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Hello players who hoard in-game money like it will actually help their student loans.
DMs who will write several source books for all of their favorite settings and then never play in them.
I'm Maddie.
And I'm Robert.
What are we doing today, Robert?
Today we are doing from our table to yours. It's a segment that we've talked about. We may have done an episode in previous.
Yeah, it seems like we have.
And today is going to be more creating a setting slash mechanics for one of our favorite pieces of media.
So we're hoping that this will end up being a series.
There are a lot of franchises, media, fandoms that I really enjoy that I would like to play in that don't necessarily have a dedicated system.
And kind of same for Madison. So being able to, or Maddie, whatever the fuck, being able to kind of build those out for ourselves is something that we do in our downtime outside of the podcast.
So it's kind of something that we would like to start talking about on the podcast.
In case you're curious, the conversations we have on the podcast are just about the same as we have off the podcast.
They don't change. That's why we turned it into a podcast.
It's the amount that we talk about D&D and like TTRPGs in general is like the number is vomit inducing, you know.
Yeah, pretty much.
So today, the setting that will be our, I guess, the media piece of media fandom, whatever the fuck that we'll be talking about is I've talked about it a couple of times.
It's Last of Us.
So for those unfamiliar Last of Us, well, let's see when it was first released.
It was released forever ago. It's a PlayStation exclusive. It has been for many, many years and I'm feeling it will be forever and always.
It is a, how would you describe it, like a post, like a zombie post-op, but it's very deeply ingrained in realism and role play and like story driven beats.
Yeah. And the storyline itself kind of follows Joel and Ellie through the first game at least and then Ellie through the second.
Yeah.
It was, that's not a spoiler.
I mean to an extent it is.
What do you mean? That's a spoiler?
Yeah, like.
That one of the two main characters is the focus of the second game?
Well, like when we first played the game, we didn't know how much who was going to be.
But I think with this being turned into like the HBO show that it was and it was everywhere, like I don't think that this is going to be what's, if this is what is spoiling Last of Us for you.
I think as long as we don't say that specific things happened.
You can come do what happens to Joel to me.
Whoa.
Once again, not a spoiler.
God damn.
The first game was released in 2013, feels like fucking decades ago.
And then if I'm correct, Last of Us 2, because there was in fact the second game was released, I think in 2020, 2019.
2020.
There we go.
I was running the money.
Yeah.
It's crazy, the second game was released shortly after the pandemic, which crazy.
Because like when the pandemic first started, because the setting of the universe is zombies, but the way that zombies, I guess, kind of spread, right?
Because that's always a central focus of any zombie post-op is how do they spread?
It's usually through bite.
And that's still sort of the case here.
But instead of just being like undead creatures that bite people and then in fact, they're fungus.
Yeah.
The whole concept is fungus zombies.
Yeah.
Where you can't breathe the air because there are spores and you'll become infected.
So masks are like a big thing in it.
Yeah.
And then there was also the whole like the outbreak flashbacks that they do at the beginning of the game.
It was also like has a little bit of a different tone.
Post-2020.
Yeah.
Like it's crazy to be able to look at that piece of media and then even look at the show and then be like, damn, we low key lived through a version of that.
Well, I was reading and they, so it's called like outbreak day in the game.
Yeah.
And then it was like a real thing that people like, like didn't celebrate, but like it was like a day that like people like.
Yeah.
Like outbreak day for a lot of people is a real thing.
Yeah.
It was like a, it was like a stick.
It was like May the 4th for Last of Us.
Yeah.
And then that has a very wildly different tone.
It really does.
Significantly.
In the world that we live in now.
So taking that setting then and applying it to DND slash kids on bikes, those are the two systems that we're most familiar with.
We don't really do Pathfinder.
We'll do a review at some point, but it's not something that either one of us are incredibly interested in playing at this moment.
And then there's another one.
I think you can see that Apocalypse Now.
It's been brought up a couple of months.
Yeah.
The Apocalypse Now system is used for like that is what generates or is like run on so many different TTRPG games.
Like if you throw a stone, it's probably run by the Apocalypse Now system.
Yeah.
So at some point we'll have to do a deep dive into that.
We now own like 25 games.
We have a lot of games now that are based off of that system.
So it's popular.
But for the purpose of this episode, we'll primarily be bouncing back and forth between fifth edition mechanics and kids on bikes mechanics, which for this particular setting, I think a mix.
I've talked about this particular one shot setting off camera many times and on off camera off mic and on mic.
Because I mentioned on mic as well.
Eva was literally.
Eva was based on a character from the second game.
Yeah.
And I in my head, the mechanics for this is they are kind of both.
So I guess just jumping right in then the mechanics for this in my mind are a mix between fifth edition and kids on bikes.
So in kids on bikes, there isn't a traditional combat combat system, which is where I want to be a sort of the most kids on bike.
E with this particular world with zombies.
Anybody that's familiar with that with that setting.
It's very much like you get bit once in that game.
Like there's no there's no cure.
There's no vaccine.
There's no way to reverse it.
You get bit and that's game.
So translating that to then what does that look like when you get hit by one of the infected.
Well, in theory, if you get hit, you're getting bit.
Yeah, like this game.
So how do I then translate that to, okay, you don't actually just die.
Like you don't just you don't get hit once and then that's game over.
For kids on bikes, it is a it's contested roles and then with those contested roles, there's a chart that you follow for the results.
So basically, the attacker is the person who's like instigating, but then there's the defender, the attacker roles higher than the defender or the defender roles higher than the attacker.
Whoever has like the biggest difference is the one who wins.
And then there's like different levels that you can reach with that where the effects are more serious than others.
And the person who is attacking has more control or defending has more control.
Yeah, that's a whole very mechanical bullshit way of saying this.
There was a an actual play using the system that Robert and I both watched and really enjoyed called Mentopolis on dimension 20.
And they introduced this idea of like three hits in one of the like finale episodes where they were like, OK, how many times are we going to say that it's realistic for your character to be hit and like hit more than like a plus five above, which is like part of that chart.
Yeah.
And still be around how many hits do we think it's going to take and they ended up landing on three, which is something that I know in conversations that we've had outside of the table or outside of the podcast, where we've talked about this specific setting and this one shot and how it would work.
Yeah.
So in my mind, three hits make sense.
I think something that I would still like to bring from fifth edition is the combat that you can have where it's placement.
It's a battle map you have roles to hit you have AC you have pluses, but instead of having like maximum or minimum HP following more along the lines of kids on bikes and having it be our guest Mentopolis in this case having there just be a number of times that you can be hit.
Yeah.
So in this case, three makes sense right from the standpoint that once a certain in my mind once a certain creature hits you three times that on that fourth hit or on the third hit.
That's kind of right figuring this out which one is it is it on third is it after third either way on one of those two you become infected and then you have a limited amount of time to play as that character.
Yeah.
And then pairing that with an AC and to hit system kind of doing it that way as well.
And in my mind, it also works the opposite where a player only has to hit a creature a certain number of times until they die.
Yeah, because figuring out hit points and ability to like regenerate and get back up is very difficult when you're looking at zombies and fifth edition, because some of them have mechanics where they can roll something when they die and if they roll well they come back.
Yeah, trying to avoid that as much as possible.
If something only has to hit you three times and you die, you should only have to hit it three times and it also dies without the potential of it coming back.
And that's also something that can be played with for this particular setting which we haven't really like I mean we're not we talked a little bit about before like our game plan for this episode which we don't always do.
But the idea of like there's different types of like creatures in this setting that are probably going to take like more hits than that or less hits than that like in my mind at least because there's different types of zombies you're fighting that like uploader is probably going to take a few more hits than like.
So I do want to shout out some guide that I found online.
Somebody did like a partial mock up of what a system in this for fifth edition could look like and I am going to be basing some of the stuff I talk about some of the ideas are not entirely mine from this particular person which it's all online so I don't feel terrible but you know.
Steller from Amino the website is Amino apps.
I've never seen it before literally the user is just stellar.
Oh it's so it's very fandom lore.
It's like and this person went through and made a partial mock up of a fifth edition system for Last of Us.
So looking at it some of those things down that we're kind of talking about creatures.
So for Last of Us there are about four or five different kinds of creatures that you find throughout the world and in the game.
Let me find my little document so I can write those down because it's also me literally writing this down as we go through it.
There's your standard just like infected so that's just going to be three hits.
It's just kind of like your normal your walker your Shamler your whatever your zombie favorite zombie media equivalent is like it's just a standard thing.
There are like I fucking zombie zombie the other really popular one both in the show and in the the game.
Are called bloaters.
So in my mind those are the ones that would have like five hits as opposed to three.
Yeah they're very large.
They've been infected for a longer period of time.
So the way that infected work in this universe is that the longer that they've been like gestating the bigger they are in the heart of they are to kill.
And so bloaters are ones that have been at least according to the lore of the universe.
Bloaters are ones that have probably been infected and been sitting for many many years probably since the outbreak or since outbreak day.
So in my mind those probably have five hits and hits you for two instead of one.
So if one of them hits you you're hit for two which means you can only be hit by them twice.
Yeah this is also true to end game trying to balance kind of how much of I bring from the game.
You can only really be hit by them twice before you're dead because it's the difference of something kind of small throwing its arms at you.
Versus something that's very large and is throwing its entire body weighted to you.
And then there's Missy here.
I pulled up the list of creatures.
Yeah.
Alright.
Runners.
Which are the first one recently turned.
They are defined by intense speed sluggish attacks and tendency to attack people in hordes.
Then there's stalkers.
People who have been infected from two weeks to a year.
Yeah yeah stalkers.
That was the other creature type that I was trying to think of.
Stalkers I'm probably also thinking three hits and they're usually pretty quick.
So if I'm thinking in terms of how am I separating these things mechanically.
Stalkers I'm putting at probably 40, 45 movements.
Bloaters I'm probably putting closer to 20 and then runners I'm putting at 30.
Yeah.
And that's just kind of the way to separate them.
You're going to fight runners in hordes or in groups.
Bloaters you're really only going to find either by themselves or with maybe one to two runners.
And stalkers at least the way that they're present in the game they're usually only in areas by themselves
because what they like to do is they like to ambush.
They like to wait around corners.
They're the most outwardly intelligent creatures that you can find in the world.
And so only having maybe five to six of them in a building as opposed to 10 or 15
but they're very difficult to fight because one they move faster than you
and they can probably hit you more than one time at a turn.
And then you also have the most iconic ones.
Which are...
Oh shit I forgot about clickers.
God, those are going to suck.
I can't believe you skipped that.
Clickers to me are like if you get hit you die.
Yeah.
Clickers are people who've been infected for at least a year.
Crazy.
And because the fungus is like all over their bodies they then do that fucking noise that I can't do
but they basically use...
You want to give an attempt?
No, absolutely not.
I thought that's what you were opening your mouth to do and I was very excited.
No, no, no, no.
They use echolocation.
They make this creepy as...
They're like fucking bats and they're terrifying.
Yeah.
They're probably the most iconic creature from the game series by far.
Oh for sure.
So if I'm thinking about balancing this I'm putting clickers...
Or stockers at two hits.
I'm putting runners at three hits, blowers at five and then clickers at four.
Clickers are at least in the game, both in the game and in the universe in general,
very hard to kill because they've been growing for longer.
So they have this thick layer of fungus that kind of acts as armor.
Very hard to kill and they're head in particular which is the normal weak spot right for a zombie.
It's covered in fungus.
It's fucked up.
