Alternate Earth Characters #16

[farik]

Your GM has announced he's going to run an alternate Earth game and he wants you to make a modified version of your character to fit his "Alternate Earth Setting. The GM is being deliberately unclear about whether you'll be playing your alt character or if your regular character will be facing them.

 

So what is different about your character from

Risen South-Earth

The Civil War ended with a divided nation. The Old US is now 3 countries.

The Confederacy a rural based economy with severly stunted civil rights.

The Union an Industrial based nation most similar to the real world US.

and

California a nearly anarchist state filled with extreme ideas and a nearly incomprehensible government system.

[Blue]

Hmm. California has a nearly incomprehensible government system. Wonder what actor won governorship on that Earth

 

Uncle Slam: Probably a confederate hero. While I've never purposely said where he was from, and I've never played him with a Southern drawl, I'm thinking alt-earth Slam would be "Colonel Flagg" (No M*A*S*H jokes, please).

 

Anthem would be defending the downtrodden in the wild west of CA, where laws are merely guidelines; still trying to be an example of how people "should" act, even if they don't seem to care so much.

 

Audra Blue was brought to this country by a politician, so I think she's a northerner. She'd likely be in a big city, and her tasks wouldn't be all that different from now.

 

How about that--everyone wound up on a different side of the border.

[Chaosliege]

Re: Alternate Earth Characters #16

 

Originally posted by farik

California a nearly anarchist state filled with extreme ideas and a nearly incomprehensible government system.

 

This sound like the place for me..

[Chaosliege]

Seriously though

 

I have an Armor based hero that would probably interchange with the Union side with little changes.

 

 

 

One of the characters I'v played, Vinicator, is a quasi brick with a short temper always having to hold himself in check in our four-color world. In California, he could meet out justice in his own fasion. He could even be a vilain or hired thug, as he has one of those on-the-edge personalities.

 

As for the south, I have a speedster that I'm playing in a curent game right now. He is a lawyer in his alt. ID and has the disadvantage beleives in justice because he witnessed his father's killer get off on a technicality. In this alternate earth, maybe the criminal still got off on a technicality, but this time lets say the guy was black(before I'd asigned no race to him), and in this south, thems don't care for that too much. Said speedster falls in with the wrong crowd and becomes a racist thug for the KKK.

 

 

hmmm.. Two out of my three heros could easily be vilains.. What does that say?

[farik]

Traditionally Kenneth is from California but I think in this setting his family would probably be living in the Confederacy. Husky would have initially burst on the scene to maintain the status quo of segregation but slowly he'd start to fight the system becoming an anti hero of sorts defending people but defending all people equally.

[Vex]

Hmmmm, let's see....

 

Adrenaline would still be from Dallas and not much would change.

 

Realm would be a government law enforcement agent. The south, being more militaristic would have a federal law enforcement set up instead of a local police force.

 

Hecabus would be the govenor of California, helping to pass laws to make things more chaotic.

 

I also think that Texas would have been a separate country. We pretty much are anyway and definately see ourselves as one. The reason for the lack of any racist overtones comes from Texas only partially being part of the war. No battles were fought near here and most people played little or no part in it. Also, slavery wasn't as wide spread and the Texas economy was based more on share cropping than mansions and slave trade.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Wraith: Unaffected..., no, wait.

 

Dear god. How did this impact WW1? WW2? The Cold War?

I'll be optimistic and say Britain ended up remaining powerful... which puts him in good stead. He'd probably be even wealthier off the family estate, and perhaps born earlier (and so returned earlier).

 

Under those circumstances , he's probably an elite exerienced hero (perhaps adding power armour to his abilities), and oddly powerful.

 

On the other hand... he could have lived a mundane life, as his powers were only kicked into high gear by Britain, and he only went there because of his inheritance.

 

Flippant:

Probably not an American in this timeline. I think I made him second gen immigrant, so he's a hero in whatever Russia is.

[Farkling]

FlameJet:: Let's see...Jet's distant family roots are Jewish refugees fromNazi Germany. Not that he really cared where his family an dmoney came from. Following the Turtledove predictions, the Jewish fleeing to America would find an industrialized North making friends with Germany, and a rural monied South firm friends with France and England. I'd place FlameJet in Texas. He still owns a construction company, but they build oil rigs, bridges and roads. Jet only occasionally gets involved in superheroics, more often he indulges in shortcutting building projects with his powers. He is anti-KKK, and pro-States Rights.

