RTA: An All Things Zombie Batrep - Part 2

With blood on his knuckles and a second body at his feet the realisation hit Troy like an offensive line. This wasn't an isolated incident; not road rage gone insane.

Something was wrong in Outbreak City. Something very wrong.

Above the typical quiet of an early morning, shrieks of terror could be heard in the distance. Low moans and guttural, feral cries replaced birdsong.

"Hey!" he yelled at the woman reaching in through his now broken car window after Hank. Her head snapped in his direction and she shambled towards him with a high pitched scream.

In she rushed, dead eyes fixed on Troy as he prepared himself for the assault. He braced himself as she came in and grabbed her flailing hands as she clawed at his face. He twisted, turned and pulled her to the ground. She almost had her teeth in him as he slammed her into the tarmac and her vicious thrashing ceased.

Hank's heart reached a crescendo as he repeated to himself 'Gotta get outta here!' under his breath. He cursed himself, frozen with fear, cowering upside down with his head in the footwell of his friend's sports car, unable to even close the door beside him.

Hank snapped out of his panic when Troy slammed the driver's side door. Troy fumbled in his pockets for a moment and realised Hank must have the keys.

"Give me the keys!" he yelled as Hank squirmed like an eel in a barrel in the ludicrous position he'd gotten himself into.

Outside, the walking dead, drawn to the commotion, shambled ever closer to the car.

Hank twisted into a seated position and scooped the keys from out of the footwell. Troy snatched them out of his hand and gunned the engine just as the undead were upon them.

As Troy struggled to keep his composure the squeal of rubber heralded their escape and attracted the attention of more creatures. Out of the darkened alleyways they came.

Troy ploughed across the intersection, the roar of the 3.6 liter engine accompanied by high-pitched screams as the undead, threw themselves at the car in a furious blood lust.

"Look out!" cried Hank as two figures lurched out into the road and Troy drifted to avoid them.

As they neared the figures Hank saw a gaping head wound and bared, broken teeth as the bloody mess flung itself towards them.

The car door slammed hard against Hank's shoulder and he winced at the impact. The body spun and crumpled and a shock of crimson spray appeared across the windshield and wing.

"Holy shit!" said Hank as he looked back at the crowd of walking dead gathered in the street.

Troy didn't say a word. Nor did he risk a glance in the mirror, for fear of what he might see.

They'd certainly had better days.

All Things Zombie

Outbreak City at Eastern Front 2011

We interrupt our scheduled programme to bring you this news from Outbreak City!

The Lead Will Walk The Earth will be running a display game at Eastern Front:The East of England Wargames Show in Norwich on Sunday 21st August 2011.

Eastern Front: East of England Wargames Show 2011

Historically, Norwich held host to a popular annual show for a number of years. The show began to wane and eventually fell by the wayside and now, after a prolonged drought, the new show organiser Kim Daniels decided Norwich was once again ready for wargaming event. Eastern Front premiered last year and was hugely successful.

The show features a number of display games, a strong list of traders, the ubiquitous bring-and-buy and three competitions: The National DBA league, Hordes/Warmachine and Flames of War.

Inspired by The Extraordinarii's stunning work on his Small Town USA project and in the tradition of all pivotal wargames events I have decided to construct a brand new 6' by 4' Modern City Wargames Table (the baseboard) ready for the event. "Quiiick!!!!" Always up for a slightly foolish challenge I dived right in and construction is in full flow, I will post a full 'this is how I did it' (or didn't quite manage it) after the event.

Luckily for me I kinda forgot that I had promised to make a Dystopian Wars Ocean table for my best buddy and, handily enough, he and Matt from Too Much Unpainted Lead will be running a Dystopian Wars display game at the show too. Double the Van-Damage! So I tried to grow and extra pair of hands (didn't work) and the garage is literally full to the brim with battened MDF. In for a penny, in for a pound. Wish me luck.

Eastern Front, The East of England Wargames Show is being held in the fabulous St. Andrews Hall venue in the centre of Norwich.

St Andrew's Hall - Norwich

Come support the show and if you do visit please drop in to The Lead Will Walk the Earth and introduce yourself.

The Lead Will Walk The Earth will returns to it's scheduled programming. RTA: An All Things Zombie Batrep Part 2 follows next episode.

