You have the book correctly. It is a great book. My favorite of the Shadowrun novels.

BlueMax
/who believes in "immortal humans"
//the Big D hinted at them.

*Shrugs* Then don't try to stretch the evidence that we have about nukes into something that it isn't. And yeah, I'll give you that Winternight's nukes were less powerful then they should have been, but they did go off. (If we were going to try to specilate I'd argue that the "magical enhancement" was a better candiate for screwing the pooch then the nukes themselves.) And assuming that my memory isn't playing tricks on me the blast in Bug City was contained by some serious kick ass mojo on the part of the Bug Spirits, not because the nuke itself failed to work as intended.

If you don't like the ED/IE stuff, then keep in mind magic obviously enables events that are otherwise impossible. The possibility that large scale nuclear reactions might wander into the Twilight Zone of magic isn't unpossible. Nuclear decay sure looks like magic from the outside.

True, although I would suspect that things like nuclear fusion would also be affected to the point where power generation just wasn't worth it any longer. And if you disagree then I would point out that we are talking about a point in history where the Mana Levels were just rising to a point where magic was feasible so I don't the True Elements were a factor during the NAN Revoit.

SR4A p. 29 "turned back by Israeli nuclear and magical defenses" : seems to imply bussiness as usual ? I don't see the NIJ turned back from their traditional enemy (one of them, anyway) by anything other than a true nuclear blast.

In any case, wouldn't anyone notice a change in nuclear physics over the decades ? I mean, people just build their nuclear weapons normally. I assume testing and everything went as planned. Then the attack itself failed, or nearly so.

Burning Bright thank you! I knew I had heard there was a novel about it. Excellent, that was one that I recently acquired in a pack of a bunch of old books. I might just read it next, now.

Not a huge fan of ED, but I like your idea, because it IS sensical (canonical, if you will) from a 6^th World perspective. Thanks!

The whole "Nuclear stuff not working" meme in Shadowrun that (VERY unfortunately) was semi-canonized in System Failure drives me absolutely CRAZY. It drives me crazy because of three things.

1) Everyone uses nuclear power in Shadowrun. Everyone. If nuclear power worked differently, it wouldn't be hinted at in the shadows, it would be known and quantified by every nuclear physicist in the entire world. This is because this nuclear wonkiness has been going on for more than 50 years at this point, and NOBODY would build new fusion reactors in the middle of populated areas (as they have done, in canon) if they couldn't predict if those would just fail to work, or melt down.

2) If nuclear reactions are unpredictable, it indicates that some very basic laws of the universe operate "however they want", and that's a Very Bad Thing. It makes player assumptions about other laws of the universe unreliable, and that is also a Very Bad Thing. If nuclear weapons don't work normally, why do the laws of thermodynamics? Gravity? Mundane combustions? The fact that it appears only at plot-convenient times is just too much deus ex machina: if nuke reactions don't work, I want to know why, and how, and what the world's response (scientifically) is.

3) Nukes are very fragile things. It takes very little tampering to reduce the max yield of a bomb, and it takes even LESS (ironically) to make it not work as a nuke at all, reducing it to a dirty bomb or simply a pile of very expensive parts. Given the preponderance of runners, powerful meta-beings like free spirits and Dragons, and plain old spy-vs-spy stuff, I think having nukes not work as planned because SOMEONE tinkered with them at the last minute is not only believable, but very in-theme for the game. Even the old "nukes lobbed at russia not going off" I chalked up to a nascent MIRAGE deactivating it because detonation would not serve in the best interests of the USA, and (being based on NORAD code) his prime drive is to protect and defend north america. Similarly, in a world of corrupt officials, lax safety inspections, and corporate greed, which is easier to believe: That there were a lot of meltdowns because corners were cut, scab workers were hired, terrorists hacked computers, or a safety inspection was missed? Or that one of the fundamental laws of the universe just plain stopped working and nobody noticed?

So you'll have to forgive me if I just don't buy into the "Nukes and nuclear reaction in the 6th world don't work normally at plot-important times" worldview.

Adarael:

It could simply be that someone is purposely sitting around suppressing nuclear weapons. Somebeing went and buried almost all of China's arsenal of Nukes under a mountain, in 2017 about halfway through the GGD war. (Shadows of Asia, I think)

Actually I totally buy that, if you've got a metaplot of great dragons & immortals taking over the world as it appears we do in SR, the first thing I'd want to do is try and pull all the nukes out of the hands of mundies, especially since I already know how bad the pollution from the explosion fucks up astral space.

Hrm. I may use that for my game.

