US Air Force Locations

[Olefin]

Originally Posted by kato13

I had a gaming group that was working with the 194th and the refinery.

Trying to figure out what to do with the myriad of refined products was an adventure (in research) in its own right.

There would be literally tons of asphalt and other slag elements similar to coal tar.

A huge majority of modern chemistry evolved out of finding uses for the "waste" products of coal and oil.

Just being able to produce items available in 1900 would be amazing. Aspirin, DDT, and several synthetic fertilizers fit that bill so they were given priority.

This campaign ended with out too many sessions (people went off to college), but I always considered it a interesting seed for those more on the rebuilding side of the spectrum of campaigns.

let alone all the fun involved in getting oil to the refinery - possibly setting up a barter system - so much oil delivered from wells you get X amount of trade goods or products from the refinery as pay

[kalos72]

I even tried to apply the 4th edition MP rules to the economy...haven't worked it all out yet.

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by kalos72

So in your game does the world die in 2000/2001? Cause if you follow HW to the letter like your implying everyone should, no one will be able to grow enough food to feed themselves in 2000/2001.

Of course not. The world in 2000/01 is on the ropes, a hairs breadth from the abyss but not gone yet. PCs actions can either give it that last shove, or help build something new and hopefully better. There's still a long way to fall though before it's hopeless, perhaps another 10-20% of the population to die world wide before stability and adaptation to the changed global conditions is reached.

HW deals with North America, specifically the US. This one small area is not the entire world. Other areas may have had their climate improved and wide scale migration to those areas will have to take place. Nobody can afford to presume what worked pre-war will work to keep them alive in the aftermath. HW actually states several areas are not absolutely cataclysmic. The Great Lakes region is still able to produce vast amounts of food, sufficient to help support the reduced population provided it can be distributed, or the people moved closer (and civil unrest kept under control). The Pacific North West is receiving torrential amounts of rainfall. It will take time to adapt to the climatic changes, but it's not the end of the world.

The Drought may not last more than a few short years - that's up to individual GMs to decide. The planet will heal itself, all the quicker given the drastically reduced pollution from humans.

[kalos72]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

Of course not. The world in 2000/01 is on the ropes, a hairs breadth from the abyss but not gone yet. PCs actions can either give it that last shove, or help build something new and hopefully better. There's still a long way to fall though before it's hopeless, perhaps another 10-20% of the population to die world wide before stability and adaptation to the changed global conditions is reached.

HW deals with North America, specifically the US. This one small area is not the entire world. Other areas may have had their climate improved and wide scale migration to those areas will have to take place. Nobody can afford to presume what worked pre-war will work to keep them alive in the aftermath.

So again, Germany is fine, no climate changes cause nothing was ever said about it. But the US with less tonnage and less war effects, is sent into a solar oven?

And I think your going off canon with this 10-20% number...

But my reference was as it relates to the US, since HW only really deals with the US. And what exactly is a group of PC's going to do to save the US at this point? There is no food, no water and the government is dieing off...the scale is too far out of proportion here.

[Legbreaker]

Climatic changes are really only starting to be felt when the game shifts focus from Europe. There was no real need to detail what was going on there, but GMs are certainly free to apply similar upheavals.

PCs can't do anything about the climate, that's far beyond the scope of the game. Only massive civil engineering projects will help there (new dams, railroads and other similar infrastructure). They can however be very effective as "trouble shooters", such as in Kidnapped where they're tasked to essentially clear the way for the Civgov relocation. Another example is Satellite Down where their recovery of the weather data will give the authorities a massive assist in planning how to deal with the next few years.

Failure in their mission(s) would help tip the world (or at least the world as far as they're concerned) over the brink.

[Olefin]

HW basically kills the game in NA - I think its one reason they switched to back to Europe modules - its one thing to play the game per the NYC, Texas, Allegheny Uprising Modules - its another to try to play a campaign where 3/4 of the surviving population is set to starve in the next six months battling like animals over what is left of the food while what remains of the government and military completely collapse - even at its worst Poland is a lot better off than what HW paints for the US

as for areas still producing food - they would be inundated under hordes of starving refugees - it would be like fighting a zombie horde in The Walking Dead or World War Z - and since they have nothing to lose because there isn't any food I highly doubt by the time it was all said and done there would be anything left of civilization to rebuild given the drought as painted in HW and Kidnapped

if I want to play a campaign in that kind of situation I will stick to Fallout

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by Olefin

even at its worst Poland is a lot better off than what HW paints for the US

Umm, not so. Look at Silesia and it's 97% casualty rate as per Black Madonna.
The rest of Poland isn't all that much better with 77% casualties (East Europe Sourcebook) and a LOT more radioactive craters.

