Thanks to whoever archived the last thread
We started to look at mercenary groups again at the very end of last thread but bump limit cut us short, and seems good to keep going

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Someone asked last thread about the state of the Lake District
Aside from much of the northern area by hadrians wall being nasty zones, we haven’t done much with it yet
Looks like the foundry of man has some small holding there

I don't see why the colonies and societies would not have expanded over a larger area if the danger zones are so limited. undoubtedly there would be monsters everywhere, yes, but have you considered an SSSS arrangement where literally everywhere is highly infested with monsters unless explicitly stated otherwise?

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>>66842929

>>66842929
Congested land, monsters and enough anomalous shit to make permanent habitation impractical.

>>66843650
Still think they'd put in a big effort into colonisation, as to gain more land and resources, given that conflict among the other nations would be common. Speaking of, what's the outside world like?

>>66843679
Those marked areas are chock full of nasties, even wandering the land that isn’t directly in a zone
Crusades to happen to clear out useable land, but they aren’t a walk in the park
Mainland Europe was hit much harder than the isles, and is pretty uninhabitable, France is full of spirits and ghouls, and Germany is crawling with mechanical-human abominations

>>66844285
>>66843679
The rest of the world being in the state it’s in started off like that due to a focus on Britain for the setting, though Iceland also seems to have held out for a time, until it was overrun by giants and other such beasts, driving the survivors towards the isles
This did start off more SSSS-ish, trying to go off of old folklore, but has more recently been walking the line between that and something more stalkerish

>>66842955
Really like that map
General unsafe land is still dangerous, most of the recent crusaders have been around caerleon, and the men of Yorkshire under king Edward managed to liberate York from infestation

>>66845231
That map can be done at later time, the one we have is fine at the moment really. That is till terrain is put into account.

>>66845369
Oh yeah, not saying there is an issue, just like that map that was posted

>>66842929
As well as monsters, bandits and land made infertile/unlivable by the war, sheer population deficit has played a role. In many areas there simply aren't enough people to kickstart a proper colonisation effort worth mentioning.

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>>66842550

Depending on what people prefer, ive always had a shining for Warrior household mercenaries.
Fraternity style membership, newest members do more of the upkeep of facilities, senior members handle the money, the contracts and documents explaining the array of "services" that they offer.

Everyone trains together, training is brutal but restrained as they want to be able to dominate when engaged in combat but don't want to kill new recruits or senior members in practice.
There is some matching apparel, (oldè style leather hanging belts, tabbards of similar design and appearance, silly hats, whatever they happen to be able to get enough of to put forward a unified appearance.
Names like:

>> The Butcher's Bill (The bill always comes due)
>> Blade-fanes (wielders of the faith go forth with our word)
>>Umbrian Marauders (Dollars or daughters, everyone pays)
>>The Dead King's Conscripts (We fought before the world died and our service is never completed)
>> Tagert's Chosen. ( skilled, subtle, silent)

Whats important is their presentation of a unified ideal for providing services rendered.

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>>66846329
Different mercenary groups serve key functions within the towns and villages they reside/hail from, the Butcher's Bill could come from a town close to a minor zone, an anomaly incursion of trolls and other monstrosities lead to a six-day siege, most of the ammunition was spent, long arms were dry and the wall was hours from breach, the town was falling,
The head butcher came to the militia leader and offered the Butcher's services, cleavers forged from zone-metals were offered for a modest fee, fires were stoked inside the walls and teams of butchers were sent outside the walls, taking one of the militiamen with them each; carrying a empty burlap sack, cut one or two of the anomalous creatures into bits and had the tag along militiamen bag the dismembered pieces, they escort the militiamen inside the walls and throw the pieces of the stoked pyres.

on the morning of the seventh day, the siege was broken, the town was pervaded with the acrid scent of burning anomalous flesh, half of the militia remained and one-third of the Butchers survived. a bill for services rendered was delivered, once it was paid, the Bill-house was built, the first faction-house of the newly minted men of war.

>>66846329
I love it, we could either mix it into the sort of army-developed mercs, since they seem to normally have their offspring continue in the group, or use this for another breed of mercs, contrasting the existing sort

>>66847260
Good stuff
These sorts of new-age groups would make a nice sort of alternate to the old-age military mercs

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>>66846329
>>Bladefanes.
Who answers the prayers of the common folk?

When the men and monsters that live seized by their anger seek to predate or enslave the defenseless who will stand in their corner?

The earnest bearers of faith, Turingist, kingsworn, sectless, all are unified on the side of the commoner, under the banner of the bladesworn.

Exacting their fee by asking only for food and fresh recruits, these sword wielding monks generally carry a pistol or a shield in their offhand. Their found abbeys out in the wilderness, living off the land and honing themselves against the horrors that haunt the deadlands.

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>>66847260
Addendum: they took pieces of the broken palisades and used rudimentary shield tactics to isolate enemies on the field.

I have a hard on for shield walls and goddamnit the Butcher's Bill should have shield tactics

>>66847353
I like the idea of factions of mercenaries rising from circumstance in communities instead of just a bunch of people deciding they wanna "grab a sword and fight the horde"

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>>66847326
What are your thoughts on mercenary factions who address local concerns of small communities and set up faction houses like franchises accriss the continent?

A faction house in every odd town, operated like a lodge style longhouse for travellers or mercenaries of their allegiance, avoiding embroilment in skirmishes between city states or nations and focusing on improving the environment in and around where they reside?

Something as simple as tending flocks with herders to kill any predators or rustlers who interfere, or helping build new structures and maintain the defenses of town, keeping their bodies and skills in use while still positively contributing to their home

>>66847906
It could be interesting, rather an a more singular group, we could treat it as more of a union of smaller militias with respect for each other, and cooperating if need be

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>>66842550

Travelling merchant/gunsmith mercenary companies would really activate my almonds.
To me the maintenance of weaponry in tantamount to survival on the Isles, Gunsmiths would achieve Rogue trader levels of wealth, someone who can repair and modify mounted defenses and personal firearms is worth their weight in gold. merchants would/could flock to these traveling gunsmith caravans as they're the safest way to travel between cities and nations.

Also guildhalls for craftsmen and tradesmen maybe?

>>66848271
travelling gunsmiths is the idea behind the "stenners" iirc, they're not one of mine though so can't give more detail.
As for merc bands it's very much a case by case basîs, york & lancaster might have all of theirs being hired by the military to fight each other, then again there might be more work for mercs oop north because said polities are fighting, meaning the only armed forces available to go monster thumping are private concerns.
For warwickshire & rutland, monster hunters are tenuously linked with the gleaners' guild, but fullbore pmcs tend to be more or less independent.

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>>66848573
Thank you! I've just started reviewing the archived threads so im still behind in terms of what has already been discussed.

Well, vis a vis mercenary groups, who have we got so far? I can recall some solid work being done on the Desert Rats, and the Stenners are sort-of a merc group, though perhaps less directly military than others. The SAS are also operating rather like sell-swords, if I remember correctly, though more tied to the Old World powers. Also there was talk of European groups smuggling in Were-Francs to do their dirty work. Perhaps some work should be done on new groups? Maybe three more English ones, two Irish and two Scottish, one Welsh, Two European and a US one? Just a suggestion, so we have a wide thematic range.
>The White Company-an English band of mercenaries famed for their skill with the spear, and the (relative) civility of their behavior
>Halifax' Hounds-originating in the old world town of Halifax, part of the greater Realm of York, these infamous mercenaries have tamed Zone hounds and Helldogs to fight for them, giving the band it's name
>Bonnie Boys- a rag-tag band of Scots, led by a man claiming to be the true descendant of the Stuarts, the reincarnation of Bonnie Prince Charlie. Whether or not this is true, his mercenaries are driven and skilled with both cannon and their stash of single-shot rifles.
>Jaegers-hailing from Germany, this platoon sized unit of hunters stole a shipment of Napoleonic era pneumatic rifles, which they put to great use in their stealthy escape from the continent, and subsequently as hunters-for-hire in Britain that was
Just a couple of ideas, feel free to ignore/adapt!

>>66848759
there's the mad bastards who do cross-channel scav runs from, kernow maybe?, i think the entire community of Howitzer counts as mercs given how they keep themselves rolling.
Band of the Bear were one i mentioned working in the midlands, monster-hunting & full medieval.

Just for the sake of summation listing the major on-going conflicts.
War of the Roses 2 - York & Lancaster
Welsh Railway Wars - Workers State of vs Kingdoms of Wales
Jotun Raids - Iceland versus everyone with a coastline
Any others?

>>66849145
Switzerland Tunnel Lords vs Muslims

Fionn mac Cumhaill and the Fianna vs All of the fairy tale monsters for ridership of Ireland.

>>66849625
>Muslims

*Morloks

Wtf spellcheck?

>>66849625
>>66849637
Lmao.
this is post-WW 1 Europe, not modern day Europe my dude

>>66842929
the dead zones have mutated inhabitants, but thats actually the least of the problems. The zones were created by the influence of an anomalous kind of extra-solar stellar radiation, and only exasperated by the nuclear weapons, and its mostly the mutagenic properties an weird bending of spacetime that makes the areas unlivable. Though on the continent, the monsters are more prevalent and aggressive, so on top of anomalies the continental zones are that much worse.

>>66848759
Yeah, the SAS have lived on as the Men of Stirling so far, doing raids through zones and other stuff like that
We had one or two named mercs with little else but the name like the American “Great red ones” derived from a certain division, and some others like the Highlanders, will find some of the others in archives

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>>The Icelandic war marshal shouted to his men, "The Jötun raids will not overcome Inner Iceland!" The local militia and military roared in affirmation.
>>"The weight of these raids rest on our shoulders." Our field captain planted our banner in the radiated dirt some 40 meter from the marshal and his forces.
>>" we are the protectors of our neighbours, brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, our children and our neighbors children." The Icelandic marshal continued nearby.
>>Our company's head butcher and his senior escort assumed a defensive formation around the banner while he spoke. "If this forsaken ground is to be flooded by blood, let it be the blood of the abomination."
>> " we share no kith nor kin with these people, but we have been promised fifty bullets a head for the Vickers mounted gun they have promised us with for our services today, thus they are your family today, if you must sacrifice for them you will toss yourself into the fray proudly, no battlefield is truly baptized until a butcher's blood quenches it, now lets get to work.
>> The gathered members of the Bill shouted "The bill has come, the bill will come due!"

