Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Undead Origins
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Voadam" data-source="post: 8891532" data-attributes="member: 2209"><p><a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/266941/Under-the-Scale-5E?affiliate_id=17596" target="_blank">Under the Scale (5E)</a></p><p>5e</p><p><strong>Remnant, Weeper, Ashen, Wormer:</strong> The Remnants are the product of an insidious magical act by Cluagaurakua. Seeing the Free Folk plan to retreat from the world in holdfasts, the Great Dragon crafted a virus-spell and infected a number of prisoners before releasing them. The released prisoners fled to their former communities and spread the virus. In many cases, this lead to the death of the infected, but in some cases the infected would not outright die but waste away and transition into an undead state. Thus were born the Remnants.</p><p>The virus painfully ravages and destroys the body of the host, eventually killing the host and magically animating it. Remnants retain much of their biological physiology, particularly in regards to the brain and nervous system. Their bodies go into a necrotic torpor. Blood ceases to flow and the Remnant’s body relies on magic to motivate it.</p><p>While rare, as more and more holdfasts are discovered and opened, the population of Remnants is undoubtedly increasing. Newer instances of Remnant-becoming also seem to be common near Razelands. It is believed that the magical nature of the blight somehow invigorates the virus-spell making it more likely that upon death the creature will raise as a Remnant.</p><p>Free Folk folklore suggests that every demi-human by now is infected with the virus-spell. However, the exact conditions for when the virus-spell take effect and animate the body are still a matter of considerable speculation within Free Folk communities, with little rhyme nor reason for each occurrence.</p><p>Who They Were: Refugees and the infected from many races. Cluagaurakua’s virus-spell was not choosy in those it infected and eventually raised.</p><p>Note: To play a Remnant, you must pick a race like normal and then take the Unbreathing Remnant feat (representing your death and rebirth as a Remnant).</p><p>There are also cults that are dedicated to preparing their members to become Remnants. Because the process of becoming a Remnant is still ill understood, particularly in regards to the specific conditions needed to activate the spell-virus to animate the body upon death, these cults tend to be very ritualistic and fatalistic. Leaders of Remnant cults attempt to ritually recreate conditions they believe are conducive to the virus-spell and then encouraging their members to take their own lives. Failure is seen as a misapplication of the ritual’s conditions, while the occasional success is widely regarded by the Cult as a validation of their process, even if subsequent attempts using the same process routinely fail.</p><p>Unbreathing Remnant feat.</p><p><strong>Remnant, Free-Willed Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Taragainyan Vampire:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Taragainyan Vampire, Magic Predator, Undead Vampire:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Undead, Undead Creature:</strong> Outbreaks of viral undeath (and lycanthropy) in holdfasts can be particularly devastating (the story of Illanthalas notwithstanding). In some cases, the disease can be contained and the source eliminated. But, unfortunately, this seems to be the exception to the rule. The cause for the outbreak matters in terms of if the source can be contained. Should the source of the outbreak come from a rogue spell or other arcane source, the infection may be self-sustaining, dooming the community to fight an inevitable tide that are only bolstered when their family and comrades die.</p><p>Orcish warrior cults are increasingly seeking to look beyond their mortal coil in their effort to excel and many willingly enter service into undeath. Thus, in the modern days Orcish warrior-cults are increasingly gravitating towards including rituals surrounding the dead and undeath, slowly transforming generations-old mystery cults focused on fraternity and honing martial skills into a syncratic meld of death scholarship, transformation rituals, and traditional martial practices.</p><p><strong>Mindless Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Chained Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Subservient Fodder:</strong> Likewise, Goraskin favored necromancers for their ability to create subservient fodder for its armies.</p><p><strong>Free-Willed Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Warrior-Undead:</strong> Because it is seen as just barely acceptable by most Orcish scholars, the rites and rituals of creating warrior-undead are conducted secretly and exclusively within the already shrouded militant cults - secrets within secrets.