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The Dresden Files => DFRPG => Topic started by: Mr. Death on February 07, 2012, 04:51:08 PM
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I know the game and setting already have zombies, but I've always been fond of the slow, shambling George A. Romero style zombies, so I've been thinking of ways to implement them. Story-wise, it'd probably be the result of some botched attempt at real necromancy, or an Item of Power that was misused.
As for gameplay, I was thinking of having them fairly low refresh, and low skills, with Living Dead, maybe Claws and probably Venom if I go with the Claws. No Toughness powers. Use aspects to cover the 'mindlessly wanting to devour the living' bit.
Probably Fists ratings at 3, Endurance at 2, Athletics at 1, and 2 or 3 for Alertness. As for making them tough to keep down, rather than a Toughness power, I was thinking of having it so that, unless the players make a called shot to the head, the zombies will take every level of Consequence short of Extreme (and maybe give them the one Endurance stunt to double up on Mild consequences). Taken Out by burning would also do the trick. I feel like that'd best simulate the whole, 'bits get blown off but they just keep coming' factor.
And come to think of it, giving them a solid Might score so they can grapple is probably a good idea, too.
Any other ideas you guys might have that I'm not thinking of?
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Actually, I'd say Living Dead covers the "they just keep coming" factor. You put a few bullets in one, it drops... and as soon as that scene ends, it's up and shambling after you again.
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Hmm, that's a tricky problem IMO. Romero zombies almost have a binary status: they're up and shambling or they're put down.
Your idea of having them take near-max consequences but without Toughness powers I think works, but bookkeeping could be problematic with large numbers. And Romero zombies ALWAYS come in large numbers.
The pros of the "lots of consequences" option is that it allows PCs to mangle the zombies and derive periodic bonuses by tagging those consequences. Just about any hit that lands will gradually help dismantle the things, too - with almost no Athletics to dodge with, nearly any hit will at least do SOMETHING.
A quicker way to model it could be to have a relatively tough Armor value and have the zombies take no consequences; indeed, maybe rule any hit that gets over their Armor takes them out. It makes tracking larger groups easier because
1. Any given zombie is either up 100% or dead.
2. You can beat Armor ratings with attacks that are accurate enough (headshots) or damaging enough (grenades and heavy weapons), which covers most of the basic on how to take down zombies. Just say the armor has a Catch for stuff like fire and things that would gradually kill a zombie regardless.
The downsides to that approach is that in a way, an Armor rating conceptually raises the difficulty to effectively hit the creature. Whiff factor is going to go up and players might get frustrated.
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I wrote a custom power called Feel No Pain that might be handy here.
And Belial666 wrote up a creature called a Hunger Revenant that was horror-movie-zombie inspired. But it wasn't mook-level, so you might not be able to use it.
Neither should be hard to find.
I wouldn't give a zombie any Athletics at all.
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I threw some together once that basically had 0 in all stats and 10 stress boxes. Seemed to fit just fine.
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Hm... Actually, combine ducksauce's idea with the suggestion the books make somewhere-or-other for things with physical immunity: turn any successful-but-non-damaging attack into a maneuver. So, you pepper the incoming zombie with bullets from your pistol, momentarily knocking it back / down, but it gets right up again and keeps coming until you line up a head shot (and get enough shifts to beat defense + armor).
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@wyvern:Those are good ideas, but it doesn't allow as much for debilitating hits that don't fully take out the zombie--things like blowing off its legs, or breaking it in half. I want them to be able to do that, and consequences would be a good way to model it.
@Admiralducksauce: I'm okay with a lot of bookkeeping, since I tend to use an excel spreadsheet to keep track of stress boxes and stuff in battle, and have so far had pretty fair success in keeping track of 10-ish combatants (usually 5-6 goons, 3-4 PCs). Plus, with the zombies, while there might be a huge number facing the PCs, really only the front five or six might actually be able to interact with the party so it's not that much to keep track of.
I wrote a custom power called Feel No Pain that might be handy here.
And Belial666 wrote up a creature called a Hunger Revenant that was horror-movie-zombie inspired. But it wasn't mook-level, so you might not be able to use it.
Neither should be hard to find.
I wouldn't give a zombie any Athletics at all.
Alright, I'll take a look at those. As for giving them Athletics, I figured they're still at least mobile, and ought to have some chance of pursuit (albeit slow) without going backward half the time.
