Running Law Enforcement/Investigation Adventures

[SpaceBadger]

I'm looking at this from the law enforcement point of view, but a lot of these considerations apply to running a game for a group of criminals.

What do you do as far as laying down ground rules for investigation techniques and possibilities? Half of what we see on CSI shows is science-fiction anyway, beyond what can really be expected in an investigation. How do we project what tools will be available at TL12-15, both for the investigators and the criminals?

One of the fundamental principles you read about in procedurals and hear mentioned multiple times on TV is how contact leaves traces both ways: a person who has been somewhere leaves traces on that place, and it leaves traces on him; a person in contact with another person leaves traces of that contact, and vice versa.

Players in a game where this stuff is important need to know the rules they are working with. Do the investigators have a magic gadget that can scan a room and reliably identify anyone who has been in there within certain parameters? If so, is there some means of defeating this, such as wearing a clean vaccsuit that may leave traces of where it was last cleaned, but nothing about who is inside the suit?

Or do we just take our cues from CSI shows today, much of which can't be done today but might reasonably be possible by TL10-12?

What about lasers? Murder victim shot in the face with a laser, is there any sign left on the body that lets you match to the weapon that did it?

Surveillance cams? Are they defeated by simply wearing a mask, or do they record in some way that allows reviewers to see through the mask? If the camera gets zapped, is it out of commission, or is there a whole cloud of micro-cams or nano-cams that transmit to a processor that puts the picture together like data from a very large array?

I'm just throwing out some examples where it is important for both sides to know the tools and countermeasures the other side has available.

How have you handled this in Traveller games, or how you suggest handling it?

 

[Lycanorukke]

How do we project what tools will be available at TL12-15, both for the investigators and the criminals?

For lower end of the tech, extrapolate what we have today. Bring along a holographic camera robot, and the investigators can reconstruct the crime scene on a holodeck arrangement. If the resolution is fine enough you may look at things from any angle, move things out of the way etc.[/quote]

One of the fundamental principles you read about in procedurals and hear mentioned multiple times on TV is how contact leaves traces both ways: a person who has been somewhere leaves traces on that place, and it leaves traces on him; a person in contact with another person leaves traces of that contact, and vice versa.

A specialised biosniffer could do this. Have a clean robot suck in the rooms atmosphere and analyze the contents. Atmosphere mix, skin flakes could be extensively analysed and recorded. It wouldn't make matches right away unless the world kept DNA profiles but it could eliminate races etc. ("That hairs not Vargr, its a Dandelion")

Players in a game where this stuff is important need to know the rules they are working with. Do the investigators have a magic gadget that can scan a room and reliably identify anyone who has been in there within certain parameters?

The big one here is contamination. If the body is on a public street finding relevant evidence wouldn't be easy. Also the investigators themselves have to avoid contaminating the scene (CSI is notorious for doing this - lets flip our hair dramatically, touch and rub ourselves on everything and stomp around the area in our fashionable clothing ignoring details like scene integrity)

If so, is there some means of defeating this, such as wearing a clean vaccsuit that may leave traces of where it was last cleaned, but nothing about who is inside the suit?

A small way I worked with in other games is a 'contaminaiton bomb'. A ball which squirts out an aerosol of 'pure junk'. DNA fragments, odd gasses, random fluff, etc. A biosniffer would melt down trying to make sense of all the garbage. The 'real evidence' in there - just cloaked by crap. A needle in a needle stack.

What about lasers? Murder victim shot in the face with a laser, is there any sign left on the body that lets you match to the weapon that did it?

Hole size gives you the bore, which chemical reactions occured gives you the energy levels, depth of the hole as to how close once energy is known, 'splash' on how focussed it was, etc. Maybe not enough to exactly identify the weapon, but enough to know the make and model.

Also dont forget the aliens - have yourself a Vargr on the force. A 'police dog' with the nose of an 'old fashioned' police dog, with brains to know what its doing, and able to communicate about what it detects would be a nightmare for old time drug smugglers.

 

[BillDowns]

Have you seen Almost Human? A lot of the wealthier criminals in that show have a necklace or earbug thing that throws up an interference screen concealing the face from cameras. I can see that at TL 11+ easily.

 

[JimMarn]

Something I see missing in books or shows that have people getting killed by laser. The type of laser; x-ray, gamma ray, or coherent light; will make a difference in type of damage. If coherent light ones are cheap and small and x-ray ones big and bulky they would be rarer. And kills done by x-ray lasers would be easier to spot, plus any witnesses or security cameras, would see a heavy lifter coming into an area before the killing.

 

[ShapeShifter]

What about lasers? Murder victim shot in the face with a laser, is there any sign left on the body that lets you match to the weapon that did it?