 

Lightning:: Hah. No question. Reverie (Nathan James) is in the great pioneering anarchist State of California. He has more money than this Lightning, and he has built a few theme parks to compete with Walt's DreamTown. He is currently budling one in Texas.

Anarchism and California have reacted oddly with Lightning's superspeed and moral sense. He wanders both North and South in the persona of "Reverie," when he appears he wears a historically accurate Civil War uniform of the other side, and acts for justice over law.

[Argus]

Please just one M*A*S*H Joke

 

Originally posted by Blue

Hmm. California has a nearly incomprehensible government system. Wonder what actor won governorship on that Earth

 

Uncle Slam: Probably a confederate hero. While I've never purposely said where he was from, and I've never played him with a Southern drawl, I'm thinking alt-earth Slam would be "Colonel Flagg" (No M*A*S*H jokes, please).

 

 

Argus could be your Sidekick Radar.

 

A.

[Mayday]

ShadowCross attends a good Southern college for ladies (only) and does not meet her New York husband Adam. Marries a nice southern boy and becomes a political wife and mother. With her husband appointed Ambassador to the Union she meets Adam at last and the two have a torrid affair. Word gets out and her husband is recalled. Eli is accused of giving Adam government secrets (framed) by her uncle's enemies.

 

He gives her special weaponry and a costume to use to clear her name, and thus is reborn ShadowCross.

 

Linedrive works on daddy's small Alabama farm with his brothers and doesn't get to college. He discovers his Deflection/Reflection powers while out deer hunting and as rumors begin to follow him he hops a train north to evade the rigid religious fallout it incurs. Gets work in a factory as a janitor until Cali EcoTerrorists attack it late one night. Caught in the explosions and bathed in military use chemicals Bobbie becomes property of the Corporation 'for his own good' while they study his powers (old and new). Bobby gets a huge pay raise and begins training the new super soldiers that are developed soon after. Feeling qualms about his work and his true country he steals the formulas and escapes to the South hunted by Drive teams. Giving the technology to his country he is put in charge of their own hush hush rush rush Super Soldier program.

 

The Union demands his return for various crimes and send assassins after him resulting in the deaths of his new wife and baby son. Swearing his vengeance on their graves, Bobbie Joe trains his men hard. Months of political wrangling leads to a breakdown in diplomacy. The Union invades the South seeking the Weapons of Mutant Destruction.

 

Sabre is born and bred in the Cape Cod region and becomes head of a corporation in due time developing high tech flight and weaponry systems for the Union (no change).

 

- - -

 

I considered the role of England and Europe. France and England supported the South during the Civil War and so would have retained cordial ties, but in WWII as said above, Germany would be a natural ally of the North. Without the Unions factories and the South wary of an attack by the Union if they help Britain and France, I suspect Germany won the war, or at least won Europe. So we have Germany, Soviet Russia and the divided Americas then.

 

I dont know enough about the Pacific wra to guess what went differently there, but if Germany DID lose, Id expect alot of nazi scientists went to the Union and worked for corporations or the govt, rather than going to South America... Not good for Linedrive, thats for certain.

 

I think also that without the agricultural states to balance the industrial states out that there may be a stronger pro-Corporate world going in in the North, with poor immigrants forming unskilled factory labor little better than slaves for a period early in the century. That mindset may still affect the way corporations operate in the Union somewhat.

 

[assault]

Re: Hmmmm, let's see....

 

Originally posted by Vex

Realm would be a government law enforcement agent. The south, being more militaristic would have a federal law enforcement set up instead of a local police force.

 

Really? I would have thought that the States' Rights aspect would have prevented that. After all, IRL, state parochialism was a major problem for the Confederacy. This might have been overcome if they had won, but it's more likely that their victory was a result of something like the British and French navies shelling northern ports, plus "that nasty business on the Canadian border".

 

On changes to the world:

WWI: probably no major changes. The extra troops helped, but the Western Front was pretty stable. Turkey would have cracked anyway, taking down Bulgaria, and Austra-Hungary, and leaving Germany isolated as in the Real World .

