How do!

Yes it’s a zombie thread. I know. They’re old hat. But the good news is, if zombies aren’t your jam you don’t actually need to comment. Neat, huh? Also, I’m meaning Romero style Zombies. Not the infected of the 28 movies, or super sprint being dead makes you a ninja Snyder type.

Anyways. Me? I effing love zombie movies. Bad ones, awful ones, middling ones, good ones and truly superb ones. I’ll take them all and near certainly ask, nay demand, more! There’s just something cool, awesome and inherently funny about them. Especially the dodgier Italian “Zombi” series which delves ever deeper into the ridiculous.

But one thing that’s never really been addressed in Zombie Apocaylpse films and series is exactly how it all got so out of hand.

The only one I can think of where The Powers That Be just get on and sort it out is Shaun of the Dead. But even then, before the rescue it’s still on a slightly silly scale.

See…Zombies are ultimately only dangerous in large numbers. Individually they’re slow, uncoordinated and clumsy. Whilst they’ve the not inconsiderable upside of being indefatigable, a brisk walk will see you comfortably outpace them. I’m not a fit person, but I can get a good clip of speed walking which would see me, as I can keep that up for a good couple of hours - much longer if I get the chance for the odd five minute breather.

They must also necessarily start off Very Few In Number. Even if, like in Walking Dead, everyone is already infected? The initial number of Undead is going to be pretty modest. And so, easily handled. Yes it will take some adjustment to brain the dead/dying in the bonce with whatever heavy, skull crushy object might be to hand. Heck, in a pinch you can always just stot the corpses’ head off a handy wall, or give it a right stomping. But I do accept until the pressing need has sunk in with the wider populace, things will be quite dicey.

But even so? You’ve got to really, really Not Take Things Seriously to let zombies lead to the end of civilisation as we know it.

A herd is…basically nothing to IFV and Tanks. Just give them a good old squishing, and have infantry follow up, bayonets attached to finished off any not squished in the noggin. Yes in a protracted situation fuel absolutely is an issue. But again, only a serious Brown Trouser Time issue if the military is slow off the mark.

Civilians can also easily equip themselves with protection to start hunting down any Undead. Get a glossy magazine, and gaffer tape it to your forearm. PRESTO! Rudimentary but efficient enough armour to jam in the zombie’s gob. OK you’ll need to replace it fairly frequently, but it’s still effective and plentiful enough for an initial solution. Leather jackets and trousers are also bite resistant enough for a scrap.

For braining them? Half a brick or a slightly pointy rock will do you. If you’ve the time and skill, lash it to a broom handle for greater reach. I personally wouldn’t much around with knives. Not that skilled with them outside of the kitchen, and given Zombies do like a grapple, I’d rather avoid messing myself or the living person next to me up.

Heck, even common sporting equipment should be good to go. Baseball Bat, Cricket Bat, Field Hockey Stick? All decent heft for whacking melons. A Lacrosse stick could with even a modicum of care be used to catch a zombie by its head, and so keep it relatively out of reach. That one is risky and not advise unless you’ve mates nearby, but it is an example of a non-lethal relatively household grappling device.

Civvies could also just…run a bunch of zombies over. Granted there is genuine risk here. In the earliest hours and days the shambling corpses are still fresh, and so no different to running over a living human. Not that I’ve experience of that thank *insert detiy*, but the human body can still go through a windscreen, tangle the wheels and that. So only something I’d go for in an emergency. Unless I’m going at a good speed and so they’re most likely to be hurled away from my direction of travel.

Hence…the whole Zombies Arrived And Everything Instantly Went To Pot just…feels daft.

What are your thoughts?

I essentially agree with you. Romero style zombies might pick up some momentum due to the surprise factor and initial confusion. However as soon as the military realises what it is dealing with it should be able to neutralise the threat effectively.

At worst I can imagine areas, perhaps even whole cities, being quarantined and cordoned off. Blown to pieces with artillery perhaps. I don't really see why vast areas would be overrun by zombies though.

One way The Walking Dead and Romero films try to justify it is that people who die of causes other than being bitten by a zombie will become a zombie regardless. This makes the threat pervasive and ongoing. I still don't think it's enough to cause a widespread pandemic though.

This is something that in my view is never really addressed in any zombie film that I've seen. Not a big issue as far as I'm concerned though, it's all fiction after all.

I think one relatively recent videogame / show that has addressed this effectively is The Last Of Us. Those "zombies" are more threatening than traditional Romero zombies though.

Given irl infection diseases, I wouldn’t be surprised if some people went around purposely trying to get infected, actively hurting those trying to slow the spread, claiming military is making zombies up and instigating riots that keep the military hesitant to work. Plus, doing a basic google, in Romero zombies it’s anyone who dies after the zombie stuff starts, not just the traditional bite to infection. Plus, while sure you can outwalk a zombie, zombies don’t stop to sleep, so when inevitably you need to rest, how do you make sure you don’t get attacked in your sleep? Sure, the smart thing is to have a friend keep watch, but plenty of people will slip and forget.

As for squishing, that’s fun up until the bones and blood and guts get inside your engines or gunk up the tracks. Plus, bayonets might be handy but I’m not sure how long or effective they’d be on a skull, though I’ve never tested one on my own skull so take it with a grain of salt.

Does any of this 100% explain why zombies get some big? Eh probably not but it’s just a few things I noted.

Here in the US, the military is WAY too small to secure multiple cities, so if an outbreak was nation wide the majority of our country would not have a military presence. Add in it takes time to deploy units. You need to lay on trains and other transport to move tanks and IFVs any distance within the USA.

I’m not sure it’s necessary to involve the military for containment.

Me? Despite being a big fella, I’m Soft As Mashed Potato. I’ve pretty much no fighting skills beyond a body slam or an entirely opportunistic pod shot.

But zombies here? It’s like a someone legless drunk try to start on you. Easy enough to dodge or shove away from you, because they lack coordination and sense of balance and that.

Against a zombie? Not without risk, I could more likely than not trip it, or barge it over. From there, Spesh if I’m wearing Doc Martens? It’s all over bar the kicking.

And I expect most folk could do the same. Not necessarily the stompy bit, but the “and over you go, exit stage left” bit - helping to seriously delay the spread.

For people dying general, run of the mill deaths? Any accident is probably going to leave the resulting zombie pretty messed up. Any peaceful death is going to occur with few folks around, and quite possibly in a hospital already.

Now. If it was a coordinated thing? Like some maniac intentionally infected the world’s populace, then gassed population centres? Entirely fair enough, the tipping point occurs almost instantaneously as there’s a very sudden, unexpected occurrence of the undead.

But I’ve never seen that occur in the zombie flicks and series I’ve seen.

Depends on the film, genre and type of Zombie

Yes to a certain extent if the Zombies are in fact the slow moving chompers - if there are variants, if there are fast moving ones, if there are giant monsters it changes but even if its just the dumb slow ones it may be being used by someone, something to prepare the way for a new world, for another plan and then it gets out of hand etc

Also play Project Zomboid and see how long you last

It's more to do with social decline in the face of infection.

If the dead start rising that's pushing a lot of people to doomsday cults or religious crazies who will try to overthrow government's to either progress or stop the end of days.

There's the now the shockingly large number of people who will deny it (including governments and not just for corruption reasons) and they will undoubtedly do stupid things that will make things harder for everyone.

Then throw in the personal aspect of everything. The Undead aren't combatants in the traditional sense. They're you're friends, family and neighbours, it's beyond dehumanising to have to put down what were once straight up civilians. They don't have guns or weapons, they're not wearing uniforms or shooting at you.

