THIS IS UNOFFICIAL MATERIAL

These game mechanics are usable in your campaign if your DM allows them but not refined by final game design and editing.  They aren’t officially part of the Dungeons & Dragons game and aren’t permitted in D&D Adventurers League events unless otherwise stated.  To use this content, toggle Homebrew content on in the character builder.

Undead are more than merely resurrected bodies or risen spirits.  As a race they are comprised of two distinct categories of undeath: greater and lesser.  The former are best described as rational, sentient beings whose consciousness has been retrieved from the Great Beyond.  Whereas the latter are better characterized as animalistic, reanimated bodies that rely on nothing more than basic, feral and bestial instincts.

Undeath manifests itself in many forms and stems from a plurality of sources; curses, blood magic, fungal spores, necromancy, and paracausal or preternatural energy are but the first that come to mind.

Regardless the origin of their creation there now exist today entire undead cultures and territories that are as contradictory, conflicted, and complex as that of any of the living races: each of them beset by opposing viewpoints, dreams, and values.

Despite inherent internal and external strife, undead demonstrate a tenuous capacity to achieve some semblance of tolerance and cohesion that binds their countless different species together.  This assimilation gives credence to the idea that death truly is the great universal equalizer.

In all fairness however, these virtues are not without their own shortcomings.  But whatever one might think of them the undead are here to stay for good and are sure to carve out a destiny all their own, in a world that is both at once fully unsuspecting and wholly unforgiving.  

Strangers in a Stranger Land

Typically with no place to call home, undead find themselves seemingly perpetual foreigners.  Roaming across vast, expansive regions, they wander through different time periods that are often not their own.  Complicating matters more is the living races' instinctual fear of death and their understandable, if not fallible, association of undeath with black magics and even darker histories.

While usually well-deserved, this miasma of prejudice and persecution forces many risen dead to hide their true nature.  On the scant occasions they journey into mortal realms, undead typically disguise themselves with costumes, masks, and a number of pungent perfumes.

In order to regain some sense of normalcy a few undead have even been known to take up residence in their old homes or a hearth somewhere nearby.  Fewer still succeed in maintaining such a lifestyle under these conditions though, as they are almost always discovered by the local populace and summarily executed soon thereafter.  A sad reality that is particularly true in more densely populated, metropolitan areas.

Incidentally, most undead have a better sense of what fate would befall them should they succumb to the whims of nostalgia and sentimentality.  For them the choice to walk away and live as outcasts is easy, as they exile themselves and make their way to the farthest reaches of civilization.  Once there, they plant roots in inhospitable or even outright hostile environments that would kill most living creatures.  

For instance they might travel to hazardous areas like the smoke-filled and air-choked lands near a volcano, poisonous swamps, or the frostbiting wilds of the ever wintry north.  Devoid of all the hallmarks of life however, these places typically only serve to exacerbate whatever alienation and loneliness undead already experience.

Rumors tell perhaps in spite of this ongoing diaspora, a small handful of undead might be coalescing into nation states of their own, well beyond the grasp of mortal influences.  Should this hearsay bear some truth, it remains yet to be seen if a collection of nomadic individuals can fully integrate themselves with one another and function as a properly governed and organized society.

Beyond the Grave

Depending on the level of decomposition, humanoid-undead usually range between 20 to 300 pounds in weight.  For those with aggressive signs of decay, their empty eye sockets are normally replaced by a colorful and magical, flame-like animus.  Whereas more well-preserved bodies keep intact normal eyes that occasionally flicker with the spark of whatever life-giving power has imbued them, from time-to-time.

Hair, if they have any at all, is usually lank, dark, and wrought with grime and grave-dirt that no amount of cleaning will fully remove.  As such, most choose to live bald-headed, or fashion themselves anything and everything from hoods and hats to simple or elaborate wigs to wear. 