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@wyvern:Those are good ideas, but it doesn't allow as much for debilitating hits that don't fully take out the zombie--things like blowing off its legs, or breaking it in half. I want them to be able to do that, and consequences would be a good way to model it.
@Admiralducksauce: I'm okay with a lot of bookkeeping, since I tend to use an excel spreadsheet to keep track of stress boxes and stuff in battle, and have so far had pretty fair success in keeping track of 10-ish combatants (usually 5-6 goons, 3-4 PCs). Plus, with the zombies, while there might be a huge number facing the PCs, really only the front five or six might actually be able to interact with the party so it's not that much to keep track of.
Alright, I'll take a look at those. As for giving them Athletics, I figured they're still at least mobile, and ought to have some chance of pursuit (albeit slow) without going backward half the time.
My quibbles with your method evaporate if you've got a way to handle the bookkeeping, and it seems you do.
As for Athletics, I'd say against most PCs' combat skills a +1 or a +0 doesn't mean much. But when it comes to movement, it can mean a lot. Assuming the zombies roll Athletics to move towards the PCs every round, their goal is to roll a total of 2 or more, because they're gonna move 1 zone regardless.
With Athletics 1, each zombie's got about a 40% chance of rolling a +1 or more on the dice: a few zombies half-surge, half-stumble ahead of the pack as they get the "scent". With Athletics 0, you need a +2 or better on the dice. It drops the chances to around 20% per zombie, and significantly decreases the chances of a zombie moving 3 or more zones in a round.
For keeping the tension and providing more of a challenge to players, I'd probably err on the Athetics 1 side of things. But again, it's all theoretical over here.
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I threw some together once that basically had 0 in all stats and 10 stress boxes. Seemed to fit just fine.
I like it , stolen
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Might I make a suggestion?
No stresses...zombies shouldn't feel stress.
Just consequences...simulating things getting blown off. All zombies take all consequences possible. The drive to feed is too strong.
This allows players to tag consequences faster killing zombies faster. It also creates vivid imagery of limbs flying, zombies blown in half crawling forward (extreme consequence owned by a chainsaw...etc.)
The downside is instead of only having to deal 11 to blow a zombies head off...you need to do 18.
So I suppose I invalidated my suggestion....
Ah well, I like the idea all the same.
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Might I make a suggestion?
No stresses...zombies shouldn't feel stress.
Just consequences...simulating things getting blown off. All zombies take all consequences possible. The drive to feed is too strong.
This allows players to tag consequences faster killing zombies faster. It also creates vivid imagery of limbs flying, zombies blown in half crawling forward (extreme consequence owned by a chainsaw...etc.)
The downside is instead of only having to deal 11 to blow a zombies head off...you need to do 18.
So I suppose I invalidated my suggestion....
Ah well, I like the idea all the same.
Maybe a house rule, that if they get a +5 or above on the attack, it's an automatic headshot.
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Might I make a suggestion?
No stresses...zombies shouldn't feel stress.
Just consequences...simulating things getting blown off. All zombies take all consequences possible. The drive to feed is too strong.
This allows players to tag consequences faster killing zombies faster. It also creates vivid imagery of limbs flying, zombies blown in half crawling forward (extreme consequence owned by a chainsaw...etc.)
I like it. May steal it someday! :)
The downside is instead of only having to deal 11 to blow a zombies head off...you need to do 18.
So I suppose I invalidated my suggestion....
Ah well, I like the idea all the same.
Not really. Every attack that hits will cause a consequence since they have no stress track. So it only takes five successful attacks to take it out. (Fewer if your attacks are above what a given consequence can take.) May want to add a toughness power (for the armor) to prevent successive one stress pings from dropping it. Leave the catch as a head shot and you're good to go!
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So, how are people planning to get 10 stress/no stress? GM fiat? A custom power?
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Might I make a suggestion?
No stresses...zombies shouldn't feel stress.
Just consequences...simulating things getting blown off. All zombies take all consequences possible. The drive to feed is too strong.
This allows players to tag consequences faster killing zombies faster. It also creates vivid imagery of limbs flying, zombies blown in half crawling forward (extreme consequence owned by a chainsaw...etc.)
The downside is instead of only having to deal 11 to blow a zombies head off...you need to do 18.
So I suppose I invalidated my suggestion....
Ah well, I like the idea all the same.
