Setting Questions:

[ZombieLenin]

Originally Posted by Rainbow Six

I’m not sure if this is covered in any of the basic rule sets for T2K so apologies if I’m restating something you are already aware of (it definitely isn’t in the V1 initial material and I don’t think it is in the V2 Big Yellow Book, although I may be mistaken; the main reference to it is the V1 Survivor’s Guide to the United Kingdom) but in the original T2K timeline Ireland was a warzone. To cut a long story very short, after the 1997 nuclear exchanges the Republic of Ireland invaded Northern Ireland (I as a response to alleged British mistreatment of Northern Ireland’s nationalist minority, leading to two warring armies facing off against each other – on one side you had the armed forces of the Republic of Ireland (Irish Defence Forces, IDF) and on the other the British Army, primarily represented by the mainly reservist Ulster Defence Regiment, UDR . Whilst the likelihood of events transpiring as GDW wrote is debatable, I don’t think it is completely implausible, but it would need some serious reworking to fit a 2018 date (for one thing the UDR was disbanded years ago, and events in Northern Ireland have obviously moved on since the mid 1990’s) – just for starters you’d need the peace process to completely collapse in Northern Ireland and a return to the days of the Troubles.

When my players came up with Ireland, this is roughly what I did for my timeline. Essentially, I had the campaign setting's history deviate in 2013 with a worldwide economic collapse brought on by the failure of the US congress to pass an extention of the US debt ceiling (US Bond default). A bunch of other stuff happens (like Putin dying in a shirtless sky diving accident) and you end up with a bunch of regional conflicts that sort of merge together... presto! Nuclear war!

In Ireland specifically though, I used the economic collapse as an excuse to bolster the popularity of the RIRA and the CIRA in Northern Ireland. I mixed this with global depression's ability to turn populations towards more extremists governments into a suitably reactionary response from the UK and to place a nationalist "One Ireland" government in control of the Republic of Ireland.

So, to make a long story short, my actual story line for the game became pretty close to the original that you are describing.

That all seemed pretty reasonable to me, except:

1. When I started to do the research necessary to give a realistic portrayal of the military situation in 2018 I noticed that the Irish Defense Forces has a total number of active duty members, for all branches of service, less than 10,000. When the reserves are counted, around 15,000. The Irish Air Force is composed almost exclusively of helicopters, and the Irish Army has nothing bigger than armored cars as mechanized support.

While I am sure that members Irish Defense Forces are more than capable in a fight, it just seemed incredibly unlikely that they would be capable of "invading" Northern Ireland, let alone dealing with the inevitable response from Her Majesty's Armed Forces.

Being from the UK you're probably at least tacitly aware of this, but for those who aren't, the Royal Army has 130,000 active members with another 130,000-200,000 reserves. Compare that with the Irish Defense Forces where the Irish Army, Navy, and Air Forces have 15,000 personel AFTER the reserves have been called up.

2. I wanted to put two multinational forces facing off in Ireland. The UK, The Kingdom of France (related to my 'history'), and the United States versus The Irish Republic, The Republican (and nominaly Marxist) forces (RIRA, CIRA) and elements of the Slavic National Bolshevik Union (National Bolshevik Russia).

I’m British and I’m struggling to think of anything else which would have two opposed armies facing off in Ireland, although we do have a couple of Irish members who may be able to suggest something.

I thought of using the UK actually, as my timeline matches the T2013 timeline slightly, and you have post-nuclear exchange internal conflict between England, Wales, and Scotland; However, I could find even less reason to include anyone but British and, to a limited extent, American armed forces on the ground.

As to the second part of your question, I have two answers. If I wanted to stay within my comfort zone and work with something that I am familiar with and have knowledge of, I would set a campaign in my own country, the UK. If I wanted to push the comfort zone I would probably go for somewhere in Africa – possibly South Africa.

This was my thought. I really do want to have the mixing up of beligerent forces that you got in the original T2000's Poland though, which means that using the United States--with the exception of Alaska and the Canadian Northwest--is pretty difficult to do. At least in a way that doesn't offend common sense.

I mean all WW3 stories like this offend common sense, but having Russians in Chichago or LA--or North Korea anywhere (Red Dawn remake)--just makes suspension of disbelief impossible.

