Possible Module Followups

[ArmySGT.]

So again 80-90 percent desertion rates when a) they are growing their own food and able to feed themselves and defend that food when going AWOL means you might starve and

How are they growing their own food Where did they get seed stock Where did they get fertilizer and top soil Where did they get tools Where did they get tractors Where did they get the discs, harrows, plows, brush cutters, seed drillers and other equipment for the tractors Where did they come up with the knowledge and experience Where did they learn to dry, pickle, preserve, an, and bottle it all before it just rots That is far too muh hand waving of the details. Growing food in a garden is a skill. Growing food for hundreds is a master class in industry.

b) the areas around you are overrun with marauder and bandit and cannibal groups that love to pick off small encampments and family groups - which you would know after seeing that happen ever since 1999 - is definitely not realistic

Those groups are not realistically going to last. Defenders with preparation have the advantage, it take three to five attackers for each defender. an they siege you Yes, probably. If those groups are starving as badly as you say they are; how long an they lay siege

It takes an overwhelming number of attackers with their own large supply of food and everything else to take any kind of fortification. These marauders aren't going to be harvesting crops, the will want it piked and processed. That again lays the odds into the farmers favor. A simple five sided block house with rock infill, an be built in a few days. Built on opposing corners of homes and barns with food and water they an hold a homestead versus dozens of attackers. Look to frontier forts of the American expansion into the South West.

As for cannibals, simple disease will take are of them. That is one of those PAW memes that are made to mush of. Human flesh would have to be cooked very thoroughly do to infect anyone eating it.

[Olefin]

Per canon the military formations are growing their own food by 1999 in the US and overseas - so pretty obviously they got what they needed to grow food the old fashioned way - they took it by force! Or they gathered up the local farmers and had them grow it for them in exchange for protection

In other words the cantonments are the feudal system all over again with the local lord protecting the farmers who in turn feed the lord and his troops.

So you cant say - well there is no way they would be growing their own food so I agree with canon desertion rates because they would be starving - when canon says they have been growing their own food for two years

thats why the fires flush that unit out of North Carolina - because the fires burn up the crops they were growing and leave them no choice

And Simon - definitely want to add to the canon - the issue is that trying do so in North America, given the contradictions, errors and other issues with HW and Kidnapped you either have to say "nope not going to write in NA" so I dont ruffle feathers and instead describe areas like East Africa that werent previously described - or I have to face it head on, correct the canon as much as possible or put my spin on it and go from there - and as I said that's definitely going to cause issues

and frankly there are lots of good stories in NA and the time is coming to face facts that HW needs to be revised or corrected - and that the events and timeline that Loren came up with - as well as the drought itself - are problematic and need to be corrected - notice I said corrected - not ignored, not completely rewritten but corrected

starting with addressing the incorrect desertion rates and other obvious inconsistencies and the fact that the sub made it home - and what happens afterward with the scientists and a sub to provide power to the Cape May or Norfolk area from its reactors

and that a one year short fall in rain can be addressed with irrigation techniques that go back 7000 years - and that dont need electricity to make them work - you can do it with manpower alone - if the Sumerians did it then the Americans can

[Olefin]

"It's very interesting how much Twilight 2000 and its fan base is split up like the Christian church is - with the Howling Wilderness/Kidnapped defenders in many ways being like the born again Protestants who defend every word in the Bible as being canonical no matter what it says even if it contradicts itself

Meanwhile those who don't want to use HW and Kidnapped or argue for changes in them in many ways are more like those in the Church who are more willing to accept that perhaps some areas of the Bible may have issues, either from translation or who actually authored them and need to discussed and debated to determine those particular areas of validity within the overall Church canon."

Not really, although trying to reduce a debate to a specious ad hominem false analogy in order to belittle those that disagree with you lowers the strength of your argument somewhat.

Instead of arguing over the validity of the "reality" of a work of fiction that by the nature of the collaborative story-telling element of the art form means that everyone's game will be different and will deviate from canon maybe we should focus on having fun and adding to the body of work so that people can enjoy whatever they want to take from it.

You've already done this with your new sourcebook and I'd suggest hat instead of looking to re-write canon by revisiting modules that exist that we look at expanding the areas covered before we go bac to anything already done.

I definitely plan on adding to the canon for sure - way too many areas not covered - even possibly looking at a collection of how countries not mentioned were affected by the war so people could use that as a basis for adventures

[Jason Weiser]

Then why even have the argument Simon, you just basically in one breath, accused Olefin of belittling those who disagree with him, and saying "to each their own"

I kind of wish some folks had taken that attitude with the DCWG.

