Undead Campaign

[graymachine]

I've cooked up an idea for a campaign based on the PCs being undead. I think I may have mentioned it in a few posts before, but here I want to get some lengthy feedback, discussion, and maybe an idea or two. The premise of the campaign is, obviously, the PCs are undead. I plan to set this in a, more or less, undescript city, probably on a custom world rather than the standard settings (while Faerun or Greyhawk might work I think that the setting would distract from the campaign. The basics are that the PCs were living their lives as common folk in the city, going about their business. Then, over the course of 3 days, an event occurs, which for purposes here we will call The Event. All of the PCs have little to no memory of The Event, but "awoke" 3 days later as undead. I'll get to the specifics later. They are in a city overrun by their fellow undead, mostly mindless zombies, and have no way out (this is because a nearby school of wizards noticed the Event early and have taken steps to seal the city.) The PCs group together, frankly, because they are the only intelligent undead in the area and the zombies are relentless. They'll eventually exit the city and pursue the cause of their damned state, but that is in the second story arc. Before I get to my thoughts and questions about this first arc, let me lay down the base mechanics:

-All PCs start at 3rd level.

-All PCs are required to take a NPC class as their first level.

-All PCs recieve a 3 level booster in the form of 3 free levels to put toward their undead template.

-No PC can play a non-sentient undead.

-All classes are available aside from psionic classes (classes must make some kind of sense.)

-Alignment restrictions are waived for qualifying for an undead template. However, a PC must qualify for his class alignment restrictions.

-No PC can take Leadership unless they qualify one of the following: (1) They take Undead Leadership, (2) They target a death cult or some other group that would reasonably respect them for followers/cohorts, and (3) They take extensive efforts to shroud themselves in Illusions. Note: this rule is in place to avoid, "spawning for the win" plans; players cannot control their progeny without the appropriate feats.

-Charisma drain will result in PC death as though a normal PC was drained of Constitution.

So, now that's out of the way, I have a number of questions: First and foremost, do you think this makes a compelling campaign setting?

Secondly, are there any holes in my initial outline of the setup?

Thirdly, does anyone see a character build that can break the story, based on the ground rules I've outlined?

I'm aware that the initial setting resembles a Zombie Apocalyse setting. More importantly, does anyone have any suggestions to enhance the feel of the setting?

Thanks for the discussion and I'm sorry about the text-block.

[holywhippet]

Sounds compelling enough - of course execution is far more important than the idea itself.

I see one problem - you are giving them some free levels, but they were ordinary folk before? Where exactly did this knowledge suddenly come from. You could make some fluff to justify it - there might have been some retired adventurers in the city. Either they listened to their tales enough to get the general idea or perhaps they can draw out their knowledge somehow since presumably the adventurers are undead now as well.

For character classes, it will be tough to justify paladins and non-evil clerics. Druids might also be suspect. The characters will need to be out of the city before level 13 - otherwise they might start casting control undead.

I'd also throw some random adventurers wandering around the city - they would come looking for loot and either sneak/bribe past the wizards or have been hired to investigate.

[Coidzor]

What sort of undead are you feeling for them being? Or do you not really care, as long as they're within the +5LA limit? Since how you feel about what they'll end up being can be used to flavor the feel of whatever buildup/results of the Event you wanna go into... As if they're basically just undead humanoids (non-gimp zombies with less rotting and their minds intact), that would flavor the zombie-apocalypse angle more.

But if there were a few more-or-less feral packs of other undead hiding out/trying to establish dominance over the area/control the rampaging zombies, that would allow for a plethora of options for your undead characters and possibly a sort of Fallout-esque playing of factions against one another...

[graymachine]

Sorry, I'm working 14 hour days, so I can't respond quickly.

The only class, as I see it, that is outright barred is Druid. Paladins and non-evil clerics are doable, especially considering that they are not being forced to change alignment due to the undead template. It would be rather difficult for PCs that have templates like vampire since they have to perform evil acts out od necessity, but there might be a work-around; depends on how creative the player is.

Random adventurers is a good idea; maybe the wizards outside are having them sign a waver before going in . I was thinking about factions inside the city (the PCs are hardly the only intelligent undead), but the only one I've put any thought toward was a evil priesthood glorifying the city as a (un)holy place. Any other factions someone can think up?


