Civillian Skills

[kato13]

Brother in Arms 09-06-2008, 10:15 PM I was reading the Civilian character thread and it made me think about regular people and what they know and or can do and the various things that have got them to the point they are at in life currently. So I turn to you the various people that are on this forum. While several folks here have been in the miltary or still are I suspect more of us on this forum never have been. Despite that have we have unusual and useful skill sets. I'm sure everyone has made themselves as a T2K character (though I never have.) So I thought I would give you an idea of myself and some of the skills I have to see what you think. I think I could be useful a PC in a T2K game. I'm kind of curious what skill sets and backgrounds we have here. Imagine if the members of this forum where in a t2k party.


Physical info:

Age 28, Height 5,7 Weight 200lbs. Poor Eye sight I wear corrective lenses.


Past history: I grew up hunting, fishing, camping in the woods of my home state Maine. Some of my earliest memories are fly fishing in the canoe with my dad. I was active in the boyscout for many years and did a lot of hiking and woodland survival type activities. I started shooting regularly around age 10 and spent most of my life since studying firearms. During my teens I became a historical reenactor of the French and Indian war and became immersed in the history and skills of that time period and later was a blacksmith. Spent a lot of time in the woods honing my 18th century skills using nothing but items from that time period. Last summer I started hiking the Appalachian trail but didn't finish because I landed an actual job.


Work history:

in 9 years since I graduated high school I have had many lame jobs...first I was worked in the kitchens at a college then a sewage treatment plant, Army surplus store, Furniture mover, janitor,grounds keeper at a historic site, blacksmith, stone cutter/laborer, Barristo at a coffee shop and finally as a gunsmith. I went to college for 2 years dropped out worked, was unemployed, self employed then went to trade school worked more and finally found a job in my field that I am currently unhappy with. At trade school I got interested in high power shooting which is long range competitive shooting using military rifles like the M1, M14, M16A2


I can also cross country ski, swim, sing and chase women (currently my most used skill)


So that is just a example of my life and some of the things I have done during it that would give me skills in given areas. Unlike most people of my era I don't have much in the way of modern technological skills. I can type emails and find porn on a computer thats about it. Other than that I can run my DVD player.



You don't have to go into such detail about yourself if you don't want too but I am curious about some of the skills you all may have. You may have noticed that I like most Americans have no other Language skills other than English.


Brother in Arms

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thefusilier 09-06-2008, 10:48 PM This is just civilian skills right?

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Brother in Arms 09-06-2008, 11:03 PM yup

but then again I grew up making bombs for fun, so skills might have some cross over. But using myself as an example I have never been in the military.


Brother in Arms

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pmulcahy 09-06-2008, 11:58 PM yup

but then again I grew up making bombs for fun, so skills might have some cross over. But using myself as an example I have never been in the military.


Brother in Arms


I don't think I want to know any more about that... :confused4

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kato13 09-07-2008, 12:03 AM I made RDX in high school. Very small amounts but I did it with a chemistry teacher's supervision. He knew if might try so he suggested I do it in the lab. His reasoning was


"I don't want to see a marker that says 'Here lies Michael (pause) and over there lies Michael , and waaaay over there lies Michael'".

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Brother in Arms 09-07-2008, 06:25 AM Sorry Paul

didn't mean to make you hoist the red flag of political correctness. Can't talk about stuff like that these days without people thinking your a danger to your self and others. Guess the world has changed a lot since I was a lad.


Sadly no one has actually responded to the topic of the thread yet.


Brother in Arms

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thefusilier 09-07-2008, 06:43 AM I think its a good topic... more interesting than military skills of yourself and less of the inflated skills. I just don't have that much in the way of civilian skills though.


After high school I went right into the army. I went to university near the end and learned some German... so I'd say something like 2 skill points. Oh and some geology 2. But like anything, if you don't practice it - you lose it. I think my German would be a 1 now. Too bad T2000 didn't reflect degraded skills. All the other classes in university don't really fit into the Twilight skill framework (history/psychology/sociology) .


