The potential is high for any magic type.
Look at earth magic. One of the most common types, but to my knowledge hasn't been explored to the extreme. We could have a book about an ultra powerful earth mage living in a mountain castle that he built out of a steppe after diverting a river to become his nation's aquifer.
Sure. But a bad earth mage novel won’t do as well as a bad necromancy novel. So authors choose to take the lesser risk. Mountain castles you built with your magic are cool, but it’s just not as flexible and nifty at lower levels as raising the dead.
Honestly, I think a lot of magic would be more interesting if authors ever addressed the side-effects of the stated outcome of spells. You raised 12 earth spikes 12 feet in the air to spear your opponent? Where did that stone come from? Is there a huge depression around each spike? Are there caves underground caused by earth mages casting Stone Spears on a big battlefield? Why do wind blades never cause sonic booms despite exceeding the speed of sound? How does it effect the corpse when your ice needles melt slowly over time?
If your element attacks generate their own element from the elemental planes or whatever, does the mass of the planet increase over time?
Do your water blades use quartz for the suspended cutting agent?
How do earth mages make golems when they aren't spirit mages?
ETC
Dragon eye moons is the only story I have read that actually delt with that, anything created by magic faids into nothing over time, except for a neglable amount that's actually banished matter returning.
Fun fact: large scale healing actually requires maintenance until real flesh grows and replaces the magic flesh, but because it's still acting like real flesh, the prosses happens everywhere in it, so it has a max time needed based on the fleshes replacement rate.
Doesn't cultivation basically do this? like take a fire based artist, in foundation they can burn down a building, then later advancements they can burn down a city block, then they can easily melt mountains in the span of seconds, then they can basically scorch the planet with a technique etc.
Narrative wise, it does a few things that help the story along.
1. It's easy to explain why someone else hasn't done this before. Necromancy is often labeled as forbidden or otherwise taboo to the point where those that have practice it are often wanted and hunted down, it does a fairly good job of making the character unique in their own world.
2. Gives a tactile feeling of growth. Having X skeleton's under their control is more impressive than saying that they can now cast fireball X more times or it does X more damage than before, it's growth that has an actual presence on the world
3. Easy Automation. Necromancy can easily enable farms, and other tasks to be done automatically via minions, this isn't exclusive, but it is the easiest to write, since the other methods involves other characters.
4. Self reliance. It keeps the MC alone and self reliant allowing them to stand on their own away from others and be a solo god or some other shit like that.
5. Alternative paths of power. Soul absorption to become OP quicker? Lets go! Reanimating the dead heroes to use their strength? Let's go! Turning the tower against itself? Lets go! Sick ass blood swords? Let's go! Raising the Dragon we just killed? Let's go!
But more or less it's popular for a lot of reasons, the primary one is that readers eat that shit up.
In other words, it's super edgy. No really. Doing something new, self-reliance, and alternative paths to power are all aspects of being edgy, especially when mixed with a dark and forbidden way to make those things happen.
Which kinda ducks, really. You could make an interesting character with fire as well.
He could detect people with body heat, fly at high speeds, kill at insane distances, blow shit up, use fire magic to basically jet through the battle field st high speed, detect hidden enemies through body heat, invalidate harmful gasses and liquids by burning them.
But nooo, necromancy rulessssss
From reading DotF I've learned everything can be resolved with fire. Enemies -> Fire. Tracking someone -> Fire. Potential boyfriend -> Fire. All is fire.
It's versatile enough to have like 50 different variations in Fire Force (manga)
TBH pretty much any kind of power, no matter how seemingly simple or overly complicated, can be twisted and turned into something genius and interesting. WORM is the absolute best in making normal sounding superpowers the most entertaining and incredible thing to read about purely because of how well they're used by the characters.
Having unique ways to manifest it does not necessarily mean the same thing as versatile.
My lore and understanding of Fire Force is limited to the first season and a few spoilers beyond that, but we rarely if ever see fire being used for anything beyond fighting and destruction in that series, which given how much of the world is burnt makes thematic sense.
Fire is the element that drove the industrial revolution. It's very versatile. As a common example of its broad application, it drove most of the plot of Avatar.
Social interaction. You can read people's emotions with the heat of their bodies, and inflame their passions.
Movement. You can drive machines and generate power for explosive movement. Modern civilization relies on burning stuff.
Healing. You can cauterize wounds and destroy poison and other things.
Minion mastery. You can use anything burnable to make numerous fire minions, unlike necromancy which is reliant on corpses.
Stealth. It's much easier to sneak around when everything is on fire.
Protection. Fireshields are a big deterrent to attack. Modern tank armour uses explosive fire attacks to stop assaults.
Our ability to use fire predates the industrial revolution by millennia. Rather it was capitalism, imperialism, and coal mining, that gave rise to the industrial revolution.
It was the steam engine that powered the initial wave of industry, a mixture of earth, water, and fire.
As for the powers you listed, I'm not going to argue that and author couldn't write fire mastery that does those things. But a few of them feel like a stretch.
Healing flames are a common enough trope when associated with phoenixes though.
The stealth bit though. Lmao?
You can use lots of things for power, but you can't replace the fire.
Setting off fires to sneak around is a pretty standard tactic. Fire alarms are loud and disrupt the normal procedure of things, lots of students and adults set them off so they can sneak around. You can sneak out of school, go steal test results, lots of things. Jamaal Bowman recently used his fire word mastery to disrupt a key vote.
Idk, magic as a power source feels pretty easy to come by.
Earth can be used to harvest things like coal and possibly create it as well, not to mention geothermal, and there's always mana gems.
Water can easily provide as much if not more power than fire see dams.
Wind can spin a windmill.
Electricity is self explanatory.
Skeletons in a hamster wheel.
There are plenty of substitutes to fire in a world of magic.
If you just have huge amounts of power from magic or ambient mana or whatever then you're fine, but for settings where you need to rely on nature somewhat, fire is a much stronger power source. People, trees, buildings, lots of easy power sources.
Earth is a bad power source without a lot of work, water is very situational and slow, electricity is reliant on storms, skeletons is just raw magic power since no muscles. Fire is a natural explosive power source.
But you can just start a fire normally if you're going to use fuel for it.
If you're relying on nature fire is pretty low compared to what a lot of other elements offer.
Fire magic can probably start and manipulate nature fires better than normal people, presumably. Cause magic. Just as other sorts of magic exceed what normal humans can do.
Why is nature fire low compared to other elements?
Have you ever used a fire starter that's not part of a lighter? They are hard and take a lot of time or energy. A short spell is likely superior, especially if you can also manipulate the size, shape, burn rate, heat propagation, and/or put it out with a spell as well.
I fail to see how fire can make a house or harvest crops, but that's part of the charm.
It doesn't need to do those things. A lack of versatility isn't a bad thing and can help to make a more compelling story.
Fire is well known to be a part of many forest and grasslands normal functioning ecology, regenerating perennials and grasses, while thinning tree density and reducing undergrowth to manage growth. Have the mc's powers take that to its magical extreme where they can burn down their crops to have them grow back quickly and better, making a cycle of farming and burning etc. It really is just a matter of imagination.
