Ooh, how about we double the size of the actual Dodge City, Kansas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_City,_Kansas to around 55,000 effectively fictionalising it and making room for whatever we need for our concepts.  Seedy roadhouses for me, maybe a red light district, a university, a museum of the Santa Fe trail and several archaeological sites relating to Fort Mann, Fort Atkinson, the Hopewell Culture, Old Mexico and the Santa Fe trail?

Alright, I think I've found someplace that will fulfill all our needs (well, except for the ocean).

Leavitt, New Mexico, in the eastern part of that state. It will be closely modeled on Roswell. Anything the real place lacks that we want to add can be deone with a few keystrokes.

I'm renaming this thread as Setting Discussion. There will be a new OoC thread momentarily.

A few more posts here from you folks to finish up wish lists (keeping in mind that nothing will be set in stone) and we'll get on to character creation. I should have instruction posts (including my gifts to the investigators) for Char Gen up tomorrow/Sunday.

Anyone who still wants to refine their character concepts, use the PM threads please. Hold off on naming them just yet, while we see what family connections we want to forge.

Question, North East NM, South East NM, Right on the border with Texas?

I am asking so I can do the research I need to do for my background.

You can pretty much use any road map from 1980 or so to get your bearings (Roswell = Leavitt)

100 mi south on US 285 (Main St) to Mexico border
200 mi north on US 285 (Main St) to Santa Fe NM
100 mi northeast on US 70 to ClovisNM/TX border and 90 mi more to Amarillo TX
150 mi west on US 380 to San Antonio NM, then 85 mi north on US 85 to AlbuquerqueNM
80 mi east on US 380 to TX line, anther 100 mi to Lubbock TX
Dallas-Fort Worth TX is 450 miles east

Generally, figure you can comfortably average 50mph on highways outside of city limits.
O)n Interstates 75mph is a reasonable average.

Roswell = Leavitt is all I needed. I didn’t make the connection in the previous post that you were replacing Roswell!

Makes sense. I always figured squids are aliens.

Okay well in that case, I need a roadhouse/strip club and another that hosts punk bands Thursday to Saturday, nobody big cause it's not that kind of band but Hopie Glass' band (either Jerusalem Crickets or La Llorona - both from Jaime and Gilberto Hernandez' 1980s comic Love and Rockets) might play there a time or two before they crash and burn on their break up.

Yes!

Would you believe Hopie and Maggie featured in my dissertation for my degree back in 1985 (along with the X men, Axel Pressbutton, Warpsmith and V for Vendetta).

I should hunt that dissertation down, sounds like a fun read!

My dissertation had nothing in it remotely as fun as that.

I realised I have travelled (for work) relatively close to the setting location, but on the other side of the border: I have been to the state of Chihuahua, in Mexico, to Chihuahua and Delicias.
The landscape is incredible, reminding of some western movies, with high stone pillars shaped during geologic eras by the action of the wind. The references to dairy industry are quite appropriated. The region is quite arid if not desert, but here and there, especially in the valleys, there are greener areas where cattle can find pastures and there are also some round-shaped green areas made with irrigation, for cultivations.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:17, Sun 06 Aug 2023.

I've been to where they filmed those Clint Eastwood Spaghetti Westerns (The Good, The Bad and the Ugly etc.). For now (but that may change) the Desert of Tabernas in Andalucia is the only desert in Western Europe and disappointingly, it takes about 25 minutes to cross it by coach.

With the ongoing climate change, you never know what may happen in the near future...

https://images.unsplash.com/ph...&w=1000&q=80

https://www.destguides.com/uni...landmarks-new-mexico
This message was last edited by the player at 20:20, Sat 12 Aug 2023.

Great picture of Shiprock, but a long way away from Roswell where it's flat and boring and dry as far as the eye can see.

Do we have a date in 1980? I ask because it was a presidential election year and my character is going to be keen on politics. If it is before November, she'll be all gung ho for Jimmy Carter. If it is before August, she'll be firmly in the camp of US Representative Harold Rubens for local office. If it past August 5th, when he died, she'll be on the fence between supporting his wife, Dorothy, and supporting David Keen, the Democratic contender.

If it is after November 4, 1980, she's going to be all sorts of bummed out for weeks
This message was last edited by the player at 20:18, Wed 09 Aug 2023.

OMG!!!! Really?

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Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)

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This message was last edited by the player at 17:26, Fri 11 Aug 2023.

That's not at all flat and boring!

Flat and boring. The map is pretty wide, and those interesting contour lines you can see to the west off Roswell -- here's what it looks like looking west from just outside town. See that bump on the horizon? That's the contour lines all clumped together.

Here's the view looking east from the same spot (about 4 miles out of town), toward Roswell:


This message was last edited by the player at 19:52, Fri 11 Aug 2023.

Please guys, can you put those massive images into spoiler tags?

They make this thread unreadable on mobile.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:57, Fri 11 Aug 2023.

Most definitely agreed.

I don't think the spoiler tag holds images. At least it didn't when I tried it. But I did downsize my panoramas of the view outside our ranch and will try to keep picture size smaller -- though I have to say that pictures add like 1000% to the telling of a story, and I think you're missing stuff if you only access the site on a phone screen.

In reply to Edward 'Eddie' Harper (msg # 85):

Use the beta site (https://r.rpol.net), it automagically resizes images to fit. Because figuring out what fits YOUR screen might mean it doesn't fit mine or someone else's. Oh sorry, you're using mobile. Postage stamp-sized images it is.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:07, Fri 11 Aug 2023.

Appreciated.



I don't mean you have to use "postage stamp images", but that map is way too big even for my monitor, nevermind the mobile screen (which also takes forever to load).

If spoiler tags don't work, then you can post it as a link.

Please post very large images as links.

The contour map is very interesting but much too intrusive for this thread. If you like, Kit and Naomi(and anyone else, of course), I will create a thread where these images can live happily.
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:40, Sat 12 Aug 2023.