Talk:Undead

Im thinking that maybe this page should be moved to Category:Undead so that the list of known undead at the bottom doesnt have to be maintained, or rather, is easier to maintain via adding category tags to existing monster stubs/articles. At the least the list should be removed. similarly, i think other monster groups such as devourers should be moved to their category equivalents. - Crusty 14:40 15 Aug 2005 (GMT +12:00)
 * That would make sense. I'd say go ahead and do it. --Talrath Stormcrush 14:48, 15 Aug 2005 (EST)
 * The list should be removed, the text shouldn't. The devourers (the ones that have articles, at least) are already in the category.  --Fyren 15:39, 15 Aug 2005 (EST)
 * Remove the list keep the article. Then use Category:Undead to group the monsters and reference Category:Undead in this article. --Karlos 16:09, 15 Aug 2005 (EST)
 * Is there an echo in here? --Fyren 16:49, 15 Aug 2005 (EST)
 * Is there an echo in here? here? here? --Fyren :)

Are these Undead?
I'm puzzled if the various ghost/deamon creatures in the game (for example Nightmares, Phantoms, Smoke Phantoms, Wraiths, etc.) are undead. Undead per definition of the game, in that for example they take double damage from holy damage. I will try to verify tonight, at least for some of them. --Tetris L 23:24, 26 October 2005 (EST)


 * I think Wraiths will take double damage, Nightmares won't, Smoke Phantoms SHOULD, Phatoms won't. Just my educated guess. --Karlos 00:11, 27 October 2005 (EST)


 * Phantoms take double damage from Holy, as verified by my now-Smiting monk. -- Dashface 04:12, 7 May 2006 (CDT)

Sub-Species Crusade
Can we please, finally, make a concentrated effort to pin down the sub-categories of Undead (and Ghosts, along with it)??!! We've been discussing this again and again, without a final conclusion yet. See: Talk:Grasping Ghoul, Talk:Skeleton, Talk:Ghost, and several others.

Like I suggested in Talk:Grasping Ghoul, I think we should test each and every creature that is possibly undead or a ghost, according to the following criteria:


 * 1) Name, appearance, general behaviour
 * 2) Does it take increased damage from holy damage and deathbane?
 * 3) What Collectable Drops, Salvage Items and Crafting materials does it drop?
 * 4) Is it a fleshy creature? Is it immune against Rotting Flesh or any of the following conditions: Bleeding, Poison, Disease?
 * 5) Does it leave a corpse that can be exploited?
 * 6) How does it react to Edge of Extinction relative to other undead/ghost creatures?

With the result of these tests we should set up a matrix and then start grouping them. Who wants to help me with this task? -- 07:42, 5 January 2006 (UTC)


 * 0. Deathbane shouldn't be used as a criteria for sub-species. If no extra damage from deathbane, the creature is not an undead, pure and simple.
 * 1. I say EoE on hostile PvE non-quest enemies takes highest precedence (see note below on why only PvE hostiles), in the sense that if one undead creature does not take damage from EoE due to another undead creature's death, then they are different sub-species. It might be possible that all undead creatures take damage from each other's death, in which case this criteria is moot.  But where it differs, EoE should have highest precedence.
 * 2. I would make other "of ...slaying" (exclude deathbane) on PvE non-quest hostiles the next criteria. The only one that seem to apply is Skeletonslaying, but there might be others (perhaps in future updates).
 * 3. Decayed Orr Emblems simply mark a political faction. Though other collectable drops, salvage items, and crafting materials can be used as a sub-division criteria.
 * 4. I wouldn't make bleed, poison, disease, fleshy, corpsy, and "weak against holy" as criterias of "sub-species", but perhaps "sub-types" (they can get a sub-category, but the "species" in the beastbox wouldn't care about that info).
 * Name, appearance, and behavior should have minimal influence over species/type determination, and should only be used to place creatures into known-existing sub-groups established by criteria above, usually for friendly NPCs. A new sub-species should not be created due to name, appearance, and behavior if for all the higher precedence criteria above they are identical to another species.


