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The PMS Virus; History of the Unholy Land
Topic Started: Jun 20 2011, 10:04 PM (111 Views)
Lord Rogue
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Game Master
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Gamemaster's Note: if you're bored with the historical brief, skip the blue section and find the Game Mechanic part for how the virus influences gameplay

Who released the PMS virus on Earth? It is too late to tell now. Some claim it was aliens, as alleged UFO sightings in the weeks prior to he terrible outbreak on Sunday, January 31st, 2021. Others believe it was an accidental release of a biological-warfare agent by the US, China or Russia. Others may claim it was an act of an angry god or maybe of some spirit of Gaia. In truth, experts with forensic skills and equipment were too busy dying during the outbreak to really look for the source. The most common and believable version is that Islamist Terrorists used the newfangled Insta-Courses to master biology and give their Jihad the ultimate weapon.

Sources aside, the virus that would bring the apocalypse is fascinating by itself. A quickly adapting viral agent, it modifies the very DNA helix of a person infect, frcing immediate and mostly lethal genetic mutations upon the victim. The virus has very little capability to spread by air but it doesn't need to. 1 of every 20 people infected with it would not die but instead become a menacing zombie whose bite has the chance to infect a victim. The virus, dubbed "Paranormal Mutation Strain" or PMS for short (it also makes women cranky) required less than one month to kill or zombine 99.5% of Earth's population. This left about Thirty Million normal human beings alive, about forty thousand of them in the "Unholy Land".



Game Mechanic

PMS virus is far from gone. In fact, being infected with it is one of the most common causes of death in the Unholy land. Virtually any attack by a zombie or plaguebearer has a chance of infecting the target with PMS.

While infected with PMS the character experiences a penalty of 50% to all rolls after everything else was calculated. In addition, half of the character's fortitude is ignored in all rolls and all stats requiring fortitude (such as for encumbrance and weapon difficulty calculations). Character then has a couple of game hours to inject itself with Anti Virus Serum or perish.

AVS (Anti Virus Serum) - AVS is the only possible salvation from a PMS infection. AVS injectors can be used in and out of combat. When an AVS Injector is used, character rolls a chance to survive equaling 10 + Character's Fortitude divided by 2 (so that if character has 10 Fortitude, chance to survive is 15 out of 20). Repeated infections reduce the character's ability to resist the PMS Virus by 2 numbers off the roll (8 + Character's Fortitude divided by 2 then 6, and so on). This naturally biases the chances to survive towards character in good physical health. Failure in an AVS roll results in ineffective injection. The character can try again, providing that another injector is available, of course.


Harmful Mutation - surviving an infection with PMS virus isn't always a clear cut thing. Character that has survived an infection may still find itself suffering of a harmful mutation. Harmful mutation negates the possibility of taking the Beneficial Mutation trait, and all related traits. In addition it will incur a penalty to rolls or to fortitude or increase the character's susceptibility to ESP or to infection with PMS virus.
when surviving a PMS infection, two rolls are made
First roll is the chance to outright avoid harmful mutation, which equals 10 + Character's Fortitude divided by 2 (so that if character has 10 Fortitude, chance to avoid harmful mutation is 15 out of 20). Any previous infections reduce these numbers by 4 regardless of anything. That means that a person who survived two previous infections without mutation automatically has at least 8 numbers on the dice roll chance to be mutated.
Second roll determines the effect of the a harmful mutation, assuming the character failed the first dice roll. this is a six sided die roll
1 - reduces weapon rolls by 1, permanently
2 - reduces repair rolls by 1, permanently
3 - reduces charisma rolls by 1, permanently
4 - reduces resistance to ESP talents by 1, permanently
5 - Doubles chances of future attacks to infect the character again with PMS
6 - Reduces character's Fortitude by 1, permanently.

Two exceptions exist. If a character has taken the Beneficial Mutation trait it is immune to harmful mutation and can skip these rolls completely. If the character already has a harmful mutation from past mishaps, surviving an infection means an automatic skip to the second roll (meaning the character has no chance to resist the increased harmful mutation.
Quote:
 
The only real difference between God and the Game Master is that God is supposed to be benign while the Game Master probably harbors some nefarious intents


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