Zombies! New Dungeoncraft article up

[Knight Otu]

Well, I'll put it this way, I'm ok with human zombies and gnoll zombies being identical. I can accept dwarf zombies and human zombies being identical, but I don't think they should. A gnoll zombie and a wolf zombie, however? They should be different, much like a zombie horse and an ogre zombie or a dragon zombie and a hill giant zombie. I suppose that the new monster philosophy may make it hard to create a unified template to create zombies and that new zombies may be easier to create than ever, though - take the level and a few identifying traits of the old monsters, turn it into an undead brute, adjust the statistics to zombiesque proportions and add some zombie abilities, et voilá! Instant brain muncher.

 

[Piratecat]

Annoying - it's not letting me log in for some reason. How odd.

 

[JVisgaitis]

Annoying - it's not letting me log in for some reason. How odd.

Doh!

 

[JVisgaitis]

I really dig this article. It sounds like they are making zombies the way they are supposed to be. I'm also happy about the whole non-template thing as a zombie is a zombie. It does seem that they may have different sizes of zombies statted out as they did mention medium zombie. The only bummer about this article is no artwork. Otherwise, I like it a lot.

 

[Oldtimer]

Annoying - it's not letting me log in for some reason. How odd.

No Cats Allowed

 

[Merova]

Gamist Zombies!

I suppose that the new monster philosophy may make it hard to create a unified template to create zombies and that new zombies may be easier to create than ever, though - take the level and a few identifying traits of the old monsters, turn it into an undead brute, adjust the statistics to zombiesque proportions and add some zombie abilities, et voilá! Instant brain muncher.

Yeah, I'm in total agreement with you. Overall, the design philosophy for 4E is unabashedly gamist, redesigning everything in an effort to simplify the game play inplementation, which I generally consider to be an admirable goal. However, I like a some simulationist qualities to my games. This new design seems to lump human zombies, lizardfolk zombies, and wolf zombies under the general catagory of "medium zombies." I appreciate the instant utility of the design, but I'll miss the diversity of the templated zombies.

OTOH, I'm loving the ability to crit the new zombies.

In any case, perhaps we'll get new zombie types in later releases that will address the lack of simulation, like an "animal zombie" or "draconic zombie." After all, the MMII needs more bait.

Good gaming!

 

[marune]

Yeah, I'm in total agreement with you. Overall, the design philosophy for 4E is unabashedly gamist, redesigning everything in an effort to simplify the game play inplementation, which I generally consider to be an admirable goal.

That's the best idea about 4E !

 

[GreatLemur]

It doesn't actually say that. It says you can critically hit zombies. And it is in the context of the "head shot" zombie idea. So it might be that zombies are an exception.

Or you can crit undead... We'll see.

So far, I think 4e has a general policy of making every natural 20 a big deal. I won't be surprised if critical hits are generalized to "really successfully attacks" rather than being about accurately hitting vital areas.

 

[Sir Brennen]

[...] This new design seems to lump human zombies, lizardfolk zombies, and wolf zombies under the general catagory of "medium zombies." [...]

The examples given for the Medium zombie are only orc and gnoll, two fairly closely related humanoids which aren't really functionally different once they're reduced to mindless, shambling corpses. We don't know if a "wolf" zombie is treated differently, or if Medium zombies do retain any special abilities of the original creature.

Personally, I'm hoping we'll get something somewhere between a template and a static stat block based on size.

 

[BBQ]

Hooray for 4e zombies! They sound way more fun than 3e zombies.