I don't like most zombie movies cause government forces are always incompetent imbeciles who died first 3 minutes of movie and lately we watcha how Literally incompetent people trying to survive.

In fact.. did you see how police break the crown with water cannons? They actually never use full pressure. In full power water cannon break bones and smash inners.
Or military which in that movies stupid gunheads. I don't believe they die this quick. Any army could be ready in 5 minutes. And in few hours gonna be halfway to most hot places.
And my favorite. "Civilians" if you can call so people with solid arsenal. And there is lot of guys with lot of guns. Even when I lived in city I have carbin, semiautomatic rifle and double-barrelled shotgun. Our neighborhood have 13 guns for 9 adults. And this is in country where you can have only hunting guns and with lot of restrictions.

So for me zombie apocalypse ends few days after it's started. There certainly gonna be curfew and martial law for some time. But it's have no chance in current world.

Probably much worse here in uk - extremely rare for anyone to have guns and none readily available if you went looking for them - rare even for the police - heavily populated areas abound

Plenty of brick walls and solid roads though.

Sure guns are handy (in the hands of skilled shooters, natch). But by no means essential against shambling undead.

Duh, if available internet data is correct at least in half you are doomed... Very small police force and mostly unarmed. And nonexistent army.. well, I don't want meet zombie apocalypse in UK

 kabaakaba wrote:
Duh, if available internet data is correct at least in half you are doomed... Very small police force and mostly unarmed. And nonexistent army.. well, I don't want meet zombie apocalypse in UK

We have a good army but agreed - there will be a lot of loses and conversions very quickly.

Best example I've ever seen of a "realistic" zombie outbreak was Black Tide Rising by John Ringo. But even that was "fast" "zombies".

Honestly the slow zombie thing as just general walking around dead people feels hard take as an apocalyptic event. I enjoy the outbreak movies where maybe things haven't gotten organized but the ones where society seems to have completely caved I generally need to be in the mood and turn off my cares

I think the biggest hurdle with zombies is proving that they are a thing fast enough. One thing the Pandemic showed was that even with insanely rapid communication and education systems - there was still a huge amount of confusion, missinformation, lack of education and awareness at multiple levels. That's before you get to bad actors seeding problems.

The other thing is infection speed; in some films its rapid, in others it takes time. Interestingly in many it seems ot be really fast at the start and then take ages for the "I got bit and didn't tell anyone" character. 24 Day Later was good on this; infection had what felt like a constant speed.



Rapid infection has the benefit that it can sweep through an unprepared high population area pretty fast; esp the kind in 24Days Later where a tiny organic drop spreads it to you in moments. That speed is insanely hard to overcome - one cough or sneeze and the infection spreads.

Everything about that virus was speed based.




The other option would be something with a long incubation period. Give it a 2 month incubation spread by water droplets (cough/sneeze) and you've got yourself primed for a real outbreak. At that point it doesn't matter if they are fast or slow zombies; the key part is that by the time infection is detected its already spread through a vast part of the population including military forces. Plus if the first outbreak is when its detected you'll have a rolling series of outbreaks from those infected a day later etc.... So you've got 2 months of solid infection spreading; with infected breaking out at random everywhere. Even if they are slow zombies they'll already be in people's homes and population centres. With the potential for many key people to be infected too you'd have a very rapid breakdown of effective communication. You're basically down to isolated populations and individuals along with natural immunity and such to hold things together.

You should read World War Z (not the film, dear god not the film) for a decent go at explaining how things get out of hand. In that, illegal organ harvesting artificially spreads the instigator far and wide, with initial outbreaks often occurring in hospitals with large vulnerable populations, and the bulk of society's emergency medical response. WWZ also makes the point that reliable headshots are hard. Needs a lot of training to be able to make hundreds of such precise shots for long periods required to thin out major swarms.

However, even WWZ had to handwave away overpressure effects on the human form. The magic virus strengthened muscle effectiveness and sludged up the insides to that nearby explosions didn;t do much. Otherwise say hello to Mr Thermobaric, and goodbye to large areas of unprotected meatbags.

I think it comes down to a rabbits vs foxes balance in the early stages. If its just bites that spreads it, it may be possible for home quarantines to largely isolate the population allowing capable types to keep a lid on the spread before it gets out of hand.

However, given the general unutterable stupidity of a social media-driven populace, and recent covid examples, I'm not convinced it would end well.

I agree that large machinery of any type could be used in a pinch. I'm pretty sure a bin lorry would be able to overcome a crowd in a way that a normal car would likely get bogged down in. Large dump trucks or even possibly tractors might do the trick. People are pretty splatty when it comes right down to it.

Regarding hand weapons, warhammers or halberds wojuld be best. Long shaft, big spike, relatively simple to lift and drop onto the top of the head for effectiveness. Sticking a few nails through your example sportsbat would also increase effectiveness massively.

I think it would take some time for the situation to be understood enough for the "powers that be" and everyone in the chain of command to be willing to deploy and use armor and heavy weapons against their own civilians. There would be a lot of chaos and bad advice given in the initial stages. Wash your hands, wash your groceries, etc. Many would be racing to find or create a way to profit from it. By the time a consensus is formed and everyone has embraced the horror of what is happening, it might well be too late and your military is outnumbered 2-300:1.

I think the first responders (police and ambulance crew) are among the first to get bitten. Then perhaps the police come out in force to stop the "rioting" using the same type of shield wall tactics they use today, and as a result more of them are bitten. After a day or two of that the panic shopping and the looting begins. A substantial number of the healthy LEO start calling in sick, outright desert or even join the looters. Perhaps one or two bitten people are in each of those jam packed stores and turn at the worst time, and the hospitals suddenly become battlefields. Martial law is declared and the govt attempts to contain the major cities and then clear them one by one WWII style.

The troops on the ground would likely shoot to defend themselves. Would they all be on board for firing HE rounds into each floor of each building they come across? Do they shoot anything that moves, if ordered to? If you are a pilot, do you obey your orders and drop bombs on Costco? Someone you didn't vote for said everyone in there was bad, but you've never actually seen a zombie. Do you even want to be there when your family really needs you right now? I think a large number desert and now they are outnumbered 4-500:1. And they probably don't have enough non nuclear bombs/heavy weapon ammo to clear the entire USA.

I'm a Romero fan - Dawn initially (like everyone else when they're a first year uni student), but over time I've kind of come around to liking Day more, not exactly for what's going on on screen so much as the underlying assumptions, and the feeling of macabre melancholy hanging over it all. But I feel like you have to come at it with some suspension of disbelief - especially now that most everyone knows what zombies are and are carrying around handheld video cameras connected to the entire rest of the world in real time. For me the best way to approach 'but how did an orderly society fail to deal with this?' is "They just did, okay!" and proceed with your band of survivors grappling with the collapse of civilisation as best they can (and, as a Romero fan I guess it goes without saying, I prefer that to be more along the lines of 'this ain't getting better, what do you do to keep going on in a world where you know that?' than 'there's a way to fix everything, let's do that'). Bottom line, I'm not really interested in seeing the military mow down hordes of poorly people whose only weapon is 'bite', or listen to the ruggedly handsome scientist du jour explaining why the virus does some magic things that means that wouldn't work.

Not to say that I think we could wrap up the outbreak and go back to normal without breaking a sweat; if recent events have taught us anything, it's that we're perfectly capable of making problems worse as fast as we can make them better, and it's a bit of a toss-up which comes out on top. But ultimately that's sort of the society-wide equivalent of that one guy who gets bitten but hides it from everyone so he can dramatically turn at the worst possible moment in act three, and that's also something I don't find interesting.

