Classic Undead Shamblers who infect through a bite are scarier proportionately to how 'realistic' (Outside of walking corpses) you make things.

I've heard lots of talk about making 'Zombie Traps' and 'Murder Holes' that don't take realism such as wear and tear, and what it really means when *Only* severe trauma to the brain is the way to put them down.

Even shows like 'The Walking Dead' started playing it very fast and loose on how easy it started to get to take down 'Walkers' in the end.

The real problem comes with the inevitability of weapon degradation. If you're using realistic takes on weapons, then things like swords, hammers, axes, knives and the like are going to *BREAK*, become dull, and practically useless by around the 10th body or so that you're putting down. Again also, you're having to make sure you're doing enough damage to damage the brain enough to destroy it. Most knives are only going to really be good for killing *ONE* zombie before getting stuck in the skull or the blade bending. Your Katana or Longsword is going to be broken and dull by about the first dozen brought down if you're luck... and once more you're assuming head shots and not missing and catching a limb, which the zombie won't react or care about as it moves forward to bite and consume you.

Using the 'Cattle Gun' method specifically mentioned... In most studies conducted. Cattle guns only caused instant death 84% of the time.... that sounds like a lot... until again you're factoring in it's an undead creature that doesn't feel pain, and therefore when the stun gun fails, you're probably dead.

Whose also going to clean up the bodies when they go into your murder hole and start piling up? You're going to have to effect basic repairs, and endanger yourself just to make sure the murderhole/trap is clear enough to start it's job again. Wear and tear is going to effect it, you're going to need more parts.

The sheer numbers are what are going to make your Zombie traps break, bust, and stop working... that and again, taking into account the destruction of the brain being the only sure fire way to kill them.

World War Z (the book not the shitty movie) goes into this quite a bit... and has a section where it talks about how most forms of explosives are actually terrible to use on the Undead, because it doesn't liquify their brains... which is what you need to cause death... at most you might take some limbs off and then you have crawling undead hidden among the rubble.



This means *Guns* are actually the best way to kill Zombies, but the noise of course attracts more undead. A bullet to the head, to make sure you're out of range, and it's typically going to be a Hollow Point which is again, a good thing because it'll bounce around in the brain and shred it up... Better than a FMJ which could go clear through the skull and might not cause enough damage.

This is why so many nerds don't think Zombies are scary... they go with the assumption that their swords will never break, their traps will never gum up, that destroying the brain is something easy and simple and they'll have no problem doing in the heat of the moment.

Basically people who've never been in a real fight in their life.

Quote from: migo on May 02, 2023, 06:34:11 PM
There are several takes. One is that it doesn't matter if you've been bitten. If you die, you rise a zombie. That's more of an original idea (I think one of the Romero movies was more like that), and also in The Walking Dead.

All of the Romero movies work that way. Bite kills but if you die normally you are also gonna rise as a zombie if your brain hasn't been destroyed.

I think zombies work better as a "trap/challenge" than a real monster to fight.

Quote from: Orphan81 on May 09, 2023, 03:07:55 PM
I've heard lots of talk about making 'Zombie Traps' and 'Murder Holes' that don't take realism such as wear and tear, and what it really means when *Only* severe trauma to the brain is the way to put them down.

Quote from: Orphan81 on May 09, 2023, 03:07:55 PM
This is why so many nerds don't think Zombies are scary... they go with the assumption that their swords will never break, their traps will never gum up, that destroying the brain is something easy and simple and they'll have no problem doing in the heat of the moment.

Basically people who've never been in a real fight in their life.

Operating a zombie trap isn't fighting, though. It's developing reliable safety procedures, like when dealing with animals, heavy equipment, or toxic material. For example, a bull is extremely dangerous when loose. It has enormous strength and a very thick skull. I had a cousin who was killed by a bull on his farm. But operating a cattle chute isn't dangerous if proper procedure is followed. Stuff can and will break, but there can be procedures to handle broken equipment.

