Need help fleshing out an intelligence agency modern world

[Senko]

I'm working on putting together an intelligence agenccy for the modern world and I'd like some help in setting it up I've posted what I have below any advice/helpful critism etc appreciated. If this is the wrong forum just tell me and I'll post elsewhere.

NAME
Australia Supernatural Intelligence Agency ASIA

PURPOSE
The monitoring of supernatural events/occurances worldwide, the enforcement of laws/regulations within Australian borders, possible response to major incidents elsewhere e.g. in a country with no established defense against a supernatural incident.

RANKS
Director: Head of Asia, pay 82,381 to 133,583 depending on time in service.
Deputy Director: Head of Regional Office, pay 58,626 to 113,557 depending on time in service.
Special Agent in Charge: Head of a local office, pay 40,427 to 91,527 depending on time in service.
Division Chief: Head of a division in a local office, pay 33,051 to 64,214 depending on time in service.
Supervisory Special Agent: Head of an investigative team, pay 33,051 to 64,214 depending on time in service.
Special Agent: Most of the field operatives, pay 26,681 to 64,214 depending on time in service.
Probationary Special Agent: A new recruit still being evaluated to see if they work out, pay 26,681 to 64,214 depending on time in service.
Specialist: An on base specialist e.g. forensic scientists, lawyers, Medical Examiners etc, pay 58,626 to 113,557 depending on qualifications and time in service.
Assistant: A person of limited experience used to assist specialist e.g. a medical intern, pay 26,681. Usually a short term position.

STRUCTURE
1 Regional Base responsible for information gathering in each of the following areas America, Asia, Africa, Europe, Middle East.
1 Main Base in the ACT Australia
6 Major Bases in each of the other Austrlian States
? Local Offices covering various areas in the Austrlian States, number varies depending on population, area size and likelihood of supernatural evenst there. I'm intentially leaving this number undetermined so I can add as needed.

BASE ORGANISATION
Overseas Bases
1 Deputy Director
? Special Agents, left vague as different areas would have different numbers of investigative agents.

Main Base and Major Bases
1 Director
8 Division Chiefs: Responsible respectively for Cybercrime, Major Cases, Drugs, Homicide, Public Relations, Legal, Internal Affairs and Counterterrorism.
? Supervisory Special Agents
? Special Agents
? Probationary Agents
? Specialists: Covering Legal, mis-information, equipement maintainence, forensics, autopsies, magical examinations etc.

Local Offices
1 Special Agent in Charge
? Supervisory Special Agents
? Special Agents
? probationary Agents
? Specialists: Not sure if they should have any or a few for mis-information, maintainence etc. Forensics analysis/autopsies and the like would be sent back to the main base for analysis.

 

[Mesh Hong]

welcome to Enworld!

Now please dont take this the wrong way but is the Supernatural a well known factor in your modern world? I am saying this because from your set up it seems like a pretty big organisation with a sizable public presence and quite a few resources.

Oh I like the ASIA acronym, thats cool.

Things that stand out:

- It has a lot of cross over with regular police work. Cyber crime, Drugs and Homicide for instance. How does that work exactly?

- It has a public relations office and a miss information department, thats just amusing. How exactly does it interact with the public on a day to day basis?

 

[Hand of Evil]

Create a Powers that Be Chart - this is a inter-department conflict chart, it shows who supports who and how they can interact with each other and the characters.

Do the same for how ASIA interacts with other agencies of the government.

 

[Senko]

Hmmm seems I need to hit refresh instead of just restarting firefox when I want to check for answers, sorry. Anyway onto the repsonses

Thanks for those suggestions Hand of Evil I'll start working on that.

@ Mesh Hong in reponse to your comments . . .

> welcome to Enworld!

Thank you.

> Now please dont take this the wrong way but is the Supernatural a well
> known factor in your modern world? I am saying this because from your
> set up it seems like a pretty big organisation with a sizable public
> presence and quite a few resources.

The supernatural is both well known and not well known. That is some group e.g. intelligence agencies, secretive government ovesight commitee's, ancient orders or the supernatural beings themselves are well aware that there is at least something out there even if they don't know the exact specifics.

