From: owner-deltagreen-digest@nocturne.org (deltagreen-digest) To: deltagreen-digest@nocturne.org Subject: deltagreen-digest V2 #54 Reply-To: Delta Green List Sender: owner-deltagreen-digest@nocturne.org Errors-To: owner-deltagreen-digest@nocturne.org Precedence: bulk deltagreen-digest Monday, September 6 1999 Volume 02 : Number 054 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 5 Sep 1999 23:53:59 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: DG: FICTION: Forrest Lawn (Part 3) On Sun, 5 Sep 1999, Davide Mana wrote: > >The Man in Black is : Spartacus > > Is the Man in Black aware of the fact that Spartacus was elected as > worldwide homosexual icon? Who elected the Revolting One to be faggot of the year? Not that I care about sodomy, except for it's tasteless grossout factor, like when you get back from the State Fair and "accidentally" miss your chick's stanky vagina dentata (trust me, you DON'T want to know). Only to discover afterwards the corn on the cob - as in, her unchewed corn... on your cob. Some days Delta Green really *is* better than sex. > [a fact that caused some embarassment to some Turin-based Kubrik fans a few > months back ;<] Why? Is the Film the Homo Icon, or the Historical Figure? Or both? > How are we to interpret his statement? Any way you want. Masturbate to your heart's delight. Just don't expect me to reciprocate... Now some of the things I've said may not apply to you; and some of the things I've said may offend you. But no matter what you think about what I've said; you must remember this one thing: No matter what the stripper says, There is NO sex in the Champagne Room. NONE! ...even at Club Apocalypse. The Man in Black is : never coming out of the closet. Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 5 Sep 1999 23:58:14 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: DG: Sniping On Sun, 5 Sep 1999 MSubias@ix.netcom.com wrote: > Please post these rules, I'm sure that more than two of us would like to > see them. You mean RE-post. An act repugnant to archived mailing lists. Inclusion in ICE CAVE or posting of the Archive URL might be acceptable to me. 'Course you could post binaries of child snuff porn to the list and there wouldn't be a whole lot I could do about it except complain to the list admin and then hunt you down and kill you. The Man in Black is : Kenneth Scroggins Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 00:03:54 EDT From: CroakerJr@aol.com Subject: DG: Scorched Earth, part 1 [This Case History, coded ADG.SI-0025, is a continuation of files numbered ADG.SI-0023 ("Blacker than Black") and ADG.SI-0024 ("lesserdark"). I began it several months ago, but I suspended it as other duties took precedence. I've returned to it now. I'll start it over from the beginning; minor revisions have been made.] Scorched Earth by Shane Ivey, (c)1999 Part One Sometimes it's like there's a hole in my mind, a cold blank void where sharp memory should be, like a piece of time was frozen and taken out the way a surgeon extracts a tumorous growth: maybe the thing itself was toxic, but the emptiness will never feel quite right. The void is a year of my life, or close to it, a solid year when I may have been out drinking and getting laid and watching the Trailblazers or hitting the beach in special ops on some godforsaken coast; but I think it was more likely that I was knocking my head against the wall in a padded cell, somewhere white and clean and secret. That's the only feeling that the void ever has; it feels like the nervous edge of fear. It fills my thought now, when I'm waiting, when I'm standing in blood in a grotesque room waiting for the butcher to come get his due. I'm in Bogota again. Sometimes it's hard to remember how I got here; sometimes the void seems to grow, to reach out and claim other times, bits of other events, before it recedes to the hard lines that it always defines. I came out of Bethesda one day, two months ago: that's when I came out of the void. I walked out of the lobby, past the blue suit of an Air Force captain, and I saluted her and then I looked around and smelled the traffic and the Maryland winter air. I wanted the sea, I wanted the salt water and sand and the open sky whether blue or grey, I wanted the freedom of wind and rain and sheer physical joy or misery; I wanted to go home. In a way, I got halfway there. Derzig (Captain, USMC, First Force Recon) came for me before I even had the thought to look for a cab. "Dee," he said, his voice hard, the voice of training. He reminded me of Johnstone, that motherfucking traitor. I snapped to and listened close. He was smiling, just a little, as he came into my field of