I learned everything about computers on my own, and I think I'm not bad (3-4). These would be secondary activities I suppose, since I spend a lot of free time on the pc.


I don't hunt, don't garden (farm), and can't fix cars. So my background skills would be small boat, swimming, ground veh (wheeled)... yup - just these 3 if I was honest about it. I mean, I've rode a horse and stuff... but not enough to put up my skills. They'd be 0 I guess.


So most of what I know I learned from the Army... I'd be a weak PC if I omitted that from my char/gen.

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kato13 09-07-2008, 06:52 AM All i know is I left high school with way more skill points than the 18 year old character starts with [chem (2), bio (2), swimming (3), unarmed combat (3), armed combat (2), lock picking (1), computer (3), survival (1), first aid (2), Korean(1) , Chinese, Cantonese(1) plus others I am sure I am forgetting]. We did a skills thread a while ago and it got deleted. Sorry I don't feel like reconstruction myself again.

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simonmark6 09-07-2008, 07:52 AM If I was in a T2K game with the people on this forum, I'd volunteer to be LAW's pack mule, I could hand him more ammo and guns and be praying I didn't get shot. As a PC, I'd be woefully inadequate.


Stats:

Strength: 5 (6' 6"and I used to power lift a lot, I've degraded over the years but I'm still stronger than most people around me. Assuming they're all below average, average feels about right)

Constitution: 5 (Overweight and sedentary, but I've had five days sickness in 18 years of work, that was when I was stabbed at school, I came back the next day with 26 stiches but they wouldn't let me back in until I'd seen the County Doctor, he had a four day waiting list)

Agility: 1 (could be lower, I'm a real klutz)

Education: 7 (Undergraduate Degree, Two graduate Degrees, a lot of it part time, I also have a sideline in editting Dorctoral Theses in order to make them academically acceptable)

Charisma: 6 (I'm an easy guy to get along with and many of my pupils still keep in touch and visit with their own kids, I seem to make an impression but I'm no Mr. Charisma)

Intelligence: 7 (Minimum for Graduate Degree courses but feels too high, I'd prefer a 6, I'm beter than average but not great)

Total: 30 (below the starting average for points but I guess I rolled low and made it up to 30)


Initiative: 1 (again, could be lower)


Background Skills:

Swimming: 2

Farming: 2 (helped out on my Uncle's Sheep Farm from 10-18)

Musical Instrument: Tuba: 4


Term 1: University

English Literature: 5

French: 1

Persuasion: 1

Tuba: 1 (5)


Term 2: Grad School (A bit artificial, because in the UK, the first degree is only 4 years, this conflates my Grad Degree and first few years of teaching into one)

Instruction: 4

Persuasion: 2 (3)

Tuba: 1 (6)


Term 3: Teaching

Instruction: 2 (6)

English literature: 2 (7)

Medical: Trauma Aid: 1

Promotion: Head of Year: Interrogation: 1


Term 4: Teaching

Instruction: 2 (8)

Persuasion: 2 (5)

Tuba: 1 (7)

Computer: 1 (1)

Promotion: Head of Faculty: Leadership 1 (more like Administration really)



That would take me up to the year 2000, and it's all really a moot point as where I live is five miles away from three seperate nuke targets: Port Talbot Steel Works, BP Baglan Bay and BP Llandarcy, I'd have been vapourised some time after the three minute warning. If I'd been at school, a big hill might have sheltered us from the initial blast, so I'd have gotten to die of radiation poisoning if some other desperate Refugee hadn't killed me first.


If the game focused on social interaction rather than combat, I might survive, but my initiative would probably have me buying the farm in the first firefight.

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Targan 09-07-2008, 08:41 AM Too bad T2000 didn't reflect degraded skills.The system I use has excellent skill level decline rules

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pmulcahy 09-07-2008, 10:54 AM Sorry Paul

didn't mean to make you hoist the red flag of political correctness. Can't talk about stuff like that these days without people thinking your a danger to your self and others. Guess the world has changed a lot since I was a lad.


