Pathfinder war and necromancy

[Cyclopsw]

I know there is a system for large scale battles in pathfinder but i´m kinda wondering how a necromancer would affect a battle by resurrecting fallen warriors on both sides to fight for them.

[SilverLeaf167]

During the battle? Probably not much, since the spell takes a standard action to cast and they need to physically touch every corpse to be reanimated.

During the war? A lot, if there's enough onyx to spend on material components and the necromancer can control a lot of HD. Even if your undead soldiers aren't quite as effective as living ones, they're expendable and you can refresh your stores after every battle you win. There's also a lot of creative applications for undead that you couldn't do with live humanoids.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Because of the limitations of the involved magic -a- necromancer won't have dramatically greater effect on the war than any other individual caster.

Now a cadre of necromancers could make a small army all by themselves but even then zombies and skeletons aren't terribly impressive and anything fancier can get out of hand if you aren't careful.

[Hamste]

The main problem is you can't really animate skeletons during a battle and they generally are better than zombies. Zombies are not bad in an army setting though if the setting is relatively low level (say the average soldier is level two or less) as they have a fair bit of health, their ac is slightly better than the average soldier (as they have the soldiers gear and also gain natural armor but lose some dex), they resist arrows which are one of their biggest weaknesses, they hit harder and are more accurate with melee weapons (ignoring feats which do help the soldiers catch up slightly). Unless the army they are fighting against is very mobile it is hard to kite with an army so their slowness only really comes into effect against archers (who deal a lot of damage or are out of reach), mages or armies that are skilled at hit and run tactics. The main difficulty is that necromancers need to touch all the bodies they animate so if the line doesn't move in combat they are pretty useless. If the army they are fighting against backs off even slightly though the necromancers can quickly replace their losses (or even release some undead if the native state of undead is to attack the closest living creature) by having some body collectors assigned to them who's entire job is to go out and grab the bodies that the zombies killed to bring to the necromancers with their desecrated areas.

Essentially, necromancers help win a battle with the undead they bring before the fight but during the fight they don't help you much in winning just in minimizing casualties as long as you are winning.

[Segev]

Sadly, Chain Spell isn't in Pathfinder, so the ability to pull out a chain command undead is gone. This greatly expanded necromancers' ability to control larger numbers of bigger, more potent (mindless) undead.

Even without Chain Spell, however, command undead can be used to keep control of huge-HD undead without bumping into their HD cap.

[Wendigo]

I know there is a system for large scale battles in pathfinder but i´m kinda wondering how a necromancer would affect a battle by resurrecting fallen warriors on both sides to fight for them.

It's Actually a Pretty big thing in a Game I'm Running, The nation the PC's home nation is at war with is heavily out numbered, so they started using undead soldiers, then Created undead that could create more undead. they ran into a problem at that point.

[atemu1234]

Because of the limitations of the involved magic -a- necromancer won't have dramatically greater effect on the war than any other individual caster.

Now a cadre of necromancers could make a small army all by themselves but even then zombies and skeletons aren't terribly impressive and anything fancier can get out of hand if you aren't careful.

I feel like it's actually more effective in army format, if you'd hear me out.

A group of player characters have armor, equipment, good gear and magic stuff.

Your army, on the other hand, has nonmagical gear, and typically they carry longswords and bows. Skeletons have damage reduction overcome by bludgeoning, which is not something the former typically carry.

An army of human level one warriors versus a group of similarly numbered skeletons? Doomed.

[Kelb_Panthera]

I feel like it's actually more effective in army format, if you'd hear me out.

A group of player characters have armor, equipment, good gear and magic stuff.

Your army, on the other hand, has nonmagical gear, and typically they carry longswords and bows. Skeletons have damage reduction overcome by bludgeoning, which is not something the former typically carry.

An army of human level one warriors versus a group of similarly numbered skeletons? Doomed.

You're forgetting the control limits. Putting together a modest army of skellies is doable if you -really- lean in to it but city-states will field armies of at least the same size pretty much every time and a proper nation-state -will- crush your army with theirs.

[atemu1234]

You're forgetting the control limits. Putting together a modest army of skellies is doable if you -really- lean in to it but city-states will field armies of at least the same size pretty much every time and a proper nation-state -will- crush your army with theirs.

