The city had one had a name, but that name had long since been lost to the ravages of time. Now, it was just another ruin, a man-made and man-destroyed gathering of steel skeletons and concrete hills. Nature had long ago begun its slow, tedious task of reclaiming the city into the surrounding wilderness, but that would take time. For now, clumps of brown, discolored weeds would continue to shove their way through the numerous cracks that snacked through what had once been smooth, featureless asphalt. The occasional tree persevered in what scant light could be gleaned in the shadows of the crumbling monoliths, but these lone sentinels were twisted, distorted versions of the towering pines, elms and others seen in pictures from what few printed materials had survived the war.

The sun was beginning to set, still a hand's width above the horizon, but darkness already reigned in the center of the city. Utter silence, the total lack of sound that only settles into places totally devoid of life, blanketed the ruins. Somewhere deep in the city center, something crashed, the noise loud enough to echo for blocks all around. As the multiple crashes began to fade, a new sound replaced them: a low rumbling, growing steadily in volume, only to culminate in a series of thundering crashes, punctuated by the shriek of bending metal.

Deep in the city, a young Hispanic man stood on the rough edge of a floor about two-thirds the way up the building's height. Most of that side of the building was missing, some of it likely collapsed decades ago. Some of the rubble, however, was much more recent... His gazed was fixed on the billowing cloud of dust and debris settling on ground-level below him. "Hum," he said to himself quietly. "Guess that wall wasn't as stable as I thought." His breath fogged before him, and he pulled up the hood on his shirt, a thick garment the color of old dirt. He watched the dust cloud settle, glad he'd been quick to step away when the building started to fall apart around him. Something gray drifted past his face; another particle the color of ash floated by a moment later. A glance upward confirmed it: snow.

"Great," he muttered, ignoring the soft, infrequent ticking from the Geiger counter built into the old, battered Pipboy 3000 threaded onto the strap of his bag as he turned away and sought a warmer, less exposed section of the building. He would find somewhere not directly exposed to the elements, where he might be able to start a small fire, and wait out the snow. Then he would continue scavenging the city. In the meantime, he suddenly found he had more time than he expected to give this particular building a thorough once-over. After all, he hadn't trekked all the way here to leave empty-handed...

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Hello all, this will be my first time joining you fine folks on the gamesas boards. I'm no stranger to roleplaying, but unfortunately the board where I typically confine myself is full of people who haven't played Fallout. So here I am.

The basic premise of this thread is as follows: the setting is this city in the middle of the Canadian Wastelands... the name has been lost to time, but to savvy types like us it would be known as Toronto. Why Toronto, you ask? I wanted somewhere distant from the typical Fallout settings, but still close enough to keep that classic Fallout feel. I'll be taking loads of liberties and otherwise just ignoring realistic geography of the area, with exception to the obvious stuff I can get from Wikipedia ("This city is near a big damn body of water."). I thought it would be fun to try something along the lines of survival horror mixed with the typical post-apocalyptic wasteland... heck, with feral ghouls in the game, it seems like they're just begging us to do it. So here we are.

So, we'll take a short while to introduce the characters, all of whom should be in the city and probably sheltering from the snow, which is of course radioactive to some degree (after all, snow is precipitation, coming from the local bodies of water, which are of course all irradiated). What they don't know is Toronto happens to be home to a large number of feral ghouls who are attracted by the radioactive precipitation, leading our heroes into a perilous, dangerous, and quite possibly fatal position. They will have to band together to survive, and who knows? Maybe someone will crack under the pressure. Maybe someone will make a mistake. Maybe they'll all turn into pink rubber chickens and dance the hustle!

Okay, that last one's probably pretty unlikely. But you get the idea.

I'd like to keep the number of participants relatively small and therefore easy to control, as I'll be assuming the responsibility of keeping things moving along and otherwise providing that most important ambrosia, PLOT. Let's say maybe 5-7 people, not including myself. Send PMs with character sheets to me; if I can, I'll edit my post to list them, otherwise you can throw them in your first posts once I've approved the character. Rules are pretty standard fare; no godmoding, et. al. I'm a bit of an elitist when it comes to spelling and grammar... there are enough tools available to keep yourself legible. OpenOffice is free (google it), MS Word is not, and there are tons of spellchecker websites. Please try to avoid one liners and pure dialogue... include actions, description, character's feelings. Give us some meat!

