My additions (big post)

By WillWhoopins, in Zombie Apocalypse

Posted at

Hello everyone,

I've DM'd a lot of things, and I won't bore you with 10+ years of details since I've started playing role playing games. But I do have things to contribute to this particular game: Zombie Apocalypse. Hopefully it will help enhance your own sessions. ;)

1. MADE MY OWN CHARACTER SHEET ( goolge doc share link )

I made this on a whim because I got tired of asking the group questions about where they were stashing something, or what caused what damage etc. Also the stat blocks are easier to (read and re-erase) IMO. Access the link, print it as a .pdf or whatever, enjoy.

2. GAME PLAY STUFF

-Music- I found some sound tracks from some movies floating around. I'm a big sound track guy, be it from video games, cartoons, movies, etc. Turn down the lights, and have a soundtrack in the back ground. It helps a lot! I actually sorted my songs (mostly from youtube) into 3 categories (Tension, Combat, Atmosphere). As the story flows, I cycle through these, so far people really enjoy it lol. Example

-Quick NPCs- I made a chart to help me quick whip up an important NPC that you might encounter running around the world.

I made and use this: ( d20 Chart for NPC with details )

I compiled this list from a Marvel Super Heroes source from many many years ago. Some might not fit your world but whatever:

PERSONALITIES (Random d20)
1. Adventurer - Your character seeks to recapture a spirit of adventure that humanity
has lost. He or she will go often foolhardy to revitalize this adventuresome spirit.
2. Animalistic ( Feral ) - Your character has a savage side that must be kept in check. He
or she must struggle to control these feelings, or give in and lose control.
3. Demolisher - Your character causes destruction for destruction's Sake.
Demonstration of raw power causes a sense of pride, no matter what the cost.
4. Exemplar - Your character causes destruction for destruction's Sake. Demonstration
of raw power causes a sense of pride, no matter what the cost.
5. Explorer - Your character devotes his or her life to the discovery of new ideas and
environments. He or she believes the theoretical is often as powerful as the practical.
6. Gloryhound - Your character seeks publicity for personal accomplishments. Only the
adulation of the people will satisfy this individual's longings.
7. Greed - Your character is overwhelmed by desire for wealth. Even when great wealth
is achieved, more must be gained.
8. Guardian - Your character desires to protect beloved persons or places. Threats to
those loved ones trigger the strongest responses in this individual.
9. Idealist - Your character stands for a cause for which he or she would gladly die.
Challenges to those beliefs provoke strong reactions from this individual.
10. Investigator - Your character loves to unraveling human mysteries, whether of
crime, science, psychiatry, or another field of inquiry. It is especially satisfying when
that work helps others.
11. Majesty - Your character leads a people and acts as the preserver of their
interests. Personal power is wielded for their benefit.
12. Mentor - Your character acts to encourage responsibility and competence among his
or her charges. Testing the students' abilities is high priority.
13. Outcast - Your character is hated or feared for some quality, possibly a past
allegiance. He or she may want to be left alone, or will only ally with similar types.
14. Peace of Mind - Your character seeks self-perfection or freedom from inner
demons. He or she may suffer inner conflicts, or overcomes them and keeps spiritually
Balanced.
15. Protector - Your character lives to protect innocents from harm, regardless of who
or where they are. Seeing folks in danger brings out in your character an overwhelming
desire to lend a hand.
16. Repentant - Your character acts to gain redemption for past sins. Only through the
doing of good deeds can your character feel at least partially cleansed.
Soldier - Your character prizes following or giving orders unless it conflicts with his or
her moral code. He or she may fight for money or duty, but ultimately fights for
personal validation.
17. Thrill Seeker - Your character acts because of a hedonistic desire for danger and
risk. Events that heighten his or her adrenaline are highly prized.
18. Vengeance - Your character seeks revenge against someone for some real or
imagined slight. Any sacrifice to gain that vengeance is acceptable.
19. World Domination - Your character wants dominion over as many people as possible.
Resistance to his or her will can trigger violent responses.
20. Youthful Exuberance - Your character recklessly pursues life with the wide-eyed
joy of youth. Such an individual is bored easily, and not good at listening to instructions.
-Positive and Negative Features- From that same Marvel World I compiled this list. It's mostly for quick crafting NPCs or if players may want to just try making their character random in the beginning. Some of these might not exactly fit (its from the Marvel universe), just re-roll em.

