Continuing our exploration of the Palladium books Futuristic world setting of Rifts Earth,
you can catch up with the previous videos covering the Palladium books megaverse on
the Megaverse Playlist on my channel.
Following on from our survey of the invasive extradimensional insectoids the Xiticix, the
primary obstacle to their complete domination of planet Earth is located nearby in a thin
band of territory mainly located in North America, one of the main bastions of humanity
known as the Coalition States.
Today, we are going to cover some of the history of the formation and geography of the coalition,
their military organisation, politics, culture and a little bit about why the Coalition makes
for such an interesting faction on Rifts Earth.
So grab yourself a tasty beverage, get comfortable, it's time to get Deeply Nerdy.
The Coalition States is a genocidal human supremacist power of North America in the
the dystopian post-apocalyptic future of Palladium's Rifts roleplaying game.
The year is somewhere around 2391, though most surviving humans of North America will
tell you its around 105 post apocalypse after a world-wide cosmic and supernatural Great
Cataclysm that occured in 2098 AD which saw magical energy return to the Earth at maximum
level all of a sudden, supercharging Ley lines, tearing open uncontrolled interdimensional
rifts and causing massive devastation due to natural disasters and waves of supernatural
invaders which assaulted the struggling remnants of a severely traumatized human population.
Originally the Coalition States were a loose alliance of five industrialized states which
emerged out of the ashes of the United States and Canada, the main drive was and has always
been, the bastions of still operational military hardware manufacturing and intact communications,
this was driven by one of the few remaining fortified arcology megacity sites called Chi-town
which dominates old Illinois and Iowa, creating an area which has been completely human controlled
without any major incursions of dimensional beings (known as Dee Bees) for the last 60
years at least.
Raw materials constantly flow into this region and massive manufacturing facilities crank
out a constant supply of high tech equipment to supply humanity with the war machines vitally
important in their defense and the intended goal or retaking their world back from alien
invaders.
From Chi-town, as the cataclysm and resulting chaos began to stabilize somewhat, contact
spread to other pockets of resistance and the first member state, nearby Ontario's southern
half joined with Chi-town as the new territory called Iron Heart, which had become a feudal
monarchy by that stage, so the leaders of that region have dual titles, one being their
administrative rank in the coalition and their royal rank in the Iron Heart monarchy.
One of the primary assets of Iron Heart is an arms manufacturing complex at New Kenora
and the Ontario territory is the main source of Uranium, Iron, Coal and Timber for imperium
of humanity, maintained via vital shipping routes across the Great lakes.
Control of the shipping lanes was the primary driver behind the coalitions alliance with
the Free State of Quebec, which maintains a lot more independance from the rest of the
coalition as a result of it's critical tactical position.
The coalition states considers Iron Heart to be it's northern border and aside from
the ever growing threat of the Xiticix insectoid invaders they face a serious enemy in the
form of the Monster Kingdom of Calgary.
Anyone dealing with the Coalition states will know that, along with their high technology
hardware, they also employ genetic technology and have a large population of artificially
created intelligent humanoid canines, known as Dog Boys who serve, along with registered
human psychics, as a second class citizenry and front line specialist military force well
suited to fighting supernatural threats, which brings us to the Lone Star.
Lone Star is the second-most important state in the Coalition, after Chi-Town itself.
The Lone Star research complex contains the genetic development and testing laboratories
that provide the Coalition with its mutant canines along with an extensive manufacturing
capacity beyond this, and the North Texas oilfields are one of the prime sources of
petrochemicals for the entire Coalition States.
Lone star's alliance allowed the Coalition to bring Arkansas under control and push operations
all the way down south to the gulf of Mexico, establishing a second major control point
in the state, and brough some stability to the entire coast from former Brownsville to
the Mississippi River, however there are still issues with a faction called the Pecos Empire
along the Rio Grande and Brazos Rivers, though these are really just a pack of loosely allied
bandit tribes and warlords holding out from the time of chaos.
There are exceptions, the Kingdom of Los Alamo, which controls the territory immediately surrounding
old Austin is technologically on par with the Coaltion states and would have been approached
for inclusion, but the kingdom has embraced the use of alien technology, which the coalition
simply can not tolerate, but currently, there are bigger threats to the rest of the coalition
and Los Alamo can wait.
The Coalition's main bastion in the region is their naval power, with a naval base established
at Fort Pinnacle.
Despite its idiological contention with the human population of the Pecos empire, Los
Alamos and the Free trade city of Houstown in the ruins of old Houston Texas, the Coalition
would commit serious military assets to defend the region from any major alien invasion threat,
but you can be sure the non-humans in the region would have to fend for themselves and
watch out for a lot of unfortunate collatoral damage incidents.
The other main Coalition base is Puerta Victoria, located at the confluence of the Guadalupe
river and the Gulf of Mexico, this is a major airport which links with the navy power in
the gulf of mexico and is where most intelligence is gathered on the Pecos empire activity and
the looming threat of actual vampire kingdoms all over the southern states.
The Vampire kingdoms are one of the coolest aspects of Rifts earth and have one of the
best sourcebooks available in my opinion, I would say that is one of the must buy resource
books for the setting, its well laid out, a very fresh take on vampires and just a highly
entertaining read.
Plus, if you have not taken on a horde of blood suckers with a wood chip firing rail
gun and a high powered super soaker, have you even Rifts?
