MagustheRed

War Never Changes III: Annals of the East

Just a preliminary sheet to throw my hat into the ring, may require fine tuning vis a vis the events of Fallout 4, but nonetheless, for your consideration, the Florida Expedition:

The Florida Expedition

The Florida Expedition of the East Coast Chapter of the Brotherhood of Steel.

Territory: The Florida Expedition is centred around two locations, a main base and an exploratory outpost. The former is in Cape Canaveral and the surrounding missile ranges and military bases. The latter is in EPCOT, as in Disney. Seeking to secure the area for the Vault-Tec vault attached to it, the centres technology, and the nuclear reactor that comes with it. Walt Disney was one crazy motherfucker.

History:

Founding – Florida has always been a location of interest for the Brotherhood of Steel, the home of the legendary Cape Canaveral. With the rise of Arthur Maxson, old dreams could at last be realised, and led by Proctor Gladstone, and expedition was sent south by Elder Maxson in 2285. The Florida Expedition spent two years securing cape Canaveral and its immediate surrounding area, before turning outwards to scout Florida and even some of the Caribbean Islands.

Big turning points for them - The discovery of Epcot and the Orlando vault has led the expedition to hone in its resources on these two locations. Epcot for the technology therein, and the Orlando Vault for the increasingly dangerous rogue GECKO that has begun to breach its containment and dangerously destabilise the local ecosystem.

Just before modern times - With the death of Maxson and the collapse of the Maxsonite Brotherhood, Proctor Gladstone has taken executive control over the expedition ostensibly to ensure stability, but secretly in order to ensure his own research continues unimpeded by such petty concerns as outside matters.

The general confusion in the air has however forced Gladstone to grant permission for a sub-expedition northward, to re-establish lapsed contact with the East Coast Brotherhood, or whatever is left of it, and to investigate just what exactly went on that led to Maxson’s death.

Pressing Issues:

Miami Vice – Raider gangs, Mutant overlords, Cannibal tribes, Nascent city-states and more, Florida has it all. A troublesome brew of sentient opposition to the Florida Expedition is currently kept at bay by vertibird overflights and door gunners reminding the local populace that the Brotherhood has energy guns and they have not. Whether that will keep them at bay remains to be seen, and internal factions within the expedition advocate now for either withdrawal, cooperation or outright warfare alternatively.

‘Gator Country – The local wildlife is, excluding the humans and ghouls which repeatedly object to Proctor Gladstone’s attempt at including them under that label, not conducive to stable research efforts. A rogue GECK out of the Everglades Vault has breached the containments of its vault and is now actively mutating the surrounding fauna and flora. The Epcot Outpost reports many strange and new sightings, exciting for the scribes, not so much for the soldiers.

Broken Chains – The Florida Expedition, led by Proctor Gladstone, is essentially a rogue outfit of the Brotherhood of Steel now. The number of resources they had to call upon has now been reduced dramatically, and as a newly fledged rogue outfit, internal divisions are rife within the expedition, and on the verge of becoming more than heated disagreements.

Head in the Clouds, Feet on the Ground – Proctor Gladstone seems to spend more time looking up at the stars than what’s happening around him theses days. And nobody knows exactly what the scientist has planned inside that head of his...

N.E.O. - New Earth Oracle

The Archbishop – The Anglican Communion – London

Crest of the Anglican Communion

Faith.

For the love of it or the lack of it.

Faith was what had driven Humanity towards greater and more terrible things over the long march of time. Faith in something, a god, gods or no god or gods. And pressing tobacco into a pipe between his fingers, the Archbishop looked up at the great midnight sky above and considered what it was to have faith in his day and age. That had, after all, been what the debate on the BBC had just been all about. Britain Believes, or something along those lines, a new flagship late hour program intended to round out Tuesday’s programming by asking religious experts for their answers on some subject or another. What ungodly soul had decided on an hour-long debate show from 11pm on a Tuesday night was the question the Archbishop had hoped would be asked.

But what else could be asked than what had been asked? What was faith in the age of the visitation?

Drawing a matchbook from inside his cassock, the Archbishop sticks pipe in betwixt lips and teeth, cracks match onto, along and off sandpaper, covers the spark and the flame with tired flesh and brings the heat and the light into his pipe. Soon, in no time at all, he feels the warmth and smell of the smoke in his mouth and the air around him, shaking out the match, he flicks the charcoal ended remnant into the nearby bin and considers the question.

What was faith in the age of the visitation?

Well, what had it been what it had occurred? When souls from beyond this cradle called earth had graced or cursed their little blue orb with their presence and touch? How could he explain his night in the woods staring up in horror at the burning skies above that convulsed in the aurora of a million pinpricks of colour? Waves of magnetic fire coursing over the world as the atmosphere had shifted and shivered as strange beings had strode across the surface of the earth. His chapel in the trees turned upside down, inverted in the air with twisting staircase where one could walk feet in the clouds and head to the ground. Tombstones lingering and hanging like thrown pebbles over a skimming pond, the skeletons of the dead reaching out through the once-bottoms of the graves in morbid greeting and farewell to the strangeness before them.

It had been a challenge to whatever faith you had.

Around him in that forest others had dropped to their knees and prayed, to their old god or to the new gods they saw before them. God or Gods. Faith in a higher power, but belief in which? The old order or the new order? He had remained standing, lost in and losing his mind and clinging onto the teetering scars of his faith, a subject of a photo that had graced a number of publications since then. And looking up at the hanging light above like he had all those years before, the constant reminder of the visitation in night and day. Before he can think any further, the door to the balcony opens behind him, bathing him in a wall of heat and sound, and illuminating a figure to him.

“Rabbi Weinberg. Can I offer you a light? I don’t drink.”

The Rabbi, one of the other religious leaders on the panel, shakes his head and joins him by the balcony after shutting the door behind him.

“I was just about to say the same in reverse Archbishop. One small sin we each allow ourselves I suppose?”

The Archbishop nods, before turning to lean on the railing and look back up at the twin orbs above them. The Rabbi leans too, taking a sip on what, from the Archbishop can smell, is a heavy glass of whiskey. The Archbishop pauses, before gesturing at the sight before them.

