fast-paced zombie role-play

This will be a relatively fast-paced zombie role-play, based off of the world of the graphic novel The Walking Dead. The idea is not for a small group of characters to survive from the beginning of the story to the end, but to constantly introduce new characters and have them meet their inevitable fate in the jaws of a zombie or at the hands of another deranged human being. Each player will start out with 1-3 characters. Introduction posts will start out from a specific point after the outbreak, because I don’t want long introduction posts detailing the moment of the outbreak until now to slow down the beginning of the role-play. And besides, those kinds of stories are always better when told orally, as stories but in-character.

A small percentage of characters will not survive more than a few days. A larger percentage of characters will not survive more than a few months. Possibly 100 percent of the characters will not survive to the end of the story. There will be a lot of survivors out there, so we will always have the opportunity to introduce new ones when our previous characters are killed off. We just need to think of interesting ways to introduce them into the story.

As for the character sheets, they shouldn’t be too long or descriptive. Don’t burn yourself out or become too attached to a single character. The way zombie encounters work will be behind-the-scenes dice rolls. I know it isn’t really fair to have to rely on me saying who does and does not die, but it really isn’t fun for me to lie about it. I prefer the unreliability of chance.

So here is an example encounter (using characters from The Walking Dead).
Rick, Morgan, Carl, and Dale are traveling on foot to the police station in a nearby town, which Rick has the keys to. They reach the police station with little resistance, shooting any zombies that get in their way. However, the gun shots attract more of the nearby zombies, and on their return trip they encounter a full horde blocking their path. The characters have the decision to circumnavigate the horde or to try and press through them, relying on their speed and wit to make it through.
At this point I will be rolling the dice to see who survives and who doesn’t. Unless they are multiple specific mini-encounters within the overall encounter, I will only be rolling the dice once for each character. A mini-encounter example would be Rick having to go back into the horde to try and save his son Carl. He then risks dying again, and thus another dice roll.

If unlucky dice rolls end up killing off all of the characters, I will decide who has the greatest chance of survival until meeting up with the next (currently unannounced) survivors. That character will defy the dice roll and survive…for now. However, if there is still another group of players elsewhere and everyone in this group dies…well that’s it. Again, I don’t want anyone to get too attached to their characters, because there will be deaths. Lots of deaths. This is, after all, a zombie role-play.

As far as bad dice rolls go…I will PM the result of each roll to each character involved. That way the player can decide how their character dies, and it will still be a surprise to the rest of the players. This way it will feel a bit more seamless and less like a board game. Hopefully.

I will also have some other behind-the-scenes secrets that I’ll be putting together, which you will hear about at the right time.

Anyone interested?

Me! Me! Me-me-me!

I don't usually like group RP's because it feels chaotic when people don't post in the right order and because the characters never have a chance to really get to know eachother, but both of those problems are solved when the characters are constantly recycled!

Count me in!

Right order? O.o

Eh, you can count me in Silvone. The regular character death thing reminds me of an old RP I tried; it didn't work out, but I think that was more because of another, similar RP that was starting at the same time. So, let's see how this goes, shall we?

Chainlinc3 wrote:Right order? O.o

Eh, you can count me in Silvone. The regular character death thing reminds me of an old RP I tried; it didn't work out, but I think that was more because of another, similar RP that was starting at the same time. So, let's see how this goes, shall we?

Yes - the right order. As in, person 1, then person 2, then 3, then 4. If person 4 jumps the gun and goes after 2, it bothers me. Which is why I tend to dislike group RPs.

I'll probably make a couple of characters

fragilefigure wrote:Yes - the right order. As in, person 1, then person 2, then 3, then 4. If person 4 jumps the gun and goes after 2, it bothers me. Which is why I tend to dislike group RPs.

While I kinda understand the arguments for it, my personal thought on that style is that it limits meaningful conversation. For example, if two people want to have a conversation that is basically irrelevant to the rest of the group, they have two choices:
1. They can have the convo and wait for everyone else to make a post to the effect of "So-and-so stares blankly into space because he/she has nothing to do right now," in between every single conversation piece, or
2. Not have the conversation at all.

Since most of roleplaying (in my mind at least) is about the relationships between characters, posting orders just make an unnecessary impediment. At the same time though, I can understand why they would be wanted, because otherwise things can spin out of control if the roleplayers aren't responsible. In general though, I just feel that most people on FoG are good enough that posting orders aren't warranted. But that's just my opinion.

Anyway, to make this relevant I feel I should ask about the character sheet. How detailed are you planning it to be? Because asking people to fill out big ol' sheets for characters that get killed off left right and center could be... dubious.

The character sheets are actually really small.

Example Character (from The Walking Dead series)


Name: Rick Grimes
Age: 26
Gender: Male
Pre-Outbreak Occupation: Police Officer
Appearance: White male with blue eyes, blond hair, 5'6".
Descriptive Keywords (personality, skills, etc): A natural leader with experience in handling firearms and enforcing security.

Its really simple. Most of the character will be developed in the story itself, if they last long enough for that.

Sounds interesting...haven't participated in many RPs where the characters can die at the drop of a hat in some encounters.

Should I put a character sheet like that one up there down?

Wait for the OOC, I think.

I'll try and have everything ready by tomorrow.

Silvone, I'm interested in knowing the specifics of your dice mechanics. Being an old-skool grognard, this sort of thing is my specialty.

Is this still open? It sounds ridiculously fun to me.