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 Overread wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:


Two problems. One, rhinos and the like are pretty darn rare even in Africa; in America they are kept in zoos designed to keep them from escaping. Can it be done? Possibly, but it wouldn't be a common threat.

Two, the military has been dealing with armored threats for over a century now; a LAWS will do a rhino just as easily as a BRDM. A Bushmaster will take an elephant just as easily as a BMP. And a 105 will drop zombies by the score regardless of what it is.

I didn't mean undead rhinos I was referring more to monsters with super tough armour like skin layers. Even if the regular military can deal with heavy armour, your local police force likely can't do much at al and small arms wouldn't penetrate. The main point, though, was that whilst there were zombies, there were also other things far more dangerous even if they were rarer. Creating creatures that could thus tackle an actual real military response.

Yeah, having even just more mobile vectors of infection like Lickers from RE would make a big difference in making an outbreak actually do something IRL. Throw in Tyrant level threats and the army would be spread thin if there were multiple outbreaks occuring at the same time.

But surely, and I’m no biologist so may end up with egg on my face, the sheer velocity of certain armour rounds would bugger up an otherwise bulletproof creature?

Would the impact not still cause sufficient trauma to burst organs and the like? I mean, it’s not necessarily going to drop it in the blink of an eye, but a square shot on the bonce is still going to mess up the brain?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
But surely, and I’m no biologist so may end up with egg on my face, the sheer velocity of certain armour rounds would bugger up an otherwise bulletproof creature?

Would the impact not still cause sufficient trauma to burst organs and the like? I mean, it’s not necessarily going to drop it in the blink of an eye, but a square shot on the bonce is still going to mess up the brain?

Depends, with the right density of flesh and a thick enough bone structure you can get a surprising amount of resilience. Plus if the creature is already charging it might well maintain enough momentum to be a viable threat. Then again most zombie fictions, even iwth big beasties, rely often on two key elements of victor

1) Stealth and getting close; or tight confined spaces where firearms have limited fire arcs and can't blast things apart miles away

2) Volume of numbers. Like a Tyranid or Zerg swarm whilst you can take down stuff, more stuff is coming up right behind it!

 Overread wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
But surely, and I’m no biologist so may end up with egg on my face, the sheer velocity of certain armour rounds would bugger up an otherwise bulletproof creature?

Would the impact not still cause sufficient trauma to burst organs and the like? I mean, it’s not necessarily going to drop it in the blink of an eye, but a square shot on the bonce is still going to mess up the brain?

Depends, with the right density of flesh and a thick enough bone structure you can get a surprising amount of resilience. Plus if the creature is already charging it might well maintain enough momentum to be a viable threat. Then again most zombie fictions, even iwth big beasties, rely often on two key elements of victor

1) Stealth and getting close; or tight confined spaces where firearms have limited fire arcs and can't blast things apart miles away

2) Volume of numbers. Like a Tyranid or Zerg swarm whilst you can take down stuff, more stuff is coming up right behind it!

Nothing a .50 can't go through like hot wax, or a grenade shrapnalize. Plus militaries are starting to float back to higher velocity rounds due to increasing use of body armor (USA looking in your direction).

Zombie movies have rules every bit as much as vampire movies have rules, and one sparkly-bollocked outlier doesn't change that.

 Overread wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:


Two problems. One, rhinos and the like are pretty darn rare even in Africa; in America they are kept in zoos designed to keep them from escaping. Can it be done? Possibly, but it wouldn't be a common threat.

Two, the military has been dealing with armored threats for over a century now; a LAWS will do a rhino just as easily as a BRDM. A Bushmaster will take an elephant just as easily as a BMP. And a 105 will drop zombies by the score regardless of what it is.

I didn't mean undead rhinos I was referring more to monsters with super tough armour like skin layers. Even if the regular military can deal with heavy armour, your local police force likely can't do much at al and small arms wouldn't penetrate. The main point, though, was that whilst there were zombies, there were also other things far more dangerous even if they were rarer. Creating creatures that could thus tackle an actual real military response.

