Go back to the Morrow Project Travel Guide index to get to the other regional entries.

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SECTION ONE: The Pacific Coast (Alaska, Hawaii, Washington, Oregon, California)
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ALASKA

1) NUCLEAR TARGETS

Juneau, SS-N-17
Eielson AFB, Fairbanks, SS-18M1
Elmendorf AFB, Anchorage, SS-17
Point Barrow, DEW Line HQ, Barrow, SS-17

Discretionary Nuclear Targets:
Yukon Command Training Center, Fairbanks, SS-N-17
Fort Wainwright Military Reservation, SS-18M1
Fort Greely Military Reservation, SS-18M1

2) MORROW PROJECT ASSETS
Unnamed MP bolthole : Inside Mount Hayes, southeast of Fairbanks in the Spur Glacier area.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Somewhere in the Brooks Range of northern Alaska.

3) ANCHORAGE

The War: Anchorage was destroyed by four MIRVs detonating on Elmendorf Air Force Base in the northeast part of the city ground burst, scorching most of the city away. Today, about 250 people still live in and around Anchorage, with the majority of them involved in farming the coastal outskirts or scavenging in the thick ruins. There are two main groups, both of whom dislike the other.

Whale Worshippers: The largest group in the Anchorage area are a fierce community of native Inuits known as the "Whale Worshippers", who came to the Anchorage bowl a century ago. The Whale Worshippers have been attempting to take control of the shores of Cook Inlet from the rest of the fishers and farmers in a low-grade war of attrition for three generations now. Local raids still occur between the Whale Worshippers, local farmers, and the Marines as they all try to secure the limited food growing areas. These raids usually happen at the beginning of the spring, as any action during the winter is near impossible.

The US Marine Corps: The forested hills and river cuts east of Anchorage have long been home to the ancestral remnants of the 1st Marine Division. Elements of this division came here in 1990 to fight the Soviets, but the rapidly crumbling supply and communications network soon left them stranded on their own. They came here 150 years ago as a cohesive unit, but over the generations since the rigors of life in Alaska have morphed the unit into a community of farmers and hunters with a unique history. All that remains of their USMC heritage are some old uniforms, rusty guns and even rustier vehicles. Today there are about 170 people in their community, nearly all of them descendents of the Marines and native Alaskan girls. They still see themselves as the defenders of America, though they have little concept of what America actually was anymore. They have some trade opportunities with the locals, a growing cottage industry making excellent inshore canoes. Much of their products go to the Inuits along the coasts and river valleys and to the Kodiak islanders, who prize the Marine's well-built boats.

Wittier: This small town east along the coast from of the ruins of Anchorage is home to a small group of religious nuts ruled by “Apostle Nuukut”. He is the leader of "The Church of Christ, Our Atomic Savior". The symbol of the Church is an image of Jesus crucified on the cross, painted black to signify radiation burns. The church's favorite hymns are versions of Ozzy Osborne’s “Thank God for the Bomb” and the Louvin Brothers' “Great Atomic Power”. Recently, word of this church has reached the Marines in Anchorage, who are not exactly thrilled about it.

4) THE SOVIETS
The Soviets invaded Alaska in the first week of 1990, some six weeks after the nuclear exchanges. While they didn't accomplish much, their impact can still be felt 150 years later. They landed along the islands and coastlands of Lower Alaska, aiming to move down the coast to link up with Soviet airborne forces in Washington state. There were some battles, some victories, even more defeats, before the invasion force was stopped for good. Once the invasion was blunted, the surviving soldiers either scattered, some even heading back to Siberia, or they just put down stakes in the areas they occupied, marrying Alaskan girls and having children. Generations later, the enclave that survived has become just another immigrant community.

Today: The Soviets still in Alaska can be divided into two basic categories…those that are completely assimilated and concerned only with survival, and those that are still loyal to “Mother Russia” and still dreaming of, or actively pursuing, conquest. Most of them fall into the first category, and are just pockets of people with mixed ancestry with strange customs and words, and very few seek to cause any trouble. The largest enclaves are listed throughout the rest of the entry.

Valdez: The largest Soviet settlement in Alaska and the most militant, is centered on the port town of Valdez. In late 1990, the Soviets took this strategic port in a swift amphibious landing. 150 years later, they are still here, though without support from home, the Soviet invaders have been slowly assimilated into the local population just to survive. The town's large brick courthouse is still the headquarters of the grandly-named Soviet Alaskan Landing Command with nominal control over all Soviet forces in North America, though that is in name only, of course. There are now some 600 people living here, farmers, fishermen and their families, many of them descendents of the ethnic Russians. Clustered in small farms of three or four families each, they raise grain and vegetables or harvest fish from the lakes and rivers. The militia still parades and patrols the area, keeping a little bit of the Red Army alive in Alaska. The Russian leadership in Valdez has always been mixed in their opinion of what to do in the near future. Most want to just keep fishing and hunting and making babies, while some younger men want to carry on their forefather's war. Every generation goes through this same debate, but so far the community has always stayed put.

Yakutat: Home to a small group of steadfastedly loyal Soviets (8 young men) who moved here last week from the Valdez enclave. They are the most militant of the younger generation of Soviets there, and took to the old stories about the glory of Mother Russia strongly. The splinter packed up and left in the middle of the night, taking with them their weapons and an ancient Soviet flag. Here in Yakutat, they have been stomping around threatening the local Inuit fishermen. They have standing plans to march on Seattle, but about half of them are already homesick and missing their families.

5) SOUTHWESTERN COAST
The densely forested Kenai Peninsula lies to the south of Anchorage. The oil storage and shipping facilities at the southern terminus of the Alaska Pipeline in the Cook Inlet and along the Valdez Bay were destroyed during the war and are still rusting today. Further along, the wind-swept Aleutian Chain is virtually abandoned.

Kodiak: On Kodiak Island, the town of Kodiak is a trading center known for its smoked fish and flintlock rifles. An antique arms museum in Fort Abercrombie State Park was emptied by the locals right after the war, and some of the operational long rifles (several over 300 years old now) are still used as militia weapons. Also thanks to the displays in the museum, they have some basic gun manufacturing and reloading capability. They can produce flintlock rifles, pistols and the ammunition they need for those weapons. 300 people live in and across Kodiak Island, their efforts making the town self-sufficient in most daily needs.

King Salmon: Currently occupied by what is certainly the most militant and dangerous force of Soviets in Alaska. King Salmon was captured just this summer by an amphibious assault, organized by a resurgent military government in Siberia. This government, centered north of the ruins of Vladivostok, has become that region's strongest military power and has begun sending expeditions across the eastern sea. The first landing attempt was nine years ago on the coast of Japan, which was unfortunately destroyed by a typhoon just offshore. Despite the loss of men and material, the Siberians scraped enough together to launch a second expedition, this one to Alaska. 250 men landed here with big dreams of marching on Juneau, but have decided to winter here first and head along the coast next spring. If they encounter the other Soviet enclaves along the way, they will be very surprised by their lack of fervor for the Soviet cause. Equipment includes several large cannons of recent manufacture and a dozen trucks. They are manufacturing their own alcohol based fuel to run their vehicles, though they utilize skis and dog sleds for perimeter patrols. Most curiously, they have a nice PR-68 radio (maybe Project?) that they use to spout Communist propaganda to anyone listening. The few remaining Inuits are surly and only half-subdued.

Aleutian Chain: The Aleutian chain is mostly abandoned except for seasonal fishing camps. The military bases scattered along the chain received numerous hits from tactical nuclear weapons, destroying most settlements of any size.

6) LOWER ALASKA
The chain of islands and strip of land along the coast of British Columbia, including the former capital of Juneau, were the sight of some fierce conventional action during the war.

Juneau: The nuclear missile meant for Juneau malfunctioned soon after leaving the submarine and spiraled off into the sea, sparing the city and assuring its place in the new world. The Soviets captured the city in 1990, but abandoned it soon after, choosing instead to march south on Vancouver and Seattle. Behind them they left a lot of smoking wreckage for the surviving locals to clean up and rebuild.

Today: Although severely damaged by street fighting (destroying a third of the city), Juneau is now a prosperous city that serves as the center of the trade and culture in the region. The current population of the city and surrounding foothills numbers roughly 4,200, making it by far the largest population in the state.

Economy: Operating industries include a crude steel mill and a dozen factories making everything from bullets to bicycles. However, chronic shortages of everything prevent any sort of decent production levels and most of the skilled workers' time is spent keeping the machines from falling apart rather than manufacturing or repairing anything new. The road system and most of the bridges in the city remain in decent shape, though their primary traffic is horse-drawn. Fishing is king here, and a large fishing fleet has been the pride of Juneau for many generations.

Militia: Juneau’s militia consists of 300 part-time militiamen and the "Scout Group". With a heritage passed down from an Alaska National Guard regiment, the Scout Group is made up of mostly native Inuits and has a sterling reputation of prowess in battle with bandits and mutant wildlife alike. The Scout Group now has 200 men and all the city’s best weapons. While Juneau is an "open city", strangers, either traveling alone or in a group will be scrutinized carefully and quickly tossed out if they cause trouble. For the last century, the defenders have been kept sharp by drills and exercises.

Life of a port: The harbor is the center of activity in Juneau, constantly active with trade. Some 80 small fishing sailboats and five large coal-fired merchant steamers are based here. An ancient US Navy destroyer, torpedoed early in the war, is still beached south of the docks. By now, it is nothing more then a coral-covered reef in the harbor that seagulls crap on and sea lions use as a platform for basking in the sun. However, for a seafaring people who daily brave the open sea, the lure of having such a large and powerful ship is appealing and there is yearly wistful talk of trying to refloat her.

Sitka: Some 300 fishermen now live in the town, along with their families. They often make the trip to Juneau, and ships from there occasionally dock at Sitka. The historic Baranof Castle is now the citadel of the town and acts as a safe retreat from the occasional severe storm.

Ketchikan: The southern prong of the Soviet invasion effort landed here, and the area is littered with the rusty wreckage of tanks and sunken landing boats. A Soviet troop transport is still beached on a shoal just offshore, smashed by Canadian and American aircraft during the landings. It has been looted long ago and is now just a home for seals and gulls.

Annette Island: This large island has been a Soviet enclave for nearly 150 years, the residents mostly descendants of a Soviet Naval Infantry regiment that settled here following the aborted invasion. The only town of any note is Hydaburg on the southern tip of the island. There are about 250 people here total and they have long ago become simple fishermen and farmers. Their heaviest remaining weapons are two old creaky machine guns. As they are simple fishermen who have not have retained the skills to keep these weapons functional, they have them on display in the center of the village as non-functional souvenirs from the war of their ancestors. Hydaburg has no walls or large fortifications, as they have been at peace with the surrounding locals for generations.

7) THE GREAT WHITE NORTH
The new Ice Age has brought a permanent freeze to much of Alaska north of the Yukon River. The northern and central parts of the state are great stretches of evergreen forests, blinding white snow and ice hundreds of feet thick in places. Virtually no one lives in the interior of Alaska anymore, except some totally isolated Inuit families following the caribou herds. They have to contend with hungry mutant Polar bears as well as extreme snow storms and blizzards.

The ruins of Fairbanks: The nuclear missile targeted on the Yukon Command Training Center in the city fortunately missed, stringing its stick of MIRVs into the deep forest to the southwest. Only one was close enough to cause any real damage to the city. Despite this near-miss with annihilation, Fairbanks was not meant to survive WWIII. With the loss of electrical power due to EMP, the US military soon evacuated the area and headed south to Anchorage and east into British Columbia. The civilians were left to their own and suffered greatly from marauders and army deserters. Then the Ice Age came and the snows just didn’t stop falling. Fairbanks has been unpopulated for decades now, but the rare scavenger still combs the rubble for useful equipment and material.

