since youve mostly gotten your answers on the basic questions, i will add some other information here for you as FYI. If you’re wondering, you can use regular old acrylic hobby paints for miniatures. It’s going to take some extra work and a lot of mixing to get it the right consistency and will be a learning curve there.

If you’re wondering if it’s worth the money to spend on mini paints, that’s going to be entirely up to your preference. Mini paints can be quite pricey vs regular old craft store paints. I would maybe suggest dabbling with regular paints and getting some thinner medium and see if mixing them works out well for you. If you find it too annoying/frustrating/not worth your time then get mini paints. Mini paints can basically be used right out of the bottle.

i’ve never played it; How does the system work? is it a traditional d20-like system or something else?

Yeah, looks like it got all jacked up when I posted it from my app. Gonna fix it

Yeah, we have a set day and time, and will only reconsider if 2+ people are missing

So my immediate thought given this context would be to make the new strain/miracle drug/whatever be something that combats the existing evil virus as a counteragent. So it would provide some amount of resistance/immunity to it, but i like the idea of a (probably unknown) drawback. Something like cordyceps maybe that slowly takes over and/or controls the person like you mentioned.

This could easily be told to the players through the NPC you mentioned who has control of the new strain/drug; he can slowly become more erratic/out of control, and his actions can start to get more suspect (along with any potential physical signs).

So basic idea for a campaign would be:

• Players run into NPC that has new miracle drug that provides resistance/immunity to super evil virus
• NPC is being hunted by the AI because of it
• Players try to protect and help NPC get to somewhere safe to begin process of creating/manufacturing/growing new drug at scale (current supply must be protected because it’s so low, so player’s can’t have any, but they know the NPC has tried it on himself)
• Over their time with the NPC, his motivation and actions begin to turn more sinister as the effects of the drug set in
• Player’s need to eventually make a choice as to if the current situation with the virus or the new threat from the miracle drug is the lesser evil.

What, exactly are you trying to replicate from the show? The miraculous super drug the powers-that-be despise? The plot premise of running from the authorities with a secret? The main character himself? All of it? Something else? Depending on what aspects you like, you can do different things for your game (fyi I know little about EP specifically, but translating plot into games can be universal).

Just like Pathfinder, OOOOOOHHHHHHHH!!!

nah, I’m kidding. But yeah, the video is kinda mediocre. The lyrics are ok, the delivery is meh, but like you said I appreciate the effort.

That’s the flameskull from the d&d 5e monster manual

Monster tokens are probably one of my “unsung heroes” of gaming when it comes to travel; I know people (myself included) probably always go to with minis, but if i’m going to a convention, traveling for the holidays, etc. tossing a whole pile of tokens into a bag make for great addition. No particular brand, just whatever i’ve picked up over the years.

yeah, i picked it up too; The site you get the PDFs from is pretty bad UI design-wise.

i mean, thats part of what gives it away. all the current AI generated music has a flat, auto-tuney quality to it. There’s also a fairly limited number of voices it ends up using, so its pretty distinctive when you hear one.

the art and the music are both definitely AI

i like DW, so i’d be interested to see what a 2e brings to the table. Moreover, i would be more interested in it actually getting ongoing support/supplementation/etc.

in 3e, the tarrasque had regeneration, and couldnt die from negative HP. So the idea of building a town that “farmed” an unconscious tarrasque for its meat/bones/whatever was a popular thought experiment for a setting back in the day. IIRC there was also someone who took the idea and published it as an actual book at some point too (which honestly felt kinda scummy to me, since it was basically a big community project/collaboration)

in 3e, summon spells specifically conjured the spirits of creatures that couldnt “die” per se. They would desummon if they lost all their HP and reform later.

i mean, there were plenty of other ways, including things you could do at lower level, that was just the common go to because it required a single high level spell, and usually you fought big T at high level.

the usual go to back in the day was to drown it, because it wasnt immune to that in any way. Simply gate it to the plane of water. There was a number of other work arounds like that too.

i can also confirm that the tarrasque was pretty universally clowned on for being easy in 3.5e. That discussion is basically what drove the whole “town built around the tarrasque” idea on the wizard forums and enworld. That said, it’s probably not as bad as the 5e tarrasque by comparison

Finally, a true d&d killer has arrived

I mean, thats honestly going to be a thing that happens whenever some people get into something new through a different medium, really. Warped expectations are a thing. We’ve been dealing with it for decades with people who come to D&D/TTRPGs from video games, and expect the in game NPCs to act like theyre from skyrim or something. It’s honestly not that much different, only with a different set of preconceived notions.