[hider=The Grand Confederacy]
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[b]Name:[/b] The Grand Confederacy of the Second Nations and the Great Lakes. Otherwise known as the 'Great Lakes Confederacy' or 'Grand Confederacy' for short.

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The Grand Confederacy has adopted the flag of the Iroquois Confederacy, although there is constant discussion on creating a new one.[/center]

[b]Territory:[/b] The Grand Confederacy dreams of a day when it can take back the land its ancestor-states supposedly controlled. For now, they must content themselves with Minnesota, Wisconsin and parts of Ontario. This puts them into direct conflict with the Consortium of Ohio and the Confederation of Southern Ontario, both of which they consider warily. The resources of the Great Lakes are a particular sticking point with the Grand Confederacy, who believe themselves to be the rightful caretakers of the lakes. 

The Confederacy has a few major settlements. In particular, their capital, the Grand Turtle, is a sprawling semi-urban area located in the Straits of Mackinac. Dispersed as it is, it has major build-up around the former Colonial Fort Michilimackinac, or, as it's now known- The Shell. With its palisade walls replaced by stone ones, plenty of freshwater, food, and power, the Shell is a downright pleasant place to live when compared with much of the wasteland. Mackinaw City, whose name is usually 'Greater Mac,' being only a village to begin with, has essentially become the Shell's suburban area. 

Another important city is Providence, located in Providence Bay. As a 'border city,' between the Confederacy and Ronto, and with Ronto's anti-First Nation approach to Manitoulin Island, it's one of the major hotspots between the two factions and the Confederacy is [b]very[/b] eager to make sure that Ronto breaks first. Because of this, Providence is home to a large quantity of the Confederacy's warriors, including power-armoured soldiers and is the home of the Confederacy's Lake Navy, with its flagship of a former nuclear-powered icebreaker now known simply as 'Winterbreaker.'

Another crucial city for the Confederacy is Bonfire Base. Camp Greyling was struck by a nuclear weapon during the Great War but as America's largest National Guard training centre, managed to survive. Although the proto-Confederacy were initially stumped by the ghouls, residual radiation, horrifying military defences and fiercely jingoistic and militaristic tribals that inhabited the base, by allying with the remnants of Anishinaabe groups in the area and launching several major assaults, successfully secured Greyling, turning it into Bonfire Base. Doing so turned out to be incredibly fortuitous, as the base was home to vast quantities of high-quality military hardware, including medical supplies, engineering schematics, power armour suits and more. Bonfire Base is not only the technological hub of the Confederacy, but the military one as well, with the former training centre put to good use in the post-apocalypse.

[b]History:[/b] The Grand Confederacy has an interesting and speckled history. Some of the earliest groups of theirs were First Nationers who had been repressed under the Canadian and American (then just American) governments. Ironically, this repression was what allowed them to survive so well, as reservations, underdeveloped as they were, were not considered on the list of targets to bomb. With the fallout raining down, many of these reservations succumbed, but some survived, sometimes by the skin of their teeth, sometimes even thriving despite their troubles. 

These tribals would have been unlikely to form the Confederacy however, were it not for the citizens of Vault 45. Vault 45, located just north of Grand Rapids, had been selected by Vault-Tec as part of an experiment involving First Nations peoples. Much of the history of the vault itself has been intentionally stricken by its former residents, who viewed the entire thing as disgusting and, only a few scant decades after the war, overthrew the overseer and made their escape. Venturing north, they came into contact with Iroquois and Anishinaabe groups and, working as an interim, bound them together piece-by-piece. 

As the decades moved on, the Confederacy swelled and swelled. Other Vaults: Vault 39 and the barely finished Vault 126, the first control vault built in annexed Canada, were added to the growing community, creating a strange mishmash of pre-war First Nations peoples, post-war tribals, pre-war Americans and pre-war Canadians. As the name suggests however, the rapidly-expanding Confederacy is not a fully united entity. Instead, its various constituent groups sent their representatives to the Shell, where a tribal council democratically leads the Confederacy.

[b]Pressing Issues:[/b]
[b]More Than It Can Chew:[/b] The Confederacy is much, much bigger than its population would suggest, resulting in a very over-stretched state as it tries to exert itself. Without many real pre-war population centres despite the land it owns, the Confederacy has to put in real work to actually maintain its influence across what it considers its territory. Without Providence to push back 'Ronto to the East, it's likely they would lose control over Manitoulin Island rapidly, and to the south, the Consortium gnaws away.

[b]Muddied Identity:[/b] The Grand Confederacy has a lot of ideals and ideas, but in practice, is not a very organised whole. Although the Shell Council's rulings are adhered to, the fusing of different, disparate Native groups (including those speaking very different languages, and drifters from as far west as Alaska,) with non-Natives into the so-called 'Second Nation' identity has not been wholly accepted. Vaulter and Tribal fractures run deep, some groups only kept united by their desire to see their nearer 'enemies' crumble less than other, more distant ones.
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[hider=Confederacy Claim]
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