Campaign pitch

[Hound]

Saturday I will be pitching the idea of a DR campaign to my friends, here's what I'm thinking, let me know what you think?

The Wave: I love the original idea of The Wave- it happening all at once, a worldwide wave of excruciating pain followed by the dead rising. So, every highway becomes a charnel house, planes falling out of the sky, cities on fire, etc....

BUT here's the twist I want to throw at them. One of the big draws to DR is a chance to play yourself, a PC version of you. But I also like the classes like the Hound Masters etc. Sooo... my idea is this. The Wave is an actual Wave.. a almost physical wave that washes over the planet... on top of the pain, some people are changed. They remember things they never knew, skills, abilities- their bodies are even changed. My players will play themselves, but with a new class. They will become an O.C.C. but retain their memories and personalities. I'll set this up for any class except the Half-Living (that one I'll role-play out).

As for the more supernatural elements, I will add some in, the Benford Group, and some of the monsters like the Crawling Maw, Jigsaw Zombies and Necro-Golem. I think I'll leave the cause of the Wave and Brulyx open-ended. Not sure I'll use him but I might.. we'll see how the game goes. I'm also going to add in a scaled down version of the Death Mage From CE: Rise of Magic and a version of the Murder Mage from Rifter #9.

The idea is to get out of Philly alive (I'm thinking to make it slightly easier to manage Philly will only partially be vaccinated with Unisane/Altrucure) and encounter the first of the Death Cult squads sweeping up survivors and discover the first of the "collection centers", and try to liberate them. I'm trying to add Heroic elements into a survival campaign.

[whassupman03]

Hello...

Saturday I will be pitching the idea of a DR campaign to my friends, here's what I'm thinking, let me know what you think?

The Wave: I love the original idea of The Wave- it happening all at once, a worldwide wave of excruciating pain followed by the dead rising. So, every highway becomes a charnel house, planes falling out of the sky, cities on fire, etc....

BUT here's the twist I want to throw at them. One of the big draws to DR is a chance to play yourself, a PC version of you. But I also like the classes like the Hound Masters etc. Sooo... my idea is this. The Wave is an actual Wave.. a almost physical wave that washes over the planet... on top of the pain, some people are changed. They remember things they never knew, skills, abilities- their bodies are even changed. My players will play themselves, but with a new class. They will become an O.C.C. but retain their memories and personalities. I'll set this up for any class except the Half-Living (that one I'll role-play out).

As for the more supernatural elements, I will add some in, the Benford Group, and some of the monsters like the Crawling Maw, Jigsaw Zombies and Necro-Golem. I think I'll leave the cause of the Wave and Brulyx open-ended. Not sure I'll use him but I might.. we'll see how the game goes. I'm also going to add in a scaled down version of the Death Mage From CE: Rise of Magic and a version of the Murder Mage from Rifter #9.

The idea is to get out of Philly alive (I'm thinking to make it slightly easier to manage Philly will only partially be vaccinated with Unisane/Altrucure) and encounter the first of the Death Cult squads sweeping up survivors and discover the first of the "collection centers", and try to liberate them. I'm trying to add Heroic elements into a survival campaign.

That sounds great! It's good to see that your creativity knows no bounds, and that you are using all of the resources you have available (Chaos Earth and The Rifter included... ). Anyway, I bid you good luck on your Dead Reign campaign, so please take care; thanks a bunch, and have a good day.

whassupman03

[Razzinold]

I think it's an awesome idea, it's a lot like how everyone in Smallville started getting super powers because of the pieces they found.

How did the pitch go ?

[Zer0 Kay]

I did the play yourself game with one group, the thing was we were all military stationed at Elmondorf AFB IRL at the time. Issue we ran into is that the skills for the OCC aren't enough. Even using Kevin's style where you have both the normal person OCC because that's what you were before the fall and then one of the other OCCs because that's what you learn each players skill sets were still unreplicatable. Let se so we had a munitions
tactical air traffic control
ground radar maintenance
Compsys
Flight chief
Mechanic

The thing is the AF doesn't just train you in x. We also had additional duties. Granted it isn't like the navy where almost every if not all are also fire fighters, but the military options and skill sets don't even come close.

[whassupman03]

Hello...

