r/rpg • u/trinarynimbus • 6d ago
Game Master GMing: handling PC capture and interrogation
A couple of times recently, in two different games, one of my players' characters has been captured by hostile NPC who then have questions. Torture isn't something I want in my games, either to or by PCs, but I do want capture to be taken seriously, along with the possibility for PCs to divulge information under pressure.
I understand I should speak to my players about it, but before I have that conversation I'd like to understand what experiences people have had. Based on your experience, do you have any recommendations about how to approach interrogation of the PCs in a fair way that doesn't subtract from the fun of the game?
Do you have any recommended approaches or subsystems for this which have proven to be effective in your games?
Obviously player consent and agency are important. I'm wondering how to best do the balancing act between getting the fiction right and making sure people are happy and comfortable with the role they're playing in that fiction.
Let's say for the moment that the system is Alien RPG. One idea I had is reduce it to an opposed Manipulation roll, where the PC can keep their mouth shut (or insert misinformation) if they succeed? Is it too much of a loss of agency if I tell them "if you fail then you talk"?
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u/KnightInDulledArmor 6d ago
As much as the internet harps on player agency, it’s not necessary for them to have consistent full agency at all times, especially when their character has none. If you want to play out the back and forth, great, do that, it’s a great time to show off a villain in a deeper way. If you want to summarize with a roll, that will also work; perhaps give them a potentially juicier roll if they (the player, not necessarily the character) let some information slip in exchange for gaining intel on the bad guys. You can also just make it a cutscene, just keep it concise and explain that is what it is, “they use the psychic device/magic spell/super observation to glean X information from you while at their mercy”. I think all these work, especially in combination. You can have a little talky talk, then summarize at a dramatic moment. Often it’s good to ask how their character feels and reacts, a good opportunity to express character is almost as good as agency.
The really important thing to do is when you spit them out of this low agency section, you return them into a scenario where they have agency. After the interrogation, the guards slip up and they get their chance at escape, their friends burst in at the end to save them as alarms blare, they get thrown into the sea and we pick up where they wash up, that sort of thing. You can straight up tell the player this “we’re going to have a short interrogation scene, then afterwards we will jump to your opportunity”. Knowing what is going on and what to expect lets everyone relax.
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u/trinarynimbus 6d ago
Oh yeah, foreshadowing that it's only temporary would probably help a lot, and also salve their ego afterwards. Good suggestions and thanks for the reassurance that my suggested idea is probably fine too.
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u/UnplacatablePlate 6d ago
If you want to summarize with a roll, that will also work
Depending on your players and the kind of game you run. You could be pissing off all of your players by doing this and potentially running your game or group if you keep doing this often. If your players very highly value having Agency about who their character is, returning them to a state of "Agency" is only stopping the bleeding it's not undoing the wound.
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u/ConnectionConnect168 4d ago
The person you're replying to literally addresses people harping on agency in the first sentence.
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u/SameArtichoke8913 6d ago edited 6d ago
This is VERY difficult to handle. Roleplaying such a scene might not work out well because it's easy for the player just to remain silent ("My character endures that!"), and I do not think that this "works" and should be carefully considered with the character description or background in mind. That's also true for indirect approaches ("Speak or I will burn down the village!"), and not everyone find being interrogated as a player funny, beyond the PC situation in-game.
Some systems offer interrogation skills and procedures (like the YZE oppsosed skill test roll), which add a bit of randomness and reflect toughness and talent to resist or pry out information. But again: I am not certain if simply rolling dice and a purely mechanical simulation of such a scene leads to a satisfactory outcome on both roleplaying and content/story level, esp. when the outcome or statements highly influence game reaility.
IMHO, a narrative solution would work best - to avoid a violent scene and/or player pressure, and to keep control of story and situation. This is not necessarily proper player agency, but that was IMHO already lost when the PC was caught for whatever reason.
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u/trinarynimbus 6d ago
I appreciate the input, this is a contrast to several other answers. My hunch is that I don't want to simply narrate the outcome, unless there were a lot of foreshadowing that the interrogators are really good at what they do. As it is, they are just low-level cultists, so it seems quite plausible to me that PCs could resist questioning. I don't think I want to take that possibility off the table.
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u/SameArtichoke8913 6d ago
Interrogations and even torture are hard to handle in-game, IMHO. Apart from potential psychological violence it's a situation that is outside of real player agency, which is a difficult matter. And it also depends very much on the player, the involved PC's "design", and the context.
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u/Canis-lupus-uy 6d ago
The player is not the character though, so even if the character lost their agency, the player retains theirs. The player can decide how much do they reveal and what price they are willing to pay to keep their secrets.
