I am excited because people are finally reading the darned book! It's about time! They think I'm gonna be upset by all the stuff they can do but PLAYERS: I WANT YOU TO DO THAT COOL STUFF! I'm just not gonna spoon feed it to you guys! I'm all for you reading the book or looking at the SRDs online because of how there is you can do! Combat could be a lot more fun (given i'm not doing everything i could myself).

On another note, I am trying to think of ways to make the game a bit more challenging. I think I'm going to have to increase the difficulties of certain tasks so it doesn't become overly simple and no longer fun. Guns are going to limit the combat excitement (especially against zombies) but I hope to make up for it with other tasks/skill checks/ inventive ways to make zombies more fun to kill. Then again, everyone loves killing zombies :-P

Leave comments!

Week of no posts

Hey everyone, sorry about posting nothing last week, I had a hectic two weeks there and blew off some steam by not doing anything (and i mean ANYTHING). So anyways, playing time this weekend was really short as we basically just had one small encounter, killed off a character and then got everyone leveled twice. Yep, boring weekend :-P. Unfortunately, I ruined the surprise of killing the character (basically so he could make a new personalized character) so nobody was shocked or awed.. Oh well, worse things have happened.

So now the party is two people larger. I made their boss join the game (so i can deus ex machina if need be) and another player returned. It should be fun now, I like the group and feel they should be ok with it. Gotta say though, the apocalypse (which we are just getting to now) is not comfortable, sorry girls (all players except one are female). Ultimately though, this poses problems as I need to come up with a way to keep adventures going. So far, I have basic scavenging and going to certain locations that require intense amounts of travel. I want to keep things rolling and have it be a bit scary (so scavenging a grocery store doesn't become boring but more a scary scary thing to do).

Any one got ideas for where to take the campaign? Anyone got ideas of what to do for adventures or rewards? Leave me a comment!

Another weekend, another session

The game session went pretty well this weekend... a minor hickup came when everyone was passed out and napping at the time of the game but we ended up playing later on saturday. Lots of fun, involved one person being a sniper while the rest of the group stormed a factory. One last session before the APOCALYPSE!!! i'm really excited. Unfortunately, I had to make them fail only to push the game along (actually a mistake made by the party to do research before leaving was used as an excuse for the failure :D). So yep, essentially the zombie virus was made, and before the party got to the room where all the ingredients were being mixed, the final ingredient was put in.

In a last minute effort, the party burst through the doors, gunning anyone down they could as the sniper made an amazing shot at the cult leader killing him. Unfortunately, as he fell, the ingredient (a magical flower) fell into the mixing vat and they were unable to prevent it. It was a good time though. Especially with a sniper watching over them. That was unexpected, but a bit more manageable.

One thing I'm discovering is it's much easier to just have both teams go one by one... best way to ensure everyone gets to do something and no creature/player gets skipped. Now the party has to head back to the shop to rescue their boss. I'm very excited about this as I'm going to make an NPC where I can remind them of bad ideas... and he'll be powerful :D. Always fun. anyways, i'll talk about him tomorrow I'm sure. Night all!

Feel free to comment as always!

Player Character Backrounds

Hello again everyone, new topic today (I hope... I may have mentioned this earlier) about Player Characters (PCs) and the backgrounds that I like people to choose.

Personally, I love roleplaying. I feel that when playing an RPG, the RP part of it is one of the most important (right up there with "fun"). With that being said, I've noticed that a lot of the people I play with don't actually go out of their way to roleplay and generally make characters like themself.

While this can be ok, it doesn't provide for them to think as someone else, one of the joys of the game I feel. As a result, I have required all the players to choose something they don't fit into on a daily basis, after all, we interact with each other every day, why not make a new interaction possible? Just cause we're friends in real life, doesn't mean our characters will be friends or as close. As a result, I required the players to make unique characters for them to play as and so far I feel it's been fairly successful. Another thing i've chosen to do is to give exp rewards for when people really show their roleplaying (and lack of metagaming [thinking outside the game, knowing things they otherwise wouldn't]).

And on that note, let me know what you think!

Second weekend has passed...

Ok, sorry for the delay folks! I got a little bummed when we didn't play for the second weekend back on campus but I am currently in the process of getting a game set for Sunday! Other that that little bit of excitement, I am currently thinking of markers for my campaign and a new battle mat. I am excited at the prospect of continuing the game and should it get started again I'm looking at how to represent the endless zombie hordes (once we get to the apocalypse).

I am all about visual representation, i think that it adds a lot to the game to see where you are and to also see where the enemy is. And since I'm all about visual representation, I try to do my best to get characters figurines as close to the character as possible. I also work hard to get models that visually represent the enemy. With that being said, I was very excited to hear about the Wargames Factory: Zombie Horde. A box at a cheap rate (about 1/2 the price of Warhammer zombies) with a more modern feel! I'm looking into getting one of these boxes, maybe two. Here's the companies page on them: http://www.wargamesfactory.com/_product_16676/Zombie_Horde

I think they're pretty cool. I also made a few small purchases this summer. I found that the old Star Wars miniatures line from Wizards of the Coast had some good female characters that could be painted to look like modern individuals. I got two of them, and am looking at purchasing a few more to round out the group. Should be exciting. Next time I'll talk about the battle mat I have, and what I plan to do to add to the mapping ability.

ALSO!!!! If anyone has any ideas about topics i should discuss, OR just have an idea of something for the campaign, ADD A COMMENT AND TELL ME! I am all for new ideas, or ideas about something I said or anything! Look forward to hearing from you readers!

Happy Labor Day

Happy Labor Day everyone. Unfortunately, since I did not post on Friday, I am now posting today. Anyways, today's topic will revolve around idea of City creation. Currently on the d20 official boards, some members (including myself) are attempting to build a "city" for use in a zombie apocalypse scenario. After working on a defensive strong hold (and yes, in my campaign i might use both the city and The Tower), we turned to the city to try and keep the creative juices flowing.

What this has in turn caused me to think about is the dynamics of a city, how it works, who lives there, what they do, etc. With an influx of fantasy type creatures in my campaign, I have not focused enough on the more mundane life in the city I created. I didn't put much thought into things like ethnicities, or religions, or other defining characteristics of a city. I didn't focus on population levels or industry types. Unfortunately, I'm rather busy this week but before the zombies arise, I will definitely be interested in bulking up the story of my city. When I get the chance, I might even have the players do a few missions for ordinary people before all hell breaks loose.

D20 modern boards

Well, the offical D20 Modern boards are back up today and in a new format. So far I do not like them but i guess they'll get the job done. Unfortunately by upgrading them, they did away with some of the nice features and layout so it's annoying to deal with. I suggest people check them out: http://community.wizards.com/go/forum/view/75882/136050/d20_Modern

Other than that, not much should be said, we're getting closer to starting the campaign and that means I am onto the point of character creation. One thing I definitely plan on working on is creating a better set of characters/npcs for use in the campaign. As the campaign started, I unfortunately did not have everything set up so some characters had no idea how to answer questions asked by the players. I plan to spend some of my free time working on developing the background for the world a bit more which is no small task. That will most likely start tomorrow as soon as I have free time by myself.