Australia? Options

[Zalbaar]

I was thinking of making a hunter/survivalist character from Australia. the only problem is i don't know anything about the state of Australia during the 2070s, so i was wondering if anyone could suggest some books that could inform me about the land down under.

[Martin_DeVries_I...]

Target: Wastelands is a 3rd edition book; the first half or so is about Awakened Australia. I'll dig it up and see what I can tell you, tho I'm sure someone else will chime in with info before I can get it. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) All I really recall are drop bears (HMHVV koalas), bunyips (monstrous critters--no one has seen one and survived), and that the Outback is subject to a lot of wild mana storms. Oh, and there are opal caves that were apparently used as spirit-prisons in previous Ages.

[Minchandre]

Target: Awaken Lands might as well be called "Land of Oz: the Sourcebook".

There's also a little bit in Shadows of Asia, IIRC.

[Martin_DeVries_I...]

OK, here's what I get from a quick scan of T:AL.
-Aborigines, naturally, have their own form of magic. You can read about this in Street Magic.
-Mana storms began on 12/24/11 and were so severe that the government declared the Outback a disaster area. In 2012 a storm hit Sydney; it cut the city off for two weeks and is still sporadically ongoing. Sydney became a Free City in 2030, partially because they were getting little help with the manastorm.
-The Universal Brotherhood had a pretty good toehold in Australia. By the time the government moved to squash the insect spirits in the mid-2050s, many of the bugs had already scattered. Brisbane's slums may still have insects lingering around; the Outback is also home to many bugs (there's at least a few very large Termite mounds out there).
-The nation was hit with a drought in 2057 and has never quite recovered. The gov't now enforces water rationing. Water smuggling is quite lucrative.
-The Mafia, Yakuza, and Triads are all strong in Oz. Smaller syndicates abound.

This is just a quick look. Is there anything in particular you were interested in? Will you actually be playing in Australia, or just be from there?

[Traul]

Most important: they have drop bears.

[Martin_DeVries_I...]

They who control the Drop Bears control the Universe.....

[Zalbaar]

My character will just be from Australia, the game we are playing is actually taking place in Germany. I'm mainly trying to get a general feel for the area, what corps have a strong presence, what cities are prominent, and since it is apparently somewhat of wasteland, what type of skills a character would need to survive. I want my guy to be a hunter/survivalist/sniper type guy so i figure he has probably spent quite a bit of time in the outback so he will need to be able to survive out their and in order to survive it i should probably have a good grasp of what kind of dangers the outback has in store.

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

what kind of dangers the outback has in store.

Most important: they have drop bears.

And if you don't know what they are. They are "simply" carnivorous Infected-HMHVV Koala Bears whose favorite tactic to attack someone is drop from the top of a tree on someone below it.
YEAH, IT IS THAT SCARY.

[Zalbaar]

I've read through running wild, so when it comes to critters I figure I have a decent feel of what is present in Australia, but from the sounds of it the critters are but one of the danger present throughout the outback.

[Martin_DeVries_I...]

OK, gotcha. Lemme see what I can do for you.
Cities: Sydney--Free City, essentially corp run. Big players: Aztechnology, Tanamyre (more on them below), Wuxing.
Melbourne--Financial center, home of Australian Stock Exchange. Battleground between Japancorps and the PPG.
Brisbane--Home of many Asian metahuman refugees. Yakuza and Triads are big here, as are Asian corporations.
Canberra--The capitol. Less than a million residents, most of whom seem to be civil servants of some sort rather than corp workers.
Perth--Separated from the rest of the country by the Outback and mana storms. Heavy industry, mining, and shipping, which are run by SK and Renraku. Perth is seen as a gateway into the Outback so maybe your guy is from here.
Cairns--A corporate enclave, with many Japanese corporations. Lots of arcologies and gated communities.
Darwin--Lots of displaced residents from the Outback moved here. Military present to guard against Indonesia. Magical research is heavy here; anyone interested in magic has a facility here.

Corps: Corporations took advantage of the First Crash to buy up over 50% of Oz's rural land. Aztechnology, SK, Shiawase, Tanamyne (Aussie corp--industry, miltech, mining, manufacturing) and Yung Su (Korean corp--agriculture and consumer goods) were the big winners.

