Survivor communities outside the known world

[dreki]

This is my opinion of which islands would be able to survive like Iceland did.  I did read through a big chunk of this thread but honestly not all 84 pages so I know some of it is repeating what others have said but I haven't seen all of it.

Also the thread started before covid so we have a clearer idea how places will react.

Islands that were able to lock down and avoid infection while being reasonably self sufficient.  They need to have enough space that they can move away from the shores and also support farmland. They need naval forces that will allow them to keep the sea beasts and potentially infected outsiders at bay.  And also the culture to actually lock down early. 

The last one is a big one. A lot of island nations like UK and Australia, I don't think they would lock down until too late given the politics of the place.

I think it's likely that there's a lot of places similar to Iceland throughout the "silent" world - that shut down fast enough to stop the spread and mostly suffered from famine then rebuilt.

Japan

Japan has historically shut its borders.  It also has American naval bases so while they would make it harder to quarantine the whole country - once everything went to hell they also would have had a powerful fleet to stop anyone from trying to bang down the doors.

They already have a culture of wearing masks when ill which would have helped reduce the spread as well.

I suspect that they would have initial infections, but would be one of the first countries where everyone wears masks so it never spread far and never had many trolls.

Japan's culture is also quite communally focused and has preserved a lot of traditional methods so while there would be a difficult time - I think it would handle it relatively well and come out as one of the stronger human settlements.

UK

I think Scotland would try to shut down fairly soon. It has invested quite heavily in renewable energy as well so could potentially do quite well.
It also has a landscape/climate somewhat similar to Scandinavia.

Unfortunately England wouldnt shut down until it's too late.  It had one of the worst responses to covid, and are fairly reliant on imports/exports to be willing to shut down the borders until it's too late.  Which is a shame because it could probably have been really successful if they had shut down when Iceland did.

Even if England didn't come for Scotland's resources - people would flee to Scotland or infected animals would bring the disease in.  A brief initial success would be ruined.

The UK has some small islands that might be okay because they're quite isolated already, but I'm not sure if they'd be able to handle the sea beasts.   I don't think there'd be a flood of people to them, because they are so small and don't have much resources already so no one can expect them to support many more people.

There would certainly be survivors able to establish colonies and they would have the resources to do very well for themselves, but it would be harder than it should have been.

Ireland

Potentially if they shut down early this could end really well for them. Relatively speaking.

Like I'd really love to see someone do a fanfic of Ireland in year 90 with Celtic mages and the whole island just really healing from centuries of discord and being ducked over by england.

But. I don't really think that would happen because Ireland hasn't shown the ability or desire to unify and I don't think this would change that until it's too late. 

Also if England, or anyone else, wanted to storm in - they don't have the ability to stop it.

Ireland likely has strong mages, at least.

New Zealand

New Zealand shut its borders during covid, and has a lot of farm land. 

The main question is how it's neighbors would respond.  While it has naval resources that would be strong enough for the trolls, I don't know if it's powerful enough to enforce quarantine the way Iceland did. 

Overall it has the chance to be one of the healthier settlements.

Australia

On paper Australia could do this successfully and possibly become one of the largest human settlements.   

I don't think they would shut their borders in time, though.  The question becomes how trolls would survive the outback and such - if all trolls have the inability it handle sunlight, I imagine it would be quite deadly to them so Australia may have an easier time cleansing land and establishing safe bases. 

I suspect it would end up with unsafe areas but also be similar to Sweden in having stable, safe, relatively modern settlements. 

Smaller island nations

There's loads of islands throughout the world.  A lot would be easy to shut down their borders.

I think the big question is how much the rash spread in the sea.  I can imagine a lot of smaller islands that were basically isolated from other countries already not being infected by humans - but if the sea beasts spread then they'd be wiped out easily.

It's possible that a few of them would have even lasted for decades before a nasty sea giant moved in.

Hawaii & Puerto Rico

Not a country but islands.  A few of the other islands would probably be too small, but Hawaii's big island and Puerto Rico would probably be large enough. Their main issue is whether the federal government would have allowed them to shut their borders down. 

Hopefully the mainland would be too busy trying to sort itself out so they could at least enforce a two week quarantine from day 0. 

