D20 Modern Rules For Zombie Campaigns based on
World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, and
The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks
The ZombieMedium Undead
Hit Dice: 2d12+3 (Toughness)
Grapple Points: 2d12
Initiative: -1
Speed: 30ft
Defence: 11 (-1 Dex, +2 Natural), touch 9, flat-footed 11
Base Attack/Grapple: +0/+1
Attack: +1 Melee (1d6+1 Slam)
Space/Reach: 5ft
Special Attack: Bite, Solanum Infection, Feeding Moan
Special Qualities: Blindsense, Headshot
Saves: Fort +0, Ref -1, Will +3
Abilities: Str 13, Dex 8, Con -, Int -, Cha 1
Action Points: 0
Feats: Toughness
The Zombie can only make one move action or one attack action in a round. They can make both only if they charge.
Bite: When a Zombie is grappling a human being or other creature, and reduces that creature’s Grapple Points to 0, it can then make a Bite attack against the unfortunate victim, tearing a chunk out of a random body part. The wound bleeds profusely, dealing 1d6 Constitution damage.
Solanum Infection: A Zombie’s bite attack contains a deadly virus known as Solanum. Once a victim has been bitten by a Zombie, they must make a Fortitude Save (DC 20) or become infected with Solanum. The virus has a 12 hour incubation period. After that time, the victim goes into a coma. 20 hours after infection, the victim dies (no save). At 24 hours from infection, the victim reanimates as a Zombie.
Feeding Moan: Whenever a Zombie spots its prey, it will open its mouth (if it has one) and, unless it has lost the ability to vocalize, unleash a hellish moan that will attract any other Zombies within earshot. The moan is audible from 150 feet. It takes up to 5 rounds, therefore, for Zombies that hear to respond and arrive.
Blindsight: It has been theorized that Zombies’ uncanny ability to hunt and feed even in complete darkness is because they do not share humanity’s sight-dependency. They use all their senses equally when hunting their prey, and thus are not penalized in conditions of total darkness or when their eyes have rotted out of their sockets or been destroyed.
Headshot: Zombies are notorious for their ability to ignore any and all damage to its body. They will continue to pursue their prey in spite of bullet wounds, knife wounds, severed limbs, broken spines, you name it. The only way to truly destroy a Zombie is to sever its head or destroy its brain.
Fighting Zombies:Conventional warfare is simply ineffective against the undead threat. Most shooters will tend to concentrate ranged fire at the bulkiest section of an opponent - the torso. However, due to Zombies’ inherent immunity to pain and resistance to damage, that will maybe - maybe - only slow it down, giving the shooter precious seconds to escape before being turned into ghoul-chow.
Let it be repeated: The only way to ‘kill’ a Zombie is to sever the head or destroy the brain.
Zombies are not intelligent. They don’t know how to formulate plans, call for backup, operate even the most rudimentary of weapons or tools, (much less firearms), or even duck behind cover. They will shamble towards their prey through a hail of bullets, through fire or water, and nothing can deter them once they have found their prey. Zombies have been known to fall blindly, one after another, into a ravine trying to get to a human on the other side. The fact that a Zombie’s moan attracts other Zombies is not a sign of intelligence, or organization. It is purely coincidental, and instinctual. Zombies work on instinct alone, and when they hear the telltale moan of another Zombie, they recognize only that there is human flesh nearby.
Zombie-fighting rules:Grapple Points: In addition to Hit Points, characters roll a new stat based on the primary ability of their Heroic class. These are Grapple Points, and they determine how long you can wrestle with a ghoul before it gains the edge and sinks its Solanum-infested teeth into your delicious flesh. Strong characters, for example, gain their Strength bonus to their Grapple Points. Grapple Points use the same Dice as the character’s Hit Dice. At every new class level, you roll new Grapple Points the same way you would Hit Points, adding the roll to your previous total.
Ex: A Strong character with a Strength of 15 adds this +2 modifier to a roll of 1d8 (maximum roll at first level) for a Grapple Point total of 10 at first level. At level 2, he rolls 1d8 and adds his Strength bonus to determine how many Grapple Points he earns.
Grapple Points
Strong 1d8+Str Mod.
Fast 1d8+Dex Mod.
Tough 1d10+Con Mod.
Smart 1d6+Int Mod.
Dedicated 1d6+Wis Mod.
Charismatic 1d6+Cha Mod.
This represents the character’s ability to use his primary ability to struggle with a Zombie - a Strong character will use brute strength, while a Fast hero will squirm and dodge away from the Zombie. A Smart hero will use special techniques, and a Dedicated hero will fight using their common sense to avoid being bitten.
Multi-class Grapple Points:For a multi-class character, take the Grapple Point Dice of the class in which you are taking the level. A 4th level Strong Hero/1st Level Fast Hero who gains enough experience to attain 6th level decides to take a 2nd level of Fast. Therefore, they add 1d8 plus their Dexterity modifier to their Grapple Point total.
Grapple Point Recovery: Grapple Points recover at a rate of 1 GP/round for every Heroic level, as long as the character is no longer being grappled by a Zombie.
Ex: A 4th level character recovers 4 GP/round as long as he is not grappling with a Zombie.
This represents the character recovering their strength or regrouping their thoughts, which takes much less time than recovering from wounds sustained in battle, like hit point damage.
Headshots:Zombies have a Defence of 11, which is hard to miss. However, hitting a Zombie will not kill it unless you destroy the head. So how do you do that? You have to hit it in the head.
A Zombie’s head counts as a Fine object, granting it a +4 Defence bonus for a total of 15. When attacking a Zombie, the player must specify that they are attacking the head. If the headshot misses, but the attack hits its regular Defence of 11, the attack still hits, but is not fatal.
The Zombie’s head has 5 hit points.
Other body partsA Zombie’s head is not the only thing you can sever. The Zombie’s arms and legs can also be severed, with a +2 Defence bonus each (13 Defence).
Severing a Zombie’s arm reduces its remaining Grapple Points by x½, and incurs a -4 penalty on all Strength and Dexterity-related skill and ability checks.
Severing both arms reduces a Zombie’s Grapple Points to 0 - it can’t grapple if it has nothing to grab with.
Severing one or both of a Zombie’s legs or otherwise crippling it from the waist down (severing the spinal cord still renders a Zombie paralyzed) reduces its speed to ½ and renders it prone (-4 melee Defence, +4 ranged Defence).
When hitting a Zombie’s chest (Defence 11) with a ranged piercing attack, roll d%:
1-50 - normal damage.
51-75 - damage one lung - Moan ability’s range reduced to 75 feet.
76-90 - damage both lungs - Moan ability cannot be used.
91-99 - damage spinal cord at waist- Zombie drops prone and cannot use legs
100 - damage spinal cord at neck - Zombie is completely paralyzed, but still alive.
Ability Scores:I am ruling that, due to the lack of magic items in this campaign setting and the extreme circumstances of the situation, characters gain 2 ability score points every four levels, instead of the usual 1. This reflects the incredible amount of physical and mental muscle-building that characters undergo while constantly fending off hordes of the walking dead. As in Star Wars d20, these 2 ability score points must be allocated to two different ability scores - they cannot be used to increase any one ability score by +2 at one time.
