Friendship is Dragons
Updates Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays
Page 551 - Jury of Fears
Author Notes:
Notice: Guest comic submissions are still open until this arc is finished! Guidelines here.
(Pop-out)
56 Comments:
Tell a story about zombies, and the strong, noble druids who love them just a little too much.
Druids optional.
In a modern X-Files style campaign, our team found out this one mining company was using the undead as non-union scab labor. Hilarious in the perspective that we weren't sent there to investigate weirdness with the workers, but with an unrelated haunting in the cave.
Though fixing the undead part was a bonus that the union applauded us for. >_>
Though fixing the undead part was a bonus that the union applauded us for. >_>
Zombies, the strong, and noble druids who love them to much?
Well one campaign we went on was to deal with problems in the forest. The local town's people were disappearing and the monsters were growing more wild so we figured just shave off a bit of the population and everything would be fine...
Few kills later we find towns people and rejoice as we get ready to bring them back... until they start attack. Turns out they were zombies that were devouring the local population thus making the wildlife run towards the town for food, safety, and new territory.
Lots of fire and slashing latter our chief alchemist studies the bodies because we have ran into a few strange undead in past campaigns... turns out these were the fungus brand zombie and fire was a bad idea.
Much fleeing and a quick alchemy/medical roll to make a cure to ensure we don't get infected since fire spreads the spores we find out that a black druid was behind all of it.
He was making the undead to push the wildlife forward which would destroy the town. Then when the evil empire's army would arrive they would find "Survivors" and either take them with them or kill them, but it wouldn't matter as the fungus would infect them giving them enough time to report back before they turned into zombies in the enemy's fortress.
One zombie slaughter latter and the villain would be dead as the druids would stop the zombie plague since it was plant life with their magic...
Only problem was trying to convince him not to sacrifice the town and convince him of an alternative method that didn't sacrifice the town we were sent to protect/investigate.
Ended with names being casted and a hard deal made were we would infect an enemy outpost instead... cue next adventure
Well one campaign we went on was to deal with problems in the forest. The local town's people were disappearing and the monsters were growing more wild so we figured just shave off a bit of the population and everything would be fine...
Few kills later we find towns people and rejoice as we get ready to bring them back... until they start attack. Turns out they were zombies that were devouring the local population thus making the wildlife run towards the town for food, safety, and new territory.
Lots of fire and slashing latter our chief alchemist studies the bodies because we have ran into a few strange undead in past campaigns... turns out these were the fungus brand zombie and fire was a bad idea.
Much fleeing and a quick alchemy/medical roll to make a cure to ensure we don't get infected since fire spreads the spores we find out that a black druid was behind all of it.
He was making the undead to push the wildlife forward which would destroy the town. Then when the evil empire's army would arrive they would find "Survivors" and either take them with them or kill them, but it wouldn't matter as the fungus would infect them giving them enough time to report back before they turned into zombies in the enemy's fortress.
One zombie slaughter latter and the villain would be dead as the druids would stop the zombie plague since it was plant life with their magic...
Only problem was trying to convince him not to sacrifice the town and convince him of an alternative method that didn't sacrifice the town we were sent to protect/investigate.
Ended with names being casted and a hard deal made were we would infect an enemy outpost instead... cue next adventure
Not a story so much as a plan, but still worth the energy of telling.
The infamous alchemist Isaac who I've mentioned on here a few times is in the planning stages of becoming a campaign boss for my players. He'll be working on something called the "deifaction serum" in a massive complex built specifically to generate it.
All of the machinery will be run by alchemical zombies, overseen by actual wizards and druids who will serve as mini-bosses. After the party battles its way through 90% of the complex, they'll come to the second-to-last room certain of fighting another mini-boss. They'll open the doors and find...
