Undead?

[Lukalaly]

I'm running a campaign that will have a fair amount of undead, and I've been wondering if there are any cool undead. Not just the "zombie" template, but interesting stuff. I was specifically wondering if there were anything like the Redead from the Legend of Zelda, as they are pretty SP00KY.
Thanks in advance for all the c00l undead I hope to see!

[John Longarrow]

Bone Creature. Skeletons that retain their intelligence.

Skeletal Dragon (keeps SR and Frightful presence) is very fun to toss in.

Eye of Fear and Flame can lead to a host of fun issues.

[Bronk]

I'm not sure there's anything exactly like the Redead.

Banshees have a death wail, but not paralysis.

Ghouls and mohrgs have paralysis touch, but no sonic attacks.

Shadows have a strength drain, which can eventually lead to an equivalent of paralysis, but also no sonic attacks.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

If you give a ghoul or morgh or similar undead creature (or even a necropolitan of whatever race you want) the Undead Meldshaping feat and acess to the krenshar mask or brass mane, you can have a [sonic] scream that causes issues for your players and can be fluffed like redeads.

[Pleh]

Redead, like any undead, are creepy because of their resemblance to their living counterpart. Any undead can be creepy.

Also, there are rules for creating new monsters. With a little work, you can make redead part of your campaign.

[Inevitability]

Put a Crypt Thing (Fiend Folio) somewhere in a dungeon the players visit. You haven't really lived until you've been teleported a few hundred feet in a random direction and gotten separated from your party members.

[inuyasha]

Well, if you're okay with third party books, the 3.X update to Ravenloft has some highly customizable undead templates that I love using, my favorites being the rules for ghosts and shadows (which both have corporeal options as well that I use to make custom types of wights and such). There are also rules for vampires, hags, liches, and lycanthropes as well, if those would help.

If you don't have them or don't have the money and are willing to use stuff from Pathfinder, an amazing Pathfinder update is available for free here (http://www.fraternityofshadows.com/Library/Ryan_Naylors_2_VRMHC.pdf).

[Thurbane]

Not exactly a Redead, but there is the Agarat - it's a 2E undead that inflicts negative levels with a scream. You can find a fan-made 3.5 conversion here: http://www.pandius.com/agarat2.html

http://i67.tinypic.com/256fuwn.jpg

[KillingAScarab]

I'm running a campaign that will have a fair amount of undead, and I've been wondering if there are any cool undead. Not just the "zombie" template, but interesting stuff. I was specifically wondering if there were anything like the Redead from the Legend of Zelda, as they are pretty SP00KY.
Thanks in advance for all the c00l undead I hope to see!Complete Arcane pages 161 and 162 has the spellstitched template which allows a necromancing wizard/sorcerer with craft wondrous item to give spell-like abilities to corporeal undead creatures with a wisdom score of 10+. They also gain spell-resistance and increased turn resistance. The spells you can use with it are limited to the schools of conjuration, evocation or necromancy. Imagine a devourer (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/devourer.htm) which can use (Evard's/Mage's) black tentacles (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/blackTentacles.htm) before it traps an essence.

I don't know if they were updated but there are some interesting variations on undead in Monsters of Faerûn. Tyrantfog zombies on the unintelligent evil side, and good liches/Baelnorns on the good side.

If you want, you can combine the spellstitched template with the lich templates. Undead with arcane spellcasting ability can spellstitch themselves.

[gorfnab]

The Revived Fossil (LM) undead template could be fun to play around with. Revived Fossil Baboons are CR 1 but will pretty much shred through low level parties.

[PrismCat21]

Put a Crypt Thing (Fiend Folio) somewhere in a dungeon the players visit. You haven't really lived until you've been teleported a few hundred feet in a random direction and gotten separated from your party members.

This :)
Also, here's a link for a decent list of Undead creatures for 3.5

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?156274-3-5-Undead-List

[Kelb_Panthera]

I'm running a campaign that will have a fair amount of undead, and I've been wondering if there are any cool undead. Not just the "zombie" template, but interesting stuff. I was specifically wondering if there were anything like the Redead from the Legend of Zelda, as they are pretty SP00KY.
Thanks in advance for all the c00l undead I hope to see!

You're -really- new to the game, huh? There's some creepy stuff in Libris Mortis but then again, the book centers on undead.

Personal favorite there; skin-kites. They swoop in, latch on for cha damage, then fly away and reproduce in just a couple rounds/minutes (can't remember). They're one of only a few that can reproduce without killing the victim. It can get ugly -quick- if the players don't take 'em out pretty quick.

Creepiest in LM; slaymate. Just... *shivers* Dead kid coming at you with an ability damaging touch, IIRC, and they genuinely just want to play and be loved.

