Undead Origins

[Voadam]

5e Creature Decks: Constructs, Giants, Humanoids, Undead
5e
Ghost: ?
Ghoul: ?
Ghoul Ghast: ?
Lich: ?
Mummy: ?
Mummy Lord: ?
Shadow: If a non-evil humanoid dies from [a shadow's strength drain] attack, a new shadow rises from the corpse 1d4 hrs later.
Skeleton: ?
Skeleton Minotaur: ?
Skeleton Warhorse: ?
Specter: Wraith's Create Specter power.
Vampire: ?
Vampire Spawn: ?
Wight: ?
Will-o'-Wisp: ?
Wraith: ?
Zombie: A humanoid slain by [a wight's life drain] attack rises 24 hrs later as a zombie under the wight's control, unless the humanoid is restored to life or its body is destroyed.
Zombie Ogre: ?

Create Specter Targets a humanoid within 10 feet of it that has been dead no longer than 1 min & died violently. Target's spirit rises as a specter in the space of its corpse or in the nearest unoccupied space. Specter is under the wraith's control. Wraith can have no more than seven specters under its control at one time.

 

[Voadam]

5e Creature Decks: More Constructs, Giants, Humanoids, & Undead
5e
Berbalang: ?
Bodak: A humanoid slain [by a bodak's death gaze] & then buried in the ground rises as a bodak the following night.
Crypt Thing: ?
Crypt Guardian: ?
Devourer: ?
Draugr: ?
Huecuva: ?
Mohrg: ?
Zombie: Humanoid creatures killed by a mohrg rise immediately as zombies under the mohrg's control.
Penanggalan: ?
Manananggal: When [a penanggalan] slays female humanoid w/bite drain, if foe had 10+ HD, rises as manananggal (penanggalan w/½ the HD & no Hex or Create Spawn) at next sunset. Manananggal is under creator's command, & remains enslaved until creator's destruction. May have enslaved spawn totaling up to 2x its HD; spawn it creates beyond this are free-willed.
Enslaved Spawn: ?
Free-Willed Spawn: ?
Phantom Armor: ?
Shadow Greater: ?
Shadow: If a non-evil humanoid dies from [a greater shadow's strength drain] attack, a new shadow rises from the corpse 1d4 hrs later.
Skeleton Warrior: Transformation into skeleton warrior traps warrior's soul in golden circlet.

 

[Voadam]

5E Halloween Mini-Dungeon: The Horror of Ochre Grove
5e
Wraith, Invoked Spirit, Restless Spirit of Hammond Gresham: Victor harbors a dark secret unknown even to his family – he’s a murderer.
Hammond Gresham owned the neighboring farm and founded his own distillery, and his product was becoming popular enough to outsell the Cornelius stock. Hammond and his mistress, Margaret Weber (who is also sister of his late wife, Anna), worked feverishly to keep pace with their more experienced neighbors. Their success was something that Victor Cornelius could not stand for.
Falsely accusing Hammond of working land owned by the Cornelius estate, Victor attempted to thwart his competition through legal subversion. However, when the land warrants he presented were discovered to be forgeries, the town council dismissed his claim. A few weeks later Hammond Gresham disappeared.
Margaret accused Victor of foul play, but neither a sign of struggle nor a body were to be discovered. Since Hammond had no wife or heirs, when the Gresham farm inevitably fell into tax debt it was auctioned by the council to settle the balance.
The Cornelius family won the bid. In retribution for the claims of forgery levied against Victor, he evicted Margaret from the property and had the farmhouse razed.
That was ten years ago.
Margaret is actually an evil enchantress (use oni statistics but treat as Medium size) who jealously poisoned her sister and seduced Hammond, with whom she had fallen madly in love.
When Victor murdered Hammond and banished Margaret, she fled into the forest to bide her time, scheming her ultimate revenge. She eventually summoned an incubus named Keuxahl, who swore a pact to do her bidding. Keuxahl carries a rope of entanglement, with which it tries to capture foes for experimentation and manipulation, and a book of profane ritual magic.
Using the fiend’s dark power, Margaret has now summoned the restless spirit of Hammond and commands him to take vengeance upon the Cornelius family. The invoked spirit of Hammond takes the form of a wraith riding a nightmare as a mount.

 

[Voadam]

5e Harn Bestiary
5e
Amorvrus: ?
Gulmorvrus: A humanoid slain by [a gulmorvrus' shadow's embrace] attack rises 1 minute later as a gulmorvrus, unless it is restored to life or its body is destroyed in the meantime.
A humanoid slain by [an amorvrus's life drain] attack rises 1 minute later as a gulmorvrus under the amorvrus' control, unless it is restored to life or its body is destroyed in the meantime.
A humanoid slain by [an amorvrus's] Shadow of Bukrai suffers the same effect as if killed by the amorvrus’ Life Drain.

