On the distant planet of Cornucopia, a small colony of humans has been abandoned by the rest of the human race. Cut off from high tech supplies, the population is divided in roughly half. One half lives in Cornucopia City, where early 22nd century technology remains, powered by improvised lead-acid battery banks and steam power. The other half lives in permanent exile from the city, in small farming towns and communes that have fallen back to mid 19th century technology. The Towns trade food and raw materials and occasional labor to the City in exchange for books, manufactured goods, antique weapons, ammunition, and medical supplies.
You live out in the nearly lawless Badlands, the dry, nearly treeless plain that surrounds Cornucopia City, and there you eke out a living doing odd jobs. Maybe this week you work for a Town, protecting them from a dangerous animal or a band of even more dangerous men. Tomorrow you may work for the City, helping a convoy of surveyors or guarding prisoners being sent to the mines. In between, you take what work you can get.
21st Century: The only relevant point to make is that over the course of the 21st century, orbital space telescopes in our solar system identified possible candidates for earth-like worlds. Space probes were sent to the nearest ones, taking decades to arrive and decades to send their survey results back. None of the worlds were found to have any sign of intelligent life that could be seen from orbit. Several of them were found to be suitable for colonization, if any meaningful way could be found to get there.
Early 22nd century: New advances in physics and computation make it possible to create teleportation gates. Any arbitrary distance is possible, but it takes huge amounts of pre-calculation to adjust for relative motion across interplanetary distances, and huge amounts of energy to keep a gate open. Still, Earth scientists managed to use data from the 21st century probes to calculate gate locations and combined vectors for several planets, and the colonization of other worlds begins. In each case, the gate is held open for about an hour a week: bus-loads of colonists race through with truckloads of supplies for the first half hour, and the previous week's empty buses and trucks race back through the other way for the last half hour. That way the colony has time to unload and resettle people at their leisure.
2272: The third such colony gate opens onto a planet that turns out to be at a very early stage of evolution. The early surveying teams plot out a few unimportant mineral locations in the foothills of the nearest mountain range, and determine that the planet has no fossil fuel deposits to speak of. Still, the soil is fertile and the climate near the gate is temperate enough, so the new planet of Cornucopia is marketed to potential settlers as an agricultural colony that, once its economy stabilizes, will be able to take in potentially many millions of settlers and still export enough food back to earth to pay for whatever resupply they need.
Early 2273: Over several weeks a small colony of approximately 800 mining kobolds, the descendents of genetically modified dwarf humans originally adapted to mine asteroids, arrives by gate and heads for the foothills, determined to underbid Earth-imported minerals in the Cornucopian marketplace by finding and mining local sources. They do well enough to provide themselves with food, power cells, and minimal supplies. They name their settlement Tiny Town.
2273 to 2275: Using pre-fabricated modules and 23rd century engineering technology, Cornucopia City is built almost overnight as a processing and education center for new colonists, capable of housing thousands of them for a brief time. As they graduate from classes in high-efficiency 23rd century farming, they are strongly encouraged to migrate to Haven Town, a planned farming community where each family is allotted 40 acres, a modular housing unit, and a heavy grav sled that can be adapted for cargo hauling or semi-automatic performance of planting, cultivation, and harvesting. However, several groups of religious colonists and ethnic separatists choose instead to bring their own simpler equipment and build semi-exclusive colony towns of their own.
2276: A colonial party of genetically modified anthropomorphic (animal-like) humans known as "furries," some of the last of their kind from the short-lived anthropomorphic fad on Earth, obtain the necessary permits and emigrate from Earth to Cornucopia with their children. They total approximately 500 feline humans, approximately 400 canine humans, and a few each of equine, ursine, and mustelid humans. They set up their own settlement at a distance from Cornucopia City, henceforth known as (Old) Furry Town. Disliked by all their neighbors, they stick to themselves as much as possible.
Sunday, March 11th, 2277: Silent Sunday. After 5 years and the arrival of 20,000 colonists, the gate fails to open at its scheduled time. It has not opened again since.
| Gender Roles Many normal human men arrived on Cornucopia alone, or with only their oldest male child. The common plan was to use the technology and supplies to build a farm and a farm house, and then export enough produce back to Earth to pay for passage for the wife and other children. Not every such family made it through the gate before it closed. On Silent Sunday, the male to female ratio on Cornucopia (not counting furries and kobolds) was running about 5 to 2. Casualties during The Strike (see below) dropped the ratio closer to 2 to 1, and between children being born and men still dying from taking disproportionate risks, the ratio may now be closer to 3 to 2. However, two blunt facts remain. There are still a lot more men than women. And the human race's numbers are more tightly constrained by the number of women than by the number of men. These facts made nobody especially happy (outside of Christian Town, New Church Town, New Bangalore, and maybe Dutch Town), but they were quickly recognized as facts. What resulted was a 10-year-long (and still ongoing) propaganda campaign to persuade both genders that women are simply to valuable and too important to risk needlessly. Women usually work, the colony has no manpower to spare. They farm; they care for their own family or others; they provide much of the medical care; they do nearly all of the teaching; they provide a disproportionate number of the millworkers and skilled laborers. However, there is tremendous stigma on any woman who regularly takes jobs that involve extensive travel or any combat risk; take this as a -2 Reputation, a -10 point disadvantage. |
January 1st, 2280: Cornucopia City digs in the for the long haul. The colonial government impounds all energy cells, despite much resistance, and requires a government permit to operate an electronic or electrical device unless it is supported by locally-made batteries or locally-generated power. (Obviously, many such cells are buried, hidden, or otherwise hoarded.) Approximately half of the population of Cornucopia City is forcibly relocated to Haven Town, and told to begin farming or starve. Still, food production declines as the farmers have to learn to adapt to animal-driven plows and wheeled vehicles, and farming without elaborate sensors and computerized analysis.
March 2280: Cornucopia decides that prisoners can no longer be housed for free, and forsees a day when the City Jail may overflow. The mining kobolds are hired to find and begin a lead mine. From this point on, criminals sentenced to jail sentences are convoyed to the Lead Mines, where a team of kobold mining supervisors and human guards force prisoners to operate the mines; if they do not work to the best of their ability (as judged by the guards), they are neither fed nor given medical attention. They are given only hand tools and only very minimal safety equipment, not including respirator masks; most suffer from some form of lead toxicity when (or if) their sentences are completed.
2280 to 2281: Resentment builds, as Cornucopia City becomes increasingly stingy with high technology. Local leaders in Haven begin to argue the case for using collective bargaining to force a new democratically elected colonial council.
Late 2281 (date unknown): Miners strike, refusing to work the mines without better safety equipment. They occupy the mine and refuse to allow the kobolds in to mine, either, intending to starve the city of lead shipments until their demands are met. The City council responds by quietly ordering the mine exits sealed and the mine flooded. 253 prisoners and 5 hostages drown, ending the strike. Note that this event is denied by the City, and although rumors will later be widespread, nobody agrees on exactly what happened, or how, or why, or even exactly when. Rumors of the Miner's Strike are often confused with the chronology of The Strike (below).
Monday, May 1st, 2282: Haven Town and the surrounding towns declare The Strike. All food is to be delivered to Haven's city center building, and from there distributed back to the towns on a weekly basis based on each town's production level. No food will be delivered to Cornucopia City until the governing council agrees to negotiate a consistent fair price, in cash, for crops sold to the City and technology and supplies delivered to the towns.
Friday, October 13th, 2283: The New Bangalore Massacre. New Bangalore breaks the strike, agreeing to a one-time shipment of batteries and medicine in exchange for a promise to deliver the excess production from this fall's harvest to Cornucopia City. Havenite vigilantes intercept the city's convoy, kill its guards, steal the supplies, and then enforce the strike by burning out the crops in the fields, and killing the animals, of the entire town of New Bangalore. Many houses in and around New Bangalore are also burned to the ground. The refugees are not (officially) permitted to migrate to other towns, and are encouraged to turn to their new masters for help. The colonial council in Cornucopia City vows reprisals.
Most former inhabitants choose to flee to the wilderness; many will die there. The rest establish a charcoal-burner colony in a distant part of the woods, taming local dinosauroids as draught animals and beasts of burden. This small very-low-tech colony, often half-jokingly referred to as New New Bangalore, begins exporting lumber and charcoal to Cornucopia City, and continues to do so until the present day.
November 2283: The furries burn their town (hereafter referred to as Old Furry Town), arm themselves with spears and bows, and take up a nomadic life following the migrations of established (earth-origin) herds or local dinosauroid herds. Occasional nomadic bands raid City Army patrols and outer farmsteads for supplies, leaving few surviving witnesses to identify the culprits.