I did the play yourself game with one group, the thing was we were all military stationed at Elmondorf AFB IRL at the time. Issue we ran into is that the skills for the OCC aren't enough. Even using Kevin's style where you have both the normal person OCC because that's what you were before the fall and then one of the other OCCs because that's what you learn each players skill sets were still unreplicatable. Let se so we had a munitions
tactical air traffic control
ground radar maintenance
Compsys
Flight chief
Mechanic

The thing is the AF doesn't just train you in x. We also had additional duties. Granted it isn't like the navy where almost every if not all are also fire fighters, but the military options and skill sets don't even come close.

I'm just curious: What year was your campaign set in? Depending on the year, you would have had different resources available - Fort Richardson didn't merge with Elmendorf until 2010, so before then it wasn't a Joint Base, for example. Still, it would be neat to see what most of those old and abandoned military bases in Alaska were used for post-Wave, ala the "Alaskan Freehold" of The Rifter #40. Personally, I know that some of them were WWII-era USAAF airfields that were either converted into civilian airports or abandoned, and others were part of the Cold War-era DEW Line. Of course, a lot of those bases were in the Aleutians and near the Alaskan coastline, so those bases could be put to use as a picket line to monitor Alaskan shores for pirates, zombie hordes, and worse - Brulyxian naval forces. Even so, some of the bases in the Alaskan interior could be turned into safe havens for refugees from CONUS or overwhelmed Alaskan cities like Anchorage or Fairbanks, delivered by noncombatant evacuation operations such as the Wright-Patterson Airlift. Anyway, please take care; thanks a bunch, and have a good day.

whassupman03

[Zer0 Kay]

Hello...

I did the play yourself game with one group, the thing was we were all military stationed at Elmondorf AFB IRL at the time. Issue we ran into is that the skills for the OCC aren't enough. Even using Kevin's style where you have both the normal person OCC because that's what you were before the fall and then one of the other OCCs because that's what you learn each players skill sets were still unreplicatable. Let se so we had a munitions
tactical air traffic control
ground radar maintenance
Compsys
Flight chief
Mechanic

The thing is the AF doesn't just train you in x. We also had additional duties. Granted it isn't like the navy where almost every if not all are also fire fighters, but the military options and skill sets don't even come close.

I'm just curious: What year was your campaign set in? Depending on the year, you would have had different resources available - Fort Richardson didn't merge with Elmendorf until 2010, so before then it wasn't a Joint Base, for example. Still, it would be neat to see what most of those old and abandoned military bases in Alaska were used for post-Wave, ala the "Alaskan Freehold" of The Rifter #40. Personally, I know that some of them were WWII-era USAAF airfields that were either converted into civilian airports or abandoned, and others were part of the Cold War-era DEW Line. Of course, a lot of those bases were in the Aleutians and near the Alaskan coastline, so those bases could be put to use as a picket line to monitor Alaskan shores for pirates, zombie hordes, and worse - Brulyxian naval forces. Even so, some of the bases in the Alaskan interior could be turned into safe havens for refugees from CONUS or overwhelmed Alaskan cities like Anchorage or Fairbanks, delivered by noncombatant evacuation operations such as the Wright-Patterson Airlift. Anyway, please take care; thanks a bunch, and have a good day.

whassupman03

incorrect. I got out 2009 we were already JBER. Our Squadrons were already being changed and Elmo's commander was already running oos for both bases. The merge just wasnt complete. But it was started before McChord/Lewis back in 2005 the same year I arrived there. So regardless of what civilians think we were already working on it prior to 2010. The bases were already connected at two points and shared facilities long before 2005. It still doesn't increase resources. The idea of joint vases is to reduce operational costs not overall costs. The F-22 crews can't take from the army's Stryker funds to get repair parts. The USAF and US Army funds are still separated. Armory, vehicles, munitions aren't combined. Essentially one base commander because Generals are expensive, combined compcontroll, personnel and recreation, stuff like that. So it still isn't possible for the USAF guys to go over and pick up some m203 grenade launchers (uneccesary because we had them too, just not as many) but if your talking about ease of getting onto the base... They e always been connected and don't require an ID check to go between them.

