Could you please (PLEASE!) give necormancers a time to eat/piss/smoke etc without losing undeads? Like, quit for 30 minutes or less wouldn't destroy them? It's not nice to leave inanimated body, or use triggers to keep him alive (and pray that nobody would find you). It's important when you invest 2-3 hours on raising 5 zombies and have to make a break. Thanks!

nt

It's how I've done it, and I assume others, for 20 years when I need to step away for a minute. Just go to a corner of a non busy place and it's unlikely anyone will find you. I've never died doing this, though with pets I supposed they could always do a where zombie and find you if they were looking to kill someone that doesn't show up on who... which might be unlikely unless they were already about to attack.

That said, I do wish that pets would log out with you, much like mercenaries do, since it is a pain if you have to be away for 15 minutes or more for something unexpected and come back with no undead or a 30 hour timer on archons.

I can get not resetting the timers when a conjurer quits. That prevents people from gaming conjuration types.

But is there much of an advantage to letting a conjurer quit and return with already conjured pets?

The only thing I can think of is they could enter the game loaded and ready to go for a fight. Perhaps this has been abused with cabal raids in the past but it can be done with other classes. Is there anything else?

I agree with the current systems for necro though. Zombie armies are a perk to the class that drastically increases their power ceiling. It should be tough to maintain.

Is that the player who only averages between an hour and half an hour a day, the ones who have no time to play, just can't play Necros. By the time you've even started on an army, you're logging off.

I just wish there could be some middle ground, like maybe earlier on they get a weaker animate dead option? Makes skeletons, fails less often, and has a lower CD, but the skeletons are significantly weaker? Maybe they don't take mob levels into account, and they are a level or two below the Necro's level? Anyone with time wouldn't waste their time on it (to prevent rapid armies could make animate dead not work when skeleton timer is up?). Just a thought for the guys with less playtime who might want to try a necro. Anyone who wants to be really powerful would still always use zombies, but the guy with less time could gather the weaker army in their shorter logins.

Just a thought.

EDIT: I understand coding is at an all time low, so if the imms do like this option, maybe just put it up on a list or something? I just thought it was a neat suggestion.

Like you said, the guy who wants to get the most mileage out of a necromancer is going to have to play longer sessions. I think that's okay.

But I'm inclined to believe you're under-selling how effective one can be without a full army.

A Spectre without any animated corpses can possess:
- A golem
- A greater undead
- A mercenary (there are some nice ones)
- A "special" pet from various progged items (maybe not 100% of the time, but there are quite a few of these if one can scare them up)

Then let's assume that even the laziest necromancer who plays 30-40 minutes at a crack is always going to have at least one zombie.

That's a crew of 4-5 plus whatever other zombies can be accumulated.

Combine that with a pretty scary skill set and I think you have a very playable build even given some time / effort constraints.

For bonus points one can supplement with additional offensive preps.

And of course the pièce de résistance is attaining undeath, which is really pretty easy if you're willing to "settle" for Wight.

It requires a different play style and tactics, and it'll never be the go-to approach for the power-gamer, but it's totally viable.