That was the 2006 date (I may have been off by a year or two, I haven't checked) I listed in my first post about it. That was the last succesful use of nuclear weapons I could find until Ceremak. If I remember now (it's been a day of work since I read it) there was at least 4 attempts to use nuclear weapons since that, counting lone eagle and every attempt failed. All I remember is missle strikes tho, and Ceremak & Winternight were placed bombs instead. I have no idea what that means, in terms of how they are being messed with, but it is the only distinct difference I could find so far.

Hey BlueMax, you wouldn't happen to remember where that hint was, do you?

I was coming from the Earthdawn side (There are no immortal elves, is what it teaches, only Dragonkin whom are immortal and can be of any of the lesser name-giver races just like Drakes, so humans or even orks may be out there). I remember that when I see the IE hate coating SR like toxic background count

The year of the reference I gave was 2033, at the begining of the new islamic jihad.

Yeah, but there is nothing stopping them from making NEW nuclear weapons.

There is a difference between fusion and fission, so maybe it's fission that's broken. My memory's a little hazy on if there are still fission plants operating, but if there aren't, then that could be the cause. The fusion weapons don't work because the fission part doesn't go off properly and the entire nuke fizzles

Besides the fact that the fisionables are actually difficult and expensive to acquire and refine? When you have a SuperPower (Or a former world-power) with a globe-spanning umbrealla of nations feeding you materials, that's one thing. But in the severely balkanized 6^th World? Most places where Uranium is commonplace aren't know for their big refining industry or their wealth of (breeder) reactors; Places with the ability to refine and weaponize don't often have a large supply of raw material. Like the Uranium up in present-day Canada that would be out of reach to the CAS or UCAS in the 6^th World. Enemies (or people you think might want to do harm to you eventually) aren't good people to sell those kinds of raw materials to, and developing the refininf infrastructure natively is VERY costly and intensive... in a period where NATIONAL budgets have shrunk dramatically.

Just ONE possible answer.

Based on the bit about Winternight, it seems it is only high energy reactions that flake out. Could be that fission and fusion in the gigawatt zone is a-ok but that kiloton explosions cross a line. Could be they now punch into astral space, expending that energy on astral hazing. Or there's some mystical "inertia" that gets in the way of high-speed transmutation. Or there's a radiation-eating toxic spirit that's been noshing on warheads and pushing the decay rate.

And given that natural orichalcum was found (well, deposits were found) I see no reason that materials prone to mundanely wandering along the periodic table could not also wander the alchemical variants. It's no biggie if 1% of a power plants pile alchemically mutates. Irregular burns happen and they'd adjust the control system. In a bomb, that's just enough to munge the supercritical reaction.

Ack! egg on my face Where did you find that? Shadows of Asia? I hadn't read all of that yet

Awesome!
So what ever is messing with nuclear stuff either missed one, chose not to, or can't have stopped that one.
Hmm, I thought that Israel ALSO used nuclear weapons back in the 200* something era, did they get away with using them twice in the history without anything happening?

I'm gonna be thinking about fictional convoluted conspiracy crap all day now, I can just see it now

So what is messing with the nukes then?
And I guess they could be used against NAN theoretically Although I still think they could be stopped with magic probbally.
Still also not sure I buy the US is willing to go quite that much scorched earth yet. They are already suffering from a LOT of destruction, and going scorched earth is a bit extreme.

Shadowrun 4A core book page page 29, hehe. And the nukes don't work because they didn't put out milk in saucers for the nuclear brownies.

How would the current US army/US population defend itself against magic? Volcanos, hurricanes etc? the size of Katrina?

A threat to sink California into the sea with an earthquake? or hit NY with a 7.0 Richter quake?

A.

Maybe we're looking at it wrong. We are assuming that something messed with the fission reaction. Maybe it was the fissionable material itself that was messed with by the return of magic.

The US military wouldn't know at first about who was doing this, but when Dan Coyote stuck his head up it was at that point the US government would kill all the natams* and let God sort them out.

* == in this age of political correctness it's wrong to commit genocide, but when someone kills 18,000 of your citizens and can do it again... you kill them all, because if they are all dead they are not a danger.

=================



Except nuclear power still works after magic returned. It's FASA hand waving away "inconvenient" laws of nature.

I think it's more of a general disbelief that those 18,000 lost make as much of a impact as your making out.

Want to talk disbelief? I disbelieve that a Quake hit New York a few years before the GGD and did so much damage it took 40 years to rebuild but killed only 200,000 people. 10 times more than Los Alamos. Combined with VITAS killing something like 50-70 million! in 2010, and all the host of other disasters, really 18 thousand is sadly just a drop in a already overflowing bucket.

Besides where did you get 18,000 from? I've read that story in 3 different books, and they all say DHC blows the top of the volcano but none of them mention how many people die.

People die all the time in war sadly, and not every single death is avenged before the war is over, usually for political or logistical reasons.
That's where 'Grudges' come from, like the one CAS has for example. And UCAS too if I remember the writeup of the Sioux-UCAS border correctly.

