[Apocalypse|State] - The City

[john anderson]

So, CGS's A|State. What is it, and how can AW be made to bring it to life?

I think A|State was my gateway game into the world of the indy/small game publishers. It got me to the forge, where I was confused. It led me to Burning Wheel, which is my go-to game of choice. It was the stimulii that changed what and how I play rpgs. Problem was, I really wasn't a fan of the system for A|State. Loved, and I mean really loved, and still do love, the setting, but I just couldn't get past that system. I tried NWOD, then BW and then I read AW.

A|State is a post apocalyptic setting. You've got the calamity striking down civilisation in the dim, dark past. You've got all that remains from the Bombardment and the Shift stuck in one place. The City. A circular metropolis of unimaginable size and population, with a sickening level of inequality between the industrialised, hitech and uber-wealthy macrocorps hiding in their shiny, well-protected fortresses. You've got pseudo-Victorian, smog-laden and acid-rain pelted burghs full-to-bursting with the uneducated, unwashed and starving populace all toiling to survive against horrendous odds.

There's no escape from The City, it's outer boundary is a wall of something that disappears any poor bugger who steps into it. There's the Shifted, bizarre mutants and things that appear from nowhere, kill for seemingly for no reason whatsoever, or, more scarily, they may even help you. Lost Places make entire tenements or people, or vehicles just...disappear.

The City is decaying. There's no central authority to maintain or rebuild The City. Anarchy, deprivation and decay are underlying themes of this Hobbesian dystopia. It is AW in a city. An industrialised, anarchic city to be sure, but with just as much misery, depravity, loneliness, want, humanity and weirdness to make it a great fit for AW.

John

[john anderson]

One possible route for creating the setting (The City) is to marry the idea of the Hardholding with that of the burgh. The vast majority of people within The City are born, live, work and die within the same burgh. The costs and dangers involved with travelling to other burghs makes travel less than attractive for those unable to afford private means of travel of an armed escort.

Name your burgh:

• Choose 1, 2 or 3 names from the list below, and mix and match them together for the name of your burgh. You can also include as one of your choices one of the names from pages 6-7.

Cold, skank, sullen, stacks, fell, lanes, cut, gate, sleeping, rookery, tor, rain, towers, bank, side, bright, lights, clear, water, junction, hills, lucent, mire, folly, break, parish, fog, long, spires, project, shore, warrens, pond, dog, hell, side, bath, dreaming, heights, long, calculus

You start at the bottom:
By default, your burgh is:

• moderately populated, with most people squatting in decaying tenement blocks
• it produces a mix of light manufacturing, cottage industry, crude farming, and scavenging (surplus: none, want: hungry)
• there’s no authority, no law

Choose 4
These are just placeholder ideas at the moment...

• Improve income of the burgh
• Increase the population density (increased income, but also increased hunger)
• Decrease the population density (increased anxiety, decreased hunger)
• Add a market (increased barter/credit)
• Add a well-known place that is known through The City for something cool or hard to find.
• more to add...

Choose 2
These are just placeholder ideas at the moment...

• Population even poorer than usual (want+disease)
• Very high prevalence of drug use (want+disease)
• Population decadent and perverse (surplus-1barter, want: savagery)
• more to add...

More as it comes to me...
John

[john anderson]

I think taking this route (collaborative setting of the burgh) is probably the way to go. It ties in nicely with ideas of hope in the darkness as it creates a setting that is far more personal and intimate than an entire city. It also, hopefully, creates a by-in for characters to try and improve the lot of their fellow burghers (?sp).
John