Undead types and NPCs

I recently remembered the similarities between death knights and skeleton warriors. Both are powerful undead creatures, clad in decayed flesh and ruined armor, big swords, with ominous red dots for eyes.

[Wraiths also have red dots for eyes in their descriptions. And decaying flesh. Wights are similar].

One major distinction is that skeleton warriors are typically enslaved by a wizard, compelled to serve without autonomy. Death knights retain their will and intelligence—although, theoretically, they could be bound by a powerful spellcaster, like ANY undead could.

[I'm remined of "The Empire of the Necromancers" by Clark Ashton Smit. Go read it, it is awesome. Some undead retain some memories by accident, not because a wizard decided to create a specific "type" of undead].

So they look similar and serve similar purposes. It is unlikely that PCs would be able to tell them apart.

This speaks to a broader Dungeons & Dragons trend: the proliferation of nearly identical monsters.

Personally, I’d prefer a “powerful undead” template with variations instead of dozens of creatures that mostly feel the same. Imagine, for example, a system where magical users become liches, warriors evolve into death knights, and thieves fade into shadows or something similar.

Maybe they can keep (some of) their levels, so you'd have undead of all levels of power. These can be individuals, not simply monster types. Whether they are enslaved or not, or if they lead other undead, or if they wear armor or carry a sword, depends on their circumstances.

Not all liches must be super powerful! Some minor wizards could take a chance and botch the process a bit. Same goes for other types of undead.

In my book, Teratogenicon, I describe three fundamental types of undead:

• Mindless – Purely animated bodies, like zombies and skeletons. These do not need personalities or many details.

• Bodyless – Entities of mind and soul, but no physical form (ghosts, wraiths). Some will have interesting personalities and traits.

• Soulless – Powerful creatures like vampires, liches, and death knights. While they retain their physical and mental abilities, they are somehow estranged from their souls. Maybe it is stored somewhere safe, maybe it is lost, or maybe just forgotten and they could be redeemed (but that'd probably cause their physical/mental demise). "Soulless" is a more poetic than practical description. They definitely deserve some history, personality an and traits!

This categorization offers a simple and effective way classify undead though a body/mind/soul divide. Undeath creates a fissure—some beings lose their autonomy, some exist only in spirit, and some are something else entirely.

Of course, there could still be liminal undead: creatures that keep some of their mental faculties, like ghouls, or protoplasmic shapes that are just echoes of souls and no actual souls, poltergeists that can affect the physical world up to a point, or dead bodies inhabited by spirits that belong somewhere else.

As you can see, I have nothing against undead types; in fact, I wrote a PDF with one hundred of them and ideas on how to create even more ("glowing red eyes" are there, but there are more than 100 traits to choose from!) . 

But I think some types of undead, specially the most powerful ones, should be seen as individuals (NPCs) rather than monster types.