Zombies as a Source of Loot

So here I am happily generating zombies for an up coming YotZ product (87 generated tonight), and I’m looking at the stat blocks when I realise something I hadn’t thought of before. We often make reference to how quickly stores and warehouses are looted in the rising and how scarce supplies and ammo become. But we overlook one of the richest, if a little unreliable, sources of loot. The risen themselves.

For example, taking Marshall Tucker from Fleshmongers 2, at zero hour his stats are as follows:

Marshal Tucker (Tough Hero 3): CR 3; Medium-size humanoid; HD 3d10+9 plus 3; HP 29; Mas 17; Init +2;Spd 30 ft; Defense 17, touch 14, flatfooted 15 (+0 size,+2 Dex, +2 class, +3 equipment); BAB +2; Grap +4;
Atk +4 melee (1d4+2, Brass Knuckles), or +4 ranged (2d6+0, 10mm Glock); FS 5 ft by 5 ft; Reach 5 ft; SQ; AL Tuckers Band; SV Fort +5, Ref +3, Will +2; AP 1; Rep +1; Str 14, Dex 14, Con 17, Int 12, Wis 13, Cha 12.
Occupation: Slaver (Drive, Knowledge [Tactics])
Skills: Drive +7, Intimidate +5, Knowledge (Streetwise) +3, Knowledge (Tactics) +5, Listen +3, Read/Write Language +1 (English, Spanish), Speak Language +1 (English, Spanish), Spot +7, Survival +5
Feats: Alertness, Armor Proficiency (light), Brawl, Personal Firearms Proficiency, Point Blank Shot, Simple Weapons Proficiency
Talents (Tough Hero): Robust, Remain Conscious
Possessions: Undercover Vest, Brass Knuckles, 10mm Glock with 6 magazines, handcuffs, meth, cocaine, bottle of alcohol, 2002 Ford F-150 extended cab with cab over camper.

Looking at these stats, ignoring the usual elements, we see that Marshall at this point is reasonably well provisioned for the zero hour slot. But what if Marshall had been unlucky at zero hour. He would have risen, as per normal. But a lot of his equipment would have stayed about his person. Clearly, the vehicle is unlikely to be with him as a zombie (unless he was unfortunate enough to die locked inside), but the rest would still be on his shambling corpse.

There is a chance that he will have been shooting the Glock at the time of death, and this will have a high chance of being lost. The bottle of alcohol has a good chance of being dropped too. But the undercover vest will certainly still be on his body, the brass knuckles, extra magazines, handcuffs and drugs will be in his pockets. Clearly even at this stage Marshall is a walking post rising gold mine.

There is a thought that says we will have to be careful in what we put on our zombies in the future, as to not unbalance the game. But as Tim has proven, even parties with armoured vehicles can be beaten. They have to get out of the tank to pee sometime 😉

Laters

John

New Stock Art Pack Available

Finally, managed to get my head down and pull together some work.

First out of the gate is Art by Shinkei: Modern Zombies 1. This stock art pack brings 11 images from John Picots excellent Year of the Zombie work, priced at $4.00 with license to us in fan work or other publications. Available now from RPGNow

I have also got a new Stockart Covers product ready, expect this in a few days as well as more art from John.

For those who need a reminder of some of Johns work I have also created 3 new Desktop Wallpapers for Year of the Zombie, which can be downloaded for free from the links below.

Anyway, night all.

John

Fleshmongers 2 Released at RPGNow

Following on from Fleshmongers, UKG Publishing are please to announce the release of Fleshmongers 2 for Year of the Zombie, available from RPGNow priced at $8.00

Year of the Zombie: Fleshmongers 2 brings another batch of the worst of the worst to your Post Apocalyse game.

Whether you are running Year of the Zombie, Nuclear Aftermath or some other Post Apocalypse scenerio, Fleshmongers 2 has a cast of loathsome NPC Slavers for your PCs to butt heads with and despatch.

