The Wicked Dead

An Extreme Rip-Off Production

 

An Introduction............................................................................................................................................................................. 2

Character Creation....................................................................................................................................................................... 3

Random Generation................................................................................................................................................................. 3

Templates.................................................................................................................................................................................... 3

ASPs.............................................................................................................................................................................................. 4

Carnage............................................................................................................................................................................................ 5

Combat......................................................................................................................................................................................... 5

Damage........................................................................................................................................................................................ 5

Going Crazy............................................................................................................................................................................... 5

Dying............................................................................................................................................................................................ 6

Weapons.......................................................................................................................................................................................... 7

Setting.............................................................................................................................................................................................. 9

The Island................................................................................................................................................................................... 9

The Cottage................................................................................................................................................................................. 9

Artifacts..................................................................................................................................................................................... 12

Scenes............................................................................................................................................................................................ 11

About The Wicked Dead........................................................................................................................................................ 13

Powers....................................................................................................................................................................................... 13

Defeating Them....................................................................................................................................................................... 14

Background.............................................................................................................................................................................. 14

Welcome To The Dead.......................................................................................................................................................... 14

Unresolved................................................................................................................................................................................... 16

Bonus Session............................................................................................................................................................................. 17

Character Templates................................................................................................................................................................ 18

Bambi......................................................................................................................................................................................... 18

Biff............................................................................................................................................................................................... 19

Dexter......................................................................................................................................................................................... 20

Joe................................................................................................................................................................................................ 21

Phoebe........................................................................................................................................................................................ 22

Spike........................................................................................................................................................................................... 23

Occasionally, I like a good (or even a bad) horror movie. The recent buzz about the role-playing game All Flesh Must Be Eaten had me thinking about zombies, and while my wife was visiting relatives showing off our new baby, I took the opportunity to watch the kind of films she hates: Horror films. Evil dead, Evil Dead 2, Return Of The Living Dead, Road to Rio (oh, sorry, that wasn’t a horror film).

One of the interesting things about the living dead genre is that it’s everyday folk against the unstoppable, so I started thinking about how I’d run that as a one or two night adventure.

Plus, any player who dies gets to come back as a Wicked Dead person, with full knowledge. (Except, of course, they want to kill. And maybe eat brains.) So you can’t lose your character; you just switch sides.

I briefly considered Unknown Armies for a system, but the impairment system in CORPS scales more nicely to the actual dead. Also, the lethality of combat is an important feature in this genre.

If you want to run this in Unknown Armies, it would be easy enough to do. Same for Call of Cthulhu, or even Hero.

I’m sure the Evil Dead title is trademarked someplace, so we’ll call our restless dead folks the Wicked Dead. Here are some ideas for a little session of Wicked Dead in CORPS.[1]

(Or would that be CORPSe?)

The genre cries out for between four and six characters, 100 AP, 50 SP. All characters are 21 years old, so they have 10 additional AP for age and 20 additional SP for skills. Psych lims involving practical joker, not believing in the supernatural, and being in love with other characters are encouraged.

Use the Modern Adventure Skill Tree.

I wouldn’t recommend spending a lot of time on character creation; you don’t want lovingly crafted ubermenschen, you want stereotypes. If one of the characters went two extra points over budget, who cares? Just point out to the player that he or she has no Ass-Saver Points...

If you want this to happen fast, here are two alternate creation mechanisms: Random and templates.

Generate characteristics with 4d10/4 (round down), then spend 70 SP from the Modern Adventure Skill Tree. GM’s choice if players get to apply their dice rolls to the characteristics of choice or if they just take’em as they roll’em.

You can also quickly create a character using a template. A template is a character stereotype you can customize. Available character stereotypes are:

·         Bambi (socialite: cheerleader or sorority queen); Bambis are very good at getting others to do what they want.

·         Biff (jock); Biffs are physically the toughest.

·         Dexter (brainy nerd); Dexters are the smartest and have the most obscure skills; they also have a lot of ASPs.

·         Joe (average guy); Joes tend to have down-to-earth skills, like carpentry and mechanic — a good all-round guy, with a bit of luck.

·         Phoebe (artsy type); Phoebes tend to know obscure things about the occult but are susceptible to it for that reason.

·         Spike (misunderstood person of either sex); a Spike is typically a punk, someone from the wrong side of the tracks, or a minority member, trying to fit in. Spikes tend to have unusual skills that others don’t.

