Herbert the Unstoppable (or, Pimp My Zombie)

[PlatinumVixen]

So in the game I'm running - gathering stuff for a campaign journal soon - a couple of the party members tried to set off an ambush at a wall. They had their necromancer (Well, Techromancer) and Alchemist NPC friends perform surgery on a zombie (which was promptly christened "Herbert") to make him look like he had been rigged with an alchemist bomb, then sent him to the gate and waited.

Herbert was never attacked, of course, because there wasn't anyone actually guarding the gate. But the party insisted on taking young Herbert (for reference, a 1 HD zombie in a party of then Level 4 characters) into the dungeon with them, where against my expectations he managed to avoid every area of effect attack and none of the enemies ever managed to actually hit him, despite him being an incredibly weak zombie. Then they fought the boss.

Throughout the entire conflict, Herbert slowly marched his way from the entrance of the room to the boss. Never stopping. Never being hit. I didn't have the boss' mooks worry about him because, well, he couldn't hit the boss' AC normally and did terribly small amounts of damage whenever he did it, and frankly they all would have regarded a zombie as a mild nuisance. But as the fight went on, the zombie got closer and closer to the Dread Psionic (itself a sometimes lacking class) calling the shots. And the Dread's health got lower and lower.

When the zombie finally arrived at the Dread, I knew the fight was almost over. But I fully expected the boss to take Herbert with him.

So that was when the Dread and the party missed EVERY ATTACK for a full round, and Herbert finally managed to get an attack in. He critted the boss, and rolled just high enough that he actually managed to kill him.

Needless to say the party has grown quite attached to the little brain chomper and in the sessions since I've given Herbert a small Int score and have decided to start giving him experience points, turning Herbert's continued improbable survival of insane situations into a running gag.

So my question to you folks is thus: As Herbert continues to survive, I want to start giving him the strangest class levels and templates I can find that can still be somewhat justified. All of 3.5e and Pathfinder is fair game, with Dreamscarred Press, Spheres of Power (just Spheres Of Power, I'm not familiar with anything else Drop Dead Games related), and Interjection Games' (long story) stuff all being allowed. I'm already looking at 3e's hilarious but slightly insane Survivor class. Anyone have any other ideas for Herbert to acquire...unique skills and abilities in-between appearances?

[Eldonauran]

Find a way to give the Zombie the Roll With It (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/roll-with-it-combat-goblin) and Ankle biter (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/ankle-biter-combat-goblin) feats. If you can get him a decent acrobatics score, it will help increase his survivability by denying damage and give him free bite attacks (go, zombie, go!) whenever someone gets uppity and tries to pull a combat maneuver on him to bypass the roll with it feat.

[PlatinumVixen]

Ooh, that's a great idea. I might be able to justify it by giving him the Mixed Blood: Goblinoid feat from Bloodforge first, though it might be a bit of a stretch potentially. Still, his 'parents' are a person who regularly wields metal bits to zombie and an alchemist, so they'd could easily jam bits of goblin in there somehow.

[danzibr]

Wait, Herbert wasn't *actually* rigged with s bomb?

Anyway I love the story. As for making him buffer, Warblade has good hd and defensive maneuvers. Uhh... I assume self-buffing casters are out. Totemists have good defensive soulmelds, but there's the problem with undead meldshaping (can house rule it away).

[meschlum]

Browse over here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?352704-Templates-and-you&p=18743202) for a (nearly complete) list of official things you could do to the poor corpse.

Some of the following are hard to explain, but...


Worm That Walks: Requires advanced spellcating for some reason, but Herbert is now a mass of crawling undead worms that all shamble in the same direction. Toss in Demonic Vermin later on to get a swarm of zombie demon maggots pretending to be a human (so, basically, a politician).

Clockwork Construct: Assumes the zombie has a lot of mechanical parts, and has been upgraded with a big spring in its back. Particularly amusing when it begins.. to... wind... down... as... the... fight... ... grows... ... more... .... and... ... more... ... ... intense.

