The winning tones of our last poll are: Action / Adventure, Gonzo, Philosophical. With a three way tie, things are going to get weird!
Factoring in our tone, here is our updated setting:
In the year 199X, corporate greed led to a series of experiments to create an underclass that would serve as cheap labor and servants for humanity. This ended in the only way it could have:
The complete collapse of society.
The mutants rebelled, using EMP bombs to free others, and wipe records of the experiments used to create them. Humans fought back with plagues that only hastened the end, killing human and mutant alike, and causing strange new chimera to emerge. In the years that followed, brutal conflicts raged across the globe.
The wars continued until the barrels ran dry, and the last bullet was fired. There may be weapon caches hidden away, but for the majority of people, guns are relics of a forgotten age. Only the oldest members of the Clans remember these weapons of destruction.
Of course, the odds were never even, and mutants, having far fewer resources to begin with, learned to compensate before the humans. Blending their natural talents with martial abilities. These advantages giving them an edge to carve out a new civilization in the wastelands of the old. This was the start of the Clans, the new tribes of the Earth.
The world moves into a new era. The lands are wild again, as new empires rise in the shadows of the old. The Clans, an evolution of the schools of fighting that helped mutants win their independence have grown to members in the tens of thousands. Spread out across the lands, they maintain their own places of power, towns, and schools. Humans still outnumber mutants, a thousand to one, but without their tools the spirit to fight has been broken.
In the Northern Territories, what was formally Mexico, the United States, and Canada, there are roughly 30 million people, there are a suspected 300,000 mutants. Scattered throughout the Norther Territories are a number of major settlements along with dozens of smaller villages or strongholds.
The largest of these new cities, Causeway (formerly St. Louis) is a central trading post with a population of roughly 1.5 million. With access to the rail lines and waterways it supplies the communities throughout the territories. Here representatives from the Clans along with many human settlements gather.
To the west are the Free Riders, a motorcycle club primarily made up of bear, gorilla, lion, and tiger mutants. Led by an ancient bear referred to as the Light, it’s believed that he has somehow survived from the time before the war. The Free Riders, run the highways, searching for gas, tools, and whatever they can salvage or trade. Nomads by nature, they accept all comers.
There are rumors of a new human colony, in the Frozen Lands where humans are amassing troops. Some hidden place, controlled by a power yet to reveal themselves that plots for a return to the natural order of things.
Along the East Coast fly the Moth Riders, somewhere between a gang and colony that have taken to the sky in massive dirigibles. They are believed to have a fortified city somewhere in the Lap Chains, beyond the Great Woods. Their goals are unknown, and they are as likely to strike without warning as they are to fly past. When they do attack, they drop from the sky in a hail of crossbow fire using ropes and winged suits to strike fast and slip back into the skies.
No mater what, be it clan, city-folk, raider, or rider, everyone is searching for a way to fit into the strange new world that has evolved around them.
Up to this point, we’ve referred to this setting as Untitled Mutant Martial Arts Campaign or UMMAC for short. With our Tones set, lets find a name.