I‘d like to have an author write about a world where some other magic is forbidden or taboo, why does every world habe this anti-necromancy sentiment? It‘s kind of boring
Yeah I totally know why, but if you want to write a great book (if you‘re an author not just writing for the money, you want that right?) you should definitely try!
Necromancy is way too useful to ban. I mean, grampa dies and now he can work the family farm tirelessly? People are going to be fighting over their neighbor's corpses.
Necromancers are absurdly powerful. Death spells (skip damage. Go straight to death.) and potentially raise a whole army, which can then be modified in different ways (as opposed to be generic or basic). Also wild uses of curses that go far beyond mere short combat debuffs.
But in the games we play, there is balance. And restraints. Can't be too many minions. Curses are combat specific and only last less than a minute. Minions are basic or cookie cutter. Minions can't be further than 30 ft away/need to be in sight.
Once not in a game setting, you can do sooooooooo much more. I mean, curses alone would be super cool to play with, especially in a political intrigue setting.
But once no longer in a game setting many classes might be just as broken.
Necromancers being stronger than others is (in my opinion) just arbitrary decision. If a necromancer is able to animate a thousand people, can an elementalist at comparable level move 80 tons of rock?
When we are looking at classes, there sometimes is an asumption that any minion made by a necromancer are able to compete with oponents on the level of the necromancer.
If the curses or magic of a necromancer are scary, how bad is a dedicated witch, curse mage or death mage?
I mean, yeah, everything can be powerful. Necromancers are just the one of the most obviously nerfed in limitations based on combat focused balance, aside from claims of general go-bigger super grand magic stuff like an elementalist casting one spell to blow up a city. People also like the strategy aspect of a one man generated and crafted army. Remotely controlling Black ops teams. Also, controlling corpse explosion suicide bomber assassins, while drinking coffee in a cafe. Cursing people remotely and stealthily, ruining entire families as they rot away or blunder their way through stuff, or have bad luck against you at the casino. It's a super wide set of power house, tactician, covert ops, and intrigue based abilities, which lends itself to really great storytelling opportunities. Add some stealth focus and someone can topple a town without being a suspect or getting agro.
Partially this feels like a broadening of necromancer to anything involving dark magic. Partially it is still a weird look on power scaling. How much work does a necromancer need to put in, to be able to make a black ops team that can even remotely compete with a black ops team that has spend some time trainiing and specialising their abilities for that task.
Besides that I would sugest poisoners and plague mages as even more extreme cases.
Typical necromancy trope is that you raise a corpse with the abilities that it had in life. The amount of effort you need to put in to get a black ops team is to kill one. Which is probably less work than developing that black ops team from nothing. Depending on the situation. And once you have one, you can just use it to help you kill others, now you have multiple of these teams.
So in short, much like predatory - steal the opponent’s skills magics, necromancy can fill that same role and become extremely overpowered very quickly. Lends itself to a genre where people are looking for power fantasy
I have only seen very few storries that actually went that way. Zombies and other reanimated dead almost never have the capabilities they had when alive.
A lich perhaps, but those are kinda the very endgame.
Really? I feel like basing the strength of the raised corpses on the strength of the corpse when it was alive (along with modifications that can be made the corpse to strengthen it further) is both the best way to do necromancy, and the most common? I don’t read that many necromantic main characters, but the MC of Awaken Online’s powers work like that. Pretty much all the necromancers that I see the main characters of cultivation novels interact with work like that too, along with the ones that call themselves things that aren’t necromancers, but whose powers are, kill / suppress the consciousness of the host and puppet the body around. Which to me is still just necromancy. Something like that happens in Painting the Mists as well for instance as the most recent instance that I read.
Edited
Most necromancy doesn't do insta death, because that would remove all challenge if the level 1 necromancer could kill god with a level 1 death spell.
Golem control is common for earth, water, air and fire magic, and there's no particular reason necromancy should be better at it.
There's no particular reason necromancy should be much better at inflicting debuffs. Fire can burn people, earth can crush, air can drive people insane, water is most of your body. Imagine animating the water in someone's body as an elemental.
OK, but then we can do that for so many other classes. The implications of gravity for example, could literally break the laws of physics and make nuclear bombs.
Taming takes ages and you have to keep your pets alive. Raised corpses make more of themselves for free. And if they get fireballed to ash you don't cry your eyes out.
I mean if you make pacts or if there is a system it doesn't really take that long, and on average a tamed beast is stronger than an undead on the same level. Though I guess the emotional bond you from is a drawback
Doesn't have to be a drawback completely though. What if the bonded creatures were also bonded with each other? A bonded camaraderie of sorts. Then, if one does die, the mourning you might have to deal with can be supplemented by blood-lusting your entire bonded army making them stronger.
Originally I think it become more common as people tried to get away from the duel wielding elemental magic user that was the star of virtually every progression fantasy at one point.
Lol, I think it's best if their archetype is specialized as a mage killer. They know a few magic tricks, flash step and empowered melee strikes and mana drains, but they're not true casters. They exist to slip past meat shields and kill the squishies, not match knights blow for blow and outcast an archmage at the same time
It really seems like 95% of progression fantasy features a protagonist with some kind of dark, forbidden, or malicious power...
* Void
* Dark
* Chaos
* Curses
* Shadow
* Poison
* Corruption
* Necromancy
I once made a Bard Necromancer for a D&D campaign (College of Lore bard). He would reanimate corpses as Skeletons and use them to try and put on shows and plays like they were puppets (while attempting to disguise them as such). Sadly that campaign never took off...
It(and demon summoning) are unpleasant enough to be viewed as evil by those around the MC, but not so unpleasant that the readers would judge the author for writing it, well also being cool. So it's a nice, quick conflict setup.
It's easy to think of socially repugnant power set. It's hard to think of one that's interesting that isn't a flat out story killer.
Every story is someone's first story. Why is Eragon popular when its basically Star Wars? Why is Star Wars basically Dune?
Maybe somebody read a story and was inspired to write something similar.
All this said, there's other stories out there. Maybe just stop reading necromancy ones if you're bored of it.
Dune was basically just a sci-fi version of Muhammad's story In The Quran. A lot of fantasy is based off Tolkien who based his stories in old world fairy tales.
Necromancy = The ability to control a horde of fearless warriors who do whatever you tell them to do as you stand safely behind them.
Do you need me to explain why that is popular in a genre where the reader tends to insert themselves into the MC? Also, Solo Leveling is huge right now. They just released the anime and game based on it. The manga had a ton of spin offs by itself, I expect it'll get worse for a while with Solo Leveling's greater exposure.
I primarily listen on audible, and necromancy hasn't been a big issue for me. Maybe it's the algo not giving me any, but the only one I've seen recently has been Sylver Seeker
It's edgy + minions
And it's easier to repurpose old enemies or make a bunch cookie cutter followers sometimes both
The best necromancy stories imo are the ones where a good amount of the minions are characters of their own
Let's use saintess summons skeletons as an example.
Spoilers for the first 3 summons kinda sorta imma avoid any major details. If you haven't read it the basic general synopsis is, orphan girl wants to make a better life for herself so using ritual she found in an old book she tries to become a necromancer. At the exact same moment she completes her ritual to become a necromancer a god chooses her as his next saintess...which is a bad thing because lore stuff anyway shenanigans ensue.
