Game: Zombies!!! 5: School's Out Forever

Thread: Re: guts variants out there?

Gazrok — 2008-08-08T13:15:30+00:00

We simply make 2 guts tokens = 1 health token. That way, you can choose whether to lose guts or a life, and they have a little bit more meaning. It's a simple change, and gives a lot more meaning to them.

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Steve56 — 2008-07-20T14:22:18+00:00

German Edition: Totencampus

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Steve56 — 2008-07-20T14:21:51+00:00

German Edition: Totencampus

Thread: Re: guts variants out there?

Yokiboy — 2008-04-12T21:03:57+00:00

I am sort of considering Guts the same thing; a character's mental stability. I wanted to tie Guts to Kills. Sort of like leveling when they reach a certain level of kills.

For instance, new characters start at three Guts as normal. Then award one Guts per 5 Kills. This further encourages people to hunt zombies, in addition to shooting for the 25 Kill win condition. Then just let the cards, and sitautions such as entering the sewers (Z6), lower Guts as normal.

Thread: guts variants out there?

El_Scorcho — 2008-04-11T19:04:59+00:00

Ive had Zombies!!!5 for quite some time but i never seem to get to use the guts properly. They punish players for rolling a 1 which is unnecessary and the most they ever do is give you a bigger hand. If i wanted to play with a bigger hand i would just set hand limit to 5.

I use several fixes in my play such as the movement fix, separate item deck and a customized event deck. And now im trying to give guts tokens a relevant part in the game. But how?
Ive read all the zombies!!! variants i could find but still no sign of alternate guts rules.

I tried coming up with a variant where guts represent your mental health since physical health is already taken care of. So please help me out here. How do you lose you mental health and what is the penalty if you panic(lose all you guts)? Anyone else has suggestions on this? I also tried blend in the dice with the red one determining health and the blue one determining mental state. But once again: How?

Has anyone solved this or has any ideas?

Thread: Re: Gutting Hell

Yokiboy — 2008-04-07T19:08:58+00:00

Nice review. I find the Guts mechanics poorly implemented as you're already punished in the game for rolling a 1, now just more so. However, like everything else with Zombies!!! it's easy enough to tweak for your own game.

I'd love to see a complete list of the cards in this set, but appreciate your glimpses. I don't think the rules of the cards spoil them so much, as the fun is usually in the art. I'm just curious if more cards interface with Guts than that Straight Jacket.

Thread: Re: 2nd edition?

bknightsb — 2007-07-19T15:45:03+00:00

jcb231 wrote:
Actually Zombies 6 is already published in second edition style, according to the Twilight folks. It was second edition from the get-go.
Oh, good to know... didn't have the time yet to look at it!

Thread: Re: 2nd edition?

jcb231 — 2007-07-18T17:57:15+00:00

Actually Zombies 6 is already published in second edition style, according to the Twilight folks. It was second edition from the get-go.

Thread: Re: 2nd edition?

bknightsb — 2007-07-18T17:23:24+00:00

No, not available yet as a 2nd edition! And the same goes for Zombies!!! 6, before you ask...

Thread: 2nd edition?

jcb231 — 2007-07-18T15:03:22+00:00

Does anyone know if the second edition of this is out yet? The one that matches the Director's Cut version of the game?

Thread: Guts and more

sdonohue — 2007-01-08T03:00:05+00:00

First things first, I received a copy of this game for free.

I like the Zombies!!! series, so my review may be biased. I think this expansion is the second best in the series (my first choice would be the all card expansion (3.5 Not Dead Yet!). The big reason I like it is the addition of the Guts rules.

Components
The game comes with 16 new tiles, 32 news cards (2 each of 16 different cards), a sheet of "Guts" tokens, and new rules.

Setting
As with most of the expansions, this one moves Zombies!!! into a new locale, in this case a college campus. Rules are provided for either using the expansion as a stand-alone (although you'd still need the base Zombies!!! set) area or as an addition to other expansions. Either way, the setting is well-realized. There are most of the buildings you'd expect to find and the cards are well-themed as well. Some of the cards and/or illustrations will probably remind you of some of your favorite college movies, which I consider a good thing.

