Taser effects on undead, thought?

[Icefalcon]

So I got to thinking a bit earlier. I know, dangerous prospect. But serious, how would a taser effect a zombie? Would they still be subject to the muscular spasms caused by this device? Would it cause them to flop around on the ground like a fish out of water? I am curious what the effects would be because tasing a zombie would make it easier to attack it with a melee weapon without any worry of reprisal attacks.

[Zamion138]

Hmmm a taser might spasim them out but i think zombies have less fluid in them so it might not be as effective, i dont think it should do any sdc to them but i could see a momentary stun, only while current is passing through them. No after effects. Might ignite them alight to if you hold the button long enough.
Id make them yell whiles its happening though to attract more zombies personaly.

[Icefalcon]

I had considered the constant current being necessary to keep them down. You bring up an interesting point about the lack of fluid. I might have to do a little research into that. I also agree with the no after effects, they just wouldn't feel any. I also hadn't considered the ignition factor but I know it is possible. The screaming I will have to think about because the zombies don't use their actual throat to call other zombies so no muscle control necessary for it. Hmmm, you have given me a couple of things to think about.

[ArmySGT.]

The Taser overrides the control the brain has over voluntary muscles. Now how does the reanimated corpse command the body to shuffle after you? If it is magical, I say no effect. If it is a virus that re-animates the dead, maybe and then maybe not.

[Icefalcon]

I have already decided which theory from the core book I am using (not putting here because players read the boards). I can say that I am not using the magical theory though. I do use the fact that a portion of the brain still works (the primal part) so I should think that the taser would interrupt those signals to the movement of the zombie.

[Zamion138]

if the nerves are there they should fire off kinda at random or all at once cuaseing them to go into a rigid state at the least or the fetal postion i suppose if your allowing the none magical working monster idea.

[SittingBull]

Interesting. Last ditch but interesting.

[Icefalcon]

Why last ditch? It could be used when you catch one or two of them alone.

[SittingBull]

I meant getting that close.

[Zamion138]

I meant getting that close.

Yeah but most of them are dumb so you can use electrified fences and downed power lines, or air tasers though they are not cheap even now for the cartridges

[Icefalcon]

I was thinking more along the lines of a cattle prod or stick taser (something like 18-24 inches). It gives yo a bit of reach instead of being right in grappling range.

[Josh Hilden]

I would think that it would depend on how "Fresh" the zombie is.

[Icefalcon]

I would think that it would depend on how "Fresh" the zombie is.

I don't know, passing an electrical current through a heavily decayed body might make it burst.

[Zamion138]

I would think that it would depend on how "Fresh" the zombie is.

I don't know, passing an electrical current through a heavily decayed body might make it burst.

Kinda morbid but next time you find a dead bird or squirrel hit with a car battery for a bit and see how it works out and note the level of decay

[cornholioprime]

I have already decided which theory from the core book I am using (not putting here because players read the boards). I can say that I am not using the magical theory though. I do use the fact that a portion of the brain still works (the primal part) so I should think that the taser would interrupt those signals to the movement of the zombie.

Zombies -at least in this setting -don't work off of any rules/laws of physiology as we understand them.

They are supernaturally animated, they take supernaturally high amounts of damage to destroy them (note that by the numbers they do NOT go necessarily down with the first shot to the head, even if the resulting wound would be instantly fatal to virtually any living creature), and as such, Tasers, if they work at all, wouldn't achieve their effects by interrupting signals from the brain.

Also keep in mind that in reality the brain itself dies EXTREMELY quickly (even mere moments of events such as oxygen starvation is enough to start killing cells off in significant numbers) -it's the first organ to die off as a whole in complex organisms such as ourselves.


With all that being said, and if we're going to be "realistic" here, a GM might rule, for example, that IF the zombie is still "fresh" enough ("fresh" as in time since death, not time since the undead has somehow regenerated himself), the muscles of the corpse -which take much longer as organs to die off than does the brain -might be affected in at least some small way by the passage of electricity through them and respond to the shocks as if they were signals from the brain, and act accordingly.

What I don't know about, at all, is how long that "fresh" period might be, before the muscles themselves are too degraded by decay to work as muscle groups any more; I even looked up the old "electricity through frogs' legs to make them kick" experiments before posting here......but they didn't offer any clues as to how long the animal had been dead.

[Icefalcon]

I have already decided which theory from the core book I am using (not putting here because players read the boards). I can say that I am not using the magical theory though. I do use the fact that a portion of the brain still works (the primal part) so I should think that the taser would interrupt those signals to the movement of the zombie.

