Most politicals of note have around 3-4 million stellers personal wealth.
10% Wealth ~= $350,000
A single assassination, though difficult, nets the equivalent to two capital ships with a single pull of the trigger.
Is this not worth it on its own merit?
Death of a major character should have severe consequences.
However, I don't think that Phoenix is really set up to deal with this kind of thing. The BSE tradition has always made little distinction between players and their game pieces - essentially, the player "is" their entire position.
On top of this, in-aff power struggles have never been part of the OOC culture, it's always been very egalitarian.
To really make political assassinations significant, these aspects of the game would need to change.
rob
Loss of money is arguable, but acceptable and at least one guaranteed effect of a successful assassination. Mica's explanation that this is the sum needed to cover the immediate turmoil is okay, but also (in my opinion) neccessitates the inability to act for a week.
Agents/operatives are tied to individual politicals by nature. If the political dies, there goes his contacts.
One step further I would even differentiate between agents (lost) and operatives (affiliation military personnell, not lost).
Loss of political knowledge is the most important, and potentially most crippling aspect. I feel it is a neccessity.
If you are a mistrusting person and do not share your special knowledge on systems, tech and positions then you put all eggs into one basket. Maximum security at the risk of losing it all at once.
If you are a trusting person who let his fellows in on everything then (and only then) the knowledge will outlive you.
I hasten to add that the size of an affiliation has nothing to do with this, as any affiliation of any size can have aff knowledge. The point is that if you keep your secrets to the grave, then you do it in the literal sense.
| QUOTE (Frabby @ Feb 25 2004, 10:05 AM) |
| Loss of political knowledge is the most important, and potentially most crippling aspect. I feel it is a neccessity. If you are a mistrusting person and do not share your special knowledge on systems, tech and positions then you put all eggs into one basket. Maximum security at the risk of losing it all at once. If you are a trusting person who let his fellows in on everything then (and only then) the knowledge will outlive you. I hasten to add that the size of an affiliation has nothing to do with this, as any affiliation of any size can have aff knowledge. The point is that if you keep your secrets to the grave, then you do it in the literal sense. |
Bugger... I voted for 4, but this arguement has swung me to favour 5 instead.
dont suppose the admin can change it for me?
...
plz
Can someone put me down for option 5 please.
Political knowledge loss is a must as is the loss of all agents and operatives.
Andy
I would rather seeing non aff assets being left without command until a replacement is found. Some would even revert to aff owned.
Surely 1 week with the positions stopped is enough!!
Having rich political lose 350K and a poor, or forewarned, political, transfer most assets temporarely to another position and then losing 1 stellar, isn't very fair!!!
| QUOTE (Avatar @ Feb 25 2004, 11:10 AM) |
| I'm sorry, but what's the IC reason for a 10% loss in stellar assets? |
Mica has given the IC reason for the stellar loss elsewhere as:
| QUOTE |
| Stellar loss reflects the immediate crisis situation and the stellar costs of bringing it under control, not theft. As the loss is 10% the wealth of the politician this is generally commensurate with the political rank of the victim. |
| QUOTE |
| Surely 1 week with the positions stopped is enough!! |
I read that as being unable to carry out any actions for the (replacement) political position, rather than for all positions.
| QUOTE (Avatar @ Feb 25 2004, 11:10 AM) |
| Surely 1 week with the positions stopped is enough!! Having rich political lose 350K and a poor, or forewarned, political, transfer most assets temporarely to another position and then losing 1 stellar, isn't very fair!!! |
Not positions stopped.
The political position (i.e. the political office) cannot issue orders. All other positions can carry on as normal.
If this can at a time of conflict, or a vital vote, it could be disasterous.
A prewarned political that transfers stellars effectively is taking counter measures to ensure that his death will not cost his office considerable amounts of stellars.
No, I will not accept special actions: "In the event of political death, transfer all stellars prior to the 10% loss." Nor anything saving knowledge, agents etc if we go down this road.