“I wondered once, what my mother would have thought of all this. She was a spiritualist, lost her father and brothers in the Great War. She died in an air raid in the Second, in the middle of a group tarot reading of all things. Anyway, she always said that one day the spirits would avail themselves to us one day in some shape or form. I suppose she’d say she was right. I know she’d say that. But that question, what is faith now? Well, I can’t say what it is yet, perhaps I never will, but the question, what is faith now? That aches within me for some reason.”

The Rabbi eyes him, before shrugging, more to himself and launches into an old tale.

“My old rabbi had a story when I once asked a question. In ancient Israel, during the age of King Solomon, a shepherd loses his flock to a wolf, his house and lazy son are burned together when his son falls asleep whilst tending the fire and his wife leaves him for another man who has everything that he does not after all this. So, the shepherd in his grief goes to the village rabbi. Why? He asks, why does the almighty allow such things to occur? Well, my old rabbi would say then, what would you say?”

The Archbishop nods, hums, before replying.

“I would say the lord works in mysterious ways, though I have never found that to go down well when said. I would say that ours is not to question the will of the lord, but they would then ask why they should worship such a being. So, in the end, I would say that we can ask, we will always ask, and perhaps you may be answered, but until that time comes, to do good, to abide by the word and to do unto others as you would have others do unto you. I would then offer to help the shepherd, to provide him with a new flock and house and restore harmony to his life. What the lord will do, the lord will do, but until he chooses to tell us why, all we can do, is to carry on as best we can.”

Weinberg chuckles.

“Certainly a better answer than mine. I tried to quote a full passage of the Torah, but my Rabbi shook his head, and told me to go and clean the corridor until I thought of a better answer, because the corridor needed cleaning and time would bring me clarity. Eventually, I learned the lesson. So, what is faith now?”

The Archbishop takes a long drag on his cigarette, taps the ashes onto the pavement a few floors below.

“Faith is faith. The lord works in mysterious ways. Who are we to question him? Not the answers people want to be hearing. No wonder attendance rates are falling across the board. And no wonder the number of visitation cults are increasing across the world either. Such is the state of the world entire, undergoing change. Turning from peace to war, from love to hate, from the old to the new, as it always has been, as it always will be. And what can the old faiths offer the new world?”

The Rabbi eyes him for a few more moments, before taking another swig of his whiskey, emptying the glass and looks into it, pensive and a little sad.

“The world is much changed. And we will just have to learn to live with it. We will tend to our flocks, and shepherd them from harm as best we can.”

The Archbishop nods, murmurs his agreements, and motions his thanks for the Rabbi’s company when the man leaves. They agree to keep in touch, plan some cross-communal events to help those in need and then, the Archbishop finds himself alone on the balcony, cigarette burned down to a stub of ash that drops from his fingertips and leaves them smudged in tar and dust. So, with nothing else to do, he turns, leans on the railing, looks up at the old earth moon and the new earth oracle and considers everything past, present and future in a single question. What is faith worth now?

Faith.

For the love of it or the lack of it.

N.E.O. - A Vinto-Futuristic Nation RP (Inspired by S.T.A.L.K.E.R., Half-Life, and MGS4)

Alright, got my sheet ready, try my hand at something different from a nation:

Anglican Communion

Name: The Anglican Communion

Flag:

Government: Theocracy, it’s a church, so, theocracy?

The Anglican Communion is an Episcopal body consisting of Anglican churches in full communion with each other. Led by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the communion focuses mostly on matters of faith and charity and theological discussion.

Territory: No territory as per se, but spread across the world in numerous churches.

History: Emerging from the English Reformation, the Anglican Communion’s story is entwined with the history of the Church of England. Of its struggles and intertwining with the history of Britain, of its rapid spread under the aegis of the empire and its slow decline after the first world war (Assuming it occurred in ttl), where the faith of thousands was lost in the mud and blood of Flanders fields.

Pre-Visitation: Prior to the visitation, the communion was focused on the worrying decrease in church attendance in the first world nations, and looking towards missionary activities in the third world. As well as dealing with issues regarding funding, and adjusting to the changes in laws around the world that affected its position in some countries.

The Visitation: What can be said of the visitation upon people of faith? Whether believing in a higher power or believing there was not? That it inspired and terrified them in equal measure? Driving them to their church or from it? That it upended the world and everything in it? The old order turned over and a new order in its place, and the Anglican Communion seeking its place in this changed state of existence, as with everyone else.

Recent History: The Anglican Communion has shakily found its feet after the visitation, but found itself beset by the crises of faith that afflicted the population of the world entire after the event. Aliens. Intelligent life on other worlds. An act of god? Or an act disproving god? What good can prayer do in the face of such power? Perhaps they are gods and deserving of our worship? Or are they a sign from above telling us to wash out our sins in preparation for the end of times?

At the head of it all, the Archbishop struggles to answer the questions on the lips of the faithful and faithless, for the world has changed, and the church must decide what it has to do next in reply.

Pressing Issues: Faith, the love of it or the lack of it following the visitation.

Budget: 55% to administrative matters, 45% to charitable endeavours. It's a church?

War Never Changes 2 : A Post Nuclear Nation Roleplay

A view from above – The New California Republic

It sweeps down from the arctic, or perhaps just below there, cold rising winds underneath tawny brown wings. Tracing down a fading summer clime further and further. Over cascading peaks and over tall treed slopes verdant and browning with the unceasing cycle of the seasons, summer is going, autumn coming in. Hello, how do you do? My turn now? See you next year. On and on they go in a spinning dance from one partner to the other. And with them come the tell-tale signs to the world they shape beneath their claying fingers. Buds might bloom in spring, the young in the fields dancing from the wombs into the world, the summer might raise high the corn and fatten the brahmin ready for harvest, or dry and thin them out.

Such is the way of the world, such is the way of this travelling soul from a place it does not know by name, but knows is north, is cold and knows to head south by the motion of the sun above and with the sweeping winds ruffling its feathers to help guide it to safe havens by the warmer crashing waves of a coastal shore. So today it will soar over a land it sees beneath it, turned and turned and changed evermore by the tall-walking figures that live under a fluttering cloth embroidered with a two headed bear. A wilder land in the north, a meandering river, bordered and marked by the constant riders up and down with cracking sticks that keep it to the mists away from the sudden blooms of death that took its father before it and a mate long ago.