Rules
The big addition to the core rules is the use of Guts. Guts tokens can range from 1 to 5 and govern your hand size. Players start with 3 Guts tokens. The basic way to gain or lose them is to roll a 6 (to gain Guts) or a 1 (to lose Guts) while in combat. You can also gain or lose guts as the result of certain event cards. Overall, the guts rules make a nice addition to the system and provide another area for choices. They also work to reward players who engage in combat.

Recommendation
If you like Zombies!!! this is a great addition. The guts rules alone are worth the price of admission and can make even your existing games of Zombies!!! more fun without adding a lot of complexity.
If you don't like Zombies!!! this expansion probably won't change your mind. On the other hand if you disliked it because there wasn't enough reason to fight or because you felt like you needed more choices in event cards, then this expansion may be enough to change your mind.

Overall, I think this is a worthy addition to a great game.

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Yugblad — 2006-11-05T02:37:51+00:00

Paris and Britney decided to blast their way out using automatic weapons.

Thread: Gutting Hell

Jonathan Ward — 2006-06-30T11:28:07+00:00

Zombies!!! 5 Expansion “School’s Out Forever” Review

Yet another expansion from Twilight Creations for their splatter-fest game “Zombies!!!” disembowels itself onto the shop shelves in the intestinal-form of “Schools Out Forever”. Apparently it was all over quite recently with the stand alone Zombies!!! game entitled unambiguously “The End” but nothin’ isn’t what it seems in the crazy, commercial world of zombie Armageddon! Being an ardent fan of the original game and having purchased Zombies!!! 3.5 and “The End” (not so) I was intrigued by this release. The group I skirmish with are satisfied with the base game combined with the 3.5 card expansion and have not felt inclined to buy the Mall and Army Base expansions as yet. The motivation then for purchasing this expansion was solely the “Guts” mechanic.

So what do you get for your doubloons? Well, not an awful lot but then this is a relatively inexpensive expansion. There are 16 new tiles comprising the college campus:

1 School Entrance
1 Helicopter Pad
5 Crossroads
2 Car Parks
7 Buildings

Buildings are the usual dead-ends or through-roads consisting of the Medical School, Dormatory, Hospital, Phys Ed building, Admin Building, Rec Hall and Science Center. Twilight Creations have been unusually generous in the amount of life tokens provided at these locations this time around. It is therefore advantageous to explore this part of the map when it appears in order to quickly increase your Heart quota to the max. Bullets are less in evidence but then this is a college campus.

The package also contains 32 new Event Cards to add to your existing deck. There are in reality two of each of these Event Card’s thus providing 16 new ‘event’ additions for your undead amusement. I will not list all the cards as part of the fun on purchase is scanning through the cards grunting and gasping at their level of nuisance, screwage, cruelty, et cetera. Notable cards for our group were:

Straight Jacket : Where target player loses all his GUTS tokens. Particularly cruel even by Zombiess!!! Standards.

Scalpel : Where the card (a scalpel) can be passed around the table (at a price) incurring a –1 modifier to all combat rolls on the target player. This proved great fun when played and was one of the most memorable.

Pillow Fight : Where Bullet power is reduced to half it’s normal value. Also the art on this card is so funny… in a kind of zombie-cannibalistic-necrosexual way!

Student Loan : Where players may borrow another players item and use it during their turn before returning it. This caused the odd grunt of disapproval by those on the receiving end who had earlier worked hard to get a weapon or item.

Valediction : When played allows a player to look at the next three tiles on the map stack and choose one replacing the other two in what ever order he sees fit. Can be devastating in a two-player game.

