Char-Gen Orgy '10 - All Flesh Must Be Eaten

The Game: All Flesh Must Be Eaten
The Publisher: Eden Studios
Degree of Familiarity: Read the core and numerous sourcebooks, but sadly have never had the chance to play or run it.
Books Used: All Flesh Must Be Eaten Core Rules, Fistful o' Zombies

Confession time, chiiiildren: the Bard, he loves him some zombies. Ever since being mortally traumatized in the brainpan as a child by being let see some zombie flick or another (the details beyond 'zombies!' elude me, as this was, at the least, twenty years ago), I've been a great lover of all things zombie. I'm an avid Romero fan (and slightly less but still notably a Russo fan), I own and love Shaun of the Dead, and I play the hell out of Last Night on Earth whenever I can manage to scrape together players willing to give it a go. Hells, good friend (and amusingly, zombie-phobe!) DeadlyGlories even gave me a video clip recording of a birthday greeting from Eugene "Big Daddy" Clark for my birthday some years back after a visit to the Erie Horrorfest (gotta love her, she knows what a guy likes).

So, this preamble firmly in place, ever since I learned of its existence and managed to lay hands on a copy, I've been quite taken with AFMBE, even if due to lack of available player interest or gaming table opportunities in general I've never gotten a chance to play it. So, this said.. let's make a character!

For a rare change of pace.. I actually am coming into this with a character concept in mind (even if it will end up horribly twisted, I'm sure); I'll be basing this hardened survivor on my main character-avatar in the web-game Urban Dead, a hardened, salt-of-the earth preacher, Father John Grimme (and yes, that's a Deadlands reference)

So.. to work! First order of business is to pick a Deadworld... and I want to do something a little non-standard.. see, I grew up in a part of the country (remember from above, Appalachia in the early 1980's) that was not the most culturally-exposed.. Hells, didn't have cable television until I was thirteen, and in those days, the few networks we did have showed a hell of a lot of westerns. I love westerns almost as much as I love zombies. So even though I'll (of course!) be hitting up Deadlands in some future week (and Hells, Deadlands: Reload too), I think we're going to use a Deadworld from the Shane Hensley-penned Fistful o' Zombies sourcebook.

Oh, but Bard, which one? True Grit, for that more realistic touch? Maybe touch base with my ancestry through roleplaying and go with Dances With Zombies?

Nah. We're doing a horror game here, and there's a setting in that lovely supplement, a Deadworld even more terrible, twisted, and depraved than all the others combined... it's the Deadworld that plays host to something far worse than mere zombies...

Singing Cowboys!

Yes, shudder if you must! But now, we're on to bring Father John... well, that surname certainly won't work! It's too... grim! Not setting-appropriate at all, now is it? Well then.. we'll dub the Padre.... Reverend John Parson. Staggeringly original, I know!

So, by the book, the first step is to choose our Character Type. There's none of that bible-thumping to bring down the thunder in the Singing Cowboys Deadworld (or at least their ought not be), and having every damned actually-devout preacher in a setting that supports it able to cast miraculous 'divine spells' is just.. overdone. So our Padre is a Survivor: we have 20 points for Attributes, 15 points for Qualities (and the option to take up to 10 points of Drawbacks), and 35 points for Skills. Okay, moving on....

Attributes first, then: in AFMBE's Unisystem, most traits will range between 1 and 6, with 2 being the 'human average'. Well, Reverend John isn't rightly average! He worked building railroad track before the corrupt rail barons (always a corrupt rail baron.. always!) put him out of work and set him onto the path of finding his faith and walking the Earth travel to do the Lord's good work. So he's a big, stout, hardy fellow... of our 20 points, we'll drop in 4 into Strength, 3 into Dexterity, and a whopping 5 into Constitution -- in short, the man's an ox, but surprisingly graceful for it. With eight points left for Attributes, we'll put Intelligence and Perception squarely in the middle of the road at 2 points each, and thus put the last 4 into Willpower -- the Reverend is nearly as unyielding mentall and spiritually as his great physical vitality renders him corporeally. So, our Attributes assigned, we have the following:

