Zombie

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Version 0.30: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.
A corpse raised to undeath by necromancy.

"It seemed that while the zombie came from the grave, it was neither a ghost, nor yet a person who had been raised like Lazarus from the dead. The zombie, they say, is a soulless human corpse, still dead, but taken from the grave and endowed by sorcery with a mechanical semblance of life-it is a dead body with is made to walk and act and move as if it was alive. People who have the power to do this go to a fresh grave, dig up the body before it has had time to rot, galvanize it into movement, and then make of it a servant or slave, occasionally for the commission of some crime, more often simply as a drudge around the habitation or the farm, setting it dull heavy tasks, and beating it like a dumb beast if it slackens."
-William Seabrook, _The Magic Island_. 1929.

Zombies are the reanimated corpses of once-living creatures. As a type of derived undead, their stats are based on what the monster had in life.

Useful Info

Zombies are slower, stupider, and clumsier than their alive counterparts. However, they have good durability for a derived undead. Zombies of certain monsters may be more durable than their non-undead selves.

  • HP: (HD)d5 + 6*HD
  • AC: Original - 2
  • EV: Original - 5
  • Speed: Original - 2 (at least 3)
  • Melee attacks: 80% of original
  • Attack flavour: None
  • Special: Does not regenerate, cannot traverse stairs

Zombies are immune to poison, negative energy, torment, and resistant to cold damage. Like all undead, they are vulnerable to holy.

Zombies may be created by Animate Dead spell, Yredelemnul's passive reaping, and the unrand Sword of Zonguldrok. Hostile zombies may be found the Crypt and in various vaults.

Strategy

As servants, zombies are great meatshields. Despite being weaker than the base monster, a mass of zombies can be quite effective. Most monsters are glass cannons (relative to the player), so 80% damage is still significant.

Even the weakest zombies can be used as retreat fodder. Keep these zombies behind you, and when things go poorly, go behind the zombies. The fodder will block shots and allow you to escape from attacks of opportunity. You can also attack behind zombies with Polearms or smite-targeted attacks.

Your zombies will crumble when you leave the current floor.

Identifying Zombies

Although zombie versions of each monster will have different stats, Crawl tends to lump them together, making identification at a glance difficult. In console mode, zombies will be separated into zs and Zs, representing large or small zombies. Tiles mode is more specific, providing unique tiles for several categories of monster, but there is still a lot of possible variation within those categories. In either mode, you can always press x and highlight the zombie in question to determine exactly what type of monster you are dealing with.

Below are all the categories of zombies in tiles mode:

Zombie adder.png Adders

Zombie bear.png Bears

Zombie bee.png Bees

Zombie bird.png Birds

Bat zombie.png Bats

Beetle zombie.png Beetles

Zombie hound.png Canines

Zombie centaur.png Centaurs

Zombie crab.png Crabs

Zombie draconian.png Draconians

Zombie drake.png Drakes

Zombie dragon.png Dragons

Zombie quicksilver dragon.png Quicksilver dragons

Zombie iron dragon.png Iron dragons

Zombie gold dragon.png Gold dragons

Zombie elephant.png Elephants

Zombie elf.png Elves

Zombie eye.png Eyeballs

Zombie faun.png Fauns

Zombie frog.png Frogs

Zombie cockroach.png Giant cockroaches

Zombie gnoll.png Gnolls

Zombie goblin.png Goblins

Zombie guardian serpent.png Guardian serpents

Zombie harpy.png Harpies

Zombie hobgoblin.png Hobgoblins

Zombie hornet.png Hornets/Wasps

Zombie horror.png Horrors

Zombie howler monkey.png Howler monkeys

Zombie human.png Humans

Small zombie.png Humanoids (small)

Large zombie.png Humanoids (large)

Zombie hydra 1.png Zombie hydra 2.png Zombie hydra 3.png Zombie hydra 4.png Zombie hydra 5.png Hydras

Zombie bug.png Insects

Zombie jackal.png Jackals

Zombie jelly.png Jellies

Zombie juggernaut.png Juggernauts

Zombie kobld.png Kobolds

Zombie kraken head.png Krakens

Zombie lernaean 1.png Zombie lernaean 2.png Zombie lernaean 3.png Zombie lernaean 4.png Zombie lernaean 5.png Zombie lernaean 6.png Zombie lernaean 7.png Zombie lernaean 8.png Zombie lernaean 9.png Zombie lernaean 10.png The Lernaean hydra

Zombie lindwurm.png Lindwurms

Zombie lizard.png Lizards

Zombie meliai.png Meliai

Zombie merfolk.png Merfolk

Zombie minotaur.png Minotaurs

Zombie naga.png Nagas

Zombie octopode.png Octopodes

Zombie ogre.png Ogres

Zombie orc.png Orcs

Zombie small quadruped.png Quadrupeds (small)

Zombie large quadruped.png Quadrupeds (large)

Zombie winged quadruped.png Quadrupeds (winged)

Zombie quokka.png Quokkas

Zombie rat.png Rats

Zombie salamander.png Salamanders

Zombie scorpion.png Scorpions

Zombie snake.png Snakes

Zombie spider small.png Spiders (small)

Zombie spider.png Spiders (large)

Zombie spriggan.png Spriggans

Zombie troll.png Trolls

Zombie turtle.png Turtles

Zombie ugly thing.png Ugly things

Zombie worm.png Worms

Zombie wyvern.png Wyverns

Zombie yak.png Yaks

Zombie yaktaur.png Yaktaurs

History

  • Prior to 0.29, zombies required a corpse item to be raised by Animate Dead, which implicitly forbid monsters like Slimes from being zombies. Reanimated zombies kept their weapons and armour. Zombies could also spawn randomly in the main Dungeon.
  • Prior to 0.26, raising a zombie meant losing out on the chunks the corpse provided.