That's three for linear to start, so that's what I'll be going with. As Star said, the opportunity exists later to expand into sandbox if we want. I'll be thinking up a nice starter plot for you guys while I'm at work today. I'll also be checking in periodically to see if there are any questions or suggestions.
As someone who knows very little about real life guns, whatever the country, anyone got some suggestions on where to start in regards to finding out what guns my character might have?
Whatever your imagination can cook up, as both Treue and I seem to be going for handmade stuff rather than pre war gear. That would include what the army had at that point (L85 assault rifle and its MG counterpart the L86, SIG Sauer P226 pistol) or various pistols (Glock 17, Glock 26) used by armed police officers. Benelli M4 and Remington 870 are (and were in 2013) used by the army and police respectively for breaching if you want to go with a shotgun. Some officers (such as Downing Street guards) use(d) MP-5 submachine guns. This site might help.
As we're going AU, that might change if Treue feels like it. Or maybe you could create a pre war weapon that doesn't exist, like the AK-2012 abomination from the games.
Also: In both books and games, Moscow was initially in contact with other people before the jammers were built (I recall nuclear subs being mentioned, but maybe other cities as well). Is London in touch ith anyone else and if so, how widespread is that knowledge?
We will be using real world army issue weapons, but I'll allow made up pre-war guns too if it makes sense. I've just been looking up British army weapons and am going to be using about anything from 2013 or earlier. Star is right though in that Allistair's gun is handmade. Allistair does have a army issue gas mask and canteen though. Also, I won't be taking the shelf life of gas masks into account, as that would make a functional mask nearly impossible to find twenty-four years after things went to shit. The S10 masks only had a ten year life if I'm remembering right. But yeah, if you want to make up pre-war guns we can talk out your ideas. Most handmade ideas should be fine, just don't be going overboard right at the start.
As for London being in contact with others, no jammers have been built. Radios work fine to contact people outside the city. I believe Moscow only had jammers because they thought the war was still going, which to be fair, they did have neo-Nazis running through their tunnels.
Whatever your imagination can cook up, as both Treue and I seem to be going for handmade stuff rather than pre war gear. That would include what the army had at that point (L85 assault rifle and its MG counterpart the L86, SIG Sauer P226 pistol) or various pistols (Glock 17, Glock 26) used by armed police officers. Benelli M4 and Remington 870 are (and were in 2013) used by the army and police respectively for breaching if you want to go with a shotgun. Some officers (such as Downing Street guards) use(d) MP-5 submachine guns. This site might help.
As we're going AU, that might change if Treue feels like it. Or maybe you could create a pre war weapon that doesn't exist, like the AK-2012 abomination from the games.
Also: In both books and games, Moscow was initially in contact with other people before the jammers were built (I recall nuclear subs being mentioned, but maybe other cities as well). Is London in touch ith anyone else and if so, how widespread is that knowledge?
If you guys would like, I can make a short list of commonly made weapons in the Tube. Basically handmade guns that you could find a lot of people using, due to them being manufactured by gunsmiths throughout the Tube.
If you guys would like, I can make a short list of commonly made weapons in the Tube. Basically handmade guns that you could find a lot of people using, due to them being manufactured by gunsmiths throughout the Tube.
A crossbow he made in his spare time, initially just stave off boredom. Ewan used a 105 cm long aluminum pipe (Φ50 mm, 5 mm wall) as the body. A pair of modified leaf springs from a light trailer, with several leaves removed to achieve the desired stiffness, is attached to the front, each spring driving its respective bowstring (6 mm Terylene string). As such, the Scrapheap can loose two bolts before it has to be reloaded. A charging handle, made out of a steel rod (Φ17 mm) looped over the main body, is used for priming both springs at once Priming is made easier by a series of pulleys that reduce the necessary force. Both projectiles have to be loaded individually by hand. The iron sights are marked with tritium paint for use in dark areas. Each bowstring is released by its respective trigger in a manner similar to a double-barrelled shotgun. A 10 mm polyester rope is looped through the stock and a hole in the front grip, making a poor man’s two-point sling.
14 bolts - The projectiles are 13 cm pieces of steel pipe (Φ7 mm) hammered down on one end to form a point, with three stabilisers on the other end. The back end is marked with the same green tritium paint as the sights to make recovery easier. Anything that will fit into the barrels can be used as a projectile, though to a lesser effect.
Tools - A wide array of tools for mechanical and even basic electrical work.
