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Maldraugedhen
2007-04-13, 10:45 PM
This setting is based off a short-lived RP I ran awhile ago on another forum, by the same name. Here's how it worked:

The world is comparable to our historical world around the Medieval High period, with the obvious necessary differences for a fantasy setting (magic). Around 200 years prior to when most of the campaigning takes place, a change occurred in the natural system of life and death. It happened simultaneously the world over--people simply stopped dying. It would be best to clarify, here--people still became biologically dead, but their bodies and minds continued to function after normal expiration. The bodies would decay over a normal time period, and so this false extension of life rarely lasted very long, but it meant people could take advantage of the extra time to put their affairs into order before finally keeling over. The only way to actually kill a person and deny them their second life is to destroy the head--apparently, whatever magical force was holding people in their deceased bodies was focused in the skull, specifically directly under the connection to the spinal cord (determined through careful experimentation). Damaging this location would cause a 'dead' man to truly die.

At first, people welcomed this magical change in life. Some extra time to spend with relatives meant time to set things in order and generally brought peace into households. However, as with anything involving such unnatural extensions of life, hunter cults formed dedicated to destroying these abberations wherever they could find them. How the law should treat these individuals--either the hunters or those on their second life--remained a mystery, one that would not be addressed until one of the kings passed away. The first in line to take the throne demanded that his dead father step down, but, from the father's perspective, he was still fit to rule. They were at a loss as to what would happen according to law, but the son did not want to wait for laws to clear the situation. He truekilled his father, causing an uproar throughout the nation from these dead men. An exodus from all of the nations of man, for the safety of those living when they shouldn't be, followed. They united in a blasted wasteland, declared themselves the sovereign rulers of the wastes of the world, and announced intentions to live on in peace with the nations of mankind.

Naturally, this lasted all of a few weeks.

When war finally broke out, it was a bloody affair. Soldiers often found themselves forced to hunt their comrades, brought down by the enemy and suddenly finding a change in heart. The undead could not be stomped out, and the humans could not be discouraged. Then a man appeared before the Lord of the Dead (a former king of one of the human nations), and asked if he still wished for peace. The Lord of the Dead insisted that he did. The man simply replied, "Very well," and vanished. The next day, several hundred miles away, a man remarkably similar to the strange emissary who visited the Lord of the Dead the previous day, appeared before the king of the lands this mess originated in, and handed him a document, which read as follows:
The Lord of the Dead agrees to dissolve the State of the Dead if the following terms are met:
1. Citizens of the State of the Dead shall be allowed back into the territories they came from.
2. Dead citizens shall be granted the following rights:
--May hold land
--Recieve the same protection of law
--May hold uninherited office and occupations
3. Dead citizens will submit death records to maintain census accuracy and ensure fair treatment and taxation of dead citizens.
4. Dead citizens may apply for true death if they so choose--it may not be forced upon them by the State or any individual. This ensures those who do not wish to be dead citizens may be simply dead.

The king agreed, signing the document and handing it back to the man. The same document, signed by the previous kings, appeared before each king of the living lands in turn, finally ending back at the Lord of the Dead two weeks later. He signed it, and began a systematic dissolution of the military. The dead were re-absorbed into society, and, for the most part, everyone now thinks of this as a blessing of sorts. It is this situation of relative calm after the storm that adventures begin again, with troops returning home and the precarious situation of the dead and living coexisting uneasily.

PsyBlade
2007-04-14, 08:38 PM
Hmm, I like the sound of this. But something is just not right. I can't put my finger on it. Well, still well made.

Maldraugedhen
2007-04-15, 12:28 AM
What I was planning for the RP involved a benevolent cabal of necromancers who created the spell, and the discovery that not all men could retain their minds normally solely under the influence of the spell they cast. So, to prevent moral outrage, chaos, and general all around agony, they control those who can't control themselves after death, acting as they would have in life. Those with what the necromancers call the Will can control themselves, and they tend to prefer having those with the Will die than those without. One of the characters was a member of a hunter cult left over from two hundred years ago, whose fanatical religious practices involved applying arcane body tattoos to better sense the dead. These tattoos also had the convenient side effect (although this never became known to the character, as the RP didn't last long enough) for a dead one bearing them, if they possessed the Will, to hear the voices of the necromancers examining them when they die to see if they would need their control. This would have become the principle part of our adventure hook, along with the assassination--but not truekilling--of one of the kings.

