Describe your zombie apocalypse

[DwDStudios]

I'm a HUGE fan of zombie themed movies. Always have been. I'm loving The Walking Dead on AMC. But I always hate when the zombie outbreak is explained away too easily or not at all. So I'm toying with two views, two completely different concepts: one with religious undertones (which might not fly well with some gamers but would with mine), and another with well... um... liberal undertones?

Option 1: The Christians had it right, more or less. They knew the first four seals to be broken on the book of the end times were those which unleashed four horsemen. But what they got wrong was that those horsemen were not physical riders but instead symbols of death, famine, war, and pestilence... the four aspects that describe what happens when the dead rise up with an insatiable hunger for destruction and the need to spread their disease among the living. So started the beginning of the end. Now it is the time of the fifth seal, the tribulations and time of troubles. Mankind has been weighed and measured and has fallen short. Forsaken and left in a world to fend for themselves against the terror of the four horsemen: the zombie apocalypse! The interesting aspect of this version is that the zombies are soulless, and hunger for souls that they will never be able to keep. As eyes are the window to the soul, killing a zombie permanently is done by damaging ocular nerves (or basically shooting or stabbing the brain through the eye socket).

Option 2: Mankind has finally pushed the Earth too far. With all the toxins and radiations and radio waves and micro waves and... well, plastic. All the things they have employed to make their lives less Earthly has finally poisoned the earth to the point where it has responded. Pushing forth the recently fallen bodies buried into its surface, the Earth has created the zombie outbreak as an antibody against the Human infection... a solution to the cause of its decline. It has done more than this; the cities man once held dear have overgrown with vines and tangle-weed. It has also stopped providing crops, stopped filtering its own waters through varied sizes of stones and sands. Survival in the aftermath of an outraged Earth is challenging and dangerous, and even the animals see humans as enemies rather than threats. With all of these forces arrayed against the living, humanity is shrinking and settling into tight-knit groups who roam and search for a means to survive.

I haven't decided on which to use. Heck, I might even decide not to choose and just let things unfold as I make things up as I go. But I'm very eager to hear other people's take on the coming zombie outbreak... so share!

Tell me what caused YOUR zombie apocalypse.

[Blood axe]

Truth is, most of the time the "average Joe" (players/characters) wouldnt know the cause/start of the Zombie plague. Unless they are playing a group of Scientists or top Military. The normal guy on the street is just trying to survive- hes probably not worried about "how it all started" or creating a vaccine. Hes running low on food and ammo, and we arent sure how long those barricades will last.

So I prefer a Night of the Living Dead type scenario- a bunch of normal people fighting to survive- not trying to figure it out & cure it.

If I have to choose- I pick Mankind- we screw ourselves.... some schmuck in a government lab mixes it up and it escapes.....

[greyarea]

Agree wholeheartedly with BA on this one.

[DwDStudios]

Man... I was going for a fun exercise in creativity, shared among the many folks... I was hoping to be fed with ideas as well as feed others. I'm fully aware that the average joe doesn't need to know. But to be honest, I think it's FUN to know and to feed tidbits to your player characters so that as they attempt to survive they're slowly learning about the events that led to humanity's downfall and the rise of the undead. Especially if it at some point helps lead to some kind of potential search for a cure (that ultimately will be elusive and rife with conflict by nefarious survivors trying to establish their reign over mankind, of course).

So nobody else thinks like me?

[Alan]

extra-terrestrial option: an odd space object is seen to enter our atmosphere, trailing an odd green light. The object impacts ground in rural West Virginia, and then all hell breaks loose.

Alan

[greyarea]

Sorry to disappoint, DWD, but my favorite parts of all zombie movies (aside from my favorite, Fido) are all when the characters are trapped in a house/mall/bar/car/whatever and are trying to fend off the zombie hordes. Who cares what caused the bad guys when there are mounds of them attacking you?

[gentleman john]

One idea for a zombie apocalypse that I had ...

The setting was during the Great War. Both the Allied Powers and Central Powers had fought each other to a standstill in the battlefields of Central Europe. In order to break the stalemate, both sides had started to use new weapons - everything from aircraft to tanks and chemical weapons. While these did not break the stalemate, these weapons did result in greater carnage than before. The most feared of these weapons was gas. Not only did it cause horrific injuries to those exposed to it, it also contaminated the land where it was used. The strange cocktail of war chemicals permeated the very soil and mixed, forming unknown compounds. These compounds acted on the fallen, resurrecting them in a parody of life and sending them on a killing spree across the fields of Europe.

At first the powers ignored the reports of the rising dead and sent police battalions into the field. This only served to increase the numbers of the dead, forcing the living out of Central Europe. The two sides had to build fortifications to keep the zombie hordes back. Unfortunately, these fortifications were useless against the tragedy that was brewing in the civilian areas. Many victims of the gas attacks had died in rear-area hospitals and been buried. They had brought the contamination back with them, and spread it across the burial grounds. Soon the homelands of the soldiers were suffering from zombie incursions.

Europe is now overrun by zombie hordes. Martial law has been declared in many areas. Although no formal ceasefire has been signed, the Great Powers have stopped fighting amongst themselves as they deal with the threat on the home front. However, the soldiers still man the fortifications, and the zombie armies still claim the battlefields as their own.

[DwDStudios]

Sorry to disappoint, DWD, but my favorite parts of all zombie movies (aside from my favorite, Fido) are all when the characters are trapped in a house/mall/bar/car/whatever and are trying to fend off the zombie hordes. Who cares what caused the bad guys when there are mounds of them attacking you?

Well sure, I love that too. And it will be a key type of element to take place in my games. But that's not the whole game, or we'd be playing Last Night on Earth (fun board game btw). Don't you roleplay and storytell?

[DwDStudios]

extra-terrestrial option: an odd space object is seen to enter our atmosphere, trailing an odd green light. The object impacts ground in rural West Virginia, and then all hell breaks loose.

Alan

CLASSIC simplicity! Redneck'd ground-zero!

[DwDStudios]

One idea for a zombie apocalypse that I had ...

The setting was during the Great War. Both the Allied Powers and Central Powers had fought each other to a standstill in the battlefields of Central Europe. In order to break the stalemate, both sides had started to use new weapons - everything from aircraft to tanks and chemical weapons. While these did not break the stalemate, these weapons did result in greater carnage than before. The most feared of these weapons was gas. Not only did it cause horrific injuries to those exposed to it, it also contaminated the land where it was used. The strange cocktail of war chemicals permeated the very soil and mixed, forming unknown compounds. These compounds acted on the fallen, resurrecting them in a parody of life and sending them on a killing spree across the fields of Europe.

At first the powers ignored the reports of the rising dead and sent police battalions into the field. This only served to increase the numbers of the dead, forcing the living out of Central Europe. The two sides had to build fortifications to keep the zombie hordes back. Unfortunately, these fortifications were useless against the tragedy that was brewing in the civilian areas. Many victims of the gas attacks had died in rear-area hospitals and been buried. They had brought the contamination back with them, and spread it across the burial grounds. Soon the homelands of the soldiers were suffering from zombie incursions.

Europe is now overrun by zombie hordes. Martial law has been declared in many areas. Although no formal ceasefire has been signed, the Great Powers have stopped fighting amongst themselves as they deal with the threat on the home front. However, the soldiers still man the fortifications, and the zombie armies still claim the battlefields as their own.

I LOVE it. You mean I can kill Nazi Zambies??! .

How does it spread to the united states? Asia?