TWD: The Basics

[Dave]

Any one of the experienced players want to give a quick rundown on what generally works and what doesn’t?

For example my starting crew is looking like it will only be 2-3 dudes, is that sensible? Also firearms, good for killing but also good for attracting zombies! To buy or not? Also, should everyone have a weapon of some kind, even if it’s just a screwdriver?

Cheers

[DaVinci's Cat]

I’ll start by caveating that it does depends on your play style. Everything I say after this is purely my opinion and dice rolling ability and I’m sure others will be able to contradict in their views. Sven and I tend to take quite different lists and both seem to work as well as each other. There are characters that work well with each other in terms of buffing but just be aware not to build your list relying on these ‘handshakes’.
Sven likes Alan & Donna (1 shot cannon that probably isn’t ideal for a campaign ) but Carl works well with both Rick and/or Lori and Glenn & Maggie (as long as you chose the right versions) go well together.

I’d say look at their nerve value. Anything with low nerve is going to be panicking pretty early on and is then only good for cannon/zombie fodder, and in campaign terms is likely to lose you points. That said, I know of people who have successfully run characters like Sophia as supply grabbers or Liam with a leather jacket as a human shield to their main characters.
Secondly, consider the number of wounds/health points. I get a little twitchy with only 4 HPs on character (perhaps I need to be more tactical!) and would generally look for more if I could, but at this level, you’re likely to be limited.

Consider their specialisation. I’d recommend within your 3 starting survivors you should look at a bruiser, a runner and a tactician although the later tend to be rather points heavy so they might be your next purchase when you get some points to spend. Why the spread? Runners don’t need to make movement rolls when going over obstacles (50/50 roll that can stop any movement dead). Tacticians don’t need to roll when attempting to reduce the threat leave and some even reduce the level by a die roll.

You summed up firearms well. The advantage of attracting zombies when stood behind an enemy cannot be under-estimated. Rolling head-shots also means ammo-reload/jam rolls, so you really ought to consider a weapon that is reliable or purchasing an ammo reload – don’t rely on picking one up when searching supplies – you’ll just get bandages and a booby-trap.
Without a firearm, how do you create mayhem and why should you want to? Well when the threat tracker reaches 18, the game ends at the end of that turn, so you may well wish to accelerate the tracker that way, especially if you are in the lead or you opponent hasn’t reached their win conditions. Again Sven quite likes using grenades on expendable characters…

Definitely give everyone a weapon of sorts. Firstly I’d go for more lower power dice over fewer better dice. I take 2 white and a red dice over a blue and white any day. Remember that it’s the difference in final scores that do the damage. Also pay attention to the special rules with weapons. Sharp, Bludgeon and Dual wield all confer bonuses that should work in harmony with your survivors. A small knife (3pts) is a really cheap way of getting the dual wield bonus working.

Personally I steer away from weapons that amputate – never used it and by the time a survivor needs it, they’re not going to survive the amputation. If it comes with dual wield and sharp, bonus, but I wouldn’t get a weapon just to get amputate.

You could go with 2 really well armed, high wound, high points characters (I’ve done it on occasion) but remember you are losing activations and actions, and if some of those actions are 50/50 rolls that’s quite a gamble. Also you’ve only got a couple of targets to spread incoming fire over rather than 3 or even 4.

Hope my ten pence helps…

[Dave]

Awesome, nice rundown.

I think I’ll wait until one of the admin nights before I commit to a crew load out.

[Ronq]

I agree with most of what Simon says, but probably for entirely different reasons!

Always chuck as many dice as you can against everything, 2 red dice is better than 1 white dice, a red and a white is better than a blue etc.

Only take weapons if they add dice, or you get to reroll dice you’ve already failed on, in that order. If they’ve got both even better!

Dual wield is always your friend, just take the cheapest extra weapon you can. You’ll probably never lose a melee weapon and the reroll always helps.

I don’t look at nerve levels, it’s always a dice vs cost result for me, go in hard and end it before you need to worry about that.

I’ve never got the handle on runners, tacticians and bruisers work well though. Remember that the objective is generally more important than killing the other side. To go along with that, managing the threat level is vital; if the other side needs to accomplish something, end the game soon. You can do this quickly with noise or firearms

Take a gun if you’re sure it will kill someone, probably not possible with the cap on weapon cost. A cheap fire arm is useful to cause mayhem though, but use it sparingly (I’ve been swamped too many times!)

Combinations of characters are good, but are quite specific and you will forget them! But keywords are vital, especially sharp.

Most armour is good, but very expensive. Aim for removing dice from the other side.

Currently aiming for around 4 guys. Just so I can do more things! But I may just go for 2 guys with all the armor!