 

[Voadam]

5e Heaven & Hell
5e
Celestian Bennu: ?
Celestian Blessed: ?
Celestian Saint: Of the souls who go to Celestia, the most militant are the saints.
Celestian Symbol: ?
Celestian Warrior: Although there are many souls who make it to Celestia, not all are cut out for combat. These few, often warriors in life who took up just causes, put their skills to good use in the afterlife on behalf of the divine.
Damned Discordant: ?
Damned Falsifier: These wretches inhabit the Tenth Bolgia of the Eighth Circle, that of falsifiers. As they were a disease on society, they are diseased here, including everything from alchemists to imposters, counterfeiters to perjurers.
Damned Greedy: These souls inhabit the Fourth Circle of Infernus, Avarus, where hoarders and the profligate roll boulders toward each other, each in turn thinking the other is in the wrong. Neither see the futility of their endeavor.
Damned Heated: ?
Damned Heated Blasphemer: Blasphemers committed crimes against the gods, but it also includes sodomites and usurers who committed crimes against nature and art, respectively. Blasphemers suffer eternally in the Plain of Burning Sand in the Seventh Circle, and they can use the shimmering heat to their advantage in combat.
Damned Heated Sodomite: Blasphemers committed crimes against the gods, but the heated also include sodomites and usurers who committed crimes against nature and art, respectively.
Damned Heated Usurer: Blasphemers committed crimes against the gods, but the heated also include sodomites and usurers who committed crimes against nature and art, respectively.
Damned Fraudulent: ?
Damned Heretic: Heretics are punished in flaming tombs on the Sixth Circle, which makes them excellent underground troops.
Damned Hypocrite: ?
Damned Lustful: ?
Damned Muckstuck: ?
Damned Muckstuck Glutton: In the Third Circle, the gluttonous are confined to the muck for their lifestyle of excess; bloated sacs of muds and excrement that can barely move, much less fight.
Damned Muckstuck Flatterer: Flatterers are steeped in excrement in the Second Bolgia of the Eighth Circle.
Damned Muckstuck Barrator: Barrators are steeped in pitch in the Fifth Bolgia of the Eighth Circle.
Damned Profligate: Profligates are runners confined to the Suicide Wood of the Seventh Circle. Their disregard in life for all things drives them ceaselessly forward, running from infernal mastiffs who tear them apart.
Damned Soul: Not all of the damned are combatants ready to fight. Most are simply in the place they hoped they would never be, and have resigned themselves to their fate. These poor souls are bereft of hope and submit to whatever punishments await them.
Damned Suicide Tree: There are many piteous beings residing in Infernus, but none more so than the suicide trees. Created from the souls of those who killed themselves, they land like seeds in the Seventh Circle, growing into humanoid-shaped trees that cannot move. They can only scream, and cannot verbalize their agony unless something brushes against them.
Damned Traitor: Of all the damned souls in the pits of Infernus, the worst sit with the biggest traitor of all, Innominatam. Here, they are frozen forever in rigid poses.
Damned Verme: Damned that have been destroyed, be it through misadventure or torture, collapse into a vile-smelling goo from which crawls a small verme with the face of the damned that died after 1d10 hours.
Damned Vespa: Certain souls are so aggressive that they do not form as verme, but rather as demonic wasps. These wasps, known as vespa, form 1d10 hours out of the goo of a collapsed damned. They are more actively malicious than the verme and created from the more aggressive damned souls: the heated, lustful, profligate, and wrathful.
Damned Warlock: Not all casters are bidden to Infernus; after all, magic is common and considered part of the natural universe. But those who make pacts with the infernal Dukes eventually end up here. When not employed in an infernal battlefield or on some other task for one of the Dukes, they reside in the Fourth Bolgia of the Eighth Circle, Malebolges, walking forward even as their heads are twisted around and weeping.
Damned Wrathful: ?
Purgatorian Pilgrim: ?