To customize your template, select items where the template offers you a choice (skills and choices of psychological limitations). If you want to add more, you can add another psychological limitation for 2, 4, 6, or 8 points:

2 pts: quirk

4 pts: interest

6 pts: a major interest

8 pts: an obsession

Any interest or psychological flaw can fit. A 2-point limitation of “vain” would be a character who complains when he doesn’t look his best. A 4-point limitation is a character who brought a hairdryer, even though there’s no electricity at the cottage. A 6-point character will make sure she shaves her legs when everyone else is asleep, so no-one catches her with unwanted body hair. An 8-point character will do all of her make-up when everyone else is asleep, and will have to think seriously about running from the monster, if it will damage her make-up.

You might want to add another template or two; perhaps you figure your characters ought to include Rufus (a local; use the Crazy Pilot template from CORPS 2^nd ed., substituting boating skills for air skills, and “mistrusts outsiders” for “cocky”), or The Perfesser (a distinguished but elderly academic; use the Retired Academic template from CORPS 2^nd ed). Go ahead.

Templates aren’t gender-specific; if you want your Biff to be Helga, a transfer student from the German Women’s Weight-Lifting Team, that’s fine by me.

You don’t need one of each kind of character; if your story is about six Phoebes caught with monsters, hey, more power to you.

The templates are at the end of the file; I had them in-line, but they’re kind of intrusive.

The genre pretty much demands that each character have some Ass-Saver Points; they’re up against something unstoppable, so they need some kind of edge. (Number of ASPs are one of the things that distinguish the different templates.)

If the GM is worried about the players dying too fast, he or she may ask each player to take one “quirk” psych lim, worth 2 points, that will be directly applied as ASPs. (Cruel GMs may want to withhold them at the last minute if the player hasn’t been role-playing...)

Normal rules apply. Most characters have an AGL aptitude of 1 or 2; Biffs and Spikes can have an attack value of 3 (Unarmed combat skill). On the other hand, the dead have an attack value of 1, pretty much all around. (Unless one of the dead is a former jock...)

Use whatever optional rules you want. I suggest the graze rule (when skill equals difficulty, you do half damage; to do full damage, you have to roll).

Wicked Dead take damage normally, except that non-lethal impairments have no effect. Ten lethal impairments to a limb or head are an amputation; Wicked Dead can only be stopped by removing all limbs and the head (this makes 6 parts of the body, and the evil spirit can’t maintain control over 6 parts; 5 is their magic number).

The dead can be stunned, however; one sees this all the time in the movies. Even then, the dead tend not to let go.

Amputated limbs become NPCs.

Fighting the Wicked Dead is stressful. Expect the player characters to go crazy; that’s part of the fun.

Use the CORPS fear ratings. That is, roll against WIL when seeing walking dead — difficulty 5 for 1, difficulty 6 for 2 or 3, difficulty 7 for self animated amputated limbs, difficulty 8 for seeing 4 at once. (The higher difficulty for 4 is because you’re alone by then...)

Success means you continue as you were; failure means all actions take a penalty of the amount failed until the situation changes significantly (someone smacks you to sanity, the monster leaves, etc.). Failure by your current WIL or more means you freak out: stand paralyzed, flee, or you attack with whatever’s handy and no regard to personal safety.

When they fail fear rolls, PCs can choose to adopt new psych lims during the course of play. Hallucinations, obsessions, and general psychotic hard-heartedness would be likely.

I suggest a modification of the Unknown Armies mechanic of a madness meter. Assume that when you have failed as many fear rolls as your WIL, you pick up one level of psychological disadvantage: a brief hallucination, a minor phobia about something in the room, a new obsession...

GMs should be liberal in asking for more Fear rolls. The more the merrier. After all, the sooner they go crazy, the better.

Heh-heh-heh.

Suggested madnesses:

·         “There’s a rational explanation…someone’s playing a prank. I’ll go out there and talk to them.”

·         “Make sure everything’s sealed up tight. Tight. Tighter than that.”

·         “I want to go home. Right now.”

·         Hallucinations.

·         Talking to your reflection.

·         Inappropriate laughter.

·         Adopting an item such as a hairbrush or broom as your totem of protection.

·         Not trusting anyone.

·         Curling into a fetal position and rocking, crooning to  yourself.

Any normal human who dies after having been bitten or scratched by the Wicked Dead becomes one of them. This can be prevented by amputating the bitten part within 3 hours of contact. (Tourniqueting a limb is a difficulty 4 First Aid task.)

Once dead, the normal human appears to be “normally” dead for five or ten minutes or until the best opportunity to scare the crap out of the other players.

If dawn comes, the bitten-but-not-dead-yet human can “dispossess” any invading spirit with a effective WIL or POW roll (whichever is higher) at difficulty 10, no time bonuses allowed (although psych lims or advantages may give bonuses); the GM may allow other bonuses as he or she sees fit. For example, the character who has successfully exercised his will several times without failing — such as chopping up his girlfriend and managing to amputate his own hand — could receive bonuses because he has clearly shown himself to be of strong will.