Monday, December 25th, 2283: First Battle of Haven. The inevitable attack begins, as Cornucopia deploys flyers and improvised beam tanks to attempt to seize the Haven City Hall and granaries. As both sides are still able to deploy beam weapons and limited energy shields, initial casualties are mostly limited to vehicles. To the uncomfortable surprise of the City Army, their initial attack is repulsed. Haven's farmers retreat to behind the force and brick walls of the inner Haven; eventually most townies smuggle themselves and many of their animals through the spread-out City Army lines. Both sides dig into for a protracted siege.
Early 2284: Increasingly short food rations in Cornucopia City; increasingly desperate problems from overcrowding, inadequate sanitation, and lack of health care in Haven. Skirmishes continue, but both sides know that unless one side runs out of power cells, the battle will be decided when Haven succumbs to plague or when the City succumbs to famine.
Wednesday, June 11th, 2284: Haven's Last Stand. The colonial council concludes that the City will run out of food first, and begins an all-out desperate assault on Haven Town. Mechanical trebouchets are used to hurl flaming brush and red-hot charcoal across the entire town. Over the next several days, as the Havenites fight the fires, the City Army attacks the improvised walls of Haven Town. By the time they break through, nearly the entire town has burned down, along with most of the harvest. The remainder of the harvest is seized, along with all remaining power cells, and all books, and the Townies are told to return to their farms and immediately begin working towards the fall harvest Or Else. Dissent will be punished. The towns are banned from publication and from all manufacturing. Haven Town is to be left as a burned ruin, as a symbol of defeat, and its surviving former inhabitants are ordered to build new homes and farms in the other towns. City walls are prohibited in all towns.
Total casualties of the Haven Town Strike over the entire course of the war amounted to approximately 2,000, nearly all on the Havenite side.
2284 through 2286: Cornucopia City establishes factories within its walls. The council determines that the colony will be best served by restricting manufacture to mechanical, steam, and chemical powered tools and hunting weapons. The remaining high tech is to be rationed to the local scientific community, who are to use it to find a way to advance the technology of Cornucopia as fast as can be done without depleting the effort to monitor for Earth-origin signals. A long-term contract is signed with Tiny Town, whereby Tiny Town delivers nearly all of their mineral output to Cornucopia in exchange for fixed amounts of food and supplies.
To buy food and to deliver manufactured goods to the Townies, Cornucopia City establishes the first Saturday of every month as Monthly Market Day. Individual tools, books, or weapons, or cartons of ammunition, are put up for bid; farmers bid bushels of food, cords of lumber, or the like for each lot.
Saturday, January 1st, 2287: The Amnesty. Half of the governing council voluntarily steps aside; the remainder appoint replacements to serve a 10-year term. It is announced that in 5 years, the remaining half will step down, an do likewise. The new council as its first act repeals the manufacturing and publish bans from the surrender. However, the Towns are told in no uncertain terms that Monthly Market Day will remain and no dissent from this system will be tolerated.
Today is June Market Day, Saturday, June 4th 2287. It is 15 years since humans first set foot on Cornucopia, a bit more than nine years since Silent Sunday, five years since the beginning of the Haven Town Strike, four years since the New Bangalore Massacre, almost exactly three years since Haven's Last Stand, and five months since the Amnesty.
Given that once the gate made contact with the planet surface, it would have involved huge costs in energy and computation to steer it to another part of the planet, the settlers of Cornucopia got fairly lucky. The terrain around the area where they were dropped consists mostly of low rolling hills, with a few rivers, some spring-fed pools and a scattering of rain-fed streams which only run during the rainy spring and fall. It's a matter of a few days' ride to the foothills of the mountains to the north and northeast of the city. There must be some large body of water to the southwest of the settled area, however far away.
Cornucopia is a much younger planet than Earth. The ecosystem is approximately that of Earth's Jurassic Period. There are no flowering or fruiting plants: what you get are fungi, ferns, cycads, and conifers. No more of them are poisonous than on Earth, but none of them are particularly nutritious, either. Most animal niches in the ecosystem are filled by warm-blooded dinosaurs. The streams have fish. Insects are ubiquitous, of course, and true reptiles are not particularly scarce. Foraging will produce usual amounts of edible food (mostly meat), but getting a balanced diet requires access to Earth crops or to the dwindling supply of nutritional supplements.
Before human hunters dramatically thinned the herds of large dinosaur herbivores, those dinosaurs had cropped most of the flat terrain pretty close to the soil, leaving only the faster-growing ferns and fungi, and a few scattered trees: in essence, a Jurassic savannah. Herds of Earth-origin cud-chewing herbivores are being encouraged to fill the same niche, but numbers are rising slowly; it will be a generation or more before vast herds of wild cattle, bison, and horses roam the plains. Until then, the plains are covered in ferns, evergrean cycadian and coniferous bushes, and Earth-origin grasses and saplings to an uneven height of 18 inches up to 5 feet, with occasional small forests or shallow swamps - hence, the Badlands. You can tell that you're getting near a town when the ferns have been cropped down lower on average, by the town's herds, and by the growing encroachment of Earth-origin grasses which are displacing the native plants.
On the map above, solid lines represent hard-packed dirt roads. There are wagon-wheel ruts to deal with, and part of the year the roads are painfully dusty and at times they are slick and muddy. Creeks are bridged, rivers that can't be forded are avoided. Average movement rates increase by 25%. The dashed lines represent less-consistent, less travelled dirt tracks; in places they aren't much more than ruts that can be made out through the overgrowth, and streams will have to be forded. Movement rates are normal. However, once you leave the roads behind you anywhere in the Badlands, this counts as bad terrain, and movement rates are halved. And once you enter the tree line and start up the mountains, the terrain quality switches to Very Bad and movement rates drop to one fifth of normal.
Temperatures and seasons in this area approximate those of inland southern California where it borders the Mojave desert. When it is not actively raining, relative humidity runs very dry. Precipitation usually approaches from the southwest or west, runs against the west facing of the mountain range, and runs back down as streams and rivers that cross the plain more-or-less consistently northeast to southwest. As one moves farther up into the mountains, temperatures drop, the native forest grows taller and more dense, and large predators become more common, stalking small to medium dinosaurs, reptiles, and small mammals through the trees.
| Season | Daily High | Nightly Low | Badlands Forecast (3d6) |
| Spring: | 3-9 dry, 10-16 scattered rain, 17-18 snow | ||
| Summer: | 3-15 dry, 14-16 scattered rain, 17-18 storm | ||
| Autumn: | 3-5 sunny, 6-10 cloudy w/some drizzle, 11-17 rain, 18 snow | ||
| Spring: | 3-11 sunny, 12-15 cloudy w/some sprinkles, 16-18 snow |
(Weather can change every sunrise/sunset; the GM will roll 1d. On a 1-3, the weather stays the same. On a 4-6, he will roll on the table above, and yes, the weather may still stay the same. Temperature will be adjusted day to day for cloud cover and change of seasons over time. Players can attempt to get a 12-hour weather forecast by requesting the GM roll Survival/Plains, which is an IQ/A skill with a default of IQ-5. If the roll fails, the GM will secretly roll a different forecast and report that. Roll Survival-1 for the 24 hour forecast and -2 for the 36 hour forecast. Beyond that it's anybody's guess.)
The dominant animal lifeform is the dinosaur. Some of the smaller ones are insectivorous. Due to aggressive hunting, there are very few carnivores that are taller than the tallest ferns, perhaps 4' tall on tiptoe. There are still a few herds of migratory large herbivores. But the most commonly encountered dinosaurs will be no bigger than a goose or a dog. For example, the most common aggravation on the plains is a burrowing insectivore most commonly known as the darter.
Darter: A darter looks for all the world like a rubber chicken with a snake-like head and tiny forearms. The color is a yellowish brown that blends well with the soil and with some vegetation. What makes the darter annoying is that its default reaction to anything large and moving is to freeze and flatten itself against the ground, unless (or until) something comes close to stepping on it. Then it takes off running like a rabbit. But since it waits until the last possible second to run, and because it looks like nothing familiar, this almost invariably spooks all but the largest or best-behaved Earth-origin herbivores. (Native lifeforms mostly ignore it.) This will require a Riding skill roll to keep a horse from bucking, or an Animal Handling skill roll to prevent cattle from spooking, or a Teamster skill roll to keep a yoked team of horses or oxen from panicking. It will always run rather than fight, but if cornered it will try (ineffectively) to claw with its small digging foreclaws, despite their pathetic reach.
Darter Stats: ST 1, DX 7, IQ 1/14, HT 14/4, Move 14, Dodge 10, Dmg 1d-5 cr, Reach C, Size <1, Wt 10-20 lbs, Habitat P.
