'PBB' - Gentlemen, choose your survivor

I finished painting some extra figures today (they are the ones in the first photo) so now the process of  the "Play By Blog" (PBB) can begin.

Because of various time zones around the world I am going to have players chose which survivor they want by posting comments indicating the survivor figure they want to play the most.

 If you are the only person to chose a figure then you will get to control that figure for the game.

 Players may nominate a second or third figure they would like to play on the off chance (more than likely) that someone else wants to control the same figure, but you are willing to control another one when it comes down to it.

 If two or more people still want to control the same figure, I will then put those figures up for a second round of nominations. Again players will nominate the figure they want to control the most, as well as indicating the figure they want to control the least.

 On the highly likely chance that this second round gets no results I will randomly allocate a figure for each remaining player, with the guarantee that they wont get lumbered with the figure they want to control the least.

 I am open to bribes or a strong missive as to why you need to control a figure more than anyone else, but threats will see the player removed from the game.

wow - I didn't notice until posting the photo that all figures have blue pants in this photo!

Players for the game are:

The Angry Lurker
Dan
cmnash
Vampifan
shintokamikaze
Lord Siwoc
The Extraordinarii
Brummie
Irqan

Each survivor has no name - that is for the player to come up with, but each figure has a different level of ability and different skills. What the ability and skills are will not be revealed at this stage. Figures you think look cool and nasty might turn out to be complete wimps, where as the timid librarian type might turn out to be the most promising of the lot.

The Survivors:

#1: man in suit with automatic pistol
#2: woman with automatic pistol
#3: man in casual suit with automatic pistol
#4: man wearing body armour with military automatic rifle and pistol
#5: man in sports attire with SMG
#6: woman with SMG
#7: man with SMG and grenade
#8: man with automatic rifle
#9: man with SMG and knife
#10: woman with long protective coat and two heavy calibre pistols
#11: teenage girl with unknown modifications for SMG
#12: teenage girl with katana
#13: teenage boy with silenced SMG and knuckle dusters

Each player for the game has one week to post a figure nomination in the comments section (and no one will see them until all nominations are in). Any longer than the week will put a player out of contention.

Good luck Gentlemen, and chose wisely...

Another Survivor

OK - I haven't forgotten about my 'play by blog' game.

I am busy painting a few extra figures so that there are enough for every one interested to be able to play.

I finished off the Hasslefree "Baker" figure today and this is what it looks like:

It wasn't until I was painting the figure that I realised that the jacket and the hoodie are two separate pieces of clothing and that the jacket looked very much like what you see American College students wearing in movies, so naturally enough, I tried to paint the jacket this way.

 I am rather pleased with this figure.

I have a few more figures nearing completion for the game, so I hope to have those ready soon.

Once all the figures are ready I will post a photo of them all so that people can start choosing which one they want to control for the game.

New Poll - would you participate in a 'play by blog' game?

I have an though lurking in the back of my mind: a play by blog game where followers of my blog get to play a game through my blog.

The idea works like this:

I generate some survivor characters and post them to the blog. A photo and information on each character is included.

 Those interested in playing stake their claim on which character they would like to play by posting comments.

When the game starts I take photos of the table, including notes on items of interest etc that could help with the game. Scenario objectives are also included.

With each turn the players post their orders in the comments section (and they will not be made public until all orders are in).

I then use the gaming area to play out those orders and make all the necessary dice rolls needed.

I then post new photos of the playing area showing where the figures are after every one has moved.

 New orders are then given and so on until the game ends.

Anyone interested?

What should I name my city poll finished

The poll on what I should name my city has finished - and more people voted that are followers of my blog, and more people voted for 'other' than actually left a suggestion as to what 'other' should be.

and the results are:

malediction 8
perdition 10
brimstone 7
other 9

Well, I will cast a vote myself, and based on some great suggestions for 'other' I will use my vote to tie the results to:

malediction 8
perdition 10
brimstone 7
other 10

I will use all of the names for satellite towns, but come up with a name for the big city.

 I will reveal what it is once I have made some street signs for it.

Thank you to all that voted, and an extra big thanks to anyone that left a comment - there were some great ideas in the mix, and I greatly appreciate you taking the time to help out.

Now that poll is closed I will be opening another poll to see if there is any interest in an idea I have in the back of my mind...

Zombie Golf - the rules

Ok, a long time ago when I first blogged about zombie wargaming I made mention of 'zombie golf'. Now seems a good time to revisit the idea - this way I can play some casual rounds of golf while building scenery needed for my campaign.

Basic Rules

 Each hole has a Par rating. To score par for the hole, you need to kill as many zombies equal to the par for that hole. Killing more than the par rating gives you a better score.
 Example: a par 4 hole means you have to kill 4 zombies to reach par. If you kill 5 zombies you are 1 under par. If you only kill 3, then you are 1 over par.