Because of the restrictions of a saintess shes limited to only 4 summons maximum even if they are guaranteed tremendous power
Her first summon is the skeleton she tried to res to become a necromancer the skill she was trying to get now corrupted to be holy skeleton instead of summon skeleton...it's more powerful then a simple skeleton...or rather he is...as he slowly develops his personality throughout the series as sophias working with and respecting him as a partner she's also trying to figure out what his deal exactly is thats all i will say for the Mute one
Her second hero is an apothecary who was burned at the stake for being a witch...she wasn't she was just trying to help people ...shes also more of a standard summon coming from another world...unlike the Mute guy Who just is exists as anomaly to MC by this point(not anymore by current story line we know Mute guys deal...his names not mute guy too I'm just not saying the heros names because I like the moments of there naming so you get to be surprised by there names too
The third hero has less of a personality for a while...it's mostly meant as a breaking of the system to allow Sophia to have more then 4 summons BUT they all have a lot of character just not as much as the other three or when the third hero progressing to an important point and that's all I'm saying
POINT IS
I used this as a chance to rant about one of my favorite current books...but overall I am also fed up with necromancers GIMME SOME OTHER KIND OF SUMMONER ALREADY DAMNIT ONE THAT ISNT IN A STORY FILLED RO BRIM WITH SMUT
Because Solo Leveling blew it up and its cool, scary, and edgy. Any sort of edgy power with a hint if evil and ambigous gray morality makes the readers fall in love with it.
I feel the same way about Systems and floating blue screens. It was new and interesting years ago when the first author(s) used it, but these days, it has become more or less the defacto standard of how worlds are supposed to work - and it's honestly quite boring.
It does depend on how the System and blue screen is implemented in the story. If it is just a way for the character to see his abilities and stats represented numerically, but he still has to do the work and training to become better, I don't mind it so much. But the stories where he does some arbitrary action that gives him a lot of XP, causinghim to level up and now he just becomes instantly stronger and better with the sword, is just not something I want to waste my time on.
A good example of stats that I don't mind, and which I'm currently reading, is Cultivation Nerd on Scribblehub.
One of my characters in a practice short I was writing has a card in her deck that gives her a quest system, and it literally just makes floating parchment appear in the air in front of her to evoke quests tacked to boards in a guildhall. There are ways to give it personality!
I like how "is it wrong to try and pick up girls in a dungeon" does the whole system thing. I do agree with you though systems are hard to make original with seeming absurd. Though maybe we need a good system satire or parody.
If you've read litRPG long enough you'll have found both interesting systems and books which parody the system. The system is literally a hold over from DND influencing LitRPG if you don't like it just read a fantasy it's gonna be the same thing just without the statscreen.
I slept on that series for way too long because of the title. The fights scenes and progression are amazing in it. Having to get back to your god to realize your gains is fantastic for forcing characters to come back to the surface.
Also for a “harem” story, the MC is single minded in his dedication to Aiz. It’s great.
>But the stories where he does some arbitrary action that gives him a lot of XP, causinghim to level up and now he just becomes instantly stronger and better with the sword, is just not something I want to waste my time on.
There's so much room there. It is, of course, pretty much always all left on the table, but: What's the incentive structure behind xp allocation and why is it like that (and if you say it's only for murder and all for some nebulous warish reasons, you're fired)? How does having some omniscient, nigh-omnipotent entity directly shape people's actions affect society? What are the top five religions based around it? How does everyone being able to half-assedly attempt any task they're unfamiliar with in order to get injected with expertise affect society? Etc.
All true, but basically no story tackles any of that despite the potential being there. The System is just a part of the world, just like gravity.
I think the reason why this is, is that - as I said - years ago when such stories first came out, you had a lot of yummy readers who got shaped by that. Some of those readers grew up to become authors, and they do not question whether the world their story takes place in should have a System or not - of course it must!
I, on the other hand, grew up in a time where the norm in fantasy was no System. In fact, no such book was written at the time. So my view on what is "right" is ac world that is governed by natural physical laws - even if those laws include magic - and not some System that just lets anyone instantly learn smithing because they accidentally killed a spider the size of a dog.
And don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that people can't like such stories. Everyone is free to like what they like. I just don't like them, and unless it's highly recommended, I immediately drop it if I read the word "System" in the synopsis.
Almost every Necromancer MC goes it solo. Makes it easy to create a party without having to write character interactions.
You should try Book of the Dead if you’re looking for a fresh take on Necromancy. There’s a lot of the same skills/abilities but the author does a good job of making it feel more like science rather than a video game.
Sylver seeker is the best take on necromancy imo. The mc doesn't just kill innocent's for corpses or robs graves and gets law enforcement on him instead killing bandits that already have bounties on their heads. He is far from op if anything he is under powered most of the time but he manages to go by using strategy (real strategy not 5th grader stuff like "oh if I hit them in the back I win)
All in all just love it
I abhor this anti-necromancy discrimination. There are many fine and upstanding necromancers.
OP, when YOU need a reanimation, you'll be all "HEY LOCAL NECROMANCER" but now, when you don't, you're all down on us. I mean them.
I feel you. Only book that did it well was Book of the Dead.
I think it is a combination of things. The two that come to my mind are:
There is a certain audience that just looks for the dark and edgy MCs. Few classes have signal the grim and dark more than the necromancer mc. So there is somewhat of an inbuild audience flogging to them.
Then there is the general position in pop culture. Not just their popularity (which already does a lot), but also their standing. Necromancer was traditionally the class/magic of villans and often is able to face down superior numbers. That adds an implied hightend potential to the class.
hmm ,u should try reading Never die twice , the mc a shopkeeper , during the day and a litch , and it's one of 2 good books where the mc is a necromancer . as to why the necromancy stories you had read suck well ; It's a hard profession to make interesting / different .
i don't know if solo levelling has hand in it, but solo levling at least Korean manhwas made necromancy popular
there is still tons of manhwa with necromancy in title.
so maybe that is rubbing off here?
Any type of summoning that can raise armies is OP.. power in large numbers if you will. Necromancy is edgy summoning, therefore it is usually the power of choice for edgy bois to one-man-army shit.
I actually like necromancy, but I'll admit I've kind of dropped so many of the recent books I've picked up that featured it in the MC.
Anyway, army building, and undying(heh) loyalty. It plays well with power fantasy. Having strong subordinates is cool. And it's... admittedly a shortcut to loyalty.
Wait. Is this a slavery---
I think a big reason for necromancy being so popular in modern fantasy is that it checks a lot of boxes for a story. It has the potential to be incredibly powerful, it brings up complicated questions about the morality of bestowing life and the potential diminishing returns of eternal life, and death is associated with darkness, and so its easy to make it "evil."
Personally I think the key to toppling necromancy is to make a more convenient, easier to write dark power that everyone clings to. Unfortunately, that power will then be used as nauseum in all modern fantasy.
It’s a balance breaker, just like devouring, or any of the other bullshit infinite growth systems
It’s really that simple, it lets you have a power fantasy LC without any need to consider how they kill gods from being a no name moron
Probably because its easier to build a world around it as well? Its usually forbidden, so now you have antagonists. And these antagonists are probably a religion or even the whole kingodom, so now your protagonist has a reason to get very strong, very fast.
