Poll: Choose your Apocalypse: Zombies or "The Change"

[The_Lost_King]

So the other day I was reading some of the Walking Dead comics after finishing Dies The Fire. I was thinking about which Apocalypse I would rather go through, The Change or Zombies

Spoiler: Description of the change for those who haven't read Dies the Fire

So anything that relies on electricity(it can't travel through wire the electricity in your brain works) or fast combustion(fire works but no explosions) doesn't work anymore. No cars, no guns, no radios. You are pretty much back in the Dark Ages. Except for 1 important thing, modern medical knoledge and left over medicine, so we are not trying to cure something with magical potions and the eye of newt. You will have to learn how to swing a sword, shoot a bow, ride a horse, and most importantly survive. You will have 2 options. Banditry or trying to found a new community. Trillions will die whether it be from starvation, bandits, or the black plague(yes it does come back in the book but it was not as threatening what with modern medicine.). Your new life will be a hard one but you can make it( I just realized this sounds like a summary of a videogame, some one should get on a Dies the Fire videogame)

I would pick the change. Here are the pros and cons of each:
Change:
Pros:
- I only have to worry about diseases from dead bodies rather that them coming back to life
- Settling down is so much easier seeing as only bandits will plague you rather than hordes of the dead. I also clarified the modern medicine.
Cons:
- No Modern Technology
- Farming is very hard work without machines
- Some bandits are very well organized(The Protector)
- Cannibals
- Hard to survive the winter
- Set back to square one

Zombies:
Pros:
- Modern Technology still works.
- You don't have to learn a completely different way of fighting
- Zombies are unintelligent
Cons:
- It is impossible to go back and settle places that are teeming with Zombies
- It is nearly impossible to wipe out every last Zombie
- Almost zero hope of returning the world back to normal

(I am having a hard time with zombies because the most interaction with zombie media I have had is like 40-60 pages of Walking Dead compendium 1.)

Stuff that is the same:
- Major cities are death traps
- Billions will die
- Life will seem almost impossible
- It is easy to go insane

Edit: replaced trillions with billions. Happy? Ok I looked up how many people there were on the planet and I must of got the US's debt mixed up with population or something. Made the change a little more clear. Made combustion, electricity, and medicine more clear. Nit picky bastards.

 

[game-lover]

I'd go with the Change.

Going off what I see here, if I'm in danger of possibly being eaten alive, at least the cannibals have a threshold of pain. You can incapacitate them much more easily than something already dead.

Hack off a leg or arm? They'll stay there and won't do the crawling or limping after you deal damage.

Besides, modern technology wouldn't be much use to anyone with zombies once everyone ends up blocking themselves in thresholds.

 

[DugMachine]

No combustion... we can't have fire :/? The change sounds more pleasant but those winters must be a ***** if I can't even make a fire haha. Probably going to go with Zombies. I'd rather deal with a brainless zombie than human on human action.

 

[GrimTuesday]

No combustion... we can't have fire :/? The change sounds more pleasant but those winters must be a ***** if I can't even make a fire haha. Probably going to go with Zombies. I'd rather deal with a brainless zombie than human on human action.

You can still make fire, its just things like gunpowder and engines don't work.

I just finish Dies the Fire the other day actually, and I'd rather have that then zombies. I would be much more likely to survive a situation like The Change due to my natural gifts, not to mention the area I live in is perfect for that sort of apocalypse, until the Protector starts marching his mean across the I205 bridge that is.

 

[The_Lost_King]

a couple of things.. trillians die? over estimating the population of the planet a bit there. and im confused as to no combustion. wouldnt that make fire impossible as well? i dont even think you could begin to manufacture modern medicines without electricity, etc

zombies.. wait a few weeks and it would be over completely. even quicker in warmer weather

either way a hobby of mine is learning old crafts so i should be right come any disaster

isn't there like 6 trillion people. Trillions could mean 2-3. You can pretty much count out china and Japan comepletly because in both scenarios the country is the best place to be and there is barely any country and over half of the population in each country is going to die so it would be fair to say at least half of the population would die.

a couple of things.. trillians die? over estimating the population of the planet a bit there. and im confused as to no combustion. wouldnt that make fire impossible as well? i dont even think you could begin to manufacture modern medicines without electricity, etc

zombies.. wait a few weeks and it would be over completely. even quicker in warmer weather

either way a hobby of mine is learning old crafts so i should be right come any disaster

Well it really just slows down combustion. bullets just sort of fizzle. I think that the change is man made so I don't think they would eliminate fire completely.