So good luck getting to it.
There's also shamblers.
Oh my god, there's so many different creature types.
I keep forgetting.
And for them...
See, here's the thing.
This is the only one I remembered going into this.
Well, I know them but the one that jumped out at me the most was clickers of course.
So here's the thing and this is again, this is kind of why we're doing this on air.
I'm trying to...
In my head I'm like four hits for a clicker seems way too difficult considering that they only have to hit you once.
Yeah.
I'm thinking clickers...
To be more balanced.
I'm thinking clickers to keep it balanced are probably you only have to hit them once but they only have to hit you once.
Yeah.
And then it's just a game of who can...
I mean because that's exactly what it is in the game too or even in the series it's entirely luck.
Like if you get caught by a clicker off guard you're fucked.
Yeah.
They grab you and they don't let you go and the first thing they do is they bite you.
Yeah.
They don't move particularly fast so I'm probably gonna put their speed at like 25 as opposed to 30 just to keep them a little bit more balanced
because the only thing you have on a clicker in theory is speed or at least the ability to get away.
How many did you... how many hits did you give runners?
Actually I'm probably... I think the way that I would balance clickers instead of reducing their speed is by giving them blindsight.
So they only have blindsight.
They can only see you...
Okay, gotcha.
If you move within their radius.
Because that's exactly how they work in the game.
They can only find you if you move close to them.
How many hits for what? Stockers?
How many runners?
Runners three.
Three.
And then you said stockers was two?
Stockers was two.
In my mind runners would be...
Reverse it?
Yeah.
Three hits for stockers, two hits for runners?
Yeah, that makes sense.
Because runners are the least armored out of all of them in terms of...
They're new.
I mean they're people who are like...
I mean, easier to kill a person than it would be to kill.
Which sounds crazy but like... you know what I mean?
Yeah, pretty much.
So then if I'm thinking about hits wise then, I've already decided on your third hit, that's death.
Yeah.
Because if I'm thinking like, bloaters are two, runners are one, stockers are one, clickers are three.
You get hit by them once it's done.
Shamblers are another variant of bloaters, so there are two different settings that the game takes place in.
The first one is in...
Oh, I'm forgetting where the first game takes place.
Second one's Seattle.
First one's different.
No, first one is... I mean it takes place all over.
Yeah, there's one primary place.
Where does the last of us...
We haven't spent a whole lot of time talking about the setting outside of the game.
It takes place in the United States primarily.
Yeah, no, you're right. It's kind of all over the place.
It starts in...
The whole thing is them traveling.
It starts in Austin, Texas, then they go to Boston, Lincoln, Massachusetts, Pittsburgh.
So it's kind of all over... it's like the East Coast mostly.
Yeah.
It's interesting because according to the lore of the world, there are certain variants of infected
that are only found in certain parts of the country.
Yeah, rat kings are Seattle.
Yep. Oh yeah, forgot about rat kings too.
See, this is why you need me.
I do know dead ass. This is really useful.
This is why she was like, I don't know how much I'm going to have to deal with this.
A lot actually, because I don't know.
I don't even think to look that up.
So, shamblers are more West Coast as our rat kings, which I'll talk about in a minute.
Stalkers, clickers, runners, you can find those generally all over.
Stalkers you don't really find on the East Coast.
You don't really find them in the first game.
So for a lower purpose, I'm going to say that they're only present on the East Coast.
I'll say according to this, when it's talking about shamblers, it also says that particularly areas...
Typically inhabit areas thriving with water.
Yep.
So that could also be a geographical location thing.
Oh yeah, no, that's good to...
Shamblers and... or bloaters and shamblers both.
That's kind of... that's fun.
So anyways, shamblers, instead of hitting you with fisticuffs, if you want to call it that, they basically...
Fisticuffs is such a friendly way to put it.
They're covered in spores.
Specifically, like they're covered in fungus that can release spores.
And so that's like, if you're thinking in terms of fifth edition, that's like A.O.E. spells.
So where a bloater is more of a barbarian kind of creature that's just going to run into you with a club.
Shamblers are like wizards that only use fireballs.
Like that's it.
Yeah.
And they don't take any damage to themselves.
Yeah, pretty much.
They just launch it at their feet constantly and they can throw it at you as well.
For them, I'm probably, again, keeping things balanced, I'm probably going to say that's only one hit from them, right?
Like if you're just in their radius at the beginning of your next turn, that's one hit.
And then to kill, I'm probably saying three.
Yeah.
Because they're thick.
They're not quite as thick as...
They're not quite as thick as bloaters, but they are pretty hard to kill.
Going into this, since we talked about this also being like, kind of talking about mechanics, when it comes to attacking, would there be a difference in the...
Like how many hits count for a certain number of things for players?
Like a shotgun doing a different... like doing two hits as opposed to like a knife would...
Like because that's something that happens in the game of like if you're in close quarters combat, Ellie in particular uses a knife for a lot of the stuff that she does.
Is that going to be one hit versus I think like a shotgun and a knife do different levels of damage?
So if you're talking about fighting something like a bloater or like another ranged creature or like zombie type, would that also go like from the player side?
Yeah.
So thinking through that, I would say like a pistol...
I don't know why I phrase that like an interview question.
No, that's... I mean, it's helpful, right?
A pistol would be one hit, a shotgun I would say is probably two.
Something that's automatic.
Yeah, something that's automatically an automatic rifle, you're just going to have like a multi-attack.
Anything that's like rapid fire that way, that's automatic is just one hit but multi.
And then, yeah, grenades, which are kind of like special weapons.
So there are also a lot of traps that are focused specifically with Ellie.
You really get to see Ellie's playstyle evolve over the first two games and you get a wide range of potential combat maneuvers, one of which are traps and explosives.
So making like spike bombs, they're nail bombs, right?
They're just their radius base.
If something gets close to them, they go off.
You can do the same thing with smoke bombs.
Mechanically, we block line of sight.
Grenades, which are also incredibly useful for this setting.
So that's something else to think about, right?
So with melee weapons, like a single, like just a knife, you're getting one.
You're lucky if you're doing one.
For sure.
What would be a larger melee weapon?
Like a club is probably two.
I mean, there's the weapon that I love, which is the bat with the...
Oh my God, what is it?
Tapes to it.
With the knives?
Yeah.
And I always joke is like my dream weapon.
Yep, yep.
So I'm thinking anything...
That's like what fetch uses.
Anything that's...
If you listen to the actual play that we just did.
Like just sharp or a small sharp object is probably going to be one.
If it's a larger blunt object, I'm probably saying two.
If it's a combination of both, two, maybe three.
Yeah.
Because there are some weapons that you can upgrade throughout the game.
Or if you upgrade them enough, they are pretty much a one shot for the majority of your smaller enemies.
Yeah.
So that's also an option.
Pistol or any like one shot kind of...
Shotgun two, for sure.
But I think that a one for most other ranged weapons, I think bow and arrow also is one.
Because that's another game that's used in the game.
Oh yeah, forgot.
Yeah, yeah.
See, you are so useful.
That's not even like from...
The funniest part of this, have I actually played the last of us?
No.
But you have watched me play the entire first game in the majority of the second.
But I have watched Robert play it beginning to end.
Like at this point, it feels like more than once.
Yeah.
I'm in the trenches with the lore.
So if we're thinking of what like the mechanical advantages between a bow and a pistol, I'm thinking
of the ammo that you have because ammunition in a world like this is going to play a key part as well.
And that's a huge part of the game as well.
Managing your ammunition is huge.
Yeah.
You go into the room, you loot and like turn shit over.
Ammo.
So I'm thinking reusable ammo.
It's quiet so that gives you an option for stealth as well.
Right?
Like stealth specifically with creatures like this when you're not fighting human enemies,
which are also a massive part of the game.
Oh yeah.
People that also have guns and knives and very much want to kill you in some cases, want to eat you.
The advantage there is that if your group can take out infected, quietly, even humans, it's going to save you so much potential threat.
How many hits do the dogs have Robert?
Oh Jesus Christ.
Two.
Maybe one.
I'm probably saying two.
I didn't even think about that.
My bad folks.
Dogs are a huge part of the way that the human enemies fight.
We should have given like a warning, not a warning, Jesus, like a disclaimer at the beginning of this.
If you don't know anything about The Last of Us, this episode won't make the most sense.
Just because we're relying on, focusing more on the mechanical aspect of this as opposed to the world building because this is one that we already are so in touch with the world.
Yeah, so you kind of got an idea for the creatures, they're fungus based, I guess now that we're switching to talking about the people, it is a very post op world if you're unfamiliar with it and it takes the very like Game of Thrones, which is in some ways more popular from media that you would be familiar with.
In some ways more popular.
Well, because the HBO Max series has been watched like the second most watched show on Amazon.
No, that's true.
Or on HBO.
Yeah, I didn't even meant that.
That like gritty real world, this anybody can die at any time.
Yeah, the humans in this world are very much falling into that category.
This everybody is bad.
Every single person is a potential threat because they are people and they will do what people do and put into a setting like this.
They're going to survive like many people with dads.
My dad loved walking dead or still loves.
I don't know.
He's kind of not watching it as much anymore.
But his favorite thing about the show and the thing that he would always tell me is he was like, oh, the zombies aren't the bad guys.
It shows that the real bad guys are the people.
And I think that's what a lot of zombie media does nowadays.
But that's also so true in the last of us.
There zombies just happen to be a lot more terrifying than like most zombie media zombies.
Somehow, like I don't even know how they've managed to do that specifically.
Yeah.
It's a very like, if you like, we're calling it like, it's like political intrigue, play style meets like hack and slash, but like not in a good way.
Yeah.
So people then are just as scary, if not scarier in some instances than the like the the undead, the zombies, the the in fact, I guess we're called in fact.
Right.
It's the thing that's been going on TikTok.
Would you rather be trapped in the woods with a man or with a bear?
Don't get me started on that.
Yeah.
I mean, we don't have to go down that rabbit hole, but like if you understand why the answer to that question is bear every single time, it's the same reason why people are more scary in last of us.
I was about to bring up specifically, you know, the one guy.
What's the pedophile cannibal guy?
Yes.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's last of us one puts I mean, both games do a lot to showcase just how evil people could be when they're put in a situation like this.
And they follow that to AT and last of us.
Yeah.
I mean, it's yeah, they're obviously like they're the intelligence of people.
There are multiple different factions.
There are those in last of us two specifically where you get kind of this difference in people.
You have some that are like like religious sell its you have people that are very military focused and still conquering an expansion.
You have just your run of the mill bandits who are there to just kind of rob people.
Yeah, fucking cannibal cults like skies the limit of how crazy and shitty people can be.
And so there's almost more variation in the kind of enemy types you could run in with people.
Yeah.
The first one that comes to mind is bandit.
Obviously the weapon is going to vary.
That's when it's like melee bandit versus ranged bandit.
Yeah.
I think the easiest way then to do that is to say that the shittier the faction, the shittier the weapons they have access to.
So like a melee bandit in this case would be a lot easier to fight off than like a melee military person or a melee zealot because they're more specialized in what they do.
Yeah.
So not trying to hop super far into the mechanics of that, but they would follow the same thing that all of like we just talked about what weapons would do, right?
So you already have that parsed out.
That's just assigning a human a stat block and then giving them one of the weapons that you've just talked about.
So that that kind of takes care of itself.
This is also a world in which if we're following game mechanics, you also like can take what the people, you loot like for lack of better words of like a lot of the times you're taking the weapons off of the people who just killed you.
