Previously, I talked about the idea of basing a Torg Eternity game before the events of the Invasion of Core Earth. These sorts of games present specific challenges, given that they have to operate outside of the established continuity of the metaplot, but the setting has certain advantages, in that different aspects of the game can be introduced more slowly.
The first of these pre-Invasion models has the characters start out as agents of a domestic intelligence agency. Being American, I’m going to focus on which options could be explored within the United States, but there’s no reason that these ideas couldn’t be applied to other countries. (In all truth, a group of Interpol agents would be far better as a parent agency, given the locality of many of the invading forces, but my familiarity with international criminal investigations and procedure is pretty limited.)
Within the context of the US, there are a host of various agencies that could be used, depending on how narrow a focus the GM wanted for his game. For example, the Secret Service would be brought in for things like cybercrime, which could implicate agents of Tharkold or the Cyberpapacy, as well as financial manipulation and conspiracies, which would be the province of Pan-Pacific agents. Similarly, cybercrime could be handed off to the Department of Homeland Security in certain instances, as well as the National Security Agency, depending on how the GM wanted to handle things. Really, you could set a game with the National Park Service, if you wanted to get really creative.
For our purposes, let’s focus on the big two – the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Officially, these agencies focus respectively on domestic and international intelligence and law enforcement, but functionally there is enough flexibility and overlap that they could undertake missions outside of their stated areas. And well, the introduction of the Delphi Council into the mix allows something of a weirder loosening of operational profiles.
Any FBI game would properly be set in Washington, DC, with the characters answering to a Deputy Director who would assign them certain cases to investigate. A CIA game would follow similar ideas, but properly this sort of game would be set abroad, with the characters investigating foreign threats. Where exactly these assignments would be depends upon the GM and their personal interests, but Europe and the Middle East would be fantastic locations, given their proximity to the eventual Invasions, as would China, South Korea or Japan.
Mind you, with the establishment of the Delphi Council in a pre-Invasion Core Earth, there would be a number of operational changes to how agencies like the FBI and CIA would logically work. The easiest way would be to set the game up in a proper conspiracy-oriented environment, where shadowy figures offer all manner of whispered advice to the agents, hinting at what sort of actual events are going on behind the scenes. Unnamed “consultants” would be present at briefings, given obvious aliases, and accorded far more power than would otherwise make sense.
How the conspiracy actually works would be up to the individual GM, but the most logical framework to build around the characters would be to have either Quin Sebastian or one of his representatives take on the role of the consultant to the character’s Deputy Director. The “well-informed” shadowy figures could be Pan-Pacifica, Cyberpapist, or Tharkoldu agents that are trying to leverage connections with the intelligence agencies for information. (It should be noted that, while Tharkoldu cyberdemons are pretty obviously inhuman, the humans of the Cosm are not. It has yet to be revealed if they use magic like they did in the original game, but if this is the case, there are also illusion spells that could be used to disguise a cyberdemon as a normal person.)
According to the background lore in Torg, the High Lords prepared for their Invasions by sending out various scouting missions to assess the lay of the land and prepare the area for the Axiom Wash of the Maelstrom Bridge. Some, like the street corner missionaries in France, were pretty obvious to anyone paying attention. Others, like the edeinos scouts for the Living Land, had to stay hidden while they moved about Core Earth.
This sort of interdimensional espionage would play best to the strengths of governmental law enforcement, where the characters could unravel complex plots against their government, only to discover that the plots were even larger and more sinister than they had assumed.
Adventure Ideas
Arms Shipments and Domestic Terrorism
It’s been established in the original Torg setting that Kanawa (Pan-Pacifica) is a major player in the business of international arms and vehicles. Brought forward into a pre-Invasion setting, this could take the form of having Pan-Pacific agents supplying would-be domestic terrorists and instructing them on different avenues of armed revolt. While their Invasion is concentrated in Japan, China and Korea, it’s not out of character for the different High Lords to conspire against each other. Having extremely well-organized and paranoid sects of people with high end weaponry to fight back against the edeinos would go a long way to entangling the Living Land Invasion.
For a CIA-based game, this would simply entail the discovery of new arms shipments to specific areas ahead of a foreseen Invasion. Suddenly, rebels in parts of the Middle East or Russia would have access to much better materiel than they previously might have, and the source traces back to a couple of questionable Asian gentlemen.
Mysterious Middle Eastern Diplomats
The Nile Empire is a dangerous foe, and the pulp origins of the setting imply diabolical schemes with long-ranging and unforeseen contingencies. Wu Han, the overgovernor of Cairo, is specifically modeled on Sax Rohmer’s Dr. Fu Manchu, so he’s expected to have labyrinthine plots that the characters are forced to detangle. This plays well into the conspiracy angle of a proper FBI or CIA game, where the characters would observe sinister figures with diplomatic ties moving through different social circles and stirring up trouble. This could work equally well for either domestic or foreign games, where the new figures would pop up at Embassy functions and enact plots.
Investigating these people would turn up all manner of intelligence secrets that could turn attention to the discreet efforts of other High Lords by revealing their scouts. In doing so, this would slow down the efforts of the Invasion by entangling the forward agents. (In the original Torg, Pan-Pacifica agents were responsible for helping the Russian military repel the Invasion of Tharkold. Obviously, this didn’t happen this time, but similar efforts could definitely monkeywrench other High Lords.)
Artifact Looting
The most powerful tools that Storm Knights have at their disposal to fight the Invasion are Eternity Shards. Naturally, it is in the best interests of the High Lords to remove these artifacts from being acquired by the Storm Knights. Since most of the Eternity Shards are recognizable artifacts and relics of historical import, a good portion of them have ended up in the different museums of the world. And while it’s not specifically the mission of agencies like the FBI or CIA to investigate museum heists, they would logically be in cities where these thefts would take place. (And if there came a directive from the as-yet-unrevealed Delphi Council to intercede on one of these thefts…)
This would also be an excellent opportunity for the above-mentioned shadowy diplomats to direct the player characters toward the activities of enemy agents. Properly, the diplomats would then send other agents to double-cross the player characters and steal the artifacts, just to keep things real.
Weird Happenings and Weirder Allies
Not all of the pre-Invasion incursions have to be hostile, of course. Sometimes, allies from some of the other dimensions could send agents to Core Earth to attempt to warn people. In the original edition, this was a power of Eternity Shards, but it has been replaced by an Omega Clearance ability (as seen in the Beta Clearance Guide that was provided to the Kickstarter backers) that allows an experienced character to be reborn in a new form in another dimension. Otherwise, they could sneak across dimensional lines with enemy agents.
These could take nearly any form, depending on the area. Eyewitness accounts and anonymous tips could lead FBI agents to a remote area to investigate weird happenings, only to find a number of edeinos optants trying to figure out how to get the locals to listen to them. Ayslish agents could be blending in at a local fantasy convention, only to get into a confrontation with someone and have the authorities called for a couple stray Altered Fireballs. The same could happen with a Mystery Man from the Nile Empire, whose raygun prop ended up accidentally destroying a booth at the local comic con. Recruitment of these trans-dimensional agents to the Delphi Council would bring the characters closer to the heart of the conspiracy as well, which would be a significant point in the campaign, especially since the information that these individuals carry with them would reveal much of what is coming.
Reuben Beattie
Latest posts by Reuben Beattie (see all)
- Legend of the Five Rings – Beginner Game - November 15, 2018
