Undead Origins

Horrors of the Weird West

Horrors of the Weird West
3.0
Black Regiment: The Black Regiment consists of reanimated soldiers slain on both sides of the War Between the States, whose uniforms have turned black by their own shed blood.
Bone Fiend: Bone fiends are created when a manitou finds a human skull with at least a little bit of brain matter left and sets up shop. It starts in whatever bits of gray matter are still left, then the creature spreads its essence throughout the skull itself. (This is what turns the skull black.) It then sets about assembling a bony body for itself and waits for its first hapless victims to arrive
Dracula: Dracula, the most powerful vampire in existence, was once known as Vlad Drakul, ruler of a small country in what is now Romania. Vlad, while a military genius, had a few unsavory practices—among them a habit for sticking folks on huge sharpened posts, which gained him the nickname “the Impaler.” So brutal was he that his actions resulted in his curse of vampirism back in the 15th century— when the manitous were still chained in the Hunting Grounds. That’s a powerful lot of evil!
Flesh Jacket: Flesh jackets are fashioned by certain very powerful, very evil cults around the world. To create one, a black magician with the proper knowledge removes the skin from a willing cultist, and imbues the shorn hide with a weird sort of life. The spell also gives the flesh jacket limited mobility, and it can attempt to assume control of any victim it can envelop.
Frankenstein's Monster: Victor is a Swiss-born mad scientist specializing in the study of life and death. He’s one of the few researchers to successfully bring a corpse back to life, although, as most everyone nowadays knows, not with the results he’d hoped for. Using parts purloined from local graveyards, Victor fulfilled his scientific dream. He created a man and gave his creation life.
But something went wrong. Rather than the perfect specimen he had aimed for, his creation was twisted and freakish, a parody of humanity.
Frankenstein chose the “best” parts for his creation, hoping to build a beautiful artificial specimen.
Unfortunately, the sum of the parts turned out to be greater than the whole. Stitching scars mar much of the creature’s body. Its eyes are glazed and yellowish, while its skin has a pasty pallor. Once beautiful features are contorted into a rictus of death by faulty facial muscles.
The monster itself is an odd amalgam of mad science and undeath. Although Victor’s experiments brought the creature to life, it is sustained by an unholy tie to its maker.
Ghost: Haunts, spectres, phantasms, poltergeists—all of these are disembodied souls that haven’t moved on to the afterlife and remain to plague the folks of the Weird West.
Banshee: Banshees are the restless spirits of folks who died as a result of non-requited love. Often, they committed suicide after realizing their heart’s desire was denied them. Occasionally, the banshee was actually murdered by the object of its affection. In either case, the banshee’s death occurred in a remote spot and the body was unburied.
Haunt: Haunts are the most common form of ghost. They are created when a person died while experiencing an extreme—usually unpleasant—emotion and is doomed to relive it or inflict it on others. The most common motivator for a haunt is revenge for a violent or treacherous death.
Phantom: Phantoms—also called spooks, wraiths and phantasms—are merely spirits who’ve yet to realize their time has come. They remain tied to the site of their death until someone releases them from the limbo of undeath they are trapped in.
Poltergeist: Like simple phantasms, poltergeists result from a soul’s refusal to accept the death of its corporeal body. However, poltergeists are fully aware they’re undead—they’re just mean-spirited about it!
Shade: A shades is an apparition that maintains some tie to a living person—or group of people—responsible for the shade’s death.
Spectre: Most apparitions are linked to the material world by the nature or cause of their death—not so spectres. These abominations are the black hats of the ghostly dimension. Spectres are the spirits of particularly evil people who’ve been cursed to continue their existence in a state of undeath. The Reckoners aren’t about to let a little thing like death cut short a good (if unwitting) servant’s service.
Hangin' Judge: As you no doubt remember, the hangin’ judges started out as five corrupt Confederate judges who hatched a scheme to make a land grab and ruin their enemies along the Chisolm Trail back in the 1860s. The judges’ schemes were uncovered and they were each hunted down and lynched by angry mobs of Texans. They rose as horrific abominations.
Once a month, Hiram Jackson can create a lesser hangin’ judge if he gets his hands on a dishonest (Marshal’s call) attorney, judge or lawman. This takes a night—and a hanging—to accomplish, but not consent.
Hiram Jackson: ?
Cyrus Call: ?
Walkin' Dead: Cyrus Call can also raise those killed by himself or his “mob” as walkin’ dead, although this takes one round per zombie raised.
Luther Kirby: ?
Moses Moore: ?
Marcus Lafeyette: ?
Headless Horseman: This creature is an abomination created when someone dies from decapitation. Chances are increased if the person was riding at the time of death or was a professional rider such as a Pony Express rider or a cavalry soldier.
Joaquin Murieta: Captain Harry Love led a band of California lawmen against Joaquin and his band. They surprised the bandit leader away from camp one day with only a few men and quickly dispatched the group. To prove he’d bagged Joaquin—and to claim the $1000 reward offered by the California governor—Love chopped off the bandit’s head and returned it to the governor.
Unfortunately for folks in the Maze and the rest of the Southwest, Joaquin’s come back looking for his missing head.
Mummy: Many cultures treated their dead with great respect and prepared their bodies so they would better serve their owners in the afterworld. Unfortunately, upon the Reckoners’ escape, some of these began to serve again in the world of the living.
Although mummification can result from climatic conditions, reanimation of those corpses only produces desiccated dead. Also, lesser mummies—those of servants and the like—are treated as desiccated dead as well. Only a rare few powerful individuals arise as true mummies.
Aztec Mummy: The Aztec culture relied on two methods to prepare their dead for the afterworld. The first, cremation, left little to later reanimate and plague ancestors. However, during certain periods of their history, the Aztecs practiced a form of mummification, particularly for those who were consider specially blessed or important.
Occasionally, one of these mummies—usually that of a mighty king or priest—returns to the world of the living.
Egyptian Mummy: This undead horror only arises from the embalmed corpse of an ancient Egyptian high priest or sorcerer.
Patchwork Men: Most mad scientists drawn to this unsavory practice focus their endeavors on the human body. Patchwork men are largely human in design and function, with a few “extras” thrown in every now and then to make them interesting.
Patchwork Wasp: Although it uses mostly human parts for its construction, this little horror is about as alien as you can get. The core of the body is a human head and torso. Attached to the torso like an insect’s legs are six arms, complete with hands. A small, hollowed-out cow’s horn on the backside is the stinger, with extra, external human stomachs serving as poison sacs. The wings are a disgusting marvel of bio-construction, made from hollow human forearm bones and thinly stretched human skin.
Poison Woman: An old Sioux legend claims that once upon a time, women could pull their brains out of their heads and use the old gray matter to brew poisons. While some might simply dismiss this as a misogynistic tale, there is a bit of truth to it—at least since the Reckoning.
Whenever a woman kills a man with poison within the borders of the Sioux Nations (including Deadwood), there is a chance she becomes a poison woman. (Any female guilty of such a deed returns to life as a poison woman rather than becoming Harrowed.) If she does in fact attract the attention of the Reckoners, they imbue her corpse with a seed of supernatural energy, blowing the top of her head off. Men, by the way, are not subject to this particular curse.
