Junkers

Edge: Arcane Background (Junker)

Requirements: Wild Card, Novice

Arcane Skill: Weird Science (Smarts)

Power Points: 10

Starting Powers: 1

Backlash: As Weird Scientists (see Savage Worlds).

Available Powers: All but disguise, divination, greater healing, shape change, and summon ally.

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Special Rules:

• Gadgeteer: A junker automatically gets the Gadgeteer Edge for free, but it functions slightly differently (and he cannot take the normal version of the Edge). He can bind a tech spirit into his gathered components and create a device that replicates any power available to junkers a number of times per session equal to half his Spirit. The catch for this flexibility is that each device has a number of Power Points equal to the Components consumed in its creation (up to half the junker’s maximum Power Points). Since the gadget binds a tech spirit into its construction, this takes place very quickly—one action instead of the usual 1d20 minutes required by the regular Gadgeteer Edge. The junker has to make a Weird Science roll to bind the tech spirit, and suffers a –2 penalty for each Rank the power is higher than his own. If the junker gets a raise on the roll, he only uses half the Components required.

• Junkmen: Junkers collect “Components” as they travel about the Wastes—bits and pieces of electronics, chemicals, mechanical devices, and stranger stuff they use to augment and create their weird devices. Components are gathered anytime the part is allowed to make a scavenging roll (see page 66). The junkmen gather the scavenged items as usual, but also find 1d6 Components with a success, 2d6 with a raise. Every five Components weighs one pound but are otherwise non-specific odds and ends with no other use.

• Repairs: Any time a junker’s gizmo is damaged or needs to be repaired (such as from a Malfunction), he needs Components to fix it. Minor repairs, equivalent to a Minor Malfunction, require 1d6 Components. Major repairs, as a Major Malfunction, require 2d6 Components. Total destruction, like a Catastrophic Malfunction, require a number of Components equal to the maximum Power Points in the device.

• Spook Juice: Junkers can make spook juice without a refinery. A successful Weird Science roll produces one gallon of spook juice from one ounce of ghost rock in an hour. On a raise, the junker gets two gallons. Critical failure results in a spectacular explosion, causing 3d6 damage in a Medium Burst Template.

• Weird Science: Junkers use all the rules for Weird Scientists in Savage Worlds, including the Malfunction Table.

History

Junkers are the techno-wizards of the Wasted West. With the help of the spirit world, they can build devices of incredible power out of the ruins of technology scattered about the wastelands. They depend on tech spirits to hold their devices together, ghost rock to power them, and salvage for the physical components of their inventions. Junkers tend to keep to themselves. Some choose solitary lives but most are ostracized by survivors who want nothing to do with folks who willingly deal with spirits and ghost rock—it did destroy the world, after all. Of course, these misgivings often vanish when a junker shows up with some incredible device folks just can’t live without—like a ghost rock-powered generator or alchemical healing salve. A junkers’ typically bizarre appearance only adds to most folks’ distrust. Most wear techno-talismans made from discarded bits of machine innards and have arcane schematics stitched into their clothing—or even tattooed into their skin!

The Origins of Science!

In the years following the Great Quake of 1863, a new form of science appeared in the world. Its practitioners liked to call it “new science,” but most non-eggheads referred to it as “mad science.” The gizmos born of this science often seemed to defy reality to a point where they appeared almost magical. Their effects— when they worked—were spectacular; when they didn’t, the explosions were even more so. Of course, the main reason folks called it mad science was that those who dabbled with it often became stark raving lunatics.

What these scientists didn’t understand was that their technological insight was not a product of their own genius, but inspired by the manitous. The Reckoners sent their underlings to whisper in the scientists’ ears as they slept, and their dreams were filled with bizarre and destructive devices. When they awoke, they turned their dreams into reality. These ghostly visions loosened the inventors’ grips on reality and eventually drove them mad.