I was actually thinking of changing it to give them no Endurance skill, so they've only got the base two stress boxes. Given that the PCs will either come with weapons or fashion weapons of some kind in short order, it's not that far off from having no stress boxes.
Though maybe 'fresher' zombies might have a point in Endurance, a stunt like No Pain, No Gain or Tough Stuff, or even a Fair Athletics score to make them a bit hardier and tougher to put down. On the flip side, more decayed zombies might have deteriorated Might or Fists scores, and maybe come with some consequences already taken.
As for headshots, I'm dithering on how to actually work that. Maybe make them have to tag a maneuver, or spend a fate point if they're in a hurry to invoke their "Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain" aspect. Or maybe make it happen whenever they roll a natural +4.
Or both, to allow for people to either aim (spend an action navel gazing, but not attacking first), take advantage of a Moderate or higher consequence (cripple it to stop it from moving, the head's an easier target to bash in), or just plain getting a lucky shot (either the rare +4 on the roll, or spending a fate point to make the luck happen). In any case, I don't want it to be something as easy as making a free-action declaration and tagging that.
How's this look:
Romero Style Zombie
High Concept: Shambling Flesh Eating Corpse
Other Aspects: Driven By Hunger; "Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain"; Slow but Steady; Just One Part of the Shambling Horde
Skills:
Great (+4): Might
Good (+3): Fists
Fair (+2): Alertness,
Average (+1): Athletics
Stunts:
Powers:
Living Dead [-1]
Claws [-3] (Venomous, biting)
Total Refresh Cost:
-4
Stress:
Mental OO
Physical OO
Social OO
Notes: The classic shambling zombie is slow to move, and on the surface looks fragile, but as a being driven solely by hunger, simple things like wounds and lost limbs aren't going to make it stop, so they should take every consequence before being Taken Out--and should get back up again anyway unless someone puts a bullet through its brain. While one zombie may seem easy to deal with, they've got a Weapon:2 venomous bite, Great (+4) death grip (har har) for grappling, and where there's one zombie, there's almost always more--especially since any characters Taken Out by a zombie bite will rise soon after to join their ranks. Use the time it takes them to shamble into range to put them down, or at least blow enough bits off them to make good your escape.
<Billy> The stat block represents the 'average' zombie. A fresher, meatier zombie might have a Fair (+2) Athletics score, Average (+1) Endurance, and one or both of No Pain, No Gain and Tough Stuff, making them tougher to put down for the count. Likewise, a more decayed zombie's stats might be a point or two lower all around, and may have already taken consequences.
<Harry> What, no "Braaaaaaains" aspect?
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So, how are people planning to get 10 stress/no stress? GM fiat? A custom power?
How about negative Endurance? Which also explains why they're so slow...
Could also go with a Toughness modifier or rebate power. Something like the following perhaps:
[+2] No Resiliency This character has no physical resiliency and cannot recover easily from exertion or stress. The physical stress track is set to zero.
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What if you did a heavily hacked version of Toughness for them?
At baseline, Toughness grants 2 stress boxes and 1 armor. You don't want the armor, because you want them to take damage fairly easy. And stress isn't quite right, because you want the damage inflicted to be reflected by consequences (like lost limbs and such).
So, here's an idea for the revamped power:
Zombie Toughness [-3]
Description: You have all sorts of flesh that you can (un)live without. Losing those unimportant bits (like arms and legs and guts) doesn't really slow you down ... much.
Just a "flesh" wound! You gain an additional consequences to the tune of two milds and one moderate physical. You may only make use of them if they are the last consequences available.
The Catch [+2] is your head. Whether or not your braaains are your key feature, your head is, alas, the one part of your body you can't live without. Your "Zombie Toughness" consequences con't be used to reduce the stress of a head shot.
Thoughts on useage and balance:
- A baseline stunt is allowed "one or two" mild consequences, leaning toward one if the effect is broad. This is a broad application, but (a) options are slightly limited by requiring them to be taken last, and (b) powers are allowed to have a bit of an edge over stunts, so I think that upgrading one of the milds to a moderate is justified.
- Yes, I'm aware that The Catch might easily be priced higher, allowing for a stronger power for the same net refresh. Feel free to fiddle with this if you want a stronger zombie.
- I'm sure there are several ways to deal with head shots; the simple way would be to allow any invocation of an accuracy-related aspect to be narrated as being an attack to the head. This would still allow for the +2 bonus in addition to satisfying The Catch; another option would be to require an "invoke-for-effect" for the attack to count against The Catch.
