The Wolf Tribes, and the Free Indian Tribes. So we all know about the Wolf Tribes, groups of mutant wolves that align themselves to a pre-crash indian tribe (AtB2, pg 94). They list 26 tribes and "other", so lets just round up and say there are 30 since I like nice round numbers. However, one of the two known Free Cattle characters listed , One-Year (AtB2, pg 204) has obvious Native American cultural traits. Now he obviously isn't part of a wolf tribe, so there must be 'other' native american based tribes in the PotFC. I say that these tribes were once part of the 30 Wolf Tribes. The tribes once were a collection of a different animal types, wolf, horse, buffalo, deer, fox, coyote, etc all living together in whatever tribe's customs felt 'right' to them. But then there was a split, with the carnivore members going one way, and the herbivore members going another.
Now the Wolf tribes (the carnivores) would remain small (no more than a few thousand members or so at the most, some as few as 100), keeping with standard carnivore mentality. They would consider themselves the 'true' tribes, since any pre-crash humans would probably stick with them since we like steak and hamburgers as much as the wolves do, and you can assume the split was started by the anti-human preaching of Weschek. Not a big leap from "hate the humans, they want to turn you into meat", to "hate the carnivores, they want to turn you into meat".
The herbivore tribes would start to group together into much larger tribes (10's of thousands of members), keeping with the herding mentality, and aliging themselves with the great Plains tribes; Sioux, Cheyenne, Crow, Blackfeet, Comanche, and Pawnee (there were others, but 6 sounds like a good number). These would be major powers in the PotFC, with each having their own territory. I don't seem them being overly nomadic, but staying in their perspective territories. We'll get to the true Nomads later.
The wolf tribes that were in the plains (not all were, many were of course based no where near the plains) would have been driven out and would have smaller territories scattered around the edges of the plains. They would occasional clash with the Plains tribes, especially with those of the same Native American type (Wolf Sioux and Plains Sioux arguing over who are the True Sioux tribe). Or possibly live in an unsteady peace, occasionally getting together for pow-wows and to trade. Haven't decided on that yet.
No this great split was part of a much larger conflict started by the preachings of Weschek. I call it the Great Plains War. Lets have it take place 20-40 years ago. Recent enough for veterans to remember, but long enough for the younger generations to only hear about it. Have the more pessimistic call it the First Plains War, just to give the hint of a second one starting to brew.
Now this war was between more than the Indian tribes, but between all the groups inside of the plains region. I found a good picture illustrating the area of the great plains...
It will need some major tweeking, but it's a good start. We'll push some of it east to catch up with Cardinia, push the southern boarder up to make room for La Segunda Pregunta, and so on. Anywho, back to the point, the war was between the Carns (carnivores, humans, and any omnivores and scavangers that sided with them), and the Herbs (herbavores, and the few omnivores and scavangers that they would tolerate). Cities were sacked, nomadic groups were split, fledgling nations were destroyed, refugees fled, all the standard Great War stuff you'd expect. In the end the Herbs were victorious and the Carns were driven out, and the Free Cattle were founded. The Free Cattle being a loose organization of nomadic tribes, independant territories, and a few small city states, all being perdominantly herbavorious (man, that word is a mouthful), most being herd based animals. Once a year they send representatives to one of the larger city states. Many smaller nomadic groups bring the whole tribe. There, with Weschek presiding as council cheif, they discuss the preceeding year, and plan the next year. Mostly they argue amongest themselves for a week. Treties are made between different groups, disputes are settled, and major criminal trials are held (the big ones like murder, rape, and the ever popular "Crimes against the Free Cattle"). Spiratual and philosophical arguements, er, I mean discussions are common at these gatherings, with the most common one being "Can non-sentient animals be part of your tribe, and if so can you have them pull a wagon to help contribute?" The most argued answers are "No, that's too close to slavery", and "Yes, they're a contributing part of the tribe". The arguement of "No they're not part of the tribe so you can use them to pull a wagon" was dismissed back durring the Great Plains War as akin to slavery.
I have some interesting ideas for different nomadic tribes, but I'll save that for tomorrow.
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