The length of death and severity of decay also influence skin pigmentation, which varies wildly from natural skin tones all the way to more notorious discolorations like cold-blue, motley-green, or ashen-grey flesh.

Given the restorative properties of undeath, many undead who are raised shortly after their death are able to maintain their original appearance.  Depending on how long ago their death, they might find themselves brought back as a partially or mostly decayed body, where their silhouette stays the same but their flesh shows signs of different blemishes and deformations.

Those too far gone to return to their corpses are either revived in some other available vessel or return in the form of an ethereal undead, such as a wraith or ghost.

Dead Man's Tale

Neither part the living nor the dead – those who find themselves in undeath are more often than not, reduced to a single instinct: survival.  Their newfound condition is, for all intents and purposes, a form of immortality: one that undoubtedly attracts certain types of creatures to seek its exploitation.

Still, eternal life is not without its price – senses and emotions are heightened or diminished, and food, drink, and other carnal pleasures no longer provide the same sort of relief or satisfaction they once did in life.  Not to mention, undeath is regularly imposed with a litany of strings attached – the likes of which usually bind undead to the will and whims of whatever master so chose to violate their soul, and render them nothing more than spectators inside an otherwise empty vessel of unbridled fury, unwavering obedience, and unflinching chaos.

In spite of the more common, unfortunate, and conventional means and outcomes of undeath, there is nothing inherently subservient or destructive about the living dead.  Even lesser undead that work off intuition are not intentionally malicious, much in the same way a beast is not evil simply because it behaves like a wild animal.

In fact, in rare instances both lesser and greater undead have been known to arise as natural occurrences in the world.  Just the same, others have consensually returned through the use of necromancy, or similar magic, with their free will still very much intact.  Regardless the methodology however, whatever process brings them back is still as equally jarring as the next.  This is primarily due to the fact that resurrection quite literally rips an individual's soul from wherever it has traversed to in the Great Beyond.

Once in the throes of undeath, nearly all undead who gain their autonomy greatly cherish and covet their independence.  Especially since daily reminders of their race's or own personal subjugation, and the carnage and devastation unleashed as a result thereof, are often not too difficult to find.

Interestingly, many sentient undead consider freeing their captive counterparts a sacred obligation.  In other instances where a greater or lesser undead are too forgone, their sentient brethren simply dispose of them.  Ultimately in their eyes, it is better to be awarded one final peaceful rest than to shamble about listlessly for eternity, or worse even yet, to serve at the behest of a malicious entity, entirely against one's will.

Relics of the Past

For a great many undead their past lives are as distant as their homelands: places to which they may never return.  Many forgo reconnecting with their former selves and choose to sever all ties with their fragmented memories.  Meanwhile, others hold onto whatever shreds of names and faces they can, no matter how partially forgotten – unable to let go of the love and hope and dreams of their past lives, that are now as dead as they are.

The anguish from recognizing these losses alone is enough to induce madness.  By the same measure, this intersection of rage, suffering, and melancholy can also be redirected and repurposed as a source of meaning, empowering the undead to carry on further along their journey, thus allowing them to forge their way towards whatever destinies lie in waiting. 

Frequently entire countries, customs, and cultures an undead may have once been familiar with no longer exist.  This is especially so if their death was decades or even hundreds of years ago.  As a result, undead who find themselves in this predicament are pretty easily identifiable.  Particularly since they behave or speak in an antiquated manner that is usually at odds with social mores and norms of the present time. 

This temporal disconnect interrupts their ability to relate to modern creatures, or even other contemporary undead for that matter.  Therefore these wayward souls, lost to both time and space, regularly leverage whatever compatriots they can find in order to bridge what can sometimes be epoch-long communication and knowledge gaps.

Undead Names

Many undead prefer to keep the names they held in their past life.  For others their mortal names are forgotten by them or have lost all meaning.  These undead often reinvent themselves or adopt nicknames given to them by fellow companions, and hold them to be as true as any other creatures’ birth name.