Dying Earth: The Raids

[Gary "Grail" Condra]

50 years ago the US government decided to approve a project designed to make a better soldier. This project continued for 10 years before they struck upon a new serum, they then gathered dishonourably discharged Marines to test it on. Unfortunately this is where everything went wrong, the new serum killed most of the subjects and a few survived. At this point all hell broke loss as the dead subjects reanimated, within 4 hours the entire staff was infected. And when the next shift arrived and opened the complex, the 8 surviving subjects and three scientists ran straight past them onto the bus. Then all the dead attacked the new shift and within a month all of the US was infected...

Welcome to the new Raid Earth topic, the whole idea is being reworked and redesigned. Please bear with me as I am also a TA soldier.

[Mikael]

Friendly warning: Dying Earth is a bit problematic as the partial title for your game, as it strongly associates with the book by Vance and the game by Laws.

[Gary "Grail" Condra]

Hmm thanks for the heads up, any suggestions?

[Kesher]

Howdy.

Well, given your abstract, why not just "Dead Earth"?  I assume that's the feel you're going for, right? The classic zombies-have-taken-over-the-earth kind of thing?  Or maybe "UnEarthed", though maybe that's getting close to a pun...

So what's the point of the game, if you don't mind me asking?  What do players/gms/characters do?

And forgive my ignorance, but what's a TA soldier?

Aaron

[Anders Larsen]

You need to tell more about what it is you want with this game.

From your description it sound like a "survive the zombies" kind of game, and to my knowledge there already exits a number games that do this. So I would really like to know what is special about this game; what is it in your approach that makes it unique?

- Anders

[Aussigamer]

Undying Earth? as its zombies

[Gary "Grail" Condra]

For that kind of information please click on my name and find my posts, Raid Earth was the systems old name but I'm now setting it on land and not based in space. Also yes as in zombies but not all stupid ones.

[sean2099]

Hi Gary,

Forgive me if I missed a post or two...I kept you with your posts when you had your game based in space.  So, I guess what I am asking is, is this a complete "do over" or did you just change the setting and keep some of your other ideas?\

Just curious

Sean

[David Artman]

No more space... no more raiding? *sniff*

Why don't you just go with your HOOK? That was your HOOK! Are you too good for your HOOK?
;-)
David "Billy Madison" Artman

[Gary "Grail" Condra]

The dropship remains but there now based on Earth so that they can be attacked repeatly by zombies. (My zombies lurk near the human bases.) The space version will be the first expansion release now, I've decided to make the initial system during the fall of humanity.

[Pôl Jackson]

A couple of unrelated thoughts about this game.

1.) The space angle interests me the most. I'm particularly fond of the idea that metal is so valuable, the PCs are constantly at risk of being audited by the Satellite Government. Like: every mission, there's a chance that the Satellite Government will assign an auditor to the team, to supervise. (Perhaps a die roll decides, modified by how much metal contraband the team is carrying or has used in the past.)

You'll need a better reason why metal is so valuable, I think. Maybe the zombies are carriers of a "rust plague", that makes metal of all kinds totally useless. That's why the use of metal weapons and tools is so restricted; you're not supposed to carry metal into a Zombie Zone ("Zome"?), because it might be destroyed. The auditor is there to ensure that this does not happen. And of course, of course, something awful will happen to the auditor before the mission is finished. If the PCs are smart, they'll make it look like an accident...

2.) It strikes me that this could be one game, with three scenarios. In the first scenario, the zombie attack begins, and the PCs must get to the shuttle to escape. In the second scenario, the PCs are coming back to Earth in the shuttle, to scavenge for metal and for supplies. In the third scenario, the zombie contagion makes its way onto the station, and the PCs must fight it off.

This could be a standard "follow the boxed text" adventure, as is common in games like D&D. But you could also do it "My Life With Master" style. Set it up so that all players know how each scenario is going to end, except perhaps for the last scenario. The question becomes, what will happen along the way? We know that the shuttle launches successfully at the ends of the first two scenarios, but who will be on board? Who will live? Who will die? Who will become infected? Who will be left behind? Who will be betrayed? Who will be saved? What will the characters lose? What will they gain?

Just thinking out loud, now. Hope you find some of the above useful.

[Gary "Grail" Condra]

Yes i have found some of what you've said highly useful thank you.