An office. Row after row of cubicles full of low-level zombies doing paperwork, performing the Pathfinder equivalent of faxing, and even standing at corners growling unintelligibly about "the big game" on Sunday. They won't even notice the players and some will even point to the door they need if they ask. But instead, I see the party just killing them all and destroying most of the paperwork in a dramatic and tragic fashion. The alchemist is even going to needle them about it in his gratuitous monologue.
The infamous alchemist Isaac who I've mentioned on here a few times is in the planning stages of becoming a campaign boss for my players. He'll be working on something called the "deifaction serum" in a massive complex built specifically to generate it.
All of the machinery will be run by alchemical zombies, overseen by actual wizards and druids who will serve as mini-bosses. After the party battles its way through 90% of the complex, they'll come to the second-to-last room certain of fighting another mini-boss. They'll open the doors and find...
An office. Row after row of cubicles full of low-level zombies doing paperwork, performing the Pathfinder equivalent of faxing, and even standing at corners growling unintelligibly about "the big game" on Sunday. They won't even notice the players and some will even point to the door they need if they ask. But instead, I see the party just killing them all and destroying most of the paperwork in a dramatic and tragic fashion. The alchemist is even going to needle them about it in his gratuitous monologue.
Nothing really cool to say about it: the dungeon had a lot of different kinds of zombie in it, and as the front-line guy it was my job to keep them away from the squashies. Unfortunately, a lot of them were very gooey and my poor barb got splattered with all kinds of mysterious, infectious ichor in the process.
Luckily we managed to get back to town and treatment to prevent him turning into some body you wouldn't want to meet in a dark crypt but it gave my character a deep, personal loathing of the undead. There was talk with the DM of him possibly gaining a few followers and starting his own Buffy + Scooby Gang style team in his downtime but the campaign died long before that took shape.
Luckily we managed to get back to town and treatment to prevent him turning into some body you wouldn't want to meet in a dark crypt but it gave my character a deep, personal loathing of the undead. There was talk with the DM of him possibly gaining a few followers and starting his own Buffy + Scooby Gang style team in his downtime but the campaign died long before that took shape.
I once threw a swarm of flaming fiendish cat skeletons at the party. (There was a planar incursion at the time; those were some of the least dangerous things in the area.) The party basically ran and hid. As luck would have it, they found their way to hallowed ground. (Seriously, it was luck. They managed to pick the one door that led to a sanctified shrine.)
Due to a misread with an encounter table, one time a GM had the party attacked by a tree-dwelling T-rex. :o
This went on for a while as everyone else was having issues getting them to actually stay dead. Apparenty in 5E, they have a "nope, still alive" thing that made it really really hard to kill them reliably unless the deathblow damage was radiant. Thus I was the only one that could reliably kill them. The sad thing was, outside of two shotting the ogre, I was also having a hard time hitting anything myself. That changed when one of them actually bit me for the first time in that entire battle. My cleric, being who he was, flipped out at this and proceeded to turn the rest into ash. Eventually he calmed down enough to enact their final rites, consecrate the ground, and we all went on our merry little way.
The druid was not there for that battle but he doesn't care that much for the dead so whatever.
Heh.. I was running a 1920s gangster campaign. PCs were part of a speakeasy, and I played it totally straight for the first two sessions. Then weird stuff happened.
Session one, they get a guy selling them some quality liquor. Turns out, he's with a rival gang, and was selling off their stash to get out of town. Three of his compatriots arrive, and gunfire ensues, killing all four.
Session two, a few things happen, but they notice an article in the paper about a gangland shootout at the docks, in which three gangsters, and two police officers were killed. this confuses them, as they were pretty darned sure all four were very much dead, and they'd left well before the police arrived. The party medic (ok, mob doctor who doesn't ask questions) pulls some connections, finds out that the coroner had kept the cause of death for the police officers under wraps. Not gunshot wounds, but attacked with an axe or large knife...
Session three, a guy comes in. Obvious rube, who's just lucked into some money, as he's got a new, ill-fitting suit, and is spending money like water at the gambling table. He's laughing and having a good time, until he pops a peanut into his mouth, says 'Oh." and falls dead flat onto the green felt.
