Dear
Friends of Fallen Earth™,
Over
the next several months we at Icarus are going introduce you to some
of the aspects of Fallen Earth's world, beginning with the people who
live within it. We’ll keep you up to date on progress too, but
we figured this would be more interesting than regurgitating the same
“we’re making progress and will release when we’re
ready” mantra. The next six newsletters will contain information
on the different factions, each from its own point of view. There are
no “classes” in Fallen Earth. Instead these factions are
groups that players can ally themselves with or not as they wish.
We'll
begin with the Enforcers, guardians of law and order.
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We
came to the town of Lanson’s Crossing at 0900 hours on March
13th. We’d heard from some of the scouts that the Black Hound
Raiders had been causing trouble in the area after we chased them
out of Crosston. We armored up and marched right in with guns held
ready, looking for the person in charge. Nothing like real military
soldiers to make people stand up and take notice. You could almost
hear the local troublemakers quaking in their boots. We found the
mayor easy enough with all the attention we got and offered to help
him deal with the raiders. We cut the standard deal pretty quick:
we deal with the raiders while he agrees to abide by our laws and
regulations. We don’t tolerate thieving, killing, or lawlessness
– the sort of stuff decent people never do. We don’t
save those sorts of people, we string them up. The mayor also promised
to send regular supplies of food to our base a few miles to the
south. Reasonable payment for cleaning up the town and getting rid
of the Black Hounds. The next day we marched out into the wastes.
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It
took us six whole days, two more than predicted, but we got them
all. We returned with twelve bags of raider heads, sixty heads in
all. Eight of us took out the entire Black Hound Raiders without
losing a man. The town won’t have trouble with them again,
but just to make sure, Commander Griffin sent in a squad to keep
the peace after we left. They’ll institute the standard protocols
– catching any local thieves, keeping the usual suspects under
control, organizing a militia, a nominal tax to pay for our continued
support. You know, the usual. The mayor will have to step back a
bit, but in the long run, the town will prosper and there’ll
be peace.
As requested I’ve put together some material on the activities
of some of the other groups in North Fields for our new recruits.
While some of these groups may be our allies, I don’t think
I should be going soft on the truth with the recruits. |
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On
March 15th, while patrolling the towns to the south, I stopped by
Picus Ridge, one of the settlements run by the Techs, to see about
getting some new scopes. They’re the only ones around here
that know anything about grinding glass. The Techs have put more
effort into getting this place running than previously reported,
and it’s very impressive. Electric lights, hot water, machines
that wash clothes, and even a functioning vid with some undamaged
discs showing family life from before the Fall. The folks on the
vid sure seemed to be having a great time. There must’ve been
a ton of other people there too, because even though we couldn’t
see them, they kept laughing and laughing at this family. It sure
seemed like easy living. Got to hand it to the Techs. If they can
get us back to those times, well, we can only hope. Tech towns are
usually amazing places. Sometimes I envy the non-Techs lucky enough
to live there, but then you see the work they do to pay for their
luxuries.
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These so-called
helpers do all the cooking, growing, and general work while the
Techs spend most of their time researching things I couldn’t
begin to understand. The Techs aren’t much for the concerns
of the common man. I’ve heard rumors that some of the locals
are being used in experiments with mutations. I’m not saying
I believe it, and I know some Techs who sure wouldn’t abide
by it, but I saw some pretty screwed up people in that place. Made
me wonder if we’re not turning a blind eye to something we
shouldn’t.
I guess trying to rebuild the old golden age of science is a tough
business that takes a lot of dedication. I just hope they don’t
cross the line.
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Travelers are all over the region, always on the move, looking for
a deal. If you need it, chances are they have it or know someone
who can get it, but don’t ask where it came from. Weapons,
food, drugs, information – if you’re willing to deal
with scum, they’ve got it all. Sure, they try to present themselves
as legitimate traders, and there are a few of us who will do some
trade with them on occasion. But for the most part, we are quicker
to lock them up than we are to do any dealings. They do a lot more
business on the shady side of things than on the legitimate side.
You want to gamble, drink, or sample some other vice, the Travelers
are the ones to talk to. They’ve got their hands in all sorts
of unsavory businesses, from trafficking stolen goods to contract
killing. You just better be discrete and have the chips to pay for
it. The Travelers tend to make examples of people who don’t
pay their debts. Painful examples.
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We
ran into some Travelers on the way to Lanson’s Crossing. Seems
a water well had gone bad and they were making a fortune selling
water they’d shipped in to the locals. Something smelled wrong
about it, and sure enough, a few roughed-up Travelers later, we
found out they’d poisoned the well in order to create a “market
opportunity.” We strung them up the next morning, not wanting
to waste good bullets on scum like that. Hopefully they’ll
be more generous to the crows. Nothing gets me angrier than people
taking advantage of the misery of others. We’ve got communities
of good folks desperately needing supplies to build and grow. A
good trading partner would help the whole region prosper, but the
Travelers are all about the bottom line. Yeah, they’ll provide
you with what you need, but somehow when all is said and done, you’ll
find yourself without a shirt.
