Welcome to the Wild Southwest
It is the year 2096. Maybe...
The Great War that destroyed the technological society of the 20th century took place at some point between the years 2000 and 2020. It was a worldwide conflict involving massive quantities of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons of unimaginable power. Knowledge of who started it, why it was fought and what nations were on which side is long lost. All that is known is that it was the most devastating war in history - engulfing every nation on earth - and that all of the world's major urban centres, and their inhabitants, were destroyed.
More than half the world's population was killed in nuclear and chemical strikes, and from vicious bio-plagues unleashed as weapons. Over 99% of the surviors perished during the twenty year nuclear winter that followed. For ten of those years it is said that the sun wasn't even visible in the sky, and even the exact year was forgotten.
When the world finally emerged from the devastation, the climate had altered. The weather and biosphere had reached a new equilibrium, one much colder and drier than previously. Lakes and rivers shrank and dried up, deserts spread, forests withered, rainfall patterns shifted, and when it did rain it was more likely to be cold sleet or even snow. Even the ocean had been disrupted, and surviving charts of tides and currents were useless. What survived of humanity had to start again, in a harsh and hostile new world.
Western Australia came off fairly lightly in the Great War. While the major urban centres of the coastal strip were devastated by nuclear and chemical attacks, the south coast was left relatively untouched. While there were strikes, they were carried out with conventional weapons, leaving none of the fallout, poisons and disease spores plaguing other regions. As rainfall contracted southwards, the few survivors followed, establishing a new society in the only part of the state - and perhaps the entire country - still able to support agriculture. They worked hard, restoring, recovering and improvising technologies, and over time their situation moved from desperate, through precarious, to stable, and the Southern States were born.
The Wild Southwest is a post apocalyptic role playing campaign setting, located in the south west corner of Western Australia. This website provides resources for players of the current campaign, and for those wanting to start their own campaigns.
