Fairly rudimentary rules for handling insurgencies. I wrote these with the assumption that the PC’s will be working with the insurgent groups, though I think they can handle PC’s as agents of the governing faction quite easily - perfect for running an Oversight campaign, or a Barsoomian Movement focused one. The rules cover everything from terrorism to civil disobedience on the part of the “insurgents,” while governing forces are primarily restricted to violent means, since their nonviolent choices are primarily restricted to negotiation options. Government forces will try to maximize stability and eliminate insurgent groups, while insurgent groups will try to build public support and undermine the government, moving from covert ops cell, to hidden insurgency, and finally to guerilla warfare. They're fairly vague so they can be easily applied to other settings. An insurgency follows the efforts of one or more insurgent groups to destabilize the governing forces and (ideally) replace them with themselves. [b]Stability[/b] is the primary statistic which keeps track of this. It measures the degree to which coercive tools are concentrated in the hands of the governing faction. A Stability rating at 100 automatically brings an end to any insurgency, as this means that the governing faction is the sole owner of any and all coercive tools. Stability is still important in autonomist polities, although its meaning is slightly different. Autonomist polities still require a monopoly on organized coercive force (though this might be more loosely enforced), but the objective of autonomist security forces is generally to ensure freedom from coercion (as are the nominal goals of both the Jovian and Consortium security forces, though most would agree that autonomists actually achieve this ideal.) Either way, stability is the same for every society. When starting an insurgency, determine stability by rolling 3d100 and picking the highest score. Easier insurgencies can be made by rolling just 2d100. Functionally, “safe” societies would rate in the 90’s, “unsafe” societies in the 80’s, and “very unsafe” societies in the 70’s. 40-60 is “failed state” territory, below which you’re got an active civil war, and 0 is complete and total anarchy. |Stability: | Status:| |70-100 | Stable| |40-69 | Unstable| |0-39 | Anarchic| [b]Insurgency Factions:[/b] Factions (including the governing faction) are governed by six main statistics: [/b]Popularity:[/b] Popularity is the base of public support and goodwill that a faction has created. Turns are resolved in order of Popularity, though the governing faction always goes first. Popularity ranges from 0-99, and each insurgent faction attempting to benefit from spontaneous demonstrations rolls against its Popularity score. Critical success allows that faction to immediately take an Action, and critical failure is a PR disaster, reducing Popularity by (D10/2) points. [b]Strength:[/b] Strength is the size of the faction, measured by the number of committed members. For governing factions, this would include all security forces as well as essential bureaucratic membership and core political supporters. For insurgents, this would include active membership, but wouldn’t include sympathizers, members of associate groups, or inactive cells. Depending on the size of the insurgency campaign, each point of Strength could represent 10 members, or even 100 or 1,000 members (the latter for a whole-Mars Barsoomian insurgency.) Strength affects turnout for actions such as demonstrations, rioting, guerilla warfare, and polling. An insurgent faction is automatically destroyed if its Strength is reduced to zero. [b]Organization:[/b] Organization is the faction’s strength of leadership, centralization, chain of command, and operational efficiency. Organization is treated as a skill (ranging from 0-99) and an insurgent faction is automatically defeated if its organization reaches 0. Factions must pass an Organization test each turn in order to take any Actions - failure means it cannot act at all this turn. Critical Failure reduces Organization by (D10/2) points, as incompetent personnel manage to get themselves caught or killed, and Critical Success allows two Actions to be taken this turn. [b]Loyalty:[/b] Loyalty is the deep and abiding commitment to the cause felt by the faction’s members. Loyalty levels range from -30 (completely disillusioned), 0 (ambivalent), to +30 (zealot). The loyalty bonus/penalty is applied to faction member’s efforts to resist Persuasion, Protocol checks to gain entry to secret hideouts, WIL saves to resist torture, the faction’s resistance to infiltration and defection,and other scenarios at GM discretion. [b]Security:[/b] Security measures the faction’s resistance to infowar intrusions. Like Loyalty, it ranges from -30 to +30, with the modifier being applied to hostile infowar actions. Security doesn’t directly cover infosec or mesh security gear (it instead applies to Actions within the Insurgencies ruleset) but higher modifiers will mean more mesh security infomorphs, better firewalls, dead switches, or sometimes the complete absence of hackable