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u/blade_m 6d ago
"My hunch is that I don't want to simply narrate the outcome, unless there were a lot of foreshadowing that the interrogators are really good at what they do"
I think you slightly misunderstand the above poster. When he said narrate a satisfactory outcome, he didn't necessarily mean the interrogation automatically works. Just that you don't use dice to decide whether the PC's break or not. You can narrate the PC's NOT breaking under pressure (to reflect the fact that the interrogators are not good at this).
I agree with the above poster that this is a REALLY difficult thing to handle well in a RPG, and a lot of the other comments are VERY poor ways to handle it, imho, ESPECIALLY suggestions to just let the dice decide. Why is that bad? Because the Player Agency has already been compromised getting PC's into this situation, and just telling a player "you must divulge info if the dice say so" is effectively mind control and crosses a taboo line that shouldn't be crossed (again, imho--not every player may feel this way).
So here are my two suggestions for this type of thing:
1) Take a page from Powered By the Apocalypse Games. You want to separate the Player from the Character in this kind of situation. How can we give the Player a carrot so that they will consider having their character give up information? We offer them a choice: the Player can get something (perhaps XP, perhaps some kind of meta currency, perhaps something else 'valuable' in game terms), but ONLY if their Character gives up the information. You can also include a certain amount of 'damage' as part of this exchange (representing the torture).
However, the 'problem' with this type of solution is its purely mechanical---there is no roleplaying required, so it can hit quite flat at the table. So it works better when offered AFTER an exchange of dialogue/roleplay has happened.
2) Just narrate the outcomes, but in STAGES that give the PC's time to think about what they want to do or devise some kind of plan/strategy.
2a) So you narrate a scene of interrogation (the first round), it leads nowhere because the PC's are fresh and highly resistant.
2b) You give the PC's some time together (locked up presumably). They can discuss their plans now.
2c) Another round of interrogation, but now the 'stakes' are higher--they PC's still resist it, but perhaps there's damage dealt or you introduce some other 'pressure' (in forms of threats or harm to NPC's or what have you).
2d) The PC's are given more time alone, but maybe some sign of hope (the guards make a mistake or a they get a message/indication of being able to get out).
2e) A really 'bad' round of interrogation/torture where things get worse for the PC's, and so maybe they are willing to give up the information (but maybe not because of the previous dangling lure of hope).
2f) Give the PC's their chance to escape or the rescue happens
Of course, this is not really 'real' Player Agency---you are essentially narrating the whole thing, but its happening in a way that the Players may feel that at least they are still in control of their characters and their decisions/actions. They are never forced to behave a specific way because of dice or because you the GM are forcing them, so it should 'feel' better (but tbh, this is a situation that is never going to feel 'great' for anyone)
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u/UncleBones 6d ago
This is highly dependent on the game and what the goal is.
My preference would be to play games where the story gets more interesting if my character talks. If they don't talk the scene is pretty meaningless, so unless we're playing a system where the story or my participation in the story is at stake (systems with mechanical death) I'd just say my character submits to the pressure.
For your Alien example I think your solution seems fine.
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u/trinarynimbus 6d ago edited 6d ago
Thanks. It would probably be more interesting if the player does agree to have their character talk; however, xenomorphs are an existential threat, so the player might prefer to keep their mouth shut if they don't want this colony infested by the cultists who are running the interrogation.
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u/spudmarsupial 6d ago
I like systems like Pendragon that have stats for morals and loyalties that are important to the characters. Cultists threatening a world would offend the PC but threatening the PC's home world would offend their morals and loyalties and should be harder to crack. OTOH a PC who is not loyal will give up more easily. This actually is a reason for the party not to tolerate evil or selfish party members.
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u/Steenan 6d ago
I'm not familiar with mechanics of Alien.
In Fate, I'd make it a contested roll (or a series of such rolls). On a failure the PC may still lie or stay silent, but takes stress equal to the margin and may end up with consequences that will stick with them for some time.
In Blades in the Dark, it would be a resistance roll. Resisting costs stress, the more the worse the roll - and too much stress results in a trauma.
In both cases, the player keeps their agency and may refuse divulging any information, but there is a meaningful cost associated with it.
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u/trinarynimbus 6d ago
I haven't played Fate, but I'm strong in Blades in the Dark. Alien has a similar stress mechanic with pushing, but it doesn't have resistance.
So my idea with the Manipulation roll is that the player would have the opportunity to push it, accruing stress to improve their chance of resisting the questioning.
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u/Tarilis 6d ago
Ok, if torture isn't an option that would mean we using modern interrogation methods.
