Twilight:2000-Different Direction

[M-Type]

I was thinking about those novels when the idea started to form. There'll have to be a NATO/Warsaw Pact team-up to fight the alien invaders!

[M-Type]

As promised, here's the Invasion Map documenting the landing sites of the Kafer forces.

I was trying to think about reasoning behind Europe's/North America's desolation. Maybe to do with the Twilight War somehow?

Well, they could just be saving the last superpower for last? And Europe because....it's there? The Kafers do love a good fight, and maybe they think the Americans will put up the best one?

EDIT: In looking at the map, I'm gonna chalk it up to saving it for last or lack of resources. I mean, they're basically surrounded, so the Kafer will get to them eventually...

[Benjamin]

Some of the clustering in North Africa and the Middle East can be attributed to the fact the Kafer home world is generally hotter and drier than Earth. Also, other areas that are less similar to their home world could be left to the less powerful Kafer suzerains. Reading the Kafer Sourcebook would be very helpful if you haven't done so yet.

Another old RPG that you might want to consider is Domination by StarChilde Publications and it's table top companion, Sabot & Laser. These games postulate an alien invasion of Earth occurring in March of 1992. The invasion starts in southern Africa and sweeps north. I found it very easy to move the date of the invasion to March of 1997 during the Twilight War. We played T2K with invading aliens as our primary game in college and it was a blast. Some of the human vehicle stats are a bit off in Sabot & Laser but the alien stuff can easily be converted.

Both are on sale at noble knight.com for $5.00.

Hope this helped.

[M-Type]

Yeah I figured Africa/Middle East/bits of South America would be fine for the Kafer (I bought the Sourcebook, so I took a quick peek during work).

My idea for the Antarctic cluster was that of some sort of fuel depot or airbase, but they really weren't prepared for the brutal winters (same with Alaska and Russia). This would give the humans an advantage at getting the upper hand on them in these locations.

And the Kafer could be bombing North America/Europe as they "clean-up" the rest of the world, some sort of 'challenge' to the two powers to try and fight them.

Took at look at those two books too. Looks promising, I may have to pick them up.

[Panther Al]

All said - that landing in Ontario is actually rather brilliant. Smack dab in the centre of some of the most productive Iron and Copper mines in central North America.

[DocSavage45B10]

Or maybe they are (more) rational and dropped rocks on NA and West Europe (and Japan and the Chinese coast) figuring they would take out the brightest lights from orbit and mop up the rest. What they weren't expecting was the world to be in the middle of a hot war with all the armies of the great powers slugging it out on the plains of East Europe/Russia

Those darn Tosevites shouldn't even have land-cruisers, the recon satelite showed barbarians in iron, by the ancestors!

Originally Posted by M-Type

Yeah I figured Africa/Middle East/bits of South America would be fine for the Kafer (I bought the Sourcebook, so I took a quick peek during work).

My idea for the Antarctic cluster was that of some sort of fuel depot or airbase, but they really weren't prepared for the brutal winters (same with Alaska and Russia). This would give the humans an advantage at getting the upper hand on them in these locations.

And the Kafer could be bombing North America/Europe as they "clean-up" the rest of the world, some sort of 'challenge' to the two powers to try and fight them.

Took at look at those two books too. Looks promising, I may have to pick them up.

[M-Type]

Honestly, my backstory was that a Kafer recon ship spotted humans during the 1800s and called in the fleet, with news of finding the Aach*ah. The 'military' (aka everybody) builds up and begins their trek across the stars.

The arrive on the doorstep of the Twilight War, with those tiny Acch*ah now using chemical weapons/nuclear missiles/space flight, tanks, etc.

Which was basically copying Turtledove's Tosevite issue and the aliens from Out of the Dark.

[Benjamin]

Depending how closely you are sticking to the rest of 2300AD canon, getting from Kafer space to Sol is a heck of a long trek. Also, I think the Kafers would not have been able to get a FTL probe or ship to Earth in 1800. Of course if you're willing to throw in the Ylii then the Kafers could get their info on Earth from ancient Ylii documents. These would be nearly 100,000 years old (unless you decide that the revived Ylii civilization has also launched long range exploratory probes, which is more plausible than the Kafers doing so).

Another way you could handle the invasion is by stealing the wormhole idea from Blue Planet. In that game there is a stable wormhole leading from Sol to Lambda Serpenti. The nice thing about this is that Lambda Serpenti is a major Kafer star system and would be a could launching point for the invasion.

Benjamin