So I think there's also kind of incentive for you as like a player to be like cool if I take down this person who's going to be harder to kill, I know that they're going to have better weapons.
Yeah.
And then the enemy team is 100% something that I think is valuable for this setting or something that I would want my players to keep in mind is that like there's always going to be an opportunity to disengage with a group like you don't always have to just fight them
because that's going to be a really poor dis...
Like if there's only four or five of you and you all are low on ammo and medical supplies, there's no reason to attack the military convoy.
And even talking about non people, if clickers, they because you talked about like the blindside thing and they're also like people you can go by with and if you're not in their radius, they're not going to notice you're there and being able to have the option of go cool.
Do I want to do this or if I could manage to like do some stealth checks and get through this place without entering their like attack radius and like disengaging that way.
So I think there's also like creative ways to be able to disengage.
That was just a side note.
We have talked a lot about combat and I think something that I would want to make very clear to my players for this setting is that you can 100% role play your way through the...
I mean outside of the infected, which is kind of like the one group that you can't reason with.
And this kind of a setting, if you have the numbers and you have the equipment and you have just the right supplies on you, you can talk your way out of the majority of the situations.
It's just going to be who's going to shoot first.
And can you get out of that situation before the person shoots first?
Have you finished the Fallout series?
Yes and no.
What does that mean? Like you've seen the majority of it but you haven't seen all of it?
Yeah, it's like I'm someone who reads the... I read the descriptions of things.
So there's an episode in the recent Fallout series that came out which is phenomenal.
I'm hoping we'll get to play in that setting soon.
Spoiler alert if that wasn't clear from what Robert just said.
Yeah, spoiler alert. I'm about to say something in a very small event that happens but it is very important for one of the characters.
Fallout is like a post op, radiated nuclear war happened, mutually assured destruction is exactly what went down.
And now everybody's trying to survive in this god-awful world.
Yeah.
Well they do a really good job of showcasing again like what human nature could end up being like,
everybody has a gun pointed at everybody at all the time and there's an episode where Lucy, the main character,
one of the main characters I guess it's technically, oh what is it, a tritagonist?
I think that she's the primary protagonist. I think there's two secondary protagonists in Madison.
One of the main primary protagonists, Lucy, who is a vault-dweller, she's very innocent, she's very like literally born yesterday kind of deal.
I'd love to love her.
She's traveling with another character who's a little bit more well-seasoned to the universe and to the world.
Maximus, who kind of knows exactly how shitty people are, somebody who is erased on the surface.
They end up coming to a train track and there's two people on that end, two people on their end and they immediately go,
hey, who are you? No fuck you, no fuck you.
Yeah.
And they put their guns up and they walk past each other but right as they're about to pass,
one of the bandits sees something shiny on Lucy's arm and immediately pulls out the gun, violates the truce that they just made and starts firing.
That's the exact same way that everything in The Last of Us plays out.
Yeah.
It is like the idea is that you can make temporary peace but it is not permanent.
Yeah, it is.
And so the people and the factions that you would encounter in this world is like,
you can talk your way out of it a couple of times but beyond that, like you're going to get...
At some point you're going to have to fight at some point.
Yeah.
You know, you're going to have to have something better than they have.
You're going to have to have more guns or rob them out of fucking hell.
At some point it's putting off the inevitable.
Yeah.
Eventually they'll shoot the gun after you.
And it's something where you can also like, in my head, from like something that I like, because I know that I'm not going to be running this system,
I'm going to be playing in this system and like hearing the different options and stuff of being like,
okay, these are different things that a player could do of being like,
okay, I'm going to talk myself out of the situation for now knowing that I'm going to go double back and attack them.
And like trying to figure out, using your brain to strategize and strategize with the other people around you and their skill sets.
Because you're going to, we talked a little bit about like charisma based characters in settings like this and are they beneficial or not?
Because that was kind of like a conversation we had a hot minute ago outside of the podcast regarding this setting specifically.
To kind of try and get through the rest of our mechanic stuff before we start doing more world building,
I mean, it's kind of doing both at the same time.
Classes slash tropes, this is kind of where I think it blends because there isn't a traditional hit point system.
Really, it's interesting looking at it in hindsight, so much of the mechanics in fifth edition revolve around hit points.
Oh yeah.
Like all of your damage, all of your spells, everything revolves around HP and when you take that away,
there's so little left for you to then use from the system.
Which I think is also like beneficial because we've talked a little bit about how we want to kind of create a blended system of 5e and kids on bikes.
You to run this and then me to run my personal thing that I've been dipping my toe in the water when it comes to running things full transparency.
I'm still the player though.
Still working on it.
We're getting there, we're getting there.
I don't want to be there.
We're getting there.
Nah, this is just for stupid people's cause.
You know what I'm saying?
That's besides point, but like finding a blended system because one of the things that I think is one of the weaker points of kids on bikes
or at least when you're playing with people who normally play in 5e.
We're very mechanic heavy.
Is very mechanic heavy and when you take those mechanics away from people in an instance of at our table,
everyone looks at you and goes, how do we, what do we do?
I mean it's all role play focused.
It's all theater of the mind, it's imagination.
You can do whatever you want to do.
Well, I'm going to need like a guideline for what I could do.
And then another thing I think like the checks and like the ability scores is something that 5e has a huge leg up on
because being like trying to run something with kids on bikes and being like,
okay, I desperately need you all to pick up on the thing that I said explicitly two seconds ago in the description of the room
and none of you have noticed it.
And I can't ask you to do a perception check because that's not really a thing in this world.
And like when you're like rolling in kids on bikes, it's be their bigger stakes.
Yeah, because you only roll when there's a chance for failure and that failure has like a consequence,
like a stronger consequence as opposed to 5e where it's like, cool, you don't like pass that check.
That's fine.
You just nothing happens versus kids on bikes where it's like there is a negative success and every failure has something associated with it.
Yeah, like a strong negative thing.
And then one of the things that Madison really came out of like asking for Maddie, Jesus Christ,
one of the things that Maddie came out asking for or talking about implementing for like the final portion of this is like perception checks.
Yeah.
There's you have brains, which is like the primary intelligence.
If you're thinking fifth edition investigation perception and all that fun stuff perception is what I'm talking about.
All of your ability to notice things as a player are tied deeply to your skills that you have in fifth edition.
You do not get those in kids on bikes.
So you just have to be really creative as a DM with your descriptions of what those particular checks are for, which sometimes makes it difficult.
Because it's something where it's like in kids on bikes specifically when you're noticing something about anyone's emotions,
how a person feels, what a person is reacting to, any of that, that's going to be a charm instead of a brand, which is great.
But also it takes away when you're looking at the ability with like the failure mechanic in there.
It makes it difficult because I was sitting there going, please, for the love of God, notice this thing
that I like worded very specifically to you and you're not.
I don't know how to get you to notice it.
Yeah.
So with that being said, thinking about classes, obviously when it comes to races, that's not really a thing in this setting.
You've got you got person.
You can't be a zombie.
You got person.
I think what could take the place of race though in this setting is faction.
I think that works kind of as background because you also don't really have that in here either.
Yeah.
So what faction are you a part of?
What is your like your background before coming into this setting?
And then then you would then move to individual classes slash tropes.
So thinking through the different options for factions then I would think sort of military kind of the same factions that I talked about earlier, like zealots.
I think settlement is also a very valid one because that's another kind of main area that a lot of people in the game come from or just like a normal settlement that people have managed to carve out.
Yeah.
So fedra would be I'd say that's government maybe.
So you have the military which is really showcased in an organization called WLF in the second game.
Otherwise called the wolves.
They are a think like Roman Empire in like the zombie apocalypse.
They are like they have the weapons.
They have the means.
And so their primary goal is to expand and take over as much of sort of the apocalypse world as they can.
Those that live within the Roman Empire for those that know their history live a pretty good life.
Those that live with outside of it are shot on site.
Yeah.
And so the wolves as they're called are very ruthless.
They're very unforgiving.
They're very like they provide food and shelter and education to the people that live inside.
But for the people that don't live inside it's all very like conquering bring you in if you don't want to be a part of it then you can get shot too.
Yeah.
So there's military in that case.
There's government which is going to be more like fedra which is a faction president in the first game.
They're basically what's left over from the government in some of the.
I don't remember if there was a term for it like walled cities government cities.
Oh there was.
So there's a term.
I think there's a term for in last of us there are certain cities that have remnants of government left in them and those that government is kind of like what they hand out the rations and they patrol the wall.
Isn't it.
Yeah that's better.
That's who that is.
But I'm trying to think there was a name.
It might just be federal cities.
I don't know.
We'll call it federal cities.
So there's government.
There's like government cities.
So maybe that's kind of a background.
So maybe that is settlement.
Maybe that's just settlement.
So military.
I would say like zealots religiousness because that's a big religion.
Legiosity plays a really big role in the second game.
QZ's QZ's.
I was like I know there's a name for it.
So I'll say then military zealots settlements and QZ's those to me are the four big factions in terms of criminal come from like smugglers bandits like a floater.
Right.
And then you also think about like well there's like Jackson.
Well that Jackson to me is a settlement.
Okay.
Where would fireflies fall.
I think they would be maybe a sub faction within.
They'd probably be a mix between QZ and that's a good point.
And another question and maybe this is I sound like I'm just like drilling you.
Are there like there's subclasses and 5e would there be subclasses mechanically in this or would it all be just kind of flavor text of like if someone wanted to create a new.
I'm thinking maybe sub factions less subclasses.
I'm thinking the classes are a much more broad category.
I'm thinking factions here seems to be what matters most.
Yeah.
I'm thinking you're going to inform a lot of your equipment a lot of your gear so thinking like for military there's the W there's the wolves there's Fedra.
There's pretty much only two military groups are seeing them for zealots we have the the Saffrites.
I think that's what's called.
I don't remember.
There's a group in the last of us to Sarah fights there we go.
You got there.
There are a hyper religious group that actually the lore for them is actually really neat.
So there was a person a figure in Seattle in particular when the outbreak first happened who made herself kind of like like an MLK Malcolm X Rosa Parks like kind of like a that figure like civil rights and like pushed for basically to like remove the walls and to let people in and to provide more rations and kind of to make things more of like utopia.
She dies in a prisoner exchange so Fedra ends up killing her on accident and then that kick starts all of her followers into becoming a cult as opposed to just like like an organization or a group or settlement.
Yeah.
And they take her teachings to the extreme which is the old world killed our profit.
She was saying that the old world was bad.
So we're in it.
No old world they they're basically fucking Amish people but they don't talk they cut themselves and they kill people.
Yeah.
So they know no technology is allowed for seraphites and not even fucking flashlights.
They wear yeas clothing they make their own settlements.
They they hunt.
They use bow and arrows.
They do not use guns.
They use melee weapons a lot of the time they farm.
So thinking of like religiosity is one of the potential ones I think is also kind of interesting.
And then obviously like I will let my players create their own like if I really wanted to do it that much.
I mean like yeah sure so what fucking religion come from then.
Yeah settlements.
Yes we can say Jackson Jackson ish right.
Well you have positive settlements and you have negative settlements because there was also the settlement that.
So maybe instead of David was from interesting you know yeah so this is where it's difficult.
I'm like yeah settlements the broad term and then like WLF Federer seraphites Jackson are those then like the subcategories.
I would put Fed it's difficult.
A lot.
Yeah there's a lot of crossover because I think that like well you could put Federer under military you could put Federer but I mean are we still keeping the
government one.