Pox Walker: When a particularly angry brave or shaman dies of smallpox or some other disease brought by the white man, there is a chance the Reckoners take notice of this fact and give the body new life as an abomination so it can spread the pestilence.
Ultimately, a victim killed by the pox walker's disease is wracked by a final, great spasm as they die. After death, instead of potentially becoming Harrowed, the victim must check to see if they become a pox walker.
Tarnished Phantasy: This abomination is created when a woman of questionable virtue (like your typical saloon gal) dies while trying to save a man she truly loves. While a noble death such as this would hardly seem likely to generate an abomination, the powers of the Reckoners can twist good deeds to evil ends.
If the conditions are right, such a fallen woman returns to the world of the living as a tarnished phantasy.
Union Pride Ghost Train & Ornery Will: The origin of the Ghost Train goes back to the early days of the Great Rail Wars, when a band of Confederate guerillas led by one “Ornery” Will Jenkins found a line of track laid by the Union Blue railroad across his native Missouri. Angered, Jenkins followed the track until he and his men came upon a train led by the ghost-rock powered Union Pride locomotive.
Jenkins and his men boarded the moving train, and in their rage killed everyone aboard, including all but one of the engineers. The lone survivor refused to obey Jenkins’ orders, and threw the throttle wide upon, knowing in advance he’d likely die as a result.
As the train hit the end of the tracks, it smacked the dirt so hard Jenkins was thrown against the boiler, which burst from the impact. The ghost rock inside exploded, immolating Jenkins.
Vampire: Vampires of all sorts are a form of undead pestilence. After all, vampirism itself is a contagious, fatal disease that spreads even after death!
Cinematic Vampire: ?
Lesser Vampire: Anyone slain by a vampire’s bite rises as a lesser vampire (use the statistics for a nosferatu).
Nachtzehrer: A person killed by a nachtzehrer rises again as one of the abominations herself after three days, unless they’re removed from their funeral clothing before burial.
Nosferatu: ?
Penanggalen: ?
Upir: An upir usually begins as a restless spirit or ghost, similar to a poltergeist, except that it attempts to smother folks or even domesticated animals. After a short period of plaguing the area, the spirit returns to its dead body and animates it as an undead vampire.
Ustrel: These foul little monsters rise from the corpses of very young children (two years or younger) that have died due to abandonment or neglect.
Wampyr: Wampyrs are actually little more than undead plague carriers, spreading the disease of their form of vampirism among their former loved ones.
Due to the highly infectious nature of the wampyr’s bite, this sort of vampirism often spreads very quickly through a community.
Walkin' Fossil: Whether animated by determined manitous that manage to find a trace of brain matter, or simply created as entirely new beings by the Reckoners, walkin’ fossils are extremely dangerous predators. Fortunately, these creatures seem pretty difficult for the dark forces to animate. While other forms of fossilized dinosaurs may be animated, the Reckoners and their agents typically prefer large predators.
Weeping Widow: This abomination is the grief-stricken spirit of a woman who has witnessed the violent death of at least one member of her immediate family, and then died herself soon after. These women never had time to mourn their loss, so the unfinished business of their grief and rage binds them to the physical world.
Zombie: ?
Bloat: To become a bloat, a zombie has to have been submerged at the time it was reanimated and remained submerged for at least a few months.
Desiccated Dead: Usually manitous try to pick corpses that are fairly fresh. They pack a better punch and tend to hold up a little better in a fight. However, evil spirits from another dimension can’t always be choosers, so sometimes they have to make due with bodies that have been out in the sun a while.
Desiccated dead are created from bodies that have dried up and decomposed to the point there is little left to them but a leathery skin over a skeleton. Cowpokes who’ve been bleaching in the desert and bodies from Indian above ground burial sites all fall into this category when reanimated by a manitou.
Feel free to use this type of walkin’ dead for mummies from Southwestern or Mexican Indian tombs. The desiccated dead are also representative of lesser mummies from Egyptian tombs—servants buried with the head honcho.
Many cultures treated their dead with great respect and prepared their bodies so they would better serve their owners in the afterworld. Unfortunately, upon the Reckoners’ escape, some of these began to serve again in the world of the living.
Although mummification can result from climatic conditions, reanimation of those corpses only produces desiccated dead. Also, lesser mummies—those of servants and the like—are treated as desiccated dead as well. Only a rare few powerful individuals arise as true mummies.
Feral Walkin' Dead: These zombies are created by a weak or watered-down version of Baron LaCroix’s reanimation fluid. These are similar to the abominations spawned in Nacogdoches, Texas, after one of LaCroix’s trains derailed nearby.
Frozen Dead: Sometimes the temperature in the northern plains or high mountain passes drops low enough to freeze a body solid. When a manitou decides to wreak a little havoc with a corpse that’s been out in freezing weather like that, the end result is a walkin’ dead with ice in its veins—literally.
The frozen dead are reanimated corpsicles—bodies frozen solid by incredible cold. They’re only created when the air temperature is below –30° Fahrenheit.
Note that it’s not necessary for the original body to have actually frozen to death to make one of these icy revenants. Any sort of corpse can become a frozen dead under the right circumstances.
Glom: A ’glom (short for conglomerate) is a group of corpses joined together into a horrifying mass and animated by an especially strong manitou.
Most manitous are strong enough to animate only a single corpse, creating a Harrowed or walkin’ dead. Some manitous, though, have grown strong enough to animate several bodies at once.
The creation of a ’glom requires a very high Fear Level, and vast quantities of corpses; at least two. One corpse, in which the manitou houses its primary essence, must be relatively intact, but the others need not be so tidy. Most ’gloms are formed from considerably more than two corpses, and are commonly found arisen from the piles of dead on battlefields.
Glom Colony: While regular ‘gloms are inhabited by a single, very powerful manitou, colony ‘gloms are host to a horde of lesser, but closely allied, manitous—a group sometimes called a “Legion.”
Like regular ‘gloms, colony ‘gloms are usually only found in areas where a large number of fresh corpses are available and the Fear Level is fairly high. A bad train wreck could spawn one if it occurred in an area with a Fear Level 5 or greater.
Orphaned Head: Occasionally, a manitou gets a stubborn streak and refuses to let go of a ruined walkin’ dead. As long as the original head remains intact, the spirit continues to keep house in it—even when it’s nothing but a severed head. Usually, the noggin was removed by an edged weapon, but a rare few are chewed loose by the head itself.
Headless Dead: An orphaned head can animate and control any corpse to which it has previously been grafted.
Severed Hand: This abomination comes into existence after a hand has been severed by some means, preferably one that makes it worthwhile for the hand to seek vengeance. The Reckoners then provide it a disgusting life of its own.
Skeleton: On very rare occasions, manitous may choose to reanimate bodies so old that nothing remains of them except bones. Evil black magicians also sometimes create these abominations as special servants.
Undead Animal: What kind of twisted creature brings good old Spot back from the pet cemetery to hound his beloved master? Some abominations may reanimate animal corpse, particularly ones closely associated with the wilderness or nature. Occasionally a human cultist may do so as well, just to unnerve an interloper. This sort of tactic is perfect for Appalachian witches.

