Undead World

[manfred]

The last world for your heroes...

Once upon a time there was a fantasy world as we know it, with strong wizards, wise warriors and courageos thieves or something like that. There, a gigantic conflict between Good and Evil rages, and innocent peasants and zombies get slaughtered every day.

This is not the story.

This is not the story of a mighty Necromancer, who sought the magic to transport numerous undead across large distances, found it works better than expected, for none of the 'dummies' have been spotted ever after.

This is not the story of the heroes that defeated said Necromancer, tried the spell and shared it freely with forces of Good. So was born the Disintegrate Undead spell, a magical cheap way to dispose off of the lesser undead adversaries.

This is the story of the poor zombies and skeletons and others that did not get the chance to die,but were transported to...

[manfred]

The planet is relatively Earth-like, even if it never embraced the gift of Life, and is basically a chunk of stone with some unbreathable atmosphere. (If it is hard to imagine, imagine Mars.)

Geology and Weather:
Relatively stable, with few volcanoes. No seas (well, duh, no liquid water).  Weather is limited to never stopping winds and occasional sand storms. There is but little 'sand' on the surface. Temperatures - from a human point of view - range from hot at day to d**n freezing at night.


Flora and Fauna:   None before the first experiments.

Flora: as nobody cares about the living conditions and hygiene of zombies, some older examples of basic necromantic art carry the seeds of life with them, notably lichens and mosses. Some of these hardy life forms survive even these conditions, and slowly spread on favourable places. They will probably change the face of Undead World, though it may take a few thousand years.

Fauna: none at all, the Mindless Ones are the closest things to animals and are used as such.


Society:
The undead population is divided into two distinct groups: the Mindless Ones and the Animated.

The Mindless Ones are the basic zombies and skeletons, that have little to none sense, speak very little and may be used for the simplest tasks only. You will not play a Mindless One unless you consumed too much alcohol tonight.

The Animated are all those, that have enough sense to percieve the situation as it is, and possess the initiative to do something about it.

Before beginning to play an Undead World character, care should be taken to create the history of the corpse animated into what you are now. The most important decision to make is whether you have the Mark of the Past: do you remember your Life? Those with the Mark may remember many useful things learned while they lived, but remember also the moment of death, a constant source of pain.

All Animated remember also their (second) birth, their master and creator and the years they served him/her. Those without the Mark remember their duty with pride (usually), but those knowing Life are often bitter ...


Civilization:
No houses are yet built, all structures are digged deep in earth. There is a lack of all materias, most notably metals. Stone is everywhere but hard to mine. Tools are mostly adapted weapons, and those that have them are considered wealthy.

[manfred]

Most dangerous to the undead population is naturally the Sun. The thin atmosphere makes it really bad: longer exposure leads to death, short exposure means severe burns. It should be noted the chances to regenerate for most undead are small in Undead World. Those that do not know to protect themselves, have a very short existence. All Animated have the Escape Sun skill, knowledge of sunrise and ways to hide.

Some danger are certain Mindless Ones, lost on the Sand Plains, likely to attack anyone if uncontrolled.

A real danger are the ghouls. Ghouls need fresh meat to survive, or at least to be able to communicate normally. A ghoul in Undead World has only two chances to survive:
renounce his ways and supress his needs, and live with pain in the few civilized areas, or join one of the ravenous packs roaming Outside, screaming with hunger and eating what is left - any undead unlucky to get into their fangs. The undead flesh makes them only angrier, as it stills their hunger only slightly.

[manfred]

The Pub is digged deep enough to hide you from Sun and has its own atmosphere. Really.

Located in an old volcano's crater, it puts the gas emerging to good use. The poisonous and slightly radioactive substance would choke a living person in seconds. The undead enjoy it for its debilitating effects similar to alcohol or stronger drugs. Many with the Mark remember such a thing from their living days and use it to forget.

