The Midwest Wastelands enclose the following states: Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia, most of Pennsylvania, and a good chunk of Virginia. There are a few corporate enclaves in here, but for the most part it's limited to small settlements around formerly minor cities. Much of the area is wild, and you can walk for days without seeing another person in the most isolated parts of the wastes.
The people who do live out here huddle in settlements, bunkers, and villages. Some die-hard survivalist families live alone, but many who do find themselves easily picked off by predators, and with no back-up when large groups of bandits roll through. A lot of people rarely journey more than a few miles outside their home… Travelling can be dangerous. This doesn’t stop everyone, though. A few local governments have distant holdings, and can be counted upon to send forces, even through dangerous territory. The Free Traders, a mysterious group of augmented merchants, send out representatives to lead caravans, and encourage settlement growth and trade. And the corporations have their own wants and desires out here, that lead many enclave dwellers to take trips out into danger.
The biggest corporate holding in the Midwest Wasteland is the Hall-Mart Cleveland enclave. A vast dome that spreads over both the coast and part of the lake, the smoke from its factories can be seen from miles away. The land around it is polluted beyond recognition, but most of its inhabitants never leave or see the outside if they can help it. It does sit at a nexus of highways that are useful for trade, and this keeps it alive. It also has one of the few functional airports in the waste.
Hall-Mart has been putting fortress-like Megastores into parts of the waste where it wishes to encourage growth and trade, with mixed results.
The biggest settler town in the Hio land is Kron, in the Northeast. The town of Dusky is to the Northwest, and it profits from being directly on Hall-Mart's trade route west. Zane is in the east, and it is a growing settlement. In central Hio lies Fallen Colum… The remnants of Columbus are dusted with a soup of bioweapons that killed off every living thing in the city, and contaminate it to this day. It’s still occasionally safe to travel through if you stick to the highways, avoid the center of town, and go through when the wind isn’t blowing. The radiation is strongest in the west and southwest... The Wright-Patterson crater is still glowing after all these years, and it wears the lost ruins of Dayton like a funeral shroud of concrete and rust. In the south, Poor Smoth and Hathens do a brisk trade with a loose circle of settlements. Moonveil is in the southeast, and serves as a refuge for the Meek and those who would seek their wisdom. Magic is strong in this area, for reasons that no one really understands.
Many of the settlements of central Hio are loosely governed from the Holding of Lund, in the west. Lund is the farthest western point in Hio that is still considered liveable, and even so few children are born without mutations in Lund town. This is fine, for few come to Lund to settle… Lund is an outpost set to keep watch on the Wright-Patterson crater, and to keep the traveling roads of Fallen Colum in good repair. The veterans of Lund have faced things from the crater that no sane man should ever see, and it shows in their eyes, and the way they never speak of their battles unless deep in drink.
From Lund in the west come the Arbiters, men and women who ride the settlements and carry law with them. Not all settlements bow to the law of Lund, but even those that don’t offer them hospitality and news. The Arbiters are not simply there to sit in judgement; They are there to make sure that the faint patches of civilization yet live, and that no one is truly alone.
The mega-corporations do not recognize the authority of Lund, and this has caused problems. The city of Lund in particular needs the anti-radiation drugs and treatments that they can provide, and has been forced to make unpopular concessions.
Lund is run by a military council, and those holding the seats change as needed. Some whisper that a dragon holds a seat upon the council. Others say that the old military families who kept Lund alive during the dark years have a stranglehold on the seats, and control their holders with intrigue and corruption.
The laws of Lund are simple, but the interpretation of them can be loose in far settlements. They are as follows;
1. You shall not murder.
2. You shall not take or buy slaves.
3. You shall not steal.
4. You shall not assault a surrendered or helpless man.
5. You shall not break hospitality that is rightfully given.
6. You shall not work against Lund, or her people.
7. You shall not eat of the flesh of a man or woman, or anything sentient.
8. You shall not imprison a person against their will, save that they have broken
one of these laws.
The mark of the Hold of Lund is a blue star on a white field.
West of Hio lie the forests of Deanna. Unfortunately, the way there is not easy, due to the Crater. Many of the forests are misshapen and twisted, and dark things have come west. Warhound Inc. maintains a base on the border called Richmond, and lets no one pass without authorization from their corporate office. There are ways through to Deanna in the Northeast of Hio, but it’s a severe detour for most travelers, and the roads are rough. Deanna has no central authority, but Warhound Inc. makes a show of patrolling the settlements and dispensing justice, at least when the cameras are watching them.
South of Hio is the kingdom of Kain Tuck. It composes a lot of what used to be northern and western Kentucky, and is a repressive, decadent place to live. Kain Tuck is a mecca of trade as far as the wastelands are concerned, and life is good there so long as you have money and stay on the good side of the Colonels. For those who don’t have money, jail and forced servitude (Called Bonding) is the norm. It’s a step up from slavery, but not much.
The Colonels are the major force in Kain Tuck. They’re landholders, and maintain sprawling estates throughout the kingdom. Some of them are just and kind, others are cruel and tyrannical. Most of the populace lives on these estates… The few towns left are waystations for travelers and locals to trade and conduct business on neutral ground.
King Hiram rules from his capital of Larks Town. Like many other kings before him, he was once a Colonel and managed to gain the throne by intrigue and selective bribery. He is a hedonistic man who grants office and favor to his relatives and friends, and cares little for others so long as his desires are met.
Kain Tuck has long resisted corporate intrusion. There were few nuclear detonations within this land during the fall, and the hills and wind patterns prevented the fallout from spreading as much as it has in other lands. As such, there has been little need for the medicines that the corporations offer. The Colonels are leery of diluting their power base, or letting a superior military force in without adequate means of keeping them in check. Still, some people do business with them, quietly. The ones that are loud about it don’t last long.
Lund and the Kingdom of Kain Tuck have poor relations with each other. Lund refuses to allow Kain Tuck bounty hunters to legally capture escaped bondsmen. There is also little trade between the two lands… The barrier of the Hio river and the radiation in the west makes an easy crossing hazardous. Riverboats from Poor Smoth sometimes do a good business, and there is talk of that settlement joining the Kingdom. Talk that worries the Council in Lund…
To the East, Pennstate rises mountainous and foreboding. The corporate enclave of Dubwaa is run by Icarus Inc., and Roja Cola has a mining settlement in the foothills around what used to be Pittsburgh. Rumor has it that they are searching for something in the mines around there… Few other things would explain their persistence in inhabiting the area, despite continual losses of men and material. Aside from those two enclaves, and a few more far to the east, the remainder of the land is all but deserted. Settlements have been tried, but sooner or later the people who try it disappear, leaving only empty buildings and abandoned equipment in their wake. Something lives in this land that doesn’t like people.
The rest of the continent is a mystery to those in the Midwest wasteland. Few travelers from farther points come to the wasteland, and those that do are often untrustworthy. The corporations don’t see a profit in telling the natives the state of the world elsewhere, so the ones that know hide information from unimportant personnel and remain silent.
The state of the world beyond is a matter of some conjecture. Again, only the corporations and perhaps the dragons know for sure, but they rarely share that information. The lack of a global communication network, and the fall of the internet means that one individual’s guess is as good as any other.
Whatever the state of affairs, a gun and a healthy supply of bullets are necessary tools regardless of where you go. This fallen world is dangerous, that is the only guaranteed truth left to humanity.