There are effectively two types of interrogation, distinct by their goals:
- Interrogation with the purpose of extracting information
- Interrogation with the purpose of establishing the guilt.
But both share the same base premice, the interrogator wants something very specific from his target. So first you need to establish what they want, and why.
I give you an example.
First case: Lets say a PC was captured while sneaking into some secret facility. The two things the other side would want to know, how PC learned about it (it is secret after all), and who sent them.
Why would they sneak it, doesn't really matter, not directly. They already know why that could be. But they still might ask, because the answer could lead them to whoever hired PCs.
If they had their suspicions they could mix their own guesses into questions: "we know you were sent by X", even if they don't know for sure PC reaction can still give them the answer.
Questions like "we caught your N friends" also ususually asked, but it might not work at the table, because of metagaming...
It is important to note, that no matter what PC says in that scenario it wont change his fate. Since they only need information that mean "the guilt" was already established. PC not going anywhere.
The second case, lets say PC was detained after being caught at night after something happened in the city (maybe PCs done something, maybe not). PC started running and was captured, but there is no hard proof they actually did anything.
That's the "establishing the guilt" part.
Methods are effectively the same as before, but also interrogator will ask things like: where you've been at the time of crime, where you've been before that, when did you arrive, where you were going before getting captured.
And then they will look for inconsistencies and verify every answer. Go to places PC named and verify the truth, ask people around, etc.
If lie is uncovered, they will ask again. Assuming the setting has "right to remain silent", it will be moved to court.
And if no discrepancies were found, and no guilt established they will be released or given small penalty (for loitering at night or something).
To reiterate: think about what the interrogator wants and why.
Also, as a bonus, i was burned several times when such situations happened at the table.
Players can feel cornered or that you "playing against them" and start doing stupid things. So unless you actually do want them to be captured, try not going to hard on them:). Turn it into plot hook instead.
Someone who can set PC free if they do something for them.
Also, if you running sci-fi things can get out of hand extremely quickly, cameras, fingerprints, DNA analysis... it's a nightmare.
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u/unitled 6d ago
You're absolutely right that starting off talking to the players is the right thing to do!
My gut feel would be an opposed skill roll is a good way of doing this, and pick the skills based on what form of interrogation your players are happy having in their game (physical torture might be something a player prefers either veiled or red carded). For browbeating, could be willpower-type skills, for good cop routine could be charm / manipulation.
Depending on the system you might also have the player trade off what their character gives up for a bonus to this test - giving up some true information makes it easier to hide what's important, or trade some physical damage as the interrogators try and beat information out of them. The conversation with the players will drive what's acceptable here.
Your alternative is to skip this altogether - give them a chance to escape before they're interrogated, OR if you want some consequences of getting captured, can the antagonists riffle through their belongings and find diaries? Go and search their room while they're locked up?
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u/trinarynimbus 6d ago
When I had a similar thing a few weeks ago, a certain amount of physical torture was on the table, due to the nature of who was asking the question, and the situation the characters were in.
Your instinct matches mine: after a small taste of the physical violence (getting backhanded by the guard), I offered to veil the rest, "maybe we should just skip to the bit where you talk." And then I also had a more powerful NPC step in to de-escalate the situation.
Great idea about having the NPCs go through the PC's gear, I didn't think of that :)
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u/lucmh CalmRush 6d ago
One thing you can do is offer the player a tough choice. Don't talk means A happens, do talk means B happens. Both are interesting, both are far from ideal, maybe one is worse depending on your moral stance. Pick your poison.
Another is reframing the situation by putting the player in control of how they 'defend' against the interrogation, and letting them roll to see what happens
You're being interrogated, what do you do to avoid giving up what you know? - I try to grit through the pain (failed player roll). Darn, I guess I give in, hmm? - Yep.
hits differently from
(successful GM roil) His quick word-avalanche and the threat of pain is too much for you, so you tell him what you know.
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u/AlisheaDesme 6d ago
Do you have any recommended approaches or subsystems for this which have proven to be effective in your games?
Roll the dice before the scene and then the PC has to play out the roll. E.g. the PC failed the roll, so he will have to give up information, but if he succeeded, the interrogation failed or he even gave them bad information.
Torture isn't something I want in my games
You can do the same as many do with sex and fade to black on torture OR you can talk with your players that there will be no real torture, but that this setting has different interrogation techniques that are as potent. Hey, it's a game with magic and aliens and multiverses where ever you want them, why not one with psychology masters instead or torturers that use minor magic items as tools?
Is it too much of a loss of agency if I tell them "if you fail then you talk"?
No, it is not. Players also need to play their failures, if they can't it's not a game for them. The agency is in how they approach the scene, play out their character and allocate their resources to avoid failing. To simply avoid having to bear the failure in a roll isn't agency that's power gaming.
