Questions tagged [zombies]

For questions about undead creatures, typically depicted as mindless, reanimated human corpses with a hunger for human flesh.

Filter by
Sorted by
Tagged with
34 votes
6 answers
5k views

What's the angle of repose for dead zombie bodies?

I'm writing a story where the superhuman heroes fight hundreds of thousands of zombies. The zombies are fast and agile and completely surround the heroes. Dead zombies pile up around them until the ...
Connor Garcia's user avatar
0 votes
0 answers
43 views

Virus that affects only males? [duplicate]

Furrious Rabies affects only males in this universe, in our real universe it affects both genders. in our real universe I've never heard of any virus that only affects people with Y chromies. So I'm ...
Alve's user avatar
  • 17
6 votes
5 answers
466 views

Surviving Organ Failure

This is a re-phrasing of the question "How Would Metabolism Work For A Zombie?". It's the year 2026 and a new engineered virus turns people into zombies who are very stupid and can only ...
Hi0401's user avatar
  • 445
1 vote
2 answers
216 views

Gas or Electric for a Zombie Apocalypse [closed]

This question is referring to tools, like chainsaws and weedwhackers. Gas would be easier to get, being a liquid form that can be stockpiled, but gas tools are loud and leave fumes. Meanwhile, ...
Mace19's user avatar
  • 19
19 votes
12 answers
6k views

How would zombies affect trench warfare?

After thousands of years the mightiest of magic uses have finally cracked the code to revive the dead... Kind of. The resurrection spell, while restoring the body to a basic capacity, leaves them a ...
icewar1908's user avatar
  • 6,835
15 votes
13 answers
3k views

Knocking Out Zombies

So basically we have zombies. And they are not just normal zombies... they are walking human corpses reanimated by slime molds growing around their bones! The zombies are moved around like puppets by ...
Hi0401's user avatar
  • 445
2 votes
1 answer
112 views

How would my zombies locate victims?

My world has zombies that are created as a result of infection with a symbiotic organism consisting of a bacterium in symbiosis with another eukaryotic organism, essentially somewhat like a lichen. ...
user73910's user avatar
  • 823
5 votes
6 answers
2k views

How Would Metabolism Work For A Zombie? [closed]

In this story I am planning to write, zombies are real! A bacterium has resulted in the reactivation of the nervous system in recently dead humans, who will now seek to feed on the flesh of the living!...
Hi0401's user avatar
  • 445
-2 votes
2 answers
112 views

How Well Would Humans Fare In A Romero-Styled Zombie Apocalypse? [closed]

The Story takes place in the modern world, and starting from one day anyone who recently died with their brain intact will revive as a zombie to feed on living flesh. In this question we will not ...
Hi0401's user avatar
  • 445
3 votes
5 answers
260 views

Zombie's Detection Of Prey

A while ago I was watching The Walking Dead (Season 1) with my sister, and we came across that one scene where Rick and his group theorize that zombies detect humans via smell, but here's the problem: ...
Hi0401's user avatar
  • 445
5 votes
2 answers
215 views

Farting... Zombies?

The sequel to my last question that is hopefully more meaningful. The zombie rules just in case you are new: "An unfortunate person gets infected, then the unfortunate person dies. After the ...
Hi0401's user avatar
  • 445
3 votes
4 answers
621 views

What would a zombie's brain look like?

In this universe, a type of bacteria has been created by evil people who want to kill everyone else has been infecting people and turning them into zombies. Here's how it works: An unfortunate person ...
Hi0401's user avatar
  • 445
4 votes
4 answers
489 views

Zombies with mostly busted brains

So I've seen multiple zombie fiction works explaining zombies by saying that the zombie pathogen destroys most human brain functions but leaves behind the cerebellum and the brain stem, so the zombies ...
Hi0401's user avatar
  • 445
15 votes
9 answers
3k views

How do zombies survive for more than just a few months? [closed]

There is a continent totally taken over by zombies, yet this situation somehow lasts for multiple years. How could we assume it could last for so long? A human can survive for only about a month ...
eigenvalue's user avatar
  • 1,927
19 votes
15 answers
9k views

How would the US military efficiently deal with Necromorph-like zombies?

Most of the time, when movies or video games depict zombies, they are given one crucial weakness; the head. Blow it off, and you stop the zombie. The United States Army is well equipped to fight the ...
ebinbenis's user avatar
  • 1,509
-1 votes
3 answers
203 views

How would a medieval kingdom survive a zombie outbreak [closed]

In my world, there is a zombie infestation that destroys and takes out many kingdoms, citystates, and villages. These zombies are fast and like the ones from zombieland. It is possible to get cured, ...
Crafter's user avatar
  • 2,575
8 votes
6 answers
414 views

How can civlization industrialize amidst a zombie outbreak?

In my world, there is a zombie pandemic that happens. The zombies are fast, but can be defeated by a large army. My world a little before the outbreak was close to having an Industrial Revolution. ...
Crafter's user avatar
  • 2,575
5 votes
4 answers
915 views

Does it make sense for my "zombie" to drink blood?

