The post discusses the 5th-level bard class features and how to optimize it by choosing your race, background, ability scores, and other factors. The best spell a bard can pick up for dealing with undead is lesser restoration, which is already on the bard spell list and available. Bards are largely weak on undead, but the Lvl 2 spell Shatter does okay damage to them, especially if they clump.
The Lore Bard is always good, with VM and Faerie Fire being great in every situation, as well as good buff and debuff spells. With magical secrets, you can snag some nice spells. The bardic music class feature allows you to extend the effects of your mind-affecting bardic.
The College of Spirits bard is a typical, casting-focused bard that adds some unpredictable spell-adjacent options via Tales From Beyond and access to expanded Spirit Tales. Spirit Session is a 6th-level feature that adds flexibility to the College of Spirits bard. Once per long rest, you can conduct an hour-long ritual with a number of creatures.
The dirge bard may inspire even the dead and damned, allowing their undead allies to be affected by their inspirations despite their normal immunity to mind-affecting effects. This modifies the legendary bard’s inspirations class feature, but not for the purposes of archetype compatibility.
Assuming the spell animate dead, you will have skeletons and/or zombies with you, both of which can understand any languages they knew in life. The best spell a bard can pick up for dealing with undead is lesser restoration.
Bard magic effects the minds of others, but undead are immune to it. Normal healing magic does nothing to undead in 5e, as per the specific clauses in various healing spells. Death bards are effective warriors against undead, using their magic to fascinate and bewilder the horrors.
Of course, you can raise a skeleton or zombie from any corpse, but the Bard Necro-Subclass will not be in the list.
📹 D&D MONSTER RANKINGS – UNDEAD
An analysis of the undead of the 5E Monster Manual, with attributes and tier rankings. Free monthly newsletter: …
What are undead weak against?
The Undead, also known as Zombies or Corpses, are reanimated human bodies that have risen from the grave. They are vulnerable to fire but can survive unless consumed by flames. Despite their human personalities, the Undead are not mindless husks and are not created through black magic, which violates the natural order. They are not infectious and will not lead to a plague. They resemble regular living humans but must consume living flesh to remain in this state.
If they do not sustain themselves, their skin and eyes will become pale, and their bodies will decay and decompose. Consuming flesh can reverse this process, allowing the Undead to regenerate themselves.
Are undead affected by sleep?
The description of the spell Sleep from the DnD 5e Basic Rules states that undead creatures are not susceptible to its effects.
Are undead affected by illusions?
Mindless undead are generally immune to illusions, but they are vulnerable to quasi-real effects, which start appearing in the 4th-level list. The Monstrous Manual, 2nd version, states that low and nonintelligent creatures are more vulnerable to illusions unless the illusion is completely outside their experience or competence. The text also explains that low-level undead are considered “Low and nonintelligent” creatures, and the Monstrous Manual guts illusion magic, particularly against Undead creatures, in a blanket manner. The text lists various types of undead, including common, monster, ju-ju, skeleton, animal, monster, giant, and ghoul, as non-, ju-ju, skeleton, animal, monster, monster, giant, and ghoul.
What are undead resistant to?
In the third edition of Dungeons and Dragons, “Undead” became a “creature type” with darkvision out to sixty feet and a wide array of immunities, including being immune to mind-affecting effects, poison, sleep effects, paralysis, stunning, disease, and death effects. They are not subject to critical hits, nonlethal damage, ability drain, or energy drain. Most undead can be turned or destroyed by a good cleric, and later editions introduced the ability of players to play as necromancers, able to create their own undead forces for support in battle.
Undead creatures are an embodiment of death in the game, with the most common types being mindless or near-mindless, directed to act either by the control of a more powerful enemy or acting on instinctive compulsions. The most powerful types are highly intelligent and cunning, with an array of magical abilities. The primary counter to the undead is the Cleric, who can use divine magic to “turn” or take control of the undead.
The Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 2nd edition game also incorporated the yellow musk creeper, a creeping plant that drains the intelligence of its victims, possibly turning them into “zombies” under the plant’s control. This is an expression of the “seemingly endless morphology of fungal creep and toxicological capacity” within the game.
What spell prevents undead?
Contact with a corpse or remains has the effect of protecting the target from decay and preventing undeath. This spell has the effect of extending the time limit for raising the target from the dead, such that days spent under its influence are not counted against the time limit of spells like raise dead. A pinch of salt and one copper piece are placed on the eyes of the corpse for the duration of the spell.
What are undead weakness?
The Undead, also known as Zombies or Corpses, are reanimated human bodies that have risen from the grave, retaining their human personalities. They are created through black magic, a violation of the natural order, and are not infectious. Unlike popular belief, the Undead are not mindless husks and will not lead to a plague. They resemble regular living humans but must consume living flesh to remain in this state. If they do not sustain themselves, their skin becomes pale, their eyes become glassy, and their bodies start to decay.
Consuming flesh can reverse this process, allowing the Undead to regenerate themselves. Despite their vulnerability to decapitation and fire, the Undead remain a significant threat to society and the natural order.
What spells are undead immune to?
The state of death renders individuals immune to a number of effects, including death itself, disease, mind-affecting effects, paralysis, poison, sleep, stun, and any effect that requires a Fortitude save, unless it works on objects or is harmless.
What spells are good against undead?
D and D spellcasters should focus on spells that target radiant damage or target undead specifically, such as Guiding Bolt and Crown of Stars. Magic items like the Mace of Disruption and Holy Avenger can be helpful against undead monsters, providing additional radiant damage. Fire is a strong option against physically solid zombies, as ghostly monsters like specters and allips resist fire, but tangible undead are different. Fire is reliable against most physical undead creatures, including boneclaws and zombie beholders, and even better against mummies and mummy lords.
D and D players should avoid certain elements when fighting the undead, such as necrotic damage, poison damage, and cold damage. Necrotic damage is often resistant or immune to undead, while poison damage is often immune to undead. These elemental resistances should be intuitive for players and their characters. Cold damage is another weak option, as some undead monsters resist it, such as specters, allips, and boneclaws.
Are undead immune to mind-affecting?
The undead are characterized by a lack of cognitive function and immunity to any form of mental influence. This trait remains consistent even when they develop an intelligence score and attain sentience.
📹 EVERY CHANGE to Undead Warlock & Spirits Bard in Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft!