Strength 4
Dexterity 3:
Constitution 5
Intelligence 2
Perception 2
Willpower 4

With Attributes done we move to Qualities and Drawbacks, and our Deadworld has a few required ones: namely, we need to take Hard to Kill at 3 or better and the Deadworld-specific Balladeer quality for 1 point -- Singing Cowboys do sing, after all, and in this case, sometimes that singing can have almost supernatural effects! In addition, we also have to take the Deadworld-specific Law of the West Drawback for 5 points and the Honorable Drawback at the 3 point level,which takes care of 8 of our possible Drawback points right off the bat; the Law of the West Drawback also prevents us from taking any points in the Addiction, Covetous, Cowardly, Cruel or Lazy Drawbacks. To round things out we'll go ahead and take the last 2 points of our permitted Drawbacks now; scanning the AFMBE core rules' section on the same.. we'll say that that aforementioned Rail Baron's goons have an odd tendency to show up and cause the Reverend trouble now and again (plot hooks! Yay!), thus qualifying as a 2-point Adversary Drawback. With Drawbacks settled and totals added to our default pool of 15 Points leaves us with a total of 21 Points left to spend on our Qualities. We'll go ahead and cap off Hard to Kill, putting 2 more points into it to bring it to 5; we'll keep this "tireless, tough ornery cuss" image up with 5 points into Resistance (Fatigue) 5 and another 5 into Resistance (Pain) 5 -- the Padre is a machine. 3 Points of the 9 Points left in our Qualities Bank are sunk handily into the Nerves of Steel Quality to keep the Sand in the Reverend's boots even if he finds himself staring Ol' Scratch himself down at High Noon. 6 Points left.... we'll spend half of that on a level of Good Luck to represent that occasional bit of Divine Providence, and sink the remaining 3 Points into Charisma: the Reverend's not strictly a handsome fella, but he's certainly a likable one. Qualities and Drawbacks done, and as follows:

QUALITIES
Balladeer
Charisma +3
Hard to Kill 5
Good Luck 1
Nerves of Steel
Resistance (Fatigue) 5
Resistance (Pain) 5

DRAWBACKS
Adversary (Rail Baron's goons) 2
Honorable 3
Law of the West

With that done, we move onto Skills, and as above, the rules of our particular Deadworld require a few be drawn out of 35 Point-pool right off the bat, namely Singing 1+, Guns 3+, and Riding 3+; that leaves us with b29 Points to play around with. Right off the bat we'll put 2 of our Skills into Brawling: the Reverend can throw a punch like most heroes of his genre. To represent his background mentioned above, 2 more Points go into Craft (Blacksmithing) and a single level into Demolitions. Fortune favors those who can get the out of the way when it counts, so we'll drop 4 Points into Dodge for the times we need to get the Hel -err, the- Heck out of it. 2 Points into First Aid helps when the Flock must be tended, and 5 Points into Hand Weapons (Staff) aids when the Wolves must be driven off with the aid of a stout length of hickory. We cannot be an effective preacher without some knowledge of the Good Book, so we'll dump 3 points into Humanities (Theology). Mechanic fits the Father's background, so 2 Points there, and it does a Singing Cowboy for shame if he can't Play his Instrument too, so 3 points go into just that, focused on Guitar. With 5 Points left to us, we'll add 3 more to Singing, and we'll round out the Reverend's learning with a Point each in Streetwise and Survival (Desert). Ah, and our Guns skill needs narrowed down... since the Reverend seems the calm, steady, focused sort, he seems more a rifleman than a blazing-fast ipistolero, so we'll put our Guns skill in 'Rifles.' That's got Skills done, and as they stand:

SKILLS
Brawling 2
Craft (Blacksmithing) 2
Demolitions 1
Dodge 4
First Aid 2
Guns (Rifle) 3
Hand Weapons (Staff) 5
Humanities (Theology) 3
Mechanic 2
Play Instrument (Guitar) 3
Singing 4
Streetwise 1
Survival (Desert) 1