Some dinosaurs have already turned out to be domesticable. For example, some people actually prefer the "bushbike" to a horse:
Bushbike: The "bushbike" is a popular nickname for a relatively small hadrosaur. They are so called because one can train them to take a rider, and riding one is remarkably like driving a hoverbike, because they prefer running to walking. In a running posture the spine is flat, the hind legs are kicking like mad, and the front legs hang in mid-air, while the tail whips behind and the head bobs and weaves for balance in front. A trained rider can steer one by leaning, just as one steers a hoverbike, although leaning forward and back controls speed rather than angle of attack. (There obviously is no hand throttle.) An untrained hadrosaur, after a sprint, will stand up and balance on hind legs and tail (throwing the rider) while looking around to see if it has outrun whatever spooked it, but a trained bushbike with a skilled rider will lie down at the end of the sprint, and remain there until the rider dismounts or spurs it back on. Once the bushbike learns to trust the rider, they love to run ... but it becomes the responsibility of the rider to know how much rest they actually need, and when to stop for food, because a trained bushbike will run until it kills itself if spurred on.
Unlike a horse, a bushbike can not jump, but the kicking 2-legged gait and broadly spread toes ignore almost all obstacles up to about a foot tall (animate or otherwise). However, if they hit an obstacle at the upper end of the range, they will stumble and catch themselves, a move that feels remarkably like the "bike" dropping out from under you for a moment. An inexperienced rider will be thrown. Hadrosaurs run on splayed feet with fat toes, and so have little or no problem with slippery terrain such as mossy streambeds, slick mud, swampy soil, shifting sand, or even ice. Among bushbike riders, it is this characteristic, combined with their relative familiarity with local hazards, that causes them to be preferred over a horse, even though a horseman will cover more miles in an average day. Also, unlike a horse, hadrosaurs feel little urge to wander away from herd or family, and so a bushbike doesn't have to be hobbled or tied up at night, unlike a horse; in all likelihood it will snuggle down right next to its rider and sleep through the night.
In the wild, hadrosaurs live primarily off of ferns, occasionally taking leaves off of cycads or branches (and cones) off of low-hanging conifer branches. They are utterly fearless of herbivores, mostly even including Earth-import herbivores. They do, however, react very badly to the local carnivore dinosaurs, especially the raptors and allosaurs. Their reflex is to flee, unless completely surrounded or run to ground (zero fatigue). If surrounded and in a herd or family, they will form a circle with their backs together, and attempt to bite or kick (1d-2 cr) incoming predators. But that's a desperation tactic; they're not very good at it.
Bushbike Stats: ST 20-24, DX 7, IQ 4/16, HT 10 (fatigue 6), Move 6 (sprint 20), Dodge 8, Dmg 1d-2 cr, Reach 1, Size 2, Weight 300-500 lbs, Habitat P,F,J.
The inhabitants of new New Bangalore have also managed a genuinely impressive feat of domestication. They have found the dinosaur that fills the niche of the African elephant back home, the Biceratops, and managed a limited form of domestication. As with elephants, if a biceratops is raised with and by a mahoot, they bond for life. And as with the African elephant, the Biceratops was the "gardener of the savannah," thinning copses of trees and pushing down sick or unwanted invader species in order to protect the small forests around the downwind side of each spring-fed lake and to keep the fern-covered plains open to sunlight. Now the Bangalorans use the biceratops as a workhorse animal in lumberworking, literally towing tall trees out of the ground in some cases. Several times a year, small groups of Bangalorans lead a dinosaur convoy bringing lumber and bagged charcoal to Market Day to trade for medical supplies or occasional skilled labor.
Biceratops: The biceratops is about the size of an elephant, with a bone-crested head that is almost impervious to damage. However, instead of the triceratops' parrot-like beak and small front horn, the biceratops has a round, bony "nose" that overhangs a flexible mouth full of grinding teeth. It's not a snout, don't mistake it for a snout, but the lips are quite mobile. The tail in back is long, almost as long as a brontosaur's of similar size. Like the brontosaur, they can whip that tail for significant damage at any target that isn't directly in front of them. What's more, the tail is semi-prehensile, and has tremendous strength when wrapped around something. The musculature is not quite right for crushing, but it is strong enough to be able to take as much load as the animal can safely tow. If raised by a mahoot, the biceratops will take a saddle well enough. The most common saddle has a high back and a curved seat, so that the mahoot is not thrown if the biceratops rears up on two legs, as they will do (for example) to push over a tall tree or to bite a low-hanging branch. In theory, a passenger saddle could probably be created, but the Bangalorans are possessive of their charges and not especially eager to take on passengers.
Biceratops Stats: ST 200, DX 12, IQ 5, HT 17/50-75, Move 10, Dodge 6, PD 2 (body) or 4 (head), DR 2 (body) or 6 (head), Dmg 4d imp (head butt) or 5d cr (tail whip), Reach C or 2, Size 16-17, Weight 4 tons, Habitat P, F.
Mammals are seldom seen, although there are rumors of a few larger mammals (competing with the medium sized carnivorous dinosaurs) in the denser mountain forests to the northeast of the inhabited part of Cornucopia. However, the first explorers of the edge of that forest brought back samples of a local species of mammal that is now a very popular pet. They are nicknamed the "flurps" after the noise they most often make.
Flurp: Head of a lemur, body and limbs of spider monkey, and a tail that looks as fluffy as a (giant) squirrel's - but the tail is actually prehensile and every bit as strong as the forearms are. In the wilds of their native forests, the flurps are arboreal insectivores, who will occasionally attempt to drive off interlopers by throwing branches or other tree junk down before fleeing at a ridiculous speed from branch to branch, letting them sprint at speeds of up to 14 while the tree cover holds out. (On the ground they're much slower). They are capable of jumping comfortably up to 10 feet horizontally or 5 feet vertically, with a running start. They do not have opposable thumbs as such, but as flurp owners learn quickly the difference is negligible between true thumbs and the opposable digits they do have (on all four feet). Flurps do have the mildly annoying habit of picking things up to examine them, carrying them short distances, and then putting them down again because they're bored. They obviously do not make tools, or operate complex tools, but in the wild are known to smash things with rocks to open them, scratch channels in the ground with sticks to open up insect burrows, or use sticks as levers to pry off diseased or dead tree bark to get at grubs underneath. And their grip and arm strength is sufficent that if a flurp suspects that a container has alcohol in it, nothing short of a metal box with a padlock will keep it out for long.
Anybody can call a flurp to them, unless that person has some disadvantage that makes them repulsive to animals (GM's discretion). Flurps love to ride on shoulders, and well tolerate being held and groomed. When the temperature drops, they become quite affectionate, and will bundle up to anyone wearing warm clothing, attempting to snuggle into the clothing if permitted. Beyond that, their ability to be trained is limited: treat them as IQ 3 for training purposes. Imagine a cat with thumbs instead of claws: if your character couldn't train that cat to do something on command, then you can't train a flurp to do it on command either.
Flurp Stats: ST 2, DX 14, IQ 5, HT 12/2, Move 5, Dodge 15, Dmg 1d-5 cr, Reach C, Size <1, Weight 3-12 lbs, Habitat F,J.
You should also know that I consider it fair to include, in reasonable proportions, almost any non-fantasy species of snake, fish, or insect that I find or modify from GURPS Bestiary. The plains also contain a few small herds of wild Earth-origin horses, cattle, and bison that have been released or that have escaped from captivity; however, see the section on the Furries (below) before hunting them.
There is no cash in the economy. Officially, if you don't want to starve, there really are only four options:
Most people have enough to eat, but only fairly successful people have enough food to trade. For those of you who're considering engineering or science skills, you should know that wood is plentiful. If you don't mind going all the way to new New Bangalore to pick it up, you can get small amounts of a native sap that, when cured, makes perfectly serviceable rubber; you can get wood cheap there, too. Almost all metal implements come from Cornucopia City, and are very rare, and very expensive. Small amounts of refined iron, copper, lead, tin, and a few minerals can be had from Tiny Town, if you have something to trade and have the right black-market connections. If there are mines other than the prison Lead Mines than the various kobold-operated ones near Tiny Town, you've never heard of them, and probably neither has the colony council. However, if such metals or minerals could be found and discretely delivered, there might well be a black market for them, especially if you found a receptive would-be engineer in New Farming Town or maybe Mill Town.
I repeat there are no fossil fuels: no coal, no oil. Charcoal is available from new New Bangalore, and is their primary export to the rest of Cornucopia. Everybody else burns wood or dried animal droppings.
There are blacksmiths in every town, theoretically salvaging iron and steel scrap from wherever they can get it. In theory, ammunition can only be bartered from Cornucopia City, but there are rumors that there are some people who salvage lead from wherever they're getting it to cast their own bullets, obtain powder and primer and shell casings from who knows where, and do their own reloading.
