Z is for Zombie

"Zombies are the new Vampires." - True Blood

Funny quote and mostly true.  Thanks to the various "Dead" and "Resident Evil" movies, not to mention new TV shows, Zombies have never been more popular.

Actually I have never cared for Zombies.  Sure I enjoy them as much as the next horror guy, but I'd rather read about ghosts, vampires or almost anything else really.

Same is true for games.  But I have to admit that one of my favorite games is All Flesh Must Be Eaten.


WotC may have D&D and White Wolf has the vampires, but when it comes to wipping out hordes of the walking dead then you need this book and Eden has it.

All Flesh Must Be Eaten (AFMBE) is THE premire Zombie roleplaying game. Everything you need to know is here and it uses the fantastic Unisystem game system so beginners can play it fast and pros still enjoy it. Plus it is 100% compatible with all of Eden's games like "WitchCraft", "Armageddon", "Ghosts of Albion" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer". With the d20 conversion guide in back, it is also compatible with tons of d20 games.
I enjoy it because it is so flexible.  The power rating can be altered to suit your mood. So street level normals armed with baseball bats to gods walking the earth again.

What makes AFMBE so nice is the collection of Dead Worlds that Eden publishes for it.  And like the core book, these are also compatible with other Eden games.

All Tomorrow's Zombies takes AFMBE and makes it Zombies...IN SPACE!! And in Cyberspace and all sorts of "SF" tropes with zombies thrown in. An excellent "Zombie World" book from Jason Vey and Eden. If you like AFMBE and are a fan of Sci-Fi then this is a must buy.  Even if you don't then there are plenty of high tech devices to use in other games, such as Conspiracy X.

Pulp Zombies is a collection of Pulp Era Deadworlds. This one focuses on the two-fisted action adventures of the 1930s.  A special emphasis is given on the mystical side of the pulps and of course Nazi Zombies.

Enter the Zombie is Kung Fu action theatre at's its best.  Emulate the action from Enter to Dragon to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to the latest John Wu film to Big Trouble in Little China.  There is more though too.  Expanded Chi powers, role-playing in mytho-historical Japan and China or the streets of Hong Kong and San Francisco.  Plenty of options for characters, players and Zombie Masters.

Fistful o' Zombies where the Quick and the Dead are often the same thing.  Plenty of new character archetypes for a wild west game. Whether the wild west of Clint Eastwood or Gene Autry. New qualities and drawbacks and plenty of weapons from the time.  I use this along with other Victorian era games.  The gem though in this one is the conversion notes between the original Deadlands game and AFMBE.

Zombie Smackdown. I was not sure what to think about this one.  But I am glad I got it.  I am not a fan of Professional Wrestling, but the mix of wrestling and zombies is too cool to pass up.  Plus there are plenty of good rules for matches and even Luchador wrestlers. You can do your Santo-inspired character justice.

Dungeons and Zombies brings D&D to the Classic Unisystem fold.  There are rules for using more WitchCraft like magic in your AFMBE game.  This book covers all the tropes including many new races such as elves, dwarves, halflings and orcs.  High Fantast, Low Fantasy. King Arthur and Lord of the Rings-style play.  Combine it with WitchCraft to get a full range of magical abilities.  Combine with Terra Primate for tons of new adventure ideas and races.  And of course use the AFMBE-Revised appendix to converst any d20 information you need.  Far more flexible than most d20 based fantasy games.  Really well written and one of my favorite Dead World books from Eden.

ARRGH! Thar Be Zombies! I'll admit I am not a fan of pirates.  I enjoy the recent round of pirate movies, but that is the exception rather than the rule.  What makes this book so good is that pirates and zombie just seem to go together well.  And while I may not be a fan of pirates I am a fan of ghost ships crewed by zombies.  So I use this in a modern WitchCraft game instead.  The ship to ship battle rules are great and provide an extra layer when using them with All Tomorrow's Zombies.  The voodoo in this book is a short hand version of the Vodun from WitchCraft, but still nice to have.

One of the Living is something akin to a "Players Handbook" for AFMBE.  The focus is more on new skills, qualities and drawbacks for the characters; not so much for the zombies.  Though there is plenty of Zombie Master only information.  In particular is how to run long campaigns instead of the one shots that AFMBE are really good at.

Worlds of the Dead: A Collection of Deadworlds is a collection of smaller "Dead Worlds" that don't have enough material for their own books.  Great for a starting idea, fleshing out an game of your own or adding to one of the other Dead Worlds from the other books.  Since it is also 100% compatible with Eden's other games, they can be added to those as well.