Rowanomicon
2007-04-16, 09:59 PM
This sounds interesting. Just how long after death does this undeath last?

Autarch
2007-04-16, 10:19 PM
This sounds interesting. Just how long after death does this undeath last?

With Gentle Repose, darn near forever. :smalltongue:

Maldraugedhen, this is a pretty cool concept. Of course, if you really wanted to turn this into a campaign world, you'll need to flesh out the world more or it will end up looking rather monotone. If you were only planning to run just one campaign in the world, and that campaign would center around these 'living' dead, there are no problems, of course. But if the only unique thing about your setting is that there are intelligent 'living' dead, you ought to consider adding more to the setting. :smallbiggrin:

Maldraugedhen
2007-04-16, 10:52 PM
As long as the body does. Under normal use without embalming, the body may last up to two weeks, as insects that usually aid the decomposition process avoid these individuals. With embalming applied, this time period is extended by up to two months. I should warn anyone reading the following that, as it deals with the process of rotting bodies, the description is going to become fairly graphic. I should also note that, as I am no forensic scientist, have no personal experience whatsoever with corpses, and am writing this for the purpose of chronicling the effects of something physically impossible on the human body, what follows isn't exactly going to have any bearing on science. I did, however, use several research papers on the topic I located with a search online to aid for the time period.
Decomposition is usually the first threat to the false dead, but embalming is a simple (albeit limited) counter. As the eyes cannot be so treated, they will usually decompose first, and a deadblind is a man who has lost his eyes in this manner. The eyes may take up to 4 days to lose their usefulness, the quality of vision gradually degrading over this period. Vision blurs to shapes on the third day, and by the end of the fourth, all that the false dead can see is a smear of color. Nerves go fairly quickly, too, giving the dead a similar condition to leprosy. Unembalmed, the nerves may take as little as two days to lose sensation, and embalmed, as long as a week. Taste becomes imperceptible along with the loss of nerves. Although smell and hearing change slightly over the course of undeath, they are the final senses to be lost, and usually hearing is not lost at all before the end stages. Next, tendons and muscles weaken, eventually snapping under the strain of normal use, and the body can lose entire limbs at a time this way. Tendons, muscles, and the overall flesh of the individual becomes noticeably weaker after a week unembalmed and two if embalmed. When the neck snaps in this manner, the undeath ends, and, similarly, beheading one of these individuals usually results in a quick ending. Usually, people choose a cleaner true death than that offered at the end of rotting, but those that want to... experience... as much as they can, tend to try and stay around for as long as possible.

Edit: Autarch-ninja'd. This is basically a repost of an RP setting that I used on a dying forum, stuck up here in case it intrigued anyone especially. The original RP was set specifically around 1300, in our world, with magic added and this weird death setup. I hadn't planned on re-using this campaign world--we tended to cycle through them too quickly with too many larger incompatible ideas to use--but I might do a bit of fleshing out for a full fantasy world version. The creation of the campaign setting essentially consisted of me running through a bit of magical and sociopolitical cause-and-effect. Might do some more of that style of background if I'm going to flesh it out further.

Autarch
2007-04-16, 11:03 PM
Very cool :smallsmile:

You ought to think up a prestige class or special feats for the undead. I'd probably make one that would enable them to become more and more like the living being they once were.

Rowanomicon
2007-04-16, 11:08 PM
Well, this strikes me as more of a one shot campaign idea than whole setting. You could use this idea in virtually any world or setting. All you'd need to do is create a template for the living dead.

Autarch
2007-04-16, 11:29 PM
The Deathless from the Eber-- I mean, The Campaign Setting that Must Not Be Named would work ideally for that.

Maldraugedhen
2007-04-17, 07:29 AM
Does the Template of the Campaign Setting that Must Not Be Named have varying degrees of severity for the various stages of decomposition? If not, I guess I'll hack out my own. This'd be my fourth template--I need to finish up the overall project for the other three before I get them up here.

I also thought of a way to modify the campaign slightly. But I need to get some info from a friend about the mindscape and dreamscape rules we were tinkering with, and he seems to be permanently offline. Hrrrm...