The two spooky subclasses are arriving soon! Tune in to see how the College of Spirits Bard and Undead Patron Warlock have …
You know what makes undead scary? They’re mindless. You can maybe see yourself talking your way out being killed by a goblin or hag. A Devil will at least pretend to be nice to you for a time. But undead don’t understand anything that you’re saying. You can only hope that you’re strong, fast, or lucky.
Here’s a way i used undead in my dnd games and kept it ‘fresh’ (no pun intended) but i had a faction of necromancers called “The Wheat Kings” and they sold high quality wheat at a tiny fraction the price other grain sellers would and they afforded to do by having all their labour for farming and harvesting done by skeletons and zombies. They weren’t evil with a capital E, but they did destroy farmers livings by undercutting their prices and forcing them to go broke, then they would swoop in and buy the land for cheap when the farmer has to sell it. Thats one way to use your undead in a different way that can help flesh out your world.
Death Knight is top tier IMHO. They are the Darth Vader of D&D. Arguably one of the all time greatest villains in modern story telling. Death knights are way more flexible than you’re giving them credit for. They could have any number of motivations. Even more than a Lich or Vampire. Given the fact that they would have been a Paladin of great renown and deeds in life the tale of their long fall from grace can be very rich with lore. Lord Soth books are some of my favorite to read. He was far less predictable than Strahd and Lich characters. Mechanic wise Death Knights have it going on just as much as a vampire. They are a powerhouse with a large variety of different abilities and spells. They are no one trick ponies. Also Death Knights lend to combining them with a steed more so than a vamp or Lich. The coolness factor of a Death Knight mounted on a plate barded skeletal mount, Nightmare, or even a Dracolich easily bumps them to top tier.
Given that Mummy Lords are high priests (translation: high level Clerics), I’m inclined to consider them as having as good a potential for a major villain as the Lich does. Ditto the Vampire. While we’re on the subject, though, I really wish the “Vampire” stat block was called something like “Vampire Lord”. There should be a greater gradient of vampire enemies, with ones between “Vampire” and “Vampire Spawn”. But that’s just me.
I find that Skeletons can be highly flexible. because a skeleton dosent need to be a humans keleton. how bout monster skeletons? like a hydra? or a skeleton that is amde from other large skeletons? like say a Bone kraken ? give skeletons a a reassemble trait or even a ossification trait, basically they turn your muscles and soft tissue to bone. look it up its a real condition. Zombies can also be made into a threat. like causing rot,posion,disease, maybe womit up biles,blood and maggots, being big a bloated and exploding. have the severed body parts move even after they are cut off. Mummies can be made into clerics of old gods. yes Mummified animals, that should be more of a thing. I hade an idea of a Mummy dragon. Gave it a desication aura, mummy rot, multiple attacks, either a sand breath or a breath of flesh eating scarabs, decked it out in some nice magical ornaments and gave it two mummy clerics . Also Mummies of none human races.. Yuan-ti Mummies anyone? Draugr should be a more common undead in DnD and i dont mean the rather limp version from skyrim. I am talking about the Draugr from norse myth Ghosts also have so much potential. mad ghost wizards. annoyingly flinging fireballs at you while floating through solid objects
Hmmmm just my own thoughts and grievances of some of the undead. I miss how the DemiLich is no longer the epic level powerhouse it use to be in 3.5. Now reduced into some… laughing skull in a jar in 5th edition. I miss that feeling of terror that the DemiLich used to have Trap a Soul and had to exercise extreme caution when fighting one. How the mighty have fallen. Also the Revenant… I always understood it to be bound by its desire for revenge, but once its completed its task. It disintegrates into nothing, not even the soul remains, nor the soul goes to the afterlife. Just vanishes for good. I always feel that is one of the most damning aspects of the Revenant. Bound to a quest of revenge and will stop at nothing to complete it, because your senses always pull you towards that one goal. Yet you know that once you complete that goal, your soul is damned to not a good afterlife anyway. Yet it makes it harder to complete the quest because what if your party stands in your way or they have an abrasion towards all undead? Least that is how I’ve roleplayed mine in one campaign. I agree that the Dracolich is a waste of potential in 5th edition… man makes me want to drag in the templates from 3.5 into 5th edition. Like the Vampiric Dragon or a proper DracoLich as the major hook villains. Also agreement on Vampires being among the best undead about. Especially with Count Strahd of Ravenloft and the Realm of Dread. That campaign was what got me into D&D after I was so invested into Castlevania.
I have a plan of creating a horde of bog mummies… From a halfing village which was flooded by a necromancer, who then raised the haflings as mummies and trained them as monks. Picture this: the players are investigating reported attacks on caravans. In a wooded surrounding they are started being harassed by unknown assailants until the dark brown, undead haflings attacks them in force. This would be awesome! ^^
Tier Zoo … still covering alot of creatures in one article… doing templates or type categories would allow you to dig deeper into each creature… templates such as Vampire or Skeletons… or types like Goblinoids … would allow for a deeper look and a more varied investigation of all the creatures you’re featuring, or breaking them down even further like “Sentient Undead” there are so many creatures and varieties that doing a deeper dive wouldn’t take anything away from the articles.
I’m playing a Dhampir in my groups current campaign. He requires blood plasma to survive, but will only feed on willing creatures or a creature that has died in the past few hours. He seeks two powerful magical artefacts; the Fanged Insignia and the Sword of Dracula, in order to become a creature with all of the strengths of a vampire with none of the weaknesses. He then wishes to use this power to commit genocide against vampires across all planes, finishing the job by ending his own life. His stat boosts are +2 Con and +1 Cha, he has Superior Darkvision and Sunlight Sensitivity, resistance to both poison and necrotic damage, advantage on death saving throws and a natural bite attack that deals 1d4+Str damage and once per long rest he can heal as much as he deals damage with this ability.
The flameskull gives me ptsd. My group was clearing out a mine full of monsters and we came upon a room full of corpses and a single floating skull. We had no idea what it was so we thought it was going to be easy. As soon as we walked into the room it resurrected zombie dwarves me being the fighter I charge into the zombies because why not. Then the skull shot a fireball at the entire group so I was left fighting all the zombies and got shot by a fire ball. The others were trying to hit he skull bet kept missing because we can’t role over a 13 on an attack role.
