Last Days Seasons campaign: March

 Welcome back to another monthly instalment of ‘Devon and friends struggle against the odds’. When last we left our group of survivors, things had not gone particularly well. They’d tried and failed to respond to a distress call from a survivalist, and in doing so Jess wasn’t faring too well: although she’s not been bitten, too much close contact with the walking dead had left her with an illness that she didn’t seem to be able to shake.

Seeing that bed rest alone didn’t seem to be enough for her to get better, Devon made the decision to head back into the city that they had previously vacated to try and locate some medicine - in the early days of the outbreak, the government had bombed the outskirts of the city trying to create a quarantine zone, a nice idea, but ultimately futile.

As it was the first month of spring, I decided to play the special seasonal scenario ‘When the Levy Breaks’, so Devon and company walked onto this board:

to find that the snowfall in the hills melting had flooded the outskirts of the city, leaving fast flowing water flooding from south to north on the board, making movement difficult, and potentially washing away caches of supplies.

(Side note: I finished my ruined buildings! I’ll make a separate post about those as soon as it stops raining in real life long enough for me to take a picture of them in the garden, as they’re too bit to photograph on my usual board)

With the flow of water pushing them from behind, the group barrelled onto the board into the first group of zombies. Jess and Kevin attempt to blast the zombie that they’re hanging up on, but can’t seem to land a head shot to actually take it out. 

Everyone else engaged in hand to hand, trying to move quickly and quietly to avoid drawing any more zombies onto the board with noisy firearms. In the middle, thanks to Umlaut the monkeys help, Devon is able to (despite only rolling a 2) tie with the zombie and still win due to his superior combat prowess! Despite this, he’s still not able to actually take it out though, until Umlaut manages to trip the zombie, which somehow lands on its head on some rubble and then lays motionless (which is fine, I guess, but why does Umlaut have to be a combat monster when he can’t benefit from gaining experience?)

Lynn and Dionne, who were making their way down the right flank to double team the zombie on that side, both easily beat the zombie in combat, but struggle to land a telling blow - so much for quick and quiet! 

Due to some abysmal rolls on my part, the majority of the supplies on the board at this point start to get swept away by the flood waters, and it turns out that Lynn and Dionne’s attempts at taking out the zombie were too loud, as two more shamble onto the board right by them:

Things continue much in this vein, with survivors attempting to take down zombies in pairs, and Cece at the back trying to snipe unengaged zombies, but failing miserably (I rolled a 1 to hit). 

Jess and Kevin bull rush the zombie that they had failed to take out with shooting, but mostly get in each other’s way and can’t seem to finish it off, as do Devon and Umlaut with their zombie in the centre. Dionne contracts a similar sort of sickness to Jess as she and Lynn both batter at their opponent, but again fail to take it out. When the zombies then fight back (which I think I had sometimes been forgetting to do), both Devon and Dionne manage to land telling blows, and take out their two zombies!

Umlaut, seeing that zombies are starting to mass and head towards Dionne and Lynn, breaks off to the right to try and draw some of the zeds away from the growing melee:

Over on the left, Jess finally manages to brain the zombie that she and a Kevin had been struggling with since the game began, and Dionne manages to dispatch another zombie with her samurai sword. 

Seeing everyone else picking up the pace, Cece has apparently been eating her wheaties and starts methodically sniping zombies, starting with one that had been sneaking up on the group from behind.

At this point, something clicks with the group as they realise that they might get surrounded at this rate, and they start bludgeoning zombies down with deadly efficiency (also known as my dice rolls started going in my favour, finally). Well, apart from Devon, who flails ineffectually against his opponent. 

Cece starts making her way up to a better vantage point from which to rain hot death down on her opponents, but unfortunately the rushing waters make it slow going, and pushing some supplies almost off the edge of the board:

While Lynn and Umlaut forge ahead towards some zombies that are carrying supplies, Dionne supports from the rear, finally remembering to use her Double Tap skill, but all that achieves is making even more noise than usual:

Whilst fighting another zombie, Jess unfortunately contracts a second level of sickness, so here’s to hoping we find that medicine we were looking for! 

At this point, just after midnight, my son (who had taken a danger nap earlier and so was refusing to sleep) came in to see what I was up to, and asked if he could play:

He commandeered one of the zombies, and used a supply token that was a tiny backpack as a shield to defend from my bullets. 

After multiple turns slogging through the water, Cece finally managed to climb up to a decent vantage point, but then realised that at this point she’d actually be more use on the ground trying to secure supplies…

Devon, seeing his gun is empty, makes a break for it pushed forward by the rushing floodwaters, and dashes forward to try and grab a third supply token that was rapidly disappearing out of view towards the edge of the table.

Jess flees the board with one supply token, hoping to avoid a repeat of last month’s venture. As she does so, three zombies shamble to their feet in the ruined building nearby:

Everyone else scrambles to secure what supplies they can, and make a break for it to head for home as more zombies crowd in around them.

So, all in the group managed to secure 7 supply tokens, but unfortunately one of them was ruined by the flood waters and had to be discarded. 

Post-game, Devon gained two levels, gaining the sniper skill and +1 to his firearms skill - finally, all that practice seemed to be paying off, and I was just happy that it wasn’t yet another point of Endurance!

Lynn gained the Heavy Lifter skill, which would be handy as without a firearm she usually ended up running round grabbing supply tokens, so this should help to keep her mobile. Jess gained a point of Firearms, as since being given a gun she’d apparently got a lot of practice with it. Dionne also gained a point of Firearms, as the rolls that I’d hoped for after previous games started finally happening. I was also doubly pleased with this, as it meant her double tap skill might start being more effective! Kevin gained the Headhunter skill, making him more deadly with his cricket bat, whilst Cece gained a point of close combat skill, as I was aiming for her to get better at shooting but just couldn’t swing it with the rolls I had…

For the supplies, I rolled once on the Winter table, three times on the Summer table, and twice on the regular table, hoping that the four seasonal rolls between them would furnish us with some medicine. It didn’t unfortunately, but did furnish the group with 4 preserved meals, 19 points of scavenge, a heavy club, climbing gear, and a hazmat suit (that I’ll probably have to put Jess in from now on if she ever recovers).

Without medicine, Jess is bedridden, and rest alone isn’t enough for her to recover, so she won’t be able to join the group on their next venture into the city. I set most of the rest of the group to forage for food (including Dionne, who is in the early stages of sickness, as she is an expert hunter), and set Lynn to work the cold cellar, in the hopes of building up a supply of preserved food for future months, but unfortunately all 3 forager roll the lowest possible result, and so produce no surplus for Lynn to can - we need Jess back to explain to everyone how gardening works! Dipping into our supply of preserved meals, we’re able to avoid anyone going hungry, and although luckily the sickness doesn’t spread to anyone else, with Jess bedridden and Dionne showing a worrying cough, things are only going to get harder from here on out…