Borrowed Time

Survival is a Countdown

In Borrowed Time, a squad of desperate survivors must push through quarantined city intersections, overrun hospital wards, and dark railway yards to complete critical operational objectives before their extraction route is cut off forever.

Every decision carries immediate friction. Firing an unsuppressed weapon or fumbling a search test generates sound, drawing infected out of manholes, alleyways, and tree lines in steadily escalating waves. In this world, you cannot outlast the infected—all you have is borrowed time.

FIG 1.0: Small-town crossroads deployment zone. Survivors hold the garage while scouting the gas station and clinic.

Core Gameplay Engine

• 3 Action Point Economy: Allocate AP dynamically across Move, Attack, Aim, Search, Hunker Down, Revive, and Reload. Strictly 1 Quick Hand-Off per turn is free (0 AP), enabling fluid team relays.
• Wits-Driven Scavenging: Search tokens provide access to the 36-card Core Scavenge Deck, while natural 6s grant instant access to location-specific Specialty Decks (Clinic, Armory, Garage, Police Station).
• Scaled Feeding Frenzy & Swarm Disruption: Downed survivors can be rescued before the horde feeds! Allied gunshots stagger the pack, reducing lethality by -1 per hit down to zero.
• Field Crafting & Environmental Stunts: Improvise Molotov cocktails, nail bats, and suppressors on the fly, or drop heavy industrial shelves to crush advancing pursuers.

FIG 2.0: Director Phase swarm activation. Special Infected flank along perimeter choke points.

The Scenarios

The core rules include 10 calibrated missions spanning diverse survival environments, each tuned with calibrated win rates (65%–75% sweet spot) and immersive sensory briefings:

1. Last Stop Gas (7.5/10): Siphon fuel from exploding pumps and secure clinic antibiotics while holding off a relentless central crossroads swarm.
2. The Rooftop Signal (6.5/10): Ascend a multi-story hospital tower, fire an emergency flare, and survive a high-altitude helicopter extraction siege.
3. Blackout at St. Jude's (7.0/10): Brave pitch darkness and an explosive Bloater to restart emergency backup generators and rescue viral samples.
4. Trainyard Escape (6.0/10): Infiltrate a rail switching tower to align turnout points and throttle a locomotive through blocked freight tracks.
5. Highway 9 Deadlock (5.0/10): Parkour across interstate vehicle gridlock, disarm screaming car alarms, and salvage heavy batteries to ram a roadblock.
6. The Gun Store Barricade (6.5/10): Fortify fragile plate-glass showroom windows, crack a reinforced gun safe, and breach an alleyway getaway van.
7. The Church Bells of Mercy (6.0/10): Toll bronze church bells as an acoustic decoy to pull zombies away from an ancestral crypt escape tunnel.
8. The Bridge at Twilight (6.5/10): Slay a keycard-carrying Brute, lower a hydraulic steel drawbridge, and hold a narrow 10" roadway bottleneck.
9. Camp Whispering Pines (6.0/10): Siphon fuel from a rusted tractor, ignite a bonfire decoy, and pilot an emergency motorboat across a dark lake.
10. The Bunker Door (7.5/10): Recover biometric keycards from fallen military commanders, cycle blast airlocks, and withstand an armored horde siege.