 * Note that friendly human NPCs (including allies such as Prince Rurik during Nolani, but exclude henchmen party members) are known to NOT belong to the human species due to EoE. The same thing might apply to other friendly NPCs (including those friendly to your opponent's team).  Thus EoE might not work between a PvE hostil "ghost" and a friendly Ghostly Hero / Priest.  Undead of the exact same type, one hostile and the other friendly (summoned by Vizor) might be counted as "different" by Edge of Extinction.  And "of deathbane" might simply never work against PvP Ghostly Hero / Priest of opposing teams even if PvE hostil "ghosts" are tested to be undead.  Additionally, two cases of hostile PvE humans are known to also be of the "alternate" human species.  Those two are involved in a quest and are supposed to attacked/killed by friendly NPCs, the players wasn't asked to attack them (and really had no reason to aside from the fact they are red).  Thus be suspicious of enemies spawned by quests who aren't taking damage from edge of extinction, and try to find a naturally spawned version if possible. -PanSola 12:05, 5 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Also see Talk:Bestiary for a more generic definiton. It's been up for a while ^^. -PanSola 11:10, 5 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Also, until you can bring proof that "ghost" has been used to refer to natural spirits and/or druids (I'm not debating if natural spirits and druids are same or not), please use the term "Spirit" if you want to refer to all translucent green things (plus ghost of althea who is not green and perhaps chained soul who is neither translucent nor green) just to minimize unnecessary confusion and disagreement of terminology. -PanSola 11:35, 5 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Double damage from holy damage is the ultimate criterion to determine if a creature is undead. And it is very easy to check, because spells like Banish have fixed damage, and double damage is VERY easy to see.
 * Deathbane is a valid criterion to determine undead too, but it's much harder to check, because the damage from weapons of Deathbane varies and the difference for deathbane is only 15% max, so it is harder to measure.
 * The fact that there is a weapon upgrade of deathbane as well as a weapon upgrade of skeletonslaying is most confusing, because skeletons very obviously undead. So what's the species of a Skeleton Ranger? Is it Undead or Skeleton?
 * Drops help to determine species:
 * Skeletons (or all Undead?) drop Bones.
 * Undead drop the following collectibles:
 * Skeletal Limb in pre-searing (all undead in pre-searing are Skeletons)
 * Decayed Orr Emblem in Kryta (Skeletons and other undead alike)
 * Umbral Skeletal Limb in UW/FoW (Skeletons only?)
 * Being a fleshy creature and leaving a corpse are the criteria that I would use to determine the sub-species of Undead. We can discuss the names later ("Ghost", "Zombie", whatever ...)
 * EoE results should be interesting. I wonder how it treats sub-species. Do Gates of Kryta and bring EoE. There are plenty of Ghouls fighting along with Skeletons. Ghould are fleshy creatures, Skeletons are not, so chances are they are not the same species. I wonder what EoE does to them.
 * All in all, I'm looking forward to have the confusion about undead species resolved asap. -- 12:15, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Double from holy should not be the *ultimate* criteriaon for determine undead. It is the easiest one to check, but no where in the game is it ever mentioned that undead are teh *only* creatures that take double from holy.  Deathbane is the ultimate criterion.  If you need help figuring out whether the 15% happens, use Wild Blow which always cause the weapon to do the maximum damage (plus critical value), or use the candy cane weapons which have a single damage value.  If you don't want to work out the math you can give me the numbers and let me figure it out.  The only other thing needed is mob's armor value, so use a diff weapon w/o deathbane but same damage range, and wild blow it (unless candy cane weapon).  -PanSola 13:14, 5 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Huh? I think we can safely assume that undead are the only ones who take double damage from undead. The Online Manual states explicitely that undead take double damage, and I'm pretty sure if there was any other type of creature, that would be mentioned too. I've payed very close attention to this game for a long time, and read every forum and every guide between here and Timbuktu, and never, ever, have I seen any indication, rumor or proof that there is any other creature that takes double damage from holy. And double damage is something that is not easily overlooked. -- 15:28, 5 January 2006 (UTC)


 * There might be some creature that common wisdom would consider as undead, takes double damage from Holy, but no extra demage from deathbane. Then it can be easily overlooked by the forums and guides on the planet.  The online guide is not always up to date, nor does it mention everything (like Fire damage and Cold damage dealing extra to whatever).  I do not find it impossible that something which is "common sense undead" but not suspictable to deathbane gets overlooked in the entry for Holy Damage.
 * I think if a creature takes double damage from holy, we can fairly safely assume, but not absolutely be certain, that it is undead. Deathbane is still the ultimate criterian. -PanSola 16:19, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