As for templates, I was thinking of going over it from a case to case basis. I expect I'd have a number of vampires and such, perhaps the really clever player with a ghost sorceror, and probably something completely out of left field. I don't plan on using the LA cap unless it gets simply ridiculous; if someone really, really wants to get the Morhg template and spend 20 levels doing it that's fine. Zombie Apocalypse will be in there some, but I want to avoid making it about that.

I didn't really think about where their class levels came from; your solution is a workable one. It occurs to me that I could simply not explain it, let the players draw their own conclusions and watch the paranoia fly.

[ChaosDefender24]

Dr00dz are considerably weakened if you're doing all undead. You have to burn a feat in order to wild shape, and even then you have no Con score... I'd allow it, or else ban things like wizards, sorcerers, etc.

Not sure if banning Undead Leadership is going to help you at all to that end. Creating spawn has nothing to do with leadership feats... but if everyone else is undead, you're not really going to have anyone to create spawn FROM in the first place.

Also, watch out for incorporeal PC's! Those zombies can't hit them... and all it takes is one ghost with malevolence to pilot zombie after zombie until they're all dead. For that matter, any PC who can get off the ground can pelt the undead to death. Even if a zombie can fly, it's clumsy maneuverability so the PC should be able to out-maneuver and kill with ease.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Dread Necromancer = free, unlimited healing for the party.

Also, Litch is only a +4 LA template. Ghost is +5. I'd take that, in a heartbeat.

[Jack_Simth]

Also, watch out for incorporeal PC's! Those zombies can't hit them... and all it takes is one ghost with malevolence to pilot zombie after zombie until they're all dead. For that matter, any PC who can get off the ground can pelt the undead to death. Even if a zombie can fly, it's clumsy maneuverability so the PC should be able to out-maneuver and kill with ease.

Note: a Ghost can't posess a Zombie. Malevolence doesn't work for that - it inherits from Magic Jar, which specifies it's displacing the soul - and the spell includes the line "Undead creatures are powered by negative energy. Only sentient undead creatures have, or are, souls." (note: Context rules out it saying that only undead critters have souls...).

Also - Incorporeals have an annoying drawback (well, unless you've got the Book of Exalted Deeds in play): It's really, really hard to re-equip (Dimensional Reach can potentially do it... but that requires 3rd level spells and a feat. Ghostly Grasp (Libris Mortis) can do it... but it says nothing about turning the items incorporeal, so you lose the ability to walk through most walls. If you're a Ghost (who's not incorporeal on the Ethereal Plane), then Plane Shift (5th for a Cleric, 7th for a Wizard or Sorcerer) or Shadow Walk (Sor/Wiz 6) can handle it ... if the DM rules that a Ghost traveling from the Ethereal stays corporeal.

Dread Necromancer = free, unlimited healing for the party.

Also, Litch is only a +4 LA template. Ghost is +5. I'd take that, in a heartbeat.

Yes, but the Lich is a little trickier to figure out in this scenario - how do you explain the phylactery?

Further, the Ghost gets a lot of very useful abilities the Lich doesn't - incorporeality being one of the biggies (although that has some serious drawbacks), and no dependancy on a Phylactory (but the level check gets annoying).

[Keld Denar]

Gravetouched Ghoul from Libris Mortis is pretty sweet. Its not in the normal part of undead as characters, but rather in the Monsters section. Its a +2 LA that gives a claw/claw/bite combo along with some pretty decent stat boosts and paralysis on all of your attacks. The DC is +cha based, so it really synergizes well with other cha based classes like evil Paladin varients, Hexblades, and Blackguards. No crappy UD hit dice to worry about, just +2 LA and you are done.

[ChaosDefender24]

Note: a Ghost can't posess a Zombie. Malevolence doesn't work for that - it inherits from Magic Jar, which specifies it's displacing the soul - and the spell includes the line "Undead creatures are powered by negative energy. Only sentient undead creatures have, or are, souls." (note: Context rules out it saying that only undead critters have souls...).

Ok, fine... the ghost uses telekinesis to batter all the zombies to death. Even if you're stuck not being able to walk through walls, you still get to clear the whole town without taking a single point of damage

[newbDM]

a) Are you going to allow deathless?


b) What about letting one of the PCs play a bard with that feat which lets them affect undead?

[Jack_Simth]

Ok, fine... the ghost uses telekinesis to batter all the zombies to death. Even if you're stuck not being able to walk through walls, you still get to clear the whole town without taking a single point of damage

Oh, yes. A simple Shadow-1 (Savage Species) can slaughter an arbitrary number of nonmagical corporeal opponents if it can hurt them (in the case of Zombies, this could be accomplished by using the Ghostly Grasp feat from Libris Mortis to handle normal weapons).

