Withering Souls Overhaul

Let me know about any bugs you find via the Discord server or Steam comments.

To start the cult gamemode, spawn a chosen player the item "Dense, Mildewy Tome". They must hold right click to read it, and will then become the cult leader, known as the Messenger. At least 8 players recommended for best experience!

Some notable inclusions:

Prophets of the Breathless Tide

• A mysterious cult which believes that becoming a zombie doesn't kill you, but rather stores your mind in the afterlife to be restored when their goddess is freed from the Eye.

• Structured with the death-defying Messenger at the head, followed by their disposable, devoted Prophets who can keep the heat off of them or take the fall when needed

• Able to convert any crewmember who partakes of their sacrament, by way of a conversion ritual

• Must steal items from around the ship in order to fuel their occult activities and create their special equipment

• Capable of commanding powerful rituals, which could bring your crew to ruin if left unchecked

• Ignored by zombies entirely, immune to Festering Neuropathy, could be any of your crewmates

• Tasked with performing a series of rituals which will, at their Abyssal conclusion, erase all life in the area

• To do a Ripple, a Prophet or Messenger must hold a cult tome in the Open state and stand in the visible, circular radius

• Prophets must periodically refresh their Attunement, used for their abilities and rituals, at their cult fabricator.

• If a Prophet runs out of Attunement, their blood will begin sublimating out of their head! Face coverings can conceal the smoke, however.

• A Prophet out of Attunement can be deconverted through handcuffing, and application of controlled shocks until the red gas stops pouring from their face. This does not prevent re-conversion!

Festering Neuropathy

• Festering Neuropathy is the main infection propagated by the cult

• Festering Neuropathy zombies will lunge at you, physically grabbing on and trying to gnaw into you! If you get caught by more than one, you are not getting out of there unscathed. Be careful on ladders and platforms, they sometimes demonstrate small bursts of frightening strength!

• If a zombie gets a hold of someone who is in critical condition, it will often refuse to let go of them until they bleed out. They also tend to slowly drag the poor bastard away!

• Bites are guaranteed infection, but not every attack is a successful bite, or successful at all

• Infection has visual "tells", specifically trembling with no cause that worsens the further along the infection is.

• Festering Neuropathy is treatable with Husk Infection Resistance or Psychosis Resistance before the terminal stage (~100 strength), after that point your only hope is paralyzing the patient for an extended period of time, do not cure the paralysis until the tremors stop completely

• Mercy kill anyone infected, they'll definitely stay dead!

Hadal Rot

• Presents as a black smog, and rarely encountered in the wild.

• Extremely difficult to treat, requiring antibiotics to slow the progression down enough for full paralysis to keep it from progressing to the fatal stage.

• Once infection is halted, you must inject some form of poison (Cyanide, Sufforin, Morbusine, Deliriumine) in order to reverse the infection. The effectiveness of the treatment depends on the danger posed by the poison used--Deliriumine leaves numerous lasting bodily defects, while Sufforin or Cyanide would leave very few. Be sure to apply an antidote for the poison before it kills the patient!

• If left untreated, patient will quickly die, and reanimate as a hostile Ghoul.

• Ghouls can mutate into various different forms, if they had certain chemicals in their bloodstream (Hyperactivity, Slow Metabolism, Combat Stimulant, Vigor). These mutant Ghouls are horribly dangerous to the crew.

• Fractured reports have come in of fragile Ghouls with "knives for hands" that can supposedly tear through heavy armor, or lanky Ghouls with the ability to "stare laser beams" from their eyes.

Credits

• Laserman (Ghoul textures, PBT clothing/armor textures and mace)

• CreaosisSquared (Campaign Events, Outpost Events)

• Sydwad (Some item logic which basically taught me how to make items)

• Various People on freesound.org (Many sound effects)

• No More Room in Hell (Zombie biting sounds, Hadal Rot infection music)

• Project Zomboid (Zombie scratching and biting sounds, door smacking sounds)

• Dead Space (Festering Neuropathy Zombie Vocalizations)

• SCP: Unity (Hadal Rot Ghoul breathing)

• Space Station 13 (Various PBT sound effects)

• Space Station 14 (Confirmed PBT ambience, Final Freeness background music, A New Dawn)

• Probably other sources I'm forgetting! (Please let me know if you recognize any sounds I haven't mentioned yet)

• washedAwry (Nearly Everything Else)