Fallout: Anno Domini - A Post Nuclear Roleplay Signup

War. War never changes.

The Romans waged war to gather slaves and wealth. Spain built an empire from its lust for gold and territory. Hitler shaped a battered Germany into an economic superpower.

But war never changes.

In the 21st century, war was still waged over the resources that could be acquired. Only this time, the spoils of war were also its weapons: Petroleum and Uranium. For these resources, China would invade Alaska, the US would annex Canada, and the European Commonwealth would dissolve into quarreling, bickering nation-states, bent on controlling the last remaining resources on Earth.

In 2077, the storm of world war had come again. In two brief hours, most of the planet was reduced to cinders. And from the ashes of nuclear devastation, a new civilization would struggle to arise.

A few were able to reach the relative safety of the large underground Vaults. Your family was part of that group that entered Vault Forty-Five. Imprisoned safely behind the large Vault door, under a mountain of stone, a generation has lived without knowledge of the outside world.

Life in the Vault is about to change.

---

Ahh, you're here. Good.

We've got a problem. A big one. The controller chip for our water purification system has given up the ghost. Can't make a new one and the process is too complicated for a work around system. Simply put, we're running out of drinking water. No water, no Vault.

This is crucial to our survival. And frankly, I...I think you're the only hope we have. You need to go find us another controller chip. We estimate we have a year before the Vault runs out of water. We need that chip. I've marked your maps with the location of another Vault. Not a bad place to start I think.

Look, just be safe, OK?

---

Hey! Fallout! RP! Fun! Yes! Indeed. I decided it's high time we have a Fallout RP. The thing about Fallout is that exploring new locations is half the fun, so doing it in one of the places like California or Vegas where you know all the secrets is going to get pretty boring pretty fast. So this is sort of an alternate "What if..." where, instead of the water chip breaking in Vault 13, this time around it breaks in Vault 45. This is a made-up Vault somewhere in Missouri, and there's a whole new world to explore. You'll run into interesting things, gain perks and improve your skills, get plenty of sidequests, and you'll fight to survive in this new world. How will your characters change the wasteland, and how will the wasteland change them?

I tried to gut out most of the cumbersome aspects of the game's combat system (The parts that wouldn't be easy to do in a relatively freeform RP), while still keeping that same great Fallout taste. Just like the games, you get 40 SPECIAL points, 3 tag skills, and an optional trait. This isn't a pen-and-paper game, so these stats are more guidelines that I'll use when mentally computing each 'round' of combat or eyeballing/estimating encounters, so there's no need to worry about memorizing a rulebook or something. You can find a more long-winded explanation of how I've gone about interpreting the SPECIAL stats ^here.: 
Strength: How much raw damage you do with melee and unarmed combat, and how much you can carry. Some weapons have strength requirements. Your inventory 'size' is equal to your strength, and each pistol or knife takes up one point of your inventory, rifles, bats, and swords are two points, and big guns and HUGE melee weapons take four slot points. You can carry one day of food and water for every point of strength you have. Each point also lets you carry a unit of ammo (3 pistol magazines or grenades, 2 rifle magazines, one BFG magazine/round, or if you're using a shotgun without a magazine, six shotgun shells). It'll also affect how much miscellaneous crap you can carry around in your backpack, which I'll be the judge of if you ever go too far. These are separate inventory amounts so if you have 5 strength, you can carry five pistols, 15 pistol magazines, five days of water, five days of food, and an average backpack worth of stuff.
Perception: How good of an eye you have. Can include noticing things other people might miss, seeing things sooner, or how close you can see things in the field.
Endurance: How many hitpoints you have, slightly affects poison and radiation resistances, and how long you can hold your breath.
Charisma: How likable you are. The less likable you are, the harder your speech and barter checks are, and people are less likely to trust you or tell you things.
Intelligence: How smart you are. Affects how quickly you learn. Make it 3 or more for a 'normal' person, unless you feel like roleplaying a caveman.
Agility: Hand-eye-coordination including drawing and reloading speed, precise movement control, acrobatics, and reaction speed. Since there's no way to really do VATS here, it works slightly different when it comes to guns: This will effect how many rounds I feel your character can get out in a span of time compared to other players and still be accurate. So that won't really be too much of a help when you're just shooting one bullet from a sniper rifle at a stationary target when you've had time to prepare. But when you're trying to unload as many bullets as you can, as fast as you can, on a charging mirelurk, then it'll be all the difference in the world.
Luck: Do you feel lucky?
The way skills will work here is based off of the game, but tweaked a bit to work in an RP. I will treat your three tag skills as being roughly equivalent to the game's version of having 50 points in that skill. All your other skills will be at zero to start with. There are four discrete ranks corresponding to the four skill tiers in the game (25, 50, 75, 100), so improving a skill in the game will bump it up to the next rank..