[Rainbow Six]

Originally Posted by ZombieLenin

When my players came up with Ireland, this is roughly what I did for my timeline. Essentially, I had the campaign setting's history deviate in 2013 with a worldwide economic collapse brought on by the failure of the US congress to pass an extention of the US debt ceiling (US Bond default). A bunch of other stuff happens (like Putin dying in a shirtless sky diving accident) and you end up with a bunch of regional conflicts that sort of merge together... presto! Nuclear war!

In Ireland specifically though, I used the economic collapse as an excuse to bolster the popularity of the RIRA and the CIRA in Northern Ireland. I mixed this with global depression's ability to turn populations towards more extremists governments into a suitably reactionary response from the UK and to place a nationalist "One Ireland" government in control of the Republic of Ireland.

So, to make a long story short, my actual story line for the game became pretty close to the original that you are describing.

That all seemed pretty reasonable to me, except:

1. When I started to do the research necessary to give a realistic portrayal of the military situation in 2018 I noticed that the Irish Defense Forces has a total number of active duty members, for all branches of service, less than 10,000. When the reserves are counted, around 15,000. The Irish Air Force is composed almost exclusively of helicopters, and the Irish Army has nothing bigger than armored cars as mechanized support.

While I am sure that members Irish Defense Forces are more than capable in a fight, it just seemed incredibly unlikely that they would be capable of "invading" Northern Ireland, let alone dealing with the inevitable response from Her Majesty's Armed Forces.

Being from the UK you're probably at least tacitly aware of this, but for those who aren't, the Royal Army has 130,000 active members with another 130,000-200,000 reserves. Compare that with the Irish Defense Forces where the Irish Army, Navy, and Air Forces have 15,000 personel AFTER the reserves have been called up.

2. I wanted to put two multinational forces facing off in Ireland. The UK, The Kingdom of France (related to my 'history'), and the United States versus The Irish Republic, The Republican (and nominaly Marxist) forces (RIRA, CIRA) and elements of the Slavic National Bolshevik Union (National Bolshevik Russia).

Yeah, the topic has come up here a few times and conventional wisdom with regard to the disparity in numbers / equipment between the UK and Ireland has generally been that the IDF would not be able to successfully mount operations against UK forces unless UK forces were seriously weakened (for example by being involved in major conflict / conflicts elsewhere in the World...in the original timeline that vast majority of the British military was already committed to the fighting in Europe, the Middle East, and the Far East before the Irish invaded the North, leading to the situation where for the most part the Irish were fighting British reservists. By this point the RAF and the Royal Navy had also effectively been taken out of the equation),
I would defer to the Irish members about the possibility of a pro Marxist Government in the Republic but I have to say the latter coalition strikes me as unlikely, particularly the idea of the Irish being opposed to the US...how about some sort of schism in the Irish Government that has created pro Western and pro Russian factions instead?

Originally Posted by ZombieLenin

I thought of using the UK actually, as my timeline matches the T2013 timeline slightly, and you have post-nuclear exchange internal conflict between England, Wales, and Scotland; However, I could find even less reason to include anyone but British and, to a limited extent, American armed forces on the ground.

How about the some of following...?

Russians (or other opposition forces dependent on your timeline) - escapees from POW camps / special forces types infiltrated into the UK before hostilities started to destabilise the country / shot down aircrew (possibly POW's, possibly not)

NATO / allied nationalities - withdrawn to the UK after serving elsewhere in Europe, for example perhaps NATO sent a composite force to Norway which was withdrawn to the UK after its mission was concluded (or perhaps because it suffered horrendous casualties); after arrival in the UK the unit broke up, leading to individuals and small groups scattering. You could adapt this slightly and make it a UN peacekeeping detachment that was withdrawn to the UK if you want to add non NATO nationalities into the mix (the UK still has a garrison on Cyprus and UN peacekeepers are based on Cyprus, so perhaps some blue berets could find their way to the UK that way)

Commonwealth forces - common for Commonwealth personnel to spend time on exchange postings with British units, so practically any Commonwealth (and occasionally more "exotic") personnel might be found in the UK. It was also common for foreign students to attend British military colleges, e.g. the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst (and RAF and RN equivalents) and the Staff College Camberley.

Other options may be possible dependent on your own timeline.

Plus everything Stainless Steel Cynic suggested earlier...

[ZombieLenin]

Originally Posted by Rainbow Six

I would defer to the Irish members about the possibility of a pro Marxist Government in the Republic but I have to say the latter coalition strikes me as unlikely, particularly the idea of the Irish being opposed to the US...how about some sort of schism in the Irish Government that has created pro Western and pro Russian factions instead?