Federer to me replaces government.
OK yeah.
Is there like the government sponsored military.
Yeah so I would I could say Federer could straight up be its own.
Yep I'm thinking that maybe then these are just presented straight up as the options.
So then there's like Jackson as a settlement.
I don't think we see another one like a regular non QZ settlement.
I think Jackson is the only one we see that works.
That works is the key thing there.
Oh for religiosity if I'm thinking of like bad settlements thinking of like good and positive.
I would 100% on top of this seraphites being a bad settlement to an extent they're kind of painted in a really interesting way.
I would also put the fucking cannibal guys.
That's what I was talking about.
I mean technically that is a settlement but it's not following a religion.
Yeah.
And I can't remember if it was this way in the game but at least in the show when they expand on like they expand the show just because like that is the nature of turning a game that has a certain amount of like cut scenes into a full length show.
Some of the people in that a lot of people not everyone in that settlement knew what they were eating.
You know.
Yeah they weren't all aware that that's what's coming from.
So I don't even want to say that that would be fully religious because not everyone in that settlement follows that code.
Because if it was just like everyone knew which is like definitely a thing that exists in other like zombie media and franchises like there's several of those in the walking dead I believe.
I haven't seen the walking dead don't hold me to that.
But I think that would follow more of the like the religious code or like the extremists.
So I'm thinking maybe then the way that I would present this to my players is pick your background will will figure out what what settlement you come from next.
Right.
Are you private military or like external military like WLF or you government military like Fedra.
Are you a firefly.
Are you a rebel.
Yeah.
Are you from like are you a cannibal guy.
Are you a Sarah fight.
Are you a member of QZ and then going from there and figuring out what their like their place looks like I think makes more sense here because there's just too many fucking options.
Well I think I think it can work and be boiled down when we were talking about like sub factions and subclass because I think you can do like settlement and then you can also like from there when you as a player come from
to the table and be like this is what I want like my settlement to be which I mean this is I'm also realizing as I'm talking out loud that this is something that's also very dependent on who your players are because at our table sometimes there are players who like myself included.
I want to come in and I want to like help create my own thing so I would come into this and be like I'm going to tell you about a settlement that I want to come from and there's other people who would be like well what do you mean like you need can you give me options to pick from.
Yeah so I think it could be a thing where you can have the ones in the game and just break them down under like settlements and then you can have like the cannibal community and then the Jackson community and then you can also have the option for players to be able to bring in their own and already have the ones from the world set.
If I'm thinking to just trying to break these in our broader categories like the cannibal community thing I would probably I would maybe turn that into the bandit faction or into the bandit sub faction if that makes sense.
So having like your rebels you're different like your different kinds of military and then having your like evil factions I guess if you want to call them so.
Fuck that factions.
Yeah.
That's the name of the class.
Fuck that factions I literally just labeled it on here bad factions and then or bad settlements and then just settlements.
Yeah.
And then so instead of having race bonuses you would have settlement bonuses or background bonuses so if you come from a military background you're going to have a certain like you'll probably have basic medical knowledge.
So being able to fix very quick very superficial wounds but in terms of like the shittier things like a broken bone or a super big laceration you're going to need a medic for that unless you have like a med kit on standby so having medical supplies is going to be a big thing.
Yeah.
If you come from like a traditional settlement like a QZ or a Jackson kind of place.
I don't even know what the fucking benefits that would be probably something with like bartering and trading.
I'll say you would have a benefit there I think you could have nicer equipment.
Having a better charisma score is probably going to be involved with that as well.
I think also the ability to have is going to sound kind of shitty like leisure or something like being able to have a deck of playing cards or a blanket.
Yeah like you have settlement equipment.
Yeah.
Things that you wouldn't find out something outside just the bare bones needed for survival.
Yeah some some special amenities.
Yeah.
And then for the ones that are a little bit more extreme like a seraphite or a cannibal community like having maybe some some more specific traits with those as well.
Like some hyper specific knowledge.
I'm thinking for those I would probably lump them into like having better stealth capabilities.
So because they're both factions that typically want to go unseen and unheard right.
Yeah.
Like the primary way of fighting both infected and people is to ambush and to do it quietly so giving them benefits for being stealthy probably giving them better benefits for scavenging as well.
Yeah.
Like a bird terrain.
Yeah.
100% because I mean they're very like I'm in the grass.
I would give every one of these their own favorite terrain.
Yeah.
And benefits to fighting in certain areas.
And I think for that like more specialized.
I just thought of one.
That more specialized one there being benefit being stealth in exploration and probably like scavenging.
They're used to going out.
They're used to being out in the real world.
If you're from a settlement you've probably never been outside the walls.
You know.
Animal handling for Jackson.
Horses.
Yeah.
Sorry.
I had that thought and I got really excited.
No that's so valid.
I also kind of only really one primary way people like.
Well yeah I mean that goes into like the leisure thing of like.
That's a luxury that not everyone can afford to have.
Yeah.
100% OK.
OK OK.
I like where we're going with this.
I'm just writing some of this down as we're.
I fucking love mechanics and world like when it comes to world building purposes.
It's better than.
Not.
Five.
Huh.
You're getting better at the mechanics part.
I'm good at the mechanics part when it's not 5E.
You know what I mean.
Yeah.
No I get it.
I get it.
Also when I'm not the one running it I can tell you suggestions all day long.
Something that I think is kind of neat that would be.
No.
Neat to roll in thinking about our capes and crooks system.
Having your like common citizen feature.
Like being able to.
Like if you all run into another settlement or if you're trying to get into another QZ.
If you're from another QZ or you're from another settlement there's a certain area you have about you like you're a civilized and is a fucked up way to put it right.
No that's a really it's a thing that a lot of like backgrounds in 5E have because when you take like the noble background it's like people know that you're rich and like can get that vibe from you so they're going to treat you better.
So thinking about those two like that would probably be another benefit that I would assign to that as well like you're an everyday person.
If you're come from a like a bandit kind of background or yeah I just call it bandit background.
There's really no maybe you have advantage when negotiating with the intimidation but then also maybe you're just more perceptive when it comes to pointing out traps.
Yeah.
Like Joel from the last of us you get kind of snippets of what his life was like before he meets Ellie and it's revealed through dialogue that he is a very good smuggler and he also used to run with a couple bandit groups.
They end up running into a very obvious trap and Ellie is like oh my god to run into the guy he's in the middle of the road.
Joel clocks it immediately he goes Ellie buckle your seatbelt and then proceeds to run the guy over because he knows exactly what's about to happen.
Yeah.
So thinking about people that have that background or that sort of specialization I'm going to give them advantage whenever they're trying to perceive a trap.
I think that can also with bandit and smuggling when you're looking at like finding things or.
That's probably something I would get more to a class.
Yeah.
So I think that is having a leg up when it comes to like finding things because like that's your stick at that point.
Like that's what you do.
Yeah.
I'm thinking something mechanically I'd probably give to anybody with the military background weapon jams is something that I think I would like to use not super often but just rolling some kind of a check whenever you fire your weapon for a chance for it to jam that happens a lot in real life
and you have to know how to be able to fix that very quickly.
If this is your second or third time you've ever fired a gun and you're coming from a QZ chances are with that good jams you're not going to know what the fuck to do.
Yeah.
As opposed to somebody that has a military background or even a bandit background you're going to know pretty quickly how to fix that if it is fixable.
Yeah.
You know whether or not to drop that weapon because it's not worth your time or the check is going to be really easy for you because you're used to doing it.
Yeah.
So thinking of that as kind of a benefit that specifically goes with the military also starting with a gun.
I think it's something it would probably.
It would be huge.
I think I would probably only give to military.
I think that makes sense.
Like they're really the only factions that can maintain weapons and that have enough power in the setting to hoard the ammunition needed to use them.
Yeah.
I think maybe one more class or like not to the same extent not having a gun but knowing firearms enough because I think bandit or smuggler because it's like cool.
I'm killing people from the military organizations.
Yeah.
So that's where I think it starts to separate from background and faction to class.
I think where I would stop with the background faction is this that you know about weapons you know how to use them and you have a certain starting equipment.
Something like that.
I don't know.
And then for the classes specifically I think is where I would start getting into like you start with a gun you start with this because I mean that's going to how it's broken down and fifth edition and even kids on bikes to an extent.
Your class or your role or your trope kind of determines what you start with more so than your background.
So pulling directly from the document that's stellar from Amino provided.
Thank you again.
This is actually really useful.
This is where they kind of stopped fleshing it all out.
But the four classes that they proposed were smuggler prepper bandit and soldier.
I in my mind I'm changing bandit to medic.
I think that kind of rounds it out because I think smuggler fits the bandit.
Whatever.
Yeah I think prepper makes sense because there's going to be a lot of traps and scavenging in this universe medic to me is super big.
I think having a class dedicated to that makes more sense than not.
I don't know to an extent I would almost give that with prepper as well.
I think we talked about this a little bit before where it goes back and forth.
Yeah.
Because it's like and this is something where like I don't want somebody just stuck with dealing people because what the fuck are they going to do when they're separated.
Well one of the things and this is where I think several people would be like well why aren't you just using the apocalypse now system for this.
As someone who doesn't know a ton about it but has recently went through and read the book for apocalypse now one of the classes is like it gives these notes and just the metone of it is very interesting where it's like yeah the the medic class amount is called like an angel.
And it's like it's great.
This is a great and super important class.
If things are going well you're fucking useless.
So it's one of those things where you you want to hope that it goes well but also you are going to become fucking dead weight.
No that's because if things are going well and they don't need the medic in the same way that if you are in combat and things are shit you don't need the talker.
So it's one of those things where it's like I think if you give them enough benefits.
Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Because it's a risk I mean it's the same thing of like when you play like a wizard or something you have significantly lower health than like a barbarian.
But so here's can do a lot more damage.
I think the way that I would then try to buff our because I think having an angel or a medic role in this still makes sense because the way that I think smuggler soldier prepper and medic or slash angel makes a lot of sense.
I think smuggler right that's your talker your negotiator your your bard your charisma focus class your soldier is going to be your damage your weapons your combat focus.
Barbarian.
Yep.
Your prepper is going to be kind of like an artifice or a wizard where it's traps craftables upgrading weapons.
To an extent I think smuggler also kind of fills that rogue.
Yeah.
That rogue thing.
No that's true.
And then for preppers I think in particular being really useful in this setting is the people that know how to scavenge that know how to upgrade your weapons that know how to make ammo that know how to put together a med kit like if an eight like if a medic says I need this this and this.
No that's true.
Having somebody on hand that can actually pull the pieces out of a thing to then put that together for you is going to be pretty big.
I think that's also something that could be very like almost like a subclass of prepper would be like like what is your specialty.
Right.
You can specialize in weapons you can specialize in this and that and the other.
But like I mean you still have a base level knowledge of like you can get by and do the other things but your specialty is in this.
And so it would be like cool.
You can have a specialty in medical.
Maybe.
If you want to keep it simplified in that way.
Just because I don't know what else.
Because I agree that medic feels like its own thing but.
So I think maybe scratching that taking away the med kits from prepper thing and putting that solely on the medic.
I think having them being the only people that can put those together.
So in my mind there are like the shitty first aid things you can find which are going to be like gauze band-aid staplers just sewing like a needle and thread versus a medic being the only class that can provide a first aid kit which to me is the only thing that's going to bring you up to full in a pinch.
Yeah.
You know outside of like a long rest.
