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Champions Lore & Romero Style Zombies

riveroceanriverocean Posts: 1,690 Arc User
in Champions Pen and Paper RPG
So in the online game - Zombies are mostly magical in nature. I'm curious about "Romero Style" Zombies within the lore though. You know undead created by chemical spills, radiation, mutated viruses, etc.. Part of me would love a CO campaign that focused on something like that. I guess you could argue the irradiates almost fall into the category.


But do classic Zombies exist in the PnP lore at all?
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    bulgarexbulgarex Posts: 2,310 Arc User
    edited April 2016
    By "classic zombies," it sounds like you mean the shamblers introduced by George Romero in his "Living Dead" movie series. Strictly speaking the "classic zombie" is a corpse reanimated through voodoo magic. Champions has that kind, too, because voodoo in the CU is real. ;)

    (Interestingly, George Romero has remarked he never thought of his living dead as being zombies, or theorized as to what force caused them to be reanimated.)

    But as to the broader question of scientifically-created "zombies," Mr. Zombie, member of the supervillain team, the Brain Trust, has such an origin: web.archive.org/web/20130812115532/http://champions-online-wiki.com/wiki/Mr._Zombie So the precedent certainly exists in the setting.

    As far as scientifically-engineered, monster-creating infectious viruses go, the PnP game has a direct analogue, the so-called "Ophidian Plague." Occurring in 2004 in the official CU timeline (and fully detailed in the adventure supplement, Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth), it transformed infected humans into berserkers with vaguely serpent-like features. The virus was spread through saliva, hence conforming to the stereotypical, "be bitten by monster, turn into monster, bite others in turn," method of propagation. The Ophidian Plague was engineered by the PnP master villain, King Cobra; but KC has not yet appeared in Champions Online. Moreover, the CO developers chose to take his civilian identity, Dr. Timothy Blank, in a different direction -- see the mission, "Blank and Stein's Monster" -- so his future status in the MMO is very much up in the air.

    Post edited by bulgarex on
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    riveroceanriverocean Posts: 1,690 Arc User
    bulgarex said:

    By "classic zombies," it sounds like you mean the shamblers introduced by George Romero in his "Living Dead" movie series. Strictly speaking the "classic zombie" is a corpse reanimated through voodoo magic. Champions has that kind, too, because voodoo in the CU is real. ;)

    (Interestingly, George Romero has remarked he never thought of his living dead as being zombies, or theorized as to what force caused them to be reanimated.)

    But as to the broader question of scientifically-created "zombies," Mr. Zombie, member of the supervillain team, the Brain Trust, has such an origin: web.archive.org/web/20130812115532/http://champions-online-wiki.com/wiki/Mr._Zombie So the precedent certainly exists in the setting.

    As far as scientifically-engineered, monster-creating infectious viruses go, the PnP game has a direct analogue, the so-called "Ophidian Plague." Occurring in 2004 in the official CU timeline (and fully detailed in the adventure supplement, Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth), it transformed infected humans into berserkers with vaguely serpent-like features. The virus was spread through saliva, hence conforming to the stereotypical, "be bitten by monster, turn into monster, bite others in turn," method of propagation. The Ophidian Plague was engineered by the PnP master villain, King Cobra; but KC has not yet appeared in Champions Online. Moreover, the CO developers chose to take his civilian identity, Dr. Timothy Blank, in a different direction -- see the mission, "Blank and Stein's Monster" -- so his future status in the MMO is very much up in the air.

    Wow this is a fascinating read. So much in the lore I didn't know. Thanks a ton.
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    bulgarexbulgarex Posts: 2,310 Arc User
    My pleasure. :)

    FYI, the PnP game has been around since 1981, the setting and characters built up over that time through several incarnations by many authors. The current official one is described in literally dozens of published books.
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    bulgarexbulgarex Posts: 2,310 Arc User
    I forgot one other variation on the "science-created zombie" theme in the Champions setting. Cadaver is a scientist whose body and mind were transformed by an experimental accident. He looks corpse-like -- grey skin, hairless, lips pulled back from his teeth, plus glowing red eyes -- but his "semi-living" body became stronger and much harder to hurt. The change to his mind left him obsessed with controlling other people. To that end he invented his "Zombiefication Pistol," a ray which places humans under his mental control. A side-effect of the ray temporarily makes them resemble Cadaver himself.

    Cadaver is detailed in Champions Villains Volume Three: Solo Villains.
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