My group has decided that we will be resetting the campaign, with most players creating new characters.

The setting of said campaign is to be New Orleans. Is there any published cannon on the home of the Loa? If not, any suggestions / ideas for New Orleans in 2072, apart from the obvious strong influence of Voodoo traditions?

I've ran a few sessions in New Orleans and used Smuggler Havens (old SR2 book) for details on N.O. - but Vice will have some stuff on Zobop on my understanding.

Thankfully it is a city that is well documented if you need maps and the like. Doesn't help with the SR-related fluff thats required however.

- J.

A few things to remember about New Orleans are:

1) Corruption. Centuries old, hugely entrenched corruption. Top to bottom, everyone is in on it. Who you know is really important in N.O. Favors for favors and money for favors is the rule of the day/year/century.

2) Culture. New Orleans hates to change. The reason Coca-cola Classic is called 'Classic" is because, after Coke changed their recipe in the 80s and it tanked horribly, people in New Orleans wouldn't buy Coke even after they changed the recipe back. Enter the rebranding as Coke Classic and sales shot back up. Part of this culture is straight up racism. That shit don't change.

3) Location. When you think of New Orleans, you might imagine a city by the water. That's really not quite it. What New Orleans is, geographically is an island in a swamp. It is surrounded by water on all sides, connected only by thin strips of land and bridges over water. Because of this, and its place as a Gulf port, it has almost as much in common with the Caribbean as it does with the American south.

4) Setting. A whole lot of the city is below sea level. Graves are all above ground since, if you dig any depth, you hit water. Shedim should be a problem. Currently the Itallian mob has fingers through mid city and out to the suburb of Kenner . They're pretty much synonymous with the Good Old Boy network. Most are about legit as New Orleans gets. They don't do crime, they license it. The contraband coming through the docks is largely controlled by Jamacians, Greeks and Turks. They run drugs and guns mostly. Lots of Egyptian AK-47s. Chopper City. The gangs are based around neighborhoods (wards) and housing projects. As of right now, they're having regular internal squabbles due to all the new product coming in with the Mexican labor that moved into the city after Katrina. Basically, the guys who control the flow aren't in total control anymore. The streets are absolutely flooded with heroin. All of this excitement would have logically died down by 2072, but reality makes a pretty good path to fiction.

5) Big money, poor people. New Orleans is arguably the most important strategic port in the world. Over 20% of the entire world's food travels through the Port of New Orleans. That means that every nation north along the Mississippi has an interest in New Orleans and pays to make sure things go smoothly. And a whole lot of South America relies on those food exports, (since their own farmers have been driven out of business by subsidized American [let's say Azzie] factory farms.) Besides the major shipping channels, southern Louisiana is the source of more Oil and more Natural Gas than any other State in America. There are huge oil rigs out in the waters off the coast. Easy setting for runs there. The refinery-heavy city of nearby Lafayette has more millionaires per-capita than any other city in the country. State doesn't see that oil money though, because they bribe the officials to keep their property taxes down, and they hide their income in the regular bastard fashion. Also, the State didn't work out any deals with the federal government to receive part of the federal oil subsidies like Texas did. OK, now I'm ranting. Still, it's got possibilities for flavor...

Read City of Masks by Daniel Hecht. Its set in New Orleans, so you can steal what he says to get the same vibe. Its a good book as well.

da big easy! sweet lady gumbo! old.....sampy...

Nice one!

orrr.... you can go watch Disney's Princess and the Frog, and use that atmosphere with voodoo practitioners (good and evil), talking alligators, lots of singing and songs, a prince... ok, maybe not.

Smuggler Havens has information you may be looking for, though it's worth bearing in mind that the information comes from 2nd edition and may be a bit dated as far as the metaplot timeline goes. There may be some changes in the city since then.

There are other aspects of this too. New Orleans is the favored child of the whole state, and gets much more than it's fair share of Louisiana's tax revenue...even more so than Baton Rouge, the capital. Like he said, the "good old boy" network is in full force here.