How would you pay mercenaries for their work, outside if raw currency, are weapons, armor and land appropriate for services rendered?

>>66850155
Nice stuff
Yeah, loot to keep their guns loaded and weapons in their hands would likely work

>The cavaliers are one newer mercenary group fortunate enough to maintain a small number of armoured cars for navigating the wastes
>Serving proudly in odd armour and regal heraldry, they have drawn the despisation of noblemen who see them as mockeries of the chivalrous, but for all that’s worth they have still become friends of many kings

The highlanders are famed for their bagpipes and ferocity in battle, continuing to fight even with dwindling supplies and ramshackle weaponry

Looking for more

>Other than the Desert Rats, there is thought to be one highly operational tank force (few enough have survived encounters to know numbers for sure), operating somewhere in the south - some say down near Kernow, others say it sallies out of Cambridge region, called the Ironsides, a formidable foe known for their religion and toughness both, and the speed and power of the vehicles they possess

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>>66850240

Has anyone written about taming anomalous monsters/mutant fauna for war or agriculture?

Are there any kinds of flora found in the zones that are desirable enough to seek out?

What im asking is Zone tamers and Zone-alchemy when?

>>66842772
>almost entirety of Erie uninhabitable
Jesus Christ this is depressing

>>66850351
It’s all a work in progress, and most of the zone-filled and habitable areas were marked back when we had barely started to fill the map
Got any ideas?

>>66850302
I think we had a little bit on some slightly mutated breeds of horse being used for different areas, and zone-fauna sometimes making drugs that did more than just mess you up
Most zone-beasts are just a bit too feral and dangerous to try and tame, but maybe there are those bold or I sNe enough to try out there
Mutated dogs could also work

>>66850351
Finn and his merry band of nutters are fighting back.

Is he the Finn of legend awoken from under his mountain? Who can say, he thinks he is and he's big enough that nobody is arguing.

We’ve also got that raider resurgence in the south tearing through the countryside, though we seem to have them in a pretty good spot in terms of what they’re doing and why

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>>66850351
>>66850499

"in the early 20th century watch making in Coventry declined. So did bicycle making. On the other hand, car manufacture boomed in the early 20th century but it declined after the 1950s. In 1916 G.E.C. began making electrical goods in Coventry. At the end of the century, the main industries in Coventry were engineering and making electronic equipment."

Assuming this is the Erie you're refering to theres a real opportunity for very limited manufacturing, even if it's printing press style physical manufacturing, pressing pieces with manpower.

I would do something close to Mad Max's Bullet farm, having even a cursory ability to repair vehicles would make the region rich beyond measure.

>>Terms to build off of:
>Gear gods
>blockheads (engine blocks)
>breakers ( people who junk cars for parts)

Remember that with worldbuilding the best thing you can do is throw paint at the wall, someone will see something in what you've done and build off it.

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>>66842772
Hey, would it be worth it to define what the zone colors denote?

>>Yellow=few ambient threats, minor risk of aberrant creatures, low% chance of zone metals and zone flora.

>>Orange= intermittent risk of ambient threats, major risk of aberrant creatures/possibility of Dens, possibly veins of Zone metals, meadows of zone flora.

>> Red= constant risk of ambient threats,
Aberrant monster KAIJU fight club, dens and violent territorial disputes are common between different mutated fauna, aberrations and some Carnivorous flora, overgrown with zone Flora.

I just think that if we expand on how dangerous Zones are we can build much closer to them and figure out what sort of lifestyles can exist how close to zones.

Justa thought.

>>66852732
Those yellow through red areas are singular zones, the ones so big they are actually shown individually on the map, we had some posts going through the different “levels” of zone as you go from the yellow to red

>>66842955
ayy stand still stay silent. Good taste Anon.

>>66842929
A Zone is a specific phenomenon. There's other reasons land is uninhabitable/uninhabited.

Speaking of SSSS, should we try to do some more folklorish stuff? Recently things had gone far more stalkerish

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>>66852788
Aaaaah.

Thank you!i wasnt certain and im glad you've cleared it up for me.

Off topic but something that has been bothering me, has anyone ever actually seen "the dragon of the london swamp"? Is it a real thing or a rumor out of control

>>66855148
The dragon is real. The question is how clever is it?

With regards to the Raider Resurgence:
Would it make more sense to have that whole issue taking place earlier on in the history of this timeline, within a lifetime of the 50's?

>>66855255
Back in the day there was a widespread bandit problem, whilst some of the most prestigious mercenary groups around came from the old-age army, as did violent bandit gangs, which reached across the isles until large coordinated efforts were made to wipe them out
Stragglers survived, many chased into zones where more could not survive
The resurgence is an unexpected return of veterans of this, old but hardened, leading fresher bandits and raiders as they pillage across the land
Those veteran leaders would bring much experience with them, and something just as valuable; knowledge of where to find old-age weaponry
They’ve been going around trying to consistently fight in their own terms, against technologically bad targets, using disposable troops to draw out the enemy army before descending on them with the actual, far more dangerous force
I’m pretty sure it reached the point that they had a flail tank or two working, though they would be reserved for when they were safe to use

>>66855365
Yeah that's my point: if they're lead by old timers, surely it can't have been that long, else there wouldn't have been any veterans left to come back and lead.

>>66855531
Yeah, it was back when the time since the end and such was even looser
I’d just go with the bandit purges being more recent than originally thought, as it is nice to have the resurgence around to add a large threat to everyone that isn’t just more zone-beasts

>>66844321
The Beasts and creatures of the Zones are very much inspired by Folklore, while the effects and dangers are STALKER and Roadside Picnic.

Need some sleep, will add some more stuff in the morning
Let’s try to keep this going

>>66852732
The Yellow, Orange, and Red are mainly for the levels of radiation from the bombs.
However, the higher levels of radiation also line up with what you have suggested l, so it checks out.

>>66855148
well, as written, no one who's gone deep enough into the fog to confirm its existence has ever come back, so...
But, yes, ooc, it exists, is terrifyingly vast and lies in the ruins of westminster on a hoard of pillaged treasure generally being ominous and black.

>>66855148
It has been seen enough for the tale to get out.
However, what is unknown is what exactly it is. It’s large, reptilian, and seems to hate people taking the Zone metals in the area.
It isn’t known what it mutated from, why it’s after the metals, or how smart it is.

>>66856942
Well, people have confirmed there is something there, but those people are usually doing so in a panic while screaming about the “giant F**king lizard tried to eat me!!”
Of course this is a similar reaction to Ireland’s Paranoia and the Fomorians, so some people (wrongly) think that the London Swamp has a similar effect, and whatever’s there just seems worse.
And that is where most of the dragons victims come from!

>>66856606
The isles weren’t nuked much, though one or two were detonated, generally they were very hesitant to nuke their own people, especially after what was seen if Paris after it was bombed
Most of the zones came naturally, with some more unconventional ones

>>66849625
There's also Novgorod, which is a shitty little Russian enclave under constant siege and with limited contact with the outside world currently ruled by someone who is either Rasputin in a Groucho Marx tier disguise or Koschei the Deathless.

>>66842772
Lake District could be so fragmented and remain so because time is so broken there that an army marching in would very quickly find itself spread over 50 years at least.

It sounds like it should be extremely useful for altering history but the distortions seem to be randomized and shift around without pattern.

>>66859679
I believe there were at least three bombs directed at cities as part of the War, two in Britain and one in Ireland.
The large patch near Cornwall and the Kernow Federation is from the smaller bombs used in the failed attempt to fight the Zone.

>>66856606
They originally were meant to represent the Zones 'depth' the yellow is the meridian, orange mantle and the red snd the core. The deeper you go the higher levels of fuckery start to happen. Every Zone has them but the big ones are the most stable,

>>66861874
Well, the radiation doesn’t contradict this. Zones may just have higher radiation.

Any other major castles in the isles that should receive some attention?

>>66861354
I’d go with some nasty zones like this in the north approaching hadrians wall, whilst any production-capability from the area, or at least what little could be salvaged, is in the hands of the foundry of man, given their holding on the map

>>66862971
Which castles are currently occupied in Setting?

>>66864101
Edinburgh castle seems to be acting as the seat of power of the pope
Various ones around wales are in use by the Welsh kingdoms or caerleon
Dover castle is in use in the USKS
Yorkshire has a decent number, along with the fortifications in York
Those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head, but we haven’t done much more in terms of specific castles

>>66855212
>>66855148
It's not the only dragon.

One of the reasons vast tracts of land on various continents don't have much permanent human habitation on them is because of dragons. They seem to like going after people more than mere need for food would necessitate and so leave surprisingly few witnesses for things so big.

>>66864337
I think that we should keep them very rare.
Like one in London, one in the Death Road to Cornwall, and one somewhere in Scotland.
They are an apex zone beast who normally live in the most radioactive and distorted zones, so the players would have to be prepared to the nth degree just to reach them. Not something you would find randomly on the road.

>>66864101
Warwick Castle is currently the seat of power for Warwickshire, unsurprisingly.

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>>66864506
I agree in principle but I think we could explore the idea of them migrating or having a conciousness beyond being an apex zone beast.

do they have understanding beyond just consumption?

What level intelligence are they?
>> Beastial?
>> Human?
>>Alien?

Are they creatures that exist as slaves of their urges or are they brooding beast of incalculable design that plan for events a hundred lifetimes away?

I think fleshing them out too much can kill their mystique but giving them enough bones for ideas to stick to would be cool

>>66864827
I think a point was previously made of them lacking human level intelligence, which is what made the very rare mutated bandit hiding in a zone so dangerous, a combination of zone beast and human intellect
They should still in some cases be cunning, and by no means stupid
Large, more dangerous zone beasts could be involved in serious zone excursions, such as those towards Hadrians wall, adding real threat to them

>>66849718
Ottomans, bro.

