Zombie Appocalypse Campaign

[GMSilvertide]

Hey All,

I have recently come into possession of the Spycraft 2.0 manual, and my players have expressed interest in playing in the world extablished by the Comic and TV Series "The Walking Dead". I have been actively looking over the materials to fullfill their request, but have found myself time and time again discovering that the materials as printed don't lend themselves to a post-apocalyptic setting. For instance the class abilities for most of the classes are geared toward the constant source of supplies and that Money actually means something.

I was wondering if any of y'all have any suggestions to adjust the campaign materials as presented to accomidate for this sort of setting.


Thanks,

GM Silvertide

[TheTSKoala]

Greetings Silvertide!

The Big Score (a PDF add-on for SC2) modifies the existing equipment rules to 3 optional, yet completely helpful different rule sets.

Walking Dead would probably do best with Stockpile or Cash n' Carry (I don't have my books on me right now.. so I forget which is which.  I always screw them up until I read em.)

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=55069

[Krensky]

Money is a bit of a red herring.

Even in a post apocalypitic setting there are things of value. Bottlecaps, bullets, food, whatever. Money is just an abstraction.

For gear, like the marsupial said, The Big Score should have you covered.

[GMSilvertide]

I shall be grabbing hte Big Score from my local store today to have a look over it's contents. Any other suggestions for class abilities or such is also appreciated.

[TheTSKoala]

I shall be grabbing hte Big Score from my local store today to have a look over it's contents. Any other suggestions for class abilities or such is also appreciated.

Was the print version.. Odd Jobs?  I know there's a collection of PDFs that went to print.  Be damned if I remember what the title was.  But if you can find it.. WELL worth the price.  

Oh!

Part B.  Fragile Minds.  Handles Horror better.. which is good.. for Zombie world.  (Should be in the same print book.. I think.)

As for suggestions for abilities and such.. once I get home.. (awaiting a flight home.. finally.. hooray!) I'll pull out my laptop o' PDFs and see if there's anything obvious that screams "Oh!  Oh!  Zombies!  ME! ME!")

[Krensky]

I remeber hacking a zombie contagion up years back.

[RusVal]

Was the print version.. Odd Jobs?  I know there's a collection of PDFs that went to print.  Be damned if I remember what the title was.  But if you can find it.. WELL worth the price.  

Shadow Play has the Big Score PDF, as well as Back to Basics (I believe), with translates the "Base Classes" concept from d20 Modern, which would fit the more "down to Earth" feel of zombie apocalypses.  Odd Jobs has Fragile Minds, as well as the Survival Horror pdf ("Evil to the CORE", which was an entry for Signs & Portents magazine, and is a free download on this site), in case you need some zombie stats.

[Desertpuma]

Also do not forget to look in the back near the Campaign Qualities for the suggestions for both Post Apocalyptic and Horror Campaigns including Class suggestions. You'll find some basic plot ideas as well.

[tfwfh]

I think it might help to know what sort of direction this is going.  By that I mean, what sort of arc is the campaign going to take?  Is the game just about surviving as long as possible before it ends with everyone being cornered and eaten by an endless horde of zombies (like Dawn of the Dead)?  Do they just need to hold out long enough for rescue to arrive (Dead Rising game, 28 Days/Weeks later)?  Do they need to find a cure or contain the outbreak (Resident Evil, I am Legend)?  Or do they need to survive long enough to get established somewhere and build a new civilization (Walking Dead, World War Z, Book of Eli)?  That last option is the one that comes to mind based on what I know of The Walking Dead.

If the goal is to survive long term and eventually rebuild or find a cure, then I think gear picks and categories will continue to have some usefulness.  At first, mostly to determine the character's starting gear.  Then later as a guideline for you to assign gear to NPCs and as a barometer of how well/poorly supplied the PCs are.  And finally in the end stage of things when they have established or joined a sizable community, maybe even in the intended sense as equipment that's been assigned to them by their community.

As others have said, I strongly recommend using one of the alternate gear systems in The Big Score.  Either Stockpile or Cash n' Carry could work, I think, but Stockpile is probably better.  Just don't refresh their gear unless you feel like it's appropriate.  Or, if you wanted to allow their gear to refresh, you could use that as an abstraction to represent the benefit of their scavenging.  In this case, simply restrict the gear they can choose from to what they have been able to scavenge, or are able to build or repair.

For trading with other groups, or within a large group, cash is somewhat pointless.  However, things like food, fuel, weapons, ammunition, and tools all become extremely valuable in this situation and will make excellent fodder for bartering.  The simple way to handle that bartering would be to just let most items be traded as commodities based on their listed cost, but personally I think roleplaying those exchanges and ignoring the dollar values is a better way to go.

If I were running such a game, my bigger concern would be to find a way to handle kits and equipment breaking down.  Kits would become extremely valuable in this kind of situation (and consequently anything that grants a jury-rig ability becomes much better than intended).  You might want to forbid the players from taking any kits with their starting gear picks.  As for equipment wear and tear, the solution that comes first to my mind is to prompt a damage save on the item as an option for activating PC errors or NPC threats.

On the other hand, if the goal is short term (survive as long as you can, until help arrives, until the quarantine is lifted), then gear picks and categories become fairly meaningless.  Use them to determine starting gear and maybe equip NPCs, but otherwise don't worry about them at all.

[Desertpuma]

As for the gear systems themselves...

If you are going to be stationary with day trips out, it might be better to use Stockpile while a transient game, where you are constantly on the go, would be better served with a Cash N Carry philosophy...

[LordKruelos]

Funny you should mention it, I actually have notes more than half-finished for my Left4Dead fan conversion

[Desertpuma]

I'd be interested in seeing those...

In a slightly unrelated note, I have a way stashed on how to do an IMF campaign rather interestingly when it comes to gear.

[Coyote0273]

If you want a true Zombie style apocalypse, you want to use the classes out of Back to Basics rather than the ones in the book. Those would be closer to your "normal people" than the base classes in Spycraft.

[LordKruelos]

If you want a true Zombie style apocalypse, you want to use the classes out of Back to Basics rather than the ones in the book. Those would be closer to your "normal people" than the base classes in Spycraft.

Amusingly enough, that's exactly the approach I'm using

[starwarsphil]

In a slightly unrelated note, I have a way stashed on how to do an IMF campaign rather interestingly when it comes to gear.

C'mon, stop teasing. Spill.