The paradoxes of zombie survival

[Dangerious P. Cats]

I've come to the official conclusion that zombie survival has a wonderful paradox. On the one hand you need other people to assist in your survival, not only skill specialisation but also if you're injured or sick you need people to get you through. A lone person can make only the most simple tools and forage for food, sveral people could get a viable support network going, with basic industry and food production. But there's a catch, the more people you have the more likly one will get infected and the more zombies you have to deal with should the infection spread. It's a wonderful paradox, you need people to survive, but at the same time they all represent a potential risk, the question is how do we represent this in a GURPS campaign? Could a campaign be built around it? Also could zombies be tailored to exploit this?

[vicky_molokh]

Note that in L4D-style zombie apocs, survivors are survivors because they're immune.

[gilbertocarlos]

Well, first, there is a small chance of the survivor be infected, second, there is a bigger chance that if he have guns, and you don't, he will take all of what you have, there is a chance that even if he don't have nothing, he will run with all you have during his nightwatch when you sleeps.

[Pluribus]

As for tailoring zombies to exploit the scenario, perhaps zombie-ism is a gradual onset thing. A person retains their faculties but starts to think their neighbors look tasty. Perhaps covertly killing and eating a few people before they forget how to use guns and traps or be subtle. Eventually completely losing it and become one of the shambling horrors. It could create more of a conspiracy 'enemy among us' scenario. Though if you go that route you may want to have zombie-ism spread through something other than bites. After all it would be pretty easy to just have everyone in the colony do a mandatory bite check every morning.

I've never liked spreading the disease by bite anyway. They say zombies want to eat people, but all they ever do is bite them once or twice and then leave them alone because they're a zombie now. You always have a scene of zombies swarming around Fred the secondary character, clawing him and pressing him down beneath their weight... and then the big reveal later when Fred is a zombie and... he's got like two scratches on him. What the heck did that crowd even do?


Now for some less specific ramble-y goodness. Hopefully it will be helpful in it's own way.

Another interesting thing L4D does is to have 'special' infected. Where some but not all of the zombies have special abilities.

I also encountered a browser based Zombie MMO with some interesting ideas. In quarantine2019 you can play as zombie or human. Zombies can infect humans, and humans can cure zombies. Making the sides able to shift back and forth. Well, that's the idea anyway. Good luck getting the general public to actually play it that way. But I could rant all day about that. It creates an interesting dynamic though. The most powerful humans can also become the most powerful zombies. So there's a big inscentive to try and get them back on your side. So a cure that works, but does not grant immunity, could possibly add something to your game. For instance when someone becomes a zombie it could become a quest to get them back. Plus it adds to the morality question of killing zombies left and right.

quarantine2019 also uses the concept of special infected by way of player classes. The 'Strong zombies' can wreck buildings and are generally comparable to Tanks in L4D. Infiltrators, or 'fast zombies' are adept at getting into secured buildings by climbing walls and such. 'Smart Zombies' remember how to open doors, are generally more infectious, and they can talk as well as understand words, even understanding things said over the radio.

I would be careful of overusing the talking zombie concept though. If he's mocking them or constantly walking around saying "here human human human." It would get cheesy fast. I imagine it would be scarier if the players realize that he can talk... but he has nothing to say to them. It's just an artifact of his past life to go with the other dangerous skills he remembers.

[sjard]

I got the special zombie types from All Flesh Must Be Eaten before I'd encountered L4D.

My zombie survival game has a half dozen types of zombies, and the infection can be resisted and possibly even have an immunity formed. But it is still a pretty nasty situation.

[Mailanka]

Originally Posted by Dangerious P. Cats

I've come to the official conclusion that zombie survival has a wonderful paradox. On the one hand you need other people to assist in your survival, not only skill specialisation but also if you're injured or sick you need people to get you through. A lone person can make only the most simple tools and forage for food, sveral people could get a viable support network going, with basic industry and food production. But there's a catch, the more people you have the more likly one will get infected and the more zombies you have to deal with should the infection spread. It's a wonderful paradox, you need people to survive, but at the same time they all represent a potential risk, the question is how do we represent this in a GURPS campaign? Could a campaign be built around it? Also could zombies be tailored to exploit this?

That's a very cool insight.

[jason taylor]

I thought the point of zombies was that they were not surviving.

[Stripe]

Originally Posted by Dangerious P. Cats

It's a wonderful paradox, you need people to survive, but at the same time they all represent a potential risk, the question is how do we represent this in a GURPS campaign? Could a campaign be built around it? Also could zombies be tailored to exploit this?

For the zombies' uncanny ability to seek out humans, I use Detect (Sentient Beings; Common; Vague, -50%) [10].

As for the "survival" aspect, a campaign can make heavy and strict use of the Starvation and Dehydration (p. B426) and Foraging rules (p. B427). GURPS Low-Tech Companion 3 is going to have more detailed rules for Foraging, but LTC2 advises each attempt to forage takes one hour (p. LTC2 32).

Normally, GM's are pretty lax on these rules, but in a zombie survival game, learn them, know them, use them.

Make use of bleeding rules and all the rules for recovery. If you get hurt bad, you're going to want a doctor. Not everyone is a doctor.

Vehicle or generator breaks down? You need a mechanic not only to fix it, but to identify and scavenge parts in the "battlefield."

It's peoples' skills that make them valuable.

[RyanW]

The same could be said of just about any survival situation. Each addition to the group is an extra set of hands but also another mouth to feed. It's also another person that might be infected (for plagues of a zombie nature or otherwise), and another person you might not be able to trust.

[Bruno]

Zombie movies are traditionally more about the Survivors freaking out under pressure and turning on each other more than they are about the zombies. Self doubt, doubt of others, panic, etc.