Way of the Dead

Way of the Dead
3.0
Walkin' Dead: The Harrowed can add one member to his host for every two character levels he possesses. These zombies don’t just appear, they have to be raised. Just how most Harrowed raise their host seems to vary. Some give them a kiss of life. Others simply open a coffin and say “get up.” Regardless, it takes about 5 minutes to get the corpse up and moving.
Hell Beast power.
Unholy Host power.
Possessed Undead: Possessed undead are created in many ways. Maybe a voodoo shaman poured some magical elixir in a cemetery, or an evil cultist said a dark prayer over a graveyard. The Reckoners hear the request, and if they feel it suits their purpose, sends a number of damned souls down to inhabit the corpses.
There doesn’t have to be a summoner involved. Sometimes the Reckoners just create a horde of walkin’ dead for their own reasons.
Guardians of the Pool: These are the animated corpses of hundreds who were sacrificed to this tainted cenote in ages past.

Way of the Huckster

Way of the Huckster
3.0
Walkin' Dead: Zharkov’s Saw

This large saw once belonged to Zharkov the Magnificent, a Russian-born magician of some repute. He used it nightly in his act. Each night he would “saw” his lovely assistant—who also happened to be his wife—completely in half with it.
One night, the trick went tragically wrong. Instead of cutting through an empty box, the saw’s razor sharp teeth cut into flesh and blood. Zharkov, believing his wife’s screams were part of the act, continued cutting. It wasn’t until her screams stopped that he realized his mistake.
Overcome with grief, the magician—who in addition to his sleight of hand skills possessed some true occult knowledge—made a pact with a manitou to restore his wife to him. That very night, his wife’s hastily stitched body rose as one of the living dead.
His joy at her resurrection blinded him at first to the differences between this walking corpse and his wife. Once he admitted to himself that the thing he lived with was not his beloved Antonia, he destroyed her body and took his own life.
Since that time, the saw has belonged to a number of lesser magicians—many of whom have met tragic ends.
Power: This saw’s bloody past gives its wielder the power to create living dead. To do this, the zombie-to-be must be killed with the saw. Once the victim’s death wounds have been stitched closed, the corpse arises as a walkin’ dead completely under the sadistic saw owner’s control.
The undead created by this saw are pure evil and always interpret their master’s command literally in a way most likely to cause problems. The Marshal’s sure to have fun with this.
The walkin’ dead created by the saw can be killed by a headshot, but the saw can also destroy them. However, walkin’ dead killed by the saw can be “revived” by stitching the wound which “killed” them.
A revived zombie may rebel if pushed to do something that it would have refused to do in life. If it wins an opposed Wisdom check against its master, it becomes free of his control. Its first action is usually to dispose of its former master in some grisly fashion.
Taint: The saw’s owner develops a yearnin’ to be recognized as the best at what he does. Gunslingers and hexslingers continually challenge others of their type to duels, magicians constantly try riskier and more spectacular tricks, and so on.

Hell on Earth d20

Hell on Earth d20
3.0
Harrowed: Strong-willed brainers still occasionally claw their way back from the grave possessed by manitous—the same evil spirits that hucksters manipulated to work their hexes.
Being Harrowed isn’t actually a prestige class—you can’t just decide to be one of these creepy creatures. It’s just something that might happen to particularly lucky characters when they catch a bullet with their name on it.
When your character dies in Hell on Earth, roll 1d20. Add +1 to the result if your hero is 5th level, +2 if he’s 10th level, or +3 if he’s 15th level or higher. (Those bonuses don’t stack, by the way.) If the total result is 20 or higher, a manitou has latched onto his spirit and forces it back into his body—with an unwanted roommate. The brainer’s coming back from the grave.
Most Deaders stay in the grave 1d6 days. It takes a while to fight for the hero’s soul and then another 10-12 hours for the stubborn cuss to dig himself out—assuming the body was properly buried six feet under in the first place. Some Deaders come back quicker and some take longer—especially if the body was badly mangled or otherwise in bad shape.
The manitou needs the human’s psyche, so the victim’s head must be intact. Most major head wounds that kill a person render the body unusable, but that’s not always the case. It’s up to the Marshal if a special effect of some sort has ruined the hero’s brain and made him ineligible to come back as a Deader.
One side effect of all this Reckoning crap is that folks don’t always stay dead. I’m not talking about plain, old zombies. I’m talking about the Harrowed. We Templars call ’em “deaders.” See, when really tough hombres die, they are occasionally brought back to life by those same manitous I’ve been yapping about.
Automaton: Dr. Darius Hellstromme created the first automatons way back in 1870 or so. Most believed they were “clockwork” men, propelled by an extremely complex
combination of steam and gears. What no one could figure out was how the automatons could think.
It took Hellstromme’s rivals many years to finally crack the “secret of the automatons.” It was actually dirt simple: the body was made of steam and gears, but the brain was that of the walkin’ dead.
Where Hellstromme might be now is a mystery to all, but his automated factories in Denver continue to churn out automatons.
They have the brain of a zombie, wired straight into a high-tech, heavily armed and armored chassis.
Hellstromme seems to have made most of his money back during the Great Rail Wars. That was definitely when he created the automatons: robots with human brains wired up inside, controlling the whole works.
Doombringer: the Doombringers, ugly, mutated creatures more monster than human. They retain a feral human intelligence but are twisted and consumed by their hatred for norms, disloyal mutants, and especially heretics.
Even Silas doesn’t want many of these wackos around, so he sends the worst of them off into the wastes to hunt down heretics. Even he doesn’t know that the Doombringers have transcended their humanity and become undead abominations.
Toxic Zombie: It’s amazing how much illegal dumping took place in the years before the Last War. After the Apocalypse, with no one around to put fresh loads of earth over the megacorporations’ dirty secrets, many of these toxic dumps leaked into nearby ponds or created their own cesspools of deadly ooze.
Sometimes, desperate travelers in need of water give these ponds a try. Most of them drop dead within minutes of inhaling, touching, or drinking the sludge. Occasionally, they actually fall into the stuff and become toxic zombies.
Walkin' Dead: Walkin’ dead are animated corpses temporarily inhabited by manitous. They’re very common in ruined cities, creepy old graveyards, mausoleums, battlefields, or any other large concentration of bodies.
The first listing is for “civilian” undead.
What Jo doesn’t know is that anyone killed by a walkin’ dead, who doesn’t come back a Deader, has a 1 in 10 chance of coming back as a walkin’ dead herself.
If a hero is killed by a walkin’s dead and does not come back Harrowed, secretly roll 1d10. If you roll a 1, the poor brainer rises as one of Death’s walkin’ dead.
Death’s passage through Phoenix marked it in a way that even the Last War couldn’t. Anyone killed by walkin’ dead in the area of the city rises from the grave on a result 1–5 on a d10.
Walkin' Dead Veteran: This one here is for better stock, such as zombies raised from a battlefield, a military cemetery, or the like.
War rode about the war-torn state on his red charger, and every battlefield he crossed gave up its dead to join his merciless army. Thousands of dead soldiers most still with their arms and armor, spread out from Kansas to devastate the West in their master’s name.
Faminite: Famine rode her black steed right on top of the waters of Prosperity Bay. An army of those cursed by her touch followed behind, walking out of Purgatory, the part of the Maze set on fire by the ghost-rock bombs.
Famine’s most common troops are called “faminites.” I understand these things were encountered many years ago, but they weren’t undead. I don’t know what changed, or if the old legends were just wrong. The way it works—and I’ve seen it plenty now—is that these unfortunate souls get infected with a disease that literally starves them to death. As they’re dying, they become wild and ravenous, but don’t usually try to eat their friends if they can get other food instead. Once they come back as undead, it’s a different story. They aren’t satisfied by anything but human flesh.
Unfortunately, faminite outbreaks still occur from time to time. Sometimes you can save those infected before it’s too late, but most times the victims die less than a week after being infected, then come back as little more than a voracious monster that only looks like your Aunt Minnie.
Famine’s undead are hideous faminites. A human infected by their touch wastes slowly, maddeningly, away. He is not under any other creature’s control, nor is he undead, but he is ravenously hungry, and no amount of food can sate him. If no other food presents itself, the victim turns to living flesh.
When the person eventually dies (about 24 hours later), he rises again as a faminite. Note that these are different from the ones that appear in Deadlands: The Weird West. Those didn’t automatically arise as undead. In Hell on Earth, they do.
Plague Zombie: It took a few weeks for anyone to figure out where Pestilence was. (He’s sometimes called the “Conqueror” in the Bible.) I guess “he” had to let some folks waste away before he could raise them as his new army. The bastard finally appeared in Texas on a stark-white horse. I’m told his first “harvest” of dead came from a cemetery outside of Houston, where they’d buried the victims of a recent “tummy twister” outbreak.
The Horseman known as Pestilence raises those who died from horrid diseases into horrors
Warbot: Warbots are a lot like automatons. The factory techs take an undead brain and wire it into the go-box of some massive vehicle or gun.
Cyborg: Remember I told you about deaders earlier? Good. Some of them, those who got snagged by the military, became something even more than Harrowed.
One of the last things to come out of the Last War were cyborgs. Both of the NA and SA had them at about the same time, so the militaries must have been working on them for a while. I don’t know exactly what happens, but they implant bionic parts into the deader’s corpse to make some sort of cross between a Harrowed and an automaton.