view. He was shaved bald, shorter than me but ten years older and built like a hard-ass sergeant. He carried a thick folder. I could see my name and number on the tab. "Jesus Herbert Christ, Dee, didn't you make them let you do some push-ups in there? You come in from the cold for a while and you go to seed, is that it? You look feeble, Petty." He gestured with the folder. "They told me I have to train you. Indefinite transfer, Dee. You now work for the NSA, now, on the books, and that's classified, and that means nobody's going to look into what you're really doing. You know the drill. You think you're up for it? Or do you need to rest and relax a little while more?" I blinked and I gave him the only answer I could have given. It was all squared away, all very neat and tidy and official. Derzig didn't tell me anything about the void, and he didn't want to know what came before it. He didn't ask about six men dead in the grass outside that Spinoza house, and he didn't ask about the other men I had followed into bloodshed and ruin. I was missing close to a year, but I had to get back in the field, and I had to do it right. We trained. We hit the beaches and the woods and the sand and open sky. I punished my weakened body until it performed, until muscles and mind were sharp and quick again, and then eight weeks were gone and I was back in the heat, in a team again, running down to Bogota again with Derzig and the CIA and the Army and the Navy and the DEA, chasing devil-worshippers and coke-fiends under the cloak of false identity and plausible deniability. Our group was lean, just a dozen spooks, cops, and snake-eaters chasing angles that Ollie North and his Security Council favorites wouldn't ordinarily bother with. I was in Bogota again, and I was back in the heat and chasing the Yellow Sign, and that thought made the void in my head hum with the mad panic of an unholy fucking chorus, every time. The Ricon gang worked out of warehouses and mansions on the edges of Bogota, like the Spinoza family did before they vanished in the earliest space of the void. The Spinoza family came late to the Yellow Sign, and mostly by accident; I can remember putting a bullet into the man who brought it to them. The Ricons have chased it for years. Others in Bogota call them a devil-gang, Satan-worshippers. Priests have denounced them for trucking in darkness and mothers have cursed them for the disappearances of countless children in the city every year, but no one has pursued them: the people who live around them are weak and afraid; the Cali cartel protects them as a useful distributor and ally; and the Americans and the Colombian government (when it is not busy making deals with Medellin and Cali on the side) can't be bothered with such a small group. But sometimes I get the feeling that my team couldn't care less about the drugs. That's what gets us here, of course; the claim of chasing the coke-fiends is a sure way of inserting operatives into the region without risking the harder questions back home. But Baswell, the CIA chief, and his people, they want the other side of the darkness that fills the Ricon group. They want the rumors of sacrifice and old prayers, all the trappings that turn on the most pathetic of the coke-fiend burnouts in the States. They want the Sign. And they're not the only ones. I know that better than anyone on the team: we are not the only ones. And now I'm in Bogota again, it's 1987 and I'm standing in blood in a meat-locker thirty feet deep, and the skinned and dismembered bodies of men and women and children are hanging and dripping around me. I can hear the filthy spring rain coming in sheets on the tin roof through the insulation overhead. I can see some of the bodies on the floor, piled against the wall, and some pieces are splayed on great wide tables to be trussed and drained like steaks. The stench is unreal, thick with old blood and fresh bone and open guts left lying in the cold for disposal. I already told Derzig about it. I can hear his reply in my earphone: "They're not cannibals," he says. "The meat's for their dogs." "Fuck," I breathe. I've seen blood, a lot of it, and I've let a lot of it flow, but sometimes it's just too much. Sometimes it just looks more wrong than others, sometimes it comes home that there's more to us than meat, there's more to all of us than meat and bone and cold expediency, and then I'm taking another step through the broad crimson puddle that is the floor, and the door opens behind a row of hanging men and women. For an instant I force myself to wait and listen and feel him: it's a man, walking heavily, breathing fast, angry and afraid, gearing