Let's Sperg Fear Equation : The Kiwi Run (In Progress) - 6 tards in a train vs. the nightmare fog

[Judge Dredd]

Fear Equation is a 2016 game by Screwfly, best known for the Zafehouse Diaries games. Their games are part rogue-like, part Oregon Trail, only instead of dysentery, it's people getting into arguments that causes problems.

The story (as seen in the trailer) is that a mysterious fog has appeared that makes people's nightmares real. You (ie. me) are put in charge of an armoured train. The goal is to get a safe zone to the east while rescuing as many people as possible. However, there aren't enough supplies on board to make the trip, so someone has to go outside to get some. The unlucky ones are chosen via lottery, which I can rig.


But the real highlight is I can make custom characters and they'll appear throughout the game. All I need is a picture (forum avatar will do), a name, and a job (unemployed is an option) though you can answer the survey and assign stats if you want. There are 140 slots available, so feel free to nominate yourself, lolcows, game characters, movie stars, anybody you want.

Spoiler: 3 of the 5 starters

MovieBob
Completely useless due to him sitting on Twitter spouting hot takes all day. He trusts the science, and believes none of this would be happening if it wasn't for Trumpsucking obsoletes in red states.


Jim Sterling
Pre-troon because I'm not staring at him in an ugly wig for hours. Jim is also mostly useless, but being a once popular game journo makes him good at negotiating.


And of course, Null.
He might seem OP, but that could be a curse as much as a blessing since he might end up getting chosen losing the lottery to leave the train due to his ability to get things done. And has to share a train with Moviebob and Jim Sterling.

Unfortunately, once the game has started I can't add new people, so get in while you can.

Spoiler: Roster Update 1

I filled out the jobs as best I could, but some were hard to figure out.

I also added a bunch of lolcows and fictional characters to fill out the roster.

Finally, there's the matter of the poll. The game has various themed modifiers that change my backstory.

1. The standard game.
2. Diplomat. The army won't attack the train and passengers rarely fight, at the cost of not being to upgrade the train and the radio keeps getting stuck on show-tunes.
3. Rogue Soldier. I start with a fully upgraded army radio, but the army is really out to get us, and so is the fog.

 

[BONE_Buddy]

First time I have heard of this one.

Use me as a freespace/wildcard to fit in around people with actual opinions.

Name: Bones. Berry D. Bones.

Picture: The my avatar is fine with me.

 

[UncleFezziesPantsPuppet]

Name: Nana
Occupation: 61 year old twitch streamer

 

[L50LasPak]

Think I'll finally join one of these.

Name: Archambault
Occupation: Idle rich faggot

Superlative Laugh Guy can be my face.

 

[mario if smoke weed]

Name: weed dude
Occupation: Free thinker

 

[Fetish Roulette]

Name: Upgrayedd
Occupation: Professional dolla bill nigga


Name: Goodnight Kiwi
Occupation: Sleepy boy

 

[Neo-Holstien]

Name : Neo-Holstien
Occupation : farm fag

 

[ChucklesTheJester]

I argue Jim's negotiating skill would be low. After all, how the hell did his friends Negotiate him into going full tranny if the skill is high?

 

[Judge Dredd]

I argue Jim's negotiating skill would be low. After all, how the hell did his friends Negotiate him into going full tranny if the skill is high?

That's a side effect of the career. Jobs give stat bonuses, so Nurse or Doctor gives a bonus to "treat injury". A builder might give a bonus "hauling" and "repair". It just happens that Journalist gives a big bonus to "negotiation".

Perhaps Jim isn't good at negotiation, but he has enough residual clout that others back him up?

Edit: Updated Roster

 

[Mooger Meng]

Fuck it, why not? This doesn't seem like the kind of place to bring a robot, though...

Name: Mr. Mystery
Occupation: Druid
Supernatural? YES
Punishment? YES
Influence: LOW, who the fuck is going to listen to this guy?


Look at this face. Does this look like the face of mercy?

 

[ChucklesTheJester]

Fuck it, why not? This doesn't seem like the kind of place to bring a robot, though...