Fort Wainwright: This radioactive and flattened base has been picked over for a century by wanderers and locals alike. Currently the home of a Recon Company of the “Army of the Yukon”, here from Yellowknife looking for salvage.

Fort Greely: This base far to the southeast of Fairbanks was blasted by an SS-18M1, totally destroying anything manmade. Bits and pieces of salvage can still be picked up from these ruins, provided one is wary of wolves and the occasional bear.

Galena: Typical of the villages in the southern interior where all the white people left after the war, leaving only the native Inuits to revert to their old ways. Sitting on the Yukon River, Galena now hosts some 300 residents, mostly fishermen, hunters and their families.

The DEW line: Few of the individual Distant Early Warning radar stations, spread about the state, were damaged by any weapons. Once the exchanges were over, the remaining Air Force personnel based at the stations evacuated south. Those that made the trek to Barrow were most likely killed by the locals. The other crews who ended up in Fairbanks or Anchorage, were soon given rifles and sent south to defend the lines against the Soviet invasion and were scattered. The storms came after that and buried many of them under permanent drifts. 150 years later, the DEW line stations still sit empty, full of expensive radar and communications equipment that would be a treasure to anyone who want to go to the effort to salvage them.

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HAWAII

This tropical island paradise is suffering, but it has had a faster recovery than most other states due to its isolation.

1) NUCLEAR TARGETS

Honolulu, SS-N-8
Wheeler AFB, SS-17
Hickham AFB, Honolulu, SS-16

Discretionary Nuclear Targets:
Kequkaha Military Reservation, Hawaii, SS-N-8
Fort Shafter Military Reservation, Oahu, SS-N-17
Kaneohe Air Station, Oahu, SS-17

2) MORROW PROJECT ASSETS
Later…

3) THE MAIN ISLANDS

Oahu in the war: Thick with military bases and airfields, Oahu was blasted out of existence. Eighteen nuclear weapon strikes pounded the island, reducing it to cinders and killing some 99% of the population. Virtually every structure was destroyed or damaged and all the tillable land polluted with fallout. Those few lucky survivors left as best they could.

Oahu since: For the last century, Oahu has seen a few settlements reborn. These are mostly seasonal fishing camps or salvage parties. The island is also occasionally used as a place of banishment for convicts from the Big Island. At any given time, there might be 10 to 30 people on Oahu.

The “Big Island”: Hit by only one SS-N-8, the big island of Hawaii has survived as the center of organization and civilization for the last 150 years, with the new state capitol at Hilo. The bulk of the US military in the state was evacuated to the mainland soon after the war, leaving only the Hawaii National Guard to maintain order in the state, who slowly assumed control of the state's functions. Hilo became the largest city in the chain and the most important. For all this time, the “Infantry” as they are known, have kept the people safe and fed on the island, protecting them from both outside forces and themselves. The Infantry pretty much serves as the de facto government of Hawaii. Over the years their weaponry has broken down and their organization has shifted from a single unit to scattered militias linked by one command structure. Their current, overall technology level is equivalent to the late 1700s, with the few surviving modern weapons horded for emergencies.

The “Battleship”: Hilo is protected by the “Battleship”, the only pre-war warship still active, formerly the Island class Coast Guard patrol boat WPB-1337 Assateague. Though the label Battleship might be a stretch, this steel-hulled boat is by far the most protected and well-armed in the area. Its engines have long ago been converted to run on alcohol and carefully maintained, and it can outrun nearly everything afloat if needed. The boat's hull has been reinforced with timbers and yearly coats of pitch and tar, giving it an unhealthy smell so bad that it is rumored that the reason the pirates run from it is the stench.

Monks: On a promontory on Upolu Point on the Big Island’s northernmost tip sits a small monastery. The “Brotherhood of the Virgin” is well-known for spirituality and sincerity.

4) OTHER ISLANDS
Despite Hilo's efforts, the other islands in the chain are not under any centralized control and are mostly ruled by various local factions. Many natives have reverted back to tribal customs and turned to slave-ownership and banditry, both ancient Hawaiian trades.

Kauai: Currently ruled by a white landowner named Jimmy Ford. He has about 50 armed men and many slaves working a large cattle ranch. He trades almost exclusively with Hilo, and his meat fetches a high price. Hilo has looked the other way about Ford’s brutality towards his slaves as long as he keeps supplying beef.

Molokai: Home of a former Infantry lieutenant from Hilo. Three years ago, he was caught selling foodstuffs to pirates, but before he could be sentenced he escaped to Molokai. Here he is hiding out amongst the local fishermen.

Lanai: Home to a largish local population. They generally do well, but occasionally suffer from pirate raids, mostly from nearby Maui, who raid Lanai for slaves and food.

Maui: Maui is most noted for being a pirate base and clearing house for their looted goods. The pirates, generally known as the "Hanas", from the town where they first gathered, number about 500 total including dependents and captives. The pirate "fleet" consists of five sailing schooners rigged with small arms and very long boat hooks. The flagship is the 100-foot Blooddrinker, a fast and agile sailing yacht built in 1976. The most heavily armed (and sluggish) boat is the 65-foot Jaws of the Shark, formerly a local ferry built in 1984, which mounts three large crossbows starboard and three more at the stern. The other boats of the fleet are the Helm's Deep, the Oahu, and the Captain Cook, all essentially large outrigger canoes with sails, constructed within the last 20 years or so. Offshore, the scattered islets have become the home of these pirates and renegades. They have renamed Maui "Paradise Cove" though you hear “Maui” just as frequently.

Midway: This long-abandoned former strategic island is currently the private domain of a man who has named himself Magnum Pie after an ancient ocean god worshiped by pre-war peoples. Pie has a sailboat that he uses to trade with other islands, he for food delicacies and “rented women” in exchange for salvaged bits of technology. No one knows who he is or where he came from, but rumors abound in the islands that he has been able to protect his island from the pirates all by himself thanks to some mysterious supernatural power, or by some fancy weaponry.

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WASHINGTON

1) NUCLEAR TARGETS

Seattle, SS-16
Spokane, SS-N-17
Tacoma, SS-18M1
Olympia, SS-17
Grand Coulee hydroelectric dam, SS-N-8
Fairchild AFB SS-19
McChord AFB, SS-17
Naval Ammunition Depot, Chem and Bio Storage, SS-N-17

Discretionary Nuclear Targets:
Hanford Atomic Energy Site, SS-N-17
Washington Nuclear Reactor, Richland, SS-N-8
Bangor sub base, SS-18M1

2) MORROW PROJECT ASSETS

Command Group Seattle: Combined Group Seattle was formed to help in the rebuilding of the Puget Sound Area and Seattle in particular. The 79 Morrow Project Personnel in the Group are subdivided into 15 teams as follows:
Command Team UC-1C: 4 people, Ranger MCP, bolthole near Issaquah.
Science S-6 (Group XO): 6 people, Scientific-One, bolthole near Eldon.
Recon Team P-6C: 7 people, Ranger APC, bolthole near Snohomish.
Recon Team P-7C: 6 people, Commando Scout and two XR311 jeeps, bolthole near Shelton.
Recon Team P-10C: 6 people, V150 w/20mm turret, bolthole near Rolling Bay.
MARS Team L-1: 4 people, V-150 w/TOW, bolthole near Southworth.
MARS Team L-2: 4 people, SK-5, bolthole near Mukilteo.
MARS Team L-3: Boltholed in Black Diamond and tasked to assist the staff at the Medical Facility VF-1C in nearby Auburn.
Specialty Team TP-9 (Power Reception): 3 people, Ranger APC, bolthole near Elgin.
Specialty FW-31 (Frozen Watch): 6 people, no MPV, bolthole near Sequim.
Specialty D-5 (Support): 3 people, V-150 ARV, bolthole near Duvall.
Specialty LF-2 (Engineering): 4 people (various equipment), bolthole near Granite Falls.
Specialty LF-3 (Agricultural): 6 people, Ranger, bolthole near North Bend.
Psych Team QP-11 (Psychological): 3 people, no MPV, bolthole near Arlington.
Specialty QD-40 (Decontamination): 6 people, Ranger APC, bolthole near Redmond.

The following two MP facilities are present in the immediate area of Combined Group Seattle:
Commo Base KA (Unmanned): Automated communications facility. Located under a monument in Pioneer Park on Mercer Island in Lake Washington in eastern Seattle.
Medical Facility VF-1C: This large Medical Facility was built underneath an old, very large warehouse along the Burlington and Northern Railroad line just north of Auburn in southeastern Seattle. Built between 1965 and 1966, the facility is fully stocked with medical supplies and frozen with Medical Team VB-1. VF-1C does not have complicated defenses or weaponry; since it was a closed site that would not see extensive use, such defenses were judged unnecessary. Likewise, the personnel of Medical Team VB-1 were given only minimum armament for self-defense, such as pistols and smoke grenades. Heavy defensive firepower, if necessary, could easily be brought to bear in the form of the MARS teams at either Black Diamond or Southworth.

Other MP assets in the state:
Unnamed MP bolthole: Somewhere along the Middle Fork area of Toppenish Creek on the Yakima Indian Reservation in the southern part of the state.

3) PUGET SOUND AREA

Situation, pre-war: As the closest mainland port to the Orient, Seattle was a busy seaport even though it was more then 150km from the open ocean. It exported agricultural goods, transportation equipment, seafood, and forest products. Sandwiched between the rugged Olympic Mountains to the west and the volcanic peaks of the Cascades to the east (both Mt. Rainier and Mt. Baker were visible on a clear day) the city lay on a narrow strip of land between saltwater Puget Sound and 30 km long freshwater Lake Washington. Built on a series of hills some 150 meters above sea level, Seattle had a natural setting few cities could rival.

Situation, the war: When the war started, Seattle was just starting an ordinary working day; the statewide Centennial Celebration was only a week old. Although a major target because of its importance as a seaport and a center of industry, Seattle’s destruction was overshadowed by the strike on the primary target in Puget Sound: the U.S. Navy’s Trident Submarine base at Bangor on the Hood Canal northwest of Seattle. The base took a direct hit from a 25 megaton SS-18M1 which exploded as a ground burst that was felt as far away as West Point in Seattle. To the southwest, Tacoma was obliterated by another 25 megaton blast, as well as taking the blast effects of four 200 kT warheads that exploded over McChord AFB. To the west of Tacoma lay Olympia, the capitol of Washington State; it was hit by four 200 kT warheads from an SS-17. The Seattle missile, an SS-16, carried a 1 megaton warhead and impacted at the intersection of Airport Way South and South Stacy Street, just west of Interstate 5, detonating as an underground burst and creating a radioactive crater nearly 200 feet in diameter. Seattle’s suburbs, however; survived the attack. Two things doomed Seattle: the first was the arrival of an invasion group of Soviet Airborne and ground forces. The second thing was the volcanoes of the Cascade Mountain Range: the war triggered them into eruption.

