Fallout: Florida , The Sunshine State's Post-Apocalyptic Wastes Options

[RaderOfTheLostArk]

Well, I never thought I'd be posting in this particular subforum before now. But with all these ideas bouncing in my head of what post-Great War Florida would look like in the Fallout universe, I have taken to jotting them down and (hopefully) making a cohesive guide to it. I don't really write fiction, so I don't think I'll be writing actual stories like you all do, but I suppose we'll see. For the time being, it's really going to be a guide of sorts, somewhat like a wiki or what textbooks would say.

This will obviously attempt to adhere to Fallout canon as much as possible. I chose Florida as the setting not only because it is my home state (though that is definitely the biggest reason) but because, from what I can tell, so little about the Southeastern United States is talked about in Fallout lore, giving me a lot more room to operate in. And, of course, it's the state I know best and would love to see the most as a setting for a Fallout game.

So here's the plan for all this:
[*] I'm going to break up each section of the guide into its own post to separate it sufficiently. This one will be the introduction to the setting.
[*] I may include some incomplete information on here for several reasons. For one, it'll be an easy repository to refer to just in case the Word doc I am using has something go screwy or that my computer messes up or whatever. Two, it can be a little taste of what's to come. Three, I just want to get down as much content as comes to me.
[*] The tentative list of sections to have here include, but are not limited to (and not necessarily in this order):

[*] General overview of the setting and how I am breaking up the parts of Florida
[*] The Bestiary
[*] The Timeline
[*] The Factions
[*] Profiles of each of the regions I am making

Some of the stuff you see will definitely be subject to change if needed to make it cohesive. I'll try to document what I change to make it clear.

And most of all, I hope you all like it and I'd like to hear whatever feedback you have. Presenting and communicating information is one of the things I enjoy most, although I'm more used to doing so for real-life content (particularly political science).

First section of the guide coming up!

The Setting - Basic Overview

While not experiencing the same level of nuclear barrage as places such as Southern California, New York, and D.C., Florida was plunged into nuclear fire just like virtually everywhere else in the world. This was especially true of the Tampa Bay Area, Orlando and its surrounding areas, and South Florida, centers of great economic and political importance in Pre-War America. Being the 3rd-most populous state in the country, the Great War extinguished far more lives than average here and left plenty more to pick up the pieces in the post-apocalyptic, anarchic wastes. The exceptional biological, geographical, and human diversity of Florida led to a far more varied impact on the former Sunshine State when the bombs fell.

Nevertheless, many settlements started to crop up in the decades just after the Great War, even in those once-densely populated cities and metropolitan areas. In time, former towns and cities were beginning to be resurrected and reclaiming their old names, and brand-new ones started to form. But post-War Florida--and the rest of what used to be the country's Gulf Commonwealth, Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi--was still highly fractured. In the 22nd century, the first of many ambitious attempts was made to reunite this once-thriving landscape. While extraordinarily difficult at first, a string of successes in reunification gave birth to the Gulf Coast Union, a nation similar in concept to the future New California Republic (NCR). The so-called Great Reunification--a somewhat hyperbolic title, at least currently--started extending through Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and even some of southwestern Georgia, though it has yet to reclaim the whole of any of these former states.

The process is far from completed, however, and many other factions both big and small struggle with the Gulf Coast Union for dominance in the former Southeastern United States. Many of the conflicts take place in what used to be the Sunshine State. The Gulf Coast Union was successful in claiming virtually all of Northern Florida and has made inroads into the Central Florida wastes. Major and minor powers violently feuding with each other and with the Gulf Coast Union have made the GCU's grip on these lands somewhat tenuous, preventing any attempts at expanding into South Florida.

As of this guide, it is currently the year 2130, over a half-century since the world was irrevocably changed. To most easily understand the lands that were once called Florida, it is best to divide the area into ten distinct regions--even if the divisions are a bit crude, arbitrary, or too convenient. Each have their own set of conflicts being waged, major and minor players vying for power, and civilizations trying to carve out a life in these harsh wastes. Welcome to the Sunshine State's post-apocalyptic wastes.

The Ten Regions and Their Counties

County Map
Here's how some coasts in Florida got their nicknames, though not all are explicitly mentioned here

Though these broken-up zones are somewhat crude and arbitrary, it'll be easiest to understand post-apocalyptic Florida this way. However, major conflicts in one region can definitely spill over into another.

1) Panhandle (13): Escambia, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa, Walton, Holmes, Washington, Bay, Jackson, Calhoun, Gulf, Liberty, Franklin, Gadsden
2) Big Bend (8): Leon, Wakulla, Jefferson, Madison, Taylor, Lafayette, Dixie, Levy
3) North Central Florida (8): Hamilton, Suwannee, Columbia, Baker, Union, Bradford, Alachua, Gilchrist
4) The First Coast (6): Nassau, Duval, Clay, St. Johns, Putnam, Flagler
5) The Space and Treasure Coasts (7): Volusia, Seminole, Brevard, Indian River, St. Lucie, Martin, Okeechobee
6) Central Florida (8): Marion, Sumter, Lake, Orange, Polk, Osceola, Hardee, Highlands
7) The Tampa Bay Area (6): Citrus, Hernando, Pasco, Pinellas, Hillsborough, Manatee
8) The Gold Coast (3): Palm Beach, Broward, Miami-Dade
9) Southwest Florida (7.5): Sarasota, De Soto, Charlotte, Glades, Lee, Hendry, Collier, Monroe (mainland only)
10) The Keys (0.5): Monroe (Keys only)


Just a quick side-note: The Panhandle West/East dichotomy is one I totally made up for my own purposes. They are, as far as I know, not referred to as such in real life. It is just the Panhandle, and the real-world Panhandle doesn't necessarily include all of the counties in Big Bend.

