If you were the captain of the guard for a city, inside of a kitchen sink fantasy world; how would you organize your most common unit, in order to adress your most common security risks?
>I.e. "each patrol needs 2 barbarians, one cleric, and one wizard, so we can engage without a fear of dying, and dispel or cast control spells against enemy spellcasters"
Doesnt have to be specific to a ruleset, but a d20 type fantasy is implied.
If it helps to have context, you may assume a large city of 15,000; characters, monsters, or npcs of level/hd 12+ to be unique, levels 9-11 rare, levels 6-8 uncommon, and levels 1-5 common.
You may also assume average random encounter tables, and a modest amount of crime or hostile supernatural events that aren't rampant due to your excellent ability to captain. You may also assume a single adventuring party of NG alignment is operating in the local area if that helps, of any level 10 or less.
What would your average patrol look like, and what would your key takeaways or concerns be?
I'd just take bribes and shit lol
The wizards who solve the problems and some anonymous meat shields and general muscle to do grunt work
>inside of a kitchen sink fantasy world
I would kill myself
Ah, you think you'd do a better job by transforming into some kind of undead then?
So the idea is to specialize in punishing and trying to fix things long after the fact, instead of preventing?
Going LE, is, technically, an answer...
Not a bad idea, though I wonder what the reaction to flying or blinking/teleporting perps would be.
>So the idea is to specialize in punishing and trying to fix things long after the fact, instead of preventing?
What exactly do you think it is that guards/cops do?
Patrol, respond proactively, prevent issues with some medieval 'papers please' on anyone sus? I mean, in specific, that having to upchannel and wait for mage backup for every event, and/or waiting for a wizard to prep themselves with the perfect mix of spells to later deal with a specific perp, might take an undesirably long amount of time. I suppose one could prep battle mages to hot drop in, but at that point why not just use rogues with batteries of those most common spells as scrolls/wands?
Oh, you~
Sensible
This is actually a real life problem with cops. "Patrolling" doesn't really stop as much crime as you would think, it's usually more actively a money raising thing. Think small fine things like speeding littering.
The issue breaks down into 2 real problems. The first is basically cops per area. Let's say you have 1 cop per block (an impossible figure in real life but good for examples). How much of one block can you keep an eye on at one time? There's just too many blind spots to cover. Especially if people are actively avoiding you.
The second is for a cop to do something a crime has to have already been committed or currently being committed. If there is no crime then they have no reason to act. So factor in travel time means they are usually too late to stop the crime and get delegated with collecting crime data, with most crimes basically being unsolvable. Ex: once the mugger disappears around the corner he is probably gone.
The best way to stop crime is actually been shown to have economic opportunity in an area. People turn to crime when there are no better options. Give them ways to pay their bills that have less risk and most people will take them. Basically you will pay for food over stealing it cause one way doesn't have a chance of getting your ass beat.
Go drive around a richer neighborhood and you'll see maybe one cop every couple days, a poor one every 10 or so minutes. Then tell me which one has more crime, the one with or without all the cops.
Now lets say there's Recurring McEvilguy, and for whatever reason his dastardly plans involve him and his goons doing something shady, possibly to include petty crimes, leading up to one major actual crime, and culminating in The Dark Ritual Nobody Asked For And Probably Killed A Lot Of People.
Assuming for argument a city -had- to be chosen for whatever reason, what KIND of city would be desirable to pull it off without problem?
Alternatively, how would a town you captain handle the campaign badguy? Divert all resources and ignore other normal duties, a balanced approach? Ignore it and post a bounty, hoping some plucky adventurers come by?
So the answer to that is that this is why the really long post I made about setting up a militia with groups of 5 uses groups of 5 or so - roughly the size of the average adventuring party.