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As
much as I dislike the Travelers, they’re nothing compared
to the Chota. The Chota are convinced that everything before the
Fall was corrupt and evil, so they’re trying to destroy whatever
remains of it. Somehow, they think living like animals is the future.
Their thinking is so backwards, it makes me want to shoot something.
Any sane person knows the only chance we’ve got is to drag
ourselves back to the ways of civilized folks, with rules, laws,
and order to keep everything together. Wanting to live like savages
makes about as much sense as keeping a rattler for a pet. They’re
so twisted in the head, they take pride in their so-called shamans
who worship radioactive sludge!
The
Chota may hate all forms of tech, but they’re not stupid.
If they were just mindless savages we could take them all out without
much trouble. And believe me, the region would be better off. But
anyone who’s seen a massive Chota rifle knows that they can
build things when they have to. You’d think that people who
want nothing to do with technology would be bothered by using things
that Techs produce. Not the Chota, though. Total hypocrites. Never
mind that a whole bunch of them are mutants, which only makes them
more dangerous. Fortunately they’re so unorganized they usually
can only scrounge up an axe or a nailbat, but for all their crazy
ideas, they seem to grow like weeds and hang around like roaches.
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We’ve
all had run-ins with the Chota at some point or another, and I’ve
had more than I care to remember. The one that wakes me up at night
in a cold sweat was during a skirmish near Fracture. We were trying
to get out of the area after helping some locals recover some livestock
when we realized we were in Chota territory. It was a stack of skulls
and skins that gave it away, though the wild howling was a big clue.
They came charging out of the morning mist with clubs and axes,
all rusted and caked in some nasty glowing slime. We shot down half
of them before they reached us, but the remaining half didn’t
care. We lost a lot of good men that day, and my right leg has never
really recovered from the thrashing it took. Nope, Shiva wasn’t
enough, now we got the Chota too.
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Most
people I know see the Vistas as a bunch of deluded fools chasing
a lost cause. They are always on about protecting the plants and
animals of the Province, trying to make the whole place livable
again. I’d say there’s not much chance of that happening.
They certainly know more about plants and animals than anyone else
though, and they produce more food than any other group in the sector.
But as with so many fanatics, there’s always something that
gets in the way of good sense.
The Vistas hate tech with a passion, and, unlike the Chota, they
stand by their principles. Anything that pollutes or threatens the
environment they will go after with a vengeance. While they don’t
seem to be natural killers, there are a good number of Techs who
would say otherwise. As a rule, we steer clear of Vista territories.
Sure, we could take them out if we wanted, but what would be the
point? They do some good work, create a lot of food for the Province,
and are mostly peaceful if left alone. No, for the most part we
just treat them like a crazy cousin. No reason getting them all
stirred up.
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might even be friendly with the Vistas were it not for the raiding
teams. On March 2nd, we camped in the southwestern section of Northfields
while on routine raider patrol. We woke up one morning and found
our comm-units and extra ammo gone. Good thing we sleep with our
guns. Normally I’d think only Travelers could get past the
night guard, but all our other supplies were untouched. No, odds
are if we looked hard enough we’d find a pile of smashed tech
somewhere nearby, courtesy of our neighborly tree huggers.
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year, one of the boys in Post #23 came down with a bad fever and
we brought him west to the Lightbearer monastery at Tranquility
for healing. They took him in and gave him all manner of ground-up
herbs and powders. From what I saw of the place, they even have
the tools for cutting a person open, working on their innards, then
putting them back almost like new. The healer got the boy right
again and only asked for a small donation in return. The Lightbearers
know more about medicine and healing than anyone else in this day
and age, both in the old ways of healing and the new. We stayed
in their monastery for a week helping them care for others, and
they do seem a good bunch of people… for the most part.
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heard rumors about some of the Lightbearers thinking that mutants
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better than humans. They think they are better equipped to survive
and reach spirtual enlightenment. Not all of them think that, but
I’ve heard some of the Lightbearers are even more outspoken,
saying that all humans “unblessed by Shiva’s touch”
are eventually going to die off. A few even suggest it might be
a good idea to help the untouched make their exit. But despite a
few bad eggs, we get along well with the Lightbearers. They appreciate
our help keeping the region safe from the lawless, and we appreciate
their dedication to bettering themselves in a civilized manner.
No one knows the ways of mending a body better than they do, something
we make use of regularly, so we like being friendly with them.
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about it for this report. I’ll keep you updated if there’s
any news worth your time. We’re keeping everything locked
down so I don’t expect you’ll hear anything till the
big offensive.
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