Perilous Necromancer
Undead summoner - your summons hit harder and live longer the higher you climb, and your own strikes feed them.
Overview
The Necromancer is a summoner. Instead of new spells, it reshapes the standard summon spells into undead - Bone Knights, Mummies, Liches - and pumps every summon you control full of extra health and damage as you level. Your job is to keep the horde up and pointed at something; your own attacks exist mostly to top the horde back off.
It leans on Magery and Spirit Speak, two skills detailed on the Skills & Stats page; there is no separate Necromancy spellbook, so the class layer is what makes your summons monstrous.
Passive Bonuses
Always on against monsters, scaling with your Necromancer level (suppressed in PvP). Maxed at level 10:
| Bonus | Per level | At level 10 |
|---|---|---|
| Effective Spirit Speak | +2 | +20 |
| Health of all your summons | +5% | +50% |
| Damage of all your summons | +5% | +50% |
| Damage taken | -1% | -10% |
Signature Procs
Two procs fire off your own attacks and casts against monsters (not your summons' hits), and both feed the horde. The weaker triggers at 0.5% per level (5% at 10); the stronger at 0.1% per level (1% at 10). PvM only.
- Soul Siphon (weaker): leech life equal to 2% of the target's current HP per level and heal all your summons for that amount. Purple burst.
- Essence Drain (stronger): leech 2% of the target's current mana per level and refill your summons' mana with it - keeps caster summons like Liches throwing spells.
Fork Abilities
At levels 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10 you pick one of two, permanent for the build. Each costs Soul Shards (10 / 20 / 30 / 40 / 50).
| Level | Option A | Option B |
|---|---|---|
| 2 | Bone Knight - Earth Elemental summon becomes a Bone Knight, +25% HP, costs 1 follower slot | Commune - using Spirit Speak within 4 tiles of an undrained corpse drains it for 2 mana per level |
| 4 | Mummy - Air Elemental summon becomes a Mummy, +50% HP, 1 slot | Undeath - +2.5% max HP per level to all your summons (stacks with the passive) |
| 6 | Ancient Magic - +2.5% summon spell damage per level | Skeletal Mage - Summon Creature becomes a Skeletal Mage |
| 8 | Lich - Fire Elemental summon becomes a Lich, +50% HP, 2 slots | Death Pact - at 5 mana or less, sacrifice all summons for 15 mana + 5 HP each, 120s cooldown |
| 10 | Ancient Lich - Summon Daemon becomes an Ancient Lich, 3 slots | Lich Form - transform for 2 min: undead immunities, +20% spell damage, auto-Commune, cannot mount, 5-min cooldown |
Your undead resist Dispel and the monster auto-dispel that ordinary summons fall to, so a Necromancer's horde has to be killed, not waved away.
How It Plays
PvM. You are a pet class without the taming - your power is the horde, and the horde gets tougher every level and every proc. Open with your summons, keep them healed with Soul Siphon procs and your own heals, and use Spirit Speak (buffed and, with Commune, mana-positive) to sustain. By level 10 a full field of +50% HP, +50% damage undead is a wall of bodies that most content simply cannot chew through fast enough.
PvP. The summon and damage bonuses are PvM only, and swapping class forces you to dismiss your summons, so the Necromancer is not a duel build. Its strength is grinding and clearing, not standing in a player fight.
Coins & Leveling
The Necromancer spends Soul Shards. Earn class XP worth 10% of the gold your kills drop (active class only), fill the bar, then pay the Necromancer Guildmaster the target level times ten in Soul Shards to take each level (about 550 for the full run to 10). Fork abilities cost extra coins. Coins drop for everyone off tough monsters, and Prism Coins can substitute for any class coin you are short.
Not Locked In
Your first class is free and instant. Changing later takes a 2-minute channel (hold still, take no damage, dismiss your summons first) plus a cooldown between swaps. Each class keeps its own level and forks, so switching away and back does not reset your Necromancer.
One character can also carry multiple skill builds via the Personality system - two slots to start, up to five for gold or Ether Charged Powder, swapped with a 2-minute channel (a fresh slot starts your skills at zero to retrain). So a summoner build and a melee or crafting build can share the same character.