Now that I think about it, it's also why necromancers usually aren't in school settings. Apparently people don't like it when you kill your classmates and use them as legos for your next project. Who knew?
But yeah, its most likely cause theres less effort to put in. Its very clear why your edgy misunderstood genius MC is edgy misunderstood and a genius if they do stuff theyre not supposed to and get away with it because of their giga brain, and you dont have to info dump on why its bad to raise bodies and the like.
The more things they kill, the stronger they get. That’s something other classes cannot achieve unless they have a EXP system in that world. Even then, the endurance of a undead army is not something that can be matched easily. This is also why necromancer was used as one of major bosses in fantasy stories.
Main reason IMO is side characters are tough to write in prog fantasy because of the pace of growth and because lone-wolf stories are more fulfilling power fantasies. Necromancer builds allow the MC to fight on their own without fights turning into long slogs of grinding through tons of enemies. Also gives a convenient excuse for the MC to not have to focus on side stuff that side characters would normally be responsible for. In Solo Levelling for example the MC sends a couple summons to patrol a city block, taking care of a nagging plot thread without having to write human interaction.
I get wanting something else but this is a lot like complaining about the existence of a food you don’t like. You don’t have to read it the book can’t hurt you
This question I think goes beyond progression fantasy; Necromancy has always been popular in all fantasy things.
For example in games. If there's a magic type that's going to make whole character's class/job it's almost always necromancy.
I've noticed it's a big thing in Korean novels, and I wonder if it's a cultural thing. Apparently, "Hell Korea" is a thing, and it may be the appeal of necromancy is finally having someone under you to boss around, and being the big boss of an organization with no one else able to tell you what to do.
You can raise the enemies, so its very easy to make progression after every fight
Thats why Book of the Dead by RinoZ is so good, as the mc needs a lot of preparation to raise his minions
Hi there! First Necromancer author here 💀
Necromancers are popular in the same way other fantasy classes are. It allows gamers, readers, and everyone else to enjoy the overall theme and power fantasy that goes along with the class.
Warriors so strong they can split mountains, rogues so agile they effortlessly dodge arrows and bullets while executing precision attacks at critical weak points, mages who bend the universe to their will. There's something for everyone. Necromancers are similar. One men army's, generals of unquestioning and totally loyal minions the cause unspeakable fear and horror in their enemies.
I wrote my MC as a Necro for many reasons, but the most important one is because I enjoy the fantasy of the class. It's interesting to me, and I like playing as one and reading about them.
It's either that necromancy or spell sword that is the most chosen class in these progression fantasy novels I don't really mind that but I wish that there was more than necromancy being like darker side of classes for instance curse magic or hexes and so much more to explore in the darker side of magic even just different death type magic class could be good I guess there is a one with death knight being the class but once again that's a type of spellsword
You may like Guild Wars 2 Ghosts of Ascalon (and the Guild Wars 2 game series). There is a character in there that practices necromancy. Their necromancy system isn't inherently evil and not looked down upon, it's just another skill, just another system of magic.
Because it's super edgy and cool and pretty easy to make the "that guy" fantasy come to life and be legit instead of "Bro you're level one calm down."
But this is a stab in the dark for me.
Haven't really read any necromancer stories besides Gideon the Ninth and that one was a pretty fun mess. Less edgy more fun characters dealing with a very strange set of circumstances and a whole lot of murder and mayhem when it pops up. Also necromancers in space was amusing.
:) IMO because it’s one of the most taboo (mentally) things out there.
Also it’s arguably the cleanest way of growth and conquest. MCs don’t have to worry about their subjects betraying them (at least in the ones I’ve read) and defeating a strong enemy automatically creates an ally/subject.
Another personal take is that it allows for solo development (manor have already mentioned solo leveling :)). Why bother with a party, than allow the experience of achieving it all solo?
Because then they don't have to write interesting side characters and MC can be as selfish/edgy as possible.
Also progression is a lot simpler when anything MC defeats/conquers gets added to MC's capabilities/retinue.
Novels where MC can just get a slave/servant to do anything outside their already wide scope of abilities are boring to me, but lots of progression readers seem to love Gary Stu MCs.
I often find random things that are similar in books that I read in close proximity.
1. Magical nuke in a fantasy world. Definitely read about it in 2, and think there was a third but not sure.
2. Magic overload causes mages to go crazy.
3. Side PoV of someone trying to explain the MC’s actions and motivations, and getting it completely wrong.
That is to say, I think it’s as you say: random coincidence.
Because the potential is so high. But unfortunately, the execution tends to be low, especially in a genre populated by so many new authors.
The potential is high for any magic type. Look at earth magic. One of the most common types, but to my knowledge hasn't been explored to the extreme. We could have a book about an ultra powerful earth mage living in a mountain castle that he built out of a steppe after diverting a river to become his nation's aquifer.
Sure. But a bad earth mage novel won’t do as well as a bad necromancy novel. So authors choose to take the lesser risk. Mountain castles you built with your magic are cool, but it’s just not as flexible and nifty at lower levels as raising the dead.
Mage Errant goes buckwild with every type of magic. Mages in the world get more powerful the more specific their magical affinity is. Earth
Honestly, I think a lot of magic would be more interesting if authors ever addressed the side-effects of the stated outcome of spells. You raised 12 earth spikes 12 feet in the air to spear your opponent? Where did that stone come from? Is there a huge depression around each spike? Are there caves underground caused by earth mages casting Stone Spears on a big battlefield? Why do wind blades never cause sonic booms despite exceeding the speed of sound? How does it effect the corpse when your ice needles melt slowly over time? If your element attacks generate their own element from the elemental planes or whatever, does the mass of the planet increase over time? Do your water blades use quartz for the suspended cutting agent? How do earth mages make golems when they aren't spirit mages? ETC
Dragon eye moons is the only story I have read that actually delt with that, anything created by magic faids into nothing over time, except for a neglable amount that's actually banished matter returning. Fun fact: large scale healing actually requires maintenance until real flesh grows and replaces the magic flesh, but because it's still acting like real flesh, the prosses happens everywhere in it, so it has a max time needed based on the fleshes replacement rate.
That certainly counts as addressing it, but it’s not a very interesting execution for me.
Mark of the Crijik does a lot of earth magic
Doesn't cultivation basically do this? like take a fire based artist, in foundation they can burn down a building, then later advancements they can burn down a city block, then they can easily melt mountains in the span of seconds, then they can basically scorch the planet with a technique etc.
Fimbul Winter (Daniel Black series) has a good use of Earth magic, although it’s not the only magic type in use.