So far so good. Now I will move onto to the new rules and the sole reason for buying this expansion in the first place. The ‘Guts’ mechanic. In the box you get 30 blue Guts tokens. At the start of play each player receives 3 Guts tokens (along with his usual cache of 3 Hearts and 3 Bullets) and may throughout the game increase this number to a maximum of five (just like the Hearts rules). The number of Guts tokens corresponds to the number of Event Cards in your hand. Thus 3 Guts tokens = 3 Event Cards. 5 Guts tokens = 5 Event cards (nice!). 0-1 Guts token = 1 Event Card (thank goodness! Playing Zombies!!! with not even one Event Card in your hand would be indescribable in its agony). Player’s increase or decrease their Guts token cache through zombie combat. Throwing an unmodified six during combat grants one Guts token up to a max of 5. Now for the slippery, blood-soaked down side. If a player throws a 1 on the die then a Guts token is removed from the player’s cache. At the end of his turn a player adds or removes Event Card’s to match the number of Guts tokens in his cache.

So how does this new mechanic play out amidst the claustrophobic butchery of zombie combat? Well, its all about luck and the vagaries of the dice. It can be both a depressing and rewarding experience. You do become painfully aware of how many times throughout a game you throw a one. In one game I threw three consecutive one’s losing three Hearts, three Guts tokens and thus three Event Card’s all in one turn…cripes!!! that hurt and still makes me shudder even now. Personally, I think it suits 4+ player games over a two-player game where it is a too decisive a mechanic if one player is down to 1 card while the other greedily sits atop 5 cards (personal experience!).

I think overall it is a worthy addition to the Zombies!!! base game. It has caused much good-humoured shouting, groans of despair, hoots of laughter and impatient calls for yet another game…which is in the end the best accolade a game (expansion) can receive.

Thread: Re: A new twist on a great game that enhances all expansions

jbwc — 2006-05-05T16:31:33+00:00

I have yet to play this version, but I did play the first game. I think the game moved along fairly quickly so long as people know what they're doing. (Getting newbies to play without having to consult the rules every turn was a challenge- I just created a player card, a 3.5 x 6 inch sheet to have for each player. It contains quick rules, a pool box for bullets, 5 boxes for life tokens, and 4 characters THE HERO, THE LOOSE CANNON, THE SCIENTIST to name a few, to represent the number of times you can respawn in the town square) Having this card helped out alot and gave Zombies a more 'board game' feel. This was something that Twilight Creations should have included in the set but didn't.

Thread: Re: To the helipad in 9 rounds

ccarlet1 — 2006-04-28T18:13:15+00:00

That's a tough choice. I would say this:

School's Out (First choice if you are looking to add on to the basic package IMHO): the best cards, and lots of bullets and hearts, so that is a good point. I don't like or use the Guts tokens. I don't find this mechanic adds anything interesting to the game.

Mall Walkers: the air duct mechanic is cool, but I haven't found I have used it as much as I thought I would. The cards are good, but not as good as School's Out and there are as many goodies.

Zombie Corpse: good, but if you're only buying one, just by a bag of glow in the dark zombies if you really feel the need.

Zombies 4!!!: (First choice as a standalone). Haven't used it as an expansion for the basic game, and I don't think doing so would do it justice, but if you are looking for a stand alone, this is it.

I will also post this as a general forum discussion to see what other people think.

Thread: Re: To the helipad in 9 rounds

stlcardinalsfan — 2006-04-28T14:25:04+00:00

yeah it helps. If I could only buy one, which would you recommend.

Thread: Re: To the helipad in 9 rounds

ccarlet1 — 2006-04-28T05:23:36+00:00

If you liked the original game, yes. Z5 has some very good cards, and the campus is loaded with goodies. Mall Walkers' tiles are also loaded with goodies, the air ducts help you move quickly, and the cards are good. Z2 is a little disapponting, although the uberzombies are a cool idea you can work into variants. Z4 is a good standalone.

I use the expansions with the base game, and I like how they add a new and somewhat unpredictable element to the game. I usually only play Zombies!!! of any kind with 3-4 players, and find with this number that the game is not slow, with or without an expansion pack.

I hope that helps.

Thread: Re: To the helipad in 9 rounds

stlcardinalsfan — 2006-04-28T01:43:11+00:00

Are the expansion packs really worth buying?

