Frostpunk RPG

//SETTING: Frostpunk, 1887 year, no magic, similar to Steampunk, post apocalypse, all countries in ruins after cold storms, average temperature in the world is -20 degrees in celsius, often colds to -40, also there can be storms, and temperature falls to -150💀. But, peoples still exist, they live with small/big/giant groups, making their cities around old mechanism that still can generate warmth, generators that generate big amount of warmth and etc//

In the summer of 1886 the snowstorms began. Crops failed, people starved. Millions fled south. They met only destruction, famine, and death.

In the farthest reaches of resource-rich north, the British Empire began construction of massive heat-radiating Generators, These grand engines would allow a chosen few to survive the frigid global winter, safe from the chaos of crumbling civilization.

They ran out of time.

An apocalyptic ice storm came from the south, devouring all in its path. People fled in panic. Some managed to cross the seas and reach the site of a Generator, only to find it frozen solid.

The Generator was designed to power a City capable of weathering the end of the world...

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Lore: 1822 1822, the British mathematician Charles Babbage conceives of a steam-driven calculating machine that would be able to compute tables of numbers. In our timeline, the British government-funded project failed. In the world of Frostpunk however, Babbage succeeded in building his Difference Engine; an automatic mechanical calculator designed to tabulate polynomial functions. Babbage's success with the Difference Engine resulted in increased funding from the British government. Along with the help of his friend, correspondent, and fellow mathematician, Ada Lovelace, Babbage was able to build the Analytical Engine, the successor to Difference Engine. A mechanical "general purpose computer" and the world's first computer in the World of Frostpunk.

Over the decades, Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine continued to be improved and made smaller with each generation by other scientists and engineers, until a new type of Computational Engine was invented that is capable of following orders and performing complex tasks.

1822-1866 Inventing the Steam Core Somewhere between 1822 and 1886, the Steam Core was invented by Professor Hawkins. The invention of Steam Cores became a massive boon for the British Empire and the technology was adopted by other countries, such as the United States.

However, all knowledge regarding the manufacture of Steam Cores was lost during the Great Frost and in the ensuing chaos of civilizations' collapse. Most tragically was the loss of Professor Hawkins, who attempted to escape the Fall of London by crossing the Channel with his belongings, including all the blueprints and other documentation about Steam Cores, onboard an experimental Steam Core powered aeroplane. Only a Model of the Steam Core Prototype inside a waterproof chest was found afloat by a corvette searching for Professor Hawkins.

The few intact Steam Cores available to the residents of the Last Cities must be salvaged from buildings or derelicts dotting the Frostlands.

Same timeline Birth of the Automatons Concurrent with the invention of Steam Cores, and doubtless building upon the success of Babbage's project, the giant steam-powered robots known as Automatons were invented. These metal behemoths were born through the combination of complex clockwork mechanisms, the advanced computational engine, and the application of the Steam Core device. These huge machines, towering over people and structures, were the pinnacle of human engineering before the Great Frost and a massive boon to the British economy which propelled it to become the world’s first Superpower in the modern sense. Many other countries tried to make their own Automatons independently and even attempted to reverse-engineer them with mixed results, while others simply bought Automatons from the British.

1886 Arrival of the Great Frost In the summer of 1886 the Great Frost began. Initially it presented as a chain of strange weather patterns, frost during summer, killer snowstorms in the northern countries, never-ending rain storms in the Sahara and an ever increasing drop in temperatures worldwide. The United Kingdom and several other countries sent out expeditions to the North to conduct research into the origin of the incipient changes in climate. Many of these British research outposts were equipped with Heat Generator Towers to enable prolonged study of these phenomena.

Meanwhile in Britain and in the rest of Europe, the general atmosphere continued to deteriorate. As even the hardiest crops began to fail, starvation had set in among the public. As days became months, millions of desperate people fled south in search of warmer weather and sources of food. They were met with chaos, famine, and death. Many southern countries had neither the inclination, nor the resources, nor even the infrastructure to handle a massive influx of refugees. Many governments tried to calm their people or turn a blind eye to this problem until it was too great to ignore, and anarchy erupted as man turned against man in a struggle over the few remaining resources, civilization slowly crumbled under the growing weight of snow and ice.

In an attempt to save the Empire and its people, the British Government arrived at two solutions. The first involved sending multiple naval vessels with refugees to their colonial holdings in South America, East and South Africa, India, and Australia where it was warmer. The other plan would involve sending icebreakers and purpose-built Land Dreadnoughts with refugees to the farthest reaches of the resource-rich North, where members of the British Science Expeditions have finished the construction of heat-producing Generators, and where a chosen few could survive the environmental catastrophe and the consequent socioeconomic collapse.

However, the strategy of the British Government was thwarted by Mother Nature herself. An ice storm of apocalyptic proportions came from the south, devouring all in its path, and severing all communication and travel between Britain and rest of its Empire. Robbed of options, the British Government began putting into motion the complete evacuation of London and rest of the country.

1886 The last autumn With the ever-lasting cold bringing about famine, starvation and bread riots all throughout Britain and with its colonial empire having been destroyed by an apocalyptic ice storm, the British Government, robbed of any other options, began mobilizing all available resources to carry out a complete evacuation of the British Isles, with the intent of evacuating as many people as possible to the coal-rich north to save what still could be saved of the British Empire. Ships were built or seized in order to transport both workers and resources to the far North. The Imperial Exploration Company was tasked with the goal of navigating to the sites of the British Science Expeditions' research outposts, construct Heat Generator Towers, and thus create safe havens for the people of Britain to survive through the approaching cold and eventually re-establish both the empire and civilization. All of the generator sites and cities that the player can play as are products of this evacuation protocol.

One such generator site was Site 113, or New Liverpool, set up by the Imperial Exploration Company to build a Generator to house the people of Liverpool.

The British Empire was not the only great power seeking refuge in the far north, however. The French (most likely the French Third Republic) were also sending explorers, workers and resources to the north with seemingly similar intentions of building safe havens for their people.

End of 1886 An End to the Old World Once the Great Frost arrived in force and consumed the northern hemisphere, civilization collapsed. It is not known exactly what happened but the results speak for themselves. Just as the Great Frost began to approach Britain, the British Government, financially exhausted and teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, ordered the complete evacuation of the British Isles. Boats, ships, Land dreadnoughts any other viable forms of transportation were mobilized (and seized) and outfitted to transport a many citizens to the generator sites, with a seeming priority on the wealthy upper class.

This would ultimately turn out to be the last act of the British Empire as by the end of 1886, the United Kingdom, the United States and the British dominions had been reduced to little more than scattered groups of survivors and refugees, desperately trying to make their way north to the generator sites. Many died in the harsh, icy and cold conditions while others became lost and trapped out in the Frostlands but some groups of survivors succeeded in reaching the safety of the Generator site and began gathering resources to found cities to enable their own survival and to locate and save those that became trapped in the Frostlands.