Night Of The Living Dead

[mmadsen]

Re: Re: Re: Night Of The Living Dead

A "slam" is just 3E's generic way of describing a natural attack that does bludgeoning damage (as opposed to slashing and piercing).

And?

Anyway, the Monster Manual says, "Zombies hammer enemies with their unnaturally strong fists." That's not the visual I want. It doesn't help if the "slam" is delivered via hip check or prehensile tail slap either.

There's also nothing stopping zombies grappling if they get close enough.

No, but it's not the obvious choice for the DM, when the Zombies have a 1d6+1 slam attack. A Romero-esque zombie should have a free bite attack (1d4?) while grappling and no decent attack otherwise. That way our heroes fight to avoid getting cornered or surrounded and overwhelmed by sheer mass of zombies, but it's not a battle of attrition, "slamming" fists vs. swords.

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

The Create Spawn special ability certainly fits the contagious zombie, and the bite fits better than fists, but the high Dex and the multiple attacks per round would be out of place.

 

[hong]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Night Of The Living Dead

And?

Anyway, the Monster Manual says, "Zombies hammer enemies with their unnaturally strong fists." That's not the visual I want. It doesn't help if the "slam" is delivered via hip check or prehensile tail slap either.

So substitute any friggin' visual you want. The book does not constrain you to use anything that doesn't fit the feel of your game. Complaining about what is essentially flavour text is doubly pointless.

 

[Rowenstin]

Perhaps give the zombie a % to ignore the blow completely or a large damage reduction (5/-- or even 10/--) or make the damage reduction random from blow to blow; substract 2d6 from each blow and 3d6 to damage from piercing weapons.