Iceland ideas

Zurmash · Unread post by **Zurmash** » Fri Oct 19, 2018 8:25 pm

I have an idea for what to do with Iceland in Rifts.
So the cataclysm set off the volcanoes every where, and especially here. However, Rekyjavik survived. Iceland actually got larger due to heavy volcanic activity, and Rekyjavik survived.
Anyway, many years later, NGR now has a waypoint between Europe and N America established in Rekyjavik.
The city is an amazing, safe, peaceful place in a horrific world. The Icelanders hung on and The Gemans showed up and made good friends.
Rekyjavik is a fully Triax level city, with all the amenities. HEAVILY HEAVILY PROTECTED. Flights in and out between NGR and Free Quebec are no worries. Prosek does not know about this.

Blue_Lion · Unread post by **Blue_Lion** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 1:35 am

I have an idea to.
It is a wasteland with no major settlements.

glitterboy2098 · Sat Oct 20, 2018 3:56 am

not sharing. but with the volcanic eruptions of the cataclysm, there just isn't going to be anything left there. so anyone present would have to be post cataclysm.

dreicunan · Unread post by **dreicunan** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 4:55 am

Another reason specifically against Reykjavik surviving is the tidal waves slamming the coasts. I don't see the geography of the region stopping that from happening. It is going to get wiped away like most coastal areas.

The Beast · Unread post by **The Beast** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 6:05 am

Blue_Lion wrote:I have an idea to.
It is a wasteland with no major settlements.

Copycat.

Mack · Unread post by **Mack** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 4:28 pm

I like the idea of establishing Iceland as a waypoint between North America and Europe, but I'd make it more of a encampment / forward military base / settlement. Possibly a joint enterprise between the CS and NGR, who deliberately choose to maintain a small footprint to avoid attracting Splugorth raiders.

Keep the rest of the island a wilderness, and you've got the makings of a niftly little place for an adventure or two.

Zer0 Kay · Unread post by **Zer0 Kay** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 8:23 pm

Aurora Borealis were aerial Ley Lines only visible in the past durring solar storms. Now constantly on. Rifts occur when they get suitably close to the ground. Bifrost bridge. Though the Aurora Borealis was considered to be a single phenomena there are several leylines and they are geologically synchronized. So one in Norway is different than Siberia which is different from Alaska or the one directly over the center of the Arctic. Likewise for the Aurora Australis

Zurmash · Unread post by **Zurmash** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 8:24 pm

Rekjavik was magically spared. Volcanoes sprung up and saved it. The rest is a weird playground of elementals.

Zurmash · Unread post by **Zurmash** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 8:32 pm

Reykjavik isn't a big city. 2018 Iceland only has 400k people, at most. Rekyjavic magically survived, and its all nice, with Triax robots and whatnot. And nobody trying to kill them.

Zurmash · Unread post by **Zurmash** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 8:40 pm

Not statted out, just a nice little safe city for NGR craft to land, maybe take a nap, continue on to NA.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 8:41 pm

Iceland...magically protected paradise...
Only problem; massive magically-enhanced volcanic eruptions and Ley line activity blew it into space. It re-materialized as a floating island, post-Fold Across Island style, on the other side of the Sun from Earth.
A few Orbitals have discovered it and trade with it for frozen fish and fresh bananas(which are, after the experiences of astronauts during the ISS days, banned in most zero-gee habitats, making them and related plantains literally 'forbidden fruit' and thus all the more appetizing to Orbitals wanting a 'taste of Old Earth').

Zurmash · Unread post by **Zurmash** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 9:04 pm

Ew gross. I like my idea better.

eliakon · Unread post by **eliakon** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 9:10 pm

taalismn wrote:Iceland...magically protected paradise...
Only problem; massive magically-enhanced volcanic eruptions and Ley line activity blew it into space. It re-materialized as a floating island, post-Fold Across Island style, on the other side of the Sun from Earth.
A few Orbitals have discovered it and trade with it for frozen fish and fresh bananas(which are, after the experiences of astronauts during the ISS days, banned in most zero-gee habitats, making them and related plantains literally 'forbidden fruit' and thus all the more appetizing to Orbitals wanting a 'taste of Old Earth').

This is fabulous :lol:

I might actually use this in one of my less serious games.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 10:47 pm

Zurmash wrote:Ew gross.** I like my idea better.

