An Apocalyptic Nightmare [OOC]
Posted: Tue Feb 12, 2019 9:55 amAn Apocalyptic Nightmare
Concept and mechanics inspired by the board games Tomorrow and War on Terror
Some ideas adopted from roleplays previously hosted by Harkback Union
Posterity will remember it as the Disappointing Century.
To think, it has started so well. The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 removed, or so it seemed, the last serious obstacle to the establishment of peace, freedom, and capitalist prosperity to every last man, woman, and child on Earth. Some even spoke of an "End to History," as all ideological alternative to liberal democratic forms of government disappear. The Information Revolution was swinging in full speed, with an increasingly interconnected telecommunications network, and this new "Internet" began putting five thousand years of human knowledge and discoveries at the fingertips of those who care to look. Global trade brought industrialisation and employment to the world's poorer billions as cheaper products flooded the markets of service economies, to the delight of consumers. Civilisation was a wonderful dream that would take us into utopia forever and ever and ever...
Then the dream shattered.
The diversion of billions of tons of water into vast irrigation projects collapsed the volatile ecologies of savannas, as Madrid, Beijing, and Kansas City alike saw first, dust, then sand carried by the wind into windowsills and storm drains. The slow burn of our planet's atmosphere accelerated into a fevered fire as emissions agreement after emissions agreement fell through negotiation tables. Unchecked industrial pollution choked the world's rivers, with entire communities poisoned by water sources they've trusted for generations, and the Pacific Garbage Patch started being noted on world maps. The global environment was thrown into disarray.
With neither their traditional nor modern ways of life sustainable under the threat of ever greater natural disasters and ever more deformed shorelines, many of the world's poorest millions packed their bags and left. The slums of Kuala Lumpur and the small farms of the Congolese jungles provided a truly endless supply of desperate people wracked both by the mundane threats of hunger and illness as well as those of terror and oppression knocking on the gates of where, anywhere, life would hopefully be better. With ever more expensive and sophisticated border security came ever more intelligent and thought out loopholes by which to circumvent them. Not even the vast wealth of the United States nor the vast cities of the Chinese heartland could accommodate all of them.
As the world's cities struggled to contain the destruction of the natural world around them and a strong influx in immigrant populations, they found themselves increasingly bereft of the means by which to do so. The 2008 financial crisis was only the prologue to the spectacle of recession that would haunt the world's most developed economies for the next several decades. Rapid displacement of labour, caused by the increasing computerisation of what were once well-paying middle class jobs, sent tens of millions of souls to the tender mercies of the social security system as an entire generation grew up, radicalised and disillusioned, with no hope for a brighter future. Capitalism, it seemed, was obsolete... but what new paradigm was to replace it?
Rampant resources shortages that grew increasingly common as the century went on did not help the situation one iota. The final peak in hydrocarbon production, 2022, was followed by a series of devastating energy crises and renewed proxy wars in the dormant battlefields of the Middle East, South America, and West Africa. Not even a surge in unconventional shale oil production in Canada, nor fracking techniques in what used to be protected reserves of the United States, nor the new clathrate extraction technologies in Japan could reverse the trend of an ever-decreasing energy supply. Not any more than a renewed interest in recycling efforts could catch the skyrocketing prices of copper or phosphorous.
Millions of disillusioned young men and women wandering the neon-lit streets of a world that no longer felt as bright as it looked... it was the perfect breeding ground for a new, and yet so very familiar, type of great men. China, never a democracy, grew into a prominent great power on the backs of its export industries, presenting a new challenge to the liberal world order as Russia, under Putin and his successors, showed the world that an elected government was no great security against authoritarianism. Meanwhile, the forces that should have been the most strident defenders of liberty - the established free regimes of Western Europe and North America - rotted from the insides, as ambitious politicians promised to angry masses that they and they alone could solve the nation's problems, if only the voters would get rid of all these silly regulations and institutions preventing them from doing so.
Environmental destruction, refugee migrations, economic crisis, resource shortages, and authoritarian populism... any one of these would have given a budding post-industrial civilisation a nightmare to work through. All of them, happening at once, was overwhelming. Old certainties were destroyed, and new ones arose.
The Second Hague Environmental Conference of 2037 was the final straw that jolted the world awake from the dreams of a post-industrial utopia. An emergency meeting of all the world's nations held just as the raised waters from Typhoon Rumbia was finally draining out of the streets of Singapore, this was, perhaps, the last opportunity for the world to turn itself around.
Successful, it wasn't.
As exhausted diplomats returned home, after days of wrangling between old enemies and allies alike, as the world finally let out the breath that it has been holding, and as it became obvious that nobody would take anything signed at the Conference seriously, the world's great powers finally realised.
They were now on their own.
The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism for Dummies!
a.k.a. "the rules and mechanics"
1. The Ministry of Truth
...our troops will without fail return victorious by Christmas...
An Apocalyptic Nightmare is a mechanics-based roleplay, set in a near-future Earth that is a mild dystopia. Six superpower players each represent one of these six superpower states seeking to dominate this world. Any number of players may represent non-superpowers. These may cover influential people, NGOs, governments of minor powers, international co-operative bodies, et cetera. Non-superpowers may be featured and their input requested in events and international crises, but they otherwise have no mechanical relevance, and do not need to supply orders every turn.
tip: as a superpower, do not ignore non-superpowers, lest you be hit with terrible events and crises
If you choose to apply as a non-superpower, you have no need to read the remainder of these mechanics. Skip to the applications section below.
Action is taken in simultaneous turns, which each represent the passage of one year's time in-character. All orders must be delivered by telegram to the original poster. Ambiguous orders that have no clear and singular interpretation will be ignored. Players should submit by telegram their orders for the turn no later than 48 hours after the original poster announcing the beginning of the turn. Orders submitted later may not be accepted if the original poster has already begun preparing for the next turn.
The world is divided into regions separated from each other by white lines. Click on this link to view the map; alternately, an image is provided below, below the list of superpowers. 16 of these regions contain significant land, and are referred to as territories. 7 others do not contain significant land, and are referred to as oceans. Of the 16 territories, six are considered home territories, from which each of the six superpowers are based. The other 10 are referred to as minor power territories. Regions are considered adjacent to each other if they share a common border.
A superpower is considered suppressed if it possesses fewer military units in its home territory than every other superpower and terrorists combined. A superpower is victorious if it emerges as the sole superpower that is not suppressed. Non-superpowers do not have victory conditions, as they are not a formal part of the rules.
tip: allies cannot win together, but winning without temporary allies would be an impossible feat indeed
Two regions, the United States and North Africa, have two coasts. Two territories are considered coastally adjacent to each other if there is a border between the territories runs along a coast. A territory with one coast is considered coastally adjacent to a coast of an adjacent territory with two coasts if the border between the two territories runs along the specified coast. A territory is considered coastally adjacent to an ocean if the territory shares a border with the ocean; if the territory has two coasts, the ocean is only considered coastally adjacent to the coast that faces that ocean.
Occasionally, events or decisions that only affect one superpower may occur. These occur at the discretion of the original poster, and will be used both to facilitate interesting roleplaying and to reward well-written in-character posts.
RANDOM.ORG will be used to generate the results of any necessary dice rolls. There is a considerable element of luck in these roleplay mechanics.
Within these rules, should two statements contradict, the interpretation of the statement describing the more unusual and specific situation will prevail over the more general statement. Results of events, decisions, and international crises may also permanently revise these rules.
