Quote from: Ravenswing;792000Not trying one of those obnoxious "fixed that for you" bits, but I think that's closer to the mark.  "Good" and "Evil" are very much subjective to individual cultures, and not every human culture considers dealings with the dead to be evil, by a long shot.

I'd say closer to the mark wouuld actually be : "Western Society from Rome to medieval Europe, to the present." Dealings with the dead were frowned upon in general by any society influenced by Christianity or the heritage of Classical civilization. But certainly that doesn't speak for all of humanity.

If necromancy = raise undead, it gets tricky, but, barring a strict moral rejection from the real people involved, it can be done. How, has been well covered. Just for another example, my own setting includes an order that consideres their sworn oaths binding eternally, so they turn to nekromancy on their own fallen.

The psychopomp aspect has also been very well covered.

This leaves death spells, like finger of death or circle of death in D&D. Snuffing out lives with a snap of your finger sure sounds evil, but in the end you attempt the same end result with throwing down a fireball, plus the pain of being burned to crisp. Compared to the possible deaths offered by most magic systems, I'd say instant death spells may well be downright humane.

For example, Warhammer has Amethyst Mages, who have all the instant death power usually associated with Necromancy, but are considered no more blasphemous or evil than Jade (Life) Mages.

In my D&D/PF games raising skeletons and zombies is not an evil act. It is just animating a conveniently shaped object. It may well have negative social connotations mind you. But it is not an evil act. They are mindless creatures. They have no alignment. Not any more than an animated chair would. fewer people get upset though if you animate  a chair rather than Aunt Bessy. Yes, I know that the Animate Dead spell has an Evil descriptor. I ignore it.

Mycocinds and some other plants in D&D that use dead bodies as a framework.

Quote from: Omega;792751Mycocinds and some other plants in D&D that use dead bodies as a framework.

Forget the 'dead' part. There are fungi that take over living insects and use them to spread their spores...

Quote from: Tetsubo;792756Forget the 'dead' part. There are fungi that take over living insects and use them to spread their spores...

Yeah, there was a nifty videogame about that fungus spreading to humans a while back ..."Last of us" or something to that effect. Watched a friend of mine play it ( dont play VG myself, but sometimes they're fun to watch)

Quote from: TristramEvans;792757Yeah, there was a nifty videogame about that fungus spreading to humans a while back ..."Last of us" or something to that effect. Watched a friend of mine play it ( dont play VG myself, but sometimes they're fun to watch)

A Batman comic had a similar story-line at one point. Though it was only a single person with the infection. I also don't play vieo games but I enjoy watching them on YouTube. I recommend lumin, Gopher and sloshworks.

Sans moral relativism, necros are evil, pretty simple.

Interestingly, in 3e D&D, you could animate the dead as a not inherently evil act... with Animate Object.

Mind you, there's no particular reason to animate a dead body vs., say, a dresser, and a DM may rule that it is evil as a 'desecration of the dead.' But it's not quite as cut and dried as Animate Dead (in 3e D&D, where all undead are evil).

Quote from: dragoner;792779Sans moral relativism, necros are evil, pretty simple.

Only if you view animating mindless undead as evil. And I don't. That isn't moral relativism. Animating a thing is animating a thing.

Quote from: Will;792783Interestingly, in 3e D&D, you could animate the dead as a not inherently evil act... with Animate Object.

Mind you, there's no particular reason to animate a dead body vs., say, a dresser, and a DM may rule that it is evil as a 'desecration of the dead.' But it's not quite as cut and dried as Animate Dead (in 3e D&D, where all undead are evil).

I've done that as a GM, animate corpses with the Animate Object spell. It creates undead that can't be turned. Priests hate that.

I will dispute that animating mindless undead is evil until *my* dying day.

Well, it's built into the nature of 3e D&D. I agree, though, that it doesn't HAVE to be that way.

And it's not even completely logical -- creating undead involves drawing on the negative energy plane. But the negative energy plane shouldn't necessarily be automatically evil.
I mean, if you visit the positive energy plane it fills you with energy until you explode and die. So... hey.

Quote from: Tetsubo;792787I've done that as a GM, animate corpses with the Animate Object spell. It creates undead that can't be turned. Priests hate that.

I will dispute that animating mindless undead is evil until *my* dying day.

Well, it is all based on the cosmology of the setting, and then the different cultural 'reads' o that cosmology.  So it certainly can be evil.  Or it can be neutral, or even a tool for weal in the right setting and cultural.

Saying it is evil or good without those references is sort of baseless.

Quote from: Tetsubo;792786Only if you view animating mindless undead as evil. And I don't. That isn't moral relativism. Animating a thing is animating a thing.

It is not just a thing, it was a person. Typically, necromancy, deals with enslavement, or somehow feeding off the energy of the dead, or just as a simple vandalizing a gravesite. Generally all which would be considered evil, though historically was driven by fear of sepsis or disease; not that people understood what it was, ie cholera was originally thought to be from bad odors.

Quote from: LordVreeg;792790Well, it is all based on the cosmology of the setting, and then the different cultural 'reads' o that cosmology.  So it certainly can be evil.  Or it can be neutral, or even a tool for weal in the right setting and cultural.

Saying it is evil or good without those references is sort of baseless.

D&D has literal Evil and Good in it. It isn't about cultural opinions. The standard descriptor for an Animate Dead spell is Evil. I disagree with that. The negative Plane itself is not evil. Negative energy itself is not evil. Why is using negative energy to animate a mindless undead evil? Because the writers of the game said it was evil. That is not a good justification for me. I've had this conversation a hundred times. I am in the minority opinion on this. Most folks just say it is evil because it is listed as Evil. I don't like that. Things without minds can't make moral choices. The spell itself when used to create something that can't make a moral choice shouldn't be evil in my opinion. I am sure I will be corrected.