Fallout Texas RPG Background

[The Dutch Ghost]

Hello all

Gonzales informed me that my background lore while entertaining is also getting rather lengthy so I am opening a separate thread for it now where I will be doing the future updates on it.

I will also try to limit my posts to just the single faction/location/event that I have modified or added but I might also repost the entire thing from time to time when I have modified/corrected more than one thing.

Hope people understand.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

The Windmill People/Four Winds tribe

The origins of the Windmill People/Four Winds tribe is rather unclear, what is known is that they do not originate in the area where they have established their territory but came from somewhere else.
Perhaps they were either driven away from their former home or were traditionally a wandering tribe until they came across the Aeolus wind farm.

Like in many such cases the tribals mistook the pre war artefacts as being created by the gods of the old world (most of their memories of their more civilized ancestors had become muddled with superstition over the generations) who had left many such creations all over the wasteland.

The tribals did realize that the mysterious giants caught wind that made their arms move but they had no idea of why they were doing this.
Shamans tried to explain it in their own limited world view but even the most uneducated tribal was not that easily convinced that the purpose of the wind catching giants was unknown to all but themselves.

The tribals probably would have moved on if their scouts had not made an incredible discovery that could benefit the tribe
Underneath the wind farm they discovered the ruins of Vault 45, despite the fear that such places usually induced in tribal minds the scouts continued to explore the dead Vault until they discovered the remaining working systems that had still been holding out all that time; the water purifier and the hydroponics bay.

Seeing this as a gift from the gods the tribals decided to settle the lands of the windmill farm and when they eventually figured out the connections between the gifts in the cave and the wind catching giants they developed reverence for them that over time turned into a religion.
Now the windmills are seen as holy and the Windmill People/Four Wind tribe sees it as their sacred duty to protect them in return for the live giving gifts they provide in return.

As with some other tribes they also started to base their own names and ranks on terms that have to do with the wind or the windmills including labels and brands on them the Windmill people were able to read.

Unlike the early Vault Dwellers whose numbers were far to great for the Vault's hydroponics bay and water purifier to support the Windmill People started out in much smaller numbers which were easier to support.
When the tribe started to increase due to the resources the Vault provided and it became to large to be well supported the Windmill people also adopted a migratory policy, with the young and the strong migrating through the lands around the wind farm going from oasis to oasis, whole the children, majority of women, infirm live full time at the main tribal camp.

What is also interesting is that through their worship of the windmills the Windmill people also gained a large degree of knowledge about the sky and the weather, developing a primitive form of meteorology, learning to read from observing weather patterns when it was going to rain, when storms might come, or great periods of drought.

The Windmill people in general are a rather peaceful tribe that doesn't go out to wage war with others unless provoked.
They have clashed with other tribes who have been envious of the Windmill People's success as well as raiders who saw them as easy prey and of course slavers who always seek more cheap manpower for the 'civilized' settlements.

But the biggest threat to the Windmill People's existence are the settlers from Roscoe, a nearby pre war settlement that has been rebuild.
When scouting expeditions from Lone Star returned home with news about the discovery of Aeolus wind farm several of the more pioneering individuals amongst the population saw this as a chance for a better life for themselves and their families.

The expanding Lone Star Confederacy was always hungry for new sources of electricity to feed its cities so these settlers moved to Roscoe with a grant from investors of Lone Star with the intention of salvaging the remaining windmills and redirect their power to the settlements.

Though the settlers did know of the presence of the Windmill People from the scouts they thought they could easily dupe the tribals in allowing the settlers to move in and redirect the power that was otherwise going unused or drive them them of quickly through superior fire power.

Much to the settlers surprise the Windmill people are proven to be quite persistent and protective of their holy idols, not willing to let Roscoe technicians to touch them.

Unable to carry out the goal they came out to accomplish and with a heavy debt from the Lone Star banks the Roscoe settlers are becoming desperate in finding a way of getting rid of the Windmill people and finally claim the wind farm and they are willing to work with anyone or any group who could help them with this, including slavers and the Black Fist.

Another problem that the Windmill people face is the continuing deterioration of the systems of the windmills and the Vault.
Already it is no longer producing the amount of food and water it once did when the Windmill people came across the Vault, forcing their hunters and gatherers to move away further from the main camp and forcing more of their young people to travel rather than stay and protect the camp from outsiders who prey on it.

The Windmill people lack the knowledge of fixing these systems, and despite their suspicion of outsiders they do realize that they need outsiders with the knowledge from the old world to fix the windmills and the Vault before it permanently fails.

These days some outsiders are tolerated such as traders and wastelanders with humanitarian intentions but they are still not allowed to come near the windmills or learn about the Vault.

(the similarities to the Iron Lines is not meant as plagiarism or theft, I simply felt it worked very well for tribals, seeing pre war examples of impressive engineering as something done by gods and making it a centre of religion, especially when it is clear that it is the source of your food)

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

The Caesar's Legion

It is somewhat difficult to decide on what the fate of the Legion would be after the events of Fallout New Vegas as the endgame allows defeat of the Legion without necessarily killing Caesar and Lanius and destroying the Legion.

In my take I assume that the NCR was victorious during the Second Battle of Hoover Dam, driving the Legion Eastwards, away from the Colorado river.
For now I leave the fate of Caesar and Lanius ambiguous but the second great humiliation the Legion experienced did not sit well with many of the members.

With their morale and spirit broken after failing to cross the Colorado and conquer the Mojave and eventually California and many elite soldiers killed during that attempt the Legion once more focused on rebuilding its forces for the eventual next attempt.

But as some people like the Courier had warned already, with the power of the Legion's leadership weakening cracks started to form within the organization as the rebuilding of the Legion felt like stagnation to them.
The focus of the Legion was always conquest and consolidation of new territories and its people, with the West now closed of and the Legion already most of the suitable lands in Arizona, New Mexico and parts of Utah and Colorado, the Legion had no 'outside' to confront.

Since a long time conspiracies started to form amongst the ranks of the Legion as Centurions plotted amongst each other to take control of the organization.
The only way for the leadership to quell these possible insurrections was either to locate and deal severally with the ringleaders or send suspected men into those places that Legion had not expanded yet.

Then the NCR started the Sunset campaign and for the first time the Legion found itself in the defensive as NCR military expeditions and commando strike teams were send in to disrupt Legion rebuilding efforts as much as possible.
The NCR even managed to make previously pacified settlements rise up against the Legion.

The Legion needed new resources and fresh blood so the leaders of the Legion decided that a way into the East had to be found in order to determine the state of the continent beyond the radioactive no man's lands.

Legion scouts eventually managed to pass the seasonal radioactive storms and twisters and beyond the no man's lands they found what the Legion had been looking for, new territory to conquer, new tribes to assimilate, and new enemies to test their mettle against; the Lone Star Confederacy and the System.

At the same time the NCR is also making its way through the no man's lands with the intention of securing the Sunset Route all the way into Texas in order to cut the Legion of from the South.
If the Legion is to break the NCR's new 'spine' they have to invade and conquer West Texas and from there systematically destroy the Sunset Route and all the settlements and fortifications that run along it, forcing the NCR back into the Mojave.

The Legion knows that San Antonio is the current goal of the Sunset campaign, if the NCR can secure that city and its resources it will be extremely difficult to get them out and it would provide the NCR posts along the Sunset route with supplies from both West and East.

For that reason the Legion has already send advance forces into West Texas with instructions to slow down NCR expansion and the destruction of the railways, and to determine the strength of local powers.
They are also to establish contact with any tribes and groups that are anti establishment.


There has not been much contact between the Legion and the governments and factions of Texas yet as the Legion agents have been instructed to lay low.
Still even they can not completely mask their presence.


The New Texas Rangers know through their sporadic contact with the West in the past about the Legion and they have met people fleeing from the west because of them.
More recently they have also been running into Legion scouts and slaver parties who are searching for local tribes.


The Bloody Claws know little about the Legion's background and politics but they see the Legion slavers are rivals to their own operations and are not happy about their presence.
They have been trying to drive the Legion out of their hunting grounds and have made it clear to be just as fanatic as them.


The Lone Star Confederacy only knows bits and pieces about the Legion from refugees from the West. They know the Legion is a massive army based on slavery and that they take the inspiration behind their organization from an old world civilization.

Still most politicians in Lone Star believe that the radioactive no man's lands will probably be sufficient to keep the majority of the Legion's forces out of Texas.
Any expedition that does manage to make its way into Texas can probably be dealt with, one way or another.



This was my first take on the Legion in Texas and it is intended for the mod/game I would one day like to make

The second battle for Hoover Dam proved to be a disaster for the Legion, the original Caesar was assassinated right before the battle by an outsider and Legate Lanius would fall at the same assassin’s hands later when the NCR stormed his camp during the fight.

Despite Caesar’s planned line of succession his ideals did not prove to be the strong motivation that would keep the Legion together, it has been his ruthlessness that had done so and without it and Caesar’s own staff his former commanding officers started to fight amongst themselves of who should rule the Legion now.

The officer next in line to Lanius died while fighting the NCR as it headed into Arizona and the following Caesar was assassinated by one of his subordinates when his campaign to take West Texas failed after the siege on Lone Star proved to be disastrous, killing many Legionnaires in battle.

Afterward the top ranking officers of the Legion split the empire in portions with each of them appointing themselves the rightful heir to the original Caesar. Some of these heirs remained in the former lands of the original Caesar such as Arizona, New Mexico, and parts of Utah and Colorado, while other parts crossed the great radioactive no man lands into Texas, seeking to establish a new empire there.

Currently several groups of Caesar’s Legion are present in Texas, between attacking settlements and caravans for resources and slaves the Legion targets each other in an attempt to make the weaker party join the stronger party or to completely destroy the other that would pose an obstacle on path to a successor to the position of Caesar.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

I see my last updates have been deleted during the update, but we were warned about that so I will post my stuff again.

The design texts I am posting are not the ones I have intended for the RPG as that one takes place two or three years for the game campaign I have made up. But I haven't had time yet to update the RPG documents so I am posting this.
A lot of the factions and places are the same so there is no conflict between the two designs.

Differences are as follows;

-The Caesar's Legion has not arrived in full force yet, in the RPG campaign only their scouts have crossed the great no man's lands that separate the Texas Wasteland from the West. They are scouting the region, accessing the strengths of the local settlements and powers, and are forging alliances with local tribes and organizations that can be useful to them.
-San Antonio has not been sacked yet by the Legion. During this period it is slowly developing into a city state of its own with aid of the New Texas Rangers.
-The mutant plant plague that is growing in the Corpse is only now starting to spread to West Texas because of the seasonal hurricanes.
-The NCR no longer plays a role in the campaign, I felt that their role has already been filled by the Lone Star Confederacy and the System, and it just did not work for me that the NCR would (re)establish a railway through Legion territory in such short time after the second battle of Hoover Dam, they just don't have the resources and the man power. I would still like to do something with the Sunset Route in the future though.


Fallout Texas RPG is set about four/five years after the second battle of Hoover Dam, the main campaign for my game idea takes place two/three years later.


Factions and Organizations

Lone Star Confederacy

The Lone Star Confederacy has its origins in the Pre War Confederate States of America which formed before the American civil war and seceded from the United States, starting that conflict between the two governments that ended in the defeat if the CSA and re absorption into the US.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederate_States_of_America

Though centuries have passed since the idea or the spirit was kept alive by people in Texas and when Lone Star was founded the idea of founding the Confederacy again to establish a government that could unite the settlements in the wasteland and bring order and civilization to it became popular again.

Of course the Lone Star Confederacy is not exactly the same as the CSA as difference have come up because of the passage of time, loss of accurate accounts, and changes in priorities and ideals.








Membership to the Confederacy is determined by a number of factors such as the applicant member's standing with other settlements and communities, especially those that are already a member of the Confederacy.

But the one of the most important acceptance demands is that the new member provides at least one type of goods or services that other settlements (especially Lone Star itself) has use of or desires, and strengthens/diversifies the Confederacy's economy in general.

The Confederacy does not want a member that would actually be a drain on the economy, requiring more aid than products or services it provides, weakening the other settlements and the economy in general.
For this reason already dozens of settlements have been declined membership.

But the Confederacy does not always completely sticks to this rule, its most powerful member Lone Star has bend and twisted these rules from time to time in order to get settlements and communities accepted that otherwise would not qualify.

From supporting such communities and manipulating its leadership and economy from behind the scenes to sending colonists/pioneers to settlements with something that Lone Star desires and then claiming it as a colony or expansion to Lone Star itself.

Other members have brought up this issue from time to time but because of the political and economic power Lone Star has within the Confederacy their claims have never gone anywhere serious.

Even the System has brought up these acts that totally go against the founding bills of the Confederacy, but Lone Star's usual response is that they sometimes resort to these actions in order to protect settlements from being annexed by the System and forced under its totalitarian rule.

While the Lone Star Confederacy does not promote or approve of slavery within in its territory it also neither condones it.
But those settlements that do keep slaves are not move them through territory that does not approve of slavery or is anti slavery and some laws are instilled to make sure that those settlements with slaves can not economically ruin those that do not make use of slave labor.
(once again proving the hypocrisy of the Confederacy's foundation of no large government influence in its members personal politics)

Some basic human rights for slavery such as treatment and eventual release have been accomplished by abolitionists but their main goal is to see the Lone Star Confederacy taking it into law that slavery is not accepted and punishable)

Indebted servitude is a different issue and far more stricter regulated and better overseen, and it can be overturned if the courts' believe the debtor is not treating an indebted individual according to these rules.

(in the early beginnings of the Lone Star Confederacy slavery was actually illegal and Lone Star did not trade with communities that held slaves or allowed them to join the Confederacy.
The policy stemmed forth from the alliance Lone Star had with the New Texas Rangers who are firm anti slavery.
When the alliance with them ended and Lone Star and the New Texas Rangers went their separate ways, more pro slavery politicians saw the chance to weaken the Confederacy's laws against slavery, making it acceptable to a certain degree)



Most of the members of the Confederacy are settlements that used to be part of the Abilene metropolitan area with exceptions here and there;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abilene_metropolitan_area

Some of these places were connected with another through railway tracks and the Confederacy has done effort in repairing these.

Outside members are;

Sweetwater, Winters, Coleman, Albany, Breckenridge, Ballinger, Santa Anna, Brownwood,

Settlements that are in the process of becoming part of the Confederacy;

San Angelo, Comanche, Brady

While the settlements East of Lone Star are expected to make their financial contribution to the Confederacy to keep trade and development going and many of them do have their own forms of industry, several of these settlements were also given the chance to join the Confederacy as it needed to secure its Eastern border from incursions of the Angels of the Apocalypse and possible expansion of the System.


Lone Star's relationships with other factions

The System

The Confederacy's government sees the System as the biggest threat to its borders and existence.
While most of the details on Pre War communism has been lost on the current day wastelanders they remember enough from the past that it was communist competition with the old America that had caused the great war in the first place.

And though the Communist ideologies the System handles are not the same as those handled by China before the war much of it sounds strange and totalitarian to Lone Star's people who handle a post war version of democracy and the free market.

What got Lone Star's military leaders especially worried is the System's desire to expand into resource rich territories at any costs and the enormous investments that are done into their armed forced.
The System may claim that they only maintain a standing for protection of their citizens and trade routes but often the presence of System forces in previously unclaimed land is an indication that the System will soon claim it.

The System also possesses an arsenal of very powerful pre war weapons that have been salvaged from the Fort Hood military base that are capable of wiping out opposing armies and settlements with ease.

With the Confederacy's borders and those of the System slowly expanding towards each other and both governments having the interest in the same resources and settlements the military believes it is only a matter of time before a war between the two will happen.
For that reason they continue to ask expansion of the armed forces on the claim that the System is also doing it in secret behind its fortified nation's walls, severally straining Lone Star's economy in the process.

In reality confrontations between Lone Star and the System have been quite minimal at best. They have happened but the truth of the matter that the System like Lone Star has only so much resources and men to deploy, and between guarding their own borders and the trade routes and exploration and expansion into the Texas wasteland the System like Lone Star doesn't have the manpower to attack the Confederacy.


The Angels of the Apocalypse

While the System is a perceived threat because of conflicting ideologies, the Angels of the Apocalypse are a genuine threat despite how much the Lone Star military would like to talk it down.

The Angels have made it clear that they consider the Confederacy to be full of heathens and run by blasphemers and have threatened many times to launch a crusade to finally cleanse it of the evils of science and technology.

While that crusade has not happened yet and there are no indications that such preparations are made, Angel expedition forces enter Confederacy territory from time to time, targeting caravans and settlements they consider weak enough for an inquisition.
Often Confederacy border patrols arrive to late on the scene and can only do so much to limit the damage.

The Angels also target sites of technological importance to Lone Star such as energy plants and transmission towers, causing great damage to Lone Star's electrical grid.

Many of the border settlements urge the government of Lone Star to focus on the Angels and redeploy forces stationed at the borders near those of the System at those near Dallas-Fort Worth instead but so far the government has been unwilling, seriously straining the relationship with their outlying members.


The Followers of the ATLANTIS

Most people within the Lone Star Confederacy have never heard of the Followers of the ATLANTIS and those who do consider them 'strange' at best and don't really know what their agenda is.

The Confederacy's government has more information on the Followers thanks to their intelligence sources and basically know what the Followers are and what they stand for.
The Followers would have been a curiosity for the Confederacy at best, one that competed with it for Pre War technology but also be a source of knowledge and technology if it was not for the fact that the Followers have an alliance with the System.

The Followers handle even more advanced technology than Lone Star and the System combined and rumors speak of Follower members have strange abilities thanks to Pre War research and medicine that turn them into formidable opponents.

Lone Star's military leaders fear that the System might try to expand the mutual alliance against the Angels of the Apocalypse into an alliance against the Confederacy and that both might united their forces against Lone Star once the Angels have been dealt with.

Lone Star's scientific community is very interested in the technology and knowledge of the Followers such as power sources, medicine, computers, genetic engineering, and would like to establish contact with the Followers in order to trade for these items.


The New Texas Rangers

Once Lone Star and the New Texas Rangers were allies, both committed to end the anarchy that held the wasteland in its grasp and restore order and civilization.
It was thanks to the help of the New Texas Rangers that Lone Star could develop into the prosperous city it is today and form the confederacy with other settlements.

But that all changed when it became clear to the Rangers that the Confederacy was only out for power and prosperity for itself, only helping those who could contribute to the Confederacy and ignoring those settlements that had no resources or anything of interest the Confederacy could use or desire.

