#bad tradecraft

[lovetgr76]

S1e3 Bad Tradecraft *updated*

While there is no DIRECT Standish/Lamb interaction this episode, there is mention of… - so let's see what's going on this episode!!

Jumping into the episode… about 2/3 through, Lamb and Taverner are sitting on a bench next to the canal.  it’s past 2 am and they both look exhausted after trying to press each other’s buttons and finding out what the other knows without giving up anything themselves.

Taverner sighs… then tries to work the ONLY angle she knows works on Lamb… every time… Standish.

Was Moody alone when he died? – Taverner

We’re all alone in the end, don’t you think Diana.  In those final moments… – Lamb

If he did have company, that company might come under intense scrutiny. – Taverner

By all means, call in the Dogs.  And when they’re finished tearing you apart, maybe they’ll have enough strength to pick at the rest of this.  Either way I couldn’t give a monkey’s – Lamb

Even if it was Standish? – Taverner

                *This gets Lamb’s attention, and he looks at her the moment she mentions Standish, he’s seems upset, frustrated maybe, that she knows what to say… Lamb should have no weaknesses, no favorites, and yet… Taverner goes right for the jugular when she makes any type of threat against Standish.  His reaction seems visceral*

You’re tossin’ darts.  Standish wasn’t there.  She’s at home asleep. – Lamb

I’m not talking about tonight.  I’m talking about the night Charles Partner died.  Catherine Standish came very close to a treason charge.  That file could be reopened, reassessed. – Taverner

                *Lamb is seen shaking his head*

                *Another note to say – I always think…  how was Standish so surprised at Lamb’s revelation in S3 about Partner being a traitor – when she herself was accused of possible treason after his death? Because Taverner says this time they could make it stick – so it was at least attempted in the past? ... Lamb telling Standish that Partner wasn’t saving her he was (fuckin’) USING her!! – because Partner made it seem like she was doin’ the dirty – which tbh at first I took to mean they were having an affair – but then I realize it’s the trail of treason? That Taverner ends up threatening Lamb with here?... possibly? – open to other interpretations!!*

Didn’t fly then. It won’t fly now. – Lamb

A lot of other things might come out. – Taverner

                *Lamb leans in and seems to inflect a bit of a threat in his voice*

That is not a can of worms you want to open. – Lamb

Do I look keen?  Like it or not, Slough House is part of this now. You’ll all get turned over. Standish will find out some things it would be better for her not to know. – Taverner

                *My personal take on this is that Taverner couldn’t give a monkey’s about what’s better for Standish to know, she just likes having this to dangle over Lamb whenever she wants to manipulate him in some way.*

                *Lamb seems resigned to his fate here… leans back, crosses his legs and looks into his own lap, most likely telling himself, this is NOT a weakness, you’re still a badass spy without any feelings or attachments at all, ever…* (giggles)

I’ll go knock on the door for you. But in return, I want the Standish file. – Lamb

                *Taverner appears visibly surprised at that request, but appears to nod in acquiescence*

                *Lamb makes sure he gets a visible agreement from her before continuing*

And you’ve been using Slough House as your personal toy box, which pisses me off. Are we clear? – Lamb

Crystal. – Taverner

No, there’s more. Moody disappears.  Baker, a victim of street crime. Anyone with me tonight is fireproof. Oh! And you are in my debt until you’re in a care home. – Lamb

God, you really care about them, don’t you? – Taverner

Nah.  I think they’re a bunch of fucking losers. *pause* But they’re MY Losers – Lamb

[emziess]

Jack Lowden as River Cartwright Slow Horses – S01E03 – Bad Tradecraft

[racefortheironthrone]

Someone on Twitter asked who was the British politician who has harmed the British people the most. Of course all the answers were modern politicians - the earliest suggestion was James Callaghan. Looking further back in history, who were the really bad British politicians?

In order to not answer this with a long list of "History's greatest colonialist monsters," I'm going to focus on just the ones who had a negative effect on "the British people," and in order to not answer that with a long list of "the history of English oppression of the Irish," I'm going to focus on just harm done to "the people who lived in what is currently the U.K." I am well aware that this is highly restrictive, but I don't have the time to write a complete history of Britain.

So who's on my shortlist?