General Service Respirator - A piece of his kit he wisely held onto when the bombs fell, and technically speaking stole when he left the service.
Filters - Two in the mask plus two spare.
Geiger counter - Simple machine he and one of his mates put together. Only alerts the user to presence of ionizing radiation and general intensity. Indication is done through a seven segment display and vibrations, but no sound.
Ear plugs - Army issue hearing protection.
Personality: Ewan’s generally a friendly fellow with no brain-to-mouth filter and a vast collection of pre- and post-war jokes, albeit with a low tolerance of hopeless optimists. But when things go to the dogs, his inner bitter cynic shows. Ewan doesn’t see a reason to plan more than one or two dozen hours ahead, as there is no guarantee he’ll be alive at the end of the day. He loves stories, true or fictional, and will rarely say no to a request to tell or listen to one. He’s also fond of, though not particularly good at, card games.
History: Ewan, an unexceptional kid from Stirling, enlisted in the army at the age of 16. He served as a Challenger 2 driver between 2010 and 2013, even spending eight months in Germany shortly before the war. When the tensions grew even higher, his unit was recalled to Britain and on that fateful day, had arrived to London. Someone somewhere up the administrative food chain screwed up and he and his comrades got to London a full day before the train carrying their tanks was due to arrive. Although he didn’t know it yet, this SNAFU was one of the two things that would save his life. While waiting for their equipment to catch up, Ewan and his crew took the tube to a pub, and as they were getting out at Stockwell station, Ewan stopped to tie his shoe lace, telling his mates to go ahead and he’d catch up. He never had the chance to do so.
As a member of the British Armed Forces at the time, Ewan made his way to the Westminster station to make contact with whatever might have survived from his superiors or the government, hoping to figure out what to do from there. Survivors from the parliament were trying to keep things in check with the help of a few dozen troops that had been assigned to guard the houses of parliament, an effort he joined and stayed part of even after the government fell apart.
Having spent a few years serving on a tank, he knew his way around engines and other machines, so he quickly found something to do in the Tube. Due to his infantry training being long ago and largely forgotten, Ewan continued to serve the Westminster administration in a technical role, maintaining station equipment and leading a team of trainee technicians for a few months. When the radiation levels decreased to survivable levels, he took part in a few surface salvage operations in areas previously secured by scouts. During those trips, he found most of the materials that would become the Scrapheap over the next years.
He left the Westminster administration in 2030. Instead he started offering his services as a freelance mechanic, travelling between Westminster-held as well as the peaceful neighboring stations. Having never left the relative safety if the circle line, Ewan’s combat experience remains quite limited.
Trivia:
Voiced by Paul McGillion (Carson Beckett, Stargate: Atlantis)
@Starlance Overall it looks good, but at 105cm that crossbow is only two feet shorter than Ewan. That's one bigass bow. Other than that everything seems in order, nothing over the top that I can see. EDIT: Now that I'm home and taking a second look, I don't see an image or appearance description. You'll need at least one of those. And now that I see a backpack in your inventory, I have realized that Allistair lacks anything to carry his shit in.
I measured the crossbow's dimensions against me and forgot to take his height into account. Oh well. It's not impossible to carry, just mildly inconvenient and since he hasn't done much fighting, maybe that's a problem to fix IC.
The appearance is in a hider at the very top, above the name.
Oh damn, didn't even see that hider. In any case, if you're fine with it being that large, that's fine. Might be a struggle to draw the strings, especially mid-combat. If there's anything you want to edit you can do so and repost it for my review. If not then you can post it in the character tab. I'm going to need to edit Allistair's sheet, just to add a messenger bag or something to carry things.
Also, our group will need someone as the gunsmith, if we want to be able to make more complicated modifications to our weapons in the field. I'm going to be incorporating the ability to work on weapons just about anywhere, as you could in exodus, but most will only be able to add or change simple things on their own. Stations will likely have at least one smith to work on your weapons for you, though that will cost something. If nobody takes the gunsmith role I could have Allistair fill that too, though I've already got him as the "guide who knows more than he lets on" type, similar to Khan, and would prefer to not make him seem more important than any other characters by adding too much to his repertoire.
I wrote Ewan to be a tech guy, hence the tools and what he's been doing for twenty or so years, though he may be a bit rusty with firearms. Tank crews perform maintenance and a lot of repairs of their vehicles themselves, including the two MGs and the 120 mm main gun, but that was 24 years ago.