[kalos72]

Well as for Poland, it received less then half the total hits at only 20% of the tonnage the US did and NONE of them were ground hits so residual radiation is not an issue.

So again, according to canon, Poland is safer and has a better change to survive then the US and HW pushes it over the top with the weather changes, that no other country is experiencing.

[Legbreaker]

That's Strategic warheads. It doesn't include the multitude of tactical warheads used by both sides.
Poland has been utterly thumped. It's also suffered hundreds of thousands of troops and vehicles thundering across the countryside destroying anything in their way. Poland is probably the most damaged region on the planet in 2000.

[kalos72]

But again, canon doesnt say that Poland is so dead no one can grow food like it points out in HW for the US. It doesnt even really count radiation as an ever constant concern...

So what your saying is partly assumption...extrapolating information from various data points to meet a conclusion. Not necessarily canon fact...

[Legbreaker]

The main problem the US has is water. If water could be supplied by rainfall or irrigation, many problems would be almost immediately solved (or at least when the harvest came in).
Yes there are other factors, but water really is the big one as illustrated in Kidnapped.
Howling Wilderness also reiterates this point in the description of the Great Lakes region - rainfall has fallen about half normal, but they're still able to grow significant amounts of food.
With the drastically reduced population (roughly half pre-war), total food production would be sufficient to feed the country, if only they could get it to rain! The first group that solves the water problem (or is lucky enough to occupy an area that receives decent and sustained rainfall) is going to have a huge advantage over the coming years. This is one of the reasons the information on the tapes in Satellite Down is so valuable.

[Olefin]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

Umm, not so. Look at Silesia and it's 97% casualty rate as per Black Madonna.
The rest of Poland isn't all that much better with 77% casualties (East Europe Sourcebook) and a LOT more radioactive craters.

The East Europe Sourcebook has a bunch of holes in it - not exactly the most reliable source of information - which has been discussed a lot as well.

And Silesia has an organized government and military, functional towns and some industry and grows enough food to not only feed itself but export some to Krakow - I will check my copy of Black Madonna but I don't remember a 97% casualty rate - maybe in the cities that got nuked

[kalos72]

Per HW regarding 2000/2001:
"and that the harvest, when it did come, would not feed a quarter of the surviving populace."

Thats pretty severe alright...not to mention the fact the government has no way to distribute all that food.

So we lose roughly 60% the first time around, and by 2000 another 75% of those survivors.

[Olefin]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

The main problem the US has is water. If water could be supplied by rainfall or irrigation, many problems would be almost immediately solved (or at least when the harvest came in).
Yes there are other factors, but water really is the big one as illustrated in Kidnapped.
Howling Wilderness also reiterates this point in the description of the Great Lakes region - rainfall has fallen about half normal, but they're still able to grow significant amounts of food.
With the drastically reduced population (roughly half pre-war), total food production would be sufficient to feed the country, if only they could get it to rain! The first group that solves the water problem (or is lucky enough to occupy an area that receives decent and sustained rainfall) is going to have a huge advantage over the coming years. This is one of the reasons the information on the tapes in Satellite Down is so valuable.

To have that kind of drought affect the whole country you would have to have had a much worse exchange than happened - you basically need to disrupt the Gulf Stream and the El Nino and the hurricane cycle - and if they had used that many nukes I doubt there would have been many survivors at all - especially since to disrupt the Gulf Stream on any large scale you basically would have to blow a bunch of holes straight thru Florida

and it would take several failed winters, not just one or two to drain lakes, ponds and especially rivers to where they couldn't be used for irrigation - and you can pull water out of them in multiple ways that have nothing to do with needing electrical power - if the Ancient Egyptians, Babylonians and Persians could do it so could a farmer in Nebraska or Virginia

especially with the loss already of half the population - that would have already reduced greatly the pressure on the water supply

the drought is basically a deux ex machina to kill off any chance of the US rising again in time to threaten the French hegemony from the 2300 game - one that anyone who can do math can see would reduce the US not just a howling wilderness but an almost totally depopulated one

simple math - 3/4 of the remaining population cant be fed and takes on the 1/4 that can be fed - and destroys basically all the remaining food and fields that make that food in the process - its called everyone dies - especially once the typhus epidemic from all those dead bodies lying around kills off anyone who actually survives all the fighting - starving people don't usually make good grave diggers

like I said if I want to play that game I will fire up Fallout or dig out my old copy of Aftermath

but I prefer to play Twilight as a military game that has fun aspects where you interact with whats left of civilization trying to rebuild - not fighting in the burning wreckage for the last can of beans left in Illinois or Iowa

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by Olefin

The East Europe Sourcebook has a bunch of holes in it - not exactly the most reliable source of information - which has been discussed a lot as well.