Pitt the Younger. Fought the Napoleonic Wars on the backs of the poor while violently suppressing any dissent with a police state. He passed the Treason Act of 1795 to criminalize dissent, the Seditious Meetings Act of the same year to criminalize public assemblies, spied on pretty much anyone who wasn't an arch-Tory, suspended the writ of habeus corpus, and passed the Combination Act of 1799 to criminalize trade unions. In a just world, would have died on a guilottine in Trafalgar Square.

Lord Liverpool. In the wake of the Peterloo Massacre which he was absolutely responsible for, passed the Six Acts to allow the government to search people's houses for arms without a warrant, arrest and transport people for owning weapons or attending a meeting that was deemed to involve unlawful military drilling, reduced due process, shut down all public meetings that involved politics or religion, arrest and transport anyone who wrote anything that criticized the government or Christianity, and heavily tax and impose bonds on newspaper publishers. In a just world, the Cato Street Conspirators would have exercised better tradecraft and assassinated him and his entire government.

Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington. Followed up his victory in the Napoleonic Wars by fighting a war against the British people. Arch Tory bastard, adamantly opposed any political Reform that would enfranchise ordinary people, and opposed Jewish emancipation while supporting Catholic emancipation. To be honest, I wish the mob had torched Apsley House with him inside when they had the chance.

As for the runners-up?

Bonar Law, Stanley Baldwin, and Ramsay fucking MacDonald for dropping the Geddes Axe and then subjecting British workers to twenty years of crippling austerity and repression.

[forcebookish]

didn't he once say that keeping mementos is bad tradecraft? sneaky sneaky michael your undying love is showing

[biblioflyer]

The writer's strike and franchise fatigue: two heads of the same coin?

Context: I'm shamelessly reposting a comment on a popular webforum where someone posed the question "What's next for Star Wars?" that prompted a lot of discussion about the whats and whys of what's working, what isn't, and of course everyone's favorite hobby: performing yet another autopsy on the Sequel Trilogy. I declined to go there in favor of speculating on the production side.

Ultimately I think the future of Star Wars requires Disney to do what a lot of franchise owners have been resistant to doing for various reasons: allow their creative teams a wide latitude to fully develop their ideas without unnecessarily harsh deadlines tied to quarterly earnings reports. Now that isn't to say that projects can fail on their own merits.

I don't know for a fact that Book of Boba Fett was timid, awkward, and boring because the showrunners couldn't make a cut that worked with the time and resources allotted, but we were mostly all impressed with Rodrigues' work on Mando so we were cautiously optimistic that a Cool Gangster Drama with Boba Fett could be a thing. So what the hell happened? Solve that mystery and I think you ensure that Star Wars has a future.

Looking at another popular "Star" franchise, we see a lot of similar problems with uneven writing and what seems to be differing opinions both inside and outside the franchise as to what exactly it means for something to carry that name. What sort of stories can you tell? How do you tell them? Can you have a point of view character or does it always have to be ensemble? Can you deconstruct the setting only to reconstruct and reaffirm it in the finale without losing the fans?

What explains "bad" writing? Coercion by the studio? Writer inexperience? Showrunner inexperience? A failure to find the right balance between modernizing the storytelling of a franchise without it becoming illegible as part of that franchise or to cling so hard to fan service that it is afraid to experiment and becomes a less interesting and murkier Xerox of itself?

Something that I found fascinating in the discourse around the writer's strike is that the format of streaming TV with its short seasons has turned everyone involved in these productions into gig workers. Unless you're one of a half dozen showrunners who have helmed widely acclaimed franchises, modern tv has become severely siloed on the production side: writers have limited opportunities to learn directing, editing, and show running. They also have limited opportunities to see how their work translates to the screen when it lands in the hands of directors, actors, set decorators, and FX artists.

If you add up all of the live action Star Trek shows produced to date, you end up with 8 seasons of streaming that equal roughly 4 seasons of broadcast era TV. Which means that under the old paradigm, a traditional TV show would only now just be airing its second "good" season. Which, shockingly enough, maps very neatly to attitudes about Strange New Worlds and Picard Season 3, and to a lesser extent Discovery season 4.*

*To the extent it will ever be allowed to make a second impression, which is another seeming "problem" of the streaming era that needs addressing since any "failed" first season is very likely to result in a sub-franchise that is going to get cauterized and forgotten about given the era of a permissive financial environment for funding additional seasons and permitting a production to recover and learn from their mistakes is pretty much dead and gone.