I'll grant you the issue about police. I have a hard time imagining a living creature that could withstand a LAWS outside of a kaiju movie. We ARE talking about realism and zombies, not fantasy.

I watched a guy's youtube channel as he does "real world" scenarios concerning zombies.

He did an episode regarding Prisons as a Habitat (Walking Dead Season 3) . He noted some stuff I didn't know.

In the US, if a zombie infestation occurred there would be martial law. According to judicial regulations martial law does weird things. If that happens the military takes over prisons, private guards are let go. Prisoners serving terms under 10 years (What you are sentenced to, not what you have left to serve) are either let go, or can legally be conscripted into the military indefinitely, based on commanding officer's discretion. People serving over 10 years are put into solitary, or hard labor indefinitely, regardless of time left to serve. Those serving life or on death row are to immediately be executed by firing squad. This occurs even if the state you are in does NOT have the death penalty.

 Vulcan wrote:

Nurglitch wrote:
Why would freezing or decay stop zombies when being dead hasn't? They're obviously vastly and incomprehensibly unnatural. Which is something I liked about the white walkers in ASOIAF was that it was winter, and there they were staggering through icy storms. As Peregrine stated, zombies are magical.

When zombies are literally magical in a world that has actual magic, then you would be correct.

In a world where there is NO magic, then there must be a biological cause. And just because something acts in a mindless zombielike manner doesn't mean it stops being technically alive.

Dehydration and freezing destroys tissue on a cellular level, rendering it non-functional. Doesn't matter how much 'zombie virus' there is if every cell has ruptured from freezing, or a limp microscopic sack with no water content. The muscle DOES NOT WORK under those conditions, and the body just lies there.

There are a decent number of organisms that make stuff that lets their cells operate fine under conditions of extremely low tempaerature, or just freeze without dammage (eg fish that live under the arctic ice, lots of amphibians from cold parts of the world), or can survive extreme dehydration (eg tardigrades) so a zombie 'virus' could add these abilities to human tissue, especially if its an engineered virus

 cuda1179 wrote:

In the US, if a zombie infestation occurred there would be martial law. According to judicial regulations martial law does weird things. If that happens the military takes over prisons, private guards are let go. Prisoners serving terms under 10 years (What you are sentenced to, not what you have left to serve) are either let go, or can legally be conscripted into the military indefinitely, based on commanding officer's discretion. People serving over 10 years are put into solitary, or hard labor indefinitely, regardless of time left to serve. Those serving life or on death row are to immediately be executed by firing squad. This occurs even if the state you are in does NOT have the death penalty.

Interesting find and surprising we've never really seen a zombie film do that. Then again most tend to gloss over the "mass invasion" stage. The very start and the aftermath tend to be what we see in most zombie films; at least for large scale infestations and responses.

 Overread wrote:
Interesting find and surprising we've never really seen a zombie film do that. Then again most tend to gloss over the "mass invasion" stage.

It's easy to establish "the world as we knew it ended" by author fiat, but it's really hard to explain why the army didn't murderate them all before that point, or why no one managed to effectively implement basic quarantine procedures in the earliest stages, so like a good magician, the zombie apocalypse genre uses the simple slight of hand to draw attention away from potentially suspension of disbelief breaking elements.

I think one of the more brilliant parts of Shaun of the Dead is that the army actually showed up at the end and dealt with the zombies, the one thing most zombie films know to never do cause it's tantamount to explaining the magic trick.

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:

Nurglitch wrote:
Why would freezing or decay stop zombies when being dead hasn't? They're obviously vastly and incomprehensibly unnatural. Which is something I liked about the white walkers in ASOIAF was that it was winter, and there they were staggering through icy storms. As Peregrine stated, zombies are magical.

When zombies are literally magical in a world that has actual magic, then you would be correct.

In a world where there is NO magic, then there must be a biological cause. And just because something acts in a mindless zombielike manner doesn't mean it stops being technically alive.