Hey, a reason to do a run in the AMC! Woohoo!

Well, if I recall, the "20,000" part of "Alamos 20,000" is supposed to be in reference to the casualties from the GGD. That's the only official mention I know, and in-game it could be nothing but Alamos 20k propaganda. Also, I think it's ridiculous to claim that the U.S. government would have nuked U.S. territory for any reason. And, who's to say that the NAN armies didn't acquire other WMD's to give a stalemate shortly after the start of hostilities. The NAN states have always been sparsely populated anyways, so I still don't have an issue with their creation and survival.

More ridiculous then giving up half your land area, your homes your property, your tax base etc without TRYING to do something about it? Especially when your enemy has shown willingness to blow up cities and murder thousands of people to get what they want. What would make you think you were facing anything less then annihilation and that declaring peace would only give the guerrilla forces time to solidify their claims.

My biggest issue with the GGD is the sheer size of the territory aquired vs the actual capabilities the NAN could have been reasonably expected to bring to the table. At the treaty of Denver levels of surrender it's very likely and even logical for the US to consider scor5ched earth, the the vast majority of the population their lands were being taken over by radical ethnic cleansing terrorists, or as it was tossed at my gaming table so long ago Nazi's with feathers, why in the course and context of human history would anyone think that you could negotiate with those sort of people, give them half your country without at least tryign to stop them, and expect them to be satisfied.

NAN werent about ethnic cleansing, they didn't in any way try to cleance their terratories of non-natives.

Excuse me? Nazis with feathers? Did we just Godwin this thread?

I won't comment on the "without trying to stop them" bit cause well ... that's kinna obvious

Okay ... first off, I think a Nazi comparison is a bit extreme. I don't remember anything ANYWHERE about the Amerinds stuffing people in ovens, or cutting their hair to stuff their better's pillows while the anglos do slave labor until the collapse.
Also the Nazi's tried to conquer a bunch of territory that wasn't theirs and never had been, even hundreds of years ago, you know like the whole world?

NAN tried to reclaim territory that it once owned about 200 years ago. And I don't recall them saying anyone had to die, only leave. In fact, aside from Los Alamos I can't find listing of any major loss of life. I do not doubt NAN killed people in the GGD. I do maintain that NAN likely killed less people than most Wars do, entirely because of their methods, and not out of some goodness of their hearts (which I doubt anyone in SR has much of unless they are a PC).

And even if I did agree to your interpretation of the events, I would STILL think going Scorched Earth is way extreme. I thought we were playing Shadowrun, not Mad Max, or Fallout or some other post-nuclear world-ruins-dystopia game.

I'm hearing an awful lot about nukes. As I said, I'm pretty sure NAN could stop nukes. After all they have to make it to their target before they explode.

You know as a final fuck you the U.S. could offer to transport every Amerindian or anyone who claims to be Amerindian to NAN for their new prison system. I would imply that anyone who would be willing to transfer may be eligible for release. The U.S. could insist on all SuperMax prisoners.

I don't think the NAN during the first year could feed itself let alone 100,000-300,000 prisoners.

The U.S. could then be "horrified" by the state of the fledgling NAN system at what it does to "its populace".

That is way messed up. And awesome.

Alex, he's just reporting what his players said about the NAN takeover. And Godwin is over-rated with his Nazi-meter. Or, to put it another way, even paranoids can have enemies

There are lots of things that could make NAN collapse even 50 years down the line.

1. Unionization. Certain professions go on strike.

2. Passive-Aggressive. The governor's servants all leave. The mass transit system is gridlocked.

3. Demonstrations. Demonstrations are held over racial inequalities.

4. Embargoes. The shipping of luxury goods and raw materials involve heavy tariffs.

5. Certain party-leader indiscretions are placed on guerrilla media locally to international news.

Hell, why not let those people, who have signed a sworn affidavit saying that they are a natam, out of SuperMax for "good behaviour". At this point you shred the file for the prisoner, take away his citizenship papers and kick him over to the NANs. When the NANs find out what scum the US sent over and try to send them back, the US can claim that the NANs are trying to invade with "terrorists" and invade.