Were I Disney, given these realities, I would probably fund 2 or 3 "stables" of Star Wars writers and production teams. One for light hearted action comedy, one for "serious drama," and a third for something more esoteric. Maybe a fourth for big budget tentpole films. Keep them employed and give them opportunities to develop their tradecraft.

Don't be so quick to slash and burn a dud, use failure as permission to experiment. If nobody cares about Book of Boba Fett anyway, why not take some risks and see if some writers who are claiming they can turn in a second season that can "fix" the first season by turning the stories that go nowhere or are halfhearted into the first chapters in more meaningful stories? People already tend to avoid series that have only one season anyway and become ever more likely to do so the more time passes without more seasons so you're just throwing away your investment by not trying to salvage it.

This is incidentally why I'm not antagonistic towards the prospect of trying to rehabilitate the Sequel Trilogy. The Prequels are poorly made but were rich in potential. That potential was not left on the table, it was exploited until we can no longer separate the Prequels as they originally stood from all of the tie in media that added depth and nuance to the setting and storybeats.

So were I Disney and I have all of these props and set pieces in storage doing me absolutely no good, then of course it will eventually be time to try to make the Sequel Trilogy good. Maybe do some Director's Cuts and then build out the universe to make it feel less claustrophobic and less overtly a bigger, louder, dumber rehash of the Original Trilogy.

[superfluouskeys]

Oh no these asks are GREAT I want to ask like ten of them ummmmmmmm having Restraint: 3 (vibe check) 4 ( 👀 ) 17 (especially curious abt your editing process?? I am so greedy for your tradecraft secrets) aaaaand 19 (I recently researched….. doormats. that made me feel very sane about my choices please tell me about yours)

GOOD EVENING i have finally returned to what is truly important, my tumblr ask box.

3. how you feel about your current WIP

JNSDKJFSDKNJ NOT THE VIBE CHECK but you know, I had a smol breakthrough like two? nights ago that i have yet to actually follow up on LOL. I had this transition section where i was like i need to impart some Vibes and some Character Arc but i'm literally boring myself rn, and I think I have figured out in a vague sense how to make the transition do a lot more work for me, so that's good!

In general I'm extremely excited about some Major Points of the thing, just currently have to do an inordinate amount of sowing seeds for those major points in a way that's like subtle enough that I'm not hitting the reader over the head but also exists enough that the careful reader will pick up on it you feel?

4. a story idea you haven’t written yet

Side note before I even start answering...sometimes I think about how many of my """"""story ideas""""""""""" are just glorified weather metaphors. I am genuinely not sure what happened in my brain to make me like this. What has the weather EVER done to me.

Uhm so anyway since I'm thinking about Stormchaser, definitely a story idea and not just a weather metaphor in a trench coat, why don't I tell you a little bit about my characters because I'm very normal about them.

The first person [main character we are tentatively naming Emily] meets in the city is Nolan, who owns a small bar and restaurant that she won in a messy divorce. She puts on an act of tough-and-wry-and-world-weary, but she's very soft-hearted and has a bit of a savior complex, a bit of that 'i don't want what happened to me to happen to anyone else' vibe.

She has taken in Asher and Aislynn, siblings from a prominent and wealthy family who have had a [very mysterious] falling out with their parents and are thus in need of a place to stay. Asher is guarded and protective, while Aislynn is very open and warm. People often perceive her as naive, but Aislynn actively chooses to see the best in others.

Aislynn has magic, which is the source of many of her problems. (This is like kind of a reveal but the foreshadowing is painfully obvious LOL) Back when I was thinking about Stormchaser as a multi-path story, one major decision point was going to be, in a moment where the player character is hurt (not gravely, but still not in great shape), choosing whether to allow Aislynn to use magic to heal her. It would have a huge impact on the MC's relationships with most of the other major characters, since most of them have very strong opinions either about magic or about Aislynn herself. Aislynn is also the reason I ended up wanting to write the story--I had an overarching idea for the plot, but I got soooo attached to her so quickly!

