Call of Dead notes

Ok, finally I put some notes on Call of the Dead.

Call of the Dead features a stand-in cast of American actors from horror films: Sarah, Danny, Ray and Michael.
It also features George A Romero as some kind of replacement for the 'Hellhounds', 'Pentagon Thief', and 'Space Monkeys'.
The combination of George, a weird map, strange environmental effects and a migrating Pack-a-Punch Machine, all make for the toughest map to crack yet.

First some notes about the map and gameplay features:
0. There are no traps to purchase, but there are plenty of spaces and opportunities for you to get trapped.

1. George is out to get you.
He starts in a sedate state. In this state, he slowly pounds towards the nearest player, or whoever he is focussing his attention. If a zombie walks close to him, he lets out a scream and the player characters say something about the zombies running faster. Basically, any zombie that is near him when he lets out this kind of scream becomes a fast mover.
If you anger him by hitting him, or if a stray bullet or explosion hits him, he enters an enraged state.
In an enraged state, George first bangs his makeshift lightprop cudgel on the ground, then chases after you. The cudgel will electrify any nearby zombies, which means that when you slash them with your knife/sickle, you get stung for a little damage.
Enraged George runs almost as fast as you do, probably equal, but he stops when he is close to you (much like when in his sedate state) and takes a swing at you with his makeshift lightprop cudgel.
George can only go from his enraged state to his sedate state by either: shooting him with the new VR11 weapon (read this elsewhere, haven't tried it myself yet), or if a player leads him to one of the cold water pools around the map.

2. Cold water pools are placed around the map, so basically if you run to one of them with an enraged George behind, you'll calm him down. It also slows down most zombies, and sometimes causes weak zombies to freeze into an icecube. Walking or standing in it causes your HUD to ice up like a wet windscreen going into a blizzard. Some players keep jumping as they go through the water, but basically, when you get out it slowly unfreezes.

3. Fast moving zombies are created when a normal zombie brushes close to a sedate George. These zombies seem to run as fast as you can run, maybe more so.

4. Zombies seem to have different life expectancies and other features. First, crawlers can be faster moving than in KDT, and they can last almost forever now - which is great for trying to work out the special achievement. Also, if a zombie crawler dies, or a zombie becomes an icecube in a pool of water without actually be hit to death, it seems that the zombie will spawn closer to the players rather than die and end the round, but the respawn will be weaker. Lastly, when a zombie dies, it frequently emits a sound after you kill it - definitely not like KDT - so as to confuse you about where the zombies are coming from (in case you are using a stereo headset for gaming, like I do)

5. The map has 6 mystery box locations. There is no lightbulb map or tv screens showing where the box is, just look skyward for a blueish beam of light from the Mystery Box location.

6. The map has 3 Pack-a-Punch machine locations and the characters say references to the weather getting foggy or clearing up. When foggy, the PaPmachine is unavailable. When the skies clear up, the PaPmachine comes out of the water, replacing an iceberg, at one of the 3 locations. You can identify where it is by looking at the lighthouse, its lightbeam is trained on the box.

7. The map has two ziplines that you can use by just jumping up towards it. You cannot use the zipline unless its destination is also opened up, so basically, if you get to the top of the light house, but didn't open up the front half of the ship, then you can't zipline down. 'Closed set'

8. The map also has a number of ledges that are one-way-for-players, but two-ways-for-zombies-n-George. When you drop from each of these, you will be hurt a little, and vulnerable as if already half-weakened with Juggernog, so don't delay dropping down if the coast is clear.

9. The map has a big circuit to it, and it will cost a lot of points to open up the Power Switch, Juggernot and Sickle separately. My plan is to get the Sickle first for 2750 points worth of doors + 3000 points for sickle itself, then use it to rev up the points for the Power switch (2750 points of doors) and Juggernog (another 1750 points for doors, after Power only).

10. The MP 40 is on this map; yay - now you can buy a gun with 192 spare ammo. You can't buy frag grenades but semtex is available for 250 points/4pieces.

11. Location: the coast. this is where you start. it has two land spaces with a boat 'door' on either side for 750 points. The door on the 'left' leads upwards and on to the Lighthouse. The door on the 'right' leads to the 'back half of the ship' and the Power switch. You can buy the Olympia, M14 and/or Quick Revive here, as well as the PaPmachine/iceberg, a Mystery Box location and/or find a piece of the meteor on a barrel.

12. Location: the back half of the ship. Best to run up the stairs on the side of the ship - the space is too narrow to survive getting caught in it. immediately on the top of these stairs is a boat door (1000 points) to the very rear of the ship for Double Tap, or a small room with Claymores on the wall. Buying this door will open up a new window for zombies to break in when you run up the stairs, so can increase the danger factor.
Also immediately near the top of these stairs is an MPL on the wall, and another stairs going up the ship, and then to their right, a door to the cafeteria (and a piece of the meteor) and/or stairs to another boat-door to the front of the ship. Personally I suggest avoiding opening up this door in a hurry.
If you buy the crates debris to access the upper part - the command tower, you have the 'flipper' on the left of the stairs, or upstairs is a good choke point, zipline and doors to the control room + Power switch. Before opening up the doors to the power switch, on the top level the zombies can only get you via the stairs coming up, or via the window just left of the stairs (left when looking down the stairs), which is easy to manage. After flicking on the Power, zombies can attack you from behind as there is a window next to the Power switch.
Zipline out of here to the starting coast - which is safer than Flipping/flying out of here by dropping to the next level down, because the drop to the flipper is a kind of one-way ledge, and sometimes teh zombies are down there to slap you between flipper initiation and activation.