The one I find most inexplicably off-putting though is the black skate from stormwrack. Something about a ray shaped creature madeup of the animate detritus of slain sea beasts just rubs me the wrong way.

Grossest by far has to be the atropal or atropal scion. Just... Eww :smallyuk: Though that may be just the "art" for those two.

[Lukalaly]

You're -really- new to the game, huh?
Yes. Very.

There's some creepy stuff in Libris Mortis but then again, the book centers on undead.

Personal favorite there; skin-kites. They swoop in, latch on for cha damage, then fly away and reproduce in just a couple rounds/minutes (can't remember). They're one of only a few that can reproduce without killing the victim. It can get ugly -quick- if the players don't take 'em out pretty quick.

Creepiest in LM; slaymate. Just... *shivers* Dead kid coming at you with an ability damaging touch, IIRC, and they genuinely just want to play and be loved.

The one I find most inexplicably off-putting though is the black skate from stormwrack. Something about a ray shaped creature madeup of the animate detritus of slain sea beasts just rubs me the wrong way.

Grossest by far has to be the atropal or atropal scion. Just... Eww :smallyuk: Though that may be just the "art" for those two.
Dang, that sounds awesome. One of my players asked me about Libris Mortis for his character (based off of Sans from Undertale. He even had 1 hp for a bit too) and I can't believe I forgot about it. Thanks!

[Jack_Simth]

Put a Crypt Thing (Fiend Folio) somewhere in a dungeon the players visit. You haven't really lived until you've been teleported a few hundred feet in a random direction and gotten separated from your party members.
Downside: A split party is hard to do well at a gaming table. May want to skip this one for entirely metagame reasons.

[Lukalaly]

Downside: A split party is hard to do well at a gaming table. May want to skip this one for entirely metagame reasons.

Yeah, I want to do it, but I know that party splitting is always hard to pull off. I may also finally put my Roll20 plus membership to use instead of meeting in-person for that meeting.

[Afgncaap5]

There's a few undead from Oriental Adventures that are curious oddities that don't seem to fit the mold of other undead. One of them is basically a living ball of fire, for instance, intent on consuming the living by setting them ablaze. I think they're called Gaki, or something, a sort of "hungry ghost" (though ghost in this sense is a bit different than the western sense of the word; they're more like physical creatures who changed into something else upon death.) I'd recommend using their 3.5 update instead of using them as written in Oriental Adventures, though.

And then there's my favorite undead of all time: the Brain In A Jar! A psychic monster that can telepathically control any enemy who wanders too near.

As a weird side note, I've started creating strange sub-categories of undead in my games and altering the rules for how they function, and even altering other monsters to technically be undead with the new categories even if it isn't their regular creature type. Basically: taking a Flesh Golem and giving it an inexplicable weakness to certain holy magic can really start making players question things.

-Edit-

I just remembered the Crawling Claw. I can't remember the specifics, but it's sort of a swarm of undead hands? ...or maybe it's a construct. I wanna say it's in a Forgotten Realms book but can't remember which one.

[Vizzerdrix]

Crawling claws are in monsters of faerun and are constructs, but go well with undead.

[D&DPrinceTandem]

Curst(MoF) die and come back forever infinite times, like dark souls undead....
https://tse1.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.M98ed0a8b466ca32a48df779c4b94f28do0&pid=15.1&P=0&w=232&h=184
if that helps

[Keral]

I don't know what a redead is, but since noone mentioned them I'll do: what about Bodaks?

[MaxiDuRaritry]

I don't know what a redead is, but since noone mentioned them I'll do: what about Bodaks?http://zeldawiki.org/ReDead

[Kaje]

DragMag 313 has stats for half-ghosts, half-zombies, half-ghouls, and half-vampires.

[Pugwampy]

Brain in a jar .

Very psionic and scary especially if you hide him among other specimen jars in a medical room .

Players have no idea whats hitting them ....and then one of them gets dominated .


Dire Maggots

Its a low level undead the size of a dog or cat . Has paralysis drool . If you are bored of boners toss these at players .

Dead Born vulture .

Half undead giant bird ? Its alive..ish ? It becomes a zombie flying vulture as soon as its hp is reduced to 0

[Manyasone]

Green Ronin has an advanced bestiary. Filled with cool templates, some only for undead. And all 'dread' templates can undeadify anything. Each template also has a sample creature

[ghostflame5603]

Try Necropolitan from Libris Mortis. There are a lot of way for something like that to be messed with.

[Inevitability]

DragMag 313 has stats for half-ghosts, half-zombies, half-ghouls, and half-vampires.

None of these are undead, though.

Also, is anyone surprised by the ridiculously low Fetch LA? +0 for what's basically permanent incorporeality with extra perks seems... low, to say the least.

[Mordaedil]

DragMag 313 has stats for half-ghosts, half-zombies, half-ghouls, and half-vampires.

