Day one part 2

Ling Mei grabbed her keys from the kitchen counter and headed out.  Across from her building sat the black Chevvy Suburban she had treated herself to after winning her Olympic silver in the last games. Jumping into the beast she checked under the seat for the Glock taped to the bottom, satisfied it was still there she started off to the Gas 'n Save so she could top off the tanks and grab some food.

Pulling away she manoeuvred around some cars that looked abandoned by their owners they were so badly parked.  Tutting under her breath at the terrible driving of others she headed toward the junction.  Across the way she could see a small group of citizens streaming toward the junction from the other side.  As she arrived two "people" sprang up from behind the hedges bordering her building.  Something was not right with the way that they moved, like a puppet on tangled strings.  An old man accompanied by a teenager ambled in her direction and emitted a low moan. Looking carefully at the odd pair she saw blood dripping from their jaws and running down the front of their clothing.  Zombies! The word described the shuffling creatures perfectly. Ling Mei moaned softly to herself as she knew what she had to do. Hitting the gas of her Chevvy, the big car leapt forward crunching into the zeds and smashing them into the pavement.  The sound of the gunning engine caused two more of the creatures to look up from their bloody meals....

Up ahead the citizens stopped at the junction in fear at the zeds in front of them, seemingly rooted to the spot they could do nothing as the undead monsters ran at them with outstretched hands.  Ling Mei looked out the window as she saw some of the citizens go down with zombie jaws taking big chunks of meat from their bodies.  The sight of this horrible feasting caused her to veer of the road momentarily and the crunch of gravel under the tyres brought her to her senses in time before she crashed into the side of the store.  The other humans fought desperately with the remaining z, trying to keep its snapping teeth from their throats.

Ling Mei knew that their was nothing she could do in time and rushed to the pumps with a burst of speed.  The big Diesel engine of her SUV like a siren call, caused three zombies to shuffle out of the shadows.  Throwing open her door she dashed to the pump and started to refuel.  It was not long after she heard the click of the fuel flow stopping, the pump had run out of diesel! Cursing she looked up in time to see a pair of zeds bearing down on her, she had just enough time to draw her swords before the were upon her.  Parrying the first z's clawed hand with her dominant sword she thrust her offhand blade through it's forehead, dropping it to the floor.  Stepping out from its dying grasp she swept her foot out and tripped the second creature to the floor before shearing its head from its neck in a single downward blow.

Diving into the car she sped off in time to see three more zombies fall out of the store.  Maybe she would get some food after picking up JJ!

ATZ day one

Day one then! Ling Mei needs some locations to go to to stitch together an encounter. So I have decided that she starts of at her dojo where she hears the public announcement regarding the disorder and a call by heads of state for citizens to return to their homes! Ling Mei decides to head home and check on her bff, the short and fiery Debbie and look in her landlord, after that she will get some supplies and then head out to the school where her bud Juliana is temping at before she leaves for uni. Finally she'll head back home to hunker down. Four locations, one encounter - bring on the zeds!

I'm gonna write this as a story rather than the turn by turns batreps as I have done with the WFB reps I've written.  This suits my style much better as I can't seem to get the accuracy and fluency of the batreps I have read (vampifan and the like).

It begins....

Ling Mei stretched lazily, easing her corded leg muscles after such a strenuous swords routine.  Master Wu had left moments before with a troubled brow upon hearing the state of emergency broadcast over the ancient speakers in the corner of the dojo.  His parting words to Ling Mei, hung in the air like a dark cloud - "be safe my student, it has began."

Ling Mei pondered the words as she began her cool down exercises, letting her body work it's way through the routine as her mind bent to the task.  She trusted her master like no other and if he was worried then she should be too.  Looking around the dojo for what could be the last time her gaze fell upon Master Wu's long bow in pride of place at the front of the room, "handy" she thought.  Strapping her twin swords to her hips, she swept up the bow and her gym bag and trotted out into the mid morning sun.

Jogging past the train station and looking down the long High Street, she could see her house in the distance.  A small group of people, two young women and a man ran directly toward her. All looked petrified and seemed intent on running her into the ground.  Using her uncanny speed and grace she ghosted around the citizens and headed for home.

At which point three more men burst from the entrance to her building in blind panic.  The men pushed and shoved and tripped over themselves to get clear of the doorway and barrelled into Ling Mei. Without thought she stepped into the grasp of the first man and used his momentum to flip him over her hip, crashing him into the floor with a dull thud.  Her left foot trailed behind her and planted solidly into the ground as she kicked with her right into the second man's groin with unerring accuracy, dropping him to the floor in an instant.  The third man, whose eyes were watering in sympathy for his colleague swung his fists in a flurry of blows and Ling Mei could only parry them for a second or two until she could regain her balance and the two opponents were well matched until Ling Mei could land a round house kick that toppled him to the ground.  

