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Characters / Zombie Army Survivor Brigade

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Zombie Army character index
Survivor Brigade | The Zombie Horde

General tropes

  • Multinational Team: Not counting the eight promotional survivors from Left 4 Dead, the original Survivor Brigade consists of a(n English-born) German-American, a natural American, three Germans, two Russians, and a French woman. Dead War additionally throws in a Chinese woman, a Nigerian woman, another German, an (undead) Englishman, and a African-American sea captain. And that's not including the Italian members of the Milanese resistance.

Characters

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Introduced in Trilogy

    Karl Fairburne 
An American military operative working for the Office of Strategic Services. Originally sent behind enemy lines for most of the war, he found himself stranded in hostile territory on the outskirts of Berlin when Hitler's zombie army was released. Although normally a "lone wolf", if the alternative was being eaten alive by undead Nazis, he was glad to team up with the other survivors.

For tropes related to his appearance in the mainline series, see here.

  • Adaptational Nationality: This verion of Fairburne is American while his mainline counterpart is German-British. This is thanks to the retcons in Sniper Elite 4, which changed the mainline Fairburne's backstory.
  • Alternate Self: He is an alternate version of the Karl Fairburne seen in Sniper Elite V2, Sniper Elite III, and Sniper Elite 4. Unlike that version of himself, this one is clean-shaven, never speaks (until Dead War), and is shown to have bandages on his head.
    • An alternate alternate Karl is the basis of his DLC "Occult" skin, being Karl from a universe where he turned to Black Magic to better fight the Dead War.
    • The "Future Karl" DLC invokes this, being a Karl from a Bad Future where the zombies eventually overran the entire Earth. It's basically one big Shout-Out to Terminator, with future Karl having the backstory of Kyle Reese but the body of the Terminator.
  • America Saves the Day: The game's minimalist story portrays him as the closest thing to a "main character", including giving him a key role in Zombie Army Trilogy's ending cutscene — though he does share this with Boris Medvedev.
  • Cold Sniper: Noted for being cool, aloof and a true "lone wolf" type. His passive skills in 4 encourage this, allowing him to use Empty Lung for longer than others, giving him an increased chance of scoring a Critical Hit on long range shots, and increasing the rate at which Overkill charges.
  • Dented Iron: In 4, his character flaw is that he has a much slower health regeneration rate.
  • The Hero: He's the closest thing that the series has to a default protagonist, given its ties to the original Sniper Elite franchise.
  • He Who Fights Monsters: The "Occult" DLC skin. Its associated lore goes "If the Dead War had gone differently, perhaps in another time and place, Karl's fate would have taken him to much darker places in the fight against the undead..." The skin features a glowing pentagram tattoo on Karl's chest, sickly gray skin, and Glowing Eyes of Doom.
  • Nom de Guerre: Dead Army gives him the official title of "The Veteran" on the character select page.

    Boris Medvedev 
A hulking and pragmatic veteran of the Red Army, Boris has narrowly avoided charges of insubordination on multiple occasions. Claiming to have seen and survived worse than the Zombie Apocalypse, he is willing to put aside his political loyalties for the sake of surviving, even if it means working with Germans.
  • Badass Bandolier
  • The Big Guy: In addition to being physically big, his traits in 4 give him bonuses to melee, though he moves slower in exchange.
  • Husky Russkie: He's a big, strong, stoic Russian guy.
  • Military Maverick: Boris never took well to the military hierarchy, which given it hardly exists anymore suits him just fine.
  • Nom de Guerre: Dead Army gives him the official title of "The Prisoner" on the character select page.
  • You All Look Familiar: Shares his character model with the Russian Elite infantry from V2.