Well, I'll stick the idea up here anyway. Separate the benevolent necromancers and the controllers. The necromancers, according to the controllers' perspective, made a mess of the world by tinkering, and the controllers are simply trying to keep things under control.

As to how the mental control would work, whether done by one of the necromancers or by a controller, here's how it would with the mindscape and dreamscape variant we're working on.

In order to check whether or not an individual needs the guidance of a controller upon their death, a controller-scout visits the mindscape of the individual and examines it. Those without the Will lose their subconscious avatar--basically the controlling deity of the mindscape--but retains all of their mindscapes' features, which are the memories, personality quirks, thoughts, and suspicions of the individual. If the subconscious avatar is no longer present, a full-fledged controller steps in and assumes the role of the dead individual.

Before a controller assumes command of a mindscape bereft of a subconscious avatar, the individual is, for all intents and purposes, brain dead--not a shambling, moaning zombie, just inactive. If it lasts for very long, the individual becomes biologically dead in more and more ways--drowning in their own saliva, starving, etc.--making functioning after death more difficult and shorter lived.

This campaign's overall structure was intended to make the players wonder whether or not what the cabal or the controllers--if that variant is applied--is moral or acceptable, as they are essentially perpetuating a deception, crafting 'white lies' on an unheard of scale. Their decision, one way or the other, would define their objective for the campaign.

Autarch
2007-04-17, 12:08 PM
Does the Template of the Campaign Setting that Must Not Be Named have varying degrees of severity for the various stages of decomposition? If not, I guess I'll hack out my own. This'd be my fourth template--I need to finish up the overall project for the other three before I get them up here.

I also thought of a way to modify the campaign slightly. But I need to get some info from a friend about the mindscape and dreamscape rules we were tinkering with, and he seems to be permanently offline. Hrrrm...

Well, I'll stick the idea up here anyway. Separate the benevolent necromancers and the controllers. The necromancers, according to the controllers' perspective, made a mess of the world by tinkering, and the controllers are simply trying to keep things under control.

As to how the mental control would work, whether done by one of the necromancers or by a controller, here's how it would with the mindscape and dreamscape variant we're working on.

In order to check whether or not an individual needs the guidance of a controller upon their death, a controller-scout visits the mindscape of the individual and examines it. Those without the Will lose their subconscious avatar--basically the controlling deity of the mindscape--but retains all of their mindscapes' features, which are the memories, personality quirks, thoughts, and suspicions of the individual. If the subconscious avatar is no longer present, a full-fledged controller steps in and assumes the role of the dead individual.

Before a controller assumes command of a mindscape bereft of a subconscious avatar, the individual is, for all intents and purposes, brain dead--not a shambling, moaning zombie, just inactive. If it lasts for very long, the individual becomes biologically dead in more and more ways--drowning in their own saliva, starving, etc.--making functioning after death more difficult and shorter lived.

This campaign's overall structure was intended to make the players wonder whether or not what the cabal or the controllers--if that variant is applied--is moral or acceptable, as they are essentially perpetuating a deception, crafting 'white lies' on an unheard of scale. Their decision, one way or the other, would define their objective for the campaign.
Hmm, to answer your question, you'd be better off using a homebrew template of your own.

One thing that might be cool would be to make the group of Necromancers into a group of individuals, each Necromancer with his or her own ideals, and goals. Perhaps one of the Necromancers would decide that he believes what he has helped do is an abomination, and is working to sabotage what the necromancers have made. Or maybe the group is led by one necromancer (the most powerful, of course) who has some ulterior motive for creating the undead. Perhaps he has a way of ultimately and suddenly gaining personal control of every single undead in the world... or maybe he is undead himself, and plans to harvest the souls of the undead to grant himself eternal life (not the undead kind). Perhaps the leader of the Necromancers created the undead out of pure and good reasons, but the Necromancers working under him have aspirations for more power than their master is choosing to take.

Fun suff.

Rowanomicon
2007-04-17, 10:27 PM
If this is something you're interested in fleshing out as a campaign setting I'd love to work on it with you.
I've been wanting to create a setting recently and this is rather similar to an idea I had for a main storyline for a game.

I'll send you a PM with some of my ideas.