What other benefits though.
I'm thinking maybe another benefit by having the medic on standby or having the medic near a person is maybe giving whoever their assisting advantage with something having them be the only class that can provide like a help action.
Having them be really key in supporting other characters doing literally everything.
Also then give them a charisma bonus because I mean those are the two things that are the riskiest to take if you want to take like those being your bigger things because this is a setting where once again if things are going well which is really important.
If things are going well which they won't in this setting don't count on that.
That's that's the thing about it right like they'll never go well.
Yeah you're in a combat situation.
Something has already gone wrong.
You've walked into a room or a house or a building full of people or infected that you shouldn't have you found yourself in a trap people have pulled out a gun.
You're never really going to be in an ideal situation.
But when somebody pulls out a gun in your head the person in your group who has the bigger gun is then the bigger priority.
That's not going to be.
Yeah person because they're not going to be able to hold their own.
So there's a world I think in which you could also give them the charisma because that's another thing that's.
It's the only thing that saves them in that situation.
Yeah because I mean it's a thing of like this is your person who at that point then is is your in there what's keeping you going outside of combat if they don't have the like the big combat boosts.
Yeah you know what I mean.
It's a trying to think of what mechanically then they have to offer in combat outside of a charisma bonus is difficult.
I mean I think they could still like defend themselves they'll still probably have like a knife they're not probably going to be using like any ranged weapons or anything that are going to be doing more than one hit.
But I think.
Yeah I think it's difficult.
Maybe giving them some type of armor just to keep them alive a little bit longer.
Yeah maybe a higher AC is the way that that goes then.
Or help maybe even just more hits.
Yeah right like thinking about you don't want your.
Your medic to be able to go down as quick so maybe also rolling that into it as well right.
It's also something where you want ideally your players to recognize that this is a person that's very important and they might not be able to hold themselves as well in combat.
So you also need to kind of make protecting them a priority but this is also a setting where everyone is very distrustful of each other.
And there's not a lot of priority in protecting people unless there are like crazy circumstances that are that are letting you do so or like a deep familial bond like I mean brothers like if you look at like Tommy and Joel.
Okay well that's a very like deep pre-established relationship and then you also have like romantic relationships or like semi romantic relationships are also you're going to be like very like inclined to help and protect that person.
And then you have like a situation like Joel and Ellie which is another like I said an example of like an extreme circumstance.
But outside of that if you're just somebody who's like working in the same group.
This is a world that lends itself to like you not trusting other people.
In an ideal world this would be like OK putting the differences aside we do want to protect this person.
But I think that also depends on what group of players you have at your table.
Yeah.
Because you don't want to rely on people will protect them and then you get to the table and you're like oh I grossly overestimated.
I definitely did not understand the situation appropriately like the medic is dead.
They have a bad call to take the first aid kit off of them before the combat started.
Well what do I do with that.
Yeah.
It's God that is so difficult man like figuring out what I mean ideally just the fact that they're the only ones that can really heal you should be enough to encourage like to make that class worthwhile.
But at the same time if they're backed into a corner and you don't have.
Fucking people that care about it like what do you do with them. Yeah.
I'm just like I'm trying to think of like video games and stuff that I played like how the systems are broken down and how you prioritize your like what makes it so great.
It's the fact that they clerics are chose or chosen so little in fifth edition as well.
Like I feel like that just goes to show like the class is not.
The class isn't that fun. I think it's a good class and I think that clerics can do some things that deal like some super awesome super awesome damage.
There's some of my favorite like damage dealing spells and 5E that are are from clerics.
But I think it's also a thing of like I in particular I you know this stance and I think I've said the same from the podcast.
I'm not going to play a party healer which is why I avoid clerics just out of my own personal principles and like my little feminists.
So box that I get on of I played a table full of all men and I refuse to be the healer because that's the position that like them people are often you're laughing but like I don't it's just a personal stance in the same way that I don't play video games if I can't play as a female character at some point.
That's unrelated but I think that that's also part of like the reason that a lot of people don't want to be stuck in that position because a lot of the time healers are also kind of like treated like shit.
Once again very much depends on the group of people that you're playing with but it can be very frustrating when you're playing a healer who is you are not prioritized because you're like hey I'm taking this risk with my character and putting myself out there.
Hoping that the group of people that I'm around are going to like help me out and so when they're underutilized or like I'm also saying this is a bit I just filmed a short little film for my for my film class and we like talked about like the jaded cleric and like being like I revised our course of like 22 sessions I used Revivify 32 times you know how many diamonds that was you all get to spend the dragons word that we that we get after we finish this.
On your own like little cool armor I get to spend them on diamonds to to Revivify you all that's not fair.
I'm thinking something else maybe to incentivize this role being prioritized in being played is that to heal yourself like as a non medic class or even heal another person it's probably only one hit thinking about like the hit system.
But the healer or the medic being the only person that can heal to maybe three with like a medicine kit right because it's like if you're fighting a bloater and you also have several runners if you get hit once by a runner.
If you get hit by that bloater you're dead.
Yeah like that's that's all there is to it and you can only heal yourself one time so that's that's not gonna do anything for you.
Yeah but having a medic that can bring you up or even maybe take you past those amount of hits is going to be really key.
I think that's gonna be huge and also maybe a benefit of being able to like in healing during combat is already kind of crazy.
Yeah like that's crazy thing to do.
Yeah and I think that that is alone and then maybe also giving them like more of a movement speed which I know I don't know if that comes with this in the way that we're breaking it down but like if you're the healer being able to move a little bit faster to get to people might also give you kind of a leg up and a benefit on also evading getting hit.
I'm almost thinking that maybe something that could be useful for this class is having one of the only ones that can have multiple actions per turn.
Yeah.
So being able to heal and fire at the same time or heal and attack would be a huge advantage.
I think that'd be huge and then it'd be balanced out because you're doing significantly less damage than some of your counterparts.
Exactly but you still get to do something you're not just limited to firing a gun or just healing somebody.
Yeah.
So there has to be some incentive like there's some way for you to be able to help in combat because everybody has to whether they like it or not especially in a setting like this.
I think that's the rest of these classes I think can be kind of fleshed out and pretty easily thinking about soldiers just having benefits with weapons and prepper being the class that can do craftables Molotovs bombs that kind of thing traps smuggler being your your sort of rogue or charisma focused class.
Yeah.
Okay.
So I think that's it's pretty much the majority of the mechanics that I can think of.
We glossed over rat kings very briefly.
Rat kings for those those that aren't familiar with the game.
Last of us two features that completely new and original enemy type called the rat king.
It is a basically giant mass of infected that have kind of like just stated in a dark subterranean area with a lot of water and have become large supermass one large supermassive being what you also find out throughout the course of that particular fight is that they are not incapable of splitting and then turning into more multiple different
types of attacks that are not as effective at the same time as well.
They're very hard to kill.
I would put them at six hits.
They probably do two hits per like per hit so per damage capping their speed at either 25 or 30 seems appropriate but having them being the biggest threat period I think makes sense.
The rat king and leaving is not an option the chances of you living or something done.
Yeah.
Because of the sheer amount of health they have truly is what makes them difficult to fight.
I would say my instinct is still for it to be two hits because that's a one hit in your dead.
No like six hits is how many it takes to kill them.
Yeah.
No to kill them to kill you if they're doing three hits.
No to is it to.
Oh I thought you said three.
No to never mind I'm crazy.
Two hits.
I'm just gonna go back to the fucking clicker.
Like that's it.
You know.
Yeah.
Like you can still live once of a rat king.
I mean you get to go one more but with a clicker it's like you could hit you die.
I always wanted to be like a 2.5 like I know that point fives don't exist.
You know what I mean.
Yeah.
Just for like purposes of like cool I need to run and get the fuck out so that is your
like only option and even then it's going to be like cool you're going to have half of
your movement speed and you can't do this this this this.
That was the end of that phrase.
Sorry.
Oh man.
No that's valid.
It's been a week.
I'm not.
You think I'm not intelligent.
Crazy week folks.
Okay.
By the time you listen to this we'll both be not in college.
I've already graduated.
I know.
I will have right.
I will have walked across the state.
And I'll be graduating and walking across the stage as well.
Yeah.
There's other things that can be focused out with those individual classes.
Well like some of the things on here that they've listed is like reducing weapons way.
So giving you a better chance to hit and improve focus being able to look at things more extra
attack forging that kind of stuff.
Action surge as well being a class specific thing I think makes sense all sorts of fun
stuff like that to give to those different things to make them a little bit more individual.
One of the things that we talked about for fleshing these systems out is what role does
magic play.
Obviously in this world magic does not exist but I think you can still have something like
special abilities or skills or class features that you can use in place of that that are
probably like a once per day or based on the amount of resources you can use that sort
of thing.
Yeah that's kind of where magic starts and stops.
We've talked about the factions kind of already in the background portion of this.
So you have like your military your private military slash settlement you have your government
military in the form of Fedra you have like rebel military with fireflies.
You have kind of outskirt settlements or specialty settlements with the seraphites or the cannibal
club.
Cannibal club.
Why not.
Cannibal club.
Don't give them a cute name.
That's like the fucking corn cutie shit from fantasy high.
Don't give them a cute name.
Cannibal club.
They're not a cannibal club.
They make a cute little thing.
That's awful.
And you have like your bandits your your like loners kind of outside the settlement folks
that like hang out in abandoned cities and trap people for a living or like the people
that prefer to.
The lone wolves.
I'm not allowing anybody to play a lone wolf.
I'm not doing it.
You the only way any of my players would get to play a lone wolf background is if you are
in fact not alone and are traveling with or to another person.
I'm not doing that.
It is fucking impossible to make those people interact with another person.
Well it doesn't go well.
Correct.
I stand on that without the without essentially shackling them to another human being.
They will do everything in their power to not be with that person and that makes for such
a awful party experience when you want your players to be with each other.
It's great.
I did not realize how real that trope was until I had like the amount of experience under
my belt that I have like now.
It's so very real.
It's crazy how real it is.
Not to get too medigame about it but I think it really just stems from the fact that the
hobby was created by men primarily.
No I agree.
Men on the whole prefer to do things alone.
They prefer to be independent.
They prefer to be able to be proficient in their own things and to be self sustaining
and so that trope naturally fucking finds itself in a lot of different character backstories
because that's just what they do.
And it's also crazy and this is going to be a little bit of playfulness right here.
I would say that all men are like that.
I don't agree with that.
David Madison said that entirely on her own.
Ignore me.
Don't associate the two of us.
We run a podcast together.
I'm not her.
She's not me.
We run a podcast together.
We're friends.
We live together.
Don't associate us.
I don't share her opinions.
Anyway the little playful thing I was going to say is like I ran a one shot this weekend
and it is our table that we play at.
So I was jamming and it was once all male table and they were playing in Point Pleasant.
I was playing around with that and it was crazy watching the way that all of these characters
were like acting beside each other.
There were like some NPCs and they were more interested in like the girl NPCs than like
speaking to each other.
And it was just like kind of a very goofy like thing because once again they're also
playing high school boys.
So like it's accurate in that regard.
And it was just one of those goofy things of like everyone is so committed to this lone
wolf thing.
Yeah.
No like for real.
Like and you were playing Tony so you come in late to the session and we're just like
hey guys what's up.
And it was like nah it's not like that.
Yeah.
It was a very fun session and this is not me ragging on them.
I think they're a little thing.
There are people out there who can do it well and then there are people out there that just
they get really into the aspect of the character being I don't want to be with people.
