Introduction

Super Dead is a superhero-horror roleplaying game that takes place in a zombie-apocalypse world caused by the U.S. Navy's botched attempt to prevent World War 3. In this game, you will take the role of a mutant-powered survivor and attempt to make what you can out of the end of the world.

You will gather supplies, rescue survivors, and face off against villains, while staying one step ahead of the ever present zombie threat.

Super Dead is designed to be rules-light and intuitive, encouraging quick, narrative-driven decision making, inspired by the New School Revolution (See also: What is the NSR?) in tabletop gaming as well as modern tactical war games.

Everything you need to play can be found in this ruleset.

The rules to Super Dead are free under the license CC BY-SA 4.0

Quick Start: 28 Rules Later

If you're an experienced TTRPG player, or you have already read the rules, the following 28 rules might be enough for you to play an entire game or campaign of Super Dead.

Characters

1. Characters are defined by super powers and four attributes: athleticism, intellignece, personality, courage.
2. To make an attribute save roll 1d10 under the attribute.
3. To use your powers, roll your power die pool and look for one die above the target number.

Powers

4. Powers can be used to create supernatural effects; all power uses must be narratively consistent.
5. You can power surge to create particularly powerful effects, at the cost of stress.
6. You can also power soak instead of taking a wound.
7. If there is a question about whether a power could be used in a given way, err on the side of allowing a power surge attempt to decide.

Combat

8. Combat takes place in rounds of three phases: movement, hand-to-hand, and shooting.
9. During the movement phase, you can move 30 feet normally, or 100 feet recklessly.
10. If you move into another's line of sight, they can make a ranged opportunity attack against you.
11. During the hand-to-hand phase, up to three exchanges of hand-to-hand combat can take place for all combatants in immediate range of one another.
12. During the shooting phase, each combatant outside immediate range may shoot at one target.

Wounds

13. When you take damage, subtract your armor from the damage taken. If there is damage remaining, you take one wound for every three damage taken.
14. There are four levels of wounds: healthy, hurt, wounded, disfigured.
15. You recover from being hurt after each combat, and from being wounded after receiving medical attention.
16. Wounds have lingering effects that last for up to 28 days.
17. Disfigurement is permanent; if you would be disfigured in the same way twice, you die instead.

Stress

18. Life in the apocalypse is stressful. You will accumulate stress when you do hard things.
19. If you accumulate a point of stress, you must succeed at a courage save or crack.
20. While cracked, everything is hard, and any time you try to use your powers, you must exceed both your target number and your stress number.
21. You can relieve stress by doing relaxing or enjoyable activities and making a successful personality save.

Zombies

22. Making noise attracts zombies and you are more likely to attract them at night.
23. Zombies will move towards you as fast and directly as they can and attempt to bite you.
24. If you get bitten you will likely (4/6) die.
25. Dying may take (1/6) seconds, minutes (1/6), hours (1/6) or (1/6) days, depending on how the virus effects you.
26. Encountering a horde of twnety of more zombies is terrifying and stressful.
27. Though hordes may be defeated,through combat, your best is to run away or use environmental features.
28. Anyone who finds themselves in immediate range of a zombie horde is devoured.

Characters

Attributes and Saves

The non-super traits of your character in Super Dead are represented by four attributes: athleticism, intelligence, personality, and courage.

• Athleticism represents feats of strength, speed, and agility.
• Intelligence represents cunning and knowledge.
• Personality represents your ability to persuade and convince others.
• Courage represents your ability to overcome fear and stress.

When something you do might have a cost to you, you will make a save against the relevant attribute by rolling 1d10. If the roll is under your attribute, you have succeeded and you will avoid all or most of the cost. If the roll is above your attribute, you may succeed, but you will incur a setback or pay a cost.

Because not all tasks are created equal, some saves will be harder than others. When a save is easier than normal, you will subtract a number from your roll; when the save is harder than normal, you will add a number to your roll. These bonuses or penalties are added at the game master's discretion.

Designer's Note: Super Dead is not a "bonus tallying" system. So two things that are hard do not necessarily become very hard, and hard and easy do not necessarily cancel out. The narrative scenario is evaluated in full by the game master and a single bonus is determined for the roll.

Skills

Skills are areas of training where characters have mastered tasks that would ordinarily be challenging or impossible if untrained.

The following tasks are hard, unless trained: fighting, first aid, repair, shooting.

The following tasks are impossible unless trained: engineering, medicine, performance, science.

Most characters are unprepared for the end of days and will not have any skills.

Stress

After avoiding zombies, the next most important thing you can do in the end of days is keep your cool. Your success at keeping your cool is measured by your stress.

As you adventure, you will suffer from the stresses of the end of the world. Each time you incur a point of stress, you must make a courage save. If you fail, you have cracked.

When you crack, everything you do becomes hard. If you have cracked and have more than four points of stress, everything you do is very hard; If you have cracked with more than eight points of stress, everything you do is extremely hard.