Okay, blah blah blah. Here's the character sheet, followed by my character:

Name:
Race: Typically human, but I'm okay with a ghoul or a Super Mutant (the latter obviously of the above-average Fawkesian sort of intelligence), long as you're willing to roleplay the ramifications. A ghoul would be fun because they would probably be mistrusted by some of the party, while the ferals wouldn't actively hunt the ghoul character down (unless they got too much in the way...?).
Age:
Appearance: Don't have to write a novel here, just a basic idea. You can always elaborate in RP.
Skills: Numbers aren't necessary here, and neither are strict Fallout skills, though they can be useful to reference as examples
Notable Equipment: Just basic stuff here, no need to list off EVERY LAST PIECE OF GEAR the character owns. List the big important stuff, and try to kepe this to a middling power level, please. I'm okay with big guns or otherwise largely powerful weapons, as long as there's some major drawback ("You only brought one missile?!") or something. No Fat Men, please... they're awesome, but would take all the fun out.

One last note: I'm looking for survivors, people of varying backgrounds (Vault Dwellers, Wasteland Scavengers, whatever) who aren't the PC of Fallout 1/2/3. Slightly above average individuals, but still clearly in a certain amount of danger simply for living in the Wastelands. It's more interesting if they're all flawed, neurotic, underprepared, or otherwise imperfect, ordinary people.

Hope to be sending out some PMs soon. Until next time, chillllldren!

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Characters!

Name: Isaac "Crow" Vargas (Played by Robrich8705)
Race: Human (Hispanic)
Age: 27
Appearance: 5'7", lean and thin. Light brown hair, chin length; light goatee ('Ronin' style in game). Brown eyes, smiles often and easily. Wears utilitarian clothing, not bothering with bulky or heavy armor: Brown boots covered by worn, heavy-duty cargo pants with large pockets typically full of salvage; grayish t-shirt covered by a dark brown short-sleeve hooded shirt, fingerless brahmin-leather gloves and motorcycle goggles worn around the neck when not in use, heavy canvas bag, slung over shoulder (To visualize, picture the Merc grunt outfit covered by the hoody-shirt-thing from the Wasteland Wanderer Outfit, with the gloves from the same, and add the messenger bag from the Wasteland Doctor Fatigues).
Skills: Scavenging, repairing and building (Repair/Science); Pistol-sized weapons (Small Guns) and familiar with bolt-action rifles; Basic knowledge of first aid (Medicine); Navigating; Passing familiarity in history
Notable Equipment: .44 magnum revolver (non-scoped), sawed-off shotgun, knife; Pipboy 3000 (salvaged from an otherwise empty Vault, repaired and put to use by Isaac, typically found hanging from the strap on his bag); various odds and ends (pieces of scrap metal, conductors, etc.); food and provisions to last an extended amount of time between settlements

Name: Vladamir Kamarov (Played by BGursky59)
Age:28
Appearance: 6'1, 150 pounds,Caucasian (Russian), Rugged brown hair that stops right above his eyes, thick goatee.
Clothes: Brown Ushanka, heavy black parka, heavy duty brown cargo pants, black comabat boots, black t-shirt under parka.
Weapons: a black Barret .50 caliber sniper with a sling and bipod, and a 44. magmum revolver, combat knife (strapped to boot)
Equipment: brown duffle bag with a sling which holds: .50 cal ammo, and very little food, and a brown dirty rugged blanket.
Skills: Rifling (sniper), very little first aid, and is very good a navigating.
Bio: Was born in a Russian coloney set up in Alaska after the war. There he was taught navigating and military skills. He and a squad
were sent out to head for D.C. but the exipetion went bad when they ran into a large feral ghoul nest. He was one of the only ones who were not killed
but he became seperated from the squad. Eventually, he made his way to a place called Toronto. He set up for the night in a large ruined factory.....

