Fyi brother, I have lived in Placerville and have friends there. It is being slowly encroached on by the capital city, and it's slowly going lib.
But that area is full of semi racist, almost ethno nationalist, methed out hicks. It has that reputation. In fact, many residents want the town to be called Hangtown like it used to be due the hangings they used to do.l there. I think el dorado county could have more than just a despotic sheriff
But, going forward, when you hear something like “despotic sheriff fights off incoming refugees and bandits,” that’s not just Sheriff Roscoe throwing a few ruffians in county lockup. It means he and a hastily-raised local army survived a siege in which thousands, even tens of thousands of people marched out of the wasteland and tried to storm a city or county’s prepared defenses. Pretty much every faction on the map has had to fight their share of insane Mad Max warlords and Fist of the North Star minor villains to get where they are.
I’ve read the hangtown thing before, actually, didn’t know the rest though. I figure a lot of towns have some dynamics like that going on, and it’s just a lot of work to write it all. This ended up being a 40 minute read and I had no intention of it being that long. I might go back and include something like that, I don’t know. I can’t go into excruciating detail about every single-county regime, but since El Dorado County is the first one we encounter, I might elaborate it as a kind of case study.
It was just a thought, and honestly your scope is so intensive that it makes sense some areas will be glossed over. I'm impressed by the depth of your world building dude.
I hope you wouldn't mind more tidbits like this though, as it could offer interesting unforeseen avenues.
There we go, I went back and revisited the Placerville entry. I won't do long-winded entries for all of the little factions, except maybe in Oklahoma, but as the first county dictatorship entry in the series, El Dorado County is a good example entry to give you an idea of what's happening in most other counties near exclusion zones.
One advantage of California, Oregon, and Washington comes in the fresh Pacific air along the coast. Any fallout or dust would clear out more quickly there, leading to better agriculture than many other places
It’s a small and not super relevant faction, but one of my favorites. He’s a pretty shameless Fist of the North Star reference. I’m not an anime fan, but I always thought “King” Shin was a cool villain. Sometimes you just gotta have a basic warlord with a little bit of flair.
Central valley has more towns beyond slo and pismo btw, and if slo was to be destroyed so would pismo, theyre like 5 miles away. Still waiting to see some charismatic warlord trying to revive college football in some college town. Also, Kern county with its vast land and sparsely unpopulated seems like it would be a bigger thing
Yeah Pismo wasn’t a perfect pick, and it was difficult finding cities at all. I’m not even sure if SLO would even actually get destroyed, but sometimes I throw in some extra nukes and sometimes I have some miraculous survivals for cities that really should have been hit, to shake things up.
My thought process was something like: “Shitty raider gang hangs out at the very edge of what’s potentially considered habitable because they can’t fit in anywhere else,” but this whole area was hard to write. Some other post apocalyptic stories I’ve read before just throw up their hands and write off basically everything south and west of Bakersfield as wasteland.
Out east, it should hopefully get a little easier as the population is denser and there’s far less open space to go around. Idaho, Oregon, and Nevada were hard because there’s all this open space that looks like somebody should control it but like 10 people live there in a several county area.
My point was parts of California, especially NW/Central coast, are very mildly populated and theres gemmy inlets where people could thrive post-nuke I think, and eastern California is even more sparse then other parts of the west.
Any warlord that isn't "literal lords with knights, bishops, and reeves holding land under them, all of whom rule over the lowly serfs in one big Renaissance Fair reenactment" sucks dick
One thing that's notable about California's coastline (and really, the entire West Coast) is just how rugged it is. Outside of the big three harbours of SF, LA, and San Diego, there are perhaps a half-dozen ports capable of handling ocean-going vessels. And with Monterery and Morro Bay irradiated, that just leaves Crescent City, Eureka, Fort Bragg, and Bodega Bay (and those last two are tenuous at best (Santa Cruz and SLO Bay might also be usable depending on the state of their piers)). What makes this difficult for the powers that hold these ports is that the first three are tremendously difficult to reach from inland. Bodega Bay is easier to reach by comparison, but hardly an ideal anchorage. The powers of Norcal are largely cut off from the sea.