More and more tall-walking figures pour into this land, too many even for a land as large as this, felling old friends that once seemed to stretch up with green fingers and wooden arms to bid it rest and sit and tell them of the world a while. They pull them down into squat boxes that spout smoke and the smells of burning flesh. In the higher places, metal burrowing figures hide among the mountains here and there, seeking to not draw the attention of the tall walkers. Who are these metal monsters it wonders? That fear those who might burn the flesh within the metal? The world is changing, and perhaps even the burrowers know this and seek to just survive if they cannot live as they once did.

And then it is past the changing land into a changed one. Here the tall-walkers talk and cry at each other with singular figures on wooden hills harking high and low for a strange reason. And for a moment on a stone skeleton, it waits and listens to the hackling beneath it.

“Is the new republican party even capable of governing anymore? What have you done but fattened the purses of the agricultural barons at the expense of good honest smallholders? Your party is driving this great nation into their hands! We in the democratic alliance party believe that it is time to put the voices of the smallholders back at the heart of our republic! New land for old soldiers! Fresh, organic, unchanged and healthy food is what we need, not these new-fangled geno-modified crops that depress wages and-”

“-Now that is a lie right there and my opponent should know better than to resort to slander! The new crops are a boon to us all! Cheaper food means more on the kitchen table for our children, no more famine! No more lean hungers and hard choices! That is what the New Republican party has brought to this nation, and more change will be brought in a second term! The new crops will open up new lands in sandy Baja and the mountains of Oregon previously unfarmable for our old veterans!”

It does not understand the words spoken therein, but it hears and listens and sees that much ado about something is occupying the minds of the tall-walkers. And then a young tall-walker spots it, throws a pebble and it moves up and away to a place beyond the arm of the ones below. Up and up and south and downwind it keeps on its path once more. O'er fields of golding corn and grassed plains of munching brahmin soon to be harvested and butchered in the fall. O'er a bustling scene of cars, cabs, cycles and tycoons that talk of opportunities in a land it will never see. It sweeps west to the coast and follows the tracks of tall masted ships sailing south to those promised lands of humid heat and perilous jungles that bring fortune to those brave enough to risk the risks. For now though, such plans are in the early stages of motion, a casus belli has yet to emerge from the moving pieces on the board that will secure either the salvation or damnation of the land of the two-headed bear.

And then it is back east. Over a host of red and white marching among a scene of marbled halls and statues and political capital calling and calling for something, echoing the calls of another host from another road. On and on the two hosts go, closer and closer and then through a thin cordon of peacekeeping figures into each other and there is blood on the asphalt and crying and screaming as a ghoul and wolf bray against each other and move the tired republic closer and closer to a darker illness than already afflicts the nation.

Leaving behind the scene of a bloodbath that will convulse the soul of a nation, it continues south and east and east and south. Over the neck of the long peninsula and to the mouth and marshes of the great river. Whereon either side of the banks of the watercourse workers move among the brush, weakening and strengthening constructs and setting about to foil each other’s designs on the other. But it does not care no longer about such things, as it glides gently down, feet in the warm waters of the bay, setting down after a long journey that where a sun rose up on one side, at its terminus it sets down on the other. And for the New Californian Republic, so passes a day, much the same in some places as the last day, much different in other places, and for each of them, all looking to seeing what the next day brought to them.

War Never Changes 2 : A Post Nuclear Nation Roleplay

General James Hsu – Shady Sands – Presidential Manor Briefing Room

The briefing room was probably, General Hsu reflected, a mirror of the state of the affairs of the New Californian Republic. The elite sitting in plush fancy chairs, gorging themselves on snacks, the décor full of wear and tear, a few paintings that looked rebellious in their lean, a growing mould in the corner, a threat to the room that seemingly no one cared about.

Was he the last sane man in the Republic?

It was times like this that the thought of retirement appealed to him, though he doubted there was any room to be farmed. Just retirement in a small apartment, teaching maybe as a spare time thing to keep his mind sharp? Perhaps that was another thing wrong with his country, a lack of motivation beyond a comfortable retirement. Apparently, the birth rate was slowing and already there was talk of a possible increase in social security taxes to pay for a hypothetical pension-heavy economy. Hsu didn’t know much about economics, well, peacetime economics that was.

Oh, he wasn’t mad enough to think that all the NCR needed was a good war, or some political revolution. The system worked, it just needed tweaking. Small scale redistribution, a focus less on the farms, let them collectivise, update the agriculture, and get people into the cities and into the factories, strengthen the industrialisation process. A little bit and piece from each political party raging across the electoral registers, that would be his manifesto. But he wasn’t a politician, he was just an old soldier, getting ready to fade away, as some pre-war general had said or something.

“Presidential Salute! Ten-hut!”

The soldier on the door, called the words, saluted, causing the soldiers in the room to rise to their feet and salute, the politicians in the room just standing and trying to look dignified. In walked the President, taking a seat at the head of the table, waving them to be as they were. Hsu waited until Winters had sat, before taking his own seat. The President glanced over the briefing papers in his hands, before looking up at him.

“General Hsu, an overview please, only one major agenda today, the Colorado border?”

“Yes Mister President, but we’ll get the usual stuff out of the way first if that’s alright sir?”

“Yes, yes.”

Winters murmured the words, leaning back in his chair, his eyes peering over his spectacles, glancing half at the room and half at his papers as Hsu started the briefing proper.

“Oregon Territorial Command reports no news, other than a request for some spare airplane parts to allow an overflight over Seattle, see what the status of the city is, whether there’s any major raider movement in the city that could spill over towards the border.”

“Granted, Baja want the same?”

“No sir, just to rotate in some rangers in place of heavy troopers, I concur with Colonel Dhatri, with the influx of settlers, and following on from our last slash and burn operations in the south, dissident elements are now confined to light infantry forces. Rangers can respond faster, and we need speed over armour for light infantry tactics.”