And that's appropriate and great for certain situations in certain forms of role play.
It does not work well when you have to be a party to progress the story.
It's one of those things where you have to met a game enough to know that you were playing
a game with other people.
Yeah.
You know.
100 percent.
Going over kind of the rest of the list.
We go on the lone wolf player like tangent so often.
Some questions about the universe that are helpful to know when when role playing and
moving people from location to location economy.
It's not a super fun answer for some settings.
There's thankfully in this universe not much of an answer for that.
Generally speaking things are not purchased or bought.
I don't give a shit about economy and when it comes to settlements in particular being
an accused.
It's probably going to be ration based or value.
I mean everything's going to be a bartering system.
It is a valuable for another valuable that is not money.
It's going to be medicine.
It's going to be drugs with US and American dollars.
Correct.
There's no fucking caps like all out like there's nothing used in place that is a solely
bartering system.
I would then say that maybe the secondary form of that for progressing the story purposes
would be like job based.
You know.
I'll give you this medicine if you go out and do this for me or I'll give you this
minute like I'll give you this this weapon.
No idea what the fuck you meant.
Like like like like like West Fetch.
Yeah.
You know that makes sense.
Yeah.
If you go out and do this thing or get this thing from this person.
I'll give you this stuff like a favor.
Yeah.
But like it's not a favorite.
It's like no go do the shit first.
Then we'll talk.
Climates.
So talking about the land and geographical settings obviously that's going to be location
based wherever the setting takes place or wherever the parties members travel to.
I think to an extent we kind of mentioned earlier it affects your your combat.
So having a character who is very used to the concrete.
QZ setting is going to do really well when fighting in a building or even just an abandoned
city even just yeah.
And sitting with concrete.
But if you're like caught out in the woods.
Your folks.
Yeah.
Like you're not go out there clothing your equipment.
None of that you're going to be familiar with.
Kind of this is this a little bit more specific.
What would people like like Jackson settlement people with what the fuck would their favorite
terrain be.
I would say like that the more like rural land.
Okay.
So I'm thinking there's kind of like two really different ends to it.
There's like enter there's in there's urban and non urban.
Right.
Urban and rural.
Those are the two different terrains that you can be sort of preferred in.
Is it an urban setting.
Great.
You get advantage on certain things.
Is it a non urban setting.
Disadvantaged that kind of thing.
I'm thinking there's really only two ends to that.
Yeah.
Geographical settings again this is just the United States so we don't really have to
spend a lot of time world building out what state or what the regions look like.
That's more of a throw a dart at the map pick a location figure out what factions are in
that area what states or locations you plan on letting your players.
Players travel to and then having that on a document.
Yeah.
First society and culture I know some of the questions that came up is like what are the
leisurely activities what is like the what are the populations like fashion languages
history that kind of thing.
I think leisure is entirely going to be dependent on your background right like if you come
from a Jackson kind of place it's going to be like probably hand carved dice that kind
of thing.
I mean they have darts.
That's like getting specific they I think Jackson would have like the access to the
most because there's also like the game that the kids are playing in the beginning with
like the kids are able to be in a place that is safe enough that they're able to play a
game a fucked up game albeit where they're pretending to be fucking clickers.
Yeah in fact.
The ability to have leisure time I think is something that's really interesting and not
to get to like about the human culture in society but I think it does say a lot about
like what.
Yeah this would be something to talk about on an like an individual character creation
basis so like that helps with role playing right depending on where you're from is going
to determine what leisure activities you have access to which is going to kind of determine
your personality right like if you're from a settlement like Jackson which is like 99%
great to be in.
You're not going to be super used to like going to an abandoned city or interacting
with somebody who has a very harsh life outside of the settlement because I mean you get to
like throw snowballs at each other during the winter and go to dances and throw darts
and play dice as deposes somebody who's like from an outside settlement or bad settlement
or a specialty settlement like your leisure activities are surviving.
Yeah.
That's it man like you might play dice that's like you know bet on things but you don't
really have any down time.
Sit around and talk about the people you've lost and like that's like that's what you're
doing for fun.
Are you like a survivor or are you like.
At most.
Yeah.
Anonically because of what we see sex like that's about.
Yeah.
For the sole purpose of passing the time and having anything to enjoy.
Yeah.
That's it.
Which is sad but like in the game that is the only time that like that's the only thing
that we see that any of people from like that.
If action for like a better words do.
Yeah.
I think one of the questions on here is like a population.
It's kind of sparse right far and few in between keeping in mind if you're DMing this
setting kind of if you venture outside the walls there are very few people that you will
be interacting with and 95% of them will be hostile.
That's just kind of like a note about the world as opposed to being inside of a settlement
or a QZ.
Lots of people know infected they're infected there they're doing something wrong.
I think also kind of rolling the land and in the society and culture and population having
buildings in the like outside of the walls being more likely to find supplies because
people don't want to venture there but also being more prone to having infected is something
to keep in mind as well.
Like yeah going to I don't know like there's a location in Last of Us 2 it's a bank and
there are several weapons in there they're very valuable there's also some like craftables
and cement kits because it's a place where people held up at one point but because it
has now been lost to sort of the outside world is filled with infected.
So thinking about sort of tying population of creatures in as well the more remote the
location is the more removed from a settlement it is the higher chance they're infected
something they actively participate in Jackson are patrols where they will go miles out from
their settlement and clear out large swaths of abandoned buildings yearly because they
know that infected will oftentimes move into those dark and ding places because they're
fungus based they want a dark wet place to grow.
So that's also something to keep in mind is you're sort of like moving through the world
you're out in the plane you're in a field you're traveling through streets or something
like that like yeah not a lot of people but when you start looking at enclosed spaces that's
where you're gonna find most of your infected at.
Fashion just kind of something fun to talk about it's just post-op man you're wearing
what you got you're wearing a lot of denim you're wearing you know.
I love and this is good.
Kick jackets.
This is gonna be a little like you're dressing in layers.
But I find the fact that every post-apocalyptic setting world everything they all were the
same thing and it's so goofy to me and I think it's partially because they rose in such
popularity in like the 2010s because every bitch in a post-op world is wearing skinny
jeans they have like the army the the army green jacket they're wearing maroons they're
wearing purples it's all like like that's very specific color scheme it's the flannel
I think that shit is so goofy it's so funny to me to look at because it's like it's so
specific do you know what I'm talking about like it is in every piece of media.
Yeah.
It's a very common fashion trend in zombies post-op like you can take someone who's dressed
from the walking dead and put them next to somebody from the last of us and you would
not be from the outfit you cannot tell who is who some of the outfits in the walking
dead are kind of fucking crazy.
Oh well yeah once you start getting like later in the show absolutely that show gets so fucking
off the rails so quickly.
Yeah.
This is something to keep in mind.
I think also to an extent fashion can play a role when you're looking in talking about
equipment again somebody comes from a QZ and they leave and it starts raining or downpouring
or they're in an urban area they're probably going to have a significantly harder time
navigating and feeling comfortable.
Yeah.
Because they're not well equipped for not being able to be inside of a shelter or a
building and that naturally is going to lead them to want to camp out in a building which
then leads to the issue buildings have infected.
Yeah.
So then how do you manage your whiny party member who's like I really just want to sleep
under something that doesn't I like I just I want shelter.
Yeah.
All of your shelter options are filled with infected buddies so if you care that much
about your fucking leisurely activities then you can go clear out the building.
Yeah.
This is kind of going in this vein and this is not like really in this vein because this
is like a basic necessity but I loved in the show when they're showing Ellie looking around
for things and she ends up finding a box of tampons and she's like so excited about it
like that's like score.
That's such a real thing and that's something that they don't talk about a lot in like post
up worlds.
Yeah.
Like what are they doing.
They're all on screen all the time in these post up worlds.
All these women their hair is still done.
They have a full face of makeup on.
When did you have time.
Arm bits are shaved legs are like no give me realism.
Look at baby smooth.
Give me a 13 year old girl who's really excited about finding a box of tampons.
God damn it.
The men have got super lined beards.
Yeah.
It's like no fuck you.
Fuck you so much.
You're going at that with a pair of scissors if you're lucky.
Yeah.
You know the idea that anyone has like their hair cut in this world.
Yeah.
When you're like on the run is crazy like Jackson.
Yeah.
Get a haircut.
But like another super popular thing that just about every system will talk about his
languages.
Again this is just the United States.
We're keeping it simple doing English.
You're not really going to run into any groups that don't speak English.
What is interesting though is that like the seraphites really cool faction talked about
earlier.
They they have their own language when they are communication system when they're in
combat.
They whistle and click and depending on like the tone of the whistle whether they end it
with an up or a down how many times they click the space between the clicks that it's it's
really crazy how much time was put into that particular mechanic in the game.
If you play it enough you can start to figure out what the fuck those whistles and clicks
mean.
You can learn that as the player and use that to your advantage because you know based on
how far the way the whistle is or how many times they click what the enemy is going to
do.
I don't know if I necessarily want to go for if I were to play it but I think it'd be
kind of fun.
I think it would be similar to like thieves can't in 5e.
That's basically what it is.
Yeah.
But only once again I've never seen these actions are going to use that.
I've never seen thieves can't use it.
It is not.
It doesn't.
Why would you.
Why sounds cool.
You can just talk.
You can just talk and be secret about it.
They make it a fucking feature.
You know silly.
They make it so stupid like some people get familiar and then if you're a row you get these
can't.
If you're not dealing with skull duckery in your campaign get fucked.
Correct.
That's how I feel about languages.
Fun fact my character and our capes and corrects campaign speaks every single language in
this world.
Doesn't matter in that universe.
She speaks every language.
Doesn't fucking matter one bit.
And it's just a little nugget of information that I have where I can go yeah she's actually
like very multi lingual in a world where Google translate is probably light years beyond
when it once was.
Why the fuck does it matter what languages you speak.
She speaks binary.
Yeah why does that matter.
It doesn't.
Exactly.
Languages are silly.
Yeah.
I'm sure in some aspects and in some worlds and campaigns are important like when you
know it's fun giving your players documents that are written in different languages.
Yeah.
You know because it's like a mystery.
Outside of that what the fuck does it matter.
No I agree.
I agree.
I got you walk up to somebody and they don't understand your language.
Your wizard cast fucking understand language.
Congratulations.
Problem solved.
Is there's so many spells in 5E that account for languages.
So many different ways that you can get around that.
Like it's a there's so many almost every class has access to a spell that allows you to speak
any language or understand any language and that's crazy to me because I've never experienced
sitting at a table or even friends who have been at a table where languages matter.
The last one we have on here is history.
It's it's last.
Last of us.
The only way I can really see it being important is understanding having your players understand
or in this case what could be fun players not understanding the backgrounds of the factions.
So like the the wolves in Seattle beef with the seraphites constantly because they basically
have opposing ideologies.
So if you're bartering between groups or if you're using lingo or colloquialisms that
you've picked up from a group of seraphites or wolves if you go and then use that around
the wrong group that's immediately going to set off red flags.
So to that extent history is important just to know when you're interacting with factions.
What are the things that I can say around certain groups of people versus the things
that I cannot.
Another great example from fallout vault dwellers they dress in fucking blue jumpsuits they
use funny language that is an immediate tip off to bandits and people that are looking
for valuable things and people to steal that this is a person worth it.
It's also just kind of the way that you hold yourself and like dress yourself of like when
we were talking about like people from Jackson having different air about them.