Hell on Earth d20 Horrors of the Wasted West

Hell on Earth d20 Horrors of the Wasted West
3.0
Alexander 9000: Originally, this vehicle was a one-of-a-kind prototype built as part of the US Army’s cyborg program. The Army had been experimenting with using the same technology used to make cyborgs to make cyborg combat vehicles.
Most of these attempts failed because the Harrowed human brains implanted in the vehicles simply couldn’t adjust to their new “bodies,” quickly went insane, and were destroyed. The brain of Samuel Wilkins, however, was another matter; his grey matter took to the tank like a duck to water.
Wilkins was a college professor of Greek history at the University of Pennsylvania who had checked the organ donor box on his driver’s license. When he was killed in a car accident his internal organs went to waiting patients; his brain went to the US Army’s testing facility in Montana.
Wilkin’s brain was able to adapt to its alien body and he found that he rather liked being a nearly unstoppable killing machine.
Battle Hound: Some experimentation showed that the same technology that was used to make Harrowed cyborgs could be used in animals. This led to the development of a new line of cybernetic patrol animals.
Fate Eater: Fate Eaters are ghosts of people who died on Judgment Day with unfinished business to complete.
Ghostrock Wraith: Ghost rock consists of damned souls, trapped and sentenced to eternal agony within the mineral they inhabit. When the bombs fell, they unleashed millions of such tortured beings, scattered in radioactive ash. Sometimes, however, a condemned soul has enough will, enough strength, or just enough plumb meanness to escape its material prison. It coalesces from nearby ghost-rock dust, and stalks the night, seeking to share the pain of their existence.
Any being slain by a ghostrock wraith becomes a wraith in 1d4 rounds.
Hands of Hell: Some research lab somewhere in the northwest cooked up this unholy contraption. A hands of Hell is basically a Harrowed human brain in an enclosed protective shell with ten mechanical arms jutting out from all angles. Since the construct frame is very inhuman shaped, all hands of Hell are quite insane.
Head Case: Contrary to legend, head cases are not the monstrous revenants of people who think too much; they weren’t created by demons either.
In the second half of the 20th century, a subculture sprang up around cryogenic freezing technology, which offered its mostly tech-head clients the promise of second life. The clients’ dead body would be frozen and kept on ice in anticipation of a utopian future where benevolent future scientists would cure the victim’s original cause of death. Cryo-enthusiasts on a budget could pay to have only their heads frozen, in hopes that future medical technology could also cure the lack of a body.
Surprise! When the ghost bombs fell, those cryogenic facilities that survived (mostly in strip malls, oddly enough) became cradles of undead. The frozen bodies got up and walked off—without paying their bill!
The frozen heads came to life, too, but couldn’t leave. Their intense frustration combined with the supernatural to give them brain-popping psi powers. When adventurers tried to loot the cryo-labs, the heads used these powers to cow them into servitude. They ordered captive junkers to build them armored helmets with built-in jet-packs for mobility.
Last Man Standing: At abandoned fuel stations along broken stretches of the western highways, or in desolate towns destroyed by Rad Storms and Muties, there was always one man or woman who hunkered down, and refused to give up their land. He or she fought to the last bullet, screaming bloody curses all the way. Eventually they all went down. Some, a rare few, got back up.
Angry spirits of vengeance merged with the last echoes of defiance and created the last man standing; a creature that still defends these way stations and dead towns from anything and everything.
Mojave Hunter Mark 7 King Slayer: That agency was really only one man with a monstrous budget whose mission was to kill off a species of monster. Professor Nathaniel Daniels was contracted by the South to create the last, best hope against the Rattlers. Professor Daniels ran twin experiments to find a solution. Genetically altered snakes to track the beasts were grown to monstrous sizes. DNA was enhanced to increase the snake’s brainpower as well; the goal was canine-like intelligence. Experiment number two was a giant tunnel tank that could carry the firepower to take on the Rattlers on their turf. Each plan had its success and failures, but true success seemed decades away.
That’s when Nathaniel received manitou-influenced inspiration to combine the projects. The biological brains were accustomed to enormous bodies, and the muscle that could be put on a construct’s body could handle the experimental Ghostrock plasma guns needed to blast through miles of granite. Also, a deader brain could heal itself and refuel the gun by devouring Rattler corpses, iron ore, and Ghost-rock deposits, effectively never having to stop. The frame was built to take on the new “King” Mojave Rattlers that had been sighted in the badlands.
Tin Man: Professor Hellstromme created many cyborgs, using corpses for raw materials and brains. Many of his creations became exactly what he had planned, mindless zombie-cyborgs at his complete command. But some of his soldiers regained a shred of sentience over time as bits of memory and consciousness surfaced and formed a loose personality.
Toymaker: Rosanna Marie Wulfe was a mad scientist before the manitou stopped talking. She was a member of the Sons of Sitgreaves (the SOS), one of the few who continued to invent her own ideas and plans without any help. When Velmer developed his G-ray collector, Wulfe already had several devices she wanted to build, and used that to power them. Then the bombs dropped. Wulfe died and came back Harrowed.