Sadly no one has actually responded to the topic of the thread yet.


Brother in Arms


Don't worry about it; I was actually joking!

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Lt_Kamikaze 09-07-2008, 12:13 PM Physical info:

Age 22, Height 186 cm Weight 95 kg. No serious allergies or the like, lactose sensitive and some serious dandruff at times.


Past history:

I grew up in a quiet rural town with about 8000 inhabitants. I taught myself to read when I was five years old, and read quite a bit until I was about 13. Encyclopedias and other educational materials were particularly interesting. In addition to all kind of science, all kinds of sports have been, and still are, close to my heart. Everything from Finnish baseball, soccer, volleyball and orienteering to track and field. You could say I was the sporty nerd, as funny as it may sound.


As I said, I pretty much stopped reading actively when I turned 13 and started to play around with computers.


My dad's always been the household DIY and I've gotten my share of the pie too. And I'm actually quite glad I don't have to call the maintenance man for every small problem. My wife is too.


I never hunted, went fishing anywhere farther than the nearest lake pier (with a rod) or camped much in the woods. Until I turned 16. I became very interested in airsoft, camping, the military in general etc. There's a general compulsory military service of 6 months - 1 year, and I was assigned to a border company. I wouldn't know, but I guess the training is equivalent to that of an army ranger, without parachutes, and with some border patrol training. I served for a year and became a 2nd lieutenant of the army reserves.


I've since begun my studies at Helsinki university of Technology to become a Master of Science in the field of chemical engineering. So science, and chemisty in particular, is my thing.


Work history:

Some lame (summer) jobs as a shop clerk, gym teacher's substitute and a chemical factory worker.


I can also cross country ski, swim, drive a car, speak finnish, swedish, english and german. I also know the russian alphabet, but hardly any vocabulary.


I guess that's enough. No one actually reads these anyway?!?

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Hangfire7 09-07-2008, 02:42 PM Oh, so basicaly you are saying,


Write ourselves up as a character. What skills would we have etc.


6-2, 230 <my civilian weight>, recovering from orthopedic surgery, but building back up to my old routine. Give me another 30 days before I am running again.


Per the 2nd Ed Skills <NOT the evil 2.2>


Scuba-up to Assistant Dive instructor

Welding-had my cert

A/C Mech, about 1 year or half way through my Airframe and Powerplant Cert from Northrope Tech

Machinist-1 year of school program, plus taught by my grandfather a master machinist and tool and die maker.

Mechanic-did what I had to to keep my old truck on the road, which included rebuilding the engine.

Civil Air Patrol Cadet- Did their ground school, and was one of the cadet Cadre, and ate up their SAR, First Aid, Com courses and land navigation courses I even had my arial observer pin, even a little Meteorology, as well as some aircraft maintenance, operations and some field training


Skiing- several winters at the local winter ski spots

LOTS OF TIME in the Desert as a child, <Child is pre 18> survival and land nac

Wheeled Vehicle

Melee <1 year of wrestling>

Fishing-local lakes, rivers and ocean.

Small Boat, mostly outboard motor boats on lacks and inshore

With minor knowledge in Farming and Horsemanship due to family farm

Small Arms, was an avid shooter and hunter with my .22, 30-30 and 12 guage

Avid Hiker with my freinds and dabbled in climbing and rapelling

1 Year of Spanish, 2 of Latin, 1 of French

Tracking, from hunting and hiking and taught my freinds some in addition to land navigation as well as observation.




Military Career:

Infantry, rifleman and mortarman for about 2 terms, expert SAW gunner, 203 gunner and mastergunner on the 60mm mortar.

