Except in locales where there is sufficient rainfall for crops (in the mountains) or sufficient law and order to allow irrigation (like Phoenix) there aren't a lot of people to be found in the hot dry deserts of Arizona. Still, there are more people here than you might think, spread out across the varied geophysical bands of the state.
Discretionary nuke targets:
Luke AFB, SS-18M1
Fort Huachuca, SS-19
Palo Verde Nuclear Reactor, Palo Verde,
SS-N-17
The Navahos: The Navaho Nation was a major player in the area up until about forty years ago. At that time, a terrible wasting disease struck the population, racing through it like wildfire. Death was often painful and lengthy, and no defenses were found. Only one in ten survived the epidemic, which burned itself out as quickly as it came. Today, the Navahos have tried to reconsolidate, but lingering fears of forming large, epidemic-bait populations have keep them separated in isolated bands.
The Apaches: A strip of land along the northeastern border is controlled by the Apaches from New Mexico (see that state for details). The largest concentration of Apaches is in a settlement spread out in the floor of Canyon De Chelly National Monument.
Page: Home base to an band of motorbike slavers that has been preying upon the travelers. Known as the "Fighting Porters" from the region they came from to the west, these Bikers are fast becoming a threat to the continued survival of trade in the area. The pack is some 60 strong, riding pre-war machines running the gamut from former police bikes to dirt bikes. The Porters raid in large, well-organized assaults, using horses as well as their bikes, and have been known to field old military firearms scavenged from armories. They arrived here from California during the spring, having taken a vote to head east to look for greener pastures to plunder.
Kayenta: Kayenta was the site of the latest raid by the Fighting Porters a month ago and much of the town was burned out. The remaining citizens are vainly trying to rebuild what remains with a relative few healthy men. If the Bikers are not stopped, Kayenta’s fate will befall other towns.
Mystery: Up north along the Utah border there is a possible mystery brewing. Deep in the territory of the Navaho Nation, just east of Grand Gulch, there is a large, abandoned trading post out in the desert. This seemingly worthless building is now occupied by a small contingent of commandoes from the Deseret Empire in Utah, who are combing the area for "something special". The unit is 20 men strong in two troop trucks.
The Grand Canyon: Once a popular tourist spot and a true wonder of the world, the area is the home of the Hualapai Indians, which are nominally aligned with the Gathered Tribes of the Amerind Nation. This ancient natural wonder is also home to a rumored pre-war underground base. Rumors exist of a band of explorers who were investigating a cavern in the canyon when they encountered "lizard men". Travelers have also reported strange men in dark uniforms who all seem to look alike in the area.
Flagstaff: North of Phoenix, up in the evergreen forests, Flagstaff has become a small but thriving town of traders and trappers. Some 2,000 people live here, surviving by farming and hunting in the wooded San Francisco Mountains. A large militia is armed with flintlock rifles and crossbows, more than capable of fending off the occasional bandit raid. Trade is conducted mostly with Phoenix and points south, though Mormon traders from Utah are seen occasionally. The Navaho and Hopi Indians come here every now and then, but they tend to keep to themselves.
Camp Verde: Lying on I-17, this town is typical of the settlements along that trade route. Camp Verde sees frequent road traffic between Phoenix and parts to the north. It has a small militia organized and trained by advisors from Phoenix.
The war: The SS-N-17 targeted on Phoenix collided with an AT&T satellite in orbit and was destroyed. However, a mongo-huge 25 megaton SS-18M1 ground burst hammered Luke Air Force Base on the west side of town. The size of the weapon, combined with the table-flat terrain of the valley, resulting in most of Phoenix being crushed by the blast wave. The firestorm raced east, burning most of Mesa and Gilbert before dying out. The remaining police and National Guard units in the area tried to maintain order and help with the evacuation, but they were soon overwhelmed. The refugees fleeing the city underwent food shortages, medicine shortages, riots, and the deprivations of competing gangs and most of them died in the deserts. By the spring of 1990, Phoenix was largely deserted except for scavengers and falling into ruins under the hot sun.