Fair, though a cabal of necromancers could do it far more efficiently; granted, you'd need to be able to control a large, large number of undead but with enough necromancers, the sky's the limit.

Anyone up for playing a Lich Ghoran Necromancer?

[Prime32]

I know there is a system for large scale battles in pathfinder but i´m kinda wondering how a necromancer would affect a battle by resurrecting fallen warriors on both sides to fight for them.In Eberron, one of the reasons the warforged became so popular is because they were a counter to enemy necromancers. Not only are warforged impossible to animate as undead, you also can't use speak with dead to interrogate them, and they're immune to a number of attacks commonly used by undead.

Both undead and constructs have a lot of tactical advantages in that they can march without rest (and can even travel along riverbeds to avoid detection), have little need for supplies, and are immune to spells like cloudkill that can devastate conscript armies.

[Segev]

Control limits can be exceeded via command undead. Put in a command-activated item, and you could have a stunning number under one person's control as long as he spent the time needed to keep renewing it on each one every 3 days. Just one (tedious) hour a day would be 1800 individual undead under his command. (1 activation every 6 seconds for an hour is 600. The item's minimum CL gives it a 3 day duration.)

[Fouredged Sword]

And control limits can be overcome by simply not controlling your undead. Leaving packets of undead behind with a strike group attacking your enemies' rear supply lines would be catastrophic.

[Stealth Marmot]

Animate Dead: 3rd level spell.

Material cost: 25gp per hit die. Each Zombie is 2 hit die, 50gp per zombie.

You cannot have more than twice your level in hit die of undead, so 1 zombie per level. 5th level cleric is getting 5 zombies, and costs 250 gold.

A trained mercenary hireling costs 3 SP per day. 250 GP gets you 833+ days of mercenary work.

For the same cost, you can get 9 mercenaries who can follow more complex orders for over 90 days.

Every time a Zombie dies, it costs 50 gp to replace it. Every time a mercenary dies, you get a new one. 50 GP will buy a Mercenary's work for 166 days. You can get 2 Mercenaries for 83 days.

How often do you expect to have to replace these zombies? Probably a lot more often than that if you are doing a war where battles are done at least once a month.

Long story short: Mercs are cheaper than the spell components, and more effective. While useful for a cleric to have a nice entourage, it won't single handedly turn the tide of a war.

Edit: Tide not battle. Also, DURING a battle, a 3rd level cleric spell can be a much more effective tool, with spells like Blindness against a high level warrior or fighter, prayer for bonuses to allies and penalty to enemies, cure for a high level warrior on your side, dispel magic for a major effect, Magic Circle against X for some protections, Wind Wall to negate archers, the list goes on. These are a LOT more effective than a single 2HD zombie that can be taken out by a couple of slashes with swords and will maybe take out 2 level 1 warriors before biting the dust, and that's if tactics aren't implemented and any army worth its salt WILL. Also it can be turned and destroyed by a 2nd level cleric.

[Hamste]

How would you even control that many undead using only oral commands? I mean clarion call can get them to hear you but if you shout something like fight they presumably can't tell who you want them to fight unless they can see who you are gesturing to and a similar problem with the go there command. Maybe if you pass it around you could have commanders for each segment but that causes problems if the leaders died. Intelligent creatures could also work but they are a whole host of problems.

[Segev]

Since we're talking Pathfinder, Bloody Skeletons are an option comparable to Zombies in the number of them you can have. Bloody Skeletons count as 2x their actual HD for animation and control purposes, but have a property that makes them get back up after being destroyed. They're far more economical, therefore, than mercenaries that you have to replace, simply by virtue of not having morale issues when you throw them at the enemy.

The increased costs over hireling warriors is noteworthy, however. It's interesting how often we discuss minionmancy via spells with expensive material components, Leadership feats, etc., but we forget we could theoretically hire a small squad of bodyguards to send into battle.

I think part of the allure is that the DM is free to decide that one or more of your hirelings are less than honest people who will steal from you and run off, or who will abandon you in your time of need. There's also the fact that you can't treat hirelings as expendable even if you paid them so well as to equate to animating corpses; they're not going to willingly march to their doom. Plus, as others have mentioned, undead immunities are useful on the battlefield.

[JNAProductions]

Bloody Skeletons do seem like your best bet. Drop them behind enemy lines (possibly literally, using a Fly spell, or Overland Flight), they'll die from fall damage, and get back up in an hour.

