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| The table layout |
Duregar and I played our first game of Pike & Shot and Zombies; Duregar controlled the survivors, and I took control of the shamblers.
We didn't roll up the survivors equipment, just went with approximately what the minis were carrying.
We used a stripped down events cards deck.
I used a home-made movement template for randomized zombie movement instead of the ingerent rule of moving the zombies according to where the movement-die lands. No dice rolled across my tables, please!
The scenario was as follows:
A sage once living in a village is rumoured to have gathered information on the undead - it is said that he wrote down this forbidden knowledge in a gigantic tome that was placed in his tomb with him after his demise.
The elders of the town presently harbouring the adventurers are very keen to get hold of the 'Book of the Dead', as they think it holds the key to ward off the threat of the walkers for good.
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| The party advanced across the bridge into 'biter-country', following a path leading towards the ruined village. |
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| Some of the shamblers moved about in an erratic fashion, and our heroes thought themselves safe for now. |
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| The walking dead did notseem to have any clue |
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| Suddenly, a surge of undead appeared from a small wood. |
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| The elf opened up with a deafening salvo from some piece of hand artillery he had brought to the party... |
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| ...and suddenly the area was crawling with shamblers. |
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| The dwarf addressed the new situation in a rather agressively fashion |
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| Which heralded general havoc. |
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| One of the survivors decided to wander off to shut down a spawning point with some undead still around... |
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| ...which was, so to speak, a bad idea |
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| At this point we decided to call it a day. |
This game suffered from only one player controlling the survivors. It would surely be more fun to have several players conrolling one survivor - or small group of survivors - each, and giving each player his own agenda/objectives to pursue.
PSZ has a lot of RPG-ish features, and when exploited to full extent, I think it will make an excellent beer-and-pretzel game that a group can enjoy for an infinite amount of time, given the right Game Master/Umpire to keep things moving and offer interesting scenarios.
Competitive play? No thanks, but benevolent mockery among players who know each other well should make for some interesting and fun sessions.
I think the zombies can be controlled by the 'AI', if you set up some conditions for the way you move them. Then 2 players may be enough for a spunky game, but I would prefer 3+ survivor players.
Thanks for the Batrep. I've been wondering about Pike & Shotte Zombies for a while. I get the impression you weren't that overly impressed with the rules? Nice looking table and minis though and so typical of an elf to wind everything up!!!
ReplyDeleteOh, I quite like the rules, they just are a bit cumbersome for a conventional wargame - and I don't think they are intended as such. As I wrote, they have some RPG-qualities, and when players only have to worry about their own hero's equipment and weapons (apart from not getting infected or killed), I think the game will run quite smoothly.
DeleteThe basic rulebook contains everything you need for playing, and I recommend it if you're into the genre and want to use any renaissance or Warhammer minis for zombiecalypse gaming.
The reason I didn't use the full set of event cards was that I had laminated them all, but did not have the time to cut out all of them - and that some of them would bring minis into the game I simply not have (painted), yet, and I dedided to make the movement template when I first read the movement rules; dice should be rolled with dice-cups on coasters, or in dice trays, not across a modelled and painted surface containing carefully painted miniatujres!
In that case I may well give in to temptation and buy myself a copy in the near future. Thanks for taking the time to clarify a few bits for me. Much appreciated. Looking forward to another Batrep from you.
DeleteMy pleasure! If I can help, I do.
DeleteOne thing you must keep in mind when reading the rules: The survivors get their entire allotment of actions to defend themselves in the Undead phase. It is not quite clear from the text, but I have it from Stephen Danes himself.
Feel free to ask questions about anything you stumble on here; I may not respond immediately, but I have made a habit of checking comments several times a week.