Hey, I recently came into possession of a bunch of SR novels, including some of the first published. I'm reading the 3rd one now "Find Your Own Truth" and found this set of dialogue. It has some information that touches upon some of what was discussed in this thread:

Hart gave an exasperated sigh. "Why not just ask for Howling Coyote? He certainly fits ..."
A sudden scrape and the crash of Dodger's chair on the floor interrupted her remark. Finishing his abrupt rise,
the elf stalked to the door and flung it open. He stared out at the rain.
Sam looked to Hart, who looked as surprised as he felt. "What's the matter, Dodger? Do you know this
Howling Coyote?"
The decker's voice was soft, almost inaudible over the sound of the downpour. "I think he's dead. 'Twould be
better 'twere so."
When it was obvious Dodger would say no more on the subject, Sam whispered to Hart, "Do you know why he reacted like that?" She shook her head.
"What could it be about this Howling Coyote? The name's familiar, but I can't seem to place it."
"Been neglecting the historical side of your studies again?'' Sam could see by her half smile that she noticed
the heat that would be reddening his cheeks above his beard. "Is the name Daniel Coleman any more familiar?"
"The Ghost Dance prophet?" "None other," Dodger announced, forcing himself back into the conversation.
His back remained turned to them. "Coleman was a charismatic firebrand, the leading light of the movement that resulted in the end of the United States of America, the Dominion of Canada, and the Republic of Mexico. A very influential villain. I heard him speak in the broadcast in which the Ghost Dancers took responsibility for the volcanic eruption that buried Los Alamos."
"He must have made quite an impression," Hart said. "You couldn't have been more than a kid."
Dodger shifted, as though the memory made him uncomfortable. "It was the first use of the Ghost Dance magic. Of course it made an impression."
"If you remember that, you must remember when they blew the Cascade volcanoes."
"Clearly," Dodger said bitterly. There was an uncomfortable silence for a few moments. Then Dodger collected himself and continued. "Coleman took responsibility for those as well. He was a radical and a terrorist. Were he available, I do not think you would I find in him the slightest shred of humanitarian concern for one Caucasian's plight. He might have been called the Champion of the Red Man, the Awakened Ute, and the Son of the Great Spirit, but he started the Expulsion. He earned his nickname Red Braids a thousand times over."
"Red Braids?" Sam asked. "I don't remember ever reading that. What's it mean?"
"It was for the color his braided hair turned when dipped in the blood of his enemies," Dodger said. "Not everything gets into the history books. You should know that by now, Sam."
"You sound awfully bitter, Dodger. You have a personal grudge?" Hart asked. She waited for him to respond, and when he didn't she said, "Howling Coyote was a guerrilla leader in a difficult time. He saved the Indians from an oppressive government and helped them set up their own. He helped a lot of people, and may have damn well been responsible for saving the whole fragging planet. The megacorporations were polluting and raping earth into oblivion until the Awakened magic turned back some of the tide."
"Coleman was only interested in his own people. I haven't seen the land turn green and verdant worldwide, nor have I seen the megacorps roll over and die. If Coleman was so great-hearted, where is he now? Why did he abandon his fight?" Dodger took a deep breath. "He was a butcher and an opportunist."
"He may have been," Hart agreed. "The early days of the struggle were difficult and required harsh measures.
He had a kinder side, too. He was the one who brought the NAN forces to the table in Denver. Without him, there'd have been no treaty of Denver. The war might still be going on. As to what he did during the Expulsion, I've talked to some, on both sides, who were there. If not for Coleman, the resettlement clauses in the treaty would have been more draconian. I've been told that the Aztlan faction would have slaughtered anyone of non-Indian blood. And it was Coleman who fought for the repatriation payments clause that allowed the displaced people a chance to start new lives."
Dodger snorted. "Those payments turned to smoke when measured against outstanding payments of the alleged debts owed to various Indian tribes by the various governments involved. He had power, and used it to his own ends."
"What about the education and hospital care he sponsored? Most of it made special provision for the changed, hardly a universal concern in those days. As an elf, I'd think you'd appreciate that. And what of the environmentally safe energy supplies he encouraged?"
Dodger shrugged. "Remorse? Public relations? I'm no mind-reader."
"He answered those questions in his book, Howling in the Wilderness.''
"Those were his- public answers," Dodger said sourly. "He wrote the book while he was president of the Sovereign Tribal Council. One could hardly expect a truthful account."
"The book's sort of a Mein Kampf crossed with Castaneda's Yaqui Way of Knowledge. Not exactly flattering to an incumbent. I don't think it was an apologia. It was too strange for that." Dodger turned away again, and Hart subsided into silence. The set of her jaw told Sam she was not happy with Dodger's stubbornness.
