Homebrew Awakened Undead (Skeleton) Species Details

Death comes for all things in a near infinite variety of ways. So, too, are there many reasons why the dead might return from the grave. Directly applied necromancy, cursed lands, and unfinished business are but a few, and all leave the newly undead soul with a mere semblance of the life it had before. All undead carry the physical and emotional scars of what ended their mortal lives, though some may be far more subtle than others.

Dead and Reborn

Typically having no lands to call their own, undead with an awakened sense of self are usually perpetual foreigners, wanders in a land and often a time they do not belong to. Compounding matters, most mortal cultures carry with them an instinctual fear of death and the dead, and many associate necromancy specifically with dark tidings. This forms a wall of (often well-earned) prejudice and hatred that sentient undead find themselves up against, and many undead choose to hide their necrotic natures behind clothes, masks, and pungent perfumes when journeying into civilization. Depending on composition, humanoid undead typically range a wide gamut from 20 to 300 pounds, and may possess empty eyes, a colored flame-like magical animus in their sockets, or harrowed, surprisingly mortal eyes burning with an inner fire. Hair (if they have it at all) is usually lank, dark, and wrought with grime and gravedirt that no amount of cleaning will fully remove.

Service and Freedom

Undeath is effectively immortality, a strong reason why many mortal spellcasters of a certain moral bent consider it a viable alternative to actually dying. Still, it is not immortality without a price; senses and emotions dull, food and drink no longer have taste, and often an undead state comes alongside a subservience of will and unthinking toil beneath a merciless and malevolent master. Some undead are born into freedom, while others earn it or have it thrust upon them. Regardless, all undead that are not bound greatly cherish their liberday, as the reminders of what could easily happen were they not fortunate enough to possess free will abound throughout history. Many awakened undead consider it their sacred duty to free other mindless undead, or simply to dispatch them wherever they may be found. The reasoning is straightforward enough: a final rest awarded to all mortals is greatly preferential to eternal slavery to the likes of a short-sighted, megalomaniacal spellcaster.

Fallen Home, Forgotten Past

For many awakened undead, the past is a distant homeland to which they may never return, holding names and faces now partially-forgotten, and loves and lives as dead as they are. The anguish of this loss is enough to drive many mad, but others use this rage and pain as a source of power and drive, carrying them further on the road to whatever dark destiny awaits. Frequently, entire countries, customs, and cultures an undead may be familiar with no longer exist, and the sentient dead behaves or speaks in an antiquated fashion because of this. These undead may find it more difficult than usual to relate to modern mortals, usually leveraging what companions they find to bridge this epoch-long communication gap.

Undead Names

Many undead that awaken into sentience prefer to keep the names they held in their mortal lives. For others, however, their mortal names are forgotten or have lost meaning. These undead often adopt nicknames given to them by their former masters or present companions, and hold them to be as true as any other creature’s birth name. Examples of names given in this fashion can be seen, below: Names: Bane, Carver, Clatter, Crumble, Drudge, Minion, Mort, Pale, Rattlebones, Raven, Rook, Rotface, Shade, Shiver, Spore, Wisp

Awakened Undead Traits

Creature Type: Humanoid, Undead
Size: Medium (about 4–7 feet tall) or Small (about 2–4 feet tall), chosen when you select this species
Speed: 30 feet

As an Awakened Undead, you have these special traits.

Ability Score Increases

When determining your character’s ability scores, increase your Dexterity or Intelligence score by 2, and your Constitution score by 1

Dead Immortality

You do not age. Given time, the necromantic energies that sustain you will heal most wounds you take at approximately the same rate as a mortal, and your hit dice function as normal.

Living Dead

You have been raised from death, but regaining your autonomy has returned to you some of the spark of life. You are immune to disease. You do not need to eat or breathe, but you can ingest food and drink if you wish. Additionally, you have two creature types: humanoid and undead. You can be affected by a spell or ability if it works on either of your creature types.

Restless

As an undead, you very rarely tire. You treat exhaustion as if it was one level less. In addition, instead of sleeping, you enter an inactive state for 4 hours each day. You do not dream in this state; you are fully aware of your surroundings and notice approaching enemies and other events as normal.

Unholy

Unlike other undead, you can be restored through healing magic, but it has a significantly dampened effect on you. When you regain hit points from a source that specifies it does not function on undead, you only receive half as many hit points as the source would normally provide, rounded down.

Darkvision

Through the necromantic energy animating you, you are able to perceive with greater clarity that which lurks in the darkness. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.

Bloodless

You are immune to poison damage and the poisoned condition.

Bone To Pick

Whenever both of your hands are free, you may choose to use a free hand and a bonus action to remove one of you hands. It counts as thieves' tools or a similar set of simple tools while you hold it. Removed hands may be reattached by using another bonus action.