Nice to see Jack of the Lantern is holding a turnip. The Irish originally used turnips – when the New World was discovered again, Irish migrants came across pumpkins and said “these things were made to be Jack’s lantern” and broadened the tradition to all of America. Turnips are really difficult to carve into a face. And this was before the Irish were considered white.
“This is just one of those things where you have to let go of what makes sense and embrace the smoothness of 5e’s simplicity” What a very eloquent way of saying that WotC is absolute dogshit at their job, but have become great at expecting the players to fix their nonsense for them with house rules.
I have a blood hunter with a backstory that involves quite a bit of homebrew because it sort of breaks a few rules. He’s a Ghostslayer, which has a lot of very ghost like abilities. And I explained it narratively by saying his backstory involved him being initiated into the order by allowing a benevolent spirit into his body to share its powers. And so he is “possessed” by the soul of a Revenant that, rather than taking a corpse to seek it’s own vengeance, chose to join with him to live vicariously through him and deliver justice for the sake of others. And it’s a sort of Talion / Celebrimbor thing where the revenant can appear next to him and talk to him, but he’s the only one in the party that can see or hear it.
The Lich would be a lot more flexible if they hadn’t tied its lore directly to soul-consumption. 3E made it vague exactly why the Lich was evil, giving the DM the luxury to decide that it *wasn’t*, if he wanted to explore narrative themes about what it means to transcend mortality. I prefer to assume that most Liches don’t start out evil, although centuries of living without the ability to empathize with the living almost inevitably turn them that way eventually. There’s a tragedy to the idea of someone who was once Good having turned to undeath in order to continue his mission, only to lose more and more of his moral compass without noticing the process.
AD&D also had some pretty good undead, with higher-tier undead, like mummies and ghouls/ghasts’ upgraded forms, and a vampire variant for the most common player-races, like dwarf, elf, gnome, halfling, and kender (whoo boy most people aren’t going to know what a kender is). Most of this was from the Ravenloft or Dark Sun monster manuals, which I still have lying around.
Skeletons are actualy a very good monster, as they can set the tone for a dungeon and can tell a story. like a bunch of skeletal knights shambeling out of a an old, decrepid castle or a bunch of undead bandits in a tomb. and i mean there a great fodder enemy that i always play in one of my first encounters
I think your aesthetic rating is kinda biased. Sure, is obvious when some designs are better than other but not everything has to be badass or gritty, sometimes you just want something simple, recognizable and appealing. I think a good design just needs to tie into the central themes of the creature, be clearly readable and convey character without saying a single word, but that is just my opinion.
Yes, actually I had lots of campaigns where there were no undead… In my opinion the most campaigns are quite self sufficient without them and they just get shoehorned in because “every campaign needs them”. Why did the enemies flee into the undead-filled crypt to die and not into the village directly besides the crypt where they have food, shelter and hostages as leverage? “welllllll… because…. because the cleric player complained he wanted to be of more use than just being a walking medkit. That is why…”
You could explain a wraith’s phasing ability pretty easily. “A wraith can either phase through everything or nothing.” Would work pretty well. Or maybe it takes a lot of focus to make its body non-corporeal while making its hand corporeal. Being able to make your fingertips corporeal immediately after passing through armor could be difficult. If a wraith attempted it and its whole arm became corporeal, the solid armor would likely cut its fingers off. So maybe it makes sense that a wraith wouldn’t try it.
I greatly preferred the ghouls in pathfinder/3.5e D&D’s flavor. In earlier editions, ghouls were agile creatures (15 dex with hefty bonuses to balance, climb, hide, jump, move silently, and spot), smarter than most humans (int 13), and able to speak common (Something far more valuable with a 13 intelligence over a 7). If Skeletons, Zombies and Wights are the footsoldiers of an undead army, ghouls were pack hunters, infiltrators and scouts. When outnumbered, a ghoul could pose as a potential ally to lure the party into trouble so that it can feed on their bodies when whatever the party falls into it’s trap. While a large pack of ghouls might attempt to attack the party from an ambush, once it’s clear that the party isn’t easy prey the ghouls will retreat into the shadows… and the party will always feel the gaze of dozens of hungry eyes as they progress further into the dungeon, waiting for a moment of vulnerability, for the wizard to get just slightly too far from his distracted companions before emerging suddenly, knocking the wizard unconscious and dragging him off into the darkness to be devoured. They were always my favorite undead for creep factor, knowing that while it’s perfectly willing to talk… it’s primary motive is to make you it’s dinner and it’s just smart enough to make it happen.
About the incorporeal vs Armor thing, I’d just augment it personally so they bypass Non-Magical Armor like how how mant monsters are resistant to mundane weapons. Unarmored Armor Class from Barbarians and monks apply regularly and Magical Armor apply as normal. Just a home rule thing I thought of. Just wanted to share how I’d hand that subject matter. Though I think Magic Armor is less common to come by in most settings then magic weapons so I think it’d probably buff incorporeal creatures such as Ghosts and the like. Might up there CR then by 1-3 then depending. Though something that I think should be provided in future books would be Templates for making undead versions of creatures like a Ghost, Skeleton, Zombie, or Vampire Template for monsters that are susceptible to being brought back as those kinds of creatures. They provided a Vampire Template for Player Characters but I’m not sure of that one and gave some undead forms for ogres, Minotaurs, and even a Beholder but they didn’t exactly clarify what kind of changes occur. Furthermore, a template could help with Spells by being part of a Spell used to make an undead version of a deceased creature. Like say if you revived a horse as an undead with a Raise Dead Spell or say had a Spell that could turn certain monsters undead, but the zombified version doesn’t have a Stat Block officially. Such as you kill an Owlbear and use it’s body for an undead servant.
I’d honestly say that the Demi lich Flexibility should be a lot higher in my opinion. Think about it as a being that in theory brings the most impotent aspect of a lich to the table, it’s spell casting and on top of that it’s not shackled by it’s phylactery meaning it can go where ever he pleases in the multiverse… Think a lich on the go rather that a lesser lich which is a lot more interesting of a character in my opinion because what they trade for that is some power and the ability to come back without other means and let’s be real…they most likely found a way to come back despite abandoning their phylactery.
i had one time where i was playing as a sorcerer and died… But my DM brought me back as a ghost before i could even make a new character. Sadly i died in the very next session because of a deck of many things. But playing as a spell slinging ghost, the potential was endless and i’m so mad i didn’t get to use all of that potential.