himself up to fight even though he doesn't know what he's against and he wants bad to run, I feel him coming deeper into the room and toward the corner; I take two steps on the toes of my boots and I'm as silent as a fucking ghost and as he comes around the rows of swaying meat he sees me and he sees my eyes and he sure as hell sees the barrel of my .357 Colt Python and there's a long breath where he registers the fact that, brave or not, Devil or not, Sign or no Sign, he's about to take it in the face and die. "Be silent or I will kill you," I say. My Spanish is less than perfect. He swallows audibly and nods. I remember his picture from the briefing: he's Luis Ricon, first cousin to the head of the family. Luis is the butcher. Luis feeds the dogs. Luis stares at the barrel of my revolver and he doesn't say a word. "We need to talk," I tell the butcher. "You want to live, yes?" He nods again. A drop of sweat falls from his chin; it seems to fall for seconds before it splashes into the blood of the floor, mingling with it for an instant in clear white threads of water before vanishing into the gore. "You take people sometimes to kill them," I say, forcing my brain to produce the correct words. "You kill them for your god. You kill them for the Sign." His eyes widen and bulge slightly. He shakes his head emphatically and begins to speak. I interrupt him. "Shhh," I say. My thumb lifts and draws the hammer of the pistol back until it locks into place, fully cocked, not moving the barrel a millimeter from its aim at his face. "No lies. We know what you do. We know. But you will tell me where." He shuffles slightly on his feet. He winces and breathes; in fact, he looks like he might cry. But he doesn't give me time to decide to kill him and carry on. I suppose he's seen this scene, from the other end, enough to know the rules. "The forest," he says, finally, in a high, weak voice. "Ten kilometers, south, outside the village by the road. It's... it's the holy ground. It is holy! They come, there, they come and, and, they take the meat." He suddenly looks furtive. His eyes dart about the locker and his feet shuffle again. "Hold still," I say. He surrenders. He lifts his hands again and he forces himself to be still. He makes a beautiful target. The gunshot is a bloom of gorgeous fire as the Python erupts in my hand and the magnum round enters his lower forehead and tears most of his brain through the back of his skull in a misty explosion of blood and bone and hair. The noise is horrendous. When hearing returns to my throbbing ears I've already checked the hall and I can hear Derzig in my earphone. "Room service," he says, "report." "The butcher's down," I say. "Nobody else in sight." "Bug out, by the numbers. We have Jimmy. Check for termites before we bring him out." "On it," I reply. I spare another glance at Luis. One of his eyes is still in place, staring up at the rain-pounded tin roof as if unconcerned that the rest of his face has collapsed into the cavity in the back of his head. Nothing's there. Nothing. He's become meat, nothing more. I think, This must be how he felt about everyone. I take the back door out to the rain and the gutters of shit and I leave the butcher in the blood and filth where he belongs. "Jimmy" is our half-baked code for Jaime Ricon, head of the family and chief wicked priest of them all; "termites" are what Derzig calls the other suits in the mission, agents working below the law like us. That's what Derzig and Baswell say, anyway. They showed me a research dossier on one of the men we'd managed to photograph, and he was non-existent, officially dead since a 1983 "training accident" in Honduras. Officially, our group is working on a sanctioned operation, black but still approved by the President and the NSC. Baswell won't report everything he finds, of course, and I get the feeling that they don't expect him to. The powers-that-be gave us just enough sanction to put us in place; we're tasked with doing the job without needing anything more. So, why the spooks? When I asked, Baswell just smiled, cold, and said, "They're you, Dee." I waited for an explanation. "They probably work for Johnstone and whoever owns him," he said. "They want a piece of this mission. They don't have the sanction that we have. I don't know if their men will ask more questions than you did, though, so they probably think we're the outlaws here." I stayed stony-faced, kept it down, way down low, and waited for the day to move on. "Hell of a world, right, Dee? But don't worry. This time, you're on the right side." Then he clapped me on the back like a brother, the bastard, and brought me into the Ricon