17. talk about your writing and editing process

as we all know my writing process is just getting possessed by some sort of weather-related entity and then not sleeping until well after the sun has risen, so I think that's pretty clear and doesn't raise any sort of questions or concerns.

if no weather entity possession, my strategy has become "just force yourself to write the painful and clunky sentences at the speed of molasses and then look at it again tomorrow" -- because most of the time the next day I can fix what was clunky really easily bc I made space in my brain by getting the ideas down, and sometimes, extra special treat, I reread what I wrote and it's literally not even bad I was just in a mood LOL.

I feel like a very large percentage of my editing is just being extremely insane about word choice. Sometimes I go back and forth on word choice/word order/very very minor sentence structure things literally long after the thing is published and I am trying to tell myself to let it go. But tbh I don't really have a process for this, it's just what jumps out at me when I reread it as being awkward or not quite what I was going for. I'm probably like this because I used to be such an insufferable snob (used to be!!!!) and needlessly chose so many ten dollar words that I think I have a better-than-average sense of when simpler language is better vs. when you need a more complex word to describe the thing. So it sort of depends on the character whether I do a lot of deleting or adding of extra fluff and filler words LOL.

I'm alllll about limited POV and creating a headspace/thought pattern for characters, so I do a lot of thinking about what the specific character knows, how the specific character would express something, or whether she even has the language for what she's experiencing. I really love finding ways of conveying an emotion that the reader will recognize but the character doesn't!!

On a more macro scale I think I do a lot of, like, "this section is boring me. why?" In a story you really don't want anything that's doing nothing, and you definitely don't want a whole section that's not doing much. Sometimes because I try to make my dialogue as natural as possible the conversation starts to kind of wander LOL, and so I have to be like okay hold up what are we talking about what needs to be established here. And then usually jump back a bit and figure out how to lead the conversation in a more pointed direction.

And a lot of the time idk how much transitional stuff to include, so I'll be off on some rambling journey like uhmmmm do I need this??? when do we get to the fun part???? Which, like, not to say the fun part will be easier to write or anything, but a lot of time that feeling of boredom is bc what I'm doing either isn't necessary and can be accomplished in a way that's more fun for me personally OR it's fine it just needs to be pulling a lot more weight in what it's telling the reader. I find I sometimes get caught up in, like, a story beat that would "make sense here" as opposed to a story beat I personally like.

Like, as an example, I've been thinking (for soooo long yes i know) about how to continue the chance you take, and I remember I put in my notes that like a sparring scene would make sense, where you know it's all a metaphor and there's some quippy dialogue or w/e. And ik a lot of people like that kind of scene! And idk, sometimes I do too! But like........I don't want to do that lol! And in fact I think it doesn't actually fit with the vibe of the story, which is so much less about the violence surrounding it and so much more about the quiet moments in between. But I'm literally just thinking this now as I'm typing this. Like I didn't have a good reason for why I didn't want to progress the story that way until literally right now.

Which I guess leads me to another very important editing tool: pacing my kitchen like a crazy person explaining the problem I'm having to myself so I can try to talk through why it's bothering me LOL! as you can see it's extremely efficient and time-sensitive. six to ten business days turnaround for sure.

19. the most interesting topic you’ve researched for a fic

chickens :)

I'm genuinely drawing a blank LOL, I've definitely looked into a few things I can vividly remember (boats/ships and how crews and shifts work for TCYT, horse riding/cart pulling for scorched earth, how animal testing works for uhmmm that one moicy fic, oh and I remember i looked a lot into bird symbolism for the prisoner LOL) but I think mostly what I do is intensely study the source material, and I haven't run into that many situations where I felt like I needed to make sure I knew about something in the actual world and not the fictional one LOL! Wow I'm boring! I want to know about doormats!!!!!

fic writer asks!

[ambergembr]

My version of Simon “Ghost” Riley’s past for the COD MWII Reboot 2022.