2.0 Skills


Running

Swimming

Small Boat

Instruction

Electronics <radio operation>

Small Arms Pistol, Rifle, Auto Rifle EXCELLENT, machinegun good>

Indirect Fire, EXPERT

Rocket Launcher-Good

FO-Excellent

Unarmed Melee, the good ol lines

Armed Melee, good

Observation-GOOD,

Stealth-good

Mountaineering

Skiing

With very limited language skills in Arabic, Spanish, Japanese and French.


Civilian 1st Term: Student/Factory Worker/Security Guard/Family Farm

Student:

1.) Persuasion

2.) Computer


Factory Worker:

1.) Mechanic

2.) Chemistry

3.) Persuasion



Security Guard:

1.) Small Arms

2.) Melee Armed and unarmed

3.) Interogation


Farm Worker:

1.) Farming; no real skill just alot of work and handling dumb cattle

2.) Mechanic; ancient machinery you had to repair

3.) Metalurgy ; see above, something always needed welding

4.) Strength! <cheap bastards cut 90 pound bales of hay to save on twine, and cut it green thus, making it heavier. I tossed the bails in the truck, while they drove.> So I ran as far as fast and as soon as I could from that life


2nd Civilian Term: Student/Security Guard+Corrections+Local Law Enforcement:

Student:

1.) Computer

2.)Perusasion

3.) Instruction

4.) Language, Spanish


Security+Corrections+Local Law Enforcement

1.)Small Arms pistol

2.) Melee armed and unarmed

3.) Interogations

4.) Observation

5.) Wheeled Vehicle

6.) Language Spanish


Secondary Activities This Term:

Unarmed melee

Small Arms Pistol



3rd Civilian Term: Security+Paralegal+Law School

1.) Small Arms pistol

2.) Melee armed+unarmed

3.) Observation

4.) Interogation


Paralegal+Law School:

1.) Persuassion

2.) Observation

3.) Interogation


Secondary Terms:

Small Boat: Kayaking, powerboating and navigating the coastal waters

Hiking

Unarmed Melee <through luck a jujitsu studio was around the corner from the office and opened until 2200.>

Scuba Diving

Fishing


4th Civilian Term: Security+Paralegal+HealthCare Student:


Security/Park Ranger

1.) Small Arms Pistol

2.) Melee armed and unarmed

3.) Observation

4.) Interogation

5.) Spanish

6.) Wheeled Vehicle


Paralegal:

1.) Interogation

2.) Persuasion

3.) Observation



Current Term 5th: HealthCare/Student/ Security Guard


1.) EMT

A.) Wheeled Vehicle

B.) Medical

C.) Computer

D.) Biology


2.) RN/Physicians Assistant Training/School In progress. That is just the last year term.

A.) Observation

B.) Biology

C.) Chemistry

D.) Perussion

E.) Interogation

6.) Computer



Security:

1.) Melee armed/unarmed

2.) Small Arms, pistol

3.) Persuasion

4.) Interogation

5.) Spanish


Secondary Activities:

Small Boat: Kayaking and repairing the engine and refurbishing on a small boat and Scuba.


Hiking, observation

Small Arms: Rifle and Pistol


Gardening: not to be confused with farming but it gives and reinforces the knowledge for small scale gardens, as well as experimental gardening from things learned about the horticulture used by primative man and ancient peoples prior to modern agricultural methods with hybrid seed, fertliizer and irrigation methods. Again an intermittent hobby.


It must be noted:


Many of the above skills are perishable. And thus if one has the initial training or skill, they have the knowledge and it will not totaly disapear. However, if one does not maintain it, then it will degrade. An example, I have Spanish down several times. It is intermittent though. And thus, alot of it is rebuilding skills that have degraded or been lost.


Further, there are other skills that were one time courses where the base knowledge was instilled and so the knowledge is there. Such courses include:


CQB

Krav Maga

Hyperbaric Chamber Operations

Glock Armorers Course

Building M1 Garands, M1 Carbines and AR-15 tyle weapons from stripped recivers and parts kits.