The death of a city: Into this void stepped a grocery stocker turned would-be warlord. As the world collapsed on that horrible night in 1989, a young man named Terry Griffith took steps to assure his survival in this new era. An anti-government survivalist and gun collector before the war, Griffith had constructed a fallout bunker near the eastern suburb of Apache Junction. Awoken by a premonition, he quickly jumped into his bunker and sealed it up, sure that the bomb aimed at Phoenix was on its way as well. Indeed, the nuke exploded in the western suburbs while he hid. Griffith stayed holed up for nearly three months, eating beef jerky and polishing his guns, waiting for the day when he could emerge and conqueror the world. To his fortune, by staying underground until January, he missed out on the fallout and all the rioting and carnage of the immediate post-nuke chaos that would have probably killed him. By the time he ran low on water and popped the seal on his bunker, Phoenix was mostly an empty, charred shell. Gathering together the surviving remnants of trailer trash and six-tooth rednecks from the Apache Junction area, Griffith forged a rag-tag army of misfits and terminal radiation cases. The army, eventually taking the quizzical name of the "United Welshmen Brigade", was armed with a hodgepodge of civilian weaponry and the occasional illegal assault rifle and rode in a variety of VW buses and horse-drawn carts. By the summer of 1990, Griffith was ready to expand. He marched his brigade west into Phoenix to loot and plunder, his scouts having assured him that the nuked city was populated only by scavengers and looters. For some nine months, the United Welshmen engaged in a city-wide orgy of bloodletting and pillage, massacring any who opposed them and putting large swaths of the city to the torch. The locals begin to call Griffith "El Diablo Blanco"--the White Devil -- and a certain mythology rose up about him as stories of his birth from the flaming pits of Hell circulated. But soon, as with most conquering armies, the wheels began to come off. Ideological differences between Griffith's lieutenants and an increasing scarcity of women fractured the United Welshmen. By the spring of 1991, the city was again abandoned to the elements and the scavengers, the brigade having killed each other off or wandered out into the desert to die. Only Terry Griffith himself and a core of dedicated followers remained.
Bolthole: It was then that fortune smiled on Griffith. A scout reported finding a curious underground bunker out in the desert near the Fort McDowell reservation, exposed by an earthquake. In it were some people frozen in tubes and a large cache of weapons and vehicles. Griffith rushed to see for himself. Indeed, he had found a Morrow Project Recon Team bolthole. Griffith eventually figured out how to work the cryotubes, killed the team members, and froze himself and two of his most trusted men. His plan was to stay frozen for 200 years and then emerge to take over again (see below).
Aztlan: When the Mexican Army invaded a few months later, there was no opposition to them occupying the ruins of Phoenix. The city ruins were claimed as part of the emerging Aztlan Empire (see San Diego for a description), and thousands of Hispanics moved into the valley over the new few years. The Aztlan Empire was short lived, especially in Phoenix, where the corrupt leadership was more interested in collecting wealth and weapons that creating a perfect Hispanic state in the area. Today, the valley is still home to a fairly large population, though hardly anyone remembers the name Aztlan. Most of the people live in the eastern suburbs, and they have an efficient militia.
Free city: The people here have worked tirelessly to eek out a living in this arid land. Much land has been cleared and planted and small irrigation channels criss-cross the area. Some 1,800 people call Phoenix home, with a transient population that comes and goes with the seasons. There is ample land for a larger population, but this is the upper limit that the water supply can support.
The power: The militia, known locally as the "Arizona Brigade", is a strong and well-trained unit, more than capable of maintaining the peace in the valley and turning back the few small raids from slavers and bandits. Total strength is 400 soldiers with another 800 men and women from the general population having had some training and serving as an emergency militia. 140 years ago, the Mexican Army brought with them some quantity of military vehicles. While few of them run anymore, most of them remain. There are six assorted old tanks dug-in in strategic points around the Gilbert and Chandler areas that act as immobile pillboxes. two of them are Abrams, the other four are M60A3 tanks, all captured from American Army units during the invasion. Ammunition is severely limited, mostly just dummy solid shot training rounds, and these tanks are mostly for scaring the locals.
Gilbert/Chandler: These two suburbs are now the hub of life in Phoenix. There are more occupied buildings and relatively less crime, especially as one gets further east. A large distillery has been built in southeastern Gilbert, producing alcohol for the militia's vehicles. Nearly every open area has been planted with some food crop or another. The bulk of the militia is barracked in the area and security is very good. This area is also home to many of Phoenix's productive light industries--including the manufacturing of bicycles, alcohol, reloaded ammunition, and farming tools. Electrical power for these factories is provided by an alternate power plant powered by an archaic steam boiler salvaged from a junkyard. Disease is a problem, but tough enforcement of sanitation (involving the death penalty) has kept the worst outbreaks from going very far.
Wilderness: Most of Phoenix west of Loop 101 freeway was damaged to a great extent by the nuke over Luke AFB, and almost all buildings are in a state of extreme damage to total rubble. Militia check points are maintained at some crossroads around the edges, and patrols are infrequent. Violent death is common amongst the few scavengers living in the ruins and life has little value.
Casa Grande: Located south of Phoenix, this town is home to a large population of poor scratch farmers. The large Amtrak station is now home to a marauder band called the "Pirates of Penzance". The gang is some 40 strong and all-Hispanic, making it impossible to tell the Pirates from the non-Pirates. They are all well-armed with a variety of military arms including an old M60 LMG and an 81mm mortar.