“Approved. Reno next?”

“Yessir. Nothing new there, I believe that we should use our ranger elements in Reno for the swap with Baja, show the border tribes, and any 80s, a flying of the flag. A show of force, maybe even authorise a single bombing strike against some unlucky raiders, something for the papers as well?”

Winters nodded, Hsu was always careful, the last general, Oliver, had always been a political animal, but he tried to avoid it where he could. But even he knew that the military had to cooperate a little with the administration to get them to agree to some actions. If the two converged, all the better for them both. Clearing his throat, James glanced down at his final piece of the brief, before speaking.

“Now. Colorado.”

The mood changed, from lazy disinterest, to a wary watchfulness. The Legion was always a worrisome point for everyone. They could count on House and his tin-cans to guard much of their flank against the Legion, but the river was always worrying for them.

“I’d like to engage the engineering corps in fortifying the border. The current network is, adequate, but in need of updating. And as we wind down in northern Baja later this year, I’d like permission to move those units onto the border, keeps them near to Baja if needs be, and helps shore up the line against infiltration attempts.”

“Infiltration attempts, I thought the border was secure against attack?”

Hsu nodded.

“It is, but at night, we’ve received word of back and forth crossings by single individuals. Whether legion spies, or just smugglers, we think the latter, we don’t know, better safe than sorry.”

President Winters pursed his lips, before looking at the rest of the room.

“That will be all for today for the rest of you. Could Hsu and I have the room please?”

A few frowns at that, but the politicians and soldiers stood, left the room, leaving the President and the General alone. Winters set down his briefing file, looking at Hsu over his spectacles, who set down his own briefing file.

“Everything is fine with the border, really?”

Hsu gave a sigh.

“The border’s secure, but it’s static. We haven’t changed it in years, and the legion has changed since then. We need to repair some watch posts, build some new ones, look at considering a minefield or two, clear some debris to enable clear fields of fire in one zone. Nothing major, but not a minor job either, and some outriders to catch any border-crossers are needed, likely just smugglers, but if, just if they aren’t, we need to be sure.”

The President looks away, idly taps his fingers on the faded desk before them, half-heartedly polished, a veneer of dust and sheen.

“Election’s coming up, I don’t think I’ll win it. You voting Hsu?”

Hsu frowns, speaks truthfully, if a little slowly, not sure where the President planned to go with this sudden tangent.

“I don’t vote sir; at least I don’t plan too yet, not till I’m not employed by the government anymore.”

Winter smiles tiredly, amused by Hsu’s admission, but not enough to laugh.

“Well, if you change your mind on it, think of voting for me please?”

Hsu nodded after a moment of thought. Winter sighed.

“If I could just convince the rest of undecided, I could at least scrape re-election. Still, so long as its Moore and not one of the others. You’ll get your engineers, if anything, at least it might win me some construction union support for ordering some new equipment for the army. Though god knows what the Legion think they’re up to nowadays. More bothered with Mexico, aren’t they? Well I don’t think we have any plans in Central America, do we? That’s the last thing we’d need, ending up on a collision course with the legion there.”

War Never Changes 2 : A Post Nuclear Nation Roleplay

Cassandra Moore – Redding – Market Square

One-eyed, cigarette laying lazy between her lips, Cassandra Moore brings up a hand, takes a long drag, moves away the cigarette and blows the smoke out the window over Redding’s market square and the crowd gathered there. A rally by the National Reform party, taking the steps up to the speaker’s lectern, their leader, Marcus Wolfe.

As he begins his speech, Moore tilts her head, studies the figure. A tall man, black wavy hair streaked with grey combed and oiled back, a moustache trimmed sharp and a calm voice. His tone is familial and authoritative at once, paternally stern. He speaks out over a crowd, a mix of jumpsuits and ordinary people wearing the National Reform party armband.

“How many followers does Wolfe have?”

“Across the republic? Or here?”

“Both.”

“10,000 members nationwide, 500 here.”

“There’s a hell of a lot more than 500 in front of us now.”

Her aide nods, standing hands clasped together, awaiting orders. Another long drag on the cigarette, Moore glances over the crowd, speaking as she thinks.

“Families there, friends as well. Supporters spread out through the crowd. Busy day at the market as well, gets people to stop and listen to him. Pamphleteers, the stall for membership sign-ups doing a brisk trade.”

Falling silent, Moore leans forwards a little, catches the tail-end of Marcus’ speech. The man is leaning forwards, holding the lectern, looking at all of the crowd, making those within it feel as if they and them alone are being spoken too.

“For what do we need? I ask you this? Reform. Reform. Reform. Out with the old and in with the new! Old laws from a time now gone should be unmade, new laws reflecting this modern age should be made in their place! And this I promise to you, national reform, by the national reform party!”

As the crowd cheers and Wolfe descends the steps, fist pumping into the air now and again to rising acclaim, Cassandra looks back at her aide.

“Where are most of his supporters?”

“Vault City is where you’d expect, but the Boneyard, oddly enough.”

Moore frowns, stares at Wolfe in the crowd, shaking hands, kissing babies and having photos took of him.

“I’ll bet the Communalists love that.”

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ted Jones – The Boneyard – City Hall

“Big crowd tonight.”

The chairman mutters the words to his team as they mill around, waiting for the debate to start, which by the looks of it from the moderator who has just sat down, wouldn’t be too long.

“Good luck Chairman!”

Such words are quick to be uttered his team as the lights dim and the candidates take their seats, the moderator leans forwards, taps the microphone, announces the candidates.

Cheers, boos and applause punctuated the announcement of each candidate, before the debate swung into action. All questions had been agreed on by candidates beforehand, and covered a general topic, which allowed the candidates to argue their view on each issue, before a new question was posed. As things went on, Ted Jones at first felt nervous, then confident, until finally he found himself buoyed by a wave of cheers. He had the crowd on his side, and the other candidates sat nervous. Veldt especially seemed to be struggling to maintain his composure, Zhao lost the room when pressing for the implementation of GM crops in Boneyard allotments, Rodriguez was Jones’ intellectual rival, but lacked support in the room.

