State of Decay 2: Lethal Zone

[Part of the Diary of Zombies]

Pretty good start!

Having lost contact with Sanctuary II, Team Humanity sends Umoren, Nestor and David to find out what happened but the trio get lost and crash into a Lethal Zone where it seems the only vehicle is the one they came in. Using caution and well placed outposts, they manage to recruit lichenologist Ursula who can craft medicines at will -since she's a lich- and move into a bridge fortress.

While foraging, David and Nestor run into too many zombies and Nestor saves David from a feral as they run back to base. Unfortunately Nestor is infected by the blood plague and with no cure available David shoots him in the head. Wandering hordes hear this and attack - killing David in the process before Umoren can take them all down. Umoren then goes to resupply with Cash Beaumont but also gets infected en route, so he brings his supplies as close as he can to base before heading off to a hill top graveyard to die.

Ursula reaches these supplies with new recruits Ana Maria and Keene, and the pair decide to move base back to the safer starter house. Ana Maria is infected en route and also ends up being put down by Ursula. With enough fuel and tool kits to repair the starter car now, Keene tries to make his way there but is jumped by a blood feral (all zombie types have the infection now) and while he wins the fight, he makes it back to the house only in time to turn and for Ursula to shoot him in the head.

Somehow, Ursula can maintain her solo survival (cost wise) indefinitely - so she figures why fight the plague hearts when she can just head far into the wilderness where there will surely be less zombies? COMMUNITY ABANDONED (map fail).

Insight: "Legacy characters" you bring into the new game always come with whatever is in their inventory so if you like planning ahead gear up like mad before finishing a legacy quest so that they can start with a leg up.

State of Decay 2: Hamlet Squad

[Part of the Diary of Zombies]

Despite all their talk, Rev maintains her leadership and finds more ammo thanks to the assistance of Red-Talon over the radio. David and Little Joe join her army and warn about an opposing army entering the area and much like the bandits that Val dealt with - Rev takes Joe to get information from their scouts (violently) then attacks the stupid leaders who unlike the bandits, have no backup and are meeting in a shed? Rev softens them up by luring a speedy feral into them before executing the trio to secure her legacy (map victory).

"Tell me what I want to know and I'll shoot!"

A trading team named "Hamlet Squad" composed of squidman Dan of "Team Humanity" and "Stragglers" Lory and Beth are then sent to Meageher Valley where the starting house is AGAIN almost a carbon copy of the other starting houses. Lazy much? Dan is elected leader while Team Sanctuary again provides utilities Team Humanity delivers a HUGE stockpile of weapons, ammo and grenades (benefit of winning as warlord) to them. This, along with the fact that pretty much every neighboring enclave is some form  of military group, makes the plague hearts in the region a piece of cake.

Squidman Dan wastes no time in recruiting soldiers Zeb, Rocio, Hailey and Kraken and establishes a trade summit among all the remaining soldiers. Some idiot thieves try to crash the party and get themselves killed easily. The zombie horde that comes to checkout the gunfire afterwards takes longer to clear out but are not a problem for a room full of armed and trained soldiers (on this difficulty). Once Zeb and Dan kill the final juggernaut in melee, the summit is a success and Dan secures his legacy (map victory). These successes have let the survivors expand the territory greatly, but now find their borders next to zones where the blood plague is more intense.

Insight: Trader leaders seem to be rare, and that's possibly because their legacy quests are super easy. Also without fail, every single game one survivor is going to have a prepper aunt whose quests eventually provide a jeep and a .22 silenced rifle.

Thea: Impending Doom

[Part of the Darklands of Arkania Story.]

The supplies recovered by Team Ardwulf give the Memorial Ground another period of peace during which time the legend of Chief Talarian grows, and more people join: David DM, Fiona Nerd, Dina Farmer, and Sister Kia. Also growing are the children, all following in the warrior footsteps of their chief: Plushie Mostly, Seth Megadirge,  and Screaming Monk.

The chief leads Team Talarian (composed of Tacktix TLC, Tyranno Dorkus, Ancient Gamer, Xinrae, Plushie Mostly, David DM and Liopleureodon) on another lightning raid against nearby slavers and manage to save a child but lose Liopleureodon in the process. More worryingly is the amount of high level orc raiding lairs spotted that are now around the Memorial Site. While they are out, the town is attacked by werewolves! I guess Team Ardwulf didn't get them all...

Damn dogs probably just want the bones in the Graveyard.

The wolf men are upset about the whole slaying of their lair thing, but somehow it is Rhino who scares off the whole pack with silver before any combat even takes place. Soon after, Team Talarian returns to help bolster and upgrade the town defenses for the impending siege. This is turn 300.

That Didn't go Well

Part of my XCOM: Defenders of the Earth series!

Finally we have constructed our first Firestorm, a hybrid of human/alien tech to make one badass plane. Got to try it out too as it shot down an unknown sized UFO (looked pretty big) without taking much damage. The Sky Ranger transport was not far behind with the Bondi Vet, Cosmos, Derka Derka, Lucky Jew, rookie Sofia and Captain Mustachio tasked with sweeping up the mess, and what a mess it would turn out to be! As the team neared the crash site the first thing they ran into is a mini-ufo!?

Oh... shiii@#!

Since it looked tough I ordered them to expend all their explosives on taking it down (which just barely did the trick) but just as soon as that exploded a large group of little sectoids appeared in the woods with two drones, and though the team survived the firefight they were all injured from the encounter as they proceeded into the UFO proper. It was there they encountered THREE sectoid commanders, and due to the teams lack of firepower at that point they failed to down a single one in their opening barrage, only injuring them.

