Now that we've had some good discussion on it, allow me to narrow down the options.
1) Command Undead one zombie, Steal Vitality on another, allow Omo and hopefully now commanded zombie to take out the third
2) Command Undead one zombie, allow Omo and zombie to take on the other two zombies.
3) Steal Vitality on all. Destroy them from a distance, no mercy.
4) Command Undead all zombies, new personal search party.
5) Attempt new "Unravel Necromancy" spell, or similar way to destroy undead short of Vitality damage.
6) Avoid using magic unless Omo is overwhelmed, conserve MP
Go ahead and vote for whatever you want, in whatever order you want. I won't be prompting you for combat actions round by round- basically, give me a plan of attack and you'll execute it until the plan goes to hell (e.g the kids are right in that tree there, You/Omo gets seriously injured, new enemies enter the combat, spell produces unexpected effect, etc)
Current plan is "Look to see if the kids are right here/in a tree, see whether there is any existing "ownership" of zombies, execute attack plan X." Feel free to modify any or all of it. You aren't limited to the options you've already discussed, I'm just looking to redirect the conversation from "what are our options" to "this is what we'll do"
5, then 2, then wait and help with Steal Vitality if necessary.
+1
+1
Reasoning:I was thinking that experimenting in a combat situation might be bad, but now that I think of it again, we might not get a better chance to try to unravel an enemy zombie. It could quite possibly be very different from unraveling one's own creation, and possibly vital for our survival later, if it is cheaper than steal vitality.
Hhhhm, you do make a good point. I vote for 5, then two as well. Should command undead fail for some reason, attempt 3.
And make sure to destroy the final zombie after combat, most especially if the kids are beyond the treeline.
+1
Omo wipes his hands on his pants before hefting his quarterstaff.
"The Rangers say that most zombies are slow and flimsy. Easy to defeat if you don't get spooked. We need to get by them to follow the trail- should we fight, or do you have a better idea?""Give me your hatchet. I want a better weapon than my belt knife."Omo gives you a surprised look before rummaging through his pack.
"Really? I thought you were going to magic them.""I am." You take the proffered
hatchet, hefting it.
"I'm going to try and unmake them, if I can. Then I'll try to take control of the zombie furthest from you- you can team up on the remaining zombie." "Unmake?""You know, like, unravel them. I can make them, so why not unmake them?""You can do that?""There's one way to find out."Taking a deep breath, you attempt to concentrate on the zombies. You quickly give up the endeavor as fruitless, however- they are at the extreme edge of your Necromantic Sight, and you simply cannot see them well enough to manipulate the way you want to. You need to be closer.
"They're too far away. Help me sneak up on them."Omo nods wordlessly, and begins to slowly creep through the grass.
... Omo carefully picks his way past thorny shrubs and hidden gopher holes, guiding you toward the zombies sixty feet away. Fifty feet. Forty.
When you are about thirty feet away, you put a hand on Omo's back, signalling him to stop.
... The moon rising beyond the forest casts deep shadows beneath the trees, the zombies illuminated only by the purple flame that dances in their eyes. You can see them clearly now that you are closer- in life, they were likely peasants, and they still wear their ragged tunics and stained pants. Your stomach turns at the stench of rotten meat. One zombie is missing an arm, a milky white shard of bone jutting out of the stump. The zombies have no weapons, and appear to be doing nothing more than standing idly, occasionally turning to face a new direction.
From here, you can see the shape of the necromantic energy in their bodies, if not the finer details. A great deal of it seems to be concentrated in the head, flowing down the spine and splitting off into the arms and legs. To your eyes, it's rather like being able to see the strings and sticks that move a puppet. Extending your will, you concentrate on the head of the nearest zombie- it appears to be the most important part of the zombie, and possibly the key to unraveling the undead. You can almost feel the necromantic energy there, with it's smooth, glassy texture. Suddenly, you find purchase, and you deftly begin to pull, attempting to unravel the fabric of the-
Impair UndeadYou blink as the zombie's eyes flash once, then wink out. Immediately, the zombie throws its arms out and staggers around briefly before promptly tripping over a shrub. More worryingly, both the one-armed zombie and the third, furthest zombie turn toward the bush where you and Omo are hidden and begin purposely striding over to you.
Shouting wordlessly, Omo springs from your hiding place and charges toward the zombies,
... thrusting one end of his quarterstaff squarely into the one-armed zombie's chest.
... The zombie stumbles back from the force of the blow, but remains standing.
Acting quickly, you cast
Command Undead on the zombie behind it and experience the familiar moment of vertigo as your consciousness floods the zombie. You become aware of everything the zombie is feeling- its joints and muscles are stiff and resist movement, its left leg is quite deteriorated as the rot has nearly reached the bone, and the zombie retains an impetus to find and kill human figures. Much like the crayfish what seems so long ago, you easily override its old actions and direct it to strike at the one-armed zombie reeling from Omo's blow.