Walkin' Dead: A willow wight can animate any corpses buried within reach of its roots. These creatures are considered walking dead.

Weird War Two d20 Blood on the Rhine

Weird War Two d20 Blood on the Rhine
3.0
Reanimant: Reanimants are the dead brought back to a semblance of life through alchemy and harmonic magic.

REVIVIFICATION
This is the ultimate power available to a haunted vehicle—it can bring the dead back to life (or at least a semblance thereof). Because this ability is so powerful, the WM may ban it if he doesn’t want to see characters coming back from the dead in his campaign.
A spirit with this power can hunt down the deceased’s soul and force it back into his body. There’s a catch, though. Unless the vehicle also has Regeneration at level 3, the revived person is going to die again—but this time his soul is trapped in the corpse. Characters revived in this way return as reanimants—a form of undead—and are NPCs under the WM’s control. Sometimes dead is better.
Reviving a character requires the corpse to be left in the vehicle alone overnight. The character remains dead throughout the night as the spirit hunts for his soul and revives with the first light of dawn.
Even if the vehicle has Regeneration at level 3, a revivification attempt is never a sure thing. The character being revived must make a Will save (DC25). If the save is successful, the hero is returned to life as good as new. If the save is failed, he takes 1d4 points of permanent ability damage. This damage is distributed at random, 1 point at a time, among his attributes. A roll of a natural 1 means something went wrong. The exact nature of this is up to the WM. The hero may be a reanimant, he may have someone else’s soul, or anything else the WM wants to have fun with.
The maximum length of time a character can be dead and still be revived depends on the level of Revivification possessed by the vehicle. As long as the corpse is placed in the vehicle within this time frame, it is preserved until the revivification attempt takes place that night.
REVIVIFICATION
Level Revival Limit
1 1 minute per vehicle level
2 1 hour per vehicle level
3 1 day per vehicle level