Since the release of Modern Warfare II (2009), when Ghost first appeared I've been reading fanfics about COD. I've always played the franchise's games but never had any character captivated me so much. I think I became a fan because I was unhappy with the way he and Roach (player) die suddenly, due to General Shepherd's betrayal. * 14 years later I’m still mad AF. By the way, at the time I also managed to see the comics that gave a story to Ghost... holy shit, what a sad story. And then there were all kinds of fanfics based on his difficult relationship whith family, proximity to drugs, trust issues, abuse by his father, and everything else that makes him a survivor, full of physical and emotional scars.

OK. I love these stories and this past. But let the past stay in the past.

Wth the reboot of the series I don't think it's fair that he still has the same terrible past. Sure, he has to have a bad past to make him the terrifying element of the team, but couldn't it be a different one? So I decided to create my own version of his past… and maybe write a few fanfics using it.

Today, Ghost is a character presented as someone who does solo missions, described by the game's creators as a lone wolf, a specialist in espionage, sabotage and clandestine tradecraft, so he has to be someone resourceful, such as knowing several languages, knowing cultures and being flirty to get what you want sometimes. He shouldn't act 100% of the time like a rat in a sewer just watching from the shadows. He must have contacts that help him in this, or facilitate his escape, obtain documents, and so on. Can't believe he does any of this wearing the mask 24/7.

Apart from me and some crazy fandom people who are attracted to a huge guy with a skull mask, a “normal” element of the franchise will be intimidated by him, like Rudy. Who knows Soap himself didn't feel intimidated and that little smile was just to hide and not show fear in front of a huge guy like that? As We say here in Brazil: “I'm laughing, but I'm nervous!”. Anyway, in my version of the reboot world, Ghost comes from a family with financial resources but no emotional connections. The parents are both career diplomats, as is the mother's family, while the father's family comes from a long tradition of international consultants for multinationals. With his parents divorced, he, his older brother Tommy and his younger sister Sophie (original character) were raised moving from country to country every 2 years. So he went through Japan, France, South Africa, Argentina and Chile, Spain and Portugal as he grew up. This made it easy for him to learn other languages, get to know different cultures, which made him, even with that height and physical size, manage to disappear in the middle of a crowd of Japanese people.

However, due to his parents' work, he never had the real chance to make friends in the places he went, since he always moved frequently and lost contact with these people. He wasn't close to his parents either. Richard Riley is a distant man, concerned with career advancement, when he was with his children he would leave them to be raised by nannies. Tommy, the firstborn, was his favorite, and Shophie was Daddy's little girl. Simon was the middle child.

Clearly more talented than the other two, but the most independent, that created conflicts with his controlling father.

Miranda, the mother, was a narcissistic woman. She despised Tommy because he was so much like his Dad and connected with him. Simon was her favorite, but she was not a loving mother, rather a woman who was obsessed with her two youngest children: Simon and Sophie. She raised them to succeed in the spotlight of international politics. Sophie pursued a career in law, and like her mother she knew how to use charm and seduction to get what she thought was important when a brilliant mind couldn’t reach the achievement. Simon made Miranda’s eyes sparkle. She had Jocasta’s Complex* towards him, and tormented Simon about his physical form and the possibility of a career in modeling when he became too tall, and thin with an athletic body. She wanted him to participate in photo shoots, she encouraged the daughters of Consuls and Ambassadors to try to get along with him, and she knew: if the daughter of a powerful man was crazy about him, her father would do everything in his power to get his daughter happiness, including connect politically to Miranda Riley's interests. Simon hated feeling used, physically abused by his mother and pulled in different directions based on her interest. Sophie took it well, as they were equals. He felt out of place in a family of sociopaths. When he was old enough he went to the Royal Veterinary College in London, and he drifted away from his family, who expected him to pursue a career in diplomacy or foreign trade. During college he enlisted in the army, to stop relying on family money and being pestered for it. Until he graduated he worked in the army's veterinary and training unit, but his language skills caught the attention of Colonel MacMillan (the one who was Captain when Price was a lieutenant on the All Ghillied Up mission). This led Simon to the S.A.S. exam that he passed with flying collors. Within a few years Simon was already working alone in field missions, and that's when Price asked him to join 141. MacMillan erased all of his family records, because he felt that any terrorist group that knew how much money the Riley family had would make Simon a potential target for ransom demands to finance terrorists around the world.

