Roleplay / The Wastes

"The only dedicated Fallout RP forum that ain't a bunch of commie scum."

The Wastes. A small, vibrant Fallout RP site that’s been around for since 2009. Clocking in around 1000 registered members over the years, with a much smaller active core consisting of a dozen or so members, who function like a Big, Screwed-Up Family rather than True Companions. Still, we're a likable lot as long as you don't go around acting like a jackass. (LMG is a special exception.)

The Wastes is set in the post apocalyptic Deep South, mostly East Texas, though it is expanding quite a bit, particularly to Southern Louisiana. Dealing with Raiders, Slavers, and all sorts of scum and beasts; our heroes (That would be you. Or not.) get to deal with the various other troubles that plague the world that they live in. Currently, most of the characters on the site are relativity low-level (Level 7 is the all time record, and the highest currently active is level 6.) But, most things are decided via skill of writing rather then actual level.

The Southern United States isn’t what it used to be like. Instead of friendly southern belles greeting you, or a Good Ol' Boy waving to you as you drive down the road; instead you get to deal with a rabid wild dog eating you alive or a Nomad placing an arrow in your neck.

A small list of some of the site's important history.

• Father Gerade was elected in an election. PC's influenced the election via missions.
• Small amount of work is done to Bucket Town, such as scavenging and building up the town. Also done by the PC's.
• Revolution in Bucket-town, led by two PC's. The revolutionaries are victorious, Gerade is ousted from power and power is transferred to a small council of local leaders. Also, drugs and whores. Drugs and whores.
• A group of PC's was sent to investigate a strange radio signal, which led them to an airport contested by three factions: an army of mutants, a technologically powerful secret society and an army of hillbillies. Long story short: a dirty bomb destroyed the mutants and the secret society.
• A ship captain hired several player characters to help her attack a pirate fleet blockading the ports of Crescent Top. The blockade was broken and those player characters were hailed as heroes.
• Falkenstein Castle came under siege by a power-hungry warload and PCs could either join the attacking slaver army of Gaston or join the defenders of the well-meaning Ghoul King Timothy. The defenders held the fort (and were given knighthoods for their aid). But King Timothy was killed during the battle, leading to the Kingdom being re-established as a republic.

Has a character sheet.

Due to recent events, the Wastes has moved. Be aware that moving things like settlements is still a work in progress, and thus many of the settlements can still only be found on the old site.

Link to the current site: https://wastes.jcink.net/index.php

Link to the old site: https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/the_wastes/index.php

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The Wastes contains examples of:

• Aborted Arc: The Signback thread. Merchants came to town and sold goods in an auction, bringing with them news of an approaching raid by "Signbacks", tribal raiders who wear roadsigns on their backs. A new user even had his character see the Signbacks from far away. But the attack never came, and the site moved on.

• Armor Is Useless: Averted in a recent RP. The enemy's armor proved very effective against bullets, only being trumped when the armor wearing enemies were cooked alive by a thrown molotov.
• Arms Dealer: The Armory essentially has this as their Hat, being a combination of the Minister For Defence Export and Gun Shop Owner subtypes. They sell weapons and/or ammunition to both the Texas Rangers and the Crag, and aren’t too picky about who comes in to buy weapons as long as they abide by Armory law.
• Army of Thieves and Whores: The rebels who overthrew Father Gerade was mainly comprised of Neo-Patriots, Raiders, and mobsters. Oh, and they won.
• Authority Equals Asskicking: Played straight when Roy, Bucket Town sheriff and member of the town council, killed several men associated with a secret society in a site event.
• Badass Bookworm:
  • Jackal. He graduated with an Engineering PhD back in Ireland. Considering that most people can't even read in the Fallout timeline, this makes him possibly one of the most educated, if the only, PC on the site.
  • Orion as he knows both how to read and write as well as having the foresight to see past the next two steps. Although admittedly he's more of The Smart Guy than a Bookworm.
• Barbarian Tribe: The Swampers, as a notable example. Would count as The Horde, but, there too busy fighting each other all the time.
• Bedouin Rescue Service: Southern Nomads are prone to this. Considering that there the Fantasy Counterpart Culture of the Mongols and the Bedouin's, it isn't that much of a surprise.

• The Big Easy: While most of New Orleans is a flooded wasteland, the French Quarter, now named Crescent Top, survived ans has become a thriving center for trade.

• Bounty Hunter: One of the many enemy types players get to encounter.
  • In addition, with the creation of the Bounty Boards, players themselves can now become one, and if the hunt for the bounty is written well enough, the player will earn a nice bonus item in addition to the money from the bounty. But be warned, as badly written bounties will only end poorly for the player character.
• City Guards: As the name suggests, you meet them in every-town. Generally serves as a cross between the police force, the local army and way to advance socially in town. Each town's guards range from dirt-poor farmers armed with bows and arrows to highly trained paramilitary types that are carrying machine guns.

• Everyone Meets Everyone: Normally happens during an RP in which characters don't know each other or haven't met formally.
• Eldritch Abomination: Hagan, Ellis and Evan Laramie face one of these in "Bringing Momma Home". Also a major Shout-Out to the Dune series by Frank Herbert.
• Feathered Fiend: Type C. Both the Morrigan Crows and the Howler Eagles fall under this trope. While the Morrigan Crow is no slouch at five feet tall, the Howler Eagle is the pinnacle of this trope. It's large enough to carry away mutated bears.