I that can also kind of probably be a negative.
I know there's class.
They've been washed.
They don't smell like pig shit.
Yeah.
Oh oh fucking pretty boys walking in here like the only place shut the fuck up like
you can tell.
Yeah.
It's not it's it's history in this case is almost more important to rebrand is like
common sense common sense social cues street.
Yeah street smarts common knowledge like that kind of a thing.
And that again is going to go back to your faction and your players background.
How much about the outside world do they know.
Like Ellie is she's very intelligent.
She's very curious character but she doesn't know a lot about a lot.
She's also 13.
She's 13 but I think that I think you would also find that same character present in a
lot of different settlements and like QZ's where people have been sheltered from a lot
of the outside world information.
So going out and being ignorant to the people.
I think that's more dependent on age to an extent because I don't think this is a
world in which someone is allowed to grow up and be an adult and not pull their fucking
weight.
You know what I mean.
Yeah that very much is dependent on where you're at.
I think the only world in which that could happen would be Jackson and I think even then
it's still very much a thing of everyone does their shifts everyone runs their stuff.
It doesn't matter who they have.
Everyone has a job everyone goes to school.
Like it is a communist in the true sense.
Like it's.
Yeah I would agree.
I think unless you're playing a particularly young character who just has grown up outside
of what is even considered normal for this world.
You really don't have any excuse for not like you're there is no reason for if you played
a character from a QZ and you're suddenly out in the world and you're dealing with a smuggler
and Lucy there's no yeah there's no reason for you to be Lucy and it being like oh my
god friends.
No you were smart enough to understand that the people that are outside are outside for
a reason.
That being said I think it's also a thing of like I still think that there's going to
be like there's big differences because I think someone who's raised in a fedora world
is going to have a very warped and propaganda view of what different like people like I
mean that's going to go for like any situation of like you are going to have your specific
areas view on what the world is and what like ethics and morals are and I think that that's
going to be really big and I think it's also a thing of like I think there are extreme
circumstances where someone could be a little bit more clueless like I mean if you're looking
at like a religious zealot cult and they think that you're the prophet they're not going
to let you know what's happening they're going to keep you fucking locked up.
Mm-hmm.
Or even just like with the seraphites knowing what technology does.
Yeah.
You know what it is like if you're never allowed to turn it on if you're so if you're told
to break everything you see on site then like you don't know why using a flashlight is beneficial.
An age I think one's age in a different sense of like being young of being a character that's
old enough to remember what the world was like before which once again Last of Us does
really cool there's a scene where Ellie is in a girl's bedroom and she's like reading
her diary and she's like they were worried about like boys and like how skinny they were
and like all these other things.
Yeah what they wore to school.
And like that was their worries.
That doesn't even like compute in the brain to be worried.
Yeah I think age could play a really cool part in how your characters portray themselves
like that that's such a great point.
Your age really is going to determine a large part of your attitude towards the world.
Yeah.
Age is a big part of it.
In fact, in the background is is huge but your age and being able to know certain things
and remember certain things about what the world was previous is also going to play a
really big thing like a really big role like a large reason of why Jola is so jaded is
that in characters that are around that age in this universe tend to be more jaded than
others because they've been able to see so many horrible things happen since outbreak
like it's one thing to go OK all of the people in the outside world are terrible and everybody
wants to kill everybody.
It's another thing to go I know what it was like when people weren't like that and now
I've had to see people become that.
Yeah.
Right.
If it's the only thing you know you're managing it you're living with it is what it is but
when there's this neutral almost when it's this layer of like but this is what things
could be like it sucks so much more.
Yeah.
You know and like even characters like that who have become a version of themselves that
they dislike which is a huge part of Joel's person canonically it's it's hinted at it's
never confirmed but it's heavily hinted at that at one point he tried to kill himself
because he he hated who he was.
Yeah.
He was a father going into the first like the very beginning of the first game you find
out he's a father he's very loving he shows a lot of affection and attention he has a
brother who he loves he has a family as well and then you flash forward and it is just
like this shell of a human being who's had to watch people he loves and knows die he
doesn't know where his brother's at.
It's revealed throughout the game that he's had to do horrible things to survive because
the the closer you play to outbreak day it's almost like the worst that it was.
Because they describe actively of like the military killing people and entering martial
law and the food thing happening like the shortages of food people going crazy people
still trying to figure out how the fuck the outbreak worked and how being infected was
passed like it was just so much worse than almost what it is when you flash forward to
present day in the universe.
It's anarchy immediately it's.
Yep and like the things that you have to do in that intermediate period are a lot worse
than the things you have to do today.
Yeah.
And so I think you can really play around or really could play around with how much age
impacts your character's view their attitude and some really interesting and kind of extreme
ways.
I think it'd be that would be one of the things that I'd be most interested in as a
player in exploring because I think that's a really interesting concept because it's
also like OK so the people who were born into this world who this is the only world that
they've ever known why would it like this for all intents and purposes unless you're
like reading and pouring over history books which I mean also that's another thing to
like question for characters who are born post outbreak day.
What how much like in how much detail are you taught about like what the world was like
before because I'm pretty sure things like all of the presidency of the United States
matter a little bit less.
Yeah.
Then you get a little bit of you get some glimpses of that through Ellie who's fascinated
with certain aspects of like sort of remnants of culture.
She has a huge fascination with space and with dinosaurs because they seem like such
outlandish concepts from a child who's grown up post outbreak.
Yeah.
It's like oh we went to space.
That's you can do that.
That's crazy.
There's like a dinosaurs were a thing.
There were giant lizards like so much more insane when you live in a world like last
of us post outbreak because it's like oh like 95 percent of my worries today are surviving.
Yeah.
You know but also we went to space.
That's crazy.
Yeah.
It doesn't matter.
And even just learning things that seem so everyday and so mundane like I mean there's
a dialogue when they're Joel and Ellie are walking through and she's looking at like
a super model and she's like that lady looks like she's like starving.
He's like well you know she was like I thought you had like food back then and he's like
well some people didn't like to eat it because they was considered like you were prettier
if you were like skinnier and she's like that's fucking insane.
Yeah.
What do you mean like and things like that in that dynamic.
With that knowledge basis.
It's really interesting.
Yeah.
Just because of how like fucking absurd it is.
Yeah.
I mean thinking about how far like even information in settings like this in any post-op world
like information is a luxury.
Yeah.
It's it's a leisurely activity.
It's something that if you're lucky you have the ability to dive into.
Yeah.
Because like books and Internet and like all of that is.
Yeah.
I mean the Internet doesn't exist in the setting like there is no cellular communication.
And then it's just whatever books you happen to have.
Yeah.
Whatever books you find again libraries or buildings buildings lend themselves to infected
no one's going out of their way to get books.
Yeah.
You know like a settlement like Jackson who has people that they can send to a library
and then clear it out and bring books back like that's one thing but in a QZ like books
is books are not the priority.
You burn that shit for like warmth.
You have like a super basic education like a base which is going to be taught to you
by Fedra and by Fedra sponsored people.
So it's going to be all super basic government stuff.
It's going to be very traditional like don't you know don't steal don't kill.
So drugs you know the good guys we are we are the good guys.
So what's left of society that people outside are bad the people inside are good.
There's a reason why people out can't come in and vice versa.
The rations like giving you a certain amount of food a day make sense.
Here's why all that kind of stuff.
Yeah.
Well yeah I think that's it's pretty much it.
I mean there's a lot more on the nitty gritty and specifics that we could get into with
specifically I think character classes and really nailing down backgrounds and features
and what those kinds of things do but that's pretty much all I think you would need to
know to run.
I think we've successfully D&D divide.
So I just get on bikes if I'd last of us setting.
Yeah.
Again go check out Stellar on Amino their little Google Doc that they put together with a kind
of preliminary system.
I didn't use a whole lot of it just because we have straight so far away from fifth edition
but there are a lot of really good things that they kind of keep in mind like how important
a long rest is how important a short rest is where you can and cannot do those kinds
of things to really like that they noted difficulty classes that sort of thing prep.
Which I imagine in this world is still going to be run and like those are still going to
be parts of it.
Yeah.
No they're just not necessarily as important talking about like in a in a world building
class building episode.
Yeah.
Like there's one thing on here that I probably won't use because it's too much to keep track
of like ingredients for crafting materials.
Yeah.
So there's like a list because in the game you have to.
Get a certain amount of ingredients to make materials.
I don't know how fun.
I don't know.
Resource management is something that I don't mind running.
It's not everybody's favorite thing.
I guess.
Resource management.
So there could be an easy way to do it where I just assign like I would assign and make
a table and I would roll on it and that would determine what reason like how many resources
you get.
Yeah.
So like you open a drawer I'm going to roll on a table that's like maybe one to three
or I'll roll a D4 depending on what that number is that's that's going to determine how many
resources you get from this and then I'm going to roll that D4 again or D6 or however many
resources I have total until I give you the amount that you you found.
Yeah.
And then you'll have like a little list of things that you can make.
Hell yeah.
And that I think is where I would probably do the physical props.
I'm not a huge physical props person but I think that's.
I love physical props.
I think that's where it would be cool is to have pronounced of the crafting materials.
So as you learn how to make things giving you a physical prop that says these are the
things needed and then maybe.
Here's a recipe for a pipe bomb and then maybe having little cutouts or pronounced that are
those resources so that you could physically hold them on your person.
See I'm putting things together.
I'm doing our cricket.
I'm talking physical props.
Is our cricket.
I you use the cricket all the time.
Let me teach you.
So that's another thing you could do with this having physical resources to give to people
I think it'd be a really neat way to do that crafting system to make it a little bit more
interesting.
We just make it real.
You have to craft an actual weapon at the table.
Jesus Christ.
You're not allowed to use a weapon in the game until you can produce it physically in
person.
So going to the grocery store and buying it does not count.
Yeah.
So you're going to have to get real creative there with that staple gun.
Crazy to think that you can buy a gun at Walmart.
So just to just talking about that I'm thinking like yeah like you know can't buy it at Walmart
have to have all the stuff your character has but you can.
Yeah.
You could go to Walmart and buy all the things that you need to make all of the crazy as
I'm going up to the table with so much ammo.
And it's cheap.
It's easy.
It's a one day trip.
Don't need a license for it.
You just show up.
Bob's your uncle you got a fucking gun.
Yeah.
And a Walmart.
It's crazy.
You could go to the store and get a gallon of milk and a gun at the same place.
That to me is something that would also be insane looking at and like stop being like
holy shit you could buy a gun at Walmart.
Like at a grocery like a place with a bunch of food and also clothes and also items and
cars and tires and all these other crazy things and laptops and TVs and computers.
Which like I don't even know what that is.
But also a gun.
But a gun.
Like what were they prepping for.
You know like that's where my mind goes like what were they preparing for.
Like it was just like people liked them.
Hey what do you mean people just liked them.
You could have them like you could just have them and then use them for fun and it's like
the thing that I used to murder people.
And it's like how do you use those for fun.
Yeah I was like well you put something over there and then you shoot it.
That's training like we and we don't get to train because bullets are like you you don't
get to learn how to use a gun in Jackson or like some shit like that or like a settlement
because you have limited bullets.
Those bullets and guns go to the people who already know how to use them because we're
not wasting time fucking teaching you.
We get to fire a gun like once every three to six months.
Yeah.
And it's like the one time.
What do you mean they were shooting ranges where people went and did this for fun.
What do you what do you.
It's all fucking insane.
