[3.5] Tactics/Strategies for Undead Armies

[Segial]

I'm currently running a forgotten realms campaign and I was hoping for some suggestions for an upcoming conflict. The setting is that you are an CE lvl 20 Dread Necromancer who intents to assault a mountain fortress inhabited by a lvl 20 Wizard and his golem castle guard, and who knows you are coming. You have around 500 HD of undead you can create and control, but none tougher then lets say 12HD, with the tougher undead of course being harder and more expensive to create. Which undead creatures would you want to have in your army, what spells would you use and which strategy would you employ?

[Eldariel]

Animate Dread Warrior [Unapproachable East] is an excellent reanimation spell and one I'd probably rather heavily use. I'd likely also make use of Incorporeals, particularly ones capable of attacking objects. Optimally, you'd want to control some spellcasting undead, but those are rather hard to create; tends to be easier to Rebuke-control some.

Awaken Undead [Spell Compendium] (doesn't remove control) is a rather key spell if you want a bit more useful Undead in your command. Spellstitching [Complete Arcane] some seems like a fine idea. For starters. Mostly though, I'd pray first and foremost.

[Tetrasodium]

Can't really help with the undead armies... but I can give you a spiffy spell for the golems :). Page 186 & 187 of races of eberron, humanoid essence and greater humanoid essence... strip away a whole bunch of those construct immunities :)

[Segial]

Thanks for the input so far. Awaken Undead sounds like a good idea, but I don't think I'll use Ebberon spells in the Forgotten Realms setting, [and because I don't have the books].

So far I was thinking of a few scores of awakend zombies, skeletons and ghouls as footsoldiers and cannon fodder, a few zombie giants as artillery and some zombie wyerns, harpies and wraiths for control of the airspace.

I have no clue what to use as assault units though, the golem guard is mostly flesh and bone golems, but none of the undead in the core rules are suited to really put a dent in them.

[Human Paragon 3]

If I were a necromancer, and I was serious about taking over the world with an undead horde, I would do whatever I could to abuse their immunities. Let's look at an undead army vs. a living army point by point:

A real live army has many advantages over the undead. First, they are intelligent. They can think and adapt on their feet for changing environments. They can also have class levels. This is the main thing that will make them triumph over the undead. A variety of powerful abilities, including spellcasting. With time to prepare, there are so many spells that destroy or harm or hijack undead, the living don't really need to worry about the shambling masses.

Now a look at the undead's strengths:

They don't feel fear. They will never disobey an order. They don't grow tired. They don't need to eat, sleep or breathe. They are imune to poison. And although there are many ways to destroy undead, there are a variety of spells that help them, too.

So how do you capitolize on those strengths?

1) Fear effects and morale checks. Look into the Heroes of Battle book at morale and use it to your advantage. Undead shouldn't need to make rally checks. They will never panic or retreat, and their mood doesn't effect how they fight. Theoretically fear is the biggest weapon of the undead. Don't let it go to waste by not figuring it into the rolls. People don't want to fight the corpse of their dead mother. People get scared. Undead don't.

2) Make the battle last as long as possible. Stretch it out into weeks or months if possible. This is doabe if you can constantly raise more undead as you go, something likely if you have a powerful necromancer on a battlefield of dead soldiers. The living will eventually fatigue. The army of the dead won't. Again, look at Heroes of Battle for rules on supplying armies and fatigue. If nothing there floats your boat, make something up. Your players will go with it. Wizards need to rest to get their spells back. Clerics need time to pray. Undead don't need a break. Have them wear down their opponents!

3) Fill the battlefield with poisonous gas, either magical or the real stuff. Cloudkill, Stinking Cloud, contact poisons, inhaled poisons etc. These things are deadly to the living. An army of the living will have many low level soldiers who will just die during a couldkill. The undead will be able to mop them up pretty handily once they fail a few saves vs. poison.

4) Spam negative energy attacks. The living will be spamming positive energy, believe me, so take back the night. Negative energy hurts the living and heals undead. Spam it ad naseum whenver possible.

[Eldariel]

This should be a good read (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19872470/New_Dread_Necromancer_Handbook).

[Tar Palantir]

Constructs are immune to everything the undead are, as well as to mental ability damage and necromancy spells. Your undead will have a hard time inflicting real damage to the golems. Conversely, the golems have no ability to harm incorporeal undead whatsoever. Therefore, your forces should consist of two groups. Group A will be composed of the biggest and strongest zombies you can muster, especially zombie dragons (using the alternate template from Draconimicon; this allows them to keep their breath weapons, which as a supernatural ability can harm the golems fine (just avoid electrical damage and any type that heals bone golems (not sure if there is one))). group A will, through breath weapon and sheer force of blows, attempt to destroy or delay the golems. Group B, meanwhile, will be composed of incorporeal undead, and will move to strike at the wizard himself. Do what you can to conceal the existence of this force, up to and including having the troops remain just underground at all times in case of scrying; this may limit the number of protective spells the wizard places on himself to protect against ability and level drain. A wizard who has invested such effort into creating golem servants will likely be less well equipped to handle forces the golems cannot even touch. Pray that this is the case, because if the wizard is properly prepared, you stand little chance.

[AdamSmasher]

As a rule of thumb, zombies suck. Don't use them. Two skeletons are always better than one zombie of the same creature.


If you're going to be using 1 HD skeletons, check out the Mob creature in Cityscape.

Now raise a bunch of regular skeletons and just have them mob. They become a CR 8 creature with crazy high attack/grapple that can auto-grapple and practically auto-damage everything in it's area. A mobs attack deals 5d6 damage to everyone in their space, and they have Trample, too. They're practically a swarm. WAY better as a unified whole than as separated soldiers.

And, better yet, that wizard won't wipe them out with one fireball or artillery attack. The fireball will still hurt, doing 1.5x damage, but since they're counted as a single creature they stay strong until their collective hitpoints hits zero.

You can send a mob of fast skeletons in to WRECK an unprepared group of his golems.

Major bonus points if you can get orc skeletons.

If you have a large number of individually weak combatants it's WAY better to have them Mob than attack as a group. It takes about 20-25 human COMMONERS to make a strong CR 8 creature, and your skeletons with their claws and damage reduction will be a strong CR 9-10. For the same HD in 12 HD skeletons, you can only get about a CR 8, and a hilariously weak CR 8 at that.

[Halae]

there are a few trimes when zombies are good. zombie dragons, for instance, are actually not bad, and the skeleton dragon template doesn't really stack up with it. Slso, a platoon of orc zombies with slings can be absolutely devastating to enemy forces.

You should also contact the nearest chicken infested commoner - he'll be happy to sell you his chickens and if you have destruction retribution each time one of them dies it'll explode in a burst of 1d6 negative energy damage. that may not seem like a whole lot, but that's a lot of chickens you can control (assuming 1/4 HD) and negative energy heals your army but still affects constructs.

As said before, a bunch of incorporeal critters sneaking in from underground can be deadly to the unpreppared. Shadows are your best bet, but wraiths work too.

And remember that spellcasting is your friend. what I said above can make the bulk of your army, but a few full blown terrors, preferably with spellcasting ability, can make a big difference on their own. not only can you get them to withdraw and you heal them (an unlimited amount, by the way) a spellcaster can be the most destructive piece of an army if fielded right and with the right spells.