Name: Maric (Played by Erandur-Vangaril)
Race: Human
Age: 23
Appearance: 5'11", blue eyes, shaggy hair and a rough beard, both brown. Has leather armor to keep considerably warm.
Skills: Melee and Small Guns for the fighting. He knows how to cook using very low radiation, and he has a high perception skill.
Notable Equipment: His leather armor, of course. He also carries a silenced 10mm pistol, to take out his prey without alot of attention.
Other: He lives in a little wooden shack he made earlier that year. He hunts in and around the city, but usually doesn't go to far into it. He has only seen a feral ghoul once, so he really has no idea they are there. He just shrugged it off.

Name: Colin McGill (Played by Wakyzacy)
Age: 29
Race: Canadian-American, Caucasian
Appearance: A dirty Chinese jumpsuit with raider pain spike armour over the top of it, he wears a makeshift gas mask as a helmet. Bandoliers of assault rifle, and SMG ammo slung across his chest.
Has a large rucksack in which he carries his assault rifle and SMG ammo, that
Skills: He is exceptionally good with assault rifles, and Sub-machine guns, however he isn’t very accurate, and as such, is a mediocre fighter at best, but good for covering fire.
Being an ex raider, he has above average tolerance of radiation. (But not much more above.)
Notable equipment: A Chinese assault rifle in a fairly good state of repair. With quite a lot of stolen ammo for it.
An SMG in fairly good state of repair, not much ammo for it though.
A Geiger counter he wears around his neck, some looted night vision goggles he can attach to his custom built helmet to increase his view at night time.\

Name: Xavier "X" Arbelo (Played by befit)
Race: Human (Hispanic)
Age: 19
Appearance: Short hair, tall, big, Darkish-light skin
Equipment: combat shotgun, frag grenades (alot), combat knife, various tools
Skills: very experienced in explosives and chemicals (explosives, science), has knowledge in the usage and maintenance of shotguns (Repair, small arms)
Bio: Born and raised in the NYC ruins were the ghouls and raider ambush parties rule the towering sky scraqers. X became of worth to the mercenary companies of queens when he re-discoverd how to make nitro glycerine out of chemicals found in the ruins. Since then he has traveled eastward hoping to make it to alaska where he hears there is a large settlement of survivers at a place called Nome.

When Vlad (full name Vladamir but I will shorten it.) was making a bed out of insulation in the old factory he heard a lound boom. He looked out of the CEO office windowand saw part of a building was gone and a large cloud of dust. He looked at the door and then locked it. But he then turned to the old desk. He muttered to himself "Just to be safe" and then pushed the desk against the door. He then retured to the window and locked it. He then sat on the insulation bed and muttered " I hope this place isn't Radiated...

Isaac was used to being alone. He spent practically all of his time wandering the wastes, scavenging ruins for parts and useful technology. It was only when he needed something he couldn't find himself, or else when he simply couldn't carry his spare gear and needed to turn it into useful supplies and caps, that he ever entered a settlement. Quiet didn't bother him. He found it peaceful, and for those times when he did want something to listen to beyond his own breathing, his banged-up old Pipboy's radio still worked just fine. It was this he turned to now, ignoring his preset stations (which were all tuned to broadcasts in more southern, friendlier climates) in favor of scrolling randomly through the spectrum. He did this for several minutes, listening to an endless stream of static, before something caught his ear:

"...Brrzzzt....wer in... zzzt... onto. Brrzzzt.... sted the city. Stay zzt-ear. Brrrzzztt...."

He cocked his head to one side, listening intently, but the tenuous connection he'd had was lost; nothing but static was left. Curiousity was tempered by experience; he'd found many old radios, still broadcasting but with nothing to broadcast, over his ten years of wandering the wastes. It was probably a looping tape from an old radio show, or a commercial. Wouldn't be the first time.

Smiling wryly to himself, Isaac wrapped himself in a thin, woven blanket and lay back in a corner, his bag providing a suitable pillow. If one didn't mind hard, lumpy pillows. Settled and reasonably comfortable, he closed his eyes, ready for a well-deserved rest. He trusted his instincts to wake him up before he was food for something large and angry... his instincts, and the two frag mines he'd hidden in the hallway outside attached to tripwires.

One never could be too careful in the Wastelands, after all.

"Damn it, where did I leave my rifle?" Maric asked himself, half-yelling. No-one could hear him, after all, so what did it matter? He continued searching around his little shack, until he finally found it. Underneath the piles of old, empty whiskey bottles and half full Vodka bottles.

