Survivor communities outside the known world

[Ragnarok]

Yes…

I replied "Plenty of places like Scandinavia, but isolated", but I would say that they are not so common and most of the world is just the silent world.

See the option: A few groups of humans.
Yeah I really need to be more descriptive.

[Alethryia]

Yes…

I replied "Plenty of places like Scandinavia, but isolated", but I would say that they are not so common and most of the world is just the silent world.

It has probably discussed in length before, but a population needed drastic immigration control (like we have seen in Iceland in the prologue) to prevent the spread of the disease.

Agreed! It's hard to isolate a country unless it has very few land boarders!

[benbah]

Ok point one for Australia,  most of the population is on the eastern seaboard then the great dividing range. Past this we have towns that only have visitors  monthly if that.  There are stations bigger than European countries that are self sufficient in power, water and most food. There are still aborigines that are one with their land, they will come back into their own.  I believe we will survive.

Trolls do not like uv.  UV destroys the virus.  We have loads of uv.
Yes we do not have cold weather like the nords, but we are DRY and HOT.  trolls don't like these.  Fortunately crocs will not catch the virus so I think they will help kill a lot of beasts in the tropics, Cassowarys are nasty anocranisms (spelling bad) that kill today,  they would love to go a troll.  Hell, they troll people themselves...

Yep I can see Aussies surviving in the outback.  Roll on Mad Max!!!!!

[Róisín]

Benbah: yeah, I do wonder how we would go here in Australia! Our deserts have something going for them beside high UV: however hot the days are, and they can be hotter than you'd believe, at night the deserts freeze. Thoroughly. In summer it gets down to just a few degrees Centigrade, some nights. In winter, however, it can get well below zero C. I've worked in the Tanami desert, and also out by Mintabie and Copper Hills, about this time of year (July is the middle of winter here), and woken in the morning to find all the water containers not in vehicles frozen solid. You need a very well-lined swag! Then of course three hours after dawn it's hot again, though nowhere near as hot as in summer.

We do get snow, mostly in the eastern and southeastern mountains and Tasmania. Not a lot compared to Scandinavia, but a good Snowy Mountains storm can still ruin your whole lifetime. Where I live now, in the colder part of the Barossa, it snows some winters, usually not much or for very long. The little town where I lived in the Snowies used to be snowed in for a few weeks most winters. I think they get less these years, was just reading a news report about how we're having the worst ski season ever, despite the first snowfall being very early this year. Climate disruption, huh!

I'd be curious to see how Taipan venom affected trolls, if at all. Or Sydney Funnelweb venom. A lot would depend on whether marsupials count as 'mammals' for the purposes of the Rash. If yes, we're doomed!

[Emblin]

Hello. Sorry too, but I haven't the time to read 49 pages of lengthy discussions to catch up on this thread. So I'm starting here

From what I believe, most people have talked about keeping the monsters and the Rash out of communities by: Living somewhere cold, living somewhere with little population of animals (and us), or surviving somewhere through the brute force of technology to keep things out.

But what about living in a place with extreme climate change  (Blistering hot in day, freezing at night). But not just that, what about living somewhere that monsters cannot hide or take shelter. My suggestion is Death Valley. In some regions of Death Valley, it's just flatness for miles upon miles, making it near impossible for anything to set up a nest, or hide from the heat and our prying eyes. The extreme heat (and direct UV rays), and the extreme cold should sterilize the environment of the Rash Illness. Aaaand, Death Valley has a sheer lack of any organic material, so a food source for trolls is unlikely.

Of course, humans don't wanna die in Death Valley either. But, if they had the technology and the resources, plus some determination, they could have a society in Death Valley completely safe from the Rash and it's monsters

[BarbaryLion22]

Of course, humans don't wanna die in Death Valley either. But, if they had the technology and the resources, plus some determination, they could have a society in Death Valley completely safe from the Rash and it's monsters

I think the determining factor here, for the whole secret human community, is how large the aquifer is in that region. Digging wells is a huge operation, and no matter how stealthy one gets, large operations draw attention. Especially in Death valley, which has little to no (I think) overland water sources, they'd either have to dig wells, or pipe in water from other regions, which is a risky maneuver. Also, depending on the size of the community, and what kind of agriculture they're doing, the drain on the aquifer varies. They could also support the water supply with catchment systems, but depending on the annual amount of rainfall, this could be hit or miss. If the community draws water faster than the aquifer can replenish itself, they're going to be in trouble very quickly.

Of course, this could develop into a sort of society in which water access is representative of wealth, which evolve into all sorts of turf wars.
On a similar note, fresh water in Hawaiian is wai, and wealth iswaiwai.

[princeofdoom]

I didn't live IN Death Valley, but I lived pretty darn close for most of my life. Just like the rest of California, the water table today is getting really low, due to both the high population and current drought. This is even affecting the local plant life which normally are drought resistant by tapping into that deep water.

