Welcome, Herr Himmler, to the U.S.A.

[GMMichael]

I am reading Operation Paperclip - its the real world gathering up all the Nazi scientists by the US to continue their work while completely ignoring their warcrimes (experiments on concentration camp prisoners, used slave labor during war, etc). I think many people know about it (certain people know of von Braum for example) - but the extent and what was overlooked is rather troubling. It gives you lots of warm and fuzzies when the government says "trust us"

Lots of interesting items that could be taking for gaming. One could directly play out the discovery of some of these things. It would also be interesting to move it to a generic moral quandary - after defeating one horrible enemy do you overlook what some individuals did so you can them use them against another enemy - how are are you willing to go?

Now you have me wondering. (Paranoia just looked like a good label - this isn't necessarily about the game.)

What would Operation Paperclip look like as an RPG? Obviously, there's the Wolfenstein plan: create Nazi supervillains who have giant machineguns, occult powers, and don't really die until you've shot them 200+ times.

What if the game stayed more real-world though? What if each character was always two bullet wounds or one good K-bar stab away from death? What would the villains look like then? How would a typical adventure run?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

They'd look more "normal"...more like pulp villains or action film adversaries.

In a FRPG, this would play out better in a low-magic/gothic/steampunk setting than is typical of D&D.

In Paranoia, it would be just another mission...

 

[Umbran]

What if the game stayed more real-world though? What if each character was always two bullet wounds or one good K-bar stab away from death? What would the villains look like then? How would a typical adventure run?

How fantastic do you want the science to get.

I think Call of Cthulhu (or maybe Trail of Cthulhu) might be a good model for this...

 

[amerigoV]

If you are looking for WW2 with weird stuff going on (Nazi's into the occult, making superhuman, set), Savage Worlds/Pinnacle has done this for you in their Weird Wars line (note, there is some older d20 versions of this material on their site/RPGThruDrive through as well if you are not a Savage like myself).

https://www.peginc.com/store/weird-war-ii/

My angle when I posted that was more on the dark fantasy angle - what choices would you make in such situations.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I think that's highly situational, based on the overall game & campaign expectations, as well as the particular adventure, party, and the players.

After all, they may well be willing to compromise their morals here and there for the good of the war effort, but everyone has their limits. Those limits could be aggregate- "We've done this so many times, but I've had enought and I'm not doing it anymore!"- or particular- "I didn't say a word when we did W, X, and Y, but I'll be damned if I'll do Z!"

 

[GMMichael]

Well, on one hand, I'm wondering what the planned encounters would look like. With drawn-out shootouts mostly out of the question, that might leave:

- Nazi investigation
- USA smuggler (of Nazis) investigation
- confrontations with politicians
- confrontations with higher-ups or other officials
- capturing/releasing Nazi war criminals

Most of these could easily devolve into a shootout. And the quandaries mentioned by [MENTION=19675]Dannyalcatraz[/MENTION] could come up against the opponents implied above - but really, they should come up with each of the player-characters first.

Would this best be run as a sort of mystery-resolution RPG? Each encounter involves either collecting evidence or putting together an argument against opponents. Or....convincing people to help you?

My primary question, really, is this:
If D&D players derive their pleasure from putting together and executing a battleplan against a monster until the DM says, "your opponent dies," from what would Op Paperclip players get their kicks?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Winning, for them at least, would look something like this:

 

[Umbran]

Would this best be run as a sort of mystery-resolution RPG?

That wouldn't be a bad idea.

My primary question, really, is this:
If D&D players derive their pleasure from putting together and executing a battleplan against a monster until the DM says, "your opponent dies," from what would Op Paperclip players get their kicks?

For that, I turn to GUMSHOE for advice. In that system, it is noted that finding clues isn't really the interesting bit. The interesting bit is figuring out what the clues mean, and what to do about them. The Op Paperclip players would get their kicks out of successfully find out who the Nazi scientists are and their location, determining what the secret research was about, and then making a plan to extract them from their complicated situations alive and in one piece. Basically, out of solving uzzles and making workable plans (just plans to *avoid* combat, rather than engage in it).

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Yep. Extended combats should only be happening when something goes wrong. Most "fights" in such a campaign would either be disabling, knockouts or kills of sentries and other mooks to get access to some mission-sensitive objective. Ideally, those should be very short.

Think of a James Bond movie...or better yet (since we're talking about teams), an episode of Burn Notice. Or the Mission Impossible TV series. Sure, things get shot at or blown up...but they're usually distractions. The protagonists actually shooting (etc.) with intent to kill happens only in the rarest of circumstances.