No joke, my group's "campaign" is based off something very similar to that: it's a collection of one shots where everyone is connected to the same organization that sends out parties to investigate weird shit - it's Kitchen Sink Fantasy RPG by way of the X Files and Delta Green. So we have groups we've formed that do exactly that, and since we rotate GMs, we often have separate storylines that go and float off, some intersecting with one another. This means that the total group adds up to about 15 people who can drop in and drop out in a coherent world - and one of the storylines by one of the GMs is that - a series of minor unconnected threats connected to a cult, but since they're responded by different officers and react based on different players, there's fog of war for the group on that end.
It's actually really fricking cool.
few humans, dwarf, troll, and werewolf
As long as that one guy has official paperwork saying he's human.
Also, patrician taste, anon.
>patrician taste
FRICKING.
BRILLIANT.
I dont get it
Bugrit, millennium hand an' shrimp
>inside of a kitchen sink fantasy world
I would use mages specialising in controlling plastics, ceramics, metals, and water, since that's what I'm expecting to find for the most part.
All members of the City Guard are required to have a minimum knowledge of magic and its uses. Favorable promotions for those who advance their magical skills.
I would also make use of magical creatures that can detect magic as well.
At the end of the day, magic users can still die to bullets and blades but I'd also try to find means to restrain them without killing them if possible.
>captain of the guard of a significantly sized city of about 15k
>which is roughly the population of Marseille in the middle of the Medieval period
So at that point, guards and police likely would've had the duty of patrolling routes away from highwaymen rather than keeping city order, and because they often were funded by merchants and not by a central state authority. Yes, I realize this is gonna go a little bit weird, but bear with me.
First, I'm gonna form a staff; I need a bunch of people who are good at mapmaking, doesn't matter who - ideally we have one excellent map maker and a bunch of scouts; I need a bunch of good diplomats; I need a handful of engineers; and I need someone to be a chief of staff and organize a lot of everything else. Then I'll reach out to all nearby towns proposing an unified road patrol group. Aim this both at any sort of guards and at any merchants and pilgrims groups; they stand to win the most from this. I think responses would be mixed; but find the ones that are willing and forge deals with them. The next step is a way of preserving our independence in face of any significant royal forces - which is to say I'll swear fealty to the king and promise to maintain and improve roads and bridges, levy forces in case of warfare, and to enforce royal law. This is as trick; the objective is for the royals to leave us the frick alone. If I'm the one organizing this, I don't want a government that will take significant time to be the one I have to relay information to; I wanna be able to act rapidly. By swearing fealty and fulfilling basic duties, I've been granted a lot of flexibility even though I'm technically bound to them.
Everyone gets a brief period of training on things like combat and first aid, while the patrol leaders get taught cartography, tactics and diplomacy as well as communications magic, and the engineers get taught engineering and logistics and related magic. Find anyone who is willing to serve, and make the position presitigious. Training should emphasize defense against raids, convoy protection, and enforcement of the law without resulting to significant bloodshed - if I do, then any power I've acquired has just been wasted. Generally, an unit is about 5 men, and it's incorporated into larger groups that are multiples of 5. The engineers are to maintain the bridges and roads - that's what we've been bought to do. The gist is that instead of being specific and inflexible, I'm instead going to bypass that and say "we need a scout, we need a leader, we need an engineer, and we need 2 enforcers" - enforcers being anyone whose skills are primarily in fighting and protection. Doesn't matter which walk of life, this is entirely chosen by the leader, so the leaders have control of their own group. This keeps going up into a chain of command - eventually feeding back to me. They rotate between patrol guard, city guard, and rest.
Basically, I'm trying to set up a paramilitary/militia organization right under everyone's noses.
>Patrol
Correct, that is where policing started indeed, but it rarely was within the cities, more between the cities - which is important with pilgrims and merchants.
>respond proactively,
>cops
>proactive
lmao
>prevent issues with some medieval 'papers please' on anyone sus?
The main policing the Constabulary did was not preventing, but gathering information and verifying if and how the crime in question happened. You'd have to patrol the area and then report back to the king for the closest equivalent; it's how you end up as the physical enforcer of the law, which merges with the trade and pilgrim routes patrols later on.
Enjoyable read, learned something there, I was pulling a random stat block from "large city" and Marseille I did not know about.
