The undead were once living creatures, returned to a horrific second life. Undead can be created through necromantic spells, profane curses, or even sometimes through divine decree. Such creatures are rarely bothered by the needs of their former life, instead craving something unique to their new form.
The Tales of the Valiant Monster Vault has 23 undead in its arsenal to pair with the multitude of monsters ready for conversion from the Creature Codex and Tomes of Beasts 1, 2, and 3. All these monsters are more narratively interesting and tactically dynamic than their counterparts in similar games.
The Need to Feed
While the lore for many undead speak to a certain craving, there are few mechanical implications for their hunger. By adding game mechanics to these undead, the Tales of the Valiant framework offers more nuanced foes to challenge the players—but all the more so, to tell more interesting tales for their valiant heroes.
Brain Eaters
What are Tales of the Valiant zombies known for? They’re low-level foes with low AC, a bundle of hit points, and an aversion to the channeling of divine energy known as Turn the Profane class feature. With their 20-foot movement speed, even smallfolk can outrun these shamblers, and their Undead Fortitude allows them to shrug off killing blows.
But there’s a part of the zombie lore that’s missing—eating brains. So let’s look at the baseline ToV zombie and modify it into a hungry zombie and sated zombie.
This is a by-the-book zombie, that book being the Tales of the Valiant Monster Vault.
Zombie CR 1/4
Medium Undead
Armor Class 8
Hit Points 16
Speed 20 ft.
Perception 10 Stealth 8
Immune Undead Resilience
Senses darkvision 60 ft.
Languages understands the languages it knew in life but can’t speak
| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
| +2 | −2 | +3 | −4 | +0 | −3 |
Undead Fortitude. If damage reduces the zombie to 0 HP, it must make a CON save with a DC equal to 5 + the damage taken, unless the damage is radiant or from a critical hit. On a success, the zombie drops to 1 HP instead.
Undead Nature. The zombie doesn’t require air, food, drink, or sleep.
Undead Resilience. The zombie is immune to poison damage, to exhaustion, and to the poisoned condition.
ACTIONS
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 5 (1d6 + 2) bludgeoning damage. The target is grappled (escape DC 12) if it is a Medium or smaller creature, and the zombie doesn’t already have a creature grappled.
BONUS ACTIONS
Rotten Hold. The zombie gnaws idly on the creature grappled by it. The target must succeed on a DC 12 CON save or take 2 (1d4) poison damage. A Humanoid slain by this bonus action rises 24 hours later as a zombie, unless the Humanoid is restored to life or its body is destroyed.
The zombie’s survival instinct kicks in when it gets hungry. The zombie gets fasterr, and its attacks focus on shocking its prey into submission.
Hungry Zombie CR 1/2
Medium Undead
Armor Class 10
Hit Points 24
Speed 30 ft.
Perception 10 Stealth 10
Immune Undead Resilience
Senses darkvision 60 ft.
Languages understands the languages it knew in life but can’t speak
| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
| +2 | +0 | +3 | −4 | +0 | −3 |
Undead Fortitude. If damage reduces the zombie to 0 HP, it must make a CON save with a DC equal to 5 + the damage taken, unless the damage is radiant or from a critical hit. On a success, the zombie drops to 1 HP instead.
Undead Nature. The zombie doesn’t require air, food, drink, or sleep.
Undead Resilience. The zombie is immune to poison damage, to exhaustion, and to the poisoned condition.
ACTIONS
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 5 (1d6 + 2) bludgeoning damage. The target is grappled (escape DC 12) if it is a Medium or smaller creature, and the zombie doesn’t already have a creature grappled.
BONUS ACTIONS
Jarring Strike. If the zombie hits with its Slam attack, it makes a second Slam attack. If this second attack hits, the creature is frightened until the end of the zombie’s next turn.
Once the zombie has gorged itself on its prey, it slows down. Its hit points increase to reflect its newly nourished condition, and it absorbs some memories and skills from its victims.
Sated Zombie CR 1/2
Medium Undead
Armor Class 8
Hit Points 32
Speed 10 ft.
Perception 10 Stealth 8
Immune Undead Resilience
Senses darkvision 60 ft.
Languages understands the languages it knew in life but can’t speak
| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
| +2 | −2 | +3 | −4 | +0 | −3 |
Undead Fortitude. If damage reduces the zombie to 0 HP, it must make a CON save with a DC equal to 5 + the damage taken, unless the damage is radiant or from a critical hit. On a success, the zombie drops to 1 HP instead.
Undead Nature. The zombie doesn’t require air, food, drink, or sleep.
Undead Resilience. The zombie is immune to poison damage, to exhaustion, and to the poisoned condition.
ACTIONS
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 5 (1d6 + 2) bludgeoning damage.
BONUS ACTIONS
Rotten Hold. The zombie gnaws idly on the creature it grapples. The target must succeed on a DC 12 CON save or take 2 (1d4) poison damage. A Humanoid slain by this bonus action rises 24 hours later as a zombie, unless the Humanoid is restored to life or its body is destroyed.
REACTIONS
Transferred Memories. The zombie absorbs the skills from the last brain it ate, gaining a trait for one week. Choose one of the following:
- Cleric. When a Divine spell of 1st circle or higher is cast within 30 ft. of the zombie, it recovers 16 HP.
- Fighter. When a creature the zombie can see hits the zombie with a weapon attack, the zombie makes a Slam attack. If this attacks hits, the zombie scores a critical hit.
- Rogue. When an attacker that the zombie can see hits it with an attack, the zombie can use its reaction to reduce the attack’s damage by half.
- Wizard. When a creature enters the zombie’s reach, the zombie casts shocking grasp against that creature.
A sated zombie can only have one transferred memory at a time. If it eats another brain, it loses its prior transferred memory.
Thanks for this. I think I will try the variants out in the next Zombie encounter the party have. Should make them scared after the initial encounters with some variants!
The Sated Zombie can “[gnaw] idly on the creature it grapples”, but there’s nothing in its stat block that suggests grappling. Is this to suggest that a creature gets grappled by a Hungry Zombie, which then becomes a Sated Zombie during the embrace?