Post-Holocaust Midwest
From ThreadsWiki
| Post-Holocaust Midwest | |
|---|---|
| No Requirements for Entry Shots Required to Re-Enter Penn State | |
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| Gateway | Port Tucumcari, Canadian River 28 miles east of Port Tucumcari in the Canadian River |
| Gateway Status | Reliable but difficult to find. |
| Boundary Type | |
| Tech Level | 6* |
| Supernatural | Low |
| Hypertech | Medium |
| Population Centers |
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| Language | English, Indian dialects |
| Continuity | Close to Primary |
| Time Since Divergence | |
| Currency |
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| Exchange Rate | No official Exchange |
| Leaders | |
| Primary Religion |
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| Metadata | |
| Contact Person | Lawrence L |
| Genre/Flavor | Adventure/Post Apocalyptic |
| Created | |
After The Event, the Dustbowl came again to the Midwest, although this time it never stopped. For the last forty five years the dust has blown, sometimes harder and sometimes slower. Along the banks of the half-dead rivers such as the Arkansas, and the Platte to the near dried beds of the Republican and the Kansas, the old engines pump water and levee, canal, and sluice create a narrow band of fertility.
But life cannot exist without the pumps, and the pumps cannot be built without metal or run without gasoline. So the supply lines began, running through the arid wastes along broken interstates and dusty tracks, passing through ghost towns, the fortresses of oilfields, and the mines in the hills. To the west, Native American populations have surged, making the well armed Indians a real political force. Additionally, raiders scour the land in ultralights and hand-built biplanes, taking what they can from whomever they are able.
In this world of want, only the strong survive, the only law is that the strongest take what they want, and every man and woman carries a gun.
Contents |
The Breakup
Following Reunification the P-Poc broke into a series of sub-threads. They share wide, sometimes porous boundaries, but like the North and South of Rising Sun constitute very distinct entities.
The Red Zone
The Northermost part of what is currently the PHMW. This is the place for post apocalyptic adventure. Anything goes in this high sigma wasteland. Mutants, Lost Technology, Bad Ass Warriors, and good old fashioned Human Greed are the common motifs. Up here, adventures might include stopping a powerful Hummingbird ritual from being performed. If the ritual isn't stopped, thousands of Red Zoners will be killed, their hearts burnt to a coal in their chests.
The Midwest
This is the "normal" part of the PHMW. This is where simple folks struggle against the worst that life has to offer: Starvation, Isolation, Banditry, and the looming menace of Fort Knox. Not to mention their own government. Which includes Fort Knox. This Thread includes the political plots. Nation building and providing for the needy when everything is scarce and there are no easy or pat answers. An adventure here might be a closed room meeting of the Government Council having to decide whether to send marshals to save a town that is being threatened by bandits (in the pay of Fort Knox?) or to send those marshals to stop an uprising in a distant part of the Midwest (stirred up by religious fantatics that want to destabilize the government?).
The Heartland
This is the high adventure Thread. The Heartland is made up of a very small population of rugged survivalists. They accept no outside aid, and they don't need it either. As long as you're tough, smart, fast, and lucky you can get by. This is where the Santa Lance caravan is attacked by Darklings and fought off by the heroic actions of a few dusty hard bitten heroes. The Gershom and Dark Bedlam Funfair used to spend a lot of time in these parts. The time of your life is guaranteed. Buyer beware.
The City of Glass
The ultimate frontier. With a gate to the Outer Realities this west is wilder than most. The City is safe enough, and where else can you play poker with a djinni, go drinking with Hercules, and talk politics with Mephistopholes? Adventures here would be wild west themed epic fantasy with some Babylon 5/Deep Space 9 style political intrigue. All of the PHMW Satellite Threads share some basic concepts. All of them are places of extreme hardship. The entropy drain is a major factor, but the way it manifests itself changes. The split I propose goes something like this:
The Mormon States
The People of God live in a world where the word of the Prophet has always been true. They live among the Indians who are descended from the Lost Tribes of Israel, and who once built great cities. The ruins of those cities and other evidence of their times can be found in the Mormon States.
But Adherents know that it wasn’t always like that. There was a “Time of Trial” when God drew a veil over some of the secrets that had been revealed to Joseph Smith. This time was to try Adherents, in many ways. Without physical evidence, they had to believe. Without visible proof of the truth of the Book of Mormon they had to struggle to convince others in Charity.
The Adherent were fully successful…so successful that an Adherent, Saint Romney, was nearly elected President of the United States. But the unfaithful sinned and the time God had given them for repentance ran out. God drew back the veil and drew the Adherents together and let them see the world as it had always been. While those outside suffered in the Dust, the Adherents always had all that they needed.
Old Map (Pre-Reunification): Midwest Map
Characters
Main article: List of PHMW Characters
Gates and Trade
Tucumcari Gate
NOTE: New Orleans is currently closed and the only things coming through the gate are nasty and not human.
A gate which runs to a nasty riparian badland, uninhabited by anything or anyone you want to speak to, affectionately termed the Kessel Run. A considerable (and sometimes indeterminate) distance along this river, there is a bend south and it emerges into “Upriver” which is an agricultural shard governed by New Orleans. Steamers from New Orleans typically dock Upriver, and transfer their cargoes to the few smaller, sternwheel, shallowdraft steamers willing to hazard the run into the PHMW.
New Orleans Trips
A trip to NOLA would mean a trip downriver by steamer, probably including getting out and pushing or hauling at various points, then fighting off whatever nameless monstrosities (More dead than alive some folks say...it’s always dark and you learn never to get off the boat) came at the boat along the run. Then probably a good one to two month turnaround in New Orleans waiting for a trip that was actually going back upriver.
There are a fair number of trips so some people might have been more than once. There isn’t really a lot of *trade* because the shallow draft steamers that can navigate the Canadian River don’t carry much. There were some experiments with portaging through the run, but apparently if you aren’t on the river, you aren’t necessarily really fixed in time and space there, so what trade there is gets carried on small flat-bottom, shallow draft steamboats. They can run outboard V8s north of the run if they want to, but by that time, they’re mostly using tow cables to haul along through the muck. There are some professionals who frequent that section of the river with old multi-ton pickups and winches to help pull out stuck boats, but they’re kind of jealous about their territory and don’t take well to competition, so most boats just pay when they need help.
The Caravan
The Oasis
Main article: The Oasis
The whole caravan numbers over 50 vehicles, but The Oasis and its protection only number around 5-10 at any given time; this set up allows a lot of ground to be covered. The main body of the Caravan is usually 2 days behind.
The job of the Oasis, aside from "entertainment", is to act as an advanced scout and set-up group. In other words, to make the deals without intimidating the locals, to find out information in a (generally) friendly manner, and to make sure the way is clear for the rest of the Caravan. If support is needed, the Caravan can send out an escort unit that is able to reach the Oasis within a day.
See also
- History of the Midwest
- List of PHMW terms
- Zero's Survival Guide
- Dark Carnival
- P-Poc Stories
- Recruiting Poster
- Dark Carnival
- Jackalope
- City of Glass