If players insist on mechanics shafting players that loose a political position, you can bet your bottom dollar that everybody will be in the same boat.
| QUOTE (Frabby @ Feb 25 2004, 11:05 AM) |
| Loss of political knowledge is the most important, and potentially most crippling aspect. I feel it is a neccessity. If you are a mistrusting person and do not share your special knowledge on systems, tech and positions then you put all eggs into one basket. Maximum security at the risk of losing it all at once. If you are a trusting person who let his fellows in on everything then (and only then) the knowledge will outlive you. I hasten to add that the size of an affiliation has nothing to do with this, as any affiliation of any size can have aff knowledge. The point is that if you keep your secrets to the grave, then you do it in the literal sense. |
Losing all political knowledge doesn't work for me as Political knowledge is the sum total gained by all of a players positions. In that scenario a freighter that has previously made a run to an outpost not run by the same person could suddenly find itself 'not knowing' where the OP is.
Furthermore, do we actually consider a political position as a single person or as an office? ie - would you expect the political position to have staff that are responsible to him/her? I don't mean to suggest that there is a secretary out there who knows everything that the PD does - but the way I see it is that there would be underlings responsible to a political postion (kind of middle management).
If for example you look at the British government, the Chancellor doesn't do all the calculations for the budget himself - he has a team of people. He'll make the final decision, but much of the background work will have been done for him. Individually these people may not know much, but collectively they would actually know more information than the Chancellor himself.
Loss of agents (but not operatives) and loss of politcal actions for a week seems reasonable to me. Loss of cash? Maybe...but again I think the cash, like knowledge would be recoverable.
Personally I quite liked the suggestion that the Affiliation would take a morale hit - the level of which dependent on how powerfull the pol was. This would mean that bases perhaps have a hit against their efficiency, that would steadily decrease over several weeks. Even if the leader was particularly hated by the people, it could be argued that the transition of authority, and state funeral would cause disruption
Keep it nice and simple is my motto!
As for having disastrous effects in times of war...well that's point right? Not having the enemy lose 10% of stellar assets. Those that have 3M, losing 300K won't hugely affect the capacity to wage war, whereas having his owned positions get discoordinated, would not only force a good proportion of aff owned and distribute ships across new players, but also cause the sense of turmoil when personal troops and ships lose their commander.
Now if the ships just happen to be fighting a battle they won't stop fighting, but if fleet deployment was necessary then those ships would be left behind, as they wanted to know you who'd take care of them from then on
Fighting against the tide ain't I?
suffice to say, im not in agreement with some of the above, but the will of the majority will rule, just remember though, if you make something like this too powerful a result for which is still a minor amount of effort in comparison to trying to kill the objective through major warfare means, you will have every man and his dog trying to kill everyone that moves
it may soon be safer to board a platform or join a 1 man ground party and sod off somewhere, where that hole saddam left..............
| QUOTE (Avatar @ Feb 25 2004, 01:25 PM) |
| I understand your reasons Mica, but political assassination is meant to act as decapitation, thus incurring not in stellar loss, but in loss of the proper chain of command. But I guess we can see the 10% tributation as payment to commander to not going rogue, a bribe of sorts. |
Not sure if it makes a difference, but I think that these effects will be felt even if your political dies via a stray bullet/strange beam/wmd on the head during a regular battle, so it's not just assassinations.
| QUOTE |
| just remember though, if you make something like this too powerful a result for which is still a minor amount of effort in comparison to trying to kill the objective through major warfare means, you will have every man and his dog trying to kill everyone that moves |
A moderatley skilled assassin at a 70% Security Starbase has only about 13% chance of success with an 88% chance of capture. It costs on the order of 50k to even attempt the order (successful or not). It costs a Vet Soldier and 1k stellars to create the Assassin. Then there is the matter of inserting the Assassin into the starbase in the first place (which carries a chance of being captured). That is all after you have found out WHICH starbase to put the Assassin into - this requires putting Ops into EVERY possible location and looking specifically for the quantity of a Political Item - which only gives you a yes/no indication if they are there. You then have to perform a Special Action to find out their unique ID number so that the lifeform can be targetted. Not quite so "minor" an amount of effort as people would think...
My hat's off to the one who succeeded - it's likely to be a one-time only event.
Cheers,
Rich Fanning
aka
Lord Lawrence Scrimm
CIA Intelligence Director
My hat's off to the one who succeeded - it's likely to be a one-time only event.