Finally, as the debates drew to a close, each candidate delivered their closing speech. Drawing the last word, Jones listened, applauded politely, or shook his head in disagreement as he felt necessary, until at last, he could stand and make his speech. Taking to his feet, Jones looked over the crowded room of the State Capitol chamber and began to speak. He pressed home his argument, the erasure of income and social inequality, business regulation, upper income taxes and more. Until, as he came onto the issue of mutant rights, the room seemed to stir. A jeering cry, Jones ignored it, unable to quite see the back of the room where a lot of noise seemed to be emanating from. He rose his voice, and then suddenly, there was a loud cry, something flew from the crowd, clipped the side of his head.

Ducking, Jones stands and sees the room fall to pieces, the crowd scrambling into or away from the brawl as blue jumpsuited national reform party thugs try to push forwards towards him. As the police wade in to regain control of the floor, Jones finds himself pulled from the stage by a civil protection agent, ushered to the room where most of the candidates are waiting. He can’t see Veldt, and casting one desperate last look back into the room, with fists and truncheons clashing, he can only find one thing to say to himself.

“It’s like 2076 all over again.”

------------------------------------------------------------------

Maria Cruz – San Jose – Trade Board Office No. 24

Ceiling fans spun and spun and spun, circling out hot air and bringing in hot air, not at all helped by the constant state of agitation that gripped the office. Raised voices, lowered voices, the criss-cross of a dozen languages and tongues, and sat waiting at a desk in the corner, Maria Cruz, captain of the NCRMS De La Gado and its attached wagon train. With papers in hand, fanning herself as she waits for the customs official to finish signing the last pieces of bureaucratic red-tape. With a final muttered apology, the last paper is signed, releasing cargo from improper impounding.

Standing, muttering a thanks, Maria Cruz stands and gathers her papers, before departing the office, where she meets one of her crew outside. One of the hands, James something-or-over, she can never remember half of their names.

“We done?”

Maria quirked an eyebrow at the question by the hand, impatience clear in the voice. She nods, hands over the papers, glancing around the square as she does so.

“Yeah, get these to the wagonmaster. It’ll take two hours to be ready for moving for the harbour, so I’ll be in the Dancing Diablo if I’m needed.”

The hand nods, moves away, leaving Maria Cruz alone. Content with this, the captain turns, makes her way to the local watering hole for most of the foreign traders in San Jose. A crossroad of trade in Central America, along with Panama, and Nicaragua, and wherever else had functioning roads to connect the Pacific to the Atlantic, San Jose these days seemed to be more prosperous than ever. It could be heard in the air, more and more traders moved through the city than ever before. The world had burned, but as with every wildfire, the charcoaled soil became fertile again and new things sprung forth once more.

Stepping over the threshold into the Dancing Diablo, Cruz holds up her hand, signals for a tequila from a waitress. Sitting down at a nearby poker table, she takes up a hand, buys in, begins playing and half an hour in, a new player joins them. Maria notes the new voice, a new tone, English-speaking, heavy accent.

“Say, that accent, you Texan?”

Maria said as the dealer shuffles the deck, a brief break in the game, time for a conversation, a cigarette or just a silent drink. The Texan nods, sips a bourbon and replies.

“Yeah, you one of them New Californians?”

Maria nods, a talker and a drinker evidently, someone after her own heart. As she takes a sip of her tequila, a thought occurs to her.

“Say, how much do they know about the NCR in Texas?”

Post Deletion

roleplayerguild.com/posts/5151324

This post please, accidental double post.

War Never Changes 2 : A Post Nuclear Nation Roleplay

President Winters – Shady Sands – Capitol Building Senate Chamber

“Order! Order! We will have order!”

A den of vipers, hissing and slithering and fangs bared. Poisonous inequity they stewed amongst themselves. Dealing deals within the shadows in order to carve up the limelight so that they might bask in the sun without interference.

A group of politicians, hollering, shifting and thrusting papers. Stirring up sentiments against each other, and seeking to improve their own lot above all else.

The similarity of the two images seemed easy to behold for President Winters, sat awry in his chair as the speaker attempted to regain control over the chamber. A few passing remarks between senators, a not-so-veiled insult in the house minutes and lo and behold, arguments abounded. A small nudge, the President notes the gesture of an aide towards Senator Moore, standing up, casting a single eye about with cigarette smoke tracing these motions. Order, some semblance of it, restored in time for her to speak up.

“Oh, here we go.”

He murmurs the words under his breath to himself. A hand stretches high holding a newspaper aloft for all to see. Before it is brought down, and dropped onto the floor before Winters. A number of inflammatory headlines emblazoned black and white and bold as brass.

“Another five hundred cases of allergic reactions in Redding!”

Moore turns, acknowledges the shouts of support from her fellow senators and from some of those watching in the galleries around them.

“Three hundred in Oregon territory! Three thousand in the Boneyard! Six hundred here in his own constituency of Shady Sands! And many more across our great nation! Our great nation, made less great by the man who sits across from me! Where sir? Is your shame? Have you no heart for our people? More and more you push forwards new technologies and more and more the people suffer for it! Where are our jobs for veterans? Where are the lands our settlers were promised? Where sir, is your head? For you seem to have lost it!”

He shakes his head, waits for his own allies to finish cry shame, before taking to his feet, one hand resting on walking stick, the other
sweeping the chamber.

“I have no shame for there is nothing to have shame for. An unfortunate side effect I admit, oh, woe betide the 50% drop in food prices. Woe indeed for the five-fold increase in nutritional value for our average citizen, for the 87% decrease in hospital admissions for malnutrition and other such nutritional deficiency afflictions. I will not apologise for putting fresh full meals on tables where before there were but flea ridden scraps.”

A raised hand, an actor’s gesture, the humble acceptance of the cries and applause of support, letting the waves of opposition merely wash over him.

“As for the matter of jobs and land. I can only say that it is such a shame, that we have delays in surveying suitable lands and parcelling them out, because our territories are so vast in size! In the coming days, weeks and months, we will see five thousand families settled across the Oregon and Baja territories! We will see the establishment of new businesses from our good settlers thereon!”