“They would never pay anything for me, Sir. Only if it was a tabloid making a fuss about the family name. Terrorism is not enough” - Simon once commented, but MacMillan found it hard to believe. Meanwhile, Simon was thinking “Perhaps my paternal family would kidnap me just to justify sending money to some country in civil war that served their interests”. That was always the problem. People thought the Riley family was perfect. Divorced parents who acted civilly by attending the same events. The older brother with a commercial family (the Barbie blonde wife, the smiling little son), the powerful, successful and single beautiful sister, and himself, tall, handsome and shy prince, who publicly assumed the identity of an intelligence officer of MI-6, in the rare appearances he made. That's why the file doesn't have a photo, and he never acts without a balaclava. The secrecy of his identity is an absolutely important part of the job. He cannot be identified, as protection for him and his family. Although he is a football fan and a Manchester City supporter, he is a mountaineer, highly experienced, having climbed Everest twice, and K-2, among other peaks over 7,000 meters high. The second time he climbed Everest, while making the trail to base camp he met Nataly, MacMillan's middle daughter. The two began dating during the months they spent acclimatizing on the mountain, and maintain a serious relationship, in the midst of all the difficulties she has to accept distance matters because of his job, and the fear of intimacy he has because of his family. And those are some of the foundations for my current version of the Ghost character’s past.

*Jocasta’s complex: In Greek Mythology Jocasta married her own son and had children with him (without knowing). So he was the father of his own siblings and a curse to his community. In psychoanalysis,  in short (I'm not an expert. If there is an expert among the readers, fell free to enlighten us about it.) it's a study on the increase in women's libido in circumstances that make a male child the target of the mother's incestuous and possessive sexual desire.

💚💛

[lovetgr76]

Catherine x Jackson have no interaction in S1e3 Bad Tradecraft... so instead, today, I offer these...

[emziess]

Slow Horses, S01E03 – Bad Tradecraft

[tmwwriting]

Snippets of a fic I'll never write: (1/X)

“You ever think of getting out?” 

Lucas stays quiet so long that Rolf wishes he could take his question back, snatch it from the silence it fell into. Just dust it off and pretend he’d meant to let it slip from his grasp. 

Then, finally, but so flat that it takes Rolf a few moments to register it as a question in return: 

“To do what?” 

Ah. He’s downed Jägermeisters with less bitterness than what's in that tone. There’s a dash of regret in there too, and a sprig of want: a bad cocktail that burns its way out of his friend's throat into the compressed quasi-question. 

“Dunno. Anything. Everything.” Rolf leaves the rest unspoken - that the pay might be good, but there’s more to life than violence and bloodshed. He’s not sure Lucas would believe him anyway. 

“Everything, huh?” Lucas doesn’t laugh, but Rolf hears the echo of a smile dancing like a blade’s edge around his words, and everything is alright. “And that’s why I always end up pulling you out of hospitals, prisons, pubs - one of these days it’ll be a morgue.”

“Don’t remember things happening quite like that, sir,” Rolf says easily. “ ‘sides, it’s called tradecraft. Reconnaissance.” 

Lucas does laugh at that, quiet and reserved like he doesn't quite know how, but Rolf knows what he hears and it warms him more than the scorching desert sun. Then the smiles die, like everything else in this fucking place. 

“Hostiles, corner building, south side.”

“I see them, 550 meters out. Wind zero. On you.” 

[sirkaid]

It's important to note that this sort of behaviour is literally no shit *legally required* in the USA - possibly elsewhere, but I'm only familiar with the American law - due to a law regarding "fiduciary duty to shareholders". Basically, the law states that board members of publicly traded companies MUST prioritize share value over everything else. If Huggies didn't raise their prices when given the opportunity the board would *go to jail*.

"but sirkaid," you may be saying, "doesn't that mean that there's no reason for a company to ever be responsible?"

Yes. That's absolutely correct. As far as the law is concerned, the only people who matter are the investing class.

I'd have suggestions on what should be done about this, but posting about felonies online is bad tradecraft.

A LOT of "inflation" is actually corporations taking advantage of "inflation" to hide profiteering.

[thryth-gaming]

Modern Monsters for Modern Problems

In the last 10-15 years we've seen the rise of what has been called the gig economy. This came along with the promise of being a new way to fix your financial problems by just doing some small gigs on the side now and again. Or, hey, if you worked at it you might even be able to replace your full time job.