technology. [b]Equipment:[/b] This is a measure of the quality of gear (usually combat gear) available to the faction, as well as the amount of training they are capable of providing. Generally, governing factions have higher equipment ratings. Since equipment is very dependent on the GM’s selection of a faction, I’ll only give a “example” table for the average mook. |Equipment level: | Morph: | Armor: | Weapon: | NPC CP:| |0-19 (Rag-tag) | Case | None | Improvised weapons | 600| |20-39 (Low) | Worker pod | Armor clothing | Medium pistol | 800| |40-59 (Adequate) | Exalt | Light combat | SMG | 1,000| |60-79 (Good) | Novacrab | Heavy combat | Railgun Assault Rifle | 1,200| |80-99 (Professional) | Ghost | Battlesuit | Plasma rifle | 1,400| Insurgent factions have a 6th statistic, [b]Visibility[/b], which determines the amount of media or social coverage their actions receive. It ranges from 0-99. Each Action is accompanied by a Visibility Check, to determine Publicity, with effects as described within the action. Visibility must be tested even if no action is taken (for the possibility of investigative reports, losing the spotlight, or the emergence of damning XP). General Publicity tests are taken at a -10, with the following effects: Success or Excellent Success: +1 or +D10/2 Visibility points. Failure or Severe Failure: -D10/2 or -D10 Visibility points. Critical Success or Critical Failure: +D10/2 or -D10/2 Popularity points. [b]Generating an insurgency:[/b] First, you must pick a governing faction and a primary insurgent faction. For each of these, you can either hand-select their statistics, or roll them up: Popularity, Organization, Equipment, Visibility (insurgents only) : Roll 5d100 and assign the top scores to each category of your choice. (Yes, this means insurgents are at a disadvantage, as they only drop the lowest 1 die, rather than the lowest 2.) Security and Loyalty: Roll 1d10-4 for each of these, counting results higher than +3 as 0. Strength: Roll 4d10. Governing factions roll 8d10. Next, either choose 3 Faction Traits, or roll 3d10 to generate three Traits. Discard any that don’t work (i.e. they contradict another trait or the nature of the faction. The government can’t be a “sub-faction”!) [b]Faction traits:[/b] 1- Mass appeal: Add 2d10 to Strength and to Visibility. 2- Secretive: Subtract 1d10 from Strength and Visibility. 3- Meshed In: Add 1d10 to Equipment, subtract 1 from Security. 4- Low Tech: Subtract 1d10 from Equipment, add 1 to Security. 5- Demagogue: Faction is vulnerable to a special Leadership Assassination action - assassinating the demagogue has quadrupled results, but she has triple the bodyguard contingent. 6- Clade Organization: Subtract 1d10 from Organization and add 1 to both Security and Loyalty. 7- Ahimsa: +10 to organizing nonviolent Actions, but negative publicity is doubled from intentional or unintentional violence. 8- No Innocents: May not take nonviolent Actions, but can use Suicide Bombings. 9- Front Group: Faction has a loosely associated front group that can be scapegoated for failed operations. May take an Organization check to avoid negative Publicity, with a cumulative -10 modifier every time it is used. 10- Sub-Faction: This faction is a wing or party within another faction (could even be the governing faction). Its Strength, Organization and Visibility are halved, and it is treated as a part of the main faction until any of those three stats are higher than its parent organizations, or some major schism occurs, at which point it breaks off. Finally, generate 1d10/2 (or more/less, if you’d like) “latent” factions. Roll up or pick their stats and traits. These factions won’t necessarily be “active” at the start - they may range from opposed, but just as active insurgent groups to hidden social schisms that only emerge as stability breaks down. Introducing latent factions is most convenient as stability moves between each “step,” or as major events occur, such as a successful leadership assassination or the start of negotiations. Some of these may be extremist pro-government forces. Alternatively, they could be several factions allied to the PC’s insurgent faction to create an “insurgent coalition.” [b]Running the insurgency:[/b] Each turn represents two days. Every active faction gets to attempt 1 action per turn, with the governing faction getting the first attempt at 7:00 AM +(d10-5), and the other factions acting in Popularity order afterwards. Each Action occurs d10 hours after the preceding one. Attempting an action requires a successful Organization test. Failure means it cannot act at all this turn - make a General Publicity test. Critical Failure reduces Organization by (D10/2) points, as incompetent personnel manage to get themselves caught or killed, and Critical Success allows a second action to be taken after the final faction acts. PC-controlled Actions are generally run as short missions under that Action’s mission guidelines. GM-controlled actions are resolved under the Action’s guidelines. At the end of each Action, test Visibility to see if the action gets publicity. Success doubles the action's effects, regardless