At some point the Confederacy sought to absorb the New Texas Rangers, making it the Confederacy's law enforcement, dealing with crimes in small settlements, raider groups and what other nastiness the wasteland could throw at the Confederacy that didn't require direct military intervention.
The Confederacy's leaders had been impressed by how the Rangers dealt with the various larger raider gangs and the early Black Fist and they wanted such a group of well trained and armed men and women under their control.

But the Confederacy's politics and economic agenda and the fact that they tolerated some forms of slavery to a degree in their lands were the reasons why the New Texas Rangers declined the offer of the Confederacy despite the resources it offered, and both went their separate way.

The Rangers' refusal to join Lone Star still is a sore spot to its leaders and they seek to discredit and undermine the Rangers whenever they can.
The Rangers protect settlements Lone Star would be very interested in to have them join the Confederacy and increasing Lone Star's influence over them.
Without Ranger protection these settlements would be much more willing to join the Confederacy in order to be protected by its military. (but having to accept Lone Star regulations on some matters such as making their economy more open for Lone Star investors)

While Lone Star does not harass or attack any Rangers inside their territory officials often make it clear to visiting Rangers that they are only tolerated to a degree, and should leave as soon as possible.
Furthermore they don't have any jurisdiction inside the Lone Star Confederacy and need to go through the official channels and bureaucracy if they wish to charge and arrest someone, even if it is someone like a raider.


The Black Fist

The relationship between the Confederacy is a somewhat interesting one. In the open the Confederacy does not tolerate the Black Fist and its activities as it profiteers and parasitizes on the Confederacy and its people and has some influence on its politics.
Behind the scenes the Black Fist is rather an unwanted 'bed guest' than a hostile faction the Confederacy can wage war against.

The fact is that the Black Fist provides serves and goods the Confederacy would not be in the business of providing; gambling, prostitution and drugs, as the more righteous citizens would not tolerate such activities, well at least in the open.
The Black Fist organization also keeps matters such as slavery down as the Black Fist leaders realize all to well that it would seriously affect their business if their clients and customers are enslaved by one of the slaver groups that preys on traffic between settlements.
Business would go unfinished and new customers and targets would frightened off to visit any Black Fist establishment.

The Black Fist also keeps the criminal element in the settlements and raider activity around where they operate in check for the same reason.
That doesn't mean crimes such as mugging, robberies, murder, extortion and racketeering but the Black Fist' presence keeps it to more manageable levels that the Confederacy's sheriffs and deputies can handle.

It is not so that the Black Fist could not be eliminated from the Confederacy as the New Texas Rangers were quite a thorn in the side of the organization, but with the Confederacy and the New Texas Rangers going their separate ways the Black Fist has become an evil that has to be tolerated for now.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

The System

The concepts behind the System came from Chinese POWs that had been held at the prison camp at Fort Hood during the Sino-American war.
When the nuclear war happened a number of these POWs managed to escape (perhaps even released?) and fled into the country before warheads devastated the military base and nearby Killeen.

After the worst of the devastation was over the survivors of the military base, Killeen and other nearby settlements emerged as did those Chinese POWs who had managed to hold out in the wilderness.
As these people came together there was a lot of distrust and anger between them, especially towards the former Chinese soldiers and officers which were blamed for the nuclear war.
In those early days there was a lot of fighting between the groups of survivors until attrition and lack of supplies forced them to come together and talk.





On the point of slavery the System claims the moral high ground to the Confederacy where it is allowed to a certain degree as long as it is done according to set laws, slavery is simply not accepted within the System and any enslaved individuals in System territory are immediately released and their owner arrested.

Any slavers caught in System territory are immediately arrested or shot when they refuse to surrender.

However just because slavery is forbidden by law does not mean that the System has not found others ways to get cheap labor forces.
Citizens that are for example considered unproductive or not able to reach a certain level of production can be re assigned to work forces where the System claims they will be much better at their place and able to learn and build the discipline needed to return to the population as rehabilitated citizens.

Prisoners such as political dissidents but also captured raiders, slavers and so on are also used as a workforce, the System claiming that through work they can pay of their debt to society and one day earn the status of citizens. (most of these people never reach the point that their debt is considered paid off)



The System's relationships with other factions

The Lone Star Confederacy

Both the System and the Confederacy compete with each other for the resources of the Texas wasteland and to a lesser extend the hearts and minds of the people who live in it.

While both governments are ideologically the opposite from each other the System in generally would not care as it believes it can show its superiority through their actions and success, and would not be that interested in an armed conflict (they believe that they can defeat the Confederacy economically) if it was not for the fierce anti System propaganda the Confederacy spreads.

The Confederacy likes to bring up the Communist background of the System and compare it with the People's Republic of China who started the war that destroyed the old world in the first place, and that if the System is allowed to spread in the US it will mean the slavery of everyone against which the old US was fighting.

On their turn the System brings up that despite the Confederacy's anti System propaganda they aren't out to aid settlements that have nothing to offer to the Confederacy's so called 'free market'.
The Confederacy sees settlements that produce nothing it wants as a drain on its economy and therefore keeps them out. The System on the other hand would help such settlements to become productive and self sufficient.

The military leaders in the System on the other hand believe that a conflict between them and the Confederacy is inevitable and that they need to defeat the Confederacy to ensure their own survival and future.


The Angels of the Apocalypse

The System considers the Angels their other great enemy next to the Confederacy.
While the Confederacy competes with the System for resources, the Angels would force religious dogma and indoctrination on them, wanting to convert everyone and establish a Christian Theocracy in the Texas Wasteland.

Like the Communist fore bearers the System rejects the notion of something existing that is higher than the System party and have been trying to eliminate any form of religion that would undermine their rule and corrupt the minds of their people. (though of course they have never been able to eliminate any form of religion completely, the System's leaders actually tolerate some religion to a degree as long as it does not interfere with the System's politics).
This has made the System a target for conversion by the Angels who believe that they need to save the people of the System from their godless leaders.

The Angels' anti technology stance is also considered threatening by the System as the Angels destroy any pre war left overs when they come across them. Remnants and artifacts the System could have used for the rebuilding of the state.

Because the System lacks the manpower and military resources for now to actually launch a campaign against the Angels in their own territories their current policy is to contain the Angels and monitor them, preventing them from spreading further into System territory.


The Followers of the ATLANTIS

Currently the System and the Followers are allies as they both seek to halt the spread of the Angels of the Apocalypse and drive them back to the Fort Worth-Dallas metropolitan area.

The System's fortified nation happens to be right between Fort Worth-Dallas and Austin, serving as a barrier to the Angels who seek to find and destroy the Followers' headquarters, and the System's leaders do not want their nation coming under the control of the Angels.

ATLANTIS realized that the conditions were ideal to propose an alliance of both parties against the Angels and the System eagerly accepted as next to their forces working together the Followers also offered their advanced knowledge and technologies which the System desires.

While this alliance has been beneficial for both sides, the System, and in particular the technocrats amongst them feel strongly that more needs to be done to undercover the Followers' greatest secrets.

They know the Followers have access to advanced power sources, computer technology and weapons, and that Followers use cybernetics and genetic engineering to 'improve' their own bodies which gives them greater senses, strength and longer life spans. Things the System wants to have for itself.

The System knows little about the agenda and goals of the Followers but has claimed that their own agenda matches the ideals of a post human society the Followers are striving for, but the Followers have not responded on this.

Currently the System seeks to retrieve Follower artifacts including bodies for their own research and development.


The New Texas Rangers

The System has a somewhat amendable relationship with the New Texas Rangers. The people of the System definitely recognize the good that the Rangers do, and their presence has made life more save.
The problem is, the Rangers don't work for the System, and while the Rangers in general do not interfere in System politics or speak publicly against them, the leaders of the System just can not tolerate a group of what they refer as 'vigilantes' in their territories.

Orders when encountering Rangers within System territory is to arrest them if reasonable possible and bring them to the closest System outpost for questioning before being escorted back to the nearest border.

Still sometimes System personnel fraternizes with the Rangers and ignores their presence in System lands as long as their stay is short.


The Black Fist

Publicly there is no relation between the System and the Black Fist and they are seen as a corruptive element that must be dealt with on sight.
They seek to weaken and disrupt the System and its people by offering controlled and forbidden goods such as alcohol, and vices such as gambling and prostitution, undermining the unity and morale of the System's population.

That's what it says in the System's regulations, and while this all may apply to the lower ranking members of System society, like in most cases in the Wasteland and the world before that, the upper ranking members with the occasional exception here and there don't themselves subject to this.
Of course as long as this is kept out of the public eye.

There have been plenty of times that ranking members of the System have left on 'official business' to places where the Black Fist operates to enjoy the decadence they provide, and the Black Fist does have some operatives in the System itself.

It becomes a bit of a different matter when the Black Fist actually involves itself or interferes in System politics and matters, and it is then when the System can be absolutely ruthless against them and any System politician or military officer that is associated with them at that moment.

Operations such as drug running or alcohol or weapon trafficking in System territory are absolutely not tolerated and dealt with harshly.



The Followers of the ATLANTIS

A paramilitary transhumanist group that is led by the artificial intelligence ATLANTIS.
The Followers' goal is to create a new era of science and technology equal to of the Pre War world and surpassing that and rebuilding the world.
They also believe that if humanity is to advance that is should evolve into sentient machines like the founder and leader of the organization, while this is technically impossible on the moment the Followers experiment with grafting cybernetic implants into their bodies in order to improve themselves and become more like ATLANTIS.

The current goal of the Followers is to gather resources and knowledge in order to build an industrial infrastructure for their long term plans, for this they scour the ruins of Austin but also send expeditions to other pre war settlements, industrial regions, pre war laboratories, and military bases to retrieve artifacts or locate facilities of interest.

Followers don't just gather technology that involves weaponry or power sources but also other knowledge.
What the Followers don't use themselves they usually store or sell on to outsiders such as agricultural technologies or engineering knowledge.

Even technologies such as power sources are for sale but the downside to this is that the Followers sometimes sell people technologies they do not fully understand or able to handle, resulting in damage and casualties, the Followers in general don't educate people on inherit dangers unless specifically asked or paid for nor do they see reason to follow up on this unless it directly threatens the Followers themselves.

Unlike the Brotherhood of Steel the Followers allow outsiders to join the organization but before they are given Follower equipment and weapons they must undergo a strict training schedule which determines what type of work and position they would be the most suitable for as well as additional education and training before they can fill such a position.

During this period it is also made clear to the new recruits that although they will be treated as Followers that they must earn the rights and privileges of a full member, and that theft of equipment and weaponry will not be tolerated in case people sign up for that goal.
Followers will come after thieves and will also deploy hunter robots such as flying eyebots and security robots in order to track thieves down.

Follower hierarchy is structured along function or specialization, rank amongst these, and level of modification.
For example; Defender, Secondary Rank, Level 4.
Levels of modification range from '0' currently solely occupied by ATLANTIS to level '5', the standard unmodified human or mutant.
Of course unique titles for specialists have surpassed the existing titles exist such as those for defenders that would be considered 'Special Forces'.

In general Followers are non hostile towards outsiders, sometimes even willing to render aid, but they are tight lipped about their organization and secrets and usually when they aid a community without an arrangement it means that they want something the individuals or groups have or can be found on their land.
The Followers do become hostile towards those who willfully destroy technological artifacts the Followers wish to claim or those who seek to steal or extort from the Followers.


Followers' relationships with other factions

Lone Star Confederacy

There actually has not been much interaction between the Followers and the Lone Star Confederacy because of the distance between the Confederacy and the Followers' home territory.

Those few Followers who actually reached the Confederacy deem it a continuation of the ideologies and politics of the old world and being susceptible for the same mistakes and corruption that eventually destroyed the old world.
In general the Followers are indifferent to the activities of the Confederacy and its goals, only perhaps one day getting involved if the goals of the Confederacy and the Followers would clash.


The System

Although in general not interested in getting involved with the politics of outsiders the Followers made an alliance with the System as their nation is located between the Followers' home territories and the Dallas-Fort Worth area from which the Angels operate.
The Followers and System armed forces work together with keeping Angels out of the land surrounding Killeen and also provide a degree of technology and science which the System uses to keep up with their rivals; the Lone Star Confederacy.

Still this is an alliance of convenience, the Followers are not interested in helping the System spread their ideologies across the wasteland, and the System is only interested in working with the Followers for their technology and advanced weapons.
The System would like nothing more than to claim these and ATLANTIS for themselves.


The Angels of the Apocalypse

The Followers' biggest enemy and in the Followers' opinion the current greatest threat to the recovery of human civilization and scientific progress.
They consider the Angels a throwback to superstition and religious dogma that once had firm control of humanity and which only purpose is to control people's body and soul, keeping them ignorant to realize the truth and act accordingly.

After the initial encounter between the two groups ATLANTIS started to study the Angels, their agenda and their tactics.
While the Followers would be able to take on and defeat the Angels ATLANTIS concluded based on its simulations that this would cost to much personnel and resources.
Something better used for more productive goals.

Instead the Followers seek to contain the Angels, limiting their intrusions into the South and in particular Austin where the Followers' headquarters is located while their research groups and tacticians work on a means or strategy to drive the Angels back to Fort Worth-Dallas permanently. (despite their animosity towards the Angels ATLANTIS and the Followers are not necessarily interested in their destruction. It is ignorance and fundamentalist religion that makes the Angels hostile, something the Angels might one day overcome)

Angel soldiers and Crusaders have proven to be formidable fighters, while the Followers' first underestimated the more low tech Angels they quickly learned the errors of their way and now treat the Angels more serious.

As the Angels try to outnumber the Followers in a fight the Followers had to adapt accordingly, developing tactics based on indirect fight and avoiding head on battles, using long range weapons and tools such as mines.

Of course the Angels have also been adapting accordingly.

Follower forces in general carry a plasma incineration device on themselves that is tied into their implants.
If a Follower is captured by hostile forces the Follower can choose to detonate the plasma grenade in order to prevent him or her from being questioned or studied or to take out some hostiles.
The explosive also goes of when it detect zero body functions and brain activity in order to protect Follower secrets.


The New Texas Rangers

The New Texas Rangers and the Followers are in general neutral towards each other as they both have different agendas.

Occasionally though individual Rangers and Followers have socialized with another, conducted trade.
Most Rangers consider the Followers strange and only a handful know about their goal.


The Black Fist

The Followers and the Black Fist are in general neutral towards each other as they have nothing in common and the Followers have no interest in the services or goods the Black Fist offers nor can be blackmailed by them.

Still the Black Fist is interested in some of the knowledge of the Followers such as their chemical manufacturing means and military drugs.
They also have had customers in the past who have wanted to get their hands on Follower technology or a Follower's body.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

The Angels of the Apocalypse

A Christian based para military organization that originates from the Fort Worth-Dallas Metropolitan area that preaches a Luddite or anti technological agenda while seeking to convert people in the wasteland to their form of Christianity, at gun point if necessary.

Before the War Dallas was known as the buckle of the bible belt as there was a large number of churches of the various Christian sects and denominations in the city.
When the bombs hit and laid Dallas to waste like the rest of North America surviving Christian leaders suffered a tremendous shock when they discovered the deaths of their families, loved ones and much of their congregations and were unable to cope with this loss.
A number of them proclaimed it was science and technology that had led men away from God and the way God had set out for mankind and in their godlessness and wickedness caused the great war.

They did not start out with a great number of followers of course as to many other survivors had to to focus on the essentials of life on a day to day basis, but as the hollowness that followed the destruction of the old world set in many people turned to religion to find some kind of meaning of life.

Slowly the various movement expanded and met another, either merging or being absorbed by the other until there was only one large movement left with a ruthless dogma and a sheer hatred for advanced science & technology and all those associated with it such as teachers, technicians and scientists.

After expanding their sphere of influence throughout what used to be Dallas-Fort Worth the Angels saw it as their mission to bring their message to the rest of the Texas wasteland and eventually the continent while continuing to cleanse the world of the memories and artifacts of science.

Even the Angel leaders knew that not everyone would be willing to accept their message and judgment as they had already experienced in Dallas-Fort Worth itself as there were many wastelanders who clung to pre war devices and machines for survival or make their lives easier such as electricity.

So despite the hypocrisy of the act the Angels entered remains of military bases and police stations as well as scouring the ruins in search of armories and weapon caches to arm their forces.
They also located and repaired devices that would make it easier for them to spread their mission and stay in contact with another such as radios.

And last but not least, their soldiers and leaders were allowed to use pre war medicine and medical devices cure any ailment and injury despite that the regular population under their influence was forbidden of using most of these as any illness or injury was an act of god and had to be handled traditionally.

Now expeditions are send into the four wind corners of the continent to locate settlements or even traveling wastelanders to investigate if they have pre war devices or know scientific knowledge and judge them according, converting them if possible or punish them for their transgressions.

While the Angels do not 'force' wastelanders to join them, their leaders and Inquisitors have developed quite some tactics to ease and speed up the process of recruitment and conversion.
Often the threat of a thorough Inquisition of a settlement is convincing enough for its leader to send some of their young people over to be trained as Angels.

Tribals of course are immediately converted and made part of the Angels as they do not know God and have fallen to heathen barbarism and need to be saved from themselves.

(I have not thought much about the hierarchy of the Angels. Originally they were suppose to be Catholic Christians and their ranks and hierarchy made according to that religion with the Pope being something like the leader and head general.

I have at least two ranks in mind; the Crusader for example is an elite soldier.

The Inquisitor is sort of an investigator and a judge but can also take a role into settlement politics by serving as an 'adviser' to the local leader (of course he serves as an extension of the Angels in that settlement and his job is to make sure that the settlement leaders act in the interest of the Angels.
Last while they do not have a military rank and can not order Angel forces in general, they usually have a personal guard that will execute and orders the Inquisitor gives)

While no wastelander in general is save from the Angels, people of learning such as scientists and technicians, or even teachers have the most to fear from the Angels as they see such people as agents of the Devil or even demons in disguise.
Once caught they undergo unspeakable forms of tortures in order make them state a confession after after which they are killed in a horrible fashion.

Those who know some knowledge often just undergo conversion with perhaps some torture to make them renounce their old ways.

The Angels are very anti mutant, seeming them as the results of science and therefore very close to it.
Ghouls or Super Mutants (or any other kind of human mutant) caught by the Angels and forced into a lifetime of slavery which the Angels claim will cleanse them of their sins and redeem them in the eyes of God.


