Rules......where are they?

[Droganis]

@unholy_blaze
But it seems to state in the latest survivor update (Doug the Salaryman) they more specifically say that ambidextrous makes all weapons dual-weapons, both for purposes of having two equipped at once along with his ability "Matching Set!" of pulling doubles whenever he searches and finds a dual-weapon. I seem to recall hearing the same thing previously, so maybe they are updating/changing some minor bits and pieces to the rules? Always hard to say.

 

[shamar]

What I find slightly disconcerting about this is that the rules will already be in an electronic form, which would probably be very easy to port to PDF (if it's not already in PDF), and wouldn't take long to upload to the website.

Ya I understand what you mean. But I beleave they are putting all their man power in getting the game out. But I could be wrong. We will see if the game is early.

 

[KingZombie]

Ya I understand what you mean. But I beleave they are putting all their man power in getting the game out. But I could be wrong. We will see if the game is early.

At most it would take an hour to post the rules...so I don't think it's an issue of man power, it may be that they have different priorities. Who knows.... it would be nice to hear something official though instead of us pondering. :waiting:

 

[Scorpion0x17]

At most it would take an hour to post the rules...

Exactly why I'm finding it a little disconcerting.

:nailbiting:

 

[Shoogoo]

You can watch a 1 hour video here

http://www.trictrac.tv/video-zombicide-de-l-explipartie

They said it covers 80% of the rules. It's in french though. I don't have the time to translate or anything, but overall I'd say it's ok. It's a big light, but we knew that.

One thing that I found a bit disappointing (and that I'll probably house-rule asap) is when they kept handing over the handgun from one survivor to another.

Player1: "I don't have a weapon so I'll take yours, using one action"
Player2: "Can I have it back? I'll use one action too"
Player3: "I searched the room and only found a bottle a water, I'll take your gun for an action"
Player1: "Guys, my f*cking gun please, one action to take it back"

Thematically it's a bit lame I thought.

The leveling, and the mission looked very cool however. It's a scenario with a police car in the middle, and when you search it you always find a weapon. If you don't draw a weapon, you discard the equipment and draw another until you get a weapon. You start with 3 survivors and you can find other survivors (up to 3) and the mission requires you to end with all 6 alive. If one dies, the mission is failed.

 

[KingZombie]

Thanks for the update Shoogo. I agree, the handing things back and forth is a bit lame. I might allow it once because that makes some sense... but multiple times is ridiculous.

 

[Shoogoo]

I'll try to find some time to post more about that video. Check it here by tomorrow.

 

[Droganis]

While my knowledge of French is piss-poor, I was able to glean enough from that to see what was going on. Nothing in that was particularly new, although I seem to recall an earlier suggestion that the survivors begin with a crowbar, frying pan, and flashlight, or something to that effect. In general it's neat, but I would have liked to see it played through a little more, and a few more card close-ups. At least now I see how the early game works and some ideas of what not to do.

 

[Shoogoo]

After watching it a second time, I have to say that I like it more and more. It's simple yet effective, it's probably going to be a very good (and easy to set up!) game for my gaming group. As Droganis said, there is little we didn't know in the rules. One thing I learned is that when a zombie has 2 possible paths to get close to the survivors, he'll split in two instead of having the survivors chose which way he's supposed to go. Things can go very bad if you have 5 zombies splitting to make 10 zombies!

Another thing I'll consider house-ruling, because it seemed a little stupid (they even made fun of it) is the priority target with guns.

I understand how you could shoot a friend if you're at a range of 1 or 2, but being in the same zone as another survivor and one zombie doesn't change that rule and that looked dumb. I understand that the weapons need to be balanced, but there is no advantage in using a gun from close range anyway (if you fail to kill the zombie, you're taking one damage next turn, and you don't want that), so that priority target penalty seems to be just annoying and a bit anticlimatic. I mean if I want to save a friend stuck with a zombie in the bathroom, I can see myself coming in the room shooting the zombie in the head from close range while my friend was crawling under the sink. There's plenty of room to imagine that instead of just assuming that I'll slip and hit my friend in the arm before shooting the zombie.

I'm not sure I'm being clear, it's a bit hard to explain

 

[Mistersam]

Things can go very bad if you have 5 zombies splitting to make 10 zombies!

Its not 3 zombies each way? you split the group in half and the one you can't split you double it?

 

[Shoogoo]

I don't know, they only had the situation with a single zombie. I didn't hear of that mechanic before that video so I only assumed that it would double every zombies. Though your explanation seems more likely. Did you read that on BGG?

 

[Scorpion0x17]

Thanks for the update Shoogo. I agree, the handing things back and forth is a bit lame. I might allow it once because that makes some sense... but multiple times is ridiculous.