I'll let you two deal with this because to be honest I don't really care, but it seems to me that Bane Signet, or some other Holy damage spell is the way to go. I haven't played with Wild Blow, but I know for a fact that my level 20 W/R routinely does 100+ points of damage against lower level enemies with an axe whose damage range is 6-28 (or whatever the max damage for an axe is). This may be accounted for because of the level difference or because of his level in Axe Mastery, and maybe Wild Blow will ignore those things. But really that seems like too much work and effort to go to for this, when you could just stand outside of aggro range and cast bane signet.

Either way, like I said, I'll let you guys deal with it, I just wanted to give my $0.02.--Rainith 17:38, 5 January 2006 (UTC)


 * The high damage you dealt, FYI, is due to both your high axe mastery + critical hit (contributing to a high damage level) and the mob's low armor level, resulting in a very large multiplicative bonus for your damage. See Damage to see how the two contributed to greatly increase your damage (-:  BTW, if you find any deathbane upgrade (for whatever weapon), can you save them for me?  I don't think I have any, and looks like you wouldn't need it anyways d-: -PanSola 18:42, 5 January 2006 (UTC)


 * PanSola: "There might be some creature that [...] takes double damage from Holy, but no extra demage from deathbane." <- Strictly speaking, you are right, but frankly the chance is so small, and it has so little practical relevance for the player that I think we can ignore this. Double damage from holy is what counts for 99% of the players (especially the UW/FoW smiting monks). Deathbane is a minor feature used only by a small portion of players, and the difference in damage is only 15% max. Who cares about that small amount? Holy damage is so much easier to check, and if we want to do extensive testing, especially against high level undead in UW/FoW, then checking with deathbane would 10-fold the time we need for this task. This simply isn't worth it for the hypothetical chance of incorrectly classifying a foe as undead who isn't. Holy damage is the way to go! -- 04:38, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Usually I don't care too, and I'm willing to bet real life money that "creature take double damge from holy if and only if they are undead". But you pulled out "the ultimate criterion", in which case the difference is important, and I do care.  Holy is easy, and I don't mind it being used in general, as long as you don't claim it's the ultimate criterion so if in the future someone claimed a creature recorded here isn't actually undead due to deathbane results, we won't be dismissing it immediately on the grounds of "we tested it with holy, so it is undead", but rather would seek to reproduce the claim that deathbane doesn't work (and most likely proving deathbane still work, the user just messed up the damage equation).  "Ultimate criterion" seems to be the one that has the "final say", that's all the reason I actually cared. -PanSola 05:47, 6 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Hmmm ... okay ... disagreement settled. I agree double damage from holy isn't the "ultimate criterion". That was a bad choice of wording.
 * So, can we agree to do a first test run on all creatures with holy damage, and based on the results classify a creature as undead or not undead, until results from deathbane in a second test run show otherwise?! The second test run can be done by whoever volunteers to do it. I won't. :p ;) -- 06:31, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
 * I have no issues with that (-: Anyone have a spare deathbane mod?  preferred for melee weapons so whild blow makes the math easier. -PanSola 06:47, 6 January 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't have a deathbane mod, but I will keep my eyes open for you. Bad news is I think I've only ever gotten one or two of them over the whole time I've been playing.  --Rainith 11:38, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
 * I just picked up a staff wrapping of skeletonslaying, don't suppose you want that to test if Zombie Warlocks or Necrid Horsemen are skeletons? --Rainith 00:10, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Nice, that would be handy actually (-: What's the increase for that one? -PanSola 02:06, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

EoE Report
Skeleton Sorcerer, Grasping Ghoul, and Hell Hound belong to three different species. Tested outside the Hot Spring -PanSola 08:32, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Damned Cleric, Smoke Phantom, and Wraith are 3 different species. Hellhound, Necrid Hourseman, and Bone Fiend are 3 different species. Hellhound and Damned Cleric are different species. Tested at the Black Curtain. -PanSola 08:54, 6 January 2006 (UTC)