The Beast Of London lairs in the radioactive ruin of westminster, atop an immense horde.

>>66866020
What kind of Hoard is it? I know that they have a strange fondness for Zone Metals, but what else do they have?
They wouldn’t have books, since they aren’t intelligent enough to understand them, but what stuff could they gather that would make it worth pursuing?
Does anybody even know if the hoard even exists beyond zone metals? The existence of the dragons are mostly Folk tale and rumors, so the hoard might not be as extensive as some would think.

>>66866158
It is possible that the hoard changes depending on who is looking at it. The hoard and the Dragon might be different parts of the same thing, lure and mouth of a great angler fish.

>>66866233
I can see the hoard shifting, since the Zone has time and space distortions. Not to mention the Zone metals.
However, the Dragon and hoard being the same it a bit too hard to conceptualize, and unfair to the party if they are able to defeat the beast just to find the hoard worthless.

I think the great beast of London should stay shrouded in mystery overall, since nobody has come back from a direct encounter
As for any hoarded treasure, that would be within the core of the zone that engulfs the great London swamp, so probably a lot of zone-tainted material, could also have its hoard be around the entrance to one of those old-age laboratories, perhaps the one it sprang from as the world ended, to consume london

>>66866858
That sounds good. The Dragons are few and mostly unknown to the wider world.

>>66866020
>>66866158
>>66866233
>>66866376
>>66866858
>Have the Beast consider itself the ruler of the British Empire. The horde is all the treasure pillaged by the brits during their world conquest phase.

>>66867906
The beast doesn’t have human level intelligence.
A mutated cult saying that, however, would work.

>>66867906
Neat, but I think we should stick to zone-beasts being at best cunning and deadly, they’re lacking human intellect
But that does make me think, are there any pith helmets about?

>For those wealthy enough to arm their elite troops with old fashioned rifles, rank firing has made an effective return against man and beast alike

>>66867906
when i wrote it up i did intend its hoard to be basically pillaged from all the museums & palaces etc across london, so it is sitting in top of all the riches of empire, specifically excluding the crown jewels.
as regards INT, the intention for the beast of london was for its stats to be basically fuck you i'm a dragon, how smart it is or isn't is irrelevant because it's *googles* nearly 300m long from nose to tail and as such is a Foe Beyond Any Of You©, even before we get into the whole aspect of it being made of shadow and fog and smoke.
You don't fight it, you hide and hope.
However!
The Beast was meant to be exceptional, there are plenty of other zone monsters that fall into the dragonish space without being a gargantuan, semi-corporeal incarnation of terror.
I feel that going to folklore is generally best, so 'true' dragons, as various people have said are rare, but things like the Laidly Worm, drakes, wyverns, etc are relatively common, competing with giants for apex predator status wherever men haven't cone and devoted the time to murdering them.
I would prefer giants to be a more common foe desu, given their prevalence in gaelic folklore they should be a more common antagonist than they seem to be thus far.

>>66869554
It’s most effective against Beasts. Mainly because while Armies can gain access to guns, Beasts cannot.
The exceptions being Wights, crazed rad-wizards, and the smaller races of Giants. Though these have the excuse of coming from man.

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>>66867906
>>66867932
>>66870344
Am I the only person who likes the idea of the Beast being fully sentient, if a sociopathic predator by human standards?
>>66868588
>But that does make me think, are there any pith helmets about?
Sounds like it would fit in with the turingists and their religious goal of restoring the lost capabilities of the Old World. A subsect/knightly order of Dispellers based around the ideas of the heroic explorer-colonialist and big game hunting of zonespawned abominations?

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>>66870927
>Am I the only person who likes the idea of the Beast being fully sentient, if a sociopathic predator by human standards?

>>66870927
We are taking the Low Fantasy route here since this is basically post-apocalyptic Britain. The beasts are given the names of Folklore due to their similarity, not that they are legitimate animals of magic.

>>66870344
I think 100-150 meters would be more likely. 300 Meters is equivalent to Legendary Godzilla. A bit to big to be able to gather valuables.

>>66870927
i have no issue with it being sapient, i just don't think it matters.
>>66871202
it's almost as long as westminster, ergo the nearly 300m figure. Long tail, long neck.

>>66870402
Rank firing could be nasty against melee troops though, as it was meant to be
>>66871202
Some of the old stuff did say that the things that swelled in the zones could be neither fully explained by magic or radiation, leaving it as some mix of the two
Hell, would you call this middle fantasy then?

>>66871715
I would say it’s the same level of Fantasy as STALKER and Metro.
So most of the beasts are just powerful animals.
But the ones that are sentient were purposely made.

>>66871631
I think that 300 meters would be hard to hide, even in the Zone. It’s still a creature shrouded in Rumor after all.

>>66871821
Some mix of magic and radiation would be nice to stick with, since a lot of the anomalous stuff and some of the creatures cannot be fully explained by conventional means
>>66871631

Come to think of it, if someone could get hold of the Crown Jewels, that could do them a real favour in supporting their claim to being king

>>66871202
>>66871715
>>66871821
Just how Fantastical depends where on the setting you happen to be standing. In the regular, post-nuclear Europe, things are Low Fantasy/Post-Apocalyptic, but then there are the Zones which are basically the Feywild by way of Roadside Picnic.

>>66872079
Sounds good
Speaking of zones, should we try to flesh out any other major zones, or what the zones are like generally in a large region?
We’ve done that for a few like London, the Death Road to Cornwall, Ireland and the industrial zones, could try to build on the Scottish zones for example

>>66872079
Exactly. Feywild, but there is nobody in control.

>Zone “physics” works more on fairytale logic.

>>66872403
The spacial effects are Less fairytale and more M. C. Esher. The mutations become a bit fairytale, only the process is through a kind of Mad Science.

>>66872155
The major Scotland zone is one of the most annoying and potentially dangerous zones to navigate. While it still has your standard beasts and bomb radiation, it is the most dense region of spacial distortions.
An Edinburgh man once followed a river downstream from a waterfall to find the top of the same waterfall. They used it to power a waterwheel.
On their way to the clans, another followed a sheer goat path up a mountain when it became a Penrose Stairway. They were lucky to survive leaping off.
A Clan woman was chased by a troll when they got caught in a Mobius. The Troll almost immediately gave up, but No matter which way they went, she and the Troll would meet up again. Time seemed to go different for them, though, for while she was found by a passing Rad-wizard merchant after three days in the loop, the Troll was a mass of dried bones.

>>66873132
Good stuff!
Lots of spatial distortions in Scotland sounds good, I’m sure it’s really messed with some of the invading forces as well, who would be even less used to it

>>66873383
Well there had to be a reason for there being such a large unoccupied area between The Clans and Edinburgh despite the Zone center being so far.

It’s also why Iceland hasn’t simply steamrolled south. Supply chains are practically impossible.

>>66873547
Nice, that adds up
It would be helpful for the Scots that the Horned Men are attacking the Icelanders if they weren’t also attacking Scotland
That fighting on the sea must be pretty nasty
Need to get some sleep, but let’s try to keep this going

>>66873132
Exert from a Scottish Gleaner’s Journal:
>Okay, I know that the Big Cat’s wound was fatal. The sword went into the lungs. I was able to track the blood to this Tree, and the den underneath has obviously been used. So why wasn’t it here?
>Lost Trail. Backtracked to Tree. Found the Big Cat’s corpse near the Tree. Good riddance. Hope my town counts this as a victory.
>GODDAMNIT! Three times! I passed that Tree three times!! The trail should have been a straight shot home!
>Looping. Heard of this. Should have brought the guide rope your brother had but nooooo. You would have lost the “Glory”. But now you are stuck in the woods near a stupid tree without a forced reference point. F*ck you old me.
>Cat’s corpse is gone. Is something else here?
>Two days. My brother must be sending a search party by now.
>SH*T! They don’t even know I’m gone! I haven’t even been gone two minutes for them, have I?? Crap!
>Okay, just write it out. You just now killed the Cat whose corpse you found Three days ago. So time doesn’t work the same here. And you are looping in the woods. But You HAVE heard of this before.
>To break a Loop, you need to have a solid reference, like a rope or line-of-sight. Breaks the zone or something. Will have to make do.
>Trail Blazing doesn’t work. Most constant enough.
>Can’t gather enough sticks to outlast the loops distance. I keep running out after a hundred or so yards and loop while searching for more. Need to look at this another way.
>Line-of-Sight. The Forest is Dry.
>If I die before this works, at least I will take this place down with me. If it works, I told you guys I could be a Gleaner. So Ha, I win either way.

This journal was found on man coming out of the Forest Fire near Loch Lomond. Was found deliriously laughing that he had won. Is currently being treated for burns and severe smoke inhalation.

>>66873611
Storms, monsters, and water Zones can be problems on the seas.

>>66873132
>Rad-wizard merchant
I thought all rad-wizards beside Merlin had all been driven mad by their radioactive and Zone-exposure corruption?

>>66860655
>someone who is either Rasputin in a Groucho Marx tier disguise or Koschei the Deathless.
that isn't a set of alternatives, that's just different degrees of success on a lore check. Also, a Red Army game with an expedition advancing from the urals

>>66876982
Urals might have some unmarked nuclear bunkers.

If they have survived then it's safe to assume that cheyenne mountain complex also survived.

>>66875567
They’re all at least a little unhinged from the start, and a good number lack finer control of their power
The maddening only gets worse when they succumb to the curse, setting slight in radioactive fire

>>66876982
"Rasputin" isn't a rad-wizard, at least so far as anyone can tell. Exactly what he is is debatable. Despite it being many generations since the world stopped making sense he seems to remember The World That Was in extensive detail all the way back to far antiquity. He looks early middle years so it could be that he's some combination of history buff and temporal displacement as he only came to power about ten years ago at most.

The problem is that people remember seeing him about town minding his own business for years before, as did their fathers. And grandfathers. And they all remember him looking of early middle years.

What he is is hard to say beyond unnaturally resilient.

