What would you change in Blood Of The Zombies

[CharlesX]

We've already had quite a bit of talk about this - with good suggestions - but I think it's worth another shower. Aside from writing another gamebook entirely, how would you alter Blood Of The Zombies? The app has a medium setting, but that doesn't go near far enough. My suggestion is new weapons & armour, maybe bazooka and a helmet. It might also help if the book were less linear, maybe if you could choose between characters, each obviously stronger than the original.

[kieran]

- Simplify the weird background. No need to make you a mythology researcher, you can just be a kidnapped tourist
- Don't use dollars if it's set in Eastern Europe
- Keep the combat system as I like it but you start with 100 Stamina points
- No need to kill every single zombie
- Zombie Kong should be a lot weaker
- Have some actually mutually exclusive paths
- Remove the pointless ammo pickups or design actual ammo management rules

[paperexplorer]

Since my son is playing this by the rules, what is a fair starting stamina score that would give him a fair chance of getting through? Is 100 (as noted above) reasonable? It's a far cry from 2d6 + 12

[thealmightymudworm]

Jul 20, 2023 23:28:50 GMT paperexplorer said:

Since my son is playing this by the rules, what is a fair starting stamina score that would give him a fair chance of getting through? Is 100 (as noted above) reasonable? It's a far cry from 2d6 + 12

Champskees included an above-the-rules table for STAMINA numbers which would give percentage chances above zero. Going by that, if you change nothing else about the rules or the book text, 100 will give some chance but a pretty low one. Perhaps 100 + (2d6 x 10) would be less tedious...?

[paperexplorer]

Okay, so I played with 100 stamina and completed it with 19 points remaining, and that's with some fortuitous rolling with the browning in particular. I might ask him to try 80+2D6

Or cheat, like I did when I slew Razaak back in the day

[kieran]

Jul 20, 2023 23:28:50 GMT paperexplorer said:

 Is 100 (as noted above) reasonable? 

Well the 100 was also assuming that the Zombie Kong fight would also be made easier. As is, you need 140+ to stand a better than average chance.

[sylas]

Change the Intro and Outro.
Remove the Zombie tally requirement.
Change the combat system back to simple SKILL, STAMINA, LUCK rules but adjusted for the various weapons.

[thealmightymudworm]

Jul 21, 2023 3:51:47 GMT paperexplorer said:

Okay, so I played with 100 stamina and completed it with 19 points remaining, and that's with some fortuitous rolling with the browning in particular. I might ask him to try 80+2D6

Or cheat, like I did when I slew Razaak back in the day

Well I only have that table to go on which would suggest that 80 + 2d6 would give a chance of between about 0.9% and 4% (assuming an otherwise perfect playthrough) if you don't tweak anything else. 

That still seems a bit harsh to me but I'm a bit of a softy. If there's a real zombie apocalypse maybe you don't want to have lulled him into a false sense of security.

[paperexplorer]

I think those odds take into account two rolls where you have a 50/50 chance of dying (eg. 1-3 die, 4-6 live), which is skewing the % chance to succeed

...and in the theme of this thread, there was clearly room for a luck stat in this book in place of rolling one dice with the outcome determing whether or not you live or die. Luck should have been included

[a moderator]

Jul 22, 2023 4:26:03 GMT paperexplorer said:

I think those odds take into account two rolls where you have a 50/50 chance of dying (eg. 1-3 die, 4-6 live), which is skewing the % chance to succeed

...and in the theme of this thread, there was clearly room for a luck stat in this book in place of rolling one dice with the outcome determing whether or not you live or die. Luck should have been included

Ian used rolls like that even when there was a luck stat.

Where there are only two outcomes to the roll, using Luck would generally be the better option (at least as long as the stakes are high enough - having to waste a point of Luck to see whether or not you lose a negligible amount of Stamina is just annoying), but a straightforward die roll can offer a greater variety of results, so (provided not too much depends on the pure randomness), there can be some merit to the 'Roll one die. If you get 1-2... If you get 3-4... If you get 5-6...' approach as well.

