CCTV surveillance - effects on non-mortal PCs

[FangGrip]

And now I have a mental image of a Loup Garou in a straw boater and a walking cane singing "Hello my baby, hello my darling, hello my rag-time gal!"

Should'nt it be one of those frog demons from the first book?

[Arcteryx]

Got around to watching National Geographic's Megacities last night, their episode on London, and there's an inside view of the London traffic control center and the War Room that has all the CCTV feeds. This is the authority that monitors traffic in London's metropolitan areas and its network of roads and highways, and they adjust timings on lights and signals to relieve congestion and traffic build-up.

Anyways, long story short - their video feeds are Crystal Clear - nothing grainy or small screened about it - it was really great quality.

It made me remember a story by Charles Strauss about a special unit called The Laundry, which was able to use the surveillance cameras in Milton Keynes to transmit the paralytic gaze of a basilisk. Pretty awesome stuff.

[babel2uk]

It made me remember a story by Charles Strauss about a special unit called The Laundry, which was able to use the surveillance cameras in Milton Keynes to transmit the paralytic gaze of a basilisk. Pretty awesome stuff.

It's Charles Stross, and there are 3 books in the series - "The Attrocity Archive" (which contains the story you're thinking of - "The Concrete Jungle"), "The Jennifer Morgue" and "The Fuller Memorandum" - plus a couple of short stories available online. They are great books and well worth a read.

Anyway, if the cameras are all crystal clear then you're back to either the supernatural not showing up very well (which would cause suspicion in and of itself); the supernatural community being very careful and discreet; or someone removing the footage before it can be made public - a secret government department would probably not be out of place for this purpose.

[Lanir]

You do have the option to alter the city somewhat. Depending on the preferences of you and your players that's always a possibility. A city with no alterations would be everyone trying to roleplay people they know doing their 9 to 5 jobs and watching TV at night. When you're to the point of adding wizards, several flavors of vampire and more kinds of furry thing than you can shake a stick at, it's not a great stretch to redefine the video resolution.

One other note, the graininess and static of the video in the novels

(click to show/hide)

of the loup-garou

is caused by the target of the videos being supernatural, or that's how I read it. No one involved seemed to expect the video to be that ambiguous.

[toturi]

Given the way the Dresdenverse is written, it might be more likely that a city with a lot of CCTV coverage like London, may have an Aspect like "Big Brother is always watching".  If hexing (deliberate or accidental) surveillance electronics causes the nearest police unit to check out the cause of the disturbance, the supernatural may have more wary of using their powers there.

[Arcteryx]

Given the way the Dresdenverse is written, it might be more likely that a city with a lot of CCTV coverage like London, may have an Aspect like "Big Brother is always watching".  If hexing (deliberate or accidental) surveillance electronics causes the nearest police unit to check out the cause of the disturbance, the supernatural may have more wary of using their powers there.

That's pretty elegant - and it sets the tone for the setting, but I did some looking and characters may not have all that much to worry about:

According to a Liberal Democrat analysis, in London "Police are no more likely to catch offenders in areas with hundreds of cameras than in those with hardly any." A 2008 Report by UK Police Chiefs concluded that only 3% of crimes were solved by CCTV. In London, a Metropolitan Police report showed that in 2008 only one crime was solved per 1000 cameras. (Wikipedia)

Still, the threat of a looming Big Brother somewhere in the background is pretty attractive...

[Becq]

Note that a number of the above ideas are not necessarily contradictory.  For example, start with the understanding that stuff of the supernatural doesn't play nice with others (ie, images of supernatural creatures will be grainy at the very best).  Next, assume that in the Dresdenified London, there is a significant amount of supernatural activity playing havoc with the comprehensive CCTV coverage there.  I imagine that at first the police was very responsive to irregularities caught by the cameras.  Of course, responding every time the cameras went white with static would probably tire out the response units pretty quickly.  Now -- years after it's inception -- the authorities have the system set to merely log most of the irregularities, sending an actual response only to the most serious cases.  So perhaps the aspect would be something along the lines of "Big Brother is always watching ... and sometimes even takes notice."  If a wizard blows up a camera on an otherwise calm night, it will probably be responded to by a a couple of technicians in a truck.  If, on the other hand, the emergency lines are ringing, the surveillance folks might be alerted ... and they might start seeing things that bring up questions -- either in the form of odd stuff occuring or in patterns of CCTVs suddenly going white with static.