What the...?

None of these make sense to me.

Except half-vampire, I reckon that'd be either like Blade or like Twilight. Depending on who you want to torment at the table.

[Inevitability]

What the...?

None of these make sense to me.

Except half-vampire, I reckon that'd be either like Blade or like Twilight. Depending on who you want to torment at the table.

There's some reasonable justifications given: half-zombies are the result of resurrections gone wrong, half-ghouls happen when a pregnant individual is ghoulified, half-ghosts are the result of gods (Evening Glory seems like a perfect fit here) allowing lovers separated by death to have a child.

[Mordaedil]

That seems like fairly rare cases and thus are kinda interesting when they happen.

Kinda strange that they have rules for that, but not what spells you can put on a wand.

[TheifofZ]

It depends on the general theme of undead you want, as well as the mood you want to create with them.
There's a slew of awesome/awful undead available in later Monster Manuals, many of which have unique and horrific patterns.
The Bonedrinker is a good example if you're looking for more of a lurking darkness type feel, matching well with undead like Skin-Kites and others that hide in the dark.
On the other hand, Bloodhulks are basically a slap in the party's face with how blatant and undead they are.

A little more detail about what you're going for with them would be extremely helpful.

As an extra: With the sheer vast numbers of monsters available, don't be afraid of the Zombie/Skeleton templates. Always having new monsters that are different undead might sound good, but your party will expect some reliable substance to the campaign beyond 'new things all the time'. So long as you stay away from the default examples, you've got a lot of versatility while still being well within 'meat and potatoes'.
And believe me, a Skeletal Giant encounter will play out very differently from a Zombie Roc encounter. Even if you can spitball them at about the same CR.

[Inevitability]

It depends on the general theme of undead you want, as well as the mood you want to create with them.
There's a slew of awesome/awful undead available in later Monster Manuals, many of which have unique and horrific patterns.
The Bonedrinker is a good example if you're looking for more of a lurking darkness type feel, matching well with undead like Skin-Kites and others that hide in the dark.
On the other hand, Bloodhulks are basically a slap in the party's face with how blatant and undead they are.

A little more detail about what you're going for with them would be extremely helpful.

As an extra: With the sheer vast numbers of monsters available, don't be afraid of the Zombie/Skeleton templates. Always having new monsters that are different undead might sound good, but your party will expect some reliable substance to the campaign beyond 'new things all the time'. So long as you stay away from the default examples, you've got a lot of versatility while still being well within 'meat and potatoes'.
And believe me, a Skeletal Giant encounter will play out very differently from a Zombie Roc encounter. Even if you can spitball them at about the same CR.

A Remorhaz skeleton is especially evil.

[Kelb_Panthera]

That seems like fairly rare cases and thus are kinda interesting when they happen.

If you comb through everything, you'll find rules for a whole slew of things you didn't even know you needed rules for.


Kinda strange that they have rules for that, but not what spells you can put on a wand.

Uh, you can put any spell 4th level or lower in a wand. That's the rule.

[Segev]

Given that you mention Redead as being particularly spooky, I think you may also benefit from not just considering their raw stats, but various undead behaviors and how they can contribute to an atmosphere.

Take the Shadow. Incorporeal, strength-draining undead which can turn victims into more of themselves. Somewhat generic, insofar as spawn-creating undead go.

But they're shadows. Think, briefly, of the vashta narada from Doctor Who. "Don't go into the dark." "Don't move; you have two shadows."

Imagine the dimly-lit room with scattered light sources casting plenty of natural shadows. Then, something moves. Maybe it was just a curtain. Maybe it was a shadow moving on its own. Describe the bone-numbing chill of stepping through one. Of being near one (within 5 ft. or so). To one player, describe it being almost painful, with a lingering shiver. Later, reveal to another player how that one's character's shadow has shreds missing from it, like a torn piece of cloth. Maybe even a bite taken out of it. (He suffered a strength-draining attack.)

Shadows can reach out of the walls and floor, and retreat to hide within them. While this isn't canon, I like to describe them as actually laying on surfaces like real shadows do, and interacting with the shadows of solid things. So their attacks aren't a black man-shaped blob in the air striking at you, but instead a shadow cast by nothing striking at your shadow. And fighting back against them requires using the shadows of your (magical/ghost-touch) weapons.

Have them be cowardly; they hide from the light. It doesn't hurt them, but they don't want to be plainly exposed. This will build the fear level, as the players have something they can do to drive them off...temporarily...but at the expense if narrowing their visual world to the circle of light they cast. Play up that description; the surrounding darkness grows thicker in contrast.