Your best bet, IMHO, to make your scenario work would be to have your Icelandic communities somehow magically protected(ancient Viking magicks)...perhaps use the Phasetown(or 'Brigadoon') concept in which the city(ies) are out of phase with the rest of Rift Earth for certain periods; perhaps during the winter or summer. The NGR can only use Iceland as a stopover during those time periods, so they try to schedule the most important movements of gear to and from the West during the time periods they know they can rely on Iceland to be there, and not a hostile wasteland of raging fires and freak ice formations that move.
The Icelanders are used to these periods of 'downtime' when they're cut off* from Rifts Earth, but the NGR personnel aren't entirely happy with it, so it takes a certain strong will or mental attitude for German personnel to be able to stay on Iceland during these periods.

*Perhaps one of the secrets of their periodic 'sequestrations' is that they're in contact with alien entities who have helped them survive. These entities can ONLY interact with the Icelanders during the out-of-phase times. This may or may not be known to the NGR, and certainly NOT to the Coalition States(who WILL find out about Iceland if they fly their own transports and consult a map of pre-Rifts air routes and start asking questions) who have been fed some line about Iceland being a secured, but still sensitive, outpost of the NGR, so that the CS doesn't investigate on their own and zap the hell out of the obvious rift/d-bee-infected locals, apologize to the Germans, and offer to move their own people to secure the islands for the way station.

Even without a Phase-dodge to keep the Icelanders alive over the centuries, magic is going to play a big role if you're planning on dipping the rest of the islands in Elemental mayhem. As I've suggested, old Viking magic is one way to go.
Even if the magic is a predilection for communicating with the Elemental spirits frolicking/fighting around Iceland, it is going to be/should be an issue. Maybe Iceland is home to an unusually high concentration of Elemental Fusionists, or Warlocks. Either way. it's going to raise issues with the magic-suspicious NGR and the magic-HATING Coalition States.
The rub is that the NGR/CS can ONLY use Iceland as a stepping stone/emergency way station is because the Elementals LIKE the local Icelanders. If either outsider group tried to muscle in, bully/harm/exterminate the locals, or even try to wean them off their new/old ways, the results would be a weakening of the protections keeping Iceland habitable to humans, and maybe even a total wipeout. So, yeah, the NGR could be on good terms with the Icelanders, but it's a fine balance that the Germans have to be careful not to abuse or upset.

**It's the bananas, isn't it?
Truth is, NASA found bananas don't travel well in space; they rot quickly, smell particularly bad even to z-gee stuffed-up noses, and the convenient self-packing peel tends to crumble and flake, which you DON'T want to zero-gravity ventilation systems. No raw bananas for space, unless you got gravity and a ready means to clean up the mess.

Curbludgeon · Unread post by **Curbludgeon** » Sun Oct 21, 2018 3:47 pm

The topography of Iceland's Capital region (roughly SW corner, contains the majority of the population, and is the location of most large industry such as aluminium smelting) is such that rising water levels during the Cataclysm would likely wipe it out. Much of the Highlands is currently uninhabitable, but through elemental/shamanic magics could be effectively terraformed. Since the expertise/relationships with spirits necessary for this would take at least some time to develop, it seems likely that Iceland would only be repopulated post-Cataclysm, with very limited hold-outs from previous.

That said, if one wanted to use Iceland in-game, there are some interesting things going for it. It isn't the farthest reach to suggest, for example, that given the country's insistence on maintaining its own currency as a symbol of independence and interest in eco-neutral technology, that closed-system biosphere development became a focus for the country. It's frankly a more interesting place to stick something like that than Antarctica. To differentiate it from the Sovietski bunker complexes, I could see emphasizing things like biotech and greenhouses potentially superior to those of the CS, while practically eliminating weapons production.

The magic of a potential Rifts Iceland seems like it should focus on elemental magic due to how phenomenically jam-packed it is, geologically speaking. One reason I have low expectations for anything involving Rifts Scandanavia is the likelihood of it going hog-wild in a hamfisted portrayal of magic from the Eddas. I'd blanch a bit at anything more involved than an Icelandic Elemental Shaman switching out fetish creation for something mild and fluffed as using sigils, and because it would be expected having a write up for necropants. I haven't read the Antarctica preview, but if the cold magic in it has some spells related to subsistence farming I think dipping into those would be fine.