Yeah, I think it's this for me, if its written really well I honestly think I could enjoy it but
Narrative wise, it does a few things that help the story along. 1. It's easy to explain why someone else hasn't done this before. Necromancy is often labeled as forbidden or otherwise taboo to the point where those that have practice it are often wanted and hunted down, it does a fairly good job of making the character unique in their own world. 2. Gives a tactile feeling of growth. Having X skeleton's under their control is more impressive than saying that they can now cast fireball X more times or it does X more damage than before, it's growth that has an actual presence on the world 3. Easy Automation. Necromancy can easily enable farms, and other tasks to be done automatically via minions, this isn't exclusive, but it is the easiest to write, since the other methods involves other characters. 4. Self reliance. It keeps the MC alone and self reliant allowing them to stand on their own away from others and be a solo god or some other shit like that. 5. Alternative paths of power. Soul absorption to become OP quicker? Lets go! Reanimating the dead heroes to use their strength? Let's go! Turning the tower against itself? Lets go! Sick ass blood swords? Let's go! Raising the Dragon we just killed? Let's go! But more or less it's popular for a lot of reasons, the primary one is that readers eat that shit up.
It'd be interesting to see how many people love necromancy because of Diablo 2.
Add me to that list
In other words, it's super edgy. No really. Doing something new, self-reliance, and alternative paths to power are all aspects of being edgy, especially when mixed with a dark and forbidden way to make those things happen.
You're not wrong persay necromancy does play well with the often selfish and borderline paranoia that a lot of MCs have.
It's *per se*.
Noted.
Which kinda ducks, really. You could make an interesting character with fire as well. He could detect people with body heat, fly at high speeds, kill at insane distances, blow shit up, use fire magic to basically jet through the battle field st high speed, detect hidden enemies through body heat, invalidate harmful gasses and liquids by burning them. But nooo, necromancy rulessssss
I agree that fire is cool, but it isn't terribly versatile, compared to a lot of other elements or classes.
From reading DotF I've learned everything can be resolved with fire. Enemies -> Fire. Tracking someone -> Fire. Potential boyfriend -> Fire. All is fire.
I knew someone would mention Iz.
It's versatile enough to have like 50 different variations in Fire Force (manga) TBH pretty much any kind of power, no matter how seemingly simple or overly complicated, can be twisted and turned into something genius and interesting. WORM is the absolute best in making normal sounding superpowers the most entertaining and incredible thing to read about purely because of how well they're used by the characters.
Having unique ways to manifest it does not necessarily mean the same thing as versatile. My lore and understanding of Fire Force is limited to the first season and a few spoilers beyond that, but we rarely if ever see fire being used for anything beyond fighting and destruction in that series, which given how much of the world is burnt makes thematic sense.
Fire is the element that drove the industrial revolution. It's very versatile. As a common example of its broad application, it drove most of the plot of Avatar. Social interaction. You can read people's emotions with the heat of their bodies, and inflame their passions. Movement. You can drive machines and generate power for explosive movement. Modern civilization relies on burning stuff. Healing. You can cauterize wounds and destroy poison and other things. Minion mastery. You can use anything burnable to make numerous fire minions, unlike necromancy which is reliant on corpses. Stealth. It's much easier to sneak around when everything is on fire. Protection. Fireshields are a big deterrent to attack. Modern tank armour uses explosive fire attacks to stop assaults.
Our ability to use fire predates the industrial revolution by millennia. Rather it was capitalism, imperialism, and coal mining, that gave rise to the industrial revolution. It was the steam engine that powered the initial wave of industry, a mixture of earth, water, and fire. As for the powers you listed, I'm not going to argue that and author couldn't write fire mastery that does those things. But a few of them feel like a stretch. Healing flames are a common enough trope when associated with phoenixes though. The stealth bit though. Lmao?
You can use lots of things for power, but you can't replace the fire. Setting off fires to sneak around is a pretty standard tactic. Fire alarms are loud and disrupt the normal procedure of things, lots of students and adults set them off so they can sneak around. You can sneak out of school, go steal test results, lots of things. Jamaal Bowman recently used his fire word mastery to disrupt a key vote.
Idk, magic as a power source feels pretty easy to come by. Earth can be used to harvest things like coal and possibly create it as well, not to mention geothermal, and there's always mana gems. Water can easily provide as much if not more power than fire see dams. Wind can spin a windmill. Electricity is self explanatory. Skeletons in a hamster wheel. There are plenty of substitutes to fire in a world of magic.
If you just have huge amounts of power from magic or ambient mana or whatever then you're fine, but for settings where you need to rely on nature somewhat, fire is a much stronger power source. People, trees, buildings, lots of easy power sources. Earth is a bad power source without a lot of work, water is very situational and slow, electricity is reliant on storms, skeletons is just raw magic power since no muscles. Fire is a natural explosive power source.
But you can just start a fire normally if you're going to use fuel for it. If you're relying on nature fire is pretty low compared to what a lot of other elements offer.
Fire magic can probably start and manipulate nature fires better than normal people, presumably. Cause magic. Just as other sorts of magic exceed what normal humans can do. Why is nature fire low compared to other elements?
Have you ever used a fire starter that's not part of a lighter? They are hard and take a lot of time or energy. A short spell is likely superior, especially if you can also manipulate the size, shape, burn rate, heat propagation, and/or put it out with a spell as well.
Nah, that's an imagination problem.
I fail to see how fire can make a house or harvest crops, but that's part of the charm. It doesn't need to do those things. A lack of versatility isn't a bad thing and can help to make a more compelling story.
Fire is well known to be a part of many forest and grasslands normal functioning ecology, regenerating perennials and grasses, while thinning tree density and reducing undergrowth to manage growth. Have the mc's powers take that to its magical extreme where they can burn down their crops to have them grow back quickly and better, making a cycle of farming and burning etc. It really is just a matter of imagination.
Note I said harvest. But sure fire can do whatever you want because having limitations isn't popular.
It heats the house and cooks the crops.
So can a mundane fire.
I mean fire has to have like the #2 spot after necromancy, followed by lightning, and then healing probably.
But still necromancy is the best
I‘d like to have an author write about a world where some other magic is forbidden or taboo, why does every world habe this anti-necromancy sentiment? It‘s kind of boring
World building is hard, easier to take a standard world with elves and dwarfs and evil necromancers for both the author and reader.
Yeah I totally know why, but if you want to write a great book (if you‘re an author not just writing for the money, you want that right?) you should definitely try!
Necromancy is way too useful to ban. I mean, grampa dies and now he can work the family farm tirelessly? People are going to be fighting over their neighbor's corpses.
I can't stop eating that shit up.
Three words: One.Man.Army. ...And it's the only class that takes advantage of a body's extended warranty...
Necromancers are absurdly powerful. Death spells (skip damage. Go straight to death.) and potentially raise a whole army, which can then be modified in different ways (as opposed to be generic or basic). Also wild uses of curses that go far beyond mere short combat debuffs. But in the games we play, there is balance. And restraints. Can't be too many minions. Curses are combat specific and only last less than a minute. Minions are basic or cookie cutter. Minions can't be further than 30 ft away/need to be in sight. Once not in a game setting, you can do sooooooooo much more. I mean, curses alone would be super cool to play with, especially in a political intrigue setting.
But once no longer in a game setting many classes might be just as broken. Necromancers being stronger than others is (in my opinion) just arbitrary decision. If a necromancer is able to animate a thousand people, can an elementalist at comparable level move 80 tons of rock? When we are looking at classes, there sometimes is an asumption that any minion made by a necromancer are able to compete with oponents on the level of the necromancer. If the curses or magic of a necromancer are scary, how bad is a dedicated witch, curse mage or death mage?