In truth, while I'm sure a few of the gig-based companies were founded by people that at least believed they had good intentions, in truth this has created a host of new problems. The people doing the job are classed as independent contractors and thus are responsible for handling their own taxes and insurance. They often use this to avoid workman's comp as well. The freelancers are not well vetted and the company does not take responsibility for crimes performed by the freelancers. Likewise, they will not take responsibility when crimes are committed against their freelancers.

I'm not the first person to make a game out of this new brand of faceless corporate abuse of the population. iHunt is already a TTRPG that handles this subject and one I've been meaning to pick up. Likewise, Phasmophobia and a small host of games based on its model have also used the gig-economy as a framing device for how they do things.

For Swipe-to-Slay, I decided to actually make the App itself part of the mystery. Perhaps it is well-intentioned, but it's definitely out-of-touch and there's some reason why the people running it don't want to meet their freelancers face-to-face.

Toward this end, I decided to have a mix of common people that have felt a bit forced into the monster hunting life due to the daily pressures of bills and survival alongside a professional monster-hunter who's a bit down on their luck and is monetizing their normal hunting. Alongside an oblivious fool and thinks this is all awesome.

MON$TER APP - Swipe to Slay

Style: Can't Escape

The App

Where did each hunter learn about the app?

Courtney Mendez and her grandfather received a spam email and were desperate.

Grady Simmons thought it was an ARG.

Mariketh's heard rumors about the app from other hunters.

Willy Siegrich had it recommended by his husband and sister-in-law.

Why did they start?

Courtney and her grandfather need the money.

Grady thinks it's amazing fun and is a way to protect his neighborhood.

Mariketh was asked to investigate by her sect.

Willy Siegrich hasn't been able to get the app to stop sending jobs.

What are the clients like?

Skeptical and Disbelieving

Often Dead

Grateful and Appreciative

Two Good things about the App:

Good Pay

Strong Communication

Two Bad things about the App:

Intrusive job requests

Uncaring "support" staff

Who do you suspect is behind the app?

Greedy tech-bro

Odin

Core Traits

Team Enemy: Saunders Enterprises, a corporation seeking to collect and control the supernatural.

Team Ally: Frank Keep, a computer security specialist who has been digging into the app and has concerns.

Team Move: Thanks for the Rating

Team Assets

Never Offline: Smartphones or other devices can always connect to the app even when your phone has no bars or internet. This includes the community forum and support line.

Inventory: A big stockpile of mundane gear that might come in handy during a hunt.

Courtney Mendez - The Covenant

Look: A professionally dressed hispanic woman with green-highlights in her hair and mild gothic make-up. She's often seen working along side her grandfather Thomas Raleigh, a bald white man who dresses in rural work-clothes.

Charm -1

Cool +1

Sharp +2

Tough +1

Weird +0

Covenant

Watson

Her grandfather, a 65 year old farmer named Thomas Raleigh

Moves

Basic Weird Move: Tradecraft

Moves: Smash Cut, Who said I was alone?

Gear

Smartphone

Plentiful wardrobe of socially appropriate clothes

Shotgun (3-harm close messy loud)

History

Grady was there the first time Courtney encountered a monster. Neither of them were veterans at the time and they only barely survived the job.

She and her grandfather are related to Mariketh by blood, being his grand-niece and her second cousin.

When Willy approached her about the App, she reluctantly took him on a job with her and Grady.

Courtney was never a wildly successful lawyer. She lacked the charisma and social confidence to be an effective litigator and thus mostly worked in contract law. Among other things, she could get away with some goth-touches to her look here and there. She found herself disbarred recently over an apparent mistake with on of Grady's problems. She honestly doesn't remember making the mistake she was accused of. Courtney and her grandfather have taken to the app to try to keep his farm going against the creditors.

Grady Simmons - The Crooked

Look: A flashy young-man with too-blonde hair and rippling muscles. He dresses with an eye for looking impressive and doesn't think much about whether his look is practical or not.

Charm +2

Cool +2

Sharp +1

Tough +1

Weird -1

Heat

Grady pissed off a well-connected chop-shop owner by robbing his shop and taking one of the cars on a joyride that got it tracked down by the police.