Cheers,
Rich Fanning
aka
Lord Lawrence Scrimm
CIA Intelligence Director
| QUOTE (Lord Scrimm @ Feb 25 2004, 04:35 PM) |
| That is all after you have found out WHICH starbase to put the Assassin into - this requires putting Ops into EVERY possible location. Not quite so "minor" an amount of effort as people would think... My hat's off to the one who succeeded - it's likely to be a one-time only event. |
It must have been wild luck then that the assassins checked out the capital first
Still, kudos to them for pulling it off.
As Rich has pointed out, with the current orders available to Operatives/Agents is is a time consuming and expensive business to locate a valid target (not that I know this from first hand experience you understand
). If the effort involved is more expensive than the effect it generates then its not worth having in the game - especially if its an action that will fail more often than not. Losing 300K$ as the example Mica gave is a pretty crap return in my opinion. If I want to make an aff lose money then I'll rob their banks or embezzle the funds for my own use.On the point that a political has staff and other captains who would know the location of various outposts etc that point has some merit. However the simple solution is to restrict political info loss to private data only with aff data remaining regardless of who gets offed. You then have to decide which info to share with your staff (AFF) and which with a few select individuals within your aff (private).
Loss of political actions for a week is pretty much a non-event as far as I'm concerned. How many affs can function quite happily without political orders. I'm lucky if I issue a political order in a given month.
I like the idea of some efficiency penalty throughout an affiliation for a week (or more) depending on the level of political assassinated (since the game has no morale effects)? All that time wasted by staff as they gossip over the assassination, who's next, who's to blame etc. Paranoid ship crew watching their shipmates in case they are a hidden assassin
The political is an office, which means the only real effect would be his positions loyalty, all non aff owned positions should auto join the aff, to become aff owned.
Reason is that him they where connected too is dead, so they nolonger have the same loyal feelings as before.
But loss nothing else, if malcolm and just 1 other player are in GTT and that other player do have a vote, he could make himself PD instead and take ships and starbases from Malcolm, so this is enough to really change an Aff, so in itself a real threat to the aff.
This will hardly effect minor affs with 1 or few players, but with bigger and later on when phoenix gets more players, then do you need to ensure you got allies, in case you are killed off <g>
My only proviso is that I'm not sure that the loss of political knowledge need be complete; if a random 10% of your personal knowledge survives (because it was on the desks of your subordinates, your captains can remember, etc), this might add a bit of spice :-).
There are plenty of arguments to justify the loss of stellars (death duties, changing all the stationery, arranging with the bank for the new person to be given the right to make transfers, etc), and the loss of all agents/operatives is entirely reasonable (as I would consider them to be loyal to the person, not the position).
Richard
AFT
And agents.. Well as long as the money is coming in who cares who’s paying "The agents first and foremost loyalty is purely to themselves." Page 2. Of course they may split as with the political murdered they may worry for them selves!!!
Pete
| QUOTE |
| There are plenty of arguments to justify the loss of stellars (death duties, changing all the stationery, arranging with the bank for the new person to be given the right to make transfers, etc), |
Absolutely. It sounds obsurd, by I have personally witnessed over 250 theatre seats being removed and trashed because a new local party came into power - can't have blue seats now, they have to be red! Stupid thing is they wern't replaced with a neutral colour.... This is where your Council Tax is going
The question of operative loyalty is a little more complex though. I agree with Richard that they are loyal to the person, and not the affiliation, but that doesn't mean they will leave because their "boss" dies/leaves/disapears. Many opertives would accept the new boss as long as they worked for the same Aff, while others would be very untrusting and fear being set-up.
Same with agents - some won't care where the money comes from as long as they get it, but others will run a mile. The agent is risking their life, career and family to make some extra bucks on the side - would you unquestioningly follow new orders from someone new without some serious thought? Assuming you know that the top man has changed that is...
If I were James Bond in the field and I got a secure message telling me that I now take orders from someone else, I would do one of two things. Continue with my previous bosses mission ignoring the new one until I can varify it, or go straight back to base to confirm. No way would I let my butt swing in the breeze and just go hoo-hum another day, another boss.
Maybe a % chance per Agent/Operative? Based on length of service or something? Don't understand the mechanics of agents/operatives so no idea if that can be done.
Just some ramblings
Going back to James Bond now I come to think of it, it is like him (but a programmed Jason Bourne type James Bond). No matter what the Prime Minster (be it male, female or other, Margaret Thatcher in mind here) they are expected to do their job. When a new government comes in do we expect to see half the MI5 hand in their notice or do they go on working as if nothing changes. Where the orders come from makes no difference as long as there are orders.
