This Character & Assets PDF is optional; you don’t need it to play, but it is a great addition and a convenient option that gives you a pre-made Survivor. Cut out the cards, standees, and tokens, use some card protectors or laminate them, and you are good to go!
Thank you again for purchasing this book. We hope you love playing Population Z as much as we do.
HOBO JOE
Hobo Joe is a solitary wanderer with a story as unique as his survival strategy. Avoiding the limelight and the chaos of the crumbling civilisation, Hobo Joe roams the remnants of towns and cities, a ghost among the ruins, doing everything in his power to remain unnoticed and out of harm's way. His home is wherever the night finds him, often under the vast, indifferent stars, his companions the gentle whispers of the wind and the occasional freight train that carries him to his next destination.
Hobo Joe's life is one of simplicity and makeshift survival, far removed from the complexities of a society now in tatters. His routine in the apocalypse isn’t that much different from the one he followed before the outbreak. With a heart as vast as the open skies under which he sleeps, he finds solace in rescuing injured animals, nursing them back to health with the same care and attention he wishes the world would use on itself.
His only true companion on this lonely journey was an old dog named Bobby, a loyal friend whose memory haunts him still. Each black dog that crosses Joe’s path stirs up forgotten memories, each a cruel reminder of Bobby and the heartbreak of not being able to save his dear friend when sickness took hold.
The backdrop to Hobo Joe's current existence is Huntsville, a place he never intended to explore but was led to by fate, waking up in a scrap yard from a ride on a freight train. It was here, among the discarded remnants of what once was, that he first encountered the zombies. Until that moment, he had managed to stay away from the larger settlements, instinctively avoiding the chaos following the outbreak of that mysterious virus that turned everyone into monsters. Hobo Joe's tale is not just one of survival against the undead but a story of a man who wants to be forgotten. In a world where humanity is the rarest commodity, Joe might just get his wish.
