I was looking at the animate dead spell. It says that I lose control of an undead after 24 hours, that implies it has free will after that. I was thinking, assuming I revive a person who was friendly to me, would it be friendly as a zombie/ skeleton or would it still be evil? (My paladin is CG for reference)
Undead are animated by necrotic power into a foul imitation of life. While there is some imprint of the previous creature, it is not the same creature. Zombies and skeletons are inherently hostile toward living things. However, Animate Dead also allows you to continue to dominate the same undead creature by recasting the spell within the 24-hour window. It also allows you to control up to 4 undead per casting, so if you have 2 - 3rd level slots, you can use one to animate a corpse, and the other to maintain control over your flock.
A DM can always create exceptions. Intelligent undead, like vampires and liches, can be negotiated with, but you won't have the ability to create those.
And assuming I go with a bard instead of sorcerer, or home brew something similar to divine soul (like nature soul or bardic blood) I could make a skeleton/ zombie intelligent by using the awaken spell.
Edit: I apparently can’t do it on skeletons because they have an intelligence of 6.
Or, after I control an undead, I could simply use the ceremony spell. Assuming it had been good or neutral in life, I could use ceremony to shift a creature to its previous alignment.
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Sounds like it’s kind of missing the point
I was looking at the animate dead spell. It says that I lose control of an undead after 24 hours, that implies it has free will after that. I was thinking, assuming I revive a person who was friendly to me, would it be friendly as a zombie/ skeleton or would it still be evil? (My paladin is CG for reference)
Undead are animated by necrotic power into a foul imitation of life. While there is some imprint of the previous creature, it is not the same creature. Zombies and skeletons are inherently hostile toward living things. However, Animate Dead also allows you to continue to dominate the same undead creature by recasting the spell within the 24-hour window. It also allows you to control up to 4 undead per casting, so if you have 2 - 3rd level slots, you can use one to animate a corpse, and the other to maintain control over your flock.
A DM can always create exceptions. Intelligent undead, like vampires and liches, can be negotiated with, but you won't have the ability to create those.
And assuming I go with a bard instead of sorcerer, or home brew something similar to divine soul (like nature soul or bardic blood) I could make a skeleton/ zombie intelligent by using the awaken spell.
Edit: I apparently can’t do it on skeletons because they have an intelligence of 6.
Or, after I control an undead, I could simply use the ceremony spell. Assuming it had been good or neutral in life, I could use ceremony to shift a creature to its previous alignment.