Atlas of the Walking Dead. Part Monster Manual, part scholarly overview of the myths of the world.  Full of creatures including some I had never heard of (and that is saying something!)   A must have for any of the Dead Worlds or any of Eden's other games.  If you are a Zombie Master then you need this book.  If you play horror games then is one of the best works on various zombies you can buy.

Book of Archetypes, Book 1 and Book 2.  Pre-generated archetypes for AFMBE, but usable in any Eden Unisystem game.  Players can use these as starting points for characters.  Zombie/Game Masters can use them as pre-gens, NPCs or anything they set their mind too.  Over 30 archetypes in each book plus new qualities and drawbacks.

With these you will be ready for the upcoming Zombie Apocalypse.

New Podcast Interview

I recently gave an interview over at Penny Red, website of Victoria author Daniel Hodges.

You can hear it here:
http://victoriaroleplaying.blogspot.com/2012/04/post-36-i-lex-luthor.html

We talk about Victoria RPG, Ghosts of Albion and why Lex Luthor is really the hero of the Superman world.

Enjoy!

ETA: Looks like the file is not working yet.
ETA2: File is working fine now!

Zatannurday: Y is for Young Justice Zatanna

As Zatanna fans we have been living is some really great times of late.  We had a great Zatanna comic from Paul Dini.  Now we have Justice League Dark and best of all, teen Zatanna in Young Justice.

Of course according to Action Figure Insider we are not going to be getting a Young Justice Zatanna figure.
http://www.actionfigureinsider.com/main/afis-ask-matty-mattel-qa-answers-for-april-16th-2012
Though the Wal-Mart exclusive Zatanna looks pretty close.

We do still have Green Ronin's DC Adventures game.
The official game has Zee's stats, but these are closer to what she was when she had her own title.  Zatanna from Young Justice is just getting into her powers.

Here is the Young Justice version of Zatanna.  I did this from my memory of what she could do in the episodes.

Zatanna (YJ) - PL 7 (104 points)

Strength 0, Stamina 1, Agility 2, Dexterity 3, Fighting 1, Intellect 3, Awareness 3, Presence 3

Advantages
Artificer, Attractive, Benefit, Wealth (well-off), Connected, Fascinate (Deception), Languages 3, Luck, Ritualist, Teamwork

Skills
Acrobatics 2 (+4), Athletics 2 (+2), Deception 4 (+7), Expertise: Magic 8 (+11), Insight 4 (+7), Perception 4 (+7), Persuasion 2 (+5), Ranged Combat: tsalB: Blast 8 6 (+9), Sleight of Hand 8 (+11)

Powers
Magic
   !ediH: Concealment 0
   dleihS: Force Field 8 (+8 Toughness)
   sehtolC egnahC: Transform 4 (Affects: 1 Thing > 1 Thing, Transforms: 12 lbs., DC 14)
   sthguohT yM raeH: Mental Communication 4
   tegroF: Affliction 2 (mind, 1st degree: Impaired, 2nd degree: Exhausted, 3rd degree: Unaware, Resisted by: Will, DC 12)
   tropeleT: Teleport 4 (500 feet in a move action, carrying 50 lbs.)
   tsalB: Blast 8 (DC 22)
Mystic Senses: Senses 5 (Acute: Mystic, Analytical: Mystic, Detect: Mystic 2: ranged, Ranged: Mystic)

Offense
Initiative +2
Grab, +1 (DC Spec 10)
sehtolC egnahC: Transform 4, +1 (DC Dog 14)
tegroF: Affliction 2, +1 (DC Will 12)
Throw, +3 (DC 15)
tsalB: Blast 8, +7 (DC 22)
Unarmed, +1 (DC 15)

Complications
Motivation: Responsibility: Zatanna feels responsible for her father's current state as Dr. Fate.
Power Loss: Needs to say spells/powers backwards to use them.

Languages
English, Greek, Italian, Latin

Defense
Dodge 6, Parry 4, Fortitude 4, Toughness 1, Will 7

Power Points
Abilities 32 + Powers 27 + Advantages 11 + Skills 20 (40 ranks) + Defenses 14 = 104

Not quite yet the powerhouse she will grow up to be.

X is for Conspiracy X

(and X-files too!)

One of my all time favorite shows is the X-Files.  It was a fantastic myth of everything that made for good TV in the 90s.  Sure it went on a little too long, but when it was good it was the best thing on TV.

So it should be no surprise that I enjoy similar themed games.  I like Alternity Dark Matter and I mentioned the Unexplained earlier.  But my favorite has been Eden Studios'  Conspiracy X.
So today X is for Conspiracy X.

ConX (as it is called) comes in three different editions.  There is the original rules, a GURPS version and the newest Unisystem version which makes system-wise compatible with WitchCraft RPG (but still not thematically compatible).  I have all three, but I prefer the newest Unisystem version, not just for the system, but it brings ConX out of the paranoid 90s and into the post millennial, post-9/11 world.