Crystal Creature: If there is enough metal in Herbert's frame to make it an Earth creature, it is now a slowly advancing disco ball, guaranteed to draw the attention it so rightly deserves. Be sure to mix with Alchemically Invisible so you have an invisible glowing ball of rainbow colors implacably advancing on your foes.

Mutant and Mana Wasted Mutant: to reflect all the tinkering being done on the body. Fleshwarped falls in this category too, I suppose.

Fey: because a winged zombie that is a friend to all animals and teleports at random intervals is perfectly normal.

Penanggalen: mostly for the detachable head. Have enemies taunt Herbert from outside its reach, and suddenly its head springs out to gnash and bite!

[BilltheCynic]

It's 3e, but since you gave Herbert an intelligence score you could make him an Emancipated Spawn (Savage Species 75). While the class says that you must be created by another undead using create spawn, that can be houeruled away.

Basically, an Emancipated Spawn is a three leverl prestige class that lets an undead that starts remembering what he was like before he was undead. Some of the benefits include getting back your old feats, your old class skills, and finally your old memories. This would allow for slow progression from barely intelligent zombie to...well, whatever he ends up as.

You can be very creative with this. Come up with a crazy backstory for Herbert (this would be a good place to start (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxXJ2XSMT6Q)) justifying the feats and abilities that he is getting.

I have to agree that Survivor would be hilariously appropriate for Herbert. Another funny option would be to take the Illithid Savant and remove the 'Illithid' requirement. Now they have a pet zombie who is getting stronger when he eats their enemies' braaaaaains.

[PlatinumVixen]

Wait, Herbert wasn't *actually* rigged with s bomb?


Oh yeah, the party tends to come up with some creative solutions to problems, even if they often don't pan out due to overthinking (It's even worse when I'm a player. I tend to overthink AND overexplain things, though I've been getting better. It's an enormous problem.) To give more context, two of the party members were at the head of an expedition from the Underdar-I mean, the Belowgloom - to the surface world and needed to get past a checkpoint gate, but the checkpoint had been overrun by ratfolk, gelatinous cubes, and homebrewed alchemical ooze zombies (I'm extremely partial to oozes, okay). They tried to goad the ratfolk into attacking the zombie and revealing their position by pretending to have Herbert try to bomb the gate. Fortunately for Herbert, the ratfolk didn't fall for it at the time.



Worm That Walks: Requires advanced spellcating for some reason, but Herbert is now a mass of crawling undead worms that all shamble in the same direction. Toss in Demonic Vermin later on to get a swarm of zombie demon maggots pretending to be a human (so, basically, a politician).


Oh man, that would be pretty hilarious. The final form of the final boss of our last campaign ended up being a Mythic Worm That Walks Witch - I was a player in that one and killed her with a macguffin, so the group actually doesn't know how to handle them normally if Herbert ever goes rogue. It'd probably freak out the party.


Clockwork Construct: Assumes the zombie has a lot of mechanical parts, and has been upgraded with a big spring in its back. Particularly amusing when it begins.. to... wind... down... as... the... fight... ... grows... ... more... .... and... ... more... ... ... intense.


Also pretty fantastic. I could see the Techromancer (bizarrely enough, the character is the grand-niece of the person who came up with the idea to use Herbert in the first place - like I said, weird party) doing it.


Crystal Creature: If there is enough metal in Herbert's frame to make it an Earth creature, it is now a slowly advancing disco ball, guaranteed to draw the attention it so rightly deserves. Be sure to mix with Alchemically Invisible so you have an invisible glowing ball of rainbow colors implacably advancing on your foes.


Night Of The Living Rave


Mutant and Mana Wasted Mutant: to reflect all the tinkering being done on the body. Fleshwarped falls in this category too, I suppose.

Appropriate!