I watched a show on Netflix a while back, before I cancelled Netflix because screw them, called Kingdom which I found quite refreshing - set in 17th Century Korea, so your anti-zombie gear is bows and slow-firing gunpowder weapons, and news travels at the speed of guy-on-horse. It let the zombies present a credible threat, without needing to have any superpowers to compensate for modern weapons. Similar to how I feel about War of the Worlds, where it loses something when you bring it into the modern day and have to counteract nukes with deflector shields and it's basically just 'our physics magic vs their space magic'. (Second season of Kingdom kind of fell off the rails a bit as I recall though, there was a palace politics subplot the whole time, and it pushed the notion of the zombies being an actual society-destabilising event out of prominence. First season damn solid though. There was a spin-off prequel miniseries or something I remember quite enjoying as well.)

 Overread wrote:
I think the biggest hurdle with zombies is proving that they are a thing fast enough. One thing the Pandemic showed was that even with insanely rapid communication and education systems - there was still a huge amount of confusion, missinformation, lack of education and awareness at multiple levels. That's before you get to bad actors seeding problems.

The other thing is infection speed; in some films its rapid, in others it takes time. Interestingly in many it seems ot be really fast at the start and then take ages for the "I got bit and didn't tell anyone" character. 24 Day Later was good on this; infection had what felt like a constant speed.



Rapid infection has the benefit that it can sweep through an unprepared high population area pretty fast; esp the kind in 24Days Later where a tiny organic drop spreads it to you in moments. That speed is insanely hard to overcome - one cough or sneeze and the infection spreads.

Everything about that virus was speed based.


The other option would be something with a long incubation period. Give it a 2 month incubation spread by water droplets (cough/sneeze) and you've got yourself primed for a real outbreak. At that point it doesn't matter if they are fast or slow zombies; the key part is that by the time infection is detected its already spread through a vast part of the population including military forces. Plus if the first outbreak is when its detected you'll have a rolling series of outbreaks from those infected a day later etc.... So you've got 2 months of solid infection spreading; with infected breaking out at random everywhere. Even if they are slow zombies they'll already be in people's homes and population centres. With the potential for many key people to be infected too you'd have a very rapid breakdown of effective communication. You're basically down to isolated populations and individuals along with natural immunity and such to hold things together.

Yeah, I think starting from some of the scenarios where it's either rapidly transmissible or everyone is already infected/cursed to reanimate after death (in films that handwave it more) makes sense. You're not just fighting the mob of zombies on a battlefield, you're also going to have to enact extremely authoritarian monitoring of your population which won't go over well. Otherwise you'd have a random heart attack or accident leading to a new outbreak each time.

And as we've lived through things that break down global trade and local social cohesion can lead to spiraling out of control real fast.

The primary conceit for most zombie films is that they exist in a world that doesn't know of zombies. If zombies are remotely understood or known, it would definitely be contained by most civilized areas, though I think it would certainly spread and alter civilization.

If it is going to take out and break down society, as others have pointed out its going to need to be a fluid borne illness. Depending on the potency and durability of the pathogen, and assuming its undead and can't be killed, you could see cities fall to contaminated water sources regularly.

Someone takes their last restroom break after being infected, the water supply is compromised, as regular filtration and such can't kill this zomvirus, and you have people falling ill just from water. It would still need some reason to hit multiple countries at once, because if this happened and it swept through Africa or Asia the rest of the world would put protocols in place to prevent it.

But honestly, that's not really a zombie movie at that point, it's just a super virus that kills humanity movie, that happens to turn the dead into zombies. They aren't the threat, just the vector.

Slow zombies just aren't doing the job unless for some mysterious reason they're able to overwhelm enough of the population that they can't organize a response. More likely it creates a rough few months or years, and then becomes a daily part of life. Zombie detecting dogs, elevated houses, MUCH more sturdy doors, clearly marked pit traps that have a simple code to drop a ladder to get out. I can definitely see people taking to wearing zombie safety headbands, that destroy your brain if the virus is detected, or your heart stops for 5 minutes.

Don't let yourself kill your loved ones- Safety bands are here for you.

All these things are explored really well in WWZ I’ll stop fanboying about it now

I'm saddened the thread is this deep and no one has mentioned Sean of the Dead yet. Which had a competent military appear at the end and not only neutralize the zombie threat, made it trivial following on.

im with ya flinty... WWZ was good.
i think fear the walking dead showed a decent representation of an outbreak.

love me some zombies but yeah... not gonna happen haha

it would have to be transmitted like a sickness, flu etc... hello covid

The core problem with zombies is that the movies all pretend people are surprised by zombies, when in fact people talk about them and plan about it constantly.

As soon as the first hint of shambling starts, everyone's going to be dialed in on what kind they are and how it spreads, so the notion of people being confused by it is pretty ludicrous at this point.

Heck, the military has actually run anti-zombie exercises (a less politically charged topic than say, riot suppression), and in the US, just about every state has National Guard troops specifically trained and equipped for this mission who are supposed to be ready to equip and deploy in a 96 hour window.

So once an outbreak is detected, a battalion of mechanized infantry will be in motion, and other states will mobilize as well and provide follow-on forces.

And of course all the troops will be equipped for CBRNE to prevent the spread.

The real "horror" element of zombies is that they represent the enemy within. You never know who is infected, so your buddy, spouse, even kids can turn on you.

Tactically, however, vampires or werewolves are much more interesting.

I am disappointed in this thread.

How you all missed the best "Terry Pratchett approved," UK zombie story, written by a Scot (Michael Logan), is beyond me.

Apocalypse Cow


Zombie Cows. 'Nuff Said.

Had a sequel: World War Moo.

Yeah, you're not getting a Zombie Apocalypse unless you have loads of simultaneous outbreaks that stretch resources too thin and everything gets overwhelmed, or the zombies are just basically indestructible.

Although, I do think Mad Doc is vastly overestimating the general public's ability to stay calm, collected and get stuck in with the noggin bashing, instead of running about, limbs flailing wildly, like a panicky idiot.

To be slightly fair to people, depending on when such an event happens, a lot of front of brain activity will be going it “how do I get my family together and to safety” rather than “how do I kit up to take the fight to the monsters”.

If I’m at work when some kind of balloon goes up, I will absolutely heading straight to steal some kind of water craft as all other transport links to my home from my work will clog instantly.

One of the things they explore in WWZ (book) is that zombies aren’t afraid. So a lot of military tactics like covering fire, suppressive artillery fire, etc. just don’t work. Also a lot of modern military equipment is designed to very efficiently break the military equipment on the other side, not inflict mass casualties on large formations of humans.

I think The Walking Dead probably got the viral transmission about right, in that the initial infection is an airborne transmission, that takes several days for you to get ill and succumb. That gives time for infected people to move around and spread the infection. As cool as the Rage virus is in the 28- series, it’s way, way, too fast. No one’s taking that unnoticed on a transatlantic flight! Although I did like the zombie “ecosystem” in the recent film, representing different levels of natural immunity/adaptation to the virus.

I used to think it was improbable too.

Then COVID happened and I realized that it was all too easy to disrupt and destroy a society.

 Flinty wrote:
To be slightly fair to people, depending on when such an event happens, a lot of front of brain activity will be going it “how do I get my family together and to safety” rather than “how do I kit up to take the fight to the monsters”.

Yeah plus the human mind is wired up to narrow its thinking focus during panic.

I think we forget so easily that society isn't a single unit, its loads and loads of tiny ones that link together. Extreme stress on the whole can cause those smaller segments to start to self-isolate into smaller and tighter groupings.