A character who dies should be allowed to read the “Welcome To The Dead” text in “About The Wicked Dead.”

Now that you know about the effects of combat, you might want to know what’s available for mayhem.

The following items can be found in and around the cottages on the island. PCs may be carrying pen knives. The machete, pitchfork, scythe, and sickle are in the cabin to the east. The hoes are in the cabins to the north and east. All four have chainsaws and the other equipment.

Name	Damage	DV	Init	Lngth	Size		TL		Mass	AV
Knives and Blades
Bowie Knife	lethal (c/p)	+1/+1	+0	28	2		11		0.4	16
Hatchet	lethal (c)	+2	-1	30	4		4		0.7	10
Lumber axe (2-handed)	lethal (c)	+3	-3	90	8		3		2.1	8
Meat Cleaver	lethal (c)	+1	-1	30	4		4		1.3	18
Hunting Knife	lethal (c/p)	+1/+1	+0	25	2		11		0.2	12
Pen Knife (cheap)	lethal (c/p)	+0/+0	+0	10	1		6		0.1	4
Pen Knife (expensive)	lethal (c/p)	+0/+0	+0	10	1		11		0.1	12
Machete	lethal (c)	+1	-1	55	4		7		0.4	5
Clubs
Billy Club/Truncheon	combination (b)	+1	-1	55	6		3		0.3	2
Medium club	combination (b)	+2	-2	70	11		1		1.4	5
Big club (2-handed)	combination (b)	+4	-2	50	9		2		5.5	22
Tools
Claw Hammer	lethal (b/p)	+1	-1	25	5		5		1.5	30
Hoe (2-handed)	lethal (c)	+2	-3	140	11		4		1.4	4
Hoe (2-handed)	lethal (c)	+1	-1	130	19		5		1.4	6
Pen/leatherworking awl	lethal (p)	+0	+2	17	1		1		0.0	0
Pitchfork (2-handed)	lethal (p)	+0	-3	180	14		4		1.4	4
Scythe (2-handed)	lethal (c)	+5	-3	240	33		5		2.4	6
Sickle	lethal (c)	+2	-2	50	7		5		1.2	12
Chainsaw (2-handed)	lethal (c)	+6	-5	70	8		7		6	10
Improvised
Stick, Pointed Metal	lethal (b/p)	+1/+0	-2	70	5		4		1.8	6
Stick, Pointed Wooden	lethal (b/p)	+0	-2	70	5		2		0.9	2

There are guns on the island, but not in this cottage. The Haggard cottage occupies the southern part of the island; the cottage on the west has a .22 caliber rifle and the cottage at the north has a .22 caliber rifle and a shotgun. The PCs will discover these if they go to those cottages and break in, trying to find a phone. (No, none of the cottages have phones.)

Name	Caliber	DV	Init	RMod	Size	TL	Mass	Extra Clip mass	Rate of Fire	Clip	AV
Remington 870	12 ga	10	+0	2	13	10-12	4.1 kg	-	2	7i	8
(with 00 buckshot)	12 ga	4(+0)	+0	1	13	10-12	4.1 kg	-	2	7i	8
Ruger 10/22	.22LR	6	+0	2	13	11-12	2.5 kg	.2 kg	4	50c	5

“i” means internal magazine, load individually; “c” means a clip.

Your four or six friends are going to Professor Haggard’s cottage for a week. It’s remote and it’s at one end of the season (early or late), so none of the other four families are on the island. Professor Haggard is an archaeological philologist; translating dead languages is his specialty.

The cottage is one of four on a large island in a lake in the Muskokas. It’s owned by the family of Professor Haggard; they use it less frequently now that the kids have grown up.

The only way to get to the island is by boat; the families that live on the island keep their boats moored at the harbour of the nearest town, Blackwater Mills. It’s a forty-five minute trip by boat to get to the island.

(None of the templates have familiarity with boating. This is intentional, but don’t stop any player who wants to have some knowledge of boating.)

The soil is thin, over rock; there is a light coating of grass in some hollows, moss and lichen in other parts, and some tough bushes and scrub. There is some wildlife on the island; there was a bear there some years ago, and there are a family of skunks and a porcupine on the island right now, as well as a variety of squirrels, chipmunks, snakes, etc.

Each cottage has its own dock. For Professor Haggard’s cottage, there’s a dock on the south side, sheltered from the winds. From the dock is a stairway that leads up to the deck/front porch.

The cottage is medium size and tidy. It’s not sealed up, as one might expect; the shutters are open.

Underneath the cottage is a small cold-storage room. It’s quite low (four feet tall or so). It also contains the propane tanks mentioned later; there is an external door to get to the cold-storage room, but it’s normally padlocked shut to keep animals out.

