Night Of The Living Dead

[Tetsubo]

Having seen Resident Evil last week I was inspired to resurrect an Undead campaign
idea. The main campaign component would be an ever increasing zone where-in the dead revive and hunt the living. There would be a number of undead taking advantage of this effect. But the main campaign opponents would be Zombies. I'd like to make them more like the George Romero Zombies. Firstly they would be carnivores, exclusively
hunting the humanoid races. I don't think I'll have them chanting, "Brains..." I'm having
a few problems with how to modify them however.

Romero's Zombies were very persistent, practically unstoppable. They just kept
coming. How should that be reflected with the 3E rules? Add a DR feature? Require a head strike to take them out (not a good choice in 3E)? Add HD? Give them full actions instead of partial (though I like the stumbling undead image)?

One thing I am going to do is have cold effect the Zombies movement. If cold effects ordinary flesh I see no reason why it shouldn't effect Zombie animated flesh. To reflect this cold will slow and eventually paralyze a Zombie. Once the Zombie suffers an equal amount of cold damage to it's HP it will be Slowed (as per the spell). Once the Zombie has taken twice it's HP in cold damage it will be frozen in place. This will not actually
harm the Zombie. And once it thaws out it may resume normal movement. Cold damage could be both spell derived or natural. I'm planning on Zombies being a year round problem for the worlds population. Those areas with hard winters would get a reprieve from Zombie attacks.

Any thoughts on this?

 

[RogueJK]

In George Romero's "Living Dead" world, the zombies didn't exclusively hunt humans. They attacked and devoured any warm flesh. This is alluded to in the movies, and IIRC, in NotLD, one of the zombies eats a mouse. (It's been a while since I've seen the original, so it might be one of the 2 sequels. Or I might just be remembering things incorrectly.)

And none of George Romero's zombies spoke at all. They groaned and wailed sometimes, though. The chanting "Brains" schtick is taken from Return of the Living Dead, a completely different movie with which George Romero wasn't involved. Besides, the RotLD movies were parodies.

As for the zombie's toughness, I'd go one of two ways:

You could have zombies which are just like normal zombies in the MM, but they require a coup de grace to kill once they reach 0 HPs. Otherwise, they regenerate a small amount (1 or 2 HPs)after a round or so, and keep coming. This will make them only slightly more difficult, but it could be a hassle for the players when fighting a large horde, since a CDG is a full-round action.

Or, another way to do this is simply to give them more HD, and change the way that they reflect the amount of damage that they have taken. For instance, when one loses 1/2 or 3/4 of their HPs, you might say that the fighter cleaves it in half, but the upper body begins pulling itself towards the PCs. You would then alter it's movement speed. Or, a zombie has its arm chopped off, so it loses some of the damage on its attack. Then, once it reaches 0 HP, you tell them that the zombie takes a lucky blow to the head, which destroys it. This way is a lot more work for you (the DM), but it's probably a lot more enjoyable for the players. It does make the zombies tougher, though.

 

[Kaptain_Kantrip]

There was an old Dragon Halloween issue (#146? Elmore cover of a witch and a scarecrow, I think) that had a section on new types of undead for D&D (1e oe 2e, not sure), including "the hungry dead." which were based on Romero's version of zombies.

 

[Victim]

I have often thought that the way undead and criticals work is kind of backwards. Since minor wounds and fatigue will have no effect on a tireless, unfeeling zombie, they require critical hits to hit instead of being immune to them.

 

[AuraSeer]

In a recent issue of Polyhedron, there was a mini d20 game that included Living Dead-type rules for undead. All wounds are treated as subdual damage, unless you know the way to actually kill it. You kill zombies by hitting the brain, vampires by driving a wooden stake into the heart, et cetera.

To hit an active monster with the special attack, you need to roll and confirm a critical hit. Or, you can do subdual damage until the monster stops moving, and then CDG. Either way, the monster is instantly destroyed.

My addition: in a campaign world where such monsters are prevalent, I'd create a new feat. Call it "Improved Slaying" or some such, and let it double the threat range against a specific undead creature, no matter what weapon you're using. (Kinda like a backward Improved Critical.) So the undead horde is hard to stop in the beginning of the movie, but two hours later the protagonist has learned Improved Slaying: Zombie, and it's time to kick ass.

 

[epicycloid]

You also need to rethink/change the ablity of clerics to turn your zombies. An cleric of 4th plus level could destroy (2D6+level+Chr mod)/2 a round (3+chr mod) times a day. Which puts down lots of zombies. Not counting extra truning and other turning feats.

 

[Hand of Vecna]

My thoughts -- for a truly "Dead" campaign, make the Zombies have some sort of poisonous saliva/pus/ooze that inflicts 1 point of Con damage per hour. The victim gets a Fort save to resist (say, DC 15), but even if they make the save, they've still got to make another one 1 hour later, and for every hour that passes, the DC goes up by 1, thus making anyone eventually sucumb...

Also, rule that any damage a Zombie takes that is not either (a) a result of a Critical, or (b) Acid, Electricity, or Fire does only "subdual" damage (if "subdual" damage is equal to or greater than the Zombie's hp total, it is immobilized but still able to attack anyone in it's square). To truly be rid of it, you must either burn it to cinders, melt it ocmpletely, or smash the brain completely. (yes, this gets somewhat into RotLD territory, but I really liked those movies...)

Finally, let Bards be able to Turn or Command Undead (according to their alignment), but only if they're wearing red leather... each Turn/Command attempt would use up 1 Bardic Music/day 'slot'

 

[mmadsen]

Romero's Zombies were very persistent, practically unstoppable. They just kept coming. How should that be reflected with the 3E rules?

Within 3E, that simply sounds like lots of hit points (and a very low AC). Also, you might make them partially immune to piercing weapons.

If you want to emphasize the need for a head shot to take them out, allow crits against them and allow piercing crits to do full damage. If you want to force the issue, I guess you could make the Zombies immune to non-crits, or have them take a single point of damage from non-crits, but that seems quite extreme.

For unstoppable Undead, you could house-rule that they don't die at 0 hp but are simply staggered and will get up next round. They can be coup-de-grace'd through the brain pan while down, but if our heroes are too busy, they'll get back up and keep coming, only to be staggered again by any attack that lands. Perhaps they're hacked to pieces by -10 hp.

Also, I much prefer the notion of Zombies grappling and then biting rather than "slamming" with their fists.

 

[hong]

Re: Re: Night Of The Living Dead

Also, I much prefer the notion of Zombies grappling and then biting rather than "slamming" with their fists.

A "slam" is just 3E's generic way of describing a natural attack that does bludgeoning damage (as opposed to slashing and piercing). There's also nothing stopping zombies grappling if they get close enough.

Actually, a ghoul (sans paralyzation ability) might be a better way of describing these zombies.

 

[Bob5th]

To simulate hard to stop part of it give them regeneration of however much you see fit and let it be canceled by criticals. Like the trolls regen is overcome by fire/acid.