Help! Need someone who knows more about North American geography than I do!

[sparkindarkness]

As mentioned here: http://sparkindarkness.livejournal.com/204537.html I am running a werewolf game. Because I prefer to stick mostly to game canon and because the game requires the interaction of many many tribes it is to be set in the Americas (European werewolf tribes tend to have their own established territory and multi-tribal septs are rare or limited to maybe 3 tribes. It‘s also easier to shoot them there).

The things is I don't know exactly where to situate it. I want to keep it as close to the real world as possible (makes for less invention and more interesting research - in my last campaign they went Yuma, Arizona to Miami to Townsville, Queensland and I had lots of fun researching them all) but I am willing to tweak things (turn a moderate city into a NYC sized metropolis, for example). But I need somewhere to start.

So, what do I need?

A city moderately close to forested wilderness “close” can be “within 2-3 days solid travel” but more than a week would be pushing it. The wilderness has to be predominantly woodland.

Temperate/cold climate Snows in winter. Has pine trees. That kind of thing. No deserts, palm trees, calypso dancers.

Not somewhere already heavily established in White Wolf’s canon I like the canon, I use it a lot and don’t want to clash with it too badly since I may want to use it. So NOT: NYC, New York State, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago

A Camarilla City So nowhere that is established as Sabbat - so NOT Toronto (rest of Canada’s fine, I never bought the idea of all of Canada being a Sabbat holding - it made NO sense) Detroit, Miami, Mexico

Bonus points
Not essentials but they’d be nice bonuses if possible:

Native wolf population
Wilderness is actually a National Park or similarly legally protected
The city has a history (not necessarily current presence) of organised crime ties


All suggestions gratefully appreciated!


(ETA: I'm going to do brief research on each suggestion and probably post another post on detailed pros and cons of each :))

Comments

[stormcat.livejournal.com]

You want the Pacific Northwest -- Washington (state), Oregon, etc. Fits perfectly. Far northern California might work as well, though don't quote me on that.

Past that, grab Google Maps and find a decent-looking town near Seattle or something (just to give you a city name to grab on to.)

West Virginia/western Virginia (Roanoke, VA etc) might work as well, though not so sure of the wolf population. I know damn well they have cougar, though.

Hmm... Maine, Vermont, upstate New York, etc -- basically the upper states on the East Coast -- might work, though not sure about the wolf thing. Might also be a tad close to New York City.

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to avoid California because it's a huge place of kerfuffule in the Canon - but Oregon and Washington are promising but a little far west. I may have to ping Seattle again :)

Cougar - now that might be useful to throw in some nice bastet possibilities. Werekitties :). I'll have to put Roanoke on my check list

I don't mind a state CLOSE to NYC and New England would be a bonus - but the whole area looks rather built up. I look for National Parks in the area and keep running into the Adriondack - but I'm trying to avoid New York STATE not just NYC because White Wolf has produced a lot of canon for it. Maine doesn't seem to have much of anything in it - map just shows a lot of empty space. Wilderness perhaps? But lacks any cities of any real size. Vermont also seems to lack national parks and cities