RTA: An All Things Zombie Batrep - Part 1

The sun was almost up over Outbreak City. It was quiet, very quiet and too early for Hank. He'd stayed up late last night to watch the game. The Outbreak City Ragers, his team, were through to the play-offs and, seeing as adrenaline had prevented him from hitting the sack, he'd downed a few more beers to celebrate. It seemed like only a few hours ago, it probably was. Troy pulled the car up across the street from the incident. When he cut the engine Hank breathed a sigh of relief.

Troy Pulled the car up across the street from the incident.

"Does your car have to be so loud?" Hank asked.
"Said the bear with a very sore head." replied Troy, with an eyebrow raised.

The ambulance crew had called in the RTA about an hour ago, single vehicle, most likely a DUI.

"Point taken." said Hank.

This incident really looked no different from a typical scene but something didn't add up. Troy and Hank had worked together for a while now. Road Traffic Accident Analysts; Crash Scene Investigators and they had seen enough scenes to know something was amiss.

As they strode over to the scene they could see two figures stumbling around behind the crashed coupe, both bloodied, both shambling, perhaps delirious from blood loss.

"This doesn't look good." said Hank as they both started off at a trot.
"Sir. Step out of the roadway sir." Troy called out.
As one of the figures stepped from behind the car a glint of recognition flickered in Hank's eye.
"Tony? Tony are you ok? What happened?" asked Troy, setting off towards his colleague, a paramedic he recognised from the work they'd done together.

Tony lurched forward, blood oozed from a wound on his face, his jaw hung limp but his teeth gnawed. He was closely followed by another male, who had to be like the victim of the accident, with a broken nose and what looked like lacerations on his neck.
"Are you sure that's Tony?" asked Hank.
Before Troy could answer the two figures lunged towards them with viscious intent.

Gnashing and flailing the two assailants rushed towards Hank and Troy. Troy jostled with the thing that once was Tony a Hank struggled with the man on him. They were caught off guard but moments later Troy's college wrestling day came flooding back to him. He manhandled the paramedic onto the ground and held him in a headlock.
"What the hell?" yelled Hank holding the wrists of the man biting at his face.
Troy pulled hard against the paramedic till a dull crack reverberated through his limbs and, to his horror, the body went limp. He rolled up out of the hold as Hank kneed his attacker in the face. The thrashing ceased as his assailant dropped to the tarmac.

"We gotta call this in." panted Troy as Hank raced off back towards the car.
"I'm on it." came the reply as Hank opened the door and reached for the radio.
"What just happened?" asked Troy. He stopped in the street, looking back at the two bodies in the middle of the road.

Hank poked and prodded the radio as he slammed the car door
"Just static." He yelled to Troy. "It's like nobody is answering."

Troy rested his hand on his thighs and tried to breath deeply. Adrenaline coursed through his veins and his hands started to shake.
"Let's get back to the office ASAP." yelled Hank. He twisted the ignition key. He was in no state to drive, but at least he'd have the car running for Troy. The engine turned over but the car wouldn't start.

As he looked up from the instument panel to his horror he saw another bloodied figured reaching for his friend.
"Troy, TROY!" yelled Hank, but it was too late. The raging thing was upon Troy just as he seemed to be gesturing to Hank. Hank turned in his seat to open the door but right beside him was a woman, bleeding from a viscious wound on her head, clawing at the car window with hate in her eyes.

Troy twisted as cold bloody hands clawed at his neck. He brought his large fists to bear on the man who had grabbed for him. Once, twice, three times. More than any normal man should be able to take. He connected with a stong right hook and the attacker finally went down like a sack of rice.

Hank jumped out of his skin as the woman smashed the car window and reached in to grab him. He pushed himself away from her as fast as he could, kicked at her hands and cowered down in the passenger footwell.

To be continued...

All Things Zombie

Let's Go Camping! - Even More Vehicles for 28mm Zombie Gaming.

I was going to post another All Things Zombie Batrep this week but having fine-tuned my scale-dar, this was too good not to share.

I went camping with the family this weekend, just a few quiet days with nothing to do except stay out of the rain, catch the sun (when it dared show it's face), eat far too many baked beans and share your sleeping bag with grass and earwigs. It was a chance to completely switch off from hobbies and zombies and I didn't even take a zombie novel with me. My scale-dar had other ideas!

I was looking for a lighter (we'd forgotten ours and uncooked bacon just doesn't cut it) what I found, in the on-site 'glamping' store, was these.

VeeDub
First up was this 1962 VW Campervan from 'Welly'. It's not particularly fancy and it wasn't marked for scale although it is pretty iconic. Having picked up quite a few vehicles recently I was happy to take a chance - the second purchase was marked for scale and the two looked okay side by side. The doors don't actually line up that well but I'm fine with that. It is a toy, not a collector's model. and priced accordingly at just over £4.00.