Here is my biggest issue with the strict canon fans: When will they get in the ring They tell us "How dare you write that!" and proceed to tear the author, whom has worked his ass off on a given work, I assure you, but did they write anything themselves Nope. When I did my Australian target list, I did it partly to prove a point: The Twilight War was a WORLD war. Nobody was immune, nobody got off scot free. Was it a world ending event No. But it is one that will be felt for a while.

So here is my challenge to the strict canonists: Write something. You don't have to submit it to Marc..but you do have to submit it for peer review here. I for one, would like to see what you come up with.

So, gentlemen, the gauntlet has been dropped..are you willing to pick it up

[Olefin]

Not really, although trying to reduce a debate to a specious ad hominem false analogy in order to belittle those that disagree with you lowers the strength of your argument somewhat.

Actually I am not trying to belittle anyone - as I said "and for the record I can see both sides of the argument and the validity of both sides and appreciate how both sides feel (as a Christian too - lets say my family encompasses both sides of the Bible argument and it does make for lively discussion)"

And I definitely plan to address areas that havent been touched yet - as Jason said this was a world war - and thus its affects, as V2 pointed out, are truly global - and thus telling new stories in new areas is something I am working on

People here have always known I have an issue with Kidnapped and HW - when I played my GM and the players in my group loved the early US modules but were disappointed by Kidnapped and HW as to the incredibly bleak future of the US they painted (one that in my opinion and others would have destroyed the US beyond any hope of recovery in less than a century if ever and went way overboard compared, for instance, to how the timeline for the UK was handled which was much more hopeful and showed a country on the path to recovery and rebirth - not a short path but definitely on that path)

The line in HW that my GM at the time said was the one that really turned him off when he read HW was that there was only going to be, at best, food for one quarter of the remaining population - meaning that the US, which had already lost half of its population was now going to lose 75% of the remainder - and thus be reduced to 12% or less of the pre-war population - we talked about it and our group agreed that it was completely at odds with the idea of a war that had a limited nuclear exchange - let alone the fact that having that many of the remaining people die in such a short time would have basically lead to a spread of disease that would have most likely wiped out the remaining 12% of the population that could be fed - that is if they were even still alive after the desperate fights there would have been over any remaining food at all -

even more so with the remaining military units basically destroyed in most of the country and thus leaving people unable to even defend what did grow and get harvested when they got overrun by starving thousands or tens of thousands

We read it and agreed that what Loren painted wasnt a Howling Wilderness for the future of the US, instead what he painted was an empty wilderness devoid of people that used to be the US

Thats why we didnt even play Satellite Down when he bought it - the idea of a US military so emasculated that the best they could do to get a satellite back that was crucial for national survival was a single small squad of soldiers and a single decrepit boat - frankly even if they did get it back if thats all thats left there isnt anything MilGov or CivGov would be able to do to take advantage of the data

[Olefin]

thus if I do revisit any of the modules it would be by going back further along the timeline and showing how the Last Submarine trilogy would have done to change the HW timeline - or make changes that would actually give the US some hope by using some of the Challenge magazine articles that came out after HW and Kidnapped - I see HW as being the situation as of April 2001 - I have never seen it as actually telling the story all the way thru to the end of the year - and Med Cruise and Boomer and Satellite Down definitely would have changed how things went after those missions as to the rest of 2001

[ArmySGT.]

Per canon the military formations are growing their own food by 1999 in the US and overseas - so pretty obviously they got what they needed to grow food the old fashioned way - they took it by force! Or they gathered up the local farmers and had them grow it for them in exchange for protection

In other words the cantonments are the feudal system all over again with the local lord protecting the farmers who in turn feed the lord and his troops.

That sets the stage for mass desertions right there. When the General declares himself King and the Colonels are now Dukes, the soldiers will rightfully and legally rebel. Those are not legal orders. What you are suggesting is called Extortion.

I promise you, if I were in that situation and the General declared we would be extorting food from civilians I would apprehend him, his staff, and anyone that obey such an unlawful order. Given the exigencies of the system, they would likely found guilty by Trial, then hung from the neck until dead.

Even the FEMA "powers" by Presidential Executive Order (President J.F. Kennedy) are on very weak legal ground with more than enough justification for Citizens to ignore them and arrest anyone that invokes or obeys them.

The chain of command is failing and falling apart in those units with offiers and senior non commissioned officers torn between MilGov and ivilian Gov.

Units loyal to the United States Constitution and units "Going Feudal" aka marauder firing upon one another... another reason desertion is 80-90%.