Stress Relief

Resting in a safe place provides some relief from stress. If you can manage to find such a place, a successful personality test reduces your stress by 1 point for every 8 hours of rest.

Additionally, you will have a preferred form of stress relief. If you engage in that activity during your rest, you reduce your stress by an additional 1 point.

Background

Even if it's hard to remember now, you were someone before the end of the world.

Every character has a background. This background may allow you to have skills, at the game masters discretion, and may make certain tasks easier for you than others.

Backgrounds are not strictly professions, but rather broad areas of familiarity. You should specify your background as it applies to your character.

Improving Your Character

As you strive to survive the end of days, certain activities such as killing zombies, rescuing survivors, gathering supplies, and defeating villains will gain you experience points.

When you first gain 300 experience points, you can improve your character. Every subsequent improvement costs an additional 300 experience, (e.g., 600, 900, 1200, etc.)

When you improve your character, roll 1d6. On a 1-3, select from list A; on a 4-5, select from list B; on a 6, select from both lists.

Note that there is a limit to the number of times a given improvement can be taken.

Personal Improvements

• Increase your Athleticism by 1 (2 times)
• Increase your Intelligence by 1 (3 times)
• Increase your Personality by 1 (2 times)
• Increase your Courage by 1 (4 times)

Power Improvements

• Develop a new Alpha power (2d4) (1 time)
• Develop a new power Bravo 1 power (2d6) (1 time)
• Increase a power one die type (6 times)

Character Creation

The following steps can be used to quickly create Super Dead characters.

Super Dead characters can be recorded on a note card, a piece of paper, or dedicated character sheet.

1. Roll Attributes

Roll 4d6. Add 2 to each die and assign each value to an attribute. Higher is better.

2. Powers

Select either 2 powers at the Bravo 1 (2d6) level or 1 power at the Bravo 2 (2d8) level.

3. Background

Roll 1d20 for a random background.

4. Flaws

Roll 1d20 for a random flaw.

5. Stress Relief

Roll 1d6 for a random form of stress relief.

6. Equipment

Add any equipment your character may have, depending on their background.

New Survivors

When creating new parties, roll on the following table to create bonds between the characters.

Assuming there are more than two players in the party, each player should roll at least twice. Each time, pick a player you do not already have a bond with.

Powers

Using Powers

When you use a power, roll the dice associated with the level of the power you are using. If any of the dice meet or exceed the target number for the power, you succeed. If all of the dice you rolled are below your target number, then you have partially succeeded, and incur stress.

Superhuman feats of power levels two or more levels below your own power level are trivial, and you can succeed at these feats without rolling.

Power Level

In coordination with the Department of Justice and the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security's Mutant Registration and Protection Agency enumerated four categories of mutants, based on the threat they posed to public safety:

• Alpha-level mutants, who pose limited or no threat to public safety;
• Bravo-level mutants who pose moderate threat to public safety;
• Charlie-level mutants who pose a severe threat to public safety; and
• Zulu-level mutants, who pose a critical threat to public safety.

MRPA did not require Alpha-level mutants to register with the government, but all mutants at Bravo-level and above were required to be registered. Charlie- and Zulu-level mutants were required to register, and serve 10-years in the U.S. armed forces.

Powers at the Alpha and Bravo level, the domain of player characters in Super Dead, are considered "street level". At this level, heroes' powers are approximately equal to the destructiveness of handheld weapons. Though in practice, because of the versatility of powers, mutants will be more dangerous than an armed individual.

Using your powers

When you declare your intent to use super powers, the gamemaster may have you roll to determine the outcome. If they do, you will attempt to roll your dice pool associated with the level of that power, against the target number of the effect you are trying to create. If at least 1 die exceeds the target number, you succeed.

If no die exceeds the target number, your attempt succeeds, but you incur a point of stress may crack as a result.

Normally, you may attempt to create any effect at your power level or below it. Any effect three or more power levels below your current power level is considered trivial and should not require a roll.

To create more intense effects, you will need to use a power surge.

Example: Sammy Strong has the power Super Strength at power-level Bravo 3. He can attempt to lift 10 tons by rolling 3d8 and attempting to get at least one 4, or 1 ton by exceeding a 3. He may also attempt to lift 800lbs without rolling. To lift 20 tons, he would need to power surge.

Using Powers While Cracked

When you have cracked, your stress reduces your ability to control your powers.

To succeed in using your powers while cracked, one die must exceed your target number as usual, and one other die must exceed your stress.

If both conditions are not met, you lose control of your powers and the gamemaster determines what happens.

Power Surge

Your powers are not fixed; they ebb and flow with your energy, adrenaline and intensity. At critical times, you can surge your powers to achieve a more incredible effect than you are normally capable of. Doing so is stressful, but allows you to temporarily exceed your normal limitations.