I think the way I'll house-rule that is that the current owner of the item has to agree - so it's more 'ask for gun from' rather than 'take gun from'.

 

[Shoogoo]

I think the way I'll house-rule that is that the current owner of the item has to agree - so it's more 'ask for gun from' rather than 'take gun from'.

It's a cooperative game, anybody saying 'no' to that kind of request is going to be pictured as an asshat!

I was thinking of a mechanic where you spend 1 action to let another player play one of your remaining action(s). It would make more sense to tell someone that you saw a zombie outside, than to actually take the gun out of his hands to shoot said zombie.

 

[onelostvi3tboi]

The french video was interesting and I agree with everyone here that specific rules with the scenario builder would help tide me over until the release. Just to help in your potential rules search here is a link to a thread post over on BGG where someone compiled everything they could find from the rule book: http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/795478/partial-rules-scenarios-and-hero-dashboards-skills, hopefully its okay that I post a link to another forum. Can't wait to kill some zombies.

 

[unholy_blaze]

It's a cooperative game, anybody saying 'no' to that kind of request is going to be pictured as an asshat!

I was thinking of a mechanic where you spend 1 action to let another player play one of your remaining action(s). It would make more sense to tell someone that you saw a zombie outside, than to actually take the gun out of his hands to shoot said zombie.

The problem with that is you just made "Born Leader" useless.

 

[Droganis]

Born leader just gives anyone else a free action, at no cost of the owner, so it's still useful, assuming I understand the rule right. The free action is also any type, and is used during that figure's turn, not the Born Leader's.

More notably, I could see it as a problem of giving the only armed survivor too many actions. Maybe, instead, an item can only be passed once per turn? Really, it shouldn't be as much of an issue, even though I have an odd picture in my head of 6 survivors with one rifle blowing away a large mob of zombies by passing therifle around... Maybe force a 2nd action to actually put the weapon in your hands? I dunno. Hopefully it won't be as much of a problem.

For the shooting rule, I'm actually surprised you can even shoot a pistol at range 0. For some reason I was under the impression that that was only the shotgun. Maybe it just allows you to not hurt other people, so shoots like a melee weapon at range 0? Dunno. I was kinda assuming melee were only good for range 0, but did not invoke friendly fire (which is also more of a mechanic thing, as in a pitched battle like that hurting allies with melee weapons is all too easy, too) while guns always have friendly fire potential, and can only be used at range. *shrug*

 

[unholy_blaze]

Actually, watch Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

There's a scene that involves passing one weapon between two people multiple times in one fight.
I wouldn't want to spoil anything, so I'll just say that weapon passing can be awesome.

 

[Shoogoo]

so I'll just say that weapon passing can be awesome.

Not if it's done 57 times in a single mission

 

[KingZombie]

You're being clear. I get it. I just can't wait for the actual rules.

Thank you again for the French to English translation. Greatly appreciated.

 

[Scorpion0x17]

It's a cooperative game, anybody saying 'no' to that kind of request is going to be pictured as an asshat!

I don't think it's any less cooperative than "I take your weapon".

Cooperation requires consent, and whilst you'd hope the players would just agree amongst themselves, outside of the game, we're all used to board games being competitive, and it may be hard for some players to break out of that mindset.

In fact, though some will need house-rules, probably the simplest solution is to encourage between turn game talk amongst the players - like Player1: "If you shoot the zombie, I'll...", Player2: "but you've got the +1 bonus, so...", Player1: "Ah, yeah, give me your gun then, and you go..."

For the shooting rule, I'm actually surprised you can even shoot a pistol at range 0. For some reason I was under the impression that that was only the shotgun. Maybe it just allows you to not hurt other people, so shoots like a melee weapon at range 0? Dunno. I was kinda assuming melee were only good for range 0, but did not invoke friendly fire (which is also more of a mechanic thing, as in a pitched battle like that hurting allies with melee weapons is all too easy, too) while guns always have friendly fire potential, and can only be used at range. *shrug*

From the partial rules on BGG, I was also under the impression that weapons fall into one of two categories - ranged or melee (with the shotgun, and maybe the pistol, falling into both (presumably weapons also have a maximum range? (and a minimum range?))), and when you're in a room or zone with one or more zombies, then you use melee weapons only to attack those zombies, ranged weapons being used when you want to attack from one zone to another. And the wounding priorities applying only to the use of ranged weapons (or ranged/melee weapons when used at range).

The other way to deal with it would be to have a second roll, of 2D6, to see what you hit:

• 7 = hit player, fatty, walker, or runner, in that priority order.
• 5 or 6 = hit fatty, walker, runner, or player, in that priority order.
• 3 or 4 = hit walker, runner, player, or fatty, in that priority order.
• 2 = hit runner, player, fatty, or walker, in that priority order.