[Psyren]

This is the kind of thing that might be best handled by a Ritual. That would allow you to get a bunch of necromancers together in a graveyard and raise an entire army overnight without the limitations or time cost of the individual spells.

[Hamste]

Bloody skeletons don't cost twice for control just for animation. They are pretty nice, particularly if you can figure out a way to get the enemy to retreat from the battle or ignore the oldies

[Stealth Marmot]

This is the kind of thing that might be best handled by a Ritual. That would allow you to get a bunch of necromancers together in a graveyard and raise an entire army overnight without the limitations or time cost of the individual spells.

I always wondered about graveyards, I mean if I recall exhumed corpses correctly, they always looked incredibly frail. Does Animate Dead also fortify the bones and flesh? Not to mention that the corpses are stiff from embalming. Alternatively, the bones becoming brittle from the rotting flesh eating through the bones.

When I imagine necromancers animating dead, I always figured that undead creation was a more involved process that required proper preparation and creation, peeling flesh from bones to create skeletons or using a fresh, recently dead and not dried out corpse for a zombie.

[Segev]

Another thought: 1/day command-activated animate dead items. Make it an altar that also has desecrate, and assume it's cleric-made for CL 5. That's up to 20 HD of undead per day. The 1/day 3rd level CL 5 spell is 15*1800/5 = 5400 gp market value, plus up to 20 HD material components is 20*25*50 = 25000 gp. 30,400 gp total.

Alternatively, cut its maximum HD down to 10 (so it isn't dependent on desecrate to use its maximum) and give it 2 uses/day. This cuts down the largest size you can make, but if you're mainly animating humanoid bloody skeletons, that's not a big deal. This would be 15*1800/(5/2) + 10*25*50 = 10,800 + 12,500 = 23,300 gp.

Just for further comparison, 3x/day at 6 HD of undead per use would be: 15*1800/(5/3) + 6*25*50 = 16,200 + 7500 = 23,700 gp.

Personally, I'd go with that last one, because it's only 400 gp more expensive than the second one, and actually gets you 4 more HD of undead overall. You are limited to only 6 HD maximum in any one of them, but the more commonly expected use is medium humanoid bloody skeletons, so that's 3 of those per use, for a total of 9 of them per day.


For final comparison, an unlimited-uses version that animates only 1 humanoid bloody skeleton per use would be 15*1800 + 2*25*100 = 32,000 gp, which is comparable to the 1/day version that can make up to 20 HD in a single go.

A dedicated user of the last item would still be capped at 20 HD he could control from his animation, but if we have other control means or are happy with uncontrolled undead, he can animate 1280 HD of undead in 16 8-hour days of (tedious) work. That is the point at which you'd break even on the material cost of the 32,000 gp item, compared to simply casting the spell and expending the material component.



Thinking on it further, while the item is granting the spell effect, the control cap is still per user, I believe. So you could have one sergeant use it 10 times on 10 corpses to make 10 bloody skeletons which he can control, then hand it off to another sergeant. This would reduce the tedium, though it would still take 128 hours of use (not necessarily continuous) to make enough undead to break even. Still, it's quite doable.

1280 HD of undead is 640 bloody skeletons. Raising that in between 6 and 16 days (depending on how efficient you are in having your sergeants on hand to pass the baton) is not bad. And it's 64 squads of 10, under 64 sergeants.

And remember, because these are bloody skeletons, each sergeant's squad is highly likely to recover after each battle without further need to use the magic device, so you can just keep issuing new squads with it all day, every day.

[Segev]

Bloody skeletons don't cost twice for control just for animation. They are pretty nice, particularly if you can figure out a way to get the enemy to retreat from the battle or ignore the oldies

Oh really, now? Oho. That's even better.

So our magic item-based sergeants can command full squads of 20 medium humanoid bloody skeletons. Really only halves the number of sergeants you need, rather than reducing any production costs, but still.

Do they count twice for material components, or just for HD cap in animation?

[Psyren]

I always wondered about graveyards, I mean if I recall exhumed corpses correctly, they always looked incredibly frail. Does Animate Dead also fortify the bones and flesh? Not to mention that the corpses are stiff from embalming. Alternatively, the bones becoming brittle from the rotting flesh eating through the bones.