Thread: To the helipad in 9 rounds

ccarlet1 — 2006-03-30T18:36:44+00:00

I have all the expansions for Zombies!!! (if for no other reason than I am a big zombie movie fan), but had only had the chance to use Zombies!!!5 expansion once, and that was in combination with Mallwalkers and the core game. That time the campus gate came up after the mall entrance and we didn't explore much of it.

This time we played with just the core game and Zombies!!!5 and it was a fast and furious game. This was a three player game with my wife, Penny, and my son, Cole.

Reading other reviews of Zombies!!! I have read complaints about game speed, but I haven't found this to be a problem, with very little tinkering. This session was faster than some, and clocked in at 45 minutes.

I shuffled the campus entrance into the top third of the core deck of tiles (I have found this to make games with expansion packs more interesting than shuffling the entrance into the top half). We used two separate piles of cards: one for the core game and one for the expansion. Players are free to draw from both.

In round 1 two stores popped up from the core set, and in round two the entrance to the university came up. The great thing about Zombies!!!5 is that it has lots of goodies, and named buildings were coming up fast. By round four, the whole campus was milling with zombies.

One very important modification to make when playing with an expansion pack is not to fill the entrance and the four way intersection that comes after it with zombies. We only put one zombie in the middle of the four-way and none at the entrance. Otherwise you have to run a wicked gauntlet to the expansion area and players wisely stay in the town.

By the fifth round, Cole was on campus killing zombies at a furious rate, and had bagged 11 of them. After all, you have to be going for the 25 zombie win at all times. You never know when the helipad will show up, and the 25 zombie kills wins about 50% of our games. (This is one rule you should not dispense with unless you enjoy long drawn out games).

By round six, I had bagged 11 zombies, Cole 12, and Penny 7. Then Cole was killed by a zombie who just wouldn't die, and went back to town square.

In round seven, the helipad was drawn and place by Cole so that he had to cover the minimum distance possible from town square. While Cole was back at town square, I was ready to make my run for the helipad. I had been raiding buildings, and had one life and one bullet left, and I got a little closer. Penny was still back in town surrounded by zombies, due to a zombie master card, but was bagging them at every opportunity.

By round eight, Cole was back on campus, and I was within sight of the helipad. I got a good roll, but was sent in the opposite direction by a card played by Penny.

By round nine, Cole was within five of the helipad, and that was exactly what he rolled. I played the "Where's the Admin Bldg." card, which would have sent him in the opposite direction, but he countered with "Raise you hand" which negated my card. (We try to make use of the discard virtually every turn to ensure a good supply of cards--unless you are to certain to be going to the building on a building specific card, discard it). He killed four zombies and made it to the helipad, winning the game.

Penny had accumulated 17 zombies, while I had 15.

This was a very good session. Penny wins the majority of our games. She claims that it is because she is less aggressive and quietly goes about killing zombies while the rest of us go in for the big kills and the helipad.

The Zombies!!! series is a blast!!!

Thread: Re: A new twist on a great game that enhances all expansions

jcrim13 — 2006-03-13T21:03:31+00:00

The 'speed' problem is everybody's issue with Zombies!!! in general. Without a doubt, use the 'fastplay' rules posted on the geek for the original game, and suddenly it's a fun frantic zombie-bashfest... those tweaks change everything, remove the over-rolling factors, and make the game fun imo... try em.

Thread: Re: A new twist on a great game that enhances all expansions

Broken — 2006-03-13T03:45:25+00:00

My problem with Zombies!!! is mostly speed. The game plays too slowly, and the endgame is really friggin' long (or happens so quickly that it might as well not exist). Does this expansion change that at all?

Thread: Re: A new twist on a great game that enhances all expansions

anubis9 — 2006-03-12T05:51:25+00:00

Maybe.
It depends on why you hate it.
If you hate it because there's "too much" randomness and luck involved, then NO.
The guts are earned and lossed based on the roll of the dice and the luck of the draw, there's nothing your "skill" can do to change it.
But if you want to play a game, where you get to sacrifice your friends to the zombie horde, while you watch from the helicopter, then the sadistic side of you will really like this expansion.