Several Shooting Courses mostly pistol to rifle when time, money and the oportunity avail themselves, as well as a few automatic weapons shoots which are rare.


Things not done every day, but on occassion, so one knows how, but to do them after a long pause it would take one some time and often trial and error to complete. However, the base knowledge puts that person ahead of someone who is doing it without any knowledge, skill or experience, and then after one refamiliarizes themselves with the task they will relearn faster as the skill and knowledge returns to them.

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Mohoender 09-07-2008, 04:32 PM So lets evaluate skills. Calculation will be slightly different than that from the game as I allowed myself more than 1 secondary activity.


From kid time

- Skying: 3

- Farming: 1

- Cooking: 2

- Swimming: 2

- Navigation: 2

- Observation: 1

- Small Arms (Rifle): 3


Undergraduate School (1 Term)

- Scuba: 1

- Skying: 1

- Swimming:1

- Computer: 1

- Persuasion: 1

- Horsemanship : 1

- Small Arms (Rifle): 1

- Instruction (History): 2

- Ground Vehicle (Wheeled): 1

- Language: 6 (English), 1 (Russian)


Military Service (French Airforce/unit soon to be disbanded)

- Small Arms (submachinegun): 2

- Computer: 1

- Navigation: 1

- Meteorology: 2


Wine business (1 Term)

- Cooking: 1

- Farming: 1

- Computer: 1

- Chemistry: 1

- Persuasion: 2

- Leadership: 1

- Horsemanship: 1

- Ground Vehicle (Wheeled) : 3


Grad School (1 1/2 term)

- Language: 1 (Portuguese), 1 (Russian), 1 (English)

- Cooking: 1

- Computer: 2

- Persuasion: 1

- Observation: 1

- Instruction (History): 4


Independent Business as Ghost Writer (1 Term)

- Cooking: 1

- Computer: 1

- Persuasion: 1

- Observation: 1

- Language: 1 (English)

- Instruction (Writing): 5


I think that will be about it and the total is:

- Scuba: 1

- Skying: 4

- Farming: 2

- Cooking: 5

- Swimming: 3

- Computer: 6

- Chemistry: 1

- Navigation: 3

- Persuasion: 5

- Leadership: 1

- Observation: 3

- Meteorology: 2

- Horsemanship : 2

- Instruction : 6 (History), 5 (Writing)

- Ground Vehicle (Wheeled): 4

- Small Arms: 4 (Rifle), 2 (submachinegun)

- Language: 7 (English), 2 (Russian), 1 (Portuguese)


Then, my skills in meteorology and submachinegun are going down, I'm a fairly good historian (Russia and the middle ages) and I'm not bad with a bicycle. Oops, I forgot, I have some skills with a crossbow. I also start shaking when I have to climb anything but I could enter my appartment from the fourth floor window when it was needed. Last time someone draw a knife at me it ended with the guys offering me a beer and calling me brother. So far I have got out of these kind of tricky situation 5 times out of 5 only by talking (so I'm not bad with persuasion, really). Anyway our major tank base is less than 10 miles away, the french artillery school is about 15 miles as is one of our marine infantry regiment, and our main naval base on the Mediterranean (Toulon) is about 60 miles away. So, I live in a nice setting with several military targets around. At least I'm more than 80 miles away from any of our nuclear reactor .

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Milano 09-10-2008, 01:18 AM I guess a brief history would be inorder before assingning skill levels to myself. I am 31 and am currently living in California USA. I was born in the suberbs of a town of 30,000. Played "Army" as a kid. My father was a Ranger and he taught me some things which took playing with plastic guns to a WHOLE new level. My parents made me get a job at 12 and was sent with my uncle to help him on his cattle ranch. All day, all that I did was fix fence with his Mexican ranch hand. My father also got me into computers in the days of Compuserve.