Situation, post war: The volcanic eruptions of the Cascades darkened the Pacific Northwest in mid-day and kept it black for days. Those who survived the bombs were choked and buried by the volcanic ash from the explosions of Mt. Rainier, Mt. Baker, and Mt. St. Helens. The Soviet Forces being airlifted into the Pacific Northwest flew straight into a scene from Dante’s Hell. Some of the planes made it to their targets and landed; most went down in the wrong places, either crashing into the sea or flying into other parts of America and Canada. Those who made it to the ground found themselves in the same plight as the survivors; in the cities of Puget Sound, things were unimaginable. A city is more then people and buildings; it is a tangled web of dependencies. A modern city cannot support its inhabitants on its own, relying instead on food from the countryside brought in and distributed by a complex procurement and transport system. Without electrical power, generated at distant power stations and carried over miles of vulnerable electrical cable, there is no power to move water and sewage, to transport people up and down in skyscrapers, to run lights or heaters or any number of other necessary things. A single disaster can wipe out all the things everyone takes for granted, yet are so vital to survival. In Seattle, everything collapsed in just a few hours. Those who survived at all found themselves in a desolate, barren land. At the end of that first horrible winter, the city of Chicago had a population of no more then 10,000 people; the city of Seattle had no more then 1,000. Those people who were left in the Puget Sound region–Americans, Canadians, and Soviets–fought to survive among the empty buildings and the streets littered with the dead. The land was emptied of people and whole cities stood deserted. Today, 150 years later, the land is still empty. The cities are still there, empty ruins dusted with ash, left alone except for the scattered survivors and occasional wandering trader. Still, nature is working the slow process of healing, and in many places patches of green dot the landscape.

The People of the Land: The Seattle area of today has perhaps 5,000 people living in it. None of these are in any one, large concentrated group; rather, they are spread out among farming and fishing communities, and scattered pockets of survivors in Pre-War cities. Because of the scarcity of arable land in the region, most people depend on fishing and hunting (supplemented by trade with outsiders when possible) to maintain themselves. Hunger stalks the land fairly regularly and these people have never had a food surplus worth mentioning. Traders are respected, though, since contact with the outside is more necessary here then in other regions of the country. However, road attacks are common and people travel armed, often in sizable convoys. People traveling through the ruins themselves usually move about on foot in small groups and work on the “scatter and hide” principle since large numbers of people draw to much attention from hostiles. Given the constant fighting that has been waged here all these years, the level of wariness and suspicion present among the inhabitants is somewhat understandable.

Opposing sides: The two primary groups in Seattle are the Rebels and the Soviets. The Rebels are centered around the Space Needle at the Seattle Center, and generally hold the northern end of Seattle as their territory. The Soviets are more scattered, holding pockets of cleared, arable land south and east of the blast zone from the Seattle SS-16 impact. The blast zone effectively isolated both groups on the strip of land between the marshes of Puget Sound and the fresh waters of Lake Washington. Because of the struggle between these two factions, strangers are regarded with a great deal of suspicion and fear.

Roads: None of the roads are maintained or even well cleared, with the exception of the Open Road. This means that travel is often slow and rough, more like going cross-country, even in the inner city. Bridges are non-existent off of the Open Road but fords and crossings exist where possible. Within the city the streets are clogged with piles of rubble and windblown ash, and are barely useable at all; any city area cleared for vehicle use will rarely be more then one lane wide. Since the vehicles that would be expected in the City are often Gypsy Trucker semis, any bridges in use will support the weight of the MPV.

Here come the Russkies: The first day after the War was complicated (if that were possible) by the arrival of an invasion force of Soviet Troops airlifted into the region of the Pacific Northwest. The Soviet aircraft flew into an unimaginable storm of ash clouds and lightning that tore many of the transports apart in mid-air. The Soviet Troops who crash-landed their aircraft in Puget Sound (mostly Desantniki–-airborne troops--from the 6th Guards Air Assault Division, with mixed elements of the regular Soviet Army) found themselves in a situation unlike anything the Soviet War Machine had trained them for. The four days of Mt. Rainier’s eruption dumped meters of ash on the frightened, confused Soviets (most of whom had never seen a volcano) and it choked their lungs, clogged their vehicle’s engines, and jammed their weapons. Those who survived their first days in the United States were to learn a bitter lesson about “liberating the oppressed masses.” Those same oppressed masses were quite certain that these Soviets were the cause of the devastation and went berserk when they discovered Soviets had actually landed on American soil. Cut off from the outside world, unable to call for help, the people of Puget Sound rose up and began fighting the invaders with whatever they had on hand. In the days that followed the bombings, this was, often as not, as much a fight to steal the Soviets food, clothing, and weapons, as it was to destroy the enemy.

The Needle: The Space Needle at Seattle Center had been caught in the Moderate Damage Zone of the Seattle Blast, yet survived fairly well; the 186 meter high tripod had been built for the 1962 Worlds Fair and was the hallmark of modern technology at the time of its completion. The Seattle blast rocked the tower, jarred the rotating “Eye of the Needle” restaurant at the top of it’s axle, blew out the blast-side windows and burned off some of the paint, but the tower stayed up… a tribute to it’s designers. Just as important a point was the fact that the site was not irradiated (although areas closer to Ground Zero were too “hot” to approach safely). Since the Space Needle was a symbol of what had existed until all too recently and since it was a defensible hideout, the Americans who fought against the Soviets set about claiming it. The Americans centered in the areas north of the Space Needle and they used it as a secure haven for their precious food stocks and as a symbol of their will to survive; it was also a symbol at a time when the people desperately needed one. They soon became known as the “American Rebels” and vowed to continue the war against the Soviet invaders as best they could.

Seattle today: 150 years after the War, Seattle is still mostly abandoned and empty, a maze of ruins interspersed with ashfields and rubble. The main inhabitants are the Rebels to the north of the bomb crater and the Soviets to the south. The situation is still much the same, although the reasons behind the conflict have been somewhat obscured and twisted with the passing of time. Most of those living on the fringes of these two groups--outsiders like the Northwest Indians and Whale Worshippers--take the matter of the feud between the two groups as a normal part of life and compensate for it. Attempts to play both sides against the middle rarely works however, and the status quo remains much the same as it has been for decades. The occasional Gypsy Truckers who come through the area make a point of stopping in to visit both groups, although neither group realizes that the Truckers are trading with “the other side”. Relations between the Truckers and these two factions are just tolerable: the Soviets fear contact with outsiders, even friendly ones, and the Rebels suspect the Truckers of being “un-American”. As traders, the Truckers are used to dealing with the different factions and work around the matter since each group has on occasion found unique and valuable materials that the Truckers can use or trade to other groups in the interior.

Other factors: There is little knowledge of “The War” among these people, though the Rebels have handed down an oral tradition of the War that, despite decades of telling, still holds fairly true to the way the citizens of Seattle saw the War happen. To most people, though, the War is something that occurred a long time ago; it changed things, but they are alive now and now is what matters. Money is not used here. Gold and Silver have no value whatsoever, except as metals for making things… and steel and iron are often better for many things, like knives and axle rods. Barter is the only medium of exchange these people have known and they are quite good at it, since it is often the difference between a hungry winter and a merely lean one. People who enter this region from “outside” are usually traders on their way to deal, or scavengers out to get something. The presence of the Open Road tends to channel people along a fairly narrow corridor and road gangs make use of this fact to waylay strangers. People travel armed. The region has no growth to speak of; the situation is stagnant and can only be changed by some outside force; either for good or otherwise.

The Open Road: This is the name for the main road system in use by the Gypsy Truckers, Bikers, and other highly mobile groups. The Road is usually old interstate highway when possible, but on occasion follows whatever road is still intact. Maintenance is rare and is often limited to using rubble to level out potholes and other deficiencies. Since few vehicles can move very fast anymore, these sub-standard repairs are usually satisfactory until the next big rainstorm. The Open Road is sparsely populated but connects several different areas of the Pacific Northwest together, and two very tenuous passes through the Rockies link the region with the plains beyond. Aside from the occasional farming community, the people found near the Open Road are either Truckers or Bikers, or people serving them. These people take the form of blacksmiths or homegrown mechanics who will trade repair work for food and barter goods; the Innkeepers, who sell meals and dry sleeping places to those who need it, and the all important Gassers; people who run the stills that make the alcohol needed to keep these mobile people on the move. There is no law on the Open Road other than that imposed by those who travel it, and as each group sees its needs and the Law differently, things vary from place to place and from time to time, depending on who is doing the interpreting.

4) OLYMPIC PENINSULA/WESTERN WASHINGTON
Though always lightly populated, the small scattered communities on this rugged peninsula are surviving in these difficult times by the independent spirit that they are known for. The good fishing and ample game in the forests provide enough food for their numbers.

Forks: Forks is home to the largest community in the area. A mixture of whites and Indians working together for the last century have turned the town into a veritable fort. The 50-man Forks Militia maintains vigorous patrols of the nearby countryside, armed with a variety of muskets and some pre-war small arms.

Port Angeles: The winter home of a large slaver group called the “Tubthumpers". They have recently found one of Recon P-10C's caches that was exposed by a landslide. Suddenly, there are the best armed slavers in the state and a real threat to the area.

Issaquah: Issaquah is buried in decaying volcanic ash that is in places 10-feet thick. The town is completely abandoned and in ruins, and shows no signs of human habitation in quite some time.

La Push: In the late 1980s, the US Navy built a secret underground submarine pen here to hold and re-supply their missile submarines in the event that the main bases were destroyed. This, in fact, happened, and 150 years later, the sub base is still here. No one has entered the base since the war, and it is completely forgotten. Inside there is the Ohio class SSBN Montana. The crew is all dead, but the sub is intact, covered with a long-term storage gel that resists rust and corrosion. The sub holds a full load of Trident II nuclear missiles and there is a full reload in the base as well.

5) CENTRAL WASHINGTON
The central plateaus of Washington are notable for wide-open high deserts, endless fields of wild grasses, and scattered farming communities. Most people are found along the river valleys and on the shores of the numerous lakes.

Wenatchee: The citizens of Wenatchee are currently working on a "town project" of sorts. For some years now they have been united in one goal, the repair and care of a large tour bus that was found in a covered garage in a small town nearby. They hope to get it running, load the three dozens citizens of Wenatchee inside and drive somewhere where the cows are thicker and the women are thinner. So far they have collected some 50 gallons of alcohol fuel, now all they need are ten new tires. They have long feared that anyone traveling by will try and steal it, so they keep the bus secret with fanatical fervor, even to the point of killing innocent travelers who act suspicious.

Hanford Site: To the northwest of Richland is the US Department of Energy's Hanford Site, hit by a nuclear strike during the war and now almost completely abandoned. This huge government reserve is long rumored to be the home of a secret underground complex, though none of the salvagers and scavengers have ever found it.

Moses Lake: Recently a strange violet algae has been spreading in the Potholes Reservoir that has provided this town's water for generations. The citizens are nervous because the gunk is spreading upriver and the fish have begun to disappear. There is much speculation that something leaking out of the Old Hanford Site, roughly two days travel south from the reservoir, is causing the problems. Real fear is driving people to take drastic measures.

Ephrata: A large town with a unique view of their place in the world. The town's leaders have always legitimized their power hold over the surrounding area by claiming they are the "Washington State Government in Exile", and as such have the legal right to loot and pillage the countryside. Most locals refer to the government by the somewhat derogatory term of the "Ephrata Empire". Ephrata's cavalrymen operate far and wide, “keeping the peace” and “enforcing taxation laws” with equal ferocity.

The “Tams”: One of the more widely known biker gangs is the Tams, a female led group who are the descendents of a pre-war motorcycle gang of the Pacific Northwest. There is a town which they have rebuilt which is a winter base they return to and whose location they never reveal to anyone. Period.

6) EASTERN WASHINGTON
Following the war, this area of evergreen forests and blue grass scablands was severely depopulated. Over the years some people returned and rebuilt settlements. Today, the area supports a few thousand people spread out in the river valleys and foothills.

The ruins of Spokane: Demolished by nuclear hits on the city itself and nearby Fairchild Air Force Base. Few people venture into the ruins except for scavengers brave enough to face the mutants and the treacherous rubble.