    Dr. Efram Schweiger 
A German academic researcher; a pacifist who strove to avoid conscription by lending his skills to the Nazi researchers investigating the occult. To his horrified disbelief, he actually unlocked real magic, ultimately paving the way for "Plan Z". With the horrors of his research all around him, Dr. Schweiger's desperation to survive is matched only by his desperation to atone.
  • Alternate Self: He is an alternate version of the Schweiger who appears in Sniper Elite V2. Instead of attempting to defect from the Nazis to the Western Allies, here he ends up fighting the zombie horde alongside Karl Fairburne in search of a way to stop the undead.
  • Ascended Extra: He had a minor role in V2, as a scientist who helped with the V2 rocket programme.
  • The Atoner: He was an integral part in the research that made Plan Z possible, and he deeply wants to atone for that. Doesn't come up during gameplay due to the limits of the story mechanics, however. It does show up more overtly in his appearance in Dead War, since he actually speaks there, and it ultimately drives him to perform a Heroic Sacrifice in order to finally end Hitler and with it the Dead War.
  • Badass Bookworm: Has all the same skills as his trained fighter squadmates despite being merely a former scientist.
  • Back for the Dead: He's downgraded from a playable character in ZAT to an NPC in Dead War, with a role that ends in his Heroic Sacrifice. Later subverted during the DLC, where it turns out he's still alive.
  • Big Good: He serves this role throughout most of Dead War alongside the Milanese resistance leaders. While he does turn against Alpha Squad after being corrupted by his stay in Hell, Schweiger would resume this role after being freed from Baron Umbra's influences, and even vehemently refuses the Ragnarok cult's offers of power when they attempt to sway him over to their side.
  • Demoted to Extra: He's back to being a supporting character in Dead War (and doesn't appear for a large chunk of the campaign), and he doesn't live to see the end of the Dead War.
  • Face–Heel Turn: The Deeper than Hell chapter reveals that he survived despite being stranded in Hell, albeit at the loss of his sanity after exposure to its blood magics and the knowledge of the ancient civilization the Nazis were trying to uncover. He serves as the chapter's Final Boss, where the player is forced to defeat him in order to prevent him from wielding the ancient power for his own ends. After finally cleansing his madness in the Return to Hell chapter, Schweiger regains his sanity and once more fights for the side of good.
  • Grand Theft Me: The Return to Hell chapter in Dead War has Baron Umbra spell this out for you, as he plans to subjugate Schweiger's mind in order to take over his body and unleash Hell on the world above. With the help of the Survivor Brigade, this effort is thwarted.
  • Heroic Sacrifice: At the end of Hell Base in Dead War, Dr. Schweiger remains behind in Hell to activate the portal out, leaving him severely burned and essentially stranded in Hell, surrounded by hostile creatures and zombies. The Return to Hell DLC then subverts this by revealing he's still alive, albeit having suffered major Sanity Slippage and undergone a Face–Heel Turn, as Baron Umbra needs him as part of his Evil Plan.
  • Hollywood Atheist: Averted. Having seen first hand that there is a Hell and zombies can be animated by Black Magic, Dr. Schweiger is no longer as skeptical as he was.
  • The Smart Guy: Ends up saving the group at various points of the game thanks to his knowledge of what the collected relics can do.
  • Spared by the Adaptation: In the main continuity he dies from wounds during the Battle of Berlin. Here, he manages to survive the Nazi Zombies and lives to tell the tale. For a while, at least; in Dead War, in order for the protagonists to get to Rome and thus Hitler in time, he sacrifices himself to sustain the portal that takes them there. And then it turns out he's still alive during the Return to Hell DLC.
  • Uncertain Doom: We are never sure if he actually died at the end of Hell Base or not. Although he was left behind in the Thule dimension, and the activation of the portal back to Rome left him severely wounded, Schweiger was still alive when the protagonists last saw him. The Deeper than Hell chapter reveals that he survived, albeit possibly driven insane by his exposure to the Thule dimension, which led to his Face–Heel Turn and defeat at the player's hands. He ended up being sealed in a stone chamber underground and presumably died for good as the Z5 machine overloaded his powers. Return to Hell confirms that he is still alive despite all that, but sealed deep within impenetrable layers of Hell that can't be reached without aid from Baron Umbra, who plans to possess his body and unleash chaos on the world above. With the help of the Survivor Brigade, Schweiger manages to snap out of his madness and return to the side of good.
  • Violence Really Is the Answer: As pithily put by his Zombie Army Trilogy character profile, in the face of being eaten alive by the demonic undead, Dr. Schweiger has forsaken pacifism in the interest of survival.

