Jet has been down on his luck lately. He's had a few run-ins with the local thugs, dealt with a band of escaped convicts, and just narrowly avoided becoming zombie food. Oh, and a mysterious man recently shot him in the head and buried him in the dirt. Life on the Mojave Wasteland is harsh for everyone, but this is ridiculous. For some reason, he can't handle conflicts in the wasteland the way he'd like. That's because he's a product of my imagination meant to make my time in Fallout: New Vegas more tolerable.
The role-playing elements of the Fallout games cause me nothing but stress. I hate having to assign points to a variety of stats based on vague descriptions without knowing what's waiting for me in the world.
Still, that world is so wonderfully realized that I decided to give Fallout: New Vegas a shot, with one twist: I decided to take the phrase "role-playing game" at its word by living in the wasteland as avatars modeled after the five colors found in my favorite trading-card game, Magic: The Gathering. Jet was the first of those five characters.
He was also the last.
There are five colors of mana in Magic: white, blue, black, red, and green. Each has its own views, motivations, likes, dislikes, and means of getting what it wants. Having played the game for years, I figured I knew the colors well enough to adapt them into five unique wastelanders.
When the local ruffians, the Powder Gangers, threatened a wealthy merchant passing through the town where Jet was rescued, I decided to have my shady avatar seek to align himself with the thugs before swindling both sides. I went around convincing the townsfolk to offer all the supplies they could spare, then searched high and low for the Powder Gangers so I could get them to do the same, but I could never find them. When I finally gave in and progressed with the quest, I immediately found myself fighting alongside the townies, tarnishing Jet's reputation with the gang before he had even met them.
Later on, I stumbled across another group of troublemakers holding New California Republic soldiers hostage. The NCR had the place surrounded but feared their brothers would die if they decided to attack. I saw this as an opportunity to go in as a neutral party and assist the highest bidder. Unfortunately, neither side's representatives were programmed to deal with someone as selfish and sly as Jet. Even with his amazing speech skills, the options were purely black and white: encourage a fight or persuade a truce.