... Your zombie swipes at the target with one hand, but misses as the enemy once again moves toward Omo.
The one-armed zombie rears back before swinging wildly at Omo,
... effortlessly smashing the staff from the elf's hands.
... The cold hand of the zombie scratches a furrow down Omo's arm as the elf dances back, cursing. Desperately, you direct your zombie to attack before One-arm can follow up its advantage,
... ... and this time the clumsy swing crashes into the side of the one-armed zombie's skull with a wet thud. One-arm collapses, the lights in its eyes winking out and the necromantic energy that animated the body dispersing.
Omo curses as the first zombie regains its feet, flailing around blindly. Scooping up his staff, Omo runs up to the impaired zombie
... and swings his staff like an overlong club, crushing the zombie's knee.
... The blind zombie collapses once again, its leg twisting uselessly under it. Before Omo can wind up to deliver the killing blow, your minion arrives and awkwardly kicks at the prone zombie,
... connecting with the chest
... and cracking its ribs. The zombie convulses once before lying still, dead once more.
Breathing heavily, Omo shouts happily.
"Ha! Yes! There, that wasn't so hard."You let out a breath you didn't know you were holding.
"Are you alright?"Omo's grin turns to a grimace as he examines his arm.
"Yeah, it's just a scratch. It smarts, but it's not too bad. I just underestimated how hard those things can punch.""Please try to hold onto your weapon in the future, you just about gave me a heart attack."Omo ignores you, looking around on the ground. Walking over to where the zombies had been clustered, he crouched down before grunting to himself.
"Well. The tracks of the children definitely run into the woods. For whatever reason, those three zombies stopped short of the forest. I wonder how long they've been standing here.""Are you sure they're the same zombies?"Omo shrugs.
"Sure enough. I don't see anything to suggest otherwise, and it'd be a pretty big coincidence that three other zombies happened to wander to the exact location those kids ran into the forest. The question is, what do we do now?"You shiver in the cold night breeze, eying the forest with distaste. It's quite dark in the thick growth beneath the branches, and you never did get a chance to ask about those rumors that the forest is haunted in some way. It's one thing to go searching for missing children, it's quite another to do so in the middle of the night in a cursed forest. Then again, you now know that the kids weren't caught by the zombies- it's quite possible that they are still alive, lost somewhere in that same forest. And speaking of zombies, you should probably do something about the one you're commanding.
Vitality- 11/11
Mana- 8/12
XP- 23/35
Inventory- Belt Pouch (
80 Silver Pieces),
Elven Traveler Garb,
Elven Cloak, Headband, Belt Knife,
Hatchet, Leather Backpack(Bedroll, Flint&Steel,
Weak Mana Potion, Scroll Case(4 blank Parchment,
Charcoal),
Trail Rations Fishing Equipment,
Spare Traveling Clothes x2,
Prestidigitation for the Beginning Practitioner by Joddo Meadtrust, Crystal(5oz))
Abilities-
Sense Necromancy(Passive),
Improved Necromantic Sight(Passive)Skills-
Competent Fisher,
Dabbling SwimmerStatus- Commanding a Zombie Human
Twenty and a half days since Manifestation
General
Detect Magic- 1 MP - Detects spells and magical items near you
Calm Animal- 1 MP - Causes wild animals to become peaceful
Sense Vitality- 1 MP - You can detect the Vitality of living things, with a bit of effort
Brew Mana Potion- A Mana Potion takes twice the potions potency in Mana cost, and requires 1/2 hour per point in brewing time
Waterproof- 1MP/Hour duration - Makes an object non-absorbent. Does not prevent corrosion (such as from acid or rusting) or magical effects related to water/liquid
Necromancy
Raise Zombie- ? MP - You can take the formerly living body and turn it into a zombie, but you lack understanding or even much knowledge of the particulars. It seems the mana cost is related to the overall quality of the corpse, and maybe the size?
Command Undead- 2 MP - You can merge your awareness with an undead creature, gauging its general condition and issuing explicit orders it will obey to the best of its ability. You can also give orders that will persist beyond the end of the spell.
Steal Vitality- 3 MP - Range: Line of Effect. You can suck the Vitality out of living things. This spell removes up to 6 Vitality from the target and gives 1/3 of it to you.
Animate Object- 4 MP - You can force Vitality into inanimate objects, things that were never alive to begin with. It seems to be more complicated than Zombification though- your Rock doesn't do anything, which is hardly useful. You'll need to experiment with this more.
Alter Golem- 2 MP- You can make basic alterations to an existing construct or animated object.
Impair Undead- 2MP- You blinded a zombie with this spell
Vitality- 12/13
Mana- 3/3
XP- 26/30
Inventory-
Elven Tunic,
Elven Cloak, Belt Knife, Leather Backpack(50' Rope,
Camping Supplies),
Masterwork Elven StaffAbilities-
Track,
SurvivalistSkills-
Novice Observer,
Competent Ambusher,
Competent Staff User,
Poor Liar,
Dabbling SwimmerStatus- Victory Pose!