I'd pin the population of the entire island at a max of a couple thousand, many of which would be clinging to the new coastline. I could see value in a NGR depot placed there, and there's potential for a story about attempts to convert magical geothermal activity into conventional generators as another form of non-TW.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sun Oct 21, 2018 7:40 pm

Make it both a logical way station for the NGR AND leyline fliers(owing to a convergence of several leylines making it convenient for Ley-lane switchovers).
Any Rift activity is likely to land incoming travelers from out-dimension into the middle of an active lava field or instant flash-freezer.

dreicunan · Unread post by **dreicunan** » Sun Oct 21, 2018 10:48 pm

Zurmash wrote:Rekjavik was magically spared. Volcanoes sprung up and saved it. The rest is a weird playground of elementals.

Did the volcanoes just want someone to lava?

If you want it magically protected, I'd suggest coming up with a better explanation than that. Or just make a different location. A "New Rekjavik" arcology located further inland could more easily be explained as having survived. Or perhaps Rekjavik had turned been enclosed in an MDC dome to protect it from aggressive anti-whaling operations. Perhaps they'd constructed substantial underwater facilities and MDC breakwaters that would have protected it during the Cataclysm.

Jefffar · Unread post by **Jefffar** » Sun Oct 21, 2018 11:14 pm

Or perhaps a very seismically active island covered in glaciers is a bad place to stay when all the volcanoes in the world go off at once, a mega tsunami and an 80 year mini-ice age all occur....

dreicunan · Unread post by **dreicunan** » Sun Oct 21, 2018 11:27 pm

Jefffar wrote:Or perhaps a very seismically active island covered in glaciers is a bad place to stay when all the volcanoes in the world go off at once, a mega tsunami and an 80 year mini-ice age all occur....

I don't disagree. :ok:

Curbludgeon · Unread post by **Curbludgeon** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 12:06 am

The books do not state that "all the volcanoes in the world go off at once".
Chaos Earth pg 12: "Mount Saint Helens erupts, as do nine other volcanoes in the west(ern US)". Please note this is out of 71, and doesn't include Yellowstone, which goes off the next day. 14 volcanoes (of ~44) erupt in Mexico, and pg 21 mentions scores of volcanoes on other continents erupting (out of ~1500 worldwide). I'd also argue that given the quick temperature drop a lot of Icelandic volcanic activity would result in tuyas, and not necessarily be spewing out tons of ash and pyroclastic what-have-you. I think a modest Icelandic Highland arcology focused on biointensive farming is more likely to survive for 80 years and contact the mainland than an equivalent in Antarctica, or even a Sovietski bunker, would be for 200.

I'm also now convinced there needs to be either a Fire/Water Fusionist ability or variation on the spell Tidal Wave called Jökulhlaup, because it sounds metal.

glitterboy2098 · Mon Oct 22, 2018 3:59 am

counter point would be that the Icelandic highlands are comprised of some of the more active volcanos on earth (30 volcanos on the island, of which 13 have erupted since the first settlement in 874AD, several multiple times) of the ones that haven't erupted in recorded history, they are mostly the largest and most potentially destructive, and are due for another eruption any century now, if geological sampling is any indication.

further, that so many volcanos erupted during the great cataclysm indicates something was going on inside the earths mantle, to push more magma up and increase the pressures in so many magma chambers around the world. Iceland's volcanos are due to the divergent plate boundary beneath it (part of the mid-atlantic ridge) causing a massive hot spot where magma is flowing up from the mantle nearly continuously.

so it would make logical sense that most of iceland's active volcanos erupted during the initial days of the great cataclysm, and probably erupted sporadically for decades after.

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 11:31 am

If memory tricks me not, Iceland is mentioned as a place where Wothancrellyth/Wothan the Slayer secured a place to build anew as a secret base.
That said, even in Pantheons it's more of a possible hook than incontrovertible fact.

As an aside, any other references to Iceland in the books that people can think of?

Ah, just remembered two threads touching on things thaat might relate to the topic somewhat, here and this one too.

