D&D General have we had a player race of undead?

[MGibster]

This kind of OMG OVERPOWERED!!! line worked before a zillion people played Warforged, which are exactly what you're describing - "an immortal who doesn't age and can ignore a vast swath of the messy biological necessities of the living".

Warforged are a great example of a new race that fits within the context of the setting they were created for, and I certainly think you could do the same with an undead race.

 

[Kurotowa]

I assume it is a cope out for why necromancers have to be evil as people do not what to question why something is wrong beyond god/feeling say so hence 5e adding of lich needing fuel.

Yes, that is certainly a take you obviously have.

 

[Tonguez]

There were others, they weren't a total one off. I'm trying to remember the name but there were a number of you trawled the various Monstrous Compendium appendixes and so on. For example there was some kind of Elf Lich which was positive energy, and I know the art was by Tony DiTerlizzi - it was in a Forgotten Realm MC appendix.

Baelnorns? They were non-evil aligned but there is no mention of positive energy in their creation. There were also archliches which were non-elfs who were also not evil and instead dedicated beyond death to pursuing a noble cause. Both liche-kind were still unnatural and could paralyse with a touch though.

zombies might eat brains, but theres no reason for revenants, ghosts or mummy to hate the living. Undead as guardians protector their tombs is a good enough reason for them to be antagonistic to tomb robbers.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

In 5e most undead have a decent list of immunities or resistances. Taking the revenant as a conceptually sort of PC friendly model they get:

Damage Resistances necrotic, psychic
Damage Immunities poison
Condition Immunities charmed, exhaustion, frightened, paralyzed, poisoned, stunned

Yeah I always personally felt like the 5E list was excessive and made some limited sense for powerful non-free-willed undead, but none at all for free-willed ones, particularly not ones with semi-operative corporeal bodies, and where those conditions could be applied from sources that, conceptually, would mess with a ghost or wight or whatever.

So like taking your handy listing, I'd say, even NPC undead should almost certainly lose:

Resistance to Psychic damage
Immunity to Charmed, Frightened, Paralyzed, Stunned

None of that makes a huge amount of sense, and some of it is actively perverse - I mean, in fiction, free-willed undead certainly have emotions, and typically can even feel fear and like/dislike things - especially bloody Revenants! Paralyzed and Stunned should absolutely be possible to inflict on most corporeal Undead, esp. as they're often from highly physical sources.

There's no earthly reason Psychic damage shouldn't work on Undead of any kind. If anything it should be one of the more effective kinds of damage.

Re: poison I note that the PC construct/undead template already has that:

• You have advantage on saving throws against being poisoned, and you have resistance to poison damage.

Personally I think for corporeal undead with semi-functional bodies like Revenants and Vampires they should have resistance not immunity (esp. as "vampire drinks poisoned blood" or similar is a classic fantasy/horror trope). For your Lord Soths and Zombies and so on full-on immunity to both makes sense. Exhaustion immunity makes sense for NPC undead (esp. Revenants who are legendarily relentless), but given that PC undead already have reduced sleep is probably unnecessary (I doubt it would break much RAW, but I know a lot of people have house rules making more use of Exhaustion than RAW does).

So the only remaining question is Necrotic damage. It's a fairly good Resistance to have, but not nearly as good as Fire damage (23 monsters in the MM do Necrotic, vs 46 in the MM do Fire, based on what I can find). Could take or leave.

I think the D&D of ancient times (pre-OD&D!) and 4E both hit on the right approach for someone wanting to be a "serious" undead, which is to make it a class (or in 5E, probably a subclass*). Ancient D&D had Vampire as a class (indeed the Cleric class was created in reaction to this), even if it never made it to a rulebook (but OD&D specifically says "Yo if your player wants to be something wack and you're into it, go for it!" - giving a dragon as an example, just saying they should have to start weak and get strong, like other classes). 4E's Vampire class was solid if not particularly optimal.

* = I dunno if it was a UA but I feel like there was one already.

 

[Voadam]

Re: poison I note that the PC construct/undead template already has that:

• You have advantage on saving throws against being poisoned, and you have resistance to poison damage.

That's a bit weird when it comes up in play. Narratively it seems like it should not apply for some category of things.

I run a game with a warforged PC who is narratively a full robot. Poison just seems like something in the narration a robot should not be affected by, not just get advantage or resistance.

Living dead Rasputin downing tons of poisoned vodka with no effect seems appropriate.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Yes, that is certainly a take you obviously have.

evil being that which is seen as unnatural and breaks the order of nature starts looking like rot when it is through unnatural means one makes it past their first frost, others have other compelling reasons.

undead as antagonists is fine to me but them just having to be evil without even options limits stories as it butchers even the tragic ones.

I do not need made of evil for a skeleton to want me gone, it also limits what undead could be.

 

[Weiley31]

why would the undead have an all-consuming need to kill the living?

Various reasons ranging from outright jealousy that the living can still "do things" they can't anymore, personal business/baggage/fetters keeping them from moving on**, being in a crappy mood from being just dead now in general, evil Necromancer, the need to feed on the energy generated from living beings, blood, various other *insert other pop culture desires, and personality being potentially warped due this new nature now.

Alignment may affect whether or not those circumstances on whether or not said Undead preys on the living or not.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Various reasons ranging from outright jealousy that the living can still "do things" they can't anymore, personal business/baggage/fetters keeping them from moving on**, being in a crappy mood from being just dead now in general, evil Necromancer, the need to feed on the energy generated from living beings, blood, various other *insert other pop culture desires, and personality being potentially warped due this new nature now.

Alignment may affect whether or not those circumstances on whether or not said Undead preys on the living or not.

so all I am seeing is more reason the has to hate all living just because is foolish

 

[Weiley31]

so all I am seeing is more reason the has to hate all living just because is foolish

Look: If I couldn't enjoy pizza anymore too, I'd be hella mad at the living too.

 

[Kurotowa]

evil being that which is seen as unnatural and breaks the order of nature starts looking like rot when it is through unnatural means one makes it past their first frost, others have other compelling reasons.

undead as antagonists is fine to me but them just having to be evil without even options limits stories as it butchers even the tragic ones.

I do not need made of evil for a skeleton to want me gone, it also limits what undead could be.

I'm all for the shift to treating orcs and goblins as real people and not ethnic stereotypes. I see plenty of room for ghosts and ancestor spirits to be benevolent (or at least non-malevolent) post-death entities. But the undead, at least as defined by official game lore, are up there with demons and mind flayers as inherently hostile to humanoid life. And I'm okay with that.

It fits with their narrative heritage, where the fools who think they can negotiate with vampires or that their loved one's hungry zombie corpse can still be reasoned with are the ones who end up lunch. It fits with their game lore, where the undead are animated by negative energy that's inherently antithetical to life. It fits with their game function, which is to be a clear evil that can be fought directly and without compunction.

Now, it's possible to do something else with the undead. Heck, I played my share of Vampire: the Masquerade back in the 90s. But as I got older I've grown less fond of vampire sob stories about they feel really bad about all the terrible things they do. So if you want to create worlds of selfless necromancers elevating the worthy into deathless immortals that can coexist seamlessly with the living, go right ahead. I'll continue to enjoy my games of Smiting the undead scourge before they murder a village of innocents.

The only difference is that one playstyle is going to continue to get official support and the other isn't. That doesn't have to be a value judgment if you don't want to make it one. Just don't get upset or confused as to why one is getting official support and the other isn't.