The party medic notices the man's skin is ice cold. An autopsy confirms that his liver temperature is colder than the room temperature (it's January, and snowing outside). His blood has congealed, and basically the guy shows every sign of having been dead at least twenty-four hours... despite having been gambling an hour ago. This caused much discussion. The genre-savvy players were perplexed and confused, but intruigued.
The next session, they went out to shut down (blow up) a rival gang's still. This was the same gang they'd met up with the first session. They're in the process of setting a few charges when a naked, bloody man drops on the enforcer from above, screaming. He's missing most of one hand, and the left side of his head, but he's still very interested in trying to tear the enforcer's head off...
To their credit, they were able to dispatch the revenant, and THEN had a good, solid collective freak-out moment. The guy playing the enforcer was actually, visibly shaken.
Session one, they get a guy selling them some quality liquor. Turns out, he's with a rival gang, and was selling off their stash to get out of town. Three of his compatriots arrive, and gunfire ensues, killing all four.
Session two, a few things happen, but they notice an article in the paper about a gangland shootout at the docks, in which three gangsters, and two police officers were killed. this confuses them, as they were pretty darned sure all four were very much dead, and they'd left well before the police arrived. The party medic (ok, mob doctor who doesn't ask questions) pulls some connections, finds out that the coroner had kept the cause of death for the police officers under wraps. Not gunshot wounds, but attacked with an axe or large knife...
Session three, a guy comes in. Obvious rube, who's just lucked into some money, as he's got a new, ill-fitting suit, and is spending money like water at the gambling table. He's laughing and having a good time, until he pops a peanut into his mouth, says 'Oh." and falls dead flat onto the green felt.
The party medic notices the man's skin is ice cold. An autopsy confirms that his liver temperature is colder than the room temperature (it's January, and snowing outside). His blood has congealed, and basically the guy shows every sign of having been dead at least twenty-four hours... despite having been gambling an hour ago. This caused much discussion. The genre-savvy players were perplexed and confused, but intruigued.
The next session, they went out to shut down (blow up) a rival gang's still. This was the same gang they'd met up with the first session. They're in the process of setting a few charges when a naked, bloody man drops on the enforcer from above, screaming. He's missing most of one hand, and the left side of his head, but he's still very interested in trying to tear the enforcer's head off...
To their credit, they were able to dispatch the revenant, and THEN had a good, solid collective freak-out moment. The guy playing the enforcer was actually, visibly shaken.
The idea of undead that don't realize they're corpses sounds very interesting! That casino encounter! :D
Yeah, it was fantastic. They were watching the guy, because a rube spreading money around is always entertaining at the very least. Then *thud*... much consternation and uproar!
Party necromancer turned a deceased former teammate into a walking coffee machine. Corpseaccino machines are now one of our best bargaining chips.
So in this particular game, the traitor's gimmick was Zombies. We had to collect some MacGuffin from the basement as part of our win condition, and we had access to an elevator we jokingly call the Tardis (randomly warps to some other room in the house). I decide to step out of the elevator to go after the item, knowing that where a pair of zombies were now, they were going to each get an attack off.
So the zombies' turn comes up, and sure enough, they attack me. The traitor rolls 6 dice of damage against me, which does a decent amount but doesn't outright kill me. I misinterpreted this as both zombies attacking me for 3 dice each and was about to take my turn until he said "Okay, now the other one attacks you."
And that's when we knew we were screwed.
I once sent my party up against a group of 6 zombies in the middle of a village. It wasn't so bad... until the zombies started turning the villagers into zombies... By the end of the encounter (and 2 villagers surviving), the party had had to fight 28 zombies altogether.
In a long running game I'm playing in, there was a fire in a town where a Player Character lich had set up shop. So he hears the commotion, takes a look outside, sees the orphanage is on fire, and quotes the meme word for word: "Go, my undead minions! Save the children!" Fun fact--undead make surprisingly good firefighters, and the rescue was a rousing success.