Zombies -at least in this setting -don't work off of any rules/laws of physiology as we understand them.

They are supernaturally animated, they take supernaturally high amounts of damage to destroy them (note that by the numbers they do NOT go necessarily down with the first shot to the head, even if the resulting wound would be instantly fatal to virtually any living creature), and as such, Tasers, if they work at all, wouldn't achieve their effects by interrupting signals from the brain.

Also keep in mind that in reality the brain itself dies EXTREMELY quickly (even mere moments of events such as oxygen starvation is enough to start killing cells off in significant numbers) -it's the first organ to die off as a whole in complex organisms such as ourselves.


With all that being said, and if we're going to be "realistic" here, a GM might rule, for example, that IF the zombie is still "fresh" enough ("fresh" as in time since death, not time since the undead has somehow regenerated himself), the muscles of the corpse -which take much longer as organs to die off than does the brain -might be affected in at least some small way by the passage of electricity through them and respond to the shocks as if they were signals from the brain, and act accordingly.

What I don't know about, at all, is how long that "fresh" period might be, before the muscles themselves are too degraded by decay to work as muscle groups any more; I even looked up the old "electricity through frogs' legs to make them kick" experiments before posting here......but they didn't offer any clues as to how long the animal had been dead.

As I said, I am not using the "supernatural" animation. Say for example, that the brain was partially reanimated (the primal part as I said earlier) by a virus (like in The Walking Dead), would that change your answer?

[SittingBull]

I was thinking more along the lines of a cattle prod or stick taser (something like 18-24 inches). It gives yo a bit of reach instead of being right in grappling range.

Cattle prod?! Nice! That's worth xp!

[SittingBull]

Urge to play a mad scientist who survived now.

[Icefalcon]

Urge to play a mad scientist who survived now.

Don't forget your acids, lime and sodium.

[ArmySGT.]

Thinking back....... None. None at all.

The Zombie is not affected by discomfort.

[Icefalcon]

Thinking back....... None. None at all.

The Zombie is not affected by discomfort.

And what about the electrical impulses that make muscles move? Would they not be interrupted?

[ArmySGT.]

Thinking back....... None. None at all.

The Zombie is not affected by discomfort.

And what about the electrical impulses that make muscles move? Would they not be interrupted?

Depends upon how and in what way the reanimation affects the voluntary and involuntary muscles. If it is a virus acting as its own transmitter, without need of the nerves themselves, none.

If it is just transmitting through the fluids, and not the nerves, none.

Though it could affect the muscles and cause them all to contract. The affect lasts for the duration the current is applied. The typical Taser runs for 5 seconds, then must be re-activated.

[say652]

since tasing counts as a stun attack and undead cannot be stunned.................

[Icefalcon]

since tasing counts as a stun attack and undead cannot be stunned.................

I think I am going to allow this in my games. This will be the only "stun" attack they are vulnerable to.

[SittingBull]

All electrical stuns you mean?

[say652]

in a few of the unkillable zombie movies i watched(you most likely know what series) the unkillables were killed by electricity and in the next movie of the series a "stun"gun of sorts was developed.

[cornholioprime]

As I said, I am not using the "supernatural" animation. Say for example, that the brain was partially reanimated (the primal part as I said earlier) by a virus (like in The Walking Dead), would that change your answer?

The layman's misconception about a Corpse is that it is essentially a sort of biological "blank slate" automaton that just needs something like a little electricity or a few chemicals or a brain transplant to get it back up and running again.

In reality, a corpse that is more than a day or two or three old -especially in the non-refrigerated conditions of the Dead Reign setting -is little more than a human-sized, human-shaped piece of hamburger. The internal structures of the corpse are actually largely liquified at that point, and for that reason not only would your virus be ineffective (Viruses don't work in quite the way that you seem to think that they do, and they replicate by using the existing "DNA Factories" of a LIVING cell to reproduce), but your Taser also wouldn't work because the inner workings of something like a Muscle Cell needs more than just a jolt of electricity to get it up and running -muscle movement is actually a pretty complicated electrochemical process that also involves the proteins that make up the physical fibers of the muscles themselves. Those structures break down rapidly after death.

Essentially, there aren't many, if any, muscles there in the putrefied corpse for the Taser to affect.

[Icefalcon]

All electrical stuns you mean?

Pretty much.