Something like a slow incubation leading to mass sudden zombie outbreak would very rapidly cause loads of fragmentation.



Also lets consider whilst zombies are something we 100% know and talk about its a huge difference between debating them as a fantasy and dealing with the concept as a reality. First hurdle is "is that really a zombie or just someone loaded up on drugs/drink/mental imbalance etc...." Identifying them as dangerous is one thing, but its a huge leap to actually get to real life zombies. It's just not something any of us encounter in reality to have any kind of mental preparation.
That's even more the case if said zombies that you encounter first are friends, family, coworkers and the like.

Almost every zombie film has at least one person trying to look after a zombie family member thinking they can recover or just save them etc.... Reality it might be far more the case that it would happen way more often.








Also there's another kind of zombie outbreak; or rather two that you can see in Resident Evil
1) Directly promoted outbreak. Ergo a weaponised use of the infection which could easily make it a LOT harder to combat if a specialist interest group are trying to use it for their own gain. If one country were trying to use it on another and thus seeding infections via food/plane/etc... Much harder to fully remove the infection and risk if there's a group promoting its use.

2) Additional threats. Not just zombies but other mutations and monsters at the same time. If you look at fantasy, zombies are most often used as an additional threat. The zombie is slow and lurching; but also backed up with other monsters and threats. Similar to part 1, but this suggests active side by side combat and more monstrous allies of the zombie.

I will add to the pile of recommendations on World War Z for a logistics component. One of the best elements of it is how it defines the threat differently to conventional warfare and is eventually solved by developing equipment and tactics address those challenges.

Basically it leans on zombies being impossibly durable which is my personal favorite variant. The only real problem with it is it doesn't really jive with the desire to have your survivors get by with a baseball bat with a couple nails sticking out. That's ultimately the real logic failing in these stories; not that things can get that bad but that somehow the ones who survive do so with pointy sticks.

What's odd is that that is often happening with films set in the USA which is world famous for having LOTS of guns and ammo and such.


If you're set in the UK or many other nations yeah suddenly "oh just grab a gun" becomes a serious issue. Even places where you might find guns (like farms or rural regions) the ammo would be in much smaller supplies.


Of course you can go find a ruined castle to live in which will stand up to any zombie threat - at least so long as dragons don't become an issue!

In most of there situations people assume they'll be one of the small percentage of survivors but I do not. I will be dead and it won't be my problem or the zombies will be my new friends, in which case now you're the problem.

 Overread wrote:
What's odd is that that is often happening with films set in the USA which is world famous for having LOTS of guns and ammo and such.


If you're set in the UK or many other nations yeah suddenly "oh just grab a gun" becomes a serious issue. Even places where you might find guns (like farms or rural regions) the ammo would be in much smaller supplies.


Of course you can go find a ruined castle to live in which will stand up to any zombie threat - at least so long as dragons don't become an issue!

Also, that old castle probably has a museum full of swords, pikes, bill hooks, maces, and various other interestingly pointy metalwork, which could be handy.

Probably better off raiding hardware stores for pickaxes and other hand tools. Although we would be taking the family sword off the wall if that particular push came to shove

Honestly, it's rather niche, but a larp troop, better yet SCA, or even better a Buhurt group if they're able to assemble will likely be incredibly effective. They're trained in shieldwall, and muscle powered weapons, and all they need is access to actually lethal weaponry (which most of them have) and you have an armored group that can fight until they tire, and retreat. Use them as an anvil, and any shooters as your hammer. The instructions are easy- shoot anybody without a helmet.

 Gitzbitah wrote:
Honestly, it's rather niche, but a larp troop, better yet SCA, or even better a Buhurt group if they're able to assemble will likely be incredibly effective. They're trained in shieldwall, and muscle powered weapons, and all they need is access to actually lethal weaponry (which most of them have) and you have an armored group that can fight until they tire, and retreat. Use them as an anvil, and any shooters as your hammer. The instructions are easy- shoot anybody without a helmet.

You would have to be careful picking terrain, or risk being outflanked by hordes of undead. I prefer a lot more mobility than shield wall type tactics allow.

If we are basing this scenario on the Romero Zombies, we have to take two things into account.

1. Zombies have roughly the same strength as a comic book super hero. This ridiculous superstrength is required to dig through casket/concrete slab/6 feet of packed earth.

The extraordinary forces of a modern grave:

A modern burial setup is designed to be permanent, trapping a human corpse under immense pressure.

The coffin: A standard coffin is robust, but a zombie could potentially damage it. However, the inner coffin is often placed inside an outer burial container, such as a concrete or metal vault. The lid of a concrete vault alone can weigh over 1,500 pounds.

The earth: A standard burial places a body under at least 6 feet of earth. One cubic foot of loose soil can weigh up to 100 pounds, meaning a zombie would need to displace thousands of pounds of dirt above it.

The physics: The dirt acts like a fluid, collapsing into any space the zombie creates, making it nearly impossible to dig or push your way out.

2. As Adam Savage pointed out, Romero (and Walking Dead) Zombies can't climb ladders.

Simply destroy the stairs and use easily deployable/retractable ladders to deny Zombie mobility.

Thus mobility and area denial are your strengths... not a face to face melee.

Until we get into Romero's Land of the Dead Zombies... and that's a whole other ballgame.

Not convinced Romero Zombies do have super strength.

There’s no instance of any breaking out of tombs or digging their way out of a grave in the films. We do see them, eventually, batter down doors. But that isn’t a single blow being used, rather just a body immune to pain and fatigue, and sometimes the press of bodies behind it.

Likewise when grabbed by a single zombie, we tend to see the heroes shrug them off.

Though…there is that devouring in Day of the Dead. With the disturbing scream. If you’ve seen the film you’ll know the bit, and why I’m not describing in greater detail here.

one thing ive always wondered... how hard is it to bite through clothes, especially something like leather haha!
seems you could just cover yourself head to toe and be ok.
well until the press of a horde got you

World war Z (apparently there is a film as well) tries to address all this.

I suppose the key thing is it a) infection or b) universal infection/the rapture/whatever. If its infection it is dealt with as per book and the above. Cities would be fairly terrible but really you would lose have your population tops with an ongoing threat.

If its B) and everyone has it, turning to a zombie when dying, that gets more grim. Every miscarriage might kill the mother. Dying in your sleep kills your family and you get back up as they sleep. And so on. he threat is then constant.

 usernamesareannoying wrote:
one thing ive always wondered... how hard is it to bite through clothes, especially something like leather haha!
seems you could just cover yourself head to toe and be ok.
well until the press of a horde got you

Depending on jaw strength, it could still inflict painful crushing damage and of course you've now got its teeth stuck into the leather.

The discussion of transmission cuts to the core of the problem: if it really is viral, with a lag time, 100 percent contagious, etc., we're all doomed. You've moved from The Walking Dead to Omega Man (aka The Last Man on Earth, I am Legend, etc.).

For narrative purposes, one needs something that *not* everyone will get. If the virus can activate upon natural death, cremation becomes the default form of burial, so that's pretty easy to solve.

Also worth noting that we've had similar experiences before. In Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year, it describes in detail the responses to London's last plague outbreak. The ones who fared best were Dutch and German merchants who had much more knowledge of these events and washed the ground floor with bleach or ammonia, made sure all food was sealed in barrels and then lived upstairs.

The City was placed under quarantine, and plague lines were set up around it, with roadblocks on the highways and roving patrols who were empowered to kill violators. Thus an interesting scenario is being on the wrong side of the line and trying to get by. Society at large is okay, but the town is encircled by a ring of claymores and concertina wire. Escape from New York vibes.

