D&D as a Post-Apocalyptic Wasteland

[Blackrat]

There is a finnish rpg called Astraterra that is basically a fantasy setting in a postapocalyptic dyson ring. The magic in the setting is actually manipulation of ancient tech. The game was designed to be kid friendly. I know the writer was working on english translation, but I don’t think they’re ready yet. It does have english website with some of the fluff however: The Setting — ASTRATERRA

 

[Oofta]

I got some idea spooking around in my head for a while on how to best do a setting a bit alike some ravenloft domains, like Falcnovia with its oppressive regime or the one which map is basically 19th century industrialization London (cannot recall the name of this one atm it's got some Jack the Ripper theme I think).
What I imagine is something extremely gloomy, literally dark, maybe foggy but not always, but when not, the sky is clouded also with smog eventually. It should be a populated area on the one hand otoh many houses should be empty or inhabited by something else than the normal folks. The normal people would only leave their homes if they absolutely have to.
Basic things like water and food supply should still work somehow though, but I have no good idea on how to make this logically consistent, because this would require rural areas providing these goods.
While the rural areas could be as gloomy and dark, having lonely farm houses strewn about, there would have to be some market or traffic of goods in larger quantities. I do not know how to resolve that.

That's where darksun really shines, it is thoroughly consistent and still gives that postapocalytic feel.

In my old campaign, it was far more gloomy and morose. But crops will still grow even with constant fog as long as it is warm enough, just not as well. Some may even grow better because of the constant moisture. However, the crops were always sickly looking, food spoiled more easily, certain crops worked others didn't. Mushrooms were also a big thing.

The problem with ongoing resource scarcity though is that in the long term the population will drop to the level that the environment can support. Assuming the population hasn't dropped to zero, scarcity becomes the new normal. You can set the campaign in an era where the population is still dropping but at some point it stops being "shortages" and becomes "normal".

If you had a small region that was unsustainable, there would have to be a reason people stay there. But anyway, that's why I don't do the constant shortages thing. Life can be hard for "commoners" and it may be difficult to scratch out a living but it faded into the background quickly.

 

[Quartz]

The 3E Epic rules provided an easy way out. Those artifacts aren't artifacts at all, 'just' Epic magic items. Once the PCs got to those levels, they could create those items. Look at it like a PC's origin story: their tutor was really high level - 6th or so (!) - but the PC meets and surpasses them. So too do the PCs come to meet and maybe surpass the ancients.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[jayoungr]

I think "apocalypse" implies a sudden, complete collapse rather than general decline of knowledge and civilization. I've never heard the fall of Rome referred to as an apocalypse or the middle ages as post-apocalyptic.

Thanks, that was some of what I was trying to get at when I said lost knowledge doesn't automatically mean post-apocalyptic. You articulated it better than I did.

 

[Guest 6801328]

I don't think we should be taking "post-apocalypse" too narrowly. The apocalypse doesn't have to be recent or sudden. Basically it means "there used to be advanced civilizations who could do stuff we can no longer do, and we keep finding their amazing stuff.*"

*If usually we "find" that "stuff" by killing monsters and taking it from them, so much the better!

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[jayoungr]

I don't think we should be taking "post-apocalypse" too narrowly. The apocalypse doesn't have to be recent or sudden. Basically it means "there used to be advanced civilizations who could do stuff we can no longer do, and we keep finding their amazing stuff.*"

I respectfully disagree--I think that definition of "post-apocalyptic" is so broad as to be nearly meaningless. Finding ancient, advanced artifacts is such a staple of both fantasy and sci-fi that it would mean there are very few settings that aren't post-apocalyptic under that definition.

 

[Beleriphon]

Depends on how recent the apocalypse is.

During the apocalypse: 0 - 1 generations: primary consideration: living until tomorrow

Fallout.

Recent post apocalypse: 1 - 5 generations: primary consideration: scrabbling for necessities to rebuild; scrapping with next village

Fallout 2, Fallout 3 and Fallout 4.

Old apocalypse: 4 - 10 generations: primary consideration: rebuild, reclaim, scrapping with next county

New Vegas.

Very old apocalypse 10+ generations: primary consideration: find opportunities, scrapping with other nascent states

Not any Fallout, at least not yet. I doubt there will be since the setting revels in its post-nuclear wastelands.

In Greyhawk, for example, it's been about 50 generations since the Invoked Devastation. Long enough that people have been told of it, but no one really understands what went on, critical infrastructure has been built, new cities founded, wealth and populations rebounded.

It's not post-apocalyptic in genre, but it uses the tropes to provide ancient ruins to explore -- those created during the devastation and other created by other powers in the interregnum and treasures to find -- things that can't be reconstructed or whose cost would be more too prohibitive to comtemplate.

A lot of fantasy settings borrow a similar series of tropes. As mentioned LotR does the same thing, but its a slow decline after a war rather than sudden devastation. The Third Age by the time Aragorn is crowned is over two thousand years old, and Gondor been on a slow slide for centuries.

That said, at what point does it stop being post-apocalyptic? If I blow up a modern day setting, and then have my game 1000 years into the future with a new society is that post apocalyptic? Even if the society is fully functioning and as advanced as our own?

 

[S'mon]

Basic things like water and food supply should still work somehow though, but I have no good idea on how to make this logically consistent

The Dark Powers did it.