What kind of personalities do you think Awakened mindless undead would tend to have?

[Coidzor]

I was thinking that certain variants of zombies, like the ones that exist to eat brains or to spread their zombie plague/curse would have a fairly predatory bent, but I don't see any reason for the ones which were simply corpse puppets before being awakened to be particularly predatorily inclined.

If rot and decay were ongoing issues, I suppose they'd possibly be jealous of undead that didn't have to deal with that and maybe resent fleshies for not having their stuff falling off.

Non-fast zombies, I guess might either have minds that plod along as slowly as their bodies or might be given to being frustrated by the limitations of their bodies.

That's the extent of my thoughts for now, though.

[Malroth]

Had an awakened Skeleton Cryohydra that wound up having the personality of a small dog. It was very good at play dead.

[Celestia]

I would assume that they could have just about any personality that any intelligent beings could have.

[Coidzor]

I would assume that they could have just about any personality that any intelligent beings could have.

So you don't think they'd be predisposed towards anything by going from either TN or NE mindless entities(depending upon whether you're using a semi-popular houserule or not) to a TN or NE entity with a mind?

Or do you believe that Awakening them would set them as a blank slate and their actions and personality as they develop from then on would actually determine their alignment?

[Celestia]

So you don't think they'd be predisposed towards anything by going from either TN or NE mindless entities(depending upon whether you're using a semi-popular houserule or not) to a TN or NE entity with a mind?

Or do you believe that Awakening them would set them as a blank slate and their actions and personality as they develop from then on would actually determine their alignment?
Alignment has no affect on personality.

[weckar]

Alignment has no affect on personality.

Objection? Like, seriously?

[Necroticplague]

Objection? Like, seriously?

Other way around. Ones personality and actions dictate their alignment, not the other way around.

[Pleh]

Nah, both points are entirely subjective.

There's no universal answer to this, nor any right or wrong answer.

Alignment is descriptive, not prescriptive, and so it describes personality, not prescribes it....

Unless magic forces a shift, which it could in the case of necromancy. In some systems, using necromancy is inherently evil, so awakened undead would likely be constrained to evil and corrupted personalities.

In a setting where necromancy is not inherently evil, just about anything could happen as it would depend on the nature of the creature being awakened.

Only caveat is I don't expect it to act as it did in life no matter what, because the spell doesn't resurrect the soul that died. The body has a new mind, not the old one.

The part of the spell that specifically says that it keeps obeying your commands seems to imply that any personality attained is muted since they can't reject your commands for any reason.

[Celestia]

Objection? Like, seriously?
Seriously. Alignment dictates only one's values. One's personality is entirely separate. One can be Good and a jerk. One can be Evil and friendly. One can have any alignment and have any personality.

[weckar]

I suppose personality is subjective enough, but I would say one's values are an intrinsic part of their personality as they dictate how they will respond in most situations.

[IcarusWulfe]

As far as personality goes, the character Duane from the webcomic Unsounded could be a good place to start.

[tedcahill2]

I suppose personality is subjective enough, but I would say one's values are an intrinsic part of their personality as they dictate how they will respond in most situations.

Sociopathic serial killers (evil) are often described as being some of the nicest people (until they eat you).

As far as awakened undead I think I would be on two trains of thought, assuming no magical interference with their alignment. Either they have managed to hold on to a shred of who they were when alive, and they would regain that personality, or they would be a blank slate with no memories of themselves as living beings, and would develop who they are as they "live", heavily influenced by those around them I would say.

[Psyren]

How are you Awakening them? The method might yield some insight.

[Coidzor]

How are you Awakening them? The method might yield some insight.

As far as I'm aware, there's two ways to take a mindless undead creature and then give it a mind. Awaken Undead and then a more obscure spell that puts a fiend of some sort into them whose name I cannot recall.

My natural inclination is that putting a fiend in there would probably just mostly give it the fiend's personality, but I can't recall either the name or the particulars of that spell.

I was honestly expecting more answers along the lines of something based upon the personality of the creature whose corpse was turned into the undead, but, then, I was honestly expecting more answers instead of people telling me that I shouldn't even have asked anyone what they thought. :smallsigh:

[Psyren]

As far as I'm aware, there's two ways to take a mindless undead creature and then give it a mind. Awaken Undead and then a more obscure spell that puts a fiend of some sort into them whose name I cannot recall.

My natural inclination is that putting a fiend in there would probably just mostly give it the fiend's personality, but I can't recall either the name or the particulars of that spell.

I'm unfamiliar with the fiend one too, but I'm guessing the end result of letting a fiend pilot something's actions and morals would be evil.

Awaken Undead, in addition to being an [Evil] spell itself, doesn't appear to change the target creature's alignment. Since skeletons were evil before, they'd likely still be evil after.



I was honestly expecting more answers along the lines of something based upon the personality of the creature whose corpse was turned into the undead, but, then, I was honestly expecting more answers instead of people telling me that I shouldn't even have asked anyone what they thought. :smallsigh:

Well, you have my answer at least - same alignment as before (generally evil) or definitely evil if using the unnamed fiend method.