Now that is something I wasn't aware of (the Coke thing), but yes, a lot of New Orleans is change-resistant, though you see more progressiveness as you move out towards Metairie and Kenner.




Ehhhh, the West Bank(Merrero, Gretna, etc.) feel like that, but not Downtown. Once you get into New Orleans proper, like say on Canal, it feels just like any other downtown metropolis, with a dash of old-world flavor (see French Quarter). From a geographical standpoint, you are probably right, but you don't get that feel when you are actually there.




Spot on.




I'd be interested to know where you found those numbers. I know Lafayette like my own back yard, and while there are a metric shit-ton of offshore oil related companies there, I've never gotten the feel that there is a disproportionate number of millionaires.




Yeah, I could see that.


Also, remember that New Orleans has much more heavy spanish influence in general than french. You'll see it in everything from the architecture to the cuisine.

Oh, and you won't find much that is authentically "Cajun" in New Orleans. You need to go a bit further west for that.

Actually, it looks like that hasn't been true since the 1970s. My bad, (last line of the demographics section,) but being a millionaire isn't all that special, these days anyhow.

Still, it might be worth it to have some sort of massive plastics manufacturing going on in the area. I mean, with all the petroleum and sulfuric acid, old school plastics are ready to go. Though, I'd imagine by 2070, they'd have some catalytic processes for plastic manufacture which doesn't have the sort of waste sulfuric acid produces, or they'll just be making plastic out of plant cellulose exclusively.

Do any of the supplements say if the levies broke in the SRverse? I'd think the weather disruption spawned by the Ghost Dance would have broken or overtopped them.

That would, for the Shadowrunner sense, be good for the city since it gives you an extensive barrens region where the cops either don't go or take forever to get there.

New Orleans would be very important to the CAS as it is a major freight harbor and is a gateway for petroleum from the Gulf.

I'm hoping New Orleans will get a proper treatment sometime, but for the moment your best bet is Smuggler Havens and the brief bit about the Zobop in Vice.

If you're interested in related but non-canon materials, Beyond the Storm: Shadows of the Big Easy has what might be the first SR4 adventure, set in New Orleans, and Shadowland Magazine had a couple SR2 adventures set there that would be fairly easy to adapt.

I have started reading Smuggler Havens, & it looks like New Orleans is basically left alone by the CAS, under the theory that because it's the best place for smugglers, the smugglers won't go anywhere else. & the CAS apparently also runs a few smuggling rings through it, unless I misunderstood in my half-awake daze.



Also, what's the best source for info on the CAS in general?

Neo-Anarchist's Guide to North America, probably.

Shadows of North America, with some updates when the Sixth World Almanac comes out.

I'd argue, effectiverly, against it being the most important strategic port. Maybe import in the USA but with the US breaking up it goes from being at the mouth of the most central river in a nation to an almost frontier border. With only Texas as a buffer to the west theres not much there. Most of the CAS will feed eastward towards the Atlantic and with much of the northern bread basket in the hands of either the Souix or UCAS odds are they are going to be not to willing to ship via another country-raising costs. I'd expect much more traffic on the Great Lakes, like in the days of the Wheat Pit at the start of the 20th century.

To be more positive you can asusme NO will resist change and look much as it does today. Try TV travel/cook shows for the look and feel of the place. Emeril Legasse, Samantha Brown, lots of stuff on mardi gras, heck even the ghost hunting plumbers on sci-fi show parts of the city. Horro movies like Dracula 2000 or Interview with a Vampire . I think Clint eastwood's movie Tightrope was set in NO. Now natives will say movies don't show the real NO, guess what, it doesn't matter! it's the perception and what people htink it's like.

Corruption is infamous and between storm damage and it's lesser status as a port the income would be down so, like New York, they would be more likely to accept some corp interferance. Lots of work around who has control of the pump stations to keep the water out.

Also you're going to have barrens-ward 9, lostds of small ruined houses with the swamp growing back on it. The region was particularly hard hit by Katrina in 2005 and still has not recovered. The people do not want to build unless they have power and water put back in, the government doesn't want to spend the money to put stuff back in until they know there will be houses to use it.... assume that it will not have sorted itself out by 2070.

