Introduction
A useful equipment list is a short answer to what the group must see, survive, fix, carry, and leave with today, rather than a catalog of everything the group owns. The official catalog is deliberately broad: a survivor can find equipment for combat, medical care, navigation, communications, environmental protection, repair, power, demolition, food, and field living. The point is to make those capabilities scarce and consequential, not to turn every character into a walking warehouse.
Use the official list to look up exact weight, reliability, availability, cost, modifier, power requirement, and special procedure. Use this guide to decide which category belongs in the mission kit and where it should be carried. It does not reproduce the official item lists, tables, prices, supply ratings, or entries.
Hot Take
Observation gear is the most under-packed category on this list, and it is the only one that can end a problem before it costs anything. Binoculars, a compass, a light, and a working radio do not win the fight; they are how the group learns there is a fight and decides not to have it. They lose out at packing time because their payoff is invisible, while an extra magazine feels like insurance.
Flip the test. When you build the kit, ask what the group must see, hear, or find its way through before contact, and give that capability an encumbrance unit before you give the third weapon one. A party that spots the roadblock at range keeps every option it packed. A party that discovers it at fifty meters is spending ammunition to buy back a choice it already had.
Build the Kit in This Order
Start with the objective, then pack for the failure that would make the objective impossible.
- Purpose: What must the group accomplish?
- Environment: What weather, terrain, darkness, contamination, or exposure is likely?
- Information: What must the group observe, navigate, or communicate before contact?
- Sustainment: What food, water, shelter, heat, fuel, or power is required if the trip takes longer?
- Emergency: What handles injury, a broken item, a lost route, or an unexpected night?
- Defense and exit: What creates time or distance if negotiation, concealment, or movement fails?
- Load: Can the group still move, climb, fight, and carry anything back?
This order stops the common "weapons first, everything else later" loadout. A weapon can protect a group for a round. A map, canteen, medical item, sleeping bag, radio, or tool can determine whether it reaches the next morning at all.
Put Gear Where the Scene Can Reach It
The character sheet separates gear by accessibility. That placement is a tactical choice.
| Storage place | Put these items here | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Combat gear | Immediate weapons, ammunition, canteen, map, compass, flashlight, personal medical item, or radio | These items can be drawn with a fast action |
| Backpack | Food, shelter, spare clothing, larger tools, reserve batteries, spare parts, and contingency gear | It adds capacity, but access during combat is slower and requires a Mobility roll |
| Vehicle | Group tools, larger medical stores, fuel, heavy power gear, stockpiled food, and repair reserve | It carries bulk but may be absent, inaccessible, or lost |
| Base or cache | Large stores, workshop equipment, trade goods, and long-term reserves | It supports the campaign but cannot solve an immediate field emergency |
Backpacks create extra capacity equal to the carrier's Strength die size, but impose a -2 modifier on Mobility rolls. Dropping a backpack is fast; retrieving an item from it in combat is not. Pack for the scene you expect, and decide before trouble begins what gets dropped if the group must run.
The Encumbrance Guide covers the full procedure. Its practical lesson is simple: access is a resource, just like weight.
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Observation and Navigation: Know Before You Go
Observation gear lets the group identify people, vehicles, routes, hazards, and opportunities before they become immediate danger. The official list includes tools for visual observation, darkness, thermal contrast, lighting, navigation, and signaling. Each solves a different problem and may introduce another.
| Need | Equipment question | Planning consequence |
|---|---|---|
| See farther | Who is actively observing, and can they spare the time? | Observation only helps when someone is assigned to use it |
| Work in darkness | Is light safer than blindness at this location? | Visible light can reveal the group to others |
| Navigate roadless terrain | Who carries the map and compass, and who makes the Survival roll? | Do not put both on a single separated scout without a backup |
| Signal allies | Is the signal discreet, visible, reliable, and understood? | A signal can help friends and reveal the group to everyone else |
| Confirm a hazard | Does the group need to identify radiation, chemicals, or a route condition before entering? | Detection gear needs time and sometimes power, which may not exist under pressure |
Do not treat advanced observation as automatic safety. Night vision, thermal equipment, GPS, searchlights, and other specialized devices are valuable because they are limited by reliability, power, conditions, scarcity, or visibility. Bring a low-tech fallback: map, compass, agreed route, daylight plan, and a rendezvous point.
