Classified Information in Play

[AlexanderHowl]

Some, let us say that you have a player who is playing a PC with Top Secret Clearance. Let us say that the PC is given access to Top Secret information and decides to share it with a sexy member of their preferred gender in order to impress them. Let us then say that the person that they were trying to impress was an undercover CIA, FBI, NCIS, etc (don't laugh too hard, NCIS was well known for doing this in San Diego).

What do you do as the GM? Do you have the campaign about the PC trying desperately to avoid prison? Or do you gloss over the potential threat to national security?

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

What do you do as the GM? Do you have the campaign about the PC trying desperately to avoid prison? Or do you gloss over the potential threat to national security?

I had a similar problem with a Transhuman Space game that I ran, which eventually devolved into one of my worst gaming failures. The player of the captain of a Royal Navy SDV kept doing things that really should have resulted in court martial, culminating with an atrocity (he fired the particle cannon at a civilian asteroid). So definitely don't gloss over it, because this kind of thing can only get worse.

I should have taken that player aside and talked to him about how his actions are going to have consequences and maybe he could be a little more professional or perhaps play a different character. Instead apparently I came across as telling him he's playing his character wrong.

On the other hand, if it doesn't sabotage the game, trying to avoid prison makes a pretty good spy story (really all the good spy stories). So maybe ask the players how they feel about that direction for campaign.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

What do you do as the GM?

Depends on where I want to steer the campaign.


But I wouldn't gloss over anything. Unless it was that sort of campaign.

[patchwork]

Didn't I have a plan when the campaign started, which the PCs knew about in vague outline and signed on for? Which option better supports the plan we all agreed to in the beginning?

In the absence of a plan, I would probably gloss over it, long and ill-timed questioning sessions, ass-chewing from superior, and a Quirk "ineligible for promotion", perhaps. At worst, force them to spend a fair bit of money hiring a lawyer. I've found Top Secret documents while cleaning my living room. My clearance was only Secret. There were no consequences for anyone. The important stuff presumably has code words attached to it and actual vetting; holding back the flow of the merely TS is something like bailing out a sinking ship using a teaspoon. If an example was to be made of him, it's because he ****** off people in wider ways than this little peccadillo.

[AlexanderHowl]

Originally Posted by patchwork

Didn't I have a plan when the campaign started, which the PCs knew about in vague outline and signed on for? Which option better supports the plan we all agreed to in the beginning?

In the absence of a plan, I would probably gloss over it, long and ill-timed questioning sessions, ass-chewing from superior, and a Quirk "ineligible for promotion", perhaps. At worst, force them to spend a fair bit of money hiring a lawyer. I've found Top Secret documents while cleaning my living room. My clearance was only Secret. There were no consequences for anyone. The important stuff presumably has code words attached to it and actual vetting; holding back the flow of the merely TS is something like bailing out a sinking ship using a teaspoon. If an example was to be made of him, it's because he ****** off people in wider ways than this little peccadillo.

It made my bowels clinch when you said you found TS documents in your living room. I knew people who were given OTH discharges for getting caught taking Secret documents home for studying and knew people who went to jail for losing TS documents in their possession. Of course, that was a couple decades ago, when Secret and TS meant something and was not applied to everything up to and including cafeteria menus.

[Refplace]

Not laughing, when I was in the service OSI did the same thing, though the time I ran into it it was much more casual.

I also would not gloss over it. PC actions should have consequences, otherwise there are no stakes and you lose a lot of the tension and excitement for the game.
I'm not saying I wont fudge a die roll or adjust an encounter to avoid a TPK, but its more a last resort. So I would inform the player about possible consequences based on his skills and knowledge. If he chooses to go ahead then he made an informed choice and its all on him.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Refplace

Not laughing, when I was in the service OSI did the same thing, though the time I ran into it it was much more casual.

I also would not gloss over it. PC actions should have consequences, otherwise there are no stakes and you lose a lot of the tension and excitement for the game.
I'm not saying I wont fudge a die roll or adjust an encounter to avoid a TPK, but its more a last resort. So I would inform the player about possible consequences based on his skills and knowledge. If he chooses to go ahead then he made an informed choice and its all on him.

The general problem is when player actions have consequences that will tank the whole campaign. What do you do then?

I think the right answer is talk to the player and if that fails boot them.

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

The general problem is when player actions have consequences that will tank the whole campaign. What do you do then?

I think the right answer is talk to the player and if that fails boot them.

I agree. Talking with the player is a must.
Booting may occur but if the players going to get everyone else sidelined (prison) or dead without their agency I feel justified in some shenanigans to mitigate the effects for them.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Refplace

I agree. Talking with the player is a must.
Booting may occur but if the players going to get everyone else sidelined (prison) or dead without their agency I feel justified in some shenanigans to mitigate the effects for them.

Yeah, I think the best, if it gets that bad is to send the offending character to prison off-stage and get on with the game with the remaining players. Which is what I should have done in my game.

[Brandy]

What I would do, off the top of my head, is something like have the CIA agent at some future date use the incident as leverage over the PC. They would then have to decide whether to help the agent do some sketchy thing to come clean to their superiors and try and set the agent up or something like that.

That sets up a situation with a dilemma that's powered by player choice, not just where they are at the whim of powerful outside figures like the courts.