Potentially they could survive pretty well, but the ties to america could destroy that.

[Róisín]

The UK does have the Isle of Man, which even nowadays has its own culture which is a mix of Scandinavian and Celtic, as well as its own style of magic. I would be curious to see how that played out.

And I have had a go at some fanfic set in Australia. I’m Tanist on Archive of Our Own. In the real world I live in country South Australia, but I have lived all over Australia as well as in other parts of the world. See what you think. I think deserts as well as islands might have a good chance.

[dreki]

The UK does have the Isle of Man, which even nowadays has its own culture which is a mix of Scandinavian and Celtic, as well as its own style of magic. I would be curious to see how that played out.

We'll need to visit it, it's not far. (we're near Liverpool)

It's nestled between Ireland and Great Britain so it would probably be protected from earlier sea beasts.   It goes back to what sea beasts do and how far you have to get away from the shore - it isn't very big.

Hopefully some areas figured out a netting system or something to block sea beasts from around the area?   Potentially it could be worked into a generator that uses waves to create power as well.  Although I don't know how distribution of that kind of technology would work.

Then I wonder how well reefs block sea beasts.  Just thinking about like the island in Moana - which is protected from the ocean by a ring of reef around it. 

I do think there's a lot of pockets that would be safe for years, but would be devastated by a single outbreak. 

And I have had a go at some fanfic set in Australia. I’m Tanist on Archive of Our Own. In the real world I live in country South Australia, but I have lived all over Australia as well as in other parts of the world. See what you think. I think deserts as well as islands might have a good chance.

These right?  https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tanist

The title "an historical document" made me think of the aliens in Galaxy Quest who thought tv shows were accurate documentaries. 

[thorny]

Japan currently imports some 60% of its food; so they'd have to make it through a very bad famine at the start. By year 90 I expect that would have sorted itself out; though with a much smaller population than they currently have.

What the societal repurcussions would be of having such a huge chunk of the population starve to death, plus malnutrition effects on the children of year zero and those born in the generation after , is an interesting question (interesting from a safe distance, of course, especially the safe distance of a fictional context.)

[Jitter]

I suppose sea beasts are an issue wherever there is marine mammalian life (mammalian marine life? I can usually tell the order but not this time), so dolphins and porpoises, seals, sea lions, sea otters etc are a concern too in addition to the great whales and walruses etc. In a way the smaller ones are easier to stop (try to imagine a sea defense capable of withstanding and attack from a whalebeast) but also harder because they can get through small cracks.

[dmeck7755]

I suppose sea beasts are an issue wherever there is marine mammalian life (mammalian marine life? I can usually tell the order but not this time), so dolphins and porpoises, seals, sea lions, sea otters etc are a concern too in addition to the great whales and walruses etc. In a way the smaller ones are easier to stop (try to imagine a sea defense capable of withstanding and attack from a whalebeast) but also harder because they can get through small cracks.

Can you imagine if a blue whale or orca managed to grow limbs and climb ashore?  They are giants naturally, and would be truly frightening as beasts.

[Jitter]

I suppose Minna can: http://www.sssscomic.com/comic2.php?page=80

(These are not my favorite beast but yeah. Wouldn’t want to meet, even dolphin-sized)

[dreki]

Japan currently imports some 60% of its food; so they'd have to make it through a very bad famine at the start. By year 90 I expect that would have sorted itself out; though with a much smaller population than they currently have.

What the societal repurcussions would be of having such a huge chunk of the population starve to death, plus malnutrition effects on the children of year zero and those born in the generation after , is an interesting question (interesting from a safe distance, of course, especially the safe distance of a fictional context.)

IIRC, Iceland lost 2/3 of its population to famine.  I think Japan is about as reliant on fish as Iceland is, too.

Age is really different, though - Iceland's median age is 36 with 1.7 births per woman, Japan's is 48 with 1.3 births per woman. Japan already has a big problem with it's ageing population and relatively low rate of childbearing.

It's likely that losses in Japan will be a larger percentage elderly compared to Iceland - which is still tragic but honestly it's far easier to swallow people over 70 dying than it is to swallow children dying.   