Behind the cottage is the toolshed; one side of it is stacked with lumber for the fireplace. It contains a variety of tools, including a chainsaw, a lumber axe, some leatherworking tools.

Down the hill, behind the toolshed, is a path to the boathouse. It’s closed on all four sides; there’s space for two boats, and there’s a canoe up in the rafters.

The cottage has three bedrooms, a living/dining room, a kitchen, a pantry/laundry room, and an indoor bathroom (which contains a composting toilet and a shower). There are large picture windows; every window has a shutter (to protect during storms), but one must go outside to close the shutters. One of the bedrooms also serves as the Professor’s office when he’s up here, and contains certain artifacts and papers (see Artifacts).

An extension to the cottage contains the workshop, with a variety of tools (hammers, drills, handsaws, bowsaws, screwdrivers, screws, nails, a portable generator, a boom box — the professor helped build this cottage and he likes music while he putters). This room also contains the batteries that power the few electrical appliances (notably the TV and the VCR in the living room).

Some furnishings (such as beds and sofas along the picture windows) are built in, with drawers underneath. Others are clearly cast-offs from earlier in the family’s life: the formica table in the kitchen, the web lawn chairs tied to the deck

Underneath the cottage is a water tank and a water purifier which takes water in from the lake, but each sink has a “lake water” tap; don’t drink that water. There’s enough water in the water tank to take a bath, but then it takes about six hours to refill from the lake.

The living/dining room has a wood fireplace. The kitchen appliances run off propane; there are a pair of propane tanks in the cold-storage crawlway under the house.

Light is by propane lamps; the building is rigged for it. The only electrical appliances are the TV, the VCR, the stereo, and a hand-held hair dryer in the bathroom. For power, they have a set of batteries and a portable generator to recharge them.

There is a videotape in the TV; if a PC turns it on, it features Professor Haggard reading in an old language. (Listening to the videotape gives the creeps to any Phoebes.)

Players! Don’t read this stuff. (You know why.)

Use the “vacation in a friend-of-a-friend’s cottage” gimmick to isolate the characters. The Wicked Dead are evil spirits that have been raised by the owner of the cottage and who are looking for bodies to possess.

The genre generally breaks down into four acts:

1.       Afternoon. In which the PCs arrive, we get a flavour of their interaction, and we get the sense that something might not be all right. The PCs discover the interesting artifacts left behind by Professor Haggard, and unleash the forces of nature.

In this act, there should be hints of oddness: the missing boat, the fact that the shutters are open, a stopped clock, a mound of dirt behind the toolshed. These hints should suggest to anyone with “practical joker” that it would be good to set up a joke for as soon as it gets dark.

The PCs should discover academic papers such as “Hastur: A Phonetic Evaluation” and a manuscript in process entitled “A Translation of Anomalous Prayers in Lothal.” There are more artifacts listed in the next section.

2.       Evening. In which things go wrong: at least one person is seriously hurt (typically a Phoebe; call this player the “doorway”). Still, it seems as though the pleasant holiday can still be saved (although they’ll have to get the injured person to a hospital in the morning). The words of the injured person hint at something much more frightening, but no one believes. This is the point at which a Joe might be coerced into taking a Phoebe back to civilization.

If they do try to leave, prevent them. Bring up the wind so the waves are treacherous, or damage the boat’s engine, or collapse the boatshed.

3.       Midnight. In which things go from bad to worse; the nature of the horror becomes plain, and nearly everyone becomes a believer.

This act should involve several short combat sessions. By liberal use of ASPs, players should be able to keep the evil outside the cottage (although by the end of this act, all but two should be dead).

Once PCs are actually Wicked Dead, the need for the surviving players to use ASPs is vastly increased. Players tend to be much more aggressive in their attacks.

Reading the professor’s notes — or looking at the videotape — will tell the players that the “creatures” need to be dismembered to stay down: arms, legs, and head must be removed from the torso.

4.       Before the Dawn. In which it’s always darkest. This is the point for the make-or-break action; the last desperate effort. At this point, the surviving players will try a number of tactics: translating the spells, destroying the ancient artifact, setting fire to the dead.

When running a session, hints of oddness should be sprinkled through act 1 and act 2. The players can hear the truth about what happens to the doorway; penalize them if they act on that knowledge.

The Professor has some artifacts in his office, at his desk. They are:

·         A ceremonial knife, intricately worked in obsidian and copper

·         His rough notes in a binder, including phonetic mappings of the various glyphs in the Book of Discord (spellbook).

·         Another binder containing a photocopy of the spellbook.

·         If you decide the Professor is waiting at the bottom of the lake (see later), then the spellbook itself is here as well.