Name: Mr. Mystery
Occupation: Druid
Supernatural? YES
Punishment? YES
Influence: LOW, who the fuck is going to listen to this guy?
View attachment 3376047

Look at this face. Does this look like the face of mercy?

His super natural power has to be this theme is always playing when he around right?

Or is it tht his face is always stuck in that half angry half disgust look?

 

[SalmonForSale]

Is it too late to submit Chris Chad?
Occupation: Any good one will do

 

[Fetish Roulette]

OP, when do you think we're going to get rolling?

 

[Judge Dredd]

OP, when do you think we're going to get rolling?

I was supposed to start Monday, but was busy in RL, and used my gaming time to catch up on the E3 thread. Will try to play today, free time permitting. Post should be same day or the day after.

 

[JongleJingle]

Think you can squeeze in one more?

Name: Ron
Occupation: Random hobo who snuck onboard without anybody noticing

 

[Judge Dredd]

Managed to add you, you got here just in time.


Our story begins in an unspecified place. A heavy, supernatural fog rolls in. People's nightmares become real, and those nightmares seem to be getting worse. What's worse, the fog seems to have a mind of it's own. It's drawn to activity, and seeks out people. There are rumours that a place called Sanctuary is free from the fog. It's a long shot, but it's the only shot we have.

Luckily I've "acquired" an armoured train. Unluckily, it doesn't hold enough fuel to get me to Sanctuary.


I already described the game in the OP, so I won't repeat that here. Instead, I'll go over the basics of how the game works, and go in depth into mechanics as it becomes relevant.

This is the train cabin, and is where pretty much the entire game takes place. You move around using wasd or the mouse between three (i guess technically four) workplaces.



The desk is where you manage power, cargo, and passengers.


The computer where you manage messages and deal with things to do with outside the train.


The cab where you plot your course.


And technically I guess the bed counts too.



We don't start with any passengers, so I have to send up a flair and see who responds.

Moviebob, Null, Spoony, Snake Plisskin, and a 40k Space Marine. Nobody brought anything, you cheapskates.


Not much happens early game. I order some defences built, tune the radio to survivor FM, and set course to the nearest town at medium speed. For me, it's a couple of days of waiting around, but something is going on the carriage. For whatever reason, our current team five decides Moviebob is the best to lead them despite being completely useless. Over the next few days, there's clearly something happening back there as the political pie chart moves around before settling on optimistic superstitious.


Soon we are hit by our first attack. Spirits. Not the drinking kind either.


Things go well.

We arrive at town. Our first mission, a raid on a library for supplies and survivors. This screen likely means nothing to you, but here's the battle plan.

Basically, you can order each guy to do one of two things. Search or Guard. Search is self explanatory. You search for supplies. Guard defends people, but it's main use it to shout for survivors so you don't have to go in the room.

However, there a time limit. Run out of time and the fog gets angry and will start to pick off people in areas of high fog. The longer you stay at a given stop the less time you have at each following raid at the same stop.

To buy more time in the fog, you can turn off the train's engine. The problem is this drains the battery. If the power goes out, people on the train start to disappear, and generally bad things happen. Since we're going to be here a while, I choose to turn off the engine for the first raid. The plan is simple, null is the one going to the north of the building because he's fast, and his radius allows him to search both rooms. The rest search the main rooms, and the lolcows search the entrances because they're slow.

Okay team, let's go.

Off to a good start.

Good stuff. Got the supplies, got the survivors (the little dots, 2 are left behind) and leaving the building with lots of time on the clock (the white one) with 40% power to spar- ...guys. ...who is still in the building?

Finally he starts slowly strolling towards the exit. Lights are flashing, alarms are going off, power is at 10%.

And then he seems to get lost.

The last power light is off, time has been at 0 a while.


Fuck.

As soon as the mission ends, I sprint to the front of the train and turn the engine on, so I didn't read or get a screen shot of the results.

But ...we seem to get away with it. No one dies from the fog or power cut. The slow guy got lucky, and I think the power cut didn't kill anyone because everyone was outside the train during it.

And our reward is ...a bunch of normies.

They form their own faction in carriage 2.