What the spell does is apply the template. So if someone was feeble in life (e.g. a Venerable Human with huge Str deficiencies who died of old age) then their skeleton or zombie will be feeble too (the zombie slightly less so.) However, it could also be a bit tougher since its Cha will become 10 and its HP will be based on that rather than its (likely low) Con.

The usual way to get stronger skeletons and zombies is to start from stronger corpses - e.g. animals, giants, monstrous humanoids and dragons, the kind of monsters that have RHD.



When I imagine necromancers animating dead, I always figured that undead creation was a more involved process that required proper preparation and creation, peeling flesh from bones to create skeletons or using a fresh, recently dead and not dried out corpse for a zombie.

As long as you have the spell, an intact corpse and the necessary materials/conditions, there isn't much more preparation that's needed.

[JNAProductions]

Bloody Skeleton T-Rex, anyone?

[Hamste]

They do cost twice for cost (essentially the HD count twice for everything except once under control they count normally for controlling).

[Serafina]

And control limits can be overcome by simply not controlling your undead. Leaving packets of undead behind with a strike group attacking your enemies' rear supply lines would be catastrophic.That, and you can actually keep mindless undead in a cage pretty well.
You then keep the undead you control permanently around as bodyguards and maybe elite troops, and cast a Control Undead spell (or other temporary means) to get a bunch of disposable cannon fodder units. Once they're dead, you control the next wave, and so on.

This would basically give a necromancer-army a lot of attack waves, but an upper limit on how large a wave can be based on the number of necromancers they have. Attacking these containers of uncontrolled undead would also be a priority, but still dangerous since those are still going to attack your troops if they get close.


As for the onyx component cost:
Do keep in mind that in a real economy (especially one that isn't a modern globalist one), not everything can be sold and bought in unlimited quantities. And wealth-by-level is a guideline for the GM, not some sort of in-universe natural law.
So yes, in sheer gold piece cost a mercenary is cheaper than an undead soldier, though of course even then the undead soldier won't need a wage, just a one-time payment.
But that assumes that you have resources in the form of gold pieces, and could spend them freely on either mercenaries or onyx, with no supply limits at any point.
Needless to say, this shouldn't be the case.

Instead, an undead army that needs onyx would have onyx mineral deposits as vital strategic resources. They wouldn't be able to just sell that onyx on the free market either and hire mercenaries instead - so regardless of the technical inefficiency, they'd be best off actually using that onyx.

That's assuming that it even has to be onyx, instead of other minerals, and that the necromancers do not have some method of bypassing the material component cost entirely.

[Segev]

I have occasionally pondered magic item creation rules being used to create foci that replace material components for specific spells. On topic, thus, an item which doesn't cast animate dead for you, but which does serve as a focus that obviates the need for expending black onyx. It would come to 2500 gp per HD of undead it could allow you to create, using Pathfinder's guidelines.

[Kelb_Panthera]

I always wondered about graveyards, I mean if I recall exhumed corpses correctly, they always looked incredibly frail. Does Animate Dead also fortify the bones and flesh? Not to mention that the corpses are stiff from embalming. Alternatively, the bones becoming brittle from the rotting flesh eating through the bones.

When I imagine necromancers animating dead, I always figured that undead creation was a more involved process that required proper preparation and creation, peeling flesh from bones to create skeletons or using a fresh, recently dead and not dried out corpse for a zombie.

Given that it's omitted from the rules, you could go either way but I'm inclined to see it that the magic fortifies the flesh and bones since that is either explicitly or implicitly the case with a number of undead. I can't think of a good reason it shouldn't include them all.

[Coidzor]

I always wondered about graveyards, I mean if I recall exhumed corpses correctly, they always looked incredibly frail. Does Animate Dead also fortify the bones and flesh? Not to mention that the corpses are stiff from embalming. Alternatively, the bones becoming brittle from the rotting flesh eating through the bones.

When I imagine necromancers animating dead, I always figured that undead creation was a more involved process that required proper preparation and creation, peeling flesh from bones to create skeletons or using a fresh, recently dead and not dried out corpse for a zombie.

Presumably they're tougher than they'd otherwise be. Then again, a Human Skeleton only has 1d8 hp, with no constitution. So tougher than average than a Human Commoner 1 with anything less than a 14 constitution, and on par with a Human Warrior 1, if they put their 13 and 12 into Strength and Dex and boost one of those.

