Zombie Dark Heresy Game?

[Forum Explorer]

So I was thinking that DH is actually a really good system to run a zombie survival game in. It needs some tweaks though.

Have the zombies basically only die when critical damage to the head is done. The zombies themselves only do melee and on a successful hit infect the victim but do no damage. That victim then takes increasing difficult T tests until they fail 3 times and become a zombie. Each fail lowers all of their stats by some amount.

A big thing would be that you aren't working for the Inquisition yet but are just normal people caught in the mess. So Assassin, Sanctioned Psyker, and I think Guardsman would be banned. The goal would be to survive long enough though a particularly ambitious team might try and find the source/cure for the disease for when the Inquisition showed up.

The game would be very high mortality but I think a team of 5 would be best with every player having backup characters.

What I really need is a good stat block for the zombies, a good random encounter table for when the team is holed up, and most of all a really good map.

Also are there any extra things I haven't thought of?

[PrinceOfMadness]

My thoughts:

- If the zombies are only dying from head shots, make certain that shots to the rest of their bodies has at least some benefit; for example shots to the legs blow their legs off, forcing the zombie to crawl, whereas shots to the arms hamper their melee ability.

- I would make it a chance for zombies to infect their victims, not automatic. Alternatively, make the zombie take a grapple action to hold the target, and then a bite action on its next turn (which automatically infects). This gives players a chance to either survive melee (in the former case) or to react to the grapple (in the latter).

- Similarly, there's no reason to simultaneously scale up the difficulty of the Toughness test while also decreasing their stats. One or the other should be sufficient.

- I'm not certain why you would ban Guardsmen. It seems highly likely that a member of the local PDF would work alongside others to survive. Assassins, Psykers, and I think also Sisters of Battle would be good choices for banning here (assuming zombies have ANY corruption, Sisters become stupid good against zombies).

- Backup characters are a very good idea in any Dark Heresy game.

- There are actually a couple of ways to represent a zombie plague in the 40k universe without breaking established fluff. Typhus has a plague that literally creates zombies. You could also have the world be targeted by the Enslavers. For stats on Enslavers you can look at the Dark Heresy supplement Creatures Anathema.

[Forum Explorer]

My thoughts:

- If the zombies are only dying from head shots, make certain that shots to the rest of their bodies has at least some benefit; for example shots to the legs blow their legs off, forcing the zombie to crawl, whereas shots to the arms hamper their melee ability.

- I would make it a chance for zombies to infect their victims, not automatic. Alternatively, make the zombie take a grapple action to hold the target, and then a bite action on its next turn (which automatically infects). This gives players a chance to either survive melee (in the former case) or to react to the grapple (in the latter).

- Similarly, there's no reason to simultaneously scale up the difficulty of the Toughness test while also decreasing their stats. One or the other should be sufficient.

- I'm not certain why you would ban Guardsmen. It seems highly likely that a member of the local PDF would work alongside others to survive. Assassins, Psykers, and I think also Sisters of Battle would be good choices for banning here (assuming zombies have ANY corruption, Sisters become stupid good against zombies).

- Backup characters are a very good idea in any Dark Heresy game.

- There are actually a couple of ways to represent a zombie plague in the 40k universe without breaking established fluff. Typhus has a plague that literally creates zombies. You could also have the world be targeted by the Enslavers. For stats on Enslavers you can look at the Dark Heresy supplement Creatures Anathema.

- Right, they already have rules for legs being blown off and such so that's easy enough to do. Torso would be mostly useless unless they get complete torso destruction. (Which would be an effective kill as well.)

-Not grapple since the zombies would have weak S and WS. So I would make it an initial T test to resist.

-Good point, I'll stick with the decreasing stats. The zombie made has the ending stats of the original person so they'll be pretty weak.

-Forgot about PDF. So sure they'll be in. Yeah Sisters are right out.

-:smallbiggrin:

-I think I'll go with Nurgle plague. The Enslavers are more mental then infective sorta things.

[The Glyphstone]

Wouldn't weak individual zombies encourage them to mob with the Gang Up rules, appropriate for swarms? Have it as an option in case of people with really high Toughness, at least - Slams/punches to potentially spread, a Bite only usable in grapples for auto-infection.

[LCP]

There are stats for zombies (and I think guidelines for running a sort of zombie apocalypse scenario) in Disciples of the Dark Gods, under the Vile Savants. Has most to all of the features you're looking for here.

[Forum Explorer]

There are stats for zombies (and I think guidelines for running a sort of zombie apocalypse scenario) in Disciples of the Dark Gods, under the Vile Savants. Has most to all of the features you're looking for here.

awesome. Thanks for the advice.