I was thinking about this just yesterday, how the mountains lock off those small coastal towns up north. My godfather is from Chico and he raised the same objections as you. What I’ll probably do is create semi-autonomous county factions on the coast that are under the suzerainty of the bigger ones. Southern California and Arizona are already pending a rework that I’ll put in place once I’ve covered all 50 states. Thank you for the input here.
Bridgeport Marines support a continued military dictatorship. They want to pick up where the Kahului Government left off. Although most military regimes in this setting incorporate some kind of civilian body, even if it’s just in an advisory or symbolic capacity.
As for citizens’ quality of life, the Bridgeport Marines are among the better places in California to live. Not great, but leaps and bounds ahead of what most warlords have to offer. A decent enough portion of the population has working utilities, and rule of law is secure. It’s ideologically right-leaning, but not to an extreme extent. It’s one of those generally competent dictatorships, with all the quirks that might come with such a regime.
“Inland Empire” is a term that refers to San Bernardino and Riverside Counties. It dates back to the early 1900s as a booster term to encourage settlement and investment. There are a few other areas of the country that have names like this, such as the “Northeast Kingdom” in Vermont.
I added an extra paragraph to explain the odd choice of name. From speaking with Californians, I've gathered that they don't seem to identify within their state at the city level, and sometimes don't even identify at the state level. When I ask Californians where they're from, I almost always get a regional answer. Orange County, Inland Empire, the Bay Area, Northern California, Imperial Valley, etc. It's such a huge state, I guess, that regions like that matter.
Fyi brother, I have lived in Placerville and have friends there. It is being slowly encroached on by the capital city, and it's slowly going lib.
But that area is full of semi racist, almost ethno nationalist, methed out hicks. It has that reputation. In fact, many residents want the town to be called Hangtown like it used to be due the hangings they used to do.l there. I think el dorado county could have more than just a despotic sheriff
But, going forward, when you hear something like “despotic sheriff fights off incoming refugees and bandits,” that’s not just Sheriff Roscoe throwing a few ruffians in county lockup. It means he and a hastily-raised local army survived a siege in which thousands, even tens of thousands of people marched out of the wasteland and tried to storm a city or county’s prepared defenses. Pretty much every faction on the map has had to fight their share of insane Mad Max warlords and Fist of the North Star minor villains to get where they are.
I’ve read the hangtown thing before, actually, didn’t know the rest though. I figure a lot of towns have some dynamics like that going on, and it’s just a lot of work to write it all. This ended up being a 40 minute read and I had no intention of it being that long. I might go back and include something like that, I don’t know. I can’t go into excruciating detail about every single-county regime, but since El Dorado County is the first one we encounter, I might elaborate it as a kind of case study.
It was just a thought, and honestly your scope is so intensive that it makes sense some areas will be glossed over. I'm impressed by the depth of your world building dude.
I hope you wouldn't mind more tidbits like this though, as it could offer interesting unforeseen avenues.
There we go, I went back and revisited the Placerville entry. I won't do long-winded entries for all of the little factions, except maybe in Oklahoma, but as the first county dictatorship entry in the series, El Dorado County is a good example entry to give you an idea of what's happening in most other counties near exclusion zones.
It's phenomenal! Looking forward to more.
One advantage of California, Oregon, and Washington comes in the fresh Pacific air along the coast. Any fallout or dust would clear out more quickly there, leading to better agriculture than many other places
I'd pledge my allegiance to the King.
It’s a small and not super relevant faction, but one of my favorites. He’s a pretty shameless Fist of the North Star reference. I’m not an anime fan, but I always thought “King” Shin was a cool villain. Sometimes you just gotta have a basic warlord with a little bit of flair.