    Hermann Wolff 
An apolitical captain in the Wehrmacht, Hermann Wolff had never bought into many of Hitler's more insane ideas, but loyally followed orders for the sake of protecting his family. With Hitler's insanity now threatening the lives of every human on earth, he can no longer feign even that level of loyalty to the mad Fuhrer.
  • Alternate Self: Possibly? He shares a name with the Mad Scientist Big Bad of Sniper Elite V2 and looks somewhat like him, though if they're meant to be the same, it's definitely a case of way more Alternate and far less self and more like a What If?.
  • Enemy Mine: Given he's Wehrmacht and the Survivor Brigade includes an American OSS operative, two Red Army soldiers, a French Resistance fighter, and a German woman turned Nazi hunter after her family was executed.
  • Heel–Face Turn: It's safe to say that considering what happens in the trilogy, he's now turned his back on Hitler for good.
  • Invulnerable Knuckles: Averted in the final cutscene. Hermann gets spooked by a zombie while escaping and comically resorts to punching it right in the face. Immediately afterward he is shown shaking his hand in slight pain while continuing to flee.
  • Noodle Incident: What happened to his family after Plan Z was launched.
  • Punch-Clock Villain: Started out as this, carrying out the Nazis' orders to the Wehrmacht to protect his family while never buying into the Nazis' ideology of racial supremacy. Then Plan Z happened, and he couldn't stomach even that level of villainy any more.
  • Token Enemy Minority: He's an actual member of the Nazi Army, but is strictly portrayed as a decent man who never believed the Nazis' racist creed and simply sought to protect his family. He would be the only Defector from Decadence in Trilogy aside from Schweiger, until the introduction of Werner Sauer in Dead War.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: His fate after the Zombie Army Trilogy is unknown, although the "Undercover" costume for Karl Fairburne does kind of look like him, and his Suspiciously Similar Substitute, Werner, has a DLC costume that is explicitly based on Hermann's outfit from ZAT.
  • You All Look Familiar: Shares his character model with the generic German Officers in V2.
    Beth Coleman 
A female American portrait artist who found herself caught up in the catastrophe of Plan Z, Beth Coleman was fortunate that her keen eye and steady hand proved to be as applicable to slinging lead as it was to slinging paint.

    Marie Chevalier 
A female French resistance fighter who was instrumental in key sabotage missions that facilitated the Allies' advance after the Normandy Invasion. Having travelled to Berlin on a personal mission to assassinate the Fuhrer, she found herself forced to team up to survive after the dead rose and began to devour the living.
  • Action Girl: Marie was a tough, smart and resourceful resistance fighter even before the zombie apocalypse.
  • Age Lift: In ZAT, she looked like a young woman, but in Dead War she looks and sounds middle-aged.
  • Ascended Extra: She features prominently in preview screenshots for the ZAT complete game, replacing Dr. Schweiger. She's also one of the three ZAT player characters who returns in Dead War.
  • Call to Agriculture: She dreams of owning a vineyard once the war is done.
  • Canon Immigrant: Marie became a canon character in the mainline series in Sniper Elite 5. She's the first of the original characters from ZAT to appear in the parent series.
  • Distaff Counterpart: To Efram, albeit only in that she replaces him in cutscenes and wears a similar outfit. Backstory-wise they are nothing alike.
  • Glamorous Wartime Singer: She was apparently a lounge singer prior to the war, according to her Lounge Singer DLC description. She gave it up to join the Resistance.
  • La Résistance: Previously she was part of the French Resistance against the Nazi occupation, and then ended up as part of the Human Resistance against the Nazi undead hordes.
  • Master of Disguise: According to flavor text in Dead War, Marie is an expert at disguising and infiltration. One of her DLC costumes is an SS uniform, complete with Eyepatch of Powernote .
  • Nom de Guerre: Dead Army gives her the official title of "The Survivor" on the character select page.
  • Noodle Incident: Either Marie somehow knows what the various artifacts are needed for (due to her replacing Efram in cutscenes) or she's managed to save the group various times through sheer luck.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: Zigzagged. Initially, she was absent from Dead Army, but returned as a playable character via purchased DLC.

    Anya Bochkareva 
Formerly a University student, this amateur sharpshooter gave up her studies and signed up for the Red Army when Hitler ordered the invasion of her homeland of Russia. Taken on as a sniper, she proved surprisingly formidable, one of the traits that has kept her alive after the retaliation of Plan Z.

    Hanna Schulz 
A German freedom fighter who was roused to fight against Hitler's tyranny after one of his officers executed her husband and children. Having succeeded at murdering the man who pulled the trigger, her quest for vengeance led her to continue striking against Hitler's officers, until the Nazi dead rose from their graves.
  • Action Mom: Went from a happy housewife and mother to a murderous guerrilla fighter to a zombie-slaying badass.
  • Creepy Souvenir: The Nazi army officer uniform she wears is somewhere between this and a Tragic Keepsake; it belonged to the man who executed her family, and who was her first kill.
  • Distaff Counterpart: To Hermann.
  • Mama Bear: Having been an orphan, her fierce loyalty to her family is one of her defining traits, especially since her family was killed.
  • Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Her entire motivation for killing Nazis before the war was because they murdered her family. When they rose from their graves, that was just a chance to kill them all over again.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: Absolutely no mention is made of her in Dead Army.