2. The Ministry of Plenty
...produced in the last 5-Year Plan 144 million pairs of shoes...
The world economy revolves around the control of vital energy resources, and resources are measured in energy credits (§). Vital energy credits are primarily earned through hydrocarbon extraction from territories, for which refineries must be constructed.
Energy credits and refineries built in a region may be freely gifted between superpowers. Orders to gift refineries must clarify which refinery of which region is being gifted, and will transfer alongside the refinery any income generated by that refinery that turn, if there are any. No other superpower resource may be so traded. Gifts are not revealed to superpowers other than the one giving it and the one receiving it, unless the gift order by the superpower giving it specifically clarifies that it should be revealed.
tip: beware that if you trade with another superpower by gifting to each other, you have no means of cancelling the gift even if the other superpower doesn't keep up their side of the deal
Each territory has an integer extraction number between 2 and 12. The extraction numbers of minor power territories are unknown, except for Central Asia with a known extraction number of seven, and will be revealed to a superpower once that superpower has deployed at least three armies (see section 4 for more on armies) or constructed at least one refinery in that territory.
At the beginning of each turn, three six-sided die are rolled. All refineries built in territories with an extraction number that matches the sum of any pair of die so rolled will produce an income of energy credits for that turn. For example, if the numbers rolled are 2, 4, and 5, then territories with extraction numbers of 6 (2 + 4), 7 (2 + 5), and 9 (4 + 5) will produce energy credits that turn. Double rolls are counted -- for example, if the numbers rolled are 2, 2, and 3, then refineries in the territories with the extraction number of 5 will produce twice. If all three dice are rolled to the same value, one will be re-rolled until it no longer shows the same value.
tip: build refineries in many different territories to reduce uncertainties in energy income
The number of energy credits each refinery produces is dependent on the highest number of refineries there was at any one point in that territory. If there were never more than one refinery in a territory, it will produce §20. If there are or used to be two, §11 each; three, §8; four, §6; five to six, §5; seven to nine, §4; ten and higher, §3. Furthermore, a penalty of -§1 production will be applied per turn of production in excess of three turns, to a minimum of §1 per refinery. If the territory contains more terrorists than refineries and more terrorists than armies (see section 4 for more on terrorists), then all refineries will only produce §1 regardless of any other factor.
tip: building a refinery in a territory where another superpower already has a refinery is a good way to drop that superpower's income
Energy credits may be used to fund social policies, espionage, crisis resolution (all covered in section 3), unit maintenance, military unit recruitment, terrorist incitement (all covered in section 4), and refinery construction (already covered in this section). How much a superpower spends on espionage, terrorist incitement, or crisis resolution is not revealed. How many energy credits a superpower has saved is also not revealed.
Refineries cost §6 to construct, and may be constructed by any superpower in any territory on the map unless that territory contains armies of another superpower but no armies of the constructing superpower. Refineries may be destroyed freely by the superpower owning it. This may be useful to replace old and unproductive refineries with new and more productive refineries without raising the total refinery count.
3. The Ministry of Love
...with a supermajority of 164 members in the National Assembly...
The cost to properly fund social policies is either some percentage of the sum of the total number of refineries and mobile units on the map rounded down. This percentage is 15% for the superpower with the most military units plus refineries (initially the United States), 10% for the second (Russia), 7.5% for the third and fourth (China and the European Union), 5% for the fifth and sixth (Dar al-Islam and India), plus 2.5% extra for each terrorist army in the superpower's home territory, or the social policy cost for that superpower in the previous turn, whichever is higher. If it is not fully paid, then one terrorist army appears in the superpower, plus one more per §4 in social policy cost not paid, rounded up (see section 4 for more on terrorists or armies).
tip: social policy costs do not ever decrease -- reconsider climbing up the rankings if you are unsure if you can sustain the costs of the higher rank
tip: recall that energy credit incomes are not fully predictable; consider maintaining a reserve to ensure you can pay for social policies even in turns when none of your refineries produce
Spies may be recruited for §6 each, and may be used for espionage beginning from the turn following their recruitment.
Using a spy for offensive espionage costs §4, and the spy may conduct one of the following espionage missions against one other superpower. If desired, the superpower issuing the offensive espionage order may choose to clarify the order as public, in which case any information revealed will be announced to every superpower.
Target Industrialist: all minor power extraction numbers known to the target will be revealed to the spy; the age, in production turns, of all refineries possessed by the target will be revealed to the spy; he number of energy credits a superpower has saved will be revealed to the spy. All information so revealed will be current as of the end of the turn in which the mission is conducted.
Target Politician: the target's actions for the last 4 turns including the current turn will be revealed to the spy; one randomly-selected order from the target's current turn orders will be interrupted.
Target Diplomat: Any terrorist action and offensive espionage orders or gifts made by the target superpower this turn are ignored, and revealed to the spy; the number of spies owned by the target superpower is revealed to the spy.
Target Union Boss: a mobile military unit or refinery of the target superpower is destroyed (the order must clarify which one is to be destroyed); the target superpower loses §4 or however many energy credits it has saved, whichever is lower.
Support. Support the offensive mission of another spy in the superpower.
A spy may be used defensively in any superpower including the spy-owner for §2. This protects the target superpower from foreign offensive espionage. Conducting defensive espionage in a foreign superpower will be revealed to the superpower protected.
To determine the success of offensive espionage missions, a 6-sided die is rolled. -1 is added for each spy on a defensive espionage mission in that superpower. +1 is added for each spy supporting the offensive mission. On a roll of 3 or higher, the offensive mission succeeds. On a roll of 2 or lower, the offensive mission fails. On a roll of 1 or lower, the target superpower learns what mission was attempted. On a roll of 0 or lower, the target superpower learns by which superpower's spy it was targeted. On a roll of -1 or lower, the spy on the offensive mission (but not the supporting spies) is killed. On a roll of -2 or lower, the mission is such a dramatic spectacle of a failure that every superpower will learn which superpower so horribly botched up the mission (but, other than the target superpower, will not learn who the target was or what mission was attempted).
tip: defensive espionage costs less than offensive espionage; espionage arms races always favour the defender
A spy that is idle costs a base maintenance of §1, and may be disbanded at any time.
Occasionally, an international crisis will involve multiple superpowers and demand the contribution of energy credits to the crisis. How to contribute to an international crisis and what the effects of an international crisis is depends on the specific international crisis, and will be announced alongside the crisis itself. International crises occur at the discretion of the original poster, and will be used to encourage roleplaying.
4. The Ministry of Peace
...an unprovoked renunciation of the Pact of Non-Aggression...
The sole non-mobile military unit is the nuclear weapon. Nuclear weapons are not placed on the map, but are considered to be part of an abstract superpower "stockpile." Nuclear weapons cost §15 to construct, and have no maintenance. The world sees nuclear weapons not as a regular part in a nation's arsenal of war, but as a tool of last resort. As such, nuclear weapons may only be used by superpowers that have foreign armies in that superpower's home territory, and may only be used against territories in which the owner of the offending foreign army has at least one military unit or refinery.
