Post-Apocalyptic Biomes

So, I've been thinking about the setting for an RPG idea I have, and I've decided I want it to take place in a Sci-Fi-ish/Modern-ish/Maybe-A-Little-Fantasy-ish After the End setting. There's quite a lot of details about it that I haven't quite worked out yet, but I have decided that the apocalypse was sufficient to wipe out all of humanity and leave their cities crumbling, yet also allowing for the survival of numerous animal species that evolved into Uplifted Animals. The technology level is of the Schizo variety, because at some point in time the animals stumbled upon a human facility that had been maintained by robots for several centuries, from which they were able to obtain all sorts of technological knowledge and goodies that they could reverse-engineer and reproduce.

My current thought is that the apocalypse was the result of a massive war in which humanity set off a bioweapon which devastated their population beyond recovery, but had mixed results on the wider ecosystem, mutating animals and plants all over the place - all the buildings that weren't being maintained by robots started crumbling not because of the apocalypse itself, but because Ragnarök Proofing isn't in effect. This could change in the future, but the general question is: what sort of post-apocalyptic biomes could show up - and which one would be the 'dominant' one, if any?

When I say 'biomes' I basically mean the general 'look' of the surrounding geography, along with the climate - and note the plural, as well. I decided ahead of time that I wanted to avert the typical 'desert wasteland' popularised by Mad Max and Fallout [or its polar opposite, the Nuclear Winter Wonderland] in favour of something more diverse, particularly because there's still lots of life milling about, just no humans.

edited 16th Oct '17 5:26:27 PM by PresidentStalkeyes

I would think that ultimately the biomes would be essentially the same as what exists now, with the addition of "reclaimed" cities and towns and what have you. If the bioweapon just wiped out humans and left the biosphere more or less functional our cities would slowly become part of nature again. I'm not sure what type of ill effects you anticipate the mutations having, but if everything is working more or less like it does now in terms of function as an ecosystem there wouldn't be any massive changes to the biomes we have currently.

There was a documentary a while back on Discovery that went into what would happen if all humans disappeared and our stuff falls apart pretty quick once we're not taking care of it any more. With nobody to pick up after natural disasters damage would slowly pile up in a lot of areas, and even places where those aren't as frequent would be affected by weather and general disrepair.

Reinforced concrete doesn't hold together longer than like a century, so after a while only the toughest structures would remain. I imagine big cities would end up being fairly hilly areas after a long time from all the rubble of collapsed skyscrapers, and maybe the metal girders could form a boneyard of sorts. Places that rely on lots of water control like the USA's southernmost states would go back to being swamps. Anywhere artificial irrigation is used to make deserts more habitable would similarly be affected. Cities with extensive underground infrastructure might become fairly treacherous, with the ground liable to collapse at any moment and half-buried passageways and chambers all over the place.

If you've never played the game, check out some videos of Horizon Zero Dawn. Their post apocalyptic setting is set in the far future and basically nothing survived, other than some hardened military installations and the completely overgrown remains of the occasional building.

It's really dependent on what the apocalypse was like...

(hint.)

The Death Lands series of pulp post apoc novels has a huge variety of environments. They also have piles and piles of mutated animals and people. Left over war equipment and other hazards that are still a danger. There storms in the desert that can basically sand blast the flesh off the body. Rainfall from highly contaminated areas can kill and/or corrode most things. Wintery areas are intensely cold. There are a lot of similar biomes that we have now but often with extremes of weather and life forms.

One kind of biome I've always wanted to see is something like a Great Glass Desert. Some desert area gets hit by nukes and melts the sand to glass. Obviously you can't have a great sheet of unbroken glass, but just the imagery of a wide expanse where the ground is completely covered in shards and lumps of glass shining in the sun appeals to me. But, seeing as how you're going for a biological apocalypse rather than a nuclear one, that's rather off the table.

As to what biomes would be most prevalent, well, I'd imagine it would mostly reflect the type of biomes that are most prevalent today. Depending on how long it takes for the uplifted animals to get to human level intelligence and start up industry again, the sudden removal of our civilization's carbon footprint will definitely have effects on global climate. Depending on how much the bioweapon mutated plantlife, this could lead to your typical grassy plains becoming the most prevalent biome, especially once wildlife starts reclaiming all those unattended ranches and farms.

edited 26th Oct '17 9:27:05 AM by danime91

@danime

Why must you conjure up more nightmares for me?

Hmm? You have something against glass?

I've stepped on enough broken glass to fear it.

The glassed area might not be all that scary with enough weathering. The long term effects of wind and weather erosion would break up the glass and effectively tumble it creating relatively smooth pieces. Though I wouldn't want to breathe in the local dust and I would highly recommend some sort of enclosed eye protection. There may be a few areas with smooth plates or broken pieces in various states of being rounded. It would be an interesting place to say the least. If you want a rough idea of what it might look like, google Glass Beach around Fort Bragg, California.

Well, technically speaking it heavily depends on what exactly happened.

For example, if it was a nuclear fallout then nothing will change much except for it will take several thousands of years for the wildlife to recover and breed out various deadly mutations but like...it might take about 30 000 years. So if you take about 1 million years in the future - then it will be perfect since all the deadly types of radiation and its aftereffects will dissolve to a natural level, ecosystems will be working properly again and sapient creatures will be able to develop.

Though, yeah, it will be good to know details. Also who are our lucky "people"?