Weird War Two d20 Horrors of Weird War Two

Weird War Two d20 Horrors of Weird War Two
3.0
Acheri: The acheri is the undead form of a young girl in India who died from disease or illness.
Youngsters killed by acheri-induced disease may rise after 1d4 days as acheri, but they are not under the sire’s control. The acheri makes a Charisma roll (DC 17); on a success, the victim becomes undead itself.
Alraune: Two decades ago, Professor Ten Brinken created her in a foul experiment that even he now freely admits was both repulsive and misguided. Guided by medieval German folklore, Brinken scraped the ground beneath a freshly hanged convict and used his “seed” to impregnate a prostitute. Nine months later, Alraune, named for the mythic mandrake root that grows where a hanged man’s “seed” falls, was born into an unsuspecting world.
Animated Dead: Appearing as strange clockwork and flesh composites, the animated dead represent a high point of Nazi biomechanical engineering. Inspired by run-ins with zombies across the globe, Nazi scientists realized that the human body could be reanimated to function at a basic level. Through electrical and mechanical means, these scientists sought to create a similar creation to what magic had accomplished. The animated dead are the result.
Animated dead are simply human remains that have been filled with a wide assortment of mechanical and hydraulic equipment that allow the body to move as if it were alive. The bodily fluids have been replaced by a bright blue, ionized fluid that pumps though the body via a set of two pumps encased in steel in the abdomen. This fluid is then supercharged with electrical currents that allow the decaying brain matter to operate the embedded machinery.
Asphyxiation Zombie: These unfortunate souls had the non-privilege of participating in one of the Nazi’s most horrific and diabolical experiments. In lesser known concentration camps, the people exterminated by gas were not only killed, but also used as guinea pigs for Hitler’s occult research. Psychoactive gasses were poured in with the normal doses of Zyklon-B to see the results on the human mind. The recipients went rabidly mad shortly before asphyxiating to death in the massive chambers. For fear of the odd mix of chemicals doing damage to other Nazi soldiers and citizens, these corpses were not burned, but buried in mass graves under the former barracks and living spaces that the corpses once occupied. After death, the psychoactive gasses continued to stimulate the muscles in the corpses’ bodies and give them basic drives such as hunger. Their minds are completely wiped of all memory. They only live to satiate their horrendous hunger.
Battle Spirit: The battle spirit is a collection of the restless spirits of those slain on the battlefield, reborn as a giant poltergeist that attacks anyone involved in combat on the battlefield of its birth.
Comprised of the restless spirits of soldiers on both sides of the war, the battle spirit remains dormant until fighting starts nearby and attacks both sides equally.
Carrion Vulture: ?
Dead Man's Helmet: Dead man’s helmets are invisible spirits that occasionally form in helmets worn by soldiers who died traumatically. The dead soldier’s spirit manifests in the helmet, although it fades over time (generally within 4 to 6 weeks after death).
Deserter: Shame and dishonor bind the spirits of deserters who died in the act of running away to the earth. They are forever doomed to flee in fear from both friends and enemies alike.
Der Einzelgaenger The Lone Wolf: The U-90 was one of eight U-boats assigned in 1942 from the 9th Unterseebootsflottille to the Rudeltaktik (better know by the British term “wolf pack”) designated “Wolf.” On July 24, 1942, during an attack on convoy ON-113, the U-90 was destroyed off the coast of Newfoundland. Four solo depth charges from an old four-stacker Canadian destroyer, the HMCS St Croix, ignominiously ended the U-90’s first and only patrol. Those crew members who escaped the initial explosion and the ensuing hull implosions drowned in icy water scant minutes later. All of U-90’s 44 hands were lost. The U-90 had been in active duty on the Atlantic front for only 24 days…and 24 days later the submarine once known as U-90 returned to the service of the Third Reich. Enraged by the prospect of early and inglorious death, Kapitaenleutnant Hans-Juergen Oldoerp and his crew wished for more time in their dying moments. More time in battle. More time to prove themselves. More time for success and the glory of the Fatherland—something, somewhere, heard them.
Explosive Zombie: Explosive zombies are corpses reanimated through dark and sinister magic. Their twisted creator has taken this a step further and filled them with explosives, turning them into mindless walking time bombs.
Finn Haunt: During the dark ages, a race of people, actually small giants called Greater Frisians, inhabited much of present day Holland. In the 5th century, one of the Frisian chieftains, Finn, established a coastal village named Finnsburgh, but was betrayed by the Angle warlord Hengist. Hengist and his retinue were enjoying Finn’s hospitality when they barred the door to the great hall and set fire to it, murdering the entire population of Finnsburgh.
The spirits of Finn and his people have not found rest in the 15 centuries that have since passed since the act of treachery.
Flagellant: Flagellants are a type of reanimant raised by blood mages through dark magic. Far more powerful and intelligent than most zombies, flagellants are created with a single purpose in mind—to drive the German soldier to perform his duty, regardless of the obstacles before him and heedless of the personal cost. In many respects, they are akin to Russian Commissars in the duties they perform. Flagellants have all perished from grievous wounds to their stomachs, the type of wound that left the medic nothing to do but hold the entrails in until the soldier succumbed to loss of blood. Reanimated from their graves, the flagellants now make no attempt to hold back their entrails, allowing them to spew out and trail behind, almost proud that they had suffered such grievous wounds in service of the Reich.
Gangrene: One of the most disgusting and putrid forms of undead in existence; gangrenes are the evil animated remains of those who died from infection. Like a virus themselves, their only purpose is to spread and propagate by attacking the living and infecting them with their disease.
Any humanoid
killed by a gangrene rises as one itself in 1d4 days. The only way to prevent the transformation is to cast protection from evil followed by remove disease on the corpse before the end of that time.
Ghost of the Red Baron: As the war progressed, it became clear that the newly-trained German pilots did not have the same dogfighting capabilities as the Allied pilots. This inability allow the Allied bombers to penetrate farther and farther into Nazi territory. The blood mages had an idea that they believed would “enhance” the air combat abilities of the German pilots. They located the body of Manfred von Richthofen, the late Red Baron. The blood mages sought to create talismans from the Baron’s bones that would transfer some of his piloting skill to the bearer of the talisman. Almost every pilot who bore a talisman was shot down and killed. The project was a complete failure.
Or was it? One pilot, Gregor Itlistien, still possessed his talisman. Itlistien was transferred back to German soil and was promptly shot down by a daring Allied raid. As his FW 190A-8 burned, the distinctive red and black plane of the Red Baron emerged and eradicated the all the Allied planes remaining. The Germans were ecstatic. They had a devastating new weapon.
H.M.S. Sapphire The Dreadnaught: In 1909, an arms race on the ocean led the world’s greatest sea powers to mindlessly produce the immense Dreadnoughts. England secretly sought to advance in the race by covertly producing several ships outside her ports. While the ports of Bristol and Newcastle-on-Tyne were setting the HMS Hercules, Orion, and the Princess Royal to sea, a secret port in South Africa was home to the HMS Sapphire. Her maiden voyage was to England itself so that she and her crew of 160 could join with the rest of the Royal fleet, but her voyage was cut short. On her way to a scheduled stopover in Gibraltar, the hull began to mysteriously creak and buckle. Within seconds, the steam engines that powered the ship shrieked and exploded sending her crew into the dark waters wounded, burned, and near death. As the steam cloud built up around the wailing sailors, the ship and her crew vanished into the Atlantic. Because of her secret nature, the Sapphire and her crew were left to rot in the sea by her nation.
With the Atlantic now saturated with the dead of war, the Sapphire has returned to the waves to claim the lost souls of her countrymen.
Kamikaze Spirit: The ghostly kamikaze spirit has been created by the Kuromaku quite by accident. In the rituals of preparing a living soul of a kamikaze pilot for one final dark-magic enhanced battle against the United States’ fleets, sometimes the soul desires to remain.
The Japanese kamikaze spirit rises from the burning sinking wreckage of the now-deceased kamikaze’s aircraft to seek another plane to crash into those who oppose the Empire of the Sun.
Kill-Roy: Kill-Roy began its existence when Private Roy Sharpes was killed at Pearl Harbor. His spirit longed for vengeance no matter what the cost, and he got it.
Kon-Nichiwa Samurai: The Kuromaku has committed its greatest perversion with the creation of the kon-nichiwa samurai. To prepare for the creation, the Onmyaji take dead bodies and place them in samurai armor. Calling on dark arcane powers and using the mystic Books of Shan, the Onmyaji bring forth spirits of fallen samurai. They then bind these spirits to the empty armored vessels.
Pak Mule: As the war drags on, Germany finds itself faced with a number of challenges as its armed forces are ground down by years of total warfare. The PaK mule is an effort by the Nazi blood mages to address two of these concerns: attrition in the technical combat arms, especially tank and artillery gunners, and the gross obsolescence of the PaK 35/36 antitank gun, a weapon still in widespread use throughout the army.
The PaK 35/36 is an easy to operate and easily transportable gun (so light, in fact, most vehicles could pull it) that has seen wide use in the Spanish Civil War and throughout World War Two. It was originally designed for use against light armor, but even as early as 1940, tank technology was moving forward at such a pace that it was outstripping the capabilities of the gun. There was never enough of the newer antitank weapons, so the Pak 35/36 soldiered on in vast numbers; by 1942, it was derisively known as the “door knocker,” since all it could do was knock on the sides of the Russian tanks it faced.
An attempt to improve effectiveness saw a hollow charge stick bomb (known as HEAT by the US Army) developed specifically for the gun. This new round could penetrate 6 inches of armor, but could only be used at a suicidally short range of 150 meters because it is propelled by what amounts to a blank charge—giving it a low velocity.
Not wishing to see this promising technology wasted, but equally unwilling to risk valuable trained gun crews to operate such a suicidal weapon, Hitler ordered his blood mages to find a solution. Reanimates proved unsatisfactory in the role of gunners, so the PaK Mule was devised.
Essentially, the blood mages married the heads and nervous systems of dead and crippled gun crews recovered from the battlefield, with body parts from other deceased soldiers. The result is an automaton with a gunners’ eye, intuition, and training in a powerfully built and nigh unstoppable package designed to manhandle the PaK 35/36 as a personal weapon into combat.
Panzerschrek: Panzerschrek’s (literally “tank fear”) are spirits of deceased tank crews conjured by blood mages to serve as expendable antitank killers.
The spirits have no ability to speak and no personality to speak off; they are simply tools to be manipulated by blood mages for the sole purpose of stopping enemy tanks. A temporary expedient that was never envisioned for greater utility, the blood mages put little effort into their creation; they are therefore inherently unstable.
To provide a modicum of stability and material cohesion, the blood mages have etched runes into the antitank weapons the panzerschreks have been conjured to wield, effectively binding them to the weapon. Should they become separated from their weapon, the spirit’s material form harmlessly disperses, to reform several days later.
Russian Risers: In Russian graveyards and battlefields sleep its undead protectors. Drawing upon supernatural energy and fierce patriotism, these restless spirits of fallen soldiers wait to again defend the Motherland. Areas where a desperate defense has been erected against an invading force draw the spirits.
The spirits seek out these places and then inhabit the dead husks of former heroes and protectors that have been buried. The spirits usually inhabit the bodies of soldiers who have died on the current front but some have whispered that they have seen rotted corpses in tattered, rotting uniforms used by Russia soldiers who fought against Napoleon Bonaparte.
Upturned: The activity on the Western Front has awakened more than just hatred and monsters. The restless souls of the battlefield dead from prior wars have also taken to the earth so they may quiet it again and regain their eternal slumber.
In areas where shelling and entrenching has been prevalent, soldiers from all sides have upturned bodies from the unmarked graves of the First World War. In most instances these areas have been long abandoned out of respect or fear. However, in cases where the battle now rages on, the dead have awakened. Clawing their way though the thin earth, the mangled, burned, and decayed bodies of the upturned seek to kill the living that disturb their resting ground with the plagues that defeated them.
The upturned are always historically recent dead, as they need their bodies to carry out vengeance on the living for disturbing their sleep. Strung together with rotten sinews and still wearing the uniforms, weapons, and gas masks of their German, French, English, and Russian countrymen, they shamble in small hordes toward their victims, breathing out mustard gas through the holes in their own protective gear and prodding the living with rusted and dulled bayonets atop outdated carbines.
War Geist: War geists are manifestations of spiritual energy that take the form of battlefield noises and visions. In certain cases those who die on the battlefield, paralyzed by extreme shell shock, have never let go of their fear. These formless spirits now wander the earth in search of fear to quench their thirst.