[whassupman03]

Hello...

incorrect. I got out 2009 we were already JBER. Our Squadrons were already being changed and Elmo's commander was already running oos for both bases. The merge just wasnt complete. But it was started before McChord/Lewis back in 2005 the same year I arrived there. So regardless of what civilians think we were already working on it prior to 2010. The bases were already connected at two points and shared facilities long before 2005. It still doesn't increase resources. The idea of joint vases is to reduce operational costs not overall costs. The F-22 crews can't take from the army's Stryker funds to get repair parts. The USAF and US Army funds are still separated. Armory, vehicles, munitions aren't combined. Essentially one base commander because Generals are expensive, combined compcontroll, personnel and recreation, stuff like that. So it still isn't possible for the USAF guys to go over and pick up some m203 grenade launchers (uneccesary because we had them too, just not as many) but if your talking about ease of getting onto the base... They e always been connected and don't require an ID check to go between them.

That's interesting. Personally I was thinking about post-Wave salvage more than anything else, pre-Wave funding aside. Units may have been forward-deployed to regions such as Iraq and Afghanistan with their weapons, equipment, and vehicles attached, which led me to believe that some resources may have been shipped elsewhere for deployment, emptying the armories and motor pools of large amounts of hardware. You also have to remember that during the Wave some other units may also be deployed to other regions to aid in the relief effort, before Hell Followed the Wave by delivering millions and millions of zombies and other human threats into the world. While I don't know which units were shipped overseas at what times and to where, this was the factor I was alluding to. Anyway, thanks for clarifying, and please take care; thanks a bunch, and have a nice day.

whassupman03

[Zer0 Kay]

BTW FYI There is a Marine Deltaforce anti terrorism detachment on JBER. The Elmo side is F-22s and F-15s a few C-5s and two AWACS. The Rich side is primarily Strykers and Black Hawks. Of course both sides have a bunch of HMMWVs and Duce and a Half's as well as government owned vehicles GOVs that are baseline no-frills civilian vehicles, frequently painted in blue for USAF or green for US Army. All base entrances are guarded by civilian contractors at the gate with support from Security Forces and MPs who also patrol the base. That isn't to say a zombie couldn't slip on undetected, after all we had an old guy who wandered on somehow after deciding to leave the bike trail that runs the Eastern and Southern border fences of the base, wild animals are also always crossing base as well. There is a Green Beret unit there and a group of TACP. The bases are also home to an ULF array and an elephant cage (AN/FLR-9). Besides the armories their are three fighter alert facilities which each house five fighter on stand by. Most of the military facilities are constructed of brick and the housing is constructed using conventional means. USAF bases are usually built with the housing closest to gates, as well as the golf course, and the military facilities surrounding the airfield past the housing. The army bases I've seen usually have the services (commisary, PX, etc.) closest to the main gate surrounded by the military facilities with housing to the sides near secondary gates and the recreation stuff toward the rear. Granted I've only been on Ft. Richardson, Lewis and Sill compared to Lackland, Keesler, Altus and Elmendorf AFBs. So I guess my experiences with both are somewhat limited but that's what I've noticed. Oh, there is always, ALWAYS some sort of weird "no body ever goes in there" facility on base.

Hey, have fun.

[whassupman03]

Hello...

BTW FYI There is a Marine Deltaforce anti terrorism detachment on JBER. The Elmo side is F-22s and F-15s a few C-5s and two AWACS. The Rich side is primarily Strykers and Black Hawks. Of course both sides have a bunch of HMMWVs and Duce and a Half's as well as government owned vehicles GOVs that are baseline no-frills civilian vehicles, frequently painted in blue for USAF or green for US Army. All base entrances are guarded by civilian contractors at the gate with support from Security Forces and MPs who also patrol the base. That isn't to say a zombie couldn't slip on undetected, after all we had an old guy who wandered on somehow after deciding to leave the bike trail that runs the Eastern and Southern border fences of the base, wild animals are also always crossing base as well. There is a Green Beret unit there and a group of TACP. The bases are also home to an ULF array and an elephant cage (AN/FLR-9). Besides the armories their are three fighter alert facilities which each house five fighter on stand by. Most of the military facilities are constructed of brick and the housing is constructed using conventional means. USAF bases are usually built with the housing closest to gates, as well as the golf course, and the military facilities surrounding the airfield past the housing. The army bases I've seen usually have the services (commisary, PX, etc.) closest to the main gate surrounded by the military facilities with housing to the sides near secondary gates and the recreation stuff toward the rear. Granted I've only been on Ft. Richardson, Lewis and Sill compared to Lackland, Keesler, Altus and Elmendorf AFBs. So I guess my experiences with both are somewhat limited but that's what I've noticed. Oh, there is always, ALWAYS some sort of weird "no body ever goes in there" facility on base.