Dehydration and freezing destroys tissue on a cellular level, rendering it non-functional. Doesn't matter how much 'zombie virus' there is if every cell has ruptured from freezing, or a limp microscopic sack with no water content. The muscle DOES NOT WORK under those conditions, and the body just lies there.

There are a decent number of organisms that make stuff that lets their cells operate fine under conditions of extremely low tempaerature, or just freeze without dammage (eg fish that live under the arctic ice, lots of amphibians from cold parts of the world), or can survive extreme dehydration (eg tardigrades) so a zombie 'virus' could add these abilities to human tissue, especially if its an engineered virus

That's... a fair point. With that caveat, the zombies would go dormant when frozen or dehydrated and re-animate under less severe conditions. So destruction of found bodies becomes very important...

 LordofHats wrote:

 Overread wrote:
Interesting find and surprising we've never really seen a zombie film do that. Then again most tend to gloss over the "mass invasion" stage.

It's easy to establish "the world as we knew it ended" by author fiat, but it's really hard to explain why the army didn't murderate them all before that point, or why no one managed to effectively implement basic quarantine procedures in the earliest stages, so like a good magician, the zombie apocalypse genre uses the simple slight of hand to draw attention away from potentially suspension of disbelief breaking elements.

I think one of the more brilliant parts of Shaun of the Dead is that the army actually showed up at the end and dealt with the zombies, the one thing most zombie films know to never do cause it's tantamount to explaining the magic trick.

Well, the same thing basically happens in the 1968 and 1986 versions of Night of the Living Dead (let's all forget the theatrical abortions of the other two reboots of this movie). It's also, kind of, seen in 28 days later.

 cuda1179 wrote:
Well, the same thing basically happens in the 1968 and 1986 versions of Night of the Living Dead

I wouldn't consider this "zombie apocalypse" even though the genre spawned from Romero's work. They were more grounded relative to the times (and I thought it was like a mob that showed up at the end? Am I remembering it wrong?).

It's also, kind of, seen in 28 days later.

Yeah, and 28 Weeks Later doesn't shy from trying to show it with some success. Black Summer was a good stab at it for TV.

 cuda1179 wrote:
I watched a guy's youtube channel as he does "real world" scenarios concerning zombies.

He did an episode regarding Prisons as a Habitat (Walking Dead Season 3) . He noted some stuff I didn't know.

In the US, if a zombie infestation occurred there would be martial law. According to judicial regulations martial law does weird things. If that happens the military takes over prisons, private guards are let go. Prisoners serving terms under 10 years (What you are sentenced to, not what you have left to serve) are either let go, or can legally be conscripted into the military indefinitely, based on commanding officer's discretion. People serving over 10 years are put into solitary, or hard labor indefinitely, regardless of time left to serve. Those serving life or on death row are to immediately be executed by firing squad. This occurs even if the state you are in does NOT have the death penalty.

I... literally believe none of that.

Edit: two minutes research reveals that to be internet rumor bs. As someone who works with jails that's frigging insulting. Do research before you post such bs.

To be fair, it's YouTube. It's increasingly become the realm of fringe conspiracy nuts who are really, really good, at making lies look like gold. Some of the stuff I've found there does a really good job of looking authentic.

Very true. Apologies, that hit a nerve I did not know I had.

 Frazzled wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:
I watched a guy's youtube channel as he does "real world" scenarios concerning zombies.

He did an episode regarding Prisons as a Habitat (Walking Dead Season 3) . He noted some stuff I didn't know.

In the US, if a zombie infestation occurred there would be martial law. According to judicial regulations martial law does weird things. If that happens the military takes over prisons, private guards are let go. Prisoners serving terms under 10 years (What you are sentenced to, not what you have left to serve) are either let go, or can legally be conscripted into the military indefinitely, based on commanding officer's discretion. People serving over 10 years are put into solitary, or hard labor indefinitely, regardless of time left to serve. Those serving life or on death row are to immediately be executed by firing squad. This occurs even if the state you are in does NOT have the death penalty.

I... literally believe none of that.