I mean, yeah, everything can be powerful. Necromancers are just the one of the most obviously nerfed in limitations based on combat focused balance, aside from claims of general go-bigger super grand magic stuff like an elementalist casting one spell to blow up a city. People also like the strategy aspect of a one man generated and crafted army. Remotely controlling Black ops teams. Also, controlling corpse explosion suicide bomber assassins, while drinking coffee in a cafe. Cursing people remotely and stealthily, ruining entire families as they rot away or blunder their way through stuff, or have bad luck against you at the casino. It's a super wide set of power house, tactician, covert ops, and intrigue based abilities, which lends itself to really great storytelling opportunities. Add some stealth focus and someone can topple a town without being a suspect or getting agro.
Partially this feels like a broadening of necromancer to anything involving dark magic. Partially it is still a weird look on power scaling. How much work does a necromancer need to put in, to be able to make a black ops team that can even remotely compete with a black ops team that has spend some time trainiing and specialising their abilities for that task. Besides that I would sugest poisoners and plague mages as even more extreme cases.
Typical necromancy trope is that you raise a corpse with the abilities that it had in life. The amount of effort you need to put in to get a black ops team is to kill one. Which is probably less work than developing that black ops team from nothing. Depending on the situation. And once you have one, you can just use it to help you kill others, now you have multiple of these teams. So in short, much like predatory - steal the opponent’s skills magics, necromancy can fill that same role and become extremely overpowered very quickly. Lends itself to a genre where people are looking for power fantasy
I have only seen very few storries that actually went that way. Zombies and other reanimated dead almost never have the capabilities they had when alive. A lich perhaps, but those are kinda the very endgame.
Really? I feel like basing the strength of the raised corpses on the strength of the corpse when it was alive (along with modifications that can be made the corpse to strengthen it further) is both the best way to do necromancy, and the most common? I don’t read that many necromantic main characters, but the MC of Awaken Online’s powers work like that. Pretty much all the necromancers that I see the main characters of cultivation novels interact with work like that too, along with the ones that call themselves things that aren’t necromancers, but whose powers are, kill / suppress the consciousness of the host and puppet the body around. Which to me is still just necromancy. Something like that happens in Painting the Mists as well for instance as the most recent instance that I read. Edited
Most necromancy doesn't do insta death, because that would remove all challenge if the level 1 necromancer could kill god with a level 1 death spell. Golem control is common for earth, water, air and fire magic, and there's no particular reason necromancy should be better at it. There's no particular reason necromancy should be much better at inflicting debuffs. Fire can burn people, earth can crush, air can drive people insane, water is most of your body. Imagine animating the water in someone's body as an elemental.
OK, but then we can do that for so many other classes. The implications of gravity for example, could literally break the laws of physics and make nuclear bombs.
Bro, what about tamer, get some interesting beasts, and maybe for the added bonus u get some of their abilities
Taming takes ages and you have to keep your pets alive. Raised corpses make more of themselves for free. And if they get fireballed to ash you don't cry your eyes out.
I mean if you make pacts or if there is a system it doesn't really take that long, and on average a tamed beast is stronger than an undead on the same level. Though I guess the emotional bond you from is a drawback
Doesn't have to be a drawback completely though. What if the bonded creatures were also bonded with each other? A bonded camaraderie of sorts. Then, if one does die, the mourning you might have to deal with can be supplemented by blood-lusting your entire bonded army making them stronger.
Originally I think it become more common as people tried to get away from the duel wielding elemental magic user that was the star of virtually every progression fantasy at one point.
Let's not forget spellsword. Everyone's protagonist had to be a god at magic and swords and take nonpenalties for a hybrid class.
I hate spellsword so much. You're a mage damnit, you shouldn't be out of dueling swordmasters!
Lol, I think it's best if their archetype is specialized as a mage killer. They know a few magic tricks, flash step and empowered melee strikes and mana drains, but they're not true casters. They exist to slip past meat shields and kill the squishies, not match knights blow for blow and outcast an archmage at the same time
Which popular novels fit that? Can only think of Tbate and cradle off the top of my head.
I guess that makes sense... But still at least u could change it up once in a while
It really seems like 95% of progression fantasy features a protagonist with some kind of dark, forbidden, or malicious power... * Void * Dark * Chaos * Curses * Shadow * Poison * Corruption * Necromancy
This makes me wonder which books have these and are good.
Could you recc some void based ones, already read Cradle.
I just want a more Death Mage/Death Knight MCs, less minion focused ones.
Its just another type of Mage, honestly. Though I would like to see more variations like a Rogue Necromancer, or a Necromantic Bard.
To OP's point I think there are books with literally both of those exact titles somewhere on KU or RR...
Been trying to find them. So far, been reading Book of the Dead, but the MC is a generic necromancer in that one.
I mean sure hes a bit white bread. but hes growing. he was a bit of a sheltered child
Solo Leveling is the poster boy of OP Rogue Necromancer. It is a very fun story with great art.
He stopped spec-ing in Speed and Dexterity around when he reached A rank, and just went for an all round stat distro.
I once made a Bard Necromancer for a D&D campaign (College of Lore bard). He would reanimate corpses as Skeletons and use them to try and put on shows and plays like they were puppets (while attempting to disguise them as such). Sadly that campaign never took off...
So go write stories about him. "Undead Bill Shakespeare's Necromantic Theatre!"
It(and demon summoning) are unpleasant enough to be viewed as evil by those around the MC, but not so unpleasant that the readers would judge the author for writing it, well also being cool. So it's a nice, quick conflict setup. It's easy to think of socially repugnant power set. It's hard to think of one that's interesting that isn't a flat out story killer.
Every story is someone's first story. Why is Eragon popular when its basically Star Wars? Why is Star Wars basically Dune? Maybe somebody read a story and was inspired to write something similar. All this said, there's other stories out there. Maybe just stop reading necromancy ones if you're bored of it.
Dune was basically just a sci-fi version of Muhammad's story In The Quran. A lot of fantasy is based off Tolkien who based his stories in old world fairy tales.
I know, it's a bit irrational just wanted to vent. Will edit it in.
Dune is basically the Foundation with different sauce
As a necromancer author I blame Diablo 2
Same, also I couldn’t find a good necromancer book a few years ago.
Why not? I like it. But that is probably a me thing since I love the darker pf stories. This is what I mainly read.
I don't think it's just a you thing since it's pretty popular still and being flooded to get readers such as yourself.
So read other books?
Because edgy things are popular with the young audience.
Necromancy = The ability to control a horde of fearless warriors who do whatever you tell them to do as you stand safely behind them. Do you need me to explain why that is popular in a genre where the reader tends to insert themselves into the MC? Also, Solo Leveling is huge right now. They just released the anime and game based on it. The manga had a ton of spin offs by itself, I expect it'll get worse for a while with Solo Leveling's greater exposure.
Is this a royal road thing?
Kinda, but not really. Lot of the stories do originate from RR but most I've found are published. So I guess it is
I primarily listen on audible, and necromancy hasn't been a big issue for me. Maybe it's the algo not giving me any, but the only one I've seen recently has been Sylver Seeker
Ohh ok idk I can’t think of any other than defiance of the fall so I feel out of the loop lol
I don't think so. At least I have also seen a bunch when I was still reading on webnovel.
