alt.WAR, Fixing War's problems by writing a new book Options

[Stahlseele]

Isn't lagos simply the biggest black market for milspec on the planet?
That would be reason enough for that.

[Chance359]

I would like to help with this project. I've got some ideas for gear.

[sabs]

Lagos could just be where most Merc companies do their shopping, and keep their nominal Headquarters.

If you want to hire a Merc company, you go to Lagos? I could live with that.

The thing I'm trying to wrap my brain around is that.. currently Mercenary groups get their employment primarily from SE Asia, and Africa.

In 2073, that doesn't make any sense.
Africa is mostly back to it's pre-colonization era, except with way less people. Vitas I and II effectively killed around 90% of the African Subcontinent population. There's been /some/ re population but not much. Most of the Continent is a Highly Magical Nature realm of scary Paracritters. Now, I can see Corps hiring Mercs to go "In Country" and clear out an area of Paracritters/what small pockets of metahumanity remain. But it's not much of a Campaign hook. Maybe a couple of adventure hooks, but that's about it.

Asia, of course is just rife with fun and excitement, but most of that was covered in Shadows of Asia.

China would make for an interesting place. Warlords, Corporate interests, mercenary groups in the middle, working their trade. But that's almost a whole sourcebook on it's own.

Are Amazonia and Aztlan really hiring Mercs to fight the war along side them? If so, what does that look like.

[Doc Chase]

The way I see Lagos...

It's one of those places you can get anything. The corporations use it to field their military surplus without getting sanctioned by the Corporate Court. They can also offload designs that may have fundamental flaws, as they found in Desert Wars testing - but discount-minded mercenary buyers can juryrig it enough to make a fix and get one up on their competitors. All one needs is money.

The Dark Continent may be pre-colonial once more, but it does have two things that have people going batshit insane over it: Rich natural resources, and a plethora of self-styled warlords trying to control them, people be damned.

I'll see what I can do about seeing the current writeup on Lagos and going from there. Don't have Feral Cities, but I get the feeling that a lax national government plus proximity to, say, Desert Wars gives the area a large supply of milspec weaponry and the freedom(and necessity) to use it without having to worry about LEOs coming down on your keister.

**
I think what I would really like to do is revisit the Azzie/Zonie theatre and work in everything. War! suggests there was fighting in Maracaibo between the two - and that makes sense, Venezuela still has petroleum - and the Free City of Caracas was the original border state that kept everyone in check. Its a city that nobody but the people who live there wants.

Caracas can be the Northern Gateway. It's a major shipping hub, all the corporations have offices there because they can make their fleet's ports of origin there for cheap. The harbor security has major holes, so smugglers park in there all the time to offload black market arms. It's about 650 miles as the T-bird flies to Bogota, which can make it a substantial pirate supply point. Once we're done with it, we can ensure it has deeper shadows than most.

It may not be on the same scale as Bogota with open war being fought in/around the city, but I can certainly see a shadow war being fought there with many of the same major players as Bogota - Amazonia, AZT, the Cartels, and the Megacorps. AZT has a substantial military presence based out of Maracaibo, but not on the scale of Bogota's deployment. Companies with a bone to pick with AZT funnel in arms and supplies through La Guaira that is linked by high speed rail to the rest of the Caracas sprawl.

[sabs]

I have an idea in mind for a proto-beast master(from Earthdawn) Adept/Tradition that's being developed/rediscovered in Amazonia.

Not sure if I want to write it up as a primarily adept Tradition, (which doesn't do much) or maybe as a PACKS like common adept build for Amazonia. Or an example character. I'll have to think about it.

They use Paracritters as shocktroops for combat. That means they have trainers, and people who can control a Paracritter in the middle of blood lust, and who can help counter the Aztlan blood mages attempts to use possession spirits.


I just looked at Google Maps, and I realize I have no concept of what the Aztlan/Amazonia border even looks like.

Bogota is in Columbia, Caracas is in Venezuela. There's a giant mountainous area separating those places from Brazil. I would truly hate to be Aztlan trying to fight a land war against paracritters in the mountains.

[Doc Chase]

Parts of War! describe the Amazonians as already using paracritters in the area. Both sides do utilize mercs, but the rules of engagement vary wildly between the two. If you take an Amazonian contract, expect them to deny you use of explosives, chem weapons, and anything else that might damage the ecology of the rainforest.

I'm looking at the maps as well, and I might be able to see the demarcation lines. We'll see.

[sabs]

Yeah, I know they're using paracritters.. I just thought they'd almost have to have adepts who can control said paracritters. Hence the idea for a beastmaster type.

[Doc Chase]

I would agree, which is why I like your idea. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

There's enough mesoamerican history in the jungle to make it workable.

[sabs]

Can you imagine though moving through tight ravines and thick jungle, and getting attacked by intelligently coordinated parajaguars of some kind, or the equivalent of barguests. The Aztlan side of the conflict must be full of really paranoid bastards who lay down suppression fire first, and ask questions never.

