19th century is pretty pessimistic depending on what caused the apocalypse. Pockets of knowledge will exist and assuming a 2012 "disaster" there are still plenty of pockets of older tools/technology around to be exploited along with the people with the knowledge and skills to use them so I'd be surprised to see things fall that far in only 40ish years. But your scenario so those are the rules.

You might try looking over the book 1632 by David Weber for some ideas and an interesting scenario where an entire town gets transplanted from the USA of today back to 1632 in the middle of Germany (can you say right in the middle of the 100 years war!). It is science fiction but makes several good points about what it would take to survive and even thrive when the infrastructure is ripped out from under you.

- Eric

Ok, first things first, if I was picking out traits for a character for a role playing game, for the situation you have described, these would be the attributes I would pick (some have already been mentioned and I am a bit constrained by not knowing the rules and bounds of the particular game you will be playing).

Physically tough, physically fit and trained in some form of self-defense or martial arts (if we are to assume another member of the trek group will handle the fighting parts of the trek then you could leave the self-defense/martial arts part out). Keeping in mind the usual roles for an RPG (a fighter, a healer, a thief, and so on) it would seem your character is taking the role of a healer. That said perhaps your skill set and knowledge should be focused on that aspect of your character.

Mentally tough, ready to take on the mental challenges of being flung through time into a harsh new reality (culture shock on an epic scale) as well as the mental challenges the new reality will present.

A master of improvisation. Since the technology may be older or non-existent, and the supplies from the past cannot last indefinitely, the character should be ready to improvise what is needed, like a splint for a broken bone, or a replacement knife handle, or a remedy for a stomachache, or a water filter, etc.

Good at communication, to facilitate truces between warring groups (if that is a likely scenario) or between individuals. At any rate, having good communication skills can’t hurt. This also implies an understanding of human nature and human behavior, which is also very useful.

If I understand the scenario correctly, the house takes care of her need for shelter, and the needs of food and water are being provided for her already and will not need to be addressed by the character? If not, then she also needs to be knowledgeable about horticulture (or at least have books in the home about it) and raising, foraging, and preserving her own food supply. She would also need ways to procure, purify, and store quantities of water. If we can safely assume her survival community is taking care of these needs for her (or the game master is simply ignoring these details) that is fine, but wouldn’t these skills make her a better asset to the survival community anyway?

You have mentioned thus far that the knowledge base will be your own. In my opinion, for this scenario, knowledge will be a far greater asset than any gear (tho for the short term gear could prove very useful). If you don’t already know some of the things discussed, could you add some books to your library that will survive the 40-year time span? Books on herbal medicine, home remedies, edible plants, primitive living, etc could prove worth 1,000 times their weight in gold. Given your character’s healer role, books focusing on this aspect would seem most logical.

OK, now for the confusing part. Your premise says “Jeanette is a Wilderness EMT getting ready for a wilderness expedition when she suddenly finds herself in a survival situation.” Is it ONLY the gear she has on her person that is not affected by the 40-year time span? Also, is she already on her own expedition when the time transport takes place? Because if she isn’t, I find it hard to believe that some of the gear you mention (like the knife and the AMK mountain medic, which weighs in at 7 lbs 12 oz and is 16" x 10" x 8") would REALLY be on her person at that moment. Also, are you considering just what she might have on her person? Or what she might also have in a pack she has just slung on her back? If she is just gathering up the gear, and it survives because it has been laying around her house for the past 40 years, then most of the contents of the FAK will be useless, as will other items mentioned. For now I will assume that she is either already on her own expedition, is gearing up as she is about to leave, or whatever so I don’t get too bogged down but the details ARE important. For the most part tho, things like medications, maybe adhesives, and other things prone to breaking down (like rubber and elastic mentioned earlier) that remained in the home will be useless to her. Thinking in terms of surviving 40 years just lying around, one word comes to mind: Titanium.

Assuming the gear for the expedition was stored at her house, she should still have access to any of it that survived the 40-year time span. So another thing to consider is what expedition was she going on? An expedition to, say, the jungles of Brazil would entail a whole different set of gear than would, say, an expedition to the North Pole. If your game master isn’t as detail oriented you could get by without being specific, but in terms of getting the most out of the experience you should consider this little detail.

Any chance you will need to do any bartering in the game world? If so you might consider including some simple luxuries like candy and gum and other needed items for this post-apocalyptic future that would be worth trading.

That's what I have. Sorry I could not offer more specific information like book titles and such. Hope it helps.

