100 Posts Preamble & It’s Not D&D ‘March Madness’ Blogathon Day 25

Wow, just realized I made 100 posts! March Madness has pushed me over the top, which is good because the next two months will see a bit of a slowdown. Big deadline end of May so wish me luck as you’re having fun gaming and blogging.

I see Dyvers’ top 10 rpg books meme, and sad to say that I won’t be answering because I don’t believe my repertoire is wide enough. I’ve read about lots of good games and supplements in the responses to Dyvers, and I hope March Madness has provided the same widening of perspective in some degree, though not as elegantly or concisely.

Anyway, on with the show!

Other blogs can be found HERE. It is up to an even dozen now, so I am pretty happy with that.

The questions can be found HERE. They’ve proven not to be perfect, but they are stimulating some good discussions and sharing of experiences.

  

25 Which game has the sleekest, most modern engine?

Kreg Mosier’s The Dead, a free rules lite zombie survival RPG, hands down. It is a lean, mean RPG machine that does exactly what it says on the tin – emulates The Walking Dead and its focus on survival through making relationships. The game was slick, with only those rules impacting on the story remaining, but with just enough dice rolls to make you sweat when the dead came calling. The game is almost postmodern with its lazer-like focus on story-supporting mechanics.

We played two sessions and it was scary how stark yet just like the comic book the game was – this was long before the TV show. I made notes for adding occupations and advancement for a long campaign, but these are unnecessary and just show how the game inspired me.

The game originally came out free with great atmospheric art, great writing, and rules lite enough to be nearly non-existant. Mosier cleaned it up and produced a second edition, but with an art-free no charge version.

It is available HERE. Pony up and get the art dead tree if you can.