[Icefalcon]

As I said, I am not using the "supernatural" animation. Say for example, that the brain was partially reanimated (the primal part as I said earlier) by a virus (like in The Walking Dead), would that change your answer?

The layman's misconception about a Corpse is that it is essentially a sort of biological "blank slate" automaton that just needs something like a little electricity or a few chemicals or a brain transplant to get it back up and running again.

In reality, a corpse that is more than a day or two or three old -especially in the non-refrigerated conditions of the Dead Reign setting -is little more than a human-sized, human-shaped piece of hamburger. The internal structures of the corpse are actually largely liquified at that point, and for that reason not only would your virus be ineffective (Viruses don't work in quite the way that you seem to think that they do, and they replicate by using the existing "DNA Factories" of a LIVING cell to reproduce), but your Taser also wouldn't work because the inner workings of something like a Muscle Cell needs more than just a jolt of electricity to get it up and running -muscle movement is actually a pretty complicated electrochemical process that also involves the proteins that make up the physical fibers of the muscles themselves. Those structures break down rapidly after death.

Essentially, there aren't many, if any, muscles there in the putrefied corpse for the Taser to affect.

Undead. Not quite dead, not quite living. There is no applying scientific principles of decay and putrefaction to that.

[cornholioprime]

As I said, I am not using the "supernatural" animation. Say for example, that the brain was partially reanimated (the primal part as I said earlier) by a virus (like in The Walking Dead), would that change your answer?

The layman's misconception about a Corpse is that it is essentially a sort of biological "blank slate" automaton that just needs something like a little electricity or a few chemicals or a brain transplant to get it back up and running again.

In reality, a corpse that is more than a day or two or three old -especially in the non-refrigerated conditions of the Dead Reign setting -is little more than a human-sized, human-shaped piece of hamburger. The internal structures of the corpse are actually largely liquified at that point, and for that reason not only would your virus be ineffective (Viruses don't work in quite the way that you seem to think that they do, and they replicate by using the existing "DNA Factories" of a LIVING cell to reproduce), but your Taser also wouldn't work because the inner workings of something like a Muscle Cell needs more than just a jolt of electricity to get it up and running -muscle movement is actually a pretty complicated electrochemical process that also involves the proteins that make up the physical fibers of the muscles themselves. Those structures break down rapidly after death.

Essentially, there aren't many, if any, muscles there in the putrefied corpse for the Taser to affect.

Undead. Not quite dead, not quite living. There is no applying scientific principles of decay and putrefaction to that.

Not quite the way that you're stating it.

They die first, then come back as a zombie, as is evidenced by the ample amount of information given by the authors themselves regarding the ways in which they function, how they feed, their resistance to normal forms of injury that is harmful or fatal to most lifeforms, and so on.

They're not alive at all, and there's no "Schroedinger's Cat" type of situation going on here -they are corpses, unliving things, reanimated and motivated by supernatural forces.

As such, they can be affected or unaffected by just about anything and everything that the authors want them to be either affected by or impervious to, without regards to physical or biological rules.

[Icefalcon]

You say they are animated by supernatural means. I say they are not. If that is the way I wish the zombies to work in my games, then that is how they work. I am after all the GM of my games.

[cornholioprime]

You say they are animated by supernatural means. I say they are not. If that is the way I wish the zombies to work in my games, then that is how they work. I am after all the GM of my games.

So I got to thinking a bit earlier. I know, dangerous prospect. But serious, how would a taser effect a zombie? Would they still be subject to the muscular spasms caused by this device? Would it cause them to flop around on the ground like a fish out of water? I am curious what the effects would be because tasing a zombie would make it easier to attack it with a melee weapon without any worry of reprisal attacks.

Questions posed to Forum Members typically elicit a Canon response unless otherwise stated in the OP.

[Icefalcon]

Dead Reign, pages 7-8, I think you should read them again. There are five theories on what caused the zombies. It is up to the GM to decide which to use.

[cornholioprime]

Dead Reign, pages 7-8, I think you should read them again. There are five theories on what caused the zombies. It is up to the GM to decide which to use.

The early pages of what the Author tells you to choose from regarding theories about those zombies, has nothing to do with the host of official supernatural powers presented in their stats and list of capabilities.

(Also, pages 7 and 8 are Brad Ashley's listing of opinions on the possibilities of what happened from the limited perspective of the survivors, not the "God's Eye" view, provided to us by the Authors themselves, of how the zombies really function.)

[SittingBull]

I'm curious as to what the 5 popular theories are.