So what is ConX about?  Well  the basic system is Classic Unisystem so I won't detail that all here.
The premise is that the U.S. Government has been in contact with three different alien races over the last few decades and how they have all these various plans for the world.  In addition to all of this there are rival government agencies and all sorts of unrelated (or related) weirdness going on.  The focus is much more psychic powers and MKULTRA than the magic and covens of WitchCraft.

Con X 2.0 also has rules for more equipment, weapons, and governmental agencies.  The coolest mechanic in the game though has to be the Pulling Strings one.  Very useful when working through the myriad of governmental bodies you will need to deal with.  These alone make it worth the price if you play any other Classic Unisystem game.

Ok, so my love for the WitchCraft RPG is well known and well documented. Creating a WitchCraft world of adventures, situations or even meta-plots of my own are nearly second nature to me.

But I also like Conspiracy X. A lot.  The games are not really thematically compatible and both have very different points of view on magic, gods, monsters and the like.

If you like conspiracies and the X-Files, Con X is your game.  If you want to run a paranormal game, but don't want to get bogged down in myths, legends and want your magic to be somewhat more controlled then Con X is your game.

Here is another way to look at it.  You are a character in a Modern Paranormal game.  Suddenly a glowing figure appears before you.  What is this creature?  If you say Alien, then play ConX.  If you say Demon, then play WitchCraft.  Both games can be used for horror, ConX is dark sci-fi, WitchCraft is dark fantasy.


Plus it will be a feature of this years Free RPG Day! So stop into your local game store and pick a free game.

Question for you all

I was digging through the depths of my hard drive tonight and I found the remains of one of my oldest documents.

"The Urban Survival Guide" was going to be a guide book for living in and running adventures in cities.

I never finished it but it got me thinking.
Have you all ever used cities as a main adventure area?  In a D&D like game?

I have Vornheim and it is awesome, but any city is fine for this discussion.

W is for What Next?

(Apologies to all coming here for the A to Z challenge, you might not be all that familiar with the back story of today's rant.)

I wanted to talk about World of Darkness today. But instead I am going to rant.  Well not rant so much as complain about gamer privilege. I know in the scope of things this is so minor as to be non-existent. But yet here I am...

W is for What Next?

So unless you were away from the internet like was all day yesterday you probably missed the "Big news" that Monte Cook packed up books and told WotC, "Screw you guys I'm going home."

Ok, not exactly like that.  Lots of times people leave projects on properties they love due to disagreements.
I have left playtests in "protest" before over a direction the author wanted to take that I felt was a bad idea.  I won't name names either, but it was a property I really liked and was honored to be a part of.  The game in my mind still sucked, but plenty others still liked it so maybe I was the one in the wrong (I don't think so).

So Monte Cook has left Wizards and his work on D&D Next; the nom-de-net for Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition.

I am a D&D fan. I am a D&D loyalist in fact.  I have every single edition and played them all.  I have nearly every retro clone.  I bought into the D&D 4 hype and bought a ton of books for it. I loved moving the minis on the maps with my kids, I loved the fact that the classes were balanced and I loved that 1st level characters all had something to do.  I disliked how long combats took. I disliked all the meta-gaming that had to go on with feats and surges and actions and markings.  But it was D&D and I still was able to do the sorts of things that worked for me.

Now we are going into the next version, and I have barely played the last version.  My kid's group, The Dragon Slayers, are wrapping up their 3.x game.  We have gone through many of the "Classic" adventures and as much as I love 1st Edition, I really don't want to go back to it.

I know.  I am complaining about having too many games to play. Woe is me...

I guess I'll wait for the playtest like everyone else.  But I have to say that at the moment, D&D 5/D&D Next is not filling me with a lot of excitement.

Meybe I'll just back to D&D Basic and house rule the hell out of it.  Start characters at a higher level (really, wizards should have more spells than 1) and use some of the rules I like from 4e (bloodied) and 3e (multiclass).

V is for Victoria RPG

Continuing my exploration of Victorian era RPGS I can't help but mention the the game that uses the eponymous Queen herself.

Today, V is Victoria.

Victoria is the premier game from Daniel Hodges and Hazard Gaming.  Unlike most of the games I have reveiwed, Victoria is focused on running a game in the historical Victorian Era.  So focus on class, station and no magic (well...mostly).

Victoria is heavy on atmosphere and history.  In fact among the Victorian games, Victoria stresses the history the most.  It is trying to go for an authentic feel of the era sans monsters, magic.