This 70 page pdf includes:

• Sample slaver groups and NPC’s, documented at various points in time as the Rising progresses.
• Printer friendly version

Or to put it in the Words of the Author “It was once noticed by a reviewer that the bad guys in Year of the Zombie are all assholes with bad hygiene and no redeeming qualities. This pattern repeats in this supplement, as I plan on showing Fleshmongers as the worst of the worst, the bottom of Post-Rising society, and some of the most disgusting parasites out there. This book is probably one of the most grueling for me to write, and this one pulls no punches. The NPC’s detailed in this supplement are the positively worst that I’ve designed. These people are absolutely disgusting, the worst of the worst, ones that are so bad that other villains want them dead, hate them, hate them and fear them. This is a book of villains, their tactics, their methods, their equipment, and how they operate. No glory, no misunderstood diamonds in the rough that just need a little bit of guidance, no showing a better society through slavery. I wholly suggest that the PC’s be allowed to kill these assholes wherever they find them without feeling pangs of conscience or shades of gray, and to that end I crafted nothing but scumbags, losers, and assholes. -T Willard

WARNING! FLESHMONGERS IS RATED M FOR:
VIOLENCE
LANGUAGE
GORE
ADULT CONTENT

SERIOUSLY THESE NPCs ARE NOT NICE PEOPLE!

New Release: Year of the Zombie – Eat the Rich

UKG Publishing are pleased to announce the release of Year of the Zombie: Eat the Rich.

Restricted communities exist in many places in the United States of America. In many ways they are a dirty little secret, havens of the rich who choose to get away from “undesirables” of certain types. Some are little more than carefully worded dens of racism, while others are communities for older people who wish to stay away from children and younger people and live out the fantasy of “how things used to be.” While not all restricted communities have agendas, a few do, and Green Hollows is one such restricted community.

Eat the Rich is a Zero Hour and beyond location book for a group of 4-8 characters of any level. Within this document are the people who live in Green Hollows, descriptions of the buildings, the strength of the walls, as well as suggestions on how to get the PC’s involved in the situation. Also included is a nearby town, which has the unfortunate luck to be the site of a passenger train derailment prior to Zero Hour. The town will be quickly overrun, and the PC’s and population of the town will have only one place that might serve as a haven.

As is usual for Year of the Zombie products, this product is rated M for Mature. If you are easily offended this book probably isn’t for you.

Priced at $8.00 this product is available from RPGNow

It’s been a Busy Month

Well, here we are after a busy month of layout, uploads and publishing. And as usual my thoughts return to the blog, which as usual isn’t updated as often as it should be.

So what have we been up to  and what’s on the Horizon.

In the month of March we released 4 new products on RPGNow.

Sorcerer Specialist: The Illusionist is a rework of the old Illusionist class for 3.5e with a twist, being based around the sorcerer class, rather than a Mage subclass, Nicholas Thalasinos brings us his vision of the class.

A re-imagined PC class for your d20 campaign.

Nicholas J. Thalasinos brings us his vision of the Illusionist, re-imagined in the role of a specialist sorcerer.

Illusionists are arcane spell casters who specialize in casting illusions – spells that deceive the senses or minds of others. They cause people to see things that are not there, not seeing things that are, hear phantom noises, or remember things that never happened. As such, their spells manipulate light, darkness, shadow, sound, and (to a lesser extent) thoughts.

This 21 page document brings the class to life, including access to illusionist familiars, and 28 new spells.

Priced $2.00

Art of Shinkei: SciFi 6 brings another of John Picot’s stock art sets to our stable of stock art.

SciFi 6 includes 11 full colour CGI images by CGI Artist John Picot, for use in your gaming, fan publications or full publication. The license extends to allow use of these images in web pages, both non-profit and profit publications. Please download the demo for samples of the art include in this product.

Priced at $5.00

Year of the Zombie: Traders is the latest in the YotZ line, bring Tim Willards vision of Post Apocalyptic bartering, and illustrated by John Picot.

Despite an apocalypse, despite disease, war, famine, or widespread disaster, trade and bartering often continues. Trading something you have excess of or that has no use to you for something you have none of is a long standing human tradition. While killing someone over an item is still happens after the Rising, most people would rather trade or barter for items than kill for them.

Money has become just a little better than worthless, making a good toilet paper or tinder, and the standard for bartering has become ammunition. Even empty shell casing are worth something to people, as they can be reloaded and used again. Firearms are another standard, usually made for large/expensive trades involving vehicles, medicine, or working electronics. A firearm with a usable amount of ammunition is usually enough to get medical treatment or a couple cans of gasoline at the least.

Year of the Zombie: Traders is a 49 page book detailing trading and bartering in the Post Apocalyptic World, and those people who scrape a living as traders.

As usual, Year of the Zombie: Traders contains strong language and references.

Priced at $6.00

Finally, Brains and Souls is the latest SotC supplement from Richard Fannon which examined the Zombie Apocalypse genre and bring rules for SotC to the table to run games in this setting.

Human, but not human; dead, but not dead. Abandoning all civilised behaviour as they descend below the level of animals. The Arabic ghuls, the Wendigo of Algonquian myth, thedraugar of Norse legend and, from Haiti, the zombi.