Dodger's hunched shoulders showed Sam he wouldn't get help there, either.
"You caught me out on tradition history," he said quietly to Hart, "but I've never been real big on political history, either. I know Coleman was real important once, but he stepped down or something. What happened to him?"
"No one knows. About, oh, I guess it's been fifteen years now, he just up and walked away into the mountains." "Why?"
"Got fed up with the politics in the STC and the Native American Nations, I suppose. When the big push to get non-Indians off the continent didn't work out, NAN solidarity sort of slipped. When the elves and such put Tir Tairngire together and Coleman backed them, he lost a lot of credibility with some of the tribal councils because of his policy of welcoming metahumans into Indian lands. Then Tsimshian broke away, too. I guess it was too much in just one year. He resigned and left everything behind."
Once again Dodger broke in. "Or so say the official stories. There was shadow business then as well. Perhaps he had a falling out with his radical friends. Terrorists who disagree rarely settle their arguments with words."
"You think somebody killed him?" The idea troubled Sam, and not just because murder was wrong. Tending more toward Hart's than Dodger's version of the man, he had begun to think that Howling Coyote might be just the shaman Janice needed.
"Somebody might have," Dodger said. "Enough people might perceive a disgruntled magician with a history as a terrorist and a very dangerous threat." "Or a promising ally," Hart pointed out. Which was what Sam needed. "He really was a great shaman, wasn't he?"
"Oh, yes. No doubt of it," she said. "Some people think the stuff in his book about learning the Great Ghost Dance was after-the-fact fantasizing, a political make-over to improve his image as Council president. But he was more than a figurehead for the Ghost Dancers. He really did lead the Dance himself."
"That would make him a very powerful shaman." "Yes," Hart agreed slowly. "Perhaps more powerful than any magician the Sixth World has ever seen." Then, after a moment, "Human magician, that is.�
Sam wasn't worried about racial concerns. "Then he would know more about shamanic magic than anyone else."
Hart laughed. "Like I know everything there is to know about being an elf? Stay real. He was a man who stumbled into power. He used it and used it well. He taught a lot of other people how to use it. But know everything? Who knows everything about anything?"
"But he led the Great Ghost Dance," Sam insisted.
"Yes. And he claimed more power than any human I've ever heard of. Knowledge may be power, but the reverse is not necessarily true."
Sam thought about that for a while. "The Dance was transformation magic, wasn't it?"
"In part."
"Then he wouldn't have to know about everything. Just how to channel the power to make the change. He could know that, couldn't he?"
Hart mulled it over. "I don't know. I think you're grasping at straws."
Sam did, too, but what other choice was there? If he wasted time tracking down lesser shamans who couldn't do the job, he might not have enough time to get to Howling Coyote. It was a gamble, but he didn't see an alternative. "I've got to grab on to something. Otherwise Janice will slip away."
"You may not be able to stop that," Hart warned.
Sam didn't want to hear it. He could not believe his sister was irreversibly set on a course to becoming a monster in mind and soul as well as body.
Hart still seemed set on dissuading him. "Why not start with some resources more to hand? Didn't you say that Professor Laverty once offered to help you with Janice? Just because Estios works for Laverty doesn't mean that the professor agrees with that bastard's field decisions. Talk to Laverty. Find out where he stands."
"I don't think that would be advisable at this time," Dodger said.
"Why not?" Hart asked.
"I'd rather not say."
"It isn't because he's involved with this Australian elf who's looking for Sam, is it?''
“I said I'd rather not say.''
Sam's stomach flip-flopped. "Dodger, are you holding out on me again?"
Dodger turned and fixed Sam with bleak eyes. "Sam, I am asking you not to press. Were I to speak of how I learned of the one who hunts you, others beyond our circle might learn as well. That could have undesirable consequences for someone I would rather not see hurt."
Sam suspected he knew to whom Dodger referred, and a surreptitious glance at Hart told him that she suspected the same. "Well if I can't go to Laverty, who else is there to ask?"
"Lofwyr?" The bleakness in Dodger's voice betrayed him as more barren of reasonable ideas than Sam.
"I don't think I could pay the price," Sam said.
"Or survive the deal. That dragon nearly got us all killed the last time."
"Sam, Father Rinaldi would know who to ask." Sam shook his head sadly. "We could hardly go to
him now."
Hart sighed. "I'm a hermetic magician, Sam. I don't know many shamans, and those I do know probably couldn't pump the power you seem to think is necessary. I'm trapped. I don't see an answer."
Dodger nodded solemnly. "Naught to do now but face the inevitable."
"It's settled then," Sam said firmly. "We'll get Howling Coyote."
"But no one knows where he is," Hart protested.
"If he is alive at all," Dodger added.
Sam shrugged, dismissing their objections. If only his own fears could be dealt with so easily. "I'll find him," he said.