Agents on the other hand now there I agree, its their lives on the line.
Pete
| QUOTE (MasterTrader @ Feb 29 2004, 08:48 PM) |
| My only proviso is that I'm not sure that the loss of political knowledge need be complete; if a random 10% of your personal knowledge survives (because it was on the desks of your subordinates, your captains can remember, etc), this might add a bit of spice :-). |
I'd agree that it should not be complete - while transferring knowledge to aff should be a 100% effective way to avoid the problem here, there are some affs where private knowledge fits into their profile and losing ALL of it would be a hard blow for the player.
There is a huge amount of effort involved in assassinating a political, and the rewards should be large. But we must make sure that we don't stray over the line into making political death the be-all and end-all of war in the game. While there is a lot of preparatory work involved (not least in finding the political's IC presence), there are many players out there with the resources to make multiple simultaneous attempts - and not worry about the cost - if they gain enough to make it worthwhile.
Dan
Current RL Asset (Agent) recruitment is a long, involved process of gaining a persons trust to such an extent that they would be willing to sell out their position of trust for their "handler." Oftentimes this is less for sheer monetary value than for favors (of one kind or another), blackmail/extortion or political/religious sympathies with their handler. Further, their handler is the only contact that they have in order to insulate the entire espionage organization should their activities be uncovered - this is adequately reflected in the rules for Agents imho.
Operatives are field agents whose expertise places them in positions where they need to have absolute loyalty and dedication to their "masters". They are fanatics who believe wholeheartedly in the ultimate "Rightness" of their actions and who do not question orders from their superior. As a consequence, they need to be absolutely assured that what they are doing IS "Right" and that can only be accomplished through long association and trust built up over a span of time.
If the head of an Intelligence Cell is compromised, for one reason or another, then all lower echelons of that cell will tend to "go to ground" as a matter of self-preservation. There is no way to adequately determine whether information about their missions was compromised during the Event until such time as they can be assured that their master/handler truly has/has-not been compromised. Even if they can be brought back in and reassigned, there will be a significant amount of time spent "debriefing" the Agents and putting them back into positions where they can be of continued use to the agency. Even so, there are no assurances that their position has not been compromised in some fashion so this inevitably ends in reassignment to an administrative (Desk) position.
As such, the loss of the Operative/Agent network of an assassinated political would make a good deal of common sense. An interesting side effect would be for a small percentage of the Operatives in place to "go rogue" and act on their own accord after thay have been able to positively establish that their master/handler has been eliminated. This would enable the newly formed political the opportunity to bring these operatives "out of the cold" by picking them up (using their target codes) or eliminating them using other Operatives.
Rich Fanning
aka
Lord Lawrence Scrimm
CIA Intelligence Director
The operative is not just a fanatic they are programmed. They don't need to believe what they are doing is right. It is the only thought allowed, be it via brain washing, chemicals or surgery. If the figurehead dies they go on. They probably don't even know whom they work for anymore and why.
The Agent (if they know who they work for which is very, very doubtful) may go to ground.
The operative keeps doing their job its all they now know. I feel your thinking of them as being far to autonomous; they are vet troops who have been forever altered into order receiving machines that will die on command. Or am I reading the wrong rules here?
Pete
| QUOTE |
| The operative is not just a fanatic they are programmed. They don't need to believe what they are doing is right. It is the only thought allowed, be it via brain washing, chemicals or surgery. If the figurehead dies they go on. They probably don't even know whom they work for anymore and why. The Agent (if they know who they work for which is very, very doubtful) may go to ground. The operative keeps doing their job its all they now know. I feel your thinking of them as being far to autonomous; they are vet troops who have been forever altered into order receiving machines that will die on command. Or am I reading the wrong rules here? |
This assessment of the Operative has to be wrong IMO. When you create an operative you are taking your very best people and giving them highly specialised training. Any "programming" or "conditioning" they are given is to make sure they don't crack under interrogation (and maybe boost their innate loyalty to the aff) and some implants to allow the aff to terminate the operative (which the Operative may not even be aware of).
The Operative has to be able to think for himself considering the range of tasks he has to perform - from entering a base and recruiting Agents, to espionage and Sabotage. If an Operative was merely a brainwashed automaton then we would use mercs or meklan for the job. These are highly skilled, loyal and very motivated people working for a cause they believe in passionately.