Miles: In the days after the nuclear strikes on the Spokane area, Captain John Long Bow Smith, as Indian Bureau police chief of the Spokane Indian Reservation assumed almost dictatorial powers. The first thing he did was organize the citizens of Miles into an effective militia to combat the refugee streams. When the sea of refugees from Spokane arrived, they were faced by strong obstacles patrolled by armed guards. After trying unsuccessfully to swamp the town with sheer numbers, the refugees went around it and the town was saved. 150 years later, Miles has a shaky trading system established with other towns in the eastern part of the state, and small groups of people are allowed inside the walled compound to conduct business. About 450 people now live in Miles and the militia is still well-armed and well-trained.

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OREGON

Oregon is still a thickly wooded land and, unlike most of Washington and Idaho, is actually getting a little too much rain. Combined with a terrain that discourages outside invasion, and a fairly well-armed surviving populace, people out have made it work for them. The only organized governments are located along the Willamette River valley from Corvallis south to Eugene. Outside of this strip of small trade cities and outlying farms, there are just scattered villages and caravan waystations.

1) NUCLEAR TARGETS

Portland, SS-17
Salem, SS-N-8
Bonneville Hydroelectric Dam, Columbia River, SS-N-8
John Day Hydroelectric Dam, Columbia River, SS-17
Chief Joseph Dam Hydroelectric Dam, Columbia River, SS-17
Umatilla Army Depot, Hermiston, SS-N-17

Discretionary Nuclear Targets:
Broadman Bombing Range, SS-N-8
The Dalles Hydroelectric Dam, Columbia River, SS-N-17
Squaw Butte Range Experimental Area, SS-N-8

2) MORROW PROJECT ASSETS

Regional Command Base: Located on Wizard Island, in the middle of Crater Lake, this is the headquarters of Combined Group Southern Oregon. The command staff and support personnel assigned to the base are still sleeping peacefully.
Unnamed MP bolthole: On the north side of Bull Run Reservoir area near Mount Hood, and very close to Larch Mountain and south of Benson State Park.
Unnamed MP bolthole: About 20 miles inland in the wilderness near the old ribbon of Highway 42 near Coos Bay.
Unnamed MP bolthole: Somewhere north of Fort Rock Basin.
Unnamed MP bolthole: Somewhere in an abandoned mine shaft near the southern shore of Applegate Lake, just north of the California border and southwest of Medford.
Unnamed MP bolthole: Near the town of Klamath Falls.

3) THE WILLAMETTE VALLEY
More fertile than before, thanks to the changed climate, the area is teaming with life and the problems that come with it. At the north end are the ruined cities of Portland and Salem and peaceful enclaves around Eugene and Corvallis, while at the southern end are the woodsmen and slavers who have their own claim to "civilization". Linking them all is the “Coast Road” where it follows I-5, in places a major trade route thick with caravans and vehicles, and for other long stretches a hobo's highway, a migration route for the homeless and hopeless and the road bandits who prey on them. In the north, the settlements have formed a system of shared security and commerce, elsewhere it is every man for himself.

The ruins of Portland: Though nuked during the war, most of the damage to Portland came from the blasting of the dams upriver. The massive torrent of radioactive water washed away much of the city, leaving it a marshy plain to this day. The current population of the Portland area is around 500, mostly north of the river in old Washington state.

The ruins of Salem: Little remains here but mutant bugs and brave scavengers.

The Salvage Yard: South of Salem is the "Salvage Yard", a large compound dedicated to the recovery and repair of ancient vehicles from around the region. They are currently on a program of refurbishing as many semi-trucks and motorcycles as possible, for the Gypsy Truckers and Bikers who come and go on a regular basis. It is run by a combination of local leaders and fiercely independent salvagers and merchants. Many of the operating vehicles that ply the Coast Road and other Open Roads across the West were once just junk heaps brought to the Salvage Yard. This is an extremely lucrative business and the salvagers here have been able to purchase a large quantity of pre-war military weapons to help defend their Yard. The Salvagers currently employ about 200 men and operate a wide variety of repair equipment including two six-wheel trucks, a trailer fitted out as a mobile workshop, an eight-wheel truck fitted out as a mobile radio repair shop, another eight-wheel truck fitted out as a mobile 20-ton crane, a six-wheel truck fitted with a crude electrical arc welding kit, an old airport taxi tow-truck converted for medium recovery work, an old construction grader for larger wrecks, and a former Oregon National Guard M88 ARV fitted with a bulldozer blade for road clearing work.

Corvallis: Due to the wonderful climate and relative peace, Corvallis is a relative well-off city that is the center of learning and trade for the Willamette Valley. Home now to about 5,000 people. Like many other areas, the strength of the city is the university (OSU), and their passed-down smarts to go along with the brawn of the people. All the land around here is cultivated or ranched and they have running water in most public buildings. Frequent trade caravans arrive and leave for Eugene along the Coast Road and the city's security forces are well-qualified as escorts. The city's defensive militia is strong, boasting 450 full-time soldiers who do nothing but train and patrol. The militia has been responsible for a variety of internal security and civic action roles throughout the upper Willamette Valley for the last 100 years and is an everyday fixture of people's lives. Although relatively prosperous today, Corvallis has suffered much in the last 150 years from the occasional plague outbreak and the near collapse of city infrastructure on an almost once-per-decade level. This has caused Corvallis to be constantly on guard for the next disaster.

Eugene: Another prospering trade city, home to nearly 3.500 people. The city's defenses are currently under the control of Colonel Bill Myler. He has great experience in organization, but he is not overly bright nor imaginative and often looks to his treasured, dog eared copy of Eisenhower's "Crusade for Europe" for advice. In Eugene he has some 125 assorted soldiers, headquartered in an old National Guard training camp.

5) EASTERN OREGON
The relative security provided by the wide open spaces between towns has helped numerous survivor enclaves in the eastern part of the state survive and flourish. The Umatilla Indians control much of the region, though they are generally peaceful.

Enterprise: Enterprise is controlled by a group of mobster-like people calling themselves "The Boris Mafia", descendants of a group of Soviet Spetznaz commandoes whose plane was pushed off course while attempting to land in Washington state. Their interests are everything that would gain wealth--drugs, guns and women. While ruthless and violent, they live by an anachronistic code of honor amongst thieves. Enterprise is the one place in Oregon that no self-respecting person would willingly go.

Madras: The resurgent Warm Springs Amerind tribe has been active in the Madras area for the last few decades, raiding on horseback as far as the Columbia River. They have come into contact with the Umatilla and many clashes have occurred.

Bend: In the center of the state, Bend is a small agricultural community. Bend in notable for having a homebuilt tank, constructed from the remains of a former Morrow Project Agriculture Team tractor. The team awoke some 85 years ago, realized what happened and decided to settle in Bend in order to carry out the mission of the Project as best they could. Over the years, they wisely used their resources to improve the living conditions of the people in Bend. The people of Bend are known for the hardy, disease resistant crops they produce, the best in the state. The tractor's fusion power plant has long since died out, but a crude combustion engine has been inserted. The vehicle looks impressive with plates of metal and gun loops added, but it is useless in the thick forests and mostly sits in front of the town hall.

Pendleton: Current home of a small band of Gypsy Truckers. They have recently been checking on some rumors that the nuked Umatilla Army Depot still has some goodies to salvage. Just last month, the truckers went into the depot and brought something back to Pendleton on a flatbed semi-trailer. Nobody in town knows what it was, but rumors are that it was either loaded with live nukes or dead alien bodies.

Redmond: Redmond has prospered under the auspices of a small monastery of the new Catholic Church. They even have a small, armed force of Jesuits who act as a militia. This monastery was founded in the dark desperate days of the nuclear winter by a group of Catholic monks and priests who were passing through Redmond at the time. With no place to go, and refugees coming in, these monks and priests decided to settle here, and set up a mission. Some 800 residents live here now and more are moving into the area each year.

NEW!!! An adventure setting for the area around Burns, Harney County.

6) SOUTHERN OREGON

Grants Pass: The scenically beautiful Rogue River valley has always been a wild and wooly place known for independent people and well-armed bands of slavers. About 20 years ago, several of the smaller slaver groups in the area banded together to form one large slaver band, about 450 strong, and marched on the peacefully farming town of Grants Pass. Once they captured Grants Pass, they disarmed the remaining populace and set up a little kingdom of their own. There are about 100 civilians still here, kept as slaves for the leaders. The Slavers have pillaged a National Guard armory somewhere in the past and have amassed supplies in the town, including thousands of MREs, clothing, weapons and ammo and have done a good job of fortifying the town.

Medford: A burgeoning farming and trade center, one of the best places to live in the entire southern half of Oregon. The security and relative peace the townspeople have brought over the last 150 years has swelled the population of Medford to around 7,000. The Grants Pass slaver enclave is in constant conflict with the peaceful people living here.

Klamath Falls: At the old Kingsley Field Airport near Klamath Falls, a large caravan stop and trading bazaar has been active for almost a century. The town of Klamath Falls itself serves as a place where travelers from the hinterlands and other towns can come and exchange information, goods, and news about the larger world. The bazaar is ringed by barbed-wire barriers and patrolled regularly to keep the bandits outside and the hookers inside. Up until a few years ago, the town was in contact with the Northern California towns in the Sacramento Valley, but marauder attacks along the trade roads have stopped this. Around 2,250 people live in Klamath Falls, making a good living through trade and lodging.

Wiccans: The forests of extreme southern Oregon are home to the " Wiccans", an ancient organization of neo-pagans and converted riffraff with roots that go back into the nineteenth century.

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CALIFORNIA

1) NUCLEAR TARGETS

Los Angeles, SS-18M1
Long Beach, SS-16
Oakland, SS-N-17
San Diego, SS-N-8
San Francisco, SS-N-17
Anaheim, SS-N-17
Berkley, SS-17
Fresno, SS-N-8
Glendale, SS-N-17
Pasadena, SS-17
Sacramento, SS-17
Santa Ana, SS-19
Torrance, SS-17
Vallejo Nuclear Submarine Yard, SS-17
Livermore Nuclear Weapons Laboratory, SS-19
Fort Ord, Monterey, SS-N-8
Sacramento Army Depot, SS-N-8
Sharpe Army Depot, Lathrop, SS-17
Sierra Army Depot, Herlong, SS-N-17
Camp Pendleton Marine Corps Base, Oceanside, SS-N-17
Fort Irwin, SS-17
Beale Air Force Base, SS-N-8
Mather Air Force Base, SS-17
Travis Air Force Base, SS-N-17
Vandenburg Air Force Base, SS-N-17
Castle Air Force Base, SS-19
March Air Force Base, SS-N-8
Rancho Seco 1 Nuclear Reactor, Sacramento, SS-17

Discretionary Nuclear Targets:
Edwards Air Force Base, SS-17
Lemoore Naval Air Station, SS-N-8
North Island Naval Air Station, SS-N-17

2) MORROW PROJECT ASSETS
Xeta Base: Located in southeastern California. Manufacturing Point for GUCX-1,2,3 robotic combat vehicles.
Morrow Rail Center: Location unknown, but somewhere near the Colorado River. Contains the resources to build a new bridge across the river as well as rebuild railroads and engines.
Morrow Steel Mill: Location unknown, but somewhere in the Mojave Desert. This mini-mill uses electric furnaces and scrap steel to make new steels, then rolls, presses, and machines them. The Project buried a fusion reactor nearby. This facility, once reactivated, can produce anything from steel rails to flat plate. Nearby equipment adds the capability for making braided cable, nails, and even small arms and shell casings.
Service and Support Team IS-2: Bolthole located in a small, caved-in mine shaft north and west of Ludlow, about 40 miles east of Barstow. A specialized team tasked to repair the railroad lines and bypasses in the Mojave Desert area. Because of the possibly of severe radiation hazards, the team was assigned a High Capacity Armored Tractor (HCAT) with an Engineering attachment trailer.
Unnamed MP bolthole : In Iron Canyon in the El Paso Mountains. The canyon is near Gofer, northwest of the old trading town of Garlock and over a dozen miles north of the well-known town of Mojave.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Four miles due west of the town of Darwin in Inyo County at the northern edge of the China Lake Test Center.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Near the town of Quincy in the Plumas National Forest northeast of Chico.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Near the town of Ukiah in Mendocino County.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Inside Kokoweef Cave in the Ivanpah Mountains in San Bernardino County.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Near the town of Morongo Valley north of Palm Springs.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Somewhere in Santa Barbara County, in the thick diatomite strata.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Somewhere in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Near the town of Benicia in the northeast suburbs of San Francisco.
Unnamed MP bolthole : Somewhere in the Chocolate Mountains in the southeast corner of the state.