Justice for the shadow, it is a major threat for low level parties and anyone who uses dexterity or a spell casting mod to attack. At higher levels if a boss has shadows they can actually lower damage to the boss by reducing the to hit and damage of strength based characters like fighters, barbarians, paladins, and some other niche builds. And you can’t ignore them because if they go after the spell casters they will go down fast unless they wear heavy armor (and thus have high enough str for it).
How to make the skeleton more versatile and interstiting. Add a second type of necromancy. In wich the undead are not mindless and regain their old souls as they were in life. (Basicly they become sentient.) you can still use them as mindless creatures. (this is what I refer to as type 1 necromancy.) This can be used in many ways, such as: •necromancers being hero’s as they reunite family’s who were separated by death. •whole towns of undead as they go about their lives • interesting NPC’S •and whateverelse you can think of! •
Every issue you pose with mummies, dracolich, and wraiths are artifacts of 5th ed. In 2nd and 3rd, when ravenloft was more than just a bad boardgame… mummies, ghosts, vampires and others had magnitudes of power from 1to5. The MM vampire is merely magnitude 3, the mummy lord is 4, the ghost is 2. There were also bog mummies, drowned zombies, elf, and illithid liches (baelnorn and alhoon) even the rare bardic lich deep in 2ed forgotten realms
Your description of ‘demilich’ didn’t sound right to me, so I looked it up again and found that for some reason there are two descriptions for what a demilich is. Some say what you said, that they’ve decayed from their former strength, but others say they are the advancement a lich makes when its done learning on the material plane, upon which it gets some soul gems, sticks them where its eyes used to be and shifts its soul into them. Why are there two descriptions?
This reminds me, I’ve often found it confusing to classify vampires as undead. Generally speaking every other undead is in some variety rotting decay, have low or no intelligence, have reflections, do not need sleep, do not need sustenance of any kind, do not breathe, and do not get turned to ash at sunrise. I can’t think of a single quality that vampires really share with any other kind of undead.
Just like how regular dead can be unsettling, only amplified. We’re ‘ugly bags of mostly water’ as Star Trek put it, and looking at an ugly bag of mostly water that’s no longer moving and knowing that the only difference between us and it is a tiny little spark that will inevitably be snuffed out. That keeps you up at night. With undead you are looking at something that was a lot like you… once. Something you might become either by shit luck or by giving in to your fear of death.
Would you like to hear a shocking fun fact? No mummies or hieroglyphics were ever found in the Egyptian pyramids, mind blown. My guess is the mummies got up and cleaned the walls then picked up their loot and tossed it on their boat to the underworld and took off, but it’s true that nothing was ever fought other than tunnels and occasionally the large room, but otherwise nothing there. People don’t know about this because they don’t pay close attention to what the archeologists who actually went and explored it said, they think “theory = fact” or “theory = unconfirmed or has no evidence” and not the accurate “theory = object to be taken with an open mind but not to seriously that I believe everything I hear”
I had one of the best times with a Revenant. The party had this NPC that they liked, but due to some unlucky rolls he fell into a river where they were escaping.. they assumed he drowned. Well one day they heard: “”I didn’t drowned, you didn’t come, they tortured me, you didn’t come”” From that point on it became a thing, a whole ark, and it became almost like a bogyman. It was awesome! Especially when they destroyed his body, but they forgot that they killed a giant not long before, which was closest body to it… So few days later they herd from the giant mouth: “”I didn’t drowned, you didn’t come, they tortured me, you didn’t come”
Revenants are the perfect middle finger to murder-hobos. If your characters slaughter every NPC you have, keep a list of those NPCs, so that they can all return, like, have a an army of ~20 revenants just wait inside an area where they know the players will go, and you’ve got the perfect anti-murder hobo plan.
For a guy who likes Beholders as much as you, I’m surprised that you didn’t mentioned the “Death Tyrant”. You also didn’t include the “Bone Naga”, “Minotaur Skeleton”, “Warhorse Skeleton” and “Ogre Zombie” (Since you mentioned the “Zombie Beholder” I’m assuming that variants count as separate entries).
So the 5th E Dracolich and Demilich got nerfed? In 3, 3.5E they were terrors. The Dracolich got the Lich’s powers plus some extras like it’s Frightful Presence being stronger, control of undead and Paralyzing Stare attack. The Demilich was the evolved version of the Lich, able to make several instant kills a with it’s soul stealing attack, inmunity to most magic and damage reduction that only could be surpassed by vorpal weapons. I missed the Atropal, does it appear in 5E?
ghouls, ghosts, vampire spawn, death knights, and lichs can have class levels man. up that flexibility rating! why don’t you rate flying monsters (especially ones without wings) as being any more flexible in there use than ground bound counterparts? the ‘ghost’ occupying all culters and permeating literature is completely ignoring that D&D divides ‘ghosts’ into a cast of varied undead. that is why you where talking about revenant and other incorporeals. you even talked about the banshee being straight out of Irish folk lore, yet at the end you credit it all to the ghost to to it’s popular use as a catch all term.
Wow! I mean just wow! This was such a fun article to watch and I was wondering why I had not seen it and I see now that this is a recent article and you are growing! You really need to keep this up! I dont know if you can beat this article personally because I love the undead but I hope you make great content! I will most certainly follow you! 😀
TBH, you really should’ve put Revenant and the Dracolich at A tier considering how powerful they are, the dracolich is really just a dragon plus a lich combined into one form, despite it being skeletal the size and weight of the form is surely nothing to take lightly, and as for the Revenant… Typical they’re a mix of Ghost, Zombie, and Vampire qualities and have been said to be as strong as vampires, even full-blooded vampires, though not as fast as them, but they are faster than they were in death, and another thing is, a revenant is EXTREMELY rare to see or witness and can happen to nearly anyone if they’re spiritual energy and willpower is strong enough to will themselves back to life using negative energy, so if you have someone who’s already extremely powerful in life ends up dying and coming back, they’re skill and power and life combined with their revenant undeath enhancements can definitely have them compete with even the strongest of vampires or even liches in some cases.
