I run a 5e group that started with The Lost Mines of Phandelver. However, before the campaign was completed, it took a really weird turn. One character has convinced the rest there is nothing meaningful about Phandalin and that they should abandon the quest and allow the Black Spider to do whatever he wants. Another is a Necromancer aspiring to Lichdom and has convinced the party that they should start a business where they "tame" zombies and rent them out as construction workers, trash collectors, housekeepers, and even nannys. I don't care that they're abandoning the original quest (they can face the consequences of that later). However, finding a method of controlling hoards of zombies is a very slippery slope. How do I make this fun but also fraught with adventure and still maintain that balance?

Well…I don’t think most commoners would be willing to hire zombie help, since they wouldn’t trust them not to suddenly go murderous. And even if they did, most nobles, mayors, and guards wouldn’t want them on their land, for the same reasons. Not to mention the number of paladins and clerics who would be after the players for necromancy and desecration of bodies.

You know who would hire them, though? Evil people. Goblin chieftains, Old One cult leaders, wererat sewer-kings, you name it, who are bored of raiding for food and want zombies to farm for them. And evil people have evil plans that they need adventurous people’s help to accomplish, so inviting the PCs might kill two birds with one stone…

Now, your group would have to be comfortable going on adventures for villains, and you’d have to be comfortable homebrewing it. But it’s the only way I can logically see this going. And if handled right, it could be the lead-in to a fun villainous campaign!

(Of course, you can also just talk to them out of game and ask them to actually play the adventure. It’s the players’ job to help move the story along too, and there’s nothing wrong with that!)

You make excellent points! They all claim to be "good" but walk the thin line of being "murder hobo" and thug.

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You make excellent points! They all claim to be "good" but walk the thin line of being "murder hobo" and thug.

 

 Yeah…a Good character, even if Chaotic, will always help others in need and stand against evil, even if they gain no benefit or even endanger themselves. Letting the Black Spider do what he wants means they’re definitely not Good.

Now whether they’re Neutral or Evil remains to be seen. An Evil character (but not a Neutral one) is happy to hurt others for selfish reasons: necromancy walks the line here, but can fall under Neutral if they don’t harm innocent people.

And you’re totally allowed to mandate an alignment change as a result of their behavior, to make them aware of the direction they’re going in!

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they should start a business where they "tame" zombies and rent them out as construction workers, trash collectors, housekeepers, and even nannys. I don't care that they're abandoning the original quest (they can face the consequences of that later). However, finding a method of controlling hoards of zombies is a very slippery slope. How do I make this fun but also fraught with adventure and still maintain that balance?

tl:dr This could be fun, but don't just let them have it at the get go.  Done right, this could be the basis of the rest of your campaign.

So the "goal" is the zombie biz, but I think you're recognizing that one does not simply organize a group of zombies into a workforce.  They've got a way to go.  Animate Dead is a third level spell so the PCs don't even have access to it yet.  

If you're not familiar with it, you may want to check out either the comic or the sourcebook for Acquisitions Incorporated.  It sort of has fun mashing up contemporary real world entrepreneurial capitalism with D&D, lampooning both.  It might be good tone and plot hooks.

But again, the big thing is the characters just aren't at the level to have the magic to manage a Zombie workforce of any particular size (make sure all of you know how animate dead works, the spell does not create a minion for life, magic has be spent to maintain the control).  So rather than just jumping into the Zombie management biz, you can build a whole campaign around the accomplishment of this goal and the allies and foes they meet along the way.  To really do this, your necromancer will probably need to be at least (IMHO) 7th level and/or get access to some sort of magic item that helps them sustain dominion over their undead labor force.  Such an item wouldn't be common and probably extremely coveted by a whole stack of NPC enemies.  There's also the possible response of the communities they try to set up shop in.  They could be run out of town, and the next town etc.  Keep in mind while you're players may think it's fun and games, and maybe their characters do too, most of the communities in the Forgotten Realms have feelings regarding desecrating the dead that map to real world attitudes.  So the aspirations and managerial exercises and marketing etc can be played for laughs, to get at your evil question, there's also ample opportunity for "Wait, are we the baddies?" moments.  

If this game goes really high level, big baddies of necromancy (Liches, Mummy Lords, maybe even Orcus) may propose a merger ... they actually mean acquisition but they're trying to win you over as friends first.  Maybe that'll be the turning point giving the players and opportunity to redeem themselves of all the heinous stuff. 