Reanimant: ?

Fading Suns d20

Fading Suns d20
Fading Suns d20
Husks: Husks are clinically dead but animated creatures who quickly become host to all manner of carrion.
A “zombie plague” first erupts among those on the verge of death — soldiers dying of sword wounds, terminally ill patients in Church hospices, or peasants dying of malnutrition. These near-dead suddenly discover a new hunger for life. Possessed by an unnatural strength and bloodlust, they can carve their way through a rural population in no time. Each person they kill also becomes a husk.

Fading Suns d20 Lord Erbian's Stellar Bestiary

Fading Suns d20 Lord Erbian's Stellar Bestiary
Fading Suns d20
Malignatian Husk: Reanimated cadavers have been recorded on all worlds throughout history; the most virulent plague of shambling husks is presently occurring on the Decados planet Malignatius, where Church legions have been attempting to besiege the stronghold of a known necromancer. This sorceror has been calling up local corpses to serve in the ranks of his defending forces, deploying them on the vast blizzard-swept arctic plains that surround his fortress. The husks created in this freezing environment can be especially tough, one Kalinthi officer reports, because even heavily deteriorated tissue is highly resistant to damage when it is frozen hard as ice.

Fantasy Craft Second Printing

Fantasy Craft Second Printing
Fantasy Craft 2e
Ghoul: Ghouls are said to be folk cursed for great transgressions against life — massacre of the innocent, cannibalism, murdering the holy and benign, and worse. Their acts have damned them with endless, unnatural hunger for decaying flesh.
Mummy: Sometimes the dead can’t let go of life. Case in point: mummies, which are the remains of powerful mortals — emperors, high priests, nobles and others of station — risen to reclaim what they possessed before the grave. Mummies retain their former bodies, rotted or desiccated by time or the unholy ceremonies that allowed for their return.
Wight: Wights are age-old victims of pagan sacrifices, animated by the bitter spirits still trapped in their flesh. Their flesh is stretched taut by peat and time, and they return imbued with the chill of death itself. Their mere touch fills a man with bone-chilling dead, enough to bring a stout warrior to his knees or kill a lesser man outright. Victims of this grisly assault become the wight’s eternal companions, driven by the same dark impulses.
A character killed by a wight rises again 1d6 rounds later as a wight.
Ancient Ghoul: An ancient ghoul is a corpulent, withered king, bloated by great feasts on the dead and many years of relative comfort.
Ghostly: Some who die linger, unable or willing to embrace their afterlife. They remain fettered to the physical realm as terrifying apparitions, manifesting to destroy the spirits from unsuspecting adventurers…
Ghostly Hell Hound: ?
Ghostly Goblin Strumpet: A lonesome victim of a horrible hate crime, this angry ghost jerks through the air like a deranged mutant rag doll.
Lich: Liches are the immortal remains of sorcerers or magical creatures that have traded their souls for eternal “life,” and like most unholy bargainers they’ve paid a terrible price.
Lich Necromancer: ?
Lich Royal Dragon: As if dragons weren’t greedy enough, some focus their natural magic ability toward living forever.
Risen: As if dragons weren’t greedy enough, some focus their natural magic ability toward living forever.
Risen Peasant: The walking dead are a common sight in lands infested with necromancers and dread lords, usually as the unfortunate victims of a biological or magical plague.
Risen Watcher in the Dark: Evil overlords must sometimes hunt Watchers when conquering dungeons. The savvy ones reanimate them, gaining access to their mighty abilities without the pesky independence.
Skeletal: Magically animated skeletons are comprised solely of bone with no connecting tissue.
Animate Dead I spell.
Skeletal Man-at-Arms: ?
Skeletal Triceratops: Magically animated skeletons are comprised solely of bone with no connecting tissue.
Vampiric: A character killed by a vampiric creature rises again 1d6 rounds later as a vampiric creature.
A character killed by a vampiric elf nobleman rises again 1d6 rounds later as a vampiric creature.
A character killed by a vampiric chaos beast rises again 1d6 rounds later as a vampiric creature.
Vampiric Elf Nobleman: Centuries ago, this nobleman blasphemed against the gods. They damned him to a life of animalistic bloodlust, which he sates on the front lines of wars he arranges.
Vampiric Chaos Beast: ?
Skeleton I: Animate Dead I spell.
Animate Dead II spell.
Animate Dead III spell.
Animate Dead IV spell.
Animate Dead V spell.
Zombie I: Animate Dead I spell.
Animate Dead II spell.
Animate Dead III spell.
Animate Dead IV spell.
Animate Dead V spell.
Skeleton II: Animate Dead II spell.
Animate Dead III spell.
Animate Dead IV spell.
Animate Dead V spell.
Zombie II: Animate Dead II spell.
Animate Dead III spell.
Animate Dead IV spell.
Animate Dead V spell.
Skeleton III: Animate Dead III spell.
Animate Dead IV spell.
Animate Dead V spell.
Zombie III: Animate Dead III spell.
Animate Dead IV spell.
Animate Dead V spell.
Skeleton IV: Animate Dead IV spell.
Animate Dead V spell.
Zombie IV: Animate Dead IV spell.
Animate Dead V spell.
Skeleton V: Animate Dead V spell.
Zombie V: Animate Dead V spell.
A character killed by a zombie V rises again 1d6 rounds later as a zombie V.
Undead: A supernatural force clothed in the physical or spiritual remains of a once-living creature.