Battlestar Galactica, "Murder on the Rising Star" dealt with this very issue, and quite effectively, I might add.

 

[CosmicGamer]

How have you handled this in Traveller games, or how you suggest handling it?

I know this doesn't help much, but I tend to stay away from heavy investigation and follow the clues type scenarios as it often highlights the players abilities to investigate and pick up on things more so that the characters.

To me, to be properly character driven, there would be little player involvement as it would all be the GM telling the player what the character does and does not know based on their abilities and rolls.

I'm not trying to rain on your parade, just something to keep in mind - what does the character know how to do and what do they discover and deduce.

 

[SpaceBadger]

I know this doesn't help much, but I tend to stay away from heavy investigation and follow the clues type scenarios as it often highlights the players abilities to investigate and pick up on things more so that the characters.

To me, to be properly character driven, there would be little player involvement as it would all be the GM telling the player what the character does and does not know based on their abilities and rolls.

I'm not trying to rain on your parade, just something to keep in mind - what does the character know how to do and what do they discover and deduce.

I agree this is a problem to balance sometimes. When it has come up, I tend to point out things that the PC notices, and things that the PC's training suggests might be worth further scrutiny, and let the Player take it from there. And if a Player asks, "With my PC's [skill] training, what would he conclude from looking at A, B, and C?" I will roll and give suggestions.

The difficulty is giving the Player the advantage of the PC's skills, while not making it a railroad. (I have certainly BTDT on the Player side with a GM who wanted me to figure out how to defuse a bomb, which I personally had no knowledge of, while my PC was an expert with Demo-4!!! I wanted to roll using my PC's skill, but this GM insisted that I actually tell him which wires would be cut, etc. o

Thanks to everyone for the suggestions, and I hope we can keep this thread going with more discussion. I have lately been watching old episodes of CSI:NY on Netflix, and a lot of what they do seems at least a TL or more beyond reality, which started my speculation as to 1) what forensics tech at higher TLs might be, and 2) how to handle PC knowledge and skill in such things, which the Player wouldn't actually know.

 

[SpaceBadger]

Have you seen Almost Human? A lot of the wealthier criminals in that show have a necklace or earbug thing that throws up an interference screen concealing the face from cameras. I can see that at TL 11+ easily.

I keep meaning to check that show out on Hulu, but haven't yet. Will move that up in priority on my "can't sleep" list.

 

[SpaceBadger]

A related problem to the above is overly-competent NPCs, and avoiding having their skills (while necessary to the adventure) not overshadow the PCs or turn into a railroad device of "you need to go here, do this, look at that".

I'm facing a problem like that currently in my SBRD campaign (links in sig). The truth is that the NPCs Nero and Heather, with maybe one extra shooter, could realistically solve and resolve the current situation all by themselves, but that would not be much fun for the PCs. So I pretty much restrict Nero to providing resources, and Heather to providing info-dumps out of which the PCs have to decide what is important to follow up on. I will be more careful in the future about such NPCs.

 

[CosmicGamer]

Have you seen Almost Human? A lot of the wealthier criminals in that show have a necklace or earbug thing that throws up an interference screen concealing the face from cameras. I can see that at TL 11+ easily.

I saw it but had to take things with a grain of salt.
Quote on the tech:

Flash Masks are an aerosol spray which when sprayed on a person's face causes a bright white light to be emitted when they are viewed via camera over the area which has been sprayed. A person's visage is still recognizable to a human eye.

Like most of the show, the example above is an example of both a lack of TL parity, understanding of technology, and lack of tech imersion. Of course, it is a TV show so it does whatever necessary to produce the outcome it wants - realism is rare in TV.

TL parity: high tech programs analyzing the camera feeds would immediately determine there was an issue and raise an alarm. I'd think something better than current day convenience store tech would be applicable.

Lack of tech immersion: For this example, they could have mentioned legal uses of the tech. Privacy, like not wanting to be captured tanning at the beach.

Understanding Technology: There may be something I'm not thinking of but how is it that somehow the human eye can see the face but a camera working on the exact same principle of reflective light can't? Before you start going into techno mode, remember, it isn't somehow messing with the cameras overall capability as the camera sees everything else perfectly fine.

 

[Carlobrand]

... It wouldn't make matches right away unless the world kept DNA profiles but it could eliminate races etc. ("That hairs not Vargr, its a Dandelion"). ...

Which could be pretty damning if one of the suspects is a scientist known for his work on creating ambulatory plants from Terran weedstock.