The only major city in Missouri is New Chillicothe, though there are several military bases along
the Mississippi river and a very large military presence containing the Great St. Louis Rift,
a permanently open rift in the old St. Louis Gateway Arch.
Mostly Missouri has a patchwork of settlements where landed families accept refugees that
always wander in from the wilds and work as second class members of the community in the
old feudal style.
St Louis, very much like the dark ruins of Old Chicago, is kind of a training grounds
for coalition soldiers to cut their teeth on fighting the supernatural, where theory
and veterans scary stories turn into a cold, traumatic reality and a recruit becomes a
soldier.
A lot of the excess population is sent off to Missouri as the lands are a main food production
territory and so a lot of outpost settlements are a bit like advanced firebases with families
living among the very vigilant armed forces stationed there...
not many of these settlements last the distance.
Northern Missouri is the Leavenwood live training territory and home to the 3rd Security Forces
Division, also known as the Death's Head division, composed of three full regiments, lots of
brigades, heaps of high tech hardware and auxilary specialists, so if you need squads
of dogboy mutant canine packs lead by Psi-stalker mutant psychic predatory human commanders,
or elite sniper ranger specialists, or rumbling squads of four high tech tanks smashing down
trees with support vehicles rolling in on massive tires like mobile military base with
medical support and fresh supplies for your players, or even a fly by from some SAMAs
power armor, raining rail gun fire as they scream by out of the blue sky, just a sqwuak
on the radio that summons glossy black armored angels of death from above.
There is even a full brigade of condemned coaltition criminals pressed into military
service, with lieutenants ready to put a bullet between the eyes of any trooper who fails
to comply with orders, warhammer 40K style.
From a roleplaying point of view, Squads are what most players will deal with, with the
larger operations of the coalition military being the background goings on, the orders
come in, the squad gets to work, no questions asked.
The game master always has the option to bring in support to get player characters out of
dire situations if need be without breaking from the players immersion, its just the way
things work in the coalition states.
In general, the Game master can bring in squads of four tanks, or two battle tanks, power
armor units such as SAMAS are available at a rate they can be manufactured and trained
pilots permit, attrition is very high as they see a lot of front line action away from further
support, such as artillery.
Other Coalition territories include the manufacturing facilities in El Dorado along with a lot of
oil and gas fields, there is also Fort Jerico, which used to be the city of Newtown and Pine
Bluff, home of a massive storage facility for ancient chemical weapons, and the Greensville
coalition navy base that operates on the Missossoppi river.
A hard fought campaign has liberated Little Rock and a navy base is being built to dominate
the Arkansas river.
Other notable locations include the fee city of Whykin, now known as the sixth coalition
state with control over southern Missouri and Oklahoma, this is a main coalition soldier
recruiting territory with a very high degreee of predjudice against any alien visitors to
rifts earth, even going so far as to enforce indentured servitude and slavery on dee bee's.
Effective Foundation Day, 110 (1 January 110), the Coalition government organized a number
of "territories" which are considered to be purely military areas of authority with no
civil government.
These are in most cases active combat zones.
The goal with the Territories is to pacify, then settle them, with the intended goal of
eventual statehood and membership in the Coalition.
I won't go into details about the war between the coalition, the city of tolkeen and the
Federation of magic, it is enough to say that magic is strictly forbidden in coalition society
and outlawed in all coalition territories.
Coalition citizenship is hereditary, citizens are issued with holographic identification
cards upon reaching adulthood which have all their information on them and also serves
as their primary currency exchange; however, it can and typically is removed as punishment
for severe crimes, along with exile to the labor service.
All citizens are nominally required to perform two years of military service upon their 17
birthday.
Non-citizen humans may apply for citizenship but it can take years to process, so enlisting
in the military is a better option in that regard.
It's basically a lot like the movie Starship Troopers, the government are fascists, their
military is the only thing keeping them in power and humanity alive, but the attrition
is very real, so, the official policy is to offer citizenship to any Earth born human
who enlists for a minimum term of five years of military service, the minimum amount of
time it takes before a soldier can advance to the rank of Corporal.
The longer you serve, the more benefits you and your family receive as citizens, for Humans
not born on Earth, the duration of all service requirements are doubled.
It's generally accepted that humans not born on Earth face certain death in the military,
but at least they get food, shelter, weapons and some training.
In addition to holo-IDs, major and master psychics, mutant animals, commissioned officers
of the Coalition military, most officials, recipients of authorized bionic augmentation,
members of the labor service, and convicted criminals are implanted with identification
coding (IC) chips.
IC chips allow easy identification, though each category has a different chip type.
Officers, officials, and bionic recipients are given so-called “green” chips, entitling
them to much greater freedom of movement within Coalition cities; psychics and mutant animals
are given “yellow” chips, for monitoring, and laborers and criminals receive “red”
chips, subject to close scrutiny, inspection, and death if they step outside very narrowly
defined parameters.
Canines walk on two legs and talk in the coaltition, these dog soldiers are created by Lone Star
laboratory facilities and citizens are quite used to them, usually quite fond of them really
and the dog boys love to serve the coalition for the most part.
Psychic powers do not face the same xenophobic fear as magic power, the citizens are divided
into minor, major and master psionics if they register psionic ability, the vast majority
don't and the minor psychics are mostly considered to be harmless so the authorities don't bother
with them much.
That seems like a good point to pause our studies for now, I have a viewer request to
talk about psionics in much more detail in my next video, until then, as always, my name
is AJ Pickett, thanks for listening and I will be back with more for you, very soon.