The sectoids responded by mind controlling Sofia the rookie which panicked Cosmos into shotgunning her to death. Soon after Cosmos himself was mind-raped by one, causing him to put the barrel of his weapon into his mouth and blow his own brains out. A panicked Derka was shooting wildly, injuring Captain Mustachio who then found a face full of plasma bullets, melting it off and killing him in slow agony. Not sure how Bondi Vet and the Lucky Jew pulled it off then, but between the two of them (and ricocheting bullets from Derka) they downed the remaining enemies and got the hell out of there. Mission complete!

My Churro, Your Taco

Part of my XCOM: Defenders of the Earth series!

Soldiers Lost in the Second Month: 2
Campaign Total: 9

After selling a surplus of scopes to Russia to help them with some missile launch, it was time for another council meeting and the end of month two. Thanks to last minute satellite launches everyone was still onboard with the XCOM project giving me a grade of "A" again, but those little panic bars just seem to keep creeping up. A large UFO made an appearance not long after but my little fighter plane had no chance to shoot that one down so I ordered it back while it could still fly. Back in the base I -FINALLY- have my officer training school and can now send FIVE operatives on the field.

Just what I need, because Dr. Vahlen's wailings were getting too annoying and it was time to capture one of the bastards. Next contact was at a gas station in Mexico where floaters and thin men were enjoying burritos I suppose. I sent veterans Panicman, Mister "Nuke" Mustachio, Big Mike, Gravedigger and David "the lucky Jew" because he got to carry the tazer. :P

Taking cover next to cars and pumps at a gas station sounded like a catastrophic plan but it surprisingly worked very well. With suppressing fire from Panicman, accurate sniping from Gravedigger and well placed grenades and rockets from heavies Big Mike and Mustachio the aliens lost their cover pretty quick, followed by their lives. The Lucky Jew even managed to taze one before almost getting killed himself, yet on one HP he killed two more bastards with his pistol and flanked a thin man for a point blank shotgun blast.

Mission complete! Excellent performance all around if I do say so myself, and finally Dr. Vahlen is happy. I saw her singing and skipping past my office door with a large bottle of lube in hand. That poor, poor alien we captured though...

Dr. Dolly Vahlen is ready to begin the "interrogation".

Alien Necromancy

Part of my XCOM: Defenders of the Earth series!

Nigeria called, and no - it wasn't to try phish me a million dollars. It was because the aliens were digging up the dead bodies in a cemetery there, I can only assume because they were having major issues killing living humans. Sent a sniper heavy Valkyrie team composed of Ikede, Airhead, Bald Witch and sole assault Punk Chick. They sorted that mess out quick smart since the open ground made for the perfect playground for the snipers while Punk Chick took control of the central tomb. Their reward was a black sniper dude I call Gravedigger with a massive ... rifle. I'm certain they enjoyed their trip back.

Just as well because the alarm went off again, and the global news showed the aliens were altering their tactics. Punk Chick geared up again this time with Panicman, Mustachio and David to stop a terror strike on Canada. Almost immediately they came upon a pair of incredibly fast moving bug critters called GENESTEALERS... I mean, Chrysallids - literally running up to Punk Chick's face. A point blank blast from her shotgun only grazed the creature (1 dmg!) but lucky for her the rest of the team had enough firepower to bring it down.

The second one abruptly altered course to feast on a nearby civilian before being blasted to hell. This is where Punk Chick's luck ran out as suddenly the dead man rose as a zombie right next to her and in a sudden move tore out her insides and began eating them. David and Panicman put the reanimated bastard back on the floor, then the team swept up the remaining murderous jetpack boys to finish the mission.

Mission complete. Of the 18 civilians in the area initially, they saved 10. That's a pretty good result!

Probably wouldn't even have been an issue if there were more strippers in the area.

Raiders of the Downed UFOs

Part of my XCOM: Defenders of the Earth series!

Finalising a trade to Australia (who wanted to buy alien alloys) the UFO alert went off again, this time in Japan. A bigger ship than last time! Fortunately I had constructed an interceptor there and our ace pilot Vince McCool was visiting the region at the time. Looked like a nasty dogfight but Vince shot down that bastard in the end despite taking a ton of damage himself. Deployed Mister Mustachio and Panicman along with newbies Cosmos and David.

Seemed this ship contained Jetpack boys AND Thin men along with the little dudes. The first group was a non issue, eliminated by overwatch fire mainly while the thin men got to enjoy high explosives of the rocket and grenade variety. It's annoying then that as the team advanced on the ship Cosmos was downed by overwatch fire from the normal little dudes, because he didn't DODGE!

Even the aliens facepalmed.

After teaching those SOBs a lesson my remaining three men busted into that UFO, surrounded the alien pilot and summarily executed him (Dr. Vahlen: WHYYYYYY!?). At least it seems I'm improving with these UFO raids. The following one that landed (not shot down) was tactically cleaned out by David, Big Mike, the Italian and Mustachio with no casualties through liberal use of explosives and lure and kill tactics. As a celebratory gesture I let them explode the ship. (Dr Vahlen: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! MY RESEARCH!)

Missions Complete, and somehow Cosmos actually survived (guess I finished before he bled out)! Despite all these victories though it seems like most of the world is on the verge of panic. Oh well, I'm sure that's not important. Right?