Hey, have fun.

Surely that's a lot of fun stuff to salvage. Yet some of that hardware and the fighting men and women trained to operate it might be forward-deployed to combat the Wave or to fight terrorist organizations in other parts of the world, such as Afghanistan for instance. And let's not forget that a lot of that, such as the USAF aircraft and the USA helicopters may be inoperable or lost to enemy action or attrition during the aftermath. Using the available aircraft as an example, they may be effectively lost due to reasons such as a lack of fuel reserves, spare parts, munitions and/or a lack of qualified pilots, not to mention that some of those might have crashed in the field as most of the world's airports, both civilian and military, become compromised by either human or undead foes. But still, much of the ground vehicles (HMMWVs, trucks, Strykers, etc.), weapons (Personal and crew-served weapons belonging to the USAF Security Forces, MPs or otherwise), and supplies would be useful to survivors of the Wave, and if qualified survivors from the military get their hands on them, they can do a lot of good (Or bad, if they have been corrupted by the Death Cults or otherwise...). Even so, please take care; thanks a bunch, and have a nice day.

whassupman03

[Zer0 Kay]

Hello...

BTW FYI There is a Marine Deltaforce anti terrorism detachment on JBER. The Elmo side is F-22s and F-15s a few C-5s and two AWACS. The Rich side is primarily Strykers and Black Hawks. Of course both sides have a bunch of HMMWVs and Duce and a Half's as well as government owned vehicles GOVs that are baseline no-frills civilian vehicles, frequently painted in blue for USAF or green for US Army. All base entrances are guarded by civilian contractors at the gate with support from Security Forces and MPs who also patrol the base. That isn't to say a zombie couldn't slip on undetected, after all we had an old guy who wandered on somehow after deciding to leave the bike trail that runs the Eastern and Southern border fences of the base, wild animals are also always crossing base as well. There is a Green Beret unit there and a group of TACP. The bases are also home to an ULF array and an elephant cage (AN/FLR-9). Besides the armories their are three fighter alert facilities which each house five fighter on stand by. Most of the military facilities are constructed of brick and the housing is constructed using conventional means. USAF bases are usually built with the housing closest to gates, as well as the golf course, and the military facilities surrounding the airfield past the housing. The army bases I've seen usually have the services (commisary, PX, etc.) closest to the main gate surrounded by the military facilities with housing to the sides near secondary gates and the recreation stuff toward the rear. Granted I've only been on Ft. Richardson, Lewis and Sill compared to Lackland, Keesler, Altus and Elmendorf AFBs. So I guess my experiences with both are somewhat limited but that's what I've noticed. Oh, there is always, ALWAYS some sort of weird "no body ever goes in there" facility on base.

Hey, have fun.

Surely that's a lot of fun stuff to salvage. Yet some of that hardware and the fighting men and women trained to operate it might be forward-deployed to combat the Wave or to fight terrorist organizations in other parts of the world, such as Afghanistan for instance. And let's not forget that a lot of that, such as the USAF aircraft and the USA helicopters may be inoperable or lost to enemy action or attrition during the aftermath. Using the available aircraft as an example, they may be effectively lost due to reasons such as a lack of fuel reserves, spare parts, munitions and/or a lack of qualified pilots, not to mention that some of those might have crashed in the field as most of the world's airports, both civilian and military, become compromised by either human or undead foes. But still, much of the ground vehicles (HMMWVs, trucks, Strykers, etc.), weapons (Personal and crew-served weapons belonging to the USAF Security Forces, MPs or otherwise), and supplies would be useful to survivors of the Wave, and if qualified survivors from the military get their hands on them, they can do a lot of good (Or bad, if they have been corrupted by the Death Cults or otherwise...). Even so, please take care; thanks a bunch, and have a nice day.

whassupman03

Airports only control approach and route traffic within their airspace. Aircraft usually have toward facing aircraft esp. military, however, all military vehicles are maintenance intensive esp. the aircraft.

[Hound]

I think it's an awesome idea, it's a lot like how everyone in Smallville started getting super powers because of the pieces they found.

How did the pitch go ?