There is an unofficial currency that's used for minor trading, such as renting books from libraries, buying drinks in an inn or paying small fines in the towns: manufactured ammunition. One standard pistol/carbine cartridge will buy you one beer or one shot of whiskey, that's a pretty standardized price since liquor started being sold in quantity at New Farming Town. Prices elsewhere depend, as they do on Market Day, on how badly people need ammunition and how much of whatever else there is that they have to trade. Daily wages, in the very few places where such wages are paid, run to around 2 to 3 cartridges a day, which isn't anywhere near enough to live on if that's your only source of support. People would pay more if they could, but ammunition's just that scarce; it's all that pretty much anybody can afford to pay. In many places, empty manufactured shell casings are accepted as if they were ammunition at a steep discount, ranging from 2 casings per shell up to 5 casings per shell. So once in a while you'll see a merchant with a sign that prices something at "1+3," meaning one loaded cartridge and 3 empty shell casings. (Don't be surprised if he doesn't give change.) (Kids actively hunt shell casings, obviously, as if they wouldn't anyway.)
The standard cereal crop rotation is corn or wheat, followed by peanuts or soybeans. The most common root crops are potatoes and sugar beets. Gardens often include green beans, tomatoes, carrots, peppers, spinach, squash, peas, chilis, and/or lettuce. The lettuce doesn't do well but there's a local broadleaf fern that's almost as good and a local thistle that when peeled makes a perfectly functional (if slightly bitter) celery. Pumpkins and several kinds of squash are also grown in some fields. Hemp is widely grown for rope, at least one farm in every town, because it is almost the only source of cloth; small amounts of it are cultivated for herbal medicine and intoxicants. Coffee won't grow, but tea does; order chai instead of coffee. It's not wet enough at the colony site for rice, but bamboo is grown in many towns and makes handy wood for some uses. Orchard crops are especially important to the colony, especially apples. People have planted apple trees all over the place. Walnut trees are spreading like weeds. Plum and pear trees are scarce, but not unheard of; their fruit is a seasonal delicacy. Colonists are trying to establish groves of oak and elm near many towns, and maples up by Tiny Town, more out of nostalgia than actual need; the local evergreens are faster growing and meet most of the need for wood quite handily. It gets too cold for citrus; old-Earthers can only reminisce about oranges and grapefruit, and nobody even remembers what strawberries taste like.
The furries brought buffalo, and are trying to create two giant herds out in the Badlands; the furries don't take well to hunting them yet. The Amish brought large herds of cattle and horses, and have traded young animals to farmers all over the colony; cattle are treasured as much for milk and fuel (dried dung) as they are for meat or leather. Lots of people brought lots of chickens, pigs, and sheep, and a there are a few goats. Nobody thought to bring donkeys. The colony had not yet given approval for house pets, so there are no cats or dogs; people eagerly adopt and raise the local "flurps" as pets instead. (Some rats made it through; their descendents are easy pickings for the local snakes, reptiles and dinosaurs.) Darters and other local small dinosaurs are occasionally hunted for meat; old-timers say that they taste something like wild turkey. Remember, there are no native flowering plants so there are no local fruits and no insect equivalent to a honey bee. There is a local insect species that's halfway between a cockroach and a termite, but bright red and about 18" long. If you steam them in the shell you end up with a meaty thorax that the colonists call "prairie lobster" and treat as a delicacy when they can find a prairie lobster colony. Native fish and crayfish are a mainstay of Cornucopian diet, as well; however, there are certain times of the year when one must remain alert against Water Tigers while fishing or drawing water from streams; they're an especially dangerous form of large insect larva with a nasty ranged attack.
Cornucopia City
Mayor Bowne was approached early on by four families of feline humans who didn't want their children to grow up to be nomadic hunters and herders. After a very long town meeting with a lot of shouting, there was a narrow vote to let them build their own farms and join the town. Since they work hard, are scrupulously polite to the local normal human residents, have well-behaved kids, don't mingle much, and keep quiet when not keeping to themselves, the resentment has faded to near background level - as long as they "know their place."
Non-believers in Brother Darren's preaching should enter town only in emergencies, lie their heads off if cornered, and get out of town quietly and quickly. Furries who attempt to enter town will be killed on sight, posthumously accused of whatever crimes are necessary to justify a claim of self-defense, and then their bodies hung from wooden gibbets as a warning. Or so the rumor goes; it hasn't actually come up yet.
All characters will be generated based on GURPS, the Generic Universal Role Playing System 4th Edition from Steve Jackson Games. The free Lite version of this rulebook can be found at http://sjgames/gurps/lite. Characters will be built on a 75 point base, with a maximum of -37 points in Disadvantages and at most 5 Quirks at -1 point each. If you take the maximum -37 points in Disadvantages and all 5 quirks, that lets you spend a total of 117 points on your character.
Age: You may start a character between the ages of 14 and 17 who is trying to pass for an adult, or as an actual adult any age from there up to 69 on the assumption that nobody over the age of 60 moves to a new colony at the beginning. Base stats are figured below. The disadvantages from this do not count against your 37 point Disadvantage list. However, you must spend enough XP each game year to buy off each year's lost disadvantages. Also, multiply your starting age by 2; you may not spend more than that on Skills.
Tech Level: The basic tech level of the game is TL5. Earth-origin characters age 35 and up may take their skills at any level from TL4 to TL8. Otherwise and in general, your tech level is constrained based on your city or town of origin, see the descriptions above. To raise all of your character's skills to TL6 takes one level of the High Tech advantage, 5 points; TL7, 2 levels and 10 points; TL 8, 3 levels and 15 points. To lower all of your character's skills to TL4 takes one level of the Primitive disadvantage and is a 5 point disadvantage; TL3, 2 levels and -10; TL2, 3 levels and -15. Note that TL2 is a very severe limitation when it comes to weapons and equipment.
Language: Languages are based on a level of Spoken English (native) and Written English (semi-literate) being free, that being the default after 15 years of limited availability of books and limited time for reading and teaching. In general, Earth origin characters over the age of 25 should spend the 2 points to bring Written English up to literate. For all native born and all Earth origin characters under 25, consult the language list for the city or town of origin to see what range of choices are available to you. If you want languages other than that, you will have to justify them to the game master.
Wealth: Wealth level is based on city of permanent residence. If you are a permanent resident of that town then you have had no real opportunity to get richer than the maximum, and your neighbors have probably helped you stay no poorer than the minimum. If you have no permanent residence, your character should be Dead Broke or Poor. Because of the lack of cash in the economy, do not use the standard Starting Money table or equipment cost lists, not until much later in game time if the economy improves. For now, characters of Average Wealth will start with two standard equipment "packages," see below under Equipment. Each level of Wealth up or down from Average will buy you or cost you one such package at starting time. In addition, Wealth will be used as a reaction modifier, and will affect what jobs you are offered, and will indicate what level of comfort you (and possibly a few guests) live in between adventures.
Status: Social status advantages will be hard to justify for most player characters. Here are the few standard modifiers I'll let you take. Remember that each +1 of Status is a 5 point advantage, and each -1 of Status is a 5 point disadvantage, and yes, these count against your limit. And remember, because of their species packages, kobolds and furries start from a base status of -2, not zero.
Reputation: With only about 20,000 people on the whole planet, and nearly all of those people living within a week's horseback ride from each other, virtually every adult has a Reputation except maybe for a few of the remote homesteaders. If you are playing an adult character, you are strongly encouraged to take one, whether positive or negative.
| Boy Scouts of Cornucopia The Haven Town Library had a donated complete set of facsimile Boy Scouts of America handbooks. In the aftermath of the fire, only the 1948 5th edition, Handbook for Boys survived intact. There were also a historical set of Future Farmers of America Student Handbooks. Only the 1957 edition survived intact. At the encouragement of many civic leaders planet-wide, these two books were combined into a single volume, the Boy Scouts of Cornucopia Handbook (or BSCHB). The current 2nd edition, first published in 2285, replaced the Earth-specific wilderness survival information (poisonous plants, weather, etc) with material more up-to-date for Cornucopia. Outside of New Church Town and Dutch Town, the 2nd edition Boy Scouts of Cornucopia Handbook is universally known simply as "the Book." (The Bible is usually referred to as "the Good Book" for contrast. A popular joke calls the Complete Works of Shakespeare "the Big Book" and Rudyard Kipling's Complete Works as "the Other Book." These four books get their own nicknames because they make up the entire library in most homes and many remote schools.) The Book is a best seller with adults. Identical copies are printed for trade in the factories of Cornucopia City and by Connecticut Press in New Farming Town. Most locally-raised male children obtain their copy for free or at greatly subsidized price when they join the Boy Scouts of Cornucopia at any age from 10 up to about 17. (Many girls have read the Book, but girls are not permitted to join the Scouts. See see the earlier sidebar on "Gender Roles.") Scouting is a very popular activity; the overwhelming majority of all males raised on Cornucopia spent at least several years in Scouting, and thereby picked up at least Survival/Plains at IQ (cost 2 points), Farming/TL5 at IQ (cost 2 points), Riding/Horse at DX-1 (cost 1 point), Knot-Tying at DX (cost 1 point), and First Aid/TL5 at IQ (cost 1 point). If your character is 20 or younger and male and you don't have those skills, why not? Many adult men have been tapped to serve as Scoutmasters at least once in their life: assume the same two skills plus at least Leadership at IQ (cost 2 points). Current and former scouts and scoutmasters get a +1 reaction bonus from each other, and current and former scoutmasters may take All Scoutmasters as a Contact Group. The Scout's Oath counts as a Minor Vow (-5 point disadvantage): "On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my Colony, and to obey the Scout Law; to help other people at all times; to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight." |
Boxing (ST/A), no default: If Boxing is DX+1, +1 per die to punch damage; DX+2 or above is +2 per die. Two bare-handed melee parries per turn at (Boxing/2)+3, rounded down, -2 for kicks and -3 for anything but thrusting or punching damage.
