I ran a session 0 for a new TTRPG called Morticians. One more session 0 and we’ll have a full crew ready to kill some zombies!
Morticians is an adrenaline pumping, fist-bumping, belly-laughing,
zombie-hacking new tabletop role-playing game! I was a
play-testing Funeral Director (Game Master) for the starter kit. I
play in a campaign with the designer of the game called The Zombie
Trail and I am also starting a campaign at the LGS.
- How did session 0 go?
Awesome!
- Three players made characters
Three players completed making characters. I’m going to be double
checking everyone’s character twice before we start playing (yes
that’s four checks). I’ll also be offering another session 0 in
two weeks for players that couldn’t make it.
- We found several errors in my automated character spreadsheet
I made an automated character spreadsheet for Morticians
TTRPG. It’s still very rough but it does a lot of math
quickly. Each skill has a small calculation (shooting is a
particular combo of Dex and Awareness) but there are a dozen
skills. The spread sheet allows a player to change an attribute
and instantly see how that affects all of their skills. It also
calculates HP, Armor, Action Points, and fetches item info for
player reference. We fixed the starting skill points, staring
level, starting bacterial resistance, critical hit threshold, and
expanded the item notes. I am happy all the players used the tool
I made and that I got to improve it.
- We had some fun silly role play with bonds and nicknames
I have begun to implement PC bonds at each table. at session 0 and
whenever a new player joins the table they will roll to see how
they know another PC at the table. The dice pick the relationship
and the player picks which PC. I am hoping that this will
encourage RP and party unity. Some of my games have been getting a
little wild, with PCs pursuing private goals instead of working
together. That can be fun once in a while but it’s not the only
way to have fun at the table. This session 0 we wound up with
slightly estranged and strange sisters and a disreputable though
winning lacrosse coach.
- Three players made characters
- Play-testing
Last year I was lucky enough to be able to start running games
regularly at my LGS. This happened right about the same time as
the developer for Morticians was ready to set up play-testing
events. The shop linked up the developer, several adventurous
dungeon masters and whole lot of play testers. I think I’ve around
10 play-test sessions now, several at play-test events, some at
charity events and some try it out sample games around town.
I will be using an early version of the upcoming Morticians Core
Rule Book for the campaign.
- About the game
Morticians is set in a post zombie apocalypse reconstruction. The
players take on the role of Morticians, a group of people that
band together 7 years after the collapse and dedicate themselves
to eliminating zombies and making the world safe again.
The mechanics are a d100 roll under system. If, for example, your
character has a 40 in their shooting skill, you’ll need to roll 40
or less to make a basic hit on an unarmored target. Each level up
gives you skill points to distribute. Characters have 7 basic
attributes (Str, Dex, Int…) and a dozen skills (Shady,
Survivalist, Shooting…) Characters also have an Archetype that
grants talents, benefits and flaws (Athlete, Fanatic, Soldier…)
- About the game world
I really like the morticians game world because it is less
fantastic than many other options. The game lends itself to using
real local places for your adventure. The game includes some
fantastic elements but there are no aliens, power armor or
radioactive mutants. In this way it is clean slate and if you want
to include them in your game though, the d100 system makes it very
intuitive to create monsters or items and gauge their power. For
my game, I’m excited to explore the survival aspects of our local
environment. I’ll be making some local animal zombie
monsters and a bunch of local wild usefull plants.
- Some local spots that I might be preparing for battle maps
In Morticians, as published, the apocalypse struck in 2012 and the
game is taking place 7 years later. You can change that for your
game easily enough. I will be looking at old maps from the
way-back machine of these locations. If I find a good reference
map and it has enough xander to it and the PCs have need or reason
to go there then I’ll be mapping it.