The macro plan sounds excellent, and it feels like your relying on the momentum of that to 'natually' solve your local problems with an overwhelming amount of willingness and resources.
With that emphasis would you expect that you won't need to keep the peace as much at home?
Would you be encouraging a melting pot and relying on the goodwill of the public, or trying to limit foreigners and non-core races?
Bloodless enforcement wherever possible sounds like you could be walked over?
>With that emphasis would you expect that you won't need to keep the peace as much at home?
I'm there to protect the merchants and pilgrims that are funding me; I'm not there to keep the city's peace; that's a collaboration that they thrust unto the town as a whole, and the city's duty is to judge and punish. I'm there to keep the order of my patrons, not the city's. Sure, they often align, and I'm more than willing to collaborate with each city's government with searching for criminals and even finding the ones in the areas we've been assigned to or hired by, but the judging of these crimes is not for us to do.
>Bloodless enforcement wherever possible sounds like you could be walked over?
I'm trying not to get myself killed by having people commit massacres. Naturally, they are to use deadly force when the time calls for it (notably in Patrol Duty, but City Duty will use deadly force if someone inflicts or attempts to inflict deadly injuries upon them), but the less chaos I create in the power base I'm currently basically squatting on, the better. The troops will also patrol/guard multiple cities - the objective here being to make an association not with the city, but with the organization. And thus law enforcement has to be as bloodless as possible - if my enforcers are committing massacres, I'm going to get kicked out.
>Would you be encouraging a melting pot and relying on the goodwill of the public, or trying to limit foreigners and non-core races?
It's simple. Whatever gives us the most prestige. Ideally, by virtue of serving multiple cities that may be significantly disconnected, the best prestige is the one that focuses on the goodwill and melting pot. No longer are we Phocia, Arpitan, Segalauni and Genawa, but now we are the Rhonish Confederation and we are, if not brothers, then certainly blood brothers. I can't focus on "limiting foreigners" when my organization is drawn from a large area short of the entire area being completely monocultural.
Thanks for the replies, it was a thoughtful balance between efficacy and survivability.
My instinct would be to show favor to the city's biggest export or cash cow, increase severity of punishments to scare small-timers straight, and use the breathing room to focus on any big name problems. Pardon informants, and power creep from a very confident position.
I'd commonly use units of 3 for my most common patrols, and only a third of the force would specialize in communications/logistics magic. The idea being if I need more than 3 people, its not a problem I should rush into anyway, so there would be a tank role, a utility and damage role, and then the third is for either going to get help, or using abilities to pursue a flier/teleporter. I can attempt to control a scene, keep eyes on scene, and have a runner.
Excessive force would be a thing so everyone knows that we can go hard, and be respected, but I would use a lot of magic to eliminate mistrials and make the people confident complying is actually a good idea because the system they submit to is fair, hopefully the expectation of magically assisted factfinding will survive my tenure.
Keep a few of my best on rotation to be on call, especially some spellcasters for when a real OP move is needed, and closely partner with local clergy for synergy there.
I expect a fair bit of budget will go to healing/fixing the risks I take.
I think excessive brutality and favoring cash cows could potentially backfire; the trust of not bringing problems with the law when hired for security is a big factor. That's important because a possible hire is a caravan; if you have a single unit working together that's used to one another both on the road with deadly violence and in the city with minimal violence, they'll be more effective as a quick response team. You could deploy a party of 5 and they'd be able to patrol and maintain their own quarters in the area and communicate back to barracks for extended periods of time - which is gonna help with patrol even with limited communications, and handle a lot of convoy work between cities.
The support with the clergy and pilgrimage routes is pretty important - if we get annointed as knights because of our work, we can begin wrestling power away from the king, slowly, steadily, until we can truly gain power.
Standard Operational Unit consists of
>Three crossbowmen, operating repeating crossbows and wielding a selection of magical or specialist ammunition, involving sleep charms, or specialist damage types. Also trained in sword use.
