the zombie apocalypse survival game

[soundguy]

by M E brines


I got a copy the other day.

it will be play tested ( ) by my gaming group tomorrow after lunch.

it looks almost like a print and play game.. or one from cheap@ss games.

hope it works out. if not.. it was only like 9$

will post a report monday.

[samuraitrev]

I look forward to seeing the verdict.

[soundguy]

it looks a bit rule-e.. though not too many rules. just complicated in the way you administer them.

also looks a hair like it is geared to be difficult.. kind of like dawn of the dead baord game was. ie.. hard on the hero's.

looking at combat with zeds. gun combat is safe.. you are at range.. but hard to get head shots. d6 # or better to hit. ( say.. 4 ) hit is a body shot , once that is scored..you have a 1 in 6 chance of a head shot.. so you have to hit.. then see if the hit is a head shot. non head shots have no effect on zeds. zeds move 3.. at onset of combat, palyers and zeds are on a combat board with only 5 spaes seperating.. so you basically get 1 free ranged shot. next shot is zed on you. zed hits that connect basically kill you.. though you can freely grab a new character and continue playing. hand to hand weapons are harder to hit.. but hits automatically stop zeds.. but in hand to hand.. you are easier to bite.

there are other dangers. ex military.. private security squads.. redneck canibals. most of those if you wound.. they are out of combat...

for players.. you have 2 levels where you get negative modifiers. if you are out of food.. you get -3 on all rolls. if you roll up starving twice. ie. need to 'test' for food and have no food chits to discard.. you die. same with injury. .. injury is -3.. a double stacked injury is death. DOES appear you can double stack an injury with a starving and just be -3 and not dead.. and not -6.. but takes a food chit AND a first aid chit to remove BOTH conditions before the -3 leaves.

resource items never leave the game. after you loose/use them they go back to the supply pile.. so an extended game is possible.. with all original players dieing and new ones coming on all the time to repalce dead survivors, and still have resources. goes is to find a safe ghaven to escape to.. there is no 'zed win' other than all players die i guess atthe same time, as you do not 'resurect' in the middle of combat but only after your turn..e tc..

dawn of the dead was like that. combat with zes was difficult. they were hard to injur..

still. it was like 9$ and I have most other zombie games in existance.. so I gotta try..

[soundguy]

ok.. game play update.

after breakfast on sunday we set out to survive the zombie holocaust.

5 of us.

unfold the board.. a brief re-hash of the rules for turn sequence. ( also discussed basics at breakfast ).

We chose to all start together as a group at a house and go from there.

thru play we found that, 1, since you only start with the items that you get from the search in the area you start at.. that you are extremely limited. if you start at a place that might have food.. they usually have no weapons... if you start near weapons.... no food. since on the very first turn you can start starving if you roll the need for food and have none.. that becomes a problem.. on the 1st turn, 2 of our party with 'injured or ill, -3, for starvation. AND we ended up finding no weapons.

Movement. we found it kind of odd that you have to move the entire roll and not a part of the roll ( roll a die to move ). after all. if you are walking, you can always stop.. or if driving, always pull over.

since we did find a vehicle at the house.. and not much more ( flashlight and a radio ).. we were driving and covering more ground. we tookthe next turn house ruled that you can move up to the dice roll or less, reasoning that you can always just stop the truck.. etc.

doing this let us have a rnage of choices for our next move... .. we found a place to get food.. after that move we started wondering if maybee the house rule wasn't a good idea as then all of a sudden it made the game way too easy, as the game board was only like 10x15 spaces on the outter edge.. and a vehicle moves 2d6. that's a range of 2-12.. meaning a person or group could really have a range of movemnetof like 1/3 of the baord at a time.. making getting exactly what you needed way too easy.. and it would let you avoid a few of the hazard spaces that you don't want to land on.. so we kileld the house rule after only using it 1 move turn.. so we didn't cheat too much.

Now.. backing up a bit. with no weapons.. we couldn't fight, as hand to hand with no meele weapon is impossible to kill a zombie ( needs 4 to kill, hand to hand with no weapon is -3 ).. thus at least to kill a zombie in meele needs and improvised small weapon ( flashlight ).. which is only a -2,a nd then roll a 6. so... we got inthe habit of stealthing/sneaking by each encounter instead of fighting it.

