I am setting up a Fallout game, and was wondering if anyone had come up with good rules for scavenging. I'd like to emphasize that most gear in this setting is either found or crafted out of spare parts by the PCs, with trading and purchases being a more rare means of acquiring gear.

I have been working on a PA game and have dug through several other PA rpgs looking for similar ideas. Most (combat crawl) games have random tables for finding junk and the occasional treasure (ancient tech). Ultimately, Genesys is a narrative game and not a game of bean counting. Major items (plasma guns, powered armor, computer tablets, etc) should be placed deliberately as part of the story and not left to random chance. Minor items should be treated like Ammo, meaning that unless they are significant to the economy of the world (barter/sell) then they don't really need to be tracked. Also keep in mind that the type and condition of items found will be based on how many years/centuries have passed since your doomsday event (doomsday was in the 23rd century, mine started 700 hundred years later). If you need some lists for flavor, try the ones I have listed below. Others can be found with a little searching on google. You can also use Tablesmith to generate custom results from supplied tables to have results that are more appropriate to your setting.

https://wizardawn.and-mag.com/tool_loot.php

A list on reddit

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/159bBISFaV7XS5iO2vYWDfQ67WBdUEkCYTS5tHl9k4YQ/edit#gid=0

I’m thinking that maybe adopting the Requisition rules from the 40K games for salvaging stuff from the wreckage. Just need to get the details down.

My group just used the same rules provided for rarity on page 82-83 of the core, only instead of negotiation/street-wise we used perception or survival. Most fully intact weapons were rarity 5-ish modified by the location to scavenge (copy of the table I.5-2), plus GM upgrading difficulty dice on defined dangerous locations (like a battlefield or raider territory). Most of the time we got one to two scenes of downtime to scavenge per session, basically the shopping/resupply scene that we can get if we are in the middle of nowhere or out of cash.

On 2/23/2019 at 5:09 PM, HelloRPG said:

My group just used the same rules provided for rarity on page 82-83 of the core, only instead of negotiation/street-wise we used perception or survival. Most fully intact weapons were rarity 5-ish modified by the location to scavenge (copy of the table I.5-2), plus GM upgrading difficulty dice on defined dangerous locations (like a battlefield or raider territory). Most of the time we got one to two scenes of downtime to scavenge per session, basically the shopping/resupply scene that we can get if we are in the middle of nowhere or out of cash.

How do you determine how much loot they discover?

Fallout styles scavenging with Genesys styled Encumbrance rules is going to be tricky.

One thing I created for my DELVE setting was a way to harvest magical essence, or the reagents to make those essences, from defeated foes. It would be very simple to reimagine that for a tech-based game: just change the terminology to minor and major components. In order to create some improved, advanced, or otherwise superior piece of hardware, the future scavengers would have to harvest components either from defeated foes (that use tech), or from scrounging in areas where components may be available (ruins, junkyards, old battlefields, crashed warships, etc). Once they have a sufficient number of major components, either found intact or assembled from minor components, they can use those major components to create the new item or modification they're after.

The rules for harvesting essence are in the section for Artifice and Enchanting in my open sharing folder, but the quickie version is:

Different types of adversaries drop different types of components. You'll have to decide what suits your setting best, but some possibilities are Offensive, Defensive, and Power components.

To harvest an enemy, or a suitable site, you use an appropriate skill. In a tech-based game, that is most likely going to be Mechanics across the board, but you may want to allow Survival, Perception, or Skulduggery as well.

The GM sets the difficulty for the scavenging roll. The difficulty for a site can be whatever seems appropriate for the location. For enemies, I typically use:

Minions = Average
Rivals = Hard
Nemeses = Daunting

Net successes mean that you recover minor components. Triumph means you acquire a major component. More powerful enemies may yield multiple major components, or even award them just for succeeding (since the roll is harder to make).

8 hours ago, maquise said:

How do you determine how much loot they discover?

Basically by narrating the dice result. If they get a lot of advantages it was a quick and lucky find and they get more (in quantity/quality; increase rarity) or have enough time to search more (generally trade ^^ or ^^^ for another search); even if they fail they can trade the advantages for more searching. If they get a lot of disadvantages they might get lower than average loot, took too long for the downtime, or alerted some enemies/wounded themselves (strain or wound) on their search. I also made situation for the players to choose to rest up (normal strain/wound healing) or search for loot, so they had consequences on the scenario. Also adding boost dice for light-sources, or something like a crowbar, etc.

Give this one a shot. I use it all the time.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/84406117601398784/559519906748432404/Encounter_and_Loot.pdf