This game will take place over months, if not years, of in-game time. The world is a wasteland, which means that there are points of interest scattered around hundreds of thousands of square miles. Going long distances away from any civilized area will involve traveling for several days, with occasional random encounters. This means food, water, and ammunition will be very important factors when traveling, and also means that healing even the worst injuries isn't such a big deal since recovery times will be swept into your travel.

Also I won't start the game for at least a week, so you have plenty of time to think up ideas, or work things out with your fellow players.

---

Character Sheet:

• Name:
• Age: As a note, the wastelands are a scary place and your characters will be getting shot/stabbed/maimed/smashed/slashed/burned/lasered with great frequency, and I really don't like having to write about injuring kids, so your character has to be 18 at a bare minimum. I'm sorry, but this is non-negotiable.
• Sex:
• Appearance: Just the physical details for now. They'll start with a Vault 45 Jumpsuit, but you'll quickly get the chance to pimp out your outfit as you explore the wastes.
• Personality: While I don't care if your character is good, bad, or in between, keep in mind that if you make a character whose personality will involve them trying to kill the other players instead of playing ball, that will probably not be accepted. And if somehow that falls through the cracks, I'm not exactly going to step in when the others all team up to kill your character at the first sign of betrayal.
• Karma: Just a ballpark estimate of if they're neutral, slightly good, or slightly bad. Growing up in a vault, there hasn't been too much opportunity to go very far in either karmic direction.
• Starting Weapon: A meta thing your characters wouldn't know about is that your vault's armory, was, conveniently, well-stocked when the bombs fell. I'll use the New Vegas weapons list to make things even more convenient. Your starting weapon can be pretty much any non-unique weapon valued at 850 or less. You don't need a tagged weapon skill to have a weapon, so people not that great at combat can still pick a weapon. But for weapon requirements, treat your tag skills as being 50, and your untagged skills as being 0.
• Secondary Weapon: Same deal as above, but this one's valued at 100 or less.
• Starting Inventory: Leave this blank for now, I'll give you all starting inventories that could vary depending on your tag skills. You'll also start with all the food and water you can carry, and 3 strength points worth of ammo (unless you have a strength lower than that, or decided not to get a gun.).
• SPECIAL Scores: (You have 40 points total, each category has to be between 1 and 10)
  • Strength:
  • Perception:
  • Endurance:
  • Charisma:
  • Intelligence:
  • Agility:
  • Luck:
• Tag Skills: Pick three of these skills. For a quick idea of how this relates to the games, a tagged skill is like having 50 points in that skill.
  • [Skill 1]
  • [Skill 2]
  • [Skill 3]
• (Optional) Trait: Unfortunately, due to not having as much of a direct reliance on the game's combat system, only a few of the traits can even work. You can feel free to run a custom one by me, but remember that these aren't the same as the perks you'll be getting through the game, a trait is supposed to have a downside.
• (Optional) G.O.A.T. Result: Not required, but could be a funny thing to talk about
• (Optional) Birthday: In case we get to that day during the game, and you want to make anything of it. The game starts on December 5, 2161.
• History: Feel free to conspire with each other if you want to establish any pre-existing relationships. The Vault's got 500 people, so it's possible to have all of you be strangers to each other if you really want.

---

• Your characters are the first to know about the situation, and are hand-picked by the Overseer('s computer): So you guys wouldn't be volunteers, and you don't have to worry about explaining why they want to save the Vault (you could potentially play someone who starts out wishing they had never been put on this stupid quest, if you feel like going for that angle), and virtually no one else knows about it before your characters do. They're chosen to do it, and any rumors that get started about the water chip are the result of your characters saying goodbye to their loved ones before the start of the RP. Otherwise this game would be less about the adventures of your characters, and more about how you all got trampled to death in a swarm of Vault dwellers who thought they could do a better job.
• You can pick any GOAT result you want, even if your character doesn't have the skill associated with the job: Or you can make some up, something you'd think people in a Vault would need. It doesn't even have to be the job they're doing in their backstory - it's a placement test, and usually winds up being what you do, but if multiple people have the same result, someone would definitely wind up being stuck at a job that was less-optimal.
• You get a PIP-Boy 3000, in case anyone was worried that you wouldn't have one. It's where the 'map' mentioned in the OP is.
  • You can customize the case of your PIP-Boy 3000: It doesn't have to be the generic metal-looking one unless you want it to look like that. Paint it pink and put unicorn stickers on it, if you want. People in the vault have a lot of time to kill.
• You'll all get some basic goggles (simple things that fit over your face/glasses) that don't take up any inventory space. This is mostly just a flavor thing, since no one's ever seen the sun before, so for the first few days you'll probably be wearing them, at which point it won't really matter since your eyes will have adjusted. It's something to talk about between each other if you want, not a gameplay mechanic.