It is all true, if a tenuous truth at that. There are still fifty thousand others awaiting lands for awarding, a further twenty thousand job losses estimated in the next quarter. And sitting down, as he ignores the truthful accusations of some of the voices in the braying crowds, he turns to his aide, enquires of his schedule.

“When am I to meet Hsu?”

“Not today sir.”

“I thought it was a JCS meeting today?”

“It is Mr. President, but Hsu is engaged elsewhere?”

“Where elsewhere? Where has he got to?"

---

General Hsu – Ensenada – Sentry Tower No. 4

The landscape that lies before him, James Hsu thinks, is chillingly familiar of the burning landscape of the Mojave. Rocky, sandy, a high sun above and little else below.

“At least there aren’t any fiends.”

A musing sentence, Colonel Dhatri aside him lets out a chuckle.

“I’ll fucking drink to that sir.”

Hsu is tight-lipped, the fingers of his right hand rapping the wooden balcony, before turning to look at Dhatri.

“Movement in Colorado?”

A sharp nod.

“Yes sir. Caravan fresh in from Mexicali, could just be a scout force, they weren’t clear. All these merchants, they count twenty as fifty,
fifty as a hundred and on and on it goes. Damn civvies.”

Another moment of tight-lipped silence, Hsu turns, looks out over the desert. They stand high, a wooden sentry tower, the walled fortress of Ensenada, the future state capital of Baja, whenever it became a state. Dhatri in combat fatigues, Hsu the same, one dusty though, the other not-so-dusty.

“A patrol’s out of the question. No chance of it. Can we get a flyover?”

“You’d know better than me sir, the planes work, but operational go-ahead means a request to the JCS, would Venken go for it?”

“Doubt it. She might be stubborn, but with how little budget she has if something goes south, I’d do the same. What funds can we rustle up? And can we get a local?”

“Last time I did that, she killed all the fiends, then kicked our asses at the hoover dam and laughed all the way to the bank. Mexicali’s borderland. We might find someone who hates the legion, but we might one of Vulpes’ in sheep’s clothing.”

A heavy sigh, Hsu raises a hand, pinches the brow of his nose, before lowering it, looking out over at the desert, that damnable desert, raps knuckles on wood, before making a final heavy tap.

“Do it.”

Turning around, seeing the twinkling lights and raggedy huts of Ensenada, Hsu muses to himself, silently this time, that he’d rather be home at Vault City, retired, and maybe taking a walk in the market. Couldn’t be anything happening there.

---

Marcus Wolfe – Vault City – Market Square

Row upon row of blue jump-suited humans stand tall before him, and appraising them with a proud eye Marcus Wolfe steps up to the platform. Today is the day he sets out his rallying call across the NCR, starting here in Vault City, a tour across the NCR, finishing in Shady Sands, with hopefully enough success to make him Senator, and if a few other of his fellow candidates win, as President.

“Humans! One and all! I salute you! And greet you warmly, for we are all one and the same, and we know that what faces us will require one mind, one voice, one species. Our republic divided and decrepit. And why?”

None speak, the onlookers moving around the vast crowd of blue jump-suits pause, wondering what reason he’ll give. Wolfe leans forwards, speaks to the crowd as if he was addressing an individual alone, a soft voice that is carried by the speakers to the back of the marketplace, and feels more like a conversation, than a speech.

“Because no voters before have ever had the chance to vote for what they feel, what they know, needs to be done. Reform? No other party offers it. They offer the same old offers, land and food. Yes, good and true, if delivered. And time and time again, what do we get? No land and no food. Or no land worth farming, and no food that can be eaten without sending you to hospital.”

A few nods, a gathering murmur, a few non-uniformed party members in the market crowd, stirring things up, encouraging the swayed to speak up as well. To sway ever more voices and votes to him.

“Well, I do not promise you land and food and reform. No, I guarantee it! As city comptroller, I cleared the slums and rebuilt the shining suburbs that created and secured a thousand jobs and homes for our veterans. Did I not do that? I did. Did I promise that? No, I guaranteed it. And I did it, I did not dither and delay, as Senator Dyke does. She umms and errs and sits in Shady Sands even now, espousing dithering and delay. I say, no more! No more dither and delay! Now is the time for vim and vigour! For a new way. A new direction. Not backwards, not sideways, not staying in the same place! No. Forwards! Forwards! Forwards!”

His voice grows to a roar as shouts of approval echo across the square from the onlookers, not just his own people now, but many others too. The sick and downtrodden, who see this man, hear his words, remember his actions, and say yes. Yes. Forwards!

“And so, let us go forwards! Forwards as one mind! Forwards as one voices! Forwards as one species! Forwards as One!”

“Forwards as One!”

And as the crowd before him raised their fists as one, saluting him, Marcus Wolfe smiles, for who can beat him now? Mad Moore? Withering Winter? Or that mutated freak from the boneyard?

---

Ted Jones – The Boneyard – Communalist Party Headquarters

“Well done everyone! That was a fantastic turnout and response to our rally!”

Standing atop a chair, Ted Jones smiles and gives a small bow at the whoops and cheers of his supporters, his wrecked skin stretches as he motions for quiet, and drives a fist into an open palm.

“Now! I know we’ve worked hard these past few days, but we’ve got further to go, take a moment to breathe everyone, because it’s a full sprint next. We’ve got the state capitol debate at the end of this week, and then we’ve got the counter-march against that bastard Wolfe next Monday after that! And we want to send that fascist packing home tail between his legs, don’t we?!”

More cheers, cries and even a few bawdy shouts that gain many laughs, Jones smiles and nods, before motioning for silence again.

“Alright everyone! I’m going to prep for the debate starting now, but I expect at least to see a few hangovers tomorrow okay? Not to hungover though, tomorrow we hit the ground running!”

And jumping down from the chair, he sets off at a small jog, gathering cheers and laughs, makes a victory lap of the bullpen, before making his way towards his office. The door is shut behind him, his aide Jenny, eyes alight and breathless.

“Chairman! That was great!”

“Thanks Jenny, but no more time for all that. Has the line-up been confirmed?”

“Yes, it’s mixed news chairman, the national reform party have enough signatures, so Veldt will be at the debate as well.”