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Forcing them to take an NPC class at level 1 is a bad idea in my experience. It basically screws every character out of a useful level, and many characters end up falling behind considerably especially in the early levels, especially spellcasters and skill-based characters. One thing I've done is say everyone who's 1st level has an NPC class, but as soon as anyone hits level 2 they replace that NPC class with a level of a PC class, so an Expert 1 who reaches 2nd level could become a Rogue 2 instead of having to stay Expert 1/ Rogue 1.

[AdamSmasher]

I agree. There's really NO point in making them play an NPC class 1st level. It doesn't do anything but needlesly make them significantly less powerful and really cripple some types of characters.

[Calinero]

I like the idea, it sounds interesting. What were you planning on having the adventure be? Are they trying to escape the city? Restore themselves to life? Are the other undead trying to kill them?

[graymachine]

Deathless are not allowed as the Event was purely a negative energy one.

I suppose in retrospect the 1 level in an NPC class is wasteful, although I'm making up for it by giving 3 free levels worth of template. Still, I agree with the point and I'll nix that part.

The goal of the first story arc is to exit the city by some means, which should occur around 10th level, so the PCs will be in the city for a good while. The death cult I mentioned before would play partially as a social structure and partially as an antagonist. Think of the city as some post-zombie apocalypse with little pockets of civilization (i.e. intelligent undead) spread all over. They can travel between each other somewhat easier than normal people could, but it's still dangerous. Other factions could have big roles in-city, but I'm not really coming up with any at the moment. Once the PCs are outside the city they should have gathered enough information from the first arc to set them on the trail for what caused the Event, and possibly for some, retribution.

I've been debating with myself as to whether or not the PCs can restore themselves to life. While normally achievable in a typical 3.5 game, the cause of the Event in this setting is somewhat more than someone just casting Create Undead. If they can restore themselves to life, however, that goal won't be achievable until epic level. Either way, though, tragedy or triumph, it makes a good story.

[JoshuaZ]

It might make more sense to allow them to replace the NPC level with a normal level instead of an advancing a level. Also, you could just not count it towards their ECL and count it only a tiny bit to CR and that would likely make things work out fine.

[jmbrown]

Having played an undead campaign once, Wizards suddenly become a more dangerous class because they now have access to healing (negative energy spells).

I can't offer many tips because it was a short campaign, but I played a true necromancer who eventually got destruction retribution feat. Since I could turn my own creations, most battles were a matter of keeping a few servants close to me and when I needed a quick fix I would turn them, destroy them, and got healing off that (it causes 1d6 points of negative energy damage, ref 15 save half, +1d6 every 2 levels). Eventually my DM got pissed off and made a villain that threw a cog in my character's wheels every single adventure.

Now I will say you should instill the fear of turning and disruption among your players. Undead clerics can still turn each other and while the undead races like Necropolitan offer increased resistance, it's still pretty easy to screw an entire party. Since you have crappy fortitude saves, disruption weapons are like keen vorpal swords. If your game takes place in an undead city you could make interesting quests revolving around them. In our campaign, disruptive weapons were banned on sentence of destruction but city officials (vampires no less) contacted our group to find the person that was supplying a vampire hunter with disruptive maces and using it to destroy vampire lords in their sleep.

[JoshuaZ]

I thought that undead can rebuke but not turn and that any turning ability became rebuking when they became undead?

[keilyn]

Something else to think about - I don't know how much attention your characters pay to templates and the rules therein, but the undead template would grant them a bunch of additional feats. I don't think anyone has mentioned that...
You gain them at a different rate as well.
1 feat, +1 per point of intelligence, +1 per four levels, instead of every three. MMII. Unless I'm reading something wrong...P.10.

[Hadrian_Emrys]

If folks are rapidly becoming undead... does that allow for stacked Evolved templates? Hard to say no to a Necropolitan with fast healing 9.

[graymachine]

Well, I count on PCs to come up with clever answers to problems, i.e disrupting weapons.