Sorry it took so long to reply, between schedules etc, we only had a couple sessions up till now! (names changed to protect the guilty!)
So… here’s what the party made up-
1) Doug- Shepherd of the Damned
2) Brian- Wheelman
3) Ed- Scrounger
4) Jason- Zombie Researcher
The game starts on 4th of July, my buddy Doug (playing the shepherd) always has a huge BBQ at his house. Both he and Brian (the wheelman) live 5 minutes from each other and are on opposite sides of a HUGE Casino complex called Parx which is in the middle of a wide open field.
So.. the Wave hits around 3 pm (using the setting from Rifter 40-45). After the minutes of rolling around in pain, they all get up to see devestation, car fires, a plane slammed into the TGI Friday’s nearby... etc.
None of the other guests died from the wave, so Doug and the others ran to the road to help with the car crashes. That’s when they first see the Zeds getting up...3 of them. Jason (the Researcher) quickly yells out to stop them moaning- then wonders how the hell he knew that…
The fight was quick and rough… they were all using bits of the car wreckage as improvised clubs to beat off the Zeds. Afterwards they gathered in the backyard and all the guests said they were heading off to check on family etc… Cell reception was spotty at best and they already heard the EBS signal from the TV & Radios. Doug’s family started bunkering their house and securing the windows. I elected to stay with the group (I put myself in as an NPC… what they don’t know is I did die in the Wave… and am back as a full thinker- from Rifter 40). They all discussed how they all seem to know things they shouldn’t… especially about Zeds….
They agreed to head to the other side of the casino to Brian’s house to collect his wife and kids and return. He also suggested picking up a car or 2 from his family reair garage behind, sure he could armor a van up… (again.. how do I know this?) As they head out they see a newly crashed police cruiser on the corner, both officers didn’t make it. As they move in to collect the weapons etc… they see more Zeds shuffling towards them… and they hear multiple Moans…….

[Razzinold]

Sounds pretty cool so far. But as a Thinker do you still look like you or can they visually tell that you are now undead ?

[Hound]

Since I died from the pain in the initial Wave there are no visible wounds on me, so right now I look alive, if a lil pale. Later... we'll see... (evil grin)

[Pepsi Jedi]

Saturday I will be pitching the idea of a DR campaign to my friends, here's what I'm thinking, let me know what you think?

The Wave: I love the original idea of The Wave- it happening all at once, a worldwide wave of excruciating pain followed by the dead rising. So, every highway becomes a charnel house, planes falling out of the sky, cities on fire, etc....

BUT here's the twist I want to throw at them. One of the big draws to DR is a chance to play yourself, a PC version of you. But I also like the classes like the Hound Masters etc. Sooo... my idea is this. The Wave is an actual Wave.. a almost physical wave that washes over the planet... on top of the pain, some people are changed. They remember things they never knew, skills, abilities- their bodies are even changed. My players will play themselves, but with a new class. They will become an O.C.C. but retain their memories and personalities. I'll set this up for any class except the Half-Living (that one I'll role-play out).

As for the more supernatural elements, I will add some in, the Benford Group, and some of the monsters like the Crawling Maw, Jigsaw Zombies and Necro-Golem. I think I'll leave the cause of the Wave and Brulyx open-ended. Not sure I'll use him but I might.. we'll see how the game goes. I'm also going to add in a scaled down version of the Death Mage From CE: Rise of Magic and a version of the Murder Mage from Rifter #9.

The idea is to get out of Philly alive (I'm thinking to make it slightly easier to manage Philly will only partially be vaccinated with Unisane/Altrucure) and encounter the first of the Death Cult squads sweeping up survivors and discover the first of the "collection centers", and try to liberate them. I'm trying to add Heroic elements into a survival campaign.

Not a bad idea at all. I kinda like it. I don't go 'supernatural' with my zombies. (Well more than the fact they're dead up and walking around) but I like the general premise. For mine it might be caused by aliens doing an experiment and that's where the 'unknown skills and such' come from.

Thing about a zombie game is the back ground is cool and all, but realisticly the player char's have almost zero chance of ever actually finding out, unless you want to make it a part of the game on purpose. 99% of the time they'll be trying to survive. Not play detective. When the entire planet goes Zed. the "Why' Doesn't matter overly much. Seeing the next sunrise takes priority.

Now if your group juuuuuust so happened to be at Ground zero for 'the Reason" (What ever it might be) That can be rolled in. But I wouldn't think it's overly common for people to know.

Still. Nice twist on the 'play yourself'.

Sadly some of us already fit the OCCs... >_>

When my group read the 'Survivalist' they all looked at me and we all cracked up.