Edit: two minutes research reveals that to be internet rumor bs. As someone who works with jails that's frigging insulting. Do research before you post such bs.

My apologies. The guy supposedly has a reputation for doing research, so it looks like I got suckered this time.

Here is a link to that video though, if interested. The part about martial law begins about the 4:45 mark. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-A3rCDq4ZI

I’m also wondering about how there’s relatively little illness during Zombie Outbreaks.

With lots of mobile rotting flesh, we should expect a fly epidemic. Like, lots and lots of flies.

Whilst the maggots would help render down the Dead into a pile of bones, the adult flies remain a serious disease vector. And without ready access to antibiotics? That’s bad.

I know TWD sort of played with that during Season 4. But still. Should be a larger and more common issue.

I suppose we don't see the problem with plague because in most zombie situations the people are separate from the zombies. The survivors are rarely living in filth invested spots, in fact many are quite clean in all truth.

The other aspect is that zombies don't tend to leave flesh lying around and most variations appear to resist maggots and flies nesting in them whilst they are active zombies. One would also assume zombies consume their fallen. This would help reduce spread of maggots and the like considerably because there isn't the lying around flesh.


though yes with a total collapse medical supplies would be a very important and risky aspect to life. Though again we've vast stocks of basic things, so long as you could secure youreslf some freezers/coolers early on you could likely stock up quite considerably for a small group of survivors.

In North America one of the worse infested areas would likely be New Orleans.

Most of a zombie's brain is shut down. While they do herd-up and go after random moving/ loud things they tend to just aimlessly wander without outside stimulation. They also tend to follow the path of least resistance (in general).

This means that baring some other influence, after several years zombies would gradually work themselves into lower elevations. All the zombies between the Appalachian and Rocky mountains would eventually work themselves towards the Mississippi River, and then downstream. The end of the line is New Orleans, or if they are in the river the Gulf of Mexico.

 Overread wrote:

The other aspect is that zombies don't tend to leave flesh lying around and most variations appear to resist maggots and flies nesting in them whilst they are active zombies.

They're depicted as being resistant to maggots, rot, and dehydration and the like because they become much less of a society-shattering threat if the bodies decompose to biological uselessness in a matter of days. The reality of things is... not that kind. Rather horrific, actually, how fast a body can be ripped apart by maggots... especially in warm weather.

so long as you could secure yourself some freezers/coolers early on you could likely stock up quite considerably for a small group of survivors.

The real trick would be maintaining power to the freezers, or finding a reliable source of ice for the coolers.

 cuda1179 wrote:
In North America one of the worse infested areas would likely be New Orleans.

Most of a zombie's brain is shut down. While they do herd-up and go after random moving/ loud things they tend to just aimlessly wander without outside stimulation. They also tend to follow the path of least resistance (in general).

This means that baring some other influence, after several years zombies would gradually work themselves into lower elevations. All the zombies between the Appalachian and Rocky mountains would eventually work themselves towards the Mississippi River, and then downstream. The end of the line is New Orleans, or if they are in the river the Gulf of Mexico.

That's a really interesting thought actually. Someone should use that.

 Vulcan wrote:


The real trick would be maintaining power to the freezers, or finding a reliable source of ice for the coolers.

Short term it wouldn't be too hard - many hospitals already have their own generators and most urban areas will have ample stores with generators within them. Fuel is an issue, but in the short term at least you can drain cars and use garages - that is unless the mass fleeing panic drained the supplies, though an industrious person might use a map to find a local storage site.

One would assume most major reactors would have either been shut down or shut down on their own through safety shutoffs. However renewable energy sources like wind turbines might well keep going. In fact one could suppose that power generation following a major renewable program, could be quite a trivial matter for a smaller number of survivors. So long as the national grid remained active and functional power wouldn't be a huge problem. Of course logistically one might want to move closer to a reliable power source and potentially try to isolate it from the national grid so that it can supply a regular amount locally. Though honestly I've no idea about how much of the national grid could function without human operators and for how long it could maintain itself before it would break down. Still the infrastructure would be there.

