I feel like knights in a post-apocalyptic setting is an under utilized setting in rpgs. The sort of thing where in the mid- to far future, human civilization has gone back to something more like the Middle Ages. Often magic will have returned or old science will seem like magic. There is some pretty good source material out there, but the only game I think can think of is Mutants in Avalon.
Fiction-wise, we've got: Moorcock's History of the Runestaff, Christopher's Sword of Spirits trilogy, and Harrison's The Pastel City (less so the sequels), at least. Comics-wise there isn't an exact fit (beyond the adaptations of Moorcock's work), but Camelot 3000 is close. There is even an 80s cartoon and toyline in the form of Visionaries.
Stephen King's Dark Tower series does a bit of this, but also leans on Western aesthetic and tropes and does that a bit more. Into the Badlands likewise has an Western element, but also wuxia.
Hiero's Journey is also a major example of the genre.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiero%27s_Journey
There was also the short lived Hex series,a post apocalypse version of Jonah Hex.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonah_Hex
Fits the theme a bit...
I dug Hex back in the day.
ReplyDeleteThe original 1960s version of DC's Atomic Knights are exactly what you're talking about. Explicitly post-nuclear apocalypse, actual armored knights, even ride around on cool mutant Dalmatian mounts.
ReplyDeleteThe Sal the Cacophony books by Sam Sykes fits this genre.
ReplyDeleteThe Apocalypse Nyx books by Kameron Hurley too.
Huh, the Interwebs swallowed my first post...
ReplyDeleteHiero's Journey, by Sterling Lanier, stikes me as being much in this vein. He does not wear shining armor, but he seems to be rather a paladin/ranger nonetheless.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiero's_Journey
Can't remember the name of it, but read a story or something a while back that had a neat sort of nearer-future post-apocalyptic knight - basically the knights flew aircraft against each other in WWI/WWII-style dogfights, and kept them running with biofuel refined from crops harvested by their peasants.
ReplyDeleteYou almost apply this to Patrick Swayze's 1987 Steel Dawn movie.
ReplyDelete@James Mishler Can't recommend the Hiero books without warning people it's an eternally unfinished trilogy that only released two books before the author died. They're fun reads, but we'll never see all the plot threads wrapped up.
ReplyDeleteDeadlands: Hell On Earth has the Paladins that are basically post-apocalyptic knights
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