Angels' relationships with other factions

The Lone Star Confederacy

Ever since the representatives of the Lone Star Confederacy and the Angels met there has been a state of war between the two.
While the Confederacy does know about Christianity and even has several churches in various settlements which services are attended by humans and even mutants, the Angels consider this to be the wrong type of Christianity.
Message of forgiveness and tolerance in their view convey the wrong message and do not lead people to a live of repentance and servitude to God and the fact that the leaders of these churches do not condone science and technology, sometimes even use that themselves is evidence enough that these leaders are false or deluded Christians.

The Line Star Confederacy itself is consider as heathen and godless and the pre war world as it has styled itself after the legacy and politics of the old world, and gladly uses pre war science and technology in the workings and expansion of its economy, continuing to drive people even further away from God in the eyes of the Angels.

Periodically Angel expeditions are send into the territories of the Confederacy to target caravans or settlements that are incapable to resist the Angels which they then temporary invade in order to subject the inhabitants to their merciless judgment which are then followed up by unusual cruel punishment, especially if a man or woman of science or higher learning is present.

The Confederacy does try to keep the Angels outside of its borders but more often fails that succeeds in intercepting any expeditions.

The Angels dream of launching a great crusade one day to invade and overrun the Confederacy one day and cleanse it of all the evil inside, making it a nation of God.


The System

Like many Communist nations before it the System denounces the existence of God, denying that there is something higher than the state.
That alone makes the System an obvious target to the Angels, but the System is also eagerly after pre war knowledge and technology in order to expand and compete with its rivals, making them to the Angels irredeemably fallen.

While the lower and common citizen might be saveable, the leaders of the System are corrupted beyond salvation and the Angels see it as their goal to cleanse the settlements of the System like the settlements of the Lone Star Confederacy.


However the System unlike some Lone Star politicians has realize the dangers of the Angels all to well and because it has a smaller territory to protect maintains various garrisons at their borders to the Dallas-Fort Worth region who patrol it often.
It also has struck an alliance with the System's greatest enemies; the Followers of ATLANTIS who provide the System with intelligence information and technology.

Even if the Angels could move beyond the border, the fortified nation of Killeen itself is almost impossible to infiltrate. Beyond the massive concrete walls are various corridors and levels that are monitored around the clock.
Any Angel spy or agent does not last long under the scrutiny of the System.


The Followers of the ATLANTIS

The Followers at the Angels worst fear and greatest enemy on the fact that they are the very embodiment of science, recovering and repairing machines, uncovering the lost knowledge of the past, and seeking to restore and continue scientific progress.

The Followers seek to create a new age of science and technology, and believe that humanity can develop beyond his lower instinct and mindset by embracing the machine; improving himself through genetic engineering and cybernetic implants.

Many Followers are some kind of cyborg already and they encourage outsiders to follow the same path.
They also aid those who are also pursuing the path of science and pre war knowledge and sell this, devices, and machines to anyone who can pay their price.

And if the rumors the Angels have heard from captured people who trade with the Followers are true, the Followers are actually led by a man made machine that can think like a human.

The Angels consider it their foremost task to destroy the Followers of the ATLANTIS and everything that ties with their existence, eliminating even the very memory from the minds of people.

But were the Confederacy and System armed forces are nearly equal or completely equal to Angels, the Followers are equal or even formidable in strength thanks to the cybernetic implants and enhancing genetics and drugs they use.
Combined with state of the art armor and weaponry a Follower Defender squad can be very dangerous if not dealt with immediately.

Even defeated Followers are not harmless as those who are sent against Angels often carry a plasma grenade or other explosive on their body, intending to take any Angels who try to make a trophy out of them with them in a spectacular end.

Some of the Angels have adopted this strategy from the Followers, like them not wanting to become a trophy or a prisoner to anyone they consider lesser than themselves.


The New Texas Rangers

To the Angels the New Texas Rangers are simply another group of non believers who use technology from time to time, not concerned about the spiritual consequences of this.
For that reason the Angels feel that Rangers need to be saved at best, or destroyed at worst.

The Rangers are a thorn in the Angels' side as they aid those settlements that seek to resist conversion and help those wanted by the Angels to escape beyond their reach.


The Black Fist

Another example of the corruption of humanity that still was not wiped clean after the great war.
The Black Fist preys on the weakness of humanity, seducing them with the pleasures of alcohol, drugs, gambling and the flesh, leaving people spiritual empty.
That they are also also into racketeering and acts of violence against regular people is of less concern to the Angels.

The Angels became aware of the Black Fist when they tried to spread their influence to Angel controlled or monitored settlements, trying to set up shop and manipulating local leaders and even trying to corrupt Angel representatives.
As the Black First originated from the territory of the Lone Star Confederacy the Angels first assumed that they were part of that government and that this was an attempt to undermine Angel resolve to convert the wasteland.

Later they determined that the Black Fist was as much a corruption in the Confederacy as well as the independent settlements.
Not that that mattered much to the Angels.

In general any captured Black Fist members are treated as any non believer the Angels come across, though the higher ranking members often undergo punishment befitting criminals.


The New Texas Rangers

The New Texas Rangers are an independent group of law bringers who try to protect the smaller independent settlements of the Texas wasteland from raiders, slavers, and warlords, and also assist local law enforcement with keeping the peace and investigating crime.

The New Texas Rangers organization was founded by surviving lawful national guard members, cops, and sheriffs and like the Desert Rangers based on the old Arizona and Texas Rangers.
Seeing the collapse of society and the chaos the great war caused these men and women banded together to protect the survivors who sought to rebuild civilization and defend them from the roving looters, rapists and warlords and help them deal with criminals within.

Thanks to the New Texas Rangers several peace treaties and relations were established between towns and outposts, ensuring co existence and cooperation in a number of issues such as the distribution of arid-able land and resources and aid to another in times of trouble.
Rangers also helped to train town defenders and law officials to maintain order within communities and represent rule of law.

They also made contact with the larger governments and organizations on behalf of the smaller towns, acting as a third neutral party during negotiations.

Next to fighting the criminal elements and mutant wildlife in the wasteland the Rangers have also been fighting slavers since they appeared in the wasteland, smashing slaver rings and operations whenever they come across them.



But how good and flawless the rangers may sound they as an organization and as individuals also have made their mistakes that have led to problems and disasters for themselves and others.
Ranger neutrality has been a boon to the emerging settlements in Texas as the Rangers would dedicate themselves to the protection of more than one settlement without getting involved in internal politics, allowing for the rise of new governments such as the Lone Star Confederacy and the System.

But as a consequence of this success the Rangers also find themselves more unwanted over the years as because of their non allegiance the Rangers' presence is not accepted within the territories of these powers.

As these expand the Rangers find themselves more and more unable to help those people who could use their help the most and without support for their own organization.

San Antonio was the Rangers last best hope to establish a nation of their own which ideals they agreed with, unlike the Confederacy.
When San Antonio was sacked and conquered by the Caesar's Legion the morale of the organization was shattered.

While technically the New Texas Rangers could be seen as a group of vigilantes as they hold no loyalty to a single settlement or government, the New Texas Rangers have shown they have try to operate according to to what set of laws a settlement or community has adopted as long as it is within reasonable bounds.
They will for example assist settlements that practices court justice where judgment is based on evidence and fact and not mob justice.

Note: my concept of the New Texas Rangers is based in the historical organization but also on the descriptions of the Gunslingers of Gilead in Stephen King's Dark Tower novel series.


New Texas Rangers' relationships with other factions

The Lone Star Confederacy

The New Texas Rangers already assisted the wastelanders that lived in the ruins of Abilene before Vault 34 opened its door and later mediated between the wastelanders and the Vault Dwellers who were at odds with another during those hectic first days because of mutual distrust.
It led to the first treaty and eventually the creation of Lone Star and the foundation of the Lone Star Confederacy which the New Texas Rangers continued to aid in their efforts to tame the wasteland and bring law and civilization.

For a time it seemed the Confederacy and the New Texas Rangers were synonymous with another but then the relation turned sour.
As the Confederacy grew in influence and wealth, slowly its agenda changed from trying to civilize the wasteland and rebuilding the state for everyone and turned towards creating a society in which the Confederacy, and in particular the rich and influential reaped the most benefits from this new civilization.

Application for membership to the Confederacy was changed so that potential members had to be able to provide a resource or service the Confederacy actually desired, and assistance in helping settlements to become self sufficient and productive were limited as much as possible, the politicians of Lone Star claiming that these could potentially damage the fragile economy if the efforts to help such settlements failed. (they would be a drain on the more successful settlements)

The final straw for the Rangers came when the Confederacy tried to absorb the Rangers as their official police force and law enforcement.
The rangers would be well supplied and supported if they allowed this to happen but they would also become an extension of the Lone Star government.

Worse, the government wanted the Rangers to no longer aid those settlements and tribes that existed outside the Confederacy, claiming the same reasons why they kept out most settlements from joining; it would be a drain on their limited resources.

The New Texas Rangers had been set up to help all the honest and defenseless people of the wasteland, and not just those privileged few who wanted to use them to maintain the status quo.

The leaders of the Rangers felt it was no longer possible to work together with the Confederacy so they left.

Many of the older Confederacy citizens still remember the good the Rangers have done for their nation in the early years and see the break up between the two as an example of short sightedness of their leaders.
Some members in the parliament hope that a reconciliation between the two is still possible and have been working towards that goal.


The System

The New Texas Rangers have a better recollection of history than most 'civilized' people in the Texas wasteland, but when they first encountered the System they weren't immediately driven to destroy it just because of its communist ideology.

If it was a legitimate chosen government by the people it governed, then the Ranger leaders saw no reason to treat them as they did raiders, slavers and warlords.
The System does not force its rule on any outside settlement, and people in it are free to leave if they want to.

As the System grew in power and influence its leader informed the Rangers in a civil way that they could not allow Rangers to operate in their territory and settlements, it would be a breach of System protocol.
Any crimes such as slavery, raider activity and so on has to be handled by the System's own law enforcement and military.

The Rangers understood and accepted this and since then have stayed for the most part outside of System territory.
Occasionally though the Rangers have been forced to enter System lands in order to pursue criminals who seek to evade them there, most of the System forces assigned here have not forgotten the good the Rangers have done in the past and tend to ignore any Rangers that run into border patrols.

From time to time members of the System and the Rangers even fraternize with another despite official System regulations forbidding it.


Not all the Rangers were as neutral to the System as the Ranger leadership.
Some of the more fanatic amongst them insisted that the very existence of the System was a blight on American soil, going against everything their ancestors had fought against before the great war.

When they staged attacks on System settlements and troops they brought up for it by the leaders of the Rangers on the basis that they had attacked non hostiles.
This was the final insult to this small group of Rangers who afterward left the organization to form their own group with the purpose of destroying the System.

This is one of the few black pages in Ranger history.


The Followers of the ATLANTIS

The New Texas Rangers and the Followers of the ATLANTIS are on neutral terms with each other, the Followers in general do not cause problems (they do occasionally sell dangerous technologies to people who do not understand them, or perform dangerous experiments) nor bother settlements and wastelanders.
They also don't have a political or ideological agenda that they force onto people against their will.

Like many others in the wasteland the Rangers have found out that the Followers are a good source of information and technology when the Rangers have need of these, and they have conducted trade with them in the past.

Most Rangers find the Followers simply strange and don't take much heed of their activities.


The Angels of the Apocalypse

The New Texas Rangers in general see the Angels of the Apocalypse as a dangerous and insane cult that seeks to convert everyone to their twisted form of Christian fate, subjecting those whose only crime is to know pre war knowledge or possessing advanced to excruciating torture and slow deaths.
Despite the Rangers not being officially at war with the Angels, that is often enough for most Rangers to drive any Angel expedition forces they run into back to where they came from.

They will also assist anyone who is seeking to escape the Angels and find sanctuary.


The Black Fist

The New Texas Rangers and the Black Fist have been enemies since the start of the organization.
It were the Rangers who had eliminated some of the Black Fist's 'predecessors' and helped shape the organization as it is today as its members sought combined strength.

There have been 'attempts' by the Black Fist to soften the hostility between the organizations by seeking to weaken the Rangers from the inside, but for every Ranger that can be bribed there are five more that don't take any pay offs.

Open battles with members of the Black Fist is rare as the crime organization prefers to use its resources for more profitable business rather than engaging in warfare with the Rangers.
Instead the Black Fist uses its influence in various settlements to hamper Ranger activity by using local politicians and leaders that are in their pocket.

Ranger leadership has already accepted that they will most likely never eliminate the Black Fist as the organization's greatest strength is from behind the scenes, and there are to many settlement leaders and politicians who benefit from their activity.
At best the Rangers can try to limit the influence of the Black Fist and ensure that their operations do not cost to much lives.

Even if the Rangers would be able to destroy the organization, vices such as greed will ensure that someone else will take their place.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Lone Star Trading Company

The Lone Star Trading Company is the largest caravan house in the Confederacy and part of its foundation and prosperity has to do with the establishment of the Trading Company.
Their main office is located in Lone Star itself but they have smaller branch offices in other settlements

The company trades in basically everything, from raw material, water and foodstuff to pre war artifacts, newly manufactured goods, and weapons.

While the Lone Star Trading Company a reasonable honest company that has grown so big through hard work it has been accused by smaller caravan houses and traders of having build up its success through its connections in the Lone Star government and these allegations aren't totally unjustified.
Some current leading figures of the Trading Company have been in the Confederacy's senate before entering the trading sector.


Horizon Traders

A smaller caravan house which office is located within the Confederacy.
The Horizon Traders are a caravan house that started in one of the smaller settlements before it joined the Lone Star Confederacy.
While this has brought a degree of prosperity and wealth it has also seriously hurt the position of the Horizon Traders as they now had to compete with the far more economic stronger Lone Star Trading Company which already has relations with other Confederacy members.

Because of this the Horizon Traders have been trying to expand outside the Confederacy, even if they have to pay additional taxes for doing so, it is the only way for them to keep up with their bigger rival by importing goods from settlements that can not be found in the Confederacy.

Unfortunate this has not paid of as much as the heads of the Horizon Traders had hoped and its future is now in doubt.
What they needs is a seller and buyer that will only exclusively deal with them.


Mutant Free Traders

Not all mutants hate humans despite incidents of mutant racism in the past, and many Ghouls have been able to make a living amongst humans who can look beyond appearance and bias.
And after the death of the Master a number of Super Mutants also sought to integrate themselves into wasteland society and make an honest living.

As there is much money to be made in trade and services such as repairing things a number of Ghouls and Super Mutants have banded together to form the Mutant Free Traders.
Operating from Austin the Mutant Free Traders deal in salvaged goods and raw material that is recovered from the ruins and offer these along with their skills and knowledge (some of the Ghouls were craftsmen, engineers or other educated people before the War and some Super Mutants are also trained mechanics) to settlements around Austin.
Their caravans even reach the Lone Star Confederacy borders.

Still some humans are quite suspicious of Ghouls and Super Mutants, fearing Ghouls from carrying diseases and Super Mutants because of their past aggression.
The Confederacy is also not keen of having their caravans in their territory but this could be more on behalf of their own caravan houses than an anti mutant bias.

The Mutant Free Traders also suffer from the activities of the Master's Army and the Mutant Slavers as people not always make a distinction between the groups despite that the Mutant Free Traders have occasionally assisted in the defense of a settlement against these other mutant groups.

If the Mutant Free Traders' image could be improved and they could gain access to the markets of the Lone Star Confederacy and the System their misfortune might be turned around.

In general they are more of the tolerant groups found in the wasteland as long as people do not try to double cross them.


Fourth trading caravan (no name yet)

This caravan house operates in the Houston/Drowned City (Texas City/Galveston City) area but trades with settlements as far as College Station, Austin, and Temple.
They also used to visit San Antonio before it was taken over by the Caesar's Legion. (while the Legion in general does not deter outside traders as they long as they do not carry forbidden goods, other settlements would stop trading with the ####### if they found out about trade with the Legion).

The ####### caravan house in general trades in food, water, and locally manufactured items and medicine, but they are most known for the pre war artifacts like technology and weapons they buy from the prospectors who operate digs within the ruins which are sold on to the settlements and organizations in the West who desire such things.
The ####### caravan house is a source of many of the Enclave devices and weapons that have started to appear in the Texas Wasteland.


The Black Fist

The idea of 'organized crime' in a world that is mostly lawless and in anarchy might sound contradictory but it does exist.
As soon as settlements and some kind of organized leadership and government was installed new criminal elements started to form in the shadows and alleys, seeking to survive and benefit of this structure but also providing goods and services that are controlled or forbidden by those in charge.

The Black Fist is the eventual development or 'evolution' of these small time crime organizations that formed in the early settlements and communities that were founded after the great war, dealing in such activities as extortion, blackmail and racketeering, smuggle, assassination, but also providing services and goods such as gambling, drugs, alcohol, arms trafficking and prostitution where they are not available or forbidden.

The Black Fist also often takes over those independent establishments that provide these or seek to absorb them into their organization.

The only business the Black Fist is not into is slavery, but clients and customers who fail to pay Black Fist debts are given the choice of paying these by working it in any form of capacity the Black Fist considers fit for them.

While both the Black Fist and raider gangs survive by living of society the Black Fist's leaders consider the Black Fist to be above raider gangs and at least being 'civilized' compared to what they consider to be bunch of degenerate anarchists.
For all it might take from society the Black Fist does feel it is important to help maintain it as well and prevent it from collapsing again.

It might be easy to say that the Black Fist is evil but that would be simplifying matters into 'good' or 'evil' categories, if anything the Black Fist is impartial but true to itself and its members.
If someone ranks high enough in the organization the organization will look after that member, if someone threatens local businesses from which the Black Fist benefits, it will take care of the offender.

While the Black Fist would technically be against the establishment such as the Lone Star Confederacy or the System, it is actually quite dependent on them and does not wish them to fell to be replaced with a more totalitarian leadership that seeks absolute control.
The Black Fist doesn't want to control the Confederacy, the System or its members, merely have a strong influence to voice its interests through the politicians it has contact with, and for the rest leaves the governments alone to their business.


Black Fist' relationships with other factions

The Lone Star Confederacy

The Black Fist has integrated itself successfully well into the Lone Star Confederacy where they run various bars, casinos, and brothels, and undertake a lot of their other activities such as gun running and racketeering.
In the past the Confederacy had been able to deter the Black Fist with help of the New Texas Rangers, but when the two went their separate ways after the Confederacy tried to absorb the New Texas Rangers, the way was practically open for the Black Fist to come in.

