Australia in Champions - Not A Gazetteer

[assault]

I'm fiddling about writing a bit of a "how to use Australia in a Champions campaign" type essay. Here is a bit of an excerpt I just wrote. It needs a polish, obviously, but I would be interested if anyone had any feedback. The whole essay will be fairly short, so I'm cutting corners.

 

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NOT A GAZETTEER

 

Australia is a continent. It contains snow-capped mountains, deserts, tropical rainforests, a wide variety of other kinds of forests, extensive farm and grazing lands, beaches, substantial cities, and a wide variety of other areas. It’s big – only slightly smaller than the continental USA, and larger than most of Europe.

 

At the same time, it is highly urbanized. The overwhelming majority of the population live in cities. More than half live in the handful of capital cities. That means there is a massive area that is only sparsely populated – which is quite likely to be the part that our heroes are interested in.

 

We can simplify the geography.

 

The city most likely to be important in an Australian scenario is Sydney. It’s the oldest and largest city, with the busiest airport. It contains landmarks like the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House. It has a number of universities. If it becomes relevant, use the University of Sydney.

 

As the national capital, Canberra can be important too. It contains the Federal Parliament, lots of bureaucratic headquarters and the various embassies. However most of its plot functions can be played by Sydney, which contains a wide variety of consulates and even has a Prime Ministerial residence, Kirribilli House, which at least some Prime Ministers prefer to the Lodge in Canberra. Canberra is the location of the main campus of the Australian National University, but see the University of Sydney above.

 

The Great Barrier Reef is another interesting place. It’s easiest to visit via Cairns, which has a port, airport and the main campus of James Cook University, which is a noted centre for research into marine biology.

 

 All of these are a fair way apart. Rounding off slightly, it’s about 180 mi / 290 km between Sydney and Canberra, and about 1500 miles/2400 km between Sydney and Cairns. Easy if you can fly or run at superspeed. The distance between Cairns and the relevant bits of the Great Barrier Reef varies, but the Reef is big.

 

If you are heading to “the Outback”, and you don’t have a particular location in mind, just head 1000 mi/1600 km west or northwest and you are in the middle of nowhere. If you are going to, say, Uluru or the Nullabor Plains, then it’s much further, especially in the latter case.

 

Obviously there are plenty of other places to go!

[Lord Liaden]

Thank you for doing this.   A few bits could use a little clarification IMO.

 

"Slightly smaller than the continental USA" -- does that include Alaska? If not I'd use "contiguous USA." And if it's "larger than most of Europe," does that mean it's smaller than all of Europe? A few actual dimension/area stats might be nice, but in the Internet age not really necessary.

 

"Handful of capital cities" -- I'd specify that you mean the national capital and state capitals.

 

What is Cairns? Is it a city? On the continent, on the Reef, or on an island?

 

I'm assuming you'll elaborate on Uluru and the Nullabor Plains in future installments.

 

Thanks again!

[Ninja-Bear]

Lord Liaden not sure where you are from but Contential U.S.A never includes Alaska.

[dmjalund]

Australia's mountains are only snow-capped in winter - and only some of them (more to the south)

[Lord Liaden]

Lord Liaden not sure where you are from but Contential U.S.A never includes Alaska.

 

Canada, and I'll take your word for that.   Seems kind of odd, though, since Alaska is part of the North American continent, which Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Samoa are not.

 

EDIT: This does seem to be a point of contention among various sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contiguous_United_States#Continental_United_States

[assault]

Thank you for doing this.   A few bits could use a little clarification IMO.

 

"Slightly smaller than the continental USA" -- does that include Alaska? If not I'd use "contiguous USA." And it it's "larger than most of Europe," does that mean it's smaller than all of Europe? A few actual dimension/area stats might be nice, but in the Internet age not really necessary.

 

"Handful of capital cities" -- I'd specify that you mean the national capital and state capitals.

 

What is Cairns? Is it a city? On the continent, on the Reef, or on an island?

 

I'm assuming you'll elaborate on Uluru and the Nullabor Plains in future installments.

 

Thanks again!

 

Obviously, maps would be a good idea!

 

Comparison maps like the ones from here and here sound like a good idea. I'll have to find ones that are public domain though.

 

Fact boxes on Sydney, Canberra and Cairns might be good. A pronunciation guide would be handy too, but that can go in my section on languages, accents and spelling.

 

I wasn't really planning on writing more on Uluru and the Nullarbor Plain.