'Welly' 1/43 VW Campervan with 28mm Studio Miniatures Zombie.

It's the freedom it gives you
The second find was the one that got me really fired up. This 1/43 scale 'Teamsterz' car and caravan set is superb and the caravan would definitely count as a building or encounter location. The generic SUV is nothing to write home about but it's a good representation. A little under £7.00 is not bad, especially as you get two models. The caravan is pretty much all plastic but the SUV is die-cast.

"Pull over!" Teamsterz car and caravan.

SUV from the car and caravan set - with opening doors and tailgate.

These two vehicles have given me a great idea for an All Things Zombie scenario, so it's likely they'll crop up in a future Batrep.

The boxed models - if you want to go internet shopping for these.

Speaking of Batreps... coming soon on The Lead Will Walk The Earth...

More Vehicles for 28mm Zombie Gaming

Finding good die-cast vehicles for a 28mm Modern Wargame isn't necessarily difficult, once you settle on a scale, most of us go for 1/43 (I certainly did), it is simply a case of trawling the interwebs, scouring ebay and visiting high street stores.

Unfortunately, it is not always so easy to pick up suitable models at a reasonable price. Some of the more desirable 1/43 models can sell from anywhere up to £200 (yeah, I was surprised too). And at the lowest end of the price scale, the cars are often not even marked so you know what scale they are.

Whilst hunting for vehicles to fill the streets of my All Things Zombie campaign's Outbreak City one tip I found useful was to keep a 28mm model (unpainted) in my pocket whenever I headed to the shops. So if I stumbled across something that looked promising, I had something to compare it against. This didn't guarantee against the perils of scale creep, but it certainly helped.

This little trick stood me in good stead this weekend when, whilst guarding the trolley against the addition of surplus items (kids do that sometimes) during our weekly food shop, I spotted these three beauties in the reduced goods aisle at Tesco.

1/43 - 28mm stone quarry tipper.

1/43 - 28mm Up-and-over skip

1/43 - 28mm refuse lorry, comes with an 1100l Eurobin

These are from their 'large industrial series' and the three models available were a refuse lorry, a truck hauling a large skip and a stone quarry delivery tipper. These are not the smaller HotWheels/Matchbox scale cars. These 1/43 equivalents are not always on the shelves for long, but they're worth it if you can find them.


£1.75 each in Tesco's reduced section. It got my attention.

The potential of the Tesco models was first highlighted to me over at Colin's Down Among the Zed Men. I've always kept an eye out since. Each one of these models was sold for the princely sum of £1.75. Falling prey to the 'addition of surplus items' demon, I almost bought the lot, but settled on one of each instead.

I think they're actually might be just a little bit bigger than 1/43. But they match very closely in scale to the delivery trucks I picked up - the Tesco Load and Go sets, which I updated with BioFlex livery.

Comparison - same scale, more detail, lower price.

In comparison these vehicles are of a far better standard than the previous ones, with crisper lines and additional detailing. They all have moving parts - great for us gamers who like to move bits on models to represent different scenarios on the tabletop and the inclusion of the 1100 litre Eurobin (sometimes referred to as a Taylor bin) is a bonus.

A little large for 28mm but it works well enough.

However, as the name suggests, I'm not sure they have Eurobins in the states, where my Outbreak City All Things Zombie campaign is set. I think I'll use it all the same.

Zombie Shop - UK's first all zombie online store.

In my last post I said I'd been working on a little project, so, here it is:

What is Zombie Shop?
Everything is better with zombies, so, Zombie Shop is the UK's first all zombie online store. It is, quite simply, as much zombie gaming and entertainment goodness as we could fit into one place. It's a shop... with zombies - shopping... but better.

How did Zombie Shop come about?
I've been a fan of zombies since seeing The Night of The Living Dead late one night when I should have been getting some sleep ready for school the next day. Zombies are awesome and zombie stuff is awesome too, but, something always bugged me a little. I always had to get my zomb on from lots of different places. Wouldn't it be good if you could find all sorts of awesome zombie stuff in just one place?

What does Zombie Shop sell?
That's easy - zombie stuff. Stuff that has zombies in, zombie themed stuff, zombie gifts, zombie play-things and zombie gubbins. Zombie gaming and entertainment!

What's in Store?