Protective Gear Is a Costed Choice
Protective equipment can reduce the danger of chemical exposure, radiation contamination, weather, and combat. It also has practical costs: weight, reduced observation, lower mobility, discomfort, a need for correct use, and sometimes a limited scope.
| Hazard | Ask before packing | Mistake to avoid |
|---|---|---|
| Cold and wet | Can the group sleep, walk, and recover if conditions worsen? | Counting on clothing that does not meet the expected weather |
| Chemical threat | Does the group have the right mask, suit, detector, and time to use them? | Wearing a mask as if it protects against every effect without tradeoffs |
| Radiation | Can the group detect exposure and change route before it becomes a crisis? | Entering unknown areas because the group assumes it will notice danger in time |
| Combat | Is the armor worth its coverage and carrying burden for this mission? | Treating protection as a replacement for cover, distance, or an exit plan |
Pack protection before entering the hazard. A mask, insulated layer, detector, or armor left in the vehicle will not help the person who needs it on foot. The Radiation Guide and Armor Guide provide the focused survival and combat context.
Medical Gear Is an Immediate-Access Resource
The medical section includes personal treatment items, larger medical kits, surgical tools, medication, and emergency treatment for specific hazards. Their value lies in the actual treatment problem they address, not in the fact that they are labeled "medical."
| Medical question | What it prevents |
|---|---|
| Who carries the immediate kit? | A lifesaving item buried in a vehicle or backpack at the wrong moment |
| Who can make the Medical Aid roll? | Gear without a capable user or a plan for assistance |
| Which injuries or exposures are likely? | Spending limited space on a cure for a threat the group will not face |
| How many uses remain? | Assuming disposable or dose-based supplies are permanent equipment |
| How does the casualty leave the scene? | Treating the first-aid roll as the end of the rescue |
Medical gear can improve relevant rolls, but it does not cancel time limits, exposure, fire, infection, or the need to reach safety. Pair it with a withdrawal plan, water, warmth, communication, and transport. The medical supplies section of the gear guide covers kit choices and care limits in detail.
Tools, Parts, and Power Need a Work Plan
Tools, spare parts, fuel, stills, generators, and batteries turn equipment into a working system. They are especially easy to carry without being able to use.
| Resource | Supporting question | Field consequence |
|---|---|---|
| Basic or specialized tools | Does the group have the right tool type for the expected repair? | A generic tool roll may not replace a specialized one |
| Spare parts | Which kind of item might break, and which part type restores it? | Parts take cargo space and are consumed by successful broken-item repairs |
| Battery-powered device | Who carries compatible power and how is it recharged? | A working device can become dead weight after one mission |
| Generator or vehicle power | What fuel, noise, location, and security does operation require? | Power creates capability and attention at the same time |
| Still or workshop tool | Does the group have time, materials, safety, and a stable location? | A base asset is rarely a portable emergency solution |
The Vehicle Repair Guide explains the repair economy for transportation. Apply the same thinking to radios, lights, weapons, and other equipment: maintenance is less expensive than a breakdown in the middle of a mission.
Food, Field Gear, and a Delayed Return
Food and field gear are the equipment that keeps a mission from becoming a disaster when the schedule fails. Official entries distinguish field rations, domestic food, wild food, shelter, clothing, sleeping systems, and practical field tools. Their exact values matter less than their role in your return plan.
| If the plan fails because... | The kit needs an answer such as... |
|---|---|
| Darkness arrives early | Light discipline, warmth, shelter, and a known overnight location |
| The route is blocked | Extra water, food, navigation, and enough time to detour |
| Weather turns | Clothing, sleeping gear, tenting, and a dry way to recover |
| A vehicle cannot continue | Personal carry capacity, foot-travel gear, and a cache decision |
| Scavenging produces useful finds | Empty capacity, pack organization, and a rule for what gets left behind |
Field gear is not glamorous. It is often what gives the group the freedom to refuse a bad road, wait out a storm, or sleep before a difficult decision. The Shelter Guide, Food and Water Guide, and Fuel Guide turn those needs into procedures.