Warning: Prolonged imbibing may cause the dead bodies to gradually fall apart and thus slowly kill you while you enjoy it. It is worth noting the few unlucky immaterial undead ending up in Undead World have mostly, sooner or later, entered the source of Gas and slowly dissolved.

[DaWergyling]

COOL!!!!!! You could write a book about this, seriously!

Anyway, if you're making this a campain for the heros, ESCAPE FROM THE UNDEAD WORLD that'd be interesting.... Anyway, there's also having the world by itself, which alone is pretty good.  Keep it up. This is really going somewhere.

[manfred]

Additional Skills
(The first is Escape Sun, you gain it really fast or die anyway.)

Sun Runner
(more a feat or so) To gain this skill, you must expose yourself for short
moments to the Sun, and gradually gain a weak immunity to its effects. That means, with a succesfull save you can run through sun-lit areas (but not with direct sunlight!) without getting burned. Of course, for very short distances. Allows to move through less shadowy areas in the day.


Mindless Shepherd
The knowledge how to approach uncontrolled Mindless Ones, how to appear non-threatening to them, and finally how to convince them you can protect them from the dangers of Undead World. Such a thing requires at least a week of careful treatment and a save. If succesfull, you gain a faithful servant, otherwise you might get attacked. Mistreating or percieved mistreating may cause it to leave you or attack, as with other animals.
To convince a controlled group of at least 5 Mindless Ones to do anything, a succesfull save has to be made, two saves for a group of 10, three if 15 etc.

The skill may be used to release a Mindless One from someone else' control, through making it feel mistreated. Or to teach one some nice trick, as if it were intelligent. Smart boy!


Intimidate
Knowledge how to convince one or more Mindless Ones to do what you want, quickly but with force or threats. The Sun will get you! May provoke hostile reactions.


Undead Anathomy
Basic knowledge of types of people, err, material undead, and their bodies. Gives a chance to repair or heal SOME minor wounds. This means mostly physical wounds, not sunburn.

---

Locations

The Old Wise Man Up The Hill
There lives a wise man on a high mountain, you can speak him if you risk the way. It is actually an old shadow, formerly a Sage of some kind. He values his loneliness above all, and don't forget there is little cover on the way up. Only his cave offers some protection, so better don't insult him...

The Dusty Gardens
There is a bit of life here. Moss and lichen take a long time to grow, and still longer in this conditions. But it slowly spreads. Covered by a thin layer of dead matter and dust, it still looks a bit different from the horrible desert the whole planet is. A small community of former farmers call this place home and take care of it. While they are peaceful, any violator of their rules can make a fine addition to the compost.

The Sunny Fields
Some vulcanic eruption created a nice plain area. The ground is black, smooth and very hard, stretching for miles like a great stony river. On one hand, there is useful material here: black glass. Until it breaks, it is sharp as any knife. On the other hand, there is no cover to be found or made for miles, so anyone to forget the time here will be fried.

The Road
Over a mile long ditch from The Pub to The Hill (they never needed better names). A good Sun-Runner can run down the Road during the without problems. Most inhabited holes are connected to it, as well as the Pub.

The Outside
...the rest. The whole planet that is yet unexplored.

---

Groups
The greatest problem of the Animated is that they distrust one another. This is doubly true for those with the Mark, for the Living were ever distrustful of the Undead. And now that you are the monster, you cannot even trust yourself. Some have done horrific things on command of their Master, some on their own. No wonder it is hard to find company.
Still, some did:

The Diggers
Among the first to take action, instead of covering in sand they began digging the first holes. Later digged The Road. Will accept anyone experienced with stone or willing to work hard.

The Metal Seekers
Occupying a small (currently sleeping) volcano, this fanatics mostly of dwarven origin try to work metal, anyhow. The tools they produce are very crude, and the worker zombies often perish in the dangerous fiery enviroment, but it is the only guaranteed source of metal.

The Farmers
See The Dusty Gardens.

The Anoymous Flesh-Eaters
Ghouls that ignore the Call of the Flesh, trying to help one another.