>>66875005
The waters are already a very dangerous place, plagued with great sea beasts, and forcing travellers to dash between safe spots whilst the waters are “calm”
Zones within the sea hasn’t been touched on so far, but they could add another danger to navigating on water

>>66878928
Nobody even knows if Rasputin is his real name or just a nickname.

>>66874029
Good stuff!
Hell, crafty Scots could even try to weaponise this, luring enemies into loop zones
The real horror is when five months later a raiding party of Icelanders emerge out of nowhere

>>66879662
He could even be multiple people

>>66879672
Depending on how time passed for them, it could be two types of horror.
One would be a fresh party who felt not a single day pass. Though they would be in for a surprise when their escape plan is missing.
Another horror would be the starving hollow shells of men who had been wandering lost in the place for years.

>WURLLLBUILING
Please take this cringe to /qst/

>>66880390
>S_E_E_T_H_I_N_G

>>66880390
spot the newfag ladies and gentlemen, in his most unpleasant form, the one with nothing to contribute who's angry about it.

>>66852313
I think that most of the vehicles in this setting are either already repurposed or rusting in the sun and radiation of the Zones.
However, finding a still intact engine is still very desirable. The most industrialized kingdoms will pay top Holy for them.

>>66880891
It also doesn’t help that most of the remaining useable vehicles are in the hands of mercenary groups, who would never consider selling such venerated relics of the old world

>>66877730
There's a bunker with the soviet leadership in it. They're all somehow inexplicably alive and unchanged since the War, despite the time, radioactivity and food supply having ran out centuries ago.

>>66860655
>>66876982
>>66877730
>>66881502
This feels like a good time to bring up >>66695021 again so its sorted out. I also would like to know if Western Approaches Command survived Liverpool's end and if that has something to do with the Isle of Man's beachhead near it.

>>66881965
And I forgot to ask about Central Government War Headquarters, and should have said that Western Approaches Command may have value for what it is not what it contains.

>>66881965
We had something a while ago on a great battle between the Royal Navy and a horde of sea beasts that allowed the second Dunkirk evacuation to occur, crippling the navy in the process
Some remnants could have survived from this for a time, and perhaps some military survivors joined more permanently with the foundry of man, providing them with extended reach across the isles

>>66881502
>>66881965
>>66882070
The things in the bunker look like the soviet leadership. That's no guarantee they're the genuine article and plenty of evidence against it, what with the time.

>>66882268
>Amidst these rumours of Stalin still living, some say the Tsar has returned

>>66882070
>>66881965
depends on where they were at the time, wasn't WAC in portsmouth in ww2?
>>66882109
Also VANGUARD and its decision that it doesn't need such fripperies as a crew, ammunition or fuel to keep sailing around fucking up sea monsters in the name of King and Country.
>>66880891
>>66881094
depends on location again, there's no reason to think there was a large-scale pattern of vehicle destruction, i'm in favour of the railways still being semi-functional, limited by 'orrible things with teeth and leaves on the line, as well as canals and internal county motor vehicle usage on a limited scale.
Always however, with the caveat of 50s britain, cars aren't super common and there are no motorways/highways.

>>66883005
WAC is in the epicentre of the Liverpool Zone and relatively close to the Isle of Man territory just across the river Mersey. Maybe it is part of the reason why the Isle of man set up a base in a zone, so it can act as a staging point to secure the famous bunker complex. Sort of a high risk high reward thing.

CGWHQ is just outside of Corsham in Wiltshire, and is south west of Oxfordshire territory and south east of Caerleon territory across the river Severn. It is not in a zone at all which means it and all its resources would be intact, and its personnel would have survived.

>>66881965
>>66882070
>>66882109
>>66883005
>>66883264
These may be useful for sorting out what happened to military locations but it may also be a slog see which listings match the time period.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Nuclear_bunkers_in_the_United_Kingdom


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Military_installations_of_the_United_Kingdom

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Military_communications_of_the_United_Kingdom

>>66883005
Some railways, along with the canals have stuck around
Horses have made a big comeback, but would terrain generally be in a state for 50s cars to work?
The few surviving tracked vehicles would handle rough terrain better

>>66884093
The Clans of the Great Glen are able to keep the Caledonian Canal operational. The whole stretch has been surprisingly resilient against the Zone and time.
The fact that the Canal is frequented by Nessie has also made it the safest waterways in the Isles, due to Nessie being quite effective at driving away other beasts.

>>66884586
How do they keep nessie from eating the boats though?

>>66884651
The prevailing theory is that it considers the Clans of the Great Glen to be under its protection, and the Clans (for the most part) return this favor by helping fight Water beasts and letting it through the canal. It has thus become beneficial for both parties to keep the other around.

Nessie’s intelligence is a bit up for debate, much like other Great Beasts. It knows that humans of the Glen are beneficial to it, but nobody has been able to approach it to see if it really knows why.

>>66885074
Well that’s better for them than Nessie coming up to kill them all

>>66885595
Not every beast is automatically hostile. While it’s true they’re aggressive, they are mostly just animals looking for food and territory.

The great beasts like Nessie and the Dragons are different. They have already claimed an area and go about their own desires without much care for anything not a threat.
Nessie doesn’t see humans as a threat. May God help anybody she does.

>>66885074
>>66885595
Nessie has some sort of connection to a young looking lady seen in and about the loch and other bodies of deep water. Is called, among other things, Nimue. People aren't qite sure if she's a Zone creature, an altered human or something else. What is known is that she can heal mortal seeming wounds and make people drown on dry land.

She seems to speak a language not unlike Welsh.

>>66850302
It kind of depends on what sort of alchemy is going on in The Zones. It's possible that potatoes native to the contaminated places aren't safe for agriculture.

>>66887241
We started to look at some chemicals or drugs derived from zone-plants, we could do that some more
Most stuff from those would just be plain unsafe to consume, but some have potentially useful properties

>>66888096
The environment of the London Swamp is ideal for a great many herbs. After so long, many plants have become tainted in one way or another.
Most of the time, this taint is high amounts of radiation. However, for one plant this is due to the plants ability to effectively absorb and store the radiation. A plant known as Rad-vine thrives in the London Swamp. A poultice made from it can sooth all but the worst radiation burns. The most effective use was recorded by a Turing Monk when it was used to save a man who had maxed out their Geiger counter.

The effectiveness of the plant has proved quite useful for the companions of Rad-wizards, of course.

>>66888468
Captured Changed have also been covered with this substance as a way to attempt to suppress their abilities, though this can also cause extreme pain to the subject

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Thoughts on this tangentially related map?

>>66889187
It’s a cool map, seems a tad wetter than normal for the isles
I don’t think we’ve had any kind of major changes to the land like that, aside from any distortions caused by zones, or stuff like the great London swamp
Speaking of maps, I still think it would be neat to do some smaller scale maps made out of old ordnance survey maps, as those could become a valuable commodity in the isles
I even found a load of old 50s era ordnance survey maps, would just be a matter of those stitched together depending on map size, with important features and such over the top

>>66889187
>Rule Britannia x Under the Sea - Remix 2100 new

>>66889187
Cool, but I don’t see any way it would be able to relate to the world we’ve built. Too much water.

Need to sleep, but let’s try to keep this going
Will try to do a little more with mercenaries next tomorrow

>>66842550
Gas masks are common equipment to be given for knights and Gleaners venturing into the zone. They are very useful in reducing exposure to radiation and any residual toxins.

However, I have to ash, Who makes the filters? Not just anybody can produce them with a quality greater than “Crude”.

>>66886104
Both “King Arthurs” has rewards out for somehow finding her. They want their sword back.

>>66890565
That’s actually a rumor. The reward for the woman is real, it’s the sword that’s the rumor. One has a sword, the Other has Merlin.

It’s likely the players will find that the Arthur’s are trying to get her to legitimize them in one way or another.

>>66889187
7.6/10, too much water

>>66889187
I don't think that the sea level had changed in this AU.

>>66888468
>companions of Rad-wizards
I thought there was one sane Rad-Wizard, Merlin, and otherwise they were basically feral ghouls with the ability to cast magic missile and kill you with their own radioactivity if you got too near one.

>>66893276
They’re all rather unstable and disfigured, but the turning into a flaming mindless madman comes later
Succumbing to the curse seems to be an inevitability for Changed, but for some it may happen quickly, whilst it may lay dormant for a great length of time
The lucky die before the curse takes hold
Some cautions can be taken to slow the oncoming damnation

>>66894090
>>66893276
Merlin however, may have shown himself to so far be immune to the curse

>>66870949
>no Jews or blacks
>but Irish potato niggers are fine

>>66890612
Yeah, seems like Caerleon’s Arthur has a fancy zone-metal sword that must be new-age stuff, artillery and some good cavalry along with more support due to all the crusades
The Arthur beginning to emerge in Kernow has Merlin with him, and assumedly less manpower and such, but access to lots of the high value artefacts and oddities that Kernow is famed for

>>66890402
That’s probably another field covered by groups like the Order of Saint Turing and Foundry of Man for the best ones, and lesser groups like Stenners and such for passable ones
We could come up with some new groups focussed around other commodities like these, since the stenners and such were focussed on guns

is ireland okay? also is there any lore one france?

>>66895456
Ireland is almost completely consumed by a layer of Paranoia that makes long-term inhabitation impossible. It also has the serpentine Fomorians.

France has a lost of ghosts and paranormal happenings. You can see the Eiffel Tower at almost any point, and it’s lights lure you to Paris.

>>66894105
>>66893276
>>66894090
is Rad Merlin going to turn into a tumor tree later?

>>66895491
>That France description
reminds me of https://youtu.be/iF9uvk0x4_w and brings up images of courts of specters and balls of shades

>>66895456
It’s home to the Order of Saint Turing, who strive to understand mathematics, the language of god through massive number crunching machines, along with the Theocracy of Cork
There is still some empty space in Ireland for any other groups
As has been said, paranoia grips the island, especially around the zones
>>66895492
He’s been incredibly stable so far for what he is, but the most vigorous acceleration to degradation comes from using massive power
>>66895512
Yeah, whilst a fighting retreat was fought through France people became so desperate as to nuke Paris
What emerged from the destruction was an ethereal city of lights
Don’t look at the lights

>>66895589
Paranoia is understandable when you take into account the number of face-stealers, changelings and other such things. The worst is the Taker of Names considering the power that names can have in the wrong hands. Keep your name safe.