So you cant say - well there is no way they would be growing their own food so I agree with canon desertion rates because they would be starving - when canon says they have been growing their own food for two years

That is inconsistent with the famine too. If no one is growing food, then how is it that units in Cantonments are able Without tools, seed stock, the means to preserve a harvest, or the knowledge to do any of that. These units are succeeding. That in and of itself is a logical inconsistency.

[ArmySGT.]

The line in HW that my GM at the time said was the one that really turned him off when he read HW was that there was only going to be, at best, food for one quarter of the remaining population - meaning that the US, which had already lost half of its population was now going to lose 75% of the remainder - and thus be reduced to 12% or less of the pre-war population - we talked about it and our group agreed that it was completely at odds with the idea of a war that had a limited nuclear exchange - let alone the fact that having that many of the remaining people die in such a short time would have basically lead to a spread of disease that would have most likely wiped out the remaining 12% of the population that could be fed - that is if they were even still alive after the desperate fights there would have been over any remaining food at all -

f

As Nationalistic ( even Jingoistic, admitted to a degree) I am still inclined to agree with canon.

Those nuclear weapons didn't just hit military bases and few downtown shopping districts.

Those nuclear weapons destroyed infrastructure. Most specifically hydroelectric power infrastructure that the U.S. would find very difficult to repair if nothing else was destroyed.

Bonneville dam and Boulder dam are destroyed. There is little pockets of power west of the Rocky Mountains. This affects even Western Canada and Northern Mexico.

The water backed up in Lake Mead (and further upstream Lake Powell) is desperately needed to irrigate crops in Arizona and California.

Without that power even deep rock water wells are untouchable.

The nuclear power, LP power, and coal power plants are not enough except very regionally.

On the east coast, that means the Tennessee Valley District and more.

I don't think, personally, that Loren was really off much at all.

[Raellus]

Guys, please be careful regarding the canon debate. It's historically been pretty toxic here.

It's really cool that Marc Miller has dubbed Olefin's East African Sourcebook canon. Is Mr. Miller sole arbiter of what is and what isn't canon I don't know. Does his nod make Olefin a co-arbiter of canon Should we take it on authority, second hand, that HW is no longer canon This is a slippery slope.

Let's all keep in mind that T2K is whatever the GM running the campaign wants it to be. If a GM likes the America described in HW, cool, let him use it. If a GM hates it, cool, let the GM build a different setting more suited to his sensibilities. Different strokes and all that.

Secondly, there seems to be a bit of a double standard at play here. If it's OK for members to critique HW, it should be OK for members to critique fellow members' works as well. Constructive criticism is not off-limits. According to forum guidelines, criticism is OK as long as its asked for, constructive, and doesn't devolve into personal attacks.

Lastly, if we want to debate the merits (or lack thereof) of HW, there's a whole thread already devoted to that.

[Olefin]

Guys, please be careful regarding the canon debate. It's historically been pretty toxic here.

It's really cool that Marc Miller has dubbed Olefin's East African Sourcebook canon. Is Mr. Miller sole arbiter of what is and what isn't canon I don't know. Does his nod make Olefin a co-arbiter of canon Should we take it on authority, second hand, that HW is no longer canon This is a slippery slope.

Let's all keep in mind that T2K is whatever the GM running the campaign wants it to be. If a GM likes the America described in HW, cool, let him use it. If a GM hates it, cool, let the GM build a different setting more suited to his sensibilities. Different strokes and all that.

Secondly, there seems to be a bit of a double standard at play here. If it's OK for members to critique HW, it should be OK for members to critique fellow members' works as well. Constructive criticism is not off-limits. According to forum guidelines, criticism is OK as long as its asked for, constructive, and doesn't devolve into personal attacks.

Lastly, if we want to debate the merits (or lack thereof) of HW, there's a whole thread already devoted to that.

Completely agree with you Raellus - and if anything was just trying to show how hard it is to write new material and keep the majority of people happy when there are so many splits in the fan base as to canon versus non-canon especially when it comes to HW and the drought.