Gotta point out that Demi-lich’s can actually mean two different creatures: Either the “weakened” lich you mention OR a lich so mind mindbogglingly old that it decayed down to a single body part stuffed with magic gems that contain slowly digesting souls. The ancient demilich version is what Acererak was and they’re so powerful they might as well count as a demigod. Hell, Acererak was pretty close to becoming an actual god supposedly. Generally you can tell the difference because the weaken ones are called “Demi-Lich” while the overpowered ancient ones are called “Demilich”.
why does everyone hate the giff? (hippo men) i seem to find that every DND youtuber, when its mentioned, put it as a very low ranked or tiered monster and i just dont get why, its a hippo, with a monocle, and a fine british suit, what not to love? you could have the world biggest james bond or helmet von kruger if he were a hippo! there’s so much silly stupid shit to do with them.
Crawling Claw is easy, kidnap a village, lock them up in your villians hideaway all together, tell them, anyone who murders one of the other villages gets to live, and will be set free, after one of them does so, escort them out of the location, or more likely have your undead minions do so, out of sight of the rest use hold person or the like to freeze the target, cut off both there hands and wait for them to bleed out, because after they do you can use the rest of them for some other undead monster, and you just said they were free to leave, you never said anything about not hurting them beforehand, and if somehow they manage to escape and get healing, before then, well, good for them, repeat as desired, using the murdered villages for as said, some other undead horror /laugh
Ghasts, ghouls and palemasters are on the top of my list. Ghouls pop up probably just out of circumstances out of their control but, Ghasts are created from truly evil villains cursed for their actions while they were still living. And don’t get me started on palemasters, absolute monsters. Playable monsters.
8:35 I like this part where you talk about the literary origins. Considering Gygax’s fantasy bibliography given in the AD&D (aka, “first edition”) Dungeon Master’s Guide, I bet he got the wight from the Tolkein lore you mentioned. Another favorite of Gygax — HP Lovecraft — made distinctions between ghouls and ghasts in “The Dream Quest of the Unknown Kadath.” It’s fun to trace it back like that! 😀 18:28 That same Lovecraft story has a mummified reptilian race in it!!!! I disagree that the Demi-Lich is somehow less than Lich in the rating. It’s the same creature in a different state (like a star that has evolved). I was absolutely filled with wonder and stress when I played a character investigating The Tomb of Horrors (in AD&D) when I was a very young teenager. Acererak has an enormous amount of pseudo-lore (i.e., organic to D&D, not from an outside source that I know of) and it is more inspiring than the Lich to me!!!! I liked the “Tomb of Blacktongue” too! I miss the old story media you used to portray your stories — the minis on the maps. I think doing it that way made it seem more like D&D than some of the other stories you do with the artwork — with the exception of “Eldritch Castle” which reminds me of retro AD&D art, for which I will always have some nostalgia.
Regarding Wraith, since they can move through solid objects, I always thought that players are able to block a wraith’s attack its because in order for the Wraith to physically harm, it has to concentrate and give solid form to the part that it’s attacking with be it their hand/claws or if the Wraith has a weapon.
While I have come to greatly respect your articles, I must object to one major mistake in this article: Skeletons should not be F Tier. While they are very simplistic on the surface, and have little to do if their controller is a very poor necromancer, skeletons actually have substantial intelligence, in 5th edition. They can operate in coordinated armies, understand languages they knew in life, act out scenes that their living counterparts would have performed in life (see the description in the Monster Manual). Arguably, given their capacity for armor usage, along with weapons, Skeletons understand how to properly use at least simple tools, and one might actually see, for example, skeleton woodsmen or blacksmiths, even if they are vulnerable enough that you wouldn’t expect them to last long. Because of the fact that undead naturally spawn at scenes of tragedy, and skeletons have near-sentient intellectual levels, one might expect to see them in towns long since abandoned to the plague, or manors where mysterious forces rendered the life there suddenly extinguished (as suggested when the Monster Manual mentions that high society skeletons might actually engage in dancing with one another, for example). Mechanically, on a very basic level, they are nothing to write home about; however, there is much roleplaying and lore potential, in my opinion, that arguably should at least place them in D tier, if not potentially C (considering they have much more to go off of than zombies).
The version of the Demi-Lich you describe in this article seems very different from the one I remember from 3.5 As I recall, a Demi-Lich is a deliberate ascension from Lichdom to a more ephemeral form, consciously leaving behind many of the weaknesses of the physical world. If I am remembering correctly, the two jewels in the eye-sockets of the skull are a part of the ritual a Lich performs to ascend to a Demi-Lich. The version you describe sounds more like a downgrade to a Lich, which happens when the Lich isn’t being a good enough Lich. The ascension from Demi-Lich is the Aka-Lich or “Shadow Lich”, such as Nimrod, who was so powerful he literally killed and imprisoned Gods to be eaten later.
My favorite concept of using the undead in creative ways was someone who proposed a giant extra-dimensional undead super computer. If the zombie raised its arms, it was a 1. If it kept them down, it was a 0. Make time move super fast in this dimension, and you have a working computer comprised entirely by undead.
I disagree with the comment about touch AC. The 5e creators have said multiple times that AC IS NOT your ability to block damage, but you ability to AVOID damage. That’s why characters like Barbarians and Monks can have high AC while not having any armor whatsoever. Don’t think if AC as how much your armor protects you, but your characters ability to avoid being hurt by multiple means
Of D&D simplicity : 5e D&D is inherently a system that is supposed to be tweaked. Its stipulated at the very beginning of the DM guidebook. Source material provides basics, simplistic system, relatively easy to pick up for people completely new to RPG’s. Lots of other RPGs have more realistic or coherent systems, but these often carry a very human flaw : people will tend to treat material as bible canon. And few things are more irritating to a DM that these rules lawyers players. I do really like the fact D&D leaves a lot of space for tweaking, and even encourages the DM to get massively creative to top up source material. Then again, some monsters simply can’t be run-of-the-mill. There’s no « ordinary » lich or revenant, and even less so for demilich, death knight, dracolich or vampire lords. We’ve got a base, but they’re entirely supposed to be spiced up and built up by the DM for their personal history, items, eventually levels ( imagine Muiral, the half scorpion barbarian wizard of Halaster’s undermountain accessing Lichdom…)
It’s SO nice to see someone with a brain put zombies on a higher tier than skeletons. I love your candor and wit. I do think Vampire and Vampire Lord should’ve been 2 categories. Strahd is no average vampire. Anything that is summoned and commanded will complete chores. All zombies “have” skeletons and thus SHOULD be more formidable. They should never be weaker. The Dragon Magazine back around 1993 or so put out a Halloween issue with the assassin skeleton, Bloody Bones, and the flesh eating zombie, Hungry Dead. Imagine a high level campaign where there’s a rumor that …. “The assassins guild has been killed. Every last one of them…” Of course a death worshipping cult has made them a deal “they simply could not resist”.
