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Hauled up from the archives...
This is one of the first discussions started on the list, back when
the
listmembers were simply getting acquainted and started gauging the quantity
of data available through the Delta Green List.
The following document is not indexed, as it is a considered a required
reading for Keepers, expecially if they do not intend to limit their games
to the USA scenario.
This is not a long document.
Go on and read it.
The Curator.
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 1998 12:47:43 EDT
From: SteveL1979
I have to say I'm impressed with the geographic diversity of the people who've posted as part of the "information exchange" -- this list seems to have people on it from just about every continent! That's a definite information resource plus. :)
Out of curiousity, a question for the non-Americans on the list: since DG is based strongly around US events, settings, and government agencies, how does that affect your view of or use of the book? Do you, or would you, run games with American PCs, or do you adapt the information presented to your own countries or regions?
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 1998 11:09:07 -0800
From: Gareth Wood
I have only run one short DG adventure, and it was set in and around Boston, with FBI agents. Odd, since I am in Vancouver Canada. I plan to start a campaign set in the Pacific Northwest, western Canada, and parts of the arctic. Dependin on how it goes, I may need info on Turkey, Iran, and Israel. The strong US feeling of DG is adaptable to other nations pretty easily. The Greys and such are pretty worldwide, so could be anywhere.
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 1998 22:28:32 +0200
From: PM
I've always liked to use US locations in my games (you may consider it is exotism for us :-) and besides we're so immersed in american TV shows than the United States are at least moderately known to all of my players. So I've used DG for US based adventures just like I used CoC for US based stories (despite the release of the 1920 France Sourcebook a few years ago). Another thing is our own agencies are much more rigidly defined than the US ones (think about the comment about big polices agencies in the beginning of the Big Brother chapter) and because of that less fun to use. And rather than creating a fictitious agency (a la Aegis i Conspiracy X), I prefer to use DG as per se, even if I may create a european equivalent later for my players to be confronted to).
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 1998 22:58:26
From: Davide Mana
I'm working on an adaptation of sorts.
Let me explain...
My first DG campaign is still being tested down in the lab. We had sort of a "dry run" this week, with one of my players keeping a (supposedly) stand-alone US-based scenario, using an old, unrelated, home made cinematic game-system.
The whole US.GOV agents/conspiracy/aliens athmosphere was rather well received.
The real problem was another: a government-issued weapon ad a badge were generally taken to mean "unlimited ammo and impunity" - some of the players (including a normally very level-headed young woman) simply went on rampage.
Still ok in the above mentioned scenario, but a certified suicide attitude in a DG game (the way I see it, at least).
So, to avoid things taking a suicidal run and spoiling the whole setting, I'm moving the introductory campaign back on this side of the Atlantic, in Geneva (Switzerland) to be more precise; as it's a "Old Nazis"-fuelled business, this might even help (as the K-cabal are on their home turf here). And I'm giving my players some really low-impact characters: security-cleared "readers" in a DG sponsored "Foundation", like the one featured in the "Three days of the Condor" movie (and "Six days of... " novel).
More infos are available if someone is interested, of course.
From: Phil A Posehn
In regard to DG being primarily centered around U.S. intelligence agencies: Can anyone tell me the compartmental structure of British Military Intelligence? As I understand it M.I.5 is similar to our FBI in some areas, and M.I.6 is a lot like the CIA, but as I understand it there are M.I. departments up to M.I.12 and possibly beyond. These strike me as useful sources of NPCs.
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 1998 17:03:03 -0700 (PDT)
From: Chris Womack
> In regard to DG being primarily centered around U.S.
intelligence
> agencies: Can anyone tell me the compartmental structure
of British
> Military Intelligence? As I understand it M.I.5 is similar
to our FBI in
> some areas, and M.I.6 is a lot like the CIA, but as
I understand it there
> are M.I. departments up to M.I.12 and possibly
beyond. These strike me as
> useful sources of NPCs.
Check out Tsiolkovsky's Demon's webpage at http://www.cix.co.uk/~coherent-light/
You'll want to follow the Delta Green link, where you'll find descriptions of various UK intelligence agencies, as well as DG character templates and other goodies. Excellent stuff!
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 1998 11:22:26 +0900
From: Jay and Mikiko Noyes
> Out of curiousity, a question for the non-Americans on the list:
since DG
>is based strongly around US events, settings, and government
agencies, how
>does that affect your view of or use of the book? Do
you, or would you, run
>games with American PCs, or do you adapt the
information presented to your own
>countries or regions?
