So one of my party members was attacked a killed by zombies in our most recent campaign, not wanting to leave him behind the est of the party collected his head which has no been reanimated as a zombie. I was hoping to get some ideas as to how i should get this head to be capable of intelligent thought again and also what the party could potentially do with him, he was a level 3 ranger but its been discussed forcing him to study linguistics to become a sort of all in one translator for the party. is there any other magics or knowledge that would be helpful and possible for an undead disembodied head?
You could go really crazy and attach his head to a warforged body via magic either literally as a head or just via the brain. This is a bit farfetched but I mean.. its dungeons and dragons so at the same time is it really? I'd say that sticking the head/brain on/in a warforged body (or.. even better.. Frankenstein style on another corpse if your party wants to get really freaky) and using something like revivify could *technically* in your own personal setting help bring this person back. Plus it could give this player the chance to try new racial feats, or keep the old ones. Imagine having a half-orcs racial feats in the body of a halfling.
I'm not sure if it'll work but a headband of intellect will give him an intelligence score of 19, you could Rp that it "restores his ability to reason"while wearing it... maybe. He'd probably have a morality shift though, could be some fun RP to have an intelligent amoral zombie head travelling with you.
If I were the DM and I was blessed to have a party as clever as yours come up with the idea to actually keep the head, I would instruct the player to create a new character to play as, but letting him know that he'll still be in control of what is essentially a lightly-sentient magic item. His last character's zombified head.
Along those lines, I'd say that zombies aren't really known for their mental prowess, so the head would have to take some severe penalties to Intelligence and Wisdom. Maybe also Charisma. Idunno. You're the DM. But that would be an absolute blast to keep the zombie head around.
Do you have any way to directly resurrect the person via divine intervention/necromancy spells? I would just go with that and it could be fun to have someone build a new body, which would be a cool dynamic for a ranger to be bound to technology.
The most funny way to go is to not allow him a body, but allow him to continue to play as the head (only). It could work if your campaign is quite RP focused, and the other PC's thinks it's a good idea and allows you to do some workarounds.
The most obvious is that he must go for a spell casting class. A mage hand should actually be able to carry him, and I think I would at least allowed the player to "move" his head with the hand as a bonus action.
I would also have considered to allow him to redistribute his stats. He's after all just a head, so a stat like dex is quite meaningless, and I would have bought that this experience might have changed his mental abilities as well.
Don't give him too much to start with (especially not if you have creative players), let the player(s) try up to come up with good ideas and see if they might "work".
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Ludo ergo sum!
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So one of my party members was attacked a killed by zombies in our most recent campaign, not wanting to leave him behind the est of the party collected his head which has no been reanimated as a zombie. I was hoping to get some ideas as to how i should get this head to be capable of intelligent thought again and also what the party could potentially do with him, he was a level 3 ranger but its been discussed forcing him to study linguistics to become a sort of all in one translator for the party. is there any other magics or knowledge that would be helpful and possible for an undead disembodied head?
You could go really crazy and attach his head to a warforged body via magic either literally as a head or just via the brain. This is a bit farfetched but I mean.. its dungeons and dragons so at the same time is it really? I'd say that sticking the head/brain on/in a warforged body (or.. even better.. Frankenstein style on another corpse if your party wants to get really freaky) and using something like revivify could *technically* in your own personal setting help bring this person back. Plus it could give this player the chance to try new racial feats, or keep the old ones. Imagine having a half-orcs racial feats in the body of a halfling.
Full of rice, beans, and bad ideas.
I'm not sure if it'll work but a headband of intellect will give him an intelligence score of 19, you could Rp that it "restores his ability to reason"while wearing it... maybe. He'd probably have a morality shift though, could be some fun RP to have an intelligent amoral zombie head travelling with you.
So he's just the head.
If I were the DM and I was blessed to have a party as clever as yours come up with the idea to actually keep the head, I would instruct the player to create a new character to play as, but letting him know that he'll still be in control of what is essentially a lightly-sentient magic item. His last character's zombified head.
Along those lines, I'd say that zombies aren't really known for their mental prowess, so the head would have to take some severe penalties to Intelligence and Wisdom. Maybe also Charisma. Idunno. You're the DM. But that would be an absolute blast to keep the zombie head around.
you could always use the lingering soul class that matt mercer created to either bring the character back, or twist it a bit to fit a zombie head.
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/226513/The-Lingering-Soul--Class-PostDeath-Option
Do you have any way to directly resurrect the person via divine intervention/necromancy spells? I would just go with that and it could be fun to have someone build a new body, which would be a cool dynamic for a ranger to be bound to technology.
one just verbal spell is teleport. they could be just a escape option. it is ridiculous, but it could be fun, if the DM allows them to learn it.
Love it!
The most funny way to go is to not allow him a body, but allow him to continue to play as the head (only). It could work if your campaign is quite RP focused, and the other PC's thinks it's a good idea and allows you to do some workarounds.
The most obvious is that he must go for a spell casting class. A mage hand should actually be able to carry him, and I think I would at least allowed the player to "move" his head with the hand as a bonus action.
I would also have considered to allow him to redistribute his stats. He's after all just a head, so a stat like dex is quite meaningless, and I would have bought that this experience might have changed his mental abilities as well.
Don't give him too much to start with (especially not if you have creative players), let the player(s) try up to come up with good ideas and see if they might "work".
Ludo ergo sum!