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| Rulebook; WIP, need player input please! | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: May 22 2009, 01:20 PM (329 Views) | |
| Acclue Lockheart | May 22 2009, 01:20 PM Post #1 |
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Keep in mind, I'm looking for more ideas for content in this, specifically: play types, skills, extra-intuitive abilities, and breakdown conditions. Other feedback is welcome too. ----- DM's Guide Play Types Viruses Infection (True Style): zombification is as described in the zombie survival guide. One infected wound and you'll find yourself turning in a matter of hours. Equipment is unchanged. Fatigue: zombification can be spread through any type of zombie-inflicted wound as normal, but rather than acting on itself it remains dormant until the subject actually dies, whereupon it will raise the infected within hours. Equipment is unchanged. Airborne: the virus is in the air and acts the same as in infection. Any contact with the infected air will cause infection and zombification within hours. Equipment includes a biohazard suit which the character is assumed to already be wearing. Periods Outbreak: a group of ordinary people in the wrong place at the wrong time have to get over their panic and figure out a way to escape and survive the horde of undead beating on their door. This is the beginning of the end... the good news is that there aren't too many zombies yet. Equipment is strictly civilian. Runaway: the group has learned about the zombies, but they are in no shape to hold their own against the horde. The only option is to run and hope you can make it to tomorrow. The horde is growing strong; riots and widespread confusion make other humans a danger as well. Equipment is mostly civilian with limited rations, few first aid supplies, and maybe one or two conventional weapons taken hastily to share between the whole group. Runaways have had some time to pick up something from their first experience, all characters starting here gain an extra skill. Survival: the group has come to grips with the zombie apocalypse, and is making the way of life a normalcy despite how insane the world has become. Equipment is a decent supply of scavenged weapons and supplies which, although still finite, is enough to establish a sort of base out of. All survivors have learned a few things from their time in the battlezone, all characters starting at this stage start with an extra 3 skills. Class IV: The world has fallen apart. The zombies have won on a global scale. Humanity has dissolved to individual groups of people either hiding for their survival or bent on destroying as many of the undead as possible. Some humans have reformed into societies in well-protected areas, making their own small countries out of maybe a few apartment buildings. Depending on the circumstances, equipment can be anything you think could be scavenged from the world. Well-trained to the wastes of the new world, Class IV survivors have earned an impressive extra 5 skills. Options Fast Zombies: The zombies have maintained enough of a hunting instinct to be able to move quickly rather than shambling about toward you. Zombies have a speed of 7 rather than 2 Careful you aren't outrun... (not recommended for infection play). Talent Talent represents the natural merits and existing abilities gathered before the infection spread. 30 points to distribute Strength (any action that requires physical strain: withstanding rough damage, pulling one self up to higher ground, or just plain clubbing a zombie over the head with the nearest blunt object) 0: weak, character has three fewer dice for feats of strength. Certain actions may be limited when it comes to physical power. Character can carry up to 25 pounds of equipment at no penalty. 5: average, character has no extra dice added to pool for feats of strength, and can perform normal feats of strength. Character can carry up to 35 pounds of equipment at no penalty. 10: strong, character gains two extra dice for feats of strength. Character can be expected to be able to perform feats of strength slightly greater than an average person. Characters can carry up to 50 pounds at no penalty. 15: iron, character gains five extra dice for feats of strength. If it's physically possible for a human being to do something, this character can do it and then some. Characters can carry up to 100 pounds at no penalty. Encumbrance Rules: characters can carry more than the aforementioned values at penalties. A character with less than or exactly the earlier mentioned value, they have a light load and receive no penalty. From that value to double the value, it's a heavy load, and they receive two fewer dice on feats of dexterity as well as losing two spaces from their speed. Dexterity (any action that uses quick hand-eye coordination: aiming guns at eyesight range, moving feet around quickly, and the like.) 0: clumsy, character has three fewer dice for feats of dexterity. Shaky hands, bad reaction times, and a tendency to drop things. (special: this also impacts long-range attacks, lowering dice for feats of perception that involve weapons by two) 5: average, character has no extra dice for feats of dexterity. This character has normal reaction times and movement and a steady hand. 10: nimble, character has two extra dice for feats of dexterity. This character would have no trouble freerunning across rooftops. 