Once used, the used nuclear weapon is destroyed. Every mobile military unit and refinery from every superpower in the territory attacked is destroyed. The targeted territory gains the Nuclear Fallout (-§1 to the output of refineries) modifier. If the territory targeted was a minor power territory, it also gains the Chronic Instability (if the territory does not at the beginning of the turn hold a terrorist army, one is generated) modifier. If the target was a superpower home territory, the superpower gains the Reconstruction (the social policy cost ratio of the superpower is increased by 5%) national spirit.
tip: a large nuclear stockpile is the best deterrence against invasion of your home territory, but seriously reconsider if the high costs are worth it
Two types of mobile military units are identified: armies and navies. Armies may exist in a territory. Navies may exist in territories or oceans. If a navy is in a territory with two coasts, it must also be specified which coast the navy exists in. Armies and navies exist in one of two states: not exhausted ("fresh"), and exhausted. The location and loyalties of all mobile military units are always known.
Armies and navies each cost §6 to recruit, and §1 per turn to maintain. If this maintenance cost is not fully paid, a number of units corresponding to the amount of maintenance not paid must be disbanded. Units are always recruited in the home territory of the constructing superpower. If a navy is being recruited in a territory with two coasts, the recruitment must specify on which coast the navy is being recruited in. An army or navy is not considered to exist in the turn in which it is recruited.
Each army or navy may execute one order each turn. Exhausted units may only execute movement and disband orders. Military orders are announced to every superpower. The list of available orders is as follows:
Disband. A unit is removed from play.
Movement. An army of a superpower may be ordered to move from the home territory of that superpower to an adjacent territory, vice versa, or between two minor power territories that are adjacent to each other and to the home territory of that superpower without convoys. An army may move from any territory to any other territory provided that the appropriate convoys are provided. A navy may move from a territory or ocean to a coastally adjacent territory or ocean. If an exhausted army is unable to complete a movement order due to a lack of convoys, it is disbanded. Fresh units that execute a movement order are also considered to be defending in its destination region that turn.
Convoy. A navy may assist the movement of an army from one territory to another. For each army moved, one navy must be ordered to convoy in each region the army will need to pass through en route to its destination. Armies must pass through at least one intermediate region unless it is executing a movement order that does not require convoys, each region passed through must be coastally adjacent to the previous region in the route. The army being convoyed must be specified in a convoy order.
Defend. An army or navy holds its current position and will resist hostile attacks on itself. Units that receive no orders will be assumed to be defending.
Defend and support. An army or navy holds its current position and will resist hostile attacks on itself, the units of any other superpower(s), or terrorists. The order must specify which other superpowers are to be supported, and whether terrorists are to be supported.
Hold. If an exhausted unit is unable to move, it will hold.
Attack. An army or navy will attack the defending armies and navies in that territory or ocean. The target of the attack must be specified, and may be a superpower, a set of superpowers, the terrorists, or a set of superpowers and terrorists. All armies or navies of one superpower ordered to attack in any given territory or ocean must have the same target or targets. If multiple superpowers order attacks in the same territory or ocean, they are resolved in random order.
tip: if you have the dominant military position in a region, consider attacking multiple enemies at once to speed up your consolidation of the region
In an attack, a four-sided die is rolled for each attacking unit. A four-sided die is rolled for each defending unit targeted. Only defending units of the same type (army or navy) as the attacking units are considered. For the purposes of resolving attacks, navies on different coasts of territories that have two coasts are not considered to be in the same territory. +1 is added to the defending roll. Unless the attack was made using navies in a territory, then another +1 is added to the defending roll for each refinery possessed by the defending superpower or superpowers in that region. The side with the higher total emerges victorious. The losing side exhausts a number of units equivalent to one-third the margin by which it lost, rounded up. If there are multiple defending parties, the losses are distributed randomly. If there are no more non-exhausted defending units left to exhaust, then exhausted units are disbanded in lieu of non-exhausted units being exhausted.
tip: these battle mechanics mean that a heavily outnumbered force cannot even inflict casualties on the enemy; consider finding allies to support and be supported by
Should the defending side find itself with no remaining non-exhausted defending units of the type attacked, all units of the same type of the defending parties in that territory or ocean, even if not defending, are exhausted and their orders interrupted. If the attack was made using armies, half the refineries of the defending parties in the territory, rounded up, is destroyed and the remainder transferred to the attacker. A terrorist army appears in that territory for each refinery so destroyed. Terrorist armies are not exhausted, and are destroyed in situations where they are to be exhausted.
An exhausted unit in its own superpower's home territory may also be ordered to recover, which will remove the exhaustion from the unit. This costs §2 per unit.
Terrorist armies may, in addition to appearing in previously mentioned situations, also be recruited by any superpower in any minor power territory for §3. Energy credits may also be freely donated to terrorists. Superpowers that choose to do either may also issue terrorist incitement orders in that turn. One terrorist incitement order may be issued per every three territories in which there exists at least one terrorist army, rounded up, with a minimum of one. Terrorist incitement orders are to be listed in order of priority. The following orders may be issued to terrorists:
tip: inciting terrorists is an excellent way of meddling in conflicts that are too far from your home territory for you to send regular military units
Raid. All the terrorist armies of one specified territory attack the armies of one specified superpower in that region. Any refineries transferred to terrorists as a result of the battle are converted into more terrorists.
Transfer. Some number of terrorist armies in one specified territory, up to the half number of terrorist armies there are in that territory rounded up, moves to a different territory. In the destination territory and, if the destination and origin territories are not directly adjacent, in each territory in between passed through, there must already be present a number of terrorist armies not lower than the number being transferred.
Defend and Support. Identical to the regular military unit order of the same name.
Sleep. All the terrorist armies in one specified territory will hold and resist any other superpower attempting to incite them.
tip: remember that a high number of terrorist armies affect income of refineries in that territory; terrorists can thus be useful even if they are sleeping
A fixed number of terrorist incitement orders, equal to the number issued by each inciting superpower, is distributed between the inciting superpowers in proportion to their relative contribution to the terrorist cause (a recruited terrorist army is equivalent to §1 in donations), and that number of orders from each superpower is executed. It will not be revealed which superpowers issued which incitement orders.
2040 World Almanac
a.k.a. "the superpowers"
China
中华人民共和国
After its reunification in 1948, in the aftermath of the Chinese Civil War and the shadow of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the world's most populous nation, for China was such in those times, remained in abject poverty. China's rise to superpower status began with Deng Xiao-ping's liberalisation policies, which in just a few decades transformed China from an agrarian low-income country to a developed post-industrial one. The slowly growing isolationism of the United States and its withdrawal from world affairs in the late 2010s and the 2020s created a great power void in Asia, which China, with its new wealth and the military and diplomatic leverage that affords, grew to fill. Its high dependence on imported petroleum, however, proved a crucial weakness as the conventional oil fields around the world began to run dry. With necessity forcing it to take the front stage in world markets and diplomatic forums at the exact moment when the superpowers of the west were coming out of their isolationist hibernation to do the same, China faces a difficult road ahead. To save a billion people from being thrown back to poverty, China needs to act further than ever more decisively than ever, whether it is ready to do so or not...
China starts with the following national spirits:
Export Economy -- China earns §1 per refinery built in a foreign superpower home territory, each turn refineries in home territories generate revenue.
Brown Water Navy -- Chinese navies in oceans cost §2 instead of §1 to maintain.
China begins with two refineries in its home territory, two nuclear weapons, and §24 in starting funds.