Fast Draw/type (DX/E), no default: Must specify Pistol, Long Arm (rifle & shotgun), Knife, Ammo/TL, or Arrow. Success on a weapon means not having to take 1 turn to draw. Success on Ammo or Arrow shaves at least 1 second off of reload time.
Farming/TL (IQ/A), default IQ-5: In this game, only used for the monthly success roll on the Profession table for farmers.
Games/Chess or Games/Poker(IQ/E), default IQ-5: Self-explanatory hobby skill. Chess sets are pretty common, and decks of cards are becoming affordable again. Games/Poker needs to be combined with the Gambling skill (and perhaps the Carousing skill) to make you a profitable poker player.
Knot-Tying (DX/E), default DX-4: Used for everything from securing loads to securing prisoners to climbing to camping to hanging a man.
Lasso (DX/A), no default: Allows a large number of specific rope tricks. See GURPS Old West, page 34 (or get a copy of that page from the GM).
Musical Instrument (IQ/H), no default: Separate skill for each instrument. Guitars and fiddles are fairly easy to come by, and anybody can buy these skills. There are a few pianos, violins, trumpets, bugles, flutes, trombones, and snare drums; there may be even more of these later if the economy ever picks up; until then you must have learned the skill back on Earth. Many dancers (and "entertainers") do have (and play) finger cymbals. Some furries play hand drums. The following musical instrument skills are considered hobby skills: Harmonica, Jew's Harp, Panpipe, Tambourine, and Tin Whistle. Nobody will pay to hear you play these five, but if you play well nobody minds. As such, they are considered "hobby" skills and are IQ/E skills.
Soldier/TL (IQ/A), default IQ-5: Only available to Milita NPCs and crippled retiree ex-Militia member PCs. Ridiculously over-powered skill, gives rolls against virtually every combat and survival skill.
Survival/type (Per/A), default Per-5: Must specify Survival/Plains, Survival/Forest, and Survival/Mountains are separate skills.
Teaching (IQ/A), default IQ-5: Must be 12 or more to teach your skills to other player characters.
Veterinary/TL (IQ/H), default Animal Handling(any)-6 or Physician-5: Treated like Physician skill for animals. +5 for familiar and trusting animals, -2 or more for unfamiliar species.
Whip (DX/A), no default: For this game, you can take a 3' whip or a 6' whip. The latter has 2-hex range, but can't attack anything at close or 1-hex range. Can not parry. I'm still waiting to get the disarm and entanglement rules, or the rules for how long it takes to ready one after the first attack; they're in book 2 which I don't have yet.
Riding/Horse (DX/A), default DX-5: Important Warning! The basic default Riding/Horse skill (DX/A), if you invest no points in it, is DX minus 5 (usually written DX-5). That means that if you have a typical DX of 10, you must roll 5 or less on 3d6 every time you get onto or off a riding animal, and every time the animal is startled, and every time you need it to do anything other than stop or carry you forward at a walk on flat ground. If your default Riding skill is 5, then all rolls of 15 or more will knock you off and injure you and/or the animal. That's an insanely dangerous risk to take two, four, maybe six or more times per day. Strongly consider putting some skill points into the Riding skill! Riding/Bushbike is a separate DX/H skill, default DX-6. Riding/Biceratops is DX/A, is only taught in new New Bangalore, can not be taken higher than Animal Handling, and may only be used by the mahoot that has raised that particular biceratops.
Vehicle (varies): Any character of TL4 or above may take the DX/E vehicle skill Teamster/TL4 to operate a wagon pulled by one or at most two animals; Teamster/TL5 or above is required to operate larger teams. Boating/TL4 or above (DX/A) will suffice if there are occasional opportunities to use canoes or rafts. Steam Engineer/TL6 (DX/H) is just barely possible to take as a skill, but steam-driven land vehicles are still super-rare because of the limited supply of steel and copper. Pilot/TL8 (DX/H) will let you fly a grav sled, in the unlikely event that you can obtain one and in the even more unlikely event that you can rig enough stored electrical power to one to get it airborne (see Power Cells under Equipment, below).
Kobold Character Package: Discriminatory Taste (+10), Filter Lungs (+5), Flexibility (+5), High Manual Dexterity (+5), Sanitized Metabolism (+1), Talent:Miner +1 (+10); Dwarfism (-15), Easy to Bully (-10), Incompetent:Guns (-1), Stigma:Minority -2 (-10). Total package cost is 0 points (36 points advantages, -36 points free disadvantages).
The earliest form of genetic engineering in humans involved, of course, in vitro modification of embryos. The Chinese went for this in a big way, creating an entire slave race to mine asteroids for minerals, serve as deep exploration astronauts, and work as engineers on Chinese in-system spacecraft. In order to reduce the life support requirements, they were bred as midgets, averaging around 4'4" full adult height. They were equipped with taste chemoreceptors that let them identify virtually any common mineral by taste. It takes very little teaching to teach a young kobold that various combination tastes mean certain types of mineral deposits, and are therefore more likely to have other ores that they can't even taste. Further, the parts of their brains that handle spatial thinking were enhanced slightly. The intention was to make it easier for them to deal with free fall environments. Between their senses and their spatial reasoning abilities, all kobolds find it much easier to learn the basics of engineering, chemistry, metallurgy, and all related fields. To guarantee that the kobolds would not revolt against their human masters, all kobolds are bred to have a limbic system that over-reacts very strongly to physical threat, and which views any human being taller than them as a threat. By comparison with all other humans, the bravest kobold who ever lived was still one heck of a physical coward.
Unfortunately for the kobolds, once the gates were invented, the demand for in-system space travel dropped to almost nil, and the survivors were migrated back to Earth. However, life on a crowded Earth where everybody is taller than they are chafes at them, and wears on their nerves; kobolds have been enthusiastic colonists. On Cornucopia as on all worlds that the kobolds have emigrated to, they seek to live in peace in separate communities, far apart from the taller humans, trading minerals and machines back to the rest of the colony. On most worlds, this hasn't worked very well, as manufacturing concerns back on Earth could send finished goods through the gates much more cheaply than the kobolds could make them locally. This, of course, left them concentrated in the extraction industries, that is to say in mining, exploiting the colony worlds for minerals that are relatively used up back on old Earth.
On Cornucopia, the kobolds are much better placed to compete in the manufactured goods sector ... except for two things. First of all, like all engineers on Cornucopia, the kobolds are having to scale down and re-engineer everything they know to live in a world without power cells. (Kobolds who emigrated from Earth as adults, age 20+, take all skills at TL8. All younger kobolds take skills at TL5.) Secondly, early in the post-gate history of Cornucopia, they cut deals with the City that they are afraid to get out of, that have left them with almost no raw materials of their own to work with in exchange for the food and medical shipments they get from the City. Consequently, while everybody admires kobold engineering, they are only barely staying ahead of the much more leisurely (but mineral starved) blacksmiths and armourers and tool-makers of New Farming Town.
Note from the GM: Yes, kobolds get an awful lot of free disadvantages. Yes, if you wanted to play an engineer/blacksmith character, you could get an awful lot of bonuses for free by playing a kobold. But pay close attention to that -2 social stigma and the effects of the Easy to Bully disadvantage, because I will hold you to them. If you play a kobold, NPCs will bully you a lot, and I don't want to hear any complaints from the player about it, because you were warned. There's a reason why very few kobolds are willing to live anywhere other than Tiny Town.
The customized disadvantage "Easy to Bully" is based on "Easy to Read," only instead gives +4 on all others' Intimidation rolls and any similar attempt to dominate a kobold. The customized Talent "Miner" gives +1 (per 10 point level) to the following 12 skills: Blacksmithing/TL, Chemistry/TL, Engineering/TL, Explosives:Demolition/TL, Free Fall, Geology:Earthlike/TL, Geology:Rockworld/TL, HazMat:Chemical/TL, HazMat:Radioactive/TL, Machinist/TL, Mechanic/TL, Metallurgy/TL. Kobolds may take an additional 3 levels of this Talent for 10 points per level. Kobolds who've never lived in free fall can't learn the Free Fall skill, but they do get a +1 to the default skill (in the highly unlikely event that it will ever matter).