Oh such memories of reading those books.

I bought multiple sets when FASA died, just to make sure I had a pristine copy.

They really embodied SR for me - it's history and world.

That was awesome. I remember reading that series in high school

You know, I've been reading all these comments about nukes and nukes and nuk'em and scorched earth and all that. But there's one VERY good reason the US would have thought three or a dozen times about the kind of general nuclear bombardment that would have been needed to ensure getting all the targets:

The JET STREAM

Please note that the jet stream travels from West to East and dips down along over DeeCee and back up the East coast. The blast from strategic (1980's era definition) nuclear weapons has a tendency to blast massive amounts of secondary (not from the "core" of the weapon itself) highly radioactive fallout up into the straosphere where it can be carried for great distances. With the kinds of numbers (in terms of individual weapons as well as total megatonnage) you would need, we're talking about making Chernobyl look like a sciecne experiment. It's sort of the idea of starting a wildfire in your neighbor's yard when the wind's blowing against you. sure, you're going to level his property, but now you've got a problem of your own.

Just a thought.

And if the natives are willing to sell you the same corn and soy beans that came from those fields without inflating the prices any more than the budding mega-corporations that already owned the agri-combines were doing, you're not losing any irreplacable resources, either. Corporations want to make money and pay as little in taxes as they can; They don't much care who the taxes have to be paid to as long as the laws don't staunch their revenue flow and the taxes are tolerable (read: relatively low).

Chrysalis' third listed item that could provoke a collapse of the NAN, demonstrations, is a good part of what makes me think the NAN must have had all along the support of at least a significant part of its non-Native population. Just because you can spirit-pound militaries into the ground doesn't mean you have any better options than anyone else for dealing with peaceful protesters. And while some of the NAN regimes might arguably have been the sort to simply violently crack down on open defiance, can we really say that about, say, Pueblo? That kind of crackdown is going to push a lot of fence-sitters into the camp of strong anti-NAN sentiment and destabilize things. And if most of the people living there were really anti-NAN, you'd have seen these demonstrations, at some point.

Hold on, if you get to consider the enviromental impact and the jet stream motion of a nbuclear blast i get to count the massive destruction and the literally blotting out the sun that would occur if a whole mountain range went up at once. The NAN was already using tactics that would have a ridiculously bad effect on the environment.

Bah, after all the global warming we have had you need to block the sun out a bit for some nuclear winter cooling.

I'm not talking about "environmental damage". This isn't about "nuclear winter". I'm talking about lethal radiation doses along most of the East coast. And if you're the one controling nature (read: wind direction) getting your OWN skies clear again isn't such a challenge, right?


*snickers*
That's not funny.

Air bursts produce very minimal fallout, and very little of that is distant. Against anything other then 2000 PSI hardened missile silos you want to use air bursts.

Let's compare the cons of nukes vs. volcanoes.

If the NaN fire the volcanoes: Crop yields will probably drop at least10-20%. Several thousand acres of timber will also be destroyed along with some percentage of Portland. Deaths may be in the thousands or tens of thousands. Oregon/washington water supply will need extra treatment to remove ash. Many fishing estuaries will suffer near total collapse in Oregon and Washington.

US uses nukes (assuming one target per NAN state): A sizeable number of nonNAN citizens likely to die from blasts' immediate fallout, probably in excess of 1 million (one base a few dozen miles east of salt lake city, vegas, or denver will do it) Likely to contaminate the water supply of 60 million citizens (NAN area US loyalists plus California). Will likely kill or contaminate the 2016 crops of the entire western and midwest states entirely due to fallout and radioactive water. Write off most inland fisheries between the Mississippi and California. A sizeable percentage of cropland useless for the next 5-15 years depending on bomb yields. Good chance midwestern & eastern states along the jetstream will have deaths in the first month from fallout, increased cancer for the current generation and significant birth defects for the next generation.

But at least those stinking indians will be dead. Who's still alive to be with me?!?

During the war, firing nukes on any of the NAN areas would have taken out a significant number of U.S. citizens as well. The way I read, the natams fought more like an insurrection, and as we know from Iraq and Afghanistan, it's hard to fight an insurrection with conventional weapons. No matter what, I really don't see the U.S. government nuking its own citizens, no matter how scary the big bad Native American is. And after the war, a preemptive nuclear strike on the NAN states would have brought hell from all the other Treaty of Denver signatories, and depending on how quickly the NAN states were able to arm themselves with WMD's, could have been suicidal as well.

Ah yes because totally anytime the military tries to do something it's on a scale that should be considered world ending by accident. I'm pretty well done with this thread for reasons stated a page ago.

When Shadowrun first came out there was obviously some very angry people writing it, so in the process of shaking up everything they said "Hey wouldn't it be cool if the indians rose up and killed all the whites and took back their lands, it's be a great way to isolate seattle the primary campaign setting."

No one considered that this is unfeasible even with MAGIC Natam Am's due to population concerns, the constraints of magic in the setting and requires a whole string of increasingly rediculous constraints. Some of these constraints were retconed away in future books, others have quietly been left to rest as there's only so many stories you can tell about "magic injuns" before people get bored or they offend somebody.

I'm glad that someones fantasy got fulfilled. I'm sorry that everyone else in the setting, had to go full bore retard to make it happen especially when with just a slightly smaller scope it could have certainly been more workable.