ANIMATE DEAD I
Level: 1 Necromancy
Casting Time: 1 round
Distance: Close
Duration: 1 minute per Casting Level (dismissible, enduring)
Effect: You animate the remains of 1 dead character as a standard NPC with a Threat Level equal to your Casting Level.
• Skeleton: A skeleton may be created from mostly intact bones, whether flesh remains or not.
• Zombie: A zombie may only be created from a mostly intact corpse (including muscle).
With GM approval, you may modify your choice, apply the Skeletal or Risen template template to an NPC from the Rogues Gallery (see page 244), or build a new NPC, so long as it has the Undead Type and a maximum XP value of 40.
An animated skeleton or zombie cannot animate or summon other characters and becomes inert when killed or when this spell ends (whichever comes first). Certain spells and other effects can render animated dead inert earlier.
The skeleton or zombie may not act during the round it appears. Thereafter it follows your commands to the best of its ability. In the absence of instructions the skeleton or zombie falls under the GM’s control, though it continues to serve you as best it perceives it can (e.g. attacking whatever seems to be your enemy, bringing you things it thinks will help you, etc.).
Skeleton I (Medium Undead Walker — 36 XP): Str 10, Dex 10, Con 10, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init II; Atk II; Def III; Res IV; Health II; Comp I; Skills: Acrobatics II, Notice III; Qualities: Damage defiance (edged), damage immunity (bows), ferocity
Attacks/Weapons: Claw I (dmg 1d6 lethal; threat 20) or Bite I (dmg 1d8 lethal; threat 18–20), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the skeleton’s XP value above 40)
Zombie I (Medium Undead Walker — 36 XP): Str 10, Dex 10, Con 10, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init II; Atk III; Def III; Res IV; Health II; Comp I; Skills: Athletics IV, Blend III, Notice IV, Survival III; Qualities: Devour, lumbering, monstrous defense I, shambling
Attacks/Weapons: Claw I (dmg 1d6 lethal; threat 20; qualities: grab) or Bite I (dmg 1d8 lethal; threat 18–20; qualities: grab), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the zombie’s XP value above 40)

ANIMATE DEAD II
Level: 3 Necromancy
Effect: As Animate Dead I, except that you gain 1 skeleton or zombie (max. 60 XP) or 2 skeletons or zombies (max. 40 XP each).
Skeleton II (Medium Undead Walker — 56 XP): Str 10, Dex 12, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init IV; Atk III; Def IV; Res VI; Health IV; Comp I; Skills: Acrobatics II, Notice IV; Qualities: Damage defiance (edged), damage immunity (bows), ferocity, rend
Attacks/Weapons: Claw II (dmg 1d6+1 lethal; threat 19–20; qualities: finesse) or Bite II (dmg 1d8+1 lethal; threat 17–20; qualities: finesse), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the skeleton’s XP value above 60)
Zombie II (Medium Undead Walker — 56 XP): Str 12, Dex 10, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init III; Atk IV; Def IV; Res VI; Health IV; Comp I; Skills: Athletics V, Blend IV, Notice IV, Survival IV; Qualities: Devour, monstrous defense I, shambling
Attacks/Weapons: Claw II (dmg 1d6+1 lethal + debilitating poison; threat 19–20; qualities: grab) or Bite II (dmg 1d8+1 lethal + debilitating poison; threat 17–20; qualities: grab), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the zombie’s XP value above 60)

ANIMATE DEAD III
Level: 5 Necromancy
Effect: As Animate Dead I, except that you gain 1 skeleton or zombie (max. 80 XP), 2 skeletons or zombies (max. 60 XP each), or 4 skeletons or zombies (max. 40 XP each).
Skeleton III (Medium Undead Walker — 76 XP): Str 10, Dex 14, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init V; Atk IV; Def V; Res VII; Health VI; Comp II; Skills: Acrobatics IV, Notice IV; Qualities: Damage defiance (edged), damage immunity (bows), ferocity, rend, tough I
Attacks/Weapons: Claw III (dmg 2d6+2 lethal; threat 19–20; qualities: finesse) or Bite III (dmg 2d8+2 lethal; threat 17–20; qualities: finesse), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the skeleton’s XP value above 80)
Zombie III (Medium Undead Walker — 76 XP): Str 14, Dex 10, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init IV; Atk V; Def V; Res VII; Health VI; Comp II; Skills: Athletics VI, Blend IV, Notice V, Survival IV; Qualities: Devour, monstrous defense I, shambling, tough I
Attacks/Weapons: Claw III (dmg 2d6+2 lethal + debilitating poison; threat 19–20; qualities: grab) or Bite III (dmg 2d8+2 lethal + debilitating poison; threat 17–20; qualities: grab), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the zombie’s XP value above 80)

ANIMATE DEAD IV
Level: 7 Necromancy
Effect: As Animate Dead I, except that you gain 1 skeleton or zombie (max. 100 XP), 2 skeletons or zombies (max. 80 XP each), 4 skeletons or zombies (max. 60 XP each), or 8 skeletons or zombies (max. 40 XP each).
Skeleton IV (Medium Undead Walker — 96 XP): Str 10, Dex 16, Con 16, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init VI; Atk V; Def VI; Res VIII; Health VII; Comp III; Skills: Acrobatics IV, Notice IV; Qualities: Class ability (Sage: assistance I), damage defiance (edged), damage immunity (bows), ferocity, rend, tough I
Attacks/Weapons: Claw III (dmg 2d6+3 lethal; threat 19–20; qualities: finesse) and Bite III (dmg 2d8+3 lethal; threat 17–20; qualities: finesse), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the skeleton’s XP value above 100)
Zombie IV (Medium Undead Walker — 96 XP): Str 16, Dex 10, Con 16, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init V; Atk V; Def V; Res VIII; Health VII; Comp III; Skills: Athletics VI, Blend IV, Notice V, Survival IV; Qualities: Class ability (Sage: assistance I), devour, monstrous defense I, shambling, tough I
Attacks/Weapons: Claw III (dmg 2d6+3 lethal + debilitating poison; threat 19–20; qualities: grab) and Bite III (dmg 2d8+3 lethal + debilitating poison; threat 17–20; qualities: grab), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the zombie’s XP value above 100)

ANIMATE DEAD V
Level: 9 Necromancy
Effect: As Animate Dead I, except that you gain 1 skeleton or zombie (max. 120 XP), 2 skeletons or zombies (max. 100 XP each), 4 skeletons or zombies (max. 80 XP each), 8 skeletons or zombies (max. 60 XP each), or 16 skeletons or zombies (max. 40 XP each).
Skeleton V (Medium Undead Walker — 116 XP): Str 10, Dex 18, Con 18, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init VII; Atk VI; Def VII; Res VIII; Health VIII; Comp IV; Skills: Acrobatics V, Notice V; Qualities: Class ability (Sage: assistance I), damage defiance (edged), damage immunity (bows), ferocity, rend, tough I, treacherous
Attacks/Weapons: Claw IV (dmg 2d6+4 lethal; threat 19–20; qualities: finesse) and Bite IV (dmg 2d8+4 lethal; threat 17–20; qualities: finesse), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the skeleton’s XP value above 120)
Zombie V (Medium Undead Walker — 116 XP): Str 18, Dex 10, Con 18, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 10; SZ M (Reach 1); Spd 30 ft. ground; Init VI; Atk VI; Def VI; Res VIII; Health VIII; Comp IV; Skills: Athletics VI, Blend V, Notice V, Survival V; Qualities: Class ability (Sage: assistance I), devour, killing conversion, monstrous defense I, shambling, tough I
Attacks/Weapons: Claw IV (dmg 2d6+4 lethal + debilitating poison; threat 19–20; qualities: grab) and Bite IV (dmg 2d8+4 lethal + debilitating poison; threat 17–20; qualities: grab), as appropriate to the remains + any weapons carried in life (so long as they don’t increase the zombie’s XP value above 120)