Good non-evocation anti-undead spells?

Grog

First Post
I need some ideas for anti-undead spells for a 10th level wizard with Evocation barred. Are there any out there, or will I be relegated to just buffing my party members?
 

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Undeath to Death? Ahhh... darn, that's one level away still! ;)

How about ...

PHB: Melf's Acid Arrow, Web, Halt Undead, Flame Arrow, Slow, Evard's Black Tentacles, Polymorph Other (?), Summon Monster V, Shadow Evocation, Telekinesis

MoF: Mestil's Acid Breath

That enough arsenal to fight undead?

Bye
Thanee
 
Last edited:

Thanee said:
Undeath to Death? Ahhh... darn, that's one level away still! ;)

Assuming 3.5 ... how about ...

Melf's Acid Arrow, Web, Slow, Evard's Black Tentacles, Summon Monster V, Shadow Evocation, Baleful Polymorph, Telekinesis

Bye
Thanee

Baleful Polymorph doesn't affect objects...does it?
 


Thanee said:
Uhm... no, but undeads are not objects!?

No, but because they don't have a Con score, they're immune to any effect requiring a Fort save unless it also affects objects.

Thanks for the other suggestions, though.
 

Minor Image.

And no, I'm not kidding.

Minor Image allows you to make figments of a group of combatants. While the spell description says "an object, creature or force" - the actual example of what that means is "several orcs fighting".

The way figments work is that they appear real until they are interacted with. This means that against mindless undead, for example, you can keep them in boxes forever. Skeletons do not, inherently, walk into walls, so if you surround them with walls they will just stand there until someone orders them through or the party hacks them to pieces.

Against the beligerent near-mindless undead, you can do similar things. A shadow chases after the nearest perceived creature, which means that you can lead it on a merry goose chase with illusions forever.

Against intelligent undead, you've got a problem, but you can still buy your party a whole round every time you cast an illusion of a bunch of combatants. It doesn't even get a Will save until after it attacks the "enemies" you've "conjured".

A properly sneaky Illusion can be as good as several rounds of attacks from the whole party. And since Undead have crap for hit points - that's usually plenty.

-Frank
 

Minor Image.

And no, I'm not kidding.

Minor Image allows you to make figments of a group of combatants. While the spell description says "an object, creature or force" - the actual example of what that means is "several orcs fighting".

The way figments work is that they appear real until they are interacted with. This means that against mindless undead, for example, you can keep them in boxes forever. Skeletons do not, inherently, walk into walls, so if you surround them with walls they will just stand there until someone orders them through or the party hacks them to pieces.

Against the beligerent near-mindless undead, you can do similar things. A shadow chases after the nearest perceived creature, which means that you can lead it on a merry goose chase with illusions forever.

Against intelligent undead, you've got a problem, but you can still buy your party a whole round every time you cast an illusion of a bunch of combatants. It doesn't even get a Will save until after it attacks the "enemies" you've "conjured".

A properly sneaky Illusion can be as good as several rounds of attacks from the whole party. And since Undead have crap for hit points - that's usually plenty.

-Frank
 



FrankTrollman said:
The way figments work is that they appear real until they are interacted with. This means that against mindless undead, for example, you can keep them in boxes forever. Skeletons do not, inherently, walk into walls, so if you surround them with walls they will just stand there until someone orders them through or the party hacks them to pieces.

-Frank

Interaction does not require a 'mind.' Interaction has to do with two entities performing an action where one causes a reaction from the other. Physical interaction is enough.

Mindless undead are not truly mindless. As you noted, they follow directions and perceive their surroundings. They have some capacity to process information. Otherwise, they would not be able to process simple commands. If an evil cleric commands a skelton to 'kill anyone who enters this chamber' (which is the example given in the MM for a legit skeleton command), the skeleton must be able to understand how to kill a living creature, it must understand what an intruder is and it must understand what defines the chamber.

When they come across something that appears to defy their perceptions, they must process how to deal with the flaw. This is done with a saving throw, the same as for other creatures.

Had they intended for mindless undead to get no save versus figments, they would have spelled it out in the rules. Unless I missed it somewhere, this was not written into 3.5.
 

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