a useful resource..

[glitterboy2098]

..about the "bomb" part of after the bomb.

in particular, The effects of nuclear war, of the kind involved, at least partly, in the events of the Crash.

[Rallan]

ya i always wondered why atb does not have rules on radiation, since it can last a very long time. hundreds of years in fact

Probably because it happened a long enough time ago not to be a major problem except at ground zero, and the writers never thought to use "mysterious pre-Flash artifact lurking in a radioactive hotspot" as a plot hook.

[glitterboy2098]

ya i always wondered why atb does not have rules on radiation, since it can last a very long time. hundreds of years in fact

actually, radiation itself is a shortlived thing. radioactive material on the otherhand can last a long time. the article i linked to talks about it, as do alot of the articles it links to.

in ATB, most fallout would no longer be a major problem. most nuclear weapons today are "clean', meaning they produce minimal fallout, and it's likely that in AtB most nuke hits were airbursts (which is standard procedure for best effect), which means low fallout. (a ground burst sends up tons of irradiated dirt and dust, since it's actually blowing up the ground. airbursts only produce fallout from the byproducts of the nuclear reaction.)

and it's been long enough that the most common isotopes in fallout would have broken down to reletively harmless* forms. the main concern would be places where wind, rain, and other enviromental action concentrates the longer lived isotopes, which would continue to be a radioactive hazard.

i'd imagine however that high radiation areas were not included mainly because it's basically just a way to run the risk of cancer, heavy metal poisioning, and other really nasty ways to get sick. not alot of fun.



*reletively harmless in a radio active sense. you might still have some toxic chemical issues with heavy metals and whatnot in some places where the stuff gets concentrated by enviromental action..

[Mechanurgist]

i'd imagine however that high radiation areas were not included mainly because it's basically just a way to run the risk of cancer, heavy metal poisioning, and other really nasty ways to get sick. not alot of fun.

I think you meant to say "radiation is a wonderful source of cool new mutations, colorations and random weirdness that makes the game even more fun!" At least I hope you meant to say that.