"Good. Now I can get some Mole Meat." he said, putting in a few .32 Caliber bullets in the gun he had nicknamed 'Ole Painless'. He exited the shack, and looked toward the rising sun. It was the only beautiful thing left in this godforsaken hellhole. Or was it? He really could care less. He just wanted to shoot something.

He made his way toward the old radio station. He usually kept his spare food in there, but he had ran out last night. I'll just go in the basemant and take out some molerats he thought, now entering his little old radio station. Before he went down, though, he wanted to check his radio transmission. It was the usual. "If anyone needs food or shelter, come to 62|614 Lat. Long. Bring your caps, this [censored] isn't free."

((Going to assume Maric's going for food in the early hours of the morning, since you mentioned a rising sun.))

It was only a short distance between Maric's shack and the small, local radio station he used as a storehouse. The building was a small, squat structure on the very edge of the city where a wilderness of stunted, twisted trees already encroached on the remains of civilization's corpse. The sun had yet to rise high enough to dispel more than the absolute blackness of the night; Maric's path was still more shadow than not. It was for this reason he didn't at first notice the two humanoid forms crouching in the shadows of the radio building as he approached.

The two feral ghouls leaped out from the lee of the building with low, hoarse cries, their arms extended and their jaws wide, ready to fill their stomachs with smoothskin flesh. Their bodies were emaciated and ravaged by their ghoul condition, the flesh hanging off in great tatters. Their feet kicked up small flurries of ash-colored snow as they ran at their quarry, completely heedless of the low-level radiation that permeated the area.

After all, radiation had made them. Radiation was their lifeblood, now.

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Isaac woke with a start, his hand automatically going for the revolver on his right hip. As the sleep began to clear from his eyes, he was relieved to find he was alone even as his mind registered the distance of the gunshot that had woke him. Yawning, he climbed to his feet, grabbed his bag, and left the room. Gunshots meant people, which meant the ruins weren't as abandoned as he'd hoped. People meant competition for his salvage. He quickly disarmed both of the frag mines he'd set the night before and made his way to the ground floor of the building.

At the entrance to the building, Isaac spent several minutes frowning alternately at the Geiger counter on his Pipboy and the light dusting of grayish snow that covered the ground. Finally, he sighed and reached into his bag, shuffling around for a moment before producing a bottle and dry-swallowing a couple of the small, bitter caplets it contained. A second gunshot echoed through the streets, causing Isaac to jerk his gaze in the approximate direction it emanated from.

Sighing, already lamenting the scavenging time he was losing, he set out in that direction.

As soon as Vlad heard the scream of what sounded like ghouls he eyes darted open. He then quickly grabbed his gear and headed out of the door.Worrying that ghouls had picked up his scent he then climbed the stairs down to the ground level. Hearing what sounded like more screams and they seamed closer this time, he drew his 44. and quicly ran to what was left of and old water tower to get a better veiw of the city. When he approached the tower he heard the creaking and moaning of the structure. He slowly climbed the later and finally reached the top.

Vlad then began to scoope out the city with his .50 cal to see if there was anything.......

Colin had been waiting for Roy, Jason and Nicola to get back all night, and it had been a long one. He had laid down several frag mines and tripwires leading to some frag mines cunningly concealed in the wall of the building they were using as raid H.Q.He figured they had been "Et" so he decided they would have wanted him to have all their spare ammo and food "shame to waste it right? Hur hur hur."
He was annoyed he'd been up all night waiting for them, only for them to go and die on him, they'd made a pact not to die on each other, and they'd broken it.
He cheered himself up by putting 3 rounds of full auto 5.56 mm into Jason's pet dog though, as he'd never liked it, and it stank.
He then shouldered his bag, and his rifle, and donned his mask, thus making his vision hazier through the eye holes of the mask, and giving his slight tunnel vision.
He then put his Geiger counter around his neck, and disarmed all but one of the frag mines, and left an ammo box with a few empty rounds in it as bait near the mine.
He then chuckled to himself "some poor sod's gonna find that and try to steal it, but I got a surprise for that git. Hur hur hur.NO one, steals from the raiders, we steal from THEM."
Finally he spray painted a large black cross with a circle around it to signify he had been in this building already. He then walked out of the dilapidated shop the raiders had been using as H.Q and looked around. Across the street, a building had collapsed one side into rubble, and that wasn't there yesterday evening. So Colin un-holstered his assault rifle and pulled the well oiled cocking bolt, and smiled to himself.
He took great pride in his weapons condition. Then, giving the surrounding area a cursory glance. He then decided whoever was in the collapsed building wasn't worth the effort, but just to be on the safe side, he set off down the lane, hugging the walls towards the nearest gun store he knew off.