Just putting everything looking at anything in today's society from a post op lens is
it looks fucking insane.
Oh yeah.
There were different prints for bags and that mattered.
That symbol made it more expensive.
That little thing on there.
Yeah.
Does that mean what what's a brand.
What do you mean it was more like like the the skinny thing is what gets me like the
most like like you all had an infant and potentially near infinite amount of food.
And you all praised people who didn't eat it.
People who didn't eat it.
And what do you mean their job was just looking pretty.
That was an option.
Crazy.
That was an option.
Crazy.
There's a lot more to model like the just looking pretty it is a real value.
Only equivalent in this world is prostitution.
Yeah.
And even then I don't think that you can make a like a true living on being a prostitute
anywhere outside like unless you were in a QZ or a settlement.
But I mean even then it's like everything's so regulated.
Yeah.
You could probably get away with it in a QZ just not in Jackson.
QZ maybe.
You could probably be like sex for this sex for that.
Yeah.
But you still like have a day job.
It's not like you're getting.
Yeah.
You're still assigned like body bearing duty or you know sweeping the floors mopping the
road like shit like that.
That's what you're doing for like penicillin.
Like you're just sleeping with somebody so that way you can get the thing you need to
live.
Yeah.
You know because they don't give you enough otherwise.
And this is a world that like when we talk about like we've we've talked about like
we've talked about also doing before of talking about like guidelines and consent of like
what things are and topics are OK to like have at the table and blah blah blah and like
this is a setting where we talked about like it's very gritty realism and that's one where
like more like fucked up things would be present at.
So just in general you're including prostitution in your games talk to your DM and your players
and make sure everyone's comfortable with that.
Yeah.
That's a little bit of a saying.
No that's that's a really good point to bring up with settings like this that are more intense
and then have a sort of proclivity for the darker side of human nature not to make it
super heady but I mean it's basically what it is.
There are some super heavy topics that are touched on and that you see and play out in
the last of us one and two that like there's a reason why those games have like an 18 operating.
Yeah.
Because they're they should really only be played by people that are on that age range
or that have permission or a super fire.
I'm not going to get into the writing thing.
But to that extent you should treat a universe like this or a world like this in the same
way.
Yeah.
You should get consent.
You should give warnings about the things that might be present or could be present.
Sure people are comfortable with the things that are present.
Like I don't think I would ever the the the pet there's to the cannibal to the big cannibal
the main cannibal.
There's a heavy dose.
Yeah David there's a heavy dose of pedophilia.
Yeah.
Underneath the cannibalism cannibalism is already fucked up.
But in a sense it's removed enough and insane enough in this setting that it's like you
know it still feels like it still feels like almost like a fantasy or unrealistic thing.
Yeah.
And to that extent it's removed enough that you can talk about it and you know see it
in view in whatever pedophilia on the other hand is a very real traumatic thing that a
lot of people encounter in their day to day lives.
Yeah.
So maybe you don't have to roll that into your game.
Yeah.
But you can like the farthest I could ever imagine going is if I were to play a character
like David like a role play character like David at the table.
In PC for clarification.
The most that I think I would ever do to that extent is hint in dialogue or in a piece of
paper that maybe this is something that he does but I would never put that on display
at the table and I would never make that a thing to talk about or touch.
You know it's just another added layer in this world.
I can make the shittier people shitty and disliked for a lot of other reasons other than
I don't like kill my family.
Yeah.
You know they burn my house down they send a band of goblins after me like the traditional
fifth edition VBG stuff.
Yeah.
And I think just making those those lines like very clear of like there are things that
we at our table will never touch and it's like a very clear thing that like that will
never happen at our tables like grape for example is not going to be is that's not going
to happen isn't something I would ever talk about same thing with sexual assault again
not going to talk about it.
Yeah.
It's not going to happen.
That is a hard line at our table that are they things that thing that is are they things
that happen in this universe.
Absolutely.
100% are they things that need to happen or need to be talked about in a any really meaningful
way at a table.
No.
Yeah.
Just no.
No reason.
Your table is your table and if this is a way that people at the table are dealing with
their trauma and like you are like you all go over everything in detail beforehand but
even then I think that's like a backstory information.
I don't think that's yeah something else to consider too is when playing the video games
murder like just the act of killing somebody is incredibly brutal and is personal.
It's personal.
Sometimes it's difficult to watch people will beg for their lives.
Yeah.
You there's no option to spare them.
If you do they will turn around and try and shoot you like that's just part of the brutality
of the world.
So that's also something that I would consider telling your players about if you plan on
wrongly you know running it true to the setting is shit's dark.
Shit is brutal like there are people at NPCs that will probably plead for their lives when
you're about to kill them and you're going to have to kill a dog.
Yeah.
Good luck.
Like because there's a chance that if you let them go that that doesn't come back to
bite you in the ass but let's be honest it's going to.
Yeah.
You know.
The reality is you are going to have to deal with hearing somebody get murdered by you
and it's going to be very personal because these are people.
Yeah.
It's crazy the way that the watching this game for the first time and like seeing characters
leading for their life and begging and being like that's bad.
Yeah.
That's like it's not.
It's traumatic.
Yeah.
Like it is a visually traumatic experience to have to watch that happen on screen and
to be in the driver's seat for it as well.
Yeah.
It's crazy.
And that's like you press the buttons that make the guy do the thing.
Yeah.
And then the guy kills the other guy in a really brutal way.
Yeah.
After he just got then pleading for his life.
And then the idea of being at the table and like that happening at the table is crazy.
Yeah.
Because it's even more personal.
You're literally playing that person.
You're in their headspace.
Which I guess we should also talk really very quickly about with this being such a system
where like cool three hits and you're dead.
What does that look like when you have people playing at a table and you all are there and
you all have plans and took off work until two o'clock to play or from whatever.
What do you do?
That's a great question.
Yeah.
I hadn't really thought about it much.
There's a reason why I've kept referring to this as a one shot.
I don't see in theory it could be a fun campaign.
However, comma with how easy it is to die a one shot makes the most sense because you
don't have to immediately turn around and make a whole new character that's going to
be present in a campaign for six months.
Finally fear would be if you all are in a combat session at the beginning of the day
and everyone gets to die.
Well not even TPK because TPK I think there's room because you can be like OK cool reset
or like or even just being like OK we're going to like you all are dead we're going to flash
back to like when you all were alive and doing something else.
I think the idea of like being someone at the table who like cool you die in the first
like hour and you all have like a five hour slot of playing of being like.
Honestly I think the easiest the easiest way to do it which is also the most boring answer
is just have backup characters.
Yeah.
Have a backup character.
I think this is a world we're having.
It's a world where you need three.
Yeah I think I think I was going to say I think this is a setting where you should have
ideally two to three backup characters because death is such a real thing and real chance
of happening in this world that like you should be prepared for that to happen.
Yeah.
You know you're not Ellie or Joel or Abby who get to restart whenever you die and go
go back to a checkpoint and then fucking hard hard push your way through it like you die
your character dead like there's no revivify in this universe there's no greater resurrection
scroll like you failure a day saving throws or if you get infected you got like a if you're
infected you have a day tops.
Yeah.
You have 24 hours.
Yeah.
If you get shot and bleed out that that's it this game.
Yeah.
So having a character that would be easily introducible in this setting I think is going
to be key tip for a DM I would be incredibly familiar with all of your alternates for your
players.
I the way I would see it would be like a larger group of people doing something and then the
other people in that group are your alternates.
Yeah.
And if you die then you just move to playing them if you're like doing something where
you're like moving across cities or something.
Yeah.
And then you have it the way that I would do it if you you wanted them all to come from
different areas or different groups having somebody close in their backstory that would
have a reason or motivation to either continue what they were doing or to go and find them
would be the way that I would do that.
So like if you were playing a Joe like character Joe has a brother Tommy the way that I would
do it is if the Joe like character in my setting or you know the character playing the player
care.
Holy fuck the player playing that character dies that player character dies.
I would then just have them pop over to Tommy who's going to go look for Joe.
Yeah.
You know or Ellie who is deeply attached to this father figure and is now going to go
out and look for Joe.
Yeah.
And having that person super easily introduced if you're doing the more military thing having
like like a buddy or somebody that you went through basic training with or yeah partner
maybe you both are out on an expedition or kind of like what Madison said a larger group.
So if like Abby's whole WLF gang there's like fucking nine of them bitches if they're
all out traveling and then the Abby player character dies cool.
Next one's in.
Yeah.
Like that's that's very how I see it.
To that extent as a DM you would want to be very knowledgeable about and intentional about
where you place your groups proximity wise.
Because if somebody travels from Massachusetts to fucking Seattle and their main gang is out
in Massachusetts and they die in Seattle nobody is coming for them because they have died
in Seattle and there is no cell phone.
They got you got a ham radio and that's if you can find one that works.
So you'd want to be very intentional about if you went with a close character kind of
backstory or close friend or comrade or family member whatever the fuck making sure that
everyone is relatively close or setting them out on a mission or job.
It's are completely unrelated which would be pretty difficult to do just consider very
difficult if you're learning like a different class and every like because this is a completely
new system that we'd be doing.
I would probably encourage my players to have the same class for each alternate.
Oh yeah because it's going to be too much to learn on the fly especially if you're spreading
it out over one maybe three sessions maximum.
Yeah you're not going to want to force one shot.
If you all can't tell from the podcast I never end up being a fucking four to five hour like
a four to five hour thing.
Our one shots are always like they're usually two to three day at least for both of our
GMing styles or DMing styles.
We like to see stories through and we like to flesh out our worlds and let our players
play in them before they just do the story or the job.
It's and we have a day and we're time blind and we're the closest thing to a real one
shot we ever did was the fucking that the guy named ship one shot in the Theros and
that was still split over two days.
So yeah we don't have a great track record of keeping things done in one go.
I guess we did well with.
Nope even with the fucking Eba the even sparrow one that was split into two as well.
The capes and crooks one might be our worst just in terms of how long.
Yeah because we set a time and we were like yeah four hours to be fair we got where we
wanted to get by the end of part three.
Yeah we did.
No that's what I'm saying but it was our worst in terms of like we went over time because
we were many campaigns we came in and we were like yeah we'll do this we'll wrap this up
in like 30 minutes and cut to like an hour and a half later we were like oh let's see.
Yeah sometimes it's just fun to let people run around in frolic and experience the whores
of your world and other times you're like.
West get the item go do the thing open the door kill the guy.
Yeah we're just not those second kinds of people.
We get way too into the shit that we make and we're like hey guys what if we did bits
for.
Yeah I shit you not 20 minutes what if we've been 20 what if we decided to be a little
sassy in a car and now we are free falling and we have to deal with that for real life
like 45 minutes and try not to get hit by cars as we are falling from the sky.
Yeah literally.
What if we had a site quest where I needed drugs you know.
All right I'm gonna try this again I think we're done.
Sorry I thought it was a relevant.
No that was relevant that was super relevant we went down a very fun rabbit hole.
We've just we've talked about that not on the podcast and I was like we didn't clarify
we were just like yeah you're gonna fucking die anyway play the one shot.
Yeah yeah just two to three alternates be very familiar with all them as a DM and as
a player and write your story well so that anybody can be switched out at any time.
Sounds awful and that's because it is.
I'm gonna check it out this world sucks so have fun good luck we'll run it at some point
and let you all know how it goes.
Yeah.
If you're tuning into another episode of Table Talk we will see you next Thursday hopefully
maybe sort of kinda.
Bye.