The Individualists
This 'group' is not named so, indeed it has no name at all. Most 'members' have been slaves, servants, or lowly peasants in their lives. Now that they are free, they recognize all their life, and even their after-life they have been serving someone else. On this world, however ugly it is, they are free and no one will take this freedom away.

They are not good at working together, being too unorganised and unwilling to cooperate. Still, they are likely to protest against any attempts at controlling other Undead.

The Awake
A few Undead begin as Mindless Ones, but slowly awake to become one of the Animated. Memories return, and one may not like to be a slave/animal to someone. This could be truly a role-playing challenge.

[forgottengods]

i dont thik sun runner as a feat is a good idea maybe

sun runner as a class or type of undead
a new breed of zombies that can resist sun light
but all the others undead se thems as a thread or something like that
well thats only mi opninion .


i think the undeads rulez!!!

[manfred]

it can be limited it further. Say that trying to outrun the Sun (literally), weakens you somewhat, or at least gives you a nice sunburn, affecting Charisma.

You can get it with much pain, so it is a limit in itself. Undead do not feel pain, except from very few sources like holy water (not available) and sunlight (available in abundance). No wonder they evade the Sun so much! May require some other limitations, considering it is the only thing Undead fear here. But, should you (or anyone) ever PLAY this, do as you wish!

Hmm, a new breed of zombies...
Remember the original world they all were forced to leave. Local necromancers would have a harder time to do their job, and improvements like this may help. But don't forget the atmosphere is much thinner here, Sun showing much more power!

Giving the feat to one breed only may do good. Thus securing the whole group cannot just acquire the feat someday! Fear of the Sun should be something they all know.

[manfred]

Did I write Charisma?

Anyone knows how to interprete Charisma for Undead? Undead don't look good, nor are great leaders. Will have to think about it, and other traditional characteristics.

[Agar]

As undead are, well, no longer living, they are likely to not be aware or care about each others or their own appearance and therefore Charisma. Perhaps only higher level undead, like vampires, would care about charisma, but even then, only amongst thier peers.

If charisma were to be a factor in lower undead, it would be more likely to be tied directly to their constitution, the measure of how well they are able to hold their form together. An undead with both legs and the better part of both arms would be more attractive than the skeleton that drags it's legless torso across the sands with it's arms.

[forgottengods]

mmm

ok we can try the charisma as how thery related wich other undeads if he is a cool guy or a bad temper

and p.b. = physical beauty for how they look ( undeads are all ugly i think )


i have an idea of how to use the undead world in my campaign (but first i request permission of manfred i dont want to steel nothing

maybe we all can play in our worlds (campaigns ) normally and when the character die we can start the campaign in the undead world maybe with a quest of how to get back to the living world (as a undead or as a living )
one question i have is : what about vampires??
do vampires live in the undead world and if they are in between the undeads how they survive because they need flesh blood to survive so what about them??

and vampires they are like living things they have a good p.b. or charisma .

[manfred]

To reply in somewhat mixed order:

Vampires?
It is easy to send weak undead to the Undead World, but hard the more powerful ones. Not only they would have a better chance to resist, or to save, but they also would slightly unbalance things.
You play a zombie? I play a lich!

I don't want all kind of powerful Undead walking that world...
There were many different and bizzare created already. Would be my personal limit. Of course an occasional powerful NPC could mix things up! Possible adventure idea? Someone coming into this anarchy and wanting to rule things now. Hmmm...

Besides, vampires would have a VERY hard time to live here. No blood, no living, no fun. Frequent visits of the Pub will have its consequences.

Undead and physical beauty? Strange words came here together. Still thinking about this one.

Oh, and YES, use it! Then tell me of any ideas you came up with!