3) THE BEAR REPUBLIC
The Bear Republic is a tight association of trading towns in the Sacramento River Valley, with a "capitol" in Redding. Their territory extends north to the Oregon border and south to Yuba City. Each town is technically independent, but all swear loyalty to the Republic and help each other out with security and trade. Out of the valley floor, the mountains are thick with bandits and isolated hamlets of woodsmen. The Republic trades heavily with the Golden Triangle cities, which makes up 90% of their trade. The larger central valley towns are all members of the Republic, but beyond that, the large areas of national parks and Indian reservations are dotted with small communities which live in almost total isolation.

Mountain kingdom: Formed in the late twentieth century as the region slowly recovered from the nuclear autumn. The towns in the northern end of the valley got together and realizing that the best way to survive was to pool their resources, they formed a confederacy. Over the years this became known as the "Bear Republic", taking the name of an independence movement of the 1960s. Times were often difficult, and more than once internal and external pressures threatened to tear the Republic apart, but the hearty mountain folk would not give up their dream of independence. For the last sixty years or so, the Bear Republic has stabilized and is now a relatively secure area of farmers and tradesmen, nestled in the valley beneath the stunning mountain peaks.

Militias: All Bear Republic towns provide manpower for a common militia. This militia knows their territory very well and is highly motivated. Equipment is mainly civilian hunting gear, usually limited to sporting arms, police issue weapons, and the occasional bit of military equipment. They have adopted a standard camouflage pattern for their uniforms. Each town in the valley has a militia garrison, responsible for their stretch of the trade route and the surrounding forests. In the event of a major invasion, the militias are expected to combine into one army.

Trade: The Republic's main trading partner is the Golden Triangle to the south, with some routes going to San Jose or east over the mountains to some select mountain towns. Some caravans made the dangerous journey north to Klamath Falls, Oregon, but the Klamath National Forest is so thick with bandits that virtually no one tries anymore. Interstate 5 and Highway 99 are the most common trade routes to the Golden Triangle, and are reasonably well maintained by engineers and maintenance crews.

Baron Vincent Puddy: The current leader of the Bear Republic, known behind his back as “The Inbred” for the supposed relationship of his biological parents. Baron Puddy is a tall man in his 40s, who is cursed with a face as ugly as his mind is brilliant.

Yreka: The northernmost town in the Republic, Yreka has about 2,000 citizens. They are organized, and have a clinic, schools, some home-generated electricity, and water and sewer service. The militia garrison here has 100 men.

The town of Mount Shasta: On November 18, 1989, a 25 megaton SS-18M1 arced in from Siberia aimed for some southern city. As if pushed by the hand of an angel, the warhead veered off course and smashed deep into the ground directly in the center of this small town. In a millisecond, the entire town was turned into glowing magma and drifting atoms. The remains solidified into a freakishly smooth circular plain two miles across. Around this circle, a ridge of vitrified stone and earth rise sharply then taper off. In all directions, where the forest had been blown down, trees snapped like twigs and burned in a flash, nothing grows. 150 years later, the town of Mount Shasta is still a radioactive wasteland inhabited by scores of Blue Undead, and travelers must take a wide detour to avoid danger.

McCloud: A typical mountain town in the Bear Republic, McCloud boasts 300 citizens, almost all wackos and six-tooth rednecks. The militia garrison is just 30 men, drawn from the local population and given only the most basic training. Most of them spend their nights drinking and carousing instead of guarding the town.

Dunsmuir: This small town on the southern edges of the Shasta crater was protected from the blast by a steep ridge. It is home of a saloon called "The Hitching Post", run by a kindly woman who often lets straggling travelers stay upstairs for free. It is an honest establishment frequented by Gypsy Truckers and Bikers, all of whom respect the "no guns, no knives" sign above the door.

Redding: The capitol of the Bear Republic is Redding, a largish town of 4,000 citizens and the headquarters of the militia. The militia garrison is based at the former Redding Municipal Airport, and has a standing force about 275 men and recruits from the Redding population. Most of the men are transported in trucks, but there is a sizeable cavalry force as well. Redding has a fairly good medical facility and ample alcohol fuel for its vehicles.

Red Bluff: Further south, Red Bluff is located on the Sacramento River, at the junction of I-5 and State Hwy 99, the two north-south corridors through the region. As such, Red Bluff is an important trade town and watering hole. Roughly 100 soldiers make up the militia garrison, based in an old bank building south of town.

Corning: Once just a small rural community, Corning is now a large fortress town of 2,000 citizens known for excellent produce and beef. The militia garrison here has 60 men, plus a number of local recruits.

Chico: The southernmost large town in the Republic and the "port of entry" for the rest of the valley. Most all trade caravans stop here and the town's industry is geared towards servicing and maintaining the vehicles. The militia garrison here has 200 men and is barracked in the remains of a heavily fortified television factory along the side of the highway. This garrison is unusually busy, and is adept at imposing "tariffs" on incoming caravans. The countryside to the east of Chico is infested with bandit groups. The main bandit gang in the area has undergone a major leadership change in the past few years. The moderate leader was killed by a homicidal maniac that has begun to attack the more isolated towns in the area, burning and pillaging them. So far they have completely razed several towns, including Graeagle and Cloverdale. The militia in Chico is making plans to hunt them down, something that no one feels like doing.

Mount Shasta: This imposing volcano became active following the nuclear war, exploding violently more than once in the last 150 years. Shasta has long been rumored to be the site of a secret underground complex, the rumored home of an ancient race with high-tech machines. Legends also claim that the people in the city are all usually tall, blue-eyed blonds.

4) NOTABLE NORTHERN CALIFORNIA LOCALES NOT IN THE BEAR REPUBLIC
The area is known for being backwards and poor. There is almost no trade traffic and people when met are dirty, timid, and impoverished looking. Many small towns have been destroyed by rampaging bandit gangs and forest fires pose a constant threat. Along the winding and lonely Pacific coast north of San Francisco there is a unique ethnic community.

Eureka: Home of a largish population of people of Japanese descent, living an isolated existence on the Pacific Coast. These are mostly the survivors of the large Asian communities in San Francisco and Sacramento. After the war, these survivors banded together for mutual protection and Survival, moving in groups and pairs up the coast to a place where they could settle. The radiation-free and isolated port of Eureka was eventually where they stopped, after nearly a decade of moving like nomads across Northern California. Over the years, as their technology dwindled, the ancient code of the Samurai was reborn. The Japanese in the group began to assert their authority and soon took over leadership of the enclave. Not long afterwards, members of "inferior" Oriental races such as Korean, Vietnamese, Chinese and Filipino people found themselves to be lower class citizens of the New Samurai era. For the last century, these people have been nearly slaves, but still retain a great deal of freedom as long as they keep their place. Only the Japanese are allowed to have weapons above the melee level. Soldiers and Samurai are armed with high-quality swords and excellent black powder weapons. Eureka has a number of re-loading facilities and gunsmiths who can repair and maintain the few remaining modern and military weapons. Extensive martial arts skills are still taught to Japanese children, and nearly everyone is dangerous in a hand-to-hand fight. These people will rarely trade with outsiders unless they are of Oriental background, leaving them more and more insular. It is probably the case that most people in Northern California more than a 100 miles away from Eureka have only heard rumors about the Japanese here. The Bear Republic has sent occasional ambassadors over the years, but they have all been rebuffed. (Thanks, Chris Van Deelen)

Herlong: This town was mostly demolished by the nuke strikes on nearby Sierra Army Munitions Depot. Today, just a few dozen families still live in the immediate area, and they avoid the ghostly cratered remains of the depot for fear of "wandering vengeful spirits". It is rumored that there are still some surviving chemical and biological weapons at the depot, but with the damage it received, that is unlikely.

The Coast Road: The long and winding ribbon of Interstate 80, stretching from the ruins of San Francisco to the shores of the Inland Sea in Utah. Through the mountains between the ruins of Sacramento and Tahoe, the Coast Road is infrequently traveled because of rockslides, washouts and bandits. The violent Slavers at Tahoe also serve to keep traffic down.

Tahoe: Home of a powerful enclave of Slavers. The Slavers are mean, selfish people who deal in human lives. However, they are not fanatical and place a high value on their own hides (they will not fight to the last man for anything). They do not kill people indiscriminately since this would be a gross waste of income and these people do not waste anything when it can be sold. They range far and wide into the mountains of California and the deserts of Nevada to capture their slaves. This is not a nice place to end up. The Tahoe enclave produces homemade automatic 12 gauge shotguns, fed from 10-shot magazines. These weapons are relatively new, being a product of the Tahoe local technology.

NEW!!! A companion sourcebook for the area around Tahoe and across Nevada on the Coast Road.

Donner Pass: This high mountain pass east of Lake Tahoe is really very beautiful in the summer and has been a survivalist’s dreamland for hundreds of years. It is defended by a garrison of the Tahoe Slavers. A pair of 200-foot observation towers are used to patrol the vast swaths of desert, communicating with other patrols on the ground via oil-fired signal lamps and mirrors.

Nevada City: Strange things have been rumored in the old Mayflower Mine east of the town. Frightening noises and "devil-men" have been reported by locals brave enough to enter the long tunnels.

The "Biblemen": The name for an ultra-religious clan who are found up in the thick mountains. They can be found in most large towns, passing out handwritten tracts and preaching on corners. They sing and pray at nights, which either brings a crowd or forces the people to kick them out. There are perhaps two or three hundred all together, scattered around Northern California. You will not, however, find them anywhere within a hundred miles of Tahoe. Brother Mark is the informal leader of the Biblemen. He is a small, skinny man who is quick to declare anyone a sinner and a heathen who doesn't believe in the bible.

5) THE GOLDEN TRIANGLE
The so-called "Golden Triangle" is the economic center of the state, and probably the most peaceful of all the empires in the state. The corners of the triangle are Davis, Stockton and Santa Rosa, with all the land in the middle well-traveled and filled with farms and cattle fields. They trade with the Bear Republic, Bakersfield and San Jose, and pretty well dominate the merchant routes in the region. Like the Bears, the cities and towns in the Golden Triangle share security and commercial concerns, with policy coming out of the capitol in Davis.

History: The Triangle was originally just a line drawn in the sand by desperate citizens trying to save their homes from hoards of refugees fleeing the nuked cities. The Governor was in Davis when the bombs came, and he rallied the citizens together in the face of the crisis. Over the first few weeks, scattered military units came in, adding their firepower and authority to the Governor's martial law. Once things stabilized, Stockton and Davis were slowly linked. Santa Rosa joined later, about 2010, and the Golden Triangle was formed.

