Shattered Kingdoms

I liked Surrit. Sorry to see him go.

As an aside... I have always been a big fan of animate instead of control. IMO, control is too much like charm, but animate has much more flavor and I've loved the image of a necro walking around with an army in tow. I remember the days when animate was TRULY a big pile of crap, and I've always taken a lot of pride in being the one who spearheaded the original change to the spell (and which, admittedly, took it into the realm of totally OP, 10+ years ago). Definitely agree that there is room for it to be re-buffed, in baby steps, to prevent it from going OP again. It has actually seen one tiny tiny re-buff in the past year or so, but that seems to have been relatively negligible. The problem with a spell that can build an army, is that even a small change has a chance of going from nothing to uber when multiplied by 8.

+1

Not to derail but have you recently tried to equip animated wraiths with polearms?
I think the spell needs to be evaluated and the animates slightly upgraded. Controls are def the way to go for the time being.

I never had any problem with being on the receiving end of OP animates way back when. The necro had to put an immense amount of time and preparation into building his army, why shouldn't it be ridiculously powerful? In a game that rewards preparation in pvp, the necromancer animate army should still be at the top of the OP list. Plus I loved that if a single necromancer attacked a city it was serious business.

Disclaimer: I have never played a necromancer.

In a roundabout way, necros probably wouldn't have been changed if Edoras didn't do his bounty NPC purge daily to "fight the system"

Anyway I was a staunch defender of the necro changes - looking back, I still like the different undead affects, but animates need made a bit stronger overall.

You and I have the same mindset, Baranov.

I doubt that's true, because if it is then the nerf totally missed the mark. Necros can empty accounts with the exact same level of effectiveness now as before the nerf.

On a slightly related note, I know that a lot of people hate on me for spam killing bounty NPCs, but the fact of the matter is that PvP is impossible in cities if you have a long enough outlaw list. It's not just difficult, it's impossible, because you spawn 3 NPCs -just for yourself- for every non-wilderness step you take. I understand that's the intent, and I don't really argue with it, but that should be a frame of mind to be aware of next time you get angry at someone for spending their time trying to empty an account. In the last week I played Surrit, I went to go gather an item from the Taslamaran palace when no Peacekeepers were online, and I'm pretty sure that I was forced to kill at least a hundred bounty NPCs to do that. Interestingly enough, it used to be a lot -easier- to drain accounts and much more costly to replace tribunal guards until I suggested a change to lower the maximum amount for the tribunal balance while also lowering the cost of bounty NPCs even more. I didn't spend my time emptying accounts to "fight the system." I spent my time emptying accounts because that was the only option available to me if I wanted my characters' battles in enemy territory to actually mean something.

Ditto

Thank you for testing so much, Dabi and Nashira.

The part you're distinguishing there must have taken a while to understand.

I appreciate necromancers not being unbalanced.

Without playing-

I think they can be a critical part of the gamesmanship of CRS.

It would be greatly appreciated if they could have the power to actually change the tides, due to the skill development investment of time and concentration.