Ascended Lich being tier 3 and regular Lich is tier 5? That certainly tiers it. Thanks, 5E, for confusing DemiLich for Deci-Lich. “Well, demi means it’s part something and part something else. Hercules is a demigod and he’s a lesser god.” Yeah, he’s a demi-human but it doesn’t make sense when comparing him to other people. But it does work when describing a demilich as something more than other lichs as calling one a “demigod” isn’t descriptive enough for a MM. Oh well, I’ll just take my memories of beating several lichs only to have my butt handed to me by a spell slinging floating skull and sulk in the corner.
First off, Children of the Grave is a good fucking song. Not a D ranked one. Anyways, on with the rest of the critique. Skeletons come in so many different flavors. I’d put them higher at least better than zombies. I would swap skeleton and zombie, personally. Will’o’wisp do not out beat wights. Flameskulls are C at best. Death Knights can be more flexible if you play around with it. Revenants are not immortal. Once they complete their task, they can rest in peace. As for the Dracolich, I’d add shit to it myself. I agree, it’s just lazy they didn’t edit it. I may or may not have created a zombie thot that could give you mummy rot if you fucked her. It’s sad since she was sweet too. Also, mummy lords annihilate ghosts for me, personally. I’ve also made a vampire thot too. I need to stop with the monster girls. XD “I need a human to quench both my blood and sexual lust.”
“The first question, the obvious question is…are these cannibals? No, they are not. Cannibalism, in the purest sense of the word implies an inter-species activity. These creatures cannot be considered human – they prey on humans. They do NOT prey on each other, that’s the difference.” – Dawn of the Dead
I might make a character that’s a “Human” Named Trelly. Trelly would be a monk. Lawful Neutral, wearing clothes that covers his whole body, a Cloak that goes over his head, gloves and a mask. After the party opens up to him and becomes his friend. He might ask if they would be okay with the dead around them. Because Trelly, is a Skeleton. He was a human monk that died and was revived.
Instead of saying “draco-lich” and “zombie beholder”, which is like cheating because you’re using those creatures WITH the undead status on them, you should have them all together as one and say “there can be an undead version of anything, skeletal dragon, zombie unicorn, lich centaur etc etc, which is how versatile the undead can be” and have that as the number one at your tier A in the list.
Excuse me,did you just put skeletons in the bottom tier…you sir have no imagination,skeletons are incredibly flexible creatures,maybe its just the DMs your familiar with arent as loose and flexible with rules as me or other DMs i play with,undead in general can be very flexible,hell ive even allowed people to PLAY as skeletons or zombies…
Though I am a failed wizard as well as witch my sorcery is flawless even still. That being stated as fact, I wiah to speak of energy. Concerning celestial, abyssal, fiendish or monstrous PERVERSIONS of self like any perverse or corrupt at all finility is their fate. It’s intuitive, instinctive & logically deduced no matter the circumstance. Energy captivated (fire, earth, air & water..) can only be done by the being as a individual abusing their self thus others or visa versa. No amount of sin prevents this. That is intuitively known if sober, solely. Those who have deceased or transcended entirely are a spiritual being as a whole which classifies as a departed spirit unless transcendence occured as then it is simply a being, still. Demon, Daemon & Devil in particular can captivate energy of any caliber including divine though only for a time no matter it’s space. I ask this; those revenant are the key to the lock that is redemption no matter the being or lack there of guilty or guilty by association & this status can be attained through meditation unlike ALL other ‘undead’ tiers. What IS liberty? 🤡
“armor blocks a wraiths touch as much as Kobold’s spear” This is one of things that comes down to narrative description in D&D. You’d never narrate it that your armor stopped a wraith’s attack, instead you must have managed to avoid it. Mechanically you could decide to homebrew it that you only get your 10+dex AC instead of any armor benefits, but this would make them a lot more scary.
This was fun; liches are far and away my favorite D&D monsters. I love Wizards, and seeing one forgo mortality, and sanity, to procure a body that gets away from almost all the wizard’s classic weaknesses, and is immortal, is cool. Even after spending decades honing their arcane skills, they can gain a form that may let them enjoy it for centuries, if they can simply justify the nightmare process required to achieve it. I also like Baelnorns; elven liches created by Correlon Larethian Himself, in order to allow the extra time needed to achieve some great deed; something so crucial even the God of All Elves allows one of His to become undead.
About wraith being able to phase through armor, as a dm, I always count that as a part of its hit bonus. Which…yeah doesnt make sense considering leather, studded leather or plate armor shouldnt make a difference, so I guess youre right. The phase through is just flavor purposes while describing how “you got hit for the 9372nd time”
Its unrelated but the Hollows from Dark Souls, I have my own headcannon that Hollows (like D&D Demons) form under specific conditions. Hollows are the returned souls of slaves, prisoners, people taken from their homes and forced to be soldiers. Those who were abused in life, or died a in terrible, depressing way. Generally if you lived in a miserable way you return as a Hollow (because it’s a Hollow afterlife of the hollow life they initially lived)
Shadows are just cool in my mind. Imagine polymorphing into one in front of others; you’re living, and flesh, then all of a sudden, a black, shadowy thing crawls out of you, dumping your body onto the ground, to then suck in your body, becoming one with its shadowy figure. If that doesn’t give you advantage on intimidation then I don’t know what will.
You know, the one problem I have with conventional undead is that there’s really no explanation for why they don’t decompose. Like, I’ve heard estimates that if the world were really to be attacked by a zombie plague, it would only take 10 days after the zombies were reanimated before they were too decomposed to function. Decomposition is basically just the process of bacteria, fungus (eventually), and carrion feeding animals preying on the corpse. Like, if a corpse is left out, botflies will find and lay eggs in it within a day of death. This is reliable enough that an entire specialty of Forensic Entomology exists to use the cycles of this process to determine the time that has elapsed since a corpse has died. It wouldn’t be difficult to explain it. Perhaps the negative energy that animates undead has a kind of antipathy effect that keeps carrion feeders from feeding on it, and kills any bacteria and fungal spores present in the corpse. Still, there’s one other form of decomposition that even this wouldn’t stop. When you die, the acid in your stomach continues it’s work, only instead of digesting your food, it instead digests you. The organs in the torso are slowly broken down in the torso, turning into gases that build up over months, making the corpse appear bloated (this is one of the inspirations for the vampire legend). Eventually though the presssure becomes too much and the belly ruptures open, the soup of digested organ matter pouring out. Unless a necromancer takes the time to surgically remove the stomach, this would inevitably happen to the corpse.