Zombie Inspiration
We've got zombie films on DVD and zombie books, both fiction and survival instruction - classic, mainstream and cult. Zombie Shop has a huge offering of zombie entertainment to keep even the most die-hard zombie-phile in countless hours of zom-bliss.

Zombie Tabletop Skirmish Games
Zombie Shop stocks the full range of Two Hour Wargames' much-loved All Things Zombie, including: the All Things Zombie core rules, the two supplements ATZ: Haven and ATZ: I, Zombie and, a current UK exclusive, the fantastic ATZ: Risks and Rewards Deck. So if you're based in Europe and concerned about shipping, import taxes and duty, you know where to come.

Zombie Board Games
We've hooked up with Europe's leading distributor to offer a massive selection of board, card and tile-based zombie games, from the classic Zombies!!! from Twilight Creations to Flying Frog's hugely popular Last Night on Earth.

Zombie Role Playing
We have something for the tabletop gamer with All Flesh Must be Eaten, the fantastic D20 based RPG game from Eden Studios and the Zombie LARP gamer will be right at home with our selection of zombie slaying Nerf blasters and gaming accessories.

Zombie Contact Lenses
We stock cosmetic contact lenses that make a startling impact on the way you look. Perfect for zombie LARP, cos-play, Halloween, zombie walks and costume parties, or just for sending a picture into your boss and telling them you feel a bit 'peaky' today and perhaps it's best if you stayed at home till this all blows over.

What's Next for Zombie Shop?
The current offering is a mere drop in the radioactive-meteorite-borne-virus of an outbreak we have planned for the future. We'll be expanding all the current lines and adding some fantastic new ranges including: zombie fancy dress, zombie t-shirts, zombie jewellery, zombie crafts and zombie novelties.

You can follow Zombie Shop on Facebook, so drop by, click like and share with all your friends.

We're also on Twitter.

And... Zombie Shop has it's very own dedicated Blog where you'll find plenty of fresh meat of zombie gaming and entertainment news, reviews and views.

Tell the world, tell your friends, tell your dog, tell your neighbour, tell your hairdresser! If you need a zombie fix, you know where to go...

Get yer zomb on!

zombieshop.co.uk

What does this mean for The Lead Will Walk The Earth?
The Lead Will Walk the Earth will stay exactly as it always has. This is, and always will be, the blog about my Outbreak City 28mm zombie gaming project: the modelling, miniatures, vehicles, painting, play-testing and Batreps. Somewhere to share and gather ideas from fellow zombie gamers.

I will link to the store if I was going to link somewhere else, it would be kinda silly not to, and you might already have noticed the banners, but other than that it's zombie gaming business as usual.

I'm currently working on some new buildings and some amazing custom terrain that a fellow blogger had quite a lot to do with and the next ATZ Batrep is on its way. Till next time.

Zombie Ad

10,000 Hits & Shelldrake's Zombie Wargame Blog

The Lead Will Walk The Earth reached one of 'those' milestones today.

10,000 hits! Blam!

One good hit is all it needs. You're got red on you.

Colin over at Down Among The Zed Men recently nominated me for a stylish blogger award, thank you Colin. As it was so soon after a previous nomination, rather than follow the rules to the letter and take up the whole post with more tedious facts about me, I wanted to share the zombie love and pimp out the work of an Australian zombie game blogger that I've recently discovered.

Shelldrake's Zombie Wargame Blog is putting out some fantastic work on the development of a new zombie gaming project. He's been moving at a fair old pace and, most notably, innovating. He's experimenting with rules and initiative systems, coming out with some great modelling suggestions (his road sign is inspired) and even designing some of his own custom card/paper terrain which he is offering up for free to other zombie gamers and bloggers. Fantastic! So visit Shelldrake's Zombie Wargame Blog and click follow when you get there.

I couldn't finish this post without saying a massive thank you to everyone who has followed, commented, contacted me or otherwise supported the blog. Special thanks have to go to Matt (who got me stated on the whole thing), Bryan (The gentleman superstar of zombie gaming) and Fran (for the awesome blog, the additional traffic and setting such a superb 'how to' example), and OK, if Ray reads this little bit, sorry dude but your buddy does kinda rock! :). It is wonderful to do something you love and find that other people enjoy it too.

Thanks to everyone for the ideas, the inspiration and for sharing the journey so far. I've been busy of late on a little project that might be of interest, some of you might have picked up on it already, but more on that in the next post. In the mean time here's a teaser of a soon to feature All Things Zombie Batrep.

Just when Troy and Hank thought their day couldn't get any worse...