Feel free to use http://www.floodmap.net/as a source, try 740 metres
Welcome to Earth, with just one major difference...
Welcome to Earth, with just one major difference...
The Story of The Great Deluge
It is the 1st of March, 2012- 50 years after the Great Deluge began, and 22 years since sea levels finally peaked. Earth has been ravaged by the wrath of the oceans, and human civilisation is a shadow of its former self.
The root cause of the Great Deluge can be blamed on one man- General Secretary Joseph Stalin, the dictator of the Soviet Union. In late 1952, with the arms race of the Cold War beginning, Stalin suggested to his highest officials that despite the USSR's pre-existing nuclear capabilities, it would be a wise idea to develop other weapons of mass destruction apart from nukes in an attempt to one-up the Americans. The top echelons of the Russian military went through a wide array of ideas and to a limited extent attempted many of them, but one proposal above all gained prominence- Project Perun.
Project Perun, named after the Slavic pagan god of thunder, was a plan to create a device capable of causing earthquakes. With the threat of seismic warfare as a deterrent, the Soviets believed that the West would have no choice but to refrain from aggression against the Communist bloc. It was thought that this in turn would greatly aid the expansion of Communism across the globe.
The project was top secret until 1962, when the USSR tested their seismic weapons and caused massive earthquakes (magnitude 7.9) off the coast of Kamchatka. This was partially in response to tensions resulting from the Sino-Soviet split, but at the same time the practical realisation of Project Perun was nigh inevitable regardless.
However, what the Soviet army did not realise was that their deeply unnatural earthquake had disturbed an enormous subterranean reservoir with enough water to massively increase the volume of the earth's oceans.
About a week after Project Perun made its grand debut, flash-floods were recorded across the sea of Okhotsk. Tens of thousands of people perished, and all countries affected declared a state of emergency. The Russians and the Japanese lead separate committees into investigating the source of the flooding, and eventually, despite Cold War rivalries, they united their efforts. It became clear that a subterranean reservoir had been disturbed by Project Perun, and that massive amounts of water were now flooding into earth's oceans. The information was to be kept secret for as long as possible
By 1965, sea levels had risen globally by a metre. The Dutch government declared martial law and moved its headquarters to the Dutch embassy in Brussels as Amsterdam was swamped, the Americans swiftly built a series of dykes and levies around Manhattan, San Francisco and the Potomac, the Vietnam war ended in a Korea-esque armistice on pre-war boundaries and the Communist bloc forcibly evacuated its people inland. The world was united against the rising tides, whether they knew where they came from or not. Hoping to further unite Americans in the face of disaster, President Lyndon B. Johnson (who had learned of Project Perun's great mistake from the Japanese) released information on the underground reservoirs to the public.
This caused panic across the world. Attempts were made by the UN, fuelled by popular demand, to try and sentence the military officials responsible for Project Perun's execution. When trials could either not be made or gave inconclusive results, the USSR gave them a show trial and executed many of them. Rapes, murders and riots became commonplace, with several death cults gaining prominence in the more liberal West by the end of the century.
By 1970, sea levels had risen by 9 metres. The Americans launched an invasion of Vietnam, swiftly destroying the North Vietnamese government as it struggled to evacuate Hanoi. The Khmer Rouge took power in large sections of Cambodia as the central government collapsed, eventually advancing into Thai border regions. The Eastern Bloc struggled to retain order, while the West struggled to keep survival efforts on top of public panic. Following the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971, East Pakistan was annexed by India.
From there sea levels continued to rise, with the rise growing exponentially. By 1974, sea levels had risen by 40 metres. The European Union took over governmental powers in its member states (excluding the United Kingdom, which refused and was promptly ejected from the Union) and declared martial law.
In 1978, with sea level rise approaching 120 metres the nations of the world led a series of submarine expeditions to determine the final extent of the sea level rise. It was expected sea levels would stabilise at about 700-800 metres above pre-1962 levels. The whole ordeal was coined "The Great Deluge", and was met with mixed reactions of relief and panic.
By the end of the 70s, millions of people across the world were dying (often with the help of drowning, starvation or government-provided cyanide tablets) and taking to the sea as pirates and refugees. China began damming the Yangtze upriver (it's unsure if they ever succeeded) and moved their capital to Chengdu after the annihilation of Beijing. Creeping sea level rise turned into a constant, marching flood. Switzerland and Austria closed their borders to millions of European refugees after their social systems were overwhelmed, and in response the European Provisional Government blockaded the two countries from all sides (except Titoist Yugoslavia, which eventually developed excellent relations with the two nations). The USA began to fragment as individual states focussed on their own survival, and the American capital moved to Denver. The government of the UK fled to Canberra after most major British cities were destroyed.
The 1980s were a blur. Human civilisation teetered on the brink of collapse and did indeed collapse in many places. Billions of people died, sea levels rose by hundreds of metres, countries descended into despotism or anarchy and rations were soon replaced by solemn apologies and cyanide pills. In some regions apocalyptic cults actually became governments and ruled over millions of people. In some places people of different races and religions were united by the disaster, while in other places people descended into genocide and squabbling. The peoples of North Korea, Israel, Albania and several other nations entirely disappeared, with nobody knowing where they went. Nations lost contact with eachother as civilisation degenerated.