Kobold Professions: Except for one politician, a couple of lawmen, a merchant, and a couple of teachers (all based in Tiny Town), virtually all kobolds work as Prospectors or Skilled Tradesmen, and except for a very small contingent who live in Cornucopia City, they nearly all live and work in Tiny Town.
About a generation after it became possible (but unpopular) to create whole new human races, someone found a way to "hack" the genetic code of an adult human being. By using customized retrovirii to rewrite the DNA at the deepest levels, then causing tremendous amounts of damage and using ultra-tech regeneration techniques to heal the tissue as it's being eaten away, a full-grown adult human being can retroactively modified to incorporate traits from many species. However, the process has multiple drawbacks. For one thing, it turned out to be impractical to incorporate traits from species other than mammals. More importantly, the process is incredibly dangerous; many of the subjects died. This leads to the next drawback: it is still very, very illegal.
However, there were still genetic engineers willing to do it if the money was right, and some of them found havens where they could operate for a long time before their criminal gene-surgery rings were smashed. They found ready customers among the ranks of those who greatly admired animals for specific appearance traits, abilities, or perceived (projected) emotional traits. Soon society found itself having to adjust to the existence of people who were returning from overseas, or emerging from shadowy slums and furtive secret labs, with a wholly alien appearance. These modified humans liked to call themselves "anthropomorphics," but virtually everybody just calls them the furries.
The unmodified humans, and even most kobolds, reacted with horror and disgust that anybody would choose to make themselves and their descendents that alien from their neighbors. In a world that barely remembers nationalism, and where ethnicity is so blurred that it can't really be distinguished from the faint vestige remaining of nationalism, society rediscovered bigotry and prejudice. Almost everybody hates the furries. Back on old Earth, hate crimes against furries are barely even investigated, and punished only with slaps on the wrist. So needless to say, when the gates began to open, nobody was more eager to emigrate from Earth than the furries. Most of Earth's furries had fled to other worlds before the Cornucopia gate even opened; the original furry colonists to Cornucopia in 2276 were some of the last remaining furries on Earth and their furry children.
When they arrived, the furries planned on running an agricultural colony town, the same as everybody else. From the beginning, though, there were difficulties, as the rest of the locals were unwilling to deal with anthropomorphic humans except on the most hostile of terms, offering only terrible deals and charging terrible prices. When the Haven Town Strike broke out, the leader of the furries persuaded them that it was inevitable that both sides would use this war as an excuse to make war on the furries. He also argued persuasively that TL5 is too high for a population of tech-dependent greenhorns to sustain into the next generation, and proposed that it would be easier to form a stable society for the next generation at the Paleolithic (late stone age) tech level, TL2. To this end, the furries burned down Old Furry Town themselves, packing their tipis and such of their belongings as they intended to take with them onto small-wheeled horse-drawn sledges. They then set out for the treeline at the foothills of the mountains, and broke up (mostly along "species" lines) into smaller tribes that follow the various herds or packs of animals around the plains, and retreating into (or from) the forest as necessary.
As a rule, each tribe follows one herd of herbivores, whether dinosaur or Earth-import mammal. They are careful to keep the size of each tribe down to what that herd can sustain. They protect that herd from native predators and from human hunters but prey on the herd themselves, in essence inserting themselves into the ecosystem at the medium-sized-predator level. Preferred weapons are either bow and arrow or throwing/thrusting spear; nearly all living furries are adept at one weapon or the other. The skills of Armoury/TL, Brawling, First Aid/TL, Running, Stealth, Survival (plains), Tracking, and Traps/TL are also highly thought of, and most furries have been taught at least the rudiments. (Players: If your character is anywhere near adulthood, spend at least one point on each skill or justify why you didn't. Also spend at least one point on either Bow/TL2 or both Spear and Thrown Spear, or again justify why you didn't.)
Because of their determination to drop back several technology levels, it is not uncommon for furries who were raised on Cornucopia to have up to 3 levels of the Primitive disadvantage (TL2 = 15 points, TL3 = 10, T4 = 5), and many of the older adults assiduously pretend to have it. Similarly, the Illiterate (English) 2 point disadvantage is distressingly common among the younger generation.
Note that as furred characters with expressive tails, furries dress only for modesty and decoration. Shoes are seldom worn. Both genders wear loin cloths or harem pants. Both genders are prone to wearing small decorative vests, although some warriors of high status wear wood or bone armor vests (DR2, front protection only, weight 8 lbs). Some spearmen also carry wooden-rimmed, stuffed and hardened leather round war shields (DR 6, Dmg 10/40, 20 pounds). (Player characters may only obtain armor or shields on loan from Crazy Chief if they have him as their Patron and make the necessary die roll.)
In the snowy and rainy seasons, ponchos are sometimes worn outdoors, especially by those of below average Health. When trying to mix with non-furry company, some furries are willing to wear a gunman's duster and a hat to disguise their silhouette and blur the differences from normal humans. A few have learned to put up with skirts or kilts for short periods of time. But these compromises suit neither side: it's extremely uncomfortable to the furry in all but the coldest weather (and even then it cramps the tail), and even so costumed no furry can pass for normal human at any distance below 20 feet, and then only on a dark moonless night. All furries with expressive tails and mobile ears should take the Easy to Read -10 point disadvantage, which gives others +4 to read your emotional state. This disadvantage can be temporarily masked by wearing clothing that binds the tail and flattens and/or conceals the ears. However, this causes cramps. Doing so for more than a few minutes will give the character a cramp equivalent to a temporary Chronic Pain disadvantage: -2 to all DX, IQ, and self-control rolls for the next two hours.
Anthropomorphic Character Package: Damage Resistance 1 (+5), Fur (+1), Temperature Tolerance 1 (+1), Spoken English:Accented (-2), Stigma:Minority-2 (-10). Initial package cost = -5 points. Add up to 22 points of species-specific advantages and up to -17 points of species-specific disadvantages. Any mundane modifier can be used. Exotic modifiers must make sense for the species being modeled. No supernatural modifiers permitted.
In general, anthropomorphic humans do not hold any particular grudge against regular humans; do not assume that they will react to kobolds or regular humans with a matching -2 social stigma the other way. (Those who do should take it as a Hatred disadvantage.) Normal humans and kobolds who are sexually attracted to anthropomorphic humans do not react to furries at -2. However, this attraction itself is seen as a disgusting perversion itself, a -10 point Odious Personal Habit (Furvert), and will result in a -2 status modifier if detected by any human, kobold, or furry.
The Temperature Tolerance trait comes from the fur and is always taken entirely on the cold side of the equation. Normal humans tolerate temperatures from 35°F to 90°F without penalty. For every +1 in Temperature Tolerance from thick fur, furries subtract 10°F from the low end of that.
Lupines: Blunt Claws (+3), Damage Resistance 1 (+5), Discriminatory Smell (+15), Fur (+1), Sharp Teeth (+1), Temperature Tolerance 2 (+2), Chummy (-5), Easy to Read (-10), Spoken English:Accented (-2), Stigma:Minority -2 (-10). Total package cost: 0 points (27 pts advantages, 27 free disadvantage points).
Lupines have variable appearance and markings, by family, and can be modeled loosely after any species of dog or wolf (but not fox).
Felines: Acute Hearing +3 (+6), Acute Smell/Taste +2 (+4), Damage Resistance 1 (+5), Fur (+1), Night Vision 4 (+4), Sharp Claws (+5), Sharp Teeth (+1), Temperature Tolerance 1 (+1), Easy to Read (-10), Odious Personal Habit:Composure Grooming (-5), Stigma:Minority -2 (-10), Spoken English:Accented (-2). Total package cost: 0 points (27 pts advantages, 27 free disadvantage points).
Felines vary less from each other in shape, but do vary widely in markings, and can have the markings or coloration of any terrestrial species of cat. Female felines bear with the worst aggravation from furverts, and will react to furverts of either gender with an additional -1 reaction modifier. All cats are a trifle high strung, and so feline society has a coping mechanism. When a feline is upset, or needs to stall for time in a conversation, or is startled, they compulsively clean or brush or smooth their fur. This is called "composure grooming" and it is an iron-clad rule of feline society that when any feline begins composure grooming, the conversation stops until they are done, and it is never, ever commented upon except by total bores (or clueless lupines, humans, or kobolds). Criticizing a feline for his or her composure grooming will earn you a permanent -2 reaction modifier; two separate sufficiently abject apologies are necessary to reduce this modifier by 1 each time, to get back to normal.