[toturi]

So perhaps the aspect would be something along the lines of "Big Brother is always watching ... and sometimes even takes notice."  If a wizard blows up a camera on an otherwise calm night, it will probably be responded to by a a couple of technicians in a truck.  If, on the other hand, the emergency lines are ringing, the surveillance folks might be alerted ... and they might start seeing things that bring up questions -- either in the form of odd stuff occuring or in patterns of CCTVs suddenly going white with static.

That may be the case. Or it could be the case that the police keeps up the pressure and the city becomes an unfriendly place to supernaturals and they move away.

You could combine "Big Brother is always watching" with "Velvet glove, iron fist" for a more police state feel. Maybe "Rendition Protocols" to simulate the effect that even supernaturals are not safe from the mortal governments. Maybe the government decided to make an example of the various courts and rendition a Red Court noble.

[Becq]

That may be the case. Or it could be the case that the police keeps up the pressure and the city becomes an unfriendly place to supernaturals and they move away.

You could combine "Big Brother is always watching" with "Velvet glove, iron fist" for a more police state feel. Maybe "Rendition Protocols" to simulate the effect that even supernaturals are not safe from the mortal governments. Maybe the government decided to make an example of the various courts and rendition a Red Court noble.

This assumes that the government as an entity is even aware of the Supernatural, let alone the various supernatural faction.  While it might be interesting to play in a game in which this was the case (I think it would look somewhat like the X-Men), the 'vanilla' Dresdenverse does not include clued-in governments.  That we are aware of.  Individuals within the government, yes, but governments as a whole, no.

[Arcteryx]

I've put this question on my list to ask my players when we get into our setting creation - what is the government's awareness of the supernatural? And what is their response to it? How long have they known for?

Figured I'd let them set the tone on that big decision, but I'll let'm know what the state is in the canon Dresdenverse.

[toturi]

This assumes that the government as an entity is even aware of the Supernatural, let alone the various supernatural faction.  While it might be interesting to play in a game in which this was the case (I think it would look somewhat like the X-Men), the 'vanilla' Dresdenverse does not include clued-in governments.  That we are aware of.  Individuals within the government, yes, but governments as a whole, no.

I agree that governments as a whole do not appear to be clued in. But departments or divisions of agencies within those governments? A Fringe division of the Department of Homeland Security? A black ops section of the CIA that is in charge of rendition protocols? Afterall, most parts of the government do not have "need to know" of the supernatural.

Should the story break that there is such a group within the government, a small number of individuals takes the fall. Thus it appears that in the "vanilla" Dresdenverse does not include clued-in governments.

[Jaxom Faux]

not to derail everything you guys have been up to but the loup garu showed up perfectly clear. it was harry throwing the giga-spell that gave the camera issues.

supernat creatures cause no problem to cameras aside from when they get annoyed and hex.

otherwise i'd wonder how laura raith was a porno star.....

harry was on tv....

other wizards have been photographed.

ghosts have been photographed...

etc. all in the books.

basically as long as it has a physical presence. it's the active magic part that makes things fuzzy.  or at least that's how it appears to me.

[babel2uk]

supernat creatures cause no problem to cameras aside from when they get annoyed and hex.

Supernatural creatures don't generally hex, it's a mortal magic thing, but good points on the rest.

[Becq]

"Wizards and some other monsters cause nearby technology to malfunction simply by their presence." (YS11)

[Arcteryx]

"Wizards and some other monsters cause nearby technology to malfunction simply by their presence." (YS11)

Probably if that monster has a mana static ability; I just did a quick search through Our World and none of the ones listed have that ability, but we all know its far from being an exhaustive listing. Looking forward to reporting back with how my group of players decide to go with this...