 

It's all going to be a bit 'here's a starting point, now do your own research", but that would be the case even if it was four times as long as Champions of the North, instead of 8-12 pages maximum.

 

The main thing is that people are interested. It means it's worth finishing.

[assault]

Australia's mountains are only snow-capped in winter - and only some of them (more to the south)

 

Correct, but I don't think it's relevant in the context, where I'm emphasising that Australia has a wide variety of terrain types and climates.

 

This isn't a legal contract or a computer program.

[steriaca]

Any list of Australian heroes and villains? Prehaps just names and a short description, cause this isn't Champions Down Under.

[assault]

This is intended as a short "how to" kind of thing, so I'm not planning on making up a whole bunch of characters. That said, I might stick a  few characters on at the end, but only after I've got the main essay finished.

 

It doesn't help that I'm mainly building 2e characters at the moment. Even that's an overstatement, since I'm actually mainly collecting/creating character images, which is a lot harder than crunching the system.

[DShomshak]

I'd be more interested in What's Real About Australia than in sample heroes and villains. (There's use for sample characters, but first I want context that goes beyond Crocodile Dundee, kangaroos, and sheep ranches.)

 

Dean Shomshak

[wcw43921]

Any list of Australian heroes and villains? Prehaps just names and a short description, cause this isn't Champions Down Under.

 

 

The International Catalogue Of Superheroes Page For Australia

 

Hope that helps.

[bubba smith]

Thank you for doing this.   A few bits could use a little clarification IMO.

 

"Slightly smaller than the continental USA" -- does that include Alaska? If not I'd use "contiguous USA." And if it's "larger than most of Europe," does that mean it's smaller than all of Europe? A few actual dimension/area stats might be nice, but in the Internet age not really necessary.

 

"Handful of capital cities" -- I'd specify that you mean the national capital and state capitals.

 

What is Cairns? Is it a city? On the continent, on the Reef, or on an island?

 

I'm assuming you'll elaborate on Uluru and the Nullabor Plains in future installments.

 

Thanks again!

what is a" gazeteer ?

[assault]

what is a" gazeteer ?

 

"A geographical index or dictionary", according to the first result I got when I Googled it.

[assault]

I'd be more interested in What's Real About Australia than in sample heroes and villains. (There's use for sample characters, but first I want context that goes beyond Crocodile Dundee, kangaroos, and sheep ranches.)

 

Dean Shomshak

 

What kind of "What's Real" are you thinking of?

 

I'm actually encouraging the use of cliches and stereotypes, since 'getting it right' isn't going to happen, and doesn't actually matter outside published material.

[Banakles]

Somethings Real

 

The Australian Military

1. Three branches of service, Army , Navy and Airforce
2. Special Units: The Special Air Service Regiment (SASR), 1st and 2nd Commando Regiments, Clearance Diving Teams CDT-1 and CDT-4, Special Operations Engineer Regiment (SOER) and Regional Force Surveillance Units RFSU's
3. Counterterrorist Taskforces: Tactical Assault Group (East) (2 Commando, CDT-1 and SOER personnel) and Tactical Assault Group (West) (SASR, CDT-4 and SOER personnel)
4. RFSU's patrol the far northern regions of Australia.
5. Civilian Security: In an effort to release soldiers for more critical roles, some roles have been outsourced to civilian agencies, for example base security (not all installations) is provided by private security companies.
6. beginning in late 2015 and continuing into 2016 combat roles are becoming available to female personnel, a quick look at the bottom of the general requirements page on the Defence Jobs Website for each job will tell you when they become available.

[assault]

I wasn't planning on covering the military in this first piece. Police, of course.

 

But, more generally, there's no reason why I should be the only one doing this kind of thing. I'm certainly not trying to cover everything, and it's pretty easy to churn out a handful of pages of "stuff".

 

Why don't you try to write up a bit of something? Don't worry about duplication.

[Banakles]

I wasn't planning on covering the military in this first piece. Police, of course.

 

But, more generally, there's no reason why I should be the only one doing this kind of thing. I'm certainly not trying to cover everything, and it's pretty easy to churn out a handful of pages of "stuff".

 

Why don't you try to write up a bit of something? Don't worry about duplication.

I am slowly assembling a list of package deals for my campaign, including the military, it's a heroic level campaign but they should still be useful. I'll post them as I finish them.

In the meantime here is a list of Australian English military slang and a shorter list that may be more up to date.