Outback: It's not just a desert, but a variety of ecosystems--all of them harsh. Plains, swamps, rainforests, some mountains... Little bit of everything. Water is a commodity and often used to barter with. Magician are invaluable. Aborigines are prevalent, see themselves as protectors of the land, but are usually nice. Many don't speak English though so you'd need linguasofts or a guide.
Bring a lot of water, anti-insect gear, and make sure all your stuff will work in the heat.
RL Australia has a lot of dangerous creatures; the Awakening did not help. Awakened dingos, aforementioned drop bears, metaroos (Awakened kangaroos--sensitive to mana so they can be good indicators that a storm is coming), wombricks (big ass wombats that are essentially Nature's roadblock). Plus there's the creepy-crawlies: pakaitu worms (scary--larval Glass Wasps. They lay hundreds of eggs in fruit; eat the fruit, and 2-3 days later the worms start eating their way out of you), poisonous snakes, redback spiders (dual natured, the size of a fist, and of course poisonous).
And then there's bug spirits, toxics, and (maybe) some dragons.

[AStarshipforAnts]

Outback: It's not just a desert, but a variety of ecosystems--all of them harsh. Plains, swamps, rainforests, some mountains... Little bit of everything. Water is a commodity and often used to barter with. Magician are invaluable. Aborigines are prevalent, see themselves as protectors of the land, but are usually nice. Many don't speak English though so you'd need linguasofts or a guide.
Bring a lot of water, anti-insect gear, and make sure all your stuff will work in the heat.
RL Australia has a lot of dangerous creatures; the Awakening did not help. Awakened dingos, aforementioned drop bears, metaroos (Awakened kangaroos--sensitive to mana so they can be good indicators that a storm is coming), wombricks (big ass wombats that are essentially Nature's roadblock). Plus there's the creepy-crawlies: pakaitu worms (scary--larval Glass Wasps. They lay hundreds of eggs in fruit; eat the fruit, and 2-3 days later the worms start eating their way out of you), poisonous snakes, redback spiders (dual natured, the size of a fist, and of course poisonous).
And then there's bug spirits, toxics, and (maybe) some dragons.

Good God. Like the Outback needed to be more dangerous. Although, it does make one hell of a setting. If it wouldn't outright slaughter all of my players, I'd send them on a trip to do some snipe hunting in the outback.

[Martin_DeVries_I...]

In Australian Outback, snipe hunts you.

EDIT: Sorry. I couldn't help myself.

[Doc Byte]

Once I created a SR Mod where the Outback was taken over by alien invaders, but I guess that's a bit OT... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

Good God. Like the Outback needed to be more dangerous. Although, it does make one hell of a setting. If it wouldn't outright slaughter all of my players, I'd send them on a trip to do some snipe hunting in the outback.

It now makes me wonder how the Geographic Channel, Animal Channel of the 6th World would make recordings of an Awakened fauna and flora... I believe that Awakened parazoologists would be a must have.

[AStarshipforAnts]

Even Awakened Parazoologists would probably need a couple of body guards hanging around just to make the recording process less than a guaranteed suicide mission. And that sounds like a run to me.

[Martin_DeVries_I...]

Scary thing about Oz is--as you noted above, Starship--you could do a run like that and never even need to bring any paracritters into it. The regular animals there are frightening enough!

[AStarshipforAnts]

Scary thing about Oz is--as you noted above, Starship--you could do a run like that and never even need to bring any paracritters into it. The regular animals there are frightening enough!

Makes it one hell of a place to hide, though. Imagine what kinds of crazies are hiding in the Outback, where only people who are equally nutty would go to find them. Depending on the way you look at it, that's either the best or worst bounty hunt ever. Now I'm really going to need the book(s) that cover all of this. I think I might have my next campaign setting.

[Abstruse]

If I'm not mistaken, there's a massive Ant Spirit colony in the middle of the Outback. Like as big as a major city massive.

Also, can anyone remember what happened to the Spider Spirit that tried to awaken in the first novel trilogy waaaaaaaay back when? I can't remember...

[Martin_DeVries_I...]

Taken from Ancient History's site:
-The shadowrunner Twist unknowningly releases the Spider Totem from its captivity in Imiri ti-Versakhan. The Spider totem attempts to gaina ccess to nuclear weapons by transforming its servants into invae-like creatures, but is thwarted adn diminished in power when Twist performs a Great Ghost Dance.