15: wraith, character has five extra dice for feats of dexterity. This character could run up a vertical slope from a standstill if they tried. Perception (any action that uses careful use of the senses. Searching around for salvage, aiming at long ranges, and seeing or hearing things going on around them fall into this.) 0: inattentive, character has three fewer dice for feats of perception. This guy can't catch the zombie moaning at him from the next street down. 5: average, character has no extra dice for feats of perception. This character will have no problem pinpointing where the horde is coming from. 10: alert, character has two extra dice for feats of perception. This character can see and hear subtle movement around them. 15: eagle, character has five extra dice for feats of perception. This one can snipe the head off a zombie a mile away with misaligned crosshairs. (special: eagle characters automatically receive the internal sonar extra-intuitive ability at a range of 10 spaces, even if they are a realist) Intuition (a character's extra senses. Just that unexplainable feeling that something's there...) 0: realist, character cannot gain extra-intuitive abilities without first raising their intuition to average. 5: average, character has no extra-intuitive abilities. 10: sensitive, character has one extra-intuitive ability. 15: adept, character has three extra-intuitive abilities. 15: paranoid, character has four extra-intuitive abilities, but the character must also gain paranoia as a permanent condition. Speed (how quickly a character can move) 0: lame, character can move only 5 spaces per turn. Character has some small barrier that limits their movement such as a limp from an old injury. 5: average, character can move 6 spaces per turn. Character can move around normally. 10: trained, character can move 8 spaces per turn. Character has been trained in some way to be faster than normal. 15: lightning, character can move 10 spaces per turn. Character is most likely an athlete of some sort. Feats Feats are any action that take a considerable amount of effort to accomplish. Pulling oneself up over the edge of a rooftop, aiming a gun, spotting a cache of ammunition, all these and many more action need checks to see if one can succeed. This is done with a number of six-sided dice. By default, characters use five dice for a check, with more added or subtracted depending on the governing talent of the action, and any appropriate skills they have. The success of these rolls are determined by counting the number of dice that landed on a six. Typically, actions only require one or two successes to pass, however, as actions become more and more implausible, the DM will most likely find it necessary to make things harder, only feasibly passable by those characters have trained specifically in the action. As an example, the DM would most likely make shooting a single zombie in the head with a magnum at point blank range a difficulty of one, making only one success necessary. However, should the player decide to use the same weapon to do something so complex as to shoot through the zombies head, into the next three behind him, the DM might say to get five successes. Of course, an action like that could have what is called variable success. Suppose in the above example, the player only rolls three successes. One can't simply discount the whole thing and say that he missed, hitting the first one only needed one success. In situations where there can be more than a succeed or fail to the whole action, the feat can be partially successful. For example, in the above once again, the shot might go through the first zombie, then hit the second, and trail off before making contact with the third. If the character gains more successes than required, they may, at the DM's discretion, actually perform the feat better than they had intended. Using the above again, let's assume that the player gains seven successes. After the DM finishes checking to see if he has loaded dice, he may decide that the bullet not only goes through all four victims, but ricochets out of the last one, hitting the other zombie around the corner. Of course, there is always the chance of failure, but on occasion, a character may fail so gloriously that they make the situation even worse than it was before. As the player is trying to roll sixes on his dice, he must also be wary not to roll too many ones. If a character rolls more ones (failures) than sixes (successes), then the character has critically failed. What this means exactly is up to the DM and the situation, but typically a critical failure will mean accidentally digging yourself deeper into the situation than you were before. You might be trying to hotwire a car and its alarm goes off, your gun may jam, you might accidentally trip in your running start before a jump. Skills Skills are things that people have learned since the outbreak occurred. These are practical abilities in more specific realms than talents. After every feat a person performs successfully, they will roll one six-sided die for every skill they've already learned plus one more six-sided die. This means before they have learned any, they roll 1d6, once they earn that skill, it becomes 2d6, and so on. To actually gain the skill, these six-sided dice all have to be successes. If not, then nothing happens, ignore failures. Unless stated otherwise, skills stack with each other and can be taken multiple times unless otherwise stated Skill List Brawler - character gains three extra dice on feats involving unarmed combat. Classic Weaponologist - character gains three extra dice on feats involving armed melee combat. Controlled Breathing – character recovers 5 more stamina for every