I'd have to say, though, that I'm more interesting in, at the inter-city level, a conflict of factions. Unfortunately, I only have the death cult that I've cooked up to work with; can someone come up with another (or several) faction(s) of intelligent undead within a closed environment. I will say that the primary point of interest for my Cult is an (un)holy spot located in the small market of the city. It is an area between two stalls, in the middle of the road, that is a pulsing beacon of Negative Energy. All undead within close proximity to it heal all wounds almost instantaneously and, furthermore, there are rumors of people gaining power and magic from the point. Anyone else have some interesting factions that could come up from this situation?

EDIT: For those concerned about the needs of the undead, there is actually a small, living component of the city left; near-mindless people that, while technically alive, are empty husks going about. Most of them are killed by the overwhelming zombie population, but they have become, in the short days after the PCs wake up, a highly valuable commodity. Furthermore, as was decided earlier, the Wizard Guild holding the border of the city is allowing adventurers through, so there is some fresh, live stock.

Also, I'm tempted to run this game online, since my work schedule is looking heavy and my typical group only wants xps and loots. Unfortunately, I have no experience with running games via PbP. I made an attempt a while back with another concept I had on Mythweavers, but that failed tragically, mostly due to me not understanding how to use the site. Is there someone that can coach me, preferably through PM, on using PbP so that, if I make the time to run this online, I won't cripple it before it gets going?

[Vexxation]

Anyone else have some interesting factions that could come up from this situation?

Well... an interesting one from a moral standpoint would be to set up a well-known church of Kelemvor before The Event. Many Clerics and Paladins, devout worshipers, the works.

Have them become intelligent undead, too. Not all, but a decent-sized group. Now you have a group of intelligent undead who worship Kelemvor, one of whose main tenets is the destruction of undead to return to the natural order. These Paladins and Clerics know who they are, what they are, and that they represent abominations of order... and yet... there exist so many other undead that the real crime would be allowing the others to exist.

Now you have a horde of zealots dedicated to annihilating the undead presence, and then themselves.

Could be fun.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

• Bandits/semi-organized looters:essentially, people taking advantage of their new state to rob from others. Random-encounter fodder, mainly.
• Cult of Renewal:Priest(any class with Rebuke Undead) with maxed bluff/disguise to appear alive promises salvation/renewal to his followers in exchange for the standard 'contributions to the church". Those he revives are actually just rebuked, disguised, and used to further the deception.
• The Order:Paladins and Clerics who view the entire city, including themselves, as a bastion of darkest evil. Their goal is to wipe out everything in the city, then suicide to eliminate the last traces of Undead in the region.
• The Guild:Researchers from the Guild of Wizards you mentioned, attempting to figure out what caused the 'event' and how to reverse it. Whether they actually plan to reverse it if they figure out how or just use it as a weapon is unknown.
• His Majesties Guard:Observers from the nearest Liege Lord. They are trying to make sure that whichever faction comes out on top is willing to work with their boss.
• The Mayor:Local government that is still attempting to maintain order. He has no real power other than a small number of guards, but a lot of the population is willing to listen to him out of habit, and the other factions generally pay lip service to him, at least.
• The X(race, I like using elves):Mysterious forgeiners. They never intigrated and always seemeed to be huddled together before the 'event', and only obeyed local law when it didn't conflict with their King's commands. Now they have all moved into a small area and seem to be working towards something, but no one is sure what.
• Kobolds(or other Evil race):Now that a human city is overrun, they feel they can conquor it without any Good nations caring, and get themselves a foothold in the civilized world. But because they didn't send enough men, they are having to wait and play politics, hoping the other factions will kill each other off.

The citizens suspect any and all of these factions of causing the cataclysm for their own reasons, and all of them suspect each other. Go to town.

[graymachine]

Well... an interesting one from a moral standpoint would be to set up a well-known church of Kelemvor before The Event. Many Clerics and Paladins, devout worshipers, the works.

Have them become intelligent undead, too. Not all, but a decent-sized group. Now you have a group of intelligent undead who worship Kelemvor, one of whose main tenets is the destruction of undead to return to the natural order. These Paladins and Clerics know who they are, what they are, and that they represent abominations of order... and yet... there exist so many other undead that the real crime would be allowing the others to exist.

Now you have a horde of zealots dedicated to annihilating the undead presence, and then themselves.

Could be fun.

Yes, the moral purists could be an interesting faction. However, factions require stability. Let's assume that the majority of the order charges out the gates to destroy the evil. They are of course slaughtered, the number of undead they manage to take out being irreliviant. The leaders left are forced to make hard decisions; working with the tools they have to fulfill their divine mandate. Obviously they must replenish their ranks given heavy losses, so what do they promise their fellow damned? Eternal life in heaven? It seems at least for the time being they would need to work within the system available, no matter how distasteful. I'd imagine they'd consider it a test.

