Aaron Burr
First time out of the vault
Completely unnecessary biographical information: I played the original Fallouts a long time ago, enjoyed them, and then set them down and didn't look at them again. Over the next decade or so I got a degree (Environmental Econ/Poli Sci with a focus on water sharing across international borders) and while I was researching the portrayal of water sharing in the media (on my own time, I'm a nerd), I suddenly remembered the Fallout series. FNV was out at the time, and you can imagine my excitement when I started reading about the plot and world. I decided to write a paper on the importance of water in the Fallout series, but quickly gave that up after becoming immensely frustrated with how the water purifier worked in Fallout 3 (especially because by this time I had professional experience with water resources and lived in the DC area. The inaccuracy drove me insane). So I forgot about the project and moved on, although the idea still lingered in the back of my mind.
Gist of my questions: I'm currently enjoying a hopefully temporary state of underemployment, and decided I wanted to go back to my tabletop gaming roots. I've decided I want to tell a story about Fallout's California in the 2250s, with the NCR-BoS War at the forefront and the rebuilding of California's Central Valley into the NCR's agricultural heartland. I'm going to lay out the research I've done so far, the ideas I have, and if anyone here finds mistakes either in the lore or my understanding of post-nuclear climate shift, I'd greatly appreciate it. I'm not a lore expert and while I have experience in the field, it's largely on the policy/smaller scale NGO side. I'm not a scientist unfortunately.
In real life, California suffers from chronic recurring drought, with a population based in areas that lack sufficient access to water, and grows water-intensive crops in regions that would be desert if not for heavily subsidized state irrigation projects. If California stopped pumping groundwater today, it would take 50 years for it to recharge to viable levels.
I'm imagining that in the Fallout universe, without the environmental/anti-dam movements of the 1970s, the government would have continued to create bigger and bigger dams, deeper and deeper wells, pinning the hope of America's food production on the Central Valley. Particularly with the famines of the 2050s and 2070s, I'm imagining the specter of another dustbowl, this time in California. Given the limitations of desalination (irl, even with practically 0 energy costs the price of transporting water from the coast to the Central Valley is far beyond what's economically feasible for profitable agriculture), the only viable solution would be an aggressive pumping of California's already diminishing aquifers. In real life, wells are being drilled down past 900 meters in some cases.
Enter the nukes.
My understanding of post-nuclear climate change suggests a short-term cooling accompanied with decreased precipitation rates. Van Buren design documents suggest a "Global Winter" in the 2130s, so this appears plausible. However, this would obviously be balanced out by the extreme decrease in population (I realize that Fallout fallout/nukes operate differently than irl ones, but I'd like my estimates to be plausible). The NCR's population during F2 is possibly 700k, and I'm imagining that by the period I'm interested in it could theoretically be hitting near 1 million due to rapid development and general stability. That's probably a high estimate, but the population numbers seem to vary as the plot demands so I'm in good company here. By the time of New Vegas, the NCR is able to project a substantial military force across an immense physical barrier in the form of the Sierra Nevadas. While their hold of the Mojave is not particularly stable, their ability to send an organized military out that far suggests at least the beginnings of a large scale industrial agricultural effort. While it's difficult to estimate the complexity of a state in real life, and even harder finding a parallel for a universe so dense as Fallout, I'd wager the NCR would feel comparable to late 1800s/early 1900s. The frontier is not perfect, but neither is it nearly so dangerous as it had been a few decades before, and the propaganda posters in FNV remind me strongly of WWI era recruitment posters, complete with Wilsonian idealism. If this estimate is the case, then the NCR is likely seeing a slow migration from the country to city, with food being supplied by an increasingly mechanized and large-scale agricultural effort.
If the Hoover Dam remains intact, I'm guessing the rest of California's are largely intact and not nuked either. Given Fallout's cultural stagnation in the 50s (known to be the era of big dams and water projects), I'm seeing California's rivers dammed to hell and back, with an even more massive version of the Oroville Dam. Decreased precipitation should be more than offset by the severely decreased water consumption rates of a post-apocalyptic population, so aquifers should have time to recharge, albeit not fully. And while NCR's population seems to be more reasonably re: water, it still requires a massive amount infrastructure to irrigate the Central Valley properly. Dams work well enough to a point, but after that you're going to start having to hit groundwater sources.