When you make a power surge attempt, pick a power level one or two levels above your current power level and roll your power dice against the target number for that power level. If you succeed, you achieve the intended effect. If you fail, your power surge attempt will fail or succeed with a significant cost.

Regardless if you succeed or fail, you will incur stress after you power surge. Following a power surge attempt, you will take 1 point of stress for a 1 level power surge, and 3 points of stress for a 2 level power surge.

Designer's Note: Because this is a rules-light system that involving super powers, you will often find yourself wondering "would a player's powers be able to do that?" If the answer seems to rest somewhere between certainly yes and certainly not, allow the player to take a power surge to accomplish the feat.

Power Soak

Your powers also provide you with an enhanced durability. You can use your powers to soak damage. Whenever you would take a wound, instead, you may choose to soak that damage with one of your powers.

When you soak damage, you temporarily reduce a power by as many levels as you would have taken wounds. Your power stays at this reduced level for 24 hours, or until you have a full night's sleep, whichever is longer.

Powers reduced below Alpha in this way cannot be used until you have recovered.

If you incur more wounds than you can soak with a single power, you can use multiple powers to soak the damage. If damage is partially soaked, the remainder is incurred as wounds.

Complete Power Tables

While the tables above are sufficient for player characters, non-player characters may be more powerful. These complete power tables include the effectiveness of Charlie- and Zulu-level mutants.

Table. Complete Strength, Speed and Area of Powers

Table. Complete Weapon Comparisons of Powers

Combat

You likely never thought you'd find yourself in a life or death fight. Unfortunately, that has become all too common.

Whether you are fighting humans, mutants, or zombies, combat is now a fact of life.

Designer's Note: Combat in Super Dead is not modeled on standard tabletop roleplaying game systems that allows for heroes to make decisions on a second-by-second basis. Rather, Super Dead combat is inspired by modern tactical war games. We've chosen to do this because modern firearms and Super Powers, which are present in Super Dead, feel silly in the extended duel-like encounters of fantasy TTRPGs. Firearms and Super Powers are too deadly, from too far away -- and encourage a style of combat where engaging rarely, and on your own terms, is the best approach.

Phases of Combat

Combat in Super Dead takes place in rounds of three phases: the movement phase, the hand-to-hand phase, and the shooting phase.

The Movement Phase

During the movement phase, you declare your intent to move. You may move 30 feet with standard movement or up to 100 feet with reckless movement.

Reckless movement makes any other task very hard and makes attacks against you easy.

If you move into another character's line of sight, you are exposed to opportunity fire. If you take opportunity fire, regardless of whether or not you take damage, you must make a courage save. On a failed save, you must retreat and find cover.

Opportunity fire is a free ranged attack against a combatant who enters your line of sight. You may take one opportunity attack per target so long as you have ammunition (if necessary).

The Hand-to-Hand Phase

After the movement phase is resolved, if there are any combatants within immediate range of one another, the hand-to-hand phase of combat occurs.

The hand-to-hand phase consists of up to three exchanges of attacks. Within an exchange, each combatant declares who and how they would like to attack, and then attacks are resolved simultaneously.

Shooting a pistol or shotgun at immediate range is hard, and shooting a long-gun is very hard. Attacks with ranged powers are also hard.

Obstacles within immediate range can obstruct hand-to-hand combat. If during the hand-to-hand phase you are separated from your intended target by an obstacle, e.g., a table, a car, a chain link fence, etc., your damage from the first exchange occurs during second exchange.

After damage has been dealt, for each exchange, another exchange occurs until one side has been entirely eliminated or until three hand-to-hand exchanges have occurred.

Fighting in hand-to-hand combat when outnumbered is at least hard, but can be very hard, or extremely hard depending on the number and skill of your opponents.

Fighting

To hit in hand-to-hand combat with a handheld weapon--such as a bat, knife, axe, or even your fists--you must make a fighting check. On a successful fighting check, you deal damage to your opponent determined by the weapon you are using.

Because most characters will not be skilled in fighting, the default is a hard athletics save.

The Shooting Phase

Once the movement and hand-to-hand phases have been resolved, combatants in the ranges close, near, and far may declare one target within range of their weapon and make a ranged attack.

All successful ranged attackers roll damage, and damage is evaluated simultaneously for all combatants.

The best way to avoid enemy fire is by hiding behind cover. Cover may make you hard, very hard, or extremely hard to hit, depending on the quality and degree of cover. If you are completely shielded by cover, you may not be targeted.

Shooting

To hit a target with a firearm, you must make a successful shooting check. On a successful shooting check, you deal damage to your opponent determined by the weapon you are using.

Because most characters will not be skilled in shooting, the default is a hard athletics save.

Ranges

There are four ranges of engagement. From farthest to nearest, they are:

1. Far range
2. Near range
3. Close range, and
4. Immediate range.

Far range begins at 1,000 feet and requires the use of specialized weapons.

Near range, from 300 feet up to 1,000 feet, is the ideal range to engage with a rifle, but too far for many powers.