[Doctor Despair]

I'd imagine, for those without memories of their life, they'd have a predisposition towards either nihilism or hedonism due to their brush with mortality.

[daremetoidareyo]

They're obviously all hipster philosophers who speak eloquently about the needs of the proletariat to throw off the yoke of tyranny. Even when dead, they were put to work. So now they're really salty about how mortals quest for power ultimately yields oppression.

Obviously.

[Celestia]

They're obviously all hipster philosophers who speak eloquently about the needs of the proletariat to throw off the yoke of tyranny. Even when dead, they were put to work. So now they're really salty about how mortals quest for power ultimately yields oppression.

Obviously.
My new headcanon.

[PacMan2247]

Libris Mortis offers some good points on this subject; different types of undead have different drives. An awakened skeleton or zombie would still lack a living creature's need to breathe, eat, drink, sleep, and reproduce. Their responses to environmental conditions would be very different from those of the living- I could see a skeleton inclined to be helpful shoveling every driveway in town so that its living neighbors don't have to go out in the cold, and a zombie that comes off as callous because it doesn't understand pain the way we do.

Since awaken undead has the potential to affect a great many creatures at once, the interaction of those creatures also becomes a consideration: do they view one another as rivals, or as friends, or are they more like siblings, with aspects of both? The spell provides, at best, average Intelligence scores, but that's enough for them to be able to learn how the world works, and how people respond to them. In a cosmopolitan society, perhaps they become valued members of the labor force: tireless, never taking a sick day or getting injured on the job, and never needing so much as a bathroom break, much less a lunch break. Around a less tolerant society, where they're shunned or even attacked on sight, maybe they become like a dog that's been habitually beaten, and become aggressive or violent. Then again, they could go the complete opposite direction, and become wanderers looking for a place where they can exist without violence (or if they're able to find work, they pool their savings to create a haven for themselves away from the living creatures that persecute them).

Awaken undead is one of those spells that got tagged with the [evil] descriptor, and I'm not sure it's appropriate- there's no rule I'm aware of that says a soul is any way affected by the body it once inhabited being animated by magic, so I don't see that creating skeletons or zombies is inherently evil (and even for creating undead that prey on the living, there are already scores of living creatures that do the same thing without being tagged as evil), and the spell takes it one step further and grants a measure of self-determination to a slave, which I have a hard time accepting as an evil act. Calling one form of energy [good] and another [evil] is completely arbitrary; fire can keep you warm or burn your house down. Alignment is a question of actions taken and the motivations behind those actions, not of the circumstances that led to your existence.

[VonMuller]

The general rule in D&D is that most beings have both a soul and a body. There are of course exceptions, but undead are generally described as bodies risen without consent from the soul (again, exceptions)

I would supposse that in D&D's mythology, being an awakened souless naturally evil creature would predispose to envy, pain, and a hunger for having a soul.

Since you are probably a former member of a race that used to have a soul, that can (per True Resurrection) be brought back, you would probably be a being quite different from your true self if you had memories at all. If not, D&D souls are almost spiritually meaningless.

On the other hand, that predisposition could be overcome via intellect and thought. At least if nothing magical or inherently spiritual forbids an alignment change (like Evil outsiders, which are Evil (Adj.) because they are Evil (Noun))

An interesting subject. In my games I would rule the majority to be evil, but with exceptions.

[Zanos]

Awakened undead typically aren't all that bright(5-10 int), have pretty much no sense of self of force of personality (Probably 1 charisma) and the awakening compels them to follow the casters orders.

So their personalities probably lie between "Sir, yes sir" and being chronically depressed. Their alignment remains Neutral Evil as well, which I guess is nice because they're probably being told to kill stuff fairly frequently.



I would supposse that in D&D's mythology, being an awakened souless naturally evil creature would predispose to envy, pain, and a hunger for having a soul.
Intelligent undead have souls, as per magic jar. So now let the metaphysical consequences of a 7th level spell creating souls sink in.

[PaucaTerrorem]

Would probably have a deadpan sense of humor.

[Lord Haart]

Would probably have a deadpan sense of humor.
I guess a skeleton could be a great comic, sans facial expressions.

[Pleh]

I guess a skeleton could be a great comic, sans facial expressions.

I always thought papyrus was funnier than sans.

[Tiri]

Intelligent undead have souls, as per magic jar. So now let the metaphysical consequences of a 7th level spell creating souls sink in.

It's a sixth-level spell if you get it as a domain spell.

Also, it's far from the only one. Look at Curse of Lycanthropy.

[PacMan2247]

What version of awaken undead are people looking at that put the awakened undead under the caster's control? I checked Spell Compendium and Libris Mortis, and neither of them include that clause (unless we're taking the last phrase of the sentence "Undead regain the armor and weapon proficiencies they had in life (...) and will don armor and take up weapons while obeying your commands" out of the context).

[Venger]

As far as I'm aware, there's two ways to take a mindless undead creature and then give it a mind. Awaken Undead and then a more obscure spell that puts a fiend of some sort into them whose name I cannot recall.