This was one of the precipitating incidents in setting for the liches to get together, lick each other's wounds, and become the Big Goods.
This was one of the precipitating incidents in setting for the liches to get together, lick each other's wounds, and become the Big Goods.
Also, I kinda get that thing with zombies as well. I think for me it tends to be the fact that horror zombies have the whole "one bite, scratch, or glob of slobber and you're joining them" and the idea that they just don't go down and that there's just too many of them, whereas fantasy zombies are usually just dumb mooks for necromancers to throw around at you.
So when one of our targets ended up being a necromancer whose base of operations was an abandoned military fort, and his guards were skeletons and zombies, it was not a good day for the party. It actually came to the party fighting me and I was given the buffs because undead were technically involved. I almost killed the mage and the rogue, and battled our fighter to a standstill before our druid knocked me out with some sleeping powder.
By the time my character woke up, they had already reversed the necromancer's spell and all the undead were re-dead. They at least gave me the privilege of smiting the guy.
During one session the party was sent ahead of their caravan when it reached a village that was supposed to let down a bridge for them to cross but had went strangely silent. Night had already fallen and the moonlight revealed a thick mist which gave everything a very spooky vibe. Turns out, this mist was a necrotic poison that was slowly killing anything in the town then raising them as zombies. Bigger and stronger (level wise) things were much slower affected, but it just so happened that the first place they investigated was an outlying farm. A poultry farm. Cue ominous clucking followed by a swarm of zombified chickens flooding out of the coops hungry for BRAINS!
How does he tug at the end of that mane, anyway?
And, speaking as a librarian who constantly deals with unattended children, where is his mother? He's new in town, and surely his parents wouldn't send him off with a complete stranger?
And, speaking as a librarian who constantly deals with unattended children, where is his mother? He's new in town, and surely his parents wouldn't send him off with a complete stranger?
Earth ponies are magical, and so are their natural weapons. Thus, they can interact with the incorporeal, though only half as effectively as normal unless they have the ghost touch special ability.
All very logical.
All very logical.
Well he is dressed as a pirate, and pirates tend to be touched by ghosts and all manner of supernatural entities quite often. ;)
I love that you made that reference <3
Tis an awesome game series!
Tis an awesome game series!
Well, all that glitters is gold and isn't that mane shiny?
I like zombies only insofar as they lend themselves to humor about braiiins.
What is it that undead string theorists constantly crave?
Branes.
Branes.
Well, most zombie movies (beyond the garden-variety, direct-to-video/DVD nasties) aren't really about the zombies, but how people react to the world changing so severely - what they'll sacrifice, what they'll fight to keep, what people will do to survive in a hostile world. The zombies themselves are just the device to put the human actors into a difficult situation. Zombies could easily be replaced with ghosts, or demons, or a flood, but people seem to find zombies a bit easier to accept than more supernatural beasties. Zombies are also small enough to be a personal threat, aggressive enough to actively pursue the protagonist (unlike a hurricane, for example), vulnerable enough that the protagonists can fight back and all wrapped up in a nasty little package that nobody feels sorry for killing. You can also do the effects relatively cheaply, which always helps. If you want to do a disaster movie, Zombies are easy mode.
They have additional benefits when it comes to computer games: they're dumb, so you don't need much in the way of AI. If they're animated a little jerkily or if the graphics are a bit janky you can just say "they're zombies. They're just not fresh yet". Zombies also give you a good excuse for lots of splatter when you kill them - if you treated a human character the way you can treat a zombie character, your game rating would shoot through the roof.
tl;dr zombies aren't going anywhere.
They have additional benefits when it comes to computer games: they're dumb, so you don't need much in the way of AI. If they're animated a little jerkily or if the graphics are a bit janky you can just say "they're zombies. They're just not fresh yet". Zombies also give you a good excuse for lots of splatter when you kill them - if you treated a human character the way you can treat a zombie character, your game rating would shoot through the roof.
tl;dr zombies aren't going anywhere.