A biker jacket would probably provide reasonable protection, for a time at least.

I’d definitely see any armour outside of LARPers in chainmail and plate as a precaution rather than a solution.

Whether it’s a newspaper wrapped and taped to the forearm, a reasonably thick leather jacket or similar, they’re more about delaying a bite that outright preventing being bitten.

A plastic neck brace (the ones with the padding) may limit your vision movement, but again provide some kind of foil should you get jumped and taken by surprise.

All it needs to do, in that moment, is give you some chance of getting out of the zombie’s grip. Either to then give it a good kicking, or perhaps more sensibly, just get away from it in general.

Likewise, you really don’t need guns to tackle the Romero undead. Yes, ranged defences are preferable. The further away you are, the safer you are from any accidents.

But a cricket bat, baseball bat, golf club, half a brick gaffer taped to a broom handle are all perfectly capable of stoving a rotting head in. Heck. Get a sturdy broom handle and sharpen one end? You’ve a reasonably efficient if rudimentary spear. A weapon which one doesn’t need a huge amount of training and practice to make dangerous only to the target.

The only argument I’d make is Do Not Engage Unless It’s Your Only Option, or you’ve other, similarly armed, watching one another’s back.

And, if you’ve had to have a scrap with any number of zombies? Make sure you’ve finished them off, and have a rigorous inspection of your mates to check for bites and scratches after.

Bites? I’m sorry but that’s “we’ll take you out now, to best manage that risk”.

Scratches? Simply secure the person in isolation and monitor them. If they’re still fine after a couple of days? They’re most likely not going to turn.

Remember Romero Zombies got an upgrade when Zack Snyder remade "Dawn" - if we are including that one.

Also, by Land of the Dead, the Zombies had gotten a lot smarter, and a lot of the tricks humans had relied on didn't work anymore.

The "Dead of Night" series by Jonathan Maberry closely follows the beginning of such an outbreak, and the first book of that was enjoyed by Romero himself so much that he decided it was the canon origin of his zombies, then collaborating with Maberry to have him write a short story that tied the series to Night of the Living Dead, which can be found in the anthology book Nights of the Living Dead. I have yet to read the anthology, but enjoyed the "Dead of Night" series and its full portrayal of a zombie outbreak from its origin to full breakdown of society as we know it and would highly recommend it to any zombie fan.

It's certainly a change of the times where traditional slow biter zombies aren't really an issue for the modern day with newfangled technology like the Internet and drones.

It's where the fast zombies or inherent plagues work in more modern settings where despite modern technology, it can't really be fought effectively.

Black Summer is quite good for early days in a conventional Zombie outbreak

SCA types all started out using carpet as ersatz armour. I thought this was used for dog training as well to certain extent.

Joints need something a bit different as always, but I’m not sure human jaws and teeth are capable of penetrating carpet without like a week of gnawing.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
If we are basing this scenario on the Romero Zombies, we have to take two things into account.


One cubic foot of loose soil can weigh up to 100 pounds, meaning a zombie would need to displace thousands of pounds of dirt above it.

There was a lot in your post that made me chuckle at the inaccuracies, but the above was the funniest. Just a couple weeks ago I bought 20 3-cubic feet bags of gardening soil. The ones that were wet were maybe 70-80 pounds, the dry ones closer to 40. There is no way you find a cubic foot of loose soil that weighs 100 pounds.

 Flinty wrote:
SCA types all started out using carpet as ersatz armour. I thought this was used for dog training as well to certain extent.

Joints need something a bit different as always, but I’m not sure human jaws and teeth are capable of penetrating carpet without like a week of gnawing.

The upside of armour on your hands and forearm is you can jam them into the zombie’s mouth. Again, you’d want to ensure you’ve mates with you to take advantage of that, and have something in your other hand to smash its head in with.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:


The upside of armour on your hands and forearm is you can jam them into the zombie’s mouth. Again, you’d want to ensure you’ve mates with you to take advantage of that, and have something in your other hand to smash its head in with.

I can see having a buddy trying to smash or pierce the head of the zombie who is munching on my armored arm not being a good thing. The machete glancing off the skull and burying itself in my forearm would be bad.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
The upside of armour on your hands and forearm is you can jam them into the zombie’s mouth. Again, you’d want to ensure you’ve mates with you to take advantage of that, and have something in your other hand to smash its head in with.

Armor has a lot of downsides, including weight, loss of mobility and heat retention. If you are going to be slugging things out, it makes sense, but against zombies, evasion is a more useful tactic, either through superior speed or obstacles they cannot easily surmount.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
The upside of armour on your hands and forearm is you can jam them into the zombie’s mouth. Again, you’d want to ensure you’ve mates with you to take advantage of that, and have something in your other hand to smash its head in with.

Armor has a lot of downsides, including weight, loss of mobility and heat retention. If you are going to be slugging things out, it makes sense, but against zombies, evasion is a more useful tactic, either through superior speed or obstacles they cannot easily surmount.

Yeah, it’s a trade off. I’m fairly sure my HEMA gear would give me complete protection from zombie bites, but I’d die of heat exhaustion after a couple of hours. Plus it generally limits your mobility a bit, and severely restricts your senses. Similar situation with my bike leathers.

Always the trade off.

But if I was out scavenging for food? That’s in theory a finite time out in the wild. Some form of personal protection, even if it’s not full body seems prudent.

Until recently (when I found the damp in my old flat had riddled it with mould), I had some comfortable leather bracers for LARP. They were light weight, but plenty thick enough to prevent a human or zombie bite.

Anything bigger and the crushing force would still get me. But that’s not the concern here.

Given a classic zombie death trope is having your stomach exposed and nommed? A leather jacket zipped into leather trousers can help reduce that risk.

But clanking around in plate? OK you're about as well protected as can be. But you’re making noise. And a mob of zombies could still de-limb you. So more something I’d consider if I was looking to clear out a building or something.

Upside for plate of course is that you needn’t be rushing about all the time. Zombies are slow. Zombies lack coordination.

Actually, perhaps a chainmail hauberk? Make sure it’s Riveted Mail, making it highly resistant to being prised apart. Also flexible.

Essentially I see armour as a Get Out Of Being Bitten card. If you’re daft, silly or unwise you’re probably still dead. But even the most rudimentary protection will see you live to learn that particular lesson.

I’ve been pondering on this and unlike historical armour, where you’re facing intelligent opponents with pokey objects, I think against zombies you could really cut down on the body protection. It’s very difficult to get a bite purchase on the torso (try it with a friend, consensually!). I think you need to prioritise “edges”, where it’s eased to get bit. So legs, arms, top of your shoulders and head. So long as you have some reasonably sturdy clothing on your body, say denim, I think you’d be ok. Of course, it would mean that survival in the zombie apocalypse requires everyone to be wearing a Canadian tuxedo, so at that point, is life worth living?

Yeah. Historical headgear wise? Even a reasonably padded arming hood might do the trick. It’s there to prevent nibbling and chewing. Zombie jaws are no stronger than ours - possibly weaker due to general decomposition and that.

Gloves I’m torn on. I for one hate wearing gloves. I don’t like things on my hands, even jewellery and watches. I don’t like the loss of the sense of touch and the clumsiness that comes with them.

But? Even a pair of thorn proof gardening gloves are reasonably bite proof, allowing you to punch a zombie with relative safety. Certainly you don’t want to bare knuckle or knuckle duster it. Only takes a scrape from a tooth and you’re stuffed.