- The "bonus consequences must be taken last" rule is there to make head shots useful. If the bonus consequences are used up against initial 'wearing-down' attacks, then the fact that head shots ignore them is wasted.
- If you want more one-shot-to-the-head zombie kills, then it would be best to combine this stunt with allowing the zombie few if any basic consequences. Any consequences not tied to this power make head shots less likely to be fatal, so only fairly powerful head shots will take down the zombie without softening it up a bit first.
- If you want a zombies that require more softening-up or multiple head shots, then add in extra 'general-use' consequences (like the No Pain, No gain stunt).
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Ooh, I like that one. That'd be a good way to throw a singular, tougher zombie at them, something they'd have to land several solid hits on before it went down (barring a headshot).
I think for the mobs, though, the standard set of consequences (maybe the extra one for No Pain, No Gain), should do the trick. If they concentrate their fire on one zombie, sure, it'll be easy to hit one for Severe consequence-level damage and knock it more or less out of the fight in one or two shots, but if I can encourage them to make spray attacks through sheer numbers, it should give each individual zombie some longevity.
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Actually, I think it might work well for both zombie mooks and zombie 'bosses' by combining it with the ideas in the 'Types of Opposition' section on YS327. So you end up with (assuming that the zombie template includes Zombie Toughness and No Pain, No Gain):
- Crunch-All-You-Want-We'll-Make-More Zombie: Zombie template + Nameless NPC. Consequences: mild (mild mild moderate). Assuming Endurace 0, taken out by a 5-stress head shot or 13-14 non-head stress.
- Strong Zombie: Zombie template + Supporting NPC. Consequences: mild mild moderate (mild mild moderate). A head shot of 11 stress would do it (possibly requiring some softening), or 19-20 stress worth of non-head hits.
- Oh-My-God: Zombie template + Main NPC. Consequences: mild mild moderate serious extreme (mild mild moderate). A one-shot kill would require at least a 25-stress head shot, making it unlikely unless your name is Kincaid.
Of course, the bigger zombies might well have additional powers/stunts and higher skills, making them even nastier (possibly including a buffer version of the Zombie Toughness power and or Inhuman Toughness). Bumping the Endurance up to 1 (or higher) can also add to staying power. If some of the mid-to-high-grade zombies happen to have been former cops, then they might still be wearing ballistic vests.
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I like the negative Endurance idea best, since it's elegant. But YMMV.
Does Zombie Toughness cost -3 before or after The Catch?
Given how effective consequence tags are, even a Main NPC zombie ought to be fairly fragile.
Giving Zombies any Athletics skill at all means that many people will have been made faster by death. And that seems wrong.
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Umbra Lux - "steal" away.
GM fiat covers lack of stresses or all stresses just fine. Romero Zombies don't need no stinkin' riles.
I agree zombies should have 0 athletics or less. Athletics also covers how many zones they can run. Shambler style zombies don't run and bump into stuff all the time.
If we want faster "28 days later infected" that is entirely different.
People should design the left 4 dead and dead island zombies too. Gives those necromancers more to play with.
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Does Zombie Toughness cost -3 before or after The Catch?
It would be -3 before the Catch, -1 net cost. Of course, it can be scaled upward or downward by adding or removing consequences. Point for point it's a bit better than No Pain, No Gain, but I think that's ok. I think I would hesitate to recommend this for a PC, though, and without the fairly easy-to-bypass Catch it might well be OP.
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Giving Zombies any Athletics skill at all means that many people will have been made faster by death. And that seems wrong.
You could say the same about the other stats, though, especially Might. I see what you're saying, but call it a thematic decision: To me, part of the effectiveness of zombies as a horror creature is that they're always coming. They spot you, they're going to shamble at you inexorably, so I wanted it to be that the majority of rolls for movement would have the zombie going forward to ratchet up the tension. If it's 0, then half the time the zombies will either not be moving, or falling over themselves.
Might it work better as a stunt? Give them 0 Athletics, but a stunt where their movement speed jumps by 1 or 2 when they detect prey?Actually, I think it might work well for both zombie mooks and zombie 'bosses' by combining it with the ideas in the 'Types of Opposition' section on YS327. So you end up with (assuming that the zombie template includes Zombie Toughness and No Pain, No Gain):
- Crunch-All-You-Want-We'll-Make-More Zombie: Zombie template + Nameless NPC. Consequences: mild (mild mild moderate). Assuming Endurace 0, taken out by a 5-stress head shot or 13-14 non-head stress.
