(Mods, I'm not sure where this goes but feel free to move it)

As many of you don't know, I'm running a campaign based on kyle's Osere setting. Osere (in my campaign anyway) is a semi legal multinational security firm dealing with espionage (corporate and international) and grounded in realpolitik of the most dubious kind - is there any other kind, well no.

Field operatives are recruited from all over the world and almost always former military or espionage personnel. When they are not, they are from underworld  organizations or so-called unfriendly groups of certain nations. Osere prides itself with associating with professionals and for the most part they do, however, most recruitment are from individuals who realize that Osere is the last chance for them, being that they have lost their jobs with their former masters for various personal or professional reasons or in some cases lost faith in the causes they fought for.

So what you get are highly individual operatives with differents creeds and levels of professionalism forced to work together in units, operating around the world.

My campaign deals with the South African branch and revolves around the turf war between Hani Salaam ,former head of Jordanian intelligence and newly appointed, director of Special Projects  and Karen Hayes, former National Security Adviser to an unnamed President of the United States, and current head (African division) of the most powerful (and feared and off the books) division of Osere -  The Bureau of Sabotage.

The PCs are naturally caught in the middle. That's just little back story. What I want to write about is the interior lives of player characters. Here's what happened.

The PCs (all members of Special Projects Retrieval unit (hopefully kyle can help a brother out and post a link to a real world company involved in retrieving "big" toys) under orders from Hayes (long story) had retrieved a vehicle (from a deadbeat CEO) which was of immense value to Hani. This normally would not be such a big deal but due to certain obligations owed to Hani (even longer story), they realized they had to steal the vehicle from Osere and deliver it to Hani's operatives. Of course this is a very bad idea. Osere deals with betrayal in a way that would give the most virulent Jihadist, an attack of conscience.

Now, there was no way they could steal the vehicle from Osere's holding facility. What they realized they had to do, was to steal it on route back to Osere's client. A risky proposition for various reasons , the least of which was the internal witch hunt  that would ensure. But their obligation to Hani, superseded any Osere fallout.

Now stealing the vehicle back from Osere themselves was an option but one they didn't want to risk. They knew this was a favor to Hayes and she would be relentless in tracking down whoever was involved with the help of the Cousins (slang for Internal Affairs). If ever they were implicated.....

So they decided that they would outsource this particular project to reliable comrades. They settled on crew who were the close associates of the leader of their group, a vicious half French/Tamil Sri Lankan expatriate :

Osere NPC : What were you doing before joining Osere ?

Vicious Bitch Leader : I served in Sri Lanka

ONPC : Doing what ?

VBL : Nation building

Right, this particular crew were a close knit group of siblings and friends. Although they operated beyond the fringes of the law, they were basically honorable thieves. Their main rule was : No Killing. They were professional thieves, not professional killers. Because of this and the fact that they had known criminal connections (unpredictable Russians), firms like Osere, the big cash payoff contracts were not an option for them.

So instead of just letting the PCs hire them and make a few rolls I thought I would allow the players to play these NPCs and make an adventure out of it. You now, an exciting side trek from the main plot line. Have a bit of fun. Play other characters. Let the setting breathe a bit. It's a big world out there and here are folks other than yourselves.

Hey, what now, you guys think it's a great idea (I game with the best group in the world, yay me !) and have a few suggestions ( all this while rolling up stats) about character and back story - sounds great.

So there we were, for three whole sessions, the players ditching their characters for these new ones. And what a close knit group they were. I even developed a new part of the fictional South African city, to add a little more space. The players really got into character, creating amusing and substantive relationship between the characters. There was even a subplot involving vicious Russian gangsters.

These characters were all about family obligations and friendship. They were honorable. What was important to them was that  they were doing this because they made some bad choices and were hoping to make enough money to get out of this shithole life and move on to better things.

And all this came from the players themselves. This was not a simple diversion but rather a complex beast, with characters of depth. And they did this within a few sessions. And best of all, the players wanted a soundtrack. Ok, it was basically pop - Stones (Rolling and Stone), Beatles, good stuff.

And the action. We really out did ourselves. Regular Osere adventures were  toned down affairs. Gritty as opposed to action adventure (can you dig it?). But this here was Fast & Furious  type shit. Jumping from moving vehicles. High Speed car chases (not in public though, most of the action occurred at night), shootouts that defied reality but made movie sense and one liners from over payed Hollywood hacks.

VLB played the honorable leader of the crew - a Gulf war vet (first one) who had a tender if complicated relationship with his compassionate but drug addicted younger fast driving (Master of Wheels) brother (essayed by another player) the rest of the players had equally compelling characters. It was great fun.

They managed to pull of this really cool but highly improbable plan and managed to steal the vehicle. And best of all, they did this without any killing. They snuffed out a some nasty gangsters, though. But the thinking was that these Osere types were "not the bad guys".....they are like us.

To be honest we kinda of forgot about the regular characters. My players were having a great time with this bunch. It was all just spontaneous. Like I said, good rpg stuff.

The crew meet the Osere PCs (which is where I took over the characters). In the background that song which title I always forget is playing....

My heart goes boom , boom, boom.


VLB is actually smiling, holding the briefcase stuffed with laundered cash. A new life. Everyone is happy. Jokes and one liners from me and them flying back and forth.