The heavy loss of population would stop the water table's loss, but unless there were some extremely rainy years, and mostly "normal" years in between, the water table wouldn't recover for a long time. Maybe it would recover by year 90, but it could just as easily stay depleted and in drought.

[Baz]

The major issue with Australia's deserts as refuges against the rash, is that they support substantial populations of vertebrates of all kinds. Animals as large as camels and as small as marsupial moles thrive in the harsh conditions. An infected bull camel would be a formidable foe. Smaller creatures live cryptic lives, mostly underground. Of course the huge population of feral cats would be immune and would keep the smaller beasts under control, so that would be one benefit of what is at present a major ecological problem.

In fact, it's interesting to speculate what sort of an ecology would evolve in different parts of the Silent Lands. So far all we've seen have been 90 years old trolls and beasts. But can they reproduce? Has Minna stated anything I might have missed on the issue? If infected people and animals are effectively sterile, then over time they would surely die out, just from accidents if not from diseases other than the rash. In the long term the immune would inherit the Earth because they can replenish themselves. The Silence would be merely another bottleneck and humanity would re-emerge as top predators, chastened but undefeated.

[urbicande]

In fact, it's interesting to speculate what sort of an ecology would evolve in different parts of the Silent Lands. So far all we've seen have been 90 years old trolls and beasts. But can they reproduce? Has Minna stated anything I might have missed on the issue? If infected people and animals are effectively sterile, then over time they would surely die out, just from accidents if not from diseases other than the rash. In the long term the immune would inherit the Earth because they can replenish themselves. The Silence would be merely another bottleneck and humanity would re-emerge as top predators, chastened but undefeated.

It's not clear that humanity will survive at this point.  Iceland is awfully volcanic.

[BarbaryLion22]

In fact, it's interesting to speculate what sort of an ecology would evolve in different parts of the Silent Lands. So far all we've seen have been 90 years old trolls and beasts. But can they reproduce? Has Minna stated anything I might have missed on the issue? If infected people and animals are effectively sterile, then over time they would surely die out, just from accidents if not from diseases other than the rash. In the long term the immune would inherit the Earth because they can replenish themselves. The Silence would be merely another bottleneck and humanity would re-emerge as top predators, chastened but undefeated.

I don't think Minna has said anything about how infected animals live or reproduce. I know that the population increases when more animals get infected, but the amount of uninfected animals is much smaller than initially. However, I'd assume as long as populations of uninfected animals exist, then the Rash has a chance to spread, increasing the number of infected beings. If this was the case, then infected animals don't necessarily need to reproduce, because as long as there are uninfected animals reproducing, the Rash can continue, albeit at a slower pace than before.

I do wonder what they eat, though.

Oh! Another thought. If trolls absorb other trolls, becoming giants, then does that mean giants have a higher concentration of Rash than regular trolls? In a sort of accumulation of toxins way? Could it be more difficult to deal with a giant because the risk of outbreak is higher than regular trolls? Or is any amount of contact dangerous?
No, wait, that makes no sense, never mind.

[ParanormalAndroid]

Oh! Another thought. If trolls absorb other trolls, becoming giants, then does that mean giants have a higher concentration of Rash than regular trolls? In a sort of accumulation of toxins way? Could it be more difficult to deal with a giant because the risk of outbreak is higher than regular trolls? Or is any amount of contact dangerous?
No, wait, that makes no sense, never mind.

I think that, judging by what we saw on the train, a giant is an amalgamation of individual trolls- kind of like a hive mind, only more purposeful.
The talk about viable heads and the "hjalp"-remnant seem to back this up.
Still, that's just my guess- honestly, I don't have a clue and I don't think we have any Word of God to clear the issue.

[Baz]

Yes, Barbarylion22, the rash could continue to infect creatures and humans that don't have immunity, but given that there exists a reproducing cohort which is immune I would guess that this strategy would eventually become an evolutionary dead-end. Over time the non-immune strain would be bred out of the various populations. Unless the organism causing the rash can mutate pretty rapidly, like influenza, it could find itself confined to an infected population in decline from the everyday ravages of accidents, starvation and active hunting by immune humans.

[BarbaryLion22]

Yes, Barbarylion22, the rash could continue to infect creatures and humans that don't have immunity, but given that there exists a reproducing cohort which is immune I would guess that this strategy would eventually become an evolutionary dead-end. Over time the non-immune strain would be bred out of the various populations. Unless the organism causing the rash can mutate pretty rapidly, like influenza, it could find itself confined to an infected population in decline from the everyday ravages of accidents, starvation and active hunting by immune humans.

That makes sense.

[Danskjavlar]

OK, so I've been reading this thread an any ideas I have come up have probably already been posted/suggested by others, but I thought that maybe someone could create a map of the world showing any possible locations of surviving communities, just so we can get a picture of what the whole world looks like? I know people have made maps of smaller areas, but that could be quite interesting.

[Mayabird]

A map would be cool, though it would be a lot of work to slog through the thread and sort them out.