- Strong Zombie: Zombie template + Supporting NPC. Consequences: mild mild moderate (mild mild moderate). A head shot of 11 stress would do it (possibly requiring some softening), or 19-20 stress worth of non-head hits.
- Oh-My-God: Zombie template + Main NPC. Consequences: mild mild moderate serious extreme (mild mild moderate). A one-shot kill would require at least a 25-stress head shot, making it unlikely unless your name is Kincaid.
Of course, the bigger zombies might well have additional powers/stunts and higher skills, making them even nastier (possibly including a buffer version of the Zombie Toughness power and or Inhuman Toughness). Bumping the Endurance up to 1 (or higher) can also add to staying power. If some of the mid-to-high-grade zombies happen to have been former cops, then they might still be wearing ballistic vests.
I like the idea of adding Zombie Toughness to the template, but I'm not sure about the Strong and Oh-My-God templates. I don't want the headshot thing to be purely brute force/math--needing 5 stress makes it way too easy (especially with no Athletics score), and 25 stress is way too much.
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You could say the same about the other stats, though, especially Might. I see what you're saying, but call it a thematic decision: To me, part of the effectiveness of zombies as a horror creature is that they're always coming. They spot you, they're going to shamble at you inexorably, so I wanted it to be that the majority of rolls for movement would have the zombie going forward to ratchet up the tension. If it's 0, then half the time the zombies will either not be moving, or falling over themselves.
Another option if going with a negative Endurance - they can move faster / through obstacles if they wish but doing doing so requires an Endurance test against the obstacle / speed with any shifts they don't make being taken as stress & causing consequences.
It gives you the picture of a zombie dragging itself through a broken window to get at you...and leaving a trail of its own entrails in its wake. Or the zombie who makes a sudden lunge across the room to grab you...and you hear its own bones snapping as it does.
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For some inspiration on a good scenario for zombies, I highly suggest the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode Dead Man's Party. Lots of dumb, shambling zombies. Magical mask. Built in end-boss. It's great for a zombie situation.
As for rules, instead of stress, give them a threshold you need to overcome. If you don't cause 3 stress in one hit, you do surface damage that isn't even worth tracking. You either do enough to take the thing out, or you do nothing. Of course, that's past whatever armour rating you decide to give them from toughness.
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For a horde of zombies rolling athletics for all of them will be a chore anyway.
Just like the concept of GM fiat: 10 stresses or no stresses...
Just say they can always manage one zone as long as they aren't impeded by terrain, then they get slower. I mean even at a 0 athletics some of the horde should move ahead every round.
The suggested stunt: bonus athletics for the purposes of movement once prey is detected may work better.
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You could also stat the hoard (or a section of the hoard) as one "creature." Give it supernatural toughness, and anything that inflicts stress on it means that some of the zombies in it are getting turned to chunks. Consequences could be along the lines of "Hole in the middle of the blob," which the PCs could take advantage of to kill even more of them.
You could also give it the multi-limbed power from the custom thread, to let it make (weak) spray attacks with fists.
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If it's 0, then half the time the zombies will either not be moving, or falling over themselves.
I'm sorry, maybe I'm just misunderstanding the rules. If you spend your action for the round moving, and without taking into account obstacles and blocks, you should ALWAYS move 1 zone at minimum. You can move 1 zone as a supplemental action and then do something else, even! You should not move backwards or fall over simply because you have a Mediocre Athletics and chose to roll that skill that round. That's dumb.
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Another option if going with a negative Endurance - they can move faster / through obstacles if they wish but doing doing so requires an Endurance test against the obstacle / speed with any shifts they don't make being taken as stress & causing consequences.
It gives you the picture of a zombie dragging itself through a broken window to get at you...and leaving a trail of its own entrails in its wake. Or the zombie who makes a sudden lunge across the room to grab you...and you hear its own bones snapping as it does.
Without much (or any) points in a dodging skill, they're going to be taking plenty stress and consequences as is, they don't need to be falling apart on their own. At least, not the fresh ones.