---

People

• Doctor Wyatt Kinsler - Infinite Paragon
• Voltaire Arounet - PBlades
• Max Geistner - tricksterson
• Jacob Barrett - goodisgood
• Sonia Richardson-Flayer - Fergard Stratoavis

edited 12th Dec '13 5:18:27 PM by nman

Yesh. Interest. So hard.

I concur. Much, much interest.

Especially since i've been made aware of the Survivor2299 thing last night.

Thinking of something akin to a Smart Guy role.

edited 5th Dec '13 7:42:14 AM by InfiniteParagon

"You lost, Dio. You lost for one simple reason - you were using charcoal." - Hank Hill

Interest too.

Interest.

To the law and for the good of man. All I need to live by.

All the interest.

UN JOUR JE SERAI DE RETOUR PRÈS DE TOI

HNNNNNNG INTEREST

-Rips off shirt-

Uh

Interested...

Interest

Never played the game but have recently done an archive binge ofFallout: Nuka Break so am seriously interested in the universe. How much will not having played the game handicap me?

Trump delenda est

Pintrest.

Interest

@tricksterson: I don't think it'll be that big of a deal. The nice thing about everyone being a vault dweller exploring the wastes for the first time is that they're not expected to know anything, which means you can learn along with your character, so this should be pretty accessible to anyone.

Though since the game takes place in an alternate universe, reading this page of the wikia about divergence could be useful for knowing what the big differences are between our world and the Fallout world. Aside from that, all you really need to know is that the world went to hell on October 23, 2077, your ancestors jumped into the Vault, and now you're here facing a water chip failure that could spell disaster for everyone living there, including your family and friends, which means your characters have to venture into the unknown, radioactive wasteland.

On the plus side, you'll get to see the sun for the first time in your life.

So I think i've been at this for an hour and a half in-between tabs for this and that, bringing you this sheet as a first submission. Please let me know if there are any glaring issues, N.

---

• Name: Doctor Wyatt Kinsler
• Age: 33
• Sex: Male
• Appearance: Like Clark Kent as seen here with the glasses. Although you'd think he's perhaps a little built from the picture, he's actually more slender than he can lead on at times. He wears the traditional Vault 45 Jumpsuit with a lab coat over it, if N has no issues with that.
• Personality: A Vault Dweller at heart, Wyatt tries to do his part for the good of Vault 45 whenever he can. When its less necessary to put the Vault's rules and regulations before his own beliefs, Wyatt's a kind soul if a bit cowardly - he feels that what can be solved through violence is more efficiently done so through using your brain. If there's anybody that you can count on to find the third option, the golden ending, it's Wyatt... if you trust him, that is. He's not very good at convincing others of his confidence unless they already know his ability at whatever is in question, meaning that while he's an effective thinker and a mediocre fighter at best, he's not a talker, not being very outspoken because of that.
• Karma: Neutral Good. He has the best interest of his patient at heart but does his part, as he firmly believes he should, to uphold order within Vault 45 and will prioritize that in daily life when the need arises.
• Starting Weapon: The Varmint Rifle. If its alright with N, it'll have the night vision scope somewhat hastily attached.
• Secondary Weapon: A 9mm Pistol.
• Starting Inventory:
  • 2 magazines (10 rounds) for his Varmint Rifle.
  • 6 magazines (78 rounds) for his 9mm Pistol.
  • 4 Stimpaks.
  • 1 Super Stimpak.
  • 2 Doctor's Bags.
• SPECIAL Scores:
  • Strength: 3
  • Perception: 8
  • Endurance: 4
  • Charisma: 4
  • Intelligence: 8
  • Agility: 7
  • Luck: 6
• Tag Skills:
  • [Medicine]
  • [Science]
  • [Repair]
• (Optional) Trait: Four Eyes, giving him a 9 in Perception as long as his glasses are on but detracting it to a 7 when they're off.
• (Optional) G.O.A.T. Result: This actually comes at some funny timing since I recently repurchased Fallout 3 and intended to start playing it soon. So for the hell of it I started it up, made Wyatt and took the G.O.A.T., answering as IC as I could to every question. He's slated to be the next 'Vault Chaplain', god help us all.
• (Optional) Birthday: July 26th, 2128
• History: Wyatt's parents were born before the war, too young to be anything but afraid at the whole situation. His mother died in childbirth, unfortunately, while his father worked as an engineer/technician for the Vault, teaching his son a couple things he prayed his son would never need to know (taught to him by his father for the same reasons). Thankfully, for the brunt of his life Wyatt never did, growing up to join the medical staff of Vault 45. Approximately two months before the start of the RP he was made officially the leader of that division despite there being a couple people more experienced in the field by a couple years. The fact of the matter is, the Overseer had a little say in that and while its never been something anybody but the medical staff is bothered by, it was an issue that stood nonetheless until Wyatt quickly got to work at proving he was fit for the role of head Doctor in Vault 45.