Old article, so probably not much point in commenting, but I want to throw a bone to the zombies. Undead fortitude may rely on the luck of the dice (or a party with little radiant damage) but against an unprepared party it is terrifying in the extreme. Zombies already have high hp, but then you need to get past their con saves to actually put them down. This can lead to a fight dragging on far longer than the players expected, because the things just won’t stay dead. Then, both Zombies and Skeletons (just like you mention with mummies) can be templates for other creatures. I recently got cussed out by a party for putting them up against an zombie purple worm, with that massive con bonus it was incredibly hard to put down, and the mindless nature meant they just had to keep hacking away at it.
My favorite undead were the 3.5e Bleakborn. Also called Moil zombies from Greyhawk, they were damn hard to kill for lower level players. Frozen and seeking the warmth of living creatures, their presence would drain you of your life. You could reduce them to 0 HP or less, but unless you outright destroyed their bodies completely, they would come back as nearby warmth reanimated them. And they would deal cold damage to you even if you hit them with non-reach melee weapons. Our party had a hell of a time with these things. We faced six of them one session without knowing what they were, and eventually decided to stuff their bodies into a bag of holding so no one else who might have happened upon them (in a deep, dark dungeon where no one had been for hundreds of years, yeah, I know) would have to face them. A few sessions and couple levels later, the party was using overland flight over an illithid city and we dumped them out into the street. Let the mind flayers figure out a way to deal with undead immune to mind affecting abilities!
I added two abilities to my Dracolich from the necromancer subclass to give it a little bit of lichness. I gave it Grim Harvest to be used once per turn, and undead thralls to be recharged on a 5 or 6. We were doing mini campaigns based on our main characters backstories. I was surprised they wanted me to do mine, because his whole clan was murder by a Dracolich when he was a small child. The ancient black Dracolich destroyed them. As 6 level 7 characters with a small amount of magic items. Looking back I probably could have leveled them up a little bit more to even out the playing field. But it was awesome to watch the raised barbarian slaughter his sorcerer brother. While the Fighter watched making sure the sorcerer couldn’t get away.
vampire spawn don’t have any flexibility? Bull crap, sure they can be described as these human creatures acting like beast, but then again, they could just go back to there everyday lives, avoiding the sun without even thinking about it, unaware of what they have become until their master vampire gives them orders or until they are put into a position of danger/stress.That’s how I run them.
I hhhhate Undead. I use to be scarred of vampires when I was a kid (thanks Buffy). More specifically I was scarred of the idra that they could be hiding among people with anyone turning out to be one and of the idea of being turned into a vampire, forced to watch through my own eyes as my cursed body does horrible things (yeah I was a curious child). It ended up with me hating all undead in all games.
So bassicly, i wanted to make a part of the dungeon specificly for stealth, and i added a death knight in the room, they are suposed to sneak past him, now they were all a 5 lvl party consulting of a barbarian,rouge,bard and wizard and had a bearded devil on they’re side (they were free’ing him from the dungeon, so he is helping them and singed a contract to help them on the adventure) and everything is going to plan right, until bard uses his bardic inspiration on the barbarian, i was really sad, but dnd isnt for children, so obviously, the death knight locks them in the chamber, and then proceds to slaughter the entire party until the bearded devil opened a portal to the 9 hells and the party just….grappled the death knight and chucked him in there, and somehow, NOBODY DIED its just that everyone dropped besides the bearded devil and the barbarian
I beg to disagree about Demi-Lich. Its an advanced state of evolution for lich itself. Evolving past physical form. Its more less intentional process or a byproduct of them living that “lifestyle” so to say. But they have to do it intentionally, learn how to create Soul Gems and put them inside their sculls, or other parts of their body, like spine, limb joints etc. So it takes effort for it and its voluntarely procedure, most of the time.
17:00 Transmogrification, any other evilly aligned being of any sort (though undead also are teleported with those enslaved or otherwise mastered by them..) within a 100 mile distance in circumference is teleported to the Dracoliches location as it is teleported to theirs causing a blight of terrain in the entirety of distance traversed….as well as severe thunder storm at a 50% chance of occurrence. 🤨🥳🌠🤸
For most powerful of undead beings id say are Liches, Mummy Lords, Vampires, artificial phantasms like spectres or quasi-real animations, and trolls(Note: Have mild undead traits, trolls are also reptilian, their like a reptile with faint undead properties), can be totally immortal, omnipotent, infinitely supreme all those kind of things they call it. All these 6 can regenerate from death, do not feel pain, and retain some to all lifeform mind function and neural chakra elements, or even just given the traits artificially like a magically created spectre lifeform, given a concience and a holy spirit to go along with it. Next id put ghosts, zombies, and ghouls, they have less qualities, and they dont usually retain rudimentary intelligence and brain functions, they dont feel pain, but they can in some cases lack souls or regenerative properties due to the length of being dead to reality. Last id put revenants, skeletons, poltergeists, or things like phase spiders or small types of spirits like energy orbs or wisps. Many of these different types lack magical ability or immortality properties.
A mummy isn’t a creature of Egyptian mythology. To Egypt a mummy is a body that was wrapped and buried. The idea that they rise as undead and cast curses on grave robbers comes from American legends, as people are in awe at Egypt’s proficiency in preserving bodies, and attribute it to the supernatural
The sokushinbutsu are pretty neat. They’re best known through the Fiend Daisoujou in Shin Megami Tensei. Given that they’re considered highly virtuous and revered as deities if preserved, I could see them being used as a lawful, or at least neutral good entity of some sort. Something involving a samurai-like paladin feels like it’d be a proper association.
I had a really cool idea for the backstory of way of long death monks in 5e. Throughout the years they train until eventually they commit shokushonbutsu and actually become a form of undead. For funsies I thought it would be cool if they only ever had 1 apprentice at a time, like the Sith. I should homebrew a prestige class for becoming an undead monk or something
I would fix the revenant by making it possible for him to die permanently, but given his will is so strong to bring himself back to life and not lose his mind, he should at least be able to come back with much less effort, but as a price you could make every death weigh more and more with the Reaper getting impatient and restless with one’s antics, so from a neutral force, it may become a direct enemy actively seeking for the revenant’s head. That along with a decaying psyche and the player revenant may end up pushed by the DM to suddenly abandon the group to face the Reaper as his new nemesis… only to get easily claimed soon after.
