T2000: After The War

[M-Type]

I know I posted an 'Interest Check' a few weeks ago, but the interest wasn't good enough on RPOL to make it a long-term thing. That brought up my next PBP project however, which actually hits the Twilight: 2000 nail on the head.

After the War is a 'setting' I thought up a few months ago when I started writing a 'novel' about a duo surviving in a world twenty years after the v1 history. Here's my 'official' pitch:

"It is 2017, twenty years after the Twilight War plunged the planet into chaos and turmoil. The fuel ran out. The troops mutinied. The cities, silenced by nuclear weapons, lay silent. There were those that survived, and they bided their time. The Earth would re-grow eventually, but the scars of the war cut deep.

Two decades have passed since the day of the nuclear holocaust, and a new generation has been born. One that only knows the pain and harsh realities of this changing world. With no vehicles, horses and foot are the common modes of travels. With no electricity, labor and wood are the easiest power sources. Farming has allowed for a stable production of crops, though limited. Cantonments and small bands of survivors have grown into enclaves boasting hundreds of souls. Children play on the wrecks of M1 Abrams tanks, while the adults hunt the dangerous urban ruins for needed supplies. Diseases long forgotten still claim lives like an assassin in the night. Trade with other communities might bring a prosperous union, or the malevolent hand of nomadic marauder bands, quenching their thirst for violence.

Whether you are a grizzled old soldier of the Third World War, or a plucky teenager that has adapted to this hostile landscape, or something in-between, we all must work together if we wish to survive...after the war."

This would be using the 1st edition of Twilight: 2000 (My first experience with T2k, and I got the box set), and the characters would be created using the civilian guidelines (even ex-soldiers. It has been 17 years after all, people get rusty). I do have the Twilight Encounters supplement, and would be willing to add the combat rules from that, especially since things like ammo counting are a bit easier when I can have them set in a specific thread or character sheet. The PCs would be based in an enclave, I haven't chosen a location yet, though I may go with Buffalo NY like in my writings, and would focus on them coping with the challenges of life in the post-WWIII America. Things have changed, and depending on the age the character is, they may still hold painful memories of the past, or hope for the future.

Vehicles and heavy weaponry are almost non-existent now, unless they've been taken cared of for the past 20 years. Most people move about with horses and use other forms of animal labor for basic needs. The larger cities of the US have been reduced to rubble by the events of TDM, and though the radiation has fallen off, it is still a tangible threat to those who dare to enter the ruins. Most buildings are in the same shape as vehicles, forgotten and dilapidated.

This is heavily motivated by Cormac McCarthy's The Road, which I'm sure many are familiar with, and the recent video game The Last of Us, though there will certainly be no zombies in this campaign. It will not be as depressing as The Road, at least initially, but who knows what could happen. I will be sticking pretty closely with the v1 chronology, though it'll be moved beyond it. I know GDW made the after-war timeline so it meshed with Traveller, but that was technically the 2.X edition, so I figure I'm in the clear designing this as I see fit. I also call shenanigans on the whole drought thing they talk about in Howling Wilderness, so while it is certainly a challenge to make sure you can feed your enclave, it's hardly the problem they were making it out to be.

The way I envision the campaign is a split between Planning/Adventure. Planning puts the PCs in the position to deal with problems and be administrators for the enclave, and this is more long term things. Adventure is pretty self explanatory, and will focus on the PCs going out and doing something, whether it be raiding a city or ambushing the local marauder convoy to prevent them from stealing their crops. The Adventure phase would certainly be influenced by things that happened in the Planning phase.

There are 2-3 people interested on RPOL itself, but I was wondering if there were any 'veterans' of T2k that wanted to play in a world after the one we're all used to. Feel free to chime in, even with ideas for things twenty years after the end.