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Elvenoutrider
2011-11-03, 04:52 PM
So I have decided for the beginning of my fallout campaign I want to run thgough the character creation process in character, like in the last 2 video games.

in fallout 3 the lone wanderer is given the G.O.A.T standardized test as a child to determine his skills, in New Vegas, a doctor psychoanalyzes the courier after he survives a gunshot wound to his head.

In my campaign the pcs wake up from chryogenic suspension in a vault as the only survivors out of about a thousand people when the power goes out. only the Automated systems are left to direct them. The main computer has also been cut so the remaining robots need to find out what the skills of the pcs are. Here is the point where I am at a loss. What sorts of questions should the robots ask to find the pcs skill sets.

I want to use either the fallout special system or the deadlands system (in which case the skill system will be modified slightly to fit the fallout setting better.)

Project_Mayhem
2011-11-03, 09:29 PM
With regards to system you're using, the SPECIAL system sucks hard. To be honest, and I'm saying this as a fan of the first 2 games, it even sucks hard in the computer game. The mechanics are the weakest part of those games.

Your other choice is what I was going to recommend anyway. Well, sort of. Deadlands inspired the Savage Worlds system, which is tighter, more streamlined, and generic enough to be modded to most settings. It's my go-to recommendation for any slightly pulpy setting.

On the actual question you were asking - it's difficult. I probably wouldn't do that to the players myself - most of my group would have a good concept of what they wanted to play ready anyway, and arbitrary questions shaping their character would just annoy them

DodgerH2O
2011-11-05, 02:44 PM
The only way I could see it working (and not very well, at that) is that you make it semi-modular, meaning instead of "Oh, he wants to beat up the bully rather than stealing his baseball cap back" gives unarmed as a tag skill you do a sort of thing where each response gives a point or two towards a given skill.

Even that would kinda bug me as a player though, assuming you had questions that were like ABCD etc. Meaning if the question was along the lines of A- Melee B- Stealth C- Science D- Survival. What if I want a super-smart, knife-wielding thief? I have to choose just one?

Strormer
2011-11-06, 09:43 AM
This is all true, and the video games do give you the option, at the end of the questions, to change your result, so the questions are really just superficial. Fallout and The Elder Scrolls share that. To tell the truth, in Oblivion I just saved a character at the end of the starter dungeon before you are given the option to change everything, named him ANYMAN, and rarely did the starter dungeon again. At a table, that kind of thing just wastes time. You could have the players get together beforehand and have the "results" given to them in game, but skip the questions. They'll all thank you for it, and so will you.

LibraryOgre
2011-11-06, 12:49 PM
I'd be more inclined to give everyone a 20-questions type thing to think about character design option... rather than make them run through the GOAT, just let them, on their own time, think about who their character is and why he's skilled as he is.

Elvenoutrider
2011-11-07, 04:40 PM
Well you've all helped me to see the light, having a gm do this to me would probably irk me too. Ill just let them all make their characters normally. Character creation is a time consuming process as is.

Mando Knight
2011-11-07, 04:48 PM
I'd be more inclined to give everyone a 20-questions type thing to think about character design option... rather than make them run through the GOAT, just let them, on their own time, think about who their character is and why he's skilled as he is.

Well you've all helped me to see the light, having a gm do this to me would probably irk me too. Ill just let them all make their characters normally. Character creation is a time consuming process as is.
Actually, in keeping with Fallout, I'd have them run through the GOAT, then let them tag whichever skills they want to anyway. Give them bad evaluations, most of the time, to stress how flawed anything produced by Vault-Tec is, and how weird the results of occupational aptitude tests can be. Billy will be a rotary drill press operator, Butch is a hairdresser, etc.