Quote:
Originally Posted by Matt W
So you have the entire population of North America (outside KFS & Texas) as about 4 to 5 million?
To me, that seems pretty low. Some estimates put Roman Britain as having a population of 3 million - so it doesn't need a lot of space or high tech farming to create a decent-sized population. And I keep pointing out that MOST of the Encounter Groups have at least Tech Level C (1920's technology, and good but limited manufacturing).
The Modules are rarely specific about population of large areas. But, for example, 15 000 people live in the Ruins of Chicago. (7 000 in the "inner city" and 8 000 in surrounding farms).
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Yes, I posit a max of 10 million clustered in areas where energy and agriculture are much easier and winters gentler.
Roman Britain could well have had a population of three million, however they were born into that low tech agrarian existence. My point is that those skills are few in the survivors. The survivors can just as easily be truckers and janitors with no experience at all in growing food, let alone finding edible wild foods. Which is why I feel the population increase is a bell curve with few surviving the first two generations but, by the third agrarianism takes hold and more live to be adults.
As for Tech levels. That is an indicator of knowledge and repair ability. Even if they have a 1920s level of understanding doesn't mean it is all cars, wireless radio, gin joints, machine guns, and well dressed thugs. They just have a better understanding and ability to use stuff of a comparable level. There would not be the supplied raw materials and machinery to go big. Colleges and Universities may not be turning out anyone with skills if the place survived.