[assault]

Another little chunk for comments:

 

Accents, Languages and Spelling.

 

The Australian accent originated from the mix of mainly British and Irish accents possessed by immigrants to Australia. The largest single influence was from south-east England, especially London. While there are regional, class and other variations, the differences are small enough to ignore. Even New Zealand accents, which are more distinctive, probably aren’t distinguishable to most foreign ears.

 

Naturally, due to immigration, other accents are present. British (especially English and Scottish), Irish and New Zealand accents are particularly common, but people from practically any country in the world can be met in Australia. This is particularly true of the cities, naturally, but people turn up in the oddest places.

 

Native-born Australians have a tendency to be monolingual. Almost all of them study other languages at school, but few of them retain any useful skills from this. Immigrants from non-English speaking backgrounds naturally speak other languages, but their children tend to lose this over a few generations. Indigenous languages have largely been lost or are endangered.

 

Essentially, if you need to communicate with a random Australian in a language other than English, you are probably out of luck. Try pointing and charades.

 

Australians use British style spelling.

[Banakles]

Essentially, if you need to communicate with a random Australian in a language other than English, you are probably out of luck. Try pointing and charades.

 

Australians use British style spelling.

It's true, I speak a very little German and know a couple of words from other languages.

My son studied Indonesian at school, and has forgotten most of it.

My brother studied Indonesian in the Army, he probably still uses it as he married an Indonesian girl.

Oh..and a friend speaks fluent French, but she grew up in France.

But amongst all the people I know we're the only ones with any foreign language skills.

Most Australians don't see the need to learn another language, they assume first that they will not need it in Australia, second that if they go overseas nearly everybody speaks English as a second language.

 

Oh.. and the older generations (me included) are fussy about our spelling, however the younger generations (my kids) aren't fussed, if spell check accepts it their happy.

 

Ok Still working on the Australian Military Package Deals but here is the Organisation and Rank Structure for the Australian Army

[Banakles]

Assault, I have already done an options pack to replace the Dark Champions Police Officer Package Deal options. I read the Hudson City section on Law Enforcement and made an options pack for each Bureau, Division, Squad or Specialty.

I don't know if it will be useful to you when you do the Police.

Aussiefying the Police is on my to do list as well. Queensland Police first, then the Feds, ASIO, ASIS, other State Police and finally the other half dozen Intelligence agencies we apparently have.

[Ninja-Bear]

Canada, and I'll take your word for that. Seems kind of odd, though, since Alaska is part of the North American continent, which Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Samoa are not.

 

EDIT: This does seem to be a point of contention among various sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contiguous_United_States#Continental_United_States

Well just cause I never heard it like that doesn't mean I can't be wrong. However if he says the lower 48 that might make things clearer? P.s. samoa isn't a state nor is Puerto Rico nor is Washington D.C.

[assault]

New Draft. Still incomplete.

 

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Australia in Champions games.

 

Australia is rarely featured in superheroic comics, but can play a major role in a Champions campaign, especially those with an international scope.

 

In a game, playing with clichés and stereotypes is acceptable up to a point. This is particularly true in private games, but if you are going to publish your material, you should do some research..

 

This essay is aimed mainly at the former case, and thus relies heavily on stereotypes.

 

Not A Gazetteer.

 

Australia is a continent. It contains snow-capped mountains (at least in winter), deserts, tropical rainforests, a wide variety of other kinds of forests, extensive farm and grazing lands, beaches, substantial cities, and a wide variety of other areas. It’s big – only slightly smaller than the contiguous 48 states of the USA (including the District of Columbia), and larger than most of Europe.

 

At the same time, it is highly urbanized. The overwhelming majority of the population live in cities. More than half live in the handful of capital cities. That means there is a massive area that is only sparsely populated – which is quite likely to be the part that our heroes are interested in.

 

We can simplify the geography.

 

The city most likely to be important in an Australian scenario is Sydney. It’s the oldest and largest city, with the busiest airport. It contains landmarks like the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House. It has a number of universities. If it becomes relevant, use the University of Sydney.

 

As the national capital, Canberra can be important too. It contains the Federal Parliament, lots of bureaucratic headquarters and the various embassies. However most of its plot functions can be played by Sydney, which contains a wide variety of consulates and even has a Prime Ministerial residence, Kirribilli House, which at least some Prime Ministers prefer to the Lodge in Canberra. Canberra is also the location of the main campus of the Australian National University, but see the University of Sydney above.

