Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 SiegeFlank Sep 23, 2015 20:25:42	I'm having some difficulty figuring out how to handle an Oathbreaker Paladin who restrains his undead minion before trying to reassert control over it. Specifically, a Wight.   Say the minion is pretty well restrained, chains and whatnot. The idea is that if the minion saves on the attempt to be controlled, the paladin can just take a short rest and try again. Rinse and repeat until the minion is his again. I would rather not have to deal with rolling this all out, and I'm looking for a cleaner solution than just adding time-sensitive events.   With lesser undead like Skeletons, this isn't much of a problem. Not a problem with specters and other incorporeal undead of course, and higher level undead usually don't care about being restrained.   The problem is with creatures like Wights. A level 4 Oathbreaker could effectively gain control over a Wight until it dies, just by restraining it, and the Wight can control up to 12 zombies. This seems horribly broken for a level 3 channel divinity feature. Necromancer Wizards don't get their minions until level 5, and it's at the cost of spell slots. Their command undead feature is great, but even that doesn't allow retargeting of a creature that saves.   Apart from just not even providing a Wight to control, does anyone have any input on how I can handle this? Should I just houserule that the Wight can't summon the zombies?   The party does have a safe place to keep the Wight prisoner, and I'd prefer to avoid solutions that specifically target removing the Wight (i.e. people break in and kill it).
#2 Macv12 Sep 23, 2015 20:36:10	I might treat it like an unwilling puppet, for these purposes. The wight does whatever asked, but you can't control its thoughts, and its thoughts are what control the zombies. So, if left with a lot of zombies, the wight will probably throw them at the oathbreaker to free itself. An oathbreaker could command the wight to behead anything it kills to prevent zombification, or whatever, so they could safely command a wight but not get the benefit of armies of zombies that easily.   But that's a house rule, yes.
#3 Ghost_Gallus Sep 24, 2015 18:43:23	The Wright breaks free and attack him. If he gets to keep rerolling his controll, the Wright gets to keep trying to break out. Chains or not, something will wear out and break after hours and hours of struggling. Or have the twelve zombies break the Wright out. Or the Wright makes the zombies attack the Oathbreaker. Or attack the party. All kinds of things you can do.
#4 Mazzy Sep 30, 2015 22:45:22	Why are you making it so easy to take a short rest?   For one, you can't chain them. That is why it says a short rest is "at least" an hour. Taking two short rests back to back with no encounters inbetween is just a short rest that took two hours. Add up enough of them and they might become a long rest. Some DMs argue this point, but no one is tying your hands telling you that you have to put up with camping somewhere and chaining short rests. You don't.   Secondly it is only a safe place until you decide it isn't anymore. The Titanic sank; Rome burned; Sonny and Cher broke up: nothing is invulnerable. And if the party is hanging out carrying a wight who might break free and eat souls, why does nobody have a problem with this at this safe haven?   Thirdly, a wight is dead. It is difficult to restrain something that can break its own bones and expell unneeded organs. With enough work and enough time a wight can probably fit though a letter box. Manacles and rope are child's play.