Agents are a different issue. They will work for a variety of reasons - cash, idealism, revenge, thrills - its just a case of appealing to their particular requirements. In the end they are just members of the colony staff whose loyalties are questionable at best.
| QUOTE (nortonweb @ Mar 1 2004, 05:29 AM) |
| The operative keeps doing their job its all they now know. I feel your thinking of them as being far to autonomous; they are vet troops who have been forever altered into order receiving machines that will die on command. Or am I reading the wrong rules here? |
There IS a difference between what the rules state and how Operatives are actually played (especially the section about them dying before revealing who they work for... Trust me on this one!)
As far as applying broad strokes to how Ops are actually recruited, trained and employed - I think that would be disingenious to the various Affs. I somehow do not think that the DTR would employ such draconian and permanent measures upon their Ops, the rabid individualists of the DOM would never stand for it and the thought of the DNA using "surgery" to keep their Ops in line is laughable at best
Programming, Brain Washing, and Loyalty surgery would all fall under the umbrella of "Operative Kit" and it would be up to the various Affs to research each particular application that best suits their profile. As it stands, WMB, DNA, IMP and other "low-tech" Affs
can have the same effective Operatives as anyone else, so the LOWEST COMMON DENOMINATOR must be applied for each and every Aff until such time as they research more advanced means. Everyone has Pulse Beams, Missiles and Space Fighters, but a good number of Affs have taken the steps to improve upon those systems. The same goes for Operatives.And to further add to the thread - Operatives CANNOT be transferred from one Political to another in the game. If they are that closely tied to the Political that created them that they cannot be transferred to another "Handler" then they should go away once that handler has expired irregardless of who now runs the "home office". A new political would have a new political number and it would be the EXACT same as transferring the Op to another political.
...and just to throw some more salt into the mix: To those that say that a Political Position has a trusted cadre of staff that can take up the slack if they are killed - who says that an Assassin killed just one person, and not the entire staff...? Would make sense based upon the difficulty of the mission...
Cheers,
Rich Fanning
aka
Lord Lawrence Scrimm
CIA Intelligence Director
However, there has to be a suitable sting to the death of a politcal position or assasinations are a waste of time. Personally, I like to think that all personal knowledge is lost by the political. This makes sense as there are hundreds of reasons why the information would be personal to the politcal. Plus it would encourage the share of information either to the aff, or other senior positions.
Loss of agents and operatives seems a valid point. If you compare this situation to the Godfather films. On the death of the Don, all his contacts (agents) were lost, even though the rest of the family knew who they were. Also, his button men (operatives), began to break away. It makes sense that something similar would happen with the politcal positions in this game.
Positions. I feel quite strongly that all positions should be lost following politcal death. That aff owned positions should return to the aff, going to the next in line. Player owned positions should automatically convert to aff owned and go to the next in line.
Loss of politcal actions for a week is a bit of a non-starter, as it doesn't really mean much. Likewise a lose of 10% cash is a small amount. The loss of a much larger amount would be more valid.
Personally, I would like to see assasinations occur very infrequently, but that when they do occur it causes a major headache to the aff involved.
| QUOTE (DMJ @ Mar 1 2004, 04:52 PM) |
Personally, I would like to see assasinations occur very infrequently, but that when they do occur it causes a major headache to the aff involved. |
Major headache is one thing, but losing vast amounts of information accumulated over many years of playing the game is another thing.
A balance has to be struck or players who have lost their politicals could leave the game altogether cos they have lost everything they have spent so much time and RL money on.
Just an outside observation.
weenie
I have little to add to my previous mail about how politicals should keep their secrets to the grave if they wish so.
The fact that starship crews, for example, might remember the location of a starbase is a valid argument but it is not, as was also mentioned above, reflected in the game mechanics.
My opinion is that the information loss should be 100%, with a possibility to re-claim some of it by means of special actions depending on circumstances.
In this way the advantages of sharing information with your aff or at least selected other politicals remain balanced with the advantages of keeping all your secrets to yourself.
The suggestion that all aff owned assets controlled by the assassinated political be passed on to the next in line is a big no no for OOC reasons.
Imagine suddenly being handed control of several bases in one week and being charged £2 per base.Plus the cost of your own positions.That could seriously dent a players account.