[manfred]

Starting in Undead World

The characters (the Undead) do not truly start in Undead World. They start as living creatures. They can be adventurers, but ordinary people like farmers etc are OK. Then comes the Death. Help them make it however they want, heroical, gruesome, useless, natural, whatever. Then comes the moment of Animation (in some cases it happens simultaneously with Death). Create a necromancer or some creature, or event responsible for their Undeath.

Then, comes their Life as Undead (funny combination, huh?), and later their unwanted relocation to Undead World.

All above can be simply background they write up somewhere, or can be role-played in any length desired. This is why I created Undead World: to drastically change an existing campain, let characters die, and continue despite it!

As for the quest, you don't have to GIVE it to them, they can choose it themselves. They should not forget, even IF they ever return, they won't be welcomed as Undead. This is the decision they will have to make. Maybe they did horrible things while being Undead, and they surely felt the hate for all Living. Or should they stay in this hell, maybe to repent for their sins?

[forgottengods]

for the undead world

i think what i mean ith de p.b. thing is they could have a pb of -5
but a charisma of 12

if all are undeads and all ugly they could have some charisma between them just for who is cool nd who is mean etz etz

[manfred]

Charisma for Undead? How can THAT work?

To the Living, Undead do not have any charisma, they are simply d**n ugly. (Please ignore vampires and similar, we talk here mostly about lower Undead.) But we have a society composed of free-willed Undead only. Social interaction will happen, and some are heard and seen more than others.

To re-work Charisma for Undead, we must analyze their society and social-being, and to do it, we must delve a bit in their emotional baggage. Please note that Undead are somewhat emotionally-impaired. Were they not, they would probably all be dead now, or mad from this world, from commiting suicides to blind killing-sprees.


Negative emotions?

Undead, even those with free will, are not friendly creatures. The transport to Undead World was but a traumatic event. Most of the Undead were torn from their master and commander. All of them were pushed forward with a burning hatred to the Living. There are no Living nearby, the hate grows weaker, and Undead begin to remember their former lives, and their masters.

Pain and Fear: Undead do not truly feel pain. There are exceptions, like holy water and the Sun. With no holy water around, Sun is the only thing Undead fear. On the other hand, it is the fastest way to die. (And some do commit in this way a suicide.) Pain and fear can but come from their background, when they were still Living. In Undead World, many old memories awaken again. See also Self Preservation as a possible source of fear.

Hate: No Living to hate. As before, sources of hate can come from the background, too.


Positive emotions?
Not many.  If you rediscover parts of your past, you may remember things that used to make you happy. Some of them may be possible to repeat in Undead World, at least partly. Thus if you find someone doing some nonsensical activity, it may be trying to find the joy from the living days again. Many Undead try to return to jobs they had in Life. Some succeed, few are truly happy, or at least content.

(Reminds me of a particular zombie, that used to be a trapper, most probably. These days you can discover his work, as you fall into a hole and your foot gets stuck. This is a BIT dangerous, of course, if you don't manage to get free till sunrise.)


Self-preservation
Common Undead are weakly equipped in this regard, but Undead World changes much. The freedom gained here, and returning memories make them feel a bit different, almost like having value, and in few cases having found The Meaning Of Life.

It should be noted that combat is deadly, and chances to recover are few and limited. Any conflict, even with much weaker foes can damage you. While the wound may be not big, it may be beyond repair or healing.


Why do anything, anyway?
Once there is some shelter from the Sun, Undead don't need anything tu survive. (survive ) Some of them, mostly the Mindless Ones, do exactly that: nothing. It is easy to stay in your hole, maybe remove the dust swept in from time to time. Some fresh or old philosophers live similarly, having finally found the time to ponder all those big and little problems of Life (and of Undeath).

A little problem is with adventurers:
 Gold?   Too few valuables.
 Killing monsters?   YOU are a monster.
 Fame?   Very funny, my friend.
 Girls?   There are some, but would you really want...

What remains is the urge to do something, just anything, not having the boring life like everyone else. It was one of the reasons most adventurers started. Now, even former farmers may want a change.