Dar al-Islam
دار الإسلام
Born from the fires of the Resource Wars of the 2020s and the 2030s, the exact moment when the loose anti-Saudi coalition between Syria, Iraq, and Iran turned into a proper superpower is unclear, but historians usually cite the 2036 Push to the Sea as the moment when the House of Islam finally left the shadows of Russian support to become a united superpower of its own power. The traditionally petroleum-based economies of the region suffered greatly when the oil began to run dry, but this also meant that the world's existing superpowers were no longer particularly interested in using the Middle East as a chessboard for their great game. Drawing upon the extensive militarisation of the region, the legacy of decades of chronic instability, and the last dregs that remained of their half a century of domination in the global energy market, Dar al-Islam pushed against the foreign-backed puppet regimes that dotted the Middle East and North Africa, returning the cradle of civilisation into prominence. But the further they push, the greater the backlash, and the time is rapidly approaching when Dar al-Islam would have to finally confront the many superpowers that watches its growth with concern...
Dar al-Islam starts with the following national spirits:
Al-Qaeda Contacts -- Dar al-Islam may recruit terrorist armies in superpower home territories for §5 each, or §4 if the territory already contains at least one terrorist army.
International Sanctions -- Any contribution Dar al-Islam makes towards international crises resolution is only 1/2 as effective.
Dar al-Islam begins with two refineries in its home territory, one nuclear weapon, and §16 in starting funds.
European Union
Union européenne
The European Union as it exists today dates from the Maastricht Treaty of 2009, the culmination of about six decades of slow economic and political integration between Western and, since the end of the Cold War, Central European countries. Although strong popular movements and foreign interference alike has challenged the integrity of this unprecedented union of independent nations, the European Union was able to achieve some success in holding itself together while steadily pulling itself out of the shadow of NATO and US military support into an independent economic, military, and diplomatic superpower of its own right. In recent decades, however, its dependence on imported energy sources, made worse by the rapid collapse of North Sea oil production in the early 21st Century, proved a crucial weakness. With the rich Arab oil fields under the control of what would eventually develop into a rabidly anti-western alliance and Russian gas imports unreliable and politically unfeasible, the European Union was forced to look outwards with a greedy eye. If the European Union expects to ward off internal separatists and foreign imperialists alike, Clausewitz' legacy must be kept alive...
The European Union starts with the following national spirits:
United Nations Secretariat -- The European Union may suspend one national spirit of a superpower other than itself. Changing which national spirit of which superpower to suspend incurs a one turn delay.
Welfare Dependence -- The number of terrorist armies produced when the European Union fails to meet its social policy obligations is doubled.
The European Union begins with two refineries in its home territory, two nuclear weapons, and §24 in starting funds.
India
भारत गणराज्य
The history of modern India dates itself from 1947, when India, then known as the British Raj, seized its independence from the war-weary United Kingdom recovering from the devastation of the Second World War. For several decades, despite being governed by a diplomatically well-connected and liberal regime, India remained a devastatingly poor nation wracked by widespread extreme poverty. The nation began to take a different path, however, following the end of the Cold War around the turn of the century. Although the economic and political reforms pushed through by emerging forces in the political scene began to grind away at India's longstanding liberal and democratic traditions, they also delivered strong economic growth and great prosperity to the Indian people. Now, this path of economic prosperity at all costs is beginning to come up against its limits, with the world resource market increasingly strained and even the smallest rise in the standard of living costly when multiplied by India's one and a half billion people. If India seeks to continue its growth, that growth must come at the cost of others; perhaps the same industrialised powers that have so humiliated India and the rest of the "third world" in the past...
India starts with the following national spirits:
Structural Adjustments -- India may construct refineries for §1 less each, or §2 less in territories in which India has the absolute majority of all present armies.
Megacity Slums -- Terrorist armies may be transferred into India even if there are not enough terrorists already present in India to facilitate the transfer.
India begins with two refineries in its home territory, one nuclear weapon, and §16 in starting funds.
Russia
Росси́йская Федера́ция
Russia entered the twenty-first century a dying power. Born of the shattered remains of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia had to contend with, from the beginning of the re-emergence of its tricolour, antiquated military, antiquated infrastructure, antiquated civil service, and antiquated industry. Any democratic aspirations of the Russian people might have harboured following the fall of the USSR was quickly waved away, and under the strong leadership of technically elected Presidents, the country dragged itself into the post-industrial era, painful year by painful year. With the rich, if somewhat outdated, military history and traditions of its predecessor states to draw on, the Russian Federation re-emerged into the middle of the century a superpower to contend with, asserting itself against the little Eastern European states on its border and setting brush wars across the "Western" Middle East. Now, once more, the Russian people face the wealthy superpowers of the world with a grim determination that their homeland will forever remain theirs. But the bear must move carefully yet quickly, before the great game stacks itself against the world's least populous superpower...
Russia starts with the following national spirits:
Rodina -- Russian armies add an additional 6-sided die instead of a 4-sided one to attack/defence dice rolls in territories in which Russia holds at least one refinery originally built by itself.
Infrastructural Decay -- Russian-built refineries suffer the -§1 per turn modifier from old refineries beginning on the second instead of fourth turn of its production.
Russia begins with two refineries in its home territory, four nuclear weapons, and §24 in starting funds.
United States
The United States of America
Having declared its independence in 1776 and established its government in 1789, the United States has over two and a half centuries of history behind it and is the oldest of the six currently surviving superpowers that reign over the world today. Although, following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States was once the indisputable sole hyperpower of the world, able to bend almost any other nation to its will, its status as the world's foremost superpower has come under increasing fire both literal and metaphorical in recent decades, with both rabid Russian remilitarisation under Putin and his successors, strong Chinese economic growth throughout the early 21st Century, and, more recently, Islamic fundamentalism, all setting a thousand little fires under smaller American allies who found such an "alliance" increasingly less helpful as the years passed by. Now, for the first time in half a century, the United States looks out beyond its borders and sees not a world full of opportunities, but one fraught with enemies and pitfalls. It's time to dust off those Cold War jet fighters, and prepare for yet another struggle for the survival of its way of life...
The United States starts with the following national spirits:
Superpower Realpolitik -- The United States may recruit armies in minor power territories in which it has at least one navy, and armies so recruited may defend on the turn they are recruited.
Inefficient Procurement -- Maintenance costs of American armies is doubled.
The United States begins with two refineries in its home territory, four nuclear weapons, and §32 in starting funds.
Map of the World
The College of Industrial Engineering
a.k.a. "miscellaneous information"
Applications
Note: This RP requires stable and reliable commitment from all six of the mechanically relevant superpowers. As such, I will only accept superpower applications from roleplayers who submit a roleplaying sample that demonstrates their ability to write well with reasonably correct English writing conventions, and stay committed in a roleplay that lasts for at least a month. If you are unable to supply such a sample, consider applying for a non-superpower.
Note: As is typical with Portal to the Multiverse roleplays, delete all parentheses from applications.
Superpower Application
Non-Superpower Application
Accepted Players
The Superpowers
China - empty
Dar al-Islam - empty
European Union - empty
India - empty
Russia - Labstoska
United States - empty
Other Applications
None applicable
Concept and mechanics inspired by the board games Tomorrow and War on Terror
Some ideas adopted from roleplays previously hosted by Harkback Union
Posterity will remember it as the Disappointing Century.
