Civil Protection, Power and Control

[Takyon3]

There is always a great debate on Civil Protection, and how intrusive they should be on any roleplay server. Some say that with too much power, they become robocops, and are annoying to deal with. Some say with too little power, they are no longer threatening. With this thread, I will give some pointers to the CP Leadership. I will explain what power is, and how to wield it. If even one of these suggestions make it in in some way, I will be satisfied. Before I go on, let it be known that I have been playing hl2rp for five years and know a thing or two about how citizens actually react to CPs, how CPs react to citizens and essentially, how factions clash with each other on a day-to-day basis. Civil Protection as a faction is held to different standards on every server, and at the end of the day, it is only as good as the real life players.

1. Control Over the Map

The solution to avoid being labelled as robocops or pushovers is simple. Instead of focusing on one individual citizen at a time, you take into account the entire mass of citizens. Where are they now? Where are they going? Where are they going to go? If you do not have this information, you better get a means of acquiring it. A clever CP faction will be in control of every aspect of the citizenry without the citizen players even being aware of it. Real life people who are also powerful and influential do not make the whole party aware of their existence and motivations. They scheme in the shadows. They show up late and leave early. They adapt to their immediate environments, but can predict the future and change accordingly. Basically, if you go over to three citizens and yell "Isolate!" then you didn't have any power in the first place, and you have lost.

So, how do we achieve this state of cunning power? With information. Civil Protection has no power without a consistent stream of information. Utilize cameras, scanners, patrols and checkpoints to log how many citizens are in a given area at any one time. I will offer a scenario. Imagine a large plaza in a city. There are two entrances, hence two exits. Instead of sending a patrol into the plaza, set up two checkpoints at those exits. Take account of how many bodies are in the area. Keep an eye on them, and patrol every once a while to cover your blind spots. Outright stop citizens from entering the plaza if there are too many there already. This way, you make it impossible for citizens to congregate, and you are not intruding on them directly. They are coming to you. This is a very discreet way of establishing dominance and control over people and is a tactic utilized in real life. If there are no longer people in the plaza, then find out where the people are immediately, and lockdown that area instead with checkpoints. This is what I like to call map control, and has very real psychological effects on how citizens deal with CPs.

2. Control Over Relationships

Friendships always form between characters. Friendships can sometimes turn into groups, and groups can sometimes turn into alliances or even rebellions. These issues can become long term problems. So how do we prevent them from happening without being too intrusive? How do we divide people and groups with cunning? You can't separate people for too long on a hl2rp server, because they will meet up and scheme together eventually. So we must sow distrust between characters. I think the Bureau of Intelligence is more suitable for this than Civil Protection. Basically, lie. "Hey, he told me he wanted to murder you." or "That gang said they were going to raid your stash next week." If CPs cannot crack down on groups, then the BoI is perfect for this task and should be utilized to effectively divide and conquer. This way, player-created groups can grow without CPs having to raid the sewers on a weekly basis, but Combine-sponsored agents from the BoI will attempt to spy on them and turn them against each other. In a sense, this is somewhat similar to what we see in HL2. Where the resistance hid out in the sewers, but spies like Judith Mossman were sent down to work for the Combine. If CPs and the BoI can get people to a stage where they no longer trust each other, then they are doing very well.

3. Control Over Resources

This one is a lot more simple than the other two. Items like money and rations should be kept to a minimum in order to maintain people's dependence on the Combine for survival. It's really that simple, and it's just a matter of abundance. Again, getting the information of how "well off" people are at the time is the hardest part, and can be done via searches at checkpoints, work cycles, curfews and so on. Like I said earlier, without information, there is no power.

I made this thread so when the server finally comes back up, the Combine as a faction will act with more nuance. People will fear CPs a lot more when they are coming up to your face a lot less often, and are more like watchers, standing on the sidelines, and constantly knowing where you are. I hope I got my point across well enough. Thanks for reading.