He discovered the supernatural when he clicked through on the spam email that informed him about the App.

Moves

Basic Weird Move: Trust Your Gut

Background: Pickpocket

Moves: Driver, Deal with the Devil: Skill (1 year countdown)

Gear

9mm (2-harm close loud)

Baseball Bat (1-harm hand)

Submachine Gun (2-harm close area reload)

History

Mariketh is Grady's moral compass. She's never been afraid to call him out when he steps over the line. He deliberately sabotaged the relationship with her due to his issue with the devil deal. He suspects that if he comes clean about why he pushed her away, he'll ruin the remains of their friendship as well. Especially since she's a professional mystic.

Courtney used to help Grady with some legal advice, including recommending a litigator for his frequent court cases. He blames himself for her getting dis-barred. He tries to get her anything she and her grandfather need within his skills ability to grab.

Grady is finding himself repeating mistakes with regards to Willy. He's powerfully attracted to the man and like Mariketh, Willy is a deeply moral and kind person. Instead of going through the bother of sabotaging the relationship, he's just trying to keep it from getting started.

Grady is a trouble-maker that has a long history of ruining relationships and stirring up trouble with the cops and local criminals. It's amazing that he's not dead yet. This might have something to do with the deal he made that he's given up on solving. He didn't know what he was getting the problem fixed and instead just is doing what he can to be a problem for the worst people while keeping the best people at arms length.

Willy Seigrich - The Wronged

Look: A burly looking, bearded man who looks perpetually tired. He is generally calm and soft-spoken which makes his capacity for violence that much more disturbing.

Charm +1

Cool +0

Sharp +1

Tough +2

Weird -1

Loss

My Prey: Rilligan, a demon that his husband and sister-in-law took on a job to deal with.

At fault because he was in denial. He didn't think the app was serious.

Moves

Basic Weird Move: Warding

Moves: I Know My Prey, NEVER AGAIN, Safety First

Gear

Protective Gear (2-armour due to Safety First)

Rune enscribed Shovel (4-harm hand against Demons, 1-harm hand against other enemies, innocuous, useful)

Hunting Rifle (2-harm far loud)

9mm (2-harm close loud)

Birthday cards from his dead husband and sister-in-law.

History

He saved Grady's life when Grady was first getting into monster-hunting on the MON$TER App. A necromancer had set a trap and one of Grady's wards blocked the spell from taking hold.

Mariketh is younger than him, but helped him get started learning the ropes on fighting and magic. He's surpassed her in battle but is still lagging as a beginner on magic. The fact that she's partially not-human was surprising, but he's dealt with that.

Courtney used to handle his and his husband's legal issues until she got dis-barred. He respects her knowledge and expertise.

When he originally heard about the app, it sounded like a goofy video game thing. So, when his husband went off to try it out with his sister-in-law, he didn't really have any interest in the whole thing. It was the last time he saw them alive... or in a single piece. He's now looking into the app in hopes of figuring out who's putting this in the hands of unwitting people and maybe find the demon that killed his family along the way.

Mariketh - The Initiate

Look: A pale young woman with a serious expression often concealed behind a jet-black badger mask. She carries several talismans and golden spear.

Charm -1

Cool +1

Sharp +0

Tough +1

Weird +2

The Sect

Those Who Seek Peace

Good Traditions: Non-Human Integration, Like Family

Bad Traditions: Poor

Those Who Seek Peace are a group of inter-related humans and various spirits who make an effort to address the root causes of conflict between the human and inhuman. They've found that many of the root causes are down to socio-economic issues leaving them handling the symptoms and having difficulty gaining the traction they need to actually solve anything. They're a collection of old families, sure, but none of them have much money.

Moves

Basic Weird Move: Use Magic

Moves: Sect Move, That Old Black Magic, Ancient Fighting Arts, Mystic

Gear

Old-Fashioned Armour (1-armour)

Spear (2-harm hand close)

Silver Knife (1-harm hand silver)

Sniper Rifle (3-harm far)

History

Courtney Mendez is a lay member of her sect. Her mother has retired from hunting due to health reasons, but did pass on the information to the Sect. Courtney and Mariketh view each other as cousins.

Mariketh and