Once you have taken a shot at a zombie then you must continue to play that zombie until it is killed or you are chased off the hole.

 Killing a zombie in a bunker or the rough adds one to your score (deduct one from your score; thus a 2 over par becomes a 3 over par).


Set Up

The Golf Course

  To make it easy I suggest using your favorite local golf course as a guide, or 'google' golf courses to find out what the par for each hole is.

 For example, the Royal Melbourne Golf Club has a few courses on their web site, and lists each hole:
Royal Melbourne GC

 By looking at this, I see the first hole is a Par 4, the second a Par 5 and so on.

 Determine the Zombie Threat Level: I suggest using the rating of the golf course: a 5 star rating = 5 ZTL.
 There are web sites that give star ratings for course. This site lists the Royal Melbourne as a 5 star course.

 Place your teeing area, putting green and any hazards or features that you feel would enhance the hole.

 Put your players on the tee. A gentleman's agreement should suffice to determine who will tee off first, but failing that roll a dice and the highest roll wins (re-roll ties).

Playing a hole

Roll to determine the initial number of zombies vs the ZTL as per the zombie game you are using. These zombies are place of the far edge of the putting green facing the 'golfers'.

 Players now take it in turns to shoot at, and hopefully kill, the zombies on the hole.

 Once all players have taken a shot move the zombies towards the golfer.

 This completes one turn.

 Remember to roll the basic ZTL plus an extra die for each shot taken during a turn. These zombies are ones that come on at the same spawn point as the initial zombies.

 Should no zombies be in play at any stage roll to spawn zombies until some appear.

 Play on the hole continues until the best score for the hole is achieved or both players agree to abandon the hole (zombies are too close and will be in melee).

 A golfer that is killed playing a hole automatically concedes the game to any surviving players.

Edit: thanks to a question in the comments, the following rules have been added:


playing a zombie in a water hazard adds one to your shot. It is only a 1 penalty because the zombie wont remain in the water... unless you kill it.

 The players can move off the tee, but as soon as they come into contact with the zombies (i.e. melee) they must stop play on the hole.

 The players may not move any further away from the zombies than the rear of the teeing off area.

Still here - working in the background

It has been over a week since my last post, but I am still working in the background.


 I was away on exercise with the military a couple of weekends ago, and that usually throws my mojo out for a number of days.


 As it is winter here, I managed to catch a nasty cold a few days after coming home, and that has put a huge "dampner" (apparently 'dampner' isn't a real word) on the mojo as well.


 I haven't done any gaming, but I have been making a forest. Trees are something I never seem to have enough of for my games, so I have started to fix this problem.


This is a new method of making trees for me - they are cheap model railway trees I bought on ebay. I then cut pieces of cardboard into various shapes, covered the edges with masking tape, hot glued the trees to the card board, painted the bases brown and then flocked the bases.

 The picture shows a variety of trees at the different stages of being made.  The pine trees are actually for a friend: a wargaming mate of mine gave me the trees as he didn't know what to do with them. He is currently on holiday, and when he gets back I will give him the trees back as a surprise.


 The few trees I was making in the past took a lot of time - the method I am using now allows me to knock up a forest in next to now time by comparison. I only wish I had though of it sooner.


I also have my next road section near completion and I should get off my arse and finish it this week - I just need to slap my mojo into action.


I also have a hankering for some historical wargaming, so I might play around with that for a little while until I can get my next lot of zombie scenery up an running. As indicated in previous posts, that isn't a small task and I want to get it right.


 For those interested in my other wargame projects, please visit my other blog: Shelldrake's Wargame blog

Planning my 'burbs or "google maps is my friend'

I am currently designing and building a suburban area for my next game which will take a while to finish.

I am in the process of making a new road section for the game. This time I am making a T-intersection and doing a photographic record of the steps for posting once it is finished.

As part of my planning for the playing area I used Google Maps to help with my designs.

First I chose an area that matched what I imagined my suburb to look like:

I then zoomed in for a closer look, which also showed me the road markings I would need:

Next I 'cruised' around the block to find a house design that I could easily make:

All of this helps my planning a lot:

 I will have no centre markings on the side road for my t-intersection, put in a stop line (I wont put in the double white crossing markings so the road can be a bit more generic).

A nature strip and a footpath will go in front of each house. This will help me pad out the scenery I need to make rather nicely.

I noticed there aren't many fences between the houses in this area, but I will put them in as it is a nice way to slow down zombies, as well as help channel them into back yards before survivors jump the fence to get away.

 The house is a nice easy design - my houses wont look exactly like this, but it make a good basic design from which to work from.