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Well, it happened, the world ended. 95% of life on the planet died. The Big Freeze, they called it ... guess it sounded less I-told-you-so than the new ice age. While it was probably the actual cold that killed half the human population, and most of the wildlife, frozen vortexes flash-freezing whole areas in seconds, it was the breakdown of infrastructure that killed off the large cities, the places you could still find some warmth. Now we eke out a life however we can, making our homes underground, where the dirt is still warm, scavenge for usable good, for resources, sure never to stay out past nightfall, to keep an ear out for the signals; Enemy, Vortex, or Radiation. Now we keep close to the fires, to the heaters, to one another, with the cold at our backs, and a bleak future ahead, will the spark of humanity survive the bitter cold? Will you help the cause of community, or break off to live as a lone wolf in the cold? Welcome to New Galiano ... I hope you brought your mittens.
History: Everything started ... well, okay, everything started in like, the 19th century, but one day in the 21st century, in 2024 to be exact, the weather went all wonky. Summer and Winter were like ice and fire across the globe, the extremes in weather killing huge swaths of the population ... then winter started to spread. By the end of the year it had encompassed the entire planet. That's when the vortices started. Storms that pulled super-cooled air down from the top of the atmosphere, as cold as -135 Celcius. They moved across the countries, the continents, the world, freezing everything. It was 2026 when the oceans finished freezing over, and by 2027 we'd settled into what we now call society. Thankfully there hasn't been a reported vortex in the last year, but the wind is still blowing, and it hasn't gotten any warmer.
Landscape: The world was as you know it, basically, when the flash-freezing started ... there are a few new islands in the pacific, but what else is new, they're just rocks. Bodies of water are frozen solid across the surface of the planet, all of ... well, maybe the dead sea, and the Salton sea are still liquid, but otherwise, all water is frozen solid, right down to a hundred feet. Permafrost covers most of the open land, and with the ground frozen down to ten or twenty feet dependent on the type of ground, there is no vegetation left, just the fossilized skeletons of trees and bushes that have managed to stand up to the winds, which tear constantly across the frozen planet. The conditions have eroded most standing structures, with some cities literally toppled, and innumerable smaller towns wiped from the map by the combination of elements. That which remains is jagged, skeletal, encased in ice and frost. The safest places are those built underground; mines, caves, subway stations, old silos, underground parking, anything built twenty feet or more underground is mostly safe from the cold and the wind, though air exchange will obviously mean heating is necessary.
There are forty or so settlements scattered across the 5000(65x77-ish) square-kilometre city, hidden in underground structures, and those few above ground capable of withstanding the cold and wind, or being reinforced against them (solid stone over steel, low to the ground, could withstand a fairly sizable bomb). Most hold anywhere from 150 to 300 people, a few as large as 500. The settlements are like ... inventive shanty towns, recycled walls and tech and makeshift furniture. Because very few settlements have access to vehicles that will run in this weather, and because having and using one makes a group a target for raiders, there isn't really the options of undertaking massive construction projects. Imagine what kind of building materials you could functionally carry through a frozen windstorm at best, and a snow-blasted hurricane at worst. Some places are obviously better designed from the get-go to provide certain functions. In the case of my example, the freezers of various sizes provide the option for offices and private quarters for important people, but everyone else sleeps in the big warehouse space, maybe with like sheets, or recovered junk from somewhere nearby.
NOTE: If you have an idea for a colony, submit it to me!
1/40
Spoiler: Beacon
Environment: While the polar vortices seem to have stopped for now, the median temperature is still -75C during the day, and -100C at night, weather so cold that it has inspired new technology, though even the well equipped don't stay out after 'nightfall', which is difficult to determine without being able to see the sky ... ever. The wind is constantly blowing at between 60 and 120 Kilometres per hour. While there are no longer any clouds, anywhere, wind of this force and constancy keeps the light, fluffy powder snow in motion, never letting it settle, rendering a constant blizzard. It's possible to tell daytime from the presence of ambient light, but being outside, away from a safe space, and seeing it get dark is essentially a death sentence, unless you have some incredible heating and thermo gear.
Glowstorms are a new occurrence. With no clouds to focus charge from the upper atmosphere, focusing single points for lightning, ionic charge in the atmosphere instead discharges into snow-fronts, which then whip across the land until they hit something. While in charged and in-motion, they leave an ethereal trail of blue light.
Normal storms also occur, when the wind picks up to 380 Km/h, and the only safe place to be is underground. These kinds of winds are usually followed by the only periods of clear left on earth, but the wind quickly blows snow back into the area.
Technology: Now, you probably guessed that technology, like animals and plants, isn't designed to function in -100 degrees. Lubricants and fuels freeze, metal shrinks and warps and becomes brittle, chemicals don't react as quickly as they should, if they do at all. Any vehicle not designed or modified for use in the cold will sputter out and fail just shortly after you're blown off the open road by the winds. Guns will work fine indoors, but after a few minutes in the cold they're likely to jam and fail unless they're kept warm. Anything with moving parts, open spaces for condensation to gather and freeze, anything not proofed against the cold has or will succumb to it.