Convoys: Along with regular trade routes up and down the lower valleys, the Triangle has organized convoys of trucks and horse-carts to carry goods out into the surrounding mountains to trade with the settlements up there. These are occasionally hijacked by bandits and have to be heavily armed and escorted. The more wealthy private citizens in the Triangle also hire out their own convoys for household goods, often dealing on the black market for drugs and weapons.

The ruins of Sacramento: Most of Sacramento was demolished in the war, the rest has been abandoned by the locals. The rambling ruins are visited frequently by salvagers from the Golden Triangle, and nearly every week some amazing technological gem is unearthed.

Davis: The capitol of the Golden Triangle, having been chosen for its relatively intact university campus and defensible entrances. About 6,700 people now live and do business within its defended walls. Davis has the advantages of constant trade, active political control and a large militia body keeping the trouble to a minimum, making it a favorable place for people to live. The Davis area is protected by a large militia with around 500 armed men. The government holds court in several buildings of the UC-Davis campus and there are even some basic classes taught to citizens at the school. The Governor is still elected every eight years, though only landowners can vote. Much effort is expended to remind people of the past glory of the state and the nation, including annual festivals and even trivia contests for kids.

Stockton: This city is the trading center for agricultural and manufactured goods traveling south to Bakersfield and points along the coast. The militia has 400 men, and they control the routes into and out of the city. Many of Stockton's 6,500 people lives in the large farming centers which surround the town. The local militia wear white hats, and are called “White mice”. South of Stockton along I-5 is a large roadblock, which is mined and fortified, that all incoming caravans and travelers must stop at and be inspected. Bribes and informal tariffs are common here.

Napa: Another large farming community in the Triangle, noted for having a 200-man elite militia unit garrisoned here. This unit is a “rapid-reaction force” that is kept in reserve in case of emergencies. It has not been used in that capacity for a generation and the men usually just patrol the roads to Santa Rosa.

Santa Rosa: Always considered the weak sister in the Triangle, Santa Rosa is a largish farming town with a lot of problems.

Radio GT: The Triangle has a large radio station. They salvaged every other station for almost 100 miles for parts. Now it’s the most powerful station west of the Rockies. It plays weather reports and music as well as frequent commercials for products sold in the area. For official transmissions, the use the old California State Police frequency.

David Radison: Perhaps the richest trader in the Triangle. He is just 30-years old, but has spend his life working hard to get where he is. He lives in a mansion just outside Dixon that is a showcase for pilfered art and sculpture. Radison has a private security force and numerous working vehicles. He still has to pay taxes to the Triangle government, but has the freedom to operate as an independent trader most times.

6) SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
This lovely harbor, ringed with urban areas from the mountainous spine of the San Francisco peninsula, across to Oakland and Berkeley, and to San Jose in the south, is a mixed bag of ruin and rebirth.

The war: The bay area took a large number of nukes, on all sides of the bay. Most of the survivors on the mainland side of the bay fled into the surrounding countryside and much of the area was completely burned to the ground in the chaos and riots that followed. The zones of total destruction caused by the nuclear hits were massive.

The ruins of San Francisco: The peninsula took three MIRVs which exploded low over the city in a triangle of fire and death. East to west from 3rd Street to Great Highway and north to south from Market Street to far down the peninsula to Pacifica and San Bruno, there is nothing but charred clumps of rubble and mutant rats. Golden Gate Park, Lincoln Park and similar places went up like dry tinder, spawning mini-forest fires all over the city, adding their destructive power to the atomic firestorms. Most of the streets in the city are impassable to all but foot traffic. The small communities on the south side of the peninsula were spared both blast and radiation, but were quickly overwhelmed by refugees. Route 101 and I-280 heading south out of the city were both choked with burnt and abandoned cars and are impassible for large stretches. The San Mateo and Dumbarton Bay Bridges are still up, and are controlled at both ends by the San Jose enclave. The San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, however, is down in the water, blocking most ship traffic into the southern arm of the Bay.

Eastern bay area: The eastern suburbs of the Bay area were devastated by nukes over Berkeley and Oakland, plus others over the various military bases in the region. Over the last 150 years, the eastern fringes were slowly repopulated and the area now supports a modest population of salvagers and squatters. The thick urban zones along the shore of the bay still remain mostly abandoned, save for a few isolated communities of scavengers who have found pockets to stay in, gleaning the ample salvage. The various enclaves rarely venture into the worst parts of the destruction.

San Francisco Bay: The huge harbor is still a mess, though over the last 150 years most of the wrecks have been broken down or carried out to sea by the tides. Other than the imposing hulk of the Kitty Hawk, a tour of the harbor today would reveal only a few reminders of the atomic horror. The half-sunken remains of a Navy cruiser lying on her side in the soft mud, the top masts of a freighter and several smaller ships still visible in the shallows, and a large Hyundai container ship up on the waterfront, clear in the middle of a street, pushed there by a nuke-induced tidal wave. The famed liner SS Queen Mary still sits in the silt mud off the mouth of Coyote River in Fremont, where she was beached following the nuclear attacks. She is slowly being broken by wave action and the eroding of the sand, and soon the vessel will snap under her own weight.

The Kitty Hawk: Sitting in the shallow mud a mile southwest of the Alameda Naval Base is the huge, rusting hulk of the USS Kitty Hawk, an aircraft carrier that was caught in the blasts over the bay and sunk in the shallow water. Most of her electronic equipment and weapons were either torn off or melted by the temperature (she looks like there was a fire on board), and the hull was badly damaged. However, while the external damage is massive, much of the internal space of the huge vessel remained intact. 150 years later it has become a fortress for the San Jose enclave to the south, a secure place to regulate traffic in the bay. Having a 360 degree field of fire and view, she is ideal for controlling the lower Bay. The Hawk, as she is called, boasts a standing garrison of 100 men and a fleet of small boats anchored in the lee of her flight deck. Her fuel bunkers are bone-dry empty, having been emptied decades ago to feed smaller boats, but there is ample technology still sitting in the bowls of the ship. The flight deck is used as a gun and mortar platform with tall observation towers constructed along its length.

Survivors: North of Market Street the situation is a little better. While the tall buildings were blown down, many of the smaller buildings along the waterfront remained intact. The streets are no more passable here than further south, being little better than cow paths between rubble heaps. It is along this northern sliver of the peninsula that life still clings, along with more numerous survivors south past the worst of the blast zones. Along this northeastern edge of the peninsula, a group of people of Taiwanese descent are clustered here. They are descendents of a large tourist group that was visiting the San Francisco waterfront when the bombs fell. The community currently numbers about 70 total. About a dozen of them members have some old firearms and ammunition stockpiled and they have kept them safe so far. They survive on fishing the Bay and catching rats in the city ruins.

Fort Baker: Fort Baker Military Reservation, at the northern end of the Golden Gate Bridge, is now held by an independent clan of about 140 people. The main occupation of the group is fishing, farming the greenbelts of the area, and monitoring and occasionally taxing ship traffic under the Golden Gate Bridge. The bridge is remarkably partially intact, although just barely. One of its twin trestles has collapsed across the roadway, which cants perilously to one side and it is fit only for foot travel by the brave at heart. The northern half of the bridge is more intact and allows for ships to sail under it into the bay. The Fort Baker people have hung gondolas on ropes down to the water level to act as "customs offices" for the incoming ship traffic. They don't interfere that much, as they do not wish to discourage commerce into the area. The San Jose enclave has some trade representatives here, keeping tabs on what comes and goes from the Bay, and making sure that the Fort Baker people don’t push their luck.

San Jose: San Jose is a large independent kingdom of sorts, trading extensively with the Golden Triangle but also contesting them for the best trade routes and deals in the region. A healthy force of militia soldiers armed with a lot of salvaged weaponry keeps the city safe from outside threats and patrol the trade routes and the perimeter of the city. With the only active port in the area, San Jose has a productive, if furtive, trade with Canada, South and Central America and even receives a few ships from Asia, mostly Chinese and the odd tramp steamer from the Philippines. San Jose is run like a police-state, except that the major crimes are financial--failure to report recovered technology, smuggling, and failure to pay taxes. Everything is taxed in San Jose, on top of being inflatedly expensive. Of course, the government does maintain basic public services such as police patrols, some water utilities, a certain amount of public transportation, and extensive dockworks.

Sam Reagan: The current leader of San Jose, a distant relative of former California Ron Reagan, was “elected” 24 years ago in a landslide. He is a tall man with a handlebar mustache and gray thinning hair. Reagan, his staff and a few top traders are insanely wealthy. Reagan writes trade contracts like a South American dictator with local towns and far away cities, nothing is too ambitious for him. Reagan resides in the "mansion", formerly the Mission Santa Clara. It is now a fortress, with heavy concrete perimeter walls and armor plated facades.

The Big Gun: The San Jose enclave's prize is a massive, former US Army M65 280mm "Atomic Annie" howitzer, an enormous 85-ton monster designed to fire tactical nuclear shells and one of only twenty originally produced in the 1950s. This gun has been sitting in a field near Moffitt Field airbase facing roughly out to sea since 1989. While it is functional, no one has anything even remotely capable of moving it or turning it around. The leadership of San Jose has kept the gun covered and scrubbed for all these many decades with the hope that one day some shells might be found for it. It has become the symbol of San Jose, with it's likeness on the enclave's flag, and is a popular tourist trap for people visiting the city.

The Shells: Just a few weeks ago, a sleazy wandering arms trader came to town. He carried with him some drawings and measurements of some particularly large gun shells. It seems, however unlikely, that he had found a cache of shells for the Big Gun. He would not tell anyone where he found them, but he has offered to sell them to the city for a fortune in gold and young girls. The city leaders are in a state of euphoria over this amazing stroke of luck and just might give him what he wants. Negotiations are still in progress. The truth is actually better than the trader knows. He found forty of the shells in the remains of the old Hawthorne Army Depot across the border in Nevada. Of the forty shells, just nineteen are still capable of being fired. Of those nineteen, two will explode in the barrel of the gun when fired, but the last seventeen are fully operational. The problem is one of size and ease of movement. The shells stand about 5 feet high and weigh about 800 pounds each, so moving them any distance would take an organized effort.

7) SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO
South of the blast zones, along the forested coastline just south of the bay, there are a number of notable settlements. These include…

Rio del Mar: There is a population of "starving artists", disenchanted people from various places, wanderers, and some ex-Golden Triangle dissident exiles who have taken over a large auto ferry beached on the shallow sandbar in Monterey Bay and renamed it the Elba. They will usually trade expertise for goods, although they prefer to be left alone. The San Jose enclave often exiles "uncooperative" citizens to this area; taking them to within sight of the Elba and dropping them off with only a warning and a good-bye.

Half Moon Bay: Half Moon Bay on the western coast of the peninsula is now home to a small population of Japanese. These are descendents of six survivors of a Japanese Navy submarine, damaged in battle in late November, 1989, which drifted east until it landed on the west coast of America. The crewmembers found wives amongst the local survivors and slowly turned into fishermen. After 150 years in America, their descendents have become known locally as the "Shintos", despite their mixed race. They are aware of the Samurai community up the coast in Eureka, but have decided to keep their independence.