 

WWII: The main question is: what happened to the North's economy? As long as US factories were churning out the goodies, whoever had access to them was fine.

 

The biggest change would be in the Pacific. I'm not sure the Pacific war would have happened without the trade embargoes and similar measures the US had imposed on Japan. A lot would depend on who was running the Philippines. Hawaii would be independent or British!

 

Assuming only a limited Pacific war, no particular change on a global scale, except that Japan would be a _very_ serious power.

 

The European war would probably have resulted in the Red Army liberating most of continental Europe!

 

Britain would probably have pulled some piece of treachery to prevent this. It's quite possible that the Third World War would have immediate followed the Second, or rather have been the second round of WWII.

 

Uhh, at this point it's all too complicated. My crystal ball is fogging up...

[ParagonAlpha]

I agree there would be little change in the outcome of WWI. But WWII might have gone differently.

 

With California an independant country, there would be little involvement with Hawaii, hence no US naval bases. The US was Isolationist at best. But with a divided North nad SOuth. The OSuth's dependance on the European purchase of their textiles would have drawn them into the war. They would have provided intensly trained small cadres of soldiers (The South was all about a States right to protect and govenr itself. So the mitlitary sent over would be state miltias. (Very deadly concidering the type of war fought in WWII)

 

The North would remain distant and neutral (i real world the US wanted nothing to do with world politics and was heading towards an extreme isolationist view point). Northern Manufactueres would have dealt with whoever was providing money for their goods. I could see Germany making deal with the North US to provide Pittsburgh Steel and Detroit Engines for the German war effort. Which could have led to a second Civil War as the South turned north to stop the German Allies.

 

Oha man I love speculative history.

 

But regardless modern North America would be rough. You'd have a Capatalist/Socialist Government (Make money all you want but be responsible with it) in North US, a Democratic?Feuduel society (heridaroty transfer of wealth and politcal position) in the South US, and Robber-Barons (divided socio-economic leaders with precise, but contested, territorial control) in the California Free State.

 

Superheroes would love some of the conflict, but man the line between hero and villian would become so blurry.

 

But here goes my heroes:

 

Paragon: Though born in New England has been charged with seeing the world protected from evil. Politics don't mean anything to him, but he would be somewhat against the lax civil liberties in the South.

 

Patriot: A hardcore and staunch defender of teh power of Democracy..would have never existed in this time line.

 

StarKnight: Born a poor black man in Detroit, StarKnight would be very typical angry and embittered over the fact that blacks are not treated equally. After gaining his powers he would begin dealling with unjust Southern leaders. He'd be a villian for all intents and purposes.

 

Peace

[Farkling]

FYI

 

How Few Remain - Harry Turtledove's speculative historical fiction chronicling the second civil war. Covers Utah's attempt to secede, beginning of the subjugation of Canada, and the South purchases a few of the northern Mexican states.

Interesting work, and if you like the tale, it goes all the way through WW I in subsequent books. The battle lines drawn in OUR America are chilling...trenches and barbed wire along the Virginia-Tennessee border...and Custer deciding tank usage policies in spite of the War Department strategies dictated.

 

Let's see, he has Democrats and Socialists as the powers in the North, and Whigs and Radical Liberals in the South. I' waiting for the next part of Blood and Iron to come out in paperback.

[Glen Sprigg]

Originally posted by WhammeWhamme

Wraith: Unaffected..., no, wait.

 

Dear god. How did this impact WW1? WW2? The Cold War?

 

Read Harry Turtledove's "American Front" series, an alternate history about what happens after the South wins the War Between the States. That'll give you a good idea of what things might have been like.

 

As for my characters...most of them are Canadian, so it wouldn't mean much to them. If we go by Mr Turtledove's AH, however, things change drastically...

 

Snowbird would likely be a more patriotic Canadian, serving the American occupation authorities but secretly working against them.

 

Comet would be an international hero regardless; he'd still be fighting the good fight, trying to do good all over the place.

 

Shadowhawk would be working with Snowbird in secret; he'd probably have more to do with a higher crime rate in Toronto, but he'd definitely be helping the Canadian resistance.

 

Archangel would still be in the service of the Church, defending the entire world in the name of God and the Pope. He probably wouldn't be welcome in the Confederacy, though, due to his belief in equality and disdain for fundamentalists who reject Rome.

 

Glen