To think, it has started so well. The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 removed, or so it seemed, the last serious obstacle to the establishment of peace, freedom, and capitalist prosperity to every last man, woman, and child on Earth. Some even spoke of an "End to History," as all ideological alternative to liberal democratic forms of government disappear. The Information Revolution was swinging in full speed, with an increasingly interconnected telecommunications network, and this new "Internet" began putting five thousand years of human knowledge and discoveries at the fingertips of those who care to look. Global trade brought industrialisation and employment to the world's poorer billions as cheaper products flooded the markets of service economies, to the delight of consumers. Civilisation was a wonderful dream that would take us into utopia forever and ever and ever...
Then the dream shattered.
The diversion of billions of tons of water into vast irrigation projects collapsed the volatile ecologies of savannas, as Madrid, Beijing, and Kansas City alike saw first, dust, then sand carried by the wind into windowsills and storm drains. The slow burn of our planet's atmosphere accelerated into a fevered fire as emissions agreement after emissions agreement fell through negotiation tables. Unchecked industrial pollution choked the world's rivers, with entire communities poisoned by water sources they've trusted for generations, and the Pacific Garbage Patch started being noted on world maps. The global environment was thrown into disarray.
With neither their traditional nor modern ways of life sustainable under the threat of ever greater natural disasters and ever more deformed shorelines, many of the world's poorest millions packed their bags and left. The slums of Kuala Lumpur and the small farms of the Congolese jungles provided a truly endless supply of desperate people wracked both by the mundane threats of hunger and illness as well as those of terror and oppression knocking on the gates of where, anywhere, life would hopefully be better. With ever more expensive and sophisticated border security came ever more intelligent and thought out loopholes by which to circumvent them. Not even the vast wealth of the United States nor the vast cities of the Chinese heartland could accommodate all of them.
As the world's cities struggled to contain the destruction of the natural world around them and a strong influx in immigrant populations, they found themselves increasingly bereft of the means by which to do so. The 2008 financial crisis was only the prologue to the spectacle of recession that would haunt the world's most developed economies for the next several decades. Rapid displacement of labour, caused by the increasing computerisation of what were once well-paying middle class jobs, sent tens of millions of souls to the tender mercies of the social security system as an entire generation grew up, radicalised and disillusioned, with no hope for a brighter future. Capitalism, it seemed, was obsolete... but what new paradigm was to replace it?
Rampant resources shortages that grew increasingly common as the century went on did not help the situation one iota. The final peak in hydrocarbon production, 2022, was followed by a series of devastating energy crises and renewed proxy wars in the dormant battlefields of the Middle East, South America, and West Africa. Not even a surge in unconventional shale oil production in Canada, nor fracking techniques in what used to be protected reserves of the United States, nor the new clathrate extraction technologies in Japan could reverse the trend of an ever-decreasing energy supply. Not any more than a renewed interest in recycling efforts could catch the skyrocketing prices of copper or phosphorous.
Millions of disillusioned young men and women wandering the neon-lit streets of a world that no longer felt as bright as it looked... it was the perfect breeding ground for a new, and yet so very familiar, type of great men. China, never a democracy, grew into a prominent great power on the backs of its export industries, presenting a new challenge to the liberal world order as Russia, under Putin and his successors, showed the world that an elected government was no great security against authoritarianism. Meanwhile, the forces that should have been the most strident defenders of liberty - the established free regimes of Western Europe and North America - rotted from the insides, as ambitious politicians promised to angry masses that they and they alone could solve the nation's problems, if only the voters would get rid of all these silly regulations and institutions preventing them from doing so.
Environmental destruction, refugee migrations, economic crisis, resource shortages, and authoritarian populism... any one of these would have given a budding post-industrial civilisation a nightmare to work through. All of them, happening at once, was overwhelming. Old certainties were destroyed, and new ones arose.
The Second Hague Environmental Conference of 2037 was the final straw that jolted the world awake from the dreams of a post-industrial utopia. An emergency meeting of all the world's nations held just as the raised waters from Typhoon Rumbia was finally draining out of the streets of Singapore, this was, perhaps, the last opportunity for the world to turn itself around.
Successful, it wasn't.
As exhausted diplomats returned home, after days of wrangling between old enemies and allies alike, as the world finally let out the breath that it has been holding, and as it became obvious that nobody would take anything signed at the Conference seriously, the world's great powers finally realised.
They were now on their own.
The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism for Dummies!
a.k.a. "the rules and mechanics"
1. The Ministry of Truth
...our troops will without fail return victorious by Christmas...
An Apocalyptic Nightmare is a mechanics-based roleplay, set in a near-future Earth that is a mild dystopia. Six superpower players each represent one of these six superpower states seeking to dominate this world. Any number of players may represent non-superpowers. These may cover influential people, NGOs, governments of minor powers, international co-operative bodies, et cetera. Non-superpowers may be featured and their input requested in events and international crises, but they otherwise have no mechanical relevance, and do not need to supply orders every turn.
tip: as a superpower, do not ignore non-superpowers, lest you be hit with terrible events and crises
If you choose to apply as a non-superpower, you have no need to read the remainder of these mechanics. Skip to the applications section below.
Action is taken in simultaneous turns, which each represent the passage of one year's time in-character. All orders must be delivered by telegram to the original poster. Ambiguous orders that have no clear and singular interpretation will be ignored. Players should submit by telegram their orders for the turn no later than 48 hours after the original poster announcing the beginning of the turn. Orders submitted later may not be accepted if the original poster has already begun preparing for the next turn.
The world is divided into regions separated from each other by white lines. Click on this link to view the map; alternately, an image is provided below, below the list of superpowers. 16 of these regions contain significant land, and are referred to as territories. 7 others do not contain significant land, and are referred to as oceans. Of the 16 territories, six are considered home territories, from which each of the six superpowers are based. The other 10 are referred to as minor power territories. Regions are considered adjacent to each other if they share a common border.
A superpower is considered suppressed if it possesses fewer military units in its home territory than every other superpower and terrorists combined. A superpower is victorious if it emerges as the sole superpower that is not suppressed. Non-superpowers do not have victory conditions, as they are not a formal part of the rules.
tip: allies cannot win together, but winning without temporary allies would be an impossible feat indeed
Two regions, the United States and North Africa, have two coasts. Two territories are considered coastally adjacent to each other if there is a border between the territories runs along a coast. A territory with one coast is considered coastally adjacent to a coast of an adjacent territory with two coasts if the border between the two territories runs along the specified coast. A territory is considered coastally adjacent to an ocean if the territory shares a border with the ocean; if the territory has two coasts, the ocean is only considered coastally adjacent to the coast that faces that ocean.
Occasionally, events or decisions that only affect one superpower may occur. These occur at the discretion of the original poster, and will be used both to facilitate interesting roleplaying and to reward well-written in-character posts.
RANDOM.ORG will be used to generate the results of any necessary dice rolls. There is a considerable element of luck in these roleplay mechanics.
Within these rules, should two statements contradict, the interpretation of the statement describing the more unusual and specific situation will prevail over the more general statement. Results of events, decisions, and international crises may also permanently revise these rules.
2. The Ministry of Plenty
...produced in the last 5-Year Plan 144 million pairs of shoes...
The world economy revolves around the control of vital energy resources, and resources are measured in energy credits (§). Vital energy credits are primarily earned through hydrocarbon extraction from territories, for which refineries must be constructed.