    The Survivors 
Trilogy introduces the original lineup from the Left 4 Dead series to the horrors of Hitler's undead horde. As Trilogy lacked voiced dialogues, they are for all intents and purposes identical. For the tropes found in their source material, see here and here.
  • Artistic License – History: Coach's provided bio in Dead War gives his reason for being in this timeline was due to him stumbling upon an abandoned Kriegsmarine U-boat in the middle of Louisiana of all places. How it went all the way from Europe to a swamp in the Deep South is anyone's guess, given the shallow depths of the Mississippi river delta.
  • Moveset Clone: The survivors are merely a model swap of Trilogy's protagonists, and will replace them in cutscenes where applicable. Taken to literal levels in Dead War, where some of them even share passives and animation sets with certain characters from the game's native roster.
    • Trilogy: Nick and Bill replace Karl and Beth, Zoey and Rochelle replace Efram and Marie, Francis and Coach replace Boris and Anya, and Louis and Ellis replacing Hermann and Hanna, respectively.
    • Dead War: Bill - Karl, Francis - Boris, Louis - Hector, Zoey - Jun (uses Shola's animations), Coach - Josiah (uses entirely new animations), Ellis - Shola (uses Josiah's animations), Nick - Marie (uses Karl's animations), and Rochelle - Werner (uses Jun's animations).
  • Time Travel: Their bios in Dead War implies this being the case for their appearance in the series, with the original quartet having apparently been plucked from the Left 4 Dead timeline to 1945 Europe by the Sagarmatha relic, while the sequel group was taken due to them blundering into forgotten relics in a Louisiana swamp, thus elevating them from Guest Fighter status to canon level.
  • Version-Exclusive Content: They are only available to owners of Trilogy on Steam. Averted in Dead War, where they were added in a free update on all available platforms.

Introduced in Dead War

    Jun 
A Chinese ambassador's attache who was in Moscow when Plan Z was activated. She picked up a gun and fought her way out of the infested territories, hooking up with the survivors to become an active agent during the events of Dead War.
  • Affirmative-Action Legacy: She's a Chinese woman who has replaced Herman Wolff and Dr. Efram Schweiger as the "official" player character selection, thus adding both women and non-Caucasians to a default party that had originally been made up of four white men.
  • Badass Bureaucrat: She used to be arm-candy for a Chinese ambassador. When the Zombie Apocalypse reached Moscow, she fought her way out out successfully, and then went on to join the Resistance to try and cull the population of Husks once Hitler was defeated.
  • Fragile Speedster: Downplayed in that she actually isn't one of the characters with a "increase damage taken" type flaw, but she does have a faster movement speed and lower Stamina cost for sprinting, making her the quickest-moving of the characters.
  • The Gunslinger: She specializes in the use of pistols, to the point that needing fewer pistol kills to charge the Brain Burster special attack is one of her unique bonuses. The penalty is that she does notably less damage with melee attacks compared to her companions.
  • Interchangeable Asian Cultures: Despite being Chinese, one of her DLC skins is the "Night Ops", which is clearly evoking the traditional pop culture costume of a Ninja.
  • Nom de Guerre: Dead Army gives her the official title of "The Volunteer" on the character select page.

    Shola 
Daughter of a wealthy Nigerian barrister, Shola had already volunteered in a munitions factory when Plan Z was activated. During the interim, she transferred to the Resistance as a military engineer, and became a participant in the Dead War.
  • Action Survivor: She was a barrister's daughter, and then a munitions factory worker. Despite this, when the Zombie Apocalypse came out, she voluntarily transferred to the front lines so she could do her part to better winnow the army of the dead.
  • Affirmative-Action Legacy: She's an African woman who has replaced Herman Wolff and Dr. Efram Schweiger as the "official" player character selection, thus adding both women and non-Caucasians to a default party that had originally been made up of four white men.
  • Armor Is Useless: Whilst she has a DLC costume called "Armor Plated" that sees her dressed up in improvised heavy metal armor, it's purely cosmetic. In fact, her unique character weakness is that she takes more damage from bullets compared to the other playable characters!
  • Nom de Guerre: Dead Army gives her the official title of "The Engineer" on the character select page.
  • Wrench Wench: Her skills in the munitions factory translated to a career as a military engineer in the Resistance. This is even reflected in gameplay by causing her traps to have a wider area-of-effect, representing her superior skill at handling and using explosives.

