How long do ghouls and zombies continue in their current form? (i.e. how many years or days does a ghoul stay in it's physical form? Do they rot away?)

jh

from TGS reading, i'd say as long as their creator is "alive". When you Lazarus Mourn (possessing Madriga), all zombies/skel with him (or if you use successfully the hidden Morr's ritual, which most groups won't be able to do).

As said Nicklass Schulman to Adler "bah, just find the Necromancer and kill him, no more walking dead, problem solved" (or close enough )

read second sentence as "When you kill Lazarus Mourn (possessing ..."

Undead where created by:

spell : they will last as long as the spell indicates it, or till the spellcaster dies, whichever comes first.

Ritual, the undead can usually exist in their gruesome form long after the caster(s) of the ritual is dead, they may linger on for centuries. Although zombies will likely turn into skeletons if enough time has passed.

Necromantic winds: Some areas contain heavy necromantic winds, like sylvania or Mousillion, where the dead rest uneasy. In such places they will exist as long as the evil winds permeates the area. And such areas can spawn an almost unlimited force of undead.

But ghouls are not "true" undead, but rather people that have taken to eating the dead, either from graveyards or from battlefields. this heinous act of canibalism slowly disolves their mind and turn them into the creatures known as ghouls. So ghouls can exist as long as a man can live I quess. Furhter it seems that ghouls like many other undead are drawn to pools of stagnant necromantic winds.

Just what I think

Just make up your own rules. If you are the GM, it's your world.

Lautrer, that actually goes against Mal's First Post Reply Rules. ;]

I totally agree with you, Mal. But, just a complexification (on a complex setting)... Once I GMed an adventure on Nordland as a prelude to Paths oh the Damned. The group left Middenheim leaded by a PC that was an Initiate of Verena, as a request from one of his superiors to answer some rumour about a Village at the Sea of Claws shore which was heaving some kind of "diplomatic trouble" with sailors from Norsca.

Anyway (I was going to describe the whole adventure, but that would make this a too long and out-of-topic post), one of the things the PCs met around the village was a Morr graveyard (at a hill next to the rocky shore) that previously served the village in the adventure and another one as well. The graveyard was attacked by some ghouls, and the Priest fought them as best as he could, preventing them from desacrating the already buried corpses. The ghouls feasted on some corpses that were yet to be buried, and as the days passed the villagers (afraid to get nearer) started to leave their dead at the foot of the hill (one village was attacked by the norscan an that were a lot of them), so the ghouls were having quite a good time.

The PCs fought the ghouls and found the Priest. He was almost dead from injuries and the lack of food and water, but something prevented him from dying. Perhaps it was his faith and his will to guard the graveyard... but I let the players wonder...

He was willing to find the embrace of his God, you see. And he told that desperately to the PCs. Because he was starting to develop the urge to feed on those he swore to protect...

I too think of Ghouls as being cursed souls that, by the act of consuming flesh, become another type of creature - one that seems a lot like undead, but can walk in daylight and sometimes retain something of their minds (like the ability to speak some words). What causes a person to eat flesh vary greatly. In this case, I just imagined the curse as being something like a disease, some terrible fate that went could go to those that faced ghouls and almost found their deaths...

It was really dramatic and let the players having goose bumps. So it was a lot of fun!

Pedro Lunaris said:

Oh that was bone-chilling tale, and and very good example of how to use Ghouls in a story. And as you indicate, ghouls can be tbrain-dead monsters, or they can be something in between. A cursed creature that retain some of it's humanity, skills and abilites, like the Morr priest, could he be a ghoul? (at least your players suspected so) That uncertainty I find very warhammerish.

I find the idea that some ghouls still being able to speak is very intriquing. What if some intelligent ghoul learned to mimick the screams and shouts of a person in great distress? Now that would be nasty ambush to spring on a group of unsuspecting players.

Your input was gold, thank you for sharing

Good gaming

Lautrer said:

Actually, it's not my world. I write my stuff based on canon fluff from Warhammer Fantasy Battles and from the Role Playing Game and ask for help when I need references or creative feedback (which is what everyone here does ime).

Zombies and Skeletons seem to be clearly tied to creation by necromantic magic: Invocation of Nehek and the magic of the Necrarchs seem to be the primary basis of their creation. After some digging in the older lores of the "Vampire Counts" and the 2e bestiary, you guys are correct in that they are sustained by sorcery alone (by the command of vampires or other types of necromancers).

Ghouls on the other hand seem to be the enigma on how long they last. Ghouls seem to straddle a half-life, having begun as cannibals and created to undeath through their actions and can be summoned by the guttural cry of a Strigoi. They are constantly feeding however and I wonder if they can be starved to death (or if that is simply their ongoing desire). Once they are undead, they must be sustained by the magical wind itself eh?

jh

This is pure conjecture (so use it as you see fit), but the Winds gather in specific places and things. Much like the Yellow wind gathers in gold, or the Brown wind flows through beasts, the Dhar gathers in sites of carnage and death. What if corpses gather the black wind much like the other substances, and the Ghouls feast on them to incorporate the substance that gathers the wind into themselves.

As a spinoff, maybe some shapeshifter type has to eat gold, albeit in far less quantity as gold is less prone to get digested, or stop being flesh.

Just a thought...