follow the trail of occult evidence back to its source. To really delve into the unknown and mysterious facets of the world.

The adventure only truly begins when things take a step away from what is normal. A spellcaster's ability to see elements of the magical in the mundane is what I'm trying to get at here. Having magic and wizards and whatnot lends an element of unexpected and spontaneous significance to what is otherwise commonplace. It makes people re-examine the normal, because what is going on under the surface could be something entirely and staggeringly not normal.

I'm going to work on a list that involves non-competitive classes. Ones that can't even be compared to each other numerically because their domains are so utterly different. It would almost make it so that players in the same group were manipulating the game via vastly different mechanics that only their characters could influence, each representative of how the character perceives the world. At this point nothing is off the table, except that you can take your lightning bolts and your magic missiles and put them ... put them somewhere else. I've got a bunch of other stuff to think about. Hummm...

A Case for the Axiomatic Universe

I am a believer that, in order to be consistently surprising and interesting, a setting needs rules. It needs rules not necessarily like 'rules for combat' or 'rules for spellcasting'. Those are game rules, not setting rules. A setting needs rules that are more like immutable axioms. Laws. Ones that can be used and interacted with and that have consequences for transgression or attempts thereat. General laws that function like mathematical axioms (although it's fine if you're fairly sparse with the numbers. I'm certainly not going to spout any algebra) can help to bring a kind of reliability and structure to a more free-form campaign, or spark inspiration for a deep and involved storyline and meaningful character motivations and revelations.

Amidst the intricacies of world building, there comes a point where you have to grapple with the cosmology of the world. A point where you have to consider what actually happens to a person when they die, and why. Whether it is a simple as going to sleep forever and being subsumed by the soil, or whether it is more complicated than that, is open to different interpretations. This is not a description of the beliefs of people or their convictions or belief in any specific eschatology, but a literal account of the metaphysical (or purely physical) structure of the universe itself, including how living creatures figure into that construction.

For example, a child out for a walk with a parent (I may be recalling from life here) might see a dead bird and make some kind of comment about it, maybe ask what the bird is doing, whether it's okay, and the kid might be a bit sad because I think on a fundamental level, all children understand death in a way, unmolded by growing up. The parent might try and explain death, saying it is dead and leave it at that, or they might try to assuage the child's sadness by suggesting that its spirit is in heaven and is generally having an okay time despite its crumpled body being face down in a puddle (or indeed, that seemingly popular thing that adults say to children, 'bird heaven'. A kind of vanilla version of the Christian argument that only humans really have souls and nothing else is destined for the kingdom of eternal bliss and happiness). Does this then mean that every species on the planet has a specific heaven that they go to? Does this extend to plants? What happens when it gets all crowded? Where actually is it- is it up in the sky? Can I see it? All those innocent and practical things a child might think when first confronted with the idea of 'heaven' have an amusingly apt and appropriate place in fictional world-building.

Anyway, I digress. There are a few key questions that need to be answered in order to address the issue with the hope of coming to any meaningful conclusion. And these questions, although contentions is reality, are so easy to think about in a fictional context. Things that are tragic and immutable in the real world can function differently in fiction. They can be powerfully symbolic and catalysts for profound interpretations of our own lives. That is, after all, I feel what roleplay is for. Getting inside something or someone else in order to allow for reflection on one's own actions and life. These things can be crafted and informed by intent and the desire to convey a particular feeling, metaphor, or, you know, just because they allow for some cool stuff like magic and demons and undead and so on.

A prime example of belief informing practice- Allegedly, The Greeks and Romans were sent on their passage with gold placed upon or in their mouth to pay the ferryman to the afterlife- no one wants to be caught short in that kind of situation.

Some necessary questions (necessary for myself, anyway- take from them what you will, dear reader):

1) What is real?

Detailed in reams and reams of religious doctrine are accounts of the reality of souls, how we are animated by a divine spark or a kind of spirit, energy, identity, or consciousness separate (or not separate) from our material bodies which endures in some way after that body ceases to live in a way that is more than just memory. Scores of different belief systems around the world ascribe to the persistence of a person after they die, in some way or another. They attest to there being something more to being alive than just being able to think. Something that cannot be immediately apprehended and can be accessed through spiritual or otherwise non-physical means.

If the answer is, in actual physical real terms, anything like a 'no', then the sole existence of life after death relies upon human belief and cultural tradition. There is no reality after death that we can definitely verify, there is no afterlife except what people imagine in their minds, and people persist in no other way than the memories of the deceased that reside with the living. This system is not unlike the one we find ourselves in here on earth (that is of course if one isn't particularly religious or spiritual but let's not get into talking about things that are real. It's just D&D here, you understand).

If, however, due to the luxury of fantasy and fiction, we can imagine the answer to this question resembles a rather more concrete form of 'yes', the second question must be addressed.

2) If souls are real, what are they?

This question is not really quite as straightforward as the last one. In fact it's a bit misleading because it could more accurately be described as lots of smaller questions that can or cannot be answered definitively all masquerading as one larger question that is full of holes and confusion...

These questions might be something like-

- Is the living creature's consciousness directly tied to the soul and does it persist with the soul after death?

- Following from that, does the soul have any kind of agency or is it simply an impartial piece of matter or energy, pulled around by the universe to whatever end?

