/tg/ - Traditional Games » Thread #43308700

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Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:02:00 No.43308700 View Reply Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43308788 >>43308822 >>43308905 >>43309127 >>43309297 >>43309300 >>43309301 >>43312021 >>43312028 >>43312865 >>43313716 >>43313815 >>43315433 >>43318025 >>43322323

I need some tips on interrogating people for my inquisitor character. While straight torture is easy enough to come up with - the character is vaguely good aligned and so I'd like to hear of creative methods for extracting information without bodily harm.

Hardmode: most people I interrogate are cultists dedicated to demon lords etc - and are really hard to crack, most don't fear pain.

Any help?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:06:27 No.43308738 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43308755 >>43308781 >>43309282 >>43309904 >>43312090 >>43313716 >>43318382

Look up the actual handbooks on this topic. One of the best was written by an Ex-Nazi interrogator.

The general consensus is that torture is basically useless and that empathy and logic are much better, even with fanatics.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:08:23 No.43308755 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308738
Will do - any explicit suggestions? Either of reading material or stuff from the mentioned books?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:08:29 No.43308756 Report Delete

Quoted By:

Fear of pain is entirely subjective. Read something about field torture and interrogation techniques, they will work just fine. Just do some simple research on that subject, it all lays on the surface.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:11:00 No.43308781 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308738
Fuck, beat me to it. The short version of what he did was to convince the POWs that he was the closest thing they had to a friend in the entire camp, and only by giving up information could he help them.

Anonymous

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Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:11:23 No.43308785 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43311257 >>43317955 >>43325328

Put hoods over people's heads and conduct mock executions with theatricality and deception.

Threaten to remove another person's mask.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:11:32 No.43308788 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43318051 >>43327486

>>43308700
The best method I've ever seen for non-harmful interrogations was from the original Punisher movie:
String them up by their feet. Bring around some kind of torch, blowtorch, etc. something that clearly gets very hot. Explain how once a flame gets hot enough it completely fries the nerve, leaving only the signals for freezing, burning cold.
Go around behind them (keep them from turning around of course) and apply something that's been freeze-dried. Make sure it's something that won't melt or drip on them to give the rise away. You just want them to feel piercing cold.
At the same time, off where they can't see, apply the torch/flame to a slab of meat to simulate the smell and sound of burning flesh.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:15:32 No.43308822 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43308835 >>43311994

>>43308700
Torture isn't very effective as an interrogation method anyway, and this fact is actually accounted for in the description of the Interrogation skill. Use starvation, sleep deprivation, truth serums and psychology.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:17:16 No.43308835 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43309385 >>43309904

>>43308822
Trouble is that we're often in the field, meaning I have limited time and supplies to get a quick answer.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:22:04 No.43308880 Report Delete

Quoted By:

Demons and Cultists and the like usually value power. Is there some way you can shatter parts of their mind, take away or destroy the knowledge that gives them that power? Such a thing might scare them more than pain ever could.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:24:44 No.43308905 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43314031

>>43308700
With Cultists/Fanatics the best thing is usually to just LET them talk. Express sincere interest in what they have to say. Treat them as rational beings, and respectfully.

Anonymous

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Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:43:04 No.43309127 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43309228

>>43308700
Probably mental agony: Exposure to endless litanies to the EMPRAH and multiple types of drugs, Inquisition has many helpful things there. Additionally psychic probing and torture, these are heretics after all. The style with which you play is up to you, and options are Puritan and Radical. My suggestion: Go Radical. Puritans have their appeal, but as a certain Radical said: "Who is not Puritan when young is heartless. Who is Puritan when old is a fool."

Illegal drugs (even on the standards of Inquisition) and tech, psychic predictions, goals beside "find them heretics"... Like making humanity stronger, through Istvaanian style strife, death and war or Recongregationists (if I remember their name correctly) renovations of government, psykers and technology.

Radical Inquisitors get much more dangerous tools, much more dangerous goals and many enemies within their own organization, but in the end, the end justifies the means, at least for the ones who know the difference between them and the enemy too well. Some are even ready to willingly throw their own souls away to save billions: Desperate, borderline heretical, yet in a twisted way, noble and heroic Oblationists, for example.

Radicals are a great roleplaying option, and much less restrictive than Puritans, who do things in the way they think is "good", as radicals do things they think "necessary"

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 02:53:56 No.43309228 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43309127
Self correction: Puritans do things they consider right, they are not kind. "good" is an appropriate word, but "right" is much closer to the truth.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 03:00:09 No.43309282 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43311623

>>43308738
>The general consensus is that torture is basically useless and that empathy and logic are much better, even with fanatics.

