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Hello all, question for the realm. Can a caster use the spell Animate Object to animate a dead body, aka a non undead zombie. If so would it be any better than one animated by the Animate dead spell? Would you use the stats for a Medium animated object or base it off of the dead creatures stats. Thanks for the help
I would simply treat it as an Animated Object. Because you are taking a specific object (a dead body) and animating it, I would restrict the choice of abilities and defenses the corpse could spend its Construction Points on; casting this spell doesn't seem to imply that a dead body would suddenly turn into wood or stone, after all. However, I would allow a spellcaster to choose different purchases each time, such as Additional Attack and Additional Movement during one casting, or Grab and Constrict the next.
The spell would have advantages and disadvantages. As an object, the animated corpse would have Hardness, would be immune to critical hits, and would divide the damage dealt from energy attacks before subtracting Hardness. However, the animated object would not be healed by negative energy and would not be a legal beneficiary for many undead-strengthening effects.
Depending on the GM's interpretation, this may or may not be an evil act. True, you aren't casting a spell with the Evil descriptor, and since you are not animating the creature into an undead, its soul is still available for certain resurrection-effects. However, some GMs would still treat this as a lack of reverence from the dead and treat the act as evil, similar to dragging an opponent's body around a city or pelting bodies over city walls to lower their morale.
Depending on the GM's interpretation, this may or may not be an evil act. True, you aren't casting a spell with the Evil descriptor, and since you are not animating the creature into an undead, its soul is still available for certain resurrection-effects. However, some GMs would still treat this as a lack of reverence from the dead and treat the act as evil, similar to dragging an opponent's body around a city or pelting bodies over city walls to lower their morale.
I wouldn't call it evil so much as tacky and in poor taste. Now if you use it to torture the poor deceased's family, that would probably be evil.
Animate dead is a 3rd or 4th level spell where a image object is 6th. Something to keep in mind.
As mentioned above high have pros and cons.