By 1990, sea levels stopped rising. People across the world briefly celebrated, and then began the long process of rebuilding after the Great Deluge. Sea levels were expected to gradually decrease to more or less pre-Deluge levels over the next few million years, as excess water returned to underground sources and nature found equilibrium.
You will play as a nation, tribe or people living in this post-disaster world.
The World Today
Sea levels are between 700-800 metres higher than they are in our timeline, and this has caused many flow-on effects.
The world today is a ravaged, mysterious place. Contact is only just now being re-established between nations, and without electricity or wireless communication in wide use it is mostly limited to seaborne ambassadors. Not much is known about the world, although it is clear that the centres of global civilisation have shifted to the remains of Asia, Southern Africa and Western North America (now a reborn Laramidia). Many places are mountainous and geographically complex- Europe, for instance, is now largely a collection of islets and mountain ranges. The distinction between island and continent has, for all practical purposes ,been heavily blurred.
Resources are limited, although there is plenty to be found in some places (the Tarim Basin is the world's primary source of oil, and the Alps, South Africa and the Rockies provide large amounts of coal). People have generally become more resourceful by necessity, and conservation of resources is a very real concern in many societies.
With large swathes of agricultural land gone, famines are common and the global population is still in a state of lingering decline. With agricultural demand outpacing supply, hungry people across the world are beginning to look to the ocean as their staple source of food. While more fragile marine ecosystems such as coral reefs were devastated by the Great Deluge, commonplace fish such as Cod and Trout, along with other edible organisms such as seaweed, crustaceans and some marine mammals, are all thriving. Given that about 10% of the world is now covered by land, the oceans present all kinds of opportunities for post-Deluge humanity. Chicken has also eclipsed larger land animals in agricultural use due to its smaller size and faster maturation. Much of the world's fresh water is harvested from sea ice and put into artificial lakes, and rainfall is meticulously collected and saved.
Surviving technological advancement generally depends on how ravaged a region was by the Great Deluge and its effects. Some places are pre-industrial and even pre-agricultural, while some places maintain industrial technology and electricity for state use. Nowhere is really up to date with OTL 2012 technology or even 1962 technology, and the lack of long-distance travel and communications has decimated the rate of technological advancement.
The seas are full of raft-borne refugees, living off meagre diets of fish and seaweed, and pirates, who often use former naval vessels to prey on merchant ships and refugees. The sea has become something of a wild west, even as another age of discovery looms upon the world.
Climate is more oceanic and thus milder. The equator is cooler, and the poles are warmer. Parts of Western Antarctica and much of Greenland can now support human life year-round. There is also much more rainfall, meaning droughts and deserts are largely a thing of the past. A great lake has been formed by rainfall in the Tarim Basin,and the Great Salt lake (now salty only in name) has expanded massively. What remains of the world's rainforests are not only surviving but thriving.
Ocean currents flow across the earth largely uninterrupted, further moderating the climate. In tropical regions massive cyclones and storms are born in the vast oceans, and typhoons ravage places well into the earth's temperate zones. The salinity of the ocean has changed very little, although organic material from the flooded lowlands causes massive algal blooms every year.
What the Hell am I supposed to do?
You will RP as a state, nation, faction of people eking out an existence in a post-Great Deluge world. I'm okay with a lot of things, provided you keep it realistic. Personally I'd like to see a semi-fragmented USA, a thalassocratic Bolivia (just for the irony), a caucasus-dwelling USSR, a restored Ottoman Empire and a post-communist PRC among other things, but those are just some of my ideas. You can do anything you want within reason. In a world of oysters, the world is your oyster!
Just a few rules, however-
- remember to make reasonably good-quality posts. I'm okay with reasonable noobishness, but if you write like a ten year old I'm gonna give you a warning and kick you out after that.
- remember to keep realism going and act within the bounds of this RP's lore and situation
- don't be an arsehole or the mods might get you
- I don't accept reservations, just apps. Exceptions may apply for RP cronies.
- don't forget to have fun!
Application Template
- Code: Select all
[box]
[b]Your username and nicknames:[/b]
[b]Your nation of choice:[/b]
[b]Government type and leader:[/b]
[b]State religion (if any):[/b]
[b]Official language and recognised languages:[/b]
[b]Ethnic makeup:[/b]
[b]Location:[/b]
[b]Capital City (can be fictitious)[/b]
[b]Symbols (Flag, CoA, etc)[/b]
[b]Technological level (10 being electricity and fossil fuels used for essential industry and military, 5 being mostly pre-industrial with advanced technology used only for military means, 1 being stuck in the medieval era:[/b]
[b]Navy size and breakdown:[/b]
[b]Army size and breakdown:[/b]
[b]Rough population estimate (world population is somewhere around 900 million):[/b]
[b]Natural resources:[/b]
[b]Food sources and how regular shortages are:[/b]
[b]Major economic sectors and produced goods:[/b]
[b]Objectives, priorities and potential expansions:[/b]
[b]Brief history:[/b]
[b]RP sample (optional; I can always look through your posting history):[/b]
E112 (tracking purposes, do not remove)
[/box]
Accepted nations -
- Sunthreit- The Federated States of Laramidia
- Plzen- The Confederation of Nordic States
- The V O I D- The People's Republic of China
In Accepting Limbo -
(essentially reserved, these people are either my cronies who are yet to app, or they have apps with flaws I am waiting to be addressed. Their limbo is finite and will last as long as I feel it should.)
- Sanabel- The Republic of Virginia