Empathy and Logic only works when there is the POSSIBILITY of torture, though. It doesn't work nearly as well when there is no threat of torture.

The "Carrot and Stick" approach works incredibly well, and has for centuries, but it does require both a juicy carrot and a big stick.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 03:01:04 No.43309290 Report Delete

Quoted By:

Don't hurt them. Find out what they're afraid of.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 03:01:48 No.43309297 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308700
What game? That inquisitor looks pathfinder-y so I'd suggest cut the crap and take Leadership for an enchanter cohort. Seriously, a 1st level wizard spell makes for a better interrogator than you ever will.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 03:02:15 No.43309300 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308700
If they are cultists, you don't need a torturer, you need a deprogrammer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deprogramming

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 03:02:21 No.43309301 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43313950

>>43308700
Just roll for it. Easier

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 03:12:36 No.43309385 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308835
You let one of the other members of your team torture their way through a couple of the cultists without killing them. Then when it's the guy before your main target's turn, you come in and make a big deal about how they were supposed to let you try things your way first. (after the prior guys are tortured, return them to their cells/ general holding area) question the guy who's torture you interrupted. Don't return him to the holding area, keep him separate and isolated from the main group. Make it seem like he's free.

Then, question your target. Tell him if he can confirm some information for you you can wrap it up and your team will leave. Mix up questions you need information for with information you already know the answer to. Don't ask questions directly, ask him to tell you about things, make him speak paragraphs, not yes or no sentences.

After you're done questioning him, hold him somewhere separate from the others where he's more comfortable, but instructions the guards beforehand not to let him sleep.

Spend a couple hours trying to verify the information he gave you, requestion all the other prisoners, etc.

Requestion you HVT, to confirm the info.
Then dispose of by whatever means wanted.

Variations of this are the core of questioning targets.

Also, if your gm wants specifics for torture, toothpicks and woodshards under the nails cause a lot of pain with almost no damage.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 04:28:14 No.43309904 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43319034

>>43308738
The problem with torture (physical or psychological.) is that if it is too much for the victim to stand then the victim will say anything that they think will stop or reduce it.

So lets run three scenarios:
- Torture victim doesn't know the truth. No amount of torture will bring it out.
- Torture victim is willing to hand the information over. Torture isn't required and only serves to make him less likely to turn it over.
- Torture victim knows the truth but is trying to keep is secret. He will try to lie at first and only say the truth later. If the torturer sees a lie as the truth then he has got the wrong information. If he thinks the truth is a lie, he sends the message that the truth won't end the torture. So more lies will come.

>>43308835

Now think of a ticking time bomb scenario. A large bomb will go off soon. Someone knows where but doesn't want to share what he knows. So torture him into saying where the bomb is. If the torture victim believes that the torture is only being done to extract information, then he believes that the torture will stop when the bomb goes off. If he believes that the torture won't stop, he has no reason to tell the truth.

Worse still, he can test it by giving a false location. If the torture halts until the location is checked, he can just keep giving false locations whenever he wants to ease up the pressure.
If the torture doesn't halt, he has no reason to think that it will when he speaks the truth.
Really the only way to make torture work at extracting information is if you have someone who can perfectly tell the difference between the truth and a lie.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 08:18:16 No.43311257 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308785
U

U

U

U

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 08:22:19 No.43311296 Report Delete

Quoted By:

Torture works like shit for getting information, unless the information is both quickly verifiable and very easy to convey. For example, "Which of these two chests is trapped, bearing in mind that after having someone check I will do even more horrible things if it turns out you lied?"

Torture works a lot better when you want to force someone into doing something where the technicality is all that matters. Like signing a confession.

If you're playing anything like D&D, just use magic to get the truth out. Why would you even need anything else?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 08:30:20 No.43311358 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43311437

The only time I've ever pulled torture off in a game is when a group of conspirators had hired an assassin to deal with the local ruler, and my character quickly needed to know the time and place of the attack.

It worked because the conspirators in question were soft bourgeois types who weren't used to any kind of physical harm. Also because it's pretty fucking easy to verify when it's a lie, and easy to return and do more harm. Hardened cultists will likely not be the same.

On a sidenote, intimidation checks for torture are silly, and I managed to heckle with my DM about the fact that my character was making no effort to break their will or anything. He simply stated that he would keep snapping off fingers until he got a correct answer, or until all the fingers were permanently gone. Which, considering there were ten men, was a lot of fingers. It was up to the men to decide whether or not they liked their fingers more than their silence.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 08:39:28 No.43311437 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43311683

>>43311358
>On a sidenote, intimidation checks for torture are silly

They are, and yet you see them really often. My DM wouldn't let me blackmail someone with discriminating pictures about them, over a goddamn email, because he failed an intimidation check.