Close range, from 30 to 300 feet is the most typical engagement distance, and is the effective range of both handguns and ranged powers.

Immediate range, within 30 feet, is the range for hand-to-hand combat.

Shooting beyond the range of your weapon is very hard or extremely hard.

Zombies must get to immediate range to attack.

Attacks, Damage, and Wounds

When you take damage, subtract any armor you have from the damage taken. For every three points of damage remaining, you incur one wound.

If you have taken no wounds, you are healthy. If you have taken one wound you are hurt. If you have taken two wounds you are wounded. Once you have taken three wounds, you suffer from disfigurement or death.

Being hurt makes things hard. Being wounded makes things very hard.

You naturally go from hurt back to healthy as soon as combat ends.

If you are wounded, however, you need medical attention. A successful first aid save will treat the wound, but leave you with its lingering effects for 14 days. A failed first aid save will leave you with the lingering effects of the wound for 28 days.

A successful medicine save will relieve you of all effects of the wound.

Disfigurement and Death

Upon taking your third wound, you may elect to take a disfigurement, by rolling on the disfigurement table. If you choose not to take a disfigurement, or your disfigurement roll would double a disfigurement you already have, you die.

Using Powers in Combat

You will often want to use super powers in combat. When you do so, your single die pool roll will serve as both attack and damage.

So long as you achieve at least one success with your die pool, you can deal damage to one or more targets. Damage must be distributed based on whole dice rolled.

Example: Fionna Firefist is engaged in hand-to-hand combat with two bad guys. She rolls her Bravo 2 power "fire control" and gets a 3 and an 6. The 6 is above her target number (4), so she succeeds in her attack and can deal damage. She can either choose to deal 9 damage to one opponent, or 3 damage to one and 6 to the other.

Super Showdowns

When supers collide, the gritty tactical firefights that define human-to-human and human-to-zombie combat disappear, giving way to extended, dramatic showdowns where mutants toss their powers back and forth.

Super Showdowns proceed in an orderless series of turns. When the showdown begins, the gamemaster will determine who acts first.

When it is your turn to act, you can either declare a super showdown action using your powers, or you can attempt to flee.

Super Showdown Actions

When taking an action during a super showdown, you will (1) declare what you are attempting to do, (2) name the characters that you are interacting with, and (3) roll the dice associated with the power you used to accomplish the action.

If any of your dice are 4 or higher, your action is successful. The gamemaster will narrate the results, add 1d6 to the Showdown Stakes die pool, and you will pick one of the players you interacted with to go next. This can be either an ally or a foe.

If all your dice are below 4, your action is unsuccessful. You will roll all the dice in the Showdown Stakes dice pool. For each die below a 4, you will take 1 wound. As normal, you can power soak to avoid taking wounds. The gamemaster will then narrate the result of your failed attempt and determine the next to act.

Flee

If the tides have turned against you, and it is your turn to act, you can choose to cut and run. To escape the showdown, declare your attempt and roll the associated power pool. If any die shows a 3 or better, you escape and the gamemaster will narrate the results.

If you fail your flee attempt, you incur a wound. The gamemaster will narrate the results and determine who acts next.

Noise

Clashes between super-powered beings are loud. After the sixth die is added to the showdown stakes dice pool and for every two dice thereafter (i.e., 8, 10, 12...), the gamemaster will secretly check determine how many zombies the showdown has attracted, and how long they will take to arrive.

Each wave of zombies attracted in this way contains at least 2d8 zombies and arrives in 1d10 minutes.

When the zombies arrive, they follow the Zomb-3 and enter combat. The showdown is then over and standard combat rules apply.

Gear

Equipment is essential to surviving the end of the world. Here are some common items you'll need or encounter.

Carrying and Encumbrance

You can carry a number of items equal to five plus your athletics score without effort. Heroes with super strength or a similar ability can carry 20 items.

When carrying a number of items more than that, you are burdened by the weight. This makes many tasks hard, and some tasks like hiding or sneaking about very hard.

Stress wears on you both mentally and physically. Starting at two points of stress, and for every two points of stress thereafter, you can carry one less item.

Bartering and Scavenging

There is no central bank. No dollar. And nobody needs gold. What people need is food, shelter, ways to stay safe. Ways to relax. And ways to get away.

You won't find stores or shopkeepers in the world of Super Dead. Instead, anything you want, you'll have to find, or barter for. And since everyone has so little, you're going to need to give up something good if you want what someone else has.

Hand-to-Hand Weapons

Hand-to-hand weapons aren't the best way to take on groups of zombies. But for one or two zombies, they are quiet and effective ways of getting the job done.

Table. Hand-to-Hand Weapons

Chainsaw. Attacking with a chainsaw is hard because they are unwieldy. Because they are clumsy, chainsaws only deal damage during the second and third exchanges of a hand-to-hand phase. Using a chainsaw is as loud as a motorcycle.

