Just a thought about Lonestar.

[Preacher]

Two things on the Lone Star complex.

1st. Has anyone played with the idea about what happened to the pre rifts scientist and military personnel from the complex? If so, then what were your ideas?

2nd. After rereading the section on the Coalition finding the Lone Star complex I started wondering what became of the personnel that had been there.

This is the scenario I came up with. I don't recall any hard numbers on the quantity of people in the complex when the rifts came so I speculated and came up with some arbitrary numbers which can be changed either way.

This is what I came up with.
I figured there would be around 4-6 thousand Military personnel there at any given time with maybe 2-3 hundred being armed for security detail at any given time. I would also assume that they would be armed with good weapons for the time with weapons similar to the ones in the New Navy.

As for scientist, engineers and techs I can only guess at the numbers but I would think it would be in the several hundreds to maybe a couple of thousand range maybe a little high but I don't think so being as how they were working on the Rifts machine, had nuclear reactors and a fully functional SAMAS Factory. Not to mention the new experimental Geothermal power plant there.

Anyway, I have them being rifted to a dimension where the tech of the natives is around that of mid 19th century Earth. As for the inhabitants, I am kind of stuck on what they should be. Elves? Has elves been done to death? Dwarves? Same, have they been done to death? Then I thought Ogres! They have the same IQ potential as humans.

I know it could be argued they would not have developed to Mid 19th century Earth being all aggressive and war like but I thought maybe these are like feudal clans states or something and the competition of clans made them more organized or something where they had to develope better weapons and tech to survive.

When the LSCers(Lone Star Complexers) arrive they would be startled and scared but the couple hundred soldiers on security duty should be armed out of the like 7000 total refugees of the group. Now seeing as how they had a fully functional SAMAS factory they might I say MIGHT have even had a few maybe 3-6 Samas Security soldiers on hand.

Now whether they had a big fight with the natives and ended up wiping out like a brigade of them (I think I am going with Ogres), or whether they made a peaceful contact and alliance with one of the smaller Clan States they eventually form a peace treaty with the local government. The trade off is the Ogre Nation takes them in and feeds them and shelters them in exchange the LSCers scientist use their advance knowledge to help enhance the Clan Nation's tech and the soldiers help defend their new ally which is their only hope for survival as they have no food and water and only a couple hundred have weapons and armor.

Now it has been two hundred and sixty some odd years since this happened. In that time knowing what the scientist, engineers and techs know. Would they be able to bring that Clan Nation up to pre-rifts levels or close?
Now this is assuming that the intergration went ok.
The scientist and engineers would have to create schools and labs and teach the natives and their own descendants what they know in order to keep things going after they pass on. I think they could make great strides in advancing the nation they are in. I mean going from mid 1850's-1860's to 2098 with all their knowledge might be possible if the nation was dedicated to the advance even if it was just so they could crush the other Ogre Clan Nations. Specially if they were a smaller nation in constant danger of being absorbed into or conqueroed by a larger nation.

Anyways that was what popped in the ole bean as I reread that section.
Any feedback? Plausible? Not Plausible? If not then why not? Could it be done differently? Better?
Oh, one other reason I went with Ogres is they are compatible with humans when it comes to reproduction.
Anyway, feedback is welcome, just try to be nice if you slam the idea.

[plata_knight]

I hadn't even thought of that, but it makes perfect sense to me.
Cool idea!

[Temporalmage]

I once ran a campaign where the missing soldiers had been rifted into the future. The party witnessed a massive ammount of solders, compleate with full field gear, suddenly rift into the badlands of Utah. In that campaign the party, (Composed mostly of humans) were the first contact these missing solders had, and the party brought these time travlers up to date as far as the Rifts went. In the end the pre-Rifts army decided to take thier Company of Glitterboys and other weapons of war and go to Lone Star demanding "thier" base back from the CS. It ended kinda ugly, with the party only involved in on the outer fringes. But interesting and fun for all.

[Josh Sinsapaugh]

It may seem unflattering but (in my opinion) they either got wiped out by a plague of alien origin, starvation, or were evacuated by the Mexican branch of NEMA (This would be done to hide the base and prevent it from falling into the wrong hands.)

[Preacher]

I am pretty sure they were teleported some place. It all but says that on pg.17 under Bradfords theory. It is open to debate for sure but the author presented that as the most likely event and not some mass evacuation as the place was in pristine condition. If there was a hurried evacuation or they were over run by demons then I doubt it would be in pristine condition.

[glitterboy2098]

I mean, the Cataclysm from main Rifts was far more devestating (timing better matching the solstice, I seem to recall) than the one in Chaos Earth. Sounded like there wasn't anything left to rally.

please don't tell me that.

i'm still trying to determain how any life survived the Chaos earth depected events.

tidal waves greater than those created by the asteriod of the K-T event (for you paleo-newbies, that the asteriod that wiped out the Dinosaurs and wiped out 65% of the life on earth.), EVERY active and dormant volcano erupting, causing ashfall across the planet in excess of 6 feet, a layer of ash and dirt in the upper atmosphere causing a massive drop in tempreture, earthquakes on every fault line, massive hurricanes, storms, ect.



the combination would result in 90% of all life going extict (basically anything over the size of a worm), followed by a massive ice age that would result in the extiction of all but the most hardy of microbes, and even then you'd see a massive loss of diversity in those.



earth would be a virtually lifeless ball of ice for centuries, and after thawing out, evolution of life would once again start to create more complex lifeforms, only in forms totally unknown to us.




and you tell me the main book version is worse?

[glitterboy2098]

i think K.S. just put bad sounding effects in, and ignored any science behind it.

thats the only explanation that explains why he says the effects where less, but he describes what would kill all life.

[Dustin Fireblade]

I believe the Rifter feature describing the events leading up to Chaos Earth did state that the cataclysm on main Rifts was worse than in Chaos Earth. Granted, it's been a while since I read it, but I do believe that's what it said.

Chaos Earth is the past of Rifts Earth. The cataclysm is the same.

[Tinker Dragoon]

I believe the Rifter feature describing the events leading up to Chaos Earth did state that the cataclysm on main Rifts was worse than in Chaos Earth. Granted, it's been a while since I read it, but I do believe that's what it said.

The preliminary ideas in Rifter #7 were for an entirely different version of Chaos Earth than was ultimately published. In that version, Chaos Earth was to be an alternate timeline of Rifts. The actual Chaos Earth RPG however is in the normal Rifts timeline and explores the official past of Rifts Earth.