South Las Vegas - SuspireWiki

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Notable Graffiti Seen in the Area

Nuts & Bolts

Average Level of Resources for Residents: 1

The Area

South Las Vegas is home to the myriad people who work day and night seeing that the glittery charms of the tourist district to the north never wear off. While those who work in management or other white collar positions generally live in the “white-er” areas to the north, those who sweep the floors, deal the cards, and dance topless on the tables live in the south. The number of trailer parks out number subdivisions five-to-one. The people are wary and unfriendly for the most part, outside of their chosen grouping. The Blacks don’t associate with the Latinos and the Latinos don’t associate with the Asians and each ethnic group carves out it’s own little place. Food is bought with stamps at grocery stores where the floors never seem clean and entertainment runs towards the hookers too old to hook and the dancers too old to dance. Sleezy bars pop up and disappear like clockwork, few managing to stay above water - partially due to the poverty of the patrons and partially due to the destructive tendencies of the patrons.

The Fiefs of South Las Vegas

Boulder Strip

Allies Available: Judicial

In the early days of Las Vegas it was thought that Boulder Highway (for which the neighborhood is named) would be a mirror of the Las Vegas Strip with huge casino-hotels but that never panned out and instead the Boulder Strip is actually one of the biggest revenue sinks in the entire state. This isn't due to a lack of casinos but instead due to a lack of tourists. The gamblers here are the low income workers who come to gamble tips after a hard day (or night) of dealing cards or slinging drinks. The area is also littered with bars where The Strip workers congregate in an area without tourists.

Needing a place to live that's just a short commute to The Strip, Boulder Strip developers stopped building new casinos and hotels and instead started to build small and cheap housing communities and apartment buildings. The rent here is cheap, but of course you get what you pay for. The homeless that are mercilessly swept off The Strip find themselves drifting here to bed down in tent cities in empty lots. The outskirts of the area house a number of retirement communities so that the retired and semi-retired residents are the most common customers at the casinos in the area, gambling away their social security checks, praying to hit the one jackpot that will save them from the tent cities. Everyone here knows everyone, it is, in essence a small town in the confines of Las Vegas.

Benefits

Level 1: Worrying about immigration busts is a constant concern for the Mexican-Americans who live in South Las Vegas, the majority of them who live there illegally. Not every bust though sends the illegals back to Mexico, like most Americans believe. More than a few immigration officers are willing to “accidentally” let a few escape, for a price. Knowing these officers allows a Kindred to purchase one level of the “Staff” merit at the cost of 3 expense dots of under-the-table bribes per month.
Level 2: Cops talk. They talk to other cops in their cop bars. They talk to the bartenders at these bars and to the other regulars. You’re one of these regulars. Knowing who to talk to, who gets a little loose lipped after a few beers and who likes their whiskey on the rocks gives you a leg up in the rumor department. You can make any Masquerade Heat rolls with a +3 dice bonus which ignores any negatives that may be normally given; any Masquerade Heat rumors specifically pertaining to police related events additionally gain 9roll.

Sites in Boulder Strip

Roy's MegaPawn

McCarran

Allies Available: Underworld

McCarran International Airport, which is as close to The Strip as you can get without actually being on The Strip, could serve at it's own small city, with all the excitement of the city of Las Vegas strewn through the sprawling airport terminals. The floors are gold flecked marble and everywhere you look there are towering palm trees and indoor fountains. There are full service restaurants, boutique clothing shops and of course, casinos a plenty.

The glitter of the concourse is all that most tourists will ever see. Some Kindred however, either governed by the need to ship or receive something discreetly or the desire for a little extra something-something have spent enough time here to know which doors to can go through to the more important parts of the airport. The casinos and shops are there for show, essentially - the real money, that’s all back of the house in the storage areas and in the hands of the package handlers and cargo loaders.

While you wouldn’t expect much in the way of housing so close to the airport you would be wrong. It is, however, one of the cheapest places to live in the area. After all who ways to pay to listen to planes flying over head and interrupting television and celluar signals all day. A surprising amount of people do though, so there’s a small but thriving community near McCarran with small and low lying houses, generally no bigger than one or two bedrooms and certainly never taller than one floor and never terribly nice as it is cheap housing after all.

Benefits

Level 1: Smuggling is well and alive through McCarran airport, since it handles regular airplanes, but also cargo and private jet traffic as well. In fact, it’s exceptionally easy if you know the hangars to go to at what time. As it happens, you know these things now, and you’re accepted as part of the group. When you try to get items off of the Black Market (Working the Black Market...), you gain +2 dice on your rolls.
Level 2: The trade of illegal items is something that the brass of the police and the city bureaucrats pretend doesn’t happen in Las Vegas. But it does. The ultra rich come to Vegas to get a taste of everything, and sometimes bring back things with them. There is also quite a market for unethical research and development that has stoked the black market for years now. You have contacts with McCarran International Airport workers who handle the shipment of these “non-existent” goods, which allows you to cut out the middle-man. Black market rolls are no longer limited by the one-per-night rule as long as you have this Fief..

Sites in McCarran

American Railway Union Hall

UNLV

Allies Available: Research

The University of Nevada, Las Vegas is what is called a "commuter college." Most of the students here are past the age of normal college students, ranging any where from late-twenties to mid-forties. While the school does have a dorm building, there's just one, and usually only maintains half occupancy. Instead most students drive or use public transportation to get to class and often have to balance class work with full time jobs and families. It's for this reason that UNLV offers almost half as many night classes as they offer daytime classes. Well into the evenings the academic buildings are still lit up and professors stand over lab benches or in front of dry erase boards while tired-eyed students write notes with cramped hands. For the enterprising Kindred who wishes to further their education, or just likes to use free University resources, UNLV is a godsend.

Much like the college itself, the area around it operates at night as well. Grocery stores are open twenty-four hours, restaurants boast all-day breakfasts and bars stay open until the sun rises. The houses around the campus are small, cramped dwellings that have seen better days. It's not unusual to see five or more people occupying the same two or three bedroom house as people desperately cut corners to scratch together money for tuition semester after semester. Despite the obvious poverty of some of the residents, the people of UNLV are generally sneered at by other members of South Las Vegas as being "snobs" due to their obvious aspirations for better lives.

Benefits

Level 1: Having access to the campus and courses of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas is not without it’s benefits. Through your time with the students and faculty, you've learned some of the particularly helpful crunch-time tricks that college kids employ and you've learned some of the more effective teaching techniques the professors employ. This allows you to 9-again on any Instruction rolls, whether you are the student or the instructor. If both student and instructor have this benefit, the roll becomes an 8-again.
Level 2: Now that you’ve had time to truly integrate yourself in the campus culture, and you know what faculty gossip is going around (even if you didn’t particularly care to do so) you have also picked up the tips and tricks of professors and higher-level students in their level of efficiency in handling affairs. This manifests in allowing you to perform a Rote Action on any mundane downtime-consuming roll once per week.