 

[Muspelheim]

I did vote The Change first, but... Nah, I'd rather take zombies. For honestly, if we're going with zombies by the "rules" set in the Zombie Survival Guide (slow, unintelligent, contamination through body fluids only), it's honestly not going to be much of an apocalypse...

Zombie apocalypses seem to always hinge on one thing; all the world's authorities being utterly incompetent or just refusing to realizing the nature of the threat. Now... Lots of things can be said about the average police corps. But they don't all have testosterone-sacks for brains, and they are in just as much contact with popular culture as anyone else. When crazed, staggering cannibal-people starts popping up, I'm fairly sure they'll get what to do right quick. They've seen the movies, too. Shoot 'em in the head. Don't get bit. I think most authorities could pull that off.

If there was a real-life outbreak in, say... Kaunas or whatever, it wouldn't be too long until either the police or the army manages to get on top of things, at which point it just becomes a biohazard. Now, zombies procreate by biting people. Yes, it might happen the first few times, but... Who would let themselves be bit by someone who is obviously rabid and shambling towards you? I doubt the contamination would reach too staggering levels until it was contained. And once they run of delicious humans to bite, the zombies aren't really getting much of a chance, are they? Unless you work at the Kaunas hospital or something or are just unlucky, I'd say a zombie "apocalypse" wouldn't ruin your day too much. So I'd pick that. :3

 

[Muspelheim]

AMAZINGLY SNIPPED

Vector of contamination: bodily fluids.

Knowing how most people interact you'll have hundres of contaminations in a very short timespan, and if a large group of people gets infected at once they'll just pop up at the sime and possibly overwhelm the ability of local enforcement to contain them.

If this happens in a major metrepolitan area (tokyo, new york) you'll have your small scale apocalypse. Let's not forget that some people may travel by plane and infect other countries (assuming it takes more than 20 hours for the mutation to happen) and quite probably infect their capitals too.

Thinking about infected flight attendants: Rome -> Paris->London ??

If it's airborne the world will be dead in a week, but with fluids i think it can be contained to major population centres.

Well, that's the thing, though, lots of people getting infected at once. And the world's authorities by and large are less completly useless at their jobs than in the films, if a deadly infection like the Solanum virus were to appear, I'd say that they would be on the ball enough to at least halt the spread, or limit it to major population centres, as you say.

I suppose that the biggest question in it all would be if it only infects through bites or blood or if someone in zombie incubation sneezes in his hand and uses a doorknob which is then used to someone else. If the latter -is- true, we're probably a slightly bit more boned.

Still, I'd prefer that scenario.

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

Easy, Zombies.

Combustion includes "burning wood," "burning matches" and just plain "fire," meaning surviving anywhere far from the tropics at night, or having the ability to see if you didn't pack several metric tons of glow sticks for the end of the world where you can't light a match or rub two sticks together to get a light.

Also, since nerves transmit data from our brains to our muscles though electricity, logically we would instantly die.

Also, zombies would be a very easy thing to stop: http://www.cracked.com/article_18683_7-scientific-reasons-zombie-outbreak-would-fail-quickly.html

 

[karcentric]

I don't want either, I want nuclear war as my apocalypse, than I can live in a hole in the ground wait it out.

 

[twistedmic]

isn't there like 6 trillion people. Trillions could mean 2-3. You can pretty much count out china and Japan comepletly because in both scenarios the country is the best place to be and there is barely any country and over half of the population in each country is going to die so it would be fair to say at least half of the population would die.

There are roughly 6.6 billion people on earth, not trillion. I don't think there is enough room or resources on the planet for even one trillion people (which is over a hundred times more than the current world population).


As for the original question, I'd take the Change over Zombies. It might take some hard work, but I'm pretty sure I can adapt to living without electricity or cars (I don't even drive). And not having to worry about zombies creeping up on me in my sleep, or trying to escape deathtrap, burning cities filled with ravenous living dead and jumpy, twitchy armed people is a big plus.

