Zombies It Is

After taking a lengthy hiatus from running and playing my Savage Worlds adaptation of Eberron, I've been looking to get back into the GM seat. If you listen to the Savage Bloggers Network Podcast, you know that I was struggling choosing which new setting (as well as a couple of older ones) to settle on. The list was long.

• The Sixth Gun
• Savage Thunderscape
• The Thin Blue Line: A Detroit Police Story
• Lankhmar
• The Last Parsec
• Beasts & Barbarians
• Necessary Evil 2: Breakout

I finally settled on Lankhmar mostly because I had the complete bundle (with hardcovers) from Pinnacle Entertainment Group's site. I read through the core book, began reading through some of the Lankhmar: Savage Tales of the Thieves Guild, and started reading Swords and Deviltry to get into the mood.

Then I started reaching out to put together a gaming group for the new campaign. That's when plans changed. One of my friends, a former player in my first Savage Worlds campaign, which was a playtest for a zombie supplement I was working on with Reality Blurs, said he'd really like to play a zombie game again. He really enjoyed it, which was flattering.

The Dilemma

Disenchanted with Zombies

A couple of years ago, I had stopped bothering with anything zombie related, including reading The Walking Dead comic, my recurring reading of World War Z and the Zombie Survival Guide, etc. I just became saturated with everything related to zombies. I felt like all of the stories were told, and nothing was left.

(I was never a big fan of the crazy weird zombies like in Resident Evil or Left 4 Dead. I like my zombies simple, essentially exactly as they're depicted in Max Brooks' books. <rant>No, everyone is not infected waiting to turn into a zombie when they die. No, zombies don't just eat brains, they eat any part of the body. No, zombies can't run!</rant>)

The Decision

I sat on making a decision for a while. I was all psyched for Lankhmar, but I also knew that all of my other players were big fans of The Walking Dead. Some were also new to Savage Worlds, and I knew a modern setting would be easier for them to get invested in. In general, it just seemed to make sense to run it.

Fine! I'll run a post-apocalyptic zombie game. Geez!

Getting Ready

I started listening to my copy of the unabridged audiobook of World War Z to get into the mood. Man, I forgot how much I love that book. This is what a zombie threat is about!

Now, I'm revisiting the work I did on that old zombie supplement, stripping out the crazy zombies and abilities I was play-testing, keeping the setting rules simpler and closer to the Savage Worlds Deluxe rules, updating the zombies based on the version presented in the Horror Companion.

Starting Adventure?

Check. Looking at my shelf, I found my home-printed copy of Zombie Run. Yeah, that's a good starting point. I can hit the ground running with that.

Action Deck?

Check. Long ago, I picked up this cool deck for such an occasion as this.

Let's do this!