This is admittedly a bit tropey, but I want to run a game set in an African country in the 80s in the middle of a civil war, where the players take control of either Soviet or US agents aiding either side. So far, some of my goals include:
- Historical accuracy: I'd rather find a real conflict than make one up.
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- Although the Burkina Faso :sankara-shining: coup is perfect, I'd prefer to run it in a sub-saharan, jungle environment.
- Include 1 or 2 IRL famous people of the time and period. :mandela:
- Avoid orientalism- Depict the people of the period accurately and with respect.
- Keep the conflict about the local struggle, not just about the overarching cold war.
- Include motives for factions that aren't just "Get oil to sell to americans to be rich" :porky-happy: or "Overthrow capitalism" :porky-scared:
This is already an alternate-history project (featuring psychic powers and soviet supersoldiers), so things don't have to be super historically accurate. I'd love some suggestions for locations and famous people to include, as well as ideas for factions, missions, etc. Suggestions for movies to watch (documentaries, dramatizations, or anything) are also appreciated.
Idk anything about this in a historical sense, but the supersoldier thing already opens up troves of possibilities. Is it a serum thing or are they closer to cyborgs? Who officially and unofficially has access to the tech, and who's hands could it end up in, and how could that change, or even create and destroy, factions (all the religious schisms alone it would cause could fill in-universe libraries). I realize you've probably already considered all this, but in the absence of useful historical info to add, I just want to draw attention to what a potentially powerful a world building tool you've given yourself. Depending on when the research on supersoldiers first began, you could split timelines in like, the 1800s if you wanted to.
I would recomend trying to adapt the Congo Crisis, the only big african conflict i could think of during the 80's is the Angolan Civil War, South African Border War (Namibian War of Independence) and those Ethiopian-Somali conflicts.
Check out https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Cuito_Cuanavale
Ties into the Angolan civil war and the South African freedom struggle. Initially had Chinese support for UNITA on the capitalists side as well as the US and UK and also an intervention from Cuba revolutionary armed forces on FAPLAs side
Breakthrough news just put a video out of a Cuban volunteer fighter coincidently https://youtu.be/MVFKabQDFpE