 

[Asita]

Well it really just slows down combustion. bullets just sort of fizzle. I think that the change is man made so I don't think they would eliminate fire completely.

If fire's still an option, you might want to edit the original post to reflect that. In that case, I'd definitely go with the change over the zombies. Living without proper tech is definitely possible with the right know-how, and ultimately more stable in the long run, especially if we consider the possibility that a zombie-infection might not be exclusive to humans and/or might make a resurgance after the initial uprising. Truthfully there's a whole themepark of variables to consider with zombies ranging from the commutability of the infection to the age old 'fast or slow' question, to their habitable range, to the amount of time they can 'survive' before they starve or decompose, what it takes to kill them again, how long an infection can remain dormant, etc, with some scenarios being MUCH easier to survive than others. Without specifics, I'd have to go with the change being the more survivable situation (though granted, I'd likely choose that at any rate)

 

[DeadlyYellow]

Also, since nerves transmit data from our brains to our muscles though electricity, logically we would instantly die.

That is the first thing that came to my head when I read the op.

Also beat me to the Cracked article.

 

[Evil Smurf]

because we have enough rednecks with guns: Zombies. EMBRACE YOUR 2ND AMENDMENT RIGHTS IDIOTS REDNECKS!

 

[PrinceOfShapeir]

Fucking Zombies. If the Change were to happen, the laws of physics would have broken and it's the precursor to the end of all things. Zombies we can deal with. Besides, I still hold out hope for moon bases.

 

[veloper]

It seems to me that the only reason why people have so much trouble with zombies in TWD is because they are stupid.

Those walkers are so fragile you can bash their heads in with make-shift weapons and they lack the super strength of other zombie stories. You can actually wrestle with a walker and come out on top, as repeatedly shown.

I get how it could be an initial surprise when everyone who ever dies, regardless of the cause, may rise as a hungry zombie, but the whole scenerio would never have gotten as much out of hand, if real people acted just their normal stupid self.

A combined effort to hunt down and destroy every zombie should work. Walkers are the slowest and weakest creatures ever to get in the way of humans.
When you can hunt elephants and lions to near extinction, walkers are no obstacle.

Even if you go completely pacifist on them, merely building 7 foot tall brick wall around your farms and industries will keep the walkers out.
A construction feat that medieval peasants were capable of, only here the walls are actually an effective defense and you don't even need to man the walls to defend them.

 

[veloper]

your standard zombie relies on biting or bodiely fluids to transmit infections, they are "dead" hence you will have bacteria and flies not to mention animals making short work of them, on top of that you only need a small period of decomposition for them to be unable to walk let alone run.

humans are at the top of the food chain for a reason we are damn good at outwitting and killing other predators.

i love zombie movies as much as the next person but it would be over pretty quick. one thing you never see in the movies is how the outbreak starts all you ever get is that its poping up exponentially everywhere at the same time.

heck even if the zombies were normal people made crazy and they bit people ala 28 days later they would be come extinct pretty darn quick due to dehydration.

if an outbreak occured in a major population centre one thing you could count on is doing anything at all to contain it and if that needed nukes then thats what would be used

as for that change. if fire is still possible then humanity would just turn to steam power instead

Even if the walker outbreak got out of hand (say for example, deliberately escalated), I reckon it would be easy to get it under control again.

So the walking dead: USA = about 300 million walkers tops.
Let's recruit some zombie hunters from the military and from militias and skilled civilians across the USA.

How long would it take to destroy one zombie, slowly shambling towards you, with a headshot? Let's take our time, crack some jokes and carefully line up just 1 shot per minute.
Now we don't want to excert ourselves too much, so a zombie hunter doing actual work from 9 till 5 is enough already! That's roughly 500 destroyed walkers per day, per hunter.

Let's say we wanted all the walkers gone before the next planting, so we want them gone within one year. The zombie hunters still get benefits and holidays and some free weekends off, so let's say 300 work days per year.

Now we need to recruit only 2000 people across america to get rid of all walkers.

I don't think there should be any trouble getting that many volunteers. Best job ever!
Ugly enemies that you can gleefully kill without feeling any remorse and no chance of getting fired back at.