Energy credits and refineries built in a region may be freely gifted between superpowers. Orders to gift refineries must clarify which refinery of which region is being gifted, and will transfer alongside the refinery any income generated by that refinery that turn, if there are any. No other superpower resource may be so traded. Gifts are not revealed to superpowers other than the one giving it and the one receiving it, unless the gift order by the superpower giving it specifically clarifies that it should be revealed.
tip: beware that if you trade with another superpower by gifting to each other, you have no means of cancelling the gift even if the other superpower doesn't keep up their side of the deal
Each territory has an integer extraction number between 2 and 12. The extraction numbers of minor power territories are unknown, except for Central Asia with a known extraction number of seven, and will be revealed to a superpower once that superpower has deployed at least three armies (see section 4 for more on armies) or constructed at least one refinery in that territory.
At the beginning of each turn, three six-sided die are rolled. All refineries built in territories with an extraction number that matches the sum of any pair of die so rolled will produce an income of energy credits for that turn. For example, if the numbers rolled are 2, 4, and 5, then territories with extraction numbers of 6 (2 + 4), 7 (2 + 5), and 9 (4 + 5) will produce energy credits that turn. Double rolls are counted -- for example, if the numbers rolled are 2, 2, and 3, then refineries in the territories with the extraction number of 5 will produce twice. If all three dice are rolled to the same value, one will be re-rolled until it no longer shows the same value.
tip: build refineries in many different territories to reduce uncertainties in energy income
The number of energy credits each refinery produces is dependent on the highest number of refineries there was at any one point in that territory. If there were never more than one refinery in a territory, it will produce §20. If there are or used to be two, §11 each; three, §8; four, §6; five to six, §5; seven to nine, §4; ten and higher, §3. Furthermore, a penalty of -§1 production will be applied per turn of production in excess of three turns, to a minimum of §1 per refinery. If the territory contains more terrorists than refineries and more terrorists than armies (see section 4 for more on terrorists), then all refineries will only produce §1 regardless of any other factor.
tip: building a refinery in a territory where another superpower already has a refinery is a good way to drop that superpower's income
Energy credits may be used to fund social policies, espionage, crisis resolution (all covered in section 3), unit maintenance, military unit recruitment, terrorist incitement (all covered in section 4), and refinery construction (already covered in this section). How much a superpower spends on espionage, terrorist incitement, or crisis resolution is not revealed. How many energy credits a superpower has saved is also not revealed.
Refineries cost §6 to construct, and may be constructed by any superpower in any territory on the map unless that territory contains armies of another superpower but no armies of the constructing superpower. Refineries may be destroyed freely by the superpower owning it. This may be useful to replace old and unproductive refineries with new and more productive refineries without raising the total refinery count.
3. The Ministry of Love
...with a supermajority of 164 members in the National Assembly...
The cost to properly fund social policies is either some percentage of the sum of the total number of refineries and mobile units on the map rounded down. This percentage is 15% for the superpower with the most military units plus refineries (initially the United States), 10% for the second (Russia), 7.5% for the third and fourth (China and the European Union), 5% for the fifth and sixth (Dar al-Islam and India), plus 2.5% extra for each terrorist army in the superpower's home territory, or the social policy cost for that superpower in the previous turn, whichever is higher. If it is not fully paid, then one terrorist army appears in the superpower, plus one more per §4 in social policy cost not paid, rounded up (see section 4 for more on terrorists or armies).
tip: social policy costs do not ever decrease -- reconsider climbing up the rankings if you are unsure if you can sustain the costs of the higher rank
tip: recall that energy credit incomes are not fully predictable; consider maintaining a reserve to ensure you can pay for social policies even in turns when none of your refineries produce
Spies may be recruited for §6 each, and may be used for espionage beginning from the turn following their recruitment.
Using a spy for offensive espionage costs §4, and the spy may conduct one of the following espionage missions against one other superpower. If desired, the superpower issuing the offensive espionage order may choose to clarify the order as public, in which case any information revealed will be announced to every superpower.
Target Industrialist: all minor power extraction numbers known to the target will be revealed to the spy; the age, in production turns, of all refineries possessed by the target will be revealed to the spy; he number of energy credits a superpower has saved will be revealed to the spy. All information so revealed will be current as of the end of the turn in which the mission is conducted.
Target Politician: the target's actions for the last 4 turns including the current turn will be revealed to the spy; one randomly-selected order from the target's current turn orders will be interrupted.
Target Diplomat: Any terrorist action and offensive espionage orders or gifts made by the target superpower this turn are ignored, and revealed to the spy; the number of spies owned by the target superpower is revealed to the spy.
Target Union Boss: a mobile military unit or refinery of the target superpower is destroyed (the order must clarify which one is to be destroyed); the target superpower loses §4 or however many energy credits it has saved, whichever is lower.
Support. Support the offensive mission of another spy in the superpower.
A spy may be used defensively in any superpower including the spy-owner for §2. This protects the target superpower from foreign offensive espionage. Conducting defensive espionage in a foreign superpower will be revealed to the superpower protected.
To determine the success of offensive espionage missions, a 6-sided die is rolled. -1 is added for each spy on a defensive espionage mission in that superpower. +1 is added for each spy supporting the offensive mission. On a roll of 3 or higher, the offensive mission succeeds. On a roll of 2 or lower, the offensive mission fails. On a roll of 1 or lower, the target superpower learns what mission was attempted. On a roll of 0 or lower, the target superpower learns by which superpower's spy it was targeted. On a roll of -1 or lower, the spy on the offensive mission (but not the supporting spies) is killed. On a roll of -2 or lower, the mission is such a dramatic spectacle of a failure that every superpower will learn which superpower so horribly botched up the mission (but, other than the target superpower, will not learn who the target was or what mission was attempted).
tip: defensive espionage costs less than offensive espionage; espionage arms races always favour the defender
A spy that is idle costs a base maintenance of §1, and may be disbanded at any time.
Occasionally, an international crisis will involve multiple superpowers and demand the contribution of energy credits to the crisis. How to contribute to an international crisis and what the effects of an international crisis is depends on the specific international crisis, and will be announced alongside the crisis itself. International crises occur at the discretion of the original poster, and will be used to encourage roleplaying.
4. The Ministry of Peace
...an unprovoked renunciation of the Pact of Non-Aggression...
The sole non-mobile military unit is the nuclear weapon. Nuclear weapons are not placed on the map, but are considered to be part of an abstract superpower "stockpile." Nuclear weapons cost §15 to construct, and have no maintenance. The world sees nuclear weapons not as a regular part in a nation's arsenal of war, but as a tool of last resort. As such, nuclear weapons may only be used by superpowers that have foreign armies in that superpower's home territory, and may only be used against territories in which the owner of the offending foreign army has at least one military unit or refinery.
Once used, the used nuclear weapon is destroyed. Every mobile military unit and refinery from every superpower in the territory attacked is destroyed. The targeted territory gains the Nuclear Fallout (-§1 to the output of refineries) modifier. If the territory targeted was a minor power territory, it also gains the Chronic Instability (if the territory does not at the beginning of the turn hold a terrorist army, one is generated) modifier. If the target was a superpower home territory, the superpower gains the Reconstruction (the social policy cost ratio of the superpower is increased by 5%) national spirit.
tip: a large nuclear stockpile is the best deterrence against invasion of your home territory, but seriously reconsider if the high costs are worth it
Two types of mobile military units are identified: armies and navies. Armies may exist in a territory. Navies may exist in territories or oceans. If a navy is in a territory with two coasts, it must also be specified which coast the navy exists in. Armies and navies exist in one of two states: not exhausted ("fresh"), and exhausted. The location and loyalties of all mobile military units are always known.