As for rules, instead of stress, give them a threshold you need to overcome. If you don't cause 3 stress in one hit, you do surface damage that isn't even worth tracking. You either do enough to take the thing out, or you do nothing. Of course, that's past whatever armour rating you decide to give them from toughness.
I've mentioned why I'm against the "take it out, or do nothing" approach before: Consequences, I feel, are a good and convenient way to model the fact they can take a lot of punishment but keep coming--just without an arm or leg by the end.
For a horde of zombies rolling athletics for all of them will be a chore anyway.
I use a bot for rolling purposes, so it's not much of a big deal to roll a dozen times in quick succession.
I'm sorry, maybe I'm just misunderstanding the rules. If you spend your action for the round moving, and without taking into account obstacles and blocks, you should ALWAYS move 1 zone at minimum. You can move 1 zone as a supplemental action and then do something else, even! You should not move backwards or fall over simply because you have a Mediocre Athletics and chose to roll that skill that round. That's dumb.
Well, mostly I was going to use the rolls to determine which, if any, zombies are actually getting into range of the PCs. A conflict might start with the PCs at one end of a hallway, and a couple dozen zombies at the other, say, two or three zones away, and I'd roll a handful at a time to see how much of the horde is managing to get close. I figure giving them Average Athletics would end up with more making the roll per turn, cranking up the tension for the PCs better.
In all, I think I'm going to go with 0 Athletics and a stunt to boost it when pursuing prey. That plus Zombie Toughness ought to make them easy to hit, but still able to pursue and able to take a lot of punishment before they're Taken Out.
How's this as a revision:
Romero Style Zombie
High Concept: Shambling Flesh Eating Corpse
Other Aspects: Driven By Hunger; "Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain"; Slow but Steady; Never Just One Zombie
Skills:
Great (+4): Might
Good (+3): Fists
Fair (+2): Alertness,
Average (+1): Contacts
Stunts:
No Pain, No Gain: Extra Mild physical consequence
Predator's Drive: Athletics is rolled at +2 when pursuing prey.
Powers:
Living Dead [-1]
Claws [-3] (Venomous, biting)
Zombie Toughness [-3] (2 extra Mild consequences, 1 extra Moderate)
The Catch [+2] (Headshots)
Zombie Moan [-1] When spotting prey, a zombie may make a Contacts roll at +2 to summon more of their friends. This allows any zombie within earshot to take advantage of Predator's Drive.
Total Refresh Cost:
-6
Stress:
Mental OO
Physical OO
Social OO
Notes: The classic shambling zombie is slow to move, and on the surface looks fragile, but as a being driven solely by hunger, simple things like wounds and lost limbs aren't going to make it stop. Zombie Toughness and No Pain, No Gain mean that while they have no effective dodge score, they can take a lot of punishment before they go down--they should take every consequence except Extreme before being truly Taken Out--and should get back up again anyway unless someone puts a bullet through its brain. One zombie shouldn't be much trouble for a competent combatant, but they can still be dangerous if they get close, with a Weapon:2 venomous bite rolled from Good (+3), and Great (+4) death grip (har har) for grappling. If that wasn't bad enough, any zombie who spots you might use Zombie Moan to bring more to the party, and any character Taken Out via zombie bite will rise as one within the hour. Use the time it takes them to shamble into range to put them down, or at least blow enough bits off them to make good your escape.
Older, more decrepit zombies might have Athletics, Might, or Endurance one point lower--and thus no physical stress track at all--and come with consequences already filled. Fresher or just tougher zombies might have a point in Endurance or Athletics, and the stunt Tough Stuff to add armor against blunt objects.
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I've mentioned why I'm against the "take it out, or do nothing" approach before: Consequences, I feel, are a good and convenient way to model the fact they can take a lot of punishment but keep coming--just without an arm or leg by the end.
My suggestion serves two purposes:
1. Non critical attacks against zombies are often portrayed as doing more or less nothing to stop them. My suggestion is an easy way to do exactly that without complication.
2. Tracking Consequences for literal hordes of zombies will get very tedious very quickly. My way keeps the bookkeeping to a binary status: They're fine, or they're down.
In short, it's a simple way to quickly and easily represent how zombies are often portrayed in movies that requires very little effort.
However, if you were against that, I'd represent a horde of zombies almost like an environmental hazard with armour and a stress track. Everyone inside the area of effect has to resist the attacks and damage. Causing stress and Consequences is about ending the threat a lot more than it is about causing harm to an individual zombie. This accomplishes much the same thing as the above suggestion and allows you to dial up and down the threat by changing armour, stress, and number/type of Consequences.