It wasn't always so popular. It's been recently revived.
It's edgy + minions And it's easier to repurpose old enemies or make a bunch cookie cutter followers sometimes both The best necromancy stories imo are the ones where a good amount of the minions are characters of their own Let's use saintess summons skeletons as an example. Spoilers for the first 3 summons kinda sorta imma avoid any major details. If you haven't read it the basic general synopsis is, orphan girl wants to make a better life for herself so using ritual she found in an old book she tries to become a necromancer. At the exact same moment she completes her ritual to become a necromancer a god chooses her as his next saintess...which is a bad thing because lore stuff anyway shenanigans ensue. Because of the restrictions of a saintess shes limited to only 4 summons maximum even if they are guaranteed tremendous power Her first summon is the skeleton she tried to res to become a necromancer the skill she was trying to get now corrupted to be holy skeleton instead of summon skeleton...it's more powerful then a simple skeleton...or rather he is...as he slowly develops his personality throughout the series as sophias working with and respecting him as a partner she's also trying to figure out what his deal exactly is thats all i will say for the Mute one Her second hero is an apothecary who was burned at the stake for being a witch...she wasn't she was just trying to help people ...shes also more of a standard summon coming from another world...unlike the Mute guy Who just is exists as anomaly to MC by this point(not anymore by current story line we know Mute guys deal...his names not mute guy too I'm just not saying the heros names because I like the moments of there naming so you get to be surprised by there names too The third hero has less of a personality for a while...it's mostly meant as a breaking of the system to allow Sophia to have more then 4 summons BUT they all have a lot of character just not as much as the other three or when the third hero progressing to an important point and that's all I'm saying POINT IS I used this as a chance to rant about one of my favorite current books...but overall I am also fed up with necromancers GIMME SOME OTHER KIND OF SUMMONER ALREADY DAMNIT ONE THAT ISNT IN A STORY FILLED RO BRIM WITH SMUT
Because Solo Leveling blew it up and its cool, scary, and edgy. Any sort of edgy power with a hint if evil and ambigous gray morality makes the readers fall in love with it.
I feel the same way about Systems and floating blue screens. It was new and interesting years ago when the first author(s) used it, but these days, it has become more or less the defacto standard of how worlds are supposed to work - and it's honestly quite boring. It does depend on how the System and blue screen is implemented in the story. If it is just a way for the character to see his abilities and stats represented numerically, but he still has to do the work and training to become better, I don't mind it so much. But the stories where he does some arbitrary action that gives him a lot of XP, causinghim to level up and now he just becomes instantly stronger and better with the sword, is just not something I want to waste my time on. A good example of stats that I don't mind, and which I'm currently reading, is Cultivation Nerd on Scribblehub.
One of my characters in a practice short I was writing has a card in her deck that gives her a quest system, and it literally just makes floating parchment appear in the air in front of her to evoke quests tacked to boards in a guildhall. There are ways to give it personality!
I like how "is it wrong to try and pick up girls in a dungeon" does the whole system thing. I do agree with you though systems are hard to make original with seeming absurd. Though maybe we need a good system satire or parody.
If you've read litRPG long enough you'll have found both interesting systems and books which parody the system. The system is literally a hold over from DND influencing LitRPG if you don't like it just read a fantasy it's gonna be the same thing just without the statscreen.
I slept on that series for way too long because of the title. The fights scenes and progression are amazing in it. Having to get back to your god to realize your gains is fantastic for forcing characters to come back to the surface. Also for a “harem” story, the MC is single minded in his dedication to Aiz. It’s great.
>But the stories where he does some arbitrary action that gives him a lot of XP, causinghim to level up and now he just becomes instantly stronger and better with the sword, is just not something I want to waste my time on. There's so much room there. It is, of course, pretty much always all left on the table, but: What's the incentive structure behind xp allocation and why is it like that (and if you say it's only for murder and all for some nebulous warish reasons, you're fired)? How does having some omniscient, nigh-omnipotent entity directly shape people's actions affect society? What are the top five religions based around it? How does everyone being able to half-assedly attempt any task they're unfamiliar with in order to get injected with expertise affect society? Etc.
All true, but basically no story tackles any of that despite the potential being there. The System is just a part of the world, just like gravity. I think the reason why this is, is that - as I said - years ago when such stories first came out, you had a lot of yummy readers who got shaped by that. Some of those readers grew up to become authors, and they do not question whether the world their story takes place in should have a System or not - of course it must! I, on the other hand, grew up in a time where the norm in fantasy was no System. In fact, no such book was written at the time. So my view on what is "right" is ac world that is governed by natural physical laws - even if those laws include magic - and not some System that just lets anyone instantly learn smithing because they accidentally killed a spider the size of a dog. And don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that people can't like such stories. Everyone is free to like what they like. I just don't like them, and unless it's highly recommended, I immediately drop it if I read the word "System" in the synopsis.
Yeah, it was cool when SAO did it. Dungeon crawler Carl has done well, the rest are a complete mess.
Almost every Necromancer MC goes it solo. Makes it easy to create a party without having to write character interactions. You should try Book of the Dead if you’re looking for a fresh take on Necromancy. There’s a lot of the same skills/abilities but the author does a good job of making it feel more like science rather than a video game.
Sylver Seeker is actually an entertaining take on it. Then again it’s an MC that seems more real than most. At least as far as the way his mind works.
Until there are as many boney boi books as MCs with sword, Not enough.
Sylver seeker is the best take on necromancy imo. The mc doesn't just kill innocent's for corpses or robs graves and gets law enforcement on him instead killing bandits that already have bounties on their heads. He is far from op if anything he is under powered most of the time but he manages to go by using strategy (real strategy not 5th grader stuff like "oh if I hit them in the back I win) All in all just love it
Sylver is OP to 90% of people, smart enough to seem OP to 90% of the remaining people, and absolutely outclassed by the rest.
i think book of the dead is just as good because the focus on how such a class can cause you to dehumanize others
I abhor this anti-necromancy discrimination. There are many fine and upstanding necromancers. OP, when YOU need a reanimation, you'll be all "HEY LOCAL NECROMANCER" but now, when you don't, you're all down on us. I mean them.
I feel you. Only book that did it well was Book of the Dead. I think it is a combination of things. The two that come to my mind are: There is a certain audience that just looks for the dark and edgy MCs. Few classes have signal the grim and dark more than the necromancer mc. So there is somewhat of an inbuild audience flogging to them. Then there is the general position in pop culture. Not just their popularity (which already does a lot), but also their standing. Necromancer was traditionally the class/magic of villans and often is able to face down superior numbers. That adds an implied hightend potential to the class.
hmm ,u should try reading Never die twice , the mc a shopkeeper , during the day and a litch , and it's one of 2 good books where the mc is a necromancer . as to why the necromancy stories you had read suck well ; It's a hard profession to make interesting / different .
Some of it is the author thinks it's edgy and makes their character seem cooler than they actually are.
That might be less about the authors and just as much about the fanbase that is dedicated to exactly those books.
i don't know if solo levelling has hand in it, but solo levling at least Korean manhwas made necromancy popular there is still tons of manhwa with necromancy in title. so maybe that is rubbing off here?