·         There is a journal that contains a set of rough translations, but not phonetic pronunciations.

The Wicked Dead are spirits from Harappan culture; the spells were excavated from a temple in the city of Lothal, along the west coast of what is now India. The Wicked Dead ruled the city of Lothal from 1900-1700 BCE.[2]

Wicked Dead are almost the same as people. (Well...except for the level 10 psych lim involving killing and eating human flesh.) Will and Power go up; those rely on the inhabiting spirit. They’re also slightly stronger: their strength increases by the POW of the human, or to 6, whichever is greater. And they’re dead: they have a lower AGL (due to rigor mortis), dropping by 1 point when they die and a second point 8 hours later, when the second rigor hits. They also gain some strength; all dead seem to be preternaturally strong. That also means they don’t need to breathe; you can’t choke them or drown them.

Wicked Dead start off with full knowledge of everything they knew as people and their normal amount of creativity. The longer they are dead, the less creative they become. Most movies don’t last long enough for this to be a problem.

The longer they’re dead, the more corrupt their bodies become, giving evidence of the evil spirit within.

Your typical Wicked Dead person would have these characteristics:

STR	6	0.8 Toughness (80 AP)
AGL	3	Sense spirits of living (Detect, range, self, invisible, no drain, independent, inherent, detect based on POW Apt of Dead) (21 SP)
AWR	4
WIL	5
HLT	5	Illusion (Dominate, range, self, invisible, no drain, independent, inherent, only to create illusions, concentrate each phase) (19 SP), 2 Area multiples (38 SP), affecting 2 hex radius.
POW	10

Once ensconced in a body, the Wicked Dead have three supernatural powers:

1.       They ignore all impairments in combat up to the point of amputation. (The GM is free to make judgment calls — in the movies, zombies are frequently stunned, they just keep coming back for more. Obviously, a zombie without fingers won’t be able to operate the car radio.) This represented as 0.8 Toughness, but it’s simpler to just ignore all non-lethal impairments as outlined here.

2.       They can voluntarily hide this corruption and appear as if they were alive and healthy. They can’t attack and use this ability simultaneously. They often use this to draw in their shell-shocked former companions.

3.       They can find the living based on their Power aptitude. This isn’t a targeting sense — they can’t reach through the specific spot in the wall for you — but they know you’re in there. They find you based on your Power, so Phoebes stand out.

As spirits, they’re powerless in the daytime; the only way they can function in the light is to have bodies to possess. At night, they have certain poltergeist-like effects. They can cause tree branches to grab you or roots to trip you as you run. They can stop clocks and levitate small objects. They can make it appear that the walls are bleeding or that the faucets are running with blood; they’re particularly good at Biblical plagues.

With bodies, they can enact the rituals required to completely open the doorway into the Other World.

Five was a magical and evil number to the Harappans; six was holy. By dismembering a possessed corpse into six major pieces (head, arms, legs, torso), the spirit is no longer able to control the body, and must flee it. The spirit is still around, however, and can possess another person. (From an adventure standpoint, the evening is a success if someone ends the night without being possessed.)

The only way to actually dismiss the Dead from this plane of existence is to cast the Spell of Dismissal. The only way to do that is to finish the translation.

From the viewpoint of the characters, it may be sufficient to chain up the remaining possessed dead and leave. However, if they take this option, make sure a Wicked Dead person greets them at the dock…

Reference books on the shelf will tell the players a little bit about Lothal: it was a theocracy, ruled by a High Priest, who was forbidden to go into the sunlight.

Since the Harappans practiced ancestor worship, it was easy for the original spirit to possess the High Priest. The taboos on the priesthood were designed to keep the spirits in power.

The Wicked Dead were eventually “evicted” from the Lothal culture by priests of nearby cities, dragging the living “hosts” into the sunlight and casting the relevant spells (recorded in the Book of Discord, being translated by Professor Haggard.)

The spirits have learned from this; they’ve learned that they need to move into Earth in force when they get the chance, rather than having a cozy human time-share.

(The clues from the Professor’s notebooks should give hints that the Dead are rather like Lovecraftian horrors: creatures from beyond that seek re-entrance to earth, to use humanity as their playthings.)

The first spell in the Book of Discord is the spell to summon the Wicked Dead, originally intended to ensure that they didn’t simply take off for safer pastures before being bound and dismissed. This is the spell that Professor Haggard translated.

You know everything you used to know, but you also know this:

Your kind are ancient; you are the Old Ones. You moved through space before the Earth was born. Your kind achieved great things: they warped time and space to their own ends, and discovered that your era was circumscribed. There was an end fated to your rule of the universe.

You chose not to accept it, and when your stars were snuffed, you continued to exist, tucked into a fold of space-time, hungry for existence again.