Central valley has more towns beyond slo and pismo btw, and if slo was to be destroyed so would pismo, theyre like 5 miles away. Still waiting to see some charismatic warlord trying to revive college football in some college town. Also, Kern county with its vast land and sparsely unpopulated seems like it would be a bigger thing
Yeah Pismo wasn’t a perfect pick, and it was difficult finding cities at all. I’m not even sure if SLO would even actually get destroyed, but sometimes I throw in some extra nukes and sometimes I have some miraculous survivals for cities that really should have been hit, to shake things up.
My thought process was something like: “Shitty raider gang hangs out at the very edge of what’s potentially considered habitable because they can’t fit in anywhere else,” but this whole area was hard to write. Some other post apocalyptic stories I’ve read before just throw up their hands and write off basically everything south and west of Bakersfield as wasteland.
Out east, it should hopefully get a little easier as the population is denser and there’s far less open space to go around. Idaho, Oregon, and Nevada were hard because there’s all this open space that looks like somebody should control it but like 10 people live there in a several county area.
My point was parts of California, especially NW/Central coast, are very mildly populated and theres gemmy inlets where people could thrive post-nuke I think, and eastern California is even more sparse then other parts of the west.
*Central coast not central valley, whoops, and SLO is just a middling college town but I get it
Any warlord that isn't "literal lords with knights, bishops, and reeves holding land under them, all of whom rule over the lowly serfs in one big Renaissance Fair reenactment" sucks dick
One thing that's notable about California's coastline (and really, the entire West Coast) is just how rugged it is. Outside of the big three harbours of SF, LA, and San Diego, there are perhaps a half-dozen ports capable of handling ocean-going vessels. And with Monterery and Morro Bay irradiated, that just leaves Crescent City, Eureka, Fort Bragg, and Bodega Bay (and those last two are tenuous at best (Santa Cruz and SLO Bay might also be usable depending on the state of their piers)). What makes this difficult for the powers that hold these ports is that the first three are tremendously difficult to reach from inland. Bodega Bay is easier to reach by comparison, but hardly an ideal anchorage. The powers of Norcal are largely cut off from the sea.
I was thinking about this just yesterday, how the mountains lock off those small coastal towns up north. My godfather is from Chico and he raised the same objections as you. What I’ll probably do is create semi-autonomous county factions on the coast that are under the suzerainty of the bigger ones. Southern California and Arizona are already pending a rework that I’ll put in place once I’ve covered all 50 states. Thank you for the input here.
What kind of government do the Marines support? Are they a democracy or a dictatorship? And how do they treat their citizens?
Bridgeport Marines support a continued military dictatorship. They want to pick up where the Kahului Government left off. Although most military regimes in this setting incorporate some kind of civilian body, even if it’s just in an advisory or symbolic capacity.
As for citizens’ quality of life, the Bridgeport Marines are among the better places in California to live. Not great, but leaps and bounds ahead of what most warlords have to offer. A decent enough portion of the population has working utilities, and rule of law is secure. It’s ideologically right-leaning, but not to an extreme extent. It’s one of those generally competent dictatorships, with all the quirks that might come with such a regime.
Also going back to this Did Barstow get nuked?
Yes, because of the USMC logistics base there, and its role as a central rail hub.
Why is the inland "empire" democratic?!
“Inland Empire” is a term that refers to San Bernardino and Riverside Counties. It dates back to the early 1900s as a booster term to encourage settlement and investment. There are a few other areas of the country that have names like this, such as the “Northeast Kingdom” in Vermont.
I added an extra paragraph to explain the odd choice of name. From speaking with Californians, I've gathered that they don't seem to identify within their state at the city level, and sometimes don't even identify at the state level. When I ask Californians where they're from, I almost always get a regional answer. Orange County, Inland Empire, the Bay Area, Northern California, Imperial Valley, etc. It's such a huge state, I guess, that regions like that matter.