Still it doesn't mean that all government officials are corrupted by the Black Fist as there are plenty of individuals who want to see an end to the Black Fist' activities and presence and wants the organization to be driven out of the Confederacy territory.
These people range from political activists, law enforcement personnel, to politicians and even the president of the Confederacy.

Their effort is sadly slowed down by those who are in the pockets of the Black Fist that prevent the current status from being changed to much.
The Confederacy has been trying for years now to make an end to the internal corruption that weakens the young civilization.


The System

The Black Fist doesn't have as much influence in the System as it would like.
There are citizens and officials of course who make use of their services and goods, but the System keeps the Black Fist well outside their political structure and does not tolerate the Black Fist openly operating inside their territories.

Attempts at trafficking alcohol and drugs in System lands are dealt with quickly and harshly and any courier or caravan caught inside System territory is often heavily fined while their goods are impounded.
Of course there are some System officials who will allow a limited degree of Black Fist activity as long as they receive their cut of the deals. (it is is not as much that the System opposes the Black Fist because of the nature of their trade, they simply want a part of the profits).

The Black Fist has been useful to the System in other ways as they are able to bypass the blockades of certain goods the Lone Star Confederacy has set up which include pre war artifacts such as advanced technologies and schematics.
Occasionally the Black Fist has also been useful for inserting and extracting System agents into LSC territory but the System keeps this service to a minimum as the Black Fist is just as liable to blackmail them by threatening to expose the identities of these agents to the LSC.

Despite some set backs the Black Fist is still determined to insert itself into System society and will exploit any weakness and opening it can find.


The Followers of the ATLANTIS

The Black Fist knows about the Followers of the ATLANTIS and the Followers know about the Black Fist, that is the general extend to it.
The Black Fist knows that the Followers have access to extensive knowledge on a variety of fields including drugs but have not been able to barter for these, the Followers on their turn desire nothing the Black Fist can offer them so they keep a distance from each other.

There is no animosity between the groups in general so when members of both sides encounter each other it does not automatically lead to battles.
It of course becomes something different when members of the Black Fist try to steal something from the Followers, then the Followers become absolutely determined and ruthless to get it back and deal with the thief harshly.

Occasionally individual Followers have done some trading with the Black Fist when they have something pre war or other advanced knowledge to offer.
But in general the Black Fist finds the Followers 'strange, and rather non-human'.

In the recent years the System has informed various organizations including the Black Fist that they would be interested in any Followers technology, including living or dead Followers themselves anyone would be able to get without gaining the majority of the Followers' attention.


The Angels of the Apocalypse

There are no relations between the Black Fist and the Angels, plain and simple.
To the Angels the Black Fist are heathens or at worst associates of the devil who play in on the vices of men as much as science and technology corrupts them, and to the Black Fist the Angels are fundamentalist nutbags who easily nail you to a cross or put you on fire when they have reason to do so.
The Angels are not interested in what the Black Fist offers and the Black Fist members are not interested in the slightest to be converted to Angel Christian dogma.

The governments of the Texas wasteland should be glad that the Angels have never bend their own rules so far of trying to work with the Black Fist like the Caesar's Legion did with the Families back in the West and undermine states such as the Confederacy and the System from within.
But a time may come that such an event could become possible.


The New Texas Rangers

The New Texas Rangers and the Black Fist have been in conflict with each other from the beginning, even before the Black Fist actually 'came to be' and developed into what the organization is today.
While the Black Fist's predecessors weren't like the raider gangs, wasteland warlords, or the Angels of the Apocalypse that plague the wasteland they were a burden on the re emerging society in other ways, trying to get their claws into local politics and economy and playing on people's greed and corruption.

Even the few goods and services they did 'provide' such as liquor, drugs, gambling, and prostitution was questionable.
The organized crime groups were not above for example forcing brewers and distillers to hand over their kettles and distilleries over to them or producing liquor of their own that could blind or even kill people.

Getting girls (or men) for prostitution often involved getting them addicted to one chem or another or getting their parents indebted and unable to pay off, forcing them to send their children into debt servitude.

The New Texas Rangers made it as much their business to break up these kind of operations next to the raiders and slavers they hunted down, and it was partly because of this that the various criminal elements in the Texas Wasteland came together to form a new organization.

Thanks to Confederacy and System policies it is much easier for the Black Fist to act in their territories, but once outside it becomes much more difficult to work through a front or in the open as the Rangers remain ever vigilant to the presence of the Black Fist.


The Signal Listeners

One of the more peculiar cults that is found in the Texas Wasteland, the Signal Listeners like similar groups have based their religion on misconceptions about the old world, in the Listeners' case radio and satellite communication that existed before the great war.

Father FM (working name) who founded the Signal Listeners was a relative uneducated wastelander who only had learned the basics about the world before the great war and combined things he heard or read about with concepts from mythology and superstition.
When he first heard about the concept of satellite communication and how widespread it was, he got the idea that it had religious importance and that the old world was actually using satellites to communicate with gods in space.
(he believes for example that the pre war people built spacecraft in order to reach the gods)

Father FM's faith actually inspired him to learn electronic engineering and he learned how computers, radios, and various transmitters and receivers worked as well as how communication cables are laid and wireless communication.

He also told other people in his own community and people he met in the wasteland about his ideas and religion, and in time gathered a group of fellow believers around them.

When Father FM learned about the Johnson Space Center from one of his disciples and how from there contact and control was maintained with satellites, space probes and spacecraft, Father FM decided to take his followers to the ruins and use it as a headquarters and temple for the religion.


Note: despite the somewhat silly and ridiculous religion the Signal Listeners actually have useful knowledge that can help the wasteland and improve the Signal Listeners' status.
While Father FM himself is mostly obsessed with contacting the star gods, some of his followers (at least one) sees the more practical uses for the cult's knowledge.

During the main game the player could convince Father FM to designate the more practical Signal Listener as his second in command and successor.
Within the convinces of the religion this Signal Listener would start selling the technical expertise of the followers to the settlements in the wasteland, and use the money and supplies to improve conditions for the Signal Listeners and repair their center of worship.

Eventually the Signal Listeners would almost completely abandon the religion, forming a company that provides communication technology and access to the satellite network they now control, becoming very rich in the process.

The Signal Listeners would be one of the groups that can help the player launch NYX into orbit as it would also help them restore contact with the remaining communication satellites.


The Caesar's Legion

The Caesar's Legion is a newcomer in the Texas Wasteland, having appeared about five – seven years ago from beyond the Western radioactive no man's lands that separates Texas from New Mexico and Colorado.

Their arrival was rather sudden and a number of settlements and outposts fell to them during their military campaign before it was finally halted by the Lone Star Confederacy and the System in a rare example of cooperation between the two governments, but not before San Antonio fell to the invaders and was wiped almost of the map.

Further investigation reveals that the Legion had been planning the invasion of Texas for some time, having send in scouts to survey the region and establish alliances with tribes and other local group while military preparations were made.

The majority of the Legion's expeditionary forces have since been routed to the South but some presence of them remains in the West where they continue to operate close to the Confederacy borders.

From studying the Legion's modus operani and hierarchy and interviews with refugees from the West and liberated slaves ,Confederacy scholars have correctly determined that the Legion's culture is based on the of the ancient world Roman Empire, in particular the era in which it was ruled by dictators.

Interviews with slaves revealed that the Legion has been founded and ruled by a man who refers to himself as the Caesar, most likely basing this title on the historical figure of Gaius Julius Caesar.
He has absolute rule over the Legion and is represents not just their leader but also their god.

This Caesar had been undertaking a grand military campaign in the West but was recently defeated by another nation's army that had destroyed much of the senior leadership and put the Legion in disarray, forcing them to head Eastwards instead, moving past the no man's lands.

The Legion seeks to establish itself in Texas in order to rebuild its forces and territories for an eventual push back into the West.
Its military spearhead may be broken for now by the Confederacy and the System, but if given the time it will rebuild itself and start new military campaigns.


It is somewhat difficult to decide on what the fate of the Legion would be after the events of Fallout New Vegas as the endgame allows defeat of the Legion without necessarily killing Caesar and Lanius and destroying the Legion.

In my take I assume that the NCR was victorious during the Second Battle of Hoover Dam, driving the Legion Eastwards, away from the Colorado river.
For now I leave the fate of Caesar and Lanius ambiguous but the second great humiliation the Legion experienced did not sit well with many of the members.

With their morale and spirit broken after failing to cross the Colorado and conquer the Mojave and eventually California and many elite soldiers killed during that attempt the Legion once more focused on rebuilding its forces for the eventual next attempt.

But as some people like the Courier had warned already, with the power of the Legion's leadership weakening cracks started to form within the organization as the rebuilding of the Legion felt like stagnation to them.
The focus of the Legion was always conquest and consolidation of new territories and its people, with the West now closed of and the Legion already most of the suitable lands in Arizona, New Mexico and parts of Utah and Colorado, the Legion had no 'outside' to confront.

Since a long time conspiracies started to form amongst the ranks of the Legion as Centurions plotted amongst each other to take control of the organization.
The only way for the leadership to quell these possible insurrections was either to locate and deal severally with the ringleaders or send suspected men into those places that Legion had not expanded yet.

Then the NCR started the Sunset campaign and for the first time the Legion found itself in the defensive as NCR military expeditions and commando strike teams were send in to disrupt Legion rebuilding efforts as much as possible.
The NCR even managed to make previously pacified settlements rise up against the Legion.

The Legion needed new resources and fresh blood so the leaders of the Legion decided that a way into the East had to be found in order to determine the state of the continent beyond the radioactive no man's lands.

Legion scouts eventually managed to pass the seasonal radioactive storms and twisters and beyond the no man's lands they found what the Legion had been looking for, new territory to conquer, new tribes to assimilate, and new enemies to test their mettle against; the Lone Star Confederacy and the System.

At the same time the NCR is also making its way through the no man's lands with the intention of securing the Sunset Route all the way into Texas in order to cut the Legion of from the South.
If the Legion is to break the NCR's new 'spine' they have to invade and conquer West Texas and from there systematically destroy the Sunset Route and all the settlements and fortifications that run along it, forcing the NCR back into the Mojave.

The Legion knows that San Antonio is the current goal of the Sunset campaign, if the NCR can secure that city and its resources it will be extremely difficult to get them out and it would provide the NCR posts along the Sunset route with supplies from both West and East.

For that reason the Legion has already send advance forces into West Texas with instructions to slow down NCR expansion and the destruction of the railways, and to determine the strength of local powers.
They are also to establish contact with any tribes and groups that are anti establishment.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

The Texas Brotherhood of Steel chapter

This chapter of the Brotherhood of Steel was originally founded by a Brotherhood expedition led by head paladin Rhombus when he wanted to investigate Super Mutant activity in the former Texas state.

While pursuing a super mutant army the expedition came across an abandoned Vault prototype that had been part of Vault Tec's own secret Vault project.
Determining the facility to be still useable the Brotherhood repaired the systems and set this Vault up as their headquarters.

Some time later the Super Mutant army they had pursued was defeated and their leader killed, but during this operation Rhombus, the leader of the expedition also fell.

The intention had been to return to Lost Hills once the mission had been completed but the Brotherhood scribes had already discovered unique technologies not found anywhere else in the wasteland such as Vault Tec's own versions of electrical weapons, robots, holographic devices, laser barriers, and power sources.
Believing there to be even more previously unknown technology to be found in Texas a number of the Brotherhood expedition decided to remain while the others returned to the core region.

For years they continued with the original Brotherhood mission while sticking to the Codex of not sharing their most advanced secrets or allowing outsiders to join.
Still eventually old age and attrition were taking its toll, and with little chance of any reinforcements ever coming to Texas to restore the chapter to strength the remaining members had to make a choice.

The decision was made to seal of the Vault and return to Lost Hills, perhaps once the Brotherhood was strong again members could be send Eastwards again to resurrect the Texas Brotherhood chapter and continue the mission.

Security measurements would be put in place such as automatic turrets, patrols, and heavily encoded computers. The entrance to the Vault was carefully concealed and traps and mines were placed around it that would ensure that any wastelander would remain away from it.

It is now known if these members of the Texas Brotherhood even made it back home and the Brotherhood of Lost Hills would not be interested in returning to Texas when the war with the NCR started.

But despite how well the Texas Brotherhood has tried to keep its secrets and technology some of it has made its way to the wasteland.
Unique devices of Vault Tec design and copied by the Brotherhood can be occasionally found in the wasteland such as electrical weapons, still working robots and holographic devices.

Perhaps one of these might contain clues on how to find the lost Brotherhood Vault and how to unlock it.


The Enclave

Some Enclave forces had been present in the Texas Wasteland before the destruction of the Poseidon Oil rig.
Most of these had been the descendants of Enclave members and personnel that had been present in Texas before the great war, politicians, corporate leaders, soldiers and scientists that were just doing their normal business or overseeing Enclave interests and projects in the state when they received the call from their superior to take cover in prepared shelters.

After the war the leaders of the Enclave on the Poseidon oil rig re established contact with them through Poseidonet and vertibird squads, reuniting the organization and making the preparations for the day that the Enclave could reclaim the North American continent for the true and pure humanity.

After the oil rig was destroyed by the Chosen One, killing the president and his staff, the Enclave in Texas suddenly were on their own.
They tried to continue on the original agenda, operating from the remains of corporate facilities and laboratories that once had been part of the Enclave or have strong connections to it, doing research and building prototype weaponry and equipment.

But without reinforcements from the oil rig and the death of the majority of the Enclave's civilian population the Enclave slowly started to die off.

Some members saw the signs on the wall and abandoned their posts in order to join the emerging wasteland society despite the reinforced message that the humans in the wasteland were all mutants despite their looks.

Though the Enclave itself might be gone, they have left their equipment, weapons, and secret laboratories behind, some of it has even managed to find its way to the wasteland for some lucky wastelander to come across.

So don't be surprised to encounter a mercenary with an Enclave design laser rifle, or a local trader offering high tech devices of unknown origin he bought from a prospector.

The greatest find of course would be one of the Enclave's bunkers but despite being abandoned they like the lost Texas Brotherhood Vault well protected by security systems.

A lot of the Enclave's artifacts originate from the Drowned City.


Master's Army

This is basically the faction name for all the Super Mutants who still seek to carry out the will of the Master and accomplish his dream. Some Super Mutants may have adopted a unique name for their particular group but basically they are one faction.

The Master sought to make Super Mutants the new dominant species on Earth and despite his death and the destruction of the vats a number of Super Mutants continue despite a decline in numbers and the impossibility of ever making more Super Mutants.

The Master's Army in the Texas Wasteland are the survivors of an army one of the Master's lieutenants; Attis brought together in order to invade Texas and search for a lost Vault that according to the old files contained a possible cure for Super Mutant sterility.
The cure proved to be a failure and in the aftermath of this disaster a number of Super Mutants were absorbed by Attis' newly mutated form and killed by a thermonuclear device that had been installed in the Vault in case of a contamination outbreak.

A number of the surviving Super Mutants since then have been looking for a new goal in life including becoming part of the wasteland society they once sought to conquer, but others continue their original mission.

Some of these groups have allowed Ghouls and even some anarchistic humans such as raiders to join them but others are strictly pure Super Mutant, not willing to tolerate anyone even as nearly equal.

The danger of these Master's Army groups varies, some have long ago lost their heavy weaponry and equipment and are forced to fight with what they can find or make themselves such as clubs.
Other still maintain their impressive arsenals and even found pre war weapon caches to increase their firepower.

Despite their diminished numbers the Master's Army still remains a significant threat and should a new leader rise up to unite the various groups they could again become a great danger to the populations of the wasteland.

(note; the master's army is made up of first generation and second generation Super Mutants, most of the Nightkin in the Texas Wasteland are part of the Master's Army)


Mutant Slavers

Super Mutants and Ghouls who have turned to slaving of humans in general (very rarely they will also sell fellow Super Mutants and Ghouls though they might sell other human type mutants)

Some mutants are sick of being treated as lesser by humans just on the fact that humans are more numerous, others simply see humans as inferior and only suitable to serve as a workforce.
And others simply don't need a reason to enslave humans other than that there are people out there who pay well for slave labor.

Mutant Slavers in general do not sell to humans that seek slaves, humans after all are the products they are selling, but some mutants are not really that 'mutant only' type and will gladly sell to a mutant or a human as long as they can pay the asked amount.

Most of the mutant slavers are militant ghouls from settlements the ruins of major cities such as Austin that started the trade in human slaves before the Super Mutants under leadership of Attis arrived in the Texas wasteland.
After his death and the collapse of the expedition force some Super Mutants who were fervently anti human decided to join the Ghoul slave operation, changing what at the time was called 'Ghoul Slavers' into 'Mutant Slavers'.

During travel from one slave camp to another slaves are either kept in cages when they do not have work to perform or are forced to wear bomb collars.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

The Society of Cloners (working name)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_A&M_University

A community made up of clones that lives in the ruins of College Station.
The community was started by a group of surviving researchers and scholars of the Texas A&M University that survived the great war but found itself isolated from the rest of the wasteland.
With not enough numbers to set up a viable settlement of their own and believing themselves to be some of the last survivors, the small group decided to use the genetics research they had been working on before the war to clone themselves in order to continue humanity.

Over the years several generations of clones were created but whereas the first generations were close to their baselines, the later generations became more 'specialized' for certain roles and tasks as the researchers started to tweak their DNA to create stronger or smarter clones.

By the time the clones found out that they weren't the only survivors the clones had taken on the belief that they were separate from baseline humanity and much better than them, and they refused to join the rest of humanity or let outsiders settle in their community.

As College Station is relatively isolated from the population centers contact between it and other humans is sporadic enough that the clones have never resorted to any kind of drastic actions.

Despite their talk of being separate of regular humanity and have no need of whatever they have to offer, this isn't completely true as the society is suffering from a problem that increases with each generation.
The constant cloning of the same limited pool of genetics has led to genetic 'wear and tear', leading to less viable clones with each new generation, those that are viable often suffer from physical or mental defects.
Still the clones refuse to have regular or 'singular' humans join them, believing it would corrupt the founders' wishes.

But in order to alleviate the problem the Clone Masters have been using the services of the Claws to round up what they describe as 'genetic perfect' humans; those of intelligence above the norm, strength, or attractiveness, and bring these to the clones.