Maldraugedhen
2007-04-18, 10:20 AM
I'll take ideas from anybody on this one. I definitely should flesh out the necromancer's council, but I'm gonna try and avoid some of the more often-used vaguely-evil-organization problems. I think I'm gonna avoid the soul implications or motivations of that variety--try to stick with more mundane or benevolent motives, even if their actions themselves are debatably good.

Autarch
2007-04-18, 07:25 PM
Here is a question you should ask yourself, if you haven't already:
Who knows about the Necromancers? If no one knows, why not? If someone knows, why, and what are they doing about it?

Hmmm... and are humans the only one's who end up undead, or can other beings live on after death? (imagining an undead dragon right now, and shuddering)

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll
2007-04-18, 08:06 PM
A Dracolich. very scary.

Maldraugedhen
2007-04-18, 10:46 PM
Nobody knows, because the only people who are affected directly by the necromancer's actions (and can attest to it) are the Willess undead they're controlling. The Willess are not completely brain-dead, however--their subconscious still controls their dreams and imagination, and through them, the bodies of the individuals insofar as adrenaline, fear, and other effects that can be projected from dreams. Necromancers have reported incidents in which the individual simply dreams the scenario that they are in time and time again, hoping that a Mindguard stumbles through and realizes the greater implications (see the War of the Mind thread for details on this PrC). Thus far, the only creatures who continue on after death are humans and those most closely related (elves, half-elves, dwarves, half-orcs, orcs, halflings, gnomes, etc.)--if the necromantic magics pervade the world further, it may spread to other creatures, but it wouldn't modify itself in the way Gwyn Ap Nud is suggesting--it would just be a dead version of the creature, unimbued with magical power or amazing fortitude. In fact, it would be less challenging than a living creature, as it has to deal with the effects of decomposition--since it cannot preserve its own corpse in the many ways humans can.

Maldraugedhen
2007-04-19, 11:06 AM
Fleshing out the Necromancer's Organization (Guild? Guild.):

The council is divided into three primary branches--the Hand (Research), the Eye (Maintenance), and the Mind (Control). The Hand branch does the majority of the tinkering with necromantic energies, directed in their approach and goals by the Mind. The Eye consists of the members of the order dedicated to keeping the order unknown, and ensuring that nothing the Hand does gets out of hand. The Eye provides reports to the Mind, letting them know when the Hand is overstepping their bounds and is about to create problems for the organization at large. The Mind balances the pace and direction of the Hand, making sure that whatever the Hand does is for the benefit of the people at large.

No specific 'home' for the necromancer's guild exists--instead, they make use of a spiderweb of telepathic links and written letters to communicate. All of the councilmembers of the Mind are linked directly to each other, to one of the lieutenants of the Eye, and to the head councilor. The head councilor is telepathically linked to the councilmembers, the lieutenants of the Hand, and the head of the Eye and the Hand. The head of the branch of the Hand is linked to his subordinates, the lieutenants, and to the heads of the Eye and Mind. The lieutenants of the Hand are linked to those in the Eye in charge of watching them, to the head of the Hand and to the head of the Mind. The head of the Eye is linked to his subordinates and to the heads of the other branches.

The head necromancer of the branch of the Hand, Dravin Fellarm, founded the organization, choosing a trusted friend, Gallin Earthreach, to head the Mind and to keep an eye on his subordinates to make sure nothing deviates from his goals of aiding humankind in ways they may not even wish to be aided in. Dravin was not one for leadership, and so trusts the judgement of Gallin instead as the head of the organization. Dravin does oversee any tinkering the necromancers of his branch do, aiding where he sees fit and making sure that his charges learn from what they are doing. The Mind consists of its own council, only partially composed of necromancers. Gallin, a diviner, is the head of the council, but mainly regulates discussion of reports from the Eye and acts as a tiebreaker vote. It is rare that the Mind sees fit to interfere with the Hand's actions, but total compliance is expected of the Hand's wizards if such a scenario arises. The Eye was founded when the Hand grew too large for the Mind alone to regulate. Kell Hammerhaft, a former member of the Hand, was elected to head the new organization. He deigned to accept, giving up his research position for the good of the organization as a whole. The Eye has a man watching the direct actions of 2 to 4 necromancers of the Hand, as well as a virtual army managing the minds of the Willess. They are assisted in this task by necromancers of the Hand, but well over 90% of the necromancers directing the Willess are of the Eye. The necromancers of the Hand that DO control Willess do so to find out more about their unique condition, hoping to cure it to solve the massive drain the Eye is taking in personnel due to the global magical effect.