FEATURES (Random d100)
Pick one positive and one negative from each category
Physical Features (positive)
01-07 Acceleration Tolerance 08-13 Adrenal Surge 14-20 Ambidexterity
21-27 Fighting Logistics 28-33 Gravity Tolerance 34-40 Hardiness !
41-47 High Pain Threshold 48-53 Learned Resistance * 54-60 Natural Talent *
61-67 Omnidexterity 68-73 Rank Increase !* 74-80 Rapid Healing
81-87 Sensory Increase 88-93 Strong bones * 94-00 Sturdiness
Mental Features (positive)
01-08 3-D Sense 09-15 Alertness 16-23 Cyber-immunity
24-31 Fortitude 32-38 High Stress Capacity 39-46 Karmic Shell !
47-54 Magical Potential 55-61 Mechanical Aptitude 62-69 Psionic Potential
70-77 Quick Learning 78-84 Rank Increase !* 85-92 Sanity
93-00 Static
Personal / Social Features (positive)
01-09 Ally 10-18 Assistant 19-27 Attractiveness *
28-36 Benefactor 37-45 Cash Flow 46-54 Charmed
55-63 Fame * 64-72 Fan Club 73-81 Likeability *
82-90 Luckiness 91-00 Reputation *
Physical Features (negative)
01-06 Acceleration Intolerance 07-12 Albinoism 13-18 Allergy *
19-24 Colorblind 25-30 Dwarfism 31-36 Epilepsy
37-42 Feebleness 43-48 Gigantism 49-54 Gravity Intolerance
55-60 Lameness 61-66 Low Pain Threshold 67-72 Missing Parts
73-78 Rank Decrease !* 79-84 Reduced Healing 85-90 Sensory Decrease *
91-95 Weak bones 96-00 Weakness !
Mental Features (negative)
01-03 Absent-minded 04-05 Action Addict 06-08 Allergy *
09-11 Attitude * 12-13 Bloodlust 14-16 Bluntness * 17-19 Bully * 20-21 Combat Paralysis *
22-24 Compulsiveness *
25-27 Cowardice * 28-29 Cyber-neurosis 30-32 Delusions *
33-35 Dyslexia 36-37 Fanatic * 38-40 Greed *
41-43 Gullibility * 44-45 Honesty * 46-48 Impulsiveness *
49-51 Inept * 52-53 Insanity ! 54-56 Insomnia
57-59 Jealousy * 60-61 Karma Deficiency ! 62-64 Laziness *
65-67 Mania * 68-69 Multiple Personality * 70-72 Pacifism *
73-75 Paranoia * 76-77 Personal Code * 78-80 Phobia *
81-83 Pushover 84-85 Rank Decrease!* 86-88 Rudeness *
89-91 Shyness * 92-93 Stubbornness * 94-96 Temper *
97-00 Vow *
Personal / Social Features (negative)
01-07 Alien Customs * 08-13 Bigotry * 14-20 Disgusting Personal Habits *
21-27 Dependent 28-33 Enemy * 34-40 Illiteracy
41-47 Jinxed 48-53 Loner * 54-60 Mega Nerd (heh heh)
61-67 Repugnant Personality *
68-73 Snob 74-80 Social Dependent *
81-87 Unattractiveness * 88-93 Unluckiness 94-00 Weirdness Magnet
3. WHAT ARE YOUR "ZOMBIES" LIKE?
Everyone thinks differently. In my particular setting, the source of my infection is:
" A rare intelligent carnivorous plant that was discovered frozen deep in the Arctic by German Explorers but only just now coming out in details because of a plane crash 50 miles outside of LAX where it was headed. ( Inspired by this story ) People unknowingly contract spores (see details below) and become hosts for the plant. It needs to consume more blood (plasma?) from humans/animals, and when it does, it grows bigger, stretching and distorting the normal features of its host until it expands and bursts."
I dunno, its a thought in progress... :/ anyway, so far its working and we're having fun. You can have normal sized "zombies" and larger disfigured horrible "zombies" to combat the PC's.
  • Minimal human intelligence (Responds to light, smells, sounds, vibrations)

  • Slow twitchy walking (Shambling or quick hobbling, can climb very clumsily *sometimes depending on terrain and motivation)