I doubt KJC would let you run them for free,even for a week while you convert them to Outposts!!!
I'd go along with '5', except that rather than no turns for a week I'd suggest the dead political's controlled positions take a large efficiency loss instead. They could remain attached to the 'dead' position until transferred to another player, or a new political position belonging to the original player. The dead political couldn't process orders, or receive updates, so wouldn't 'cost' anything - it's only purpose would be to tie together the leaderless positions for game functions.
Aff-owned positions could be transferred within the aff, as at present. Player-owned positions could be transferred from the dead political to a new one; allowed due to them both being under the same account. I suppose there should be some method of going back to being a player, controlling positions without a political at all, too.
This would be the only scenario in which an account might have more than one polital position associated with it - only one of them being alive.
TonyH
Even if option 5 is chosen from the poll, in the long run is that really going to screw your enemies as badly as if you take out their prized (and no better protected) +3 scientists?
| QUOTE |
| I have little to add to my previous mail about how politicals should keep their secrets to the grave if they wish so. The fact that starship crews, for example, might remember the location of a starbase is a valid argument but it is not, as was also mentioned above, reflected in the game mechanics. |
This can also be described by game mechanics. The ship does not need to contain the knowledge of the starbase location. Like with restricted systems that are accessed through Aff knowledge - the ship contacts base and asks for the relevant navigation info to be sent. Its sent, used to calculate the course and then deleted when its no longer needed.
Mica has already stated that blocking of communications is not an issue he will allow in game (already tried that
) so with 100% reliable comms why would you need to store the info in a position if it can be held and distributed centrally?| QUOTE (Sam_Toridan @ Mar 2 2004, 09:46 AM) |
| so with 100% reliable comms why would you need to store the info in a position if it can be held and distributed centrally? |
And if not held centrally a case could be argued for obtaining this kind of information if a position is captured; from interrogating crew to extracting the information from computers...
Can assassins (and other agents/operatives) only work in starbases/outposts? If so, if a political is on a ship can he ever be assassinated? Ok, the ship could get blown up, but a ship is far harder to find, especially if its stealthed, small and moving. A pretty easy way to avoid all the problems of assassination? Surely the greater the danger from assassination, the less likely it is to occur?
If option 5 is chosen....what happens if the political is kidnapped? Say the ship, outpost, base or whatever they are on is captured? Does that mean all cash, knowledge (and positions?) could be taken over by the kidnapper? Or will they die before revealing such things? Seems doubtful they would die first, as veteran agents/operatives can be broken then surely a political could too?
Mark
| QUOTE (Ted @ Mar 1 2004, 10:55 PM) |
| As it seems the vote is going in favour of option 5(which I don't like,but never mind)It looks like a lot of data will be passed across to other politicals very quickly. The suggestion that all aff owned assets controlled by the assassinated political be passed on to the next in line is a big no no for OOC reasons. Imagine suddenly being handed control of several bases in one week and being charged £2 per base.Plus the cost of your own positions.That could seriously dent a players account. I doubt KJC would let you run them for free,even for a week while you convert them to Outposts!!! |
[/QUOTE][QUOTE]
Good idea there Ted. Upon assasination the politicals assets are automatically converted to outposts. Then transfered to the next line.
Evil, but disrupts mass production for a while.
All funds, data, info on agents, etc would be held on file, not in the late political's head. Any computerised system, however secure, would include a back door for access by the system administration in event of this sort of emergency. It would doubtless include controls that would require input from some out of a munber of top level individuals, so unlee the whole administration was wiped out at the same time access would be available as the new incumbent was being installed in the job.
Information held in a safe on hard copy could also be accessed in an emergency, if only by the judicious use of a controlled explosion or a thermic lance
Geoff
| QUOTE (HPSimms @ Mar 3 2004, 02:46 PM) |
| The only bit that makes any sense at all is not being able to submit actions for a week. This would be the result of the new man getting set up. All funds, data, info on agents, etc would be held on file, not in the late political's head. Any computerised system, however secure, would include a back door for access by the system administration in event of this sort of emergency. It would doubtless include controls that would require input from some out of a munber of top level individuals, so unlee the whole administration was wiped out at the same time access would be available as the new incumbent was being installed in the job. Information held in a safe on hard copy could also be accessed in an emergency, if only by the judicious use of a controlled explosion or a thermic lance Geoff |
| QUOTE |
This also assumes that the information your dealing with is simply 'information'
There is the possibility that with the controller of such information dead, it is no longer possible to use such information. Heck, unless the information has been gained by less than savoury motives, it should be easy to get on the new political.