way i read the rules.. at an encounter you can try to sneak or stealth by.. if you are cought, then you must try combat or to flee. if you flee, you cannot search ( scrounge ).. .. but apparrently you CAN scrounge if you sneak. so.... we got int he habbit of sneaking by ALL the encounters we came upon. somewhere mid game we all found some weapons. we liked swords for extra reach and fight bonus... plain guns and rifles were ok.. but have to roll a 6 to kill a zombie. a shotgun the same.. but if you hit 4+ it at least pushes the zeds back. molotov's are ok.. but not as good as a grenade. both can scatter.. but a grenade can actually kill as it rolls a d6, effects a sqaure and the 8 around it. a molotov the same.. but rolls a d6-1 thus cannot kill a zed. WILL knock them over though .. and they must spend a turn standing... and in combat you can only shoot/fight OR move. so as long as you don't start a combat with a zed ON you.. you can't be hit. In a sample fight.. we rolled up 16 zombies vs our 5 hero's. we were armed with 3 pistols, 1 shotgun and 1 rifle at the start. zombies move 1, we stayed back at the back of the board. we took our turns firing for 3 rounds till they were 2 spaces away, and then most of us switched out to a sword. the zombie wall whittled down as it approached. in the end we had to use a well placed molotov and a lil hero movement, and we killed the last zed ont he turn it could have attacked. .. so the wall of zeds DID make it to us. zeds are found as signles or in groups.. up to 6d6. 3-4d6 were common.. so our test fight using 3 was about right...

int hat fight.. we each expened 1-2 ammo chits ( running us out of spare ammo ).. and 2 of the 3 pistols ran out of ammo and had to discard since we had no ammo chits., plus the rifle, and the used molotov. so.. combat is expensive. out of our 5 guns.. we lost 3 of them.. and a total of 7 amm chits, plus a molotov. in the end we swung swords to kill the last 3 zeds, and save our last 2 pistols .. an ammo out roll (1) is all that is needed to drop a gun.

thus.. we can only conclude.. that while it may be fun to run around and kill zeds in a game or movie. .. in reality.. the maker of the game gave us a stealth method for a reason. .. an average combat used MOST of our combat resources. since each baord space could have a combat.. it is reasonable to believe that you should try to sneak where you can, and then if caught.. fight... etc.

We made it thru the entire game sneaking due to this realization. sinply too hard to find and carry enough guns and ammo on you to walk into each space and blaze away. we would spend way too much time searching for ammo. time = more turns. more turns = maybee needing more food. if you are starving -3 and miss another food roll you DIE.. so we tried to stay up on food.

there are helocopters in the game.. if you use them once you know the location of the sanctuary, you can move drastically closer. basically thru seaching for notebooks or maps, or getting radio signals you must find the location of sanctuary. once you find it, there is a seperate track marker and you are 6 locations away from sanctuary. each time you circle the baord clockwise you move 1 space closer... on foot or ina vehicle it still takes quite a few rolls to get around. a roll of a 1 on movement means you ar ill or injured fromt he environment.. .. meaning you have to use med supplies. thus dozens of movement rolls to get around may mean dead palyers or a drastic use of med supplies and food. if you find the helo.. you roll a d6 and MOVE that many spaces on the seperate board closer. meaning the turn you find sanctuary .. you are 6 away.. technically on a good roll, you can fly right there if you find a helo. we took a helo part way and then hoofed it a bit, then found another vehicle.

helo makes you discard your old vehicle.. so we lost a few supplies inthe truck.. etc..

interesting resource management game with board elements to bother you.

game has rules to play NON cooperatively.. but I highly suggest coop play.

[samuraitrev]

Hmm... It seems to have some good ideas but I think the Movement mechanic sounds broken to me. If I wanted to move my character 1" towards a building or cover etc why the hell would I have to use their full move? e.g. 6"
I like the hunger idea but it sounds to me that it bogs the game down. Who wants to play a 'let's find some food' game. I can play that in real life by going into the kitchen.
I do appreciate you letting us know about the game and I look forward to your ATZ report.
I have 2 questions
1) Does your group intend to play this game again?
2) What's the best miniature based tabletop game you've played so far? (I mean with buildings and scenery etc.)

[soundguy]

my group plays on sundays and we usually try to get 1-3 games in each week.

we do plan on playing it again. many times we will play thru to get a feel. then see if there are any house rules needed for enjoyment or playability. if a game is hosed. we quit it.

the hunger rule does make you constantly think about resources.. especially since you can only have 10 items.

lets be real. I can carry WAY more power bars and ammo than my character inthe game...

best table top / sceinery...game. HMM....

we have all played the war hammer games. just to spendy to keep up with.

we like LNOE.. but have played thru all the scens mor ethan once. though I did just get that timber peak we havn't played.

dnd or pathfinder with teraine maps, mats and 3d buildings and bits is nice...

hard call. we like em all..

[samuraitrev]

Let me rephrase that
2) What's the best Zombie miniature based tabletop game you've played so far? (I mean with buildings and scenery etc.)

[soundguy]

most of the ones I play have 2d buildings and such.. can't think of any with 3d buildings and such.

but for 2d... zombicide was ok.. and lnoe was ok. I like a game where there is no zombie player.. so.. while i love lnoe.. i'd choose zombicide over lnoe due to zeds being board elements