The subsequent smash a grab raids go off without a hitch.

I set course for "anywhere but here" and go to sleep. You guys don't get to sleep though. You've got to build me things.

We're attacked by wasps that night. I didn't get a good picture of the attack. Both carriages don't take it well.

I send one of the normies who's good with medicine into the carriage 1 to help heal the people there.

Then there's more bad news. The only way forward is through an army blockade, and I doubt hanging around town stealing scrap and leftovers until they move on is a wise move.

Next time. Ramming speed.

 

[Judge Dredd]

As I left off last time, I set course for the next settlement and floor it, or the train equivalent, only there’s no attack. The army moved before I got to them, which was nice of them.


We get word of an outpost on the way. Null, Snake, and three normies are up for the rescue mission. It goes smoothly, rescuing robocop.


On the way to the city, we’re attacked by wasps again. They attack the normy carriage.

I notice that everyone is healed up, except Spoony. Somewhere along the way he was permanently cursed. Seems appropriate.

At the city, another survivor and supply raid. The first goes smoothly, but we lose a normie on the second.

The politics of carriage 1 are strange too. Bob is elected out in favour of some normie. Later I move the normie out and Bob is re-elected.

I won’t give you the details of everything that happens. It’ll suffice to say that you likely have a good idea of the gameplay loop. For whatever reason, normies are coming up almost exclusively, with the occasionally filler character. I expected two thirds of the characters to be normies as I only filled 40 of the 150 slots (a little over 25%) but other than a YouTuber, no more come up this session. If I run this game again, I’ll see if I can set everyone as priority. Because of this, I start rigging the lottery on days where I know people will be leaving the train so there’s characters you might actually care about.



Not a lot happens honestly. Even attacks by the army do little except the most minor of damage, instantly repaired by the passengers. There’s a passenger dispute entirely between the generic NPCs. Even a throw away suicide mission with normies results in everyone coming back alive.

Then the game softlocked. The save seems to be intact, but there’s a chance we'll have to restart.


Helpful.


So to end this post, let me explain purging and rebellion.

If people like the driver too much, they’ll start a purge, killing anyone who doesn’t like the driver. A rebellion is similar, where they try to overthrow the driver if they don’t like him and end up being killed by sympathisers. Null appeared to be a co-conspirator in a purge. However, despite being woken up by screams and someone banging on the engine door, everyone liked me already so nothing came of it.

 

[Peasant]

Hard to see the downside of a loyalty purge, unless the loyalists are too picky about what constitutes sufficient devotion to Dear Driver, or you just need warm bodies at the moment.

If more nominees are needed, then may I suggest Narcissa Wright? I'm sure those supply runs will go a lot snappier with everyone's favorite speedrunner taking point.

 

[Judge Dredd]

The Let’s Sperg continues. Been busy, and unfortunately, this playthrough has been a bit uneventful. Hopefully I can make it up in future Let’s Spergs.


We stop at one of the major cities. Supply raids go well, except when they don’t. Snake disappears into the fog and never returns. Moviebob is also painfully slow, likely due to his curse. It wasn’t all for nothing though, as we rescued Chris Chad.

Another day, another city. This time Moviebob’s average size McDonalds gets the better of him and fails to outrun the monsters in fog. RIP In Piss


As we progress to the next stop, there’s a dispute in one of the cars. It’s between normies and is largely a nothing burger. I’ll include a screenshot just to show what they look like.


Unfortunately, the fog is so thick at the next stop that it’s not worth the risk to send anyone out. So we keep rolling.

Eventually, we picked up Master Chief as well.

The people on the little flags mark people of interest. They are powerful NPCs that grant special perks. Master Chief was one of these, and his power is the army won't shoot at us.

Like I said, this playthrough has been both uneventful, and most of what has happened has involved the generic NPCs. Hopefully the next one will be better. I'm picking up games on Steam sale that should make for good Let's Spergs.

 

[L50LasPak]

It will make more work on your end, but letting people make more characters per person, say five or six each, might be a good idea since we're not sure which ones we might get. Having to hand-edit 100 character files sucks but it would reduce the normie problem.