My heart goes boom, boom, boom

Then as she hands Mr. Cool Honorable guy the cash, VLB shoots him in the face. I can't remember exactly when the others started shooting. I'm sure it would not have made a difference with all the penalties my "crew" had incurred.

My heart goes boom, boom, boom

Hani Salaam once said that if you wanted to make moves in this game, you have understand that there were only survivors and dead men. Of course one of the smart ass players said -obviously.

Hani shakes his head condescendingly, being a survivor does not mean you win and being dead doesn't mean you lose.

Personally I think he's wrong.

All I could say to my players who honestly didn't understand my confusion was :

BUT THE CHARACTERS HAD INTERIOR LIVES ! WHY ?WHY ?

So, kyle, you wanted to know how my Osere game was coming along. That was a little taste.

Regards,
David R

Awesome! A bit hard to follow in parts, needs fleshing out.

I'm impressed that my little campaign summary / adventure outline inspired this.

I wanted to understand, and I have in parts... I received the excited vibe for sure. Otherwise it's very difficult to follow for me.

Sorry guys. I always do this stream of consciousness type thing which is absolutely terrible for describing games. It's simple really. The PCs hired this gang to steal something for them and instead of just rolling to see if the gang succeded, I allowed the players to role play the gang. They played this gang for three sessions, completed the mission and had so much fun.
When it come time for their regular PCs to pay them, they chose to butcher the gang they hired instead.

Again, my apologies for the rather confusing OP

Regards,
David R

The song was Solsbury Hill, by Peter Gabriel.  That's the third line in the chorus.  Unless of course there's another song out there with that line, which is entirely possible.

Don't apologize David. I had a little trouble identifying who played who but otherwise it sounds like marrow on toast with a glass of Pessac-Léognan.

Did any form of guilt show in the original PCs for the massacre?

Quote from: boulet;325725Did any form of guilt show in the original PCs for the massacre?

Well, they felt a bit bad that I got attached to the "other" PCs. They assumed I knew of the bloodbath that was coming because we had all agreed on the tone of the campaign. They had created some very damaged characters and this was the natural out come of the situation with the hired hands. They loved playing those characters but that's what it was to them, an exciting side trek from the real game.

Regards,
David R

I meant about PCs guilt, not the players. They're just tough cold blooded bastards?

Good question,boulet. My mistake.

Well two sessions have passed and none of them have shown any remorse or guilt. But there's a sense of "how far will we go" , that may have roots in the massacre. After all this was a killing that they conspired and carried out all by themselves and not an objective that had anything to do with their employment. And yes these characters are cold blooded bastards/bitches.

Regards,
David R

So, what was the actual purpose of blowing away the gangsters?

They were not gangsters, they were honorable thieves. They did not want any witnesses or evidence of their betrayal. One thing I have noticed about this campaign, is that there is an almost obsessive attention to detail. Eveything is planned. Not surprising since these PCs are high end hijackers. I try to throw in an least one "mission" every two or three sessions, but it get really technical/tactical (in a fun way) because they plan everything. They scope out targets, have practice runs etc. It's kinda of funny though, they leave nothing to chance but at the end of the day it's about rolling dice.

Regards,
David R

Wow, a party who plans things, if only we could all have such gamers

I find myself reminded of the movie Taken, which I saw last night. Totally relentless and ruthless. I liked it

Funny thing kyle, all the players think that this film is way cool (leaving aside any sub textual analysis) and .... well just the kind of conscious brutality that permeates this particular campaign. They loved the "translation" exercise that Neeson's character pulled off, in the film..."that's so Osere style" they said.

Regards,
David R

See, that's just the kind of thing I like to do in a game session.

Unfortunately, GMs often do not reward that kind of thinking, being unprepared for it. "Uh... nothing happens." And hardly anyone runs espionage games anyway.

Sigh.

Funny you should say that kyle. The PCs decided that actually hijacking back items was getting too dangerous - who wants to be shot at ? - so they decided they would bribe, blackmail etc anyone who had access to those items.

See, with all the lethal inter office politics and spending more time trying to figure which side to take in the turf war between the two main players in this particular Osere branch, I guess actually doing the job you are being paid for becomes secondary.

I thought why not? For two sessions things went as planned. They discovered the weak link in the security detail or family of the people possessing the items and blackmailed or bribed them into delivering the items to Osere. This freed them up to do other things.

Then this last session, their blackmail attempt on the head of security of an Indian steel magnate (with dodgy connections to the Serbian mob) who was down to his last 16 billion, didn't go as planned.

The head of security, a  Frenchman and former operative of DST: Directorate of Territorial Security - (Direction de la surveillance du territoire ), was banging the magnate's 16 year old daughter, was supposed to be the weak link, but intead turned the tables on them.

They made a couple of mistakes - unusual for them. They allowed him to have a day to consider their offer - "Give us the yacht or we will tell daddy what you have been up to with his precious virginal daughter" and they let down their guard by not covering their tracks.

So in that one day, this Frenchman discovered who they were but more importantly who they worked for. So he told them to go fuck themselves and he would dissapear but not before letting his employer know what they were up to and blowing their cover on the streets thereby making them worthless to Osere.

So now, not only have they got to get this yacht, they also have to contend with a head of security who knows what they are up to.

Regards,
David R