Stories about zombies are stories about humans. We project our fears onto them, fears about how fragile our civilisation might be and what would happen if everything that we love and everything that we think that we need was suddenly taken away.

SotC is a OGL role-playing game written by Evil Hat Productions and based on their FATE system. This supplement contains additional rules to tailor SotC to the zombie survival genre.

As well as the rules, this book also contains a history of the zombie survival genre of fiction (both in film and in literature) and an exploration of the genre’s influence on today’s society. It asks questions about what it means to be a human being – both as an individual and as part of society. This book should allow you, the GM, to create games where you and your players can explore these issues – and have fun while you’re doing it.

Priced at $2.00

Further more we have been working hard to get our back catalogue into print. To that end I have already got Brass, Blood and Steam formatted for print and have received a proof copy. this weekend I have also set up Brains and Souls, Thousand Faced Heroes, Limitless Horizons, YotZ Traders and Sorcerer Specialist: The Illusionist for print. Proofs have been ordered.

You can order our print catalogue from Lulu. Please note however, that whilst the five new books are listed on the site, we have not received a proof copy yet so order at your own risk.

What’s on the horizon, I understand Tim is hard at work with Fleshmongers II, and Richard Fannon is working through some SotC adventures for Brass, Blood and Steam. I am working on a few books myself although these are embryonic at the moment, so more on those later. Eat the Rich, is having the maps created and ready for layout, and I have a number of Stock Art packs from John Picot ready to load. So Busy Busy Busy.

Back from Greece to a Nice Review

Just got back from my jollies to Greece, to find a nice review for Hold at All Costs 1 on RPGNow.

You can read it at http://www.rpgnow.com/product_reviews_info.php?products_id=62430&reviews_id=20694

So now its time to settle back, and get on with some new material.

UKG Publishing Release Encounters: Dead Stock a YotZ Adventure

UKG Publishing are pleased to announce the release of Dead Stock, an Encounters Products for Year of the Zombie.

Encounters, the roleplaying supplement line from UKG Publishing aims to provide small encounters and adventures which can be dropped into any game as a filler between adventures. These side quest adventures are written in a setting neutral manner to ensure the maximum compatibility between the supplement as written and your campaign world.

Dead Stock is a small early rising setting suitable for parties just starting out in a Year of the Zombie campaign of around 4th level  and includes a 13 page adventure book (+printer friendly version), maps, full battlemaps (27 pages).

Priced at $2.50 this product is available from http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=62524

Hold at all Costs:1 Released

It’s taken 3 years to bring to fruition. It’s grown to 3 times its original size. But it’s here!

UKG Publishing is pleased to announce the release of Hold at all Costs 1: All You Can Eat for the Year of the Zombie setting.

Hold At All Costs One: All You Can Eat is the sequel to Hold at all Costs Zero. Set roughly 24 to 48 hours into the rising, HAAC:1 rejoins the team of Seeker 7 (75th Rangers) as they seek to facilitate the rescue and withdrawal of US personnel to the US Embassy in Calstinopa.

Recommended for levels 6-12, Hold At All Costs One provides the following:

• Main Adventure Book (100 Pages): 19 separate missions ranging from simple rescue and extraction to guiding in Tomahawk Cruise Missiles using a laser designator, rules for exhaustion and additional military equipment.
• Hard Options (9 Pages): 7 Additional side missions which provide additional NPC’s which can be drafted into the Player Character pool in the event of a fatality.
• Personnel Database (49 Pages): Includes the 6 original pre-generated player characters (with stats modified to reflect HAAC:0 if necessary) and 45 NPC’s including SAS, SEALs, Marines, Delta Force and more.
• Cast of Extra’s (21 Pages): A separate book listing all the NPC’s used in these missions.
• Cast of the Risen (33 Pages): Including stock zombies, random appearance and possession tables and Risen stats for every PC and NPC in the above books.
• 4 x Battlemaps (Total of 42 Pages) for the more combat intense missions.
• Player props and handouts (4 Pages): Including satellite intelligence.

This huge adventure (254 pages) also includes all the above books in Printer Friendly format and the Battlemaps and handouts are provided in colour and greyscale.

Hold at all Costs:1 is available from RPGNow priced at $10.

Year of the Zombie – Hold at all Costs:1 Nearing Completion

Well, it’s been a long time in the making, with re-writes, re-thinks, mapping, layout and stat blocks. The follow on from HAAC:0 is a monster, with over a dozen military missions set in the post rising world just a few hours after the dead began to return to life.