Paranoia is, in fact, not paranoia because there is a very real chance that the people you don't know really are out to get you and there is a very real chance that the people you know actually aren't the people you know.

>>66895965
Are you sure you’re not just being a little paranoid friend?
Jokes aside, the paranoia is still real, but for all the trouble it can cause, it is useful in the thick Irish fog, where folks are disappearing in the night and strange hooded figures have been seen lurking in the mist

>>66890402
>Whilst Stenners and Stirling Circles can provide adequate firearms, resources such as good quality filters are more reliably acquired from groups dedicated to these survival supplies
Another valued commodity are old-age ordnance survey maps, showing the lay of the old world and ideally having changes to this copied over by explorers

te: france, there's also french werewolves, who are apparently employed as mercenaries kn britain. whether they're actually french and just swim over, or are merely from Petit France, or survivors who came from Dunkirk 2 - The Dunkirking and are still around has yet to be detailed, as has exactly how they're werewolves.
I will work on this.

>>66896909
How do the werewolves work? I don’t see them being able to transform, unless it’s an adaptation to the radiation of the zone.
I think it would work best if they looked like 1941’s Wolfman instead of anything more bestial.

>>66897438
don't know desu, they were someone else's concept, but after googling, they are definitely more bestial than whatever the fuck that was supposed to be, sorry anon, but a frenchman with hypertrichosis is not what i picture a scary gallic werewolf as.
Think Beast of Gevaudan.

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>>66895589
>the Order of Saint Turing, who strive to understand mathematics, the language of god through massive number crunching machines
Also Norman Borlaug-style techno-optimism as a religion. Technology once led to the greatest increase in human living standards, until sinners misused it and destroyed the Old World. And the radical turingists who are the same thing, but with wicker men deamon engines and half-machine monstrosity "knights"

>>66895492
Probably. Which is a catastrophe in the making for his faction, seeing as he’s singlehandedly most of Arthur’s defence policy against an otherwise superior foe.
>plot book, find a cure-all and hope it’ll work for rad-wizardry corruption. Specifically, the grail.

>>66897535
I think the idea for were-francs was pretty standard as far as they go, with some small groups of uninflected french mercs smuggling an afflicted comrade behind enemy lines the day before they turn, and then trying to smuggle them back out after the damage is done

>>66897698
Sounds good
The Turingists are after their “holy grail” of the transistor somewhere within London, and Kernow Arthur wanting a zone-artefact that can cure the most terrible afflictions
Maybe it’s deep within a zone in the isles, or even across the channel in the ruins of France

>>66897569
Sounds good, though aren’t the knights a feature of all Turingism? The few deemed worthy of bearing the monks’ supply of old-age weapons
It just happens that the radicalists have made them quite a bit scarier

So what sort of stuff can some Changed be capable of, aside from more blunt things like blasting radiation at people, or that crude telepathy?

>>66899776
>Some Changed have shown a proficiency in calming or appeasing the violent spirits that haunt some zones
>This has provided another reason for Changed to be taken on expeditions into zones, if one can be found and the team are willing to work around one

>>66900356
There are a few mercenary groups who make use of the Changed in their ranks. There have been Intelligent Giants, Sane Rad-Wizards, and once even a penitent Fomorian to join a group of men.

>>66899776
Very rarely they can make machinery run that should, by all rights, be entirely non-functional, e.g. planes that are missing engines.

I think somebody did a really nice write up in one of the first two threads about that, at least.

>>66898689
Regular turingist knights are the respected heroes of their monasteries. Radical turingist “knights” are inhuman things constructed of corpses, old-world machinery and Zone-sorcery.

>>66901186
This is a trait of the Changed from France, where they basically summon the ghost of what the machine once was.

>>66901071
>A major example of the hiring of Changed as mercenaries has been Lancashire’s recruitment of the collection of Changed that congregate in the zone around Bath
> They are currently being used to try and counter Yorkshire’s Men of Stirling raids through zones, with hope that Changed ones’ knowledge and power within a zone will let them pursue the guerrillas where normal men cannot
SAS fighting wizards in a radioactive hellhole

>>66901211
>Knights are only called upon for dangerous tasks deserving of their might
>From leading teams to recover ancient treasures of the old-age to fending off attacks on the monasteries, they are a force to be reckoned with, normally armed with fine protection and terrifying old-age weapons

>>66901186
This power can be useful within zone expeditions for all number of purposes, such as restoring power to ruined buildings
Rarely a Changed One does not even need a generator, and can summon electricity from their very being and the radiation around them, though Brian is hardly safe for anyone involved

>>66879672
Or when you get attacked by raiders who haven't been born yet.

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>>66895589
>What emerged from the destruction was an ethereal city of lights
>Don’t look at the lights
From a distance, Paris looks like it did before the war, an intact city illuminated by ancient electrical lighting. Anyone who gets close enough to actually see what's going on never comes back. Some cultists think it's a stable time portal to before the war. They are wrong.

>>66904368
The Anglerfish is a great allegory for that city. It lures you in and entraps you, but it’s unknown what set the trap.
Is it some unknown beast? The collective despair of the spirits? Some of the zone gaining sentience?
It is one of the great mysteries of the European Zone.

>>66842550
In a previous thread numbers stations were discussed by me briefly, I came up with a bit more specific stuff than before, and what the messages actually say, for those that have discernable dialog, not all of them do.

>House of Laughs - Each barely discernable fragment of dialog is a cartoon character saying either just one number between 0 and 9 and including both 0 and 9, or a letter from A to G. The number/letter combinations tell the meaning.

>The somber house - crinkling foil, barking seals, "Somber is the house the lord provideth for the dead, but even from there I shall praise him." KABOOM!* 18.5 seconds of silence, then a repeat.

* - It is unclear if the kaboom is actually part of the message or if it was simply accidentally sent along with the initial message and repeated by the repeats.

>Strangers Calling - "Tell scarlet I don't give a damn." ; "I thought that beauty would satisfy, but the soul is gone." ; "Go! And never darken my towels again." ; "We'll always have paris." ; "They abide, and endure."

>The Poacher - "Oh, 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year." ; "We called into a neighbour's house, and sold her for a crown." ; "Bad luck to every gamekeeper that will not sell his deer." ; "We plopped her into my bag, my boys, and through the woods did steer."


>Gypsy Dame - "Everything you see I owe to spaghetti." ; "A gentleman is simply a patient wolf." ; "Enemies are so stimulating." ; "Elegance is the only beauty that never fades." ; "Please don't interrupt me while I'm ignoring you."

>The Night Caller - "Would you like jam with your scone?" ; "The telephone is ringing." ; "Ah yes, the old tire swing." ; "Same as usual, beans, biscuits, bullets." ; "1 potato 2 potato 3 potato 4, kick that old man out his own front door." ; "Smelter weight 27." ; "B, I, N, G, O!" ; "The Siberian larch is, as you might guess, native to Siberia."

>>66904714
And just for good measure, have one more.

>Message Message - Broadcasting from somewhere off the north-coast of france. A text-to-speech voice with a French accent says "Message Electronique, Message Electronique" 4 times, with exactly 7.3 seconds of time between each, followed by a text to speech voice saying 5 random double digit numbers followed by 2 random letters between Q and Z and including Q and Z, usually followed by a 'serene waves hitting a beach' sound and 2 short pipe organ notes.

>>66904714
I know that many of the Numbers stations have no known origin, but There are definitely a few used by mercenary bands to relay messages that cannot be heard by their opponents.

Out of the ones listed, I would say Stanger Calling, The Poacher, and The Night Caller are used by mercenaries.

>>66905069
Hmm I like that idea but as I recall some of the stations are physically within the zones themselves, or very close to the zone boundaries, some also have absolutely no functional tech whatsoever and are somehow continuing to broadcast. Some are also designed to be unmanned.

All that being said, HAM radios existed at the time most likely, so they could still use radio signal to communicate with each other.

I left the meanings of the messages out because I like it to be very unclear what the meaning is, but question; what do you think The Somber House's message actually means?

>>66905150
I had the thought that the Somber House message was meant to be a 'A missile is going to hit us, there is nothing we can do' boom a few seconds later, type message. But that seems very mundane. Somber House's originating location is definitely known, it is broadcast from Independence Fjord, Greenland.

>>66905150
It is true that a many of those stations are products of the zone. That’s why specified only those three stations as being used.
After all, long range communication can turn the tides of a battle, if not a war.

>>66905238
As mundane as that explanation is, it has a suitably tragic tone.
The big mystery is why it continues to broadcast after the missile hit.

>>66905279
Very true, and certainly a suitably armed and provisioned force might control a numbers station for a potentially indefinite period, they are not that big, though the specific number of rooms is classified, as far as I know.

>>66905302
In that case the mystery kaboom that you hear in the message might be the missile hitting and exploding. I find that terribly spooky. Think of it for a moment, peoples last moments encapsulated in a coded message, repeating endlessly.

>>66895589
A region of Ireland is inhabited by Paleo-Men, these beings a roughly even mix of stone age Neanderthal and stone age Homo Sapien. Both are hostile to the zone, though its by the zone that they came to our time period, some tribes are friendly towards modern humans.

>>66905787
Sorry, but the Fomorians take up the “almost human” niche in Ireland.
Though the main problem is that it would be impossible to designate them as paleo-humans instead of simply humans going tribal.

>>66905901
That's fair. Perhaps tribals are found somewhere else then.

Do you know the artist John Duncan? He painted a picture called 'The Fomorians, or the powers of evil abroad in the world'. They look like rad mutants there.

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>>66905923
You mean this one, I believe?

While these are good examples, the ones currently in Ireland have more snake-like appearances, in reference to how snakes were once driven from the Isle but now return.

>>66906046
Yeah that one. The hooded figure on a white horse is Balor. Duncan's work was very celtic revival in theme, it might be interesting, even if it's only tangentially related to this thread's topic.

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>>66906064
Balor?
Interesting, I though they were giant even among the Fomorian.