So what does Victoria have? Well for starters character concept is king here.  You should have a good grip what sort of character you want to play.  The book suggests thinking about characters from literature or history.    One of the things things you are going to want to do is decide on your class.  Not how it is typically used in games, but social class.  Social class is everything in this game and there are plenty of examples of of how to use it in play.   The game is really targeted to the newer player with plenty of examples of game play and how to use skills.

Speaking of which, looking at the character sheet you might be surprised to see that everything is a skill.  The first three group are grouped by Social Class.  So there are Upper Class skills (High Society, Linguistics, etc.), Middle Class (Adventure, Law, etc.) and Working Class (Stealth, Street,etc.).  Depending on your class you have more points to allocate to one of the groups and then secondary and tertiary.   You can move points between skill groups (at a cost of course).  There is a fourth group, Personal, which are closer to "Attributes" but are treated just like skills.

The mechanic is a very interesting one and one I have not encountered before to be honest.  The skills are ranked 2 to 12, but you start around 7 and work your way out.    You roll a 2d6 and when you roll the number of your "Main" (a spread of scores) you make it, if you roll outside you don't.  Pretty easy really.
Double "1"s are a critical failure and double "6"s are always a distinctive success.  In either case you can be granted Plot Points.

Plot Points play like Drama Points or Hero Points in other games.  In Victoria the Point economy is bit freer with points being spent and gained quicker.  So if your Main is 5-9 and you roll an 11 then you can spend 2 Plot Points to extend your range and make it.  I mentioned before that critical rolls can grant you Plot Points.   If you fail, if you can describe your failure well then that is worth some plot points to be used at a later challenge.

Half the book is for the players and the other half for the Gamemaster.  The Gamemastering section is not to be missed really, especially if you are a new Gamemaster or starting one.  There is great advice here.  There is also good game-based advice for the giving out the Plot Points and how to reward play based on Social Class.

Chapter 10 is an interesting one since it deals with the Supernatural.  The "paradigm" of Victoria is the "Sherlock Holmes" one.  That is there is no magic, but many people that believe in it.  I think that is where this game works the best.  Some background (but not stats) are given for many creatures.  Chapter 11 similarly deals with alternate settings.  Chapter 12 is an example adventure that stretches science to near Frankenstein levels.

Victoria works best as "Charles Dickens" or "Sherlock Holmes" the Game.  Realism with real problems.
If you want a game with more magic, then we have those as well.  Take advantage of this game's strengths.

I would use this as an expansion is most any Victorian game to add another level of realism to the play. There is quite a bit of history and even a handy guide for how much various professions make in a year.
The character creation section is fantastic for any Victorian era game since it does require you to think about your character not as a collection of stats and numbers, but rather as a concept and as a person within society.

The book itself is fantastic to look at.  The layout is clean and easy to read. The art is the similar PD art found in Ghosts of Albion, Gaslight and Victoriana, but to me that is a good thing.  That is what a Victorian game should look like.

If you like historical games and like your games with a bit more realism in it, then Victoria is a great choice.

You can also go to Daniel's webpage to hear his weekly Podcasts.   In fact next week I am going to be in Episode 11.
http://www.hazardgaming.com/
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=99046&affiliate_id=10748&

Dirty Nel
So, the one thing about Victoria is it lacks a proper magic system and supernatural creatures are non-existent.
That all being said, that doesn't mean I can't try to emulate my street faerie prostitute Dirty Nel.
You can see her in her Ghosts of Albion, Rippers, and Victoriana aspects. Here she is as a normal human.  She is still a prostitute working for the elite upper class. Her clientele are not just the upper class, but the upper-class spiritualist and occultist of the age.

Name: Dirty Nel
Class: Working
Occupation: Prostitute/Informant
Backstory: Nel is a young elfin-looking woman. She claims she fell on hard times, but Nel didn't have far to fall.
Flaw: Fallen Woman, Greedy
Skills


Upper Class

	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
High Society					X	X	X				X
Linguistics						X	X				X
Medicinal						X					X
Research						X					X

Middle Class

	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
Adventure					X	X	X				X
Law & Inv					X	X	X	X			X
Martial						X	X				X
Tactics & Org.					X	X	X				X

Working class

	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
Chameleon				X	X	X	X	X			X
Stealth				X	X	X	X	X			X
Street*				X	X	X	X	X	X		X
Trade & Source					X	X	X				X

*extra skill speciality: Dark Secrets


Personall

	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
Atheltics						X	X				X
Machines						X					X
People					X	X	X	X			X
Wits					X	X	X				X

Possessions: clothes, boots, purse, couple of knives.
Ht: 5'0" Wt: 6.7 stone Age: 16
PP: 4
Money: what she made the night before.