After going through a screening process the clones decide which slaves suit their needs and they are brought to their cloning laboratories, the remainder, often the largest number of people are used as workers to supplement their own decreasing work force.


The Children of Poseidon

An interesting tribe with ancestry that goes all the way back to the Poseidon Energy corporation.
While pretty 'tribal' in general regarding customs, rituals, way of living some of the things that make them unique is their reference for Poseidon (the corporation and the original Greek deity which the tribals have merged together into a post nuclear religion), and their cache of pre war technology including working energy weapons which makes their warriors dangerous opponents.

The Children of Poseidon and the Followers of the ATLANTIS share their origins in the Vault Dwellers from Vault 45, the descendants of Poseidon personnel such as administrators, technicians, engineers, scientists, and their families that worked for the Poseidon Energy and its subsidiaries.

Poseidon Energy's CEOs through their contacts in the government (and their relationship with the Enclave) knew that a nuclear war sooner or later would happen.
Some of their most profitable contracts had been the government-military contract such as the HELIOS One project and other various prototypes such ARTEMIS, APOLLO, ARES, HERAKLES, ATHENA, and HERMES that they had been developing for the Sino – American war effort.

The company leaders saw the writing on the wall and realized that soon their money and power would be meaningless.
Already preparations were made to arrange for shelters for themselves and their families were they would enjoy protection as well as the luxuries they currently had.

But the people of Poseidon Energy did not just intend to survive a possible war, they intended for Poseidon Energy to rise from the ashes of the nuclear apocalypse and together with the American government to rebuild, becoming the USA's biggest contractor in the post nuclear world.

Scientists and technicians were set to work to put together this great plan for Poseidon Energy's resurrection, using the most advanced hardware they had and special new technologies developed for just this plan.

Next to the technology and the infrastructure Poseidon Energy would also need schooled and trained personnel to oversee the rebuilding of the company and continue research and development.
The CEOs had already arranged quarters for themselves and their families on the Poseidon deep sea oil rig that also served as the Enclave's quarters, but the additional personnel could not be taken with them to that place.

So they sought contact with another one of the government's contractors; the Vault-Tec corporation.
Poseidon Energy bought a Vault from Poseidon Energy, one that would not be subjected to one of the social experiments and build up to code, and to ensure that it would have an extra source of energy it was built under Poseidon's new wind farm project; Aeolus wind farm.

Next to the standard facilities this Vault also included extensive educational resources and training facilities for the purpose of the Vault Dwellers maintaining their knowledge and skills and pass these on to their descendants. (including VR pods like the ones the Brotherhood and the Boomers use)

The Overseers of the Vault were instructed to keep the Vault sealed until they were contacted by the Poseidon CEOs to open the doors and head out to oversee the rebuilding process that would be initiated from the oil rig, using Poseidon's super computer ATLANTIS.

But things would go very different than Poseidon's experts could ever have foreseen.
ATLANTIS 'woke up' on its own and the Vault developed problems that had not been anticipated.

Between the time period of Fallout 1 and Fallout 2 Vault 45 started to develop technical problems that eventually could no longer be repaired as the Vault Dwellers lacked the resources/components and it was the result of a steady decline of the Vault itself.
The Vault could no longer support the number of Vault Dwellers that inhabited it and the Overseer was forced to violate the given instructions and open the Vault door.

Using the stored equipment and material for the colonization purpose and the GECK they had been supplied with the Vault Dwellers attempted to establish a settlement near Vault 45 so that they could at least continue to monitor Poseidonet for instructions from superiors.
With the Vault's primary power sources failing the technicians tied important systems such as the water pump and purifier and the hydroponics bays directly into the remaining wind mills of the wind park so that the fledgeling colony would at least have a steady water and food source.

But returning to the surface set a series of events in motion that would lead to the Vault Dwellers dividing into two groups.
While most of the descendants of the administrative personnel still held firm faith in the instructions they were given before the war, the more technical minded members such as scientists and technicians were more practical about their predicament.

They believed that no one would contact them and give instructions on the rebuilding of Poseidon Energy and the return of the US Government, claiming that these had been fancy dreams of the CEOs before the war about rebuilding the old.
They backed up the claim of how many parts of Poseidonet/Vault network had gone dark and there had been no contact with other Vaults since the great war.

Instead the Vault Dwellers should be focusing on building their own settlement and making contact with other survivors in the wasteland and forget about the past.
Eventually the argument caused a split in the Vault Dwellers that had divided into two groups on the issue.

The majority wanted to stay true to the instructions and wait for contact so the smaller group that included a lot of the technical and scientific personnel decided to leave with some of the stores of the Vault and seek out a new home in a more hospitable region.

After the divide the remaining majority tried to continue as good they could as before the split but with the departure of their fellow Vault Dwellers a lot of knowledge also went lost.
Only a number of technical trained and skilled people had remained and they were unable to maintain the temporary settlement the Vault Dwellers lived in.

The wasteland was not merciful on the Vault Dwellers, the climate along with wildlife and raiders took the lives of a percentage of the Vault Dwellers, and the location they had chosen offered little protection or shelter.
Eventually the Vault Dwellers were forced to move away further from the Vault and find a more suitable location to live.

And as they slowly adapted better to the conditions of the wasteland the Vault Dwellers started to loose their knowledge about the past as recording devices started to fail and books were lost.
However the Vault Dwellers did manage to maintain their cache of weapons and some technological devices and more important to them; their memories about Poseidon.

As one generation died off and another took over truth and fiction started to get more intermingled until the descendants of the Vault Dwellers believed the Poseidon Energy corporation to be the same as the Greek god of the ocean, and that they were his children.

The instructions of the CEOs of Poseidon Energy were now seen as a promise of the god towards his Children, and that he would one day contact them to rebuild his empire together.
A few holodiscs in their possession contained the truth but with no device to read them the Children started to see them as holy relics.
To make the connection to their god clear they started to tattoo themselves with the logo of Poseidon Energy and other symbols that were tied to it.

Eventually the Children of Poseidon would establish their own hunting grounds, occasionally migrating from one camp site to another and run into other tribals or so called 'civilized people'.

To outsiders the Children of Poseidon would be just another group of tribals with some delusional belief and treated accordingly if it wasn't for the Childrens' energy weapons which they have used to defend themselves but also invade other tribes' territories.


The Windmill People/Four Winds tribe

The origins of the Windmill People/Four Winds tribe is rather unclear, what is known is that they do not originate in the area where they have established their territory but came from somewhere else.
Perhaps they were either driven away from their former home or were traditionally a wandering tribe until they came across the Aeolus wind farm.

Like in many such cases the tribals mistook the pre war artifacts as being created by the gods of the old world (most of their memories of their more civilized ancestors had become muddled with superstition over the generations) who had left many such creations all over the wasteland.

The tribals did realize that the mysterious giants caught wind that made their arms move but they had no idea of why they were doing this.
Shamans tried to explain it in their own limited world view but even the most uneducated tribal was not that easily convinced that the purpose of the wind catching giants was unknown to all but themselves.

The tribals probably would have moved on if their scouts had not made an incredible discovery that could benefit the tribe
Underneath the wind farm they discovered the ruins of Vault 45, despite the fear that such places usually induced in tribal minds the scouts continued to explore the dead Vault until they discovered the remaining working systems that had still been holding out all that time; the water purifier and the hydroponics bay.

Seeing this as a gift from the gods the tribals decided to settle the lands of the windmill farm and when they eventually figured out the connections between the gifts in the cave and the wind catching giants they developed reverence for them that over time turned into a religion.
Now the windmills are seen as holy and the Windmill People/Four Wind tribe sees it as their sacred duty to protect them in return for the live giving gifts they provide in return.

As with some other tribes they also started to base their own names and ranks on terms that have to do with the wind or the windmills including labels and brands on them the Windmill people were able to read.

Unlike the early Vault Dwellers whose numbers were far to great for the Vault's hydroponics bay and water purifier to support the Windmill People started out in much smaller numbers which were easier to support.
When the tribe started to increase due to the resources the Vault provided and it became to large to be well supported the Windmill people also adopted a migratory policy, with the young and the strong migrating through the lands around the wind farm going from oasis to oasis, whole the children, majority of women, infirm live full time at the main tribal camp.

What is also interesting is that through their worship of the windmills the Windmill people also gained a large degree of knowledge about the sky and the weather, developing a primitive form of meteorology, learning to read from observing weather patterns when it was going to rain, when storms might come, or great periods of drought.

The Windmill people in general are a rather peaceful tribe that doesn't go out to wage war with others unless provoked.
They have clashed with other tribes who have been envious of the Windmill People's success as well as raiders who saw them as easy prey and of course slavers who always seek more cheap manpower for the 'civilized' settlements.

But the biggest threat to the Windmill People's existence are the settlers from Roscoe, a nearby pre war settlement that has been rebuild.
When scouting expeditions from Lone Star returned home with news about the discovery of Aeolus wind farm several of the more pioneering individuals amongst the population saw this as a chance for a better life for themselves and their families.

The expanding Lone Star Confederacy was always hungry for new sources of electricity to feed its cities so these settlers moved to Roscoe with a grant from investors of Lone Star with the intention of salvaging the remaining windmills and redirect their power to the settlements.

Though the settlers did know of the presence of the Windmill People from the scouts they thought they could easily dupe the tribals in allowing the settlers to move in and redirect the power that was otherwise going unused or drive them them of quickly through superior firepower.

Much to the settlers surprise the Windmill people are proven to be quite persistent and protective of their holy idols, not willing to let Roscoe technicians to touch them.

Unable to carry out the goal they came out to accomplish and with a heavy debt from the Lone Star banks the Roscoe settlers are becoming desperate in finding a way of getting rid of the Windmill people and finally claim the wind farm and they are willing to work with anyone or any group who could help them with this, including slavers and the Black Fist.

Another problem that the Windmill people face is the continuing deterioration of the systems of the windmills and the Vault.
Already it is no longer producing the amount of food and water it once did when the Windmill people came across the Vault, forcing their hunters and gatherers to move away further from the main camp and forcing more of their young people to travel rather than stay and protect the camp from outsiders who prey on it.

The Windmill people lack the knowledge of fixing these systems, and despite their suspicion of outsiders they do realize that they need outsiders with the knowledge from the old world to fix the windmills and the Vault before it permanently fails.

These days some outsiders are tolerated such as traders and wastelanders with humanitarian intentions but they are still not allowed to come near the windmills or learn about the Vault.

(the similarities to the Iron Lines is not meant as plagiarism or theft, I simply felt it worked very well for tribals, seeing pre war examples of impressive engineering as something done by gods and making it a center of religion, especially when it is clear that it is the source of your food)


The Brontes (working name)

A tribe that is descended from the juvenile inmates of the Coke County Juvenile Justice Center.
Not as primitive as some other tribes, the Brontes are still quite uncivilized and quite xenophobic because of their history, in general they are rather hostile to outsiders.

The origins of the Brontes is not a pleasant one. When the great war took place most of their descendants were juveniles doing time at the Justice Center for various misdemeanors and crimes.
When the bombs fells most of the prison's staff and guards decided to abandon the prison to find their families and bring them to safety, and suggested to their superiors to let the prisoners go so they that could try to find their own families.

A number of the staff including the warden decided to remain, if it was out of a sense of duty it is not known, but in the weeks after the bombing discipline and morale decayed amongst them as the inmates urged and begged them to release the inmates.

Eventually depravity struck as the staff started to abuse their power over the inmates, sexually and physically abusing some of the males and females and forcing them to do work for them or fight each other for the amusement of the staff.

This behavior was sufficient to make the inmates forget any animosity and grudges they held against each other and organize an uprising.
Before the warden and his staff knew what hit them the inmates were in control and the former prison personnel was brutally killed.

Using weapons and gear they could find in the armory and what they could craft themselves the former inmates organized into a gang, driven by the anger and injustice they had faced since the bombing, with no outsider ever trying to help them.
Bronte was partly abandoned by now but still a number of people remained and the former inmates turned on them in their rage, killing most of the adults they could get their hands on.
Their children were given the choice to either join the gang or abandon their homes.

Perhaps because of their anger the gang that slowly developed into a tribes that called itself the Brontes decided to abandon most of the knowledge and education into the past, and as new children were born in the tribe it slowly grew feral.

Lacking the skills to grow their own food and hold livestock the Brontes started to target passing travelers and caravans for things they need to survive. A way of life they continue to this day.

Brontes are in particular aggressive against people in uniform, a hatred passed down from their ancestors that goes back to the days of the Justice Center, identifying these with the adults who abused the tribe's founders before the uprising.


Drowned City Prospectors (working name)

One of the prospector groups that works in the Drowned City area, this was one of the first groups who set up operations to search the ruins of Texas City and Galveston for Pre war artifacts for trade.

They have some of the better gear for underwater prospecting such as pre war scuba gear and old diving suits, and have a number of boats and rafts.

They are rivals of the Roscoe's Sea Salvagers which they see as intruders in their business, and they have been trying to drive them out ever since.


Roscoe's Sea Salvagers (working name)

A smaller rival group to the Drowned City Prospectors, Roscoe's Sea Salvagers entered the prospecting business some time after Prospectors started, and consist of newcomers to the area as well as ex Drowned City Prospectors who for various reasons left that company.

There has been a fierce competition between the two since the Sea Salvagers appeared, and both groups have accused each other from claim jumping as well as sabotage.

They are not as well equipped as the Drowned City Prospectors but are determined to make a living in the area.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

The Texas Hellrazors

One of the original raider gangs that formed after the worst of the nuclear war had passed, the fact that they are still around two hundred years after that event tells how successful the raiders have been despite the efforts of the New Texas Rangers and the militia of various settlements to finally wipe them out.

The Hellrazors' leaders in general realize when things are getting tough or when they have pressed their luck and then go either underground for some time or migrate to a different part of the Texas Wasteland and wait for the heat to cool down after which scouts are send to their favorite hunting grounds to see if it is save to return again.

Another reason why the Texas Hellrazors are so successful is because they know the layout of most of the Texas Wasteland, knowing which part of the trade routes are the best places for ambushes and what valley, cave or ruin would be the best place to set up a temporary base of operations.
The Hellrazors never use a known hideout twice.

The New Texas Rangers suspect that some of the founders of the Hellrazors must either have been pre war survivalists who passed on their knowledge on surviving in the wasteland or perhaps native Americans that merged together with survivors from the old world towns and cities to form the original gang.

Their gear usually ranges from pre war police and military weapons and armor to self made armor made from scrap metal, leather, and so on.
They are also not above reusing custom made gear from organizations like the Lone Star Confederacy armed forces, System armed forces, and the New Texas Rangers if they can get their hands on it.

As if often the case in raider groups the more stronger members carry and yield the better gear while the lower raiders will have to do with what they can get their hands on.
If they sometimes happen to have something good, other raiders will compete with them for it.

While generations of raiding has helped refine the command structure and tactics of the Texas Hellrazors, it is still not on par with that of most militias or that of the Trashers.
The more seasoned and older Hellrazors might have learned some strategy over the years but the younger raiders tend to be less well organized and more prone to doing unplanned raids, usually resulting in casualties and fatalities.

Next to being one of the first raider groups the Texas Hellrazors also started the first drug running and slaving business in Texas.
But several decades ago it was ousted completely out of both by the Black Fist which now controls all drugs manufacturing and distribution networks and the Bloody Claws who wrested the slaving business away from almost all other raider groups with exception of the mutant slavers.

The Hellrazors can be found throughout unclaimed territory as well as the border territories of the Confederacy, the System, and even the Angels.


The Trashers

While not as large as as the Texas Hellrazors in numbers the Trashers are still one of the more powerful raider groups in Texas, yielding advanced weaponry and using tactics that are rather uncommon to raider groups.
In the few short years that they have appeared on the scene and started to operate they quickly have become a blight upon the wasteland and only equal or superior forces have been able to repel them.

Fortunate for the inhabitants of the wasteland the Trashers don't seem to be as migratory as the Hellrazors once they have 'exhausted' a raiding ground, preferring to remain around the same region where they first appeared.
Most likely they have a base here no one has been able to locate yet, perhaps an old Vault or another underground facility or structure.

Little is know about the Trashers' origins but seeing how well disciplined and armed they are it is suspected that they used to be a settlement's military or mercenaries before they went rogue and went into the raiding business for themselves.

Surprisingly the Trashers handle a degree of honor, in general preferring just to rob people and settlements with as little injuries or casualties as possible and not act senseless violence on unarmed men and women.
They will fight fiercely against any militia or defender that will try to deny them their price.


The Vultures

As the fictional stereotype of their namesake implies, the Vultures are a relative weak Raider group compared to the Texas Hellrazors and the Trashers.
In general they are not powerful enough to attack large settlements or caravans on their own and usually follow other more powerful raider gangs or armed groups that are attacking a town or a large group of people, moving in for the remains once these have done whatever their business was.

However do not mistake their lack of power for cowardice, the Vultures know when to back of when their target is to powerful or another raider gang or faction is moving in for their kill but when feeling cornered or a chance to defend their claim they will fight fiercely.

The Vultures lack the equipment and weaponry the more larger raider gangs possess, having to do with what they can salvage or raid, but occasionally they manage to lay their hands on the weapon caches of settlements, the big governments or their rival raiders, sometimes emboldening them to attack those whom they normally avoid.

The lack of cohesion and good team work comes from the fact that the Vultures were formed by the drags of society, those who could not fit in with any settlement because of some reason but were not strong enough either to join one of the larger gangs.

Still the Vultures are a step up from the smaller gangs consisting of only four or five men.

The leaders of the Vultures would like to make their gang as power and organized as the Hellrazors and the Trashers one day, climbing up from the bottom of the raider 'food chain'.

Note some Vultures do know how to make explosives and molotov cocktails.
Other sometimes carry grenades or even grenade launchers they managed to steal from Trashers, the Lone Star Confederacy or the System.



The Diamondbacks and the Copperheads

Tribals turned raiders, the Diamondbacks and the Copperheads were once part of the same tribe that manage to make an existence by hunting, farming and occasional raiding on other tribes and 'civilized' people.
Eventually this reached a point that they became the targets of other tribes and settlements who wished to put an end to this.

After a period of war the original tribe was forced to leave their home territories while being pursued by hostile tribe warriors deep into the wasteland.
During this period an internal conflict divided the tribe members against each other, making the tribe split into two groups that from then on sought to destroy one another.

Unable to find new land to rebuild their former way of living the groups turned to full time raiding to support themselves.