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I like the idea of adding Zombie Toughness to the template, but I'm not sure about the Strong and Oh-My-God templates. I don't want the headshot thing to be purely brute force/math--needing 5 stress makes it way too easy (especially with no Athletics score), and 25 stress is way too much.
Just to clarify because it sounds as though you misunderstood ... I wasn't suggesting three different power levels of templates, or that a GM might want to use the "Oh My God" option as a 'standard zombie'. I was just pointing out how you could use the 'Types of Opposition' section (YS327) in combination with a 'standard' zombie template to allow for weak mook zombies and more powerful "boss-grade" zombies without needing completely seperate templates. This is no different than any other NPC type; nameless grunt RCVs have no inherent consequences and are therefore easier to kill than archvillain RCVs.
And if you have a 'main NPC' who is a zombie, you don't want them to be one-shot insta-killed, so the 25 stress is perfectly fine; it just requires that the PCs wear him down by burning through those consequences a bit (lopping off arms and such) before they can take him out (either with head shots or with brute force).
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I suppose I misspoke, but my point was that a single Romero zombie shouldn't be that tough to kill at all. It is, after all, a slow, stupid creature with no sense of self-preservation or any protection aside from its bones and ability to not give a shit about having big holes blown through it. The classic Romero zombie isn't something that should take someone a while of wearing down to kill if you have some idea what you're doing. It's when there's a bunch of them, and you don't have time to bring them down one at a time, that the consequences they can take come in to keep them going, and they become a real threat.
The way I see it, a single zombie faced by a group of PCs, or even a lone PC, shouldn't last more than two rounds--one to pull a maneuver or inflict a strong consequence (any PC with a weapon and half-decent attack skill ought to be able to manage it, given the zombie's 0-base defense roll), two to blow its brains out and finish it off. Unless it manages to get the drop on someone, and barring freak good/bad rolls, it shouldn't be able to do much damage. But if the PCs are significantly outnumbered, sure they might still be able to finish off individual zombies, but each time they concentrate on one, five or six more get to move in and attack. The tactics shift to crowd control and spray attacks to make breathing room--inflicting consequences, possibly Severe ones that all but cripple the zombies, but no true Take Outs.
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No problem, just use the mook variety, then, and bring them on in hordes. The "supporting character" and "main NPC" options are just that -- options.
Another option, by the way: someone proposed a power called "swarm body" or something like that a while back. I can't find it right now because the search feature on this site hates me, but possibly Sanctaphrax or someone else might be able to point you to it.
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Swarm Body. (http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php?topic=29678.0)
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So I finally got a chance to try these out in a side-game, and I'm happy to report they worked more or less as intended. The group in question was an avatar of the phoenix with healing powers and Breath Weapon for fireballs; an ex-mafia doctor with sponsored magic geared toward healing and Fair skill with guns; and a katana-wielding, water-magic-slinging avatar of a balance guardian. While it was 11 to 12 refresh (characters coming from different campaigns), only the balance avatar was able to deal out crazy magic damage (but preferred her sword).
As few as two or three zombies ended up being child's play to take care of barring freak rolls (one zombie just kept rolling +2 and +3 for his defenses), and because of some surprisingly good rolls (first zombie attack was made at 7) the old "try to help the 'wounded' person only to get bitten" cliche played out entirely on its own.
Once I threw a horde of them at the group of two defenders (represented mechanically by four zombies attacking at a time and 'rotating' in as others fell), they still proved dangerous--they were landing stress hits by sheer weight of numbers (turns out if you roll four times in a row from 3, it's almost a guarantee that at least one will hit 5 or 6), and using spray attacks meant while every hit caused a consequence and gained some breathing room, they didn't actually take out more than two or three of them over the course of the fight. They ended up having to spend at least a couple turns blocking and maneuvering just to keep from being overwhelmed (and even then, one of the zeds managed to get through a 5-shift block).
I ended up not using the Zombie Toughness for the most part because the fights didn't go on that long.
In all it ended with the balance guardian managing to shut down the faulty necromantic spell (after chopping in half the faulty necromancer), and I think it went rather well.
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I would just rearange the skills. The classic ones where more horror based. They are never shown to be good in a fight.