If a cattle chute gets gummed up, the result isn't death for all the handlers. It just means that cattle stop getting killed until the foul is cleared. Dealing with zombies via trap is very similar.

If we supposed something like Night of the Living Dead where survivors are in a house surrounded by zombies. Picture that there's a small hole in the side of the house, just big enough for one zombie to crawl through at a time. But when a zombie crawls through, they're in a small chamber where they can't move effectively. The operators inside pin the zombie from outside the chamber, then use a hammer or something to destroy the brain. It may take a few tries, but since the zombie is pinned and unable to move its limbs, there is no rush. They pull the zombie through, dispose of the body, and let the next one in.

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Quote from: robertliguori on May 06, 2023, 07:50:58 AM
Mind you, my own preferred answer is to lean into the engineering solutions when I get them, and just reflect them.  Once you've got PCs in the mindset of designing the most efficient kill-traps for zombies, then you start introducing other dangerous, panicking people, who keep acting not like engineers and threatening everyone around them (including themselves), and wait to see how long it takes for that efficient, problem-solving mindset to solve the problem.  Then iterate and repeat with just a little less-dumb survivors, until the PCs are safe and secure in the little corner of the apocalypse they've carved out for themselves, and then reflect on who they had to carve through to get there.

That's a good point. That sounds like a long campaign, but I wonder if there is a way to handle that in a one-shot adventure.

It's the "Contagion" that's scary in infectious zombies, not so much the undeath. It turns everyone into one-hit-wonders, dropping you to undead automation, a disease that dominates judgment. The other infectious "Contagions," like Vampirism and Lycanthropy, are frightening because of the awareness retained, a disease that corrupts judgment through hunger & atavism.

So typical Romero zombies mostly frighten through the fear of stolen autonomy and isolation of grinding hordes rendering your world into minority pockets. Yes, it's very much a metaphorical commentary upon society. But that's 100% normal as horror has always been a metaphorical processing of one's conscious and subconscious fears.

So really, one has to break down WHY you are wanting to use Undeath, what TYPE of Undeath you want to portray, and whether you NEED Contagion to represent that. THEN you break down that Contagion's elements, and WHY you want to emphasize that metaphorical element of horror. Me personally, I don't find the tactics of survival, or the mechanics of monstrous threat development, as interesting as the elements exploring the comprising fear. So that's why I think you should start at the core and draw forth creatively from there.

I am oddly reminded of an old Hellboy story where Hellboy gets called out to this little Eastern European village that had a zombie outbreak. Not to handle the outbreak, though, but to tidy up some questions (the last intact zombie kept saying his name). Seems the villagers had stomped out the zombies just fine.

There's a reason zombies are typically low-level fodder. Honestly, I would throw tougher undead, rather than feed the zombies metagame steroids. Ghouls, wights, etc.

Quote from: Ghostmaker on May 10, 2023, 09:47:39 AM
I am oddly reminded of an old Hellboy story where Hellboy gets called out to this little Eastern European village that had a zombie outbreak. Not to handle the outbreak, though, but to tidy up some questions (the last intact zombie kept saying his name). Seems the villagers had stomped out the zombies just fine.

There's a reason zombies are typically low-level fodder. Honestly, I would throw tougher undead, rather than feed the zombies metagame steroids. Ghouls, wights, etc.

Yeah.  Zombies are zergs.  If you want to give your players the power fantasy from the feeling of wading through acres of enemies, zombies are pretty good.  If you are looking to challenge the strategies or tactics of your players, you have to change the zombies to the point where they are zombies in name only...

I already think zombies are threatening.  Give them a to-hit bonus for flanking and crowding around players.  Give them an ability to grapple/drag players down to the ground to make them prone, and then you'll be exposed to more attacks as they keep dragging you down and holding you down.

