My character grew up in southern California with his father and uncle, and they got by from raiding caravans. The father was a chem addict, but was a damn fine shot with his rifles and a talented fighter. His uncle was the more composed, intelligent one, and taught the courier how to plan an ambush (as opposed to his fathers plans of running in all guns blazing high on psycho), how to maintain and repair weapons and how to effectively hunt animals in the wastes.
They lived nomadically for years, before stumbling into an old library on the edge of an irradiated town, and settled in. The courier began learning about medicine and science here, slowly becoming the doctor for the small family of raiders (there were eleven of them in the library). He stopped going on the raids, preferring to read, and play around with repairing weapons, before slowly fixing up the library. He grew distant from his violent father, and closer to his uncle.
Weeks after his uncles mysterious disappearance, the courier came across a journal and a stash of chems in his father locked desk. The journal detailed how his father had murdered the uncle who 'wished to corrupt the mind' of the courier.
Shocked by the betrayal, he took some of his fathers psycho, and when his father returned, he stabbed him.
Taking only a lead pipe and a laser pistol, and a few medical and scientific books, some makeshift explosives with him, as well as his fathers stash of chems, he fled the library, abandoning the others and headed north.
After a few years as a bounty hunter, then a door guard, he settled into a job as a courier...
So that's the story of Jackson. He'll use explosives and melee, being skilled with repair, survival, medicine, lockpicking and science. He'll use stealth to set traps, or just slash away at the legs of an unsuspecting enemy.
So what perks should I take? And who would such a character likely side with? AND which followers would be fitting? AND FINALLY, weapons?