Thankfully that's not the case. The Skeletons will peel themselves if that's what you choose to make, at least when casting Animate Dead. Even if that's required to be the case, there's two spells that'll either peel the corpse for you or rejuvenate the rotted flesh so it's not desiccated. Decompose Corpse and I can't remember its opposite number's name off hand.

[aphilosoraptor]

don't forget that you could make plague zombies for double cost and than release them ageist the enemy directly or behind their lines and the necromancers would probably be safe between hide from undead and just using their undead as a wall.

a cheap horde that continues to grow at an exponential rate. :smallbiggrin:

mu ha ha!

[Calthropstu]

Because of the limitations of the involved magic -a- necromancer won't have dramatically greater effect on the war than any other individual caster.

Now a cadre of necromancers could make a small army all by themselves but even then zombies and skeletons aren't terribly impressive and anything fancier can get out of hand if you aren't careful.

Not too impressive?

I beg to differ. Even a standard drow or elven army (drow slaves such as kobold warriors or elven lvl 1 warriors) that will standardly represent most better mortal armies will have a difficult time with a like numbered army of skeletons.

You look at skeletons and say "meh, not impressed..." but think 1000 skeletons vs 1000 orcs... and the picture becomes a lot different.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Not too impressive?

I beg to differ. Even a standard drow or elven army (drow slaves such as kobold warriors or elven lvl 1 warriors) that will standardly represent most better mortal armies will have a difficult time with a like numbered army of skeletons.

You look at skeletons and say "meh, not impressed..." but think 1000 skeletons vs 1000 orcs... and the picture becomes a lot different.

Control limits. It's not 1000 skellies vs 1000 orcs. It's ~150 skellies vs 1000 orcs.

Even if it -was- 1000 skellies, they're pretty useless for anything even loosely resembling complex tactics since they're unthinking weapons-platforms, not soldiers. Against drow battle-fodder, sure. Against anything like unto a decently led army, not so much.

[Coretron03]

So, a 5th level undead master (for 3rd level animate dead) wizard can animate up to 20hd of undead and can get 5hd more of undead from control undead leaving them with 25 hd worth of undead. They can animate 10hd of undead in a single casting, using blood money to entirely negate the cost and with bloody skeletons they can get 25 1HD bloody skeletons for very little investment that have 6 hp (1d8+2) each. In low level warfare thats a pretty good a amount of troops that you could have on hand permanently, leaving their spell slots for something like fireball for "murder that 20ft square".

[unseenmage]

Check my sig for a mostly complete list of necromancy options. Including Frostfallen, Animate Dead creatures that keep their Special Attacks.

One imagines that might change the Necromancers at war outcome some.

[Calthropstu]

Control limits. It's not 1000 skellies vs 1000 orcs. It's ~150 skellies vs 1000 orcs.

Even if it -was- 1000 skellies, they're pretty useless for anything even loosely resembling complex tactics since they're unthinking weapons-platforms, not soldiers. Against drow battle-fodder, sure. Against anything like unto a decently led army, not so much.

I dunno, that dr 5/bludgeoning is a nasty trait. And interspersed with zombies, which are actually quite tough to deal with at really low levels, it could be tough for a standard army to deal with. An army is generally made up of lvl 1 warriors after all with a few higher level characters as sergeants, captains etc.

Throw a lvl 1 warrior up against a standard skeleton, and the warrior is fighting an uphill battle, even armed with a mace.

[Coretron03]

Burning skeletons are also a option, sending a couple (25) of them into a fight would go pretty well as a normal warrior has 8 hp and they deal 1d6 damage to people around them and have a explode on death for a dc 11 reflex save or take 1d6 damage and +1d6 damage on hit. Could be pretty effective against mooks, considering a hit from them has a very good chance of knocking out a warrior including their aura with 3d6+str damage if thy hit and they still get the DR. I am gonna have a look at the war rules for a bit, to see how useful it is "officially".

[Segev]

Regarding plague zombies, if you don't have a solid plan for dealing with the zombies that are still there when you conquer the area, or which leak back out into your territory when your enemies are dead and risen as them, you're going to have a serious problem on your hand. It's not even about limiting collateral damage; it's about having usable territory after you win. Darned things aren't auto-controlled by anything. You'd have to provide your own clean-up mechanism.