Armies and navies each cost §6 to recruit, and §1 per turn to maintain. If this maintenance cost is not fully paid, a number of units corresponding to the amount of maintenance not paid must be disbanded. Units are always recruited in the home territory of the constructing superpower. If a navy is being recruited in a territory with two coasts, the recruitment must specify on which coast the navy is being recruited in. An army or navy is not considered to exist in the turn in which it is recruited.
Each army or navy may execute one order each turn. Exhausted units may only execute movement and disband orders. Military orders are announced to every superpower. The list of available orders is as follows:
Disband. A unit is removed from play.
Movement. An army of a superpower may be ordered to move from the home territory of that superpower to an adjacent territory, vice versa, or between two minor power territories that are adjacent to each other and to the home territory of that superpower without convoys. An army may move from any territory to any other territory provided that the appropriate convoys are provided. A navy may move from a territory or ocean to a coastally adjacent territory or ocean. If an exhausted army is unable to complete a movement order due to a lack of convoys, it is disbanded. Fresh units that execute a movement order are also considered to be defending in its destination region that turn.
Convoy. A navy may assist the movement of an army from one territory to another. For each army moved, one navy must be ordered to convoy in each region the army will need to pass through en route to its destination. Armies must pass through at least one intermediate region unless it is executing a movement order that does not require convoys, each region passed through must be coastally adjacent to the previous region in the route. The army being convoyed must be specified in a convoy order.
Defend. An army or navy holds its current position and will resist hostile attacks on itself. Units that receive no orders will be assumed to be defending.
Defend and support. An army or navy holds its current position and will resist hostile attacks on itself, the units of any other superpower(s), or terrorists. The order must specify which other superpowers are to be supported, and whether terrorists are to be supported.
Hold. If an exhausted unit is unable to move, it will hold.
Attack. An army or navy will attack the defending armies and navies in that territory or ocean. The target of the attack must be specified, and may be a superpower, a set of superpowers, the terrorists, or a set of superpowers and terrorists. All armies or navies of one superpower ordered to attack in any given territory or ocean must have the same target or targets. If multiple superpowers order attacks in the same territory or ocean, they are resolved in random order.
tip: if you have the dominant military position in a region, consider attacking multiple enemies at once to speed up your consolidation of the region
In an attack, a four-sided die is rolled for each attacking unit. A four-sided die is rolled for each defending unit targeted. Only defending units of the same type (army or navy) as the attacking units are considered. For the purposes of resolving attacks, navies on different coasts of territories that have two coasts are not considered to be in the same territory. +1 is added to the defending roll. Unless the attack was made using navies in a territory, then another +1 is added to the defending roll for each refinery possessed by the defending superpower or superpowers in that region. The side with the higher total emerges victorious. The losing side exhausts a number of units equivalent to one-third the margin by which it lost, rounded up. If there are multiple defending parties, the losses are distributed randomly. If there are no more non-exhausted defending units left to exhaust, then exhausted units are disbanded in lieu of non-exhausted units being exhausted.
tip: these battle mechanics mean that a heavily outnumbered force cannot even inflict casualties on the enemy; consider finding allies to support and be supported by
Should the defending side find itself with no remaining non-exhausted defending units of the type attacked, all units of the same type of the defending parties in that territory or ocean, even if not defending, are exhausted and their orders interrupted. If the attack was made using armies, half the refineries of the defending parties in the territory, rounded up, is destroyed and the remainder transferred to the attacker. A terrorist army appears in that territory for each refinery so destroyed. Terrorist armies are not exhausted, and are destroyed in situations where they are to be exhausted.
An exhausted unit in its own superpower's home territory may also be ordered to recover, which will remove the exhaustion from the unit. This costs §2 per unit.
Terrorist armies may, in addition to appearing in previously mentioned situations, also be recruited by any superpower in any minor power territory for §3. Energy credits may also be freely donated to terrorists. Superpowers that choose to do either may also issue terrorist incitement orders in that turn. One terrorist incitement order may be issued per every three territories in which there exists at least one terrorist army, rounded up, with a minimum of one. Terrorist incitement orders are to be listed in order of priority. The following orders may be issued to terrorists:
tip: inciting terrorists is an excellent way of meddling in conflicts that are too far from your home territory for you to send regular military units
Raid. All the terrorist armies of one specified territory attack the armies of one specified superpower in that region. Any refineries transferred to terrorists as a result of the battle are converted into more terrorists.
Transfer. Some number of terrorist armies in one specified territory, up to the half number of terrorist armies there are in that territory rounded up, moves to a different territory. In the destination territory and, if the destination and origin territories are not directly adjacent, in each territory in between passed through, there must already be present a number of terrorist armies not lower than the number being transferred.
Defend and Support. Identical to the regular military unit order of the same name.
Sleep. All the terrorist armies in one specified territory will hold and resist any other superpower attempting to incite them.
tip: remember that a high number of terrorist armies affect income of refineries in that territory; terrorists can thus be useful even if they are sleeping
A fixed number of terrorist incitement orders, equal to the number issued by each inciting superpower, is distributed between the inciting superpowers in proportion to their relative contribution to the terrorist cause (a recruited terrorist army is equivalent to §1 in donations), and that number of orders from each superpower is executed. It will not be revealed which superpowers issued which incitement orders.
2040 World Almanac
a.k.a. "the superpowers"
China
中华人民共和国
After its reunification in 1948, in the aftermath of the Chinese Civil War and the shadow of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the world's most populous nation, for China was such in those times, remained in abject poverty. China's rise to superpower status began with Deng Xiao-ping's liberalisation policies, which in just a few decades transformed China from an agrarian low-income country to a developed post-industrial one. The slowly growing isolationism of the United States and its withdrawal from world affairs in the late 2010s and the 2020s created a great power void in Asia, which China, with its new wealth and the military and diplomatic leverage that affords, grew to fill. Its high dependence on imported petroleum, however, proved a crucial weakness as the conventional oil fields around the world began to run dry. With necessity forcing it to take the front stage in world markets and diplomatic forums at the exact moment when the superpowers of the west were coming out of their isolationist hibernation to do the same, China faces a difficult road ahead. To save a billion people from being thrown back to poverty, China needs to act further than ever more decisively than ever, whether it is ready to do so or not...
China starts with the following national spirits:
Export Economy -- China earns §1 per refinery built in a foreign superpower home territory, each turn refineries in home territories generate revenue.
Brown Water Navy -- Chinese navies in oceans cost §2 instead of §1 to maintain.
China begins with two refineries in its home territory, two nuclear weapons, and §24 in starting funds.
Dar al-Islam
دار الإسلام
Born from the fires of the Resource Wars of the 2020s and the 2030s, the exact moment when the loose anti-Saudi coalition between Syria, Iraq, and Iran turned into a proper superpower is unclear, but historians usually cite the 2036 Push to the Sea as the moment when the House of Islam finally left the shadows of Russian support to become a united superpower of its own power. The traditionally petroleum-based economies of the region suffered greatly when the oil began to run dry, but this also meant that the world's existing superpowers were no longer particularly interested in using the Middle East as a chessboard for their great game. Drawing upon the extensive militarisation of the region, the legacy of decades of chronic instability, and the last dregs that remained of their half a century of domination in the global energy market, Dar al-Islam pushed against the foreign-backed puppet regimes that dotted the Middle East and North Africa, returning the cradle of civilisation into prominence. But the further they push, the greater the backlash, and the time is rapidly approaching when Dar al-Islam would have to finally confront the many superpowers that watches its growth with concern...