Though honestly I think this is my favorite design of them, even if it’s completely different from the others (and most likely wrong)

Still, a great example of how grotesque the Zone can get.

>>66906046
That is a nice one for some of the mutants wandering the isles
Ireland certainly has some more snakey creatures around, but also other stuff like those giants in Dublin

>>66906381
Some source describes balor as wearing a cape over himself so that his eye didn't kill his own people, I'm not familiar with Duncan's specific inspiration for the picture. I do know that it was painted in or around 1912.

>>66904714
Here's a spooky as hell thought, the somber house's 'crinkling foil' is Geiger counters going insane and 'seals barking' is seals abandoning all posts to diveski-diveski-diveski into the sea as a visibly obvious missile flew down and blew up (the mystery kaboom).

But this is most likely something only a storyteller should know, players should have no idea what the messages mean or why they are being sent unless it's part of the storyline.

>>66906404
I think the fomors that are with Balor are all related to him (which is why they are with him, I would guess). It's been an age and a half since I read the accounts of the battles. The fomors in the picture I mean.

>>66906046
That's a great pic

There's rumours of a small new mystery island of the western coast of Ireland. The Icelandic avoid it.

Guys, will you put up a 1d4chan page? Stuff seems great but I really would like a concise summary. Would love to use the setting and ask a few questions about it if you're up for it.

>>66909547
There isn’t a 1d4chan page yet, but there is a google docs:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cDqaDJykx2hYP3gO3wNrknAajH5yyWKePk47ZFdkKqw/edit?usp=drivesdk

>>66909547
As >>66909935 said there’s the doc, but we should put a 1d4 page together

>>66909487
This island gives all who approach it an unnatural compulsion to turn back and leave
The question is what’s on the island

>>66910461
Wait, there’s something weird going on, even by Zone standards.
The only new land was Dogerland, and that Island appeared to the East of Britain. But it has the exact same effect!
Is that island moving?

>>66910695
Is the island moving, or swimming?

>>66910695
Dogerland and whatever the fuck is west of Ireland are two separate things. Dogerland is about the size of Northern Ireland.

The thing out west is about half the size of the Isle of Arran.

Dogerland is inhabited, this other island doesn't seem to be and nobody wants to check.

>>66906414
Radiation shielding?

>>66910850
So it’s constantly blasting terrible radiation wherever it looks?

>>66911579
That would fit well with the legend.

>In several old-age cities, whilst the area around the settlement has been kept clear, far fewer eyes have turn to the scuttling in the sewers and tunnels below

>>66911579
That fits well with the legend, in the legend, Balor kills by simply -looking- at you. Literally all he has to do is open his eye and observe you, (note that this is not a gaze attack, you do not have to meet his glance for this to happen) and you get scald, crisp, wither, spew smoke out your mouth, get covered in giant bursting open blisters, shit a massive blast of shit, vomit black fluids, and then keel over dead, all of this happens in less than 5 minutes, and it happens to everyone within a radius of sight cone.

>>66913015
Morlocks, hairy brutes with large yellow eyes which range in length from 5 to 8 feet, move about on all fours in some surviving underground locations. They have five fingers on each hand and six short stubby toes, their bodies are very dark purple, with gold-yellow to red/gold mix tone hairs each about 5 inches long. Morlocks have teeth similar to a baboons, their canines are much bigger than a humans, and their block teeth are significantly bigger, and stronger, than humans.

Despite moving about on all 4s, Morlocks use their two forelimbs to do several things, including; use simple tools, use simple weapons, climb, throw, punch, slap, grip, twist, crush, and build. Morlocks build very simple structures that are usually 1 room enclosures built from whatever is found.

On occasion, Morlocks have been seen doing very simple routine maintenance on things, such as tightening bolts on pipes, applying greases to moving parts, using nails and scraps to place patches, and pouring fluids into containers.

It is very unclear how smart Morlocks are, though very simple tools such as handsaws, wrenches, and hammers have been found in so called 'tomb' enclosures.

Essentially a tomb enclosure is the little 1 room enclosure Morlocks make but the door area has been blocked off or otherwise sealed, with the deceased body and a few simple belongings inside.

>>66889187
So... your average English summer then? I'll pack the wellies, you pack the tellies.

>>66913474
Nice stuff
There probably aren’t many treasures down in the sewers, but they need to be kept sealed off or ideally clear if you don’t want a Morlock breakout inside a settlement

>>66914537
Actually, I think the sewers under the London Swamp is the lair of the Dragon living there.
That would explain why something so large is still and to hide so effectively.

>>66915830
Oh yeah, much of the Great London Swamp is in its domain, but there must be some other sewers out there, underneath human-occupied cities filled with Morlocks

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>>66913474
The largest concentration of Morlocks is in Switzerland, or at least the largest number that have been encountered, fuck knows how far those tunnels go. It might just be that the underground kingdoms of Switzerland are invading their realm so they are more commonly encountered.

On the subject of which Vaduz Castle is Liechtenstein is still inhabited. Sort of. Not sure what is happening there, it’s possible everyone inside is dead, there are 81 soldiers and other staff in there all wearing uniforms of that nation form ~1910 and one man in an Italian uniform. They claim to be the last remnant of the Holy Roman Empire despite it having been dead a century before those uniforms were adopted and fly a banner with a double headed eagle above the battlements.

They seem to be reliving the same day over and over again, sort of. They are aware of it and if it ever bothered them they have come to accept it. You can stay there if you ask, are polite, accept the authority of the Holy Roman Empire and don’t try and change anything too much. They protect the land for a few miles around the castle and those that dwell on it. Sometimes one of them dies but they seem to reappear after a few weeks, they are aware that they have died but it doesn’t bother them and they don’t consider it odd anymore as they have all died many times.

>>66889187
Better to just say that a global nuclear winter prevented this map from occurring, so we can have an easier time of world building with real world locations already established in the lore as well as existing themes(right word?) that are not about naval action.

>>66916649
There weren’t too many nukes detonated though, most zones seem to have come about “naturally” save for a dozen nukes mainly across europe

>>66916775
Didn't America and western Russia get nuked to hell?

>>66917493
Not Nuked to Hell. They did get the brunt, with Europe being a close Second, but it was the Zone and fighting the Zone that caused them to completely collapse into hell.

>>66916324
Sounds like it would make a decent safe spot for anyone mad enough to wander the surface in Switzerland

File: A Wizard Abroad by Diane Duane.pdf (405 KB, PDF)

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>>66906414
>>66910850
>>66911579
>>66912047
>>66913338
>"The legend says that anything that the Lone One in Balor's form beheld with his eye open, burst straightway into fire and fell as ash, and poisoned the ground for leagues around, so that nothing would grow there, and men who walked that ground died."
>"Sounds like something nuclear," Nita said.
>"So it might have been," Mrs Smyth said. "The Lone One has never minded using natural phenomena for Its own ends."

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>>66906414
>>66910850
>>66911579
>>66912047
>>66913338
>>66918969
Could tie in with the earlier idea of Balor living beneath Dublins harbor.
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/66255181/#p66272942
Powerful as he is, he needs the water to dissipate heat and keep him from melting down like a nuclear reactor.
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/44496286/#p44496550
>Reactorscamps flitter from one pile of mechanical offal to another in the hopes of finding precious cooling rods needed to keep its nuclear core stable. Those that are nearing the end of their cycle are easily identified with incredibly visible heat signatures and the signs of their eventual self combustion

>Docile ones in the beginning, nothing more than background NPCS for flavor. The further away from the scrapheaps and their easily dug-through riches they'll get more and more feral until the point where you're running from a pack of them that intentional rip the cooling rods from weaker members and use them as unwilling suicide bombers.

>>66918969
Wow. Very appropriate.

Balor is the world's greatest rad-wizard, unstoppably, terribly powerful and mutated beyond human recognition, limited only by his need for coolant, keeping him permanently submerged in frigid atlantic seawater to avoid a meltdown rather than leading his fomorian armies in person.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OrcusOnHisThrone
>>66895492
>>66897698
>>66898057
Merlin isn't the only one seeking the Grail and its power to cure the side effects of rad-wizardry. If Balor gets his hands on it first, he'll be unstoppable.

>>66919932
Nice, we’ve got a grail race going
Wonder if anyone else would also be on the grail trail, seeing it’s healing properties and assumed value?

>>66920538
Wait, there is a Grail Race, and the Basis for the “Death Road to Cornwall” is that Kernow has discovered a Zone artifact of value to the Isle of Man.
But nobody has specified what exactly that artifact is. While it’s unlikely that it’s the Grail Itself, it could be the beginning of the trail.

>>66920637
It was said that the artefact attracted sea beasts intensely, but if Kernow Arthur wants it for Merlin, why is it now being sold to the Foundry of Man? Perhaps an unaligned lord selling an artefact as usual, but that would mean the party delivering it would be chased after by other Kernow people for Arthur?

>>66920702
>It was said that the artefact attracted sea beasts intensely
Balor IS a "sea beast". He may have been BORN human, but after centuries of rad-wizardry mutations, he sure isn't one any longer.

>>66920702
The path would also take it Through Caerleon, where the other Arthur lives.
So while the artifact likely isn’t the trail itself, the fact that the Isle of Man is sending a small team (players) for it would make it seem that they’re trying to slip something under these two King’s noses.

>>66920812
He is true Fomorian now.
Mostly he’s in conflict with the Turingists, but it seems to be that their aim is the ports they protect.
There is also the Paranoia of Ireland, so that cannot have done their minds good.

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>>66920885
>He is true Fomorian now.
He's the original Fomorian. He made the others. Human slaves just kept dying from his magnificence and radiation exposure in his presence.

So whilst the artefact being taken to Foundry of Man territory may not be the grail, they are trying to be subtle about it, and Balor still wants to make sure he’s not letting the grail slip away
So what could it be that the other Arthur at Caerleon may interfere should he find out?

>>66921202
If they knew, both Arthur’s would try to stop it. The players in the Rose War would then want it because if Arthur wants it it must be powerful, and the Monks of Turing would try and protect it.
Though the Monks of Turing and Isle of Man might be working together since the Foundry of Man is the most heavily armed and protected place in the Isles, bar Sealand.

