3: This is actually still a W.I.P. since I am trying to see how I can most effectively implement the system into the RP. My idea for the moment is to just have players pick those three main skills. As the RP progresses, there will be times where characters can talk to an NPC, learn from books, or practice on their own to improve a skill of their choice a little bit. This way, no points will be needed. I am, however, open to suggestions on how better to make this work.
As someone who once ran a Fallout tabletop based on general D20 stuff and a somewhat incomplete guidebook, my suggestion would be that if you include SPECIAL at all, include it as "soft" stats just to give an impression of characters--"Hmm, this guy's character has a STR of 9 and mine has a STR of 6, it'd probably be IC of me to write about how intimidating his build seems when I meet him"--or for simple "challenges" like the following:
"The door is electronically locked, with a still functioning keypad, but the mechanisms are old and rusted. Does anyone in this party have a STR or an INT of 7+?" "Damn, we left the only hacker in the group back at the bar, time to backtrack!" "Backtrack? This is what I brought the dynamite for!"
SPECIAL didn't usually increase too often over the course of the games, picking Perks and Traits were much more useful, at least in my experience. So you could let players "earn" those over time or something, they'd be easier to envision narratively since they're usually descriptive anyway. My two cents.
@Zeroth All of that is pretty much what I was thinking, though I do not want to worry to much about the actual numbers. Instead, when a player picks a skill, it will help overcome different challenges they will be faced with. They can take time to improve upon them from different areas of the RP stated in the first post, and eventually learn new ones through the same methods. (Aka they will have to earn them.)
@Letter Bee Please try and use more realistic art or images.
>Just trying to iron out his heel-face-turn to avoid slapping everyone with whiplash since he started out diehard for the Enclave's fascistic ideology and broke away from it after they reached Washington...
Appearance: Billy is 6'10, quite broad with a lithe muscular frame covered in scars and tanned from long hours outdoors. He has shaggy red shoulder length hair, and a wild untamed chest length beard to match, and pale blue eyes. His face is handsome if a bit angular and he has a hawkish nose that has been clearly broken multiple times. He wears a suit of leather armor that has been stained to resemble camo, a pair of worn boots, and a decently well-kept cowboy hat.
Armor and Equipment: Leather Armor, canteen, camping backpack, rope, mortar and pestle, bed roll and tent, flint and steel, tender box, Coffin nails (Brand of cigarette), one dose of jet.
Weapons: Bow and arrow, 20 arrows, hunting knife, revolver.
Personality: A grumpy loner who doesn't trust others easy as he's never really gotten along with most folks. Bill can be blunt and rude, tough if your able to pierce this rough outer shell they'd find a brave, loyal, and caring friend. He has a tendency to shoot first and ask questions later. He has a soft spot for animals, even the most horrible mutated. He loves nature and all the secrets she hides. He dislikes most people on principal but especially hates raiders. He dislikes super sweet things but loves sour or spicy. He tends to spoil Honey(his pet gecko) and is very protective of her. He has a bit of a substance problem so he's often short on caps, which isn't too much of a problem as he can survive of the land mostly.
History / How they came to be part of Whitlash: David was raised on his family ranch as the son of one Robert Clark and Olivia Clark. His upbring wasn't much to write home about as he had loving if strict parents and he rarely went hungry, which these days is a miracle. He learned to hunt, fish, skin, butcher, and tan from his father, while he learned all he knew about how to raise animals and grow plants, what was safe to eat and what wasn't from his mom. He took to ranch life quick and was a natural at it to boot, though his isolated upbringing did seem to make him less social. It wasn't long before he could handle a bow better than his father and the animals seemed to just natural love him. This continued until he was 17 and his father never came back from a hunting trip. It was three days before they what was left of him. It seemed he'd run into something nasty deeper in the woods and tried to escape. His mother seemed to draw into herself after that, she rarely smiled and only ever talked when David asked her something. It was only a year later that she passed. David kept the farm going more out of habit than want for the next few years, until on one of his trips to the market he found a trader from Nevada had a couple cages with a couple gold geckos inside. He didn't know why but he bought three breeding pairs and brought them home. He'd never raised a gecko and their ornery nature and tendency to bite made it quite difficult, but after months of hard work and lots of bandages he'd done it. They still nipped at him sometimes and had a bad habit of chasing the bramen but otherwise they were tame. He learned a lot from them and though at first he'd planned to raise them for their hides he'd grown fond of the little devils. The turned out to be great at tracking and running down prey and he'd even used their bad habit of chasing his cattle to turn them into herders. This went on for a long while with him raising new clutches each year and occasionally going back to that same trader to buy new geckos every now and then. It was 18 years later that tragedy struck once again as a local group of raiders decided his ranch looked like a juicy target. They attacked in the middle of the night, rushing in and shooting anything that moved and either taking or burning everything else. David fought back when everything he had and so did his scaly friends, but it wasn't enough. He tried to save the younglings but found all the eggs smashed and the few hatchlings dead. All but on, a little albino who'd hidden under one of the nest boxes. He quickly scooped her up and ran. He's just lucky they were bad shots as the didn't hit anything too important. It was almost a day later that he wandered into town almost dead and clutching a baby gecko to his chest. That was 2 years ago, now he makes his living by going out into the wilds and bringing back meat, hides, fur, bones, poisonous and medicinal plants and fungi, and whatever else he can find out there in the wilds. He has a small shack on the edge of town and most people leave him be, unless they need something and have the caps. Extras: Honey- a three foot tall albino gecko that acts as his faithful companion and helps him hunt. She has a leather harness a spiked leather collar with a hear shaped silver tag with her name on it. She tends to be a bit aggressive towards strangers, but won't attack unless told, touched, or herself or David is attacked. If she get to know you or David she turns into one big teddy bear, though she'll still playfully nip.
I made two updates on the main post. First, a better explanation of how S.P.E.C.I.A.L. and Skills will work in the roleplay. Secondly, I added two images that show the explorable area of Montana for this chapter of the roleplay. Everyone please go take a look when you have the chance.
>Wasn't too sure about what the average shopkeeper would have in terms of caps, or ammo for that matter, but since he pulls guard duty on occasion I figured it'd be more than 10 rounds or 20 caps and the like.