[Icefalcon]

I'm curious as to what the 5 popular theories are.

#1 Miracle Drug
#2 Pandemic
#3 Germ Warfare
#4 Wrath of God
#5 Death Cults and Dark Magic

[SittingBull]

I read somewhere, not talking about DR talking about a novel, where the zombie outbreak was caused by a flu vaccine. LOL

[Icefalcon]

I read somewhere, not talking about DR talking about a novel, where the zombie outbreak was caused by a flu vaccine. LOL

Plague Town? If so, I have read that one.

[say652]

a comet passing by earth started the plague in a few books i have read and a movie or two. how the exist and function is up to the gm. i call this type of zombie a plague zombie(passes disease along) other types include created zombies(create zombie spell) which do not pass plague along but retain a higher level of intelligence and do not decay. i use both types in my game. i also use a third type the unkillable zombie,plague bite, retains intelligence.

[Icefalcon]

a comet passing by earth started the plague in a few books i have read and a movie or two. how the exist and function is up to the gm. i call this type of zombie a plague zombie(passes disease along) other types include created zombies(create zombie spell) which do not pass plague along but retain a higher level of intelligence and do not decay. i use both types in my game. i also use a third type the unkillable zombie,plague bite, retains intelligence.

[SittingBull]

Cattle prod... still awesome.

[Icefalcon]

Well, I will find out what my players think in a couple of weeks when I run my game.

[ZINO]

The Taser overrides the control the brain has over voluntary muscles. Now how does the reanimated corpse command the body to shuffle after you? If it is magical, I say no effect. If it is a virus that re-animates the dead, maybe and then maybe not.

I will say no effect but after reading this maybe
I agree with you on this one

[ZINO]

a comet passing by earth started the plague in a few books i have read and a movie or two. how the exist and function is up to the gm. i call this type of zombie a plague zombie(passes disease along) other types include created zombies(create zombie spell) which do not pass plague along but retain a higher level of intelligence and do not decay. i use both types in my game. i also use a third type the unkillable zombie,plague bite, retains intelligence.

reminds me of the video game coming out "the last of us" sorry could not help my self

[Icefalcon]

Well no word from my players yet. I was missing half the group (8 total players) at the last game but will ask the next time about what they think.

As for the mystical zombie vs. the disease zombie, I like the idea of the disease zombie better and is what I use.

[arthurfallz]

Look up examples of people who cops have had to wrestle to the ground even while being tasered.

Imagine, instead, these people are undead monsters who feel no pain. Tasers are worthless against the undead, unless massive voltage was put through the body (enough to start super-heating the tissues).

Tasers are DAMNED useful against bandits, death cultists, fellow survivors, rabid dogs, bears, cougars... all of these things feel pain, and would not like tasers at all!

PS: I voted Brains.

[cornholioprime]

Look up examples of people who cops have had to wrestle to the ground even while being tasered.

Imagine, instead, these people are undead monsters who feel no pain. Tasers are worthless against the undead, unless massive voltage was put through the body (enough to start super-heating the tissues).

Tasers are DAMNED useful against bandits, death cultists, fellow survivors, rabid dogs, bears, cougars... all of these things feel pain, and would not like tasers at all!

PS: I voted Brains.

It's a recurring issue in many discussions that center on taking down the undead -assuming that Zombies react or respond to the normal rules of biology. If I remember correctly, one person was even discussing martial arts moves and pressure points/nerve strikes as being useful against them, for goodness sake!

People often talk about physically combating these creatures in more or less the exact same way that one would take down a normal being of flesh and blood......when they should really be thinking of these creatures as being closer to robots in composition and durability than the humans they once were, in terms of weakening or defeating or destroying them.

[Trent]

I was thinking more along the lines of a cattle prod or stick taser (something like 18-24 inches). It gives yo a bit of reach instead of being right in grappling range.

There are ways to increase the output to those but forget where I read it

[Tirisilex]

In the movies "Land of the Dead" and "Zombie Apocalypse" electricity effects them.
Land of the Dead has electric fences that keep zombies out.
Zombie Apocalypse they use Police Tasers that make Zombies fall to the ground and flip around like dead fish for a few minutes.

As for an explanation I have none.. Someone thought about using electricity in their movie and figured yes.. electricity would stop a zombie.

[Josh Hilden]

In the Book The Zombie Autopsies electricity and Dopamine inhibitors both effect the dead.

http://www.amazon.com/Zombie-Autopsies- ... +autopsies