of whether the action itself was a success or failure. Critical Success increases Strength by 2. Critical Failure reduces Strength by 2. At the end of every turn, roll against Stability and the government’s Popularity. If both of these fail, generate a Spontaneous Demonstration. The demonstration’s Strength is 1d10, plus 1d10 per critical failure rolled. Reduce Stability by half this number. Each Insurgent faction may make a Popularity test to see if the demonstration is favorable to them. Success adds half the demonstration’s Strength to the faction’s Popularity. Critical success allows that faction to immediately take an Action, and critical failure is a PR disaster, reducing Popularity by half of the demonstration’s Strength. [b]Trading Places:[/b] Once Stability has reached Anarchic levels, the "government" more or less ceases to exist, and the remaining factions must jockey for territorial control based on their strength and popularity. At the beginning of every turn, roll 2d10. If the result is higher than the current Stability, each faction must roll to see which becomes the new "government" that is responsible for restoring order to a shattered society. Each Faction makes a Popularity test and modifies that faction's Strength by a percentage equal to its MoS. The faction whose modified Strength is highest becomes the new governing faction. [b]Government Actions:[/b] Censorship: Mission - The PC’s must secure or delete incriminating XP files or propaganda xcasts from a major media station before they are publicized. There are at least three. GM Guidelines: Test against Equipment, with the Security bonus or penalty. Success: Reduce target faction’s Visibility by 1d10+5. Increase Stability by 1d10/2. Reduce Popularity by 1d10/2. Failure: Reduce Popularity by 1d10/2. Increase target faction’s Visibility by same amount. Reduce Stability by 1. Arrest/Leadership Arrest: Mission - The PC’s must subdue and jail an insurgent political leader without inflicting casualties. Leadership Arrest doubles the leader’s bodyguard and causes them to open fire earlier. GM Guidelines - Test Organization, with Loyalty bonus or penalty. -20 for Leadership Arrest. Success: (Leadership Arrest doubles these results) Reduce target faction’s Organization by 1d10. Increase Stability by 1. Failure: (Leadership Arrest doubles these results) Reduce Popularity by 1d10/2. Reduce Stability by 2. Search and Seizure: Mission: The PC’s must go home-to-home in search of hidden weapons stashes. There are at least two. GM Guidelines - Test Popularity, with Loyalty bonus or penalty. Success: -1d10 Equipment from target faction. -1 Stability. -1 Popularity. Failure: -1d10/2 Stability and Popularity. Purge: Mission - The PC’s must locate and interrogate moles within the faction. GM Guidelines - Organization with Security bonus or penalty. Success: +1 Loyalty. -1d10 Strength. Failure: -1d10 Strength. -1d10/2 Organization. [b]Nonviolent Actions:[/b] Boycott: Mission - The PC’s have to scrounge equipment and food for inconvenienced members of the population or those who can’t independently afford the boycott. GM Guidelines - Test Organization with Loyalty bonus or penalty. Success: -0 Stability, +1d10/2 Visibility, +0 Popularity. Each of these increases by 1 per consecutive success. Failure: Reset the Boycott action’s Success table to +0. Sit-In: Mission - The PC’s must endure several hours of “sitting in” a restricted area. SAV-based checks to converse with media, SOM checks against hostile shoving, WIL saves against losing temper. GM Guidelines - Test Organization, with Loyalty bonus or penalty. Success: +1d10 Visibility, +1d10/2 Strength. Failure: -1 Strength, +1 Stability, -1d10/2 Popularity. [b]Guerilla Actions:[/b] Bombing: Mission - The PC’s have to plant a bomb in a symbolic structure or factory and then call in the threat so the area is evacuated, and not get caught. GM Guidelines - Equipment, with Security bonus or penalty. Success: -1d10/2 Stability and Popularity, +1d10 Visibility Failure: d100 civilian casualties, -1d10 Popularity, +1d10 Visibility, -1 Equipment Assassination/Leadership Assassination: Mission - The PC’s must kill a high-ranked government official and escape. GM Guidelines - Test Organization, with Loyalty bonus or penalty. -20 for Leadership Assassination. Success: (Leadership Assassination doubles these results) Reduce government’s Organization by 1d10. Reduce Stability by 1d10/2. Reduce Popularity by 1d10. Failure: (Leadership Assassination doubles these results) Reduce Popularity by 1d10/2. Reduce Stability by 1. [b]Terrorist Actions:[/b] Suicide Bombing: Mission - The PC’s must disguise, arm, and deliver the suicide bomber to a tightly packed location. GM Guidelines - Organization, with loyalty bonus doubled. Success: Reduce Stability and Popularity by 1d10. 2d100 civilian casualties. Failure: 2d10 civilian casualties. Reduce Stability by 1 and Popularity by 1d10. Purge: Mission - The PC’s must locate and interrogate moles within the faction. GM Guidelines - Organization with Security bonus or penalty. Success: +1 Loyalty. -1d10 Strength. Failure: -1d10 Strength. -1d10/2 Organization.