LAW ENFORCEMENT IN DELTA GREEN
Added 2024-05-30 15:09:27 +0000 UTCBy request, an article on using law enforcement in your Delta Green games:
"I can't express how many times I've heard a Handler say, "well, the player characters were Federal agents/police/marshals, so dealing with local police/getting the file/talking with witnesses was no problem," and every time I hear it, I cringe.
No. A thousand times no. Even when it is easy and the Agents are known to the local police as law enforcement, it should never feel easy. The players are part of a conspiracy that those law enforcement officials must never uncover, and this primary conceit must factor into all decisions and interactions. That secret should be a burden for the Agents — a constant fear of being found out they carry with them everywhere."
Comments
Hi Dennis. As always, thanks for writing up some great advice on running DG, it's not always obvious to budding Handler's like myself. Just wondering if you'd ever thought about posting some of your session notes/plans to Patreon? It'd be a great insight for me given that you've got a few decades worth of experience running DG games. Always a pleasure getting to know your perspectives and processes on Delta Green. All the best 👍🏻
Nathan Fenwick
2024-07-21 03:39:42 +0000 UTCI don't see a problem in a 900+ pages Handler Guide! Well, actually I think there would be a lot of logistics and physical reality issues there, but in an ideal world that would be awesome! As someone above said, maybe the solution would be a series of Handler Guides (v2, etc.), or if enough material was created with the right periodicity, annual expansions with a more miscellaneous approach.
Gus Diaz
2024-06-10 08:22:01 +0000 UTCHi, Dennis. Absolutely. Having all useful info of this kind together would simplify a lot the checking process when needed.
Gus Diaz
2024-06-10 08:16:41 +0000 UTCDefinitely
Ryan
2024-06-04 13:19:48 +0000 UTCMay I present "The Montana Incident" Agents starting getting too pushy with a friendly in the sherrifs department and then shut him out of the investigation. As a result he grabbed a buddy to go check out a scene. Too bad the cult they were hunting got there first. From there it descended into a serious of rash decisions that's led to the killing the friendly by overdosing him, two separate arson scenes, a staged car accident, and multiple homicides including several innocents. Needless to say I have record of all the slip ups to come back to haunt them later.
J M
2024-05-31 02:42:07 +0000 UTCI believe it would be a fantastic idea!
Fabio Santos
2024-05-30 23:44:49 +0000 UTCI was going write the same thing, really good for Agents and Handlers that arnt super familiar with police procedures as most of our education comes from TV shows. And not every one reads police manuals and criminal forensic books 🫡
Christer Eriksson
2024-05-30 22:19:46 +0000 UTCAbsolutely fantastic idea. Would be great to have these all in one place.
Kesh
2024-05-30 21:00:42 +0000 UTCWe couldn’t fit them in the HG. The book would have been 900 pages. ;)
Dennis Detwiller
2024-05-30 20:53:11 +0000 UTCThanks for this useful article. I will talk about this to my players. And they’re still chocked by God’s Law scenario ;) I hope you can write more details about the US justice and police system because as a non-US Handler, it’s sometimes difficult to understand and talk about thr police/justice system with truthness. There are not enough details in the HG.
bouik bouik
2024-05-30 20:51:59 +0000 UTCYES, actually this one needs to be in the Handler’s Guide V2!
bouik bouik
2024-05-30 20:48:40 +0000 UTCI think it would be great to include in a book. Handlers can't expect newer players to really get the nuance of this right away. I'm a newer player myself and I've yet to play with a Handler that has pushed this part of the game in a truly satisfying way. It's not that they're bad at running games, it's just that perhaps there isn't enough information to help them get in the right frame of mind.
Mike Nusbaum
2024-05-30 19:32:56 +0000 UTCOh that can happen! Certainly. But you can also bet those cops are saving up a nice big “fuck you” for them.
Dennis Detwiller
2024-05-30 18:46:27 +0000 UTCAs a Handler, I find myself guilty of letting Agents with FBI/DOJ badges run herd over local cops.
John Johnston
2024-05-30 18:44:23 +0000 UTCWe've chatted here about assembling the DELTA GREEN HOW TO articles like this one into a book. Any interest guys?
Dennis Detwiller
2024-05-30 17:19:35 +0000 UTCYeah, a lot of people don't realize the rivalry between local cops and feds. Especially when the local cops are used to everyone doing exactly what they say, a Fed coming in undermines their authority & suddenly the locals are having to take orders, which absolutely pisses them off. Agents aren't going to just get locals to smile and hand over evidence without a problem.
Kesh
2024-05-30 15:35:30 +0000 UTC