Queen Creek: Much of Phoenix's food comes from the growing regions around this town and the lowlands to the southeast. As has been the case for 400 years, virtual slave workers tend to the fields and the products are shipped north to Phoenix to feed the city dwellers. The fields and the roads between are heavily guarded by militiamen.
Camelback Mountain: This distinctive sandstone mountain in the center of Scottsdale dominates the landscape of the overgrown suburb. A huge mansion built on its summit by a wealthy publisher in the 1950s has become an observatory of sorts, with a big telescope here. This instrument, salvaged from the Kitt Peak National Observatory some 120 years ago, offers a brilliant view of the night sky. Much like the similar situation at Mount Palomar in California (see that state), a small order of "astrological monks" resides here.
Superstition Mountains: Rumors for generations have spread about secret underground bases below the Superstition Mountains east of the ruins of Phoenix. Locals tell stories about "dwarf-men" or "lizard men" wearing hooded cloaks.
NEW!!! An adventure setting in the Tortilla Flats area east of Phoenix, submitted by Luccia Rogers. Tortilla Flats.
Apache Junction/Rebirth of Griffith: As it turned out, a malfunction awoke the warlord Terry Griffith four years ago, killing his two followers. Griffith emerged from the bolthole to find a city prospering and getting along just fine without him. This shocked him, but he quickly made plans to begin his conquests anew. Apache Junction, his old home town, is now home of Griffith's rejuvenated United Welshmen Brigade, growing stronger daily with the influx of refugees and the marauders that prey on them to the area and is now up to some 120 effectives. They have been raiding for some time and have gathered a large supply of weaponry and supplies including five trucks and a battered but serviceable M60A3 tank scavenged from a ditch out in the desert (the tank is primarily a hollow threat as they have only two HE rounds for its gun and no oil to keep it lubricated once they get it running). Supporting him is a settlement made up of dirty locals with a fluctuating population of about 100, mostly known for its large open-air trade market. Griffith has big plans for the future, including starting up the old copper mines northeast of Phoenix and even blowing the Salt River Dam to create a huge lake in its old bed in the middle of the Phoenix valley. It is doubtful that he will ever accomplish anything so grand. The militia in the city is watching him closely, but so far has not felt the need to go in after him.
Ajo: Typical of the dozen or so small settlements in this region. A stone-walled hamlet that has banded together with local farmers to grow crops and raise chickens.
Gila Bend: Unfortunately, also fairly typical of pre-war towns in the area. Abandoned during a typhus outbreak about a decade ago and then burned to the ground by a lightning strike this summer, nothing remains but blackened rubble.
Quartzite: Although located far from the large military targets, this tiny community was affected by earthquakes and low-level nuclear fallout. Due to its prime location, however, the town has survived over the generations as a caravan way station and watering hole. Quartzite is probably the best place to live in the desert, but that's not saying much.
Yuma: Now home to some 450 people, farming the land and fishing the Colorado River. This is the only spot in Arizona that still claims heritage to the Aztlan Empire (see entry on California). The Empire's old flag still flies from the tops of buildings and people still look fondly to the day that the Empire will be reborn. The citizens have long ago looted the radioactive remains of the Yuma Marine Corps Air Station to add to their defenses and now possess some heavy ordinance, including some light artillery (some of which is still slightly radioactive).
The ruins of Tucson: Obliterated in the war, the remains are now a barren tangle of twisted girders, fused brick, broken stone and rusted metal.
ICBM: Though blasted by a hundred nukes, one of the Titan II silos still contains its missile. Whether it malfunctioned or was not fired deliberately, no one knows, but the silo was abandoned by its crew soon after the exchanges started. The missile still sits there 150 years later, secure it its silo protected from the elements. It was not a mechanical problem, but a software problem caused by a flub of the fingers. A single comma was misplaced when the base code was written for the launch sequence, causing the missile to abort at that critical moment in 1989.
Globe: Typical of the settlements in this area. Always in danger of being burnt to the bedrock by a forest fire or wiped out by some mysterious disease. A few dozen people live amongst the intact but empty buildings, farming and hunting the best they can.
Bisbee: Bisbee is a town with a problem. This town still exists because of a local spring that continues to provide fresh water for the community. About a month ago, a traveler stopped by and drank from the spring. A witness claimed he saw the man sprinkle something into the spring before he vanished into the desert on his horse. Very quickly, the people started to get very sick, and die in fits of frothing rage. Today, there is only one man left alive, strangely immune to the effects of the "problem".
The ruins of Fort Huachuca: Blasted by nuclear warheads, this Army base is now abandoned except for some scavengers and transients.
"Site-E":A secret Snake-eater Regional Supply Base is located deep in the Coronado National Forest in the southeastern corner of the state. This is a "special weapons" facility, holding a number of specialized armored vehicles and heavy support weapons, uncommon for normal Snake-eater bases. It is intact and the men are still sleeping.
People who have contributed to this entry:
John Raner