The world of Amanita.

This thread is for changes or expansions to the world made in this campaign. These are canon for this game.

Canberra Old City

On the other, if you need to hide something or someone, there’s no better place.
Just make sure you put them somewhere safe. Of course, in the AFS, that’s the real trick.
-attr: Zack Adams, freelance technical consultant/soldier of fortune

The Best Place to Live in the Freestate!

The former capital of Australia, and now home to Amanita Ltd, is often described as being a violent, dirty place riddled with crime. While technically true, this over looks some of the subtleties of the city. Cut off from the rest of the world by the desert wastelands of Australia, Canberra has developed a very insular society. The world is against them, so they joined forces against it. As such, crimes against locals of the city tend to be small scale, thefts mainly. Crimes such as murder or burning down someone's house are generally treated harshly by the rest of the society, which, in an environment like this, can be deadly. Individuals coming in from outside Canberra however are fair game, until they integrate themselves into the city's harsh life style.

The population has a wide varity of mutations from the radiation and chemicals left over in the Free State from the Corporate wars. Most are unpleasant, and contribute to the low average life expectancy of the city, however there are also a lot more voids and telepaths than most areas of the world here. People are often desperate for medical care, but EI doesn't care about the city, so most care is provided by back street doctors, with all the risks that that intials. (Jon Laston of Amanita also provides care sometimes in his downtime, but this isn't reliable since he is often away).

Government
Canberra does have a city wide government. While they don’t have too much clout, they often act as meditators and help sort out disputes, as well as attempting to keep the struggling infrastructure of the city together. They have no UIG backing, they wiped their hands of Canberra a while ago.
The government is democratic, called The Assembly, formed of a representative from each area of the city and a mayor. It has its roots in the remains of the Australian government, which didn’t become part of the UIG. They have three year long terms, and the current mayor, a well regarded local business man named Simo Fisan, indicates he will step down at the next election later this year.

Economy
The city’s main source of both income and contact with the outside world is the scrap and waste dumped in the continent around it. There are several different groups of scrap collectors in the city, as well as various individuals, who scramble around the piles of discarded materials and products looking for things that can be of use. Mostly building materials are found, but sometimes rare materials and intact items are found, which are often sold back to either Australian Free State Waste Management, the company who handles dumping material or other buyers such as the Ai Jinn or Shi Yukiho.

Another base of the economy is the wildlife of Australia. Unlike most areas of the world, Australian creatures not only survived the Corporate wars, but survived by becoming even more deadly. As such, hunting is a standard skill in the Australian population, even in Canberra.
The side effect of this is that Australia is one of the biggest exporters of real meat and animals in the world. Even giant emu breast meat fetches a good price at high price restaurant, and what kind of EI rich kid wouldn’t want a pet Drop Bear of their very own? (the answer is an intelligent one). This does mean that someone, say an assassin, may find a useful pet somewhere here.

The largest Corporate employer, other than the Australian Free State Waste Management corporation, who doesn’t so much employee the locals as buy cool stuff off of them, is Multimeat, who keeps a R&D lab and a small production centre active here, along with a team of agents. These agents are drawn from the local population and are often local celebrities, particularly the team that intercepted a rogue scout class cyberlin that someone (definitely not the Ai Jinn cough cough) had left in the free state, which had gotten worryingly close to the city before the team dealt with it. The stripped down carcess sits in the corner of the Multimeat complex, towering over the buildings. It is both a warning to those who would attempt to stamp out the citizens of the city, and a warning to everyone to not fuck with Multimeat.

Weekly convoys from the Australian Free Transport Corp. set off to Dampier Arch to collect individuals and supplies shipped in from there. The convoy is very well armed, and hires only the best fighters to help guard the goods. It appears to have some kind of Corporate backing, but who is unknown to most people.

Utilities.

The WDN is available via satellite here, and power mainly comes from a large, smoke belching power plant outside the city, one of the few left that uses waste combustion for energy on a large scale.  Water is scarcer than most regions of the world, but several enterprising citizens have started purifying sea water from the coast for the city’s use on a large scale, thanks to the recent discovery of discarded purification equipment from the SY.

Languages
The main language is a heavily modified dialect of English, at least in Canberra itself. While difficult to understand at first, an agent won’t have too much trouble understanding people after a week if they already speak English. Some Swahili has spread from the Comoros linked Skybridge, but not much, as well as some Manderian from the Ai Jinn.

Corporate Relations

WF: The main WF presence in Australia is AMS agents, based in Sydney, doing weapon testing, and occasionally “cleaning” the populace as they did so. Since they also effectively control the remains of the port there, they are a major factor in the poverty of the region, since for unknown reasons they have stopped it operating. The UIG attempted to intervene, but since they had already given up control of Australia, the WF was able to argue they should continue the situation.
The combination of blocking goods and occasionally killing people with little to no way of stopping them has made the WF by far the less popular Corp in the region, surpassing even those Gemini dicks who keep dumping BIOs in the region. At least you can make stuff out of those fucks.

EI and SY: Neither of these Corporations give a flying fuck.

Ai Jinn: The Ai Jinn worked out buying material back from the free state populace is actually cheaper than sorting through all of it themselves. They also have a bit of presence in the gangs of the city, but they have had difficulty integrating themselves as well as they have in other areas of the world.

Comoros: Comoros sees the free state, particularly the high levels of potent telepaths that appear there as a massive potential resource for itself, and as such works the hardest of the Corps to integrate itself into the populace. So far they’ve managed to set up a school system, but this is constantly plagued with rumours of telepathic kids going missing. The general populace views them as suspicious, but is willing to take the aid they offer as long as they don’t try anything stupid.

Amanita: Amanita has been active for around a year before the beginning of the campaign. The two existing agents who actually leave the base seem to be well regarded locally, while the Corp itself is just…there? How the new arrivals are seen is yet to be determined.

Lanzas: While Lanzas agents are often operative in the area pursuing bounties, it is rumoured that they have something else planned. More and more permanent Lanzas bases are popping up through out the continent, and representatives have approached The Assembly offering to help in a more official manner. So far these attempts have been rebuffed, but with AMS still blocking the port, the Assembly’s hands may be forced in accepting Lanzas help, with whatever strings it brings.

The UIG: Other than the Skybridge, the teleport station and the Longbridge weapons testing site, the UIG has very little to do with the Free State, and that’s fine by the citizens. The UIG has its hands full dealing with the WF in South America, handling Australia as well would be too much.

Skybridge Shuttles: Some people lack vehicles to get across the Skybridges, or don't want to risk driving at such speeds themselves. The UIG responded by creating the Shuttles, long carriages capable of carrying lots of people or cargo at once. Each skybridge has a number of shuttles assigned to both the normal lanes and the express lanes.

While not comfy, the skybridge shuttles are immensely safe. The UIG has made sure they are up to safety standards, partially out of concern for the people and partially because otherwise the Ai Jinn will use it against the UIG's attempts to make them follow safety standards. Each shuttle is made up of carriages, each capable of holding around 40 people. How many carriages are used depends on the Skybridge. A well travelled one could have up to ten, while one like the Xaafuun-Dampier Arch crossing may only have two carriages per shuttle. Two well armed UIG officers are assigned to each carriage to avoid trouble, which could be disastrous at the speeds the shuttles travel at. Light refreshments are often available on board via a minibar.

They look like this, but with bigger and with UIG logos attached. Also, they aren't trams.

Source

Also, the express lane in core breaks the sound barrier. For safety reasons (not deafening all travellers), this is not true in Amanita. They instead travel at around 650 km/h.