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Saturday, December 26, 2009

Call Higher

This is Steven Petrick Posting.

I thought I would mention something else about the live action roleplaying at Origins. This is not because I am fixated on the event, but because, seriously, it is very hard to keep coming up with something, anything, to say every time I do one of these blogs without repeating myself.

As has been noted, when "the game" got going, immersion began to take over. That is to say that increasingly I fell into my "role" as I saw it. As noted, my primary, almost singular, concern was to take care of the people who were under "my care". This did not mean that I was playing the game accurately. After all, the design of the game intends in part for the players to try to solve mysteries of what happened. But my thoughts were: "Get everyone out, and then call in the big guns to clean up the mess and find out what the heck is going on. We need to survive to call for help, to get resources mobilized to deal with the situation." If we squander ourselves, the message does not get out, and things get worse. It is practically inscribed on my very soul to "call higher and report", to not leave higher in the dark wondering what happened to my detachment. That when the shooting starts, while I am trying to assess the situation and issue orders, my ears are tuned to hear my radioman calling in a S.A.L.U.T.E. report, and if I do not, one of the things I need to do as part of the "battle management" is find out why (anything from the Radio Operator has gotten involved in the fight and forgotten, to the Radio Operator is no longer able to transmit, perhaps because he is already a casualty) and what is necessary to get that report out. In the game, that became "we have to survive". Now, telling higher was the number one concern. Higher in this case probably meant to me telling the government to get the Army here (probably also CDC and other government agencies) to resolve the situation.

So, there were two levels of thought. My immediate effort was geared to getting everyone out and thereby getting the information out.

But if a "choice" had to be made between everyone surviving, and "the word" getting out . . . the information here was too critical and the entire group was expendable in accomplishing that mission. This did not mean that I just allowed people to be killed or be left behind. I was responsible for all of them, and wanted all of them "to make it", but if it came to a choice between getting the word out and someone "not making it", getting the word out was the absolute #1 priority.

That is part of it, keep the bad thing from getting worse. If I got the word out, and the government decided to nuke the site, with me and the others still there, to contain the situation, I could accept it. But if the Corporation destroyed the site, it might conceal what happened from the government, and thus when the Corporation called in the strike, I was still trying to get everyone out to tell the story, but would have been willing if necessary to sacrifice the group to get the word out.

But there is another aspect. Another thing that was in the back of my mind. Was it possible that whatever this was could have infected any of us? The scenario does not play beyond the escape from the site, and a major leadership problem actually arises only then.

You are dealing with an infection, and while you have gotten your people out, is anyone infected? Can you exert enough control over the other four members of your security team to prevent anyone from leaving the group until a quarantine can be established on the group? Are you willing to kill any member of the group, including members of your own security team, to keep the possibility of infection contained? Members of your four man security element may trust you as the leader, and that you have all escaped alive may reinforce that trust, but fear of infection can break the bonds of trust, and command.