You'd need someone trained in how to run said infrastructure to do that. There aren't that many of them - disturbingly few, in fact, given how vital their job is...

 LordofHats wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:
In North America one of the worse infested areas would likely be New Orleans.

Most of a zombie's brain is shut down. While they do herd-up and go after random moving/ loud things they tend to just aimlessly wander without outside stimulation. They also tend to follow the path of least resistance (in general).

This means that baring some other influence, after several years zombies would gradually work themselves into lower elevations. All the zombies between the Appalachian and Rocky mountains would eventually work themselves towards the Mississippi River, and then downstream. The end of the line is New Orleans, or if they are in the river the Gulf of Mexico.

That's a really interesting thought actually. Someone should use that.

The CDC once used a "zombie infestation" as a mock-run for a contagious disease. They gave the same advice they would for some other super-diseases: Stay inside, don't go out, make sure to have plenty of food and water, check your family for signs of the disease, and quarantine them if you find it. Also, they estimated the last place in the US to be touched by a zombie would be Glacier National Park.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Overread wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:


The real trick would be maintaining power to the freezers, or finding a reliable source of ice for the coolers.

Short term it wouldn't be too hard - many hospitals already have their own generators and most urban areas will have ample stores with generators within them. Fuel is an issue, but in the short term at least you can drain cars and use garages - that is unless the mass fleeing panic drained the supplies, though an industrious person might use a map to find a local storage site.

One would assume most major reactors would have either been shut down or shut down on their own through safety shutoffs. However renewable energy sources like wind turbines might well keep going. In fact one could suppose that power generation following a major renewable program, could be quite a trivial matter for a smaller number of survivors. So long as the national grid remained active and functional power wouldn't be a huge problem. Of course logistically one might want to move closer to a reliable power source and potentially try to isolate it from the national grid so that it can supply a regular amount locally. Though honestly I've no idea about how much of the national grid could function without human operators and for how long it could maintain itself before it would break down. Still the infrastructure would be there.

Wind power is BIG where I live. There is a problem with it though. It requires A LOT of maintenance per windmill. From what I've been told the number of maintenance men needed per kilowatt hour is one of the highest out there as far as energy production goes.

 cuda1179 wrote:
The CDC once used a "zombie infestation" as a mock-run for a contagious disease. They gave the same advice they would for some other super-diseases: Stay inside, don't go out, make sure to have plenty of food and water, check your family for signs of the disease, and quarantine them if you find it. Also, they estimated the last place in the US to be touched by a zombie would be Glacier National Park.

I remember that. It was brilliant as a way of catching people's attention and didn't really cost anything. Stay inside, don't go out, stock up on food and water, and do what you can to keep the people you're with healthy are the basic steps to every disaster, be they natural, terrorist, or disease.

 cuda1179 wrote:
In North America one of the worse infested areas would likely be New Orleans.

Most of a zombie's brain is shut down. While they do herd-up and go after random moving/ loud things they tend to just aimlessly wander without outside stimulation. They also tend to follow the path of least resistance (in general).

This means that baring some other influence, after several years zombies would gradually work themselves into lower elevations. All the zombies between the Appalachian and Rocky mountains would eventually work themselves towards the Mississippi River, and then downstream. The end of the line is New Orleans, or if they are in the river the Gulf of Mexico.

That means Oklahoma is screwed. Most of Oklahoma is pool table flat.

Dunno. Do a Walking Dead, and funnel the smelly ones. Then hit them with a Combine Harvester or six.

PRESTO! Gore everywhere!

 porkuslime wrote:
Just saw The Dead don't Die last week.. I really enjoyed how the town tried to deal with the zombies.. and the "in movie" rational of how the zombies came to be was totally funnier than anyting else I had heard

Plus the characters being "meta" about being in a zombie movie was a lot of fun..

-P

Try "Strippers vs. Zombies". You will enjoy it even more.

Surely we're not just glossing over the masterpiece that is Zombeavers