Fey: because a winged zombie that is a friend to all animals and teleports at random intervals is perfectly normal.


Like half the party already has a Fey subtype. He'd fit right in! Might have arguments with the Unseelie Fey lady though. Granted those arguments are "EAT BRAINS!" "No, no, smash brains."



Penanggalen: mostly for the detachable head. Have enemies taunt Herbert from outside its reach, and suddenly its head springs out to gnash and bite!


Good grief.


It's 3e, but since you gave Herbert an intelligence score you could make him an Emancipated Spawn (Savage Species 75). While the class says that you must be created by another undead using create spawn, that can be houeruled away.

Basically, an Emancipated Spawn is a three leverl prestige class that lets an undead that starts remembering what he was like before he was undead. Some of the benefits include getting back your old feats, your old class skills, and finally your old memories. This would allow for slow progression from barely intelligent zombie to...well, whatever he ends up as.

You can be very creative with this. Come up with a crazy backstory for Herbert (this would be a good place to start) justifying the feats and abilities that he is getting.

I have to agree that Survivor would be hilariously appropriate for Herbert. Another funny option would be to take the Illithid Savant and remove the 'Illithid' requirement. Now they have a pet zombie who is getting stronger when he eats their enemies' braaaaaains.

Obviously pretty appropriate. These are all pretty fantastic suggestions.


I'm definitely going to give him Emancipated Spawn when he hits the right attack bonus, just because it seems like good quest fodder for the party. The rest is also pretty fantastic so far.

[Blackhawk748]

1 Level of Crusader then into Survivor, also Emancipated Spawn sounds like a ton of fun, as well as those templates. Bonus points: have him have been a Crusader before he became a Zombie, he gets his memory back now he suddenly gains like 4 levels. "Holy crap Herbert is a beast now"

[DrKerosene]

Aren't zombies always supposed to have an even number of HD? Like, base creature HD*2 (max 20) and recalculated as Undead for BAB, etc?

I did initially think "Survivor" myself, and then War Hulk (maybe formerly Jotunbrud/Goliath Barb?) if you didn't want the changes to be as obvious.

Have you checked out the "templates" for NPCs in the DMG2? You could say Herbert had a spare pair of arms tucked up inside himself and no one noticed. Or you could give him the Prodigy one for +2 to an ability score and +4 to related checks (+5 total at +0 CR).

It's probably too complex to change "daily", but I wanted to suggest Binder (or the three feats) so Herbert could suddenly start Death Dancing, or spontaneously become covered in +X Fullplate. The special requirements and signs might be a mild issue.

Maybe he was a Dragon Shaman, Marshal, and Bard? Maybe he was a Chameleon or Factotum? The ability to be different each day might be fun for your players.

Perhaps there was a bit of Bouman in him, and he can't speak? Herbert silently mouths the word "Brains" as he continues to lurch forward..."

I really liked the Illithid Savant suggestion.

[PlatinumVixen]

Aren't zombies always supposed to have an even number of HD? Like, base creature HD*2 (max 20) and recalculated as Undead for BAB, etc?

That is absolutely correct. I misspoke earlier.


Have you checked out the "templates" for NPCs in the DMG2? You could say Herbert had a spare pair of arms tucked up inside himself and no one noticed. Or you could give him the Prodigy one for +2 to an ability score and +4 to related checks (+5 total at +0 CR).


Hmm...I actually haven't. I'll have to give those a look (I might find them useful for other things as well).


1 Level of Crusader then into Survivor, also Emancipated Spawn sounds like a ton of fun, as well as those templates. Bonus points: have him have been a Crusader before he became a Zombie, he gets his memory back now he suddenly gains like 4 levels. "Holy crap Herbert is a beast now"


Painfully tempting. We had a Crusader who changed to a Warder (fit his character concept better, so I allowed it) and now all I can think of is "Herbert turns out to be the manifestation of the Warder's original class levels given life".

These are all pretty fantastic, really.