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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dannyalcatraz" data-source="post: 5113568" data-attributes="member: 19675">Believe it or not, we really are trying to help you.Just one last attempt here on the "start 'em off living" tack: as pointed out by Jhalen, its unlikely that a "weak" or "weakened" necromancer is going to have some non-rotting corpses of adventurers just lying around.  Its even more unlikely that he'll have the ability to raise them all up.From a storytelling standpoint, it may be disruptive of your players' suspension of disbelief.It is far more likely that he'd have a metamagic Feat like <a href="http://realmshelps.dandello.net/cgi-bin/feats.pl?Fell_Animate" target="_blank">Fell Animate</a> that would let him instantly raise up foes he's just killed as zombies, ready to do his bidding.  Given that feat's existence, its just a HR away to have Fell Animate be but the first part of a Feat Tree, with each successive feat creating more and more powerful undead...no gear needed, just some last few high-level slots filled with metamagically enhanced damage (or otherwise lethal) attack spells- preferably AoE ones, at that.And it doesn't change your plotline at all from that point on.  They're still at his beck and call.  They still have to find those goodies he sends them out for...until one or more of them find a way to break their bond to him.And even if they all slip their supernatural bonds, they're still undead.To answer your question, though, starting them off as most low-level undead makes for a bad fit- they're usually little better than necromantically animated automatons.  Now, its possible that your necromancer has some kind of special spell that can force an intelligent mind back into such a corpse, but it doesn't exist in any product I can name.  My guess is that if it did, it would also be beyond the power of a "weakened" spellcaster.So, corporeal intelligent undead are what you need, <a href="http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/ghoul.htm" target="_blank">Ghouls</a> or <a href="http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/wight.htm" target="_blank">Wights</a> probably fit the bill quite well, but are just a bit more powerful than typical starting PCs.  Ghouls can paralyze with a touch.  Wights do energy drains.  A single Ghoul or Wight could easily take a group of 1st level PCs- a party full of them would be a scourge that a small town would be seeking adventurers to take down.  Add to that whatever class levels they may have- feats, spells, etc. and it gets ugly.I'd avoid any of the incorporeal ones for this campaign- the power level of those is just a bit too much if you want to run a "starting level" campaign with incorporeal undead PCs.  You won't be able to challenge them at all for a LONG time.Ghosts, Vampires and Liches are just far too powerful for starting PCs unless you really do go for something like a full-on Ghostwalk campaign.  And even then, you have the problem of just how a "weak" spellcaster would raise up such powerful beings without being destroyed shortly thereafter.Personally, I don't see a way to have a party of low-level intelligent corporeal undead PCs balanced against the typical challenges of a low-level campaign.</blockquote>

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