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

but is thwarted adn diminished in power when Twist performs a Great Ghost Dance.

Sounds like the solution to EVERYTHING.

[Hagga]

I was thinking of making a hunter/survivalist character from Australia. the only problem is i don't know anything about the state of Australia during the 2070s, so i was wondering if anyone could suggest some books that could inform me about the land down under.

Sydney finally did what it's been thinking of for years: Take it's ball and go home. "WE're better than you all! We'll start our own country, with blackjack, and hookers!". The outback is impoassable. Well, not entirely but it's more of a hellhole than it is now, with manastorms wracking the country. The aborigines are out playing silly buggers, there's a rogue dragon running around the interior, the wildlife hates us even more (When I pay attention to things I avoid these days, I realise that a lot of the stuff really is nasty - spitfires, magpies, the many varieties of spider and snake I find in the yard, the odd territorial wombat who charges your ankles, the platypus that, on the rare occasion you EVER see one will incapacitate you for six months if you get too close to the males, the plants, oh god, the plants, like that one that spits out spines when disturbed up in the blue mountains, or that god awful lantana vine that shreds my legs). And they're plentiful, too. For example, if I go into the bush at night, and shine a torch, I see quite a few pinpricks. Hundreds, actually, of light. Those are spiders. All of this combines to give the country a siege mentality, and they all live in armed and armoured enclaves where everything is rationed and racism is nearly institutionalised as much as in Tir Tirgaire, with gated communities the norm.

Makes it one hell of a place to hide, though. Imagine what kinds of crazies are hiding in the Outback, where only people who are equally nutty would go to find them. Depending on the way you look at it, that's either the best or worst bounty hunt ever. Now I'm really going to need the book(s) that cover all of this. I think I might have my next campaign setting.

These days, it's a legal reason in the NT and some parts of QLD and WA that you may have a weapon in case of "Indigent threats", which is legal speak, as I understand it, for crazies roaming the outback. When the crazies happen to be even crazier thanks to the manastorm, which they think they avoid by wearing your skin and skipping rope with your intestines makes the storm think you're them so it leaves them alone and are empowered with magic, well, stuff is going to become terrifying.

[Martin_DeVries_I...]

Sydney finally did what it's been thinking of for years: Take it's ball and go home. "WE're better than you all! We'll start our own country, with blackjack, and hookers!". The outback is impoassable. Well, not entirely but it's more of a hellhole than it is now, with manastorms wracking the country. The aborigines are out playing silly buggers, there's a rogue dragon running around the interior, the wildlife hates us even more (When I pay attention to things I avoid these days, I realise that a lot of the stuff really is nasty - spitfires, magpies, the many varieties of spider and snake I find in the yard, the odd territorial wombat who charges your ankles, the platypus that, on the rare occasion you EVER see one will incapacitate you for six months if you get too close to the males, the plants, oh god, the plants, like that one that spits out spines when disturbed up in the blue mountains, or that god awful lantana vine that shreds my legs). And they're plentiful, too. For example, if I go into the bush at night, and shine a torch, I see quite a few pinpricks. Hundreds, actually, of light. Those are spiders. All of this combines to give the country a siege mentality, and they all live in armed and armoured enclaves where everything is rationed and racism is nearly institutionalised as much as in Tir Tirgaire, with gated communities the norm.

"In fact, forget the country! And the blackjack!"

Jesus, dude. That bit about the spiders? That's goddamn frightening, man. Actually pretty much everything you mentioned is horrible. Tell me, is there actually a reason to live in that country? Damn.

[Zalbaar]

Man Australia seems to be a scary place in the 2070s, it would be an awesome place to run a campaign in from the sounds of it.

[Minchandre]

"In fact, forget the country! And the blackjack!"

Jesus, dude. That bit about the spiders? That's goddamn frightening, man. Actually pretty much everything you mentioned is horrible. Tell me, is there actually a reason to live in that country? Damn.

Awesome beaches, food, and women?

[underaneonhalo]

"In fact, forget the country! And the blackjack!"

Jesus, dude. That bit about the spiders? That's goddamn frightening, man. Actually pretty much everything you mentioned is horrible. Tell me, is there actually a reason to live in that country? Damn.

It's good training for the apocalypse?