Is there a book you actually agree with? Seems like everything had holes in it according to you. Meanwhile many of us are happy to work with what we've got and make it work rather than continually attempt to pull it down.

Originally Posted by Olefin

And Silesia has an organized government and military, functional towns and some industry and grows enough food to not only feed itself but export some to Krakow - I will check my copy of Black Madonna but I don't remember a 97% casualty rate - maybe in the cities that got nuked

Barely functional and nothing like what remains elsewhere. Poland really has been bombed back to the middle ages and it's feudal/despotism systems.

Originally Posted by Black Madonna page 14

Spring of 1998 brought no relief. Those who survived the bombings, the invasion and the nuclear devastation were now struck by plague and famine. From a prewar population of 3,000,000, fewer than 100,000 survive, scattered throughout Silesia.

100,000 / 3,000,000 = 0.033333 remaining. Close enough to 97% casualties.

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by kalos72

So we lose roughly 60% the first time around, and by 2000 another 75% of those survivors.

In some areas yes. In other areas food is sufficient, if barely. Eventually the population will have shifted and the climate recovered enough to support the survivors. The challenge facing the various authorities is to ensure the maximum amount of people survive.

Yes, it's bleak, but there's certainly worse places on the planet, and at least it wasn't a MAD situation, or anything as bad as depicted in the films of the 70's and 80's such as "The Day After", "Threads", or "Testament".

[kalos72]

That Saving Davis Monthon write up lists the 1st and the 14th in MILGOV control, possibly in Colorado.

Do they make Air Force ORBATS that include nor "flight" units? Ill have to check the published 1996 ORBAT again...

[WallShadow]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

The main problem the US has is water. If water could be supplied by rainfall or irrigation, many problems would be almost immediately solved (or at least when the harvest came in).
Yes there are other factors, but water really is the big one as illustrated in Kidnapped.
Howling Wilderness also reiterates this point in the description of the Great Lakes region - rainfall has fallen about half normal, but they're still able to grow significant amounts of food.
With the drastically reduced population (roughly half pre-war), total food production would be sufficient to feed the country, if only they could get it to rain! The first group that solves the water problem (or is lucky enough to occupy an area that receives decent and sustained rainfall) is going to have a huge advantage over the coming years. This is one of the reasons the information on the tapes in Satellite Down is so valuable.

If one cannot make it rain, one must manufacture potable/irrigation water--from seawater. Desalination on a widespread, low-level basis could turn the tide (no pun intended) in getting water to crops, at least in the vicinity of tidal areas. New Jersey, whose sandy soils have historically been bountifully productive, would naturally benefit from multiple small and widely distributed desalination plants along its relatively close coast. With Ft. Dix in the north and Cape May Coast Guard base in the south, there are plenty of security personnel who would in turn be supplied by the crops and facilities they guard. And to tie it together, the Cold Fusion McGuffin would be the perfect small power source to drive the pumps for processing and distribution of useable water.

Slightly off-topic Note: the "Rock In Troubled Waters" article about South Jersey accurately relates the large correctional facilities in the southern part of the state: South Woods correctional facility meat and produce processing facility in South Bridgeton and the Bayside facility in Leesburg on rt 47. really exist. Considering the hostility of the world environment outside the walls, my guess would be that many prisoners would welcome a "work-release" points-toward-parole arrangement in exchange for raising and processing agricultural products, which would also be their sustenance. And the flip side would be that transgressions would be dealt with severely. Behave and work, and you get to eat, have protection, and earn your pardon. Otherwise....

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by WallShadow

Slightly off-topic Note: the "Rock In Troubled Waters" article about South Jersey accurately relates the large correctional facilities in the southern part of the state: South Woods correctional facility meat and produce processing facility in South Bridgeton and the Bayside facility in Leesburg on rt 47. really exist. Considering the hostility of the world environment outside the walls, my guess would be that many prisoners would welcome a "work-release" points-toward-parole arrangement in exchange for raising and processing agricultural products, which would also be their sustenance. And the flip side would be that transgressions would be dealt with severely. Behave and work, and you get to eat, have protection, and earn your pardon. Otherwise....

A number would have also found themselves in the military as indicated by the 2.x character generation rules. Could be a few "dirty dozen" type units formed up...briefly.

[WallShadow]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

A number would have also found themselves in the military as indicated by the 2.x character generation rules. Could be a few "dirty dozen" type units formed up...briefly.

Even so: The Pisecki Commando, comprised of former law enforcement officers and Philadelphia Chinese street gang members, again, as mentioned in "A Rock in Troubled Waters".

And Northern/Central Jersey has two Youth Correctional farms and a couple of adult agribusiness correctional farms for the Ft. Dix enclave to manage.

