Looting the Dead for Fun and Profit

Inspired by this post on Hack & Slash.

Grave Robbing

My first reaction was to make grave robbing dangerous, inconvenient, and socially negative.  If a party loots a corpse, or worse robs graves, there should be a chance of the following:

1. Curses from the appropriate god of the dead/afterlife for stealing from the dead.  Especially if they're heretics, heathens, or godless.
2. Cursed items.  Everyone knows that you bury dead warriors with their weapons not just because they need them in the next life, but because they become cursed in this life.
3. Diseases for mucking about with decomposing bodies.
4. A hit to their reputation if they're found out, because nobody likes grave robbers.  ("Hey, this looks like old aunt Bertha's necklace.  Wait, it is old aunt Bertha's necklace!")
   

My second reaction was to look at those tables.  There are some good entries there.  I'd prefer the oddities event to be rarer, but that's just quibbling.  By table:

The Monster Table is actually pretty reasonable, and does a good job of suggesting disease (an ooze and yellow mold) and anger from the gods of death (Ash wraiths, a zombie, ghouls, a mummy, a helmed horror, a swarm of crawling claws, and skeletons, and a singular death knight).  I'd consider replacing the 11-12 entries on the table.

The Oddity Table is dripping with flavour.  I'd probably make each entry a single use entry, and come up with another twenty or thirty.  In particular, I'd probably lean towards about 40-45% of them being "mundane oddities" like the melted candles and wax entry or the giant preserved lizard corpse.  Another 40-45% would be strange oddities that add flavour without much impact, like the rising mists and the balance would be odd complications, like the corpse that re-animates into a person, or the flesh vat.  It looks like -C's distribution roughly matches that.

Treasure

The Treasure Table is great, and has some evocative loot.  I'd add some explicitly cursed replacements, and give each item a 1-in-6 chance of being cursed if grave-robbed, increasing by 1 for each previous grave they'd robbed in the last year, to a maximum of 5-in-6, mainly because they're robbing the dead.



Additional entries for the Treasure:

• Sword +2 Back-Biter:  An ornate, gold-etched sword. In real combat attacks the wielder on a natural roll of less than 10 with a value of 10+the natural roll result
• Boots of Clumsiness:  The wearer cannot surprise anyone while wearing these boots, nor can the rest of the party while the wearer is with them.  In combat, the character falls when the player rolls a natural 1 on a d20 (for any reason).
• Serpent Crown:  A gold coronet in the shape of an asp, with lapis lazuli on the snake's underside, and garnets for eyes.  When worn, the wearer is immune to poison, can turn snakes as a cleric of equal level would turn undead (or command them, if chaotic), but loses his next action if taking cold or frost damage unless saving (make a savings throw even if one would not normally be required).
• Graverobber's Ring: This silver ring tarnishes instantly if put on by someone who has looted a grave.  The wearer loses 1 charisma a day as their hair becomes lank and their skin becomes pallid.  When they are down to 3 charisma, they suffer no further drain, but their charisma does not heal.  At 3 charisma, when interacting with normal people, they have a 50% chance of being mistaken for undead of some sort, while when interacting with ghouls, they instead have are treated as having 18 charisma.
• Dandy's Ring:  This plain gold ring has a phrase similar to "cleanliness is next to godliness" or "One must keep up appearances" etched on the inside of the band.  When worn, any dirt, stains, gore, or dishevelment work themselves out of the character's wardrobe and appearance within 1d3 turns.
• Ghoul's Pendent:  After eight hours without the humanoid wearer being exposed to sunlight, the this pendent becomes ethereal and invisible, but remains on the wearer.  In addition, the wearer changes:  their appearance becomes relatively pale, they do not get hungry, and they are immune to the paralyzing touch that certain undead posses.  If the wearer smells blood or a rotting humanoid corpse, they must save or succumb to a sudden voracious appetite for that which triggered the save.
• Raven Brand:  This steel disc, about four inches in diameter, has two embossed ravens on one side, and a long leather wrapped handle on the other.  When heated to a red hot temperature and pressed against an intelligent humanoid's skin, that humanoid is branded with the two ravens.  That creature's eyes go milky, and the creature no longer sees with them.  Instead, two invisible ethereal raven-like spirits are summoned and serve the branded creature.  The spirit ravens cannot take any actions, but what each one sees is seen by one of the branded creature's eyes.  Similarly, the branded creature hears whatever the spirit ravens might here, although it's not always clear whether what is heard is by the branded creature or by one of the spirit ravens.  If another creature is branded with the same brand, all previously branded creatures lose their spirit ravens, but remain blind.  Similarly, anything that would restore the branded creature's sight severs the link with spirit ravens.  If the spirit ravens are somehow driven away or destroyed, they will return at the dawn after the following night.
  