Curbludgeon · Unread post by **Curbludgeon** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 7:04 pm

If wikipedia's citation of a textbook can be accepted: "Over the past 500 years, Iceland's volcanoes have erupted a third of the total global lava output." It's reasonable to assume Iceland would have experienced some amount of activity, but given the lack of rigor in the source material and fantastic nature of the Cataclysm, appeals to logic seem a bit out of place. If Chaos Earth's mention of scores around the planet over a few days (and presumably something roughly equivalent happening in the oceans, although I don't remember if Underseas mentions it offhand) is taken as given, that's not only several times higher than the current number of eruptions (24, itself on the high side of average, and perhaps surprisingly enough with none in Iceland), that's a number not all that possible since the Paleogene. I think there was a Rifter article that posited subterranean rifts depositing minerals as apologia for all the new toy development. I'd argue there would have had to be a fair amount of such occuring in Earth's mantle in order for a couple of hundred volcanoes to simultaneously erupt. I suppose the next step would be some napkin math estimating the amount of ash that fell in the central U.S.A. As a guess, Yellowstone's eruption would have had to be a VEI9-10, unless some of the ash was magically produced.

All of that is somewhat irrelevant to an Iceland experimental arcology. It seems reasonable to assume that one wouldn't be erected in the hotspot. I'm spitballing, but I'm thinking the edge of the West Volcanic Zone, a little further out than Haukadalur, just to get some geothermal benefit from Langjökull. An alternative is to place it somewhere entirely outside the ridge, rely on solar energy, and think of it as a Mars near-analog site which perhaps did feeder product development for Svalbard expeditions.

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 7:33 pm

The contrast between Iceland's polar location and high level geothermal activity tempts me to Algors & Nimros duking it out in a "War of Fire & Ice", with maybe some elementals and norse giants (or gods) mixed in to up the ante and potentially raise the scale of the insane beatdown.

PS: I swear i wasn't thinking of either J.R.R. Martin's books or the 80's animation when i came up with that. Not that pilfering ideas from either would be a bad thing....

dreicunan · Unread post by **dreicunan** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:08 pm

SolCannibal wrote:The contrast between Iceland's polar location and high level geothermal activity tempts me to Algors & Nimros duking it out in a "War of Fire & Ice", with maybe some elementals and norse giants (or gods) mixed in to up the ante and potentially raise the scale of the insane beatdown.

PS: I swear i wasn't thinking of either J.R.R. Martin's books or the 80's animation when i came up with that. Not that pilfering ideas from either would be a bad thing....

I now want Iceland to be a combination of both of all of those.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:18 pm

dreicunan wrote:
SolCannibal wrote:The contrast between Iceland's polar location and high level geothermal activity tempts me to Algors & Nimros duking it out in a "War of Fire & Ice", with maybe some elementals and norse giants (or gods) mixed in to up the ante and potentially raise the scale of the insane beatdown.

PS: I swear i wasn't thinking of either J.R.R. Martin's books or the 80's animation when i came up with that. Not that pilfering ideas from either would be a bad thing....

I now want Iceland to be a combination of both of all of those.

Me too! Me too!

All that Elemental violence on a small chain of islands should have the neighboring arcology residents cringing....

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:42 pm

taalismn wrote:
dreicunan wrote:
SolCannibal wrote:The contrast between Iceland's polar location and high level geothermal activity tempts me to Algors & Nimros duking it out in a "War of Fire & Ice", with maybe some elementals and norse giants (or gods) mixed in to up the ante and potentially raise the scale of the insane beatdown.

PS: I swear i wasn't thinking of either J.R.R. Martin's books or the 80's animation when i came up with that. Not that pilfering ideas from either would be a bad thing....

I now want Iceland to be a combination of both of all of those.

Me too! Me too!

All that Elemental violence on a small chain of islands should have the neighboring arcology residents cringing....

In fact the Fire and Ice cartoon bits got me thinking of something like an arch-warlock long imprisoned in the long forgotten time of the rise of Atlantis, as the fall oof the Glacial Emperor follows the end of the last Ice Age, maybe some Clark Ashton Smith mixed with Snow White twisted through norse myth (asgardian dwarves descend from worms gnawing Ymir's flesh), or some weird brew along those lines. A whole empire of frost awaiting for the elemental onslaught to rouse them free from this prison of sleep, to crush a whole world anew.

Mack · Unread post by **Mack** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 9:05 pm

The elemental angle would work well with the volcanos.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 9:33 pm

SolCannibal wrote:[ A whole empire of frost awaiting for the elemental onslaught to rouse them free from this prison of sleep, to crush a whole world anew.