I'm working on another arc for my story saga, and one of the characters is a "zombie". I'm putting "zombie" in quotations because he's actually the result of genetic ...
Ivory's user avatar
  • 85
25 votes
16 answers
6k views

What kind of scientist would be ideal for studying zombies?

One of my side characters is a scientist, and he is zombie immune. This lets him get close enough to study the zombies. However, I feel like just saying he is a "biologist" might be too ...
MarielS's user avatar
  • 2,788
20 votes
15 answers
5k views

Why Wouldn't The Military Intervene with a Zombie Apocalypse?

I was looking around the site bored for a while, when I found this question: Why would the military use tanks in a zombie apocalypse? Because I'm writing my own zombie story, I realized that I need my ...
Murphy L.'s user avatar
  • 1,331
3 votes
4 answers
413 views

Best way to stop a rotting zombie

The Context I am designing a type of zombie that is made through a ritual involving an eldritch abomination called the Unsound Vulture. These zombies manipulate their decaying flesh and bones to move, ...
Kurtalmakthekoboldkiaser's user avatar
6 votes
3 answers
226 views

Zombies: if magic kept them "living" or at least conscious, what would they experience as they rotted? [closed]

Instead of being spread by a virus or the temporary effects of a voodoo-induced trance or paralysis, zombies are created by a magical curse that causes the person to rot while remaining relatively ...
daisydaisyg's user avatar
36 votes
16 answers
6k views

Politics and Zombies: Designing a balanced zombie plague that could realistically destroy civilization due to poor decision-making

As has been pointed out numerous times, zombie apocalypses of the classic zombie-bites-you-and-you-become-a-zombie are stupid and would never work in real life. Biting is a horribly inefficient method ...
IndigoFenix's user avatar
1 vote
4 answers
342 views

In a post intergalactic WW3 where most of scociety has moved into a VR world to escape, what created the zombies that roam outside (Not nuclear war) [closed]

Basically, this is after a war between human civilizations on multiple planets in our galaxy. Most people have decided to live the rest of their lives in a fully immersive VR world and a very small ...
CPSuperstore's user avatar
4 votes
2 answers
292 views

Please tell me if I got something wrong about virology

Note: Apologies for any grammatical errors. I have been working on a story of mine for quite a while now. A part of that story is a viral pathogen that turns people infected with it into what is ...
Wurzel's user avatar
  • 41
14 votes
14 answers
6k views

Would an ultra-heavy tank be a resource-efficient zombie-extermination unit for an CBRN-contaminated environment?

The question, before you get into the rest of this textual abomination: with all of the context, objectives, and design features mentioned below, is an ultra-heavy tank a resource-efficient means of ...
KEY_ABRADE's user avatar
  • 11.3k
19 votes
10 answers
6k views

What would be the average civilian's first hints that a zombie apocalypse was near in a pre-mass internet world?

I'm a big fan of zombie fiction, but one aspect that is rarely touched upon is how things look in the first stages of an apocalypse scenario. If you were an average civilian in the mid 90's when the ...
forgotenm's user avatar
  • 974
5 votes
6 answers
2k views

How can I justify the existence of massive zombies?

In my world some kind of virus/mushroom/parasite infected most of the population transforming them into zombies (so original!). I need to put different kind of zombies in my world, and while I can ...
Fez Vrasta's user avatar
10 votes
11 answers
1k views

Why not burn bodies in a world crawling with undead? [duplicate]

In the majority of the modern fantasy worlds the dead are buried in crypts and tombs. At the same time, these places are frequently crawling with undead - skeletons, zombies, etc. I understand ...
gruszczy's user avatar
  • 851
26 votes
14 answers
8k views

Why would the military use tanks in a zombie apocalypse?

So usually the use of tanks is to shoot at other tanks or fortifications. So would a tank be useful against zombies? Would they just use it to crush the Zs?
the questioner's user avatar
21 votes
6 answers
5k views

What would allow gasoline to last for years?

Looking for a way gasoline can last more than 3-6 months? Going off the simple zombie apocalypse scenario, I want a way to find vehicles and drive them after they have sat for 2,3... x number of years?...
DevelopingDeveloper's user avatar
6 votes
7 answers
601 views

Post zombie outbreak world. People who die turn into zombies. Can the government detect murders from natural death + transformation?

The zombie outbreak is contained and people survived in fortified cities and on islands and so on. Humans who die in any way that does not destroy the brain will turn into zombies. Rules of that is ...
Seallussus's user avatar
  • 8,252
4 votes
3 answers
247 views

How could zombies infect the population of an entire town? [closed]

There is a zombie apocalypse scenario where one zombie appeared in a small town in America. Would it be possible or plausible for them to take over? My problem is that the military would just quickly ...
the questioner's user avatar
4 votes
3 answers
172 views

How a zombie come back to true life?

