Volume 1: Issue 1: Inaugural : Aug 2000
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POST-APOCALYPTIC CAREERS
by Lord Irish

Cyberpunk

Cyberpunks are pure strain humans or androids outfitted with conspicuous cyber gear and – more often than not - a bad attitude. They are usually mercenaries for hire and/or enthralled to whomever outfitted them with their hardware. Even "free-willed" cyberpunks tend to latch onto a group, as their high-tech implants often make them the targets of both fearful primitives and envious, technologically advanced cultures.

Mutants and mutated animals are rarely cyberpunks. The knowledge and resources necessary to outfit a humans and androids with cyber gear is rare enough; further modifying this technology to work with beings lacking the requisite DNA "fingerprint" is all but impossible.

Signature Equipment: Body plating or Cyberlimb; Nanocomputer; BattleKlaw or Subdermal weapon mount; Optic screen; Pistol, semiautomatic or needler or tangler (mounted)

Skill Package: Armor operation – Combat armor; Melee weapons – Powered weapon; Stamina – Endurance. Cost: 29 points.

Junkrat

Adopted from the Reign of Steel campaign setting by Steve Jackson Games

Junkrats live in or near the ruined sprawls (metropolitan areas) of Gamma Terra. Here they scavenge for food, artifacts, and useful bits and pieces of equipment that they juryrig into something useful.

Junkrats differ from nomads in that they usually maintain one or more permanent residences or hideouts within a given territory. Solitary junkrats won’t easily reveal the locations of such hideaways, and it is a taboo punishable by exile or death among junkrat tribes to betray these locations. In any case, junkrat hideaways are generally well-hidden, well-stocked, and well-defended.

Signature Equipment: Bedroll; Toolkit; Lantern; Musket, flintlock

Skill Package: Ranged Weapons - Rifle; Technical Science – Juryrig; Street Smart – Ruins knowledge. Cost: 30 points.

Postals

Postals are a combination of the Pony Express riders from America’s Old West and Medieval heralds. Some postals are independents who ferry information across Settle and beyond for money; others are the trusted messengers of a tribe, warlord, or city-state; a few are simply adventurers who enjoy the excitement of constant travel and spreading the latest news and gossip from place-to-place.

Because of the nature of their work, postals – whether traveling alone or in a group – are usually well-armed, well-armored, and prone to shooting first and asking questions later. In fact, the expression "going postal" means the same thing on Gamma Terra that it does today in the real world!

Signature Equipment: Bulletproof vest; Rations, packaged; Rifle, hunting; Water condenser

Skill Package: Animal Handling – Riding 2; Movement – Trailblazing; Navigation –Land; Ranged Weapons – Rifle. Cost: 32 points.

Sawbones

Sawbones are usually (but not always) members of the Healers cryptic alliance. They are wandering healers of varying skill and repute. The best and noblest among them are almost mythical figures, welcome in all but the most xenophobic communities and respected by sentients of all genotypes. The worst are feared and hated butchers, often dealing in defective cyber gear and/or illicit organ harvesting.

Sawbones occupy a niche in the post-apocalyptic world not unlike that occupied by the clergy of Medieval Europe; their skills and collective reputation give them a degree of power and influence in post-apocalyptic society that is often more potent than any ancient artifact or mutant power.

Signature Equipment: Bedroll, First Aid Kit, Lantern, Pharmaceuticals - various

Skill Package: Life Science – Mutations; Medical Science – Surgery 2, Treatment 2. Cost: 30 points.