Thread: Re: A new twist on a great game that enhances all expansions

generalpf — 2006-03-10T19:46:32+00:00

Great review, but if you hate Zombies!!!, will this expansion help?

Thread: A new twist on a great game that enhances all expansions

anubis9 — 2006-03-09T21:14:17+00:00

First off, this is an expansion, so if you donï¿½t have the core game, this won't do you any good. If you do have the core game, this is an expansion that adds quite a bit of depth to the game.

This time you and your friends are trapped on a college campus, and like all other expansions you are searching for the single seat on the coveted helicopter. But this game does introduce some enjoyable changes that add new ways to gain the advantage and backstab your buddies.

On the surface, the changes seem pretty subtle. The biggest thing long-time players will notice is the addition of "guts" tokens. These tokens control how many cards you have in your hand (from one to five).

It sounds simple, and it is, but it has a pretty dramatic effect on the game. It's amazing how much harder the game is to play when you only have one or two cards, and your opponents have four or five.

Guts are primarily won and lost based on your performance in zombie combat (you lose one of you roll a 1, you gain one if you roll a 6), but to accentuate the addition of guts many of the cards in the expansion also effect the new tokens. Now it's possible to lose your whole hand with a well-played card.

If you're not a big fan of the campus setting, it is very easy to port the guts into the core game's city or any of other expansions, but to really get the full effect, you need to use the cards that effect guts as well.

One of my favorite additions was a dastardly little card called "scalpel." The card gives the player you give it to a -1 on their combat rolls. You can give it back by discarding a heart, bullet, or gut, token, but if you're low on guts it can really hurt to give it away.

This one card can have a pretty drastic effect on the dynamics of the game, and luckily, the card text names a number of buildings it can be played in, including the hospital, so the card can easily be shuffled into your deck when playing with just the core game's city tiles.

Another good change is the reduction of building specific cards. In past sets, certain cards could only be played in one specific building (play when you are in the Sporting Goods Store). While there are still a few of those, there are also some great cards that allow you to play them on any Zombies 5 tile. That makes the cards far less likely to end up in the discard pile.

As with all Zombies expansions (except for 2) there is a code in the lower corner of all the cards, telling you which set the cards are from, so it is very easy to pick and chose your favorite cards and use them in other expansions without worrying about them getting lost in the deck.

While I think all of the Zombies!!! Expansions have added some great elements to the game, the additions have always been very set specific (air vents are only in the mall, the super zombies are only in the military base). This set breaks that mold and gives you some great new game elements that you can use every time regardless of which setting you want to play in.

Zombies 5 is a must-buy for any fan of the game who wants to add a new level of (slight) complexity to the games as well as some great new ways to screw your friends and reach the chopper first.

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fsumarc — 2006-02-28T16:56:52+00:00

Zombies 5 new guts tokens

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fsumarc — 2006-02-28T16:56:20+00:00

Zombies 5 school themed card samples

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fsumarc — 2006-02-28T16:54:36+00:00

Zombies 5 Twilight University entrance

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fsumarc — 2006-02-28T16:53:06+00:00

Zombies 5 box back

Thread: Re: Guts?

Frozen — 2006-01-23T00:54:51+00:00

"Guts" dictate the number of cards you can have in your hand at any given time. Most of the new cards relate to adding/removing "Guts" tokens.

Thread: Re: Guts?

Dr. Wolfensteinula — 2005-12-17T11:09:34+00:00

i have no idea, but id guess some kind of modification to action rolls or for performing specific tasks, kinda like claustrophobia maybe youd have to run away if you didnt have enough guts. but then again on the other hand you might just throw them at zombies and hope they slip on em

Thread: Guts?

anubis9 — 2005-11-30T17:06:46+00:00

Ok, we have just over a month before this expansion comes out, and as a Zombies!!! addict, I cannot wait!
So in the mean time, what do you think the new "guts" mechanic will involve?
Throwing them at zombies to slow them down?

Let me know what you think or what you'd do with a "guts" mechanic.

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zombiegod — 2005-11-13T19:46:02+00:00