Other Advantages: Everybody assumes that all Lupines also have Danger Sense, Empathy, Extra Fatigue, and Ultra Hearing. Everybody assumes that all Felines also have Catfall, Danger Sense, Double-Jointed, Light Sleeper, and Perfect Balance. Given that most adult furries are only 25 to 50 point characters, and that only a few leaders rise above 75 points, obviously they don't all have all of those advantages. The truth is that these abilities run in families. Most furries have at least one of those advantages, and are raised such that when confronted by a non-furry over their "failure" at any of the others, they say little, strive to maintain their dignity, and feign an offended aloofness. The topic is impolite among outsiders (and will almost certainly trigger composure grooming in felines).
Furry Professions: Virtually all felines and lupines "work" within their tribes as nomadic herders and hunters (and their families). Since there are too few of the other breeds to raise successful families, the furries' chief has strongly encouraged them to become solitary explorers. There are a few furries, especially felines, who still resist the nomadic herder lifestyle and have separated themselves from the furry community to work among regular humans. They can sometimes overcome the prejudices against them long enough to find work as bounty hunters, farmers, ranchers, or scouts, but either way it's a very lonely life.
The following are a broad sample of the possible "character classes" in the Cornucopia campaign. Some of these are best suited as either NPCs or as character backgrounds. The sample skills next to each are recommendations only. However, see the Professions table at the end of this section to see what the mandatory monthly success rolls are to keep working in one of these fields.
Big Game Hunter:
Bounty Hunter:
Colonial Militia: The Colonial Militia was not sent here primarily as a police force, but to provide trained military to deal with threats from the ecosystem. However, it was understood that in the event of major crime or civil unrest, they were expected to step in and help the locally constituted law enforcement. This pretty much went out the window during The Strike, especially since the large-dinosaur problem has been pretty thoroughly dealt with by now. The Militia serves as both the local police force for Cornucopia City and serves as the loyal army of the Colonial Council. They do intervene in murder cases in the Badlands, but do not have the manpower to do so consistently or often. All of the regular Colonial Militia are Earth-educated, and thus getting up there in age. However, this means that all of the skills they have are at TL8. Militia enlisted men and junior NCOs are 75 point characters. Militia officers range from 100 to 200 points; to go beyond rank 3 (Lieutenant) needs superior combat ratings and good people skills and the equivalent of a college degree in several subjects. Even the enlisted men generally have Xenology/TL8, Xenobiology/TL8, and four or more Survival skills, on top of Karate, Rifle/TL8, and Beam Rifle/TL8. The Militia Code of Honor is a -10 point Vow; all Militia are sworn to defend the colony first, civilians second, their fellow Militia third, and themselves only fourth, and to obey the civilian Colonial authority in all matters that do not conflict with these priorities.
Cowboy, Herder, or Rancher:
Doctor: The fact of the matter is that there isn't very much that a doctor can do for people without supplies, and people are comig to understand that. Nonetheless, virtually every town has at least one doctor, or person who calls himself a doctor. In the smaller towns, the doctors are fed and housed at town expense. In New Farming Town and Christian Town, doctors hang up shingles and negotiate what payment they can. In Cornucopia City, of course, doctors work for the City Medical Center. Note that most of a doctor's skills have a TL component. Doctors may use any equipment at their TL or lower, but their effectiveness will be reduced as if they had the lower skill. For example, if a doctor with three levels of the High Tech advantage (TL8) can only get access to very primitive medical supplies (TL2), then all durations and rolls and so on will be based on TL2, not TL8. Anyone trying to call himself or herself a Doctor must know First Aid/TL, or they'll be found out quickly. Diagnosis/TL and Physician/TL are very nearly mandatory. When dealing with exotic diseases and trying to find cures, Observation may be helpful, as might Forensics/TL in the worst case, and Chemistry/TL and Xenobiology/TL will probably be necessary to find a cure; however, people understand that only the best doctors have such capabilities. However, out in the towns, many doctors combine their practice with veterinary medicine, by taking some Animal Handling and Veterinary/TL, because it's just about the only way to make a living in the poorer parts of the colony. Finally, the best doctors also take the Empathy advantage.
Entertainer: There are a handful of traveling musicians who are good enough to cadge free meals and housing for maybe a week in each town before moving on. Nonetheless, if you are trying to feed yourself and house yourself entirely as a musician, many people are going to see you as a parasite. The Voice, Appearance, and Charisma advantages are almost mandatory. So is the -5 point disadvantage, -1 Reputation:Beggar (common reaction). You can offset that with up to +4 in Reputation (music lovers) at 5 points per level. The more musical instruments you play (see Skills, below), the better your prospects of getting paid, or at least fed, or at least tolerated.
Nonetheless, what most Cornucopians think of when they hear the word "entertainer" used by itself is "prostitute." Many of the towns have saloons or inns, and there are working girls (and a few boys) who ply their trade in back rooms or upper rooms of some of them. Some of those boys and girls may even be free to leave, and the rest are required on pain of death to tell you that they love what they're doing. Very high Health is almost mandatory. Appearance, Charisma, and Empathy advantages are very helpful. All of the Influence skills except for Intimidation are very useful (Diplomacy, Fast-Talk, Savoir-Faire, Sex Appeal, and Streetwise). The Holdout and Pickpocket skills also common, and can greatly improve the odds of survival. ("Retired" "entertainers" often have negative appearance, either as a result of whatever disease or injury cost them their career or whatever scars their former "employer" paid to have inflicted to punish them for leaving.)
Although they don't think of themselves as entertainers, prize fighting is a popular form of entertainment on Cornucopia. Each Town has at least one current or former boxing champion. Successful boxers are often taken care of by the townsfolk, because they bring prestige (and gambling winnings) to the town. Successful prize fighters will have high Strength, Dexterity, and Health. The High Pain Threshold advantage is practically mandatory. Other helpful advantages may include Enhanced Dodge, Enhanced Parry (bare hands), Fearlessness, and Luck. The Hard of Hearing, Impulsiveness, and Overconfidence disadvantages are all common, as is negative Appearance. A few points of Intimidation skill might help, especially if you seek "outside employment." Brawling skill might help, but the more precise Boxing skill (see Skills, below) will help a great deal more, and should use up all of your remaining points. Note that unscrupulous boxers can earn money or favors outside the ring by working as debt collectors.
Express Rider:
Farmer:
Gambler:
Gunslinger: Law enforcement on Cornucopia is stretched thin. That creates opportunities for gunmen to find work, either as honest mercenaries or as dishonest thieves. Unless hired by a recognized law enforcement officer as part of a posse, killing people is still illegal on Cornucopia ... if you get caught. So if you're on the wrong side of the law, or somebody "just needs killing," don't get caught. High DX and HT are essential. After that, take all of the Pistol/TL5 and/or Rifle/TL5 you can afford. Killing from ambush is safer than killing face to face, so the Fast Draw skill is optional ... but if you use pistols, that one time you need it it may save your life. Brawling will be even more helpful than Fast Draw, because of all the times when you run out of bullets or don't want to be heard shooting. On the other hand, Tactics and/or Stealth skill may get you out of unpleasant situations even cheaper and more safely than shooting it out point-blank or slugging it out face to face, especially if you're a rifleman. Consider putting at least one point into Thrown Knives as an emergency backup skill. There is no way you can afford all of the combat-helpful Advantages that there are; pick one or at most two, and those will be your trademark moves. You may frequently have to patch up yourself or your partner, so at least some First Aid/TL5 is also essential. Your job will require a great deal of travel under a wide variety of conditions, so Riding/Horse is essential and Teamster/TL5 may frequently be very useful. At least some Survival/Plains will also be essential and if you do ever have to retreat up the tree line, so will Survival/Mountain Forest. Amateurish gunslingers specialize in Intimidation to get people to get over their negative reaction to gunslingers; smoother operators use Reputation, coupled with a Code of Honor disadvantage.
Lawman:
Politician:
Preacher:
Prospector:
School Teacher:
Scout/Explorer:
Skilled Trades: There are a few skilled trades that are in very high demand. Blacksmiths are needed to shoe horses and do custom ironwork. Coopers make and repair barrels. Carpenters design buildings that won't fall down and oversee the unskilled labor that puts them up. There are water wheel driven mills run by mechanics; other mechanics work as wainwrights, designing and making custom wagons. Leatherworkers tan hides and use the leather to make clothing, saddles, and other tack. And, of course, armourers are in steady demand to make, repair, and produce shot for firearms, and locksmiths are needed to make and repair locks.