 

The Great Barrier Reef is another interesting place. It’s easiest to visit via Cairns, which has a port, airport and the main campus of James Cook University, which is a noted centre for research into marine biology.

 

 All of these are a fair way apart. Rounding off slightly, it’s about 290 km/180 mi between Sydney and Canberra, and about 2400 km/ 1500 miles between Sydney and Cairns. Easy if you can fly or run at superspeed. The distance between Cairns and the relevant bits of the Great Barrier Reef varies, but the Reef is big.

 

If you are heading to “the Outback”, and you don’t have a particular location in mind, just head 1000 mi/1600 km west or northwest and you are in the middle of nowhere.

 

If you are going, to, say, Uluru or the Nullabor Plain, then it's much further, especially in the latter case.

 

Obviously there are plenty of other places to go!

 

Playing (and GMing) Australian Characters.

 

Aside from ‘foreign heroes visit Australia’ scenarios, the integration of a Australian player-character in a predominantly foreign group can create interesting roleplaying opportunities. But how can a Australian character be made ‘distinctly Australian’?

 

First of all, remember we are talking about stereotypes here.

 

Stereotypical Australian Traits.

*** work in progress ***

 

Accents, Languages and Spelling.

 

The Australian accent originated from the mix of mainly British and Irish accents possessed by immigrants to Australia. The largest single influence was from south-east England, especially London. While there are regional, class and other variations, the differences are small enough to ignore. Even New Zealand accents, which are more distinctive, probably aren’t distinguishable to most foreign ears.

 

Naturally, due to immigration, other accents are present. British (especially English and Scottish), Irish and New Zealand accents are particularly common, but people from practically any country in the world can be met in Australia. This is particularly true of the cities, naturally, but people turn up in the oddest places.

 

Native-born Australians have a tendency to be monolingual. Almost all of them study other languages at school, but few of them retain any useful skills from this. Immigrants from non-English speaking backgrounds naturally speak other languages, but their children tend to lose this over a few generations. Indigenous languages have largely been lost or are endangered.

 

Essentially, if you need to communicate with a random Australian in a language other than English, you are probably out of luck. Try pointing and charades.

 

Australians use British style spelling.

 

Names.

 

Australians come from all around the world, but British and Irish origins are far the most common. These should not, typically, be upper class ones, and forms like ‘E Bob Smith Jnr’ should be avoided. Throw in a mix of names (especially family names)  from other origins, and you’re good. You should probably avoid traditional indigenous names, because you’ll get them wrong, or else imply family relationships with real people. Use similar naming conventions as for non-indigenous Australians.

 

Racism and other Bad Things.

 

Naturally these topics are controversial. I will only address them superficially.

 

Australia is a developed Western country, with social attitudes related to that. That is, it can sometimes be quite progressive, and at other times dumb as a sack of hammers.

 

Historically, it was founded on the dispossession of its indigenous people, and for decades it was developed on the basis of explicit racial exclusion (the ‘White Australia’ policy). The latter was officially ended in the early 1970s, and indigenous people had won formal legal equality by around the same time.

 

That was over forty years ago. Since then Australia has changed. Perhaps we could say it is less racist than you might think, but more racist than you might hope, and leave it at that.

 

In general, superheroes from Europe or North America wouldn’t usually have a problem. Characters from elsewhere may or may not.

 

Relationships with foreign heroes.

 

It’s common in the source material for heroes and superteams to come into conflict when they first meet. Obviously, this is recommended for an Australian based scenario!

 

More broadly, you could consider treating interaction with Australian heroes as a form of friendly competition, with the Australian heroes appearing as challengers and competitors, trying to outdo their foreign counterparts. Obviously this approach is not always applicable or suitable.

 

Official organisations are less likely to have a sense of humour about uninvited incursions by foreign supers, naturally.

[assault]

I know I shouldn't use expressions like 'dumb as a sack of hammers'. I'll fix that eventually.

[TheQuestionMan]

Champions Universe Cannon

 

UNTIL Defenders of Freedom Sourcebook 5E

 

UNTIL Superhuman Training Facility and Team UNITY Training Base is Located in Austrailia.

[assault]

Champions Universe Canon (one 'n') is completely irrelevant to what I am doing.

 

Mind you, I seem to have lost the bit in the introduction that said that. I'll have to put it back in. The introduction is weak, anyway.