• Frontier Doctor:
  • Doc Nance, in Bucket Town. Often contending with low supplies, and is now dealing with some strange heart disease.
  • Trope currently occupied by Maria Gonzalez, who took over as town doctor after Nances' disappearance.
• Gentleman Thief: Darrel Cohen. Even avoids violence both on and off the job, and dresses 'slickly'.
• Good Old Fisticuffs: Both played straight and subverted. Many of the deadliest characters in hand-to-hand combat have no formal training. Subverted in Caleb Wolff, who is trained in what is essentially a slew of post-war special forces combat styles, except they've been handed down for a good twenty generations.
• The Gunslinger: Evan Laramie, through and through. Uses Guns Akimbo.

• More Dakka: The Slaughterhouse Special, the tier six minigun. An 8-barreled, formerly vehicle-mounted Gatling gun.
• Odd Friendship: Between Ellis and Jackal. It started with a bit of gun pointing and one Roaring Rampageof Revenge later, there some of the closest friends on the site. Sadly, Ellis has perished, and Jackal's been searching for the bastard that did him in. The friendship between pacifist tribal Glides-on-Ruin and Psychopathic Ghoul doctor Max Gersten fits into this trope well.
• Outlaw Town: The Crag is home to numerous raider gangs and is typically the place fugitives and exiles end up.
• Patriotic Fervor: The Neo-Patriots, an ultra-extremist group who feel that the USA is still the greatest country in the world. Typically they don't know anything about the "real" USA before the war and most of their knowledge is simple speculation. Albeit, extremely wrong speculation. This can lead to some rather humorous conversations about how George Lincoln crossed the Mississippi River to take back San Francisco, Illinois from the Nazis

• Ray Gun: Most, if not all, energy weapons, although the Tesla weapons get special mention. The various energy weapons fall into several different subtypes of ray gun. Also, the term "ray gun" is in this case accurate, as the Fallout universe is based off of the 1950s World of Tomorrow.
• Right-Wing Militia Fanatic: The Neo-Patriots are descended from a group of these guys. Some of this still shows up among the Neo Patriots main core of members, who still fight for there own twisted version of the United States that only they seem to believe in. The Leaders? They only want there own personal power, willing to continue to lie and manipulate people into trying to fight for a 'better America' just so there wallets get bigger.
• Saloon Owner: Two of them in Bucket Town, the starter town. Bobo's and Trapper Trek. The difference being is that Bobo is often used for the convenient You All Meet in an Inn while in Trapper Trek you get to buy and sell various items.
• Sinistersubway: Whether it's the sewage tunnels running under Bucketown, or the tunnel in Austin.
• Scary Black Man: Jesse Winters, and Caleb Wolff. Caleb is of mixed race, but, still a scary (and smelly) person. Jesse fits the trope a bit more clearly.
• Scavenger World: Well, it is one. Several characters make there living via scavenging.
• Shout-Out: Oh, so many. For example, the Swampers are a massive Shout Out to the Warhammer 40000 Orks; right down to the fact that they love to fight; a two god system and the clans.
  • Also, you have Jesse Winters. He's a shoutout to the blaxploitation genre of films from the 70's.
  • Ben Ezio gave a shout-out to James Bond in one of the first things he said, the cheesy one-liner "Yo, bartender, give me booze. Shaken,not radiated."
  • Evan Laramie is a walking shout-out to every Clint Eastwood Western protagonist ever developed, ever.
  • Darrel Cohen is Hudson Hawk. Enough said.
  • Other characters on site have clear inspiration from everything from Bruce Campbell in The Evil Dead to Final Fantasies Barret
• Stay in the Kitchen: Ellis Colbeck has this view on women. He even thinks that a place can't be a Kitchen can't be one if a women isn't in it. Played for Laughs.
  Jackal: Welcome to the Anarchist's Kitchen
  Ellis (In thought mode): Huh. No food here, or a barefoot women in here. Odd.
• Swamps Are Evil: Thinking of planning a trips to the Swamps? Great! You get to deal with a entire group of Blood Knight that would perfer to kill you rather then say "Hello", diseases, giant crocodiles, insects as big as your arm, and all sorts of fun stuff. Bonus Points for having the water radiated. You stay in it for too long, and your either dead or a ghoul. Yay. No wonder why the Swampers have such short life-spans....
• Urban Segregation: Unity Bridge, kinda. There two settlements, with one on each side of the bridge. Normally, the "Ghoul Side" is seen as a bit more cheerful and generally assocaited with the "Rich side". The "Human side" (Refugees) is much more like a slum, filled with people desperate to cross the bridge so they can get to Buckettown. Of course, with the Ghouls thinking that the refugees are bigots, things quickly go out of hand.

• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Andrew Hagan. He's a ghoul, which means that he lives for a very long period of time. He's also depressed, considering the fact that all of his friends from before the fall are long since dead; and some of the only friends he currently have are other ghouls (who are viewed with a mixture of hate, awe, and fear.)
• Worst Aid: Doc Nance was a former follower of this trope, prior to her disappearance à la the Bucketown revolution. Max Gersten is also a fine example of this trope.