So this is the stage for my campaign. I've always wanted to see the BoS-NCR War, and since I won't be seeing that in a sequel anytime soon, I figured I might make it myself. The destruction of NCR's gold reserves is a surprise attack on NCR's economic infrastructure, and I'd imagine the numerically limited BoS would follow that up with the seizure of key water infrastructure projects, i.e. Oroville Dam. The themes of water as population control reoccur throughout the series, and I'd like to see what I can do with it. So the players are going to be faced with two goals at the beginning of the campaign: Turn the tide of the war against the BoS by mitigating their hold over the dam, and find a longer term solution to NCR development. Here's where I found inspiration from Cadillac Desert and Van Buren's design documents. Cadillac Desert (a history about water projects in the West) introduces the topic by claiming the original Mormon migration to Utah and their subsequent colonization created the model that the rest of the West's water projects followed. What little I've read of Van Buren suggests New Canaan's leader, Jeremiah Rigdon, uses water as a means of population control as well, albeit more benign than my proposed BoS attack. I like the references to actual Western history, I like the juxtaposition of the two, and I felt the Mormons were criminally underserved in Honest Hearts and I'd like to think I could do a passable job. Looking around for an attempt to solve NCR's crises, the players hear rumours from caravans travelling along the 80 with New Canaan of advanced Pre-War drilling systems. While NCR's level of technology is quite high, in my analysis wells would have to be dug at least down to 600 meters or so, and my guess is NCR's construction equipment isn't quite up to the task.
So my general themes are water as a means of population control and dams as both a military and developmental chokepoint, as envisioned as a post-post-apocalyptic version of Chinatown (excellent movie btw). Does this sound fun to anyone? Obviously all the research isn't going to be in the forefront of the campaign, but would you, as a player and presumably a devoted Fallout fan, find the situation plausible, acceptably Fallout canon kosher, and, most importantly, a setting you'd enjoy?
Forgive my ramblings, when I can't sleep I think about water or Fallout and this just happened to be both. The setting touches on a lot of topics I have little experience with, and even the parts I do have experience with my specialization was exceedingly narrow and less than useful outside of my little niche.
I also don't see how the water chip could be used for intensive agriculture. Not sure where that fits into my wall of text, just wanted to throw that in there.
Gist of my questions: I'm currently enjoying a hopefully temporary state of underemployment, and decided I wanted to go back to my tabletop gaming roots. I've decided I want to tell a story about Fallout's California in the 2250s, with the NCR-BoS War at the forefront and the rebuilding of California's Central Valley into the NCR's agricultural heartland. I'm going to lay out the research I've done so far, the ideas I have, and if anyone here finds mistakes either in the lore or my understanding of post-nuclear climate shift, I'd greatly appreciate it. I'm not a lore expert and while I have experience in the field, it's largely on the policy/smaller scale NGO side. I'm not a scientist unfortunately.
In real life, California suffers from chronic recurring drought, with a population based in areas that lack sufficient access to water, and grows water-intensive crops in regions that would be desert if not for heavily subsidized state irrigation projects. If California stopped pumping groundwater today, it would take 50 years for it to recharge to viable levels.
I'm imagining that in the Fallout universe, without the environmental/anti-dam movements of the 1970s, the government would have continued to create bigger and bigger dams, deeper and deeper wells, pinning the hope of America's food production on the Central Valley. Particularly with the famines of the 2050s and 2070s, I'm imagining the specter of another dustbowl, this time in California. Given the limitations of desalination (irl, even with practically 0 energy costs the price of transporting water from the coast to the Central Valley is far beyond what's economically feasible for profitable agriculture), the only viable solution would be an aggressive pumping of California's already diminishing aquifers. In real life, wells are being drilled down past 900 meters in some cases.
Enter the nukes.