And who were they hiding among? Armed white-boys that wanted them dead too? I'd rather think that they would avoid the population centers and sympathies for them would have been rather low, so where would they get their supplies? In SR, magic can't feed an army.

And if the US doesn't respond with nukes, what's to stop the natams from doing it again, and again, and again, ad nauseam until all the white people either submit and worship their new overlords with uber magic* or launch nukes and take as many of the frakkers with them. You don't get to play with WMDs without being on the receiving end of them... that's what MAD is.


* == oh, by the way, that uber magic is fading... sucks to be the natams when their uber shield is gone.




No, elwood, it's hard to fight insurgents when you don't want to kill everybody who is near them as well. If I was in charge, and a complete amoral, satanic monster, I could win by killing everyone in a neighborhood that housed the insurgents. I would win because everyone would either be dead or too terrified to EVER house another insurgent because that satanic Monster KCKitsune might come and kill them, their children, their neighbors, their pets, their cattle, and destroy their homes. We are not stopping the insurgents in Iraq because we want people there to like us.



Who were the signatories of the Treaty? I checked the Sixth World Wiki and found nothing on who signed it. Also who said that the US would leave it's nuclear weapons behind? If the Treaty said that... more bullshit from FASA.

Omg. This is getting rediculous.

Um. Okay, so aside from the constant "nuke nuke nuke nuke nuke nuke" train, do you guys who think NAN is unbelievable actually have any examples as to WHY?

Seriously.

Knasser demo-ed a takedown of a group of helicopters & crew with just a couple of spirits. The only reply was "Well the US has more where that came from!", as if somehow that would change the outcome, the 2nd, 3rd, 32nd time?

Then there was the mass civilian uprising, completely ignoring the fact we're talking about areas with some of the lowest population densities on the continent , and of course ignoring anything NAN might do in responce (Spirits, Influence spells, simply leaving the fragging people alone ...)

Now Nukes, as if the US can just push a button, and all NAN goes up in mushroom cloud just like that. Again ignoring everything NAN might do in responce (Stop the missiles, not let the US find them to nuke em in the first place, kill the people giving the order, etc ..)

Of course NAN numbers only the pure blooded Amerinds in the oppsosing version of events because that nessasary for NAN to lose the numbers war. Which discounts both NAN's magic, and the fact that NAN ALSO includes people of native latin descent, aka Mexico/Aztlan and the I dunno 40+ million latinos inside the US alone? If even a fraction of them joins NAN, they heavily outnumber the US military.

Not once have I've read an actual scenario, you know with examples and maybe some numbers of how NAN is 'hopelessly outmatched'. Could you guys try examples maybe? Then I might fight your arguments a bit more realistic. The US has troops with stats not that much better than 2070 Sprawl Gangers, just with better equipment and Awakened runners stomp all over those all the time. I find it really hard to believe that in 2016 the Awakened lose, unless they just stand there and let themselves be shot.

And again, if you find NAN so unbelievable, do you find the dozen or so other 'magical rebellion' countries in SR equally so? I listed a chunk of them earlier, they are all over the globe. If not, then why is it only 'Injuns vs. US' that raises so many hackles?

What do the Awakened PCs DO in your games anyways? From the way you describe magic vs mundanes, it seems like the Hacker & Street Sam make them completely pointless.

*sigh* I had hoped for this not to become a 'screaming monkey fight' as they say.

If your only plan to win is to indiscriminately use WMD's on the western United States to eliminate all of the NAN soldiers, then you still haven't won even after you've killed them. Governing an area after you've just killed half of the citizens who lived there in military actions is going to be impossible, and I wouldn't be surprised to see the military refuse orders that would obviously kill so many civilians.

I believe the other signatory to the Treaty of Denver was Aztlan, and when I talk about the NAN's acquiring some WMD's to give you a stalemate in the region, it doesn't have to be nukes or anything out of the U.S. arsenal. They could aquire some relatively cheap and easy to manufacture chemical or biological weapons from corps or Aztlan that would have enough capability to do damage to the U.S. that another war to regain the NAN states wouldn't be worthwhile. Now, I can't speak to the economic survival or viability of the NAN's, but militarily it's definitely possible.

Alexand, yes it gets annoying when any argument you attempt to make is debunked by your opposition with "Its maaaagggggic"

1) Whether you like it or not at the time of the ghost dance war NAN forces were composed entirely of NAN's, not eco sympathizers not metahumans just angry NAN's and aztlaners who came out of concentration camps, after loosing many of their number. went underground for two years and were all transformed into complete and total indian badass super soldiers. You can make arguments to this explain that away all you want but the simple fact is you can't find it in the printed material. So in lieu of arguments to the counter the history should stand as printed on pages 24 and 25 of SR4.

