That is not dead which can eternal lie,
and with strange aeons, even death may die.

— from the Necronomicon of Abdul al-Hazred
in the fiction of H.P. Lovecraft

Like may D&D campaigns, my current homebrew adventures feature undead with some regularity—in part because they can fit into a wide variety of ancient ruins and such without worrying to much about making ecological sense. Thus, I eagerly awaited the publication of Open Grave: Secrets of the Undead (available in hard copy from Amazon and other fine retailers, and from RPGNow as a PDF), and I’ve enjoyed reading the book over the last couple of weeks.

Before I get into the review proper, let me say that Open Grave is very much a book for DMs, not for players. In this brief review, therefore, I’ll address DMs as my primary audience too. Players may very well enjoy the content of Open Grave, but the book chiefly aims to expand a DM’s toolbox when using undead.

Chapter 1, “Undead Lore,” presents a good bit of “fluff” surrounding undead. Go here for the WotC designers’ vision of undead origins, physiology, psychology, and society. The first part of this chapter also contains a fairly clear and straightforward explanation of how death and the afterlife work in the defaul D&D setting, with the default D&D pantheon. The “Society” subsection really intrigued me with its ideas about how more intelligent undead might fit into living societies, or how undead might even organize themselves into their own societies. The chapter presents one example cult (with two monsters) and two example societies (including one NPC and her mount) that illustrate the ideas put forth earlier in the chapter.

I found chapter 2, “DM’s Guide to Undead,” very useful to spark my own imagination about how to use undead in my campaign. The first section describes and illustrates how PCs’ encounters with undead might be social challenges instead of combat challenges. The example skill challenges given here make great examples for any DM who uses skill challenges; they’re a big advance over the skill challenges presented in the Dungeon Master’s Guide. The chapter then introduces “hauntings,” which a DM can cast as atomsphere, traps or hazards, terrain, or skill challenges. I absolutely loved the idea of hauntings as traps that PCs disable using the Religion skill rather than the Thievery skill. I found the example adventures and campaign arcs less useful. A few artifacts (including a jet black Ioun stone, the Tome of Shadow, and the Von Zarovich family sword) and seven rituals (which, the book suggests, a DM might place in books or scrolls found as treasure) appear next. A presentation of “undead grafts”—pieces of an undead body grafted onto a living creature—rounds out this chapter. Just in case my players read this review, I won’t tell you which of the ideas presented in this chapter will make it into the Stormhaven campaign, but at least one of the seeds planted here will blossom in next week’s game.

Chapter 3, “Undead Lairs,” runs for some 75 pages, and did the least for me of any part of the book. I liked the general discussion of the properties of undead lairs, but once the chapter turned to a parade of nine sample undead encounters (I wonder if this format resembles that of the upcoming Dungeon Delve product), my eyes started to glaze over. I doubt that I’ll drop any of these encounters into my current campaign, though I imagine I’ll come back later to dissect the encounters for idea germs.

Potential readers of Open Grave will undoubtedly expect a whole raft of new monsters, undead or thematically tied to the undead, and chapter 4 does not disappoint—much. Some of these I expected to see, like new varieties of ghost, ghoul (including the lacedon, now called “sodden ghoul”), lich, mummy, vampire, wraith, and zombie. Monsters that I did not anticipate, but liked, include the crawling claw swarm, deathtritus, and brain in a jar. Chapter 4 also presents a kind of “undead hall of fame,” bringing into 4th edition such “beloved” villains as Acererak (from the Tomb of Horrors), Ctenmiir the Cursed (White Plume Mountain), and Strahd von Zarovich (Ravenloft)—not to mention Vecna himself. The chapter closes with some new undead templates (thought the zombie plague disease referenced in the infected zombie template somehow got left out of Open Grave) and alternative powers for various undead creatures. Readers should note that not all of the new monsters presented in Open Grave appear in chapter 4; others are scattered throughout the book, but the monster list on pp. 222–223, sorted by level and role, can help you find them.

All in all, Open Grave gives DMs a good read and puts plenty of new stuff in any DM’s toolbox. I know that I’ll get a good bit of use out of it—starting next Saturday.