[thealmightymudworm]

Jul 22, 2023 4:26:03 GMT paperexplorer said:

I think those odds take into account two rolls where you have a 50/50 chance of dying (eg. 1-3 die, 4-6 live), which is skewing the % chance to succeed

...and in the theme of this thread, there was clearly room for a luck stat in this book in place of rolling one dice with the outcome determing whether or not you live or die. Luck should have been included

Possibly... but then if you can't avoid those wouldn't the maximum chance with infinity STAMINA be no more than 25%? The table has an adventurer with 220 STAMINA having nearly a 75% chance.

[CharlesX]

Jul 23, 2023 18:04:51 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

Jul 22, 2023 4:26:03 GMT paperexplorer said:

I think those odds take into account two rolls where you have a 50/50 chance of dying (eg. 1-3 die, 4-6 live), which is skewing the % chance to succeed

...and in the theme of this thread, there was clearly room for a luck stat in this book in place of rolling one dice with the outcome determing whether or not you live or die. Luck should have been included

Possibly... but then if you can't avoid those wouldn't the maximum chance with infinity STAMINA be no more than 25%? The table has an adventurer with 220 STAMINA having nearly a 75% chance.

Looking over Champskees solution, I can only see the one point where there is a 50-50 life-or-death chance. Whether there is another 50-50 chance that is off the true path, Champskees solution is wrong or you are mistaking another roll for a 50-50 life-or-death chance, I don't know.

  I believe the 75% chance arises because there is a 50-50 chance you will have to make a 50-50 chance to survive (if you make the first 50-50 roll, you don't have to face the more dangerous one).

[paperexplorer]

From the solution thread,suggests the life or death 50/50 rule is taken into account in the odds. Not sure I follow the maths, if you had 1 in 2 chance to die, wouldn't that immediately drop your odds to win to 50%?

Jan 4, 2018 21:17:08 GMT champskees said:

Jan 4, 2018 12:16:25 GMT philsadler said:

Do you mean to tell me that even with 220 stamina you still only have a 3/4 chance of winning?

Jesus Christ.

A character with infinite stamina would only have 75% chance of winning due to a roll you are required to make after acquiring the crowbar (50/50 followed by another 50/50, 1 in 4 chance of death). 

[thealmightymudworm]

Jul 25, 2023 3:29:41 GMT paperexplorer said:

From the solution thread,suggests the life or death 50/50 rule is taken into account in the odds. Not sure I follow the maths, if you had 1 in 2 chance to die, wouldn't that immediately drop your odds to win to 50%?

Jan 4, 2018 21:17:08 GMT champskees said:

A character with infinite stamina would only have 75% chance of winning due to a roll you are required to make after acquiring the crowbar (50/50 followed by another 50/50, 1 in 4 chance of death). 

I think Charles X is right (though I'm only just looking at the solution rather than the table now, and of course I don't have the book).

The line is:

Roll D6. If 1-3: Roll D6. If 1-3: Death. If 4-6: Take 1 Damage.

So the first roll isn't a life or death roll, it's just that if you 'fail' it you have to do a life or death roll. It's the difference between flipping a coin twice and needing to gets heads at least once rather than both times.

This means that for a character with infinite STAMINA BotZ is way less harsh that the OSCs in Chasms. Let us bask in Ian's bountiful generosity.

[paperexplorer]

Cheers, makes sense.

Though it does highlight that my winning the book with 100 stamina actually was quite an achievement, ridiculously enough. I knew I was lucky in rolling, I just didn't think I was THAT lucky.

Just on zombie Kong, I work to the odds of killing him at 26% each attack round based on having the machine gun (2d6+5). I find the rules of the fight weird though, he can absorb a stupid amount of damage if your rolls are bad enough, but 1 in 4 isn't bad odds, if only he didn't do 6 stamina damage each round

[roidhun]

I'd change the name. Shouldn't it logically be called something like Congealed Ichor Of The Zombies?

Oh, wait, the Marketing wonks would probably object that it lacked dramatic catchiness. Blasted capitalists!

