Fallout Game Basics

Right! We've finished up "You Can't Take it With You" and are moving on to Fallout. I still have an epilogue to write, but while I'm working on that, you guys can begin thinking about characters.

In the Cortex system, Assets and Complications cover personal advantages and disadvantages, but can also be used to construct character races, special abilities/superpowers, etc. Groups of Traits that are all meant to represent the same thing (like the combined benefits and drawbacks of being a Super Mutant or Ghoul) get lumped together and called 'Bundles.' There is no actual cost-break for using a Bundle, but it looks neater on your character sheet (rather than recording 20 different Traits), and it does have one mechanical advantage. Normally, characters can only gain 30 Trait Points by taking Complications. However, for these purposes, you DO NOT count the Complications in Bundles separately, only the overall total cost of the Bundle. Read the Traits Chapter for more details, but basically, I didn't like how GURPS worked, where if you wanted to be an elf or a dwarf or whatever you used up all your allowed points on the racial package, and then never got to personalize your character. So in Cortex you can.

I'm comfortable running the rules of the game, but I'd prefer if everybody learned enough to make their own character, for the most part; since we've played Serenity before, you probably have a fairly good idea of the basics.

Here are the rules/requirements:
1. Characters start at Recruit Level. I'm going to be messing with Advancement a bit by allowing Fallout-esque items that permanently raise abilities, skills, etc during play; there WILL be experience-based advancement, too, however.
2. We will be using a game-world-specific Skills list. Do not build your character using the default skill list from the Cortex book; I'll post the modified list here soon.
3. Characters can be bizarre, but ya'll have to work together. I'm going to let you be largely responsible for deciding, pre-game, why you are working together/how you met/etc. You may want to chat about characters while or before building yours, too. Some intra-party conflict is fine, but I'd prefer it if it didn't derail the game.
So while coming up with your charater's schtick, please keep in mind whether or not it's going to make it difficult to work with others, make it hard to roleplay, or get you killed by Brahmin-from-the-Sky.
4. There will be a 'Main Quest Line' style plot. I'll post soon what the game's startup is about, and you can keep that in mind when making characters.

And a question...what/where shall we host this game? We'll be trying to mix Skype and posting, but I think the sense was to use something other than PbPHouse because of their server problems. So; a Google website or Group? Another Blog devoted to the game? Bueller? Bueller?