And for the record Marc is the sole arbiter of what is canon and what is not - I have a few suggestions for ideas and have run them by him for future work and he will be the final decision on them not me - he owns the canon (as he owns the rights to the game) and has already told me what ideas he prefers over others - in the end no matter what I write (or others) it wont get published unless he is ok with it - not as official canon for damn sure

And there is a big difference between my personal preference and history of canon - i.e. notice what I was referring to was my GM's view of HW and how our group discussed it and did not use it as such - versus the canon of the module as a whole within the Twilight 2000 world


Keep in mind that the release of the module's themselves by the various authors changed the canon and the history as we knew it from the original boxed set - the original V1 boxed set did not have the US in any way suffering an uber drought - that came about over the course of several module releases - thus the original canon was changed by the authors with each new release

Omega, the drought, Last Submarine (and the cheap fusion reactors the scientists brought with them), New America, the idea of a change in the weather - all of them came after the original release of the game

thus with the start of new canon releases again the canon of the Twilight 2000 world is again being changed in some way just as it was during the original releases, opening the same potential can of worms as before - and thus anyone who does any new releases needs to be as mindful of possible of the old canon when they release their material - which is one reason I am going thru everything I can get my hands on to make sure I didnt miss anything

and as Raellus pointed out - completely and totally correctly - there is no compulsion to have to have your game conform completely to canon - if you dont like the changes, whatever they may be (and there may very likely be none beyond just exploring new areas mentioned but not detailed in the game) then ignore them with my blessing

example from what I just released - if you want the 2nd Armored to come home or go to Iran in your game instead of go to Kenya please feel completely welcome to do that - if you rather use Raellus's version of the order of battle for the US in Kenya than mine please do so if it would be what your players enjoy

[Raellus]

Keep in mind that the release of the module's themselves by the various authors changed the canon and the history as we knew it from the original boxed set - the original V1 boxed set did not have the US in any way suffering an uber drought - that came about over the course of several module releases - thus the original canon was changed by the authors with each new release

The chronology established in the box set ends in July of 2000. Chronologically, subsequent modules took place after EfK. It's not so much a matter of changing canon as it was adding to it, and evolving it.

And, of course, player action could have a direct impact on the game world. A good GM would make adjustments to the game world based on what players accomplished, or didn't, during the modules.

I'm by no means an expert on T2K adventure modules. I am intimately familiar with the original Poland adventures but only have a passing familiarity with the CONUS modules. Please correct me if I am wrong, but, to my knowledge, none of the published modules say, "ignore such and such- it didn't happen that way; it happened this way instead."

I think you are proposing a fundamental change to canon, by writing out the drought from HW. This alters canon, instead of adding to or evolving it.

If Marc Miller were to come out publicly (like here, for starters) and say, "ignore HW" or, "the drought wasn't as bad as initially described" or something to that effect, I think it would be easier for some members to swallow. If that were the case, I think an official, amended version of HW, would be the logical jumping-off point for post-2001 canonical material.

[WallShadow]

Once the book(s) are in one's hot little hands, they become the raw material for the GM to mold into his/her T2K universe. Maybe the HW drought was as bad as stated. Maybe the forecast didn't take into account the enormous drop-off of petroleum combustion, or the fact that the ozone layer healed faster than thought possible. Maybe friendly aliens helped scrub the particulate matter from large volumes of the atmosphere.
I tend to agree with the "twist the knife" feeling of Howling Wilderness, and would cherry-pick parts that I felt kept the storyline going and ameliorate or handwave or ignore the nastier parts as needed. By 2001, I'd be looking for more signs of organization and order, threatened by forces of conquest or greed.

[Jason Weiser]

Rae,
I think such discussions are yes, best done in a circumspect manner due to the passions involved, however...I think an honest discussion on why folks do or do not like HW is appropos, and if Marc is willing, an appeal to him to reevaluate it

[Olefin]

The chronology established in the box set ends in July of 2000. Chronologically, subsequent modules took place after EfK. It's not so much a matter of changing canon as it was adding to it, and evolving it.

And, of course, player action could have a direct impact on the game world. A good GM would make adjustments to the game world based on what players accomplished, or didn't, during the modules.

I'm by no means an expert on T2K adventure modules. I am intimately familiar with the original Poland adventures but only have a passing familiarity with the CONUS modules. Please correct me if I am wrong, but, to my knowledge, none of the published modules say, "ignore such and such- it didn't happen that way; it happened this way instead."

I think you are proposing a fundamental change to canon, by writing out the drought from HW. This alters canon, instead of adding to or evolving it.

If Marc Miller were to come out publicly (like here, for starters) and say, "ignore HW" or, "the drought wasn't as bad as initially described" or something to that effect, I think it would be easier for some members to swallow. If that were the case, I think an official, amended version of HW, would be the logical jumping-off point for post-2001 canonical material.

