Animate Armor

Choose up to two full suits of non-magical Plate Armor of Medium or Small size within range. Each suit of armor becomes an Animated Armor construct under your control. (The GM has game statistics for these creatures.)

As a bonus action on each of your turns, you can mentally command any creature you animated with this spell if the creature is within 120 feet of you (if you control multiple creatures, you can command any or all of them at the same time, issuing the same command to each one). You decide what action the creature will take and where it will move during its next turn, or you can issue a general command, such as to guard a particular chamber or corridor. If you issue no commands, the creature only defends itself against hostile creatures. Once given an order, the creature continues to follow it until its task is complete.

The constructs are under your control for 24 hours, after which the Animated Armor becomes inert and collapses to the ground.  The Plate Armor may be re-used for future casts of the spell.  Before this time, if the caster moves more than 120 feet away from any of the constructs created, the Animated Armor becomes inert but will re-animate immediately when the caster returns to being in the 120 foot range.

If you sprinkle an area up to 120 feet per side with diamond dust worth 1000gp, the constructs created by this spell become permanent and are bound to and cannot leave the area.  They will still recognize the caster as the person controlling them and issuing orders, and will continue to carry out any simple orders in his or her absence. If the constructs are killed but their armor parts remain in the area, they will re-constitute themselves in full after 24 hours and resume their duties.  This dust treatment is only necessary for a single cast of this spell, not for each construct.  Only one cast of this spell is valid for a given area, and areas cannot overlap in any way.

Any construct(s) created by this spell is a valid target for Magic Mouth.  This allows the construct to issue commands, warnings, or password challenges.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a 7th-level spell slot, you can animate four Animated Armor constructs. When you cast this spell using an 8th-level spell slot, you can animate or reassert control over six Animated Armor constructs or a single Helmed Horror.  When you cast this spell using a 9th-level spell slot, you can animate 8 Animated Armor constructs or two Helmed Horror constructs.

Helmed Horrors require the additional components of a shield and weapon to create.  Their armor, weapon, and shield must be magical or made of magic materials (such as adamantium, silver, or mithril).