My understanding of post-nuclear climate change suggests a short-term cooling accompanied with decreased precipitation rates. Van Buren design documents suggest a "Global Winter" in the 2130s, so this appears plausible. However, this would obviously be balanced out by the extreme decrease in population (I realize that Fallout fallout/nukes operate differently than irl ones, but I'd like my estimates to be plausible). The NCR's population during F2 is possibly 700k, and I'm imagining that by the period I'm interested in it could theoretically be hitting near 1 million due to rapid development and general stability. That's probably a high estimate, but the population numbers seem to vary as the plot demands so I'm in good company here. By the time of New Vegas, the NCR is able to project a substantial military force across an immense physical barrier in the form of the Sierra Nevadas. While their hold of the Mojave is not particularly stable, their ability to send an organized military out that far suggests at least the beginnings of a large scale industrial agricultural effort. While it's difficult to estimate the complexity of a state in real life, and even harder finding a parallel for a universe so dense as Fallout, I'd wager the NCR would feel comparable to late 1800s/early 1900s. The frontier is not perfect, but neither is it nearly so dangerous as it had been a few decades before, and the propaganda posters in FNV remind me strongly of WWI era recruitment posters, complete with Wilsonian idealism. If this estimate is the case, then the NCR is likely seeing a slow migration from the country to city, with food being supplied by an increasingly mechanized and large-scale agricultural effort.
If the Hoover Dam remains intact, I'm guessing the rest of California's are largely intact and not nuked either. Given Fallout's cultural stagnation in the 50s (known to be the era of big dams and water projects), I'm seeing California's rivers dammed to hell and back, with an even more massive version of the Oroville Dam. Decreased precipitation should be more than offset by the severely decreased water consumption rates of a post-apocalyptic population, so aquifers should have time to recharge, albeit not fully. And while NCR's population seems to be more reasonably re: water, it still requires a massive amount infrastructure to irrigate the Central Valley properly. Dams work well enough to a point, but after that you're going to start having to hit groundwater sources.
So this is the stage for my campaign. I've always wanted to see the BoS-NCR War, and since I won't be seeing that in a sequel anytime soon, I figured I might make it myself. The destruction of NCR's gold reserves is a surprise attack on NCR's economic infrastructure, and I'd imagine the numerically limited BoS would follow that up with the seizure of key water infrastructure projects, i.e. Oroville Dam. The themes of water as population control reoccur throughout the series, and I'd like to see what I can do with it. So the players are going to be faced with two goals at the beginning of the campaign: Turn the tide of the war against the BoS by mitigating their hold over the dam, and find a longer term solution to NCR development. Here's where I found inspiration from Cadillac Desert and Van Buren's design documents. Cadillac Desert (a history about water projects in the West) introduces the topic by claiming the original Mormon migration to Utah and their subsequent colonization created the model that the rest of the West's water projects followed. What little I've read of Van Buren suggests New Canaan's leader, Jeremiah Rigdon, uses water as a means of population control as well, albeit more benign than my proposed BoS attack. I like the references to actual Western history, I like the juxtaposition of the two, and I felt the Mormons were criminally underserved in Honest Hearts and I'd like to think I could do a passable job. Looking around for an attempt to solve NCR's crises, the players hear rumours from caravans travelling along the 80 with New Canaan of advanced Pre-War drilling systems. While NCR's level of technology is quite high, in my analysis wells would have to be dug at least down to 600 meters or so, and my guess is NCR's construction equipment isn't quite up to the task.
So my general themes are water as a means of population control and dams as both a military and developmental chokepoint, as envisioned as a post-post-apocalyptic version of Chinatown (excellent movie btw). Does this sound fun to anyone? Obviously all the research isn't going to be in the forefront of the campaign, but would you, as a player and presumably a devoted Fallout fan, find the situation plausible, acceptably Fallout canon kosher, and, most importantly, a setting you'd enjoy?
Forgive my ramblings, when I can't sleep I think about water or Fallout and this just happened to be both. The setting touches on a lot of topics I have little experience with, and even the parts I do have experience with my specialization was exceedingly narrow and less than useful outside of my little niche.
I also don't see how the water chip could be used for intensive agriculture. Not sure where that fits into my wall of text, just wanted to throw that in there.
i have a few questions about the subject 1-how could BoS conquer a dam if they can't even defend helios one? 2-This is a question i have since new vegas:why water is potable? A nucleat fallout should have irradiated every Lake/river/ocean,i mean,water purifiers should be as important as dams.