Dar al-Islam starts with the following national spirits:
Al-Qaeda Contacts -- Dar al-Islam may recruit terrorist armies in superpower home territories for §5 each, or §4 if the territory already contains at least one terrorist army.
International Sanctions -- Any contribution Dar al-Islam makes towards international crises resolution is only 1/2 as effective.
Dar al-Islam begins with two refineries in its home territory, one nuclear weapon, and §16 in starting funds.
European Union
Union européenne
The European Union as it exists today dates from the Maastricht Treaty of 2009, the culmination of about six decades of slow economic and political integration between Western and, since the end of the Cold War, Central European countries. Although strong popular movements and foreign interference alike has challenged the integrity of this unprecedented union of independent nations, the European Union was able to achieve some success in holding itself together while steadily pulling itself out of the shadow of NATO and US military support into an independent economic, military, and diplomatic superpower of its own right. In recent decades, however, its dependence on imported energy sources, made worse by the rapid collapse of North Sea oil production in the early 21st Century, proved a crucial weakness. With the rich Arab oil fields under the control of what would eventually develop into a rabidly anti-western alliance and Russian gas imports unreliable and politically unfeasible, the European Union was forced to look outwards with a greedy eye. If the European Union expects to ward off internal separatists and foreign imperialists alike, Clausewitz' legacy must be kept alive...
The European Union starts with the following national spirits:
United Nations Secretariat -- The European Union may suspend one national spirit of a superpower other than itself. Changing which national spirit of which superpower to suspend incurs a one turn delay.
Welfare Dependence -- The number of terrorist armies produced when the European Union fails to meet its social policy obligations is doubled.
The European Union begins with two refineries in its home territory, two nuclear weapons, and §24 in starting funds.
India
भारत गणराज्य
The history of modern India dates itself from 1947, when India, then known as the British Raj, seized its independence from the war-weary United Kingdom recovering from the devastation of the Second World War. For several decades, despite being governed by a diplomatically well-connected and liberal regime, India remained a devastatingly poor nation wracked by widespread extreme poverty. The nation began to take a different path, however, following the end of the Cold War around the turn of the century. Although the economic and political reforms pushed through by emerging forces in the political scene began to grind away at India's longstanding liberal and democratic traditions, they also delivered strong economic growth and great prosperity to the Indian people. Now, this path of economic prosperity at all costs is beginning to come up against its limits, with the world resource market increasingly strained and even the smallest rise in the standard of living costly when multiplied by India's one and a half billion people. If India seeks to continue its growth, that growth must come at the cost of others; perhaps the same industrialised powers that have so humiliated India and the rest of the "third world" in the past...
India starts with the following national spirits:
Structural Adjustments -- India may construct refineries for §1 less each, or §2 less in territories in which India has the absolute majority of all present armies.
Megacity Slums -- Terrorist armies may be transferred into India even if there are not enough terrorists already present in India to facilitate the transfer.
India begins with two refineries in its home territory, one nuclear weapon, and §16 in starting funds.
Russia
Росси́йская Федера́ция
Russia entered the twenty-first century a dying power. Born of the shattered remains of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia had to contend with, from the beginning of the re-emergence of its tricolour, antiquated military, antiquated infrastructure, antiquated civil service, and antiquated industry. Any democratic aspirations of the Russian people might have harboured following the fall of the USSR was quickly waved away, and under the strong leadership of technically elected Presidents, the country dragged itself into the post-industrial era, painful year by painful year. With the rich, if somewhat outdated, military history and traditions of its predecessor states to draw on, the Russian Federation re-emerged into the middle of the century a superpower to contend with, asserting itself against the little Eastern European states on its border and setting brush wars across the "Western" Middle East. Now, once more, the Russian people face the wealthy superpowers of the world with a grim determination that their homeland will forever remain theirs. But the bear must move carefully yet quickly, before the great game stacks itself against the world's least populous superpower...
Russia starts with the following national spirits:
Rodina -- Russian armies add an additional 6-sided die instead of a 4-sided one to attack/defence dice rolls in territories in which Russia holds at least one refinery originally built by itself.
Infrastructural Decay -- Russian-built refineries suffer the -§1 per turn modifier from old refineries beginning on the second instead of fourth turn of its production.
Russia begins with two refineries in its home territory, four nuclear weapons, and §24 in starting funds.
United States
The United States of America
Having declared its independence in 1776 and established its government in 1789, the United States has over two and a half centuries of history behind it and is the oldest of the six currently surviving superpowers that reign over the world today. Although, following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States was once the indisputable sole hyperpower of the world, able to bend almost any other nation to its will, its status as the world's foremost superpower has come under increasing fire both literal and metaphorical in recent decades, with both rabid Russian remilitarisation under Putin and his successors, strong Chinese economic growth throughout the early 21st Century, and, more recently, Islamic fundamentalism, all setting a thousand little fires under smaller American allies who found such an "alliance" increasingly less helpful as the years passed by. Now, for the first time in half a century, the United States looks out beyond its borders and sees not a world full of opportunities, but one fraught with enemies and pitfalls. It's time to dust off those Cold War jet fighters, and prepare for yet another struggle for the survival of its way of life...
The United States starts with the following national spirits:
Superpower Realpolitik -- The United States may recruit armies in minor power territories in which it has at least one navy, and armies so recruited may defend on the turn they are recruited.
Inefficient Procurement -- Maintenance costs of American armies is doubled.
The United States begins with two refineries in its home territory, four nuclear weapons, and §32 in starting funds.
Map of the World
The College of Industrial Engineering
a.k.a. "miscellaneous information"
Applications
Note: This RP requires stable and reliable commitment from all six of the mechanically relevant superpowers. As such, I will only accept superpower applications from roleplayers who submit a roleplaying sample that demonstrates their ability to write well with reasonably correct English writing conventions, and stay committed in a roleplay that lasts for at least a month. If you are unable to supply such a sample, consider applying for a non-superpower.
Note: As is typical with Portal to the Multiverse roleplays, delete all parentheses from applications.
Superpower Application
- Code: Select all
[size=125]Application[/size]
[b]Superpower:[/b] (one of the six listed above)
[b]Initial Social Policy Rank:[/b] (if you read the mechanics, you should know what this means)
[b]Ambition:[/b] (this will influence the kind of events and crises I generate)
[b]Roleplaying Sample:[/b] (link to a prior RP you were a participant in)
Non-Superpower Application
- Code: Select all
[b]Name:[/b]
[b]Head of Organisation:[/b] (leader and title; delete this segment if you are roleplaying as an individual)
[b]Type:[/b] (what kind of person or organisation is it?)
[b]Ambition:[/b] (this will influence the kind of events and crises I involve you in)
[b]Description:[/b] (200 words minimum; this also serves as your roleplaying sample)
Accepted Players
The Superpowers
China - empty
Dar al-Islam - empty
European Union - empty
India - empty
Russia - Labstoska
United States - empty
Other Applications
None applicable