My player-character, and everything she has on her, will not age as she is sent though the time warp. My player-character is at her home and is getting ready for a planned wilderness expedition when the conveniently-timed time warp takes place. I have a scenario in mind, I will write, which will explain why she has the mentioned gear on her person. Currently, for the scenario I have in mind, she does not have her pack on her the moment the time warp takes place.


I did not get into the detail of the planned expedition. Most likely it would be somewhere here in the contiguous United States.


The game master says the contents in the medical kit and my player-character's skills to use them will have tremendous trading power.

Jeanette Isabelle

Tools and older equipment would be around but without things such as a means of extracting some types of raw materials and a supply chain, we are back to a situation where anything new would have to come from a local machine shop. Don't get me wrong, a lot can be built with scrap mettle but we can forget about mass production and not everything can be made in a machine shop.

One player-character is almost finished building a computer with relay switches and a spinning mettle drum (drum memory). She is waiting for the punch card machine to be finished. The means of building tubes and transistors do not exist. This player-character is also building a car but when everything must be built by hand, we can't expect anything more advanced than an electric starter assuming she can get the tires for the car imported. If not imported, where is she going to get the rubber to make tiers?

Without the means of making synthetic fibers, toothbrushes would be made from horse hair. Also, there are no means of making disposable medical gloves or syringes. In short, without the infrastructure, technology level is almost back to the days of the pioneers.

Jeanette Isabelle

I'll agree on some of that i.e. no large scale production of synthetics, no mass produced transistors and very significant supply chain issues. This will result in odd pockets of technology fallback. But that isn't the end of our know how and you can accomplish a lot with cruder solutions. In fact the scenario you are examining will actually force a planned drop to a sustainable tech level that would allow a gradual build back to the world we know today. To that end, vacuum tubes would be pretty easy to build if you have the knowledge and access to some rather low tech capabilities. Crude transistors can be built with material in a high school chem lab. Machine tools and the skills to use them will be worth much more than there weight in gold.

I would expect to see electricity (including local power grids), steam power, and internal combustion engines available in lots of communities. In terms of agriculture, if the fall back goes past early tractors (think steel wheels or treads, not rubber) it will probably go all the way back to human power. It takes a long time to raise and train draft/plow animals and that know how is already pretty rare before the apocalypse. Any draft/riding animals will be very hard to come by even 40 years later. Unless you have a tannery and a black smith near by tack and other gear will be pretty crude. Similar story for wood working - not a lot of human powered wood working tools out there these days so we better hope for some grid power.

In preparing your character maybe consider some training as a naturalist / herbalist. Our current medical standard of care relies a lot on big companies and dependable transportation that will break down. Some basic knowledge of herbal medicine will go along way in a world that doesn't have easy access to tylenol etc.

Good luck and have fun,

- Eric

One valuable skill will be repairing and utilizing all the stuff we throw away now. Think landfills. These will become mines.

As for agriculture: while there won't be enough horses, there will be plenty of cattle about. Oxen have been pulling ploughs and wagons for millennia. They have also been working windlasses for grist mills. A working knowledge of animal husbandry and basic veterinary medicine would be a marketable skill.

Speaking of landfills, where do all the old computers we have go? Recycled computers and old radios would have lots of circuit boards, transistors, power supplies, fans et al . . . or were all those smoked in the "event"?

If electronics can be salvaged, that multi-tool may be a very useful thing to have . . . maybe not for you, but your computer and automobile building compadre' may find it rather useful.

It's my understanding that most compter fans are DC which means they can work as a small generator. However I suspect after 40 years of neglect their plastic peices and wire coatings would be trashed.

-Blast

But plastic lasts forever in a landfill . . TeeVee says so . . maybe if we buried the old computers . . .

Transistors may still be ok after 40 years though their leads may be oxidized and difficult to solder. Depends on how well sealed they are. Many integrated circuits (plastic bodies) will absorb moisture thru the plastic and the chip will corrode.

But power supply components like electrolytic capacitors will not. They have a chemical paste inside which dries up.

Things like switches (keyboards are an array of switches) and connectors that depend on mechanical contact may not be ok because the contact surfaces will have oxidized unless they were gold-plated.

Fans would have the lubrication issues mentioned previously.

(I still have the ham radio kit I soldered together in 1973 and the radio still works. But the electrolytics had to be replaced, the switches are a bit intermittent, and the carbon resistors had to be replaced because they'd absorbed moisture in storage and all changed value.)

Some electronics could be useable. But you still have the issue of obtaining power.

Unless the character is a total ham-radio geek nerd tinkerer, the electronics won't be of much value.