Because yeah, that makes sense. If you cannot write a threatening email, the person in question will totally disregard the fact that you're gonna send pictures of him sodomizing another man to his wife, parents, boss and everyone else he knows.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 08:58:25 No.43311623 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43309282

You can use sticks other than torture. Honestly, torture is a pretty shitty stick as most people think they can endure plenty of pain and if you need to test it, you've likely failed.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 09:04:42 No.43311683 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43311437
>This is my real me, if my wife doesn't understand is because she does not love me. I'll also sue my boss for homophobic discrimination if he fires me.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 09:35:46 No.43311994 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43312097

>>43308822
>Torture isn't very effective
>Half the suggestions are torture

Getting mixed messages here...

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 09:38:45 No.43312021 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308700
>Using physical tortures
>Against religious fanatics
You sir are retarded

http://www.ryot.org/cia-torture-songs-playlist-barney-i-love-you/887037

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 09:40:07 No.43312028 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308700
Not really an expert on torture methods, but isn't sensory depravation supposed to be excruciatingly brutal? And fast?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 09:45:44 No.43312090 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43312214 >>43313710 >>43318135

>>43308738
>/tg/'s search history
>indistinguishable from that of a serial killer

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 09:46:57 No.43312097 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43311994
More than half the board is retarded. Torture has never and will never produce reliable results.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 09:59:59 No.43312214 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43312090

You should see some of the shit /x/ obsesses about. Hell /pol/ regularly tunes into to combat footage taken from Syria from both ISIS, US backed rebel and SAA perspectives.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 10:10:53 No.43312312 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43313581

I'm kinda thinking, why do you need to torture them? Obviously there's a lot said against torture so I'm not gonna repeat those arguments. But just my 2 cents, most people who join cults don't really do so because they truely believe in a God's ideals. I feel they just felt left out in day-to-day society and wanted to feel special. There's a reason why they've got a tendency to be grimdark edy cunts. It's because they feel they're in a diffet us/them group than the rest of the world. Why not try being a nice to a cultist for once. Heck, if you got a few just pick out one to be nice too. Give him food, rest, be a humanitarian. Maybe he'll help you out of finally not being treated like a cunt.

And heck if that doesn't work hope somebody else atleast snitches on him out of jealousy or some shit I don't know.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 11:05:37 No.43312865 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308700
Kill them to show you aren't fucking around and let them have a taste of eternal damnation. Then resurrect them and start asking questions?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:02:43 No.43313581 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43312312
>I feel they just felt left out in day-to-day society and wanted to feel special.

Not that you're wrong but this is Warhammer 40k OP's talking about (I think). People have become fanatical devotees to Nurgle because someone ripped a particularly potent fart in the same lift as them. Real world psychology and logic need not apply.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:05:56 No.43313619 Report Delete

Quoted By:

its pathfinder

Anonymous

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Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:13:16 No.43313710 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43312090
At least with /tg/ you can justify it as "I'm researching stuff for a character"

wtf captcha

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:13:32 No.43313716 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43318382

>>43308738
>>43308700
How about death threats? If the information they give proves to be true, they get released. If it doesn't, they get slowly tortured to death just for fun. Don't torture during, only after. Of course, you can torture the guy to death anyway once he's said what you need.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:21:09 No.43313815 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43313969

>>43308700
You're an inquisitor. You can cast Discern Lies and Zone of Truth. Even if you can't, you can pay for a scroll of Zone of Truth or something like that.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:29:36 No.43313950 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43309301
Do you complete the investigation.
>Success on roll
Yes, congratulations, you win Dark heresy.

So much easier.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:30:46 No.43313969 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43314005

>>43313815
Wut.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:33:46 No.43314005 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43313969
"inquisitor" and "good aligned" made me this this was some kind of Pathfinder or other D&D campaign. If it isn't, there are still clearly demons and stuff, so it's not out of the question that the inquisitor might have magic powers.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:34:25 No.43314013 Report Delete

Quoted By:

I always take a hands-off approach and just monitor them relentlessly and let my analysts compile the data to look through. If they're too good for regular surveillance, then I step it up to covertly drugging them in their sleep with intense hallucinogens to get confessions. Psychological torture combined with actual interrogation is a last resort.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 12:36:32 No.43314031 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43315515

>>43308905
this, but let them starve a little first, then come in with a nice fresh loaf of bread and listen

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 14:20:06 No.43315433 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308700
Sleep deprivation

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 14:26:00 No.43315515 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43316959

>>43314031
You don't even need that most of the time, with fanatics. They're fanatics. This is their favorite subject to talk about. Most people have a hard time getting them NOT to talk about this shit.