>>66921321
Id say that the Order and Foundry of Man are not great military powers
They’re both wealthy with their own specialities, and typically able to hire mercenaries as needed, but themselves aren’t too powerful, though they still have very capable troops in terms of Knights of the Faith, they are not exactly numerous enough for tasks aside from defending monasteries and leading recovery teams

>>66921321
>>66921321
Id say that the Order and Foundry of Man are not great military powers
They’re both wealthy with their own specialities, and typically able to hire mercenaries as needed, but themselves aren’t too powerful, though they still have very capable troops in terms of Knights of the Faith, they are not exactly numerous enough for tasks aside from defending monasteries and leading recovery teams

>>66921375
>>66921385
Well, something went a bit odd there

So the actual grail is hidden deep within a dangerous zone?
Perhaps one in the Death Road to Cornwall, seeing how London already has multiple hooks for stuff
A big hunt between Balor, Arthur of Kernow and any other opportunistic treasure hunters
Need to get some sleep, let’s try and keep this going

>>66921760
The one in the Death Road isn’t the actual Grail, but it is the start to the trail.

>>66921321
>The players in the Rose War would then want it because if Arthur wants it it must be powerful
Or just to sell it to him. Maybe he's made it clear that whatever faction delivers him the grail gets his alliance and military assistance?

>>66921385
The order and aisle of Man may exactly be military powerhouses, but the Turingists are quite influential as a religious sect and preservers of knowledge, and the Foundry is the most industrialized land and have trade pacts with just about every kingdom of the British Isles.
These kingdoms have found it mutually beneficial to support each other, and have essentially set themselves up in the politics of the land so that anyone who attacks them will basically result in war from every other kingdom of the British Isles.

>>66918357
Yes. Just don't come out with shit like
>Holy
>Roman
>Empire

>>66923234
Germany is nothing but a Zonal radioactive hellscape, so no worries there.
And there are no “nazi remnants” either. They all fell into a suicidal spiral when they realized the radiation had destroyed their “genetic purity”.

>>66923683
Eh, nah, that's boring. The main Nazi cities were destroyed of course, world war 2 happened already, but some made it to New Swabia Base Antarctica, some made it to New Bavaria base Svalbard, and some made it to New Munich base, Micronesia.

All three of these bases altogether holds about 500 people, at best. Some most likely went the historic route and escaped via the rat line, too, but they went to Uruguay, not Argentina.

>>66920885
Very briefly in passing it was mentioned that Vigilant Ones, beings who do nothing but wait for a sign to invade the british isles, are found in the seas around the isles. Despite being tall enough that they are standing in place in the sea and not swimming, a significant portion of their body is above water, and they don't seem to require any form of food or water intake to survive.

I'm wondering now if Balor either knows something about them, or is related in some way to them.

The vigilant beings will one day approach the isles, exit the sea, and most likely destroy literally everyone (including zone minions and other evil antagonistical things), but as yet they never so much as even move, only watch and wait.

They're mostly your usual extremely bizarre tentacles everywhere sanity-damager type beings, except they don't actually damage your sanity to look at.

The thought came to me that the vigilant ones were balors closest most skilled students, and the sign they are waiting for is Balor surfacing from the waters for the big fracas at the end of things.

Who was Balor, back when he was human? He's the first and most powerful rad-wizard, but he wasn't always one.

>>66922934
They could, though for the two nations fighting the second war of the roses, Arthur in Caerleon (and Kernow, it’s just that ones not as well known) could present a threat to their claims to the Royal bloodline

>>66924451
I’m not sure who specifically, but that has left me wondering about what happened to some major figures of the time during the fall, we’ve had some like Stirling going on to lead the mercs named after him, but not many overall

>>66924424
That sounds pretty dangerous, but at least they’re waiting for Balor to surface
That does turn Balor surfacing from something incredibly dangerous to downright world ending

>>66924451
Nobody knows. The Paranoia in Ireland didn’t allow anybody to stick around to see the sights.

>>66920538
The Grail is a universal panacea. Everyone wants it. But in particular...
>Dumnonia's Arthur. If he gets it, Merlin can cast as much magic as he likes without negative side effects and win the conflict with Caerleon's Arthur.
>Caerleon's Arthur. If the Grail is denied to Dumnonia's Arthur for long enough, Merlin will die or mutate into uselessness.
>Balor. As-is, he needs to stay underwater to avoid melting down like a nuclear reactor. The grail can fix this and let him lead his armies in person.
>Radical turingists. The survival rate for being turned into one of their monstrous constructions of flesh, old-tech detritus and zone-sorcery is a lot lower than they'd like. With a universal cure-all, they could manufacture basically unlimited numbers of their most powerful troops and win everything.

>>66921051
>pic related
What a bunch of crap. What if they are born with an instinctive need to do evil aka they are aggressive, ill-tempered and cruel? Quad Y chromosomes or equivalent? Like some animals, literally run on a program, not just because the social structure of their packs mandated such behavior if you wanted to survive but because race progenitor (deity power or whatever) specifically selected for those traits while creating/breeding them? Nature is as much in play, if not more, as is nurture and in some cases cannot be overruled. And if you choose to change that nature, you're no longer dealing with orcs but with a post-orc variant of your own.

>>66927472
Merlin shouldn’t be an insta-win, but still a major factor

>>66927472
One twist I would like to see is that the Holy Grail is actually Holy and Good.
I say “twist” because most of the time I see “artifacts of good” in anything, some horrible person is trying (or succeeding) to use it. The only time I’ve seen an artifact of good destroy its evil user was in Indian Jones with The Ark.

>>66928600
We haven’t really had anything “holy” like that so far, but we could do that
The holy grail thing was more just a name thusfar

>>66925886
WSC is worshipped as a saint/messiah figure and it's believed by some that his return will herald a complete restoration of civilisation.
I was originally going to put the queen on a boat but never got around to it.
>>66924339
>>66923683
No goddamned nazis. Jerry did go full mad science but well post-ww2. Germany was the battlefield for the ground fighting of the Red War, so what condition it was in even before things went completely to shit is unlikely to have been good.
The continent features
- The luminously-sanity destroying ruins of Paris (Don't look at the lights, they're not ours.)
- French werewolves deployed as area denial munitions on the appropriate phase of the moon. Source unknown.
- Swiss dwarves/vault dwellers fighting swiss goblins/mutants fighting demons of unspecified character.
- German robots, robot-zombies, the women who loved them and then whatever other mad shit they managed to put together before the end.
- Soviet flesh abominations made out of the vivisected bodies of ww2 German P.O.Ws.
- I tried to set the Soviets and Germans up as pre and post war opposites, Germany was robots, ranging from Metropolis to radio-controlled corpse, the USSR was flesh, the Party might glorify steel, but it would always spend bodies first, think tanks from L4D, STALKER mutants, etc.
- The Dutch. Goddamned fishmen. It isn't right and isn't natural to live on seabed, drained or not.

>>66929459
>- The luminously-sanity destroying ruins of Paris (Don't look at the lights, they're not ours.)
From a distance, Paris looks intact. This is impossible, given that it took a direct hit with an atomic bomb during the war and burned to the ground. Anyone who goes there never returns. No saving throws, no explanation of what happens to them.

Should we take another look at horse/cavalry related stuff in the isles? They would be the most reliable form of transportation since motor vehicles are so very rare and trains are few and limited to a small number of safe tracks

>>66927518
Evil is not aggression as it is not linked to higher thought. Lions are not evil, they just eat meat and as such need to kill to live because they are biologically incapable of doing otherwise. Evil is doing harm for the sake of doing harm or doing harm when a peaceful mutually beneficial way exists as both these things are linked to higher thought. If a person kills another person out of boredom, anger, greed, lust, etc that is evil as there was no need to commit the act outside of liking the act or deciding that others do not matter and the peaceful mutually beneficial ways of doing things can be ignored. Defining evil as "a conscious decision to violate peaceful social behaviour and do harm to others because one can" not only helps us distinguish between natural animal behaviour and crime but it also helps us explain passive crime. Using a a good reputation and legitimate business to defraud seniors of their life saving is evil. Attacking a stranger on the street because the act would be enjoyable is evil. Trying to destroy an other's social standing, reputation, relationships, and or livelihood because they are not one's favourite person is evil. Cheating on one's spouse is evil. Poisoning is evil.

>>66930174
heh. yes anon, i am aware of what the lore says about paris.
>>66931056
i think for 'umie vs 'umie we're looking at mounted riflemen mostly, maybe hussars and lancers in the early 20th century mode for scouting/pursuit.
Heavy cav are going to be a strictly monster whupping force because they're just too big a target on a bolt-action rifle battlefield.
One thing to note, no one is going to be pulling horse archer stuff off, the terrain just isn't there and even if it was, infantry missile weapons hard-counter mounted ones, because the foot are smaller targets with more stable firing positions.

>>66931246
Prevalence of older cavalry could depend on how common guns are in an area, and to what quality given some horse shenanigans that happened all the way into ww2
Mounted riflemen would be a valuable thing for those who can afford all of the horses, training and guns
I think Yorkshire had some, along with the USKS

So were most likely restricted to breeds of horse that were around in 50s Britain, the more common they are the more likely they would be to survive the world ending
I know the one good thing pre-Edward Yorkshire has was horses, but other groups will also be decent in that field

>>66929459
Basically the European continent is a hellscape and utter pain to navigate.
Would make for a good endgame quest where the party had to wander there for an extended period of time.

>>66931933
I think someone mentioned a potential idea of a party being shipwrecked on the coast of Denmark, and having to trek through hell to find rescue across the channel

Also joining a Kernow salvage party across the channel could work for more suicidal players

>>66934157
If the GM wants an overarching story, that salvaging party could be the party that finds the Arifact, which then leads to “Death Road to Cornwall”.

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>>66934434
An overarching story of epic scale could be setting the woeld right. Or at least righter.