HOWEVER! Jerry rigging, homebrewing, and making weird shit in your basement is still a thing, especially since everyone now lives in one kind of basement or another. Heating rigs for guns, cars, and people, pedal generators, methane-fuel generators and converters (ew ...), home-made flamethrowers and taser gloves and sawblade-launchers ... if your twisted mind can conceive of it, and you have the skills, you can make or find it somewhere. Whether it works or not is another story, I'm sure, frozen in the ice, are a thousand and one people who thought they were buying a working jet-pack. Again, all moving parts, liquid systems, etc, are unlikely to work in the cold. As a general rule, also keep in mind that building things yourself means they're often rather shitty, and even the best have like ... a 20% risk of causing a fire or something.
Society: There are always outliers, but generally speaking people have broken up into a few distinct groups.
1) Colonists - The optimists, those who have agreed to carry the rules of society forward even after the end of the world. They believe in law, in everyone pulling their weight, and will often provide a safe place for outsiders to stay, while keeping a close eye and demanding payment from those with enough to spare. You won't find them on the surface much, hence the general nomenclature, but if you wander into any large, underground space, you're likely to bump into either a few, or a fuckload of them.
2) Traders - There are few reasons to risk the frost, but one of the most alluring is greed. Those with any morals become traders. Those without become ...
3)Raiders - Scumbags, and the cold killed most of the dumb ones, and all the weak ones. They travel in caravans of vehicles modified at various levels of skill, pray on any group or individual they think they can overpower, some have even taken whole colonies if the rumours are true. They sleep wherever they can, in utility basements and the bottoms of underground parking garages, usually roaming the cities looking for places unlooted, and people unprotected.
4) Altruists - Not everyone is driven into the frost by profit. Some people, and god knows why, are out there just to help anyone who needs it, point them toward a colony, save them from ne'er-do-wells, etc.
5) Scavvers - While the name has stuck, not all Scavvers are actual 'scavengers.' These aren't bad people, they're just ... bad-with-people people. Most make a living finding half-functional tech or scrap and selling it to traders or directly to colonies. There are other ways to make a living though, and all that makes a scavver a scavver is choosing to live out in the cold instead of the relative safety of a colony.
6) Military - Well ... you won't really run into them, they're all sealed up in their high-tech bunkers while we turn into amusingly shaped meat-sicles. Sometimes you'll pick up their broadcasts, but that's about it.
7) Sadists - You ever hear of Wendigos? Traders and travellers in the days before north america was paved ... they would get lost in winter, be forced to eat their fellow travellers to stay alive. Maybe the cold just does that to some people, makes them crazy, gets into their heads ... makes them think they're the fire. I'm not saying they eat people, but they live for cruelty ... and some of them eat people.
History: Everything started ... well, okay, everything started in like, the 19th century, but one day in the 21st century, in 2024 to be exact, the weather went all wonky. Summer and Winter were like ice and fire across the globe, the extremes in weather killing huge swaths of the population ... then winter started to spread. By the end of the year it had encompassed the entire planet. That's when the vortices started. Storms that pulled super-cooled air down from the top of the atmosphere, as cold as -135 Celcius. They moved across the countries, the continents, the world, freezing everything. It was 2026 when the oceans finished freezing over, and by 2027 we'd settled into what we now call society. Thankfully there hasn't been a reported vortex in the last year, but the wind is still blowing, and it hasn't gotten any warmer.
Landscape: The world was as you know it, basically, when the flash-freezing started ... there are a few new islands in the pacific, but what else is new, they're just rocks. Bodies of water are frozen solid across the surface of the planet, all of ... well, maybe the dead sea, and the Salton sea are still liquid, but otherwise, all water is frozen solid, right down to a hundred feet. Permafrost covers most of the open land, and with the ground frozen down to ten or twenty feet dependent on the type of ground, there is no vegetation left, just the fossilized skeletons of trees and bushes that have managed to stand up to the winds, which tear constantly across the frozen planet. The conditions have eroded most standing structures, with some cities literally toppled, and innumerable smaller towns wiped from the map by the combination of elements. That which remains is jagged, skeletal, encased in ice and frost. The safest places are those built underground; mines, caves, subway stations, old silos, underground parking, anything built twenty feet or more underground is mostly safe from the cold and the wind, though air exchange will obviously mean heating is necessary.
