Would you let a Dread Warrior use maneuvers?

[erok0809]

Animate Dread Warrior from Unapproachable East lets you raise humanoids as Dread Warriors, which are stronger than your average zombie. They get to keep and use their feats, so long as they still qualify for them.

However, it is described that "they do not have the sophistication for missile weapons effectively." They lose their attack bonus when throwing spears and the like.

If you raised a martial initiator as a dread warrior, would you let them use their maneuvers? On the one hand, they get to do the things they could do in life. On the other, they're not even properly coordinated enough to throw things well; maneuvers tend to require precise strikes and coordination, so I'm leaning towards not allowing it. I am the DM in the game where this may come up, so the call is mine in the end; I'm wondering what the playground thinks though.

[OldTrees1]

Depends on why you are allowing Animate Dread Warrior


Personally I forgot that, and will continue to ignore, RAW nixing their ranged attacks. However I allow them as level appropriate undead minions so there are limits I place on the ECL and number controlled.

I could have them be weaker (nixing ranged attacks, maneuvers, and many of the more interesting combat feats) but allow more of them.

Or I could find them too much for a campaign

Or I might be running a high enough power game that I would allow unlimited use


How do you want to allow it?

[Name1]

...In all honesty, this feels more like a restriction for NPCs than actual PC-animated Dread Warriors.

Especially since there are corpses that qualify for the spell (a rogue 3 for example) but don't qualify for the template according to that text (must be a fighter of at least 3rd level).

What even is a skilled warrior. A warrior can't become a Dread Warrior because they aren't fighters, right? Is a Wizard a skilled warrior?

Seriously, I'd say go according to the spell, maybe keep the ranged thing in there, but don't gimp them in addition to that.

[thoroughlyS]

Called forth to serve in undeath through foul necromantic magic, dread warriors are undead beings usually created from the corpses of skilled warriors. They retain many of the martial skills and talents they possessed in life but are compelled to serve their creator with unquestioning obedience. Dread warriors are created by casting the animate dread warrior spell (see Chapter 4: Magic and Spells).
A dread warrior appears more or less as it did in life, although it bears the ghastly wounds that killed it, and its eyes glow with a feral yellow light. Its skin tends to shrivel and darken, falling in on its sunken flesh to give it a gaunt, withered appearance. It usually carries the arms and armor it favored before its death and transformation. It speaks whatever languages it knew in life.
Dread warriors are not always reliable servants, as they are easily confused by complicated orders. Orders of twelve words or less cause no problems, but there is a cumulative 5% chance per word after the twelfth that the dread warrior misinterprets the instructions. If the dread warrior fails to understand its orders, treat the monster as confused (see the confusion spell) and roll randomly to determine what action it takes in response to the command that triggered its confusion.
COMBAT
Dread warriors fight with the arms and armor they used in life. This example uses a 4th-level human warrior as the base character.
Undead Traits: A dread warrior is immune to mind-affecting effects, poison, sleep, paralysis, stunning, disease, death effects, necromantic effects (unless they specifically affect undead), and any effect that requires a Fortitude save unless it also works on objects. It is not subject to critical hits, subdual damage, ability damage, ability drain, or death from massive damage. A dread warrior cannot be raised, but may be resurrected. A dread warrior has darkvision (60-foot range).
Skills: Dread warriors gain a +4 racial bonus on Climb, Jump, and Spot checks.
THE DREAD WARRIOR TEMPLATE
“Dread warrior” is a template that can be added to any humanoid of at least 3 Hit Dice or levels. The creature’s type changes to “undead.” It uses all the base creature’s statistics and special abilities except as noted here.
This template supersedes the Dread Warrior entry in Monster Compendium: Monsters of Faerûn.
Hit Dice: Increase to d12.
Abilities: Adjust from the base creature as follows: Str +4, Int –6 (minimum 3), Char –4 (minimum 3). As undead creatures, dread warriors have no Constitution score.
Skills: Same as the base creature, except that dread warriors gain a +4 racial bonus on Climb, Jump, and Spot checks.
Feats: Same as the base creature, except that the dread warrior loses any feats for which it no longer qualifies.
Organization: Solitary or company (3–12).
Alignment: Always neutral evil
Advancement: —
Necromancy [Evil]
Level: Sor/Wiz 6
Components: V, S, M, XP
Casting Time: 10 minutes
Range: Touch
Target: One humanoid corpse
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No
You transform the corpse of a skilled warrior into an undead monster under your command. The corpse in question must be that of a humanoid with at least three levels or Hit Dice and no more Hit Dice than your own, killed within the last tenday. The body must be substantially whole, although any injury short of dismemberment does not interfere with the spell.
Upon completion of the spell, the subject corpse reanimates as a dread warrior under your command (see the Dread Warrior entry in Chapter 6: Monsters of the East). The creature serves loyally and obeys your orders to the best of its ability, although a cleric with the ability to command undead can usurp your control with a sufficiently high rebuke undead check. Upon the caster’s death, the dread warrior becomes a free-willed undead creature.
Created twenty years ago by the zulkir of Necromancy, Szass Tam, this spell is found only in the spellbooks of those Red Wizards who served as his apprentices and the apprentices of those apprentices. Szass Tam has been using this spell to steadily create a vast army of dread warriors.
Material Component: A rusted fragment of a sword blade broken in battle.
XP Cost: 250 XP per HD of the dread warrior created.
From a RAW perspective, there's nothing that says they can use maneuvers, or even spells (although that is probably because they are supposed to use "martial" creatures). But they are also not mindless, just stupider. I don't see any mention of ranged attacks, so that was probably from MC:MoF (which this stat block replaces), but the mention of confusion still muddies the water. All told, I don't think I would have them use maneuvers, even though it still allows feats. From a fluff perspective, remembering the precise movements for a maneuver are too complex for their regressed minds, while the more general style of feats is still present. As a compromise, I could see leaving stances.

