Crime & Detective Roleplay

[Arganam]

EDIT|New post|: Detectives are somewhat new in Regalia. The guards usually solve crime related cases. I spent some time in the guard quite a while ago, during it's bluesteel incarnation, before it transitioned into using skins. (Skins are definitely better in my opinion.)

During my time in the guard, I only came across one case, It was large, there was a murderer going around, attempting to kill nobles. This murderer even inspired copycat killers. I didn't stay around long enough to find out how things ended.

I enjoyed working on the case, even though I contributed little. I have always enjoyed investigative work, and detective related stories. This enjoyment of mysteries and detectives lead me to create the Regalian Detective league. To be frank, I want to better the league as much as possible, I want it to last for years. I know this has been somewhat ranty, so I'll cut to the chase.

The Relations between Guards, Criminals, and Detectives.
To me, it seems that the guard's main duty is to catch criminals in the streets, they don't seem to do too much investigative work. @BillyTheScroofy correct me if I'm wrong. I made the detective league with a sole purpose, to search, find, and solve mysteries, these wont always be crime related mysteries, although more often than not, they will be. Minor crime related mysteries, I assume, would be put on the backburner of the Vigilants, and the Hightowers. They would be put on the front burner of the detective league, it has more time to devote to cases, unlike the regalian guard, which devotes much of it's time to patrolling.

Every now and then, there's a large case, a case that the guard devotes most of it's power to solving. This is when I would want the guard and the detective league to work together on the same case, but as of right now, until I do more IC work, that probably won't happen.

When it comes to criminals, investigative work can't truly function without OOC cooperation, the players will be needed to tell the detective players, OOCly, what they found. The victim player, depending on how much they know, could also help with investigations. All in all, with the emergence of a detective organization, the criminals, detectives, and guards all need to be willing to help eachother OOCly as I have stated above; and, the Detectives and Guards need to work together ICly, to make this all more fun for the community at large.

Spoiler: Old post

I changed this to the above after I read @BillyTheScroofy & @StarkFromAway's comments. I no longer support the system I came up with which is detailed here.

I believe that criminals, detectives, and even victims might enjoy working together, on an OOC level, to make crime and crime solving roleplay more fun and productive. If you own a player that is a criminal, or a gang, I want you to sign up for a little system I have came up with. It exists to bring more conflict into crime and detective roleplay. The basic idea is that once you commit a crime, you wait 2-3 days, and then notify me, OOCly, that a crime occurred. (During this time period it is possible for the league to find out about the crime ICly) This will start a series of rolls, to determine when the Detective league finds out about the crime. after the 2-3 days period of silence, I will begin to roll, once a day, to see if they find out that a crime (robbery, assault, murder, etc) was committed. Lets say the league has 8 detectives. I would roll a 16. if I get anywhere between a 1 and 8, the league finds out 1 piece of information about the crime. If we have 10, I'd roll a 20, if we had 15, id roll a 30, so on and so forth.) The first successful roll, the detective league finds out what type of crime was committed. The number tells which detective found out. The second successful roll, they find out where, the third successful roll, they find out when. The number also tells which detective finds these things out. If three days pass without a successful roll, no more rolls will happen, and if the league finds out about the crime, it will be IG and IC.

Once the rolls are complete, the detectives have a 7 day period to gather evidence, once this is done, they get another five days to come up with suspects. Then they begin searching for said suspects over a period of six days. After the first day of the search, the criminals are given the chance to break into the detective building, and steal all files related to the case. This ends the investigation. This can only be done when a detective is online, you must also PM them IG to let them know that you plan to break into the building. they then have the right to have their character ICly wander there. This will start a conflict, where the detective attempts to stop the criminals from destroying the files. It could go either way from there. If for some reason, the criminals decide not to steal the files, and the detectives have questioned all suspects, they'll create a case and send it to the guard.

(I removed the sign up because this no longer exists)

​

I would love to hear from crime and guard roleplayers, they are just as important as the detectives, and I highly value your opinion on the matter! Feel free to comment on the old system I came up with, I'm willing to work out something similar, which is not based on rolls. I'll only do so after I get more feedback though, specifically from crime roleplayers.

 

[BillyTheScruffy]

Detective roleplay, as far as I am aware, is something that is somewhat new, usually, the guards handle the crime scenes. But what happens when the guards don't have time, or names, if somebody comes to them saying "My mother's necklace was stolen!" I doubt the guard would devote much, if any manpower or time to tracking down the necklace. That is where detective organizations come in. They will attempt to get the names and faces, that the guard can track down.