Jones scowled.

“Damn. We’ll have blue-suits at the debate then. I wondered why we didn’t see any today, now I know why. They were stumping up signatures for the debate. Long sighted of them, to say they’ve got the brains of Neanderthals.”

“Neanderwhats chairman?”

“Never mind Jenny, an old expression. We’ve a new world to make, no time to think about the old.”

Jenny beams, nodding in agreement, before turning away, then swinging around. A worried frown on her freckled face.

“Do you think Wolfe has a chance at the Presidency chairman?”

The chairman leans back in his chair, hands steepling, head half shadowed as his eyes trace the map of the NCR on the wall behind Jenny, of the patches of red that he hopes to make a flood across the NCR.

“Whenever the people suffer, the elite seek only to improve their own lot regardless, Wolfe is one of them. An elite. He’s just one of them, we need to remember he’s just a single part of the disease, and who knows what rot the rest of them are spreading even now?”

---

The Cabal – The Hub – A smoke filled room

Shipped in from a small Baja plantation, cultivated delicately, hand pressed and rolled, tarred and toasted with the finest tools, then packaged into hand-made cases. These were El Majadron Cigars, the finest in all post-war America. A hundred dollars a single cigar, the box of twenty lay empty as iced tequila from New Vegas was sipped and the cigars burned into the atmosphere around them. The Redding bull-brahmin leather chairs creaked as at last, a figure seems to lean forwards, waiting for the sounds of a car horn to finish being tooted in the street ten floors below before speaking.

“What about central America?”

“Central America?”

“Central America sounds good. I own a few clippers, they move sugar and cocoa from old Guatemala, fresh stuff, sell it in New Vegas for triple the price, two hundred percent profit after tariffs and taxes. Of course, once we increase supply, prices will drop, but demand will surge.”

“How does this benefit me? It ain’t Brahmin ranching country bubba. Squitos size of goddamn footballs in Panama, they’ll be sucked dry before you can say Kimball. And I ship as well, more than you by tonnage, and I want to get more Cuban mahogany. But the canal’s busted, we ain’t gonna fix that.”

“Nobody wants to fix that, Christ. It’d take slaves to fix that, fifty men dead a day for, what a single mile per month? No, overland’s where the money is, unload for fees, transport for fees, load for fees. That’ll need lumber and steel for rails, and brahmin to lug those supplies over the hump.”

Twelve figures shift, three others murmur, the five speakers fall quiet. Who spoke in the smoke? It’s a mystery to those outside, if there were any, the voices have tinges here, a redding country accent, slick reno tones, polished vault city affectations.

“What are we gonna do to clear out the jungle? We hire some mercenaries? I can throw a few fellas to get swallowed by whatever’s in it. Can’t risk those bastards reaching pensionable age.”

“No thank you, I’ve had enough of mercs for this year. No raiders left in Oregon but they’re still charging raider protection rates for my lumber convoys.”

“Territory fees, can’t help you there, don’t want to hamper my cash-flow from Baja. I’ll throw a few bucks Oregon way for statehood-”

A number of voices criss-cross over the other, a threat of sidetrack, a clack of empty glass on coaster.

“Central America has my vote. In favour?”

A Hub City voice, a notebook on one knee, fingers smudged with pen ink. The stock market’s just three buildings down, she’s the richest of them all. Voices call out aye. An approving nod.

“How?”

Shady Sands, a trimmed accent, clicks a tongue, folds arms.

“Fabricate an incident? Start up a settlement company, secure the shoreline with ex-veterans, propagandise its success, stir up the natives. Clash, stir up the Senate. Clear the way for Moore in the election. We’ve got all we need from Winters, he’s approaching unpopularity, time to swap in for a new honeymoon period.”

A hum went around the room, a few counter-suggestions, rebuttals, amendments and then an agreement.

Central America, a not-so invisible hand of the market had stretched out, and found an investment.

War Never Changes 2 : A Post Nuclear Nation Roleplay

The New California Republic:

My Hider

Name: The New California Republic (NCR)

Flag:



Territory (picture or description) and Geography:

California and Western Nevada as States, Western Oregon and Baja as Territories (Military governed zones).

Population: 1,000,000

Government/Domestic Politics: Liberal Democratic Federation with a Unicameral legislature and a separation of powers divided between the Executive, Legislature and Judiciary. The head of state and of the government is the President, with the Senate of the New California Republic based in Shady Sands. The model is based on that of the Pre-War united states, a federal system with state legislatures and executives and a national legislature and executive.

Politically, the NCR is divided into multiple parties.

New Republican Party – Led by President Winters. The New Republican Party is the one party closest to the Tandist legacy. Advocating a meritocratic and technocratic base, the New Republican Party supports domestic reform along internalist, ensuring food security through scientific methods as opposed to expansionism. In foreign policy, it enacts a “Good Neighbours, Good fences” platform of genial neutrality, focusing on respect for internal sovereignty rather than expansionism.

Democratic Alliance Party – Led by Senator Moore. The Democratic Alliance Party was Kimball’s party, it is the antithesis of the New Republican Party. It advocates an outward looking platform, securing food and water through seizing viable lands. Expansionist but democratic, suggestions of a coup attempt were roughly shut down during a conference of powerbrokers, its natural allies are the industrial and agricultural barons and the military.

Communalists – A movement headed by a single mutant, the Communalists are led by the Ghoul known as Ted Jones, a Pre-War Socialist who now heads a growing movement calling for the radical reformation of the NCR into a society based on the group not the individual, of government not business, of nation not citizen, of revolution if no reformation.

National Reform Party – A breakaway from the Democratic Alliance Party, the National Reform Party believes in a reform of the NCR. Led by Marcus Wolfe, the National Reform Party has grown to stand for a return to Pre-War America. Anti-Mutant, Anti-Democratic, Anti-Capitalist, the National Reform Party prowls in the wings of NCR politics, waiting for the right moment to strike, to sink its claws into the NCR and reshape it into the image it believes it should be.

