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[Trylobot]

Had a zombie apocalypse occur on my fortress a couple days ago, tried to figure out how to stop it, but in the end chose to abandon.

Here's what I know.

• No game-pausing alert was issued relating to this event
• Undead appeared inside the fort and started interrupting babies
• A vampire was thriving somewhere in my fort before it started
• The vampire was my mayor and he was never attacked unless he struck first
• No necromancer(s) visible, though I'm familiar with this scenario and successfully pushed a pair of necros back, earlier in the life of the fortress
• No evil weather was present, as far as I could tell - looked up on the wiki how that manifests when you look at the zombies it creates, and it did not match the signs
• I found that at some point a floor had been built that blocked a lot of the fort off from access to the surface; the timing of it seemed to coincide with the zombies' appearance but have no idea if they're truly related
• A mass grave built just below the surface came to life late in the event, after 125 of the initial 126 dwarves died
• Zombies killed by the surviving vampire dwarf came back to life minutes later, in groups (much like when you have a nearby necromancer, yet I could find none

Any idea what horrible affliction may have cursed and doomed this particular site?

[Deepblade]

a sneaky necromancer got inside your fort and was never revealed.

[krenshala]

I'm guessing Deepblade is correct.  I actually had this happen to me on my previous fort.  I was expecting a siege, not a sneak, and he got inside and animated the kobold, goblin and yak remains in my sheltered refuse pile.  It went downhill from there.

Tips for the next one: make sure all possible entry points have watch kittens or puppies posted.  I like dogs because they can be pastured without chains, while (I believe) cats ignore the pasturing 'orders'.  Make sure the refuse pile, tannery (pre-tanned skins) and butcher shop are not visible from outside the areas where they are located.

[ZeroMcUrist]

Something similar happened to me today:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Whilst derping about on a new fortress, I sinned and forgot about booze production. It got so bad one, and only one, of my dwarves died of thirst (so far, I think some are still thirsty but being stupid). Anyways a few minutes later I see the combat symbol and look to see that the dwarf had risen. i hadn't gotten around to burying him yet.
Dwarf was outside when this happened, btw. He attamnepted to attack another dwarf but he ran away, and now the zomb was just standing there for the moment.
Lucky for me only one other creature has been murderized, and it was butchered. unluckily it hasnt rotted away yet.

Tips to sweep the area for these bastards? I have 20 wardogs and a handful of puppies if that helps.

[Merendel]

Something similar happened to me today:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Whilst derping about on a new fortress, I sinned and forgot about booze production. It got so bad one, and only one, of my dwarves died of thirst (so far, I think some are still thirsty but being stupid). Anyways a few minutes later I see the combat symbol and look to see that the dwarf had risen. i hadn't gotten around to burying him yet.
Dwarf was outside when this happened, btw. He attamnepted to attack another dwarf but he ran away, and now the zomb was just standing there for the moment.
Lucky for me only one other creature has been murderized, and it was butchered. unluckily it hasnt rotted away yet.

Tips to sweep the area for these bastards? I have 20 wardogs and a handful of puppies if that helps.

in your case I'd recomend puting your refuse stockpile in an isolated room, around a corner from that room setup another room with wardogs pastured in it, then open that to the outside.   If you have anything reanimatable the necro will try to path to it to do so.  unfortunatly for the necro he'll have to path right by the war dogs and get revealed.

[GrimDark_Majyyks]

Necromancers can sneak, unless I was misinformed in which case disregard this. To counter sneaking you can post sentries, I think one of the more common methods is to select one of your more disposable animals and leash one or two of them in an entryway such that they will detect anything that tries to enter. Though, given that this is a necromancer we are talking about you may want to consider an alternative to that and there are several good ones provided on the DF Wiki.

[Fenrisson]

Most important when dealing with a sneaking necro, is that your refuse-stockpile and butcher area have LOS-breaker shielding them from the main Hallways - the way into those areas should be guarded by pastured animals and/or traps (I use cagetraps).

[Melzer]

I had one sneak past my guard horse. That was ‼Fun‼ _{it did involve magma, and lots of it}

[MattStriker]

Just wait until you get a necromancer from one of the flying beastman races. Mine was a Batman, appropriately enough...

[Loud Whispers]

Just wait until you get a necromancer from one of the flying beastman races. Mine was a Batman, appropriately enough...

Dig deeper, acquire crossbows and shoot everything without beard.

[Kolnukbyne]

I once dug a defensive pit around the central part of my fort. After a siege from necromancers that nearly wiped out my unprepared fort I soon learned that necromancers sneak. A Necromancer had been sneaking around the edge of my pit, bumped into a dog who attacked him and caused him to dodge into my pit and break both of his legs. At this point I'd only just recently finished my pit and hadn't walled off the inside that connected it to the inside of my fort so I can dig it without trapping my dwarves and because I'm lazy. I had, however, been thoughtful and positioned my barracks right next to the hole that led into the pit. This resulted in the crippled necromancer trying to leave the pit by walking into the barracks, seeing the soldiers and running away. Over and over. Somehow, he managed to outrun my soldiers. I decided to keep him down there.

[GrimDark_Majyyks]

I decided to keep him down there.

Good choice. You can use them to create a trap room for non-undead invaders to hilarious effect.

[Kolnukbyne]

Hmm, I wish. Not long after that I was attacked by another necromancer siege and my fort perished.