Since there are no Metaphysics involved for the Reverend and all the factors that might change them are settled, we'll go back and figure out our Secondary Attributes: Life Points are equal to the sum of Strength + Consitution, multiplied by four and then with +10 added to that sum, or ([STR+CON x 4]+10), so the Revrend's base Life Points are (5 + 4 = 9 x 4 = 36 + 10 = 46, but our 5 Points of Hard to Kill aff an additional +15 to our total, so the Reverend's final Life Points total is a very impressive and respectable 61. Endurance Points come next, representing resistance to any physical duress inot caused by direct injury; the total is equal to the sum of Strength, Consitution, and Willpower, multiplied by three, and adding +5 to the final tally. Gods, Unisystem loves its bloody formulae, doesn't it? Regardless, 4 + 5 + 4 = 13 x 3 = 39 + 5 = 44, so that's our final Endurance Pool. Speed is Constitution + Dexterity x 2 in Miles Per Hour, so 16 MPH in our case. Lastly, Essence is equal to the sum of all our Primary Attributes, so that makes it a total of 20. So, that done:

Life Points: 61/61
Endurance Points: 44/44
Speed: 16 MPH
Essence Pool: 20/20

And, all that's left now is Equipment; by the rules laid down in Fistful o' Zombies, we have $50 to spend. A staff, by standards of the core rules, costs imore than this allowance, at a whopping $75.. but that's for modern standards of money... and, even less than unhelpful, unless I doth overlook it, there's not even a damned starting funds allotment in the core rules?! Delightful. Anyway, we'll just say its five damned dollars and go from there. $5 more for a Bible, $15 for a Sharps Big .50 (big man, big gun!), and a further $5 for 100 rounds of ammunition for that monster leaves us with $20 unspent; we'll (again, since the book can't be fucking bothered) say $10 for a proper guitar, and leave $10 in our pockets; never know when one may need to give alms, brother!

GEAR
Hickory Walking Stick (Quarterstaff)
Sharps Big .50 Rifle
Rifle Ammunition x100
Bible
Guitar

And with ithat done, all that's left is the Finishing Touches; we already have a name, and a rough idea of looks, but we'll elaborate: The Reverend's in his early forties, with a mane of greying red hair that's gotten a little untamedly long, and sports a thick but mostly well-trimmed beard of the same shade, complete with the same touches of grey; he thumps along cheerfully, a bear of a man with a booming, deep mighty voice, dressing humbly, his only affectation his minister's collar. He's a man who tries to turn the other cheek when he might, but when something threatens his Flock (with 'Flock' being 'Whatever needy townsfolk he finds in ithis week's dusty frontier town) may well end up on the recieving end of the business end of his hickory stick -- especially Gosh-Durned zombies who don't stay in thir graves like is right and proper!

* * * * * * *

NAME: Reverend John Parson
CHARACTER TYPE: Survivor
DEADWORLD: Singing Cowboys

ATTRIBUTES
Strength 4
Dexterity 3:
Constitution 5
Intelligence 2
Perception 2
Willpower 4

Life Points: 61/61
Endurance Points: 44/44
Speed: 16 MPH
Essence Pool: 20/20

QUALITIES
Balladeer
Charisma +3
Hard to Kill 5
Good Luck 1
Nerves of Steel
Resistance (Fatigue) 5
Resistance (Pain) 5

DRAWBACKS
Adversary (Rail Baron's Goons) 2
Honorable 3
Law of the West

SKILLS
Brawling 2
Craft (Blacksmithing) 2
Demolitions 1
Dodge 4
First Aid 2
Guns (Rifle) 3
Hand Weapons (Staff) 5
Humanities (Theology) 3
Mechanic 2
Play Instrument (Guitar) 3
Singing 4
Streetwise 1
Survival (Desert) 1

GEAR
Hickory Walking Stick (Quarterstaff)
Sharps Big .50 Rifle
Rifle Ammunition x100
Bible
Guitar

* * * * * * *

...and that's Week 3. Personally, in the extremely unlikely circumstance I could ever find a group running this particular brand of AFMBE (though honestly, it's a piece of comic genius, especially the truth about this particular Deadworld..) I would imagine the Reverend would be a great deal of entertainment to see in use at the table, and the image of a big, burly preacher singing 'Amazing Grace' at the top of his powerful lungs while crushing the hearts of zombies in their chests with his stout length of hickory is just priceless.

Alas, one never knows!