So, Borkwood, why are you making this thread?

I believe that criminals, detectives, and even victims might enjoy working together, on an OOC level, to make crime and crime solving roleplay more fun and productive. If you own a player that is a criminal, or a gang, I want you to sign up for a little system I have came up with. It exists to bring more conflict into crime and detective roleplay. The basic idea is that once you commit a crime, you wait 2-3 days, and then notify me, OOCly, that a crime occurred. (During this time period it is possible for the league to find out about the crime ICly) This will start a series of rolls, to determine when the Detective league finds out about the crime. after the 2-3 days period of silence, I will begin to roll, once a day, to see if they find out that a crime (robbery, assault, murder, etc) was committed. Lets say the league has 8 detectives. I would roll a 16. if I get anywhere between a 1 and 8, the league finds out 1 piece of information about the crime. If we have 10, I'd roll a 20, if we had 15, id roll a 30, so on and so forth.) The first successful roll, the detective league finds out what type of crime was committed. The number tells which detective found out. The second successful roll, they find out where, the third successful roll, they find out when. The number also tells which detective finds these things out. If three days pass without a successful roll, no more rolls will happen, and if the league finds out about the crime, it will be IG and IC.

Once the rolls are complete, the detectives have a 7 day period to gather evidence, once this is done, they get another five days to come up with suspects. Then they begin searching for said suspects over a period of six days. After the first day of the search, the criminals are given the chance to break into the detective building, and steal all files related to the case. This ends the investigation. This can only be done when a detective is online, you must also PM them IG to let them know that you plan to break into the building. they then have the right to have their character ICly wander there. This will start a conflict, where the detective attempts to stop the criminals from destroying the files. It could go either way from there. If for some reason, the criminals decide not to steal the files, and the detectives have questioned all suspects, they'll create a case and send it to the guard.

I want to join this system and be in constant conflict with the detectives!

PM me your skype, your character name, and/or your gang name; and i'll add you to the crime solving roleplay skype chat.

If anybody has recommendations for this system, let me know, and I will take your ideas into consideration. I would love to hear from crime roleplayers, they are just as important as the detectives, and I highly value your opinion on the matter!

Click to shrink...

Don't you think this system is a little too much in favor of your detective group and very much not in favor of guards who themselves devote a lot of time trying to find out information IC about the crime, rather than by using rolls? My main issue is how this system will negatively effect the guard's IC reputation, especially, as already stated, all methods of crime solving is handled completely IC. How would you go about making it fair for both Guard Charters, your organisation, criminals and victims? @Borkwood

Amendment: Also, how exactly will your system factor in crimes that the Guards themselves are covering up for the purpose of glory solving? Most guards would not be in favor of allowing vigilantes access to crime scenes/files or information.

I personally think because of the reasons I've stated above you should keep your methods of investigation purely and utterly IC to prevent it seeming meta. Rolls are all well and good for combat roleplay, but when you're using them to force crime solving its extremely powergamey and unfair towards guards who do not use your system, from my point of view.

That said, a co-operative narrative between criminals, guards and detectives that doesn't factor in rolls but insists that criminals have an active roll in assisting in the after effects of their criminal activity would be a great idea, such as watching OOCly as the guards examine the crime scene with replies in environment chat whenever a guard may have come across a piece of evidence. Going back to the previous point though, the poor thing about rolls is it essentially forces incompetence in scenarios where some guards/detectives or criminals would have almost definitely succeeded. I definitely agree on the point of having individuals involved in Crime Rp work together to make it more enjoyable, but leaving investigations up to chance makes it a game of luck, not of IC skill.

Tagging others who may be interested in giving input: Some guards @Fatherland @Tiber_, Some criminals that I know of: @Sozzer @Yigit

 

[StarkFromAway]

My two cents: If you need to create a roll system to be a successful detective character, don't play a detective character.

 

[Arganam]

Don't you think this system is a little too much in favor of your detective group and very much not in favor of guards who themselves devote a lot of time trying to find out information IC about the crime, rather than by using rolls? My main issue is how this system will negatively effect the guard's IC reputation, especially, as already stated, all methods of crime solving is handled completely IC. How would you go about making it fair for both Guard Charters, your organisation, criminals and victims? @Borkwood

Amendment: Also, how exactly will your system factor in crimes that the Guards themselves are covering up for the purpose of glory solving? Most guards would not be in favor of allowing vigilantes access to crime scenes/files or information.