In my world the polar opposite powers of Life and Death take turns to grow or wane, like the waves push and pull. In this particular cycle, Life is at its climax and the process of Death has started. ...
Ngoc's user avatar
  • 2,331
10 votes
5 answers
1k views

What would be the most helpful household items in a zombie apocalypse?

We all know the ideas about the "ideal zombie shelter" stocked with food, water, and ridiculous amounts of ammunition, hidden somewhere up in the Rocky mountains far from cities. But what ...
Jimothy's user avatar
  • 438
4 votes
1 answer
189 views

(Survival-Type Situation) How can I Craft a Powerful Sedative From Easy To Find/Gather Materials, Assuming No Meds in Clinics or Hospitals?

I have a character that finds himself in a decent-sized town that has already been ransacked, what can I use to craft sedatives that would be effective on both Zombies, (assuming their anatomy ...
Mr. Wulf's user avatar
-2 votes
6 answers
398 views

A zombie apocalypse is happening, what is the worst measures that a government can take? [closed]

So a zombie apocalypse is happening in two stages. First the "infection" is airborne and just popped all over the world In this stage only 1 in 3 will start changing into a zombie. It also takes ...
Seallussus's user avatar
  • 8,252
5 votes
4 answers
2k views

A virus that can mutate a human body into having insane strength and dexterity

Im writing a story about a boy in the year 2033 that is immune to a zombie like virus (world war z like zombies) and when he is bitten instead of turning into a brain dead zombie/infected his body is ...
Reaps's user avatar
  • 51
4 votes
2 answers
226 views

What would a biosphere with naturally occurring undead population look like?

There exists a planet with a similar biological history of Earth that experienced a sudden inundation of the undead during it's equivalent of the middle Pleistocene. These undead are capable arising ...
Zer0ah's user avatar
  • 333
3 votes
8 answers
271 views

How could necromancy allow for widespread filibustering without making it too strong?

In the (roughly) D&D based world of ..., The Abyss, which birthed magic, gives men the power to fulfill the deepest and darkest desires of their hearts, unleashing great suffering upon their ...
Mephistopheles's user avatar
4 votes
5 answers
404 views

Why would neutral necromancers put animal souls in human corpses?

In my world, a creature is made up of three parts: the body (the physical stuff you live in), the spirit (your senses, locomotion, survival instinct and what makes you 'alive'), and the soul (the ...
Carduus's user avatar
  • 2,046
65 votes
23 answers
12k views

Why would people bury their dead in tombs when they might become zombies?

This is partly a Skyrim-inspired question, but also relevant to a story I'm trying to flesh out. In this world, magic and necromancy are perhaps not commonplace, but certainly not unheard of. Walking ...
user avatar
-2 votes
1 answer
301 views

How would Europeans fend themselfs in a Zombie apocalypse? [closed]

Most of zombie apocalypse movies, series, comics, etc. are set in the United States, but how an outbreak look like in European countries? Would it be different at all?
Marcello Fabrizio's user avatar
6 votes
9 answers
1k views

Cultural effects of revenants

In my fantasy world, revenants are a special type of undead. They only occur when a person dies feeling that they were wronged in life. If their soul contains enough hatred for those who wronged them, ...
Cobbington's user avatar
  • 2,733
2 votes
5 answers
210 views

Why would anyone buy zombies? [closed]

In the shady city of Tarahan, ruled by the Cult of Carmine Heptagram, you can experience all sorts of arcane oddities, like hooded wraiths phasing through the buildings, stray imps being treated like ...
DarklingArcher's user avatar
-4 votes
1 answer
218 views

How could the naruto-running titan zombies' insanely fast regeneration be explained? [duplicate]

Note: !"string" means not "string", i.e: !"N-word" means: not (the) N-word. The "titan" adjective refers to titans from the anime, Shingeki no Kyojin, who possessed a similarly powerful healing factor ...
Mephistopheles's user avatar
7 votes
1 answer
470 views

How would a "zombie fungus" work on humans?

Short question: which hormones should high contagious fungi spores produce to make their human host spread the joy and infection (by hugging and kisses) on early stages of infection, and become ...
vodolaz095's user avatar
  • 5,775
-2 votes
3 answers
154 views

How can medieval knights fend off against army of radioactive ghouls? [closed]

On the night of November 27, 1419 somewhere near a river bank the water glows bright blue. It was due to a phenomenon known as Cherenkov radiation which was unheard of back then, all these high energy ...
user6760's user avatar
  • 46.4k
39 votes
20 answers
11k views

How can you weaponize a thermos?

Anything can be used as a weapon if need be: A person in my story uses a big steel thermos in a fight. How could she beef up the thermos to keep using it as a weapon.
Stupidzombiet 's user avatar
7 votes
4 answers
704 views

How Do We Protect Humans in a Zombie Society?

I'm writing a story where an intelligent zombie society has defeated humans and won. The zombies are the main characters in this story. These zombies: Have human intelligence, emotions, and remember ...
overlord's user avatar
  • 6,232