minute of rest Escape Artist – character gains three dice on feats involving escaping from another's grip Fast Healer – character heals 5 more points of health for each hour of rest Gearhead – character gains three extra dice on feats involving repairing machinery of any sort Hard to Kill – Character gains an extra 25 health High Energy – Character gains an extra 25 stamina Meditation – character recovers 2 more will (1 more while under siege) for every hour of rest Packmule – character can carry 1.5x more equipment, cannot be taken more than once Personal Armsman – character gains three extra dice on any feat involving firearms Pyro – character gains three extra dice on feats involving explosives and incendiaries Willful – Character gains an extra 10 will Traceur - character is able to ignore difficult terrain in movement In addition, one can choose to, instead of taking a skill, raise one of their talents up one degree or take an extra-intuitive ability (unless they're a realist, in which case, extra-intuitive abilities are closed to them) Extra-Intuitive Abilities Extra-intuitive abilities are a character's higher awarenesses. Generally, these abilities add up to meta-game knowledge that a character's ordinary senses could not perceive. Internal Sonar – character can tell where living or unliving beings are without knowing about them through their basic senses, and even through physical barriers. This ability can be taken multiple times for 5 spaces of internal sonar awareness each time. Durability Sense – character can reliably tell how long it will take for things to wear down. They know how much longer a barricade can last, and can measure condition of any item by sight. This will allow the user to know the exact HP of any object they can perceive (however, any form of perception other than sight will only yield a rough durability level. Difficulty Sense – character can roughly tell the difficulty rating of a feat before performing it after announcing they're going to do it. After hearing the difficulty, they may then choose to abandon the action and end their turn in a hesitated stop, losing 5 will for their doubt, but remaining safe from stupid decisions. Direction sense – character has a keen sense of direction, always able to tell which way is North at any given time, even if there are no factors such as the sun or stars present to aid them. Health, Stamina, and Will Health – Health is a character's actual physical threshold for damage. Once a character reaches 0 health, they will be rendered unconscious. If their health is -1 or lower, they will also lose 1 Health per round until they can be stabilized. Stabilizing a character takes three full rounds of attention from another character, two full rounds if they have assistance. In addition, a character has a 5% chance of being able to stabilize themselves every round without assistance. Once stabilized, a character will stop losing Health each turn until injured again. If a character reaches double the negative value of their strength talent score, they are dead (weak characters must reach -5 Health before dead). Losing more than 10 Health in one round has a 20% chance of the character gaining the crippled condition (if at all applicable), and a 5% chance of being permanent. To recover Health, a character can rest, but the more direct route is to apply first aid supplies. With rest, a character gains five Health per hour, but first aid will heal much faster (though the exact value depends on the level and type of care available, so it is at the DM's discretion how much is healed with first aid). Stamina – Stamina is a character's ability to keep going physically. If a character runs out of stamina, they will gain the exhausted condition until they can recover their stamina back to at least 50. If a character has less than 30 stamina, they are fatigued. A character uses Stamina in any feat, and sometimes in strenuous ordinary actions. How much Stamina is used in any action is such a variable thing that it must be left to the DM's discretion. A character will regain Stamina at a rate of 5 points per full minute of rest. Will – will is a character's ability to withstand mental and emotional stress. Running out of will means that a character will have a breakdown and adopt a random negative condition from the breakdown table. Any character with less than 20 will also has the stress condition. A character loses will whenever they fail a feat. The amount the character loses is, once again, the DM's choice. It is harder to overcome mental anguish than physical fatigue, only recovering 2 will per hour of peaceful rest (if the character's location is under siege by zombies, they only recover 1 per hour). In the event of a critical failure, a character will not only undoubtedly lose more will, but their maximum will will lower by 1 permanently. Unless a character has taken skills to raise these stats, the maximum values for health, stamina, and will are 100. Resources people need three basic bodily resources: food, water, and sleep. These correspond to the stats hunger, thirst, and tire. Hunger has a maximum value of 8, thirst has a maximum value of 4, and tire has a maximum value of 16. every hour, regardless of circumstances, each of these increases in value by 1. If any of these reach their maximum value, it will result in negative effects. The source of lowering these values is obvious; the DM should decide how sufficient a meal, drink, or period of sleep is. Having any of these at the threshold will cause the fatigue condition and halve the character's stamina