- Do souls have any kind of physical reality or is it impossible to interact with on a physical level? I.e. can a living person actually see or otherwise apprehend it and likewise can it do anything to interact with the physical world?

- If they can exist without bodies, are there souls that have always existed without bodies? Like angels, devils, what have you.

- Where do souls come from? Are they eternal? Without beginning or end? Are they created or do they come into being when something is born? Do they cease to exist as an individual entity at any point?

You can of course kind of riff of anything here until you get to a point you like, or until you feel you've gone far enough to cope with anything that might crop up during the course of play (of course, this is no guarantee, no matter how much you plan).

All these can of course lead into many larger questions about the nature of the universe, its structure, processes of change, its beginning and end.

3) Is the world multidimensional?

In basic terms, this is asking 'does heaven exist?'. Are there any places in the world that cannot be directly seen or interacted with by people living in the material world except by means of magic or symbolic ritual or something, and what are they? There are again many questions one can imagine when trying to puzzle out the nature of these extra-dimensional places. Such as-

-Do they have an inherent nature or meaning or are they just 'other' kind of places?

-How did they get there? Did they exist since the beginning of the universe, if indeed there was such a thing, or did some fluke or the universal mechanics cause them to be, or did some will create them?

-Do they overlap with they world in which humans live or are the two places completely separate? For example, in D&D cosmology the plane of shadow or the ethereal plane could be said to 'overlap' whereas outer planes like the abyss are, although in certain ways connected to the material plane, more or less separately located.

-Do they provide a kind of function to the universe? Like organs within a body, are they necessary to keep the structure of the universe ticking over or are they inherently meaningless? For example, Purgatory serves a purpose in that is a place that souls go if they were kind of okay but not great, or Jewish, or Pagan, or something else deemed by ye olde Catholics to be 'not really cool'.

-What are the contents of a given alternate dimension? Does it look like an alternate version or our world or is it something entirely different?

-Are there a finite number of extra dimensions?

-Are they easily accessed (and if so, how) or are they completely hidden?

Again, like, go mad with the ideas until you feel like you're at an acceptable level of cool, or weird, or intricate, or profound. I don't have to tell you, I'm sure.

This question then feeds directly into the last question

4) As a result of interaction between the answers to questions 2 & 3, what generally happens when someone or something dies, and what can happen?

Once all the things in the world pertaining to the cosmology are in place, I find it becomes quite interesting to think about what might happen to a soul after it leaves the body, or perhaps doesn't leave the body. I dunno. This then helps you answer things like-

Can the dead come back to life?

Did they ever even leave?

Does the experience of death stay with one as a concrete memory that carries on into the afterlife, or are all memories and impressions of individual personality erased upon death?

Can one influence or communicate with the dead in any meaningful way? If so, how?

How do the living interact with souls that are devoid of body (whether dead, having left the body, or other-dimensional, having never had one in the first place)?

This section of questioning is interesting in that it opens the way for some really interesting interactions and ideas, but that it also potentially suggests that no matter the structure of the universe, there are some things that are just not possible (but then that just incites a greater challenge in the minds of players upon discovery, no doubt allowing for even more story potential and DM contortion).

Conclusion

Either way, by using the framework you have previously conceived of, you can create logically consistent and interesting interactions that follow the rules that you have set down. Even better, it allows the players to do the same. If the bones of the world are eventually laid bare (in a story-appropriate kind of way, naturally) and the players see that all is not subject only to the fickle will of their DM, a fallible human, but that in many ways the DM is subject to those rules as well, it can act as an empowering experience that helps players feel invested in their story and their character.

Contrary to precluding cultural beliefs and faiths, questions like these can be used as a starting point for imagining ways in which people interpret what they can see of these processes into their own belief and faith systems. Religions and cultural practices can be informed by these things and the ways in which they impact upon the lives of people in the setting. If souls are real, and there are multiple dimensions to the world, and there is significant and meaningful interaction between all of these things, they can perhaps manifest as spirits, demons, angels, inexplicable beings, ghosts, travel to the afterlife (and back?) and they can be present in people's mythology not just as metaphor or folklore, but as tangible things about which to learn, about to wonder, about which to be afraid, and about which to whisper prayers in the dead of night. It all goes together to form a kind of mindset which people in the world have, and upon which they base their actions, beliefs, and knowledge (epistemology- sorry, I said it again).

All these questions of course do not need to be made and answered explicitly to players in a D&D campaign (in fact it is more interesting and exciting for them to figure these things out by themselves as long as, of course, these rules they discover remain the same- enough so they know what to expect next time) but, in my opinion, it really helps a DM to have a fair idea of what happens in definite terms in their cosmology when the players do things like kill stuff, get killed, travel to different planes, mess with magic and the fabric of reality. Converse to limiting player's decisions, I feel it actually allows them to interact with the campaign world in a more meaningful way. If they come to understand the structure of the world they play in, they can inhabit it and use it, they can manipulate it, protect it, destroy it, whatever really.

In any case, the jury is out when it comes to the metaphysical structure of fictional worlds, and you can have as much fun as your imagination can cope with. The key point I'm making here is that laws like this help DMs and players to create consistently interesting worlds and meaningful experiences with logically consistent cause and effect relationships that actually matter. Good things, in my opinion.