With the men unconscious or otherwise incapacitated Ling Mei opened the door to her building and started calling out for Debbie and Nash but it appeared no one was home.  "Damn it" she thought. Going into her small kitchen she saw the note on the counter from Debbie explaining that she had popped out to check on her mum and promising to return later that day....

More terrain

next board to be built was the middle class district, single town houses in neat gardens.

Obviously the monstrous cat is a concern for any adventurer....

After putting the cobble roads down so they match up to the previous board and putting in the footpaths I laid the lawns using an old GW battlemat from a previous table in the old grotto!  Add some lichen bushes, hot glue some trees and some white picket gates and job's a good'un sarissa town houses to be added separately.

All Things Zombie!

I played my first real game of All Things Zombie - final fade out (ATZFFO) today. I had a little go at it with my family a couple of days ago just to get a feel of the rules and got the melee rules wrong.  Re-reading the rules I think I have them a bit more coherently in my head now.

So it was time to play the Day One scenario. Of course before that I have to meet the star of my apocalypse!  I have a few survivor minis so decided to roll up the random attribute and think about which mini it fitted best. I rolled up and got "agile" no worries I have a great model in mind, I added "fast" and Ling Mei - the ex gymnast, Kung fu student was born.  I love this mini from Hasslefree, she comes with twin swords so that's what she's kitted out with, counting as a two handed weapon when used together (my own rule!) and I added a samurai bow (compound bow) although I haven't got a model one yet until I can either craft one or dig one out my bits box... With some power bars, mineral water, first aid kit from her gym and cash; she comes with one food, one meds and one luxury.  She has left her SUV at home (the parking is prohibitive at the gym) which is half filled and has a Big Ass Pistol (BAP) at home as well.  I wanted her to start as rep 4, I know I can make her rep 5 but I didn't want to super power her too early.

She also needs a Scooby gang so I rolled up some random grunts and picked survivor minis to match.  First of all was rep 4 Debbie (don't call me Debs!) Wills, an ambidextrous, twin BAP wielding Selene wannabe with the runt attribute, she is Ling Mei's bff and flatmate. Next is her buddy, rep 3 Juliana Jones a fun loving teen, packing a shotgun, pistol and a whip (counts as improvised) she sees the apocalypse as a great big adventure. Finally we have rep 3 Nash "Elvis" Hambleton, a faded lounge singer and Ling Mei's landlord, he comes packing a BAP and his steel guitar (improvised weapon)

Tiles in progress photos

I thought I would show the different stages of how I put together the terrain tiles I've been working on. The first one was the factory tile.

The tile is 3mm MDF strengthened by a wooden frame, I wanted the tiles to be able to be placed in any direction so there would be a road connection in the middle of each edge. The roads are cobblestone effect plastic sheets from Amera plastics - very inexpensive at £2 a sheet. The paths were made of foam sheets and with the slabs carved in with a ballpoint pen.

 

The fence was scratch built matchsticks and covered by a netting type fabric before being spray painted and then drybrushed and finally hot glued into place. The barb wire I scratch built using a tutorial I found online from a model railway enthusiast. It was so cheap to make - about £1 compared to 5 or 6 times that for shop bought from army painter for the amount I needed!

A small breach in the fence following an explosion nearby!

The finished tile with the medium factory and power plant from sarissa precision (now painted) I've just got to add some power lines, which I have ready just need to base them.

Terrain boards

So not so much a blog post as some pictures of the urban gaming boards I have scratch built recently. I've been heavily into Bolt Action lately so decided to build some modular boards 2'x2' that can be moved about to create different layouts. I've done 4 so far, a rail station, factory section and a middle class section. The fourth is a mountain base, complete with radar station (not shown as it is being painted at the moment!) currently working on a canal section... All the buildings are from sarissa and are cracking builds. The new section will be working class terraces from 4ground. The boards are expensive to build, mainly because of the buildings but I'm sure you'll agree look great!  I've also played my first games of All Things Zombies Final Fade Out on them and they worked really well.  I'm going to start a campaign and base it in mainland Europe as a bit of a change of pace for zombie apocalypse games so as to fit my terrain boards, it may look a bit strange with my minis but I'm gonna find some continental figs to fit me thinks!

Some of my urban terrain boards