Also of note is that many monster movies serve as allegories for common fears of a generation. For instance, Godzilla (at least in his first appearance) is blatantly representative of nuclear weaponry. Zombies, in their modern incarnation, usually represent out of control consumerism. Hence why Dawn of the Dead was set in a mall. Don't believe me? Check out this clip from a Black Friday sale.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=VNEhu7eqyVQ#t=132
Of course this only applies to the movies where zombies are supposed to mean something and not jut there for a cheap monster.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=VNEhu7eqyVQ#t=132
Of course this only applies to the movies where zombies are supposed to mean something and not jut there for a cheap monster.
the secret is to shake it up a bit. I had a campaign with thinking, intelligent revenants, who followed the OLD rules: Cannot cross a barrier of salt, and will die if they taste it, keep coming until they're destroyed, etc.
Having ONE Undead Terminator freaked my players out more than any number of shamblers, or even a dozen Fast Zombies.
Having ONE Undead Terminator freaked my players out more than any number of shamblers, or even a dozen Fast Zombies.
That would explain the gambler collasping in the speakeasy. The peanuts were salted.
Ding ding! Give the pony a cookie!
Yeah, see, the secret was that someone had found a mysterious form of gold, that allowed him to perform various magical feats. Including raising the dead. They'd be intelligent, but every so often, one would slip his control and wander off. One of them was the seller of the high-quality alcohol. Another was the gambler (who had sold a few nuggets of the gold for easy cash).
Actually, the zombie freakout was nothing compared to the physics major's freakout...
"Wait.. so this gold... It's radioactive? In *pulses*? And it secretes a slippery red oil, even in a sealed container? I... but... HOW??"
Yeah, see, the secret was that someone had found a mysterious form of gold, that allowed him to perform various magical feats. Including raising the dead. They'd be intelligent, but every so often, one would slip his control and wander off. One of them was the seller of the high-quality alcohol. Another was the gambler (who had sold a few nuggets of the gold for easy cash).
Actually, the zombie freakout was nothing compared to the physics major's freakout...
"Wait.. so this gold... It's radioactive? In *pulses*? And it secretes a slippery red oil, even in a sealed container? I... but... HOW??"
Zombies are usually pretty cliche', but I do like 'Emperor Zombie' from the one shot "The Amazing Screw-On Head" animated short. Hilarious guy.
...Yeah, I remember now, it was when we were talking about zombie dogs, and clowns, and I think someone said something about zombie clowns(?)... maybe not though.
Something I really fear (but I know is sort of irrational) is spiders (or the freakishly large ones).
Now if you will excuse me, I need to go load up my shotgun.
Melee weapons don't run out of ammunition. I'm just sayin'...
Always...
Probably because they're zombie ponies. Completely different from normal zombies because they're ponies and, as we all know, making anything a pony immediately makes it better...somehow...
But yea, I'm not a fan of that part of the horror genre either, much less the genre as a whole. Zombie games though? Eh, I play them occasionally (I.E: when a friend bugs me about it) but it's just not my thing. Unless they're death knights, then I can get behind them 100%.
http://www.allmystery.de/i/tb1f9be_dark-my-little-pony-zombie-Favim.com-435.jpg
Oh, and I can't forget the ones from "Story of the Blanks":
https://th07.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/i/2012/295/f/1/shadows_by_otakuap-d5ikbc8.jpg
http://i1.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/192/976/556.png
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2013/224/d/e/story_of_the_blanks_by_rikori95-d49aaiw.png
So yea, you've made a really good point there, kudos! Now if you will excuse me, I need to go lie down after seeing that first picture...