EDIT: I just had a great idea! Ordering an undead to do a maneuver would take too many words if you have only ever seen it, but if you know it's name that is all it takes! Mechanic-wise, they can perform any maneuvers the creator can name, either by knowing it themselves or making a Martial Lore check.

[erok0809]

The situation I'm in is that the party (level should be 11 or 12 by then) should be fighting a dread necromancer (right now level 12, but I might bump that up for more challenge) soon, who's a full-on corpsecrafter minionmancer. Rather than having an army of littler creatures, I'm going to have him have fewer larger creatures; still a reasonable number of undead, but a small enough number that each one should take some hits and be able to put some hurt on the party.

I kind of want his Undead Lieutenant to be a Dread Warrior Warblade, focused on White Raven with some smatterings of other disciplines. The thing is, I'm not sure if a Dread Warrior can use maneuvers, as I said in the OP.

Now that I've written it out and thought more, they probably can use at least some maneuvers, like the ones that are only an attack and then your allies get a bonus or something like that, but I'd rather set a rule than have to go on a case-by-case basis for each maneuver; any suggestions? The things that are making me hesitate are like almost all of the Tiger Claw line, which generally involve Jumps and acrobatics, and the Diamond Mind line, which involve precise strikes and accuracy. I'm finding it hard to reconcile being able to do those perfectly fine as in life, but suddenly not being able to throw a spear well because of lack of coordination.

Also, they use the word "fighter" in the fluff, but the template itself says it can be applied to any humanoid of at least 3 HD or levels, so I'm not concerned with that.

Edit:


EDIT: I just had a great idea! Ordering an undead to do a maneuver would take too many words if you have only ever seen it, but if you know it's name that is all it takes! Mechanic-wise, they can perform any maneuvers the creator can name, either by knowing it themselves or making a Martial Lore check.

I might have to use this; that actually makes perfect sense. The only thing will be when the necro leaves, since if he can he'll probably leave before he gets killed, the warblade won't be able to do his stuff anymore. That's reasonable though. Tentatively, I'll probably use this, unless other ideas come along that I like better. Thanks!

[Zanos]

Maneuvers and ranged attacks should be fine. As mentioned above, the template was replaced, and Dread Warriors retain all their class features.

You might have some issues ordering them to perform the maneuvers, but being stupid doesn't prevent one from being a martial intiator.

[Big Fau]

EDIT: I just had a great idea! Ordering an undead to do a maneuver would take too many words if you have only ever seen it, but if you know it's name that is all it takes! Mechanic-wise, they can perform any maneuvers the creator can name, either by knowing it themselves or making a Martial Lore check.

http://orig08.deviantart.net/b94c/f/2012/232/9/8/zombie_pikachu_by_darktokyofox-d5buqxn.jpg

In all seriousness, if you can find one, a Martial Adept devoted to an Elder Evil can get Willing Deformity (Madness) without losing a feat slot. This renders it immune to the Confusion effect of the Dread Warrior template.

