Interesting undead and where to find them

[GM and the Holograms]

I'm looking for ideas on interesting creatures to turn into undead and where they would be found. The party is level 5, but they don't necessarily have to challenge the party or be for immediate use.

I'm specifically thinking of regional things. Like great ape skeletons in mwangi, or strix zombies in Cheliax. This is mostly about flavor, so they're not always seeing human undead.

[SmiloDan]

First, that's an awesome avatar name you have!

It's CR 11, but I've become recently intrigued with the devourer. It has some really interesting spells for melee, ranged, utility, defense, and healing. It makes its own minions. It's really neat!

That said, it's relatively easy to add the skeleton and zombie templates to monsters. You can even tack on the advanced template to make them tougher if you want.

I think an undead displacer beast would be fun. Maybe with life-draining tentacles of some kind.

[GM and the Holograms]

I like puns and 80's cartoons, what can I say.

I'll have to check out the devourer.

I'm running an undead fighting game, so adding templates is exactly what I'm looking to do to add some variety. I'm looking for flavorful living creatures To apply templates to. Much like the displacer beast, which I'm definitely going to check out.

[SmiloDan]

I'm reading a 5th Edition module that has a zombie Tyrannosaurus Rex that can spit out 1d4 regular zombies as a swift action.

Skeletal dinosaurs are a classic for a reason.

undead

templates

There is a 3.5 critter from the MM3 called the Charnel Hound. It's a Huge or Gargantuan-sized dog made out of an aggregation of corpses. When I ran one, after the PCs killed it, all the corpses got up, and they had to then fight a horde of zombies.

[Tacticslion]

'dat name wrote:

GM and the Holograms

... so brilliant~!

[SmiloDan]

Simply simply simply outrageous!!!!

[Ascalaphus]

I think just about any undead can be interesting if you do more than just take them out of the packaging and plop them on the board.

"A zombie" isn't as interesting as "your uncle Bob is now a zombie, and he's walking around in the fancy tuxedo he was buried in".

Undead were people once. So there's a story there. If the ghouls you run into are the previous expedition that succumbed to madness and cannibalism, then have them dressed in tatters. Actually, have them talk to the PCs; intelligent undead could totally talk back. Or comment on the PCs discussing tactics in front of them.

You can also play up the yuckiness of the undead. A zombie that just slams at you a bit, meh. A gore-covered zombie that gets viscera all over you while trying to slam you, and the GM secretly rolling fortitude saves, that's more interesting already. Suddenly the PCs are thinking if they can't keep those things at a distance with reach weapons because ewwww.

[SmiloDan]

I once ran a 1st level adventure in a graveyard. They were deep in the dungeon and found the CR 1 ghoul. Ghouls have 13 Int, 14 Wis, and 14 Cha. The PCs started talking to him, he talked back, and suddenly he stopped being a bag of meat and claws and teeth, and he started being a person. A clever, cunning, articulate person. That I had to name!!!

So I ripped off Neil Gaiman and named him Mr. Vandermeer.

But undead can be a lot more interesting than a bag of bones you need to kill.

[GM and the Holograms]

Thanks for all the advice. The charnel hound sounds really interesting.

I fully intend to do interesting things with intelligent undead. This whole adventure is based around fighting undead, and I tend to use the intelligent undead as commanders directing units of mindless undead. It gives them something to hide behind while they monologue. Since they'll be fighting lots of mindless zombies and skeletons having non human and more powerful options would be really helpful.

[Meraki]

SmiloDan wrote:

I once ran a 1st level adventure in a graveyard. They were deep in the dungeon and found the CR 1 ghoul. Ghouls have 13 Int, 14 Wis, and 14 Cha. The PCs started talking to him, he talked back, and suddenly he stopped being a bag of meat and claws and teeth, and he started being a person. A clever, cunning, articulate person. That I had to name!!!

So I ripped off Neil Gaiman and named him Mr. Vandermeer.

That's FANTASTIC.

Some of my favorites:
Attic whisperer
Gearghost
Herecite
Hupia
Manananggal

And there are always haunts, for extra undead-themed fun. You can do a lot of things with haunts. >D

[Cattleman]

I like Combusted. There's also undead and skeleton templates, so I wouldn't worry too much. Just find something need and apply a template, or build something from the ground up.

I have been thinking of making an Undead Plant due to a miniature I have, but I'll probably just treat it as a Mandragora with some mild mods.

[SmiloDan]

Definitely mix it up too. Don't use just undead and just necromancy. Surprise them with illusions and enchantments and evocations. Animated tombstones and flying pickaxes. Brimstone elementals and tooth fairies. Coffin oozes and cairnivores.

[Doomed Hero]

The Necrocraft rules let you make some very unique and interesting undead.

Basically, just find an interesting base creature, and then staple a bunch of smaller creatures to it. Fun for the whole family!