Mentioning the CP leads:

@Imperator RAD-X
@Gr4Ss

 

[Bodger]

To address your points:

Point #1;
Unlike Willard V1 where CP's were dropped into the city with no training, the systems have been changed and updated for the beta and maybe further for full release depending how things go with the beta. We'll be having CP's patrolling more often in smaller groups, and even before that, being trained properly with actual instruction on what kind of interactions can be had between themselves and citizens, and even other units on the job. The CP leads will be having a meeting soon to discuss how we want to prepare the faction for the beta among other things.

Point #2;
This isn't really a job for Civil Protection, like you said, it'd be better for BoI, though from my understanding BoI is indefinitely suspended as the lead is busy with IRL stuff. With that being said, I assume if the BoI ever does get active again, that will be one of it's purposes.

Point #3;
The Combine already have control over resources, rations are going to be slow (3 hour IRL timer) and will stop giving credits out after you hit the cap, though you are still able to gain credits, they just won't come from rations. The Combine also are able to see any transactions made with credits as one of the recent additions not available in V1, and the reason for said transaction. This means that with the addition of smuggling, rebels will have to start using chips, which are only obtainable through smuggling or trade between other rebels.

How all of this affects the Citizen-CP dynamic remains to be seen, which is why we're having the beta, to see how our new systems both coded and not affect RP.

 

[Takyon3]

To address your points:

Point #1;
Unlike Willard V1 where CP's were dropped into the city with no training, the systems have been changed and updated for the beta and maybe further for full release depending how things go with the beta. We'll be having CP's patrolling more often in smaller groups, and even before that, being trained properly with actual instruction on what kind of interactions can be had between themselves and citizens, and even other units on the job. The CP leads will be having a meeting soon to discuss how we want to prepare the faction for the beta among other things.

You seemed to have ignored everything I said with this point.

Point #2;
This isn't really a job for Civil Protection, like you said, it'd be better for BoI, though from my understanding BoI is indefinitely suspended as the lead is busy with IRL stuff. With that being said, I assume if the BoI ever does get active again, that will be one of it's purposes.

BoI is suspended because unleashing undercover agents on launch seems like a bad idea to @Lord Beckett . But, they should come back up at some point.

Point #3;
The Combine already have control over resources, rations are going to be slow (3 hour IRL timer) and will stop giving credits out after you hit the cap, though you are still able to gain credits, they just won't come from rations. The Combine also are able to see any transactions made with credits as one of the recent additions not available in V1, and the reason for said transaction. This means that with the addition of smuggling, rebels will have to start using chips, which are only obtainable through smuggling or trade between other rebels.

Having the rebels use an entirely separate economy from the rest of the citizenry with "chips" seems like a bad idea to me, because it removes any reason for them to deal with non-rebels or even enter the city. But that's a whole other can of worms and I don't know all the details.

 

[Gr4Ss]

Having the rebels use an entirely separate economy from the rest of the citizenry with "chips" seems like a bad idea to me, because it removes any reason for them to deal with non-rebels or even enter the city. But that's a whole other can of worms and I don't know all the details.

Except there is no way to earn the rebel currency in and by itself - it is a closed loop system where only value is lost. If rebels want to earn more money, they need resources from the City.

Also there is no permanently living in the sewers on WN. They must come to the surface at some point.

Either way, #1 is already a thing - just not coded in but basically how we play Dispatch.

#2: long-term detainment and interrogation is an option. CP's are not going to play detective, spy or anything in that direction though - it is not their job.

#3: Already a thing (digital combine currency ftw).

 

[Robert]

Hello.

The CP leads had a meeting today and your suggestion came up. After discussing with the bois and looking into this all. Some of this is either:

A) Already in the faction
B) Requires too much micromanagement

The conclusion we reached is that we should Deny this suggestion because point 3 is already in existence... same with point 1 with Dispatch. Point 2 is basically not the job for CPs and overall doesn't seem like a great idea overall anyway.

DENIED