Yeah, a Marxist government in the Republic of Ireland is unbelievable; the Marxists in this story are Northern Ireland Republicans, like the Real IRA and the Continuity IRA. These organizations, along with the "original" (in terms of 1969-1997) IRA have been, and still are as I understand them, in name "Marxist." Meaning only that they use Marxism and "Revolutionary Socialism" as part of the ideological justification for their rebellion.

In my time line, these would be only loosely allied with the Irish Defense Forces, similar to Communist and Nationalist Chinese forces during WWII.

And as I have it Irish get in the European war only when it seems that the United States will not be involved. This is when they're reinforced by Russia and before total nuclear war.

Russians (or other opposition forces dependent on your timeline) - escapees from POW camps / special forces types infiltrated into the UK before hostilities started to destabilise the country / shot down aircrew (possibly POW's, possibly not)

This is a pretty good idea. I would have to figure out how to write in the whole "final offensive," which I had planned to figure prominently in the first few games.

NATO / allied nationalities - withdrawn to the UK after serving elsewhere in Europe, for example perhaps NATO sent a composite force to Norway which was withdrawn to the UK after its mission was concluded (or perhaps because it suffered horrendous casualties); after arrival in the UK the unit broke up, leading to individuals and small groups scattering. You could adapt this slightly and make it a UN peacekeeping detachment that was withdrawn to the UK if you want to add non NATO nationalities into the mix (the UK still has a garrison on Cyprus and UN peacekeepers are based on Cyprus, so perhaps some blue berets could find their way to the UK that way)

This is a great idea, and one I was using for "Ireland." Most of the Americans will have served in Iran, and what's present at the beginning of the game is a lose allied mixed command including Brits, Canadians, Americans, and some French.

[Rainbow Six]

Originally Posted by ZombieLenin

Yeah, a Marxist government in the Republic of Ireland is unbelievable; the Marxists in this story are Northern Ireland Republicans, like the Real IRA and the Continuity IRA. These organizations, along with the "original" (in terms of 1969-1997) IRA have been, and still are as I understand them, in name "Marxist." Meaning only that they use Marxism and "Revolutionary Socialism" as part of the ideological justification for their rebellion.

In my time line, these would be only loosely allied with the Irish Defense Forces, similar to Communist and Nationalist Chinese forces during WWII.

And as I have it Irish get in the European war only when it seems that the United States will not be involved. This is when they're reinforced by Russia and before total nuclear war.

I suepct the best model for a post apoc conflict in Ireland is probably something that follows what happened in the Balkans in the 90's. If you look at the Nationalist and Loyalist sides you essentially have similar participants with similar rationales - both have numbers of affiliated paramilitary terrorist groups who may or may not form alliances with regular forces (I could easily see a situation where regular forces on both sides are split, with some treating terrorist groups as allies (perhaps not overtly) and others regarding them as marauders who should be hunted down). Where I think the scenario you've outlined starts to drift away from what is plausible is the introduction of a Russian force...it just strikes me as too unlikely. Also, I suspect the US would, officially at least, not wish to choose sides in a fight between the UK and the Republic of Ireland, although you may find US personnel fighting on both sides unofficially .

Originally Posted by ZombieLenin

This is a great idea, and one I was using for "Ireland." Most of the Americans will have served in Iran, and what's present at the beginning of the game is a lose allied mixed command including Brits, Canadians, Americans, and some French.

Would suggest the easiest thing might be to have a plane come out of Iran as things start to really fall apart...(A C130 would struggle for the range without refuelling, but I think an IL76 or a C141 would make the UK or Ireland comfortably). You would have a wide latitude as to who could be on it...British, American, Canadians, ANZACs, a couple of Iranians who have joined them, a Mossad agent they encountered in Iran, Russians who have changed sides, etc, pretty much anyone that had a valid reason for being in the Gulf. When they get to their destination just have everyone on board that you don't want / need head for the hills, keeping the core group of PC's / NPC's. Could always throw in a plot macguffin of someone / something important being on the plane that needs to get to somewhere else, maybe the US, but you've used the last of your aviation fuel getting as far as you have...

So if you stick with Ireland you've just landed at Dublin airport in the middle of a nasty sectarian conflict, with little chance of finding fuel for your IL76 (or someone has just blown a rather large hole in one of the wings), the place is full of armed gangs and you have no idea who the good guys are and who the bag guys are (or, indeed, if there are any good guys)...good luck, you're on your own...