Actually the NA modules have several contradictions in them - and the biggest is HW compared to earlier releases - in several places it directly contradicts canon from Allegheny Uprising and the Ozarks module as well as Red Star Lone Star - that alone shows that it wasnt coordinated with the rest of the canon releases - when I get home tonight I will put together a list of the contradictions.

Also the events of the Last Submarine Trilogy - which end with the implication that the sub gets home with the scientists aboard that know how to make cheap fusion reactors and thus be able to get power going again in the US - arent even covered in the module. Or recovering the Soviet weather satellite in Satellite Down.

Its either an accurate description of the US all the way to the end of 2001- which is basically says it is - or its a snapshot in time and thus shows May 1, 2001 and after that new releases can possibly show a different path

or what Loren was saying was that the sub never got home and the Soviets got the satellite and the US timeline for the rest of the year shows that by not mentioning them in any way

And no I didnt say to ignore the drought or write it out or say it didnt exist - as I said before thats what my GM SAID when we did our campaign back when we played the original games - keep in mind my GM also had the Submarine launching three TLAM-N's and taking out Ploesti - made for a great game but no one is saying lets make that canon

What I am saying and have said before is that the drought as portrayed would have not only stopped any recovery but it would have killed the country for sure and most likely almost completely depopulated it as well. Given that kind of drought and the canon die off of 75% plus (and most likely more like 85% when you throw in fighting over the food that was left) of the remaining population and then add in disease from 70 million plus dead bodies rotting everywhere (because starving people arent going to bury them) you would be lucky if 5% or so of the pre-war US population is left by years end.

But according to 2300 canon MilGov and CivGov survive that and unite to defeat New America Sorry but in the face of that kind of disaster the US would be finished for a century or more.

Given that level of drought you wouldnt have to worry about Mexican domination of the Southwest, southern CA and Texas either - those areas would basically be lucky to have 15,000 people left alive after the Colorado and Rio Grande and the other rivers went dry in AZ, NM, TX and CA. The Apache might have survived it but I doubt anyone else would.

And if anything the winter would result in more snow not less - you have huge amounts of particulate matter from burning cities and nuclear detonations and campfires causing forest fires thrust into the atmosphere in 1997-2000 - if anything a realistic weather depiction would be more snow and a shorter growing season possibly affecting food production

so local droughts that are bad causing big population shifts - believable -

people having to leave southern CA because the system that brings water from the north is busted - yup totally believable -

snow staying on the ground till late May or June making the growing season shorter - yup again -

forest fires burning from way too many idiots with campfires and too many firefights in the woods (which is in the module) - yup completely believable

a continent wide uber drought that basically undermines the effects of every other NA module written to that point, has issues with the timelines of those modules, kills off so much of the US population that by 2300 they would be lucky to have 45 million people north of the Rio Grande (and I am being very liberal in my estimates) and that would put most of the US back to pre-industrial levels of technologies (and by that I mean back to the 1700's) when people have to kill off every draft animal there was to feed starving people so they are trying to plow by hand in 2002

and where not one mention is made of using irrigation methods that would have worked to plant and water crops to feed people that have been around since Sumeria (4000 BC)

sorry thats not believable - and if there are new works on the game some of those issues should be addressed in a way that honors the previous canon but also - as you said Raellus- evolves it as the previous authors did with their releases

[Raellus]

Actually the NA modules have several contradictions in them - and the biggest is HW compared to earlier releases - in several places it directly contradicts canon from Allegheny Uprising and the Ozarks module as well as Red Star Lone Star - that alone shows that it wasnt coordinated with the rest of the canon releases - when I get home tonight I will put together a list of the contradictions.

That would be very helpful for those of us who not very familiar with the CONUS modules. It would also be a great starting point for a HW revamp.

sorry thats not believable - and if there are new works on the game some of those issues should be addressed in a way that honors the previous canon but also - as you said Raellus- evolves it as the previous authors did with their releases

Yes, we've been over this ad nauseam. There's a whole thread devoted to it. Again, I don't disagree with a lot of your criticisms of HW. I too think it goes a little too far in places. But, at the moment, we're just talking about opinions, educated though they may be. Like it or not, right now, and for the foreseeable future, Howling Wilderness is canon.

We need Marc Miller to come out and officially RETCON, or authorize someone else to do so, Howling Wilderness. Have you considered attempting this for your next project, Olefin You are one of its most vocal critics and some of your work has recently been canonized. You strike me as being the perfect individual, other than Mr. Miller himself, to redesign HW.

Until such time as Marc Miller canonizes a module or sourcebook that RETCONs the parts of HW that you don't like- and you are not alone, I know- then this is all moot, isn't it