Perhaps you can even modify shadows so they're invisible to darkvision; it makes a certain amount of sense, since there are no shadows in the dark. The only reason they can even be in "darkness" is because they're incorporeal, and can pass through dark patches rather than treating them as solid, if they like. This is easy enough to mimic without house ruling, even: shadows sink into the walls and ground and ceiling in the dark, so they can't be spotted against the surfaces.

[TheifofZ]

Like I said earlier; it'd be really helpful knowing the general theme being shot for with this.
Beyond just spooky-cool, anyway.

Personally, one of my favorite undead for a boss-type encounter is the Boneyard.

Huge undead made of a literal pile of bones that can form itself into a gigantic serpent (or anything else it chooses, as per the statblock) and can, if it can maintain a pin on a victim for a single round, instantly pull (and absorb) all the bones from the victim's body, killing them.

[TheFamilarRaven]

Not 3.5 but easy enough to plop in to any 3.5 game. Mummies in Pathfinder (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/undead/mummy) have a Despair aura, which causes paralysis by fear. Just re-write it as a standard action sonic attack. If you're looking for something "like a redead".

Edit: Scratch that, Mummies in 3.5 do that as well ... so yeah :smallredface:

[TheifofZ]

Mummies (Snop)

Mummies are a CR 5 rating in MM I.
They include an effect that is nearly guaranteed to kill whoever it hits at that level, as most of the things that can be used to remove it occur as 4th or higher spells, or as mid-tier class abilities. (7th level at the earliest).
They also come with a couple other abilities that would each, combined with the mummy's base stats, ensure a CR 4~ on their own.
Mummies are basically the kind of thing you sneak in when you really want to remind your players that 'yes, you guys are heroes, but you're also very mortal', or throw around in mass mobs when your players are higher level and want something a little higher risk than standard bog zombies for their huge mobs of dangerous foes.

[Mordaedil]

Uh, you can put any spell 4th level or lower in a wand. That's the rule.
My point wasn't entirely clear there, huh?

There is a list of various wands in the DMG, but what if you wanted to make, say, a wand of Shield. How does that work? Does it only work on you holding the wand? Can you apply it to another player, making it slightly more powerful? Can you use touch spells at a range using a wand?

The rules don't say any of this. Just that a wand can hold any spell of 4th level or lower, so we had to have the DM call that I could use the shield spell to shield other players.

[TheFamilarRaven]

The rules don't say any of this. Just that a wand can hold any spell of 4th level or lower, so we had to have the DM call that I could use the shield spell to shield other players.

I mean ...



All wands are simply storage devices for spells and thus have no special descriptions. Refer to the spell descriptions for all pertinent details.


Basically, wands let you cast a specific spell X amount of times. Refer to the specific spell for the effects, target, Casting Time, etc...

[SangoProduction]

My best tip is: refluff anything you want as undead? Tarrasque? Sure, it's a giant mother flocking, regenerating god of death come to ...wait, that's just a Tarrasque. But you get the point!

[Kelb_Panthera]

My point wasn't entirely clear there, huh?

There is a list of various wands in the DMG, but what if you wanted to make, say, a wand of Shield. How does that work? Does it only work on you holding the wand? Can you apply it to another player, making it slightly more powerful? Can you use touch spells at a range using a wand?

The rules don't say any of this. Just that a wand can hold any spell of 4th level or lower, so we had to have the DM call that I could use the shield spell to shield other players.

This.


I mean ...



Basically, wands let you cast a specific spell X amount of times. Refer to the specific spell for the effects, target, Casting Time, etc...

Spells cast by wand function identically to spells cast normally. Range is unchanged. The wand wielder is the caster when a spell makes referrence to the caster.

[TheifofZ]

It helps if you think of spell completion items (Scrolls, Wands, and Staves) as basically being extra spell-slots that are automatically locked as the spell (or spells, in the case of staves) in the item.

So if you have a wand of 'Shield' with 40 uses, you essentially have 40 spellslots that are all filled with shield, and don't recharge ever.
If you pass the wand to the party rogue with ranks in Use Magic Device, the rogue then has 40 spell slots that are all filled with Shield.

If the rogue uses the wand, then it functions as the rogue casting the shield spell.
If you use the wand, then it functions as if you were casting the shield spell.
(In either case caster level, spell level, and any spell modifiers attached [including metamagic effects], are decided at the time of wand creation by the one that casts the spell into the wand, and cannot be modified by the wand -user- without appropriate feats.)

This in no way changes the nature of the spell in the wand; wand based spells gain no extra utility, function, range, or power beyond what they would normally possess if they were being cast from a spell-slot instead of a spell completion item; any modifications made to them through feats such as metamagic and meta-wand feats are strictly limited to the effect of the feat.

[Mordaedil]

That's entirely fair, it just wasn't extremely clear and I wish it was written with a tad more clarity, so I didn't have to theory with my DM around it.

Ah well, he allowed Shield wand to be touch anyway.