[Coidzor]

Regarding plague zombies, if you don't have a solid plan for dealing with the zombies that are still there when you conquer the area, or which leak back out into your territory when your enemies are dead and risen as them, you're going to have a serious problem on your hand. It's not even about limiting collateral damage; it's about having usable territory after you win. Darned things aren't auto-controlled by anything. You'd have to provide your own clean-up mechanism.

That's why you should always have Edgehogs (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/monstrous-humanoids/pukwudgie/)around to help out if you're serious about necromancing.

Best of all, you can pay them in your enemies' babies.

[Segev]

That's why you should always have Edgehogs (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/monstrous-humanoids/pukwudgie/)around to help out if you're serious about necromancing.

Best of all, you can pay them in your enemies' babies.

I want to like those, but the best use would be to turn them into one of the undead that a) keeps its spell-likes and special attacks, and b) is easily kept under your control.

What really frustrates me is that they're sloppily written, though. They have the [shapechanger] subtype and nothing in their abilities nor fluff text that talks about shape changing. And they have command undead as a spell-like, but their quill-animated (mindless) undead have a -4 on saves against their spell-like control undead ability...which they do not have. :smallannoyed:

[Coidzor]

I want to like those, but the best use would be to turn them into one of the undead that a) keeps its spell-likes and special attacks, and b) is easily kept under your control.

What really frustrates me is that they're sloppily written, though. They have the [shapechanger] subtype and nothing in their abilities nor fluff text that talks about shape changing. And they have command undead as a spell-like, but their quill-animated (mindless) undead have a -4 on saves against their spell-like control undead ability...which they do not have. :smallannoyed:

It took me forever to notice that they have Change Shape and can take on the appearance of Porcupines.

The sloppy editing of Command Undead vs. Control Undead is pretty egregious though, I agree.

[Segev]

It took me forever to notice that they have Change Shape and can take on the appearance of Porcupines.Oh! So they do! Thanks for pointing that out.


The sloppy editing of Command Undead vs. Control Undead is pretty egregious though, I agree.

I'd be more forgiving of it if it weren't for the fact that the -4 save would be needed for control undead, but is not for command undead, due to the fact that they only quill-create mindless undead and command undead offers mindless undead no save. I can forgive typo-ing the "command" vs "control" thing.

But with the full rule in there... which spell are we to assume they have? At-will control undead would be amazing and terrifying. At-will command undead is nice, and rather potent, but not unmanageably so for CR 7.

[Coidzor]

Oh! So they do! Thanks for pointing that out.

I'm not kidding about it taking me forever. I knew about them and kept referencing their stats for over a month before I finally noticed it. :smallredface:

I think it's partially the site layout and partially just the way the entries are organized. I'm really not a fan of Change Shape being listed just in the stat block and vastly prefer it to be listed along with special qualities. But I suppose if it's not listed with special qualities then it might not be lost along with them?

...I'm going to have to doublecheck that. :smallconfused:


I'd be more forgiving of it if it weren't for the fact that the -4 save would be needed for control undead, but is not for command undead, due to the fact that they only quill-create mindless undead and command undead offers mindless undead no save. I can forgive typo-ing the "command" vs "control" thing.

But with the full rule in there... which spell are we to assume they have? At-will control undead would be amazing and terrifying. At-will command undead is nice, and rather potent, but not unmanageably so for CR 7.

Yeah. I'm inclined to go with at-will Command Undead because that seems the less problematic and more generally useful to me.

I'm kinda biased against Control Undead, but, then, I guess I haven't wanted to fully contemplate the implications of At-Will Control Undead...

[Segev]

The one thing that I really wish I could do with command undead that I can only do with control undead is take over undead swarms, particularly of mindless things. That control undead is the only way to take over a bone rat swarm or the like is really frustrating.

At-will control undead is still less useful in a utility sense, because they'd have to re-use it every few minutes!

[Vogie]

Bloody Skeleton T-Rex, anyone?

Rallying cry - Polka will never die!

[Necroticplague]

What happens to uncontrolled mindless undead, anyhow? Because even if your control limit is low, it seems like a fighting retreat of leaving uncontrolled undead behind to basically act like booby traps or land mines could be a viable strategy if uncontrolled undead are aggressive.

Incidentally, unless I'm missing something, Burning Bloody skeletons are possible (if expensive), so the land mine comparison can be rather apt. Blow up, reform, stand up, attack, repeat.