regeneration rate. If more than one is at it's threshold then stamina regeneration halts completely and the character cannot have peaceful rest. If a character has any of its resources at its threshold for more than 24 hours, they will begin to lose 3 will and 5 health every hour as well as gaining the exhaustion condition, and if it hasn't already, stamina regeneration halts. Conditions Breakdown – not so much a condition as the effect of losing one's will and coming under a negative mental condition. There is a 5% chance that the condition received will be permanent. Roll a d100 on the following table to see what condition is received. If necessary, DM will take a certain degree of control over the character under certain conditions. If the character is already under the condition, roll again. A character cannot have more than one temporary condition at once as a result of the breakdown condition. The character overcomes this condition when their will recovers past 30. 1-26 = frenzy 27-30 = blood frenzy 31-60 = paranoia 61-95 = schizophrenia 95-100 = suicidal Blood Frenzy – a character in a blood frenzy is dangerous not just in the sense that they will throw themselves into a fight like a frenzied character. This one simply wants to kill. Something needs to die and he or she doesn't care if it's the zombies or you. If the character can't find someone else, they may turn masochistic. If the character overcomes this condition, they receive a permanent breakdown condition. Crippled – this character has an injured limb. The character has one less degree of the strength and dexterity talents until the limb can be treated. If the injury is severe enough, the DM may wish to change it to two degrees. Being crippled more than once will result in stacked penalties. If a character's talent goes below the 0 level of the talent, they cannot make these type of check until treated. Crippling can be permanent, in which case the character can learn to live with it after several days, losing the penalty but obviously still limited by their loss of limb. Exhaustion – The character is too physically tired to function properly. An exhausted character loses half of their dice (rounded up) on all checks after all other dice are added. Fatigued – Character is getting tired, a fatigued character loses one quarter of their dice (rounded up) on all checks after all other dice are added. Frenzy – this character has had enough. No more hiding, no more taking so much care, no more waging an endless war of attrition... it's time all of those zombies just died. This character immediately takes it on as his or her personal mission to murder all of these undead bastards as quickly and foolhardily as possible. Characters with this condition have been known to leap into groups of zombies, guns blazing, shouting righteous battle cries. While incredibly unlikely, there have been situations where a frenzied individual had single-handedly broken a siege, but the individual in question might not even perceive that the fight is over, deciding to split from the group to find more of the undead to slaughter. If they are controlled by their allies, they will remain in a combat-ready state until their frenzy has ended. Once overcoming this condition, a character will actually gain 5 maximum will, elated by their daring heroism. Paranoia – character is cautious to a dangerous degree. The character cannot receive peaceful rest, believing that there is something around every corner trying to get them. Treat all rest as if under siege. The character will also have their maximum sleep resource cut in half until the condition is cleared; they won't want to rest more than they actually have to. On the bright side, the character will gain two extra dice on feats of perception while under this condition (not applicable if the condition is the result of a character with the paranoia intuition level). Schizophrenia – the character's mind longs for a time when the world wasn't at war with the zombies so much that they begin confusing reality with their desires. This condition is unpredictable, the character may begin acting just like they would in a normal society, an illusion of complete safety clouding their judgment, or they may just end up sitting in the corner, spouting their illusory world out to their allies. This condition is especially difficult to overcome, and the character must gain up to 50 will before they can return to normal Suicidal – character will try to kill themselves with any method at their disposal. If they have a gun in their hands they will use it, if there's a place to fall a long distance nearby, they will use it, anything to end their own life before the zombies can get them... If the character survives this condition with the help of his or her allies, they will adopt another breakdown condition permanently from the continued sheer mental stress. Zombies And of course, the horde; this section will actually be quite simple. Zombies will attack in large groups, move 2 spaces per turn, and claw and grab the survivors at any opportunity, causing the survivors to use the appropriate feats to avoid damage. Zombies will behave just as one would expect, with extremely limited intelligence and wanton disregard for it's own safety while simply trying to attack anything alive. They will generally die in one hit if the survivors know where to hit them, and... well there isn't a whole lot to say about them that you probably don't already know. Edited by Acclue Lockheart, Jun 25 2009, 09:58 PM.
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7:56 PM Jul 10