Some thousands of years ago, your kind discovered a way into the “real world” again. You found an insignificant sentient species who were glad to offer you their bodies, who were glad to have you partake of the pleasures of their senses. These were the Harappans of Lothal. From the perspective of your kind, this was like adopting an anthill as a pet; you did what you needed to maintain its usefulness.

However, some of the other ants didn’t like this, and blocked your passage. Now that you have gained access to this world again, you will not make the same mistakes. You will not share a body with a living soul; that is too risky. Dead bodies have limitations, but they are yours completely. You will not attempt a peaceful co-existence; instead, you will take over. You will find bodies for all of your kind who enter in the first spell, and you will set about opening a gate for the rest of your kind.

You are still weak; as spirits, you have only the most tenuous control over the material world, and once in a body, you are largely limited by that body. Although you can control the body parts when they are dismembered (and if you can put the pieces back together again, you can join them), you cannot hold more than 5 pieces at a time. If the body is separated into 6 or more pieces, you become diffuse and must withdraw.

You are angry. You know that you are only the smallest fraction of what you once were, and you want to be whole again.

When attacking, you show a preference for anyone you used to love. They are the ones you want to kill first—perhaps that’s a sign of disgust at the weakness your host used to show, or perhaps that’s because those were the strongest feelings your host had.

Haven’t figured out yet if there’s really a way to defeat them once and for all; haven’t figured out why the cottage still looks okay if the owner summoned the spirits and went through this him/herself. (Those questions are never really resolved in the movies, which are an exercise in nihilism, gore, and the occasional naked breast.)

I’m toying with the idea that Professor Haggard was dying, so he weighted himself down with stones and threw himself in the lake. He’s, um, occupied right now, so as soon as the fish have nibbled enough of him so he can come to the surface, he’ll do so. In that case, there’s a boat already in the boathouse (unless it got destroyed in the Professor’s fight).

It’s also possible that the Professor has no idea of what he did. Perhaps he finished the translation (that is, cast the spell) at dawn, then left, and no one has been to the island since then. (I rather like that idea.)

After all of the players have died, give them an army unit or a SWAT team to come in and clean up the area. Wicked Dead aren’t nearly as fearsome if you’re not an average joe, and you know what you’re up against.

The ancient Harappans had only bronze weapons, so full auto weapons might make a difference.

Or not.

Here are the character templates mentioned earlier.

Any player may swap an 8 point “Skill of choice” for 4 2-point familiarities.

A Bambi is a socialite, someone who is at the top of the pecking order, is beautiful, and knows both of these things. Bambis try to get other people to do the work — they will work (cheerleading is not effortless) but they expect to see social payoffs. Bambis often have money. Veronica Lodge (from Archie comics) is a Bambi.

Male					Female				Ad/Disads
STR		5	1	25	STR	4	1	16	Psych 4: Used to getting own way (8 AP)
AGL		4	1	16	AGL	5	1	25	Age 21 (10 AP, 20 SP)
AWR		4	1	16	AGL	4	1	16	10 AP of advantages, either 1 Natural Apt on WIL or HLT; or 2 physical advantages dealing with social skills (e.g., Beautiful or Seductive or Smooth Talker or Luck
WIL		5	1	25	WIL	5	1	25
HLT		5	1	25	HLT	5	1	25
POW		1	0	1	POW	1	0	1	Psych 3: Looks to others for protection OR Practical joker OR Rationalist (6 SP)
Total				108	Total			108
Level	Skills									Cost
3	Foreign Language (studied abroad)									8
3	Psychology (knows how make people do things)									8
4	(+1) Seduction									1
4	(+1) Influence									1
2	Driving Land Vehicles (expensive car)									3
3	Theatre (has star aspirations)									8
4	Knows Area (-1) (has vacation home near here)									8
3	Major subject (Art, History, Political Science, whatever)									8
4	Drinking (likes parties)									15
	Total									75
	ASPs to spend:									1

1.       If you took Natural Aptitude HLT, add 1 to your Drinking skill.

2.       If you took Beautiful or Seductive as physical advantages, add 2 to your Seduction skill (Seduction is based on WIL)

3.       If you took Strong-willed as a physical advantage, add 2 to your Will score for making WIL rolls (but not for influencing people).

4.       Bambis are not renowned for their bravery or their tactical brilliance; the strength of the Bambi lies in getting others to do the work. Bambis are often the objects of someone else’s adoration.