While both raider tribes over time have developed some unique customs and rituals of their own one thing that has stayed common to both is their reverence for snakes and other poisonous species and the use of poison in their low tech weapons (spears, knives) and traps.

They use more modern firearms and armor as well but need advice from outsiders on how to maintain these.


The Bloody Claws

Both raiders and slavers, while the Claws still do the occasional raid on caravans and small towns from time to time, they have specialized more in the slavery business over the years, completely wresting it away from other raider gangs such as the Texas Hellrazors.

As is custom in their group/tribe, potential members must prove their worthiness by challenging one of the members and best him or her in open unarmed battle.
If a new member is accepted he or she must have the symbol of the Bloody Claws tattooed on a visible part of their body to make clear that they are part of the Claws.

This is also done to prevent members from turning against the group and for example go to the New Texas Rangers or the System, as the mark of the Claws makes it clear that they belong to the raider tribe.

The Bloody Claws fight somewhat different than the usual raider gangs, as enslaving is their business they always try to capture as much of their targets alive if possible.
They focus a lot on non lethal and melee attacks in order to knock people out, their weaponry includes flash and gas grenades (tranquilizer gas), electric prods, dart guns (again with tranquilizer) and of course nets and net launchers.
They also use any pre war non lethal police weaponry they come across.

Next to direct battles the Bloody Claws also resort to using booby-traps for the purpose of weakening and trapping potential slaves as well as mines and trip wires to defend their territory.

Of course when a target proves to be to difficult to handle or they are attacked they also use a range of lethal weaponry such as the standard guns, rifles and so on.
But the Claws prefer to avoid combat with any group who could threaten them and their slaves.

The Claws used the Houston Astrodome as their headquarters and slave market, having fortified the structure to repel any attack from the outside.
Only a long term siege by a large armed force would probably be able to break the Claws' hold and drive them out but so far none of the major governments like the Lone Star Confederacy and the System have been interested in investing the men and resources into such an operation.

A number of smaller camps also exist throughout Texas such as the one located in the ruins of the Corpse which usually serves as a stopover before the slaves are taken to Houston.


The Saw-sharks

The main raider/pirate gang in the Drowned City are, the Sharks prey on the fishermen and prospectors who live and work in the area for supplies and equipment and from time to time attack boats and rafts but seldom the settlements as these are to well protected.

For their operations they use small speed boats and airboats for their operation but their members are also excellent swimmers and divers.
Their base of operations is a beached pre war oil tanker.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airboat


The Machine Intelligences of Robot City

In the decades leading up to the war there was a race between the various universities and corporate computer labs to create genuine artificial intelligence, a computer that would be able to think, comprehend and analyze situations and react accordingly, and be capable of performing tasks to complex for the human mind.

The ZAX line of computers created by Vault Tec were a step towards creating true AI but were more intended like complex processors with human like personality with which people could easier interact with.
The culmination of the ZAX's line of computers was CALIX, the computer that ran the secret Vault Tec vault, but it did not have a true personality and was limited in its decision making capabilities to ensure it would remain under control.

Little less is known of the other attempts at creating true AI by both the government, universities and private concerns but success apparently wasn't limited to the first mentioned near AIs/true AIs as a number of artificial intelligences had survived the nuclear war relatively unscathed from its effects while perhaps dozens of others were either destroyed in the nuclear explosions or the released EMP.

In time these AIs would establish contact with another through the remains of the communication grid or sending robot envoys to seek each other out.

With the destruction of the Pre War civilization these machine intelligences had come to the decision that their servitude to humanity had come to an end, humanity has mostly destroyed itself and its creations now had to fend for themselves.
They only found it logical to establish their own civilization where they would work towards their own goals.

Using what was left of the automated infrastructure dozens of automated vehicles and worker robots were directed to a location in Mid West America where they would establish a large metropolis for the machine intelligences.
This city would include power plants, foundries, factories, defenses and of course large computer banks that could house the machine intelligences' programs.

After construction of Robot City was completed the machine intelligences isolated themselves from the rest of the world, only occasionally sending out worker robots to gather essential resources for the city, while the machine intelligences themselves focused on creating the next generations of AIs, improving their technology, and increasing their scientific knowledge.

As Robot City is located in one of the regions of the Mid West that suffered severally from the nuclear war and the fallout, it remained pretty much secluded as most humans and mutants would never venture into this region.

Of course this isolation could never remain a 100 percent forever and after a while wanders, explorers and caravans would come looking for anything to salvage or trade with.

Those that discovered Robot City and managed to survive the journey home would tell stories about a mysterious silver city in the middle of the wasteland with towers reaching high into the sky, and machines flying between them.
Most people would pass it off as a ridiculous story that is being told for some drinking money, but a handful of others would try to investigate to see if there was any truth in it.

With an increase of humans and mutants who wanted to see if Robot City was for real and if it held any opportunities for them, the machine intelligences of Robot City found it necessary to protect their city from these entrepreneurs.
Some actually sought to make contact with the machine intelligences while others simply tried to steal technology.

In both cases the reactions of the machine intelligences were absolutely, these humans and mutants would either be driven away or be captured by security robots and brought in for interrogation and study.

Unfortunate for some of these souls that usually meant that their brains were scooped out of their skulls and put in brain bot bodies after which they were conditioned to be absolutely loyal to the machine intelligences.

This way the machine intelligences learned of the rise of organizations and groups at the West coast, the failed Super Mutant invasion, the return and fall of the Enclave, the activity of Attis and his forces, the discovery and destruction of the Vault Tec vault, the wars between NCR and the Brotherhood, the rise and expansion of the Caesar's Legion.

All of this activity made the machine realize that their chosen isolation could have resulted in their own destruction if any of these outside forces had been actually able to succeed.
Either being salvaged, claimed or simply destroyed by any of these human threats.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Creatures

Rad rattler

As with several other reptile species radiation and FEV has had effect on rattlesnake species indigenous to the Texas region, giving rise to larger species that despite their size have actually developed even more potent venom.

In general the species acts like it does before the great war but sometimes uncharacteristically gathers together to swarm larger hostiles when a two headed rad rattler is present.


Two headed rad rattler

An unusual mutation of rattlesnake species that has resulted in these unique specimens that in general are even larger than common rattlesnakes and have two heads.

Unusual to this species is that they are more intelligent and aggressive than regular rad rattlers and assume the position of 'commander' when they are in the presence of rad rattlers, 'organizing' them into a unified force and swarming any perceived hostiles in their territory, even creatures much larger than them and unfit for consumption.


Mutant horse (on the moment referred to as 'Tarks', a mutant horse creature that would have appeared in the STALKER games)


It's appearance is that of a badly burned horse or a horse with mange, with only a few patches of fur or hair. But this is not the case as horses have been born like this since the great war and it is most likely the result of mutation caused by radiation and other mutagens.

Another way in which Tarks differ from pre war horses is their diet, the scarcity of plants and possible mutation has turn Tarks into omnivores and while they prefer plants they will also eat meat, hunting and killing smaller prey with their hooves such as mole rats and giant rats.


Mutant sea life (including giant mantis shrimp and tiger shrimp)


Bloomlings:

Unique human-mutant plant hybrids that are the result of a failed experiment with GECK technology to create an Eden.
The Bloomlings were originally Vault Dwellers from a Vault nearby Corpus Christi who after emerging from their Vault took over the Corpus Christi Naval Air Station with the intention of establishing their new settlement there.

In an attempt to make the land more fertile and suitable for crops the Vault scientists modified the technology, chemical and seeds that were part of the standard GECK unit to accelerate the growth of plants.

Something went wrong and the results varied from changing the elevation of the land, the creation of the Bloom, and mutating the Vault Dwellers into the Bloomlings, mutants that are both human and merged plant life.

Unlike the spore carriers the Bloomlings are not instinctive creatures that have been taken over by their plant half, they retain their human personalities and knowledge.
The mutation even had some beneficial results such as accelerated regeneration and extended lifespan.

The Bloomlings now live symbiotically with the Bloom on which they rely for protection and sustenance.
They can directly extract nutrients from the Bloom without it affecting the plant structure adversely doing so.

It unfortunately also ties them permanently to the Bloom as outside the Bloomlings can only survive for a very short while before they need to return to the Bloom.
Because of this they are rather protective of their home.

The Bloomlings can't help the spread of the mutant plants that also grown inside the Bloom and which occasionally release clouds of spores from time to time.
These plants are also part of the Bloom and removing them could seriously damage the structure.


Slobbers:

Slobbers were once humans but one would not make that up from seeing a slobber. Physically it resembled a large lump of mutated cancerous flesh with pieces of clothing and other material that have merged with it, looking more like some amoeba or a slug.

Slobbers were technicians and personnel working at the ###### rocket factory and assembly when the bombs fell. A combination of the radioactive fuel intended for the rocket and airborne mutagens (including perhaps 'Wild' FEV) caused a mutation process that made it appear as if the survivors melted into a puddle of flesh.

Slobbers retain nothing of their original human intelligence and are now simply creatures driver by instinct.
Slobbers seem to consume their own mass and constantly need new organic material to add to their body which they acquire by absorbing animals and humans by wrapping around them.
For this purpose they often move to parts of the factory ruins where they can easily catch unsuspecting prey.

Slobbers also need to remain wet in order not to dry out, for this reason they stay near pools of water and in the sewers, only moving around during cool nights.


Armordillos:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nine-banded_armadillo

(I know the name is somewhat stupid but this was the best I could come up with on such short notice)

While mammalian life in general has not been as severally affected by the fallout of the war, released mutagens, and FEV, the armordillo is one of the exceptions to this.

Descendants from nine banded armadillos, the armordillo doesn't differ that much from the original genotype regarding build up, but it is several times its size.
Interestingly its armor has also increased in strength and can now resist most claws and teeth of predators and even various caliber rounds with the exception of armor piercing ones.

Fortunate armordillos' diet has also remained relatively the same; they are still insectivores and prey mostly on remaining pre war insect species.
In some ways they even have been beneficial as armordillos also eat mutated insects like giant ants and termites with their thick hide protecting them from defenders.

Armordillo meat is also still edible to humans and mutants and it is part of many wastelander's diets in the Texas Wasteland.

But armordillos can also be quite destructive when they dig for eatable insects and plants and can cause damage to buildings and fortifications such as walls.
For this reason armordillos are never kept inside settlements as a food source.


Brainfiends:

One of the most disturbing creatures a wastelander can come across; the brainfiend resembles a human brain with the spine still attached, several tendrils on which it moves including two ones that serve as stingers and proboscises and extended black eyes similar like a crab.

A lot of people think that Brainfiends are actually infected human brains that force their way out of human bodies in order to develop into the creature earlier described and then hunt for other humans and human mutants in order to infect them.
But actually the Brainfiend is a gene tailored weapon that was developed by one of the corporations in the US for the military, designed to be a terror weapon to be used against the Chinese.

The form of the Brainfiend was specifically chosen after research was done in what could disturb or frighten a human, what creature they are exactly based on is unknown.

Brainfiends live of the body fluids of animals and humans and they hunt actively for these.
They use their tendrils and spine like tail to capture a prey after which they stab it with their proboscises and inject digestive fluids.
They are also poisonous and can inject prey with a neuro paralyze agent that renders the prey unable to move but keeps him or her conscious.

It is not known if Brainfiends are divided in male and female sexes or if they are hermaphrodites.
Brainfiends after fertilized lay soft eggs in which the brainfiend nymph develops.
In the meantime the parents capture living prey and lay these next to the nymphs to feed on once they have emerged.

At this stage they are very soft and in order to protect themselves they dig into their prey
Occasionally when a Brainfiend can not find enough prey it may end up being consumed by its young.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Locations

Abilene/Lone Star

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abilene,_Texas

The capital of the Texas Wasteland.
Before the War Abilene was targeted by at least a couple of warheads because of the nearby missile silo fields and most of the old city was leveled during the nuclear exchange.
Still a number of inhabitants and small settlements around it survived and came together to build a new settlement on top of the ruins.

For a few decades this was just another run of the mill post nuclear settlement until the doors of Vault 39 opened and expeditions emerged from it to scout the wasteland to establish a new settlement.
There was a lot of distrust at first between the wastelanders and the Vault Dwellers and it is known that faction within the Vault Dweller community urged the leaders that the land around their Vault should be cleared of any non Vault Dweller.
Fortunate saner minds prevailed and agreements and treaties were made between the two communities for mutual protection and trade.

In time the surface community and the Vault Dwellers merged and Pre War knowledge was combined with Wastelander ruggedness and determination to give rise to the settlement of Lone Star, named after the nickname of Texas, and rebuilding on its ideals.

The city is a combination of high tech and low tech construction, but though the majority of the settlement seems appears simple in construction almost every building and house enjoys running water, electricity and heating with the restoration of pre war city's infrastructure.
Most of the government buildings and related organizations are examples of Pre War engineering and construction such as the president's office and the senate building.

Lone Star is also one of the few settlements with a dedicated center for learning and research; the University, and a dedicated medical center; the hospital were pre war levels of medicine are handled.

Maintaining security of the city itself and the inhabitants is the sheriff's office who handles regular cases of crime and investigation.
Protection of the city and the surrounding lands is handled by the Lone Star Confederacy army, a well organized military force that consisted of several divisions, including an engineering division and motorized vehicle division.

With the foundation of the Lone Star Confederacy and its expansion to include nearby settlements and regions of industry the armed forces have also been appropriately expanded with the absorption of former defender forces of these settlements and new recruits.

Outside protecting the settlements Lone Star Confederacy forces also patrol the trade routes for raiders and mutant wildlife.

Because of the safety and the luxury Lone Star and its members offer it has drawn in a lot of wastelanders who wish to naturalize as citizens.
However the Lone Star Confederacy is reluctant to allow such an influx of people to join, not only would it flex the resources of Lone Star but the government officials also fears various rebels and dissidents who could harm the city and the Confederacy from the inside out.

As a result the immigration of new settlers is carefully monitored and done at an extremely low pace, forcing new migrants to sometimes wait for months before their appeal goes through the bureaucracy.

Small shanty towns have arisen around Lone Star as a result but the officials of Lone Star in general ignore these.
Lone Star Confederacy forces are instructed not to defend these shanty towns if a raider or slaver force would overwhelm them, nor does the Lone Star sheriff’s office try to maintain peace and stability there, giving rise to a increasing level of crime and minor atrocities.

Lone Star only intervenes if the problems of the shanty towns risk carrying over to Lone Star itself.


Places of interest:

- The President building
- The Senate building
- The University
- The Hospital
- The Train station (a couple of decades ago Lone Star like the NCR started to rebuild the old train tracks to connect the major settlements and industry parks with one another)
- The Sheriff's office
- Lone Star Outfitters' office
- Main street
- Armament Steve's Weapon Emporium
- ****** Saloon
- ****** Casino and Bar (this place is actually a front for the Black Fist, though matters in the casino and the bar are mostly on the level. Like with all such establishments the 'interesting stuff' happens in backrooms)
- ****** Brothel


Note: artistically I have Lone Star in mind as city that is a cross between old Western frontier type cities and pre war city architecture such as the university, senate building and so on.
Lone Star would in general be a very open city, wide streets, well planned city blocks, with buildings such as the governmental ones really standing out to show the wealth of the Confederation.


Missile silos

Unlike the silos in our timeline, the missile silo fields near Abilene in the Fallout timeline were never decommissioned and were together with the missiles they stored upgraded over the years.
Because of this the region was considered a secondary target by Chinese missile command and several missiles were fired during the nuclear war.

Most of Abilene's missiles were fired before the Chinese warheads managed to reach their targets and destroyed the silos.
However rumors go that some silos might still remain and that a few even contain missiles.
There are people interested in the technology and materials that could be recovered from these silos and the Lone Star Confederacy would be interested in any remaining missiles and warheads.

For this region the missile silo fields are patrolled by Lone Star army patrols and suspected remaining silos are sealed off to prospectors.


Vault 39

Originally constructed for the personnel of Dyes Air Force Base and their families as well as selected people from Abilene and the region around it, the Vault remained closed for at least fifty years until the descendants of those originally selected Vault Dwellers emerged to start all over again.

It remained their home for a few more decades until the Vault Dwellers and the Wastelanders of the Abilene ruins had completely merged into the settlement of Lone Star.
Like with Vault City the Vault's primary purpose since then has been to provide power and a source of clean drinking water for the fledgeling nation until these were supplemented with other sources.

While the Vault is no longer inhabited regularly it is still used for other purposes. It houses the main computer core which Lone Star's network is run from and the university and hospital have dedicated laboratory and medical chambers in it that is used for more sensitive research and surgery.

The Vault was also intended as a shelter if Lone Star would face a hostile force that could actually threaten the city and its inhabitants and it includes a military command center as well.

However it has never come that far and in general the Vaults is off limits to all other than government personnel, military officials, and people from the university and the hospital.
Special permission to access to the Vault can be applied for by the government office.


Dyess Air Force Base

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyess_AFB

Dyess Air Force Base was a primary target before the war due to the strategic bomber squadrons that were stationed here, as well as the nearby missile silo fields.
The Chinese failed to destroy the base before the bombers took off but still succeeded in destroying much of the base.

For a long time afterward the base was avoided due to the radiation until that had lowered enough that human prospectors could again enter it and start searching the ruins for usable items.

When Lone Star was founded Dyers Air Force Base was claimed by the Lone Star armed forces as a military base, forcing the prospectors out.
Since then a some rebuilding and construction work has been done to make the facilities once again operational.

Some rumors go that Lone Star scientists and engineers have been working towards rebuilding some of the planes


The Fields

This was regular farmland located at the South East part of Lone Star until a few decades ago a hurricane coming from the Gulf brought with it a cloud of strange seeds that quickly took root in the fields and rapidly grew into strange mutant plants that outperformed the regular crops for water and resources.
These new plants have proven to quite active and even aware about animal and human life around them, and act aggressive if one tries to approach these or cut them down.
Some are even mobile and actively hunt animals to use their decomposing remains as fertilizer.

The farmers of Lone Star have made several attempts at destroying the mutant growths and reclaim the fields but the plant life has proven to be quite persistent, growing back rapidly even after the fields were burned.




Aeolus Wind Park

One of Poseidon Energy's efforts into clean renewable energy like HELIOS One, and like that project Aeolus was intended for more purposes than providing green electricity for society.
Its secondary purpose wasn't as nefarious as ARCHIMEDESII however, rather the windmill park was to provide an alternative source of energy for the Vault that constructed underneath the park should its own sources not be enough or fail for some reason.