Undead: The damned can be summoned into corpses in the Prime Plane to animate them, and indeed this is why the majority of undead are evil.
Elemental Undead: These are beings that are tied to the elements. They return to the elemental planes rather than proceed to any form of afterlife. This afterlife often envisions a grander life of the one than their mortal realm, and it is a life held in abeyance until they are called back again. Reincarnation and resurrection are equally possible. Dwarves, gnomes, genasi, goliaths, and tritons are included in this category. Elementals are more sah than khet. Their corpses tend to decay faster as a result, and the instances of undeath are rarer due to their tenuous connection.
Fey Undead: The fey include a wide range of seelie and unseelie creatures. They experience death quite differently in that their souls stay attached to their corpse. It doesn't "go anywhere" and therefore undeath is a particularly brutal and painful experience. Fey are more khet than sah, which means that their spirits do not move on to an afterlife at all; it stays with the body until the khet is completely destroyed. Many fey use cremation to release the soul. Fey include bugbears, changelings, eladrin, elves, firbolg, gnomes, goblins, hobgoblins, and orcs.
Corporeal Undead: Corporeal undead retain their khet but their sah is replaced by a fiend from Infernus, or more rarely, a celestial from Celestia.
Vampire: Sah Replacement Damned, Lustful Circle (Bolgia) 2nd.
Ghoul: Sah Replacement Damned, Gluttonous Circle (Bolgia) 3rd.
Epikoros's Entomb Soul power.
Wight: Sah Replacement Damned, Greedy Circle (Bolgia) 4th.
Epikoros's Entomb Soul power.
Skeleton: Sah Replacement Damned, Wrathful Circle (Bolgia) 5th.
Flameskull: Sah Replacement Damned, Heretic Circle (Bolgia) 6th.
Mummy: Sah Replacement Damned, Heated Circle (Bolgia) 7th.
Bodak: Sah Replacement Damned, Warlock Circle (Bolgia) 8th (B4).
Bone Naga: Sah Replacement Infernal, Cianfa Circle (Bolgia) 8th (B7).
Death Knight: Sah Replacement Damned, Heated Circle (Bolgia) 8th (B8).
Zombie: Sah Replacement Circle Damned, Discordant (Bolgia) 8th (B9).
The wrathful are used to create zombies in the Prime Material Plane.
Epikoros's Entomb Soul power.
Ghast: Sah Replacement Circle Damned, Falsifier (Bolgia) 8th (B10).
Nightwalker: Sah Replacement Infernal, Giant Circle (Bolgia) 9th.
Ghost: Ghosts and revenants are the exception, souls who have escaped Purgaturus.
Revenant: Ghosts and revenants are the exception, souls who have escaped Purgaturus.
Non-Corporeal Undead: Non-corporeal undead are all sah, an evil soul that escaped Infernus.
Banshee: Sah Replacement Damned, Lustful Circle (Bolgia) 2nd.
The damned souls of the lustful are used to create banshees in the Prime Material Plane.
Will-o’-Wisp: Sah Replacement Damned, Greedy Circle (Bolgia) 4th.
Greedy souls are used to create will-'o-wisps in the Prime Material Plane.
Wraith: Sah Replacement Damned, Wrathful Circle (Bolgia) 5th.
Specter: Sah Replacement Damned, Muckstuck Circle (Bolgia) 7th.
Shadow: Sah Replacement Infernal, Cianfa Circle (Bolgia) 8th (B7).

Entomb Soul. Epikoros chooses a living humanoid with 0 hit points that he can see within 30 feet. That creature is teleported inside a burning tomb and imprisoned there. A creature imprisoned in this manner has disadvantage on death saving throws. The target is blinded and restrained, it has total cover against attacks and other effects outside the tomb, and it takes 10 (3d6) fire damage at the start of each of Epikoros' turns. There is no limit to how many targets Epikoros can entomb in this fashion. If the tomb is destroyed (AC 17, damage threshold 8, 27 hit points, immune to fire, poison, and psychic damage) an entombed creature is no longer restrained by and can escape from the tomb by using 20 feet of movement, exiting prone. If it dies while imprisoned, Epikoros regains 25 hit points, immediately recharges Soul Burn, and gains an additional action on his next turn. Additionally, at the start of his next turn, the tomb regurgitates the slain creature as a bonus action, and the creature becomes an undead. If the victim had 2 or fewer Hit Dice, it becomes a zombie. if it had 3 to 5 Hit Dice, it becomes a ghoul. Otherwise, it becomes a wight.

 

[Voadam]

5e Holiday Mini-Dungeon Bundle
5e
Wraith, Invoked Spirit, Restless Spirit, Hammond: When Victor murdered Hammond and banished Margaret, she fled into the forest to bide her time, scheming her ultimate revenge. She eventually summoned an incubus named Keuxahl, who swore a pact to do her bidding. Keuxahl carries a rope of entanglement, with which it tries to capture foes for experimentation and manipulation, and a book of profane ritual magic.
Using the fiend’s dark power, Margaret has now summoned the restless spirit of Hammond and commands him to take vengeance upon the Cornelius family. The invoked spirit of Hammond takes the form of a wraith riding a nightmare as a mount.
Shadow Wight: A beast, humanoid, giant, or monstrosity can become a shadow wight.