5.       Bambis love themselves; this isn’t shown in the disadvantages, but is true nonetheless. They’re often vain.

Your basic Biff looks like this:

STR	5		1	25	Psych 4: Aggressive (8 AP)
AGL	5		1	25	Age 21 (10 AP, 20 SP)
AWR	4		1	16	Psych 3: choose one of Practical joker or Macho (6 SP)
WIL	4		1	16	Choose 10 AP of advantages, either: 1 Natural aptitude (STR, AGL, HLT, or sport skill) OR 2 Physical advantages (e.g., strong arms, good aim, fast runner, high stamina, Pain Tolerance)
HLT	5		1	25
POW	1		0	1
Total				108
Level		Skills				Cost
3		Unarmed combat (gets in some fights)				8
5		Football (has a scholarship)				24
3		First Aid (patches up buddies)				8
3		Running (all those wind sprints)				8
3		Psychology				8
4		(+1) Intimidation (likes to psych out opponents)				1
3		Driving land vehicles				8
3		Major subject (Economics, Chemistry, whatever)				8
		Total				73
		ASPs to spend:				3

1.       If you chose Natural Aptitude STR, your strength is actually 7, so add 1 to damage you do in melee combat (that is, you do 2 DV with a punch instead of 1, or 3 with a big club instead of 2).

2.       If you chose Natural Aptitude AGL, add 1 to your unarmed combat, football, and driving skills.

3.       If you chose Natural Aptitude HLT, add 1 to your running skill.

4.       Let the GM adjudicate the other physical advantages; remember that they’re not additive.

5.       Feel free to replace “football” with your sport of choice (wrestling, swimming, basketball, etc.)

The class genius; a Dexter gets 10 AP to spend on physical advantages that apply to AWR in some way, or a natural aptitude on AWR.

Traditionally, the love a Dexter has for some other character is unrequited, even though obvious to all other characters except possibly the beloved. Bambis particularly like to take advantage of this.

STR		4	1	16	Psych 4: Curious (8 AP)
AGL		4	1	16	Age 21 (10 AP, 20 SP)
AWR		6	1	36	Psych 2: In love with one of the others (2 AP, 2 SP)
WIL		4	1	16	Limitation 3: choose one of Practical joker or Blind without glasses (6 SP)
HLT		5	1	25	Choose 10 AP of advantages, either: 1 Natural aptitude (AWR, HLT, or a particular skill)
POW		1	0	1	2 Physical advantages (e.g., Good with languages, strong-willed, good memory, etc.)
Total				110
Level	Skills					Cost
3	Foreign Language					5
3	First Aid (was a keener cub scout)					5
4	Area Knowledge (-1) (reads maps)					5
4	Electrician (tinkers)					12
3	Military Science (wargamer)					5
4	Investigative Research (Goes with curious)					12
1	Driving Land Vehicles					2
3	AWR-based skill of choice					5
5	Major subject (Economics, Chemistry, Engineering, whatever)					21
	Total					72
	ASPs to spend:					6

1.       If you chose Natural Aptitude AWR, your AWR is actually 8; this won’t affect your skills, but you’re more likely to notice things and you do get 6 ASP for this. You can also trade 5 of those 12 ASP for level 3 in some other AWR-based skill (like survival from your Boy Scout camping trips).

A Joe gets a higher POW that gives him or her creepy feelings in the early stages of the game. He is required to have a psych lim involving being in love with one of the other players.

Male					Female				Ad/Disads
STR	5		1	25	STR	4	1	16	Psych 4: In love with one of the other characters (8 AP)
AGL	4		1	16	AGL	5	1	25	Age 21 (10 AP, 20 SP)
AWR	4		1	16	AGL	4	1	16	10 AP of advantages, any at all; Joes are often extraordinary, but don’t seem extraordinary (e.g., Luck or toughness or keen eyes or Pain Tolerance or any Natural Aptitude except POW)
WIL	4		1	16	WIL	4	1	16
HLT	5		1	25	HLT	5	1	25
POW	3		1	9	POW	3	1	9	Psych 3: Nice guy (easily manipulated) OR Loyal OR Practical joker OR Rationalist (6 SP)
Total				107	Total			107
Level		Skills								Cost
3		Mechanic (keeps jalopy running)								8
3		First Aid (summers on uncle’s farm)								8
2		Carpenter (built a barn)								3
2		Electrician (and wired a barn)								3
3		Land Vehicles (Likes cars)								8
3		Hunting								8
3		Major subject (Chemistry, Anthropology, English, whatever)								8
4		Drinking (likes parties)								15
3		Skill of choice								8
		Total								69
		ASPs to spend:								8

1.       The moderately higher POW of the Joe is why Joe tends to lend credence to a Phoebe’s complaints that the place is “creepy”; being a nice guy, he may offer to help her get home after the first few scary events.