"Oh shi-" Maric managed to get out, reaching for Ole Painless. It was to late, though, and the Ferals brought him to the ground. He felt them biting into his flesh, trying to rip it out. He struggled aimlessly for his gun, before he realized it was no use. He starting punching the ghouls, not know what else to do. It turns out what was left of their own flesh worked against them, it hurt extremely when ripped off. He tore off what must have been 3 pounds on each. They screeched in pain as they fled to a nearby ruin.

"What in the bloody hell was that all about?" he said to himself, picking up Painless and heading over to where they were. He then found one, eating the dead one next to him.

"What goes around comes around, ass-hole!"

Hearing what sounded like a assult rifle he rushed to the other side of the scalfolding. He then looked at an old ruin and saw nothing. He then turned hearing the scrams of ferals. He aimed at them with his .50 cal but saw they were attacking a man. He aimed for a shot untill he saw the a was ripping off the ferals skin. Seeing them jump off the man he began to get up. Vlad then yelled "HELLO, are you alright?" He then standed there untill he got a responce.

A voice? It couldn't be! He hadn't really heard one of those, other than his own, since he had lived in Megaton. 10 years ago.

"Hey, yeah, umm... I'm down here! I'm o.k.!" he yelled, reloading his rifle. He then made his way up to the surface, where he had heard the voice.

"So, did you hear my radio signal? Or did you just hear the yelling?" Maric asked, extending his hand.

Colin approached the gun store cautiously, last time he and his (now ex-) friends had been here, they'd been jumped by a posse of OTHER raiders, and he didn't want a repeat, it was always a bit too messy to clean up afterwards.
He tried the door, it was locked, but seemed fairly old, so Colin simply shot the lock of the door, then for effect, fired a few rounds into the air, and shouted "Whoop Whoop!"
He then kicked what was left of the door down and went into the store, there was a skeleton sat in a chair holding a dilapidated shotgun in a fashion as to be covering the door.
Colin tutted "Now that gun wouldn't hurt a bloat fly mister!"
Then he smiled under his mask, and walked into the back room, where he found?
No ammo at all, there was however, a body clutching some to its chest with a pistol, and it had been mutilated beyond recognition, what was left of its clothing appeared to be raider - esque. But Colin couldn't be sure if it was one of his, or the gang they had fought before.
The body appeared to have been clawed, and gnawed at, and gore hang off most of the walls, notably, the body was without a head, thus making recognising it almost impossible. It did APPEAR to be male though.
Colin checked the body, it had 10 caps on it, which he subsequently stole, but nothing else, he checked the pistol, it had been completely jammed with gore, so he tossed it aside, he then turned, and as stealthily as possible, exited the store, he wondered what he ought to do next, he decided looting was a good option.
So he ran off quickly into the city, looking for any and all shops to loot.

"Hello, Commrade."Vlad then grabbed the man's hand and helped him onto the tower." Are you sure you are all right you got chewed out by the ghouls preaty bad?" He then began scopping out the horizen waiting for a responce from the man.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Maric said, looking at the man scope the area. "I haven't seen them in a while. And come to think of it, I've never seen you before. Where did you come from?" he asked, questioning. Maric was usually nice, but he didn't want to much competition here. There were so few animals to feed off of.

"Here you go, sonny." says the old merchant as he hands Xavier 10 shotgun shells as payment for protection for his trek to the city. Xavier puts the shells into the pocket of his raggedy old jeans afterwards he puts on his goggles and his cap, which bears an N with a Y behind it the emblem of his old mecenary company, looks toward the city and takes a deep breath. Something about this city was familiar it reminds him of home. How the city felt was most familiar to him, this feeling of death behind every corner. Xavier shook off this moment of a combination of home sickness and dread and quickley looks for for shelter. He sees an old factory with an old rickety water tower on it and begins to make his way.