Snake-eaters: Half Moon Bay is also home of a veteran Snake-eater Team. They were frozen just north of Santa Cruz and woke up about three years ago. Immediately after wake-up they were ambushed by a Children of the Night patrol. The Children managed to kill two of the Snake-eaters but only after sustaining heavy losses. After this encounter, the remaining Snake-eaters moved north, passing through Davenport, and encountered the Japanese settlement at Half Moon Bay. Realizing that it would only be a matter of time before the Children moved on this community, the Snake-eaters settled down here with the intention of protecting the fishermen. Some have taken wives and are busy fortifying the community against a possible attack from the south. There are currently four Snake-eaters living here, all US Army Rangers. The Snake-eaters have managed to retrieve the contents of their caches and are very heavily armed. They have raised a small militia from within the ranks of the fishermen and escapees from the Badges to the southeast. It is known in the area that any slaves that escape the Badges in Santa Cruz County are welcome here. The Snake-eaters simply won't tolerate slavery.

Santa Cruz: Santa Cruz is currently inhabited by a tribe of Children of the Night who moved into the ruins about 5 years ago. They are living in a half-collapsed theater on the boardwalk. The Children vigorously patrol the ruins and any “normal” human discovered in Santa Cruz is swiftly killed. Only one group of “normals” has ever managed to escape the Children; the Snake-eaters in Half Moon Bay. The humans who live around the area never visit the place anymore for fear of the “vampires”.

Badges: Just to the east of the ruins of Santa Cruz is a clan of Badges that are descended from the Santa Cruz County Sheriffs Department. These Badges will seek out any wanderers who are camping in their territory and attempt to enslave them. Slaves are put into chain gangs that maintain the networks of roads and outposts used by the Badges. If the wanderers appear to be too strong they will be issued paper tickets for camping violations. The Badges will also attempt to collect “fines” from the wanderers; as much as they think they can get away with. The Badges have recently become concerned about the presence of the Snake-eaters in Half Moon Bay. There has been talk of “teaching those freedom loving hippies” a lesson, but so far it has been just that; talk.

Davenport: A small community notable only as the home of a seedy bar called “The Whaler”, which is known for harboring refugees and escapees from the law. In an anachronistic continuation of ancient history, the secret code phrase to gain entrance to the bar's secret underground hide-out is “Please don’t throw peanut shells on the floor”. About three years ago, the citizens of Davenport and The Whaler allied themselves with the Snake-eaters of Half Moon Bay. Any refugees or escapees from the Badges to the southeast are assisted in making their way north. The 20 people who live here and call Davenport home have plans to retreat north to Half Moon Bay in the event of an attack by the Children or the Badges of Santa Cruz County.

Watsonville: Home of a small neo-wiccan religious cult that worships a male harvest deity by the name of "Jolly Green Giant".

8) SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY
The San Joaquin valley is mostly uncontested and crossed by vital trade and travel routes between Bakersfield and Stockton. Interstate 5 is the main caravan route, Highway 99 is used but you have to bypass the horrid mess that is Fresno.

Madera: Home to a thriving Oiler town, begun fifteen decades ago by a US Navy sailor named Paul Williams, who was on leave visiting his mother when the war started. His mom lived in Firebaugh, a small town a few miles to the west of Madera, out in the country. There was a general call, just before the end, for all military personnel to report to their duty stations, but Paul never got that call before the nukes began to fall. He knew, once the reports of the nuke strikes started rolling in, that it was hopeless to even attempt to get back to his base in San Diego. He also knew that there would in all likelihood be a period of desperation and anarchy as panic set in to the surviving populace. Paul began preparing his family and friends, he was a natural leader, intelligent and fit, and most people readily followed his lead. Once he had all of his family and friends gathered around him, he began organizing everyone...creating duty rosters, foraging teams and training a combat team. And, unfortunately, in the times to come, they had many opportunities to put thier knowledge to practical use. It was only due to the early organization of Firebaugh that saved anything resembling the best of humanity. From Paul's initial small group, other like-minded people began to gather, and grew until the group became a village, and then a town. To be sure, there were many trials to overcome, but having an early start on organizing attracted others. Many of these people came with crucial knowledge and skills which became vital in the years to come as the community grew. Starvation was a real and horrifying reality initially, but thanks to some favorable winds, fallout was minimal. The farmland around Firebaugh was still fertile, and with a strong farming heritage in the region, starvation was held at bay. Eventually, enough food was to produced for trade with other small communities. Eventually, they grew so big that they outgrew the tiny town of Firebaugh. The nearby larger town of Madera along Highway 99 appealed to them and they moved nearly everything and everyone to that mostly abandoned town. Madera had a small oil field and refinery complex, which were slowly reactivated over the next few years. This provided a trickle of fuel and oil to be traded to local communities, and eventually to larger empires like the Golden Triangle. Paul's legacy finally outgrew him, and councils were formed to run the community. He was slowly marginalized until finally he could see he was no longer needed. He was happy enough to care for himself and his immediate family as everything he worked so hard to create took on a life of its own. 150 years later, Paul's community is still here and still just as viable. Much of the town's citizenry either live within a fortified ring around the refinery or spread out in farms in the surrounding county. The mayor, a descendant of Paul's, drives around in an old Jeep Cherokee, repaired Frankenstein-style over the last 150 years. Most of the oil pumped and refined from here is shipped north along Highway 99 to Stockton where it is distributed further and is a major reason why vehicles up north keep running. They are often menaced by roving gangs from Fresno, but have never lost a battle.

The ruins of Fresno: Nuked during the war, the city is still largely a rubbled wreck. The few less-damaged parts are controlled a large, well-armed Chicano clan. While not much on discipline or organization, the clan has some old machineguns and mortars that have been passed down from family member to family member. Trade caravans have largely bypassed the city, swinging wide to the west on Highways 198 and 145. The clan occasionally hits a convoy but usually takes high losses in the effort.

Emptiness: Between Fresno and Bakersfield there is virtually nothing, towns such as Tulare, Delano and Calico are long-ago deserted and looted. The nearby Lemoore Naval Air Station was nuked, polluting the fields and streams for miles, further reducing the chances of finding anyone here. Trade caravans that run up and down Highway 99 barely notice the dusty ruins alongside, but keep a wary eye out for bandits and sudden dust storms.

Bakersfield: The effort to evacuate survivors from Los Angeles was met with strong resistance from central California cities like Bakersfield, who had enough problems of their own. The local National Guardsmen were called on to keep the migrations manageable and used force whenever necessary. In the first decade after the war, Bakersfield was the capitol of the grandly-named “Republic of California, a regional empire with big dreams. When the Mexican invasion came north in the years after the war, it was often the Bakersfield soldiers of the Republic that went out to battle them. They stopped the Mexicans south of them and pushed them back. They returned to Bakersfield soon after the battle, not wanting to risk loosing control of the city in the absence of the military. However, the big plans for rebuilding the area, as well as a bridge across the Colorado River, never came to fruition and the Republic was disbanded by 2010. The Republic collapsed because it tried to hold onto too much. It spent a lot of effort to keep together a region that had been pretty insular even before the war. Bakersfield struggled on as a survivor city for the next century, never fading but never really growing to match its potential. Bakersfield is now a large and strong city of some 5,200 people at the southern end of the valley, a thriving center of commerce and the hotbed of shady deals and black marketeering.

Governor Lake: Twenty years ago, "Governor" Lake began a ruthless consolidation of power in Bakersfield. One of the first acts was to gain control of the oil fields there, which had been run by a wealthy group of families for many, many years. These wells provided much of the oil and gasoline for the larger Golden Triangle to the north and these families were filthy rich because of that. With those revenues now flowing into his coffers, Lake is growing stronger by the month. The Golden Triangle keeps its own people in the area to run or repair vital oil refinery equipment. Lake thinks this is an insult to his people and is slowly building a justification for taking what is "rightly" theirs. As the Golden Triangle is dependent on oil from Bakersfield, any threat to this supply will surely be met with action. Lake is also getting old and wants to be the one to reunify California. Lake is very much an "end justifies the means" sort of person. He believes California (and the United States) needs to become one again, and the only sure way to do it is militarily. Bakersfield’s militia has long controlled a lot of military equipment left from before the war. Although most of it hasn’t worked for decades, Lake has quite enough rifles and howitzers to make taking the city and the refineries difficult. Providing ammunition could be a problem, though. (Thanks, Ken Wheeler)

9) SOUTHERN PACIFIC COAST

Monterrey peninsula: Along the Monterey peninsula, most of the historic old towns have been long ago burned and looted by refugees. The plaid waters of Monterey Bay are now home to the "Kon Tikis", a collection of boaters working together for mutual survival. They fish the waters of the bay and only occasionally venture further inland than the coastal strip.

Soledad: The old sprawling Mission Neustra Senora de la Soledad is home to the "spiritual nexus" of the "Church of the Holy Mushroom Cloud". The church is more of a cult anymore, one that demands cannibal sacrifices of its followers.

Hunter Ligget Military Reservation: Abandoned for good in 2008 by the last remnants of the military, this base is now home to a mixed bag of small-plot farmers and squatters. Mother Nature has done a good job of reclaiming this base, and stubby oak, blue grass, and scrub brush have taken over most of the area.

Fort Ord Military Reservation: The SLBM aimed at this former basic training center both missed badly and was a dud. The warhead shattered on impact, a dozen miles to the east in the rugged Diablo Mountains. This is home to about 220 farmers and hunters who till the wide open grounds of the base and still live in some of the old barrack buildings.

Vandenburg Air Force Base: The satellite launching facilities at Vandenburg AFB were nuked during the war. The warheads were all ground-bursts, causing extremely localized heavy damage and wildly indiscriminate fallout. Towns as far away as Ventura, Santa Barbara and Santa Maria were damaged by the resulting forest fires that swept through the area.

The Castle: William Randolph Hearst’s enormous palace along the coast near San Simeon, is now held by about 165 religious followers called the "Holy Army of Allah". They are led by a militant Black Muslim named Mamud Abdur-Ali, and he claims to be the legitimate Governor of California for some reason. They lead a very difficult life and follow a very strict set of dietary laws, forbidding them to eat any meat or drink any alcohol. They are busy repairing the castle and salvaging goods from the local towns, none of which are currently inhabited.

10) LOS PADRES NATIONAL FOREST
In the rolling hills and valleys of this evergreen forest north of LA, there are numerous isolated settlements, living off the plentiful game and fish still to be had. The larger towns deeper in the forest have mostly been abandoned as being too vulnerable to bandit attacks and wildfires.

Ojai: Despite being burned and abandoned at various times over the years, Ojai has lately become a thriving trade center. As the clearing house for animal pelts and salvaged goods coming out of the forest, Ojai is relatively wealthy, with a steady population of 400 people.

Santa Barbara: Badly burned by wildfires in 1989 and again in 1995, the remnants of this once beautiful town is home to an unsavory clan of xenophobic fishermen. The town is known locally as "Rattown" because of the multitudes of rats in the area. The clan is a couple hundred strong and very tight-knit, requiring you to eat a live rat to gain entrance. They are known for stringing up victims around their territory as a warning to others, and most people avoid it completely.

Ventura: This large town along the southern edge of the forest was once a cantonment of a Mexican Army mechanized brigade, which crossed the border over a century ago. Assimilated for generations, there is little left of their prior unit structure and only a few old weapons and vehicles still in service. Ventura receives infrequent ship traffic from western Mexico and other California coastal ports, and the docks are kept open year round. Ventura is a tough town, with frequent shortages of food and fresh water. Violent crime is common and at night, knife-fights are prone to erupt without warning. Because the "lights have stayed on", people have been reluctant to leave Ventura.

Santa Clarita: Another pocket of farmers and small game hunters, many of them descendants of a shattered Mexican Army regiment whose survivors dug in here 120 years ago and never left. The town currently has some 200 residents.