Firearms

Firearms are a reliable form of self-defense with the significant advantage of being effective outside of biting distance. They are all but ubiquitous in the United States. However, they are as loud as they are deadly.

Ammunition

A significant limitation of firearms is that they need ammunition to fire.

The amount of ammunition that takes up a single slot in your inventory is determined by your magazine size.

Keep track of the ammo that you use. When you have shot all the bullets in your magazine, you may reload only if you have another.

Table. Firearms

Machine guns and Assault rifles are capable of providing suppressive fire. Suppressive fire makes it very hard to take actions in the area under fire. Because machine guns are purpose made for suppressive fire, if you attempt to take an action while under suppressive fire from a machine gun it is extremely hard.

Shotgun. Attacking with a shotgun at immediate range is deadly; shotguns do double damage in immediate range.

Armor

Armor is hard to come by in the modern world, but against unarmed zombies, even makeshift protection can be the difference between life and death.

Each piece of armor has three properties:

1. an armor value indicating how much protection it provides;
2. a type, indicating what type of attacks it defends against; and
3. a durability, indicating how it holds up to damage.

Table. Armor

Armor value is subtracted from damage taken to determine whether or not you suffer wounds.

Armor type indicates whether the armor protects against hand-to-hand weapons, firearms, or both.

Durability indicates the durability die of the armor in perfect condition. After any combat round in which you take damage, roll the durability die associated with your armor. If that roll is a 1, reduce the die by 1 step. If the die would be reduced below 1d4 in this fashion, the armor has broken and offers no more protection.

Equipment and Vehicles

Table. Equipment

Anti-Mutant Weapons

When the power of the mutants was understood, the Army Research Labratory developed anti-mutant weapons for both war and policing. Becasue of the unique dangers of the mutant threat, even small-town police forces were provided anti-mutant weapons by the federal government.

These weapons work by delivering an M-shock: an electrical shock similar to a taser, that vibrates at a specific frequency capable of suppressing mutant powers.

Suppression. In addition to their damage, anti-mutant weapons also reduce the power level of mutants a number of steps based on their suppression. These reductions are always applied to the highest-level power first. If any mutant power would be reduced below 1d4 in this way, the super is incapacitated.

Table. Anti-Mutant Wepaons

Suppressor Net. The suppressor net must be thrown at immediate range. Once a mutant is entangled in the suppressor net, they must make an athletics save to escape. Until they escape, they may take no actions other than attempting to escape. You may make one escape attempt during each phase of combat.

Zombies

Zombies are the omnipresent dread in the world of Super Dead. They lurk around every corner, and are an insatiable threat to even the strongest supers.

Zombies Bites and Turning Undead

The thing that makes zombies terrifying as that if they bite you, you will turn into a zombie. Because the virus was originally created as a bioweapon to kill supers, are especially susceptible to this effect.

A bite does not always turn someone undead.

If you are a bitten, the game master will make a bite roll in secret and narrate the effects to you.

Bite Outcome Table.

If you turn in minutes, hours or days, over the course of that time you will develop flu-like symptoms, that peak, break, and then disappear as your body gets cold and you become undead.

The Zomb-3

Zombies are ravenous monsters that mindlessly hunt their prey. To a human, it looks like they follow a three-step process.

1. Search. The zombie wanders about, following sights and sounds to find potential prey. Zombies will always follow the closest sight or sound that suggest viable prey.
2. Close. The zombie makes its way towards its prey by the most direct means possible. Zombies can avoid obvious obstructions, but will fall for even a modestly disguised trap.
3. Devour. Once a zombie has closed on its prey, it will begin to grab and bite. With each bite, the virus will make its way into the zombie's victim. If they are lucky, they will bleed out before the virus turns them.

Fighting Zombies

Zombies are a predictable, but deadly foe -- you must not let yourself get complacent.

During the movement phase, zombies will attempt to move towards the nearest person they see, until they are in immediate range of at least one opponent.

If zombies are in immediate range of one or more opponents, they will attempt to stay in immediate range.

During the hand-to-hand phase, zombies will attack with their rigor-mortis hardened, claw-like fingers and their infectious bites. Because most zombies are shambling, uncoordinated creatures, their bite only occurs if the zombie is still standing at the end of the hand-to-hand phase.

This means that most zombies killed during the hand-to-hand phase will not be able to infect you.

Killing Zombies

Threat and Noise

If a zombies is not actively devouring a victim, it is on the lookout for its next. Zombies feel neither fear nor exhaustion, and their hunger for flesh is never ending.

If you are spotted by a zombie, you are in combat with a zombie.

If you are out of sight of zombies, and you make a loud enough noise, you will attract zombies.

During the daytime, anything louder than a normal conversation will attract zombies. At nighttime, anything louder than a whisper can bring out the flesh-eating beasts.

Table. Zombies Attracted by Noise Level

Once a noise loud enough to attract zombies is made, the zombies are on their way.

If the zombies will arrive all at once, they arrive in 2d6 minutes of real time.