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

Yeah, that area makes the Amazonian highlands. While not as muddy and watery, it is still as dampy as the lowlands and no diminishing in the insect population.
But yeah, imagine what it must be for the Aztlan/Aztechnology soldiers. They better shoot anything they find in the woods because it might be an amazonian soldier. If you see a harpy high in the air (the largest bird of prey of the Latin American) do you know for sure it is not a shapeshifter Harpy spying on you? And even if it isn't a shapeshifter, what if an Amazonian shaman didn't cast a spell on it and is watching through its eyes.

Yeah, we better start thinking about RoE for each side.

[sabs]

And we need a better reason for the war than.. They planted man eating trees in Bogota

I mean.. really


For Aztlan to throw down so hard in the South.. so far away from it's traditional base of power. There has to be a reason.

I mean, if the war was happening in Nicaragua.. I could understand. Panama, again, although why would Amazonia be going into panama. But so far into South America? That seems like an odd place for Aztlan to be driving down in such large numbers.

[sabs]

I'm looking at the map of South America, and I don't get why Bogota is the front line.

I could see Caracas being in the thick of it. But for Bogota to be in the thick of it, they have to be doing major fighting in the mountains. The Amazon Basin is completely surrounded by somewhat serious mountains.
The mountains around Bogota go up to 5000 Meters. That's ugly terrain to be fighting a war.

[Doc Chase]

To be honest, I'm seeing the demarcation line following the mountain range Bogota is in, with Aztlan on the west and Amazonia on the east. It would then curve around Lake Maracaibo and south of Caracas, leaving Caracas as a Free City.

As for the start of the war, it was the threat of more killer trees. From what I recall, Amazonia sent a black ops team into a facility that was researching weaponized SDDiablo, only to get caught, destroy the facility, and find out that they were researching SDDrago instead. It was a classic trap to get justification to go to war.

The real reason the Azzies wanted war is because they want to expand, pure and simple. Their casus belli was simply escalating hostilities between them and Amazonia.

[sabs]

So you think the combat zone is the Cordirellas, following that up to the Lago de Maracaibo, and around to Bariquisimeto? With the only flat area for them to fight over being between Bariqusimeto and Caracas basically?


Amazonia controlling the Amazon basin part of Columbia and Venezuela?

[Doc Chase]

I think that was the case before the tanks rolled in, though I'm also wondering if the Azzies getting control of the mountain range would give them elevation for artillery. Amazonian combat doctrine favors strike and fade and guerilla tactics, while AZT has a covnentional combined-arms approach with plenty of firebases and airstrips being cut into the basin.

I think the Corderellas were the border between the two, sort of a DMZ that the wall that was supposed to go up in Bogota was a part of. I figure that AZT has a bunch of these patrol bases they're sending reinforced patrols out of (because seriously, who sends goddamn tanks into the jungle) using T-birds and helos, and a lot of the fighting is going on in the basin and around the borders of Bogota and Caracas itself.

Judging from the extraneous war text in the book, AZT made a major push through Bogota during Ghost Cartels/War. i'll check my 6WA and see if I can get an idea of where the borders of Amazonia are; maybe get a map drawn from there.

[sabs]

The thing is, I'm looking at Bogota.. there's nowhere to venture forward from.

You've got approximately 45 kilometers of 4km high mountain ranges of doom. With only a few passes through to the basin. Then you get to Swamp land, and then you get jungle.

If you go farther north/east it gets a little better nears Caracas.

I'll be honest, I don't see Bogota being the center of jack.. in a war. if I was Aztlan and I had control of Bogota. I'd basically put fire bases at the mountain passes and just try and make sure the Amazonians can't venture through the 2.5km high passes to get to me. There's no way you're pushing a conventional army through that area into the southern part of Columbia.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm...river_basin.png
This is a map of the Amazon River Basin.. So what I would imagine belongs to Amazonia at the begining.

[Doc Chase]

Yeah, I've got a map I'm looking at as well on this end. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

Perhaps I'm going about this the wrong way, then. I'm looking at this in the constraints of established canon. I'm also using geography as my natural border when we should perhaps use the Pan-American Highway as marked on maps/atlases as our national border / DMZ (especially as it encompasses more mountains up by Caracas, including Merida, Trujillo, and Guanare).

I need to get a hold of my books, sit down with 6WA, and just start mapping. I don't want to have to Ghost Dance/Ragnarok Bogota out of that mountain range and into the basin where it'd be halfway worth hitting.

Especially if the people-eating Epileptic Trees are damn near ringing the city now.

[sabs]

Well part of the project is to ignore War completely (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

So we can ignore the freaking people-eating trees... the people eating jungle trees that are growing at 3600 meters altitude.

I'm looking at it from a different perspective. From the map itself.

If Aztlan wants to control more territory. That territory isn't worth controlling, unless you're harvesting magical components and or trees, or both out of it. And with Amazonia being what it is.... it's a magically regrowing Tropical Jungle that has 3 feathered great dragons backing it.