 

[Voadam]

5E Ice Kingdoms: Lair of the White Wyvern
5e
Skeleton Ogre, Large Skeleton: Skeleton ogres are the reanimated skeletal remains of ogres, reinforced with negative energy. They bear no flesh, musculature, or ligaments, and are instead held together through magical force. A Skeleton ogres is an animated undead ogre comprised of bones.
If there are more characters of good alignment than evil, the evil contained in the haunted shrine room will raise a wraith warrior and two large skeletons (the former orc champion and his two ogre followers).
Wraith Warrior: Warrior Wraiths are a type of undead created from warriors killed [in] battle, and kept from the dissolution of death by their desire to fight.
If there are more characters of good alignment than evil, the evil contained in the haunted shrine room will raise a wraith warrior and two large skeletons (the former orc champion and his two ogre followers).
If there are more evil-aligned than good alignments, the good contained in the haunted shrine room will summon the ghost of the heroic paladin that was defeated defending this shrine and the ghost of his faithful friend.
Animated Skeleton: ?
Animated Undead Ogre: ?

 

[Voadam]

5E Ice Kingdoms: The Temple of Drawoh Rock
5e
Ghost of the Dead: ?

 

[Voadam]

5e Lovecraftian Monsters
5e
Watchman: When a lonely person drowns, Hastur might replace the corpse’s heart with a slasher worm, animating it as a watchman.
If the watchman is destroyed, the slasher worm finds another humanoid host. It then tracks down the nearest blood relative of the original corpse – only by inhabiting a blood relative can the slasher worm turn it into another watchman.
Slasher Worm's Body Thief power.
Ghost of Ib, Ghost Ibian: Although they hail from the Astral Plane, ibians have a strong tether to their cities that not even death can break. When the men of Sarnath slew the Ibians, they returned in ghostly hordes to continue their dances to Bokrug, emptying the city completely.
Y'm-Bhi: The k’n-yanites torture and mutilate their criminals and any other humanoids who cross their path, reanimating them without their heads as a final indignity to serve as guards.
Nyarlathotep Servitor Hunting-Horror: ?
Yig Servitor Animating Spirit: When serpentfolk priests die, Yig blesses a select few with an Amulet that allows them to continue as spirits.
Yig Servitor Medusa Coil: A medusa coil is the serpent-haired remains of a particularly powerful medusa, reanimated as a form of vengeance from beyond the grave. Medusa coils traditionally reanimated along with the medusa in revenant form, but the medusa itself is bald because its coil takes on a life of its own.

Revenant: A medusa coil is the serpent-haired remains of a particularly powerful medusa, reanimated as a form of vengeance from beyond the grave. Medusa coils traditionally reanimated along with the medusa in revenant form, but the medusa itself is bald because its coil takes on a life of its own.

Body Thief. The slasher worm initiates a Dexterity contest with an incapacitated humanoid within 5 feet of it. If it wins the contest, the slasher worm enters the humanoid's body through an orifice and takes control of the target’s body. While inside a creature, the slasher worm has total cover against attacks and other effects originating outside its host. The slasher worm retains its Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores and its traits. It otherwise adopts the target’s statistics. It knows everything the creature knew, including spells and languages. If the host body drops to 0 hit points, the slasher worm must leave it. A protection from evil and good spell cast on the body drives the slasher worm out. The slasher worm is also forced out by means of a wish. By spending 5 feet of its movement, the slasher worm can voluntarily leave the body, squirming to the nearest unoccupied space within 5 feet of it. The body then dissolves within 1 round. If the slasher worm inhabits a blood relative of its original host, it transforms into a watchman instead.

 

[Voadam]

5e Menagerie: Horrors of the Aboleth
5e
Muculent Husk, Lord of the Sea: Muculent husks are believed to have been an aboleth’s botched attempt at immortality. The resulting creature is dangerously insane, hateful, and sees itself as lord of the sea. Some rare aboleth actively pursue the rites to become a muculent husk in the same way demented humans research the dark path of lichdom.
Lich: Some rare aboleth actively pursue the rites to become a muculent husk in the same way demented humans research the dark path of lichdom.
Undead Aboleth: ?
Undead Scum: ?
Undead Kraken: ?