Cattle in a chute are not trying to murder you with an instinct so strong to do so they will endure any punishment or damage to do so.   Murder chutes sound great,  but workplace accidents happen ALL the time as things fail, people get careless, or just screw up.  This combined with the fact the overwhelming majority of people have never been in a fight (as orphan mentioned) means people getting hurt and killed and freaking out left and right.  Dealing with that level of adreneline takes practice, and the sort of practice is extremely dangerous.    I think zombie shamblers against borderline superhumans (pcs in most dungeons and dragons like rpgs) is a wash for the characters....but shamblers against man on the street level characters?  Going to be a bloodbath just like real life would be.

Quote from: oggsmash on May 11, 2023, 12:45:39 PM
Cattle in a chute are not trying to murder you with an instinct so strong to do so they will endure any punishment or damage to do so.   Murder chutes sound great,  but workplace accidents happen ALL the time as things fail, people get careless, or just screw up.  This combined with the fact the overwhelming majority of people have never been in a fight (as orphan mentioned) means people getting hurt and killed and freaking out left and right.  Dealing with that level of adreneline takes practice, and the sort of practice is extremely dangerous.    I think zombie shamblers against borderline superhumans (pcs in most dungeons and dragons like rpgs) is a wash for the characters....but shamblers against man on the street level characters?  Going to be a bloodbath just like real life would be.

Workplace accidents do happen all the time, but then, there there are millions of people working. The fatal accident rate is around 3 per 100,000 full-time workers. The most dangerous professions are typically those with low supervision and workers take risks to get the job done quicker and boost their pay - like roofers or fishermen.

Safety procedures make a huge difference in reducing accident rates. Nuclear power plants, for example, have a near-zero injury rate - while other electrical plants have a much higher rate. There are tons of dangers in both - high voltage electricity, high pressure steam, volatile materials, etc. I agree that people often get careless and screw up. That's why older, poorly designed plants or factories would kill or maim people much more often. They were designed for maximum profit over safety.

I agree that typical man-on-the-street could easily make mistakes that result in a bloodbath. But avoiding a bloodbath doesn't require near-superhuman combatants. It's mainly a matter of people keeping their cool and coming up with good procedures.

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This probably doesn't make for exciting movie drama or fun RPG play, though. For RPGs, an ideal solution is something more plausible to encourage risk-taking without punishing intelligent play. Something I hate in a lot of RPGs is when the players come up with a smart way to deal with the problem, and the GM shuts it down because it isn't exciting adventure.

With zombies, the most appealing that I heard was letting intelligent player tactics work - and then having them deal with less-tactical or practical NPCs.

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As an example, one thing that bugs me with zombie films is characters dealing with zombies wearing a t-shirt and shorts -- even after they know that zombie bites are guaranteed fatal. Human teeth aren't very long or sharp. Just a bit of leather and/or padding will prevent them from being able to penetrate, which could easily be homemade.

Good procedure should be to always wear safety gear, even when operating a zombie trap that shouldn't let them loose.

I'd want to encourage thoughtful preparation like this.

Quote from: jhkim on May 11, 2023, 01:39:29 PM

Workplace accidents do happen all the time, but then, there there are millions of people working. The fatal accident rate is around 3 per 100,000 full-time workers. The most dangerous professions are typically those with low supervision and workers take risks to get the job done quicker and boost their pay - like roofers or fishermen.

That's not entirely wrong, but it is a little misleading.  The most dangerous jobs are dangerous because the jobs themselves are inherently dangerous to a certain degree.  You can't let your attention lapse for even a moment--which is difficult for people to do when tired, from say, heavy physical labor.   You can do everything "by the book" with every safety precaution, and all it takes is being unlucky when your one attention lapse happens.  Plus, you get two extremes:  Loggers are examples of one, where "by the book" still doesn't account for everything a tree can possibly do when cut.  Farming is on the other side, where a big part of the problem is not so much the routine stuff but the sheer variety of dangerous tasks to do.  You can' t be an expert on everything.