Oh, yeah, another light went on in my head re: cheap available fusion power (pun intended this time 'round)--if there is an overproduction of water, it can be stored for the darker months and the growing season extended (in limited form, year-round) by sharing or shifting the power to providing light to green houses. And Wheaton Glass in Millville, NJ might be able to provide materials for that and other essential and useful products. Just keeps getting better and better.

[kalos72]

I take it a McGuffin is a fictional device of some sort?

Desalination is definitely a good option but would only really be a life saver if you follow the HW line. I also like the cold fusion link, like that SLOWPOKE reactor tied to a desalination plant. Perfect for the reactors small size/output.

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by kalos72

I take it a McGuffin is a fictional device of some sort?

Sort of like a "thingamabob in US slang.

[kato13]

In fiction, a MacGuffin (sometimes McGuffin or maguffin) is a plot device in the form of some goal, desired object, or other motivator that the protagonist pursues, often with little or no narrative explanation. The specific nature of a MacGuffin is typically unimportant to the overall plot. The most common type of MacGuffin is an object, place, or person; other, more abstract types include money, victory, glory, survival, power, love, or some unexplained driving force.

MacGuffin

Examples would include the Maltese Falcon and the Case from Pulp Fiction.

[ArmySGT.]

Originally Posted by kalos72

I take it a McGuffin is a fictional device of some sort?

Important reference for anyone interested in writing fiction for fun or profit.

TROPES

[kalos72]

Originally Posted by kalos72

That Saving Davis Monthon write up lists the 1st and the 14th in MILGOV control, possibly in Colorado.

Do they make Air Force ORBATS that include nor "flight" units? Ill have to check the published 1996 ORBAT again...

And the article Pacific Fleet has the 3rd Wing in Alaska and the 15th Wing in Hawaii. Two more down...

Now I need a list of the ones active at the time and start to walk back the list.

[WallShadow]

Originally Posted by kalos72

I take it a McGuffin is a fictional device of some sort?

Desalination is definitely a good option but would only really be a life saver if you follow the HW line. I also like the cold fusion link, like that SLOWPOKE reactor tied to a desalination plant. Perfect for the reactors small size/output.

A "mcGuffin" is an object that is the goal of a plot, wherein it is being sought, fought over, destroyed, or whatever. IIRC the term was originated by Alfred Hitchcock to describe such a plot device. One "Remington Steele" episode had a McGuffin that was the recipe for a fat-free, calorie-free, absolutely delicious chocolate chip cookie. People were being killed for getting in the way of baddies obtaining it.

And the SLOWPOKE reactor (or even a cheap Radionucleide Thermal Reactor like the kind that is currently on a space probe wending its way out of the solar system) would be even better, since it really does exist and can apparently be constructed relatively simply.

[Olefin]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

Is there a book you actually agree with? Seems like everything had holes in it according to you. Meanwhile many of us are happy to work with what we've got and make it work rather than continually attempt to pull it down.

Barely functional and nothing like what remains elsewhere. Poland really has been bombed back to the middle ages and it's feudal/despotism systems.

100,000 / 3,000,000 = 0.033333 remaining. Close enough to 97% casualties.

Actually a lot people have issues with the East European Sourcebook - as has been said by many people here the orders of battle listed for the various countries have all kinds of errors in them

And Silesia was nuked to hell and back invaded and fought over multiple times, etc.. - most of the US didn't have that happen - I don't see any issue with big depopulation occurring where you have multiple armies fighting over the areas for four years and add in a couple of dozen plus nukes in the same area over that time - that description (with a few very limited areas - i.e. LA and some areas in Texas) doesn't apply to the US

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by Olefin

Actually a lot people have issues with the East European Sourcebook - as has been said by many people here the orders of battle listed for the various countries have all kinds of errors in them.

Really? Who?
There are 780 members of this forum. Which ones have a problem with the books?
Perhaps we should take a poll?

[kalos72]

Why Leg?

As usual, you play the game your way and others will theirs. I will assume by your response that you agree with everything written and have no issues with anything GDW has written. Noted.

I for one, do.

[Olefin]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

Really? Who?
There are 780 members of this forum. Which ones have a problem with the books?
Perhaps we should take a poll?

Oh I don't know Leg - how about his whole thread - http://forum.juhlin.com/showthread.p...ean+sourcebook

which had various people on the board discussing the issues they had with how the 8th ended up in Latvia and the fact that the Turkish and Greek armies have Russian tanks in it instead of the actual tanks they was equipped with in real life or the tanks that it was equipped with in both NATO books that described the Turkish Army for example - both forces should be equipped with older NATO tanks as both of them were in NATO in 1996 and Turkey still is