2.       If you’re going to take Natural Aptitude, apply it to a characteristic where you already have a level of 5; that boosts your characteristic to 7. If it’s Natural Aptitude AGL, you have skills based on that characteristic, you can buy one more AGL-based skill at level 3; if it’s Natural Aptitude AWR, you can buy one more AWR-based skill at level 4.

3.       Joes are the most useful characters, and they have a moderately high number of ASPs.

4.       A Joe is a good choice to survive long enough to read the spell at the end.

5.       Female Joes may want to substitute “girl” skills for Mechanic, Carpentry, and Electrician. Or not; tomboys have a long tradition in the Joe world.

A Phoebe is an artistic type, often drawn to the occult for other reasons. A Phoebe gets 10 AP to spend on physical advantages that involve being psychically sensitive. Phoebes can have extraordinarily high POW values, or Advantage: “Intuition”.

On the down side, Phoebes have the reputation for being promiscuous, which may cause trouble during the early part of the adventure.

STR		4	1	25	Psych 4: Kooky; Fame 3: “Easy” (14 AP)
AGL		4	1	16	Age 21 (10 AP, 20 SP)
AWR		4	1	16	10 AP of advantages, either: 1 Natural Aptitude on POW OR 2 physical advantages dealing with arts or the unknown (e.g., Luck or Intuition or Sensitive or Creative)
WIL		4	1	16
HLT		4	1	16	Psych 3: Choice of In love with other Character, Artistic obsession, Vegan, or Attracted to Supernatural (6 SP)
POW		5	1	25
Total				117	Non-combatant (5 SP)
Level	Skills					Cost
3	Philosophy (interested in things spiritual)					8
4	Arcane religions (listens to anybody)					1
3	Foreign Language (often a dead language, ‘cause it’s spiritual)					8
4	Art (likes to draw; used to forge hall passes)					15
3	Biology (likes plants and animals)					8
4	(+1) Pharmacy (especially the kind of plant you ingest)					1
3	Investigative Research (Curious about people and stuff)					8
3	History (Like Soylent Green, it’s people)					8
4	(+1) Secret societies (All this stuff people ought to know...)					1
2	First Aid (likes to be helpful, but didn’t study more because blood is icky)					2
2	Swimming (likes to swim naked)					2
3	Major subject (Chemistry, Anthropology, English, whatever)					8
3	Skill of choice					8
	Total					78
	ASPs to spend:					3

1.       Phoebes generally can’t drive, because they’re saving the environment.

2.       A Phoebe with Natural Aptitude POW has a POW of 7, and is a really good choice for reading spells.

3.       Since Phoebes tend to have high POW, it generally makes more sense for them to use POW instead of WIL when trying to fight off a spirit in daylight. ‘Cause they’re so spiritual, like.

A Spike is a token foreigner — a member of a racial minority hanging out with the group, the group’s token Rebel without a cause, the misunderstood punk, the military brat. (Both girls in Night of the Comet are Spikes.)

Spikes get to have additional combat, stealth, and hunting skills that reflect their broader (but misunderstood!) backgrounds. However, Spikes suffer early in the game because no one trusts them, just as no one believes anyone with the “practical joker” limitation when he or she talks about “things out in the woods”.

Male					Female				Ad/Disads
STR	5		1	25	STR	4	1	16	Psych 4: Something to prove (8 AP)
AGL	4		1	16	AGL	5	1	25	Age 21 (10 AP, 20 SP)
AWR	4		1	16	AGL	4	1	16	10 AP of advantages (e.g., Luck or toughness or keen eyes or Pain Tolerance or any Natural Aptitude except POW)
WIL	5		1	25	WIL	5	1	25
HLT	5		1	25	HLT	5	1	25	Fame 3: Mistrusted as outsider (6 SP)
POW	1		0	1	POW	1	0	1
Total				108	Total			108
Level		Skills								Cost
3		Melee Weapons (got in fights)								8
3		Projectile Weapons (sent to military school to straighten out)								8
3		Driving Land Vehicles (loves motorcycles)								8
3		Philosophy (fondness for nihilism)								8
3		Hunting (liked to sneak around and track things)								8
3		Major subject (History, Anthropology, English, whatever)								8
4		(Streetwise) (Knows people)								8
4		(Lockpicking) (Liked to see own files)								8
1		Law (knows when they’re used against him)								2
3		Skill of choice								8
		Total								74
		ASPs to spend:								2

1.       Some Spikes study Martial Arts instead of Melee Weapons; instead of a Skill of choice and Melee Weapons, they have level 3 in Martial Arts. (This gives them more damage than straight unarmed combat.)

2.       Spikes often are the objects of adoration by one person, generally a Phoebe.

3.       If you take Natural Aptitude on AGL, you can increase two AGL-related skills to 4.

4.       If you take Natural Aptitude on AWR, you increase two AWR-related skills to 4.