+4 Might
+3 Intimidation
+2 Contacts
+1 Fists
Add a power:
Sense the Living [-1] (Can always sense the nearest human)
Claws [-3] (Venomous, biting, uses might for enderance check, takeout always equals becoming one)
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Claws and venomous are already on there; sense the living is giving them too much credit--a zombie still has to see, hear, or smell a human in every bit of fiction I've seen.
A monster with a +1 attack skill is not going to hit any PC worth the term. I put it at +3 so they'd be at least a threat physically.
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Claws and venomous are already on there; sense the living is giving them too much credit--a zombie still has to see, hear, or smell a human in every bit of fiction I've seen.
A monster with a +1 attack skill is not going to hit any PC worth the term. I put it at +3 so they'd be at least a threat physically.
Well, they could always do Might maneuvers the first turn then grapple the second. Indeed, that's probably most apporopriate for how zombies actually fight...
It does make the Claws useless and the venomous a GM call whether it applies, though.
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Well, they could always do Might maneuvers the first turn then grapple the second. Indeed, that's probably most apporopriate for how zombies actually fight...
It does make the Claws useless and the venomous a GM call whether it applies, though.
The problem with grappling is, well, it's too easy to break out of. A zombie that has to rely on grappling isn't going to do much damage, because your average PC is going to have some physical or attacking skill at 4 or 5, which means it's just a crapshoot as to whether or not the zombie's grapple is even going to last the round.
So if it's grapple focused, that means that an individual zombie is going to need three turns minimum (maneuver, grapple, then pray like hell that the grapple holds until its next turn), to do any kind of damage--and short of a strength power, one shift at a time--and that's only if his target rolls really badly. It effectively neuters them as a physical threat entirely (and only threatening when they have four or five turns to freely grapple), when a zombie should be able to attack and cause damage all in one turn.
Remember that a grapple doesn't necessarily mean grabbing someone--it means restraining someone. A zombie just grabbing an arm and biting is an attack. A grapple is when they try to tackle you to the ground or pull you into the horde.
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Well, they could always do Might maneuvers the first turn
This is exactly what I was thinking actually. By themselves they are never dangerous unless they surprise people. Also they rarely seem to kill people by NOT eating them. So what I was thinking is if you have say 4 of them, 3 of them perform maneuvers (might, contacts, or intimidate) that the last one tags. Suddenly that fists +1 is now +7, and that is fairly dangerous. Like previously mentioned base venomous off of might instead of fists and you are golden.
For the life sense, I was thinking more of a long distance sense for when they have covered the earth and somehow 10s to 100s all end up crowding around some abandoned farmhouse in the middle of nowhere.
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This is exactly what I was thinking actually. By themselves they are never dangerous unless they surprise people. Also they rarely seem to kill people by NOT eating them. So what I was thinking is if you have say 4 of them, 3 of them perform maneuvers (might, contacts, or intimidate) that the last one tags. Suddenly that fists +1 is now +7, and that is fairly dangerous. Like previously mentioned base venomous off of might instead of fists and you are golden.
That kind of implies a level of coordination that just doesn't fit with the brainless zombie archetype, to me. And it still means that a single zombie can't even attack on its own and have any chance whatsoever of doing real damage. A zombie really should be able to attack in one turn.
For the life sense, I was thinking more of a long distance sense for when they have covered the earth and somehow 10s to 100s all end up crowding around some abandoned farmhouse in the middle of nowhere.
You just answered it--they're covering the earth. They're everywhere, and sound carries (especially when people aren't around as much to keep making it).
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I had some cannibal thralls in the story I ran and I handled them by using the Mook Rules from LoA and SA. Essentially I made them Average (+1) minions which means they have a single stress box before being taken out and that they roll at Average for attack and defense. They max out at up to Good (+3) Minions which would have 3 Stress boxes and roll at Good for attack and defense. This makes an individual very easy to deal with. Where they become dangerous is when they group up. They then get a bonus to attack and defense as the table below:
MINION GROUP BONUS
2-3 = +1
4-6 = +2
7-9 = +3
10 = +4
As the group takes damage it becomes less effective. You can also add whatever powers you wish (Living Dead, Venomous Claws etc.) as usual and they would work exactly as if they would on any individual character. There were additional rules for having minions work with main NPCs but I will leave it at that since that would really apply with a zombie uprising.
Using these rules my party went through over a hundred minion thralls in an epic confrontation.