Zombies looking humans..

[marune]

How to make undead (zombies) appear living ? Is there any effect like "disguise undead", etc. The idea behind is : a traveling cleric controls some zombies and don't want to look strange.

 

[Len]

Makeup?

They're still going to act like mindless undead, so anyone with Wis > 7 who watches them for more than a moment will know they're not normal people. The cleric can't expect to take his troupe into an inn for example without people realizing that something is up.

 

[ElvishBard]

I suppose that hats of diguise could work, though not only would the way they walk (which could be explained by a limp caused by a war wound), but the stench they generate would be awful. Plus, if anyone tried to talk to them the answer they would get would prove they are zombies. Although if you tried saying they were cursed and lost their intellect...

 

[ThirdWizard]

Maybe if they were really really fresh.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

Seeming would work well, except that its a Sor/Wiz or Bard spell.

 

[Nuclear Platypus]

Dress the zombies up like Vampire LARPers?

 

[RandomPrecision]

How about the Gentle Repose spell?

When I do things like that, I like to have my zombies pretend to be corpses for whom I wanted to give a proper funeral, if someone asks at the edge of town, and at the edge, I bury them and set up some sort of marker - I've had a portable grave marker with this character. When you leave town, dig up the zombies. Of course, Gentle Repose probably won't work in tandem with this, but casting Gentle Repose will keep them from rotting, as long as you continue to cast it.

 

[dcollins]

How about the Gentle Repose spell?

I had a player suggest this last session. I had to rule against it because the target is "Corpse touched", and zombies count as creatures, not corpses.

 

[RandomPrecision]

I had a player suggest this last session. I had to rule against it because the target is "Corpse touched", and zombies count as creatures, not corpses.

Cast Gentle Repose first.

Of course, when it's about to wear off, you'll have to kill the zombie, then cast Gentle Repose, then cast Animate Dead again.

As a DM, I go by the line in the zombie description "Zombies are corpses reanimated through dark and sinister magic." to argue that zombies are corpses, but I do see validity in your interpretation.

 

[dcollins]

Of course, when it's about to wear off, you'll have to kill the zombie, then cast Gentle Repose, then cast Animate Dead again.

Note that when a zombie is destroyed, you cannot re-animate it. (Under "animate dead" spell.)