If the zombies will arrive in waves, then the first wave arrives in 1d8 minutes, each each subsequent wave arrives 1d8 minutes later.

Designer's note: If you are the game master, making these roles in secret can increase suspense. Set a timer on your phone out of sight of the players, and interrupt the action when the timer goes off.

Fleeing the Scene

When players make noise to attract zombies, they will naturally want to flee the scene. Their chance of successfully fleeing depends on how close the zombies are to closing in on them and how many viable ways their are to approach the location where the noise is coming from.

Zombies will use doors and other obvious pathways to get to their destinations, so if the players attempt to escape by the most obvious means, they are more likely to run into zombies.

Table. Fleeing Zombies

Zombie Hordes

A single zombie may be a threat to a normal person, but most survivors have figured out how to outsmart zombies 1-on-1. Zombies are most dangerous in groups. And in big groups, they are especially deadly.

Groups of 20 or more zombies form a horde. Hordes move insatiably and undeterrably towards their victims before devouring them.

Anyone who sees a horde incurs 1 point of stress and must make a courage save.

Anyone who finds themselves within immediate range of a horde is devoured unless the entire horde is destroyed during the hand-to-hand combat phase.

Your best bet to survive a horde is to run away. A successful athletics save allows you to move one zone away from a horde. If you fail your athletics save, you must succeed at a subsequent save, or else the horde closes in on you.

When a horde closes in on you, your distance to the horde is reduced by one range. This is stressful. And if this would put you in immediate range of the horde, you immediately enter a hand-to-hand combat phase.

Hordes can also be deterred, blocked, or delayed by environmental effects. For most supers, this will be their best approach to surviving a horde.

Table. Zombies destroyed by environmental feature

Shooting at hordes is mostly ineffective because of the sheer number of zombies present. Some very high output, area fire weapons, like machine guns, can be useful against hordes of less than 50 zombies.

Kinds of Zombies

Shamblers

Most zombies are shamblers: slow, drudging zombies that move at you as fast as they can, but that is not very fast at all.

Stats. 4 Ath., 2 Int.

Movement. Shamblers always move at regular speed.

Attack. Shamblers bite only at the end of the hand-to-hand phase.

Crickets

Crickets get their name from the way they hop about on all fours. These zombies are fast and agile, in addition to being enraged.

Stats. 8 Ath., 2 Int.

Movement. Crickets always move at reckless speed.

Attack. Crickets bites happen at the end of each hand-to-hand exchange.

Poppers

Poppers are bloated zombies, full of infectious fluid. They move slowly and awkwardly, with stiff joints struggling against taught, waterlogged flesh.

Stats. 3 Ath., 2 Int.

Movement. Poppers always move at regular speed.

Attack. Poppers bite at the end of every hand-to-hand phase, like shamblers.

Popping. If a popper takes damage during any phase, it has a 1-in-2 chance of popping. If you are in immediate range of a popping popper, you must succeed at a hard athletics save or be subject to the effects of a bite.

Enemies and NPCs

Police Officer

Police officers are the backbone of a civilized society. These officers patrol the streets and keep them safe. They are often armed with civilian hand guns, and have received basic training in small arms and conflict de-escalation.

Gear: Handgun (2d6), handcuffs, radio, first aid kit, flashlight, extendable baton (2d4)

Police Sniper

Police Snipers have been specially trained to handle sniper rifles and support highly volatile hostage and counter-sniper situations.

Gear: Sniper rifle (4d8), handgun (2d6), radio, first aid kit

Detective

These plain-clothes officers work the streets, attempting to build relationships and gather information about potential crimes. They pride themselves on being a bit more grounded, effective, and independent than normal officers.

Gear: Handgun (2d6), handcuffs, badge.

S.W.A.T.

S.W.A.T. officers are the best conditioned and best trained officers a police force has. Like other police officers, they are trained in defensive and protective tactics, and conflict de-escalation.

Gear: Rifle (3d6), handgun (2d6), riot shield, extendable baton (2d4)

Solider

Infantry are the backbone of the military. Whether Army or Marines, these soldiers are professionals ready for battle -- and most other challenges.

Gear: Rifle (3d6), 7 magazines, first-aid kit, rations, helmet, body armor

Alternate loadouts:

• Machine Gun (4d10), 2 magazines, first-aid kit, rations, helmet, body armor
• Sniper Rifle (3d10), 5 magazines, first-aid kit, rations, helmet, body armor
• Rifle (3d6), 7 magazines, medics kit, rations, helmet, body armor

Special Ops

Special forces are the most elite fighting units on the planet. These highly trained operators are accustomed to extreme stress and deprivation and have been highly trained in battle tactics.

Gear: Rifle (3d6), 7 magazines, handgun (2d6) first-aid kit, rations, helmet, body armor

Survivor

An everyday person, just trying to get through the end of days...

