Best All Round Weapon for a Zombie Apocalypse

[WolfThomas]

For melee a crowbar, it basically a heavy piece of steel, wood can break and blades can dull, but this thing is going to outlive you. You can swing it like a bat and if it takes your fancy stab stuff with the point. It'll help you break into buildings, it's relatively cheap and 100% legal for anyone everywhere to buy prior to "Z-day" and finally if you drop it, it's not the end of the world...well it is, but you know not because you dropped it..

The book also has one chapter describing the showdown between the US army and the zombie horde, in which the utter futility of conventional weapons is shown.

Except that part is a ridiculously inaccurate portrayal of military tactics in an otherwise splendid book.

Seriously there's really long thread, http://forums.spacebattles.com/showthread.php?t=156471, which posits that even with his faulty logic and ignorance of military doctrine, they still would have won if they hadn't magically ran out of ammunition.

The best weapon though would have to be a Tommy Gun with barrel magazines. .45 caliber rounds shot at a decently high rate of fire, and if you can get yourself a suit and a cigar, you can kill zombies while looking like a true gangster. None of this modern, hold your gun sideways crap: just good ol' fashioned style. Yeaaaaaaaaaah.

A classy choice, but something that IMHO would be too heavey, too inaccurate and too much of a waste of ammo (full auto is not your friend here). For the same price you could probably get any variety of semi-automatic rifle, which would serve your purposes better. But classy choice nonetheless.

 

[Sinclair Solutions]

A pistol with only one clip. The bullets go into my brain. Looks like I'm not going to be eaten alive (or not experience it, anyways).

 

[TriGGeR_HaPPy]

Super Gravity Gun. C'mon.
My ammo will be them.

However, I've gotten used to using a sledgehammer for extended periods of time without getting too tired... That could be fun.

 

[Paelias]

Does a tank count as a weapon or does it have to be something you hold?

If not, I have to agree with a lightsaber.

 

[Bernzz]

I'm happy with my good ol' chainsaw

Which will, when exposed to real life physics and not videogame physics, quickly become blunt, and also clogged with rotting zombie entrails? Good choice.

 

[MadBlueWinnie]

Portal gun, with the blue portal going into a chainsaw, while i aim the orange at zombies

 

[Bravo 21]

Does a tank count as a weapon or does it have to be something you hold?

If not, I have to agree with a lightsaber.

id actually rather go with the lightsaber, largely because tanks use prodigious amounts of fuel, i have no knoledege of how to use them, and where there's lightsabers, there may be jedi. of course where there's tanks, there are probably someone who knows how to drive them

 

[Shock and Awe]

Realistically? If you only had one weapon you would be dead very fast, or if it was a gun; when you run out of ammo.

The only way is two weapons, one ranged, and the other melee. I would definitely use the HK-416 and a titanium crowbar. The Hk is relatively light, uses the common(in the US anyway) 5.62x45 NATO round, is highly accurate, and incredibly reliable. The crowbar is a perfect bludgeoning weapon, and useful outside of combat as well. Plus a titanium construction is just heavy enough to deliver one hit skull crackers, but light enough for quick strikes.

 

[FalloutJack]

So I know there was a post of the best melee weapon for an apocalypse but what about if you could use anything?
Personally, I would use a metal bat. You never ran out of electricity for it or bullets. All you need to do is keep up your strength for it.

I love how even though you say melee, a bunch of people entered in some ranged weapons. For me, I will say the best zombie weapon IN FICTION is the Lobo, or the Lobotomiser. Read World War Z for why. As for non-fiction? The ever-useful crowbar!

 

[Agrael]

Flamethrower.

Duh.

Shotguns don't leave flaming zombies.

 

[MARKMCMARCUS]

It really depends if these are fast or slow zombies. I mean if it was fast zombies I'd probably go with a machine gun or something, where as if they were slow I'd use a shotgun. The reload time on a shotgun would get me killed pretty fast unless the zombies were moving at a below average speed.

 

[Jezzascmezza]

A minigun?
Lots of ammo, and it could kill many zombies very fast.

 

[sketch_zeppelin]

If anyone has yet to say the human brian than epic fail on the Escapist. There is no greater weapon against the undead hord than our ability to think and reason. You may be thinking that this goes without saying but man has proven time and time again that even though he has a brain, rarely does he use it. In which case it doesn't matter how powerful the arsenal, if you don't use your brain they will eat it and the rest of you.

Now after taking that into consideration, i'd have to go with a simple crowbar. Light, easy to use, effective as both a club and a stabbing weapon and it has the advantage of being able to pry open things such as doors windows or the odd box. A gun or a sword is nice and all but a crowbar doesn't just help you kill zombies, it helps you escape from them.

 

[Tyconn4]

I actually made up a formula in case this would happen:
Gun
Blade
Melee
or GBM. For me, my GBM is shotgun, fire ax, and a sledgehammer. What's yours?

 

[mitaka7730]

give me Mjolnir,or a Katana and let me at those hordes of zombies

 

[WolfThomas]

It's obviously a good crowbar. A sword, a hammer, an axe all of these things may break over time or get dull. A crowbar is just a heavy piece of metal. You can hit with the blunt bit, and use the wedges to stab. Plus it helps you break into places for supplies, if you pick a long enough one it can be used as a walking stick and if you drop it to run it's no huge loss.

For guns anything in a pretty common calibre .22, 9mm, 5.56, 7.62m, 12gauge. No point having a massive cannon chambered in .338 Lapua Magnum (aka $5bills).

 

[mitaka7730]

everyone seems so into the crowbar... imagine this: you have 3 zombies coming at you,you stick one with the crowbar-won't do you much good,and it might get stuck in there;same problem with smacking them on the head-even bigger chance of the crowbar getting stuck and you being screwed.While a katana is MUCH better-you can hack off a limb or a head,and with a hammer..well,a zombie with a crushed head ain't much of a threat now,is it?

 

[infohippie]

Sledgehammer. You don't run out of ammo, even if you miss the zombie's head on your first swing, you're gonna be breaking something, and it will be a big help in breaking into locked doors/cabinets/etc.