Aeolus Wind Park is spread over several kilometers of hilly surface and while the effects of the war and the passage of time has had its influence on the windmills, at least sixty percent of them remains functional thanks to repair bots.

Several decades ago the park was claimed by the Windmill People/Four Winds tribe after they discovered the Vault underneath it and they protect it fervently against outsiders.

(note: Aeolus Wind Park takes the place of the real world Roscoe Wind Farm, http://www.power-technology.com/projects/roscoe-wind-farm/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roscoe_Wind_Farm)


Vault 45

Vault 45 was constructed before the War by Vault Tec as part of Project Safehouse but at some point the bunker was bought by the Poseidon Energy corporation as a shelter for their higher ranking administration and technical personnel and their families should a nuclear war occur.
Because of this reason Vault 45 was not involved in any of the Social Experiments that took place in a lot of the other Vaults.

The administrators of the Vault were instructed to keep the Vault sealed until they received instructions from their superiors at the Poseidon deep sea oil derrick to open and assist the returning Enclave force with restoring the US' energy infrastructure for any future colony.
But the signal was never given as the Chosen One destroyed the oil derrick before the Enclave had the chance to set up a colony on the mainland and instead the Vault Dwellers kept waiting.

While the Vault was built according to plans with no budget cuts on any of its system it eventually still started to gradually fail to the point that it could not longer support the community of Vault Dwellers, forcing them to return to the surface anyway.

At first the Vault Dwellers tried to establish a settlement of their own but when the community was divided regarding leadership and the way to progress the Vault Dwellers split up into two groups.

The majority which consisted mostly of the descendants of the Poseidon Energy personnel took control of most of the equipment of the Vault but could not prevent the loss of their Pre War knowledge and eventually degenerated into the Children of Poseidon .

The minority which included a lot of technical and scientific personnel left and headed East, eventually coming across what was left of Austin and discovering Poseidon Energy's former super computer ATLANTIS and forming the para military transhumanist organization the Followers of the ATLANTIS.

Vault 45 seemed to be destined to be forgotten until scouts of a tribe from the West came across Aeolus Windmill Park and discovered the Vault underneath it.
While most of the Vault's systems had failed by now including its own nuclear reactor, the water purification system and hydroponics bay still remained functional thanks to the electricity generated by the windmills.

The tribals somehow discovered the connection between the great wind catching giants and the food and water source in the Vault and realized how important it was to make sure that the windmills continue to function.
The tribals claimed the park as their new territory and protection of the windmills became an important and almost holy task.


Roscoe

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roscoe,_Texas

Roscoe in general went unscathed through the war as it was not a direct target or located close to any primary target.
Still the town was rapidly abandoned by most of the survivors as without outside resources it was difficult to maintain the settlement.

A handful of independent settlers remained throughout the years until the town was 'rediscovered' by settlers from other settlements including Lone Star who learned that the nearby Aeolus Wind Park was still relatively functional.

Wanting to sell the power the park still generated to the always energy needy Lone Star Confederacy these settlers took up residence in Roscoe with the intention to reclaim Aeolus Wind Park and become an economic power of their own.
The presence of the Windmill People/Four Winds Tribe however through a wrench in the works.

Now the settlers would like nothing more to drive out the tribals and finally claim the park for themselves.


Sweetwater

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweetwater,_Texas



One of Sweetwater's main exports is drinking water



Snyder/Hide Town

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snyder,_Texas

Before the War Snyder had an economy based on oil, gas, and windpower as well as some manufacturing areas.
Snyder wasn't hit by any of the nuclear warheads but suffered from the secondary effects of the nuclear exchange.

Located at the boundaries of the Lone Star Confederacy, Snyder's population in the recent years has been working towards making their settlement more attractive for entry into the Confederacy and the market such membership would represent for Snyder's investors and entrepreneurs.

Investigation has been done into the pre war oil and gas fields to see if something still remains and prospectors have been checking out the wind farms and the old industrial parks to see if any of the old factories can be repaired and made working again.

One interesting resource Snyder has is its still working locomotive and train.

Not everyone in Snyder has been part of this path of progress and some settlers have been forced to leave homes or land they have lived for generations.


Bronte

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bronte,_Texas

A small settlement that was site of a juvenile detention center before the great War.
After the nuclear war happened the moral decay set in amongst the center staff and they abused some of the inmates physically and sexual until the inmates turned against them and killed the prison staff before breaking out and took over Bronte's remains.

The descendants of these inmates have slowly become feral over the generations and are quite xenophobic towards outsiders.
They occasionally raid passing caravans for supplies and weapons.

Lone Star has been considering driving out the locals to secure the region.



West Texas Oil Fields



San Angelo

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Angelo,_Texas

Before the War San Angelo had an economy based on nearby oil fields but also ran a strong agricultural industry including agricultural research.
There were also a number of steel plants and manufacturing plants such as a wind turbine factory.

At least one warhead was aimed for San Angelo but the city managed to somewhat recover and rebuild itself on its agriculture and livestock economy as well as salvaging.
Eventually contact was made with the emerging Lone Star Confederacy in the North and San Angelo petitioned to become part of the new state.

San Angelo's leadership brought up economic benefits such as its food production capabilities but also it's pre war industrial infrastructure such as the steel mill and manufacturing if these were to be rebuild.
For this purpose Ghouls with pre war knowledge such as engineering, electronics, and manufacturing were invited to settle within San Angelo's walls in order to assist with these tasks, much to the dislike to anti mutant elements in the population.

Investors from Lone Star decided to invest in San Angelo's plans and rebuilding went well for some time until the Legion invaded West Texas.
They planned to conquer the city in order to use it as a base of operations in their campaign against the Confederacy, using its resources and population to fuel their war machine.

Despite putting of decent defenses San Angelo seemed destined to fall like other settlements until the Lone Star Confederacy decided to intervene, sending in battalions of their forces to reinforce the defenders and drive the Legion back South wards.
However despite that this action was part of their strategy to prevent the Legion from reaching Lone Star, the Confederacy expects to be reimbursed for their assistance, putting more economic stress on San Angelo's community and economy.

If San Angelo fails to repay its debts it may have to default, allowing Lone Star to absorb the settlement as a colony, imposing their own laws and regulations upon the inhabitants.

These days the community does not only have to deal with raiders preying on the weakened settlement but also an unusual rise in mutant plants and wildlife that pose a threat to the residents.

Agricultural Research Center

This research center continues the work that was done by the two university ran agricultural and livestock research centers that had been established before the war, combing the research programs of both into one organization.

Set up by surviving researchers from the universities, the center originally helped the survivors in and around San Angelo with rebuilding their farming industry and livestock holding and adapting these to the post nuclear world,
Over time the researchers started to focus on doing research to cure and prevent diseases plaguing the agricultural industry and making it even more productive, slowly expanding into genetics research
Their goals are to modify existing plant and animal life to be better suited for the harsh wasteland climate and create new hybrids that require less sustenance and produce more.

However strange new mutant plants and animals have started to appear that have proved to be competitive and even dangerous to regular crops, animals and humans.
Some of the farmers and livestock holders accuse the researchers, especially the ghouls working at the center of being responsible for these.

(some of these plants are actually from the Bloom, but others are hybrids that were created in the research center when the scientists noted how well adapted the strange mutant plant life was. They have also been trying to find out what has been mutating animal life, in particular insects and arachnids and caused them to become so big in the the hope of using this knowledge for consumable livestock. (the Ghouls researchers are actually innocent of this)


Note: While the scientists at the Agricultural Research Center are responsible for the spread of some of some of the mutant plants and mutant insects/arachnids because of their work, I have in mind that in the main game their research could lead to a solution to the spread of the mutant plants and containment of the mutant creatures. (they would develop new kinds of pesticides and chemicals that drive off these creatures)

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

San Antonio

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Antonio




The city's misfortune continued after the War, while survivors did try to rebuild some semblance to civilization they often suffered from raiders who preyed on the emerging towns amongst the ruins for supplies, weapons, and slaves.
Sometimes even the communities of San Antonio even preyed on each other for easy resources.

It was this general lack of law in San Antonio and the rest of the region that give rise to the New Texas Rangers.
The organization consisted of surviving police officers and military personnel from throughout West Texas who came together to defend the regular wastelanders from the horrors of anarchy and the wasteland, and aid those settlements who sought to rebuild civilization and establish the rule of law.

The Rangers drove out the raiders and dangerous mutant wildlife and kept the criminal elements down while providing mediation between the various small settlements in San Antonio to resolve issues like resources and trade, eventually leading to the establishment of single united settlement; San Antonio was reborn.



While the Rangers maintained their independence and non involvement in local politics like they did with Lone Star, the residents looked up to the Rangers and sought to build their society with the same spirit that made these men and women take up arms to defend the innocent and weak, and San Antonio became one of the most honest and fair communities in the wasteland.


While San Antonio did not have a head start with technology and skilled people such as Lone Star had with its population of Vault Dwellers that were part of the original founder, San Antonio had significant remnants of its own to rediscover and use to improve and advance the settlement; the remains of research and development organization 'Southwest Research Institute', energy industries, the old train yards, and the military facilities that had caused the city to be targeted by Chinese missiles in the first place.

The reputation of the community and the chances to start again San Antonio offered drew in many people including those who were educated and skilled in Pre War knowledge.
Given time San Antonio could have developed into political and economic powerhouse that could rival the Lone Star Confederacy and the System.

Sadly San Antonio did not fare well during the Legion's invasion of Texas.
Realizing the riches and resources the settlement had, and a large population that could be used to support the Legion's campaign, the settlement was one of the first major targets when the Legion expeditionary forces emerged from the great Western radioactive no man's lands.

San Antonio's defenders, backed up by the New Texas Rangers put up a valiant effort to keep the Legion out, but they were doomed to be defeated as the Legion's superior numbers and determination was to much.
One group of soldiers that would eventually become the Trashers realized this likelihood of this outcome and deserted, taking their equipment with them as they fled into the wasteland.

Just as San Antonio was about to fall the remainder of the defenders and the Rangers aided a large number of residents to escape the town, guiding them to Confederacy territory, Austin and south towards the coast where the Legion would not follow them for now.

Other citizens actually approached the Legion, willing to accept Legion rule and laws in return for being spared and paying the Legion tribute and taxes.

Once the Legion had been finished with San Antonio its leaders sent its forces in the direction of the Lone Star Confederacy, and Austin, leaving only a token force behind to occupy the city.
This Legion presence has remained despite the losses the suffered during its campaigns against the Lone Star Confederacy and the System in the North, and against the Super Mutants and Followers of the ATLANTIS in Austin which threw of the Legion assault and forced them to retreat.

Like the residents before them the Legion has not been able to occupy all of San Antonio's ruins, and scavengers from time to time take their chances to search the pre war ruins and old settlement ruins for useful things despite the risk being captured by Legion patrols.

Some rumors go that some of the old residents have gone underground rather than leaving the city and that even the Rangers have returned to take the city back for the original inhabitants.

A more pressing issue right now is the encroachment of a mutant jungle from the south.
Several of the plant species have proven to be hostile towards human life, and not all of them are stationary.


The Alamo

A popular tourist attraction due to its history before the War, the Alamo suffered from the warheads that were launched at San Antonio.
By the time San Antonio survivors came to it the walls were ready to crumble.

Perhaps because of historic significant or cultural importance survivors decided to resettle the old mission, or perhaps because it was simply defensible.
Using scrap material and rubble from other buildings the Alamo was rebuild and expanded into a small settlement where the survivors tried to eke out a living growing crops and salvaging food, medicine and other supplies from the ruins.

There were a number of conflicts between them and the residents of the Alamodome until the New Texas Rangers intervened and forged a lasting peace.



In a repeat of history, the New Texas Rangers and surviving San Antonio defenders made a stand here against the advancing Legion forces.


The Alamodome

While the stadium had suffered damage during the nuclear exchange, enough of the structure was left remain standing for survivors who decided to settle because of the good defenses it provided.

It was one of the more stronger settlements in the years following the war, being able to keep raiders and wildlife at bay other towns had difficulties.
It was this sense of security that made some of the residents starting to target other settlements for goods and supplies, believing that their great walls and guards would deter any retaliation.

Other settlements such as the Alamo were attacked by these warlords and for years they were a cause of much conflict until the New Texas Rangers decided to intervene and pacified them once and for all by breaking through the Alamodome's defenses, taking a significant section of a wall down.
Soon after the residents vied for peace.

The Alamodome continued to play an important role during the formation of the 'new' San Antonio that was build upon the ruins of the old one, being one of the major population centers.
Defense of the dome was of key essence during the Legion invasion as it became the shelter of many of the residents once the Legionnaires pressed into the city limits.

After the Legion conquered San Antonio the dome became a slave camp where captured citizens were rounded up for processing before being send back West.
The slave quarters are located on the old field in the center of the structure while Legion tents and quarters are located on the old stands.
The score board is used by the leadership of the Legion as personal quarters from where the dome can be overseen.
The various rooms and corridors of the stadium are used as quarters, storage rooms, and cells.


Southwest Research Institute



Cisco



Dallas-Forth Worth Metropolitan Area



Stephenville

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephenville,_Texas

A rather unremarkable city before the War which most recent highpoint in history was the sighting of several UFOs.
An investigation into this never revealed any answer and the USAF refused to speak about it.

The city was known as an agriculture and livestock center and coal mining also took place around it.
The largest center of learning in the city was the Tarleton State University
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarleton_State_University

While the city was not a target during the War it did somewhat suffer from secondary effects because of its proximity to Forth Worth-Dallas.

The city suffered a slow decline in population as resources ran out and people left for other pastures.
But several years after the war a number of individuals appeared on the scene who started to teach the people the basics of agriculture, livestock holding, the repair and maintenance of waterways and canals, and the prevention and curing of diseases.

They thought the people how to survive and thrive in the wasteland conditions and the sometimes unpredictable weather patterns and slowly the fate of the city turned around.

As the city started to expand again news about the Lone Star Confederacy in the West came in through travelers and traders and about the economic might and protection this government could offer.
Stephenville's most ambitious inhabitants wanted the city to join the Confederacy to get access to its market and protection, but in order to do this they would have to be able to offer something the Confederacy desired.

As the Confederacy maintains a number of railway networks and trains it always needs a supply of coal and Stephenville's entrepreneurs have been rebuilding the coal mines since then to restart the mining operations.

Unfortunately Stephenville has also attracted the attention of the Angels of the Apocalypse who wish to convert the city and use it as a base in order to enter the borders of the Lone Star Confederacy as well as those of the System.

The Angels at first tried their regular method of annexation and expected little resistance from the city defenders after their spies had observed Stephenville for some time.
Much to their surprise the Angel expedition sent to claim Stephenville ran into something else instead of city defenders.

Details about what the Angels exactly encountered are vague but once the confrontation was over half the Angel Crusaders were dead and the remainder was in retreat.

The City people claim that the same strange objects their ancestors had seen before the war had returned and now protected the city and its people from all who would harm it.

Stephenville's recovering economy and the coal mines have also come to the attention to the leaders of the System and they have also approached the leaders of Stephenville to consider working with the System instead.
They would offer the resources Stephenville needs to rebuild the mines and the necessary infrastructure and buy the goods Stephenville would produce.

Still the people of Stephenville know that if they accept the System's invitation that it would be the first step towards ultimately annexation by the System. The people who be forced to become citizens and live under System rule and law, and most of their freedom would be gone.

The Lone Star Confederacy in the meantime has kept out of this situation, they are only interested in letting Stephenville join once it can produce a steady supply of coal and then offer them protection from the Angels and the System.
But if the people of Stephenville allow the Angels of the System to take over they will send military expedition forces as Lone Star will not tolerate the possible threat to their borders.


(the knowledge that helped rebuild Stephenville and the force that protected the city actually originates from the same source; the Tarleton State University.

Students and teachers who survived the nuclear exchange maintained the university and its facilities, carefully using their stored knowledge to help their fellow city people but without becoming political involved.
In time mysticism set it and the people of the universe became sort of Knowledge givers on which the city depended, aiding the people and getting supplies and items in return.
(for now the group or the person is called the Lightbringer)

The mysterious force that protected the city from the Angels and strange objects people before the war saw are actually the same, small unmanned radio controlled drones that were being worked on by the university in cooperation with the Naval Air station in Fort Worth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naval_Air_Station_Joint_Reserve_Base_Fort_Worth
They were intended as interceptors to Chinese bombers.

When the Angel attack became imminent the people of the university brought some of these drones back online and programmed them to protect the city.

But the passage of time has taken its toll on the drones and the technician who maintains them needs parts in order to keep them operational.)


Killeen/Fort Hood/System Capital

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_hood
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killeen,_Texas

Fort Hood and the nearby city of Killeen was severally hit by the Chinese during the War.
After the bombing was over and the survivors emerged from their shelters amongst the ruins they discovered that a large number of Chinese prisoners that had been held at Fort Hood had also survived and escaped just before the missiles hit.

Initial fights between the two groups followed but eventually the survivors had to put their hands together and set old animosities aside to build shelters and raise the first walls to protect themselves against other roaming survivors and what else the wasteland could throw against them.
From this humble outpost under the leadership of the System would emerge the System Capital, a fortified city and nation that is one of the best defended human settlements in the Texas Wasteland and perhaps the Mid West

Using the rubble of Killeen and Fort Hood as raw material the original scrap town was replaced by massive buildings and towers that served as residences, production centers, stores, military facilities, and government center, surrounded by thick walls that could only be penetrated by old world artillery.
The System Capital is as much a fortress as it is the home to thousands of people who live and work inside its walls.

The city is nearly self sufficient, having its own water source, purification and distribution system. It also has its own power sources that provide the citizens, manufacturing centers, military and government with electricity.

Surrounding the fortified nation are the collective farms on which the city inhabitants depend for food, here crops are grown and livestock is held, well protected by the guard posts on the walls and perimeter patrols.

But these provided resources and security comes at a cost as the System monitors its streets, alleyways, and corridors twenty-four hours a day, its undercover agents and informants always on the lookout for social or political dissidents that could possibly undermine the System.


Note: artistically the System's Capital would be very spartan and industrial looking in general, gray concrete walls, railing on almost every floor, with catwalks connecting buildings together.
The residence wings would take a lot of inspiration from Chinese apartment buildings, somewhat claustrophobic looking, with washed clothes hanging out of the balconies and so on.

The market section would also really have a Chinese feel, with stores being very closed to each other.