My natural inclination is that putting a fiend in there would probably just mostly give it the fiend's personality, but I can't recall either the name or the particulars of that spell.

I was honestly expecting more answers along the lines of something based upon the personality of the creature whose corpse was turned into the undead, but, then, I was honestly expecting more answers instead of people telling me that I shouldn't even have asked anyone what they thought. :smallsigh:


I'm unfamiliar with the fiend one too, but I'm guessing the end result of letting a fiend pilot something's actions and morals would be evil.

Awaken Undead, in addition to being an [Evil] spell itself, doesn't appear to change the target creature's alignment. Since skeletons were evil before, they'd likely still be evil after.

Well, you have my answer at least - same alignment as before (generally evil) or definitely evil if using the unnamed fiend method.
You are thinking of vile death. it gives the undead the fiendish template. It doesn't specify consciousness, but says its starting attitude is indifferent. this probably means a third personality is created that isn't the base (who'd probably be nicer) or the fiend (who'd probably be madder) so you can do with that what you will.


What version of awaken undead are people looking at that put the awakened undead under the caster's control? I checked Spell Compendium and Libris Mortis, and neither of them include that clause (unless we're taking the last phrase of the sentence "Undead regain the armor and weapon proficiencies they had in life (...) and will don armor and take up weapons while obeying your commands" out of the context).
you'll retain control via however you controlled him earlier (rebuke pool, command undead, etc) it's not a function of the spell

[The Viscount]

Awaken undead is one of those spells that got tagged with the [evil] descriptor, and I'm not sure it's appropriate- there's no rule I'm aware of that says a soul is any way affected by the body it once inhabited being animated by magic, so I don't see that creating skeletons or zombies is inherently evil (and even for creating undead that prey on the living, there are already scores of living creatures that do the same thing without being tagged as evil), and the spell takes it one step further and grants a measure of self-determination to a slave, which I have a hard time accepting as an evil act. Calling one form of energy [good] and another [evil] is completely arbitrary; fire can keep you warm or burn your house down. Alignment is a question of actions taken and the motivations behind those actions, not of the circumstances that led to your existence.

While I agree that Awaken undead is unjustly tagged with the [evil] descriptor, there is perhaps a discussion to be had over awaken undead. Obviously you can use the undead you make for whichever purpose you like and without a commander they don't take action, like a mindless construct. However, there's one important consideration for animate dead: For whatever reason, they cannot be brought back to life. Raise dead and reanimate simply fail, even true resurrection requires you destroy the undead first. So the evil inherent in the spell isn't from the actions of the things it makes, but from the fact that you're preventing the creature from being brought back. You could of course use the spell on evil creatures that should not be brought back to life, and of course the cosmology and alignment murkiness that gets involved with resurrecting creatures is a whole mess, just thought I should share a potential reason for the discussion.


What version of awaken undead are people looking at that put the awakened undead under the caster's control? I checked Spell Compendium and Libris Mortis, and neither of them include that clause (unless we're taking the last phrase of the sentence "Undead regain the armor and weapon proficiencies they had in life (...) and will don armor and take up weapons while obeying your commands" out of the context).

I wouldn't say that casting awaken undead itself gives you control over a mindless undead that you find. I would instead say that the spell, even though it grants intelligence, does not disturb any existing control you have over the creature. Arguments for this are threefold. 1. The spell does not say that it in any way alters your control over the target creature. 2. Vile death is an example of a different spell that does sever your control. 3. There is precedent for intelligent undead controlled by animate dead, like the necrosis carnex.


As for my response to the original question, I think the personality of the awakened undead depends enormously on one major factor, and that's whether the intelligence (and thus soul, as per magic jar's statment) that you bestow on the undead is their original one. If this is the case, then I would expect an undead to retain their original personality, perhaps somewhat changed by the ordeal of death and reanimation in an undead body. Since their alignment technically changed to NE when animated as a skeleton or zombie, it seems by RAW that they would keep this alignment even when awakened, and we can turn to LIbris Mortis for some guidance here. Creatures like wights, for example, are intelligent so retain their souls but now have a hatred (or perhaps envy) of living things. I would expect something like this to apply to undead if we're saying they keep the NE alignment. If you've seen Buffy, you can use that for an example of what it might look like to maintain personality and consciousness while becoming evil.

[Ettina]

I'd say that the awakened undead probably sees the caster as a parental figure and is predisposed to obey them, but can disobey (barring other effects that control intelligent undead) if they're so inclined.
As for personality, I'm guessing type of undead (need to feed vs not, for example) would affect it, as would characteristics of what body they have, and their experiences immediately after being awakened. They'd also be evil, unless they were a non-evil kind of undead (I'm not aware of any mindless non-evil undead?). I see undead being evil as a predisposition hardwired into them by the magic that keeps them undead, and only those few who have been raised by special processes that don't affect alignment lack this predisposition. Intelligent undead can choose to fight their predisposition, if given a suitable reason, but most don't really want to. That's just how I see it.