Also, what are we using for currency in the Tube, unless we're going full item-for-item trade?
I'd seen he was a mechanic, didn't think that would apply to guns as well. As for currency, I do enjoy the idea of continuing to use military grade rounds while in the tunnels. They just have that metro feel to them.
I should be able to start work on a character this weekend. My own personal ignorance of guns aside, I'm happy to have my character be a gun mechanic-type character if no one else specifically wants the gig
When I get a moment I'll get a sheet together. @Kylia Quilor as a self-professed gun-nerd, if you have firearms questions I can (hopefully) help if you need it.
Surprisingly positive considering both her life pre-war and what she’s encountered afterwards, she still tries to hold others at a distance. She has a soft spot for the ‘Little Guy’ and despite her early actions in life, she loathes bandits with a passion.
Backstory
Life stacked the deck against her pretty much from the get go. The daughter of a junkie and whomever she’d fucked to pay for her next fix, Harper was a ward of the child welfare services from an early age. Ending being ‘fostered’ in one of London’s poorer boroughs, she quickly fell in with one of the interminable youth gangs as she entered the school system; by fifteen she’d been in youth detention centers twice (vandalism and robbery) and was what the media would call ‘Known to Police’. All in all her life was looking like it was to wind up a big nothing.
By the time she was eighteen, she’d been locked up a further three times and gotten out just six months before her eighteenth birthday when the world died. She was on a train, about halfway through her intended journey, when the bombs hit; the following several months are a bit of a blur, but the key notes where that she actually found a few of her ‘friends’ and some of their associates, and with this core group, they took to old habits. Bullying and harassing any solo travelers or small enough groups, they became bandits, doing whatever it took to survive. This lasted for several years, where they both gained and lost members, and Harper would have probably stayed in that life, sacrificing slivers of her humanity to survive, had she not returned to the camp one day to find they’d been attacked while she was off trading with a nearby independent station.
From what she could tell, her small group had been overwhelmed by a larger crew of bandits, who’d slaughtered everyone before looting as much as they could carry. She mourned her companions and scavenged what little there still was of value before beginning the long trek back to the station she’d last been at. As she grieved, the loss of her friends eventually made her realize that to survive they all had to work together, rather then preying on one another. From there, she started helping the small group living at Highams Park station build and gather what was needed and when necessary defend from attack. In the years since, she’s taken to travelling the Tube, offering assistance to Independent, Westminster or Commons stations that wish to hire her; that said, she utterly refuses to have any dealings with Lords stations.
Her heavy use of pre-war police gear stems from the fact that several years ago during a solo surface excursion, she found a mostly intact police van full of gear. It took several trips to get all of the worthwhile gear out, and from that she was able barter for some rather valuable items like her light, Geiger counter and straw. She used to have a police Glock 17 but lost it during an altercation on the surface.
Wasn't there a "Only one firearm, one melee/two melee weapons for now." rule? Also, good call actually giving your character money.
Any thoughts about the general pricing of stuff in the tube? If I recall, the only prices that are not weapons/ammo we got were from the first book (pork sausage 20 bullets, pig skin vest 300 bullets), though the books don't use pre war ammo.
@Athol There is currently a "one firearm only" rule, at least for the start. I neglected to add that to the actual template though, so that's on me. Other than that, most everything is ok. I'd like the specific model of firearm if it's pre-war however. Also, "food" is a little too general for my tastes. This is going to be a survival type RP, and so as far as consumables go I'll be being pretty meticulous when it comes to things such as the amount you're carrying. Aside from those things, your knife looks like a kitchen knife. If you want to carry a kitchen knife, that's fine.
Now as for the currency and prices, I'll be sticking pretty close to what we've been given for values of things. Food prices may drop slightly, as 20 bullets seems hefty for one sausage. Currency is specifically military grade rounds, not just any pre-war ammo. These can be any type of round, not just rifle rounds like in the game. EDIT: I forgot to mention that unless specified otherwise, that water bottle will be assumed to be a standard plastic water bottle, around 12 fluid ounces. If you meant it to be a canteen please specify that along with its volume.
I also just realised I didn't give Allistair any alcohol or cigarettes. He's gonna start off sad.
@Treue Edited sheet, sorry, forgot about the one gun. The knife is simple Tube made affair, more intended as a took; if she finds she needs a melee weapon she prefers the crowbar.