Excommunication & Necromutation

[njvack]

One thing that's struck me as odd for a while is that the good gods excommunicate you for going lichform, but not for doing whatever fell thing is involved in Borg's or Death's Door. It's kind of crazy that you can be following TSO in Pan and Revivify your way out of trouble, and then just kill another hundred demons and be back in TSO's good graces. And it's not like you're ever gonna invest in a dual-school spell if there's any chance you're gonna follow a good god later.

I'd suggest that, maybe, any of those spells get you excommunicated. Or maybe that none of them do -- but I think it's kinda neat.

[reaver]

I don't like whole "excommunication spells" thing since it seems that regular punishments should be enough to keep them in check. However, if it isn't going to be removed forbidding Revivification and Death's Door makes sense because they're more "emergency" spells (For example, if you learned them and then converted to Zin to cure a bunch of bad mutations it might make since to cast one in a rough spot). Maybe it would be best to just forbid every spell in the Necronomicon for consistency?

[TwilightPhoenix]

Training Necromancy should get you piety decay and penance related in some fashion to the amount of XP you're putting into the skill. Sort of like how Trog dislikes you training magic.

Edit: If they already do this, then don't kill me because I've never trained Necro while following a good god.

[duvessa]

I don't like whole "excommunication spells" thing since it seems that regular punishments should be enough to keep them in check. However, if it isn't going to be removed forbidding Revivification and Death's Door makes sense because they're more "emergency" spells (For example, if you learned them and then converted to Zin to cure a bunch of bad mutations it might make since to cast one in a rough spot). Maybe it would be best to just forbid every spell in the Necronomicon for consistency?

Blocking 4 unrelated necromancy spells but not the rest is not "consistency."
Excommunicating for casting any necromancy spell at all seems reasonable (at least once the game gets the capability to warn you about casting spells), but keep in mind that TSO is already one of the weakest gods in the game, and blocking the two best spells in the game above level 6 doesn't exactly help that.

[MDvedh]

I'm not sure about TSO being a bad god after I haste-cleansed W:3 several times.

[1010011010]

Your excommunicated because your a lich, not because it's a high level necro spell.

[carbonbasedlifeform]

Your excommunicated because your a lich, not because it's a high level necro spell.

Vouch! Thats why they prohibit ghouls/mummies becoming their followers. Not because theyre apts are shifted towards becoming necromancer or casting necro spells but because they are undead. If any reasoning fits to the change that casting (or training) any necro spell would excommunicate you they would have to do the same to zin+poison, trog+spell, muna+goin berserk , fedhas+eating/destroying vegetables/plants etc.

[Jeremiah]

Maybe TSO should excommunicate you if you cast Spider Form because poison is eeeeeevil.

[and into]

I think excommunication for necromutation is flavor more so than anything else, but it is sensible flavor and is consistent with mummy, ghouls, and vampires being unable to worship the holy gods.

As for revivification and DD—penance for necromancy is sufficient. If you really want to train at least ~16 levels of a skill purely in order to use one specific spell (and only that spell) which will nonetheless put you in penance if you do use it, anyway... Well, knock yourself out. (Putting aside the whole question of skill level investment, DD and revivification are the only spell effects that are good enough to be worth getting penance over, so you'd be training a hell of a lot of necromancy just for that.) The simple fact that doing this is stupid, outside of characters that have cleared multiple ziggurats and have literally run out of skills to train, is punishment enough. In much the same way that you don't need Vehumet to deliver special divine punishments to high elf fire elementalists who insist on wearing GDA with no armor skill and 7 strength, for instance.