edited 9th Dec '13 8:11:26 PM by InfiniteParagon

"You lost, Dio. You lost for one simple reason - you were using charcoal." - Hank Hill

Question: Would Grenade Launcher be covered by the Explosives skill or the Gun skill?

Trump delenda est

Explosives but unless the value of a Grenade Launcher in caps is under 850 it is beyond your reach for now, my friend.

"You lost, Dio. You lost for one simple reason - you were using charcoal." - Hank Hill

• Name: Voltaire Arounet
• Age: 24
• Sex: Male
• Appearance: Refined. (Coat, Floating Deutsh Number and Candelabra not included.)
• Personality: A merchant, through and through. While selfish, he understands the values of allies and accountability. Therefore, he usually presents himself as genial, always ready to lend a helping hand – for a price, of course. Have a lingering fantasy of swimming in cash, which would likely slices him to ribbons if he tries to do so with bottlecaps.
• Karma: Neutral
• Starting Weapon: Police Pistol
• Secondary Weapon: Straight Razor
• Starting Inventory: BFN.
• SPECIAL Scores:
  • Strength: 6
  • Perception: 4
  • Endurance: 4
  • Charisma: 9
  • Intelligence: 5
  • Agility: 8
  • Luck: 4
• Tag Skills:
  • [Sneak]
  • [Barter]
  • [Speech]
• Trait: Polarizing: Moves onestep closer to strangers having a more extreme reaction to him. Affable people turns friendly, and annoyed people turns aggravated.
• G.O.A.T. Result: Hotdog Vendor. Sharing profession with the Dibbler isn’t quite what he’s proud of, to be honest.
• Birthday: 7th August 2137
• History: Fascinated by books of the old world, Vol sought to make something of himself. Adopting the nom de guerre of his favorite writer, he lays the groundwork for a vault spanning conglomerate of equipment and information exchange –“redistribution of disused objects” and listening to gossips, in other words. While it hasn’t bears much fruit yet, he left it in the hands of a trusted friend to operate while he undertakes the expedition.
  • An enterprising soul, Vol’s eyes lit up with dough as soon as the plan to recover the Waterchip came through from the Overseer's terminal. After making plans to check with one of the Vault's doctor on the possibilities of being contaminated by Radiation seepages, he began packing. [Pending Possible Relation.]

  • Customized Pip-boy. How will be elaborated when I can think of something good. Merchant-y thing, but tasteful.

edited 6th Dec '13 9:28:55 AM by PBlades

Ah, I was reading the wrong column for cost. Grenade rifle on the other hand is well within my reach.

Anyway, here is a preliminary sheet that I'm sure will require correction.

• Name: Max Geistner
• Age: 36
• Gender: Male
• Appearance: 6' tall, well built, shaved head, dark eyes
• Personality: Quiet, dedicated, orderly, believes in the rules and in sticking by them. Underneath however is an urge to see what's "out there" which is why he studied what little could be known about what life was like before the vault and picked up the Survival skill.
• Karma: Neutral
• Starting Weapon: Grenade Rifle. See inventory for ammo.
• Secondary Weapon: Police baton
• Starting Inventory:
  • Nine standard 40 mm grenades
  • 3 Fragmentation grenades
  • 3 sticks of dynamite
  • 2 extra days worth of food (10)
• SPECIAL Scores:
  • Strength: 8
  • Perception: 7
  • Endurance: 8
  • Charisma: 5
  • Intelligence: 4
  • Agility: 5
  • Luck: 3
• Tag Skills:
  • Explosives
  • Melee Weapons
  • Survival
• Trait: Looked at the Trait list and didn't see any I wanted
• G.O.A.T Result: Pedicurist
• Birthday: January 7 2125
• History: Not sure yet except he's a security officer.

edited 10th Dec '13 9:27:05 AM by tricksterson

Trump delenda est

@Wyatt: He's a-okay. The coat and scope are fine, I'll just lump them into starting gear I'd have given you due to your skills. Though I'll just put an asterisk on that backstory bit about him being the only medical person who could leave. It's unlikely any other medical person would have been sent out, and I do hope for character diversity, but I also don't want to lock out anyone if they really want to make a doctor or nurse or something. So if no one else makes a medic it's fine.

