The Fall. When spoken of by the History Men, the Fall is described as something that happened so slowly, so quietly, that Mankind hardly noticed when it happened. It started with little things, a little less rain one year, a bad harvest another, and built up like a willy-willy marching across the Outback, growing bigger and bigger until it wasn't trampolines and the cat that it was picking up but houses, cars, and people. Governments began to shutdown, unrest grew and spread until it choked out the cities, food became too expensive to buy, and violence became a part of the daily routine as frustration and desperation pushed people to new extremes.
Then one sunny day, the Fall happened.
It was as if men lost all sense of reason, freed from the shackles that once bound them, and became little more than animals driven by base instinct, hunting and killing for food, for water, and for gasoline. Cities were abandoned to the wastes as people fled for safer parts, law and order gave way to rule by might, and the whole world seemed to go completely and utter mad. What then began as days of barbarity soon became weeks, weeks became months, months into years, until eventually the Old World faded into memory and a new, savage world took it's place, a world of warmachines and guzzolene where the strong ruled and the weak fell beneath their wheels.
It is said that the Coast is the only place in Aussie where the masses worship the same as they did before the Fall. In Sydney, the Clubs continue to hold sway with great gladiatorial contests, called Footy, taking place to honor the gods, at Bathurst the worship of the V8 continues with the Thousand whose warmachines pay regular homage to the Great Combustion Engine on the blacktop of the Holy Racetrack, while all throughout the Coast, spirits great and small continue to be paid homage to. Whether these gods are truly the same as those worshiped before the Fall cannot be said, for even the History Men know little of such things, but that they are considered to be very real, very potent forces by the people of the Coast is undeniable.
The Clubs - Believed to have been the dominant faith of Aussie before the Fall, the Clubs are great churches that are dedicated to the worship of gods such as the Eagle, the Rabbitoh, and the Knight, whose names and customs have been passed down over the generations. Powerful institutions in their own right, it is the Clubs that oversee the great contests of skill called Footy which are held in Pre-Fall arenas to honour the gods, contests which are as violent as they are sacred, and keep the peace between bosses. Led by Captains, overall leadership of the Clubs changes each year with Footy determining which of the Clubs, and therefore which of the Captains, is given possession of the Cup and therefore primacy over all other Clubs for the year.
The Cult of the V8 - Centered out of Bathurst, the Cult of the V8 is the worship of the Great Combustion Engine, of the V8, and the Blacktop. Peculiar to the Thousand, who named themselves after the Thousand Saints buried beneath the Holy Racetrack according to legend, those who keep to the V8 believe that the world is one great engine in a cosmic warmachine fueled by life itself. It is for this reason that the Thousand, who believe that the "sparkier" the life, the more it gives to the Great Combustion Engine, live as dangerously and as recklessly as they do for they believe that the more "sick" their lives are, the more they give to the Engine. This predilection towards reckless endangerment, constant raiding, and constant drug use, however, does mean that most who worship the V8 tend to die young, their spirits used to fuel the Great Combustion Engine before being reborn to repeat the process all over again.
The Spirits - Regardless of whether one worships the Clubs or the V8, all within the Coast believe in various spirits, folktales, and other mad shit of which tales have been repeated for countless years. Whether the Raggedy Man, a cursed avatar of justice who is said to roam the roads aboard the Black-on-Black, rescuing those in need or slaying the wicked, or the Yowie, a sort of half-man monster that steals children and replaces them with chocolate replicas, these are things the people of the Coast believe in so fiercely that they might as well be real. Signs of the worship of these figures can be found everywhere with wayside shrines dedicated to the Raggedy Man being raised at every crossroad and mystics who claim to be able to see into the Dream often being found at the side of prominent bosses as advisers and soothsayers.
CRASHPOINT is a settlement, that is somewhat of a neutral ground for the various gangs and groups out in the wastes.
