Special Conversion Thread: Moldvay's Undead

[freyar]

Hmm, could borrow things from the dread zombies, too.

I'd say that fast healing and the immunities might make sense. Maybe some kind of aura like the sickening cloud, too, but I'm not so sure.

Another necromancy-related idea is to make part of his slam(?) damage negative energy.

 

[demiurge1138]

Fast healing, immunities, and disease I all like. I think we should borrow a page from Green Ronin's dread zombies and give him improved grab plus brain eating.

Demiurge out.

 

[freyar]

You know, I'm not so fond of the disease (not a strong opinion), but I do like the brain eating a lot.

 

[Shade]

Mmmm...brains.

We could also look at the other zombielike beings from the same article that we haven't converted yet for inspiration.

I seem to recall a zombie lord in the Baldur's Gate or Icewind Dale games that reminded me a bit of this guy.

 

[Shade]

Added to Homebrews.

 

[demiurge1138]

Le Grande Zombi should be able to pull from the Death, Destruction and Evil domains, I think. I could be persuaded to swap Destruction for Darkness or Madness if we wanted to pull from the SRD's "additional domains".

Demiurge out.

 

[freyar]

This guy is a real masher, so we could give him all 5 domains. But if we restrict to 3, I think I like Death, Darkness, and Evil.

 

[Shade]

Yeah, let's go with all five.

Anyone wanna tackle the brain eating ability?

 

[freyar]

Now you're really back!

Can't think of anything with brain-eating in the SRD, but we can go with GRR's version:

Brain Consumption (Ex): When the dread zombie makes a successful grapple check to deal damage with its bite attack against a pinned or helpless living foe, the later must succeed on a Fort save (DC 10 +1/2 HD +Str) or die as the dread zombie consumes its brain. Creatures immune to critical hits and those with multiple heads are not killed by this attack.

Can't really think of much to improve on this. We could look up the illithid, also.

 

[demiurge1138]

I agree that pinning/helpless opponents -> Str based Fort DC is the way to go. I liked it so much that I used it in my mi-go conversion:


Extract Brain (Ex) A dweller in darkness can remove a pinned opponent’s brain with the clever blades tipping its tail as a standard action. The pinned foe must make a DC 17 Fortitude save or have its brain removed; on a successful save, the victim takes 1d4 points of Intelligence drain from the trauma. A creature whose brain is removed is effectively dead, unless it does not require a brain (such as an undead) or has multiple heads. The brain itself is still, horrifyingly, alive; it is engulfed by the hollow within the dweller in darkness’ tail and preserved in an oily secretion for up to a week before it finally dies. The save DC is Strength based.

Demiurge out.