  • Infectious (People need direct warm saliva and/or blood contact to get infected. When ever you take physical damage from one of these, roll a d6 on a 1, You suffer a - 1 day trauma - infected - and are in need of an unknown cure. Slow painful process. *spoiler for PC's* You become "a zombie" unless you can get into a really cold place, near or below freezing for an extended time within the next 48 hours or so to kill off the spore)

  • Attracted to living body fluids and heat (Thirst for warmth (dry or humid), temps above freezing)

  • Human appearance but with no signs of intelligence (Leprosy like conditions with zombie like tendencies, thorns poke out from pores, eyes red/dark red, pale yellowish/greenish flaky like skin)


Basically using the infected stat blocks of creatures, with a few modifications to fit my setting and story.
4. THE WORLD AROUND YOU
Use Google Earth.... I have an ipad, so I use that to navigate without revealing things to the group hinting on my plans for encounters and such. I've also based my story out of a city that no one is familiar with so it adds to the mystery and tension of escaping danger. (I picked a small land locked town in the mid west).
My session will be extended and carried on through "chapters" if all goes well enough as planned. I only use the existing scenarios in the book I got for inspiration and ideas, well worth the cost of the .pdf :)
Have fun! Hope this helps...
Edited by WillWhoopins
Posted at
3. WHAT ARE YOUR "ZOMBIES" LIKE?
Everyone thinks differently. In my particular setting, the source of my infection is:
" A rare intelligent carnivorous plant that was discovered frozen deep in the Arctic by German Explorers but only just now coming out in details because of a plane crash 50 miles outside of LAX where it was headed. ( Inspired by this story ) People unknowingly contract spores (see details below) and become hosts for the plant. It needs to consume more blood (plasma?) from humans/animals, and when it does, it grows bigger, stretching and distorting the normal features of its host until it expands and bursts."

Nice. Reminds me of the yellow musk creeper and its yellow musk zombies. Cool idea.

YellowMuskCreeper.jpg

I once did an adaption of it for the Spycraft 1.0/Dark Inheritance system many moons ago.

Posted at

Nice. Reminds me of the yellow musk creeper and its yellow musk zombies. Cool idea.

Yes the yellow musk plant from D&D is kind of what I was thinking of :) , that and the virus from AW: Days of Ruin, "The Creeper".

86-17-92.png 90-17-96.png

I just wanted to try something else to challenge these guys. They're so used to the Walking Dead and Resident Evil, I figure this would be a unique way to approach things.

More info:

  1. Researchers band together and discover the truth about the infection after they realize how rapidly it has begun to spread around the country and world. Code named: Project Venus

    1. After the parasitic plant successfully claims its host through spore ingestion, it controls its actions and core life support functions by intermingling with its central and peripheral nervous systems at a very quick rate (About 1 week from ingestion).

      1. In the first phase of the infection, you become unbearably painful and are met with rapid dehydration and greenish like lesions all over the body.

      2. The second phase of the infection consist of major organ failures and a complete breakdown of the immune system. Thorns and plant vines began to press outwards on the skin from within.

      3. In the third phase of the infection, the host will die unless sustained with life support machines in cold temperatures. A choking, clogging effect on all the major organs of the body occur.

      4. In the fourth stage, the body will 'come to life' and seek to consume a chemical found in human blood in order to propagate its species. The more it consumes the more it grows, stretching and pulling apart the host body until it has no natural method of motions.

      5. The final stage occurs if the infected host is unable to find a source of nourishment abundant enough to maintain its growing stature. The body will cease all movement and effectively, completely 'die'. However if the plant inside has fed off of enough blood nutrients it will sprout a bud somewhere from the body which forms into a menacing looking white flower containing the white powder like spores on its pedals. If ingested by someone, the cycle continues in a new host.

    2. The exact cure is unknown. Once the spore has invaded the host, it is nearly impossible to stop. The cold is the only thing that can halt the plant from rooting itself, but extended cold can have adverse effects on warm blooded creatures of course. The theory is that if "the seed" is detected and quickly frozen before it has a chance to expand, it it can be removed form the host and destroyed

    3. Cryobiology labs are leading the research efforts.

    4. So far, there have been no known successful extractions of the plant once it has invaded a host. However, there have been rare cases where an infected was quickly contained in a below-freezing chamber and managed to survive the effects of the parasitic rooting. Although the host outlived the plant, they ultimately died from an over exposure to the sub arctic temperatures.

Edited by WillWhoopins