Damn, that was quick. Thank you both for the info.

[@Pepperm1nts]

I'd thought of snapping up one of the remaining Russian states, but my main concern is that I know, well, next to nothing about Eastern European culture pre-Cold War, so I'm not sure I could play the political leadership of a formerly-Russian state very convincingly.

Who should I be asking about the established governments of the unclaimed Russian states, if there even are any?

I'm thinking that if nothing is firmly established, I might be able to scale up one of the concepts mentioned earlier to the point where they'd actually matter on the global stage. Maybe a regiment of the old Imperial Army set up a militaristic dictatorship, or the doomsday monks succeeded in establishing a small theocracy and are gearing up to spread the good news of the impending apocalypse by the sword. Or maybe a transnational art-terrorist collective that operates in cells has spread from their European origins into Russia, capitalizing on the weapons-grade disaffection of the locals to quickly recruit and grow to the size where they can no longer be ignored. The first one is 'safer', in that I'm pretty confident in my ability to write military. The latter two I'm more interested in writing, but I'm worried they might not fit the established tone of the RP very well.

If this is specific enough that it should be taken to PMs, let me know. I'm not super familiar with this site's forum etiquette yet.