Unliving Identity (Priest Spell)

A priest employs this spell to give temporary per­sonality and identity back to mindless undead, namely skeletons and zombies. The undead creature's previous consciousness and identity are restored, including memories, preferences, personality, and alignment. The creature is still undead, but now has the ambitions and thoughts it had as a living being. There is a 1% chance per year that the creature has been dead (not necessarily undead) that it goes imme­diately mad, unable to accept its undeath and the changes to its world over that time a mad undead immediately flees, its identity forever lost.
In instances where the history of a particular undead is known, the DM can apply what he knows to the new free-willed skeleton or zombie. How­ever, in cases where the undead's history is unknown, select its former class, alignment, and/level according to what best suits the adventure, or decide randomly.
Important: The undead does not retain any of its class or level bonuses; it is still simply a skeleton or zombie. None of this information will be readily apparent for a skeleton, though others guess at class from tattered clothing still worn by a zombie.
The reverse of this spell, unliving mindlessness, permanently returns any free-willed skeleton or zombie to its former mindless state, or temporarily makes other undead mindless. The undead creature retains its combat and life-draining abilities, but has no sense of who it is, was, or what its previous plans were. For the duration of the spell the undead wanders aimlessly, slaying and draining life until destroyed. This spell does not work on liches, and it affects a vampire only until the vampire feeds again.
The material component is any article signifi­cant to the undead creature's former life, such as a piece of clothing or equipment, a favorite weapon, a personally written letter, etc.
Notes: Common for priests of the Dark Sun setting.
Category:Priest Spells
Category:Spells from Priest's Spell Compendium
Category:Spells