[sylas]

There was apparently a poll to decide what the title would be called. The options were 'Blood of the Zombies' and 'Escape from Zombie Castle'. Escape from Zombie Castle sounds like a much cooler and appropriate name but the enigmatic votes (whoever they were made by) went with Blood of the Zombies.

[kieran]

Aug 18, 2023 15:29:44 GMT sylas said:

There was apparently a poll to decide what the title would be called. The options were 'Blood of the Zombies' and 'Escape from Zombie Castle'. Escape from Zombie Castle sounds like a much cooler and appropriate name but the enigmatic votes (whoever they were made by) went with Blood of the Zombies.

IIRC the poll was on the official site. I definitely recall voting for Escape from Zombie Castle.

[johnbrawn1972]

The author.

[CharlesX]

Aug 18, 2023 13:14:32 GMT roidhun said:

I'd change the name. Shouldn't it logically be called something like Congealed Ichor Of The Zombies?

Oh, wait, the Marketing wonks would probably object that it lacked dramatic catchiness. Blasted capitalists!

That was basically the option they went with. The fans had the choice of going with a very cliche, few-letters-a-word "something of the something" which has been done a zillion odd times before in FF, or Escape From Zombie Castle, which sounds evocative and cool.

   You should never rely on fans choose things. Some years back there was an expensive commemorative navy boat built and the name put to the fans. The fans chose "Boaty McBoatface" (above all kinds of vaguely sensible, worthy names).

[roidhun]

Aug 18, 2023 17:19:11 GMT CharlesX said:

Aug 18, 2023 13:14:32 GMT roidhun said:

I'd change the name. Shouldn't it logically be called something like Congealed Ichor Of The Zombies?

Oh, wait, the Marketing wonks would probably object that it lacked dramatic catchiness. Blasted capitalists!

That was basically the option they went with. The fans had the choice of going with a very cliche, few-letters-a-word "something of the something" which has been done a zillion odd times before in FF, or Escape From Zombie Castle, which sounds evocative and cool.

   You should never rely on fans choose things. Some years back there was an expensive commemorative navy boat built and the name put to the fans. The fans chose "Boaty McBoatface" (above all kinds of vaguely sensible, worthy names).

(glares coldly in the direction of Charles X)

I voted to name it HMS Boaty McBoatface!

Frivolous, childish and even downright silly name or not, the British people had been promised they could choose the name of the vessel and the government behaved utterly contemptibly by renaging on that promise and insisting the ship had to be named something "dignified" instead, settling eventually on HMS Attenborough. They made the British people a promise and then broke it in a contemptibly condescending and dishonourable fit of pompous, hypocritical self-righteous indignation at us, the British people, for daring to be frivolous rather than walking around with extra-large sticks up our backsides as the pompous jingoists in the Conservative Party and the Military top brass do.

The first thing that Sir Kier Starmer should do as our next Prime Minister, after booting Rishi Sunak out of No. 10 Downing Street on his arse at the next election, is to finally honour the democratically decided settled will of the British people and immediately order the Admiralty to rename the vessel from HMS Attenborough to HMS Boaty McBoatface. Permanently. And to refuse to let the Admiralty obstruct or delay the implementation of that directive for so much as a single, solitary day, even if every last one of them threaten to resign. Call their bluff, fire the lot and elevate some new men - and women - to Flag rank who still remember that they're supposed to be public servants, not our masters.


Edit:

(adds stiffly) But Your Mileage May Vary Evidently Does Vary, of course.

(mutters under breath) I must remember that online forums are places to engage in civilized discussion and not places to indulge in the screaming ab-dabs... I must remember that online forums are places to engage in civilized discussion and not places to indulge in the screaming ab-dabs... I must remember that online forums are places to engage in civilized discussion and not places to indulge in the screaming ab-dabs... I must remember that online forums are places to engage in civilized discussion and not places to indulge in the screaming ab-dabs... .

[terrysalt]

If I had a vote, it would have been for Boaty McBoatface too.

[paperexplorer]

Aug 18, 2023 16:19:28 GMT johnbrawn1972 said:

The author.

The referee calls a halt to proceedings and issues John Brawn a warning over that hit below the belt...