ᴬᶫˢᵒ, ʲᵘˢᵗ ᶰᵒʷ ᶠᵘᶫᶫʸ ʳᵉᵃᶫᶦᶻᶦᶰᵍ ᵗʰᵃᵗ ᶦᵗ'ˢ ᴬᵖᵖᶫᵉᵇᶫᵒᵒᵐ, ˢʷᵉᵉᵗᶦᵉ ᴮᵉᶫᶫ ᵃᶰᵈ ˢᶜᵒᵒᵗᵃᶫᵒᵒ ᵒᶰᶫʸ ᵐᵃᵏᵉˢ ᶦᵗ ʷᵒʳˢᵉ⋅⋅⋅ᴵᵗ'ˢ ᵒᶠ ᵐᵘᶜʰ ʰᶦᵍʰᵉʳ ᑫᵘᵃᶫᶦᵗʸ ᵗʰᵃᶰ ᵐᵒˢᵗ⋅⋅⋅ᵇᵘᵗ ᵘᵍʰ⋅⋅⋅ᵗʰᶦˢ ᶦˢ ᵖᵃʳᵗᶦᵃᶫᶫʸ ʷʰʸ ᴵ'ᵐ ᶰᵒᵗ ᶦᶰᵗᵒ ᵗʰᵉ ʷʰᵒᶫᵉ ᶻᵒᵐᵇᶦᵉ ᶜʳᵃᶻᵉ⋅⋅⋅
Thank ya kindly, Mykin, for understanding, appreciating and adding to my point. I forgot to mention how awesome I think the Blanks are, as well! (--And they're still creepier than human zombies...)
Anyway, Mace Direwolf, very nice pictures. You definitely have good taste in quality, and an eye for detail.
Thank ya', Specter! 'Mighty kind of you to say that. It's an even greater compliment, considering that I am an artist! Unfortunately, I haven't drawn ponies more than once yet. I'm as slow as a turtle when it comes to art...Mite shame, that.
Ugh, those things are EVIL. I had one attack the party in a game I ran and I purposely held back on it's power just to test the PCs' ability to fight dark spirits like this.
Nope, it still tore them all a new one. O.o
Nope, it still tore them all a new one. O.o
I truely havent found anything i am actually afraid of. I can get startled but not scared. Of course i do work in a haunted house as the master cannibal but still.
I have this weird thing where traditional zombies bother me in the sense that the world is basically gone. So I do my own thing with zombie-like creatures and generally eventually have a cure. Then once the cure is readily available, have the characters deal with fallout.
If I were in your position with your opinion, then I would say a Necromancer isn't zombies. A necromancer manipulates death and decay. Zombies happen to be a byproduct, not a central theme even if the Necromancer specializes in raising the dead. Zombies are a perk and almost always completely under the Necro's control. That's why someone who doesn't care for zombie games and the Zombie Apocalypse would be okay with a Necromancer. It's a piece of the death mage's pie, not the whole stinkin' tin.
I don't have any stories about the undead, sadly. All I can tell you about is my very first effort at building a D&D campaign around a Zombie Apocalypse. Well, not realy, that would imply that the zombies were a new thing. The players were going to be part of a 4e--because I have the core books--world that was almost entirely Raven's Run (I think that was the dead people region in the standard D&D world?) and the living were tired of living under the demon Orcus' thumb (because Orcus is in the book). I had all kinds of ideas for it, including a random, completely unnecessary point where Kobolds were going to fight on behalf of Orcus because "screw you, I wanna use Kobolds in my zombie campaign." I think that's part of where I wound up falling off with the idea. Not that I disliked the kobolds, but I kept looking for more offensive types for a race that was mostly small, squishy, and almost completely Rogue-y. I discouraged myself from there and the note sheets are still tucked in my 4e Player's Handbook.
The zombies were going to be fun though. I was figuring out how to take certain living races and giving them an Undead affect based on the descriptions of various undead monsters with comparable power sets that would add to the creature's threat level with all that "can't feel pain" fun of crit immunity. Or near-crit immunity. I can't remember how it works, I assume it works the same for Undead as it does Constructs?
And before anyone points out one of the players I'm currently DMing is a necromancer: That's different. In... some way I haven't thought of yet.