Shadowrun diverged from the real world history long before the hurricane hit, so that is largely irrelevant. While you are mostly correct with it not being a major import point anymore (from what I have read in Smuggler Havens thus far), it is one of the largest smuggling ports in the world, and corporate influence is almost non-existent.

I would also argue that outside perception is not nearly as important as what the city is actually like, especially in Shadowrun context.

Katrina happened before 2012 so maybe it does take affect. I was just offering a suggestion where a barren might be. Nice to have a barren IN the city and not just some in bred swamp creature a la Wrong Turn.

Y'all, New Orleans is built on a swamp, on the coast of the Caribbean. Chances are it's bee hit by three or four major hurricanes in the last sixty years, game-time.

more like 1 maybe 2.

Even barring hurricanes, that parish is likely barrens, or only half a step up. The desirability of areas in NOLA are defined by geography - below sea level means regular flooding (like at least every other year - no hurricanes, just normal weather), more pollution and so on. Katrina only reiterated that reasoning. I imagine that area will be like so many other barrios on hills in banana republics. People build up, pirate power, pirate water, then a storm comes through every few years and washes it all away. Repeat ad nauseum. If they don't do a proper job on the levies (and this is Shadowrun, remember), it's going to be a neighborhood that literally has to rebuild itself every decade.

As for corporate presence... NOLA (in SR) has a painfully high smuggling rate compared to other ports. This effectively translates to an unofficial corporate tax. Combine this with general CAS recalcitrance and corps aren't going to make as much headway as they did with other ports. You could really justify it either way as a GM without much trouble, it all depends on the actions of a relatively small number of heads.

According to 150 years of data on hurricanes, 49 of the 273 hurricanes that made landfall on the American Atlantic Coast crossed into Louisiana. 18 of the 90ish category 3 or higher hurricanes have hit Louisiana in the same amount of time. So for big hurricanes, you are looking at an average of 18 Category 3 Hurricanes over 150 years (better than once per decade) and for the smaller storms, 49 hurricanes over 150 years (about once every 3 years). Weather isn't reliable like clockwork, of course (indeed, it is known to be a capricious opposite)... But I'd say more than 1 or 2 big storms will hit Louisiana, and this will directly affect New Orleans (either hitting the city directly or having a bunch of disaster relief efforts centered on New Orleans). Having 4 to 7 big ones hit New Orleans by 2070 is not an unreasonable estimate.

For dubious Internetz statistics which may or may not be valid:
http://www.hurricanecity.com/city/neworleans.htm

This gist of the link:

How often New Orleans gets affected?
brushed or hit every 3.73 years

Average years between direct hurricane hits.(usually within 40 miles to include small hurricanes)
(11h)once every 12.55 years

If a hurricane of any force travels in the proper path, namely up straight the mouth of Lake Pontchartrain, the flood wall will wash right over the levees and drown the city in a massive wave. Even the higher parts (i.e. 8 feet above sea level,) will be suffused with water. This could happen any year. It's a total Russian roulette situation, and would be a primary reason why no corp wants to invest real money in the city.

It's also a calculated risk. Examine how often this hurricane is likely to hit * cost in loss/repairs (after insurance). If it's less than expected profit from that period + a slight amount to account for that risk, then you invest.

Plus, in 2060, it's not like they couldn't build ways around it. I mean if you can build an arcology or an underwater oil platform, you can probably build an office-building that doesn't flood.

However, the risk factor isn't given to us for 2060. Given Shadowrun suffers a LOT more natural disasters in general, it could be higher. We also aren't given the risk factor/damage level for terrorist/smuggler attacks. Or the current profitability of the area. It's all left up to the writer, so you can define it however you like.

catagory 3 isnt bad. 4 is potentially bad. 5 will break things. and katrina was a 5 when the edge started hitting, which is what counts not when the eye hits even though that is what most weather morons want to count.