Hauntings

As Konsumterra added, I'd also include traps, and more ghosts.  Probably something like a 1-in-6 chance of being haunted by a ghost for each grave desecrated.  The haunting could be relieved by going back and re-consecrating the grave, replacing what was taken, or adding something the ghost felt was even more valuable to it:



1. Favorite song played exceptionally well to a small audience (1d3x1d6 descendents of the deceased or their relatives) 
2. Eulogy spoken by a wonderful orator to a large gathering (1d20x1d6 people) 
3. Large bouquet of beautiful flowers
4. Large display of candles, lit constantly for a year and a day
5. Marble or granite tombstone engraved with an appropriate epitaph
6. A religious symbol of the right type in the right material
7. A likeness in bronze or granite
8. A burial of the right jewelry
9. A burial of the corpse of the right foe or someone from the right bloodline, who was recently alive.
10. A favorite toy, carving, article of clothing,  or instrument--not just a similar one, but the exact right one, and in great condition. 
11. 1d8 pounds of 1d6: 1-4. silver, 5-6. gold (the d8 is exploding) 
12. A valuable, gold-inlaid item of the following (1d8): 1. dagger, 2. short sword,  3. long sword, 4. war hammer, 5. breast plate, 6. shield,  7. helm, 8.  metal musical instrument

Effects of Hauntings: 

1. Constant moaning heard only by grave robbers (-2 to listen checks, +2 penalty to be surprised)
2. Nightmares (-1 to all attacks and saves for every three nights affected, can only heal 1 hit point per day) 
3. Appears superimposed over the faces of others, without anyone else being able to see it (-1 to reaction and morale roles, or bonus negated completely) 
4. One minor nearby item breaks every hour (1d6: 1-5. twig, egg, cup spilled, etc. 6 bow string, nail in horseshoe, spoke in carriage or wagon wheel, lit candle, etc. Results in -1 to initiative rolls)
5. Animals and children scared off by grave robbers as the ghost replaces their likenesses when dealing with these creatures.
6. Attempts to inconvenience grave robbers (all doors always stuck, and traps have 1 in 3 chance of affecting them)

Also, if they're robbing a graveyard anyways, you might want to consider involving the Bloodsoaked Boudoir of Velkis the Vile, since his lair is based in a graveyard.
 

Discovery Table

I'd change the discovery table to something like this:

	Content (white d10)	Loot (red d10)	Encounter (blue d10*)
1.	Monster	Bouquet of Flowers	1d6 ghouls (+1d6 for each point below 1)
2.	Empty	A decomposed love letter	A lost ghost that follows the party
3.	Dust	Wax from melted candles	1d6 ravens, crows, or owls
4.	Corpse	A silver ring (2d6+8 sp)	A cat or wild feline
5.	Corpse	A silver necklace (2d10+22 sp)	A dog, fox, or coyote
6.	Corpse	Silver jewellery (1d6x10 sp)	Cemetery watchmen patrolling the cemetery **
7.	Corpse	A gold ring or earrings ((2d6+8)x10 gp)	Teenagers or young rascals visiting the cemetery
8.	Corpse	Gold jewellery (1d6x10 gp)	Sheriff (or other law enforcement) patrolling the cemetery *
9.	Ash Wraith	Nothing	Spiritual Guardian of the cemetary
10.	Zombie or Skeleton (in grave), or Mummy (in crypt)	A tarnished brass ring	One person visiting the graveyard (+1 for each point above 10)

* Between sunset and dawn, I'd subtract 3 from the Encounter roll, while during the day I would add 3.  During dawn or dusk, I'd use a straight roll.
** If the cemetery is in a currently uncivilized place, replace with hobos, bandits, or hostile locals as appropriate.