Let it be known that I suck at generating last names. Better ones would be appreciated.

Possible sources of conflict: Kell is dissatisfied with his position cleaning up after his former associates. He doesn't want to have to do it anymore, and toward that end, he has begun studying the art of thought harvesting in combination with mind control of the undead. He has been directing small 'spook' incidents here and there across the world, and is the reason the Hunter cults exist at all. Feeding off of their paranoia and fear, he has amassed a small army of nightmarish undead creatures by tapping into their dreams, and plans on using them to carve out a kingdom for the necromancer's council, allowing them to reveal themselves to the world at large without fear of retribution. This one is my personal favorite.

Another possible source is that necromancers of the Hand are enjoying their newfound expanded freedom due to the problems the Eye has been having with this massive necromantic spell, and are actually investigating the Willess to see if they can stip of man of the Will, thus drawing away more of the Eye and enabling them greater freedom. Some members of the Eye (Kell included) have agreed to help, as it grants them more power and influence in the world at large. If the necromancers discover a way to strip the Will of the dead, the Eye will be nearly completely blind, and and the more ambitious members of the Hand will be able to do whatever they wish with the organization's resources.

A third possible source: Dravin is beginning to chafe under the bonds his friend is constraining him with. He understands that Gallin is only doing what he asked him to, but thinks Gallin may have been the wrong man for the job. Kell senses this doubt in Dravin, and has encouraged him to begin his own spying on the members of the Mind. Dravin discovers, through evidence planted by Kell, that certain members of the Mind are profiting directly by coordinating the Hand in specific ways (pushing for research into plagues if a relative is ill, drawing away research into the Will if they plan on offing one of their opponents on the council, etc.). Dravin, furious, demands that Gallin keep a tighter hold on his fellow councilmen, or he and Kell will force a vote for a new council head. Gallin agrees, but cannot block further false evidence from Kell. Dravin forces a vote onto the council, and they vote that Gallin must step down. Gallin refuses, and councilmen and necromancers of the Hand and of the Eye still loyal to the Mind begin to rally from across the world to his side to defend him from the power-hungry councilmen, an ambitious Kell, and a betrayed Dravin. The organization is falling apart, and it is unknown where the undead of the world will come out.

Rereading this, I notice how many colloquial expressions I used involving hands, minds, and eyes. Sorry. If it's too confusing, I'll rewrite it.

Maldraugedhen
2007-04-20, 09:37 AM
So what do people think? Other ideas for conflicts? I guess I'll add more on the Hunter cults...

These organizations are usually small, organized groups who use whatever weapons they can--unless they get the backing of a lord, which is a common thing. Fearing those they inherited their positions from would want them back, the Hunter cults are often considered viable tools to destroy what they view as a legitimate threat to their legitimacy. A simple sponsorship can go a long way, especially if it's accompanied by a request to destroy a specific vile zombie. Various methods to detect fresh undead have cropped up--a disguise and a crowd can usually go a long way to hide one's living condition--and it is unknown where these methods came from. Some have hypothesized captured zombies that were tested on to attempt different methods of detection, those who know about the Necromancer's Guild (the necromancers) have guessed at members of the Hand who want to use the Hunter cults to clean up their loose ends, and yet others think it's just blind luck and faith directing them.

Autarch
2007-04-20, 10:57 AM
In the DMG, there is a chapter on making new classes, and as an example they suggest how to change the ranger so dramatically that it is almost unrecognizable as the original class. They tell you how to change it into an Undead Stalker. I'm sure there are/have been people who have gone all the way and made the DMG's suggestions into a full fledged class... you might want to do a search for it on the boards, or check out that chapter in the DMG. Seems like it would work very well with your campaign.

KoDT69
2007-04-20, 01:59 PM
Back in AD&D 2.x there was a Crypt Ranger class. I believe it came from Dragon Magazine #258-262 range. I still have it packed away somewhere, but I remember it being pretty cool.