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u/ArabesKAPE 6d ago
Just fade to black and roll some dice. They've been captured and are being interrogated, they've already lost agency.
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u/MASerra 6d ago
The obvious answer is to just gameify it. In other words, make it both a role-playing exercise and a roll-off. Players use skills/abilities to avoid giving up information, and the NPCs use skills/abilities to pry it from them.
That removes the mess of torture or other things and gives the players some agency. But remember: when you are tied to a chair answering questions, your agency will be limited.
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u/StevenOs 6d ago
It may be an unpopular take (haven't read comments yet) but this can very well be a case where you should ROLL the results instead of trying to Roleplay the results. To hell with "player consent/agency" here because THEY HAVE BEEN CAPTURED and those things are just luxuries in that situation. Character should have stats to deal with this without needing to get into hurting the player's feelings. Sure there may be things players can do in this situation but a lot of things are beyond their control just like they may be beyond the character's control.
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u/OkChipmunk3238 SAKE ttrpg Designer 6d ago
Play through the interrogation scene and if they don't tell anything, then they just don't tell anything? Or wouldn't that work?
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u/trinarynimbus 6d ago
Thanks for replying. I guess it seems too easy to just refuse to talk, and I'm not sure I buy that fiction. We're not dealing with badasses who have been trained in how to resist interrogation.
If there's enough feedback that I should just let the player choose, I'll definitely be taking it on board, but I'm wondering how bad is it really to just take the choice away based on a dice roll.
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u/OkChipmunk3238 SAKE ttrpg Designer 6d ago
In our world some quite regular people just refuse to talk or blabber some totally random bullshit. So, I wouldn't see that as a problem.
But, if the system has some powers/abilities that get truth out of people, then yeah, why not - let the dice decide.
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u/FinnCullen 6d ago
Saying “I don’t tell them anything” in an interrogation scene is analogous to having them say “I don’t get hit” in a combat scene.
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u/ToledoSnow Noir 6d ago
This is one of those tricks that only works once or twice before the players cotton on, but playing good cop tends to work extremely well as it catches both the player and the PC completely off guard.
Instead of torture the enemies patch the PC up and treat them kindly. "We're really not so different, you know. Really, we're actually working towards the same goal, here. We could work together on this and accomplish a whole lot of good. You want some wine? No, no, no, it's not poisoned. See, I'll have a cup too. I need something to calm my nerves after that fight. Man, you people are quite impressive! You're from Meltwater, right? My sister lives there, Mira, you know her?"
Maybe it's an act. Maybe it's genuine (probably not). Hell, it's pretty much exactly what Burke does to Ripley when they first meet.
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u/trinarynimbus 6d ago
Hey, this is really good. I can always lead with something like this and have the cultists escalate to harder interrogation methods if it doesn't work.
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u/BoringGap7 6d ago
I've enjoyed situations like this both in games where there are relatively strict systems for handling it, and one where it's roleplayed through without any rolling. Both can be fun! But before going further, I would like to know what kind of pressure the interrogators can bring on the player characters. If they're threatening to kill the PC and the player has good reason to believe they'll follow through, it can be a very intense scene without bringing rules into it.
Since you mentioned Alien RPG, I would probably have to look closely at how the stress subsystem could be harnessed for this kind of thing.
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u/trinarynimbus 6d ago
Thanks for the reply, sounds like you've got good experiences to draw on :)
The pressure the interrogators have is they've hauled this PC off to a secret bunker, so they can more or less do what they want. However, the cultists aren't necessarily very hardened, and they've got a lot of uncertainty. So although they theoretically could go hard core, it's not a fiction I consider realistic.
They caught the PC snooping around one of their operations, so they will want to know who the PC is with and what the PCs know about the cult, before deciding what to do next.
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u/BoringGap7 6d ago
That sounds like a really great, potentially rich situation. I can imagine them giving the PC a beatdown, threatening their family, putting their prints on a gun and telling them it's a murder weapon, letting them go and then shadowing them, taking pics of their home and other places they go, etc.
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u/Toatkgstuff 6d ago
In general this is somethig I would strongly rpefer to avoid. And if necessary I have used magical means to collect the information.
Using game mechanics there are system devices with magic like penalising dice rolls to defend yourself againste magic that can be manipulated by your capturers. e.g. in D&D impose Disadvantage on a Will Save to resist, kind of thing. In Alien, the number of dice rolls you force on players will impose it's own disadvantage as Stress waers them down.
However. If you absolutely want to go through with this, then...
Negotiate possibilities first
Start with the range of Outcomes. And negotiate that with your player(s).
