Glad to know you’re interested. I must admit, I have not thought about it that far concerning most of your new questions. Animals, mainly cows, dogs, sheep and horses will still be there. I don’t feel like guns would be easily findable, and most characters will not have these in possession. 

Concerning leadership, the way I see it is that, atleast for our two settlements, there will be like a leader, a sort of mayor. And he can have a council that helps him/her. It would be cool if someone was willing to play our mayor. The mayor and leaders of Water Leafs would be NPC’s, and so would Jacob be, but it would also be interesting is someone would like to play Jacob. Further, because it’s not a lot of people, in my vision everyone knows everyone, and all of use can make use of some npc’s to fill up the town. 

Concerning the story, I think the main idea is keeping the dam save. I plan on Water Leafs trying to take it by force, for instance. However, it could be a mix between sandbox and that.

I will make a character sheet once people are interested. And the expected writing lenght is more up to yourself. It’s casual, high casual, so a paragraph of 2 of 3 is good. Sometimes however it’s just not possible and one paragraph will do. 

(Excuse any mistakes, I am on phone right now)