I personally think because of the reasons I've stated above you should keep your methods of investigation purely and utterly IC to prevent it seeming meta. Rolls are all well and good for combat roleplay, but when you're using them to force crime solving its extremely powergamey and unfair towards guards who do not use your system, from my point of view.

That said, a co-operative narrative between criminals, guards and detectives that doesn't factor in rolls but insists that criminals have an active roll in assisting in the after effects of their criminal activity would be a great idea, such as watching OOCly as the guards examine the crime scene with replies in environment chat whenever a guard may have come across a piece of evidence. Going back to the previous point though, the poor thing about rolls is it essentially forces incompetence in scenarios where some guards/detectives or criminals would have almost definitely succeeded. I definitely agree on the point of having individuals involved in Crime Rp work together to make it more enjoyable, but leaving investigations up to chance makes it a game of luck, not of IC skill.

Tagging others who may be interested in giving input: Some guards @Fatherland @Tiber_, Some criminals that I know of: @Sozzer @Yigit

Click to shrink...

Thank you for bringing this all to light, I will probably edit my original post to reflect this. By taking out rolls entirely, and scrapping this system that I have come up with.

As far as the whole guard situation goes, I would prefer to work with, rather than compete with, the Vigilants and Hightowers.

I intended for this to be a system to force investigations onto crime, to kick start narratives. I now realize that this should be done entirely with IC work, this goes for all other stages of the investigation.

 

[Arganam]

My two cents: If you need to create a roll system to be a successful detective character, don't play a detective character.

Click to shrink...

I admit, the above post, now looking back on it, seems somewhat powergamey. I can now see that rolls should never be done. Your two cents are completely true. Thank you for your feedback.

 

[BillyTheScruffy]

Thank you for bringing this all to light, I will probably edit my original post to reflect this. By taking out rolls entirely, and scrapping this system that I have come up with.

As far as the whole guard situation goes, I would prefer to work with, rather than compete with, the Vigilants and Hightowers.

I intended for this to be a system to force investigations onto crime, to kick start narratives. I now realize that this should be done entirely with IC work, this goes for all other stages of the investigation.

Click to shrink...

I would definitely be up for assisting you in whatever way I can IC for a more diverse Justice/Crime atmosphere in the city. Pretty sure something can be arranged.

With that though, I think the thread should remain, I especially am interested in seeing what Crime Rpers have to input and more specifically, see where exactly they would see themselves in a co-operative narrative system.

Again, good on you for bringing this predicament to light @Borkwood

 

[Arganam]

I would definitely be up for assisting you in whatever way I can IC for a more diverse Justice/Crime atmosphere in the city. Pretty sure something can be arranged.

With that though, I think the thread should remain, I especially am interested in seeing what Crime Rpers have to input and more specifically, see where exactly they would see themselves in a co-operative narrative system.

Again, good on you for bringing this predicament to light @Borkwood

Click to shrink...

I already changed the thread, but most of the old post is in a spoiler, and I welcome players to comment on that, as long as they recognize that I am not in support of a roll based system anymore. I am open to creating a player run system where the work is done ICly though. As far as working together IC with the guard goes, I'd like for our characters to meet up sometime.

 

[Reaganism]

During my time in the guard, I only came across one case, It was large, there was a murderer going around, attempting to kill nobles. This murderer even inspired copycat killers. I didn't stay around long enough to find out how things ended.

Click to shrink...

Hello, hi. I did one of those back during the summer of 2015, with OOC communications maintained between 0romir, CaptainSexyBeard and myself (two officers of the Violet order). And it was a rather fun experience. We had this sort-of cannibal cult with assaults all around the city and a final abduction, then investigations, finding our lovely little cannibal coves and in the end, a rescue mission to save Amber Ardor @SpoopMelon. I received mostly positive feedback from the guards on it, but there were some things that I have to specify:

• The character was made solely with the intention to spice up murder RP & provide the guards / people something to ponder about.
• I encountered numerous cases of metamaging, powergaming and god-roleplay throughout the whole thing with vigilantes seeking to "take my character down" and reap personal glory.
• The only reason the above did not hinder the story-line was due to the special RP authority rights of the Violet Order at the time which have since disappeared.
• No murder or maiming actually happened, though the frequency of attacks & injuries suffered at the hand of the group in-game prompted people to actually RP along with the fact that (despite the players themselves no murdered) the murders do happen.

