Feats For The Canny Corpse
Hello everyone, and welcome to another From the Workshop, where we bring you new and exciting material to improve your game each and every week. This week, as you may have heard, is Zombie Week here at Necromancers of the Northwest, and so zombies will be the focus of our article. Now, you might be expecting more zombie monsters, but I'm sure if you look back you will find that particular horse quite soundly beaten to death, animated as a zombie, and then made into one of a mind-boggling number of alternate zombie templates and monsters fluttering around, and while I guess I could have converted some of the more obscure 3.5 ones for Pathfinder, I didn't find the prospect appetizing. So now you might be expecting some kind of necromancer prestige class, and again you would be disappointed; after all, this week is about zombies, not their magically-inclined bosses. So at this point you might be starting to wonder if I'm ever going to stop talking about what I didn't do and start talking about what I did.
As those without obscenely small monitors will doubt already have noticed, I eventually settled on feats for zombies. No, not feats to control zombies or eventually become a zombie, but 10 feats for actual rotting and breathless zombies. Now, I know some of you are thinking that zombies are mindless and cannot have feats (except for toughness), but I naturally decided to work around that. Anyway, have fun.
Adamantine Monstrosity
Through complex surgery you have integrated adamantine plates into your rotting hide, making you exceptionally more durable.
Prerequisites: Zombie, 13 Hit Dice.
Benefit: Your DR is now overcome only by slashing and adamantine weapons.
Articulate
Through training and surgery, you have managed to gain some measure of grace and swiftness, reminiscent of a living being.
Prerequisite: Zombie.
Benefit: You lose the staggered special quality.
Awakened
Your meager self-awareness has begun to blossom into a distinct personality.
Prerequisites: Zombie, 11 Hit Dice.
Benefit: You gain a bonus to your Wisdom and Charisma scores equal to the base creature’s Wisdom and Charisma modifiers (minimum 0), as well as a +4 bonus to Intelligence.
Awesome Slam
You have mastered the art of applying brute force to your slam attacks.
Prerequisites: Zombie, base attack bonus +6 .
Benefit: You now add twice your Strength bonus to your slam damage, instead of 1-1/2 times your Strength bonus.
Draining Embrace
Once you have a foe in your grasp, you can slowly drain away his life force.
Prerequisites: Zombie, 13 Hit Dice.
Benefit: Whenever you damage a foe in a grapple, you gain 5 temporary hit points that last for 1 minute.
Regeneration
Over time you slowly heal your own wounds.
Prerequisites: Zombie, 15 Hit Dice.
Benefit: You recover one hit point every hour in addition to your ordinary healing. Additionally, you can reattach severed limbs by holding them to the stump from which they were severed for one hour.
Rotting Stench
You have learned to channel the rotting stench of your flesh into a noxious vapor which fills the air around you.
Prerequisite: Zombie.
Benefit: Any creature that hits you in combat must succeed on a Fortitude save (DC 10 + 1/2 your Hit Dice + your Con modifier) or be nauseated for one round. Creatures immune to poison are immune to this effect. Any creature who successfully saves against this ability cannot be affected by the same zombie’s rotting stench ability for a period of one hour.
Terrifying Moan
You can create a low bellowing moan which causes even mighty foes to panic.
Prerequisite: Zombie.
Benefit: Three times per day, as a standard action, you can emit a terrifying moan in a 30-foot cone. Each creature caught within the cone must make a Will save (DC 10 + 1/2 your Hit Dice + your Cha modifier) or be shaken for 1 minute. This is a mind-affecting fear effect.
Toughened Hide
Your undead flesh is particularly strong for a zombie of your type.
Prerequisites: Zombie, 6 Hit Dice.
Benefit: Your DR/slashing increases by 1.
Special: You can take this feat multiple times; its effects stack.
Unbound
You are free of the magical restraints that bound you to the will of another, and over time have begun to develop your own intellect and consciousness.
Prerequisite: Zombie.
Benefit: You gain an Intelligence score of 3 + the base creature’s Intelligence modifier (minimum score of 3). You may gain feats and skills as you gain Hit Dice and take class levels as normal. You do not regain knowledge of your past life, and do not immediately gain the ability to speak a language, though you may still spend skill points to learn a language, as usual. Additionally, you gain all the special privileges associated with being an intelligent undead, such as the ability to heal over time.
Special: A zombie that has been free of any direct control for at least six months may, at the GM’s discretion, gain the Unbound feat as a bonus feat.