Most powerful undead?

[MoogleEmpMog]

Mummies seem like the most 'civic-minded' undead, so they would be a good place to start.

Personally, I would use a Hunefer (the god-mummies from the ELH), simply because of their awesome flavor. This fiendish undead emperor spends the entire campaign trying to raise his divine self from the dead, then when he (invariably) suceeds, he discovers that his divine self find him a puny and feeble reminder of its death.

The hunefer then becomes so angry that he offers his campaign-long foes, the PCs, aid against the god he once was.

 

[Knight Otu]

As for powerful, atropal and demilich are pretty much the biggest guys out there. Demiliches in 3e are more involved in the mortal world than the demiliches of 2e (they're mobile!), and atropals have that spark of divinity.

Hunefers, as deity-mummies, also have that spark of divinity, and might be a good choice.

Death Knights, as mentioned, have more of a pawn aspect, though a undead warrior king might be a death knight (or, if I may plug one of my creations, a slaughterwar master).

Vampires might work, but in D&D, they are quite narrowly defined.

Normal liches should work quite well. Maybe the king is a mystic theurge?

 

[dren]

I would say a lich, but that's really been done to "death."

May I recommend an advanced nightwalker version of the nightshade; a gargantuan version can be up to 42 HD, with a wicked evil gaze, desecration,
item crushing, summon undead & spells. Plus, since at a minimum it's 20 ft tall, you don't have to have people recognizing what it is, there could be rumours that this is a storm giant or titan undead. Plus, since it's already in the MM, you probably won't need to go out an buy a book.

 

[LostSoul]

I would say something with a lot of class levels.

It imght be fun to have a vampire bad guy who runs a nice, "good" kingdom. Everyone is fat and healthy, living in luxury, etc. The monsters are taken care of (at night), and life is good.

Except that the king demands a number of children sent to be trained in his service every month or year or whatever. Nobody sees those children again.

But we don't like to think about that, because life is so good everywhere else. We don't want to rock the boat.

 

[Gorilla726]

Thanks everyone. I think I'm coming up with a good idea... Hehehe. I'm thinking of having the King have turned himself into a Lich and slowly recruit the other undead in the area to add more to their ranks, however they may do it. There's going to be a decent amount of Vampires who keep humans as slaves/servants/cattle. And eventually the King is going to become a lot more powerful and the area which the undead populate is going to grow and grow. I need to think of a way the King (who was a Magic-User before he Lich-ed himself) can cast something along the lines of a permanent fog cloud over the entire area to make it darker all hours of the day. I also want to eventually have it such an amazing undead area that the Death Knights will come and base their operations out of it (if I remember correctly there are only twelve of them and I always thought they should work together, so here's my chance). Once I finish I'm going to run it as an entirely undead campaign, where even the players are undead. Any thoughts?

Gorilla

 

[Pants]

I would say something with a lot of class levels.

It imght be fun to have a vampire bad guy who runs a nice, "good" kingdom. Everyone is fat and healthy, living in luxury, etc. The monsters are taken care of (at night), and life is good.

Except that the king demands a number of children sent to be trained in his service every month or year or whatever. Nobody sees those children again.

But we don't like to think about that, because life is so good everywhere else. We don't want to rock the boat.

I need to stop pimping Eberron...

Pick up the Eberron Campaign Setting and read about the country of Karrnath. A LE Vampire runs the country and while the country is under martial law, the people are happy and very patriotic. The king only wants what's best for his people and keeps a small harem of very loyal subjects to 'feed' upon. He never feeds from one person more than once during a week and never takes more than the person can handle. He manages to keep his Vampirism hidden from the locales and only a select few know about it.

I love you Eberron.

 

[Cheerful Coffin]

I say you suprise your crew. There could be a vampire and a greater vampire, a lich, but none of them are really "boss".

Turns out the boss is a kurge from Dungeon #87.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

A LE Vampire runs the country and while the country is under martial law, the people are happy and very patriotic. The king only wants what's best for his people and keeps a small harem of very loyal subjects to 'feed' upon. He never feeds from one person more than once during a week and never takes more than the person can handle. He manages to keep his Vampirism hidden from the locales and only a select few know about it.

So what exactly makes this vampire evil?

 

[LostSoul]

I read this short story once about this perfect city where everyone was happy and life was good. But all of it was based on the fact that one person was abused by everyone. Everyone knew about it and nobody talked about it. They would spit at him when they walked by, kick him, whatever.

It was a pretty neat idea. Kinda creepy.

I guess what makes that LE Vampire guy Evil (Eberron is cool! I'll have to check it out) is that he kills people for his own pleasure.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

I guess what makes that LE Vampire guy Evil (Eberron is cool! I'll have to check it out) is that he kills people for his own pleasure.

Does he, though? According to the previous poster, he only feeds from willing sycophants, and never takes enough to kill them...