Or conversely, pre-Rifts, the glacial ice was keeping something(s) contained and tamped down, even with the volcanic activity threatening to thaw it out. However, the combination of volcanoes AND climate change roused the whatever it is. Now that the magic has returned, the Ice is trying harder to contain its former prisoner, while the idiot Fire Elementals are just raging around, helping the imprisoned 'X' gain strength.
Ironically, if the two Elemental forces just worked TOGETHER, they might be able to destroy the evil force, shattering it through synergistic effect.

shadrak · Unread post by **shadrak** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 9:47 pm

The Beast wrote:
Blue_Lion wrote:I have an idea to.
It is a wasteland with no major settlements.

Copycat.

Same...except large numbers of low tech potential slave population for splugorth exploitation

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 10:14 pm

taalismn wrote:
SolCannibal wrote:[ A whole empire of frost awaiting for the elemental onslaught to rouse them free from this prison of sleep, to crush a whole world anew.

Or conversely, pre-Rifts, the glacial ice was keeping something(s) contained and tamped down, even with the volcanic activity threatening to thaw it out. However, the combination of volcanoes AND climate change roused the whatever it is. Now that the magic has returned, the Ice is trying harder to contain its former prisoner, while the idiot Fire Elementals are just raging around, helping the imprisoned 'X' gain strength.
Ironically, if the two Elemental forces just worked TOGETHER, they might be able to destroy the evil force, shattering it through synergistic effect.

You summed up a good chunk of what i had in mind better than i could.

Now let me try to up the context a little: soon after the Coming of the Rifts, a number of the dying breed of giants from Palladium ended in Iceland and through a combination of common plight, strong leaders and luck, they united, interbreed and prospered, forming one of the first non-human empires of the age. But prosperity breds arrogance, decadence and strife and the new great race of giants bred in this northern empire would break apart in clans, elemental, artificer, monstrous and other, competing for rulership, leading to the shattering of the empire in a cycle of civil war that perdures and grows ever more savage to this day.

(And we with this, a quick excuse for homebrew MDC Nimro & Algor analogs with some backstory and pseudo-GoT style drama rolled into one - and some Splugorth war-proffiteering and/or slaving to boot)

Blue_Lion · Unread post by **Blue_Lion** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 10:49 pm

Curbludgeon wrote:If wikipedia's citation of a textbook can be accepted: "Over the past 500 years, Iceland's volcanoes have erupted a third of the total global lava output." It's reasonable to assume Iceland would have experienced some amount of activity, but given the lack of rigor in the source material and fantastic nature of the Cataclysm, appeals to logic seem a bit out of place. If Chaos Earth's mention of scores around the planet over a few days (and presumably something roughly equivalent happening in the oceans, although I don't remember if Underseas mentions it offhand) is taken as given, that's not only several times higher than the current number of eruptions (24, itself on the high side of average, and perhaps surprisingly enough with none in Iceland), that's a number not all that possible since the Paleogene. I think there was a Rifter article that posited subterranean rifts depositing minerals as apologia for all the new toy development. I'd argue there would have had to be a fair amount of such occuring in Earth's mantle in order for a couple of hundred volcanoes to simultaneously erupt. I suppose the next step would be some napkin math estimating the amount of ash that fell in the central U.S.A. As a guess, Yellowstone's eruption would have had to be a VEI9-10, unless some of the ash was magically produced.

All of that is somewhat irrelevant to an Iceland experimental arcology. It seems reasonable to assume that one wouldn't be erected in the hotspot. I'm spitballing, but I'm thinking the edge of the West Volcanic Zone, a little further out than Haukadalur, just to get some geothermal benefit from Langjökull. An alternative is to place it somewhere entirely outside the ridge, rely on solar energy, and think of it as a Mars near-analog site which perhaps did feeder product development for Svalbard expeditions.

I disagree that it would be irrelevant to an arcology. Ash and lava could impare efectiveness of features such as air intake or light for farms, if not out right damage parts of the structure.(last time st hellens erupted the ash traces where found all over the world, if any of Iceland's valcono's had such a explosive eruption would cause significant issues with any attempt to live there)

Iceland has no standing military even if that changed they likely would have limited defense force to deal with demons and monsters that get rifted in. So they would lack force to repell the demon invaders, even if the vacons, and t'sunome does not kill the people off the monsters would feast on the caned meet in the arcology. Cities that where not outright destroyed became the hunting grounds of demons.

So it is a island nation with strong volcanic activity, and no standing military, even without its proximity to the polar region it would unlikely to have a significant social elements survive.