All my involvement in crime RP on either of my noble characters (of which all were involved one way or another) were also subject to OOC salt, ridicule, metagaming attempts and related. All together, I will most likely avoid anything that would require a detective league on any of my long-term characters in the future out of experiencing the related drawbacks and toxicity.

That is to say, murders and related do happen in Regalia but a detective league has to be led proper & with good informants and a web of agents in order to function, especially without charter rights. And always make sure that the sourced information is proper and not derived from metagaming. During my tenure leading the Black Hand I've encountered weekly attempts to "wash" metagamed information by obtaining it and feeding it to an OOCly known BH agent with the simple goal of muddying the trail of information and making the knowledge un-targetable as meta-knowledge.

So yeah. My comment? No point in a detective league unless you drive the narrative yourself and set up the crimes with associates.

 

[Arganam]

Hello, hi. I did one of those back during the summer of 2015, with OOC communications maintained between 0romir, CaptainSexyBeard and myself (two officers of the Violet order). And it was a rather fun experience. We had this sort-of cannibal cult with assaults all around the city and a final abduction, then investigations, finding our lovely little cannibal coves and in the end, a rescue mission to save Amber Ardor @SpoopMelon. I received mostly positive feedback from the guards on it, but there were some things that I have to specify:

• The character was made solely with the intention to spice up murder RP & provide the guards / people something to ponder about.
• I encountered numerous cases of metamaging, powergaming and god-roleplay throughout the whole thing with vigilantes seeking to "take my character down" and reap personal glory.
• The only reason the above did not hinder the story-line was due to the special RP authority rights of the Violet Order at the time which have since disappeared.
• No murder or maiming actually happened, though the frequency of attacks & injuries suffered at the hand of the group in-game prompted people to actually RP along with the fact that (despite the players themselves no murdered) the murders do happen.

All my involvement in crime RP on either of my noble characters (of which all were involved one way or another) were also subject to OOC salt, ridicule, metagaming attempts and related. All together, I will most likely avoid anything that would require a detective league on any of my long-term characters in the future out of experiencing the related drawbacks and toxicity.

That is to say, murders and related do happen in Regalia but a detective league has to be led proper & with good informants and a web of agents in order to function, especially without charter rights. And always make sure that the sourced information is proper and not derived from metagaming. During my tenure leading the Black Hand I've encountered weekly attempts to "wash" metagamed information by obtaining it and feeding it to an OOCly known BH agent with the simple goal of muddying the trail of information and making the knowledge un-targetable as meta-knowledge.

So yeah. My comment? No point in a detective league unless you drive the narrative yourself and set up the crimes with associates.

Click to shrink...

I will attempt to steer clear of Metagaming, the amount of detectives that my organization has is quickly growing, There will probably be 3-4 more within the next few days depending on how interviews go. I plan to raise the organization to charter level status. I believe that there are many crimes that will need solving, I'd like to get involved with the great gangs at some point too.

 

[Conflee]

I would be down to set up some crime-detective conflict with some simple system of: Commit crime. Detective comes in after. Detective tells us what he does (look around). Criminal gives details about scene. Detective investigates as they will. We say if you find anything. ETC.

The biggest issue with investigations atm is the lack of real... evidence, ever. Physical evidence doesnt exist without the criminal or victim saying that it does when its relevant. IE the fight might have left a huge blood pool and a trail of foot prints, but unless the investigating player asks they wont know.


So basically, if you wanna do some investigator RP, im always down to try and set up and light-dm something. Get some different gangs involved maybe off and on, and offer the same up to guards. Would be fun for occasional events.

 

[Arganam]

I would be down to set up some crime-detective conflict with some simple system of: Commit crime. Detective comes in after. Detective tells us what he does (look around). Criminal gives details about scene. Detective investigates as they will. We say if you find anything. ETC.

The biggest issue with investigations atm is the lack of real... evidence, ever. Physical evidence doesnt exist without the criminal or victim saying that it does when its relevant. IE the fight might have left a huge blood pool and a trail of foot prints, but unless the investigating player asks they wont know.


So basically, if you wanna do some investigator RP, im always down to try and set up and light-dm something. Get some different gangs involved maybe off and on, and offer the same up to guards. Would be fun for occasional events.

Click to shrink...

I agree, the lack of physical evidence can be hard. That is why I think OOC communication between investigators and those being investigated is very important.