    Josiah 
Josiah is a mischievous Creole sailor with a lifetime of maritime tall soldiers. Whilst initially he served the Resistance by ferrying soldiers to daring raids throughout the Mediterranean, by the time of the resurgence in the Dead War, he had joined the zombie kill squads of Italy. Known for his devilish wit and natural charisma.
  • Mysterious Past: Stated in his Private Detective DLC description, where it's said he's had many previous jobs. At the very least, he's a World War 1 veteran, a former private detective, and is now a river boat captain helping to fight the undead.
  • Nom de Guerre: Dead Army gives him the official title of "The Captain" on the character select page.
  • Older Than They Look: One of the available DLC outfits for Josiah is a World War I-era Harlem Hellfighters uniform, suggesting that the Captain was an active combatant during the time. Given the enlistment age during that period, Josiah can be anywhere between 44 and 48 at the youngest by 1946. The outfit description even lampshades this.
    Josiah is older than he looks.

    Hector 
A RAF Spitfire pilot who fought in both World War II and the Dead War, Hector met his end when he crashed in the Alps. When Hitler activated the artifact, Hector was brought back, but somehow kept his free will. After meeting back up with the Resistance and convincing them he was friendly, he resumed his fight against the Nazis.
  • Ace Pilot: He used to be one while alive, being one of the RAF's finest flying aces.
  • Anti-Regeneration: Being undead, Hector cannot be healed by the effects of Divine damage and has to resort to takedowns and traditional medkits to keep himself standing.
  • Heel–Face Brainwashing: If Hector "dies" in co-op, he still gets "reanimated" as an enemy zombie like any other character.
  • Noodle Incident: Why Hector returned as a zombie at all is unclear, given the reanimation spell explicitly only raised dead Germans...
  • Not Too Dead to Save the Day: Literally. The guy died in a plane crash in the Alps and was revived along with the dead Third Reich when Hitler activated the Sagarmatha Relic, but something went wrong along the way that let Hector keep his free willnote . He now serves in the Brigade as one of its officers, which its members are strangely okay with.
  • Quintessential British Gentleman: A rather culturednote , polite, and reserved zombie, keeping his cool and dry wit while killing scores of Nazi zombies.
  • Speech Impediment: His speech is noticeably slurry, and he also has a hard time pronouncing many of the words with "s" and "sh" sounds in them due to his lower lip being missing as a result of his reanimation.
  • Visual Pun: Rather humorously however, while his lower lip has rotted away, his upper lip is still intact. Which takes Stiff Upper Lip to its literal extremes.

    Werner Sauer 
Werner Sauer was a German career soldier who initially fought in the Afrika Korps, until a fateful transfer to Normandy, where he encountered one of Hitler's Occult Generals performing an unspeakable ritual and shot the man, being loyal to Germany and not Hitler. Narrowly avoiding a firing squad, he spent months surviving grueling punishments and suicide missions in a penal battalion before Project Z plunged Germany's surviving military forces into even greater chaos and gave him an opportunity to escape. Still loyal to the Fatherland, he joined the Resistance against the dead, viewing Hitler as a traitor to his nation.
  • Combat Medic: His passive traits seem to be geared towards being this, with a buff to healing via Divine ammo and his medkits being able to overheal, temporarily boosting health beyond the maximum value.
  • Defector from Decadence: Like Hermann Wolff, Werner's true loyalty lies with Germany, not Hitler's tyrannical regime. After finding out about the Third Reich's dabbing in occultism, he shot the officer he learned of it from and was sentenced to harsh labor, which provided him with the training he needed to survive the zombie hordes. Of the entire cast, Werner sounds the most enthusiastic and relieved whenever one of Hitler's plans are foiled in the campaign.
  • Nom de Guerre: Dead Army gives him the official title of "The Renegade" on the character select page.
  • The Stoic: He rivals Karl in this regard, being completely focused on the mission and outright stating he never jokes. Ever.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: His backstory combines elements of both Hermann Wolff and Efram Schweiger. He can even purchase a DLC outfit based on Hermann's costume from the first game, which is explicitly stated to be one of Hermann's uniforms that Werner found in a Resistance safe house.

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