This post has been edited by RaderOfTheLostArk: Jun 9 2020, 01:30 AM

[Renee]

RaderOfTheLostArk needs to get hired as a dev. I can just see his credit listed for Fallout V: The Panhandle.

[RaderOfTheLostArk]

RaderOfTheLostArk needs to get hired as a dev. I can just see his credit listed for Fallout V: The Panhandle.

Lol, I don't know about that but I appreciate the vote of confidence, Renee. And unfortunately, my vision of a Fallout: Florida is going to be impossible to implement fully into a video game. The technology couldn't do it. But it is still fun to think about.



Haven't been able to do much more with this project recently, but I finally finished up another regional profile.

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Regional Profile #2: Big Bend

Counties: Leon, Wakulla, Jefferson, Madison, Taylor, Lafayette, Dixie, Levy

Brief Description: Big Bend gets its name from being the section of land that “bends” between the Panhandle and the rest of Florida. The main theater of action at this time is Tallahassee by far, which is sometimes considered part of the Panhandle. As the capital of what was once Florida, the place has all sorts of secrets and Pre-War treasures waiting to be uncovered. And that is exactly what the major factions in this region are attempting to do.

Alternate History: TBD

Major Settlements: Monticello; Perry; Madison; Williston;

Minor Settlements: Wakulla; Otter Creek; Homestead Ridge; Fish Creek; Morriston

Other Points of Interest:

• Environmental Areas: Lake Talquin State Park; St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge; Waccasassa Bay Preserve State Park; Mallory Swamp Wildlife Management Area; Twin Rivers State Forest; Goethe State Forest; Devil’s Hammock Wildlife Management Area
• Landmasses: Cedar Key; Bonita Beach
• Larger Complexes: Florida State Capitol Building; Florida State University; Museum of Florida History; Florida A&M University; Governor’s Square Mall; Florida Supreme Court Building; Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare; Taylor Correctional Institution
• Smaller Complexes/Particular Buildings: Fort Braden Community Center; Leon County Solid Waste Division (Fort Braden); Donald L. Tucker Civic Center; Florida Governors’ Mansion; The Grove Museum; St. Agape Orthodox Church
• Other: “Old” Tallahassee, Williston Highlands; Oakland Cemetery; Lake Rousseau Boat Ramp

Totally Fictional Locations: Gulfwatch; Sundown; Vault 100; Green Anole Ranch; Big Bend Lookout

Partially Fictional Locations: New Tallahassee; Fort Braden Ruins; The 98; Chief’s Land (Chiefland in real-life)

Factions Involved: Gulf Coast Union; The Old Guard; The Enclave; New State of Florida

Main Conflict: Most of Pre-War Tallahassee lies in ruins due to a direct hit from a nuke, and it is now referred to as “Old Tallahassee.” Displaced residents would set up a settlement outside of new Tallahassee as the old city was taken over by all sorts of dangers, and it was uninhabitable for some time anyway due to lethal levels of radiation. In recent years, the radiation has mostly dissipated but the Gulf Coast Union has kept the area strictly off-limits to its citizens due to the monsters and robots that still infest it. As a result, Old Tallahassee was not part of GCU control despite being within its borders.

Recently, forces from the GCU, Old Guard, and the Enclave have been seeking to access the city and recover secrets and lost information regarding the rest of Florida—but another faction stands in the way of all four groups. The self-proclaimed “New State of Florida” (not to be confused with the “New Florida” that became part of the GCU), a conglomeration of robots, feral and sane ghouls, and monsters that rule the city, have been very successful in keeping outsiders away. The NSF is led by a brilliant yet emotionally unstable and megalomaniacal man turned ghoul named Ezra Davidson. Davidson was a Pre-War state senator for Leon County (the county which Tallahassee resided in) and a scientist who had gubernatorial ambitions. Of course, that last part was thwarted by the Post-War. But Davidson saw an opportunity to build a new nation of his own: He has proclaimed his government the “true, legitimate, and rightful continuation” of the Pre-War Florida state government, and he has the resources to back his power up.

GCU hope to find lost information in Old Tallahassee that will help them expand throughout Florida and rebuild Tallahassee to bolster their economic, political, and military power. But it seems that both the Old Guard and Enclave have more of an idea of what they are looking for, something (or multiple things) more specific…


EDIT: After thinking about it some more, I'm going to remove the Brotherhood from this place. They are already involved in the Panhandle and I don't want to overuse them. Plus, the Midwest Brotherhood is going to be involved in places outside the GCU, so having them too numerous spread out too much isn't going to make sense. The Southeast chapter will make an appearance in a later region, however.

This post has been edited by RaderOfTheLostArk: Jul 11 2020, 01:57 AM