[Endarire]

If you made a Dread Warrior from a sentient creature, it's still sentient. No maneuvers/stances require a specific INT.

I'm using the mechanics from Unapproachable East. (D&D 3.5 is a game that, to me, runs more smoothly by ignoring all flavor text.)

[LTwerewolf]

The big problem with dread warriors is that the fluff doesn't match the crunch. It spends a lot of time trying to convince you that dread warriors are all dumber than a box of rocks just like a mindless skeleton, yet a dread warrior is easily capable of having 8 int, or more for some of the more int based fighters. As far as maneuvers go, since a maneuver can be granted by a feat, which they would qualify for, and it specifically says they can use feats they still qualify for, I wouldn't see any reason as to why they couldn't use maneuvers. It doesn't make any sense as to why they could use the exact same thing from a feat source as opposed to a class source. It doesn't say they lose class features when they become dread warriors. I really don't see any legit argument as to why they couldn't. As for spellcasting, it goes the same way: they don't lose class features, so if they're a wis based caster like a cleric, I can't see why they couldn't still use their spells.

The command doesn't even need to be specific. "Kill that (specified) enemy to the best of your ability." 3 words to spare. You don't need to tell tigers to use their rake, you don't need to tell bears to use their grapple. When something fights, it's going to use the tools it has to do so.

[Zanos]

A wizard dread warrior should still be able to cast spells, even, if their intelligence was sufficiently high.

[LTwerewolf]

A wizard dread warrior should still be able to cast spells, even, if their intelligence was sufficiently high.

Well yeah, but the likelihood of them being optimal casters is pretty low.

[erok0809]

Alright, I'm convinced, they'll definitely be able to use their maneuvers. And yeah, certain websites don't seem to have caught the changes made about the ranged attacks, so sorry about that.

Edit: Related, would a Druid who's become a Dread Warrior get an animal companion and still be able to wild shape into a living animal, since nothing says they lose those abilities? That seems silly to me.

[OldTrees1]

Alright, I'm convinced, they'll definitely be able to use their maneuvers. And yeah, certain websites don't seem to have caught the changes made about the ranged attacks, so sorry about that.

Edit: Related, would a Druid who's become a Dread Warrior get an animal companion and still be able to wild shape into a living animal, since nothing says they lose those abilities? That seems silly to me.

Animal Companion? Yes
Wildshape? Check the dependencies. Wildshape is "as ___ except ____" so look up the spell Wildshape references and any spells it references. So how does Alternate Form work? The SRD s being buggy for me right now but I think your type and subtype are retained. So you would still be undead.

[KillianHawkeye]

Edit: Related, would a Druid who's become a Dread Warrior get an animal companion and still be able to wild shape into a living animal, since nothing says they lose those abilities? That seems silly to me.

Pre-errata Wild Shape did not work for an undead Druid because it was based on the Polymorph spell (which only targets living creatures). There was a feat in Libris Mortis that allowed undead Druids to Wild Shape into undead versions of animals.

However, in the errata Wild Shape was changed to instead be based on the Alternate Form special ability, which has no restrictions based on the user's creature type, so Wild Shape now works normally for everyone (although an undead Druid is still undead despite gaining the Constitution score of the creature it changes into, however that works).

[Eldariel]

However, in the errata Wild Shape was changed to instead be based on the Alternate Form special ability, which has no restrictions based on the user's creature type, so Wild Shape now works normally for everyone (although an undead Druid is still undead despite gaining the Constitution score of the creature it changes into, however that works).

Deliciously abusably, that's how it works (one of the easiest ways to acquire the Regeneration/Non-Lethal Immunity version of damage immunity).

[thoroughlyS]

I would think animating a Druid would cause them to fall, as they are now the thing they despise. So they would lose all druid spells and abilities (including their animal companion). This is not a strict RAW reading, as we can't know whether they still revere nature, but this explains why it doesn't sound right.

Thinking further, as soon as the Druid dies, their soul moves from their body. Considering this disconnect, the soul still reveres nature, but I wouldn't think the body does. And animate dread warrior does not bring back the soul of the Druid (who, presumably, has not stopped revering nature), but just crams a bunch of negative energy into the body. I wouldn't think negative energy reveres nature, so the body "falls" even though it was never the part with the Druid powers to begin with.