Now a possible scenario is this:
Aztlan is using Bogota as a base of operations. They pushed forward through the mountains. They have forward Fire bases along the rim of the Amazon Basin from which they are running serious Logging/Hunting business. They're doing this because they need to log the area to be able to move their tanks forward.
They're using Transport planes flying out of Bogota and air dropping tanks. (Possibly some Tanks are going through the passes.. but wow that looks ugly)

Meanwhile, there's a serious second front over by Bariquisimeto to the coast Near Caracas? Drawing Amazonian troops to that part, and weakening them for the Bogota incursion on the back end?

It's buyable I guess, but then Bogota isn't being fought over. If it IS being fought over, then the Amazonians took their jungle paracritters through 50km of mountains to attack Bogota, and are doing so even in the Winter. Keeping supplies coming from the Amazon basin. That only works of course, if the Amazonians managed to push Aztlan completely out of the Basin earlier in the War.

[Doc Chase]

Maracaibo is going to be a major hotspot. Amazonia wants to free it from the grip of ecological repression, and the Azzies need the fuel. As an extension, Caracas is the port. If you want supplies, weapons, what-the-hell-ever, it's going through Caracas.

AZT trying to take Amazonian soil is just...insane, there's no other word for it. There's no reason. Let them each bitch and moan, fine, but you're talking about a second Yucatan and we saw how well that went. The only reason Bogota would be any kind of target is to keep Amazonia busy while they're doing something else. Use it as a shell game, draw Amazonia's cells to the southern front, then roll through Caracas from Maracaibo and finish taking the port and the Free City itself.

[sabs]

I completely agree with you. The problem is that drawing Amazonian troops to Bogota is hard. It's 50+ km of Andes mountains, ranging from 1 mile to 2 miles in altitude.

For their to be fighting in Bogota, the Amazonians had to want to stop them in a way where they couldn't restart what they were doing. And really, if the Aztlan gave up control of the passes, it just wouldn't take that many troops to keep the Aztlan out of the basin. Bogota being a wartorn Beirut makes absolutely no sense.

The place I expect to be like Beirut or Stalingrad are Barquisimeto and Valencia.

Where one of the smaller Venezuelan oilfields is.

[Yerameyahu]

You should call it the Netbook of War. Classic. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Is there a wiki or Google Doc or something?

[Doc Chase]

I completely agree with you. The problem is that drawing Amazonian troops to Bogota is hard. It's 50+ km of Andes mountains, ranging from 1 mile to 2 miles in altitude.

Maybe that's why the man-eating Epileptic Trees came in. Maybe the Amazonians need to contain Bogota now?

For their to be fighting in Bogota, the Amazonians had to want to stop them in a way where they couldn't restart what they were doing. And really, if the Aztlan gave up control of the passes, it just wouldn't take that many troops to keep the Aztlan out of the basin. Bogota being a wartorn Beirut makes absolutely no sense.

The place I expect to be like Beirut or Stalingrad are Barquisimeto and Valencia.

Where one of the smaller Venezuelan oilfields is.

I expect few to none of the cities to actually be Beirut, or even Saigon. Maracaibo, maybe. Valencia and Barquisimeto, sure.

[sabs]

Maybe that's why the man-eating Epileptic Trees came in. Maybe the Amazonians need to contain Bogota now?

That only works if the man-eating trees can traverse 60 km of arrid mountains to begin populating the Basin (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
Otherwise, the Amazonians really don't give a fig leaf about them? But I mean.. maybe. Can't we pretend the trees don't exist?

I expect few to none of the cities to actually be Beirut, or even Saigon. Maracaibo, maybe. Valencia and Barquisimeto, sure.

Wait what? THat didn't make sense to me Doc (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Doc Chase]

Give me a second, had to get a second cup of coffee...Ahhh.

Beiruit - Open warfare between multiple factions.
Saigon - Sorta like Baghdad today, or Kabul.

The cities I listed I see like the above. More Saigon than Kabul. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

OKAY no more Epileptic Trees, even if I'm putting a small grove in a park in Caracas because of some crazy ecoshamans.


The only other thing I could figure is that they want Bogota for the emerald mines in the area, and the basin for all the telesma for their sweatshop enchanters. If the forest is magically regrowing at the rate that the setting suggests, then they could probably do with about half the basin and have all the telesma they'd ever need.

Of course, they would have to take the whole basin in order to defend it.

[Grinder]

And we need a better reason for the war than.. They planted man eating trees in Bogota

I mean.. really


For Aztlan to throw down so hard in the South.. so far away from it's traditional base of power. There has to be a reason.

I mean, if the war was happening in Nicaragua.. I could understand. Panama, again, although why would Amazonia be going into panama. But so far into South America? That seems like an odd place for Aztlan to be driving down in such large numbers.

Ok, so what would be possible reasons that make Atzlan go to war with Amazonia?