Omo Thunderjaw- Your best friend, brave and true. He is currently an aspiring Ranger, and is eager to leave the Vale.
Eko Cleanvise- The priest of the village of Bedscaled, his wards against the undead have failed him
Curo Nightroar- The Necromancer of Thrimesdur, said to be insane, he controls a massive army of the Undead and threatens the Cremated Empire.
Pirate King- The Necromancer operating along the Jeweled Coast, he commands a mixed force of human and lizardfolk pirates along with his undead minions.
Fale Packunion- A mysterious figure who appeared to you in a dream, attempting to recruit you to the cause of his Death God. May or may not be the Pirate King or some other known figure.
Morka- The aforementioned Death God. You know basically nothing about him/her/it, except his link to the other Necromancers.
-This one's a bit morbid, but bear with me. Take two crayfish. Shell one, leaving the meat inside as intact as possible. Remove the flesh from the second while leaving the shell as intact as possible. Attempt to revive both and compare the results. Is vitality in flesh or in bone? In both? Neither? Regardless of what we find, it should prove instructive.
-Try to find out if zombies have a memory, if they can be made to recognize specific objects. I recomend starting with a ball or something, and instructing a zombie to follow that specific ball wherever it goes. After testing it to make sure it works how we expect, substitute in another ball that has a different colour or a different size, and see if the zombie knows it isn't the right ball to follow. We can move to more abstract things from there, like having if understand things like "any ball" "any non-red ball" "the biggest ball" and stuff like that, or even to sort a pile of pebbles into stacks by colour.
-Attempt to raise a pile of ashes from a cremated corpse.
-Raise an earthworm and then, once it is raised, cut it in half at the border between two segments. Which ends, if any, are still animate? Continue cutting into halves at segment lines until all parts are dead or it has been divided into a prostomium, peristomium, pygidium and a pile of ordinary segments.
-See how much damage a dead body can sustain before it is unraisable
-Also, it seemed interesting that the loop was recognized as the center of life. We should test raising different rope Golems, some who are linear, some who are looped or knotted in different ways. How does the golem react to music, and what if we made one out of clay, with more distinguished features?
- For Animate Object, see if you can make an object levitate, or move to your will. Maybe this could develop into telekinesis..
- we should try pricking our finger, and stealing the vitality of an insect or something, and see if it will heal the cut.
- Another thing we need to play with is fire. Fire golem? HELL YES.
-Play with blood. Maybe that's what the golem needs. Blood. Mix some of your own blood into the clay.
-Like we tried to be the ropeman when we raised our first golem, we can try to be the earth when we make a clay or earthen golem, etc.
- Try to infuse vitality into the crystal to see what it does.
- See what happens if you infuse Mana and Vitality into the same crystal.
- Steal Vitality on self
1. Imbue a small, uncrushed mana crystal with mana. Cast Detect Magic on it, comparing it to a mana potion.
2. If successful, turn the imbued mana crystal into a golem using 2 vitality. It is important to later experiments that we use exactly 2 vitality. Continue observing with Detect Magic.
3. If successful, attempt to Alter Golem in order to imbue the mana cystal with the ability to cast a cheap spell using the mana stored within it when commanded to. I recommend Detect Magic, since that should be easy to test.
4. If successful, continue to have the crystal cast Detect Magic even after it has run out of mana, in order to see if it can cast the spell using vitality like a mage can. Assuming this works, we will be able to discern the conversion ratio between vitality and mana.
5. If successful and the conversion ratio is > 3 mana per 2 vitality, have a mana crystal that is able to hold at least 3 mana wrapped in thick leather with a single small hole. Firmly attach this leather-covered crystal to a stick that is suitable as a handle
6. Imbue 3 mana into the crystal before turning it into a 1 vitality golem that will cast Steal Vitality as quickly and often as it can on anything that comes within 4 feet of it, draining the vitality into itself.
7. Note to ourselves that, because Steal Vitality works on line of sight, only things that come within line of sight of the single hole in the leather will be drained of vitality.
8. Enjoy our new lightsaber.
- Trying to develop a destroy vitality spell, using the same principles of the steal vitality, except without keeping it usable. It might be possible to do it for cheaper or causing more damage for the same mana.
- Trying to use the principles of the destroy vitality or the steal vitality spell for a disinfectant spell. It will require a lot of fine control, but it should theoretically be possible.
- We could also try to overbuff a zombie. Is there a max to the amount of vitality a zombie can have? And what happens if a zombie gets a lot of vitality?
World Map
Northwest Thrimesdur
Author
Topic: You are a Necromancer! Chapter 2-36 Decisions, Decisions (Read 685384 times)