I was sent to a private school for Jr. High and High School and still worked on thoes darn fences 6 days a week, every summer, until college. I did not have the grades for Westpoint so instead joined ROTC hoping to get into Special Forces. Ohh yea, I went to school for a Major in Animal Science and a minor in Computer science.

Graduated with my BS and within a year of going active duty a large corn fed fellow fast roped onto my head and fused a few vertebrae, messed up my hips, and knees. I was medicaled and went on a good binder for a year or so. Had a bunch of jobs Ford mechanic, house construction, security guard, truck driver, hunting guide, and ALOT of cowboying ranch jobs.

Came back to California and went to running my own cattle. Recently I have gotten back into F-class shooting.


So skills: I am 6'2" weigh 210.


Strength - Alittle above average say 6.

Constitution - above average 7

Agility - Average probably -2 because of the a-fore-mentioned clutz who forgot to grab the rope.

Education - I am horrible at school related stuff. Don't know why they let me in. Say 3 or 4.

Charisma - I am friendly and easy to get along with but, I was once told that I lack command presense until I am pissed. I'd say a solid 2 to 7.

Intelligence - I am good at problems and have lots of common sence, 7


As a child---

Civil Engineer 1

Rifle 1

Spanish 6

Horsemanship 1

Wheeled 1 (I would give this a 0 level if it weren't that I had too usually drove with a 20' stock trailer with my learners permit.)

Computer 1

Survival 1


College and Army--

Biology 2

Chemistry 1

Mediacal (Diagnosis) 1 (I might not know what Cholera is but if I can figure out that a horse has Cholic and not West Nile Disease)

Computer 2

Rifle 3 total 4 (My favorite place was the firing line and I used every excuse)

Combat Engineer 1

Unarmed 1

Leadership 1

Instruction 1


Random Jobs--

Mechanic 3 (Ford Certified mechanic if you belive the ads)

Wheeled 2 total 3

Tracking 2

Survival 1 total 2

Observation 1

Rifle 1 (F-class competition)


Ranch Jobs and cowboying --

Metalurgy 2 (Hangfire is right always someting to weld.)

Machineist 1 (The correct parts are never available.)

Meterology 2 (Weather forcasting is very important.)

Rifle 1 total 6 (predation is a problem where I am)

Horsemanship 4 (5 or 6 days a week. Walking has not been my strong suit anyway)

Civil Engineer 2 total 3 (plumbing, fence building, coral building)

Biology 1 total 3 (it's important to know the difference between nauxtious weeds and good oat hay)

Computer 1 total 4 (It is the 21st century running a bussiness is much easier on a computer)

Medical Diagnosis 2 total 3 (patients can't tell you that its their pasturn that hurts not their hip)

Medical Trauma Aid 2 (I'm not paying a vet $500 to stop the bleeding and sutureing up a $1,500 horse!)

Medical Surgury 2 (Imagine sewing in a prolapsed uterus in a dusty field after tieing down a 1,100 pound animal.)

Spanish 1 total 7 (still have to comunicate)

Observation 2 (watch a herd of 700 yearlings and in a moment be able to tell which ones are going to try to escape)

Tracking 1 total 3 (find the escaped yearlings after failing to tell which ones were going to run.)


I hope you see why I am posting a reply. There are alot of jobs that have ALOT of different facets and skills that one doesn't realize. Because I have pretty much unwittingly specialised in the career of Ranch Hand I can speak only of my chosen profession. I would however like to hear of your professions. I am always adding or editing my own career list to moke civilian characters more viable in the Twilight world.

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[kato13]

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Trailer_Park_Jawa 09-12-2008, 03:00 PM Are we supposed to write ourselves up as a character given the skills we would have had in 1996-2000 or as we are today in 2008? Some of the skills i have now are based on technology that didnt really exist 10 years ago or at least was super rare.

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[kato13]

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Hangfire7 09-12-2008, 11:45 PM

I went with today. Back then, ah oh to be young again....on second thought never mind But then again my agility skill would be better and my combat skills would be more honed than today.

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