Odd questions - In your scenario, would it be legal for 2 dead people to get married?
Could a living person marry a dead one?
If a prisoner has a "life" sentence, do they get released when they die?
Do the wizards in your world make magic items to allow dead people to animate themselves?
Would that even be plausible since the soul is still there?
Would they have to share thoughtwaves with the dark spirit conjured from animate dead (if it still works that way, I remember it used to be a random dark spirit to animate a corpse)?

Maldraugedhen
2007-04-24, 10:50 PM
The law has very few dealings with marriage at this point in the history of the world. That being said, you would have a hard time finding a priest of anyone but the god of Death to perform any marriage involving the dead. In fact, there is a difference of opinion of members of the Churches scattered around the land whether or not a marriage involving the dead is moral. Some point to the line 'until death do you part', interpreting that as a direct opposition to marriages involving the dead. Others consider the period of animation directly following the first death as an extension of life--the mind is still there, the soul (according to their particular beliefs) is still there, the only difference is the body is having issues holding itself together. Up until this point, I have avoided addressing the idea of souls involving these creatures--and I think I will keep it that way. The mind and the soul are separate, and the ambiguity of the creatures on this topic is something that I think will help make the world more interesting. It certainly will for paladins.

As for the laws involving the dead--these are very straightforward in their analysis. Punishments that had as their duration a 'life' sentence are extended until the true death of the individual, and executions the world over are guaranteed true deaths.

In any case where possession occurs of a dead one's body--something I had to think about with how the Hand would have to go about its business--the individual attempting to dominate and the one whose mind is being invaded would, assuming one does not manage to completely banish the other (which is impossible for those who are fighting on home mindscape-ground), coexist inside the mind, constantly struggling to gain dominance. Not having the numbers on how a possession attempt works, here's what I've got, my own hacked out little form:

The save DC of a spell that allows one to forcefully enter a mindscape and attempt to assert dominance essentially becomes the will save of the attacker, if the attacking entity (not necessarily the caster in the case of certain mind-affecting spells) does not have a noted will save otherwise. Opposed will checks determine the state of the mind for a randomized period. The winner of the opposed will check gains control of the body for 1d20 rounds if they won by 2 or fewer, 1d20 minutes for 3 or 4, 1d20 hours for 5 or 6, 1d6 days for 7 or 8, 1d6 weeks for 9 to 10, and the attacking mind is successfully banished if the check is beaten by 10 or more (the attacking mind simply gains control for 1d6 weeks instead). For every 2 that the opposed will check is won by, the mind that lost gains one on the next dominance check.

This'd be a check of the variety that one would be better off not telling the players the result of, beyond win or loss, especially for how long the other mind is submissive.

On the topic of self-animation--this is an extremely rare thing, as, while they do not become mindless, it is another mind that controls their actions and preserves their body through magical means. Taking control of one's animated body by means of defeating the possession as outlined above makes the body simply disintegrate, collapsing instantly and, if magically maintained, fading to dust as the enchantments fade from it. The other mind would also have all of the promptings any given undead mind suffers from--a need to feed on flesh for Ghouls and Ghasts, a predilection for draining blood for Vampires, and a desire to build a tower and plan for world domination if a lich.

Autarch
2007-05-14, 08:02 PM
Your rule for what happens if someone tries to mind control one of these things seem ok. There really aren't any existing rules that I know of that cover this specific situation... and the existing rules for possession (forcibly/evil or willingly/good) don't exactly fit this situation either. So for your game, those rules are pretty good. Another way to deal with it might be to have whomever is trying to posses the already possessed undead, they need to first make a check (this one is backed up with published rules) to banish/exorcise the currently possessing spirit. This check would be a free action and part of the attempt to posses the undead creature. I don't have the rules for this particular check on hand right now, but I can get them soon enough. If no one beats me to it, I'll post them as soon as I'm able.

and...
if you like unrequested and opinionated advice, here ya go!

on another note... I really like what you've come up with so far for the Deadmen. Although you ought to come up with a different name, otherwise the players at your table (assuming you are the dm) will use it, and it will spoil the mood a bit when that happens. Perhaps the Forsaken would work, or the Undying. Or maybe the Eternals or the Graveless. All of those are more "inspiring", so to speak, and at the same time easy to remember so that players will actually use them.