For example the prime-minister of Australia or the president of America is unlikely to know its real as they change on a regular basis on the other hand the Queen of England, some sections of established intelligence gathering organisations like the CIA or MI5 would be aware it exists as they don't change that often and in the later case are technically responsible for monitoring potential overseas threats. Specific groups such as this one or its English/Japanese/German equivilent would know a lot more types, habitat, threat/not-threat status etc. However your average person on the street is going to be like one in the real world and will probably think its myths, superstition or just mumbo jumbo.

In this world its always been real but for the last few thousand years its been dying out fewer mages, species driven to extinction, others just disapearing etc. Lately i.e. in the last century or so with the rise of the scientific method, faster/wider commmunication and a more global perspective various groups have become aware that there is some truth to these legends and are now attempting to save/exploit/defend against them depending on their outlook.

> Oh I like the ASIA acronym, thats cool.

Thank you again.

> Things that stand out:
>
> - It has a lot of cross over with regular police work. Cyber crime, Drugs
> and Homicide for instance. How does that work exactly?

Much like real world police departments only directed against supernatural causes/inolvement. For example . . .

Cybercrime - magical spells bestowing intelligence on a machine, ancient demon infesting robotic body, alien technology that fuses a person into their machine.
Drugs - extracts from a supernatural being that causes loss of willpower and induces obedience, certain substances that have a similar effect to modern drugs on supernatural beings, supernatural body parts being sold on to wealthy clients for their special effects (telepathy, increased virility, increased longevity).
Homicide - murder of an intelligent supernatural being i.e did that orc foolishly eat brocoli or did someone forcefeed it, use of a supernatural means in the murder of someone i.e. magically induced hearth attack, summoning of a demon, mental domination to make them step in front of a train etc.

> - It has a public relations office and a miss information department, thats
> just amusing. How exactly does it interact with the public on a day to
> day basis?

Mainly public relations job is coming up with believable and different cover stories to keep the public from becoming aware of what exists right under their nose whether that's along the lines of "he had a heart attack", "there was a gas explosion" or "we're filming a movie". The last one may involve actually funding and filming an independant film with that theme.

It also to a lesser extent handles calming down or containing those who do find out the real truth, maintaining good relations with and providing safe secure environemnts for various neutral/good supernatural groups in an attempt to prevent their extinction and first stage recruitment when the person thinks they're applying for a regular job with the Austrlaian Security Intelligence Agency who is responsible for handling "special incidents" that occur as a result of new or developing technoligies like Genetic Engineering. The later also involves actually deciding which cases can be included in that cover identity. For example a case involving a mage wouldn't be while one involving genetically engineered velociraptors might.

 

[krupintupple]

in order to save yourself a lot of head and heartache, just flesh out the parts that the PCs interact with directly in rough first. no sense in spending an entire weekend cataloguing some arcane secret intelligence organization if they're not going to take the bait and interact with it very much, right?

you've got an excellent start, maybe now just focus on the parts they're going to brush up against, or witness directly, and then, based on how actual gameplay pans out, you can take their questions as cues to tell you which parts to specifically develop.

ie: if they want to break into a factory held by ASIA, to see what they're hiding, flesh that out. however, if they want to attempt maybe some cyber-warfare, maybe let them bump into ASIA's misinformation division?

 

[Mesh Hong]

.....loads of stuff....

Well to be honest you seem to be able to reel off a whole load of information. This tells me that you probably already know more than enough to use ASIA in your campaign.

Personally I would just write a very brief summary of each department type and add a short list of names and titles for use mid session.

I am running a Nemessis game at the moment and a thing that I find useful is to write a brief description of an organisation or person then add further information in bullet points under these headings:

Further Information (easy)
Further Information (moderate)
Further Information (hard or specialised)
Further Information (top secret or impossible)

This way I have a hierachy of intelligence that I can use if the PCs start to investigate with an indication of responses depending on their approach and success.

Being in bullet point form I can also tick off each chunk of information as I hand it out.

 

[Senko]

Thanks again for the help.

 

[ghostcat]

You've forgotten the admin staff.

Directors and Deputy Directors should have a Personal Assistant and there should be one or two Admin Assistants per division/local office.

PA will earn the same as an Assistant, with Admin Assistants wages at or near minimum wage.

 

[Senko]

Hmmm yes your right I was treating the specialist and assistant category as being all the non-field agent staff but your right it doesn't really work with some admin positions thanks for pointing that out.

 

[Senko]

On a semi-related note I've been watching some tv police shows and in NCIS the desks seem to have 2 maybe 3 computers on them does anyone know why are there so many?