Curbludgeon · Unread post by **Curbludgeon** » Mon Oct 22, 2018 11:12 pm

I don't see how tsunamis would apply to inland regions of elevation higher than any tsunami on record, and I had already stated my opinion that coastal cities like Reykjavik would be destroyed. Things like mudslides and Jökulhlaup would, however, be an issue. It's probably worth putting up a map at this point, since I'm talking about areas either on the outskirts of or completely outside volcanic regions, so things like lava are less of a concern. I hate that I can't be trusted here with the img tag

Arcology concerns: I did mention that there would be little to no weapons production capabilities, in that Iceland is peaceful as heck. I'd imagine there might be some small amount of imported legacy weapons available, but it would be far from the focus. I'd assume the Icelandic Coast Guard to have been obliterated in the Cataclysm. Whether or not monsters would have been rifted there is up in the air, and would have coincided with the return of magic. I don't ever see there being a book on it, so make up what you want.

I think it's safe to assume that experimental greenhouses in an inhospitable environment are generally not dependent upon sunlight. I don't remember which book references the CS's greenhouses but, as I stated above, I'd presume the Icelandic variant to be superior to them, it being a potential focus of their Golden Age technology along with things like silicate extraction/refinement. As for air filtration, I did bring up the idea of Icelandic biospheres serving as a R&D development hub for Martian exploration, where keeping out dust would be of tremendous importance. We could start looking into particulate sizes of different types of volcanic ash to make guesses if filters would be comparable, if you'd like.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Tue Oct 23, 2018 5:10 pm

Blue_Lion wrote:[

Iceland has no standing military even if that changed they likely would have limited defense force to deal with demons and monsters that get rifted in. So they would lack force to repell the demon invaders, even if the vacons, and t'sunome does not kill the people off the monsters would feast on the caned meet in the arcology. Cities that where not outright destroyed became the hunting grounds of demons..

Or they could just invest in a really advanced/experimental defensive system. Maybe automated lasers powered by geothermal taps. Maybe bleedover from pre-Rifts American or German/Triax laser-launch technologies. Something hidden as something relatively harmless. Part of the system survived, and occasionally takes potshots at unwary travelers or monsters who stray too close to the installation(s).

Blue_Lion · Unread post by **Blue_Lion** » Tue Oct 23, 2018 7:36 pm

taalismn wrote:
Blue_Lion wrote:[

Iceland has no standing military even if that changed they likely would have limited defense force to deal with demons and monsters that get rifted in. So they would lack force to repell the demon invaders, even if the vacons, and t'sunome does not kill the people off the monsters would feast on the caned meet in the arcology. Cities that where not outright destroyed became the hunting grounds of demons..

Or they could just invest in a really advanced/experimental defensive system. Maybe automated lasers powered by geothermal taps. Maybe bleedover from pre-Rifts American or German/Triax laser-launch technologies. Something hidden as something relatively harmless. Part of the system survived, and occasionally takes potshots at unwary travelers or monsters who stray too close to the installation(s).

So your theory is that a pasifistic nation would invest in expermental weapon tech and hide it when they do not even maintain a military? Seams out of charter for the nation. Even if they did build a defense system it would be likly small scale and not liky to be able to deal with the onslot that happened.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Tue Oct 23, 2018 7:54 pm

Blue_Lion wrote:[So your theory is that a pasifistic nation would invest in expermental weapon tech and hide it when they do not even maintain a military? Seams out of charter for the nation. Even if they did build a defense system it would be likly small scale and not liky to be able to deal with the onslot that happened.

Depends on how 'hot' the Golden Age got towards the end. A lot of smaller nations might have figured that just shouting 'we're NEUTRAL!' might not be enough, and began looking at acquiring some means to enforce their neutrality within their own territory.
But yeah, it comes off as rather silly, but we're talking a crazy-mad Golden Age of Megadamage SCIENCE!!!
Iceland-lite, they probably acquired some of the lower end MDC armored suits for their police and maybe some MDC boat hulls, just because the stuff wears better.

Blue_Lion · Unread post by **Blue_Lion** » Tue Oct 23, 2018 8:11 pm

taalismn wrote:
Blue_Lion wrote:[So your theory is that a pasifistic nation would invest in expermental weapon tech and hide it when they do not even maintain a military? Seams out of charter for the nation. Even if they did build a defense system it would be likly small scale and not liky to be able to deal with the onslot that happened.