... Quote on the tech: Like most of the show, the example above is an example of both a lack of TL parity, understanding of technology, and lack of tech imersion. Of course, it is a TV show so it does whatever necessary to produce the outcome it wants - realism is rare in TV.

TL parity: high tech programs analyzing the camera feeds would immediately determine there was an issue and raise an alarm. I'd think something better than current day convenience store tech would be applicable.

Lack of tech immersion: For this example, they could have mentioned legal uses of the tech. Privacy, like not wanting to be captured tanning at the beach.

Understanding Technology: There may be something I'm not thinking of but how is it that somehow the human eye can see the face but a camera working on the exact same principle of reflective light can't? Before you start going into techno mode, remember, it isn't somehow messing with the cameras overall capability as the camera sees everything else perfectly fine.

Never seen the show; apparently it didn't do well, maybe that tech thing is why.

A thought, though: there's been great consternation in New Mexico over red-light cameras, those cameras that take your picture when you run a red light, and then you get a ticket in the mail. The cameras depend on a bright flash to get a good image of the offender's rear license plate. The flash made it pretty obvious who'd just been nabbed (which was oddly satisfying to me as I sat there waiting my turn). Some companies started selling a film that you'd put on the license plate that supposedly reflected the light back at the camera: the plate was visible if you looked at it, but if you did the flash thing, you'd get an image of the plate with a bright spot that obscured some of the plate, rendering it unreadable to the person looking at the camera image later. I don't know if it actually worked or was some sort of scam, not being the sort that needs such services.

Some similar technique might work on these fictional cameras, assuming that they - like the red-light cameras - needed a source of light to illuminate the subject beyond what the ordinary bystander was seeing. The camera would see a directional reflection of the light it was using - a mirroring of its light source - which persons at an angle to the light source would not see. Of course, this depends on: a) the camera needing and using an additional light source, and b) some smart cookie not coming up with the idea of putting the light source away from the camera at a safe angle so the camera didn't catch that mirror-reflection effect.

However, I see no way of affecting a camera working with natural light, unless you produce some sort of EM field that messed up the camera's electronics (presupposing a camera that depends on electronics and not one of the old chemical ones), which would mess up all the other nearby electronics and therefore be illegal, not to mention downright irritating when the person using the EM field tried to start his car.

 

[SpaceBadger]

I don't know if it actually worked or was some sort of scam, not being the sort that needs such services.

We have the red-light cameras some places here in Missouri, too. Their use in one city was recently declared unconstitutional by our Supreme Court; I wasn't really following it and don't recall on what grounds the case was decided.

However, before you are too much assured that they cannot be a problem for you (assuming you mean that you never run red lights), you should know that one of the asserted problems here is that they don't differentiate legal right-turns-on-red, and can snap on other false positives such as stopping too far forward, or inching forward after a stop to view around an obstruction.

 

[Hyphen]

Of course, it is a TV show so it does whatever necessary to produce the outcome it wants...

Agreed, but hidden in there is a clue when it comes to creating a gaming experience versus studying people who would do this as a job.

It's this: don't forget you are trying to tell a story.

This is akin to "the speed of plot" concept. That is, what outcome do you want as the referee? Do you want the bad guys to succeed? To escape? Does the scenario turn into a pursuit? Or maybe just a recurring set of bad guys?

Or do you want the bad guys to be caught? Prosecuted? The PCs to give evidence? To become "marked" for retaliation, perhaps? Or to develop a reputation as famous investigators who can be brought into subsequent cases, a la Eliot Ness?

Once you've worked out that minor matter , then you can work on what you're going to allow as possible. Remember Clarke's Third Law; investigators 100 years (and 4 tech levels) ago would be amazed at modern forensic techniques. We should be similarly amazed at what is possible even at TL 12, let alone TL 15.

It's at this point you can start considering all the excellent suggestions that others have put forward in this thread.

 

[CosmicGamer]

However, before you are too much assured that they cannot be a problem for you

Or loaning the car to someone who runs the light and the citation is sent to the registered owner.

Had that happen to me.

 

[flykiller]

Or loaning the car to someone who runs the light and the citation is sent to the registered owner.

yeah, my daughter did that to me.

called her up. "HEY!"

How have you handled this in Traveller games, or how you suggest handling it?

surveillance and tracking in a high-tech society will be extensive, and cops will always be operating in the same jurisdiction. probably make for a boring game. try running a civilian starship repossession agency. special cross-jurisdictional warrants and dispensations, wide adventure area, new scenery each time, high stakes with each repo, lots of opportunities for side-action.

