|
All roleplaying games have at their hearts the "What if . . ?" question. In All Flesh Must Be Eaten, the question is "What if you were faced with a world gone to Hell, where ravenous undead sought living prey?"
What if you had to fight for survival, sometimes
against former friends and loved ones? Would you delve into the heart of the zombie-infested areas to discover the truth? Would you brave death to end the threat? What if there were no cause, no solution? Would it be better to simply flee for safety to ensure the survival of the race? All Flesh Must Be Eaten is a game that combines elements of horror (there are walking dead in this world, and they feed on humans) with survival (characters have the rely on their skills and abilities to live through the night) and conflict (the characters may know the truth; what are they going to do about it?).
Flesh Character Archtypes
How about giving us some details on the game mechanics? Attributes are a pretty basic lot (Str, Dex, Con, Int, Per, Wil), and run between 1 and 6 for humans (2 is average). They can go much higher for non-humans, but that is rare. Skills run the same gambit, but have no upper limit. Again, you will not likely see anything over a 9 or 10, however, and those will be very rare. As an example, a 4 or 5 skill is someone with a great deal of competancy, attained after a great deal of study or practice. The basic Simple Test in the Unisystem is Attribute doubled plus D10 (a Difficult Test is Attribute plus D10). The basic Task is Attribute plus skill plus D10. If you roll a 9 or better, you succeed. Otherwise, you fail. Obviously, things can get more complicated, but that's the basics. A roll of 10 grants you a further positive roll; a roll of 1 requires a further negative roll (modified to curtail the degree of success or failure -- these critical rolls do occur 20% of the time). If you need to know degree of success, you compare the number you rolled with 9. Each two numbers over 9, you get one success (e.g., a 14 is 3 Success Levels). This is important in a number of circumstances indicated by the text. Another variance occurs when two actors are pitted against each other. This calls for a Resisted Test. Each side rolls a Test or Task, and the higher wins (unless more than one roll is called for, in the Zombie Master's discretion). As for fighting, close combat is a Resisted Task between the attacker's combat skill and the defender's combat skill (if he has a weapon or Martial Arts), or defender's Dodge skill (if he has none, it's a Difficult Dexterity Test). Ranged combat is attacker's ranged skill modified for range, lighting conditions, recoil (if autofire is used), etc. Defender's only response there is to duck and cover -- a Dodge and Dex Task, and he needs to beat the attacker's roll (if it's over 9). Problem there is that it uses all the defender's actions. Damage is expressed in Life Points, which are a function of Str and Con. Each weapon does a range of damage (e.g., 9mm pistol does D6 x 4), modified by bullet type. Armor protects with a range as well (e.g., basic Class I Kevlar prevents D6 + 7). If you want, you can dump all the dice rolling, and just use a set number that is provided. The system can be used with cards or a non-random storyteller's method, but dice are the default system. |
||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||
|
Copyright © 1999-2002 Eden Studios, Inc. All
Rights Reserved.
|