I'm American, but I usually GM to non-Americans. One of the points that I have often had to explain in great detail concerns the diversity of American law inforcement agencies and intelligence agencies. Most countries services tend to be better organized within the service and coordinated between services, whereas the Americna potpourri (sp?) of agencies came about both by accident and by a desire to maintain a division of power: e.g. city police, county sheriffs, the highway patrol, the FBI, and the Secret Service all have overlapping but separate domains. It's always fun explaining that in some cases you can have three or more separate agencies on one case, acting independantly to a greater or lesser degree. A related point that comes up concerns the laws that differ between the states. Gun ownership laws in particular can become tricky. Punishments for drug use vary wildly, as do attitudes for acceptable use of force.
From: taz2
I basically use the information / rules in the DG book for ideas on structure and to also impact the group (by visiting MJ12's etc) when they least expect it.
I have 'bent' the character stereotypes a bit to fit the nearest UK/Europe organisation that I want to use.
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 1998 22:26:22 +1000
From: Rob Shankly
As a GM I can't say I have ever felt a problem with being "on the fringe" geographically. Australia is "made" for CoC: the City of the Sand Dwellers is somewhere under The Great Sandy Desert (yeah, I know, it's a pretty dull name). Hobart is one of the major ports of embarkation for the Antarctic. The northern coast of Aust was visited by Chinese and Malaccan traders for centuries, there's a fortythousand-year-old Aboriginal culture, then we had all sorts of immigrants... Stories are very easy to set here. We even show up on UFO watch lists!
So how do I use DG?
Option one: US citizens in a foreign country (in this case Australia). Anthony Baxter & I did this for "Melbourne, the Right Place" over Easter. They are agents sent here deliberately: they have simply been sent a bit further than backwoods Vermont.
This gives the Keeper a chance to present a fresh perspective on the home country (does this sound a bit arty? It's true).
It also makes it really easy to cut away the Investigator's support base- no calling on backup in the middle of the outback. Isolated characters = worried players.
Option two: Locals in their own country.
I tend to take all the information given in DG as "true", and then extrapolate it to Australia. Either the PCs are investigating the perfidy of insidious Yankees, or good-guy Americans come to them for assistance (or both). This has the advantage that the players tend to distrust all the American NPCs and trust the Australians. Ha ha ha. We can be double dealing cultists too!
There are a number of US bases here, (quite a few of them are very off limits and cause some genuine paranoia- has anyone read "The Falcon & the Snowman"?. For instance, there is a deep-space tracking station (Tidbinbilla) only an hour from our capital city.
Option Three: Just be Americans at home This isn't as hard as you might think. The USA is much better known to the rest of the world than any other country (Here's a sample from tonight's Melbourne TV guide: "Home Improvement", "Oprah", "Seinfeld", "Silverado", "Singing in the Rain" etc. Three of the last five books I read were set in the USA). For someone like me, putting a story in Omaha is no more difficult than it would be for a New Yorker. With CoC, I feel just as confident of getting Arkham "right" as anyone can. In this case, we simply use DG as printed- the main difficulty is knowing "obvious" facts (is the D.O.B printed on your SocSec card?)
I have only (co)written one big DG story set in Australia. Anthony and I agreed from the outset that we wanted the PCs to be Americans in Melbourne. It was then simply a question of giving them something to investigate, and to explain why they were here.
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 1998 16:07:40 +0200
From: Morten Kjeldseth Pettersen
Since we started playing CoC some 9 years ago we've kept to the American setting, even though we're all Norwegians. Never been a problem for us, as Rob Shankly pointed out, because America is fairly known to us through TV, movies and such.
Since our current DG campaign is sort of a continuation on some of the cases the 'old' (1920s) cast encountered, it is only natural to keep the American setting. The PCs are actually descendants of the original crew, some have found their ancestor's diary and so on.
> > In regard to DG being primarily centered around U.S.
intelligence
> > agencies: Can anyone tell me the compartmental
structure of British
> > Military Intelligence? As I understand
it M.I.5 is similar to our FBI in
> > some areas, and M.I.6 is
a lot like the CIA, but as I understand it there
> > are M.I.
departments up to M.I.12 and possibly beyond. These strike me as
>
> useful sources of NPCs.
You could also take a look at Secret Kingdom, good info on British Intelligence (no pun intended ;) at: http://www.cc.umist.ac.uk/sk/index.html