If you play obvious mind games like that, they have their guard up. If you treat them like they're reasonable, they're likely to tell you about their plan just because they're so invested in the plan.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 15:58:01 No.43316959 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43315515

Fanatics don't mean stupid. It might, but anyone in a cult who knows anything of value won't be.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 17:03:08 No.43317955 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308785
They have to be big and its gotta be part of their master plan

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 17:07:34 No.43318025 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308700
I like the "mind game" aspect of the Interrogation skill - use things like sensory deprivation/overstimulation to destabilise him, as the while pushing psychological warfare and "Good cop/Bad cop" up to 11.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 17:09:11 No.43318051 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308788
That's fucking great!

I also like the doing things like sending for "a mouse, a bucket of honey and an ice cube" and watch them imagine horrible tortures using them themselves. Carrying away one of them and getting a friend to scream from the next cell also helps.

Anonymous

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Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 17:13:07 No.43318125 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43318135

>41rst Millennium
>Not just using telepathy to mindrape captives and make them talk
>mfw

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 17:14:05 No.43318135 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43312090
tumblr has this problem too. Lots of "advice for writers" on there that makes it look like you're a murderer.

>>43318125
>Year of Our Emperor 915.M41
>Being a filthy psyker

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 17:28:53 No.43318382 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43313716
There is the issue of them NOT sitting on anything useful. And you run the risk of them killing themselves after the initial information feed due the fear of torture.

>>43308738
Also that guy.
Friendship > Hope > Guilt > Harm
The time tables aren't so bad either.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 18:01:58 No.43319034 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43309904
You explained this very well and articulately, but, if torture doesn't work, do you have any suggestions for alternatives?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 18:03:20 No.43319057 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43321135 >>43322218 >>43328854

Look up Mosad interrogation methods, they have a couple of really inventive techniques. One I've used in an adversarial game before:

>split the inmates into two groups.
>bring one group into a room, leave the other group in distant earshot.
>tell group one that they will be released, a mistake has been made, you just need them to verify a few points.
>ask them to speak clearly into the mike, it doesn't pick up that end to well, etc.
>ask questions JUST loud enough for group two to hear what is being said. Group two then hears group one answer yes clearly.
>go through clerical BS with group one, then have them escorted out a different door back to the cells until "everything is processed."
>call in group two.
>group one sold you out, gave us what we want. They are being treated lieniantly, you will be treated harshly, never see the light of day again, possibly executed in a horrific manner.
>unless, of course, there is anything you want to tell us in regard to your so called companions who sold you out or the actions of your cult....

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 19:54:52 No.43321135 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43322061 >>43328854

>>43319057
Unless the group has so much solidarity that Group Two would rather get executed than believe that Group One sold them out.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 20:41:52 No.43322061 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43328854

>>43321135
Or, you know, they know very basic tricks like that. Seriously, trying to convince someone that someone fucked you over is interrogation 101.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 20:50:49 No.43322218 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43328854

>>43319057

that's Mossad propaganda and they've been doing that in inner cities of the US since before Palestine was invaded.

All Palestinians know that once they're arrested, they can easily be thrown into a dungeon for 20 years without trial. As Israel has been doing this since it invaded.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 27 Oct 2015 20:57:24 No.43322323 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308700
Magic. If magic is witchcraft go with herbs and truth serums. If that's also witchcraft you better hope your setting has faith magic that can compel the truth out of people.

Alternatively target initiates and those involved with the cult but not actually members, like people who supply them. They might know what you're looking for or at least how to find out and they wont be fanatically loyal.

Anonymous

Anonymous Wed 28 Oct 2015 00:00:41 No.43325328 Report Delete

Quoted By: >>43327456

>>43308785
The flight plan only lists me, the PC's, and the party healer. But only one prisoner. What do?

Anonymous

Anonymous Wed 28 Oct 2015 02:44:49 No.43327456 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43325328
First prisoner to talk gets to stay on your airship.

Anonymous

Anonymous Wed 28 Oct 2015 02:50:47 No.43327486 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43308788
>original Punisher movie

How young are you?

Anonymous

Anonymous Wed 28 Oct 2015 06:30:04 No.43328854 Report Delete

Quoted By:

>>43319057
>>43321135
>>43322061
>>43322218
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rN7pkFNEg5c

Gave us one of the best scenes in one of the best television shows ever.

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