>Two CQC experts, trained in the use of Polearms, Arming swords, and basic martial arts such as grappling and boxing. Both men can defend each other, and both must be armoured in half plate at minimum.
>Guard detail.
>Two crossbowmen and one CQC in half plate at minimum.
>Assault group.
>Two groups of Standard Units, with a third comprised of Two Magic wielders of some form, protected by two CQC specialists armoured in full plate.
>This group will be accompanied by two mass combat specialists, again armoured in full plate, but given permission for personal weapons choices, and a trained duelist or specialist in 1 on 1 close combat against extremely high hazard targets.
Now given budgeting the Assault group is likely most of the guards in my precinct, hence drills. If a man is being paid to stand around in pretty armour for security by the hard work of the tax paying people, the least that man can do is be as prepared as is possible for him to be, when his services are needed.
This but
I'd add domesticated or magically controlled monsters to patrols, rust monsters, griffin mounts for air support, in addition to ordinary animal support like dogs and horses. Probably have a few secret agent 'rogues' reporting in on the undermarket dealings.
>inside of a kitchen sink fantasy world
Get Mega Busters for everyone, invest the rest of the cash into giant robots.
If we're in D&D, everybody gets two six-shooters, like proper lawmen oughta carry them anyway, and Vorpal Arkansas Toothpicks.
No point in not using everything Grygax has blessed us with.
Easy bro, it all works out if you become the most hardcore furry possible. Look at picrel. Y_u j_st ____.
In Fantasia City’s war on crime, the most magical criminal offenders are pursued by the detectives of the Mage Case Squad. These are their stories.
DHUN DHUN.
>oops
>one cleric, and one wizard
Whoa there. Casters have way more important shit to do in the city than engage in beat-walking.
If you can rope any of them into joining the guard, it's better to keep them in a specialized unit that is directed toward where you need them to be by your regular ground pounders: the fighters, the warriors, and I guess if you have them barbarians, but don't expect to source those from the city.
In most kitchen sink fantasy casters aren't that uncommon. If they are that's an important consideration, and makes dealing with magical threats very difficult.
>Whoa there. Casters have way more important shit to do in the city than engage in beat-walking.
You're the type of person that starts crying bloody murder if his consumables aren't available in every village.
If I can get my hands on magic items, I'd make equipping patrols with scrolls or wands of hold person or a similar spell a priority. Also with so many leveled characters around, I'd try to create a robust system for citizens arrests and deputizing adventures.
>each patrol made up entirely of PC classes
Slow down there my man. We've got a couple dozen warriors to keep an eye on the market and the traffic coming through the gates, while they're open, and a small night shift to keep an eye on the roads, and hold down the fort at the guardhouse in case someone needs something late at night. If we need anything more than that we can raise the hue and cry and round up some strong lads and upstanding men of the community, ask the earl to come out with his household men, or both. What kind of dumpster do you live in where you need more than that?
As someone that has probably done something as close to this as possible IRL as this thread will see (was a security director responsible for officers at multiple facilities), the question you want to ask yourself is what your goals are. You want a "patrol" to be able to engage any and all threats without real risk? Thats like asking for each squad car to have a fully armed swat team inside of it, thats crazy.
Assuming these aren't guys on towers watching for signs of enemy movement, you would want groups of two, and their main goal would be to be visible. You are less likely to pick a pocket, start fight, speed, etc. while within view of officers, and thats pretty much the only way you can be proactive against crime with uniformed officers, barring divination and thought police. You have two officers because its the minimum effective unit for damn near anything an officer could be expected to do other than handing out tickets. If you have a sedentary position, you still want one guy to be able to leave to do things like use the bathroom or ask other guards for help while one can still stay guarding the position. For minor apprehensions, like pick pockets or drunks, you would want two officers to improve the odds of success. For observations you want two people there (he said she said gets a lot more complicated if there are multiple witnesses), and a second pair of eyes on things rarely hurts. For late night operations, the conversation also keeps people from falling asleep.
The main goal of this smallest possible unit is actual crime prevention. For anything larger, you would use something like a SWAT unit.