Rolling Ones

One thing I'm very happy to see survive the end of the world is role-playing games. My friends and I still occasionally find the time to play Dungeons & Dragons from time to time, and it is thanks to the existence of the game that I can make the reference that is the title of this post. 

In short: when you encounter virtually anything in a role-playing world, you roll a 20-sided die to see how well you deal with it. In this case I'm very specifically referencing traps. When you roll a one, you critically fail. Thanks to Patrick and Dodger, the zombies coming over the walls now critically fail every time they try. 

It's not so much that they don't get over, but that they don't enjoy the trip once they do. There was a heated argument between Will and I yesterday about how we would address the whole problem, and some unkind words were exchanged. Mostly from me. When I get upset and feel I'm in the right and the other person isn't, I tend to lose control of my mouth. It was Dodger and Patrick who saved the day with their brilliant and simple solution. 

We've got nearly the entire interior perimeter of the wall set with traps now. It didn't take very long once the idea was born, not with a thousand people doing the work all at once. We have the buffer on the outside of the wall--the inspiration--and now we have a buffer inside as well. Except instead of being a huge jumble of thick cables, wires, ropes, and cords, this buffer is made up almost entirely of wire strands. We had to cannibalize a lot of the extra power lines we've cut down from the county to use as extras, but stripping the insulation and splitting the wires apart into thin strands was the hardest part. 

After that it was just securing them to the wall in sections. There are bells, scavenged from every corner of town, attached to the wires at regular intervals. When a zombie comes over the wall it has to fall to the ground. The ladders and stairs down are too close to guard posts for the undead to risk using them. They fall into the wires, which does a good bit of damage in addition to tangling them up, and bells sound. Our patrols or sentries and guards hear the bells and go running. The hope is that eventually the New Breed outside the walls will learn that figuring out the weak spots in our patrols and climbing the wall isn't in their best interests and give it up. For now we'll happily take this as a solution since it takes far less people to keep New Haven safe. 

I'm still not thrilled with the leadership's response to this problem. It took a group of us getting together and fighting about it to come to a solution, and the situation never should have gotten that bad. We're supposed to be the people who work together for the common good. I confess myself disappointed. 

But then, we do have a solution, so I can't complain too much. That's very good news considering some reports we've had about the Strangers, but that will have to wait for tomorrow. I want to give any new developments regarding those folks my full and undivided attention.