Pack a Kit, Not a Pile
Use these broad templates as a check. They deliberately name capabilities rather than copied item lists.
| Kit | Include capability for | Leave behind unless the mission needs it |
|---|---|---|
| Day scout | Navigation, observation, water, immediate medical aid, concealment, a return signal | Heavy repair gear, large power equipment, excess food |
| Overnight foot patrol | Water, food, shelter, warmth, navigation, medical support, light, and a defensive exit | Bulky salvage unless a carry plan exists |
| Vehicle run | Fuel, route tools, repair reserve, communications, water, cargo security, and recovery plan | Cargo that eliminates the escape margin |
| Ruin search | Light, tools, hazard protection, observation, first aid, carrying space, and a marked return route | Equipment that turns the party into a slow convoy indoors |
| Trade visit | The offer, condition records, transport capacity, communication, security, and a walk-away option | All valuables the group cannot protect or explain |
An empty encumbrance unit is sometimes the correct equipment choice. It can hold a recovered medkit, allow a survivor to carry an injured buddy's water, or make a sudden foot withdrawal possible. Capacity is a tool.
Conduct a Two-Minute Pre-Departure Check
Before leaving shelter, ask the group:
- Who has the map, compass, and route responsibility?
- Who has immediate medical equipment, and who can use it?
- What light or signaling plan applies after dark?
- Which hazards justify protective gear today?
- Which devices require batteries, fuel, or a vehicle to function?
- What repair tools and parts are worth the load for this route?
- What food, water, and sleeping plan covers a delayed return?
- What gets dropped or left behind if the group must move quickly?
- What is the rally point if the group separates?
If nobody can answer one of these questions, the kit is not ready. The solution may be to repack, change the mission, take a vehicle, delay for trade, or accept the risk knowingly.
Common Equipment-List Mistakes
Carrying a device without its support
A radio, light, observation tool, generator, or repair kit may need power, fuel, parts, training, a vehicle, or time. Pack the whole system, headline item included.
Burying emergency gear
Immediate medical, navigation, water, light, and escape tools should not require a slow search through a backpack after the crisis starts.
Packing for only one kind of danger
An assault, storm, chemical hazard, navigation error, or broken vehicle can end the same mission. Build a compact answer to more than one failure.
Forgetting the return load
Scavenged equipment, trade goods, casualties, and water all need capacity. Leave room or establish a clear rule for what gets abandoned.
Treating specialized equipment as universal
High-tech or specialized tools solve specific problems and may create dependencies. Confirm the intended use before trading scarce supplies for them.
Where To Go Next
Return to the Gear and Equipment Guide for the wider repair and trade framework. Use the Survival and Resources Guide for the daily needs behind a field kit, the Combat and Weapons Guide for equipment under fire, and the Vehicles and Chases Guide when the kit depends on transport.
Where To Go From Here
The wider framework behind this list, starting gear, barter, repair, medical supplies, and radios, lives in the Gear and Equipment Guide. For the daily needs a kit is really packed against, read the Survival Guide: shifts, food, water, fuel, and the Encumbrance procedure this page keeps pointing at. And once the kit is settled, the Character Sheet Guide shows where each item belongs on the sheet so the table can find it mid-scene.
Source Scope
This guide summarizes Player's Manual equipment categories, encumbrance, item access, power, repair, survival, and field-use concepts. It does not reproduce official equipment lists, weights, prices, supply ratings, reliability values, modifiers, ammunition data, or item entries. Use the official rules for exact equipment effects and Referee adjudication.