The Cabal – A shadowy group of figures that represent the “Invisible hand of the market”. Enclosed in a smoke-filled room with the blinds shut tight, this faction is composed of the leading industrialists and agriculturalists of the NCR. Based out of the Hub, the Cabal believes in ensuring their business is the business of the NCR.

Notable People:

President Winters – A lifelong politician, President Winters was the former senator for Maxson before winning the election following Kimball’s resignation.

General James Hsu – Chief of Staff for the NCR military in the wake of Oliver’s dismissal, Moore’s move to politics and Hanlon’s suicide. Hsu is a political nonentity, but commands the NCR military with an ever more concerned view at the actions within and without the NCR.

Senator Cassandra Moore – Hero of the Highway war, Moore personally led the counterattack and pacification campaign against the 80s. Resigning from the military, Moore was drafted into the Senatorial seat of New Reno and outspoken in her views, was duly elected to the leadership of the Democratic Alliance party.

Ted Jones – Chairman of the Communalist Party, Ted Jones was born in Pre-War california and worked as part of the Los Angeles Commune, protesting the imperialist-capitalist policies of the USA before radicalising. Captured and tortured, Ted Jones escaped execution by a single hour when the bombs fell. Mutated by the radiation, Jones has lived in the Boneyard for centuries and now, has his sights set on forging the NCR into a New Communal Republic.

Marcus Wolfe – A denizen of Vault City, Marcus Wolfe epitomises Vault thinking, society ordered and secured, uniformity without divergence. With the upcoming midterm elections, Wolfe leads the National Reform Party, standing for the Vault City seat, he aims to push his agenda across the NCR, turning a human majority into a human totality by any means necessary.

Military (try to be somewhat realistic):

Army of the New California Republic – 25,000 soldiers. 10,000 of which are split between Baja and Oregon to pacify and uplift the new territories. Unchanged from the Mojave campaign in equipment, reforms have been made, weeding out those unsuitable for service. As a result, the Army is much more professional, but has jettisoned around 15,000 service personnel into the midst of an economic recession and political upheaval.

Air Force of the New California Republic – Consisting of Five Vertibirds and 10 Douglas A-1 Skyraiders. All Skyraiders are currently based in Baja and Oregon to act as force multipliers against tribal uprisings and raider incursions. Plans for expansion have stalled for years, upkeep is sketchy and as such, for the past three years, all Vertibirds have been grounded.

Navy of the New California Republic - A glorified coast guard, the NCR navy consists of a 10 PBRs and 3 Point Class Cutters. Once again, all PBRs are deployed in the territories whilst funding arguments have resulted in 2 of the 3 cutters being waylaid in port pending refurbishment approval.

Economy: Wage based economy backed through fiat currency.

The economy of the NCR is the largest on the American continent. A troika of agriculture, industry and services make up the vast majority of this preponderant economic behemoth.

Culture and Technology (include views towards slavery and mutants): An industrial liberal democratic society, the NCR is founded on principles of anti-slavery and anti-discrimination. A nation espousing the tenets of individual freedom, equality before the law, social cohesion and suchlike. Views range from stone age to atomic age, radios and newspapers and adverts and more influence and shape the NCR much akin to the nation-states of the pre-war age. Reactionary to Radical, Liberal to Conservative, Capitalist to Socialist. All of these and more find themselves welcomed and at home in the melting pot of the NCR.

Technologically the NCR moves between Industrialisation and Post-Industrialisation in its local economies from location to location. Radio and telegram are the main avenues of communication, mass transit provided by electronic railways and buses. It does not achieve the awesome and dreadful heights of the Institute, nor does it fall to the tribalism rife across the globe. It is a nation state in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. It makes its way through the wreckage and ruin, repairing, remaking, rediscovering all that was lost and little by little, learns more and more.

Religion: Secular State. Religious toleration practiced barring unacceptable tenets (Human Sacrifice, Cannibalism, Tax Avoidance etc). A number of religions practiced, but most citizens tend to be irreligious.

History:

The NCR has stood for a hundred years, but never in all its years, not even during the height of the Enclave’s power nor the total-war era of the NCR-Brotherhood war, has it seemed so close to defeat as it stands now.

The events of the Second Battle of the Hoover Dam were, to understate them, a crisis of confidence for the NCR. A national humiliation, dust and blood covered soldiers trudged home escorted by row upon row of gleaming Securitrons. What followed next was a flurry of events, the emergence of story upon story, the confession and suicide of Chief Hanlon, General Oliver disgraced, dishonourably discharged then driven to a drunken death and Kimball forced to resign after a tenuous year of attempting to hold power.

Kimball’s presidency might have ended, but his party remained, its politics remained and even disgraced, they clung deep into the heart of the NCR. Kimball had improved living standards, and a reasonably successful expansion into Baja and then Oregon had secured a reasonable amount of territory for veterans and settlers to take advantage of. All of this however had come at the cost of a budget deficit, uncontrolled military spending and increasing taxes.

Suffice to say, when Kimball finally was forced to resign and new elections were called, the subsequent election led to a New Republican majority. Spending was reined in, the military cut down to size and taxes scaled back. Since then, the NCR has undergone a varied change. The conclusion of the Highway war has led to the revitalisation of the Democratic Alliance as an opposition party, with the Cassandra Moore drafted, that is elected in a special election demanded by petition, as the senator for New Reno and then elected as party leader.

For the majority though, the divide between the haves and have-nots grow clearer and deeper by the year, most startlingly displayed with the “Californian Agricultural Revolution” following the implementation of data secured from Vault 22. Genetically modified properties have led to the eruption of allergies across the NCR among the lower classes, but tellingly not the upper classes, as the newly enriched diets contrast to the poorer meals of the past years. Furthermore, the new crops have resulted in agriculture being less manpower intensive, intensified by a government subsidisation programme to industrialise much of the process.

Worsening this unemployment crisis is the slimming down of the NCR military and the subsequent reduction of the military-industrial complex that supported the bloated military. Even then the civilian industry finds itself increasingly given over to industrialisation, electrification and at some extremes, roboticization. With Baja and Oregon lands already sold off to the highest bidders in a successful short-term attempt to balance the budget, calls now grow for new lands to be found, for increases in state welfare programmes and more.