Let's say that I'm a wizard or cleric and i killed a Rat Swarm. The i want to cast Animate Dead on them to have an undead swarm at my service.
What would happen?
At first it does seem to me that animate deat should work on swarms on principle, as while swarms are composed of multiple creatureas at once, the spell allows the creation of multiple undeads at once, the only limit the number of HD (in the case of the rat swarm it's 3d8 it wouldn't be hard) but ther are some issues on the result.
Creating a zombie seems not feasible RAW, as the corps must have a discernible anatomy while the Swarm does not have that, while RAI it could on the basis that every single rat of the swarm do have an anatomy.
Creating a skeleton out of it seems possible even by RAW, as the only requirement for the corpse is having a skeleton (and rats do possess skeletons)
On the other hand does the swarm subtype remain? Both zombie and skeleton template say this:
Type: The creature's type changes to undead. It retains any subtype except for alignment subtypes (such as good) and subtypes that indicate kind (such as giant). It does not gain the augmented subtype.
Some subtypes that indicate kind are obvious (demon, human or undead) and some clearly are not of kind nor alignment (so for example a Balor would become Undead(Extraplanar) while a Red Dragon would become Undead(Fire)) and the Swarm subtype seems to remain on an undead to me, but I'm not totally sure about this.
And this point is important because the Swarm subtype is the thing that gives all the special trats of the swarms as sharing spaces, being untargettable by most single target attacks and the distraction ability.
Also in the example above the Rat Swarm has Disease as an extraordinary ability. I think that it remains as the ability improves the swarm's natural attack.
Is everything right with my analisys or there are further RAW issues with creating undead swarms?
I'm not sure, but I'm interested is reading other people's thought.
To me, I'm not sure that it balanced to allow undead swarms.
In my opinion it is not possible by RAW. A rat swarm consists of 300 rats so you have to touch 300 rats during a standard action. Then they loose their swarm subtype and are not longer a swarm.
The 'carrionstorm' is an undead swarm of birds that is created when birds feed on the flesh of ghouls/undead. These swarms can be attracted with 'Command Undead' by they cannot be created by magic.
At last i think swarms are more powerful than an HD equivalent skeleton.
I think this is actually the limiting factor:
Swarm Traits: A swarm has no clear front or back and no discernible anatomy, so it is not subject to critical hits or flanking. A swarm made up of Tiny creatures takes half damage from slashing and piercing weapons. A swarm composed of Fine or Diminutive creatures is immune to all weapon damage. Reducing a swarm to 0 hit points or less causes it to break up, though damage taken until that point does not degrade its ability to attack or resist attack. Swarms are never staggered or reduced to a dying state by damage. Also, they cannot be tripped, grappled, or bull rushed, and they cannot grapple an opponent.
Swarms cannot die, therefore there cannot be a corpse of a swarm to reanimate. Reviving individual rats killed is possible, but they come back as individual creatures.
However, undead swarms seem like a thing. I can't remember the name, but I seem to remember a giant undead spider that could summon a swarm of undead spiders from inside its body.
I think this is actually the limiting factor:
Swarm Traits: A swarm has no clear front or back and no discernible anatomy, so it is not subject to critical hits or flanking. A swarm made up of Tiny creatures takes half damage from slashing and piercing weapons. A swarm composed of Fine or Diminutive creatures is immune to all weapon damage. Reducing a swarm to 0 hit points or less causes it to break up, though damage taken until that point does not degrade its ability to attack or resist attack. Swarms are never staggered or reduced to a dying state by damage. Also, they cannot be tripped, grappled, or bull rushed, and they cannot grapple an opponent.Swarms cannot die, therefore there cannot be a corpse of a swarm to reanimate. Reviving individual rats killed is possible, but they come back as individual creatures.
However, undead swarms seem like a thing. I can't remember the name, but I seem to remember a giant undead spider that could summon a swarm of undead spiders from inside its body.
Actually it says swarms cannot die by damage, for example I can kill a Swarm using Cloudkill if the swarm fails the fort save or reaches 0 Con.
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Animating a undead swarm with Animate dead? The rules simply don't cover the possibility, so it is hard to adjudicate. I wouldn't allow it.
Creating a undead rats swarm with the bones or bodies of hundred of rats and a appositely researched spell? Yes, no problem.
@Eridan, about touching 300 rats in one round.
You could make a pile of all the bodies of the rats and touch the pile, it seem appropriate.
Or, as the rules say that you can touch up to 6 friend in a round you can use that as the basis of the spell casting time: 300/6 = 50 rounds.
@Entryhazard the disease ability is similar to the ability of the plague zombies. It would require to add the casting of contagion while creating the swarm.
I'll give you an immediate death effect, but reducing CON is still damage - just ability damage, rather than hit point damage.
I am still sure that Animate Dead won't work on a swarm because the swarm ceases to be a swarm once it is destroyed.
Even if this weren't the case you have to contend with swarms being "immune to any spell or effect that targets a specific number of creatures" and animate dead has the line "Targets one or more corpses touched". Sure it says "or more" but it still requires a specific number, which swarms are immune to.
So either a swarm dissolves into its component creatures upon death and therefore wouldn't be reanimated as a swarm, or it can't be targeted in death because swarms are immune to targeted spells.