It turns out the Reckoners got what they wanted from the mad scientists on July 3rd 2063—200 years to the day after the Reckoning began—the first city buster ghost rock bomb was unveiled. The Reckoners now had the tools they needed to destroy civilization and terrorform the entire world into a Deadland. Having attained their goal, the number of manitous whispering in the ears of mad scientists declined dramatically. Inventors the world over found their muses suddenly silent. Most eventually gave up their inventors’ workshops and entered more ordinary technical professions. A few took their own lives.

When the Whispering Stopped

Not all the mad scientists who were abandoned by the manitous gave up their work. Some looked for answers. The Sons of Sitgreaves was a movement that traced its roots back to 1876 and R. Percy Sitgreaves, the first mad scientist to discover the awful truth about his “genius.” Since most mad scientists refused to believe their inventions came from anywhere except their own gray matter, Sitgreaves and his followers were outcasts in the scientific community. But after Sitgreaves’ revelation, a few of the Sons began studying other forms of magic in an effort to better understand the manitous and their goals. The demons would no longer willingly help an inventor, and in fact had nothing new to contribute.

Their knowledge of future technology ended on July 3rd, 2063. The spiteful things could be coerced into sharing past knowledge, such as how to create goggles that can see spirits or belts that project fields of energy, but their knowledge was shady and they certainly wouldn’t power these devices.

But tech spirits would.

These new creatures rose as man put a little of himself into his own inventions, and were typically tethered to the device which spawned them. The spiritual boom of Judgment Day freed the spirits, however, and now the Hunting Grounds are full of them. They don’t get along well with nature spirits, who are frequent and savage enemies.

The junkmen of the Wasted West discovered these tech spirits willingly inhabited their infernal devices to hold them together and provide the magical “pilot light” to kickstart their various powers, but to really fuel the fire, they needed “ghost rays.”

Ghost Rays

The energy given off as ghost rock burns— souls, basically—is similar to the energy of the Hunting Grounds itself. When first discovered by the Sons of Sitgreaves, the energy was called “ghost rays,” or “g-rays” for short. From this they developed the g-ray collector. It collects spiritual energy from ghost rock as it burns and stores it for later use in “spirit batteries.” The full limits of this new technology had yet to be explored before the Last War began. A few junkers were drafted into government service—a junker was responsible for the first true cyborgs, for example—but their contributions to the war effort came too little, too late.

After the Bomb

Once the bombs stopped falling, junkers really came into their own. The world needed folks who could get machines running without a few vital components, and junkers fit the bill. But the inventors need a manitou’s guidance, a tech spirit’s soul, and g-rays to do the job—all wild chicanery that makes junkers pretty suspect. Nonetheless, junkers are vital to keeping many survivor settlements running, and are therefore grudgingly tolerated. Only junkers have the arcane knowledge required to distill ghost rock into spook juice without the aid of a major refinery, a skill in high demand in the Wasted West.

Junker Edges

The following Edges can be taken by anyone with the Arcane Background (Junker) Edge.

Scavenger Supreme

Requirements: Seasoned, Arcane Background (Junker), Knowledge (any kind of science) d8+

These junkmen have a keen eye for odds and ends they can pull, cut, or yank out of the scraps they sort through. When a junker with this Edge is allowed to scavenge, he gains 1d10 Components with a success, 2d10 with a Raise.

Tapping the Net

Requirements: Seasoned, Arcane Background (Junker), Investigation d8+, Weird Science d8+

Tech spirits see the Hunting Grounds as a vast network of knowledge and information. A junker with this Edge has learned to get those spirits to do research for him. Once per game session, he can make a Investigation roll without any resources (books, computers, etc.) with a +2 bonus. Additionally, the spirits are constantly streaming him generalized information, granting a +2 bonus to Common Knowledge rolls.

Trappings

Junker powers take the form of devices assembled from pre-Last War technology. Weapons tend to be firearms of some sort, while defensive powers take the form of armor, force fields, or gizmos that obscure the caster. Utility powers might be alchemical creations like pills or balms, or energy beams that enhance a target’s natural potential.

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