Tehachapi Mountains: This mountain range northwest of Los Angeles was the site of a secret US Air Force underground base. It is located at the mouth of Little Oak Canyon, about 25 miles northwest of Lancaster. It was partially powered by the Kern River hydroelectric project, but the power went off 150 years ago. No idea of its condition is known.

The Channel Islands: The Channel Islands were far enough away from the Los Angeles-area strikes to be unaffected by the blast effects, and the steady offshore breeze protected them from any fallout. 150 years later, the islands are home to some 200 fishermen and their dependants. They rarely venture to the mainland anymore, having lost too many men in foraging expeditions during the early years. Fishers from Ventura are common visitors here.

The tanker: Just 30 miles offshore from Ventura is Anacapa Island, the easternmost of the Channel Islands. In 1989, immediately upon news of the first nuclear strikes, the crew of an Amsterdam-flagged oil freighter off Oxnard moved out to Anacapa Island to wait out the war, finding a little spot nestled away to anchor. Taking a vote, the crew decided that they would go ashore and the 20-man crew dispersed, leaving their ship to rust at anchor. This tanker has long since been pushed aground by storms and broken in half, but about 15% of the crude oil is still in the hold, constituting a big asset to whoever finds it first. The wreck has been known to the local Islanders for decades, but they have no use for the oil. Ventura's local fishing boats are constantly in the area, it is a miracle that one of them hasn't stopped to investigate the wrecked tanker yet.

11) LOS ANGELES
Under development...(going to wait until the latest module comes out, which should detail this area)

12) AZATLAN EMPIRE
The Aztlan Empire was formed in the first few years of the nuclear autumn. MEChA, "Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan" or "Chicano Student Movement of Aztlan", was a blatantly racist student activist group originally championed by Hispanic students already living in California. One of the many slogans used by these student groups was “"Por La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada” (“Everything for the race. Everything outside the race, nothing”).The more militant of these student groups fought to create an independent Aztlan state during the period right after the war. Having little success, they petitioned the Mexican government for assistance. The Mexicans, in trouble themselves and looking for a reason to get all those well-armed men out of the country and away from plotting coups, sent the Army across the border. They occupied San Diego quickly and marched north, finally being crushed south of Bakersfield. The students filled the gaps in the Mexican Army lines, forming "MEChA" paramilitary units that fought with fanatical enthusiasm, if not with tactical skill. The Aztlan Empire was soon formed, and even prospered for a while, consolidating its territory generally south of Interstate 40. However, creating an empire is not as easy as feeding one and keeping revolutionaries from longing to create the next one. The Empire collapsed in upon itself some 100 years ago, and all that remains today are scattered enclaves that still claim a common heritage. They even had their own flag, an eagle holding a machete-like weapon and a stick of dynamite on a green and crimson field, that can still be found flying in some towns, and as a "battle flag" when militia units go into action.

The ruins of San Diego: This vital port city and military town was targeted by two nuclear missiles during the war. One, aimed at the naval air installations, missed a little to the south and detonated its MIRVs in a circular airburst just offshore of Imperial Beach. The resulting shockwaves pummeled Coronado, the Silver Strand State Beach, and miles of beachfront into radioactive dust before the steaming waters of the Pacific rushed in to fill the craters. A few hours later, another nuke, this one a single warhead, came flying in. The warhead ground burst in San Diego's East County, demolishing most of the area. Flash-lit grass fires and bursting natural gas lines devastated large portions of the north side of the city, combining with the raging firestorm from the East County hit. From Imperial Beach, north to the Soledad Freeway, and from the Pacific east to the Sweetwater River, all was eventually charred into rubble by the fires. Some areas of San Diego were spared the worst, however. Parts of Mission Valley, the campus of San Diego State University, central La Jolla, and bits of North County were not too damaged and were able to retain populations.

Invasion and occupation: If twin nuclear attacks weren't enough, the Mexican Army soon crossed the border almost without a shot fired and occupied the city ruins. The city was declared capitol of the new "Aztlan Empire" and there was much rejoicing. It was short-lived, however, and soon San Diego fell back into a dirty, violent form of anarchy. 150 years later, there is little remaining of the glory days of the Aztlan Empire in California, just a few scattered settlements in the southern edges of the city and the big enclave on Coronado Island.

San Diego today: The eastern part of the city from La Mesa down through Lemon Grove to Chula Vista is still a vast stretch of broken radioactive terrain with entire ranges of hills and small mountains that once characterized the region swept clean. What remains has been reclaimed by nature, either by tangled mutant sagebrush or by vast tracts of blowing sand and ash. The actual bomb crater is still there, now half-filled with stagnant, radioactive water. Central San Diego, below Balboa Park, is a confused mix of semi-ruined buildings, burnt-out shells, and slippery rubble fields. The West Mission Bay Causeway is down, blocking the entrance to Mission Bay. The Coronado Bay Bridge is also down, awash in currents of refuse and dead seabirds. The rest of Coronado and the bridge's onramps are completely submerged as far south as the former amphibious base where the Mexican garrison is. The world-renown San Diego Zoo is now animal-free, the exhibits having long ago become dinner for hungry survivors. The empty buildings and paddocks of the zoo are occasionally home to refugees and bandits. The Imperial Beach nuke played havoc with the US Navy Fleet based here, and today the harbor is choked with the half-exposed, grounded remains of rusted and burned-out transports and warships and even some nuclear submarines. Tidal changes expose more crumbling wrecks each day. All the leaking chemicals, oils and fissionable materials have made the harbor a haven for mutated corals and fish.

Life in the ruins: Across the entire area food and water are both fairly scarce, and the city's total population has dwindled to about 1,000. Nomadic clans farm open plots and scavenge the ruins, but it is a hard and short life. Ruthless groups of bandits, most armed only with iron hammers and crude spears, make this area their hunting ground, culling the weak. The warrens beneath San Diego are swarming with Maggots, who frequently emerge at night to raid and pillage the nomadic tribes and bandits with equal furor.

Aztlan Enclave: Today, the sole remaining enclave of Aztlan power is on Coronado Island at the old USN amphibious base. Once occupied by a regular Mexican Army brigade, this unit converted to militant Catholicism a few years after the war ended. Today, the descendents observe strict Catholic rituals within the confines of the base, but are infamous for their bloodthirsty rampages of looting and plundering into the local ruins. Some 280 men and dependents currently live here, but their numbers fluctuate widely as new converts (slaves brought back on raids and given the choice to convert or die) come in and old members die or are killed in raids into the ruins. They are generally a motley bunch, with mismatched uniforms and ancient Garand carbines and they have little but pulled carts for transport, all of their vehicles having broken down over the last few decades. Despite their weaknesses, they have tried as best they could to repair the fences around the base and have dug in emplacements to guard the approaches.

Camp Pendleton Marine Corps Base: When the bombs fell, the base's resident unit was overseas. By the time of the Mexican invasion, the remaining Camp staff was severely weakened by radiation, disease and desertion. A MEChA unit from UC-SD, flanking a Mexican Army motorized brigade, drove on the Camp and after a sharp, quick fight, rolled over the hastily prepared defenses. For a while, the conquerors took pride in marching around the base in their new Marine uniforms, driving their Marine tanks and shouting slogans. Once the gas and the food ran out, however, the students settled down and became farmers and fishermen. Today, most of the Camp is overgrown, but some rusty Amtraks and tanks still poke up out of the brush. Along the coast are a healthy number of fishermen.

Escondido: A thriving trade town now, home to some 1,200 people. Travelers and merchants from Mexico often use Escondido as a waystation.

Mount Palomar Observatory: While most of the outbuildings have been destroyed by forest fires, the telescope itself has remained intact. For a long time it was a cantonment of the Aztlan Army, but they pulled out several decades ago. Today, the observatory is home to a group of Mexican "astrologist monks", who use the telescope to view the heavens and look for portents of things to come. These monks will resist any attempt by outsiders to enter the “holy sanctum” (the observatory).

13) THE MEXICAN BORDER
The strip along the border with Mexico is a rugged land of scrub oak and sagebrush, mixed with majestic pine forests and steep mountain valleys.

Manzanita Indian Reservation: Lately, the newest generations of the Indians here have been moving out into the Cleveland National Forest to the west, claiming the land as their own.

Pine Valley: The main watering hole and caravan repair shop on the trade route between the Pacific Coast and Mexicali. Some 2,000 people live here, almost all Mexicans.

Potrero: Home of the "Ocho Sols", a rather vicious clan of Mexican slavers. They were formed nine years ago when a man named Max united three small slaver clans in the area under his rule. His followers are armed mostly with shotguns and melee weapons and have a handful of motorcycles; Max himself drives around on a classic 1961 Harley Davidson motorcycle.

National Parachute Test Range: Home of a mixed race enclave with some 300 residents. This old training base just north of the border is a graveyard of rusting military equipment and discarded wrecks. It is now an important caravan waystation, lying as it does along the route to Mexicali. The residents, many of them descendants of the American military staff, have worked hard to make the base an attractive place for traders to stop. They have built a crude water-treatment plant and fortified the perimeter with fences of barbed wire and piled-up rubble. The people here trade salvaged military equipment to the caravans in exchange for water, foodstuffs, and other goods not readily available to them.

14) MOJAVE DESERT
Though 150 years have passed, the Mojave Desert is still very much that--a desert. From the Sierra Nevadas south to the Mexican border, the arid Mojave desert of southeastern California is a mixture of crumbling ruins and isolated farming settlements. Bandits and highwaymen are a constant danger to the traders, and life is often cheap and short.
Palm Springs: This former desert resort survived initially because of the wealth of its mostly affluent residents. Over the decades, this wealth allowed the town to buy protection and security. Now, some 3,000 people live in this area, and do quite well for themselves. Trade is conducted locally and occasionally with Bakersfield and Mojave. The town now has 60 full-time police officers and some 100 part-time militiamen who drill once a week and keep themselves armed and ready. Their paramilitary forces are the descendents of several dozen California highway patrolmen who were instrumental in organizing the city's first defense force. 150 years later, they still have some old CHiPs equipment, including a couple of Police Harleys that are coveted by local Bikers. Barbed wire barricades and pit bunkers have been erected along the roads leading into the town to discourage marauders and violent refugees.

Palmdale: A secret facility exists semi-underground a short drive north of Palmdale, though few locals can tell you exactly where. It is a multi-layered technology center over eight levels deep and the size of a small city. It was formerly the Northrop Corporation's underground testing center. It is unknown if it has been looted already.

Twentynine Palms Marine Corps Base: Underneath this nuked base is a suspected pre-war military complex, out in the desert southeast of Ludlow. Locals in the area have spoken of a tunnel-like structure caused by rushing water in ancient times that leads to lost caches of military gear. Attempts over the years to lower people down this shaft have resulted in the ropes being mysteriously "cut". Others report a "poisonous blue gas" that comes from below to keep people from descending.

Needles: Initially flooded out by the Colorado River when Hoover Dam was hit, Needles was rebuilt some ten miles to the west at the junction of I-40 and Highway 95. The new Needles is now a depressed farming town just barely subsiding. With almost no goods to trade, Needles is little more than a small tribal community, although one that believes in the high ideals of pre-war America.

Bishop County: This is the name given to the region north of Mojave, up the Owens River Valley and north into Bishop. It is primarily an agricultural region now that the Los Angeles aqueduct no longer sends its water to Los Angeles. It is also very protected, since it is flanked on two sides by the Sierra Nevadas on the west and the desert on the north. This has allowed a weak representative government to survive. Towns pretty much do as they please, and many hold elections for mayor every few years. Bishop County also holds various mineral deposits, partially thanks to active volcanism