[quote=Darkraven]
I completely agree that you have to be skilled, smart, quick, fast, strong and everything else...But that doesn't mean you have to be a soldier/police officer/SWAT/criminal to be any of the above. Fitness in the natural selection sense, I feel, can't be tied to your main occupation. There's plenty of office workers/toilet cleaners/coaches/shopkeepers/students/teachers/salespersons/couch potatoes/etc I know who'd make good survivors. Physical and mental traits aside, they'd have something going on the side and things like that too. E.g: There are plenty of young girls who could outpace me in a half-marathon anytime. Now that would come in handy when you're running from a horde of flesh-eating zombies. :D Which also means they could easily ditch me to them :DP.S: Will post a flashback post soon.
[/quote]

Heh, never said they had to be police officers, soldiers, etc either. My character definitely isn't.

But for many people, they are either writing the easy route, trying to get the most "powerful" character they can to have an advantage. IE, their character will know more about what it is they are doing, than the player themselves; weapons operation and maintenance, survival skills, etc.

The other "many people group" as I see it, are probably the people who are just writing what they know. A lot of people in the military turn to RPGs to kill the downtime when deployed. They [i]know[/i] how to play a military-type character, and can do it well, so some will continue to play a military-type character in game. I've known several current, and former military men who do this. 

The smaller group, I think....are people like me who know more than most about firearms, weapons, etc, and seek an outlet. I'm just all hipster and hate being cliche :P