Guest Post - Playing the Man Behind the Man

Spying, operating, burgling or any other ‘kinetic activity’ is usually thought of by players and the general public in a vacuum. Nine times out of ten when Bond or Bourne are doing their action movie thing they are doing it on their own. This makes for great cinema, but poor gameplay in a TTRPG. Luckily, the real world is not so unilateral, analysts put together targeting packages on just about every objective that a ‘doer’ will try to achieve before they ever get into action and this can offer a Delta Green party some ideas on how to include the whole party.

This post uses the example of espionage to detail one way of how to include support characters in a social scene, but the same principle could be applied to just about anything. an analyst who has looked over a cult compound and determined the best approach could give a special operator a bonus to stealth during the raid, just as a psychiatrist might give a case officer a bonus in a social scene. This is not a be all, end all solution to making support characters on par with action men but simply aims to give them another tool.

The Glaakeen, an Old Threat for Delta Green

untitled 'doodle' by Asta Daily

In the Handler's Guide, in Glaaki's part of the Great Old Ones chapter, we learn about the Glaakeen (or Servants of Glaaki as they're called in CoC). Most of them hang around Glaaki and presumably do his bidding, but they also show up in Glaaki cults, most famously under the leadership of the Fate's Belial/Robert Hubert in Holy War in Eyes Only. In fan content, they're well suited for the dual role of 'muscle' and 'ascended elders,' a bit like how Deep Ones act in some Cthulhu cults. We're given 'stats' for them in one of Glaaki's abilities in the Handler's Guide, but it is incomplete if you want to actually use them.

Simplifying B/X's Saving Throw Matrices

I like the old saving throws. To no one's surprise, my favorite incarnation of them lies within the pages of Moldvay's B/X. However, they're not perfect. They rely on a series of tables that aren't the easiest to reference quickly. It's not uncommon for one's eyes to slip and read off the wrong number. This is more of an issue for the Dungeon Master than the player, but it's not the primary problem: the saving throw progressions aren't smooth.

"But Top Hat," I hear you say, "why does that even matter?" I will admit, it's a bit of an obsessive mathematical yearning but it's in contrast to almost all of the rest of the game's mechanics. HP progression is smooth, each level, you get more HP. Spells and spell slots are smooth, barring a few levels where you get multiple at once, you get a new spell slot each level. THAC0...okay THAC0 isn't quite as smooth but it's still smoother than saving throws. Thief skills go up by 1% or 5% each level. A cleric gets incrementally better at turning each level. In contrast to that, saving throws do nothing for three (or five if you're unlucky enough to be a Magic-User) and then improve by several points all at once. And the rate of advancement doesn't even hold constant. It's a mess!

Guest Post - Locked Doors and Investigative RPGs

If you play Delta Green, or any other investigative RPG, for any length of time you will inevitably run into a ‘locked door’ — an obstacle in the path of the investigation that seems insurmountable, at least with the skills you personally have. However, if you apply some critical thinking and creativity to the problem there are often quite a few ways through that locked door well within your grasp. This blog post offers some examples for getting through a literal locked door and hopefully will inspire Agents and Handlers alike to think more creatively about solutions.

This list is hardly complete and in several circumstances different skills could very validly be used for the same purpose. It is not meant to be a definitive list of ways to get past a lock or a guide to breaking and entering. It is merely meant to serve as inspiration.

Guest Posts!

Some friends of mine are going to be writing some posts for this blog. They didn't feel like making a blog of their own and I'm happy to host their ideas that would otherwise go unseen. So hopefully you can expect a slight uptick in posts in the future.