Gear: 2 days rations, makeshift weapon (2d4)

Scientist

A researcher, doctor, or other scientific professional. Much of what they knew about the world, the cold and dispassionate world of books, has to be thrown out of the window now...

Gear: Pen and notepad, book

Preacher

Persuasive religious figures are able to get many through times of crisis. And there has never been a time where more sought faith than the zombie apocalypse.

Gear: Unarmed. Holy symbol or book.

Zealot

These true believers have chosen to believe in something, instead of succumbing to nihilist temptations of an empty world. Believing makes them strong, if a bit crazy.

Gear: Handgun (2d6), holy symbol

Street Criminal

Whether they were privy to a life of crime before the end of days, or have just embraced a world without law, these criminals pay no mind to the old standards. All that matters now is what you can get away with.

Gear: Handgun (2d6), knife (1d8), drugs, dice

Crime Lord

All those who live the life of crime are trying to get rich; those who have are crime lords. These powerful figures call the shots, and rarely have to get their hands dirty to get their way.

Gear: Handgun (2d6)

Exploration

Point-to-Point Travel

No one wanders in the end of days. At least no one you can trust. That means that travel in Super Dead involves moving from one point to another. The process of traveling from place to place via point is known as point crawling.

Point Crawling has three stages, once the players have decided they would like to travel to a new location:

1. The players are presented the paths to their destination, as well as the information they have about each of those paths. They debate the best path to take.
2. The players make preparations and set out on their journey. Based on the when, how, and where they travel, they will face one or more encounters.
3. The encounters are resolved as they occur. Each of these encounters has a may interrupt the rest of the point crawl entirely.
4. The players arrive at the location for which they set out.

Encounters, Noise, and Danger

As the players travel between two places, the question becomes, what do they find as they travel.

This will break down into three kinds of answers:

1. Something the players expect, and you expect
2. Something the players do not expect, but you knew was there
3. Something that surprises both you and the players

In case one, the players have either been to this place before, or gathered information about it, and the situation is mostly as they left it. These types of encounters can be strategic for the players, when they involve people they players are looking to build relationships with or whose knowledge they wish to use.

In case two, the players have stumbled upon something you have kept hidden from them. These are the exciting things that make exploration special and make the world feel alive! These can be an extended series of encounters that takes the players away from their intended task, or a curiosity that they must come back to later.

In case three, we have entered the world of random encounters. These are the spice that makes the world seem alive. When you can, make your random encounters as specific to your setting and adventure hooks as possible.

Designing Encounter Tables

In Super Dead, random point crawl encounters serve as a way to color the world. If tabletop roleplaying games are 1/3 exploration, 1/3 roleplaying, and 1/3 combat, you should consider dividing your encounter tables into thirds as well.

That is, split your encounter tables in thirds.

The exploration third of your encounter tables should be filled suspicious or intriguing places. If the players investigate these places, they should find clues for current or future tasks, or useful equipment or gear.

The combat third of your encounter tables should be filled with zombies, opposing factions, lone wolf mutants, zombies, and even more zombies. This isn't the apocalypse for nothing! Make the number and activity of foe encountered memorable.

The roleplaying third of your encounter table can be stocked with faction figures, independent survivors, and even faction leaders out doing important things. For these encounters, it is critical that something important is going on before the players arrive.

Nighttime Encounter Tables

Because nighttime is more dangerous than daytime, once you've created your daytime encounter table, it is often beneficial to create a nighttime version of the same table. Good rules of them are fewer roleplaying encounters involving factions survivors, and more zombie encounters.

For example, the "Villain and Minions" encounter might become "Fiona Frost and her snowmen are entering a derelict jewelry store: Veronica's Diamond Atelier. After they enter, Fiona seals the entrance with a wall of ice..."

Generic Encounter Table

The following generic encounter table can serve as a boilerplate for your session prep. To prep for your game, replace the generic encounters with specific encounters relevant to ongoing storylines in your game.

Tables for Creating Random Encounters

Having trouble coming up with your own random encounters? Use the following tables to help. Again, it works best to take these general ideas for encounters and specify them down to specific encounter that can be used at the table.

Running a City

While Super Dead cities are not like their modern thriving forebearers, they are still cities. And running a city is a challenging feat at the table. Consider the following as a procedure for running Super Dead cities.

1. Create and maintain a list of factions that occupy the city along with the players
2. After each session, update the world based on what the factions did "off screen"
3. Create new clues and adventure hooks based on those off-screen events.
4. Provide those clues and adventure hooks to the players.

Enumerate the Factions

Because survival is hard, survivors will likely organize themselves into groups. These groups will want different things, even if they are all nominally working together. These groups are factions. They must take actions, independent of the players, to achieve their own interests.

Update the World

After each session, go through your list of factions and what they want. Then, think about what they would have been doing during the last session of gameplay to further their interests.

For example, a faction that wants to run away might be looking for gas or vehicles. A faction that is afraid might be looking for weapons or a powerful ally.