2) Extrapolating from real world data as the book is wonderfully sparse on it otherwise the NAN population going into the camps would be 1.5 percent of the population as a whole, that is including folks like myself who are of mixed heritage. Even assuming none died int he camps, which "many" did p. 26 and assuming that VITAS struck down all the other populations like a thunderbolt from god killing 60 percent of the population that still leaves the NAN, who we're being generous and assuming they all thought howling coyote was the greatest thing since sliced bread, and generously assuming that everyone is a certified indian badass of fighting age. They've still got numbers comparable to the current active duty military and are 1/60th of the population as a whole. That means they still have to fight the military as a whole and are going to have trouble fighting a guerilla warfare because, again thanks to loan eagle (ref SR4 page 24 and Los Alamos, the public at large hates their guts)

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/re...ons/005684.html

3). Magical population: Even generously assuming that every NATAM got out of the camps as a certified indian brave badass ready to fight and die for their shamanic masters the population of shamans would be 1 and 10 or somewhere to that tune, i'm too lazy to grab quotations as your going to disregard them anyway.

4) Spririts are not independently tactical thinking superwearpons. First you have to summon them, then you have to bind them then you can send then on the services you sent them on. Otherwise you have to be within magic x 100 meters of them. Furthermore these would still be aspected spirits imposing further concerns abotu domains unless they were great form, which there's no reason to beleive all but a few of their already few indian population had yet. So sitting in a cave outside Spokane you might be able to tell a spirit to go attack Fairchild AFB as you can describe it based on topagraphy. Try describing tos omething that can't read a map how to get to Offuit or the Pentagon.

5) Guerilla warfare is not a fix all. Guerilla warfare doesn't win wars, over a period of years it can sap your enemies strength and force them to concede especially if you can fade and gather strength from the local population, as stated above the Natam's can't do this because their current mandate is kill whitey, no that's being genrous, their current mandate is kill everyone who isn't natam. It's not analogous to Iraq or Afghanistan or Paris or Russia/Afghanistan or Sri Lanka or any of a thousand other examples because they don't ahve the native population to fade back into. All the Natam's were supposed to be rounded up in camps. But lets say they all lived in the deep woods foraging for what they need, they can either do that or they can attack, even with magic they can't do both. THey either have to be engaging a better equipped and trained force or they have to be hiding and running striking when they can.

6) An escalation of violence and no win scenarios. Everyone's spent the last couple of pages stalking about nukes, and theat's partially my fault, because i personally feel that if the Natam's super weapons was to blow the caps off dormant volcanoes the nuclear/chemical/biological options would be placed into play. Because based on prior behavior and experience there is no reason to believe that the NAN would be satisfied with anythign less then wholesale non-nan genocide. I refer you to shadows of north america and a whole host of other books. But even before that point the US military has a considerable arms, training, and tactical advantage over the NAN rebels, they are well aware of the terrain (thanks the USGS for that) and are presumably at least as driven as the guerillas. The NAN's military arms are going to be civilian grade at best and what they can steal. No number of Klashnikov armed soldiers will be able to do anything to a A-10 or a B-52 in flight or a Bradley for that matter. So what does that leave, that leaves maaaaaggggggic. Which not all of the NAN's are capable of wielding and every loss of one that does in combat would be a signifigant setback. Contrary to some of the early stupidity expressed in this thread, just because you've been handing out food for a while doesn't mean you forget how to fire your rifle or drive your tank. So if the NAN uses nothign but nuclear class magic or the Azzies hand them dirty bombs theres especially no reason to believe the US wouldn't retaliate. Also even among nukes there is variable yield. Also what's the difference between a tacticall nuke and a conventional 300 pound bomb? Not a goddamn thing if your at ground zero when it goes off.

7) Nothing to loose. As originally depicted in story the treaty of denver would have depopulated the western half of the country of non-NAN's. This has thankfully been smoothed over because it was stupid as then the US really does have no reason not to escalate the conflict. Even so given the huge loss of land inherant int he treaty of denvers I can't see how anyone in the US or Canadian governments thought this was a good idea. Outside of a complete magical I win button, which by now I've demonstrated both logically and mathmatically they shouldn't have the NAN can't hold territory against a US counter attack nor would they be able to maintain organization needed to fight the kind of war, against a superpower, to take half a continent.

Goodnight, tip your waitress.

Be careful with this one: you're "cherry picking" rulesets to prove your argument. You mention "domains" so you're obviously taking the stance that the rules represented the reality of the time, rather than the latest version of the rules "retconning" the past; ok. I'd have to go back to my old books to be sure, but I think that the Magic x 100 meter range for Spirit services is new to SR4. Besides that, I believe in any edition a Magician can Astrally Project to a location, summon a spirit there (matched to that location's domain) and command it from Astral Space.