If enough people are willing to focus resources on the young, then with a smaller percentage of young people then it's easier to avoid major long-term problems.

It's not fun to think about, but you can survive on vitamins and incredibly low calories.  The vitamin supplement industry is pretty solid, I do feel confident in saying that at this moment the stores in most developed countries probably have enough supplements for everyone to have a one a day for at least a few months.

The newspapers in Sweden were half empty by day 9.  So I'd say that within 2 weeks, the world had to know that this wasn't likely to blow over and long-term plans had to be made.

If they start rationing fairly quickly, then a few months of nutrition supplementing plus rations can let you put a lot in place.

Japan has a lot of medical infrastructure and while it depends on the supply chain, they could prioritize creating high nutrient supplements that keep you alive while working on bolstering farming.  (And, again, this is something that will work better the younger and healthier you are)

Again this is assuming they shut down fast so aren't also grappling with the rash illness and trolls and are just grappling with supply limitations.

There would still definitely be losses to famine.  The cities especially - Tokyo is MASSIVELY crowded compared to Reykjavik. Tokyo has 6k people per square kilometer, Reykjavik has 450.  That won't be pretty.

Can you imagine if a blue whale or orca managed to grow limbs and climb ashore?  They are giants naturally, and would be truly frightening as beasts.

I remember the big blobby thing from adv1 that started following them.

It seems like sea beasts are as vulnerable to drying out as their non-beast cousins. If that's true for whales then it's a "simple" matter of staying far enough from the shore that they simply can't make it without drying out.

[Róisín]

dreki, yes, those are some of my stories.

[dreki]

dreki, yes, those are some of my stories.

They're really well done.  I like that you gave a backstory to that one bear beast that's frog shaped, too.

[Róisín]

Thank you! When I first saw Minna’s drawing of the poor beast I wondered why it might be that shape.

[Róisín]

dreki, something else I meant to mention about the Isle of Man: the name comes because the place traditionally belonged to Mananaan, the old Celtic god of the sea and of some aspects of magic and smithcraft. And there is an interesting museum of both Celtic and Nordic magical tech at the Old Mill. I know about the place, and some of the language, because the Mannion branch of my Irish kin come from there.

[dreki]

On discord there was talk about traditional food prep has made me curious about the amish populations in America re:rash illness.

They're insular, use traditional methods, often have food stores, and are deeply devout.  We know from Pastor Anne that faith in the christian god can be rewarded.

I personally feel most western christians aren't really believers. (which I partly blame on religious leaders who teach their flock not to have a direct relationship with god but to blindly follow the human head of the church) But I do think devout communities would get the christian god's blessings.

I've looked up how the Amish handled covid.  There's a medical institute that they trust and relied on - so I believe they'd follow guidance about quarantining themselves in the early days of the rash illness. They're good builders so could likely erect walls to protect themselves as well pretty quickly.

However I don't believe it'd be like Iceland, they'd be hit by the illness but wouldn't suffer as much from famine. They'd likely adjust much more quickly than modern communities.

Then I think they'd have people blessed as faith healers and able to guide the souls to god and other biblical powers. The christian equivalent of mages, not that I see them using that terminology.

[Róisín]

dreki, I think you are right about that. While I am myself a lifelong Pagan I have American friends who are Amish and Mennonites, plus other friends both in America, the UK and Australia who are Quakers. The combination of deep faith with a lifestyle of practical self-sufficiency would very likely help them to survive. Plus they and the Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) who are sort of Christians, though both they and the Quakers have had intense debate about this, also have traditions of self-sufficiency and having extensive food stores.

[thorny]

They have the food stores, the self-reliance, and the building ability -- but the attitude towards contagious diseases, at least among the local-to-me Old Order Mennonites, is "God will protect his Church". Both accidental and disease-caused deaths and injuries are taken as being God's will. Vaccination rates are very low and masking was only practiced when legally required and often not then unless strongly enforced by authorities outside the church.

How they would react to the appearance of what appears to be in effect actual demons I don't know. But I very much doubt that any effective reaction would be fast enough -- unless, of course, in that universe their version of God actually spoke to them, before it was too late, to warn them and tell them what to do.