13. Location: front half of the ship. After you buy a boat to get to it, there are two sections being the front-front part, and the middle-part. The middle-part (the first part you'll reach) has two main levels in a hollow-square arrangement. Unfortunately, you'll hear zombies from both the upper and lower levels, which can confuse you. On the upper level is the MP40, the stairs between the levels, and a train cart door for you to open (1000points), which will enable the zipline from the top of the Lighthouse. On the lower level is a door to Juggernog / PaPmachine-or-iceberg, and above it / upstairs of the Juggernog, is another door to the front-front of the Ship - with Semtex just outside of it. A Mystery Box location is at the very front of the ship.

14. Location: Lighthouse. If you take the 'left' boat from the coast, you open up the path to the lighthouse. you can pick up the MP5k on the way to the external lighthouse stairs, which is a Mystery Box location. The external stairs takes you to level 3 of the lighthouse's 4 levels, but I prefer to go downstairs to the PHD Flopper room and open that door for 1000 points. This room also has a piece of the meteor under a clock.
Downstairs of the PHD Flopper room is a door to the 'killing fields' (as NephryteJaded calls it) which is the base of the lighthouse facing the front of the ship. Personally, I avoid opening this door.
Going through the PHD Flopper room and its door, you can either buy debris-doors to go up, or run downstairs to two doors. One leads out the back, the other out the front - killing fields way. I prefer to go out the back - which causes a longer circuit for the zombies and makes the rest of gameplay a little easier. The back door leads to a space with a door to the 'boathouse' / Staminup / Mystery Box, or take the ice Slide / Sickle / SpeedCola / a circular space around a rock, and a one-way drop to the killing fields.



My circuit preference and game plan:

1. You start at 'the Coast'. Hang around here until at least round 4 and really get into lining up 3 zombies for every M1911 bullet you shoot. This really maximises your points from bullets, but don't hesitate to slash zombies still climbing out of the ground. Five bullets plus slash in Round 1, 8 bullets+slash in Round 2 or 1xM14 bullet+slash, 12 bullets M1911 or 2 bullets M14 in Round 3 plus Slash. If lining up 3 zombies, shoot as follows: Round 1: 5 bullets slash 3 bullets slash slash; Round 2: 8 bullets slash 4 bullets slash 2 bullets slash, Round 3: 12 bullets slash 6 bullets slash 6 bullets slash... afterwards, let's hope you have a Sickle by then...
2. Buy the M14 if you want, or hold out for a Max Ammo or the MP5k in a few rounds time. You and another player need points between you like 3750/5000 or 4000/4750 or whatever, then go get the Sickle as follows buy opening doors so that both players end up with 3000 points for the Sickle.
3. Open the boat-door on the 'left'.
4. Ignore the MP5k and/or Mystery Box unless you have surplus points to get the next two doors easily.
5. Go to the Lighthouse external stairs, then head 'downstairs' from that platform to PHD FLopper room.
6. Open the door at the PHD Flopper room, then take the circular stairs to the base of the Lighthouse.
7. Open the back door and take the slide.
8. Buy the Sickle on your way past it.
9. Hang out around the circular thing, or drop down together to the Killing Fields and get some more points.
10. Open the boat-door to the front-half of the ship, proceed to upstairs and the MP40 area; buy the MP40 if you want;
11. Hang out for enough slash-kills to get the tramcar door to the front-front of the ship, then run towards the back of the ship and carefully use the one-way drop, then go to the coast - maybe hang out at the next one-way drop before doing so.
12. Hang out at the coast for more points - at least 2000 points to get the boat-door on the right, then the crates-debris on the stairs at the Back-half of the Ship, and proceed immediately to the very top of the ship.
13. Camp at the top by slashing as many zombies as you can, or shooting down the stairs, without buying the doors to the Power Switch until you have at least 75- points for the door to the Power Switch and an extra 1000 points for the door to Juggernog between you and your buddies, and 2500 points each for Juggernog itself, preferably more. 
14. If things get tight, take the zipline - it is safer, then run the whole circuit again; pick up cheap spare ammo on your way for whatever guns you might have.
15. Later, open up the debris to the top of the stairs by either (a) (my usual) from the PHD Flopper room, get two pieces of debris upwards, or (b) from the external stairs, go up the stairs, open the door then get the debris on the way up
16. It may help to have Claymores while camping at the top of the ship or top of the lighthouse; Using the Flipper to get to the external lighthouse stairs, while the zombies take the zipline to somewhere else. 

The concept of 'stop killing them while you make your getaway' applies just as well here, if not more so.
And as mentioned earlier, leave a crawler at the end of the round to get to a weapon, Mystery Box, PaPmachine, Perks-a-cola or work on the Stand-in Achievement.