[Raellus]

Here in Tucson, we've technically been in a drought since 1999. It rained today. I think people misunderstand what a drought really is. It's like the folks that deny that the planet is warming because there's a big blizzard one winter. They're missing the forest for the trees.

I've thought a bit about what a limited nuclear war would do to global weather patterns. Cold War scientists warned of a nuclear winter in the event of a full-scale geothermal nuclear war. Clouds of dust and smoke would block out the sun and the surface temperature of the planet would drop precipitously. In the event of a more limited, piecemeal nuclear war as described in the T2K backstory, a significant amount of dust and smoke would be tossed up, but much less than the planet-blanketing amounts that would be required to cause and sustain a nuclear winter. What if the amount of dust and smoke from the T2K exchanges was enough to allow sunlight in, but not to allow heat/reflected light to escape, accelerating the "Greenhouse Effect" by several factors? This could cause a drought like that described in HW.

I like to take the middle ground and envision a planet ravaged by weird weather- sort of demi Nuclear Winter/Greenhouse Effect hybrid. Large migrating dust clouds could cool the climate in some regions, interfering with long-established air and water currents. At the same time, certain other regions would be bathed in almost constant sunshine. Combine this with the climate-alterating effects of disrupted air and water currents (e.g. El Nino/La Nina flip-flopping or one or both stopping, etc.), and precipitation in said sunny regions could be severely curtailed. A severe two-year regional drought, therefore, wouldn't be at all out of the question. In my Pirates of the Vistula PbP, I've got winter coming early to Poland, with the first heavy snow fall occuring in first few days of October.

I hope that I haven't strayed too far off topic here. To get back to your main point, Web, I agree that recovery-oriented missions would be an interesting basis for a campaign.