How did these endeavors go? Were they successful, or are they now worse off than they started? Decide what each faction did and which outcome they realized.

Create Clues + Hooks

For each outcome, create a clue or hook--some way that the players can learn about what the factions are up to. These are great to stock your random encounter tables, or to make the topic of conversation amongst your NPCs.

Provide Clues + Hooks

At the next session, provide those clues and hooks to the players. Don't feel like you need to provide all the clues and hooks you come up with at each session. But it is okay, even good, to provide more hooks than the players can act on.

In a city with three or more factions, there is more going on than the players could possible hope to be involved with. They will have to prioritize and strategize--an important part of the game!

Creating a Point-Crawl

One nice thing about point crawls is that they are easy to create. You write down the points of interest, draw lines between them, and you're (mostly) done.

If you have a map, point crawls can trivially be super-imposed on top of a map, by reducing the opacity of the map-layer, and drawing your points and connections on top of it.

Between each point on the map, indicate the number of encounters that would occur when traveling between those two locations. This should roughly correspond to the distance and danger of the journey.

Micro Settings

The following micro settings are designed to get you into the game quickly.

Gulf Pearl, Texas

Gulf Pearl is a massive, sprawling graveyard of a city. It’s giant highways served as deathtraps for those who sought to escape, and the mobs of zombies that roam the streets at night prove it: everything is bigger in Texas.

The shining beacon of Gulf Pearl is and has always been the headquarters of the American Oil Corporation. Their business has long since diversified from oil, but now it rests almost entirely on surviving the end of days.

Other surviving factions include the remnants of an international drug cartel and government rocket scientists at NASA.

Gulf Pearl Rumors Table

San Buho, California

They say a criminal always returns to the scene of the crime. That’s exactly what some survivors of San Buho think that the Navy is doing back in town.

With an operational aircraft carrier, and a third of the naval base liberated from the undead, the Navy’s outpost in San Buho may be the most secure place to lay one’s head in the world after.

But some factions aren’t quick to forgive: like the Blind Devil biker gang, or local parishioners and survivors of Our Lady of Guadalupe’s mutant priest: Father Juan Ayala.

San Buho Rumors Table

Skunk City, Iowa

Skunk City’s survivors are the motly, scrappy residents of a Midwestern College town. While farmers and academics, pastors and doctors wouldn’t normally have much in common, they’re finding ways to get along.

But as it has always been with Skunk City, new people keep showing up and they don’t always care about the survivors of Skunk City.

Skunk City’s factions include a coalition of independent farmers, holding onto their land, and a mutant doctor who will do anything to find a cure.

Skunk City Rumors Table

Fellsmore, Maryland

The streets of Fell, Maryland are as dangerous as ever. The surviving residents take to heart that the gang violence their city could never tamper would not be stopped by a zombie apocalpyse either.

While eastside and westside gangsters fight between and amongst themselves, the Dockworkers Union have carved out a patch of life down by the docks, and a group of survivors are holed up in the reknowned Sammuel Johns hospital searching for a cure.

And on the streets, a rumor is going around that a member of the Fell’s Street Five superhero team may have survived after all.

Fellsmore Rumors Table

West Moriches, New York

60 miles from the ruins of New York City, a small sanctuary has emerged in the city of West Moriches.

Protected by Gregory "Geo Dude" Godwin and the rock walls he has erected around the city, West Moriches offers a haven from which survivors can venture out into the zombie wasteland, in search of survivors or a cure.

Designer's Note: Though this setting can be used for any type of campaign, it is particularly intended for a "West Marches" style campaign that gets more challenging as the players farther and farther west towards New York City.

West Moriches Adventure Hooks

Inspiration

This work stands on the shoulders of giants. The following sources of media and games were inspirational in the creation of this work.

Media

• 28 Days Later by Alex Garland and Danny Boyle
• Amazing Spiderman by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko
• Batman by Robert Kanigher and Sheldon Moldoff
• Dawn of the Dead by George Romero
• Dawn of the Dead by Zack Snyder
• From Dusk til Dawn by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez
• Poison Ivy by G. Willow Wilson and Marcio Takara
• Rec by Paco Plaza and Jaume Balaguero
• Walking Dead by Tony Moore and Robert Kirkman
• X-Men by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
• X-Statix by Peter Milligan and Mike Allred
• Zombieland by Rhett Reese, Paul Wernick, and Ruben Fleischer

Games

• All Flesh Must Be Eaten by George Vasilakos
• Apocalypse World by D. Vincent Baker and Meguey Baker
• Basic Action Super Heroes! by Chris Rutkowsky
• Black Hack by David Black
• Cairn by Yochai Gal
• Force on Force by Shawn Carpenter
• Marvel Superhero Roleplaying Game by Jeff Grubbs
• Shadowdark by Kelsey Dionne
• Skirmish Ragers by Colin Phillips and Chris Pooch
• Tiny Supers by Alan Bahr