briefing. Coming out of a wing of the Ricon house I slide on my night-vision goggles and take a long look around at the street and the stucco walls of Spanish buildings nearby. The rain is still coming down hard, slapping the mud and the puddles with each drop. There are no street lights around, and the moon is gone beyond the thick stormclouds. There was one light in a window across the street when I came in, but now it's out. From the cover of the doorway I give it a long stare through my field glasses, but there's nothing there. If they're smart, they're probably down on the floor praying for the fight not to find them. If they're stupid... well, if they were stupid they'd be in the window with a gun, or they'd have left the light on as a distraction while they came down for an ambush. Two minutes creep by, slow as death, and still nothing happens but the rain. I move out fast, darting across the street to the covered walkway opposite. The walkway is built low, and every step pushes the wood down into the mud. Trotting down the walkway, I stop in the shadows of a corner doorway and wait and watch. Water drips down my face in slow, irritating rivlets, through my "cover," a plastic hood tied tight as a skullcap over my head with a second one, cloth, tied over it to reduce the noise of raindrops. I ignore the itch of the water and wait, still as I can be, in the shadows, waiting for some reaction to my arrival. There's nothing. I start to come out and cross the intersection, then I duck back into the shadow and watch. A car pulls past, going fast without headlights, and I can see men inside wearing their own goggles. I smile, despite myself, as they ride past and turn another bend, heading for the front of the Ricon mansion. "Termites are digging at the front door," I mutter into my microphone. "Back door's wide open. Tell the cubs to head north at a good clip to give the termites something else to chew on." "Got it," Derzig replies. "On the way. Eyes peeled." The "cubs" were Baswell and the other Agency operatives, of course. It started as a joke between Derzig and me when we talked about KUBARK, the old code-name the CIA used for itself in classified documents. Through the droning, hypnotic pattern of rainfall I hear a car engine rev in the distance, then the wet squealing of tires trying to find traction fast in the mud. That would be the termites taking off after Baswell and Clara, I hope. The sounds fade quickly, and in seconds there's no sound again but the rain. My ears are still ringing a little from the gunshot, but that's fading, too. It's peaceful. It's seductive. With conscious effort, I stay alert and sharp while I wait for Derzig to show. I watch the windows and doorways nearby, and those in every direction from the intersection. It's like a ghost town. Then I hear another engine, behind me, and I see Derzig's Range Rover come careening down the street behind the Ricon mansion. It hauls to a stop, fishtailing slightly, just long enough for me to jump out of the shadows and into the open door. The dome lights have been cut, of course, and he's not using headlights, either, so the car stays dark as I close the door behind me and we drive. Melendez, a captain in the Colombian army, taking more money from us than from the cartels, is at the wheel. I can see Derzig in the back with a man-sized lump in a body bag. He winks as Melendez takes three hard turns and loses us in the endless slums. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 00:34:27 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: DG: Re: DG and Quatermass On Mon, 6 Sep 1999, No. 6 wrote: > That's the one in the chemical factory at the end, isn't it? Heheee... and > is the OUTLOOK facility supposed to be the Village of Prisoner fame? I think > we should be told No. 6, you must be told that The Village was BLOWN UP in 1995 along with all it's missiles and sundry canned goods. You won't see any sky or the outside in The New Facility. It's all very glass and steel and white ceramic composite materials. Please exercise caution, some areas of The New Facility are in micro or "zero" gravity. Most are normal, but some have .95G on every surface, as if they existed within a Tesseract. If you need anything at all (except for non-material things such as freedom or ecstasy) please see one of our Valets who will assist you. Here comes Million (10^6) now. Would you like her to get you anything; narcotics, firearms, exotic manuscripts? Just say the word. Please ignore the Men in Black, they are here for your protection. Who am I? I am Zero. Tommorrow you meet Infinity. We do not exist simultaneously. The Man in Black is : Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 00:58:22 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: DG: Scorched Earth, part 1 On Mon, 6 Sep 1999 CroakerJr@aol.com wrote: > Sometimes it's like there's a hole in my mind, NOT FUNNY! NOT... FUNNY~! The Man in Black is : not funny. Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 00:58:45 EDT From: USFORREC1@aol.com Subject: Re: Skill levels (was DG: RE: RE: Sniper rifle use) Two items for thought: One, I have to agree with the MIB on having Ads/Disads. I feel that they add a level of depth to role-playing that skills and abilities alone don't. The Disads may give more skill points but the disads does help to counterbalance this and gives the player a reason to experiment. We use a house rules variant of the Ads/Disads with the Basic Role-Playing system and it has never unbalanced play. Two, on Skill levels, I would ignore both the ratings for various levels and the cap on how high skill levels go. The Elric system from Chaosium does this and within CoC it has been stated that 100% in Cthulhu Mythos doesn't mean knowing everything about the Cthulhu Mythos, so why does it have to mean that about the other skills. Just use modifiers to the skill. For example, a Marine sniper that has gained 110% in Rifle. On a clear windless day at the range, shooting at the 300 yard line, that would be his skill. At the 1000 yard line, drop it by 25%. In the heat of combat, through brush at a camouflaged target, drop it 40%. At night and in a storm, drop it 80%. Add some points for using a stable rest, time to aim and so on. A skill would still fail on a roll of 99-00, regardless of level and still succeed on a roll of 01. The same for any other skill (law: a simple small claims court civil action might add 20% to the skill, the defense of a DG agent who was seen by 100 witnesses committing a crime subtract 75% and so on). You can get detailed with the modifiers or just use abstract rulings (easy task +20%, hard task -20%, nearly impossible -75%). As for starting levels, the CoC system is meant for making those who are typically academic in nature and focused in their work. As a solution for making DG agents who are a little cut above the rest, I would suggest the following. For a rookie, new recruit, etc., use the system as is. They have been filled with training exercises and theory but don't have on the job training, years of experience and real world deployments. A green member of the unit (1-2 years in) could receive 50 extra skill points. A veteran of the unit (3-10 years) might have an extra 100 points to spend. Over 20 years give an extra 150-200 points. These extra points won't affect game balance. A shoggoth doesn't care you have a rifle skill of 1000%, its still going to eat you like nothing. Secondly, teams like MJ and the Karotechia are going to have similar men to act against the PCs. Finally, even if you don't use disadvantages in your game, make the PC give up something for these extra points. Take him out of field ops and put him into a training command (cutting down contacts and resources), have him be known within the community (attracting unwanted attention and rivalries), subtract ability points for age (he might have the skills but as he gets older he's going to slow down) and so on. Well, hope somebody found this useful... - -Dave K ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 05 Sep 1999 22:01:06 PDT From: "Doug Streifel" Subject: DG: Sniping Marco wrote: >Please post these rules, I'm sure that more than two of us would > like to >see them. Thanks to Davide Mana for fishing out an old copy and sending it to me. Unfortunately, this is a preliminary edition (I haven't finished them yet) in need of some major tweaking and playtesting (I.E. *SOME*). If you're in a hurry I can send them to you as-is, but I'd really prefer to give them some more work before I post them again. - -- Doug Streifel - --,--'-<@ "I gotta find out what's wrong first. It could be a problem with the liquid helium, or maybe the superconductors..." - Chief engineer of the Red October, Soviet ballistic missile submarine. (From Tom Clancy's "The Hunt for Red October") ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 05 Sep 1999 22:04:58 PDT From: "Doug Streifel" Subject: Re: RULES (was Re: Skill levels [was DG: RE: RE: Sniper rifle use]) (Much snippage of the MiB; I'm not sifting through that...) My sniper rules revolve around a new skill called Sniping. Complex rules, however. Still awaiting volunteers for assistance... - -- Doug Streifel - --,--'-<@ "Backstreet's back allri- Oh my GOD! NO HEAD!!!" Which is more evil, Backstreet boys, or Y'Golonac? ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 01:09:49 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: DG: Different rules systems... On Tue, 31 Aug 1999, Phil A Posehn wrote: > Has anybody out there tried doing a one shot using characters generated > in "Violence", having them fight their way out of Badass Texas and having > DG try to recruit the survivors? Whassis "Violence?" Sounds good. > I wouldn't want anyone to have these sociopaths for campaign PCs but it > would be fun as a one shot just to get it out of their system. The Serial Killer Kampaign works as an episodic, between a real game, sort of affair. Some long term threads might be worked into such a game; like a supernatural Mythos reason that drives the freaks on. It works best with mostly realistic psychos, and not Chainsaw Massacrererererers. Chainsaw dueling is best reserved for toungue in cheek one-shots. With nauseating sequel, after sequel, after unsavory sequel. Silly names for every scenario/sequel helps. The Man in Black is : Kenneth Scroggins Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 05 Sep 1999 22:12:04 PDT From: "Doug Streifel" Subject: DG: MiB's "Drain Bamage" More words of wisdom from the MiB: >I'm glad to see some people aren't too pussy to mention the drain bamage. I was reluctant to mention it... Until I remembered who I was talking about. :) BTW, it might be in your best interests NOT to show your posts to this list to your Neurosurgeon. He might jump to the right conclusion and have you institutionalized. ("I swear, doctor, there really are giant bat-winged byakhee that follow me everywhere!") - -- Doug Streifel - --,--'-<@ And I'm disappointed I haven't been tarred and/or feathered yet. ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 05 Sep 1999 22:23:04 PDT From: "Doug Streifel" Subject: DG: Nukes & odd uses for MiB wrote: >When Tokyo is near to vaporizing, and no real retaliation is possible, then >surrender starts looking pretty good to the Emperor. Almost useless factoid: The Japanese didn't surrender because of the casualties, they surrendered because up until that point, their propaganda had the civvy population believing that they were winning. It's kind of hard to keep even one nuclear detonation a secret on an island that size. - -- Doug Streifel - --,--'-<@ "Would you mind not shooting the thermonuclear weapons?!" -From "Broken Arrow" ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 05 Sep 1999 22:40:51 PDT From: "Doug Streifel" Subject: DG: Sniping Still more MiB derived... uh... Wisdom, I guess... :) >You mean RE-post. An act repugnant to archived mailing lists. It's the damnedest thing. I went through the archives (every message I posted during that time) and it wasn't there! It's got to be some kind of conspiracy. Now... Who would benefit from CoC players not having decent sniper characters... Aside from NPC cultists, of course. Again, thanks go to Davide Mana for sending them to me. - -- Doug Streifel - --,--'-<@ The universal solution: Let's go kill some cultists. (Yeah, I know I reused it. Shoot me.) ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 02:37:40 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: Skill levels (was DG: RE: RE: Sniper rifle use) On Mon, 6 Sep 1999 USFORREC1@aol.com wrote: > One, I have to agree with the MIB on having Ads/Disads. Of course you do :) but... IT DOESN'T MATTER IF YOU AGREE WITH THE MAN IN BLACK~! > Two, on Skill levels, I would ignore both the ratings for various levels > and the cap on how high skill levels go. The Elric system from Chaosium does > this and within CoC it has been stated that 100% in Cthulhu Mythos doesn't > mean knowing everything about the Cthulhu Mythos, so why does it have to mean > that about the other skills. You unknowingly answer your own question (grammar hint: put a Question mark [?] at the end of a question :) by the horrid encumbrances imprisoning good roleplaying devised below: > Just use modifiers to the skill. For example, a Marine sniper that has > gained 110% in Rifle. On a clear windless day at the range, shooting at > the 300 yard line, that would be his skill. At the 1000 yard line, drop > it by 25%. In the heat of combat, through brush at a camouflaged > target, drop it 40%. At night and in a storm, drop it 80%. Add some > points for using a stable rest, time to aim and so on. A skill would > still fail on a roll of 99-00, regardless of level and still succeed on > a roll of 01. The same for any other skill (law: a simple small claims > court civil action might add 20% to the skill, the defense of a DG agent > who was seen by 100 witnesses committing a crime subtract 75% and so > on). You can get