@Voltaire : He's alright save for one small thing about his history, totally my fault, just check the first bullet below about backstory. The trait's alright, though it might not always be as extreme as you wrote. As for the gun, he wouldn't meet the requirements for the revolver in any case, so just stick with the 22 - don't worry, I'll give you some goodies relating to him having barter when I hand everyone their miscellaneous items. Though that birthday would make him 24, if you want to change either of those to match.

@Max: Most of that technical stuff's fine, no worries there. Like I said for Voltaire, look at first bullet below for a small thing about backstory. Also your question about the GOAT being allowed, check the second bullet below, you're golden in that regard. Security officers definetly exist. For your question about ammo, I hid it up there in the nitty-gritty labelnote since it's not super important right now. Because it's his only projectile weapon and he won't have to split the load with another gun's ammo, he'll get 9 grenades to start with. And that birthday would make him 37.

If anyone needs help calculating ages from birthdays, you can use this tool. Lord knows how long I tried mentally checking if your birthdays were alright before giving up and Googling it.

Anyway, here's a few minor details I forgot to mention, and that I should clarify:

• Your characters are the first to know about the situation, and are hand-picked by the Overseer('s computer): So you guys wouldn't be volunteers, and you don't have to worry about explaining why they want to save the Vault (you could potentially play someone who starts out wishing they had never been put on this stupid quest, if you feel like going for that angle), and virtually no one else knows about it before your characters do. They're chosen to do it, and any rumors that get started about the water chip are the result of your characters saying goodbye to their loved ones before the start of the RP. Otherwise this game would be less about the adventures of your characters, and more about how you all got trampled to death in a swarm of Vault dwellers who thought they could do a better job.
• You can pick any GOAT result you want, even if your character doesn't have the skill associated with the job: Or you can make some up, something you'd think people in a Vault would need. It doesn't even have to be the job they're doing in their backstory - it's a placement test, and usually winds up being what you do, but if multiple people have the same result, someone would definitely wind up being stuck at a job that was less-optimal.
• I forgot to mention you get a PIP-Boy 3000, in case anyone was worried that you wouldn't have one. It's where the 'map' mentioned in the OP is.
  • You can customize the case of your PIP-Boy 3000: It doesn't have to be the generic metal-looking one unless you want it to look like that. Paint it pink and put unicorn stickers on it, if you want. People in the vault have a lot of time to kill.
• I also forgot to mention you'll all get some basic goggles (simple things that fit over your face/glasses) that don't take up any inventory space. This is mostly just a flavor thing, since no one's ever seen the sun before, so for the first few days you'll probably be wearing them, at which point it won't really matter since your eyes will have adjusted. It's something to talk about between each other if you want, not a gameplay mechanic.

The Revolver's supposed to be for show, really. I fully intended to let someone else handles combat except when I need to sneak around and gives someone a smile.

I'll change the backstory and other things later.

These initial conditions for starting weapon reflect that the people with a weapons skill are able to use a better weapon than someone without weapons training, much like how someone with Medicine will get some amount of doctors bags and super stims, etc. But I suppose if you want a revolver and because he's got Bartering as a skill, I'll give you a teeny bit more leeway. You can give him a Police pistol - it has no Guns skill requirement, and Voltaire meets the strength requirements for it.

Deal.

Are the grenades all one standard type or are they mixed up? I think it would be amusing if what kind they were (concussion, smoke, flare, fragmentation incendiary, whatever) was the GM's pick. The Vaults remind me an awful lot of Paranoia so I can see something like that happening.

edited 6th Dec '13 4:19:18 AM by tricksterson

Trump delenda est

I'm probably going to shoot for an explosives-oriented character, but I just wanted to check and see if you were doing one first. If you were, I'll pick something else.

To the law and for the good of man. All I need to live by.

Coolio. He's good then, you can work out that backstory stuff with IP.

Everyone gets standard ammo right now. You'll get whatever fancy ammo you can buy down the line. This Vault simply doesn't have that wide of a range of ammo types, just the basics. A vault having this much weaponry to spare is already a big enough thing, and not typical of other vaults, but I didn't want to stick everyone with the exact same pistol to start with.

If you look a few posts up, you can see his character