</p><p><strong>Intelligent Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Lesser Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Undead Despot:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Lich, Intelligent Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Rillivan, Lich:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Skeleton:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Skeleton, Mindless Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Spectre:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Spectre, Chained Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Vampire:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Orc-Made-Vampire:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Vampire, Intelligent Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Lady Tarshon, Powerful Vampire Lord:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Powerful Vampire:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Vampiric Leader:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Vampire-Lord:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Vampire Spawn:</strong> A humanoid slain in this way [by a taragainyan vampire's bite attack reducing its hit point maximum to zero] and then buried in the ground rises the following night as a vampire spawn under the vampire's control.</p><p><strong>Zombie:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Zombie, Mindless Undead:</strong> ?</p><p><strong>Restless Dead:</strong> ?</p><p></p><p>Unbreathing Remnant</p><p>You are a free-willed undead called a “Remnant,” the product of a virus-disease that reanimated you upon your death. Yes, you're (un)dead. Yes, you're hungry and uncomfortable around the living. Yes, you have dust instead of blood, but in most ways your biology still acts as if it were alive.</p><p>You do not breathe and are immune to suffocation. You do not sleep. You are immune to bleeding and poison effects. You will not waste away due to hunger or thirst -- but will get insanely hungry (see below). You do not age. When you are hit with a bladed weapon that does damage, you may roll a CON save for half damage.</p><p>On the down-side, you are unnaturally pale to the point that others outside of your community innately distrust you (-2 to all CHA rolls involving influencing people). Also, you do not heal normally. You only heal when you eat meat and as a result of a Long Rest. If you are unable to eat at least half a pound of meat (even cured meat) in a 24 hour period you suffer -5 to all your actions as you descend into hunger-driven distraction.</p><p>Condition Immunities: Poisons, Exhaustion, Suffocation</p><p>Damage Immunity: Cold, Necrotic, Poison</p><p>Damage Vulnerability: Celestial, Holy, Fire</p><p>Darkvision 60ft</p><p>NOTE: Instead of selecting this at character creation, a player may select this Feat as an investment. In that case, the Feat stays dormant until the character dies, at which point they roll a D20 and add their current level to the result. If the total is 20 or more, the character awakens in 1d8 hours as a Remnant (let's hope they weren't buried or burned in the meantime).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Voadam, post: 8891532, member: 2209"] [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/266941/Under-the-Scale-5E?affiliate_id=17596']Under the Scale (5E)[/URL] 5e [B]Remnant, Weeper, Ashen, Wormer:[/B] The Remnants are the product of an insidious magical act by Cluagaurakua. Seeing the Free Folk plan to retreat from the world in holdfasts, the Great Dragon crafted a virus-spell and infected a number of prisoners before releasing them. The released prisoners fled to their former communities and spread the virus. In many cases, this lead to the death of the infected, but in some cases the infected would not outright die but waste away and transition into an undead state. Thus were born the Remnants. The virus painfully ravages and destroys the body of the host, eventually killing the host and magically animating it. Remnants retain much of their biological physiology, particularly in regards to the brain and nervous system. Their bodies go into a necrotic torpor. Blood ceases to flow and the Remnant’s body relies on magic to motivate it. While rare, as more and more holdfasts are discovered and opened, the population of Remnants is undoubtedly increasing. Newer instances of Remnant-becoming also seem to be common near Razelands. It is believed that the magical nature of the blight somehow invigorates the virus-spell making it more likely that upon death the creature will raise as a Remnant. Free Folk folklore suggests that every demi-human by now is infected with the virus-spell. However, the exact conditions for when the virus-spell take effect and animate the body are still a matter of considerable speculation within Free Folk communities, with little rhyme nor reason for each occurrence. Who They Were: Refugees and the infected from many races. Cluagaurakua’s virus-spell was not choosy in those it infected and eventually raised. Note: To play a Remnant, you must pick a race like normal and then take the Unbreathing Remnant feat (representing your death and rebirth as a Remnant). There are also cults that are dedicated to preparing their members to become Remnants. Because the process of becoming a Remnant is still ill understood, particularly in regards to the specific conditions needed to activate the spell-virus to animate the body upon death, these cults tend to be very ritualistic and fatalistic. Leaders of Remnant cults attempt to ritually recreate conditions they believe are conducive to the virus-spell and then encouraging their members to take their own lives. Failure is seen as a misapplication of the ritual’s conditions, while the occasional success is widely regarded by the Cult as a validation of their process, even if subsequent attempts using the same process routinely fail. Unbreathing Remnant feat. [B]Remnant, Free-Willed Undead:[/B] ? [B]Taragainyan Vampire:[/B] ? [B]Taragainyan Vampire, Magic Predator, Undead Vampire:[/B] ? [B]Undead, Undead Creature:[/B] Outbreaks of viral undeath (and lycanthropy) in holdfasts can be particularly devastating (the story of Illanthalas notwithstanding). In some cases, the disease can be contained and the source eliminated. But, unfortunately, this seems to be the exception to the rule. The cause for the outbreak matters in terms of if the source can be contained. Should the source of the outbreak come from a rogue spell or other arcane source, the infection may be self-sustaining, dooming the community to fight an inevitable tide that are only bolstered when their family and comrades die. Orcish warrior cults are increasingly seeking to look beyond their mortal coil in their effort to excel and many willingly enter service into undeath. Thus, in the modern days Orcish warrior-cults are increasingly gravitating towards including rituals surrounding the dead and undeath, slowly transforming generations-old mystery cults focused on fraternity and honing martial skills into a syncratic meld of death scholarship, transformation rituals, and traditional martial practices. [B]Mindless Undead:[/B] ? [B]Chained Undead:[/B] ? [B]Subservient Fodder:[/B] Likewise, Goraskin favored necromancers for their ability to create subservient fodder for its armies. [B]Free-Willed Undead:[/B] ? [B]Warrior-Undead:[/B] Because it is seen as just barely acceptable by most Orcish scholars, the rites and rituals of creating warrior-undead are conducted secretly and exclusively within the already shrouded militant cults - secrets within secrets. [B]Intelligent Undead:[/B] ? [B]Lesser Undead:[/B] ? [B]Undead Despot:[/B] ? [B]Lich, Intelligent Undead:[/B] ? [B]Rillivan, Lich:[/B] ? [B]Skeleton:[/B] ? [B]Skeleton, Mindless Undead:[/B] ? [B]Spectre:[/B] ? [B]Spectre, Chained Undead:[/B] ? [B]Vampire:[/B] ? [B]Orc-Made-Vampire:[/B] ? [B]Vampire, Intelligent Undead:[/B] ? [B]Lady Tarshon, Powerful Vampire Lord:[/B] ? [B]Powerful Vampire:[/B] ? [B]Vampiric Leader:[/B] ? [B]Vampire-Lord:[/B] ? [B]Vampire Spawn:[/B] A humanoid slain in this way [by a taragainyan vampire's bite attack reducing its hit point maximum to zero] and then buried in the ground rises the following night as a vampire spawn under the vampire's control. [B]Zombie:[/B] ? [B]Zombie, Mindless Undead:[/B] ? [B]Restless Dead:[/B] ? Unbreathing Remnant You are a free-willed undead called a “Remnant,” the product of a virus-disease that reanimated you upon your death. Yes, you're (un)dead. Yes, you're hungry and uncomfortable around the living. Yes, you have dust instead of blood, but in most ways your biology still acts as if it were alive. You do not breathe and are immune to suffocation. You do not sleep. You are immune to bleeding and poison effects. You will not waste away due to hunger or thirst -- but will get insanely hungry (see below). You do not age. When you are hit with a bladed weapon that does damage, you may roll a CON save for half damage. On the down-side, you are unnaturally pale to the point that others outside of your community innately distrust you (-2 to all CHA rolls involving influencing people). Also, you do not heal normally. You only heal when you eat meat and as a result of a Long Rest. If you are unable to eat at least half a pound of meat (even cured meat) in a 24 hour period you suffer -5 to all your actions as you descend into hunger-driven distraction. Condition Immunities: Poisons, Exhaustion, Suffocation Damage Immunity: Cold, Necrotic, Poison Damage Vulnerability: Celestial, Holy, Fire Darkvision 60ft NOTE: Instead of selecting this at character creation, a player may select this Feat as an investment. In that case, the Feat stays dormant until the character dies, at which point they roll a D20 and add their current level to the result. If the total is 20 or more, the character awakens in 1d8 hours as a Remnant (let's hope they weren't buried or burned in the meantime). [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Undead Origins
Top