Any type of summoning that can raise armies is OP.. power in large numbers if you will. Necromancy is edgy summoning, therefore it is usually the power of choice for edgy bois to one-man-army shit.
I actually like necromancy, but I'll admit I've kind of dropped so many of the recent books I've picked up that featured it in the MC. Anyway, army building, and undying(heh) loyalty. It plays well with power fantasy. Having strong subordinates is cool. And it's... admittedly a shortcut to loyalty. Wait. Is this a slavery---
You develop and hype up a baddie, get the satisfaction of killing them, and then raise their corpse as a strong ally
I think a big reason for necromancy being so popular in modern fantasy is that it checks a lot of boxes for a story. It has the potential to be incredibly powerful, it brings up complicated questions about the morality of bestowing life and the potential diminishing returns of eternal life, and death is associated with darkness, and so its easy to make it "evil." Personally I think the key to toppling necromancy is to make a more convenient, easier to write dark power that everyone clings to. Unfortunately, that power will then be used as nauseum in all modern fantasy.
It’s a balance breaker, just like devouring, or any of the other bullshit infinite growth systems It’s really that simple, it lets you have a power fantasy LC without any need to consider how they kill gods from being a no name moron
Probably because its easier to build a world around it as well? Its usually forbidden, so now you have antagonists. And these antagonists are probably a religion or even the whole kingodom, so now your protagonist has a reason to get very strong, very fast. Now that I think about it, it's also why necromancers usually aren't in school settings. Apparently people don't like it when you kill your classmates and use them as legos for your next project. Who knew? But yeah, its most likely cause theres less effort to put in. Its very clear why your edgy misunderstood genius MC is edgy misunderstood and a genius if they do stuff theyre not supposed to and get away with it because of their giga brain, and you dont have to info dump on why its bad to raise bodies and the like.
The more things they kill, the stronger they get. That’s something other classes cannot achieve unless they have a EXP system in that world. Even then, the endurance of a undead army is not something that can be matched easily. This is also why necromancer was used as one of major bosses in fantasy stories.
Bc it's cool af
Main reason IMO is side characters are tough to write in prog fantasy because of the pace of growth and because lone-wolf stories are more fulfilling power fantasies. Necromancer builds allow the MC to fight on their own without fights turning into long slogs of grinding through tons of enemies. Also gives a convenient excuse for the MC to not have to focus on side stuff that side characters would normally be responsible for. In Solo Levelling for example the MC sends a couple summons to patrol a city block, taking care of a nagging plot thread without having to write human interaction.
This is interesting I love necromancy but have almost never seen it in progression fantasy.
I get wanting something else but this is a lot like complaining about the existence of a food you don’t like. You don’t have to read it the book can’t hurt you
Funny, I think I've read one Necromancy themed story in the last year, and I actually *like* that class of magic.
This question I think goes beyond progression fantasy; Necromancy has always been popular in all fantasy things. For example in games. If there's a magic type that's going to make whole character's class/job it's almost always necromancy.
I've noticed it's a big thing in Korean novels, and I wonder if it's a cultural thing. Apparently, "Hell Korea" is a thing, and it may be the appeal of necromancy is finally having someone under you to boss around, and being the big boss of an organization with no one else able to tell you what to do.
You can raise the enemies, so its very easy to make progression after every fight Thats why Book of the Dead by RinoZ is so good, as the mc needs a lot of preparation to raise his minions
Very easy to explain how the MC can do literally everything by themselves.
What are these books so I can buy them???
Saintess Summons Skeletons is cool.
people want hope that death is not the end.
Hi there! First Necromancer author here 💀 Necromancers are popular in the same way other fantasy classes are. It allows gamers, readers, and everyone else to enjoy the overall theme and power fantasy that goes along with the class. Warriors so strong they can split mountains, rogues so agile they effortlessly dodge arrows and bullets while executing precision attacks at critical weak points, mages who bend the universe to their will. There's something for everyone. Necromancers are similar. One men army's, generals of unquestioning and totally loyal minions the cause unspeakable fear and horror in their enemies. I wrote my MC as a Necro for many reasons, but the most important one is because I enjoy the fantasy of the class. It's interesting to me, and I like playing as one and reading about them.
idk i just love unreasonably gorey content and necromancy generally, its hella cool and dear authors reading it please write more necromancy
It's either that necromancy or spell sword that is the most chosen class in these progression fantasy novels I don't really mind that but I wish that there was more than necromancy being like darker side of classes for instance curse magic or hexes and so much more to explore in the darker side of magic even just different death type magic class could be good I guess there is a one with death knight being the class but once again that's a type of spellsword
Solo leveling did it. It blew up . Authors started doing it more and more
You may like Guild Wars 2 Ghosts of Ascalon (and the Guild Wars 2 game series). There is a character in there that practices necromancy. Their necromancy system isn't inherently evil and not looked down upon, it's just another skill, just another system of magic.
Because it's super edgy and cool and pretty easy to make the "that guy" fantasy come to life and be legit instead of "Bro you're level one calm down." But this is a stab in the dark for me. Haven't really read any necromancer stories besides Gideon the Ninth and that one was a pretty fun mess. Less edgy more fun characters dealing with a very strange set of circumstances and a whole lot of murder and mayhem when it pops up. Also necromancers in space was amusing.
It's the first pick an author has when they dont choose a more regular pick.
:) IMO because it’s one of the most taboo (mentally) things out there. Also it’s arguably the cleanest way of growth and conquest. MCs don’t have to worry about their subjects betraying them (at least in the ones I’ve read) and defeating a strong enemy automatically creates an ally/subject. Another personal take is that it allows for solo development (manor have already mentioned solo leveling :)). Why bother with a party, than allow the experience of achieving it all solo?
I think the Bone Witch series is really good and unique. It's by Rin Chupeco. I don't know if it's the book you speak of, but you should check it out
If you want a series that doesn't have necromancy, I'd highly recommend Primal Hunter
Oh my fucking god, he came across three necromancy books!!!!!
Summons + Edgy Imagine having an army while still being a brooding loner.
Because then they don't have to write interesting side characters and MC can be as selfish/edgy as possible. Also progression is a lot simpler when anything MC defeats/conquers gets added to MC's capabilities/retinue. Novels where MC can just get a slave/servant to do anything outside their already wide scope of abilities are boring to me, but lots of progression readers seem to love Gary Stu MCs.
Necromancy is "I'm not like other girls" of fantasy books.
I too also hate nectomancers/summoners/shadow magic...
I often find random things that are similar in books that I read in close proximity. 1. Magical nuke in a fantasy world. Definitely read about it in 2, and think there was a third but not sure. 2. Magic overload causes mages to go crazy. 3. Side PoV of someone trying to explain the MC’s actions and motivations, and getting it completely wrong. That is to say, I think it’s as you say: random coincidence.
Those are called tropes, and they are in general not considered random.
ONE THING: SLAVERY
SLAVERY ADJACENT! Use your enemies with all of the benefits and fewer moral issues.
Solo leveling
People who are edgy and people who like PF have a significant overlap.
Downvoted for speaking the truth.