There are forty or so settlements scattered across the 5000(65x77-ish) square-kilometre city, hidden in underground structures, and those few above ground capable of withstanding the cold and wind, or being reinforced against them (solid stone over steel, low to the ground, could withstand a fairly sizable bomb). Most hold anywhere from 150 to 300 people, a few as large as 500. The settlements are like ... inventive shanty towns, recycled walls and tech and makeshift furniture. Because very few settlements have access to vehicles that will run in this weather, and because having and using one makes a group a target for raiders, there isn't really the options of undertaking massive construction projects. Imagine what kind of building materials you could functionally carry through a frozen windstorm at best, and a snow-blasted hurricane at worst. Some places are obviously better designed from the get-go to provide certain functions. In the case of my example, the freezers of various sizes provide the option for offices and private quarters for important people, but everyone else sleeps in the big warehouse space, maybe with like sheets, or recovered junk from somewhere nearby.
NOTE: If you have an idea for a colony, submit it to me!
1/40
Spoiler: Beacon
Environment: While the polar vortices seem to have stopped for now, the median temperature is still -75C during the day, and -100C at night, weather so cold that it has inspired new technology, though even the well equipped don't stay out after 'nightfall', which is difficult to determine without being able to see the sky ... ever. The wind is constantly blowing at between 60 and 120 Kilometres per hour. While there are no longer any clouds, anywhere, wind of this force and constancy keeps the light, fluffy powder snow in motion, never letting it settle, rendering a constant blizzard. It's possible to tell daytime from the presence of ambient light, but being outside, away from a safe space, and seeing it get dark is essentially a death sentence, unless you have some incredible heating and thermo gear.
Glowstorms are a new occurrence. With no clouds to focus charge from the upper atmosphere, focusing single points for lightning, ionic charge in the atmosphere instead discharges into snow-fronts, which then whip across the land until they hit something. While in charged and in-motion, they leave an ethereal trail of blue light.
Normal storms also occur, when the wind picks up to 380 Km/h, and the only safe place to be is underground. These kinds of winds are usually followed by the only periods of clear left on earth, but the wind quickly blows snow back into the area.
Technology: Now, you probably guessed that technology, like animals and plants, isn't designed to function in -100 degrees. Lubricants and fuels freeze, metal shrinks and warps and becomes brittle, chemicals don't react as quickly as they should, if they do at all. Any vehicle not designed or modified for use in the cold will sputter out and fail just shortly after you're blown off the open road by the winds. Guns will work fine indoors, but after a few minutes in the cold they're likely to jam and fail unless they're kept warm. Anything with moving parts, open spaces for condensation to gather and freeze, anything not proofed against the cold has or will succumb to it.
HOWEVER! Jerry rigging, homebrewing, and making weird shit in your basement is still a thing, especially since everyone now lives in one kind of basement or another. Heating rigs for guns, cars, and people, pedal generators, methane-fuel generators and converters (ew ...), home-made flamethrowers and taser gloves and sawblade-launchers ... if your twisted mind can conceive of it, and you have the skills, you can make or find it somewhere. Whether it works or not is another story, I'm sure, frozen in the ice, are a thousand and one people who thought they were buying a working jet-pack. Again, all moving parts, liquid systems, etc, are unlikely to work in the cold. As a general rule, also keep in mind that building things yourself means they're often rather shitty, and even the best have like ... a 20% risk of causing a fire or something.
Society: There are always outliers, but generally speaking people have broken up into a few distinct groups.
1) Colonists - The optimists, those who have agreed to carry the rules of society forward even after the end of the world. They believe in law, in everyone pulling their weight, and will often provide a safe place for outsiders to stay, while keeping a close eye and demanding payment from those with enough to spare. You won't find them on the surface much, hence the general nomenclature, but if you wander into any large, underground space, you're likely to bump into either a few, or a fuckload of them.
2) Traders - There are few reasons to risk the frost, but one of the most alluring is greed. Those with any morals become traders. Those without become ...
3)Raiders - Scumbags, and the cold killed most of the dumb ones, and all the weak ones. They travel in caravans of vehicles modified at various levels of skill, pray on any group or individual they think they can overpower, some have even taken whole colonies if the rumours are true. They sleep wherever they can, in utility basements and the bottoms of underground parking garages, usually roaming the cities looking for places unlooted, and people unprotected.
4) Altruists - Not everyone is driven into the frost by profit. Some people, and god knows why, are out there just to help anyone who needs it, point them toward a colony, save them from ne'er-do-wells, etc.
5) Scavvers - While the name has stuck, not all Scavvers are actual 'scavengers.' These aren't bad people, they're just ... bad-with-people people. Most make a living finding half-functional tech or scrap and selling it to traders or directly to colonies. There are other ways to make a living though, and all that makes a scavver a scavver is choosing to live out in the cold instead of the relative safety of a colony.
6) Military - Well ... you won't really run into them, they're all sealed up in their high-tech bunkers while we turn into amusingly shaped meat-sicles. Sometimes you'll pick up their broadcasts, but that's about it.
7) Sadists - You ever hear of Wendigos? Traders and travellers in the days before north america was paved ... they would get lost in winter, be forced to eat their fellow travellers to stay alive. Maybe the cold just does that to some people, makes them crazy, gets into their heads ... makes them think they're the fire. I'm not saying they eat people, but they live for cruelty ... and some of them eat people.