Boundaries: A reasonably fortified sized city state nestled in the San Luis Vally in the southern colorado rockies. It is flanked by the Rio Grande Forest to the North, the Sante Fe forest in south (including the community of Taos), the four corners in the West and Puebo in the East Alamosa’s high altitude and formidable surrounding peaks (up to 14k feet) make the valley extremely defensible.
Government: Town Council.
Legal Code: US Traditionalists
Climate: Warm Alpine (Köppen BSk) up to the mid 90’s in the summer, to below zero in the winters.
Population: 4,500
Economics: Extensive irrigation for farming. Mining. Light and medium industry. Herding.
Agriculture: Widespread.
Trade: moderate with Pueblo to the East and
Religion: Order of the Martial Way 65%, Latter Day Saints 15%, Gaianism, Post Rapture Order of the Redeemer 2%, Wiccan 1%, 1%, Unaffiliated 16%.
Standard of Living:
Rural: farming freeholders and ranching estates supported by employees.
Urban: a good sized middle class, some dominant elites in the legal / political professions.
Gender Equity: Good
Armed Forces: Militia supplemented by irregular force of ‘cowboys’ deputized by the Mayor and the county Sheriff as needed.
Dominant Magical Tradition: Chi Mastery
History: The Alamosa plateau held two key advantages during the Collapse which helped the regions survival; The Rio Grande watershed contains more than enough water for significant agriculture which massively underutilized on the old days, and it is just far enough away from all of the pre-collapse cities to avoid getting overrun. So while a few refugees and well prepared travelers made it to the Almost sanctuary, for the most part, the region’s only notification of the disaster was when all of the satellites, cell phones and the internet went offline. In reality, no one really noticed at first. It was when the Safeway truck failed to show up along with the missing fuel trucks that people started to take notice. Then the trickle of refugees started to arrive.
The first group arrived from Sante Fe, talking about food riots and perhaps worse. Then a few more from Albuquerque and Denver talking about gang wars, race riots dehydration and starvation. Finally, some all the way from LA rolled in telling horror stories from the coasts, deserts and points in-between.
The end result of all of the was Sheriff Wallard Carlyle established a ‘security cordon’ around the plateau. In short, the citizenry established armed roadblocks in the mountains on Highways 116, 114, 285, and 160. The southern border required a bit more effort, roadblocks on each highway, a ranger outpost and a permanent mounted patrol in the region.
After that an emergency project was instituted to convert all of the electrically powered water pumps in the valley to windmills. These two projects consumed year 0.
Things were tight that first year, but soon bumper corn and potato crops had the region in a surplus. As should surprise no one, Yr 1 was the Sothron War, with Bangers and Eaters invading mostly from the south because of rumors of the plenty. This war rapidly evolved into a constant effort, with near daily skirmishes punctuated by large scale raids.
This warfare caused the city Elders to realize two things; that Alamosa would soon be out of ammunition and that Ranchers and farm boys were not adequately trained to deal with this level of conflict. So to conserve what they had, Carlyle and the other Elders scraped together what they could to expand the martial knowledge within the citizenry. Movies, a guy who was in the army, a refugee who took some karate at one point, SCA enthusiasts. All of these sources were pooled and eventually, over time, evolved into the Four Temples of the Order of the Martial Way.
Eventually, after a generation, the warfare slacked off to the occasional raid from Eaters. But the Martial Studies never ceased. It gave the people focus and a shared culture from which to draw. In time the Temples began to evangelize their teachings across the West, founding Temples for followers - martial arts and a movie night on Sundays.
The rest, as they say, is history.
Noteworthy things:
Order of the Martial Way
Temple of the Shining Path (inspired by Master Norris):
Temple of the Savage Dragon (inspired by Master Lee):
Temple of the Flowing Water (inspired by Masters Chan and Li):
Temple of the Ascended Masters (inspired by Master Carradine):