In a zombie story, I'd expect a good dose of both.  Keep throwing the zombie at you, that's like the logs jumping off the tree before you cut them and tracking you back to base camp. Then your resources are running out, so that you have to keep improvising.  Plus, the whole thing is draining, so that it is effort to pay attention all the time.  Games are only so/so at modeling "the will to pay attention for long periods because it matters", but whatever the game can do to hint at that aspect will help. 

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on May 11, 2023, 01:51:46 PM

Quote from: jhkim on May 11, 2023, 01:39:29 PM
Workplace accidents do happen all the time, but then, there there are millions of people working. The fatal accident rate is around 3 per 100,000 full-time workers. The most dangerous professions are typically those with low supervision and workers take risks to get the job done quicker and boost their pay - like roofers or fishermen.

That's not entirely wrong, but it is a little misleading.  The most dangerous jobs are dangerous because the jobs themselves are inherently dangerous to a certain degree.  You can't let your attention lapse for even a moment--which is difficult for people to do when tired, from say, heavy physical labor.   You can do everything "by the book" with every safety precaution, and all it takes is being unlucky when your one attention lapse happens. Plus, you get two extremes:  Loggers are examples of one, where "by the book" still doesn't account for everything a tree can possibly do when cut.  Farming is on the other side, where a big part of the problem is not so much the routine stuff but the sheer variety of dangerous tasks to do.  You can' t be an expert on everything.

I feel this underestimates the effect of safety precautions. Obviously, no safety precaution is foolproof -- so the rate will never be completely zero -- but that doesn't mean that precautions don't make a huge difference to the chance of an accident.

Operating a zombie trap like I described doesn't require constant attention for hours. If the people feel tired, they can stop and go lie down to take a break. They only need to stay alert over the time period of letting a zombie in and killing it, which takes a few minutes at most.

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In the bigger picture, this is obviously short-circuiting an action genre. Especially to make a fun film, it might be better to just ignore nitty-gritty details like this and instead go with the head-shooting action. But one of the interesting sides of RPGs is getting to explore alternatives to what they show in the movies.

More broadly than zombie movies, action films and TV often have nearly nonsensical tactics. It can be interesting in RPGs to make it into a more competitive and intelligent game -- instead of quick-cut emotions on screen.

  Nuclear power plants are inherently safer than other power plants and as most of the employees are from the Naval Power program and are smarter and better trained than other power plants.  Not the best example...as mentioned the reduction in accident rates is due to HEAVY regulation and training...something that will not be there in a post apoc zombie kill chute.

 Combined with most jobs do not have lethal creatures that want to kill you at all times involved.  You can say keep your cool...but just how many fights for your life have you been in?  I think everyone can learn to be calmer in a situation like that...but that learning comes at a price and one goof and you are done.  I would also say people who work hard physically for living have been doing so for years...we are tossing randos into a scenario where they do not understand their limits or even recognize when they are tired.   It can work with limited zombies, but any real pile up or length of time operating and there will be fatalities.

This is also not to say I do not think a kill chute is a good idea.  I just think if we are making the assumption the working crew is going to made up of a completely random mix of americans for instance....it will be a shit show.   If its a crew of construction workers, soldiers, or people I get to pick to do the job with me....then I have much more favorable outlook as to how it goes.   I just think comparing cattle to horde monsters hungry for blood is the first mistake.   I do think such monsters could be lured into a chute, I just think keeping them killed at a rate and preventing a pile up is where people are going to start to make mistakes, flavored both by terror and bravado.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on May 11, 2023, 01:51:46 PM
Games are only so/so at modeling "the will to pay attention for long periods because it matters", but whatever the game can do to hint at that aspect will help.

Pulling this point out to agree with it. RPGs (and most wargames) are games and while mental fatigue is a super important issue, it's really sidelined because tracking it would be so fiddly.