The Zones and all the shit that came with them are the remnants of the Old Wolrd reaching forward in hate at the modern era. All the nasty things that have been left behing and remembered only ins stupid fairy stories told to children, all the primal fears of the unknown we thought that we had put to bed when we filled in the edges of the map. Humanity evolved to be predated on by better hunters, but they are all gone and so we had to make replacements and these things are they.

The mission of the Party is either coming to terms with this and going forth to make the Civilized world once mor recognize and accept barbarity or set forth into The Deep Zones and go Dragon Slaying to beat back the night for another age and and drag that shit down with you into what ever pit it crawled from.

>>66934766
So the turingist theological claim that the Zones are god’s punishment for destroying the ancient world in nuclear war rather than expanding into a a spacefaring civilisation is factually correct?

Maybe for the players at least the truth to this level should not be known
A lot of stuff has had confusion in whether this is magic or radiation/other means, or both

>>66935058
Possibly. The Turingists would claim it is and so it is true to them. All of the stories are true, at least for a given value of true.

>>66931246
An man that can get a good grouping of shots on another riding target form his Bren or EM-2 at a full gallop is surely galant and skilled at arms, but a sensible soldier will reach an advantageous position, dismount, take up a good bit of cover or a good perch, and fight from there before riding on.

>>66935058
No, religions aren’t about facts, it’s about thruths. It’s only as true as any religion is.
However their creed of “trying again but better this time” would be a good message for this world.

>>66935058
Well, there are other theories that the Zones came from stellar radiation, and interplanetary space would be one massive zone of cosmic scale

>>66916324
They sound like one of the places the "Prussian Nobility" funeral parlor androids would visit to demand support in their continuing stalemate with the Reds.
>>66923132
The same seems to go for their vagabond reject cousins the Stenners too, as any raider force, town, or kingdom that gets a reputation for antagonizing the Hedge Gunsmiths too pointedly is prone to see whatever rabble that contests their will in the area become much better armed.
>>66929459
I might have just dreamed the idea instead of actually posting it, but I was imagining a large force of the Red Army marched into the endless whiteout of the Siberian Zones to 'pacify' them following the nuclear strikes upon the areas. This was a separate force than the one that marched west to fight in the soviet satellites, and is likely the Great Red Army of post-fall folklore that is said to be making its slow return out of the endless cold, marching west again to cross the Ural Mountains.

>>66936432
Sounds good
Russia is rather distant, so word of it is incredibly scarce, and Russian weapons even more so, becoming invaluable one of a kind relics

>>66936013
>space is just a big Zone.
>there is no void only the Warp.

>>66935058
A t least the impression I got was that there is also an ingrained element of disgust in the US and USSR for the nuclear war, not just the more general "those responsible". I also got the impression that they were more British centric with The Empire as the host of the spark of civilization that created all innovation and would, had it not been disassembled, have lead humanity into a golden age among the stars.

Classic good and evil story with good being the British spirit of innovation as embodied by Turing and exemplified in the Empire, and evil being the backward, greedy, and self destructive savages of the US and USSR.

The bomb was the greatest and most vulgar creation of the savages, meant to make up for their lack of prowess in combat. Had they only rallied around submission to The Empire...

>>66937468
It might also help explain why the USKS is pretty isolated. They're viewed as Savage and borderline satanic in a certain sense.

>>66937468
However, it was the bombs that (maybe) first created the Zones, which lead to the short-lived technological boom. It was when those bombs were used against the Zone and it spread over the world that everything went to the crapper.

So the Turingists beliefs of why and how the world ended up the way it did are a bit nuanced and divisive. Less Good guys vs evil guys, more innovation vs destruction.

>>66936432
>I might have just dreamed the idea instead of actually posting it, but I was imagining a large force of the Red Army marched into the endless whiteout of the Siberian Zones to 'pacify' them following the nuclear strikes upon the areas. This was a separate force than the one that marched west to fight in the soviet satellites, and is likely the Great Red Army of post-fall folklore that is said to be making its slow return out of the endless cold, marching west again to cross the Ural Mountains.
Are they still human, or were they corrupted by the Siberian Zone's malignant influence?

>>66937645
The zones seem to have begun to surface before the bombs, but the bombs did create some terrible zones wherever they were dropped
Some sort of playing god could have caused the zones, but should we actually go there? It could be better to leave unknown, as people in the present day wouldn’t be able to find out by any reasonable means

Need to sleep, but let’s try to keep this going
Is there anything specific anyone has to suggest to receive some more attention tomorrow?

>>66926594
Try to imagine how dangerous it would be if balor was real and he surfaced, killed a really huge number of people died, but then, all the vigilant ones suddenly started moving in perfect unison, exiting the sea, then destroying everyone, then balor, then each other, then the very last most powerful one melting down and exploding.

That's the end of world scenario I imagined for the thread, and it only happens as part of the script and at the behest of the overarching plot of the whole world.

>>66938473
The reason for the Zones should be a big unknown that everybody has their own personal explanation for. It’s why the Turingists believe what they do and the Popes believe what they do.

You can go into the reasons for the start World War 3 as much as you want, though. I personally believe the dominoes stared with the Berlin Airlift being changed by a soviet trooper arming an anti-aircraft gun getting an itchy trigger finger.
It happened on a March morning of 1949. He fired upon a C-54 Skymaster and it crashed to the ground. It is still unknown why he fired, for the cannons weren’t even supposed to be loaded.
It was thought war would break out there and then, but the Soviets string this man out with claims that the peace-loving workers of the USSR would never have willingly caused such a needless act of destruction.
Peace lasted for a few years, with tensions being higher than ever. There were talks of a summit being held to reduce the tension, but it all fell apart when the Zones appeared around 1955.
They first appeared in Europe near the Iron curtain. It has been forgotten what those making the reports wrote down, but the leaders of the two nations believed that they were the result of some new weapon being used against their peoples. “Retaliatory Strikes” were quickly ordered.

>>66842550
Why don't we have a wiki backup of all the work so far?

>>66939204
Because nobody has made one yet.

>>66939204
>>66939296
Beyond 1d4chan, what sort of wiki would even work?

>>66939335
I think 1d4chan would be best.

>>66939075
The bombings were short lived when it became clear that the zones were not due to to any weapon and blocked the armies ability to initiate land invasions.
The top scientists of the world rushed to study the new phenomenon. People like Alan Turing and Albert Einstein tried to find an explanation and use for the discoveries made in the zone.
And what discoveries that were made. Metals unlike any other to aid in computers, plants and animals showing prowess that could benefit the world. A technological boom that lasted for about 5 years. It was one of the fastest times of advancement, but doomed to be short lived.
It all ended when the Zone began to expand and appear in multiple parts of the world. Nothin could stop it and Nukes only made it more dangerous. With 10 years the Zone had stabilized to encompass most of the world, with only a few areas still suitable for long term inhabitation. The US and USSR were almost completely consumed, and Europe proper having nowhere untouched. The British Isles stood as the least affected of the advanced world, but even its government fell from the strain and refugees.
Eight generations have passed since the War, and people have adapted and thrived. Kingdoms stand tall against the effects and beasts of the Zones. Zone metals are harvested, beasts are slain, and wars are fought. There is glory to be made in this land for the bold, so long as one is willing to face down whatever hardship this place decides to throw at them.

>>66938436
>Well they're Reds, I heard they are born soldier, driver and mechanists all into the Great Red Army, take up the guns, tools, and works of their elders that fell in the advancing march as they go on from the settled rear echelon to the war front, forming a machine of men, the Red Dragon that moves by tread and marching boot, heavy with armor and spiked with bayonet. But the tale among the Danes is such that the Red dragon first went east, and now comes back wizened but no less its ferocious self.
They are the Reds. Who can say.

>>66938436
>>66940466
They look like human beings, but possibly have some kind of collective mind. Either that or Death Korps of Krieg-level discipline and indifference to individuality and casualties.

>>66940466
>>66940589
it may even be some mix of the two, having achieved "true communism" out in the wilds of the Zone simply by necessity, far away in the hot white blizzards where euclidian space and linear causality are barely tenable. There are some stories of the scouts of their furthest vanguard falling in with the Horned Men and Danes, if ever they break through though the eastern lands of war and horror, so great is their need for company and mission.

File: War god, foe of Usr, god (...).jpg (9 KB, 230x252)

9 KB JPG

>>66937590
Note that they still insist to bear on their standards the five pointed star, just alike their so called foe, while the banner of the empire is the great eight pointed star, made twice of the cross.

>>66938436
>>66940466
>>66940589
>>66940846
The Reds do not speak almost themselves, or possibly at all. Somehow, they can coordinate without any apparent communication.

>>66941038
In some stories they scrawl Cyrillic messages on everything from guns to castles, or incomprehensible runes depending on the teller

>>66941038
That's interesting, pale Abhumans, a rare type of sorta-human, don't use speech either, or facial expressions. They are tall with large heads, pale cool skin, and red eyes, usually in areas where old world tech, or at least machinery, exists. They do communicate with each other some kind of way, but nobody really knows how.

You'll usually find groups of them in industrial and utilities buildings. Interestingly, they make nuclear material and sometimes leave sample size (1 gram) isotope bars under images of Turing. Again, no one really knows why.

Seeing how Britain was hesitant to use any nukes after the scorched earth across Europe, what could have led to the two or three detonations that did occur?
Cut off groups blowing themselves up as zone-beasts overran their last positions?

>>66943631
britain was less hesitant to use them than didn't want to use them on its own territory, if we wanted an other USKS plothook we could have the players discover the bombs that were used on UK soil were dropped by the USAAF.
Thing to note, when they nuked paris it was specifically using an older, obsolete, type of bomb, meaning the succeeding types went unused...and are thus still out there somewhere.

>>66944243
Sounds great, and like something that would set a lot of people against the USKS if it got out

>>66944243
The Paris bomb was from the second wave, after the tech boom from studying the zone.

Though the fact that not every bomb was used could be a non-issue since they are held in either the US or USSR. And nobody is going there anytime soon.

>>66941380
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trail_pheromone

Well need to archive this one and make a new thread soon

>>66945248
What should the prompt be?

>>66945340
Perhaps a closer look at some of the conflicts currently being fought, along with those yet to start

>>66945377
Archived.

NEW THREAD
>>66946028