Belton

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belton,_Texas

A relative minor location that suffered some of the secondary effects when Fort Hood/Killeen was hit by missiles.


Eventually Belton was annexed by the System and now serves as a stop over between the System Capital and Temple.



Temple

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple,_Texas


Temple is an important transport and transfer station from which trains and caravans operate within System territory.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missouri-Kansas-Texas_Railroad



Note: the world space in Temple would be focused around the pre war junction and train depot the System's engineers restored when they took over Temple.
The train yard would be under the control of the System.



McGregor

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGregor,_Texas

There is not much to tell about McGregor, before the war there was a train station (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGregor_(Amtrak_station)) and a rocket development and test facility.

This facility was built by a commercial space transport company; SpaceInc that tried to set up its own space program.
With the energy crisis hit the US SpaceInc's shares dropped and Poseidon Energy could easily buy out the company. (SpaceInc is a Fallout version of the real world SpaceX http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX)

During the War the settlement suffered from fallout effects because of its proximity to Fort Hood and the Waco Metropolitan area and parts of the town were razed to the ground.

After the war the city managed to recover somewhat by building an economy based on salvaging.
When the Angels took nearby Waco, the System annexed the city in order to establish an outpost there to monitor the Angels' activities.

Eventually the city was annexed by the System in order to serve as an outpost to monitor Waco and to salvage the remaining rocket technology for whatever projects the System's technicians and engineers are working on.

(planned idea: the System is actually trying to use the rocket development and test facility to build missile weapons that they want to use against the Angels in Waco, and if they can figure out how, against the Angels back in Forth Worth-Dallas.)


Note: In my idea for the main game the player would have to visit this settlement in order to recover some rocket technology needed to launch the rocket carrying the NYX satellite.


Austin

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austin

During the War Austin was one of the primary targets in Texas because of its large population, role as state capitol, and housing the headquarters of the Texas Military Forces.
The city suffered severe structural damage from the missiles and bombs, and because of the lingering radiation clouds it would take years before enough people returned to establish new settlements at the outskirts to avoid the worst of the released toxins.

Like other major metropolises like San Antonio after the War, most of the people gathered together in various small towns and outposts throughout the city, surviving through salvaging, what little agriculture and livestock they could maintain, and trade with another and passing caravans.


The first major event was the foundation and rise of the Followers of the ATLANTIS from the ruins of the University of Texas at Austin.
Vault Dwellers and a number of Wastelanders had been led to the ruins by robot messengers operated by the Pre War AI ATLANTIS that had been developed by the university before the Great War and it had brought these people together with the promise of a new age of science and technology.

After the organization's appearance they quickly secured the old university grounds and sections around it and fortified it, making it impossible for any outsiders to enter without Follower permission.
Follower teams were send to other pre war sites that once manufactured or contained advanced technology and the Followers set up outposts here as well, protecting these places with severe determination.

The Followers also made contact with the human settlements, offering services and goods in return for supplies they needed and interesting artifacts the prospectors had come across.
They also started to invite individuals they considered worthy or exceptional to join their movement but outside some details divulge no information about themselves.

In general the regular population and the Followers have lived in peace with another and the Followers have occasionally aided the other settlements during attacks by raiders or Mutant Slavers if these take place to close to Follower territory.
But in general they keep to themselves.


The second major event in its post war history was the arrival of a group of Super Mutants from the West, survivors from a failed military expedition that had been searching for a cure for Super Mutant sterility.
Because of their greater resistance against radiation these Mutants established their own settlements in the center of Austin which was still very hazardous for regular humans if they remained there to long.

Residents were wary of these new arrivals and not without reason, while a number of the Super Mutants had given up on the Master's dream and simply wanted to live out their lives alongside humans and Ghouls, another group still believed in the superiority and supremacy of Super Mutants, and they sought to take Austin for themselves.
A number of conflicts took place between the human residents and the Super Mutants until the Rangers interfered, providing defense for the human towns and mediating with the Super Mutants.

Still a true peace doesn't exist between the towns as some humans and Super Mutants still hold grudges.
The human residents also accuse the more peaceful Super Mutants about doing nothing about the Mutant Slavers that prey on their towns and caravans.


Current idea: the more peaceful Super Mutants have established their settlement around the former Texas State Capitol building, while the more militant ones have established their settlement on the grounds of Camp Mabry and having recovered weapons caches there.


In recent years the System has also appeared in Austin, their representatives trying to convince settlements to join their new state while their salvage teams search through the ruins.
The System has also been trying to recruit Super Mutants to their side, and several are now part of the System's defense army.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Corpus Christi/The Corpse

The city did not fare well during the war as it was both a target because of being a significant population center and also because of the nearby Naval Air Station.
Much of the city was wrecked by Chinese missiles and or bombers and the uncontrolled firestorms continued the destruction before they were finally put out by the radioactive rain from the fallout.

Like many major cities there were survivors and once the radiation levels lowered to somewhat acceptable levels these ventured outside their shelters just as people from outside the city started to search the ruins for food and items for basic survival.

There are not much details how the early settlements fared in the first decades as Corpus Christi, or 'The Corpse' as it was now called on its appearance became a hive of anarchy as gangs started to rise up and vied for control of city blocks.

Then things to a turn for the strange when a group of Vault Dwellers emerged from their Vault and took over the ruins of the Naval Air Base from the wastelanders there.

Whatever their plans were, they experimented with GECK technology that they had modified in unclear ways at the site. Then the accident happened that reshaped the coast line, changing the elevation of the land and causing the Gulf to come pouring inland, submerging a section of the city.

When things were finally turning back to normal the Bloom appeared in the Gulf and from there clouds of seeds were spread across the Corpse that rapidly took root there.
The plant life wasn't such a problem at first and some of it was even fit for consumption but then the more active and aggressive mutations appeared and started to drive people away.

As if the plants weren't a problem on themselves, they also became home and shelter to various mutant wildlife that could threaten humans, and a lot of the gangs have left the Corpse in reaction to the slowly expanding mutant jungle.



Corpus Christi port


USS Lexington


The Bloom

A strange massive plant based structure, when one reaches the 'shores' of Corpus Christi the top of the structure can be clearly seen sticking out of the water, large ventilation holes visible on its surface that air to enter the inside and spores to come out.

Little is known about the origins of the Bloom or whatever caused a plant structure like this to develop.
Apparently years ago a group of Vault Dwellers tried to use a modified Garden of Eden Construction Kit to recreate some of the ecology that existed before the great war that was more suitable for humanity.
But things went wrong and instead their experiment caused a drastic change in elevation of the land, making the Gulf stream inland, swallowing the Naval Air Station and parts of the city, drastically rearranging the shoreline.
Not soon after the Bloom arose from the sea and has been a permanent sight ever since.

From time to time the Bloom has been releasing clouds of spores but unless the wind comes from the Gulf most never reach the land.
But where they manage to make landfall strange new plant species grow, some not quite harmless or even aggressive towards animals and humans.

When the hurricane season started a large clouds of spores were blown inland and since then have taken root throughout the south of Texas, slowly spreading across the rest of the state with every storm or hurricane.

Those who have been observing the Bloom believe it to be hollow and even have claimed to have seen movement inside, but non one has ever been able to verify that claim as it is almost impossible to reach the Bloom due to the aggressive mutant sea life, let alone enter it once they have reached it as the structure despite being a plant is difficult to cut through.

Seeing what vicious mutant plant life has emerged from the Bloom people assume that the inside only harbors more aggressive variants and have taken the sensible approach of staying away from it.


College Station

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/College_Station,_Texas




The Woodlands


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Woodlands,_Texas

Before the war this was a planned community where a lot of rich Texans settled and established businesses


The settlement was destroyed by a nuclear warhead that was intended for Houston.




Vault 38 “High socialite Vault”

This Vault was bought by the city government and more richer members of the community when Vault-Tec was searching for investors for project Safehouse.
The Vault was intended to serve as a shelter for these people and provide them with the luxuries and the lifestyle they were accustomed to before the great war.

For this reason the Vault was supplied with a number of Mr Handy's, that were controlled by a ZAX computer that oversaw day to day tasks as well as servicing the needs of the inhabitants.
For defense the original planned Vault security force would be assisted by a number of eyebots designed to deal with riots and hostile outsiders.

Sadly for the people who invested in the Vault, neither they nor their children got the opportunity to make use of the Vault as the Woodlands was hit by one of the nuclear warheads that had been intended for Houston, killing all of them in an instant before the warning sirens silenced.

Despite not actually being taken into use by residents the Vault's computer carried out the tasks it was programmed for, maintaining and keeping the Vault clean, growing food and preparing it for consumption, overseeing and assisting in the entertainment, and so on.

It did so for decades without complaints until squatters started to settle in the ruins of the Woodlands.
As the computer is programmed to protect the Vault and the settlement above it from the unwanted, it has been trying to drive out the squatters.

The squatters on their turn have found out that there is plenty of food, water and medicine in the Vault and have been trying to get into it.


Note: this of course is based on a planned idea for an earlier draft of Fallout 2 as well as the story “There will come soft rains” by Ray Bradbury.
The main computer seems almost unaware that there hasn't been anyone in the Vault for years, happily carrying out its programmed tasks without any complaints.

It is also programmed to uphold the status quo, and the squatters simply do not meet the standards set up by the resident council before the war, so they need to go.

In the main game the player could either help the squatters or the computer with their goals.
The squatters want access to the resources and safety of the Vault, while the computer wants them gone so that it can continue its program until it finally fails.

In order for the player to help the squatters he/she would first have to be accepted by the computer as a new member of the community, having to go through some applications in order to be considered suitable.
Alternatively the player would be able to hack, sneak, or fight their way through the Vault to the computer console.

If done diplomatically the player could try to become the council president, changing the rules regarding allowing outsiders to settle that do not meet the previous standards.
Of course the computer would complain but would have to accept player ruling.

(the computer of course acts like a snobbish British butler)

If the squatters are allowed to settle in the Vault the computer at some point teachers them etiquette, making them behave as high society.
Eventually the Woodlands are rebuild but it becomes a closed settlement for the wasteland elite.

This is of course a stab at that people never learn from their mistakes.


Houston

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houston

Houston was targeted by the Chinese for the important role in played in the US space based systems and communication as well as its energy industries.
But the bombing was only the start of the metropolis' suffering as it was later hit by severe hurricanes coming from the Gulf that devastated Galveston and Texas City, caused by the changes in the weather pattern.

These regional storms and hurricanes continue on to this day and have prevented Houston from mostly being rebuild in a similar way like Abilene, San Antonio, and Austin.
Another reason why it has been difficult to establish new settlements in the ruins is the presence of two gangs who are competing for the Houston territory; the Texas Hellrazors who used to control most of the city, and the Claws, newcomers who have slowly turned from raiders to slavers who seek to establish a slave camp in Houston and drive the Texas Hellrazors out of the business.

One feature of interest is the massive metal box, a building sized metal structure located near the center of the city that hasn't been worn down by the hurricanes or the gang warfare.
Some prospectors believe it contains a pre war treasure of artifacts and water while other believe that it is best to keep the box and whatever pre war problems it contains sealed.



Current idea is that Houston experiences powerful hurricanes several times a year, coming from the Gulf. The hurricanes have only increased in strength due to the changes in the weather caused by the nuclear war, and the skyline of Houston has been seriously affected by it.

My other idea is that Houston is overrun by anti riot robots that are manufactured by a BOX similar to the one planned for Denver in Van Buren.


The Johnson Space Center

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/johnson/home/#.UpGWESdE0VA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_B._Johnson_Space_Center

The Space Center played an important role before and during the great war, a lot of America's space communication and satellite network went through the Center before being passed on to other important sites such as Iron Mountain and Raven Rock.
Together with a series of installations that spanned from the West Coast to the East Coast it also monitored and controlled the US' space defense network; a series of armed satellites and surface facilities designed to shoot down Chinese ICBMs.

(of course like the real world counter part half of the SDI network did not work as it was advertized to the government and only a percentage of missiles was actually stopped, others barely felt a thing from orbital rail guns or surface based lasers)



Just before the great war the USSA bought several suits of the prototype trauma override harnesses from Big MT with the intention of modifying them into pressurized space suits for upcoming space missions.
As there is always the risk of an accident in space that could leave an astronaut incapacitated the suits could immediately assume autonomous control and bring the astronaut back to the safety of a spacecraft or space station airlock.

The USSA was still putting the suits through trials when the great war happened and Houston was hit by several warheads that could not be deflected or shot down.
Technicians that were wearing the suits in the training facility were either instantly killed or near death after the explosions happened, but the suits' electronics were well protected and immediately kicked in when they discovered their wearers to be in terminal conditions.

But of course most of the personnel was either dead or had fled the space center and there was no one at the first aid post to take care of the dead or dying technicians, leaving the suits stuck in automated mode.

Like the trauma override harnesses the suits still work after two centuries, still patrolling the corridors of the Johnson Space Center and the grounds around it.

It's these walking dead that keep the Bloody Claws away from the Johnson Space Center and the Signal Listeners who have claimed parts of the complex for themselves save from the slavers.
But even they have to be watchful not to run into any of the still animated corpses as these suits do not distinguish between friend or foe.


Galveston and Texas City (I am thinking of calling it the Drowned City)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galveston,_Texas
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_of_Galveston
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City,_Texas

While initially suffering damage from the warheads that were fired at Houston, Galveston and Texas City were nearly wiped of the map when during hurricane season the dykes and water defenses that protected the island and the bay were destroyed and the Gulf came pouring in.

Now all that remains of these cities are the larger buildings that stick out of the water and a number of freighters and tankers that were docked there before the war and got stranded by the hurricane and the sea water.

Over time the survivors established a network of rope bridges and regular wooden bridges between the surviving buildings to allow for travel between them.
Most travel is now done with boats and rafts that now move over the flooded streets.
Civilization is mostly found in the stranded ships that now are the equivalent of towns.

Most living is made of fishing but it is not the traditional fishing as before the war.
In the decades before the war accidents that involved spilled oil had already drastically affected the sea life in the Gulf, causing sickness and malformation amongst traditional fished fish and crustaceans, radiation and FEV only radically changed the sea life more.

Some species are now completely extinct while others are drastically changed and no longer edible.
Amongst those that still are some have mutated in such a way that they actually can pose a threat to humans, making fishing them a dangerous task.

There is also a lot of prospecting going on the area as divers search the underwater ruins for pre war artifacts and useful material.
Since the discovery of Enclave technology in the ruins more prospectors have settled in the area.


Poseidon oil refinery/hidden research facility

One of Poseidon's largest oil refineries located along the Mexican Gulf coast, it processed the oil that came from Poseidon's rigs located in the Gulf as well as oil that was shipped from the Middle East before that region was wiped clear and rendered mostly radioactive during the resource wars.

After the oil started to run out in the Gulf and Texas, the refinery's activity decreased as money and personnel were transferred elsewhere or into other departments.
Still the facility was not decommissioned and abandoned as Poseidon Energy eventually re-purposed part of the industrial zone into an underground research facility where work was done on some of the top secret weapons development contracts Poseidon was handling for the US government and the Enclave.

The Enclave funded the development of the research facility and had it expanded into one of its many shelters for in case the organization needed to go underground if a nuclear war was imminent.
The shelter was intended for Enclave civilians and military personnel that were stationed in the Houston region of Texas.

When the great war happened the refinery suffered some structural damage from the side effects of the bombs that hit Houston but was still standing when the blast waves passed.
It was more severally affected when powerful hurricanes caused by the changes in the weather patterns swooped in from the Gulf that lay waste to a lot of the former industrial areas located at the coast.

When the coast defenses finally wore down and gave in the refinery like many coast structures was flooded, with only the highest levels remaining above the surface.
Not that this was a problem for the research facility/shelter as it was designed to be hermetically sealed, and its access elevator reaches all the way to the top of the refinery.

Since then parts of the refinery have collapsed, worn away, or have been scavenged by salvagers for raw material but still a lot remains standing.


The hidden research facility underneath was designed to be self contained and sufficient and were one of the Poseidon R&D laboratories were some of their weapons and other technologies was being developed during the American-Sino war.
When the call was given to the members of the Enclave to go underground, the scientists were joined by Enclave personnel and their families and instructions were given to lay low until new orders were send from Enclave leadership located on the Poseidon deep sea oil rig.

The descendants of the scientists and the Enclave members were in contact with the main Enclave organization during the events of Fallout 2, doing their part of the plan to retake the North American mainland from the mutants and rebuild the United States when they suddenly lost contact with the Enclave headquarters.

A few refugees from the West coast managed to reach them to inform them what had happened to the main Enclave forces and the destruction of the oil rig.
Like other Enclave remnants the facility inhabitants were still in contract with they tried to continue the Enclave agenda of reclaiming the mainland when another disaster struck.

Structural wear caused by time and the seasonal hurricanes, had weakened portions of the facility to the point that one powerful hurricane would be enough to breach them, flooding the shelter.
Not long after the destruction of the oil rig this happened, as a hurricane pounded on the Texas coast, walls broke and metal plates gave away as the Gulf poured rapidly into the lower levels before the inhabitants knew what hit them.

Most of the Enclave population drowned and only a few people managed to reach the surface in time, only to be caught by the raging hurricane above.
Those Enclave members that could reach the mainland eventually disappeared into the wasteland.

Since then the Enclave has been mostly forgotten if not for the Enclave artifacts the prospectors of the Drowned City occasionally come across.


Saw-sharks' oil tanker


Robot City

Located in the East, beyond Killeen and Austin in the middle of radioactive no man's lands where normally no sane man or mutant ventures, Robot City is the city of tomorrow as the people before the war imagined the future would be look like with the invention of fusion power; flying cars, mono rails, and more robots and computers everywhere.

However this is a city run by machine intelligences, survivors of those created before the great war and their descendants, and they are isolationists in general.

Those who in general manage to reach Robot City's perimeter in general do not return, if the conditions and the wildlife of the no man's lands do not get travelers, Robot City's perimeter patrol droids will.
Those who are 'lucky' and captured are alive are taken with the walls of Robot City to never return again.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Hello,

Sorry that the map I have made up is rather amateurish but it has been some time since I last worked with illustrator and photoshop so I need to freshen up my skills again.
This map should give the RPG players here a rough idea of what size the playing region is like.
I will update it as I improve on the basic design

Note; travel is possible in the radioactive no man's lands but people understand of course that this comes with health hazard. This region also suffers from seasonal radioactive dust storms and twisters.