There are no canonical means of 'taming' zombies available to PCs, just spells that give transient control. You could probably rent out the zombies you control with Animate Dead but I doubt you'd be able to make more than Poor lifestyle, and 2sp/day/zombie is unlikely to break anything or even be very appealing.

I don't have any advice. I just wanna say, wow. Your players have incredible imaginations. I now fear what my players will come up with in my LMoP + DoIP campaign. o_o

I strongly suspect Omin Dran has influenced a few of my players. LOL That said, I definitely, don't want them to obtain this goal too easily. They're currently in Neverwinter which offers a plethora of undead within the rift. However, they have yet to harness the means of managing groups of them. Also, would the Lord Protector approve of their plans? Originally, I had intended on having the party deal with being the pawns in a game between Tymora and Beshaba. Although, I don't see any reasons why that can't still be the case.

Uhh, this is a lot of world building questions here.

How is raising and controlling undead perceived in the world? (that is the big one, in my world creating undead is inherently going against the natural order of things and not accepted at all, even though Necromancy in itself is not)

Else, there are a lot of other smaller ideas to think about:
- how do they acquire the bodies for the zombies, is there consent with the former "owner"
- how do they preserve the bodies? Buying a rotting carcass that smells horrible, might be a show stopper for some

All in all you could read up on The Dustmen faction from Sigil in the Planscape setting, they utilise undead (and try to achieve "true death" for themselves) and have contracts with living people, who are willing to serve as undead after death.

Cult of Myrkul probably where you want to shift the deity intrigue if they want to go the Zombie route.  Yes, setting the game in the Forgotten Realms, it's going to be hard to openly practice this business.  I suppose if they accumulate enough power they could create a mercenary company of undead.  But depending on when you set it the Cult of Myrkul flare up from time to time in league with the Banites in Baldur's Gate.  And wherever you want.  I suppose if they did a shadow crossing businesfolk trafficking in the undead might be more viable. 

I've considered having the group find a hoard of chardalyn but worry that it will unbalance the game. 

One character has convinced the rest there is nothing meaningful about Phandalin and that they should abandon the quest and allow the Black Spider to do whatever he wants. Another is a Necromancer aspiring to Lichdom and has convinced the party that they should start a business where they "tame" zombies and rent them out as construction workers, trash collectors, housekeepers, and even nannys.

This is reading to me like they simply aren't trying to play D&D anymore. I feel like a buzzkill after reading some of these other responses, but if my party said they don't care about their main quest and they want to go run a business, I'd just say "OK, you do that" and then wrap up the campaign with an epilogue with the consequences of abandoning the plot and let them shoot the shit for a while about how their business turned out. When that conversation begins to peter out you ask what they want to do for their next campaign.

First of all, is this fine with you? Abandoning the quest is a very bad vibe..

That said, if you're fine with it, like someone mentioned no one will go around and hire zombies, doesn't matter if it's a great idea (I've had a campaign where a whole country did this tbh, it's a nice idea)...

But like I said, no one hires zombies. Because it's wrong and bad and frowned upon.

How do we fix that?

The adventurers have to do every God dang goody two shoes mission they can, and afterwards when they claim the reward be like "yeah, thanks for the reward. We really couldn't have done it without these fellas tho, now this is a mighty fine zombie worker!"

They should make different adventuring groups, in name, so a bunch of groups are known for completing missions with the aid of zombies. Zaidan the holy, with his zombie horde just slayed the evil dragon! And so on.

After enough of this, you can start spreading the idea of how good they are for manual work as well. 

Then you have a working idea. Also they need hundreds of corpses. By now they are either long dead or pretty much good either way

Thank you for all the very good ideas and suggestions. You've provided plenty of fodder for ideas. I definitely have some creative thinking to do.

Quite an imaginative bunch though maye not great at business acumin.

An unskilled laborer earns about 2sp a day with all the negagive connerations of having zombies I would be surprised is anyone pay pay anythng close to that to hire  a zombie but lets go with that.