The trade off is of course general dexterity.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Yeah. Historical headgear wise? Even a reasonably padded arming hood might do the trick. It’s there to prevent nibbling and chewing. Zombie jaws are no stronger than ours - possibly weaker due to general decomposition and that.

One thing to remember is that zombies feel no pain and have no concern of hurting themselves. That is what makes them dangerous, they have no restraint. Your average human isn't going to try to bite someone (or something) that hard in practice as they may hurt themselves. A zombie will since they only have one setting, and that is max . Think about picking up an empty glass. If you honestly try you would most likely be able to break it in your hand by squeezing it. Again you don't because you would get hurt when it breaks. Zombies are able to go past normal human limits simply because they can't get hurt.

In the end a zombie is more likely to be able to bite through your light armor if for no other reason than that they won't stop trying. There jaws might not be stronger, but their willingness to use them is.

Still doesn’t grant them enough bite force to get through a reasonably thick leather cap. Especially as the wearer is presumably at least struggling.

So the armour I propose isn’t about being proof - just greatly increasing resistance, and the time needed to get back on your feet

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Still doesn’t grant them enough bite force to get through a reasonably thick leather cap. Especially as the wearer is presumably at least struggling.

So the armour I propose isn’t about being proof - just greatly increasing resistance, and the time needed to get back on your feet

Weather is a huge factor in this. I'd even say decisive. If it's cold and rainy (basically any day of the year in England), you will naturally wear a jacket and in a survival situation, insulated pants and boots.

But for about three months of the year, it's a non-starter around here. Yes, I did SCA stuff in August, and it can be done, but you're also drinking gallons of water and completely spent in short order. Not much endurance.

It really comes down to the environment and associated situational awareness. If you are deliberately hunting zombies (especially in terrain with lots of concealment), than it is a must.

But if the area has been swept, has good sightlines, positional defenses/alarms (lines of cans at ankle height), I wouldn't bother.

I did a LARP on a scorching hot August. Padded Gambeson, Chainmail and an Iron Helmet was hell!

The Chainmail itself isn’t too bad without the padding. By no means comfortable, but ultimately kinda breathable.

But pain is there to prevent animals from damaging themselves. If you are biting something hard enough to cause pain, then irreversible damage isn’t far behind. The jaw/gum/root/tooth system can only take so much before disintegrating.

Honestly in any plausible zombie outbreak scenario, the most dangerous things you are going to face out there are the other uninfected people trying to take everything you have for themselves.

THAT's what is going to sneak in and kill you in your sleep, not the ninja zombies of the movies that seem to be able to be in place for every possible jumpscare. Zombies are easy to outmaneuver, but complete societal brakedown is most definitely NOT.

It's fun and all to imagine putting on my chainmaile and using my weapons to protect my family, but I am in America. Chainmaile won't protect me much against a bunch of a-holes in a truck with AR-15's. American society would go full-Purge, and zombies would only kill you when you are preoccupied with raiders.

I hate to be the pessimist, but defending against and stopping a zombpocalypse would require un-heard of levels of societal teamwork.

 AegisGrimm wrote:


I hate to be the pessimist, but defending against and stopping a zombpocalypse would require un-heard of levels of societal teamwork.

One reason I am glad I am in a rural area. My neighbors are a little far away, but we get along and help each other when needed. With our tractor and its implements, I can put up fortifications if needed. I have a swamp/creek as one boundary to my property, and thick woods on two other sides. My house is a 1/4 mile driveway from the road.

One thing I will say is that COVID really showed that we are not prepared for a global pandemic. And your chances of survival depend entirely on having a competent government that isn't completely corrupt and only out for themselves.

The other problem COVID showed was that even when you told people exactly the issue and how to prevent it people ignored it. Containment is key to survival in a zombie apocalypse and we'd have far too many people saying "it was a joke, just weird hoodlums, zombies don't really exist" before it was too late to deal with. Think how many people would die because they were trying to take a selfie with a zombie.
Food shortages and mass panic will be more of an issue at first than the zombies.

How many police and soldiers would desert to try and get back to their families?

How many would die because someone sold them a zombie deterrent device blessed by angels or the latest AI science?

The way the zombie apocalypse succeeds is by the time all of the stupid people have made stupid decisions there's not much else left.

EDIT: I re-read this after I posted it and it comes off as a super downer it's not meant to be but people suck and are getting suckier.

One thing to remember with Covid is that the direct impact for many people was "bad cold for 3 days".

The long term implications of respiraty problems didn't directly affect everyone, so for many people the couldn't get wrapped up in the risk factor because to them the risk was "just common cold".

Throw on top missinformation; people who naturally avoid government advice anyway and those with poor education and you've certainly got a hot bed of problems.


That said most governments also didn't use their militaries. A zombie outbreak would have armed forces on the streets pretty fast. The direct impact is also VERY shocking and evident.
You don't just get a mild case of wanting to eat meat for 3 days and then get better.


Of course you'd 100% get pushback against the government because a fantasy style zombie outbreak would 100% be blamed on someone engineering it.

Also? Whilst just one in a now long line of Once In A Generation Events?

How many people that experienced the COVID Lockdowns had lived through a previous Lockdown? It’s easy to not be terribly good at something the first time.

Also the sort desperate for attention that might want to prove the zombie thing is a hoax? Zombie fodder right there. Yes they’ll swell the ranks - but how many GoPro “Journalist” Morons being devoured on their silly livestream do you think it would take to completely counteract their lies?

The biggest debate might actually be not about trying to convince people its real but rather trying to sort out if we should contain or kill zombies.

Since zombies oddly don't show much desire to eat each other (which honestly tends to only make full sense when in a fantasy setting when there's a necromancer/vampire controlling the spell and zombies); one could presumably herd them into containment areas.
Remember those aren't just dead bodies, those are living people who turned into zombies. Those are friends, family, mothers, fathers, children and all.

Zombie films nearly always dive for the universal foe and killing zombies. However one could conclude that a real world outbreak might well (at least in early stages) attempt to contain the outbreak in a bid to cure them. At least for your more shambling undead. RAGE style zombies that run, jump and are stronger/more mobile and active hunters might be a lot harder to contain but you can bet many would fight hard to have a containment approach over a kill approach.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Also? Whilst just one in a now long line of Once In A Generation Events?

How many people that experienced the COVID Lockdowns had lived through a previous Lockdown? It’s easy to not be terribly good at something the first time.

Also the sort desperate for attention that might want to prove the zombie thing is a hoax? Zombie fodder right there. Yes they’ll swell the ranks - but how many GoPro “Journalist” Morons being devoured on their silly livestream do you think it would take to completely counteract their lies?

Ooh, I have a book recommendation for this as well.

Check out Feed by Mira Grant. A rather enjoyable social media focussed idea set out in a world ravaged by a zombie outbreak. There is a sub-set of journalists called Irwins based on how they like to go in and poke the zombie masses with a stick for entertainment value.

 Flinty wrote:


Check out Feed by Mira Grant. A rather enjoyable social media focussed idea set out in a world ravaged by a zombie outbreak. There is a sub-set of journalists called Irwins based on how they like to go in and poke the zombie masses with a stick for entertainment value.

I read those a while back, I did enjoy them.

 Overread wrote:
The biggest debate might actually be not about trying to convince people its real but rather trying to sort out if we should contain or kill zombies.

Since zombies oddly don't show much desire to eat each other (which honestly tends to only make full sense when in a fantasy setting when there's a necromancer/vampire controlling the spell and zombies); one could presumably herd them into containment areas.
Remember those aren't just dead bodies, those are living people who turned into zombies. Those are friends, family, mothers, fathers, children and all.

