Highlander: the RPG - PbP Division takes place in the not so distant future after a Global nuclear “holocaust” that has wiped out 70 to 85% of the World's population....either during the nuclear attacks or afterward from diseases like radiation poisoning, etc. and 20 to 37% of the surviving population have been irrefutably damaged from eating vegetables grown in radioactive soil, meat from livestock that are sick from also eating food grown in the contaminated earth, breathing contaminated air, drinking contaminated water or from birth defects that were caused from being born of one or both parents that were infected and affected by the post-apocalyptical conditions.
In the United States there are certain areas that have been damaged and destroyed more than others because they were targeted more than other areas. In some cases, what had been a lush green wooded forest with clear running springs that fed fresh water lakes are now desolate and barren dust bowls and deserts with one thing in common....the only life they can sustained is those that had mutated and had become resistant to the illnesses, etc. that came with trying to live off of the damaged land. There a few areas that have a continuous supply of clean, fresh water and those that do either hoard it or use it to make money.....(and nobody knows for sure where the money that is now being spent comes from as Ft. Knox, Kentucky was completely obliterated in the attacks.)
In some areas of the US...a lucky few still have some of the, now old, modern conveniences like flushing toilets, hot water heaters, fans, TVs, radios, toasters and lights and they have managed to find a way to power them. They are considered to be luxury items and those who possess them are either revered or targeted by the thieves who want to acquire as many luxury items as they can to sell and make “the big bucks”....(A toaster that had sold brand new at Walmart for $7.99 before the attacks will easily bring in $700 now. Luxury items, now, have a 600% markup value.).
In some areas....especially those harder hit....some of the survivors have acquired large parcels of land and formed groups or communities...where everyone pitches in and works for a common goal (which is usually to survive) and all is shared within the community. Of course there are always those who do the same thing but for more rapacious reasons. They're the ones that rule their community as ego-maniacal tyrants.
There have been rumors that have spread across the country that tell of an area of America that was virtually untouched by the nuclear bombs. Where the grass is green, the trees and forests are lush and filled with wild life and where clean, pure, fresh water flows in abundance. The rumors also tell of a small group of survivors who have banded together, formed a strong “alliance” and are determined to resurrect a Democratic government based on the US's original Declaration of independence and Constitution with all of freedoms and rights the American people had always known. But....it is, after all....just rumors.