Assuming no spell receving items such as a peal of power a 5th level player can control 5 zombies (one 3rd level spell to control the existing zombies and the other to increase the total by one each day, once the fifth is created bith spell slows will be required to maintain all the current zombies). As a necromancer this increases to 6 as he can target an additional corpse (though not an additional zombie when maintaining). 6 Zombies earning 2sp per day earns the play 1gp and 2sp. Alternatively players seeking spel casting services can expect to pay 10-50GP for a single casting of a first level spell. He would make much more money learning some spells useful to a wealthy  (Identify, mage armor, or arcane lock for example) and charging to cast them. (But that would make gameplay very boring)

Okay Guys. Here's my initial thoughts on how to do this. As I mentioned before, the party can come across a large store of Chardalyn. Per the lore, there is a bunch of it hidden beneath Old Owl Well that was smuggled there from Netheril hundreds of years earlier. Hanum Kost found it and used it to animate a few zombies of his own. Since they killed Hanum Kost, it is now free for them to use if they locate it. Because there is only a limited quantity, they will eventually run out. Then, if they intend on continuing the company, they can go looking for more in Interior Faerun. As for how they use the Chardalyn or if the business would profit (or survive at all), that will have to be for them to figure out. I'm sure there's a lot more I need to consider. How is this for a starting idea though?

I admit, I had serious trepidations about the idea at first but then it grew on me.  They will have to start slow because it is, as you pointed out, a risky investment. Ultimately, it's their job to do what they need to ensure the company gets off the ground and succeeds. As far as the bad vibes from not completing the initial quest, I fully intend that they face consequences for that decision. The more I thought about their plan, the more fun ideas I had that could make the game a lot of fun! Thank you for your thoughts! They helped a lot!

Just a couple of ideas and things that might prove useful, from a DM currently running LMOP:

- the mine itself is a "magical nexus" -- if anyone wanted a good place to store some zombies for low cost, well, a mine that's already infested with them (and hinted to have its natural leyline already corrupting towards Undeath magic anyway) is a great home base! Plus, some zombie miners would be a great source of start-up capital for their business expansions.

- the mine also has a Flame Skull guarding it (among many other things), now according to the booklet that Flame Skull is only interested in its treasure but surely there's an opportunity to learn more about necromantic arts by finding out from said Flame Skull what it remembers about its death and revival? Or, if you're comfortable with re-writing the story somewhat, it could be an awesome way to test out the undead-taming spell -- imagine what an awesome receptionist a flying undead skull would make

- there's a magical anomaly under the Tresendar Manor which slows decay; a great thing for the party to look into and see if they can't replicate it or use it for "inventory storage" (they'd have to chase off/kill the Nothic, which would love nothing more than to feast on the corpses... but perhaps they could strike a deal where they give the no-longer-usable corpses to the Nothic in exchange for having a powerful guard creature?)

- Hamon Kast or whatever his name is up at Old Owl Well is already doing this plan to a degree. A perfect mentor or business partner!

As for the whole Black Spider situation, he's certainly a potential first customer for them. After all, he's going to need manpower for his upcoming plans; why not make use of the townfolk? He was likely planning to enslave many of them anyway, this is just the same thing with more steps. That said, the party might decide to do a hostile reduction in the members of their board later, once the business is up and running and they have no need for all the political and other (e.g. "maybe get shivved in the night, or poisoned and sold into slavery") liabilities of their founding partner...

... or the Black Spider could equally well turn around and Zuckerberg the party if the business is taking off, leading to an interesting confrontation that plays out more like an indirect attack than a "kick in the door and kill all the monsters" type of encounter.

Thanks for the awesome ideas! I hope the party finishes the initial quest so that these options can be made available. The flaming skull would be a great device!

Lost mines makes use of Doppelgangers but never really ties them in with the story.

Have Harbin Wester and some other towns people be replaced by doppelgangers under the control of the black spider.  Have those doppelgangers hire the zombies and send them to the mines as minions of the black spider.  Now the party has to go into the mines to get their zombies back.

Have the replaced townsfolk locked up with the last rockseeker brother at the end.

The rest of the module has a lot to do with undead.  The old owl well is another necro, maybe he is a quest giver now?  Thundertree is filled with ash covered zombies, and corpses of those killed by the volcano.  The banshee is an undead.  The cragmaw castle can be a location the party can use as base, and have the zombie work force repair it.

Daren Edermath in phandalin is a retired member of the Order of the Gauntlet.  You can have him alert the Order and cause trouble for the party.