Zombie films nearly always dive for the universal foe and killing zombies. However one could conclude that a real world outbreak might well (at least in early stages) attempt to contain the outbreak in a bid to cure them. At least for your more shambling undead. RAGE style zombies that run, jump and are stronger/more mobile and active hunters might be a lot harder to contain but you can bet many would fight hard to have a containment approach over a kill approach.

Take them out. 100% of the time. They’re a constant threat, and worse, an ambulatory vector for disease.

If, as we see in Walking Dead (and confirmed right at the end of WD, The World Beyond) the zombie virus also radically slows decay? What might other nasties do with that longer time infesting the same corpse?

Brain them, burn them. Not necessarily to the point of cremation, but certainly enough to destroy anything nasty growing on and in them.

It's easy to say just burn them - reality its harder.

You have to entirely de-humanise them first and the problem there is that zombies aren't "other peoples" they are your people.
They are up and around and moving and people will campaign and fight hard to protect their loved ones. Arguing that they are still alive, they just need proper medical treatment. That killing is destroying any chance of finding a cure.

That if a cure is found you've killed those who could have been saved.



Surely it would be better to corral, contain and fit them with straight jackets. Prevent them from hurting themselves and each other for their own good whilst studying and hoping to save them.

Not sure that would last for long.

Even in Walking Dead, the CDC pretty rapidly figures out They Are Dead. Only a tiny portion of the brain is reactivated.

Demonstrating that on TV wouldn’t take very long. Just inflict a normally fatal wound, and I think most of the population would get the message.

Of course, there are religious sensibilities. I’m not going to pretend I can talk about them with any authority. And honestly? Nor would I want to, especially on Dakka.

I would be interested if anyone can point me to informed discussion on that. Ideally a balanced discussion, and not one looking to bash faiths.

For instance? I’m aware of some faiths which require the burial to occur swiftly, as in within a day or two. How might someone of that faith interpret the zombie issue. Do they consider the person dead at all? Do they consider them possessed by a malevolent spirit?

Because depending where you are in the world, that is something that would need to be considered. Not just for wider containment, but how to get the populace on-side and that.

 Overread wrote:
Zombie films nearly always dive for the universal foe and killing zombies. However one could conclude that a real world outbreak might well (at least in early stages) attempt to contain the outbreak in a bid to cure them. At least for your more shambling undead. RAGE style zombies that run, jump and are stronger/more mobile and active hunters might be a lot harder to contain but you can bet many would fight hard to have a containment approach over a kill approach.

Well, that's the interesting part. Great visuals, jump scares and stuff.

Watching a bunch of staffers process reports from the field, wargame potential COAs and then hammer out an OPLAN is the sort of thing that only planning mega-nerds like me would find interesting.

Zombie outbreaks are the stuff of horror films, and are supposed to evoke visceral reactions in audiences, where emotion overwhelms logic. The tropes exist because they work (at least to a certain extent).

But once you get past the initial outbreak, things shift into mobilization schedules, arranging logistics, finding lodging, etc. and it becomes more of a math problem than anything else.

And there are lots of issues that people here aren't even thinking about, like bored troops. During the Flint water crisis, National Guard troops were called up for water distribution and it was found that they had to be rotated out after a while because the work was crushingly boring and soldiers being who they are, got into various soldierly kinds of trouble. (Oddly, Airmen do not have these problems, and seem capable of passing the time in non-destructive ways.)

The Covid response was absolutely awful, but it did show that military folks would respond to the call against an "invisible enemy."

As to the human threat, it's all about the local area. Again, we've seen this play out many times with disasters such as hurricanes, tornado outbreaks, floods, etc. If the local community is cohesive, it pulls together and relationships actually get stronger. If it is not, things can get pretty bad.

In my area, the pandemic brought much more community involvement and the first Halloween after it passed turned into a city-wide block party, with people doing cookouts in the driveways. Your results may vary.

People REALLY need to read WWZ. Some of this theorycrafting is literally just the text of the novel.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

 Overread wrote:
Zombie films nearly always dive for the universal foe and killing zombies. However one could conclude that a real world outbreak might well (at least in early stages) attempt to contain the outbreak in a bid to cure them. At least for your more shambling undead. RAGE style zombies that run, jump and are stronger/more mobile and active hunters might be a lot harder to contain but you can bet many would fight hard to have a containment approach over a kill approach.

Well, that's the interesting part. Great visuals, jump scares and stuff.

Watching a bunch of staffers process reports from the field, wargame potential COAs and then hammer out an OPLAN is the sort of thing that only planning mega-nerds like me would find interesting.

Zombie outbreaks are the stuff of horror films, and are supposed to evoke visceral reactions in audiences, where emotion overwhelms logic. The tropes exist because they work (at least to a certain extent).

But once you get past the initial outbreak, things shift into mobilization schedules, arranging logistics, finding lodging, etc. and it becomes more of a math problem than anything else.

And there are lots of issues that people here aren't even thinking about, like bored troops. During the Flint water crisis, National Guard troops were called up for water distribution and it was found that they had to be rotated out after a while because the work was crushingly boring and soldiers being who they are, got into various soldierly kinds of trouble. (Oddly, Airmen do not have these problems, and seem capable of passing the time in non-destructive ways.)

The Covid response was absolutely awful, but it did show that military folks would respond to the call against an "invisible enemy."

As to the human threat, it's all about the local area. Again, we've seen this play out many times with disasters such as hurricanes, tornado outbreaks, floods, etc. If the local community is cohesive, it pulls together and relationships actually get stronger. If it is not, things can get pretty bad.

In my area, the pandemic brought much more community involvement and the first Halloween after it passed turned into a city-wide block party, with people doing cookouts in the driveways. Your results may vary.

That’s one of my favourite bits of Shaun of the Dead, right at the end everyone has just adapted to “meh, zombies”. It’s amazing how quickly human beings will adapt to a status quo.

Mild Threadomancy.

But something I think we’ve all potentially overlooked.

How many folk, should the Zombie Apocalypse occur, would think to snaffle vitamin tablets?

Now, on their own they’re not gonna keep you alive. Oh no. But, they would help you and yours survive off foods which don’t offer much beyond calories.

Multi-vitamin tablets, powders, capsules etc.

I mean, a thread about Zombies is appropriate for some mild threadomancy.

Vitamins etc are a good shout.

Though as I’m a thoughtful survivor? I don’t think I’d go snaffling any meds me and mine don’t need.

I mean, trade is one thing. Holding a pharmaceutical knife to the next person is quite another.

Just basic vitamin tablets, expanding possible sources of calories very nicely.

Also? Down the local garden centre, snaffle as many seed pouches as you can. That’s for the longer term things. And don’t forget your flowers. You’ll be wanting those to help provide a habitat for pollinators, and so help your own crop.

Also I dare say seed packets might hold reasonable trade value. Spesh is someone else overlooked such basics.

If general human presence drops and civic maintenance stops, there will be plenty of flowers for pollinators. Grasses and wildflowers will be coming through the pavement and tarmac in short order, and dandelions will have an absolute field day in parks and lawns until a bit more of a varied ecosystem builds up over a few years.

That’s true. Think I’d still want to deliberately plant some in the short term at least.

On my property, if I don't keep the trails clear, we get saplings growing like crazy. Our perimeter trail around the horse pastures gets raspberry vines and other weeds growing taller than me over the course of a single summer (ask me how I know). At least in rural areas, nature won't take years to take over...

Heck look at Chernobyl - loads of regrowth going on there!