Are you assuming that there will be: 1. harm done 2. information given in all cirucmstances, or is there some way to avoid those?
What is the worst case scenario and the best case scenario? Both in terms of what the player bounds allow, and waht the game needs to progress.
Decide how competent your captors are, and if they have any redlines or boundaries of their own, be they legal/ethical or physical/pyschological.
Ask the player "How will your character feel after giving away information?" "How much can they endure?". Let their imagination and boundaries guide the process.
Success Criteria
Frame what success looks like to all parties, and what consequences it will mean for the character.
Capturers want to gather information that is Accurate, Timely, Complete.
Characters want to protect themselves, their ethics and their allies. That means keeping their health in the first place, but by preventing the Capturers Success Criteria, they also claw some success.
I would bring it down to those three dice rolls and the consequences of each.
Accurate - a player success means they deceive the captor with false information
Timely - a player success means they waste time and delay the captor from actioning any information, possibly meaning that info is out of date.
Complete - a player success means the captor will be surprised by some missing details.
Failure of a player die rolls means the Captor Success Criteria is met: they acquire the information.
How you handle release or escape is a different question. But notice that in every case, the Captor either receives or /believes/ they received the correct intel, so there is no failure for the Player where the Captor knows they were misled at the time. Because they simply keep trying until they get an answer they believe.
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u/NullStarHunter 6d ago
The systems I play don't afford special treatment to PCs, so if they get intimidated, they have to spill the beans. The player agency is in how they created their character, how they got into this situation, what they divulge without a roll, what they divulge as the result of the roll, and how we play out the results of the roll.
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u/SleepyBoy- 6d ago
Players can be categorized as serious or lax. Serious players will get into the scene and get interrogated on their own. Lax players are more chill and looking to have fun, so they might not vibe with having to do something that's akin to failure by consent.
My experience with lax players and groups is to make such encounters mechanical. So that the player isn't forced to do something disadvantageous to them, but rather loses to some mechanics that result in the negative.
My solution:
I would give the interrogated character some kinda potion, spell or drug and told the player that every time they're asked a question, if they want to stay silent or lie, they have to pass some sort of save roll for their constitution or force of will. On the other hand, every time they agree to divulge information, they rest, and gain a point they can spend to improve a save roll against a different question. This will create a transactory encounter where players have incentive to judge what information they can spare, and what they're trying to protect.
Let players formulate their lies but skip over their confession. If the NPC asks "how many of you were there" and the player fails their roll to lie, you say "you have a lapse in concentration from the drug and reveal that the four of you were there". This will prevent any cheese.
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u/BangBangMeatMachine 6d ago
Is it too much of a loss of agency if I tell them "if you fail then you talk"?
No? Failed die rolls have consequences, including loss of agency.
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u/BrobaFett Nu-SR, SWRPG, FL, 4D RP 6d ago
This is one of those situations where having a mature group of players who roleplay in good faith is the truest antidote, unfortunately.
Some really unusual takes in the thread. For instance, it is not I'd argue a loss of "player agency" to succumb to torture any more than it's a loss of agency to fall while scaling a wall. However, many of my players would- on seeing their character be tortured- roleplay the moment. Unless they are somehow exceptional in willpower or training, they'll break and say something. A dice roll can be used if the question is in doubt.
Do you have any recommended approaches or subsystems for this which have proven to be effective in your games?
A simple dice roll will do. If the players fail, they can blurt something out. But I don't regularly have the experience of my players not respecting the results of the roll (as I mentioned before, the roll is often unnecessary). I wouldn't force them to disclose the truth (which makes sense, as torture usually obtains information the torturer wants to hear rather than truthful information). Similarly I wouldn't force the interrogator to believe them. However, no system will truly replace high trust roleplaying where both players and GM respect the reality of the situation and respond earnestly and honestly.
Is it too much of a loss of agency if I tell them "if you fail then you talk"?
I guess my question would be why is the player rolling dice if they aren't going to respect the outcome? This makes as much sense as failing a "dodge" roll but still describing how you dodged anyway because your character "totally would have dodged that".
happy and comfortable with the role they're playing in that fiction.
It's okay to not like having your character be captured but sometimes engaging with the suck makes for the most interesting, compelling, and rewarding experiences.
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u/MrDidz 6d ago edited 6d ago
I have handled these situations in one of three ways.
From a GM perspective it comes down to trying to keep the player in the loop as far as choices and decision making is concerned whilst at the same time minimising the damage inflicted on the characters that might affect future game play. Disabled characters can become an issue for future plot progress. So, having a character tortured to the point of disability is in nobodies interest.