Types of undead

[DragonEyes]

So... I'm putting together an Undead game for my roleplayers. This is a personally built world, not tied to any existing IP. It is basically a gimme to one of the players who is a huge zombie apocalypse fiction fan. I'm not really, but I do enjoy the occasional zombie movie and I like the Walking Dead TV series.

Either way, I'm basing this on magic, not "viral infection" and having it follow stages as the effect grows.

What I'm looking for is ideas that I can use to build the stages. Different kinds of undead from myth, movie, or novel that could be incorporated to make it more interesting. I'd appreciate any help or discussion.

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Back story, in brief is that Gibbering Horrors from Beyond Time™ are making it into our world. The horrors are spiritual and they need bodies to infest. They use the dead.

As each stage progresses, older zombies can arise and, like the DV, the older the zombie, the more powerful it can be. So, the first stage, with the recent dead, will be the shambling dead. As time goes on, older and consequently faster or stronger dead will arise. Also, those bodies that have certain special circumstances might have different capabilities, ie. mummified bodies will essentially be nearly impervious to harm, smarter than the average zombie, and especially susceptible to fire.

There are also necromancers who can control the dead, but they are very rare and very far between.

[LizW65]

You could start with the literal Ur-example, the Sumerian Gallu:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallu

[DragonEyes]

You could start with the literal Ur-example, the Sumerian Gallu:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallu

So... from the takes I've seen from other people Gallu are snakelike undead, right? I understand that they are demons, but as far as how they'd be portrayed as an undead creature, it would be snakelike?

[gatordave96]

I wonder if you might delve into the original mythos from Haiti, or trace it back even farther to Africa.  Might be cool to deviate from the "Night of the Living Dead" sort of zombie and go back to the beginning.

[DragonEyes]

In a way I will be. There are necromancers, voduin or otherwise. The primary baddies are going to be petro coming back in from Guinee. They are bringing the dead back as hosts when they come, using the dead spirits to raise them. I suppose there should be some good spirits that come back too, like the Ghede. Maybe we got some good guy zombies in there. Not too much, since me and the players want this to be a survival epic, but enough to make the shoot first approach suck in its way.

[TheCuriousFan]

Just make sure not to call them Necromancers unless all they do is ask questions of the dead.

[OZ]

Just make sure not to call them Necromancers unless all they do is ask questions of the dead.

Although the literal meaning of Necromancy has to do with divination by talking to the dead, it has become pretty well accepted in fantasy and horror to use the term for any magic that has to do with the dead including zombies, liches, mummies and such like.

[TheCuriousFan]

Although the literal meaning of Necromancy has to do with divination by talking to the dead, it has become pretty well accepted in fantasy and horror to use the term for any magic that has to do with the dead including zombies, liches, mummies and such like.

Still a pet peeve.

[OZ]

I understand. I have several (pronouncing caramel as carmel for instance) my friends just sigh for the most part and ask me to please put away the soap box when I'm done with it.

[DragonEyes]

So... with that pet peeve, do you get upset whenever Dresden talks about pyromancy, ectomancy, or halfadozenothersomancy?

[TheCuriousFan]

So... with that pet peeve, do you get upset whenever Dresden talks about pyromancy, ectomancy, or halfadozenothersomancy?

Slightly if I think about it too much rather than just glance over it, but then I imagine the senior council getting drunk, playing D&D and then deciding to change the terms to those and it goes away.