You can see the same pattern in nature all over; as soon as you remove the human elements that prevent its establishment, nature takes root fast. The only times it doesn't are if the land is truly blasted to heck. A good many islands and such can be like that where the natural wooded growth was cut down generations ago and the soils then farmed and grazed so that they are thin and poor condition. Add in the windswept nature of those islands and recovery can be a lot slower

As with so many other areas, people want to game out the tactical elements when the core of the problem is logistics.

Zombies have to hit the sweet spot where the spread can be stopped, but it has to spread enough to be dangerous.

Usually, this requires a plot device which almost always includes terrible decision-making and improbable outcomes. I think of the iconic image of The Walking Dead where cars are piled up on only one side of the highway. In reality, the authorities will route all lanes in the same direction if there is sufficient need, like a mass evacuation. If tanks are downtown, both sides of the highway are open.

Civil defense planners have a shockingly large amount of contingencies up their sleeves, including zombie outbreaks.

Script writers? Not so much.

I could go for a show or film exploring that organised response.

Stick with the classic Romero style and infection vector. Show us things being figured out (do you need to be bitten to turn, or is it any recently deceased that get back up).

How do you contain? Do you just cap anyone refusing to be checked for bites? Do you simply seal off cities and wait for them to decay?

We see a glimpse of such things in Doomsday, where all of Scotland is sealed off to contain a plague. Including one guy getting hideously squished in the closing gate. And I guess Resident Evil 2, when they seal off Racoon City.

But to see the nitty gritty side of things. That might be a treat.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I could go for a show or film exploring that organised response.

Stick with the classic Romero style and infection vector. Show us things being figured out (do you need to be bitten to turn, or is it any recently deceased that get back up).

How do you contain? Do you just cap anyone refusing to be checked for bites? Do you simply seal off cities and wait for them to decay?

We see a glimpse of such things in Doomsday, where all of Scotland is sealed off to contain a plague. Including one guy getting hideously squished in the closing gate. And I guess Resident Evil 2, when they seal off Racoon City.

But to see the nitty gritty side of things. That might be a treat.

They should make film out Dafoe's Journal of the Plague Year. It's got all that and more.

No one was completely sure how the plague spread, but they knew certain things worked. The Dutch merchants moved all their food upstairs, washed their stone floors with lye solution and stayed inside, living off their stockpiles. No deaths.

There were people who got it and survived, or were resistant, they they gathered the bodies up and kept things running. Outside the City, armed patrols roamed the countryside, shooting anyone who tried to cross the "plague line." All the roads were barricaded and guards would likewise shoot anyone who came close.

We need a movie like Contagion only what they are dealing with is a zombie outbreak.

Lot's of lab and board room decision making scenes.

I don't know about a movie, but something along the lines of a political thriller novel could be an interesting spin on it - not quite a World War Z sort of thing, but looking at what might go down behind the scenes during such an outbreak.

Literally just adapt Under a Graveyard Sky by John Ringo for a tv show/film.

While it isn't at the highest level of authorities it does give some insight into that level of thinking while mostly stopping at the level of world wide banking institution handling the breakdown of society.

Uh….what uh….what did he write about world wide banking institutions?

I’m just curious because John Ringo is also the name of a science fiction writer infamous for writing Watch on the Rhine, wherein the only way humanity could defeat alien invaders was to rejuvenate the Waffen SS. Weird, right?

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Uh….what uh….what did he write about world wide banking institutions?

I’m just curious because John Ringo is also the name of a science fiction writer infamous for writing Watch on the Rhine, wherein the only way humanity could defeat alien invaders was to rejuvenate the Waffen SS. Weird, right?

Yeah, he's got some weird streaks in his writing from time to time for sure. I used to think it might be a co-author thing since outside of that Rhine book I didn't get anything other Heinlein-esque vibes. But his most recent series that he solely wrote feel like he's sliding down or just bring out his full crazy. To the point where I'm not searching for his new releases or purchasing as them advance copies like I used to from Baen back in the day.

This series is actually pretty good though and doesn't have any of that crazy undertone. In this case the first 1/3 to 1/2 of the book is dedicated to the actual fall of civilization. I can't remember the time frame but I wanna say it was somewhere around 4 months from bugout text to sailing out of a burning NY. The big banking institutions were really just their end of the world planning and handling on keeping the world moving as long as possible until they pull the plug as society collapses and they bug out.

Also I was incorrect. The name of the book is actually "Under a Grave Yard Sky" as the series is Black Tide Rising which I've updated the post with. He's created an entire pandemic/zombie universe that's become an author sandbox with similar results of the Flint 1632 series. Some are good and some are bad.

People have made some pretty good points on why a zombie outbreak wouldn't happen. Just to play devil's advocate here, I think there are some good reasons why it could spread.

1. The segment of the population where ignorance and denial meet. These are the people that will continue to think this is some sort of government psy-op or conspiracy, even when zombies are seen in their area. If they get bit, they will NOT tell anyone, even those trying to help them. I've seen this before in real life. I saw someone that refused to leave their home, in a flood plane, 1/8 mile from a river, 2-feet above river crest, after 36 hours of torrential downpour. The Sheriff literally dragged them out a couple hours before the home got pulled off the foundation. Or, the sister of a high school friend: She and her husband bought a swanky home on a mile-wide island (max elevation 10 feet above sea level) in Virginia. Totally shocked when a Hurricane destroyed their home.

2. The Yee-Haw group. This is the polar opposite of group 1, but just as bad. Sure, sure, these guys will be of some help early on capping zombies left and right. It doesn't take them long before they start to get cocky about it though. Doing things for sport will soon lead to people wanting bragging rights. This will lead to more and more foolish behavior, including herding zombies.

3. The "rules and suggestions don't apply to me" group. They expect everyone else to hunker down, not travel, etc., but not them. And I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to lump in the people that have about 2-meals (by choice) in their pantry at any given time.

4. Running from zombies, not as easy as you think. Humans evolved to be persistence hunters. We weren't faster, tougher, or better armed than anything we hunted. We walked them to exhaustion and then killed them when they couldn't fight back. With zombies having infinite stamina the shoe is on the other foot. Unless your plan is to hopscotch between defendable positions, or lose all the zombies (without running into a new group) they WILL eventually catch you.

The Yee-Haws we see in Dawn of the Dead, where the local hunters and good time boys essentially join a militia.

And I’ve got to admit? I think being able to shoot something human shaped without fear of causing actual harm (to the target or their loved ones) might actually be oddly cathartic.

The persistence hunter is something I think is fundamental to what makes Zombies actually kind of terrifying, for the reasons you said. I mean, it’s believed Humans and Neanderthals just pursued mega fauna to the point of the prey’s exhaustion, making dispatching the beast relatively straight forward, it not still entirely risk free. Ref Life of Brian, where having been lead a merry chase around the arena, the armoured gladiator dies from a heart attack.

So to have that happen to us? No thank you. Your best bet is to find somewhere to hide the Zombies can’t access (for instance, up a ladder into the loft) and hope they go away before too long. Which is where young children are going to potentially be a real drag. Up into the loft, out of sight and stay as quiet as I can.

Ideally I’d take the ladder up after me - but it’s not that far of a drop if that’s not going to be practical. Not in my house anyway.

I just watched the 1978 Dawn of the Dead with my son. Remembering the scene with the hillbillies/national guard: at their temporary little rest stop they had it looked like they were having a good time.

Now, obviously I'd rather have that than a crowd that's panicking and crapping themselves. But even in those short few scenes I cringed. A couple times zombies almost snagged people that didn't have their head on a swivel. There were injured people being treated, so either they managed to shoot each other or one got bitten and they don't know he's going to turn. A fair few of them are getting gak-faced drunk. Recipe for disaster right there.