Depends on how 'hot' the Golden Age got towards the end. A lot of smaller nations might have figured that just shouting 'we're NEUTRAL!' might not be enough, and began looking at acquiring some means to enforce their neutrality within their own territory.
But yeah, it comes off as rather silly, but we're talking a crazy-mad Golden Age of Megadamage SCIENCE!!!
Iceland-lite, they probably acquired some of the lower end MDC armored suits for their police and maybe some MDC boat hulls, just because the stuff wears better.

They are not neutral they just do not have a military. They are the only NATO nation without one. Switzerland is neutral but has a military. Pacifism is not being neutral it is just not being violent.

Given that it is a island I would say if they where to build automated point defense system they would put them at the edge of the island, or build them in the ocean. Stopping threats before they make land fall useless when rifts bypass them to release demons. More likely they would outfit there coast guard with MDC patrol boats.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Tue Oct 23, 2018 10:21 pm

Blue_Lion wrote:[
They are not neutral they just do not have a military. They are the only NATO nation without one. Switzerland is neutral but has a military. Pacifism is not being neutral it is just not being violent.

Yep, and I think that comes up in one of the early Tom Clancy books when the Russians invade, intent on neutralizing Iceland as a flanking base against their invasion of Europe.

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 12:41 am

Can anyone point me out any interesting forms of magic involving fire or ice manipulation beside Warlocks (or the Fusionists from RUE)?
Magic lore relating to craftsmanship or techno-wizardry - anything to expand or toy with Jotans (or homebrew variants) - would be good too.

Blue_Lion · Unread post by **Blue_Lion** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 12:59 am

SolCannibal wrote:Can anyone point me out any interesting forms of magic involving fire or ice manipulation beside Warlocks (or the Fusionists from RUE)?
Magic lore relating to craftsmanship or techno-wizardry - anything to expand or toy with Jotans (or homebrew variants) - would be good too.

There is some flame based magic in Russia if I recall living flame or something like that spells reprinted in BoM.
(but nothing says you can not create your own magic.)

There is also a earlier rifter with pccs (think they are non official) one of them is a freezer ice based psi.

Curbludgeon · Unread post by **Curbludgeon** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 1:28 am

Frost Magic-Rifter 70
Icecraft-Antarctica Raw Preview
Blue Flame Magic-South America 2 and Book of Magic
Living Fire Magic-Mystic Russia and Book of Magic

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 7:16 am

Lion, Bludgeon, thanks for the indications - picking up what to use or not should add some interesting twists to the Giant Kingdom as a whole.
Actually getting Greenland into the equation to make a large empire comparable (in dimensions at least) to Atlantis is quite damn tempting, i must admit.

dreicunan · Unread post by **dreicunan** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 8:08 am

SolCannibal wrote:Lion, Bludgeon, thanks for the indications - picking up what to use or not should add some interesting twists to the Giant Kingdom as a whole.
Actually getting Greenland into the equation to make a large empire comparable (in dimensions at least) to Atlantis is quite damn tempting, i must admit.

What about Greenland as an actual green land?

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 8:19 am

dreicunan wrote:
SolCannibal wrote:Lion, Bludgeon, thanks for the indications - picking up what to use or not should add some interesting twists to the Giant Kingdom as a whole.
Actually getting Greenland into the equation to make a large empire comparable (in dimensions at least) to Atlantis is quite damn tempting, i must admit.

What about Greenland as an actual green land?

I think other people have toyed with that idea in this thread and another one. As my focus is the "giant's empire broken & their war of ice & fire" more than anything, "Greenerland" is not exactly a big deal to me either way.

ShadowLogan · Unread post by **ShadowLogan** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 9:02 am

SolCannibal wrote:Can anyone point me out any interesting forms of magic involving fire or ice manipulation beside Warlocks (or the Fusionists from RUE)?
Magic lore relating to craftsmanship or techno-wizardry - anything to expand or toy with Jotans (or homebrew variants) - would be good too.

Others seem to have the Fire/Ice aspect covered, but...
TW is in RMB and RUE
Eco-Wizardry is in WB26 Dinosaur Swamp
Mystic Kuzi (sp?) in Mystic Russia (WB19?) crafts items
Nuhr Dwarves in SB4/BoM/WB30 are also craftsman

Rune Magic is covered by Nuhr Dwarves, but also Atlantis (1), BoM, PF2E main book, and Dragons & Gods (and IINM also supposed to be expanded on elsewhere in PF line).

