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Some Notes on the Carbon Plague

My Cyberpunk 2020 campaign, called The Generation Gap, takes place in 2026 and is meant to be a bridge into CyberGeneration, or at least into that paradigm. After reading all of the CDC statistics listed in EcoFront and CyberGeneration, and making some assumptions based on current population projections, I've made the following statistical observations. Assuming a national popluation of 3 hundred million (up 1 hundred million from now) with 30% under 20 and 70% over 20, and using statistics given in EcoFront and CyberGeneration regarding the Carbon Plague:

  • 50 to 2 hundred thousand children are evolved (5-20%) meaning 170 to 680 thousand children are infected (17-68% of juvenile population).

  • 10 million adults have died meaning 1 hundred million have been infected (half of adult population)!

  • In Portland, assuming current projections of a population of 2 million by 2020, that means 70 thousand people have died and 30 thousand children have evolved!

    In my campaign, I felt the numbers were a little too harsh. We're talking about a plague on the order of the 12 monkeys virus! I have chosen to have these numbers be misinformation manufactured by the ISA and released to the media as a way to maintain paranoia and fear amongst the populace. This way they could be more easily controlled and further governmental measures can be taken and justified.

    The real numbers, I feel, are much much lower. In my campaign, the paranoia still exists, but no one has actually SEEN a victim of GMDS, they've just seen the news reports and the fax-newssheets! And everyone knows that Greg Edmonds wouldn't lie. Not on World News 100. Right?

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