 

[JimMarn]

I didn't see it mentioned, but detective stories always have a few false leads and false clues. The surveilance camera could be down or the bad guys shot it form an angle it doesn't see. Or a storm knocked out the system that the cameras use to get the video back to where it is recorded. Some of the traffic cameras in my area have a radio antenna near them. Big thunderstorms could affect that signal. Or maybe one of the bad guys saved the player characters from a big problem in years/months past

 

[Hyphen]

We have the red-light cameras some places here in Missouri, too. Their use in one city was recently declared unconstitutional by our Supreme Court; I wasn't really following it and don't recall on what grounds the case was decided.

However, before you are too much assured that they cannot be a problem for you (assuming you mean that you never run red lights), you should know that one of the asserted problems here is that they don't differentiate legal right-turns-on-red, and can snap on other false positives such as stopping too far forward, or inching forward after a stop to view around an obstruction.

Yeah, right. Sounds like excuses by someone who doesn't want to play within the rules (you get the same crap about speed cameras and breathalysers). We've had them for 20 years; don't ya think they'd be properly tweaked & calibrated by now (especially considering all the court cases in which they've been tested)? These days, that's why they send you a fine with a photo attached to it. (Well, they do over here.)

And that stuff about stopping too far forward??!! I dunno about your cameras, but our are pointed up the street - that is, in the same direction as the traffic flows - because they have to take a shot of the REAR of your car IN THE MIDDLE OF THE INTERSECTION. If you are still at the lights, the camera can't see you - duh!

True, if someone else was driving, you'll probably have to send in a stat dec (US: deposition?) or appear in court with your alibi. That's probably a PITA, but how often do you (a) loan your air/raft to a ratbag, and (b) ratbag flies their "friend's" air/raft through a red light? In this case, you bring ratbag to court with you... (or else push them out of the air/raft next time you fly low over the manure pile behind your kian's stables...)

 

[Vladika]

Yeah, right. Sounds like excuses by someone who doesn't want to play within the rules (you get the same crap about speed cameras and breathalysers). We've had them for 20 years; don't ya think they'd be properly tweaked & calibrated by now (especially considering all the court cases in which they've been tested)? These days, that's why they send you a fine with a photo attached to it. (Well, they do over here.)

And that stuff about stopping too far forward??!! I dunno about your cameras, but our are pointed up the street - that is, in the same direction as the traffic flows - because they have to take a shot of the REAR of your car IN THE MIDDLE OF THE INTERSECTION. If you are still at the lights, the camera can't see you - duh!

True, if someone else was driving, you'll probably have to send in a stat dec (US: deposition?) or appear in court with your alibi. That's probably a PITA, but how often do you (a) loan your air/raft to a ratbag, and (b) ratbag flies their "friend's" air/raft through a red light? In this case, you bring ratbag to court with you... (or else push them out of the air/raft next time you fly low over the manure pile behind your kian's stables...)

I'm thinking this is heading in a political direction. In the US this technology is nor yet established anywhere universally. In addition, with 50 States, and a few scattered territories, the laws are not the same and, as yet, not fully tested (as Badger was pointing out).

Additionally the equipment is in all likelihood different, and positioning not universal.

The final difference is that the citizenry in the US are very loath to cede, or allow the establishment of, certain powers to government on any level. Earth is "balkanized", and, to a degree the 50 States (and a few scattered territories) are too.

I've heard it said that the US has a higher ratio of Lawyers to Populous than anywhere else on the earth. They have to make a living too somehow.

 

[SpaceBadger]

Yeah, right. Sounds like excuses by someone who doesn't want to play within the rules (you get the same crap about speed cameras and breathalysers). We've had them for 20 years; don't ya think they'd be properly tweaked & calibrated by now (especially considering all the court cases in which they've been tested)? These days, that's why they send you a fine with a photo attached to it. (Well, they do over here.)

And that stuff about stopping too far forward??!! I dunno about your cameras, but our are pointed up the street - that is, in the same direction as the traffic flows - because they have to take a shot of the REAR of your car IN THE MIDDLE OF THE INTERSECTION. If you are still at the lights, the camera can't see you - duh!

Obviously different camera arrangement, or else no one would be beating these tickets on these grounds, which they are.

 

[Hyphen]

I'm thinking this is heading in a political direction.

You're right. Sorry. So, to drag this thread kicking and screaming back to Traveller, you could also use the "different jurisdictions have different laws" meme to trip up your PCs.

They did this a few times on ST:TNG. Ryker was once "guilty until proven innocent" when he was accused of blowing up a space station (Point of View"? Maybe). Geordi had to recreate three different testimonies on the holodeck - plus the final, fourth solution.

Imagine trying to prove your case on a world that doesn't believe in using DNA evidence? Or even fingerprinting? That may even become a loophole allowing the bad guys to slip through the PCs net and become recurring villains.