detailed with the modifiers or just use abstract > rulings (easy task +20%, hard task -20%, nearly impossible -75%). Long Version: I like the loose interpretation of "The Body of Knowledge" better. With penalties and bonuses decided by plot driven reasons. This does not preclude the supposedly accurate modeling of reality given by a cumbersome mechanistic system. This sometimes becomes necessary to the plot, especially in games with a Techno-Thriller genre attached like a filthy sucking cybernetic leech on their pale tender underbellies. The Body of Knowledge interpretation also answers questions like "How much does this Investigator know?" without arbitrary, clumsy and inaccurate kludges. This only works if the Player/Keeper's judgement is to be trusted. I think the major difference between "A Rule for Everything" and "The Body of Knowledge" is the argument of precision. Each stance feels that their school of thought give a more accurate model for the real world. Such thinking should be discarded in favor of the much more primary consideration of having fun. If you like to wallow in rules instead of role-playing, then by all means do so. If you prefer to revel in a meaningless yap session with no similarity to a game, then proceed to blather all you want. Short Version: Rules Suck! > These extra points won't affect game balance. A shoggoth doesn't care > you have a rifle skill of 1000%, its still going to eat you like nothing. There is more to game balance than Shoggoths and extra points. What about fairness? People will feel slighted by giving extra points to "Veterans" without a significant reason; like a two page well-written character background with lots of campaign plot hooks, or a full page character illustration. Even this might prove troublesome, cause of whining blame goats bleating "I can't write" or "I can't draw" when it's perfectly obvious that anyone with hands can do so. These people are in line for impalement on my Smack-Down Spike (it goes up sideways :) Equity becomes a major factor in design based character generation. And PVT "So Motivated he OSOK'd the entire Cult, Gives 110%, and has no need of deodorant" *CAN* fuck up game balance, fuck you very much. I can think of all kinds of ways, as well as ways to thwart such ways, and ways to thwart the ways which thwart the ways that thwart the... What the hell was I talking about? Damned Bananas! The Man in Black is : thwarting bananas at this very moment. Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 02:55:51 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: DG: MiB's "Drain Bamage" On Sun, 5 Sep 1999, Doug Streifel wrote: > BTW, it might be in your best interests NOT to show your posts to this list > to your Neurosurgeon. He might jump to the right conclusion and have you > institutionalized. ("I swear, doctor, there really are giant bat-winged > byakhee that follow me everywhere!") My doctor is a ex-Army turned private practice. He used to head up the Brain section up at Tripler Army Medical Center, which serves most of the military in the Pacific. He is noted for his work concerning...get this: Marine Neurotoxins. I wonder what the Army wants/wanted with that nasty stuff, don't you? He's quite the direct sort (I like this :) and is going to end up as a DG friendly as soon as I get around to casting Summon/Bind Fractal in his office. He won't know it's me casting of course, but the perception of me kicking the crap outta Kai's Fractal Explorer 4D will do wonders for his credulity. I often wonder if DG goes out and "offensively" recruits folk in such a manner. That would be a sleazy trick for a lazy Keeper to pull new Agents together with. I think I'll call it the SAN busting lure. Active Recruitment might even be a special duty given to agents scheduled for termination. The Man in Black is : scheduling. Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 02:59:12 EDT From: LizardRoi@aol.com Subject: Re: DG: Hastur In a message dated 9/5/99 8:18:59 PM Pacific Daylight Time, mib@cyberspace.org writes: << This Yin/Yang, Newtonian Motion Bullshit is nonsense according to the Mythos. Just thought I'd like to say that. Don't fall into the trap of binary thinking. Learn to count above two, this is difficult when you only have a Left and Right Brain. Maybe the Tao is a force. Maybe not, it could be a banana. Could be a force and a banana. Maybe it's a force on Tuesdays and a banana on Thursdays and a giant Tentacular blob elsewhen. Wait...when was it a banana again? I like bananas. Damn McDonalds! >> First there is a Mythos Then there is no Mythos Then there is Mark McFadden Remember, in the middle of Life there is a space between I and F. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 02:59:10 EDT From: LizardRoi@aol.com Subject: Re: Skill levels (was DG: RE: RE: Sniper rifle use) In a message dated 9/5/99 3:30:53 PM Pacific Daylight Time, mib@cyberspace.org writes: << Genius can also mean any extraordinary ability or quality; originally based on "spirits" according to my dictionary. 'Course we low-vocab brainwashed morons of the mass-media usually only recognize one meaning of a word and put all situations into oversimplified binary categories, but I digress. >> I go with the "possessed by genius" model when I'm dealing with the genius range stats. Make them a parenthetical, there's "in the zone" and there's very skilled but uninspired. Depends on conditions. So we have Agent Hawkeye, the Olympic medalist rifleman, who is a paragon of shooting skill, with steady hands and sharp eyesight. He's brought along because some long range shooting is needed and no sniper is available. Now, if Hawkeye's only shooting is done on the range, even if he has the time and ammo to keep himself at the genius level, I don't think I'd let Hawkeye perform at that level if he's called upon to kill a human being (unless Agent Hawkeye has some issues that makes killing a human being a no-sweat proposition). But, if the task is to cut power or communications on a distant target by shooting the cable/insulator or some similar feat of shootery, hell yeah. I'll even acknowledge the genius level allows ooohhaaaahhh shooting under tense circumstances. Hawkeye placed in the Olympics, after all. I suppose it goes without saying that I play Sniper to be a profession rather than a single skill. Mark McFadden ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 02:59:13 EDT From: LizardRoi@aol.com Subject: Re: DG: More being picky about Greys, M-12, DG In a message dated 9/5/99 8:36:58 PM Pacific Daylight Time, USFORREC1@aol.com writes: << As for DG discovering the truth about the Grey-Mi-Go connection, I would personally put that as a major campaign goal. I figure DG doesn't know any better than MJ at this point, they are just willing to dig deeper and ask more questions. >> The e-mail message from Fairfield that inspired the modern incarnation of DG made much of MJ's not knowing what they were really dealing with, while implying that he (and the Cowboys) did. He also seemed to imply that MJ/Greys/Mi-Go were not a DG priority. He seemed (to me) to portray them as more of a threat to DG than a threat to Life As We Know It. But then, that was just a call to arms (and just how many individuals received that e-mail? Hmmmmm?) Alphonse might have other priorities and his own take on the sitch. Mark McFadden BTW, inquiring minds need to know when Machinations of the Mi-Go will be available again. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 03:04:54 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: DG: Nukes & odd uses for On Sun, 5 Sep 1999, Doug Streifel wrote: > Almost useless factoid: The Japanese didn't surrender because of the > casualties, they surrendered because up until that point, their propaganda > had the civvy population believing that they were winning. Not really, since American bombing campaigns kept increasing in intensity, along with the propaganda. My mom was in Sapporo during the bombing (as a very small child) and she remembers the blackouts. The Japanese people aren't all that stupid, they just went along with the government, even unto Armageddon. Fortunately, someone with royal blood decided that a Military Industrial Complex is a shitty way to run a country. Take note my fellow Americans, Eisenhower was right. Get out and take part in the governance of our great nation, that's what it's there for. The Man in Black is : a one man Military Industrial Complex. Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 03:09:25 -0400 (EDT) From: The Man in Black Subject: Re: DG: Sniping On Sun, 5 Sep 1999, Doug Streifel wrote: > Still more MiB derived... uh... Wisdom, I guess... :) Pop Quiz: "Are you READY for my WISDOM?" > It's the damnedest thing. I went through the archives (every message I > posted during that time) and it wasn't there! This has also happened to me, perhaps it's time for an official investigation we can all decry for collusion with the Conspiracy. > The universal solution: Let's go kill some cultists. > (Yeah, I know I reused it. Shoot me.) The Man in Black is : taking aim. Novus Ordo Seclorum : Annuit Coeptus : E Pluribus Unum Code Z: 233,1,42; 140,39,23; 91,3,7; 5,52,3. http://www.carnwyffa.u-net.com [EMERALD HAMMER] ------------------------------ End of deltagreen-digest V2 #54 *******************************