GURPS Lite doesn't have special skills for all of these. Assume that someone with high skill in Armoury is needed to be a weaponsmith. Assume that someone a carpenter or a miller needs the Engineer skill. Lockpicking represents the locksmith trade. Most of the rest of the skilled trades are represented by the skill Mechanic, and role play the various specialties as preferences: someone who is primarily a (whatever one thing) can also (all of the rest) in a pinch. The Merchant and Scrounging skills are also going to be very helpful. Tradesmen who travel will need a wagon and a team, and should therefore also take the Riding/Horse skill, the Survival/Plains skill, at least one Guns skill, and the vehicle skill Teamster/TL4 (or above, see Vehicle Skills under Skills, below).
Trader:
| Poor | Success | Crit Fail | |
| Laborer | ST 11+ | Worst of ST,IQ | */LJ |
| Launderer | no qualifications | ST-1 | */LJ |
| Struggling | Success | Crit Fail | |
| Cowboy | Animal Handling 12+, Lasso 10+ | Best PR | * |
| Dancer | Dancing 11+ | PR+Reaction | */LJ |
| Deputy Sheriff | any combat 11+, IQ 10+, Area Knowledge:town 11+ | Best PR | LJ |
| Farm Laborer | IQ 9 | 12 | LJ |
| Farmer | Farming 12+, ST 10+, some land | PR | * |
| Hunter | Guns:Rifle 12+, Survival 12+) | Best PR | * |
| Musician | Musical Instrument 11+ | PR+Reaction | */LJ |
| Stock Tender | Animal Handling 10+ | PR | LJ |
| Teacher | Teaching 9+, Academic skill 9+ | Best PR | LJ |
| Trail Cook | Teamster 12+, Cooking 8+ | Best PR | LJ/* |
| Trapper | Traps 12+, Survival 12+ | Best PR | * |
| Average | Success | Crit Fail | |
| Blacksmith | Blacksmith 10+, Animal Handling 10+, ST 10+ | Best PR | * |
| Carpenter | Carpentry 11+ | PR | * |
| Doctor (small town) | First Aid/TL5 10+, Physician/TL5 9+, Veterinary/TL5 10+ | Best PR | * |
| "Entertainer" | Sex Appeal 10+ | PR | * |
| Express Messenger | IQ 10+, Guns 12+, Riding:Horse 12+ | IQ | LJ |
| Gambler | Gambling 11+, Sleight of Hand 10+ | Best PR | * |
| Outlaw | Guns 14+, 2 or more thief skills | Worst PR | */jail |
| Packer | Packing 12+ | PR | LJ |
| Prospector | Prospecting 12+ | PR | * |
| Publisher | Writing 12+, Mechanic/TL5 12+, Current Affairs 12+ | Best PR | */LJ |
| Ranch Foreman | Administration 10+, Leadership 10+ | Best PR | LJ |
| Sheriff | Guns 12+, Administration 10+, Politics 10+ | IQ | */LJ |
| Shopkeeper | Merchant 12+ or any craft/profession skill 12+, shop | PR | * |
| Stage Driver | Teamster 12+ | PR | */LJ |
| Teamster | Animal Handling 12+, Teamster 12+, Whip 12+ | Best PR | LJ |
| Trail Boss | Leadership 12+ | PR | * |
| Traveling Salesman | Merchant 11+, Fast-Talk 11+ | Best PR | * |
| Comfortable | Success | Crit Fail | |
| Business Owner | Merchant 11+, Administration 12+ | Administration | * |
| Doctor (large town) | Diagnosis/TL5 11+, First Aid/TL5 11+, Physician/TL5 11+ | Worst PR | */LJ |
| Planter | Farming 12+, Administration 10+ | Worst PR | * |
| Prizefighter | Boxing 14+ | PR | */LJ |
| Wagonmaster | Leadership 12+, Area Knowledge 12+ | Worst PR | */LJ |
| Wealthy | Success | Crit Fail | |
| Large Business Owner | Merchant 11+, Administration 12+, Status 2+) | Administration | * |
| Major Planter | Farming 11+, Administration 12+, Status 2+, much land | Administration | * |
| Master Surgeon | Diagnosis 12+, Physician 12+ (at both TL5 & TL8) | Worst PR | */LJ |
Until the economy converts over from barter to cash (which won't happen until there's a lot more metal in the economy and a lot more farm production), ignore the starting wealth level in cash and the prices listed in the various game books for equipment. Everything is home-made or bartered for.
All characters start with one set of clothing, one pair of boots, two sets of underwear, two pair of socks, one hat, and either a duster or jacket, all in durable wool and leather. The combined effect of this clothing, if you wear all of it, is to provide Damage Resistance 2, at a total weight of 20 pounds. I'm also going to assume that you have "enough" tallow candles and a tinderbox, if you need them.
For every level of Wealth above Dirt Poor, all regular human or kobold players may choose one item or package from the following list. So Poor=1, Struggling=2, Average (no Wealth stat)=3, Comfortable=4, Wealthy=5, Very Wealthy=6. Yes, you may take the same item more than once.
Furry player characters start with one change of scant clothing including a belt with several belt pouches. (Clothes provide DR1 but only to groin and possibly chest, depending on style.) The belt pouch contents include the equivalent of a Personal Basics camping kit. Furries with any levels of Primitive start with a Large ("Bowie") Knife; non-primitives may optionally start with a "leatherman" TL7 multi-tool in a belt pouch instead. They may also choose items or packages from the following list: one choice if Poor, two if Struggling, three if Average (no wealth stat taken):
All other equipment for furries must be obtained via the Patron advantage.
In addition to personal equipment, the wealthiest non-furry member of the group will be given one piece of equipment intended to be shared communally on joint missions: a buckboard wagon whose base is built from an unpowered grav sled. It has no top, only low sides, a front bech seat for the driver. It requires 2 horses to pull, and can carry passengers and/or cargo up to a limit of 2500 lbs.
When selecting a firearm, your first question should not be, "What conditions am I going to be fighting under?" That's your second question. Your first question should be: "Where am I going to get ammunition for this thing?"
Black powder is not exactly free or readily available, but it can be had pretty easily with the right connections. The same can be said for lead. Casting lead bullets isn't terribly hard. Paper is fairly readily available, and so wrapping loads of black powder in paper isn't a technological obstacle. Percussion caps, on the other hand, have to be manufactured. And reliable brass cartridges with built-in percussion caps require manufacturing, and are therefore only available from the only real factories on the planet, which are all inside the walls of Cornucopia City. That means choosing between muzzle loader, cap and ball, or cartridge ammunition.
Muzzle loader weapons are based on a slight update to the classic 1850s rifled flintlock or wheel-lock musket. Black powder is measured into the barrel, and a spherical bullet is rammed down on top of it with a rod. However, since the Cornucopians have left-over piezo-electric crystals from no-longer-functioning appliances, locally manufactured muskets fire somewhat more reliably than the old flintlocks did. However, they are still difficult and slow to load. The advantage that they have is that ammunition for them can be manufactured almost anywhere, which makes these weapons very popular among the poorer and more distant settlers, and among scouts who will be operating far from civilization. Note that these weapons are often hand-made by local blacksmiths, so quality can vary widely. The examples below are merely typical.
Cap and ball breach-loading weapons use pre-measured loads of black powder, wrapped in paper. The bullet goes into the chamber, then the powder, then a circle of paper with a percussion cap. They're about as slow to reload as a musket, and require one pre-manufactured part (the percussion cap), but are much more accurate and much more reliable.
Cartridge-fire weapons use manufactured ammunition. They reload quickly, shoot consistently, and fail less often. What's more, their consistent ammunition serves as a handy medium of exchange; jobs sometimes pay in cartridge ammunition and some goods are priced in number of cartidges required in exchange. The downside is that manufactured ammunition on Cornucopia only comes from Cornucopia City, so using a cartridge-fire weapon ties you intimately to the City's economy, and limits the places you can get ammo to only the Towns that do a thriving business with the City.
Subject to those limitations, you may obtain any firearm listed in GURPS Basic Set 4th Edition, pages 278-279, at TL5 or below.
All Earth-origin equipment runs on standardized power cells. They can't be recharged, and can't be discharged quickly enough to explode. Assume that a cell will store indefinitely if not in use, and is good for two years of continuous use unless otherwise specified. They can not be manufactured below TL8 (and even then only with sufficient esoteric resources and extensive factory equipment). On Earth there were rechargeable cells (half power capacity) of the same size, but none were provided to the colony, as it made more sense to send the old ones back to be recycled and get the double-power-capacity benefit. There are six sizes of power cells, designated by letter from AA (the smallest) to E (the largest). Power cells increase in power exponentially. An A cell is ten times as powerful as an AA cell, a B cell has ten times the power of an A cell, and so on. It takes three seconds to replace an A, B, C or D cell with a new one, or six seconds to replace a tiny AA or large E cell. Cornucopia City has the monopoly on these, and will not say how many are left, but has stopped issuing them for anything short of a colony-wide emergency.