Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Scenario #1: Zombiegeddon

Zombies and Slashers and Comets, Oh My!

Players: 7 (5 heroes, 1 zombie master, and Jason)

Turns: 20

Set-Up:

Place the church and morgue tiles on opposite sides of the center of town. The other two tiles are random.

Optional rules:

  1. Jason and the zombie player may choose to work together or independently.
  2. There are two different endgames, which all players must agree on before the game begins. You can also agree to have it determined randomly by a die roll when endgame time comes.

Objectives:

Heroes: Destroy all spawning pits, all zombies, and Jason

Zombies in league with Jason: Kill 5 heroes

Zombies working alone: Kill 3 heroes before Jason does.

Jason working alone: Kill 3 heroes before the Zombies do.

Turn Order:

  1. Zombies
    1. Draw as many zombie cards as spawning pits (hand limit 5, minimum 2)
    2. Zombies move and/or attack
    3. Zombies respawn automatically (D3 -1 per spawning pit, and D3 +1 when there is only one spawning pit left.)
  2. Jason
    1. Roll for D6 movement. (Jason can move through walls. Jason must always move towards a hero, if it allows him to enter an attacking range. This includes melee and missile attacks.)
    2. If Jason does not move, and he is inside a building, he may either take a hand weapon from the discard pile or search the top hero card. If it is not a weapon, it is discarded immediately, and Jason finds nothing.
    3. Jason may fire any guns in hand.
    4. Jason attacks every hero in his square.
  3. Heroes
    1. The conventional rules apply

Respawning:

  1. Heroes – When a hero dies, he/she draws a new random hero, or on 5+ the hero may choose who to play next.
  2. Zombies – Spawning is automatic. (D3 -1 per spawning pit, and D3 +1 when there is only one spawning pit left.)
  3. Jason – When Jason is killed, he respawns in D3 turns from the nearest remaining spawning pit.

*Note: Regardless of where the sun track marker is, heroes killed by Jason never become zombies, unless they already feel strange, and have exceeded their capacity for wounds.

Destroying the Spawning Pits (3 Ways):

  1. Light and throw dynamite at the spawning pit. A direct hit will destroy it.
  2. Place a gas canister on the spawning pit from an adjacent square and light it with fire, or shoot with any gun.
  3. A character with the keyword holy can perform an exorcism. To do this, the hero must stand directly on the spawning pit, and than take a wound. This hero must then survive all zombie attacks until the next hero turn. If the hero survives, the exorcism is successful and any other undead on the square are permanently removed from the game.

*NB: Jason has the ability to pick-up undetonated gas canisters, move them, and detonate them. Heroes may also shoot the gas canister while Jason is holding it for an instant KO.

Killing Them Zombies for Good:

If Jason or a zombie is killed by a character with the keyword Holy while inside the Church, it is killed permanently, and removed from the game.

Endgame:

There are 2 alternate ways to determine victors, should no one meet their goal by sun-up:

  1. The Kill-Tally Method: At sun-up, the player(s) with the most kills wins, but the heroes’ kills are tallied as follows: Zombies do not count towards their kill total. Jason counts as 1 only if he was killed permanently. The heroes get 1 kill point for every spawning pit they destroyed. In the event of a tie, the heroes win. Jason has the tiebreaker between himself and zombies, if they chose not to work together.
  2. The Sudden Death Method: At sun-up, a meteor shower hits the town, and the meteorite destroys one quadrant at the end of each hero turn, determined by a D6 roll at the beginning of every zombie turn. This essentially gives any player in that quadrant one turn to get out before it is destroyed, and removed from the game. Heroes cannot respawn during sudden death mode, and kill totals are ignored. The game ends when only heroes or Jason and zombies remain. (If Jason is against the zombies, they must also kill off each other.) Note: the meteor shower counts as rain. (Jason and all heroes have a move penalty of -1.)

Description:

The Book of Revelation foretold a time when the dead and the living would live together as one, but the congregation of Last Chance Church didn’t think it would be so soon.

“There’s an evil force in town,” shouts Jake Cartwright. “I reckon you felt it too, father.”

Indeed there are two evil forces in town to be reckoned with. Not only have the zombies returned, but this time, the evil-undead-slasher-hellspawn Jason Voorhees is in town, lusting for only one thing – the blood of the innocent.

“Indeed I fear a very dark night ahead of us,” replies father Joseph.

“Welcome home, Jake,” says Sheriff Anderson, as he cocks his gun. “Let’s do what we should’ve done a long time ago. Let’s put these evil bastards to rest for good.”

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is a wicked scenario, and I love Jason's hero card abilities. My only nitpick would be that the hero objectives are a bit too tough - destroying all the spawning pits is tough in and of itself (we had a heck of a time taking out only four of them last games night), let alone Jason and all the zombies. I do like the whole free-for-all aspect of it, though, and I REALLY like the doomsday meteor shower endgame. Great stuff!

Malice Blackheart said...

You may very well be right. The balance may be way out of whack, but I kind of like that. Frankly, I think it's generally too easy for the heroes. Particularly when you and I are both heroes, I don't think we've ever lost.

I realize getting all the spawning pits can be tough, but the zombie player is still weakened if *some* are taken down. And also, the heroes can strategize to a certain extent because I've given them a number of ways to win.

And in the end, the sudden death mode should be a great equalizer.