Social-being.
Undead are not social. Distrust is the most common feeling if you meet someone unknown. Many simply ignore you, unless there is some reason to hear.


To sum up Charisma:
Charisma is based mainly on physical fitness, and how preserved the Undead looks. A missing limb, or many wounds (even stitched together) lower it. Whatever makes the Undead look more able to survive Undead World, improves his Charisma. Thus, weapons do help in more ways. A quality sword makes everyone listen to you. A preserved zombie with good rag-armor and an old sword can have the Charisma of a paladin. (Ironic if it was a paladin before.) Having a lot of animals/servants improves Charisma, too.

Still, most Undead value their freedom and peace, and if you are known to them as a breaker of these things, all things that improved your Charisma lower it now instead.

[manfred]

Weird option:

Reviewing things I wrote before, I mentioned for mere inspiration that Undead World could be similar to Mars, just to better imagine it.

Now let us think for a moment: What if it IS Mars?

Pure fantasy could meet sci-fi RPGs, not to forget those weird spelljammer settings. I can already imagine (yet another) B-movie with heroical astronauts landing on Mars, this time to be attacked by ravenous ghouls, helped by another friendlier Undead. Of course bearing some message about humanity n' stuff. Ugh. Any Holywood script-writer out there? My idea would not be that expensive $$$

Sure to followed by Escape from Undead World, explaining how they got there, and how they got from there. With lots of action, too. ...

(Just a question, is it necrophilia, if both participants are dead?  Certain themes cannot be just by-passed in a true block-buster.)

[forgottengods]

i think hell yeaah
mars is a good home for the undeads

maybe the could biuld their homes underground?

[manfred]

That was what I meant them to do from the beginning.

Of course, having few tools etc., means they cannot get very deep. But as they have all the time of their lives , they do what they can to get away from the Sun.

And if there are any caves, even better.

[Kassil]

Given the incredible timespan afforded to undead, what's to stop one of the sentient ones from taking a rock and carving a deep fortress well beneath the surface, safe from the sunlight? Or from finding one of those lumps of metal ore and cold-forging it into a tool or weapon? In no time at all, you could have the planet honeycombed with caverns of undead...

[manfred]

Easily possible.

Still, these are meant to be the beginnings of Undead World. There are probably only a few (ten?) thousand Undead on the planet. Many are not sentient, many are not peacefull. It is not yet the fairy-tale and many years have passed...

But rightly, with enough time and Undead the whole planet can look mightily different. Can complicate it a bit, as occasional earthquakes (or mars-quakes ) make the builder's job harder. Doesn't matter.

Before it goes that far, you may want to find caves at first, or at least some cover. Later, trips to Outside may be done for resources. Still later, it is the only kick (I mean adventure) you may get.

Feel free to imagine a society present on Undead World hundreds (or even thousands) years afterwards.

[manfred]

Not sure where this idea fits into...

For weird settings only: Undead may make fine planetar-explorers. Cheap and reliable.

[Kassil]

Actually, considering that I'm working wth my girlfriend to create a universe which is essentially a merger of everything, I could see it happening... Probably in the hands of the Trisector Corporate Authority, given that it happens o be run by a magically-inclined race...

[forgottengods]

maybe aldo a marsquake can help the undead forming many caves or a great canyon with caves .

and what about a martian thing that eat undeads?
it could be fun don´t you think?

[manfred]

There are some free-roaming undead that eat other undead.

But who knows, the planet may not be as dead as it seems.

Some theories about life on Mars suggested that there might be actually quite evolved life-forms on the surface like... polar bears. Mind you, the bigger the mass, the less warmth does it lose. Of course it would require a different diet, somehow gaining nutrients from the rocky surface (so not an animal in the usual sense). Or perhaps some less than lucky Undead?

No rule, but a possible plot.

[forgottengods]

all kinf of undeads?

dracolichs too'??

and if they , maybe the other undeads can use them against another threats like the polar bears or some other alien creatures??