EDIT: Due to the nature of the Event, no god can directly intervene. While the faithful still recieve their spells, there can be no outside influence.

[Vexxation]

what do they promise their fellow damned? Eternal life in heaven?

I think that's the best path. Consult Kelemvor, see if you can offer new recruits a chance to do some good in His name, to redeem their souls and restore Order.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

I think that's the best path. Consult Kelemvor, see if you can offer new recruits a chance to do some good in His name, to redeem their souls and restore Order.

That's an option, but IMHO, you could get a lot of milage out of the idea of a small group of holy men, locked in their church, treating it as a siege, killing all of the abominations they can, never compromising, and watching their numbers dwindle as old friends fall. Knowing that even if they win against all odds, the only reward they can expect is a drink before falling on their own blades.

[Arachu]

You could have yet another fanatical cult among the undead themselves; ones who think their deaths are punishment and others who think it's the rebirth of the world. Or, there could be a group of survivalists maiming and slaughtering everything else to survive. There could even be a group of spellcasters devoted to 'cleaning the wound'; destroying the city.

There's a lot of potential factions in an apocalyptic city. One question, though... How large is the city? Is it small (for a city) or a medieval Chicago (occupying its own region on a map)?

[Thinker]

...can someone come up with another (or several) faction(s) of intelligent undead within a closed environment...

Here's what I came up with:

Spoiler

Show

1. The Town: The mayor and some of his cronies as undead who are trying to return order to the city. They don't care that they're undead, they're just trying to make the best of it.
2. Thieves' guild: They consider undeath a boon. Think how much easier it would be to spread their clutches once they get out of this town...
3. Deatheaters: Undead who devour other undead. They hunt and corner their prey. Reflavor some undead who would normally feed on the living.
4. The Old Dead: Undead who have been spawned from the oldest crypts in the city. They're more for comic relief as they go on and on about how great the old days were. They want to restore the "old kingdom".
5. Gangs: Various unaffiliated gangs of undead have sprung up. They've already hit the merchant quarter taking everything of value, now the bosses are trying to find ways to increase their power.
6. The Scientist: A scholar who lived in the city and who's house/observatory is now the home of him and several of his flesh-golem minions. The scientist is busy trying to study undead and figure out new things to do with (or to) them.
7. The Ship: A ship that was in port when The Event happened. The crew is still loyal to their captain. They're just interested in leaving with their goods to sail (and plunder) the seven seas.
8. Psychopaths: Undead who's psyches couldn't handle the transformation. They attempt to destroy anything that reminds them that they are a mere mockery of life. That includes other undead.
9. Wizards: A cabal that foresaw the event and were able to partially shield themselves from it. They are somewhere between living and undead and were the ones who contacted their headquarters (who sealed the city).

Also instead of having travel be dangerous because of zombies (which are not traditionally a major threat), perhaps make the zombies nonhostile. They just move about the city slowly in a warped version of their previous lives. They don't know where they're going or where they've been. It's from this pool that the "awakened" undead spawn from. Perhaps the danger can come from those roving parties of adventurers seeking the treasures of this formerly wealthy city and from groups of paladins wishing to extinguish these mockeries of life.
This adds to your factions and makes it so a society can appear as the sapient undead population increases. You can also make it so that destroyed undead reanimate after 24 hours as zombies and that fresh people dead reanimate after 24 hours. This gives a reproduction rate and a reason for some of the other groups to attack intruders.

Hope this helps.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

How about a decidedly chaotic evil group? A real 'we're big, we're bad, we do whatever the *bleep* we want to because we can' type group. When order destabilizes, this is the most common proto-culture to arise, descending into neo-barbarism.

So you've got a group of undead, who happen to like being undead, embrace what they are fully, and have a 'pack mentality', where you have the Alpha Male who is in charge simply because he is the biggest and the baddest of them all, and because he can get them more *insert whatever they'd like to have here*. There are no holds barred, there are no stop signs. If you feel like doing it, then do it.

They probably use whatever they have at hand to use as weapons or whatever, they probably have lots of glorious markings and ritual scarring (since they're undead anyways, it doesn't hurt, and helps intimidate opponents), and they don't come at you in singletons, they come at you in the hundreds.