Necromancy (per BoM compilation, not sure if its from Russia addition or Africa) has a lot of "crafting" going on in terms of hardware.

Invocation Magic (generic wizard used by TW/EW, LLW, Shifter, Mystic, etc) has some construction stuff, but not much.

South America 1's Biomancy includes magic weapons/armor (found also in BoM)

Palladium Fantasy Main RPG (2E) and one of the source books (want to say Western Empire) expands a list of magic options that can be put into items/weapons.

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Tue Nov 06, 2018 1:43 pm

Took a good look into some of the giant races in the old Conversion Book and the Jotans' proclivities towards artifice, metalworking and mechanics gets compared a number of times with the Dwarves own penchant, what makes me lean toward TW (cited in CB1 itself), Mystic Kuznya and the Nuhr Dwarves' "Rune Magic-lite" brand of craftsmanship. Biomancy and Eco-Wizardry are whole different alleys from that, so i'll probably just leave out.

Necromancy, while not meshing with any of the "giant ancestor races" in particular, does offer some hands-on crafts and can go well with frost & winter imagery, as shown by the Icewalkers in GoT. Maybe Cold-Blooded Immortals or Grim Reapers, hmmm, more ideas to munch upon.

Have yet to decide what would be the ancient threat under the deepest ice too.

Vincent Takeda · Tue Nov 06, 2018 7:16 pm

I can imagine the land being taken over by volcanic activity spurning the entire scandinavian region back into the runeforged technoviking ships and building floating cities that cruise about eating nothing but new monstrous megadamage sea life, and the rise in power of the volcanomancer. As the worlds premier environmentalists I think I'd also entertain the idea that some sort of pan dimensional scandinavian returns from another dimension (the ynglings?) to rescue scandinavia from this world, and all attepts are to ferry these folks through a rift to another world beyond the rift that is idyllic and peaceful and archepelagoesque while at the same time defending that world from letting anything through that isnt scandinavian. These ynglings would perhaps begin to teach a runic version of shifter magic to the locals. I also expect giants of course. How were so many of the icelandic islanders saved from all that volcanic activity? Perhaps since most of the population centers are on the edge of the island, the major cities just broke off from the main island and floated a little bit out to sea, and now iceland itself is a bit of an archipelago...

If I wanted to jump the shark a bit the benevolent yngling king would be santa claus riding about in a seaworthy/hovering runic megadamage sleigh pulled by mutant eight legged elk.

Perhaps the finns harness the power of the runic volcanomage to build a giant citadel city of megadamage ash, geothermally heated to form a giant sauna-city metroplex.

Perhaps the dimensional gate to this new viking paradise appeared in copenhagen, which is why denmark has a reputation for being a weapons testing disaster zone that nobody could possibly survive and nobody is allowed to go near anyway. Perhaps that's just a front to protect the gates to the archipelago paradise planet. Triax has been in direct negotiations with santa to exchange 'an appearance of inhospitabableness and defense of the territory surrounding the gate for runemagic.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Tue Nov 06, 2018 7:27 pm

Vincent Takeda wrote:I can imagine the land being taken over by volcanic activity spurning the entire scandinavian region back into the runeforged technoviking ships and building floating cities that cruise about eating nothing but new monstrous megadamage sea life...

Or, if you wanna go less serious, the descendants of Vikings/Icelanders emerge from their fortified bunkers, still living off of the massive stockpiles of canned spam that 'Mad Monty' persuaded them to buy and store away.

"But do you worship in the -Olde Ways-?"
"Yes, we're all Bhuddists."

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Tue Nov 06, 2018 8:01 pm

taalismn wrote:
Vincent Takeda wrote:I can imagine the land being taken over by volcanic activity spurning the entire scandinavian region back into the runeforged technoviking ships and building floating cities that cruise about eating nothing but new monstrous megadamage sea life...

Or, if you wanna go less serious, the descendants of Vikings/Icelanders emerge from their fortified bunkers, still living off of the massive stockpiles of canned spam that 'Mad Monty' persuaded them to buy and store away.

"But do you worship in the -Olde Ways-?"
"Yes, we're all Bhuddists."

That one made me remember of a hinduist kingdom i made as little extra bit of color for Rifts: England once.

Vincent Takeda · Tue Nov 06, 2018 9:20 pm

They could have missions safely relocating the svalbard seed vault across the rift.