I don’t think flexibility as you seem to rate it is a good rating. I’d rather focus on the ease that the lore and mechanics come together to which it is for a monster to be properly used, than how many different rolls a monster can fulfill because, surprise surprise. Monsters aren’t reused in the same setting frequently so it doesn’t matter so much if a vampire could be a count or a common killer. The specter and poltergeist for instance, can easily have whole quests written around them haunting a house, and finding a way to free them. Gibbering mouthers and mimics also make fine traps, yet you rate all these as 1. Fulfilling a roll strongly is more important than fulfilling any roll, as an individual will likely only fulfill one roll to the game so it would probably be better to replace versatility with “ease of use” which encompasses the full array of how easy it is to make a monster interesting to your players, both mechanically and lore wise.
I think you’d enjoy a number of the undead designs from the graphic novels of Overlord which is now an anime. The anime cut a lot of things out, unfortunately, but there’s a lot of interesting designs in them. Example, the soul eater being a headless undead horse with blue flames coming from its neck, with it healing itself from devouring souls. Then, there’s the Viscera Egg, an egg shaped undead formed from corpses standing on legs while also forming a mouth and fangs out of undead corpses put together, all while using intestines like a frog tongue to pull in foes to devour.
You know, what’s funny is the Crawling Hand is what inspired me to buy the books. I immediately thought of a necromancer’s tower with the hand hiding on a shelf and waiting until it could leap at an adventurer, wrapping its ice cold fingers around their throat, the other adventurers struggling to pry it away before their friend is choked to death as swinging their weapons at it would be too dangerous for their incapacitated ally.
I have a really funny Revenant story. When going through one adventure, we encountered 5 revenants (one for each player) and we fought and killed them. We were smart enough to destroy the revenants fully. Except, one of our party-members decided he purposely didn’t want to destroy it. Instead, he investigated the past of the revenant, found the revenant’s still alive wife, and had sex with the wife. Then he goaded the revenant into a trap and trapped and jailed him into the town-hall jail (which he happened to be the mayor of). He would then repeatedly kill over and over again throughout the adventures we went through.
I remember one campaign where we had to help this child who was a reverent to ya know kill his killer ghost cause abuse and mental trama of slave life and was Also a death Knight as he swore to always be there for his sister to be there but ya know he died separated so that was one hell of a story arc we even found out hurray they had multi personalty disorder 1 terrified of everything aka his slave trama 2-3 his more innocent side 4 the part that views all life as meaningless and thus worthless just more bodies for the count So when it all worked out we were shocked to find out their father and mother were 25% god of majic 25% god of creation 25% god of life and 25% god of death soo overall just remember dnd anything is possible that and funny thing is we had a death domain cleric paladin of justice warlock of majic and then our 1 female bard who was the 1st to cry during this ark also ya im glossing over details for now ask if ya want certain bits
The Wraith is a great example of why I wish Armor and being dexterous was broken out into separate things. Because AC is suppose to represent how likely a PC is to taking a damaging blow it does work with the Wraith attack. However when you look closer at a character and see that the AC is really coming from some sort of armor and not some sort of acrobatic skill then it seems to make a little less sense.
Interesting critique of my favorite set of monsters as well. Eric Draven was certainly a revenant, as were many others in cinematic history. The Stranger from High Plains Drifter or The Preacher from Pale Rider I have always considered to be revenants, although the nature of those characters is ambiguous. That ambiguity could certainly be incorporated into the game for the creature’s appearance in particular, to make its true nature less apparent.
wow, having been playing since ad&d how badly some of these got mangled by 5e. for example prior to 4th and 5th edition the demilich was a lich that shed it’s body as irrelevant to gain greater power, since less was being used on body maintenance. or the prior deathknight that had quite literally ALL of its mind
I’ve gotta disagree with you, Deathknights are easily my favorite undead. Just imagine throughout the course of a long term campaign a paladin mpg is corrupted by the main villain of the game, after the paladin outlives his usefulness the villain kills the paladin without a second thought and when the party encounter him he’s become a Deathknight, a shadow of his former self.
I have an undead creature unique to my own setting, and I call it the Skinthief. The Skinthief is a ghost, Banshee, Specter or Wraith who cannot return to the physical world, but desperately tries to, and does so by skinning alive, it’s victims and using dark magics to keep the flesh alive, and the souls inside of their stolen skin, still screaming and in agony as the Skinthief uses their torn hide as a coat, and a new face, constantly trying to grow itself, and constantly trying to build itself a new, working body to return to life, but never quite getting there. They are incredibly hard to kill, and are far more recommended to flee from than to actually engage, because they fight in groups, have a stun ability, and are fairly strong if they have a few skins attached to them, and of course they have necrotic damage, life drains as one may expect, on top of them returning to life if not properly disposed of with holy water for the remains of the spirit and fire to put the skins to rest. Their desire to drain life essence is simply because they want to be alive again.
I had a really fun Revenant Monk, he was a Paladin killed by his order simply for questioning his Deity after they killed Orcs who had abandoned the Orc ways and tried and even succeeded in partnering with other towns, but being Orcs they all had to die in the eyes of this Order, he was very fun and re-rose and has had a few titeles as the GM just did not want him dead to the point he is now loremaster and protecter of his largest city.
hmm now I have an idea for how I can use clawing hands for a campaign. During the trek, the adventurers notice that every undead in the area has both of their hands cut off. Eventually once they reach the dungeon, a swarm of crawling hands will creep out from the crevices from all directions on the party.
I kinda feel like zombies being put in a lower tier is undervaluing their horrific potential in the right hands. While the same can be said for plenty of other undead, there’s little more chilling than seeing former friends or allies being made into mindless, shambling corpses baying for your blood. With a little of the right usage, zombies are a great staple to anything scurry
A few suggestions I’d add to the list would be the nightwalker and he deathlock and their variants, they have more or less as much story possibilities as the ghost. Great article, I could possibly change some of these monsters’ functionality if I ever make a campaign out of them to meet up with the downsides you mentioned