TBH this thread is going round and round with everyone making assumptions. It would be a whole lot easier if the GM could just let us know whether informstion in this game is specific to the political (i.e. no chance of reclaiming upon death) or stored in some form of office. Otherwise we're just gonna umm and ah, for the next couple of months.
| QUOTE (DMJ @ Mar 3 2004, 06:20 PM) |
| TBH this thread is going round and round with everyone making assumptions. It would be a whole lot easier if the GM could just let us know whether informstion in this game is specific to the political (i.e. no chance of reclaiming upon death) or stored in some form of office. |
The problem here is that the correct answer is that the storage of the information is largely dependent on the type of information and the type of person storing it.
Do you even need to kill the political to destroy the information? What about a 101 contingency plans.....
The point with this discussion is not to pin down how information is stored, what justification there is to each point but to decide on what can only really be a game mechanic that feels right irrespective of its believability.
A simple solution on the info side will be to ensure that all information is made available to the Affiliation. Particularly sensitive data can be limited to one or more other politicals, assuming you have some you trust <g>.
Geoff
| QUOTE (HPSimms @ Mar 5 2004, 03:06 PM) |
| My problem is that it does not feel right, believeable or otherwise. A simple solution on the info side will be to ensure that all information is made available to the Affiliation. Particularly sensitive data can be limited to one or more other politicals, assuming you have some you trust <g>. Geoff |
That why I suggested all info not flagged as AFF knowledge is lost on a politicals death. This seems the simplest solution and covers most concerns.
If you decide your aff has back ups of data available in case of political death, flag the info as aff or as Geoff, says share it with a few trusted politicals. For the 1 man affs their political data can automatically be flagged as AFF knowledge.
This gives a decent reward for those who have invested the time in money to bump off a political while allowing affs ways to safeguard critical data.
| QUOTE |
| For the 1 man affs their political data can automatically be flagged as AFF knowledge. |
I agree with Mr Toridan on his post (preceeding) accept for this point.
Single player affs should still obey the same rules - if I don't set it to Aff Knowledge then I'm taking more risks than the affs with a bigger player base. I also still have to option of trusting another political position - just not one within my one-player aff.
Small affs are more at risk all round, and I see no reason to make an exception for this point - it's part of the fun of being small and fury. Well, small anyway.
| QUOTE (HPSimms @ Mar 3 2004, 06:46 AM) |
| All funds, data, info on agents, etc would be held on file, not in the late political's head. Any computerised system, however secure, would include a back door for access by the system administration in event of this sort of emergency. It would doubtless include controls that would require input from some out of a munber of top level individuals, so unlee the whole administration was wiped out at the same time access would be available as the new incumbent was being installed in the job. Information held in a safe on hard copy could also be accessed in an emergency, if only by the judicious use of a controlled explosion or a thermic lance |
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE use this option!!!!
That will make my job SO much easier! If a case is made that there are backups, backdoors and other various methods of keeping information around so that information can be transferred to new politicals, then this raises the bugbear that my Ops can ALSO gain access to this information. I have Ops that can Hack Computer systems (finding backdoors), Agents that can compromise security overrides and Saboteurs that can crack into safes. No matter the security, there will ALWAYS be a way to circumvent it. If it's secure in the politicals head, then there is less a chance that it can get out where it should not...
If all information is capable of being handed instantly to a new political, then that information is going to be a whole lot easier to discover by people you may not necessarily want knowing about it
Cheers,
Rich Fanning
aka
Lord Lawrence Scrimm
CIA Intelligence Director
We could have the location of such data shown on political turns.It doesn't have to be in the politicals location.
I doubt heads of state now carry all their secrets round with them.Too much of a security risk.
Just remember my CIA friend,you too could be a victim of such theft!
Aff data - safe, secure and does not go when you die (but of course the whole aff knows about it)
Personal data - in your head, nobody else can find out about it, BUT it dies with the political
Archived data - still only you know about it (not the aff) and it does not get lost if your political dies - but it is available for hacking, etc. if an operative finds out where you are
Dan