User:Rosslessness/Ethos
The Outbreak Control Unit provided my first experience of a meta group, and we made a brave stand against zombie numbers in Rhodenbank. I recieved a bizarre vanguard award
(->)
for being the last player out of the red zone. (That might come up again).
Things were going well until we moved to Vinetown, where we based ourselves out of Ling Boulevard Police Department. After a couple of weeks, and a disturbing knack for recruiting newbs I got offered the position of Sergeant of their Beta team, focussing on repairs and revives. I also became the point man for communicating with other groups. Notably M.E.R.C.Y..
Now if you don't know, M.E.R.C.Y. are a group that's been operating out of Northern Vinetown since early 2007, and they're still there as of 2013. They aren't a traditional survivor group. They have an excellent roleplaying section on their forum, run one of the most reliable revive points around, and whenever they're PK'd they completely ignore it. They also very rarely shoot anyone.
However (stop reading this when it becomes familiar) an argument between one member of each group about cade levels led to our entire alpha squad going mad and gunning down half of M.E.R.C.Y. Repeatedly. It reached the stage where most of beta squad ( me and the newbs ) were reviving members of another group killed by our own members.
This was my introduction to the survivor side of Malton.
Needless to say MERCY just ignored the PK'ing and the Alpha Squad got bored, and left. ( and then declared war on each other if you believe Garden ). Meanwhile the remnants of the group got back to surviving, organised a visit from Drama Club and engaged in a miniature invasion of Dentonside with a ragtag gang made of various members of most vinetown groups. At the time the place was a ghost town, thanks to the presence of the ridiculously tiny zombie group Zomburbia!. After this the group mainly faded away, but I stayed in Vinetown.
Personally I don't like sitting still. Like Soviet Russia I believe that the safest defense is safe suburbs, surrounded by safe suburbs, surrounded by safe suburbs. Vinetown entered a year of almost total safety, barring Big Bash 2 turning up. (Twice). I spent this time roaming the area as far as Penny Heights and Paynerton, assisting where the need was greatest.
About then I started using other characters, one working for Necrowatch in the north west, and the other (also) working for Necrowatch in the north east. I'm just lucky its not a group, or you'd all shout at me for zerging.
About this time, I moved my main alt out of vinetown, so my vinetown scout could help me record all the info on all the buildings. Soon afterwards he got bored and started writing for The Daily Spotlight , moving through the south and interviewing people in game. Mostly I followed major Zombie Hordes and wrote stuff about rebuilding efforts. It really struck me how varied the reclamation efforts were. Some suburbs could be up and running in a few days, others never seemed to recover.
Then 2 things happened. The Dead turned up and Monroeville opened. My interest was devoted to the new city and I idled two high level alts packed with needles and focussed all my efforts in Malton into my main character.
Things started badly. At the start I was dying every 12 hours. In the end I had to travel 4 blocks based on a rumour that a NT was up and well manned. It turned out to be true and the almost 400 survivors inside got me patched up quite quickly. After that it was NT hopping for a few days, ploughing through revive points trying to get as many other revivers back to the land of the living.
Luckily Vinetown was the perfect place to mount a recovery. As it lacked any needle factories The Dead had just blown through and less than a week after their arrival there were sufficient survivors to retake the TRPS and the Mall. Survivors quickly filled the area from the surrounding devastated suburbs and they grabbed ammo, fak and fuel to mount a recovery.
One of the most surreal debates I've ever had happened at this time. With the danger map of Malton looking a little crimson, we embarked on a two day discussion about whether or not we should advertise the comparative safety of the area. In the end we nudged the danger report to dangerous (orange) and prayed that we hadn't doomed ourselves by stating it wasn't a complete deathtrap.
To give them their credit, The Dead were one of the best things to happen to UD. We were in a zombie apocalypse, and nowhere was safe. Survivors were forced to cooperate and the number of revives almost doubled. It brought into sharp focus the downside of current survivor tactics.
after that Vinetown Volunteer Company
More to come, Manhunts, 404 fun and some peace and quiet.
Just as The Dead began tearing the world apart. Monroeville opened. I created a few survivors, and a zombie or two. This was day one. Within a few hours I'd got bored with waving my Video Camera about, and Steve Elson had met Little Daddy
Steve's idea was to start the cities first horde. So we did. The Monroeville Many swung into action. At the same time Malton's resident zombie groups were creating spin offs, but we were there first.
Clustering around West Monroeville it took us over a week to get together in a city with no maps. IRC Strikes occurred for the first week, as the Street Treats were devoured and the precious Memories of Life became ever closer, we got better.
By week two we were tearing open TRPs everyday. We ruined the local phone mast before most survivors even got phones. Then only one day later, we began eating Archway Mall.
This all became ridiculously easy. The survivor alts idled, and zombie carnage ensued. Soon after we coordinated with the other groups to take down the jewel of Monroeville, in the wonderfully written The Fall of Monroeville Mall.
This began a mini mall tour. Archway and Drummond both falling in a ridiculously short time.
Of course then, Kevan screwed us.
With the perma headshot rule, sieges became pointless. Survivors headshot zombies then fell back behind barricades. Any survivors we killed didn't rise to replace our losses, they just stayed dead. Even The Brain Trust didn't help.
I moved with the remaining members of my horde to Newtown. There were few survivors or zombies, so XP gains were significantly lower, and few survivors had Headshot. We lasted a few more weeks here, clawing at each other when low on health to protect our members as sleeping corpses.
In the end, there were few of us left. After being shotgunned to death by a level 8 player, I decided to stay down, waiting for an oppurtunity to rise up and attack the living again.
This time was most important to me, because, for the first time, I actually played as a zombie. If you haven't done it, go create one right now. Killing survivors in a perma death is immensely satisfying. Also this was the first time I was ever involved in group leadership, and frankly its beyond me. I have a lot of respect for people who successfully run groups.
When Monroeville reopened and headshot death was removed, things moved very quickly. On the first day of the second coming we destroyed every building Outside the City, and then went headshot hunting. Counting down the survivors on the stats page, ruining swathes of the city were happy days. Few survivors escaped, but I never really understood how those last few survivors kept alive.
Borehamwood started much the same as Monroeville. A handful of alts, both living and dead.
