D&D 5E PC wants to become undead

[Quickleaf]

My current campaign (Egyptian-themed) includes not one, but two undead PCs. I wrote an "Undead" feat for just this occasion (which also involves a dizzying array of spell immunities, beneficial spells that do not work on you, and other strangeness).

One was murdered and his patron tried to have him resurrected a day past his "expiration date", and instead he came back as a partially embalmed undead.

The other was tricked by a ghul (undead genie) into giving up his heart, which was trapped in a canopic jar, turning him into a unique type of undead.

 

[Maxperson]

I would encourage the player (and character) to find other avenues to immortality, personally. In my games, the PC would become an NPC as soon as they became undead.

But for the sake of trying to be helpful, what class is the PC?

Offhand, my suggestions would be a ghast, wight, or wraith, depending on the player's goals.

1. Work with the player to come up with a new and unique undead type.
2. There are good liches in D&D and I doubt murder is part of that process. Archlich and Baelnorn are the two I know about.

 

[Imaculata]

I would come up with a quest for immortality, that does not require evil acts at all. Then along the way to the goal, confront the pc with characters that are already immortal, and their view on immortality. There is so much material here for great roleplaying.

 

[Baldurs_Underdark]

Thinking a little outside the (D&D) box, in the Discworld, there is a clan of Igors. These are basically stitched together with replacement body parts (including spare hearts, etc.). It's not undead, but may still get a lot more years than those without spares.

Igors

The Igors are a recurring set of characters in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of novels. They are members of a clan of servants from the region of Überwald, all of which are named Igor. The Igors are based partially upon Mary Shelley's Frankenstein's Monster, and partially upon the...

discworld.fandom.com

 

[Mannahnin]

Unless horribly disruptive I am generally open to trying to make the in-character goals playable in some fashion. the other PC's are also going for kinda wierd stuff. I'm ok with that stuff.
We are playing a modified Storm King's Thunder campaign.
The character build is a half gnome arcane trickster thief named Jed. So far he has mostly just been focused on throwing daggers. Only 4th level at this point.
He really isn't all that much of a power-gamer.
In all honesty I think the real-out-of-game reason that he wants to be undead is that he finds the name "Undead Jed" to be amusing. So he is developing an in-character personality reason to be an undead.
Yes, I believe he wants to keep playing the PC.

I think a rotting smelly zombie would make being a thief very difficult (but I might find it entertaining).
I think he wants to be something that he could manage to pass as a 'normal' living race unless someone looks real close.
I don't think the other players or characters would have too much of a problem with it. Although if the choice required him to kill large numbers of innocents, one of the PC's would have an issue if he finds out about it. (I thought the lich lore said you had to sacrifice massive numbers or people to the ritual. But I may be remembering a previous edition.)"

Ok, useful info.

So your world allows for some weirdness/gonzo and you're supportive of PCs achieving these kinds of things.

And you think the main reason he's doing it is for the pun of the name and the novelty of the character concept.

As long as it doesn't break the mood/theme of the game, it's certainly doable. It sounds like you want to go with a low-power template solution, like the Wildemount Hollow One or the Undead feat Quickleaf mentioned inventing.

In terms of how to implement it in fluff, I liked Quickleaf's ideas about bargaining with a supernatural (possibly also undead) power for the state, and that idea about giving up his heart/getting the Undead status as a curse. Add a couple of weaknesses, like vulnerability to Radiant damage, and maybe some penalty in sunlight, in addition to the benefits of not needing to breathe, eat or drink, and possibly not needing to sleep.

I played a Revenant character in 4th ed for a campaign, who I described as an intelligent zombie-type. It was an evil/neutral bad-guys campaign, starting at mid level, where the party were all magically bound servants of a powerful evil wizard/lich. In my background, my character was a powerful warrior who had died in an attempt to get free of the magical enslavement, and the evil wizard had raised him as undead and forced him to continue serving. So we did a lot of evil stuff as agents of the big bad, but with the overarching goal of finding magical means to free ourselves and strike him down. It was a pretty great game. From a rules perspective, we just used the rules for Revenant, which gave me some Undead traits and the ability to function (albeit at more limited capacity) below 0 HP, with feats that represented being the Goliath race in life, which gave me access to more damage-resisting powers. So he could be incredibly tough and hard to kill. That character soaked SO much damage.

 

[Al2O3]

So, it seems that WotC published a good answer in the latest Unearthed Arcana, after the last reply to this thread.

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dnd.wizards.com

There are some partially undead lineages there, including rules for changing your original race during a campaign and possible stories for how someone got that lineage.

 

[Weiley31]

Today's UA gave us the Gothic Lineage and it has the Dhampir in it. It's more of a Lineage that seems to override your racial abilities (?) But it allows ya to be Humanoid and Undead.

 

[see]

(Nevermind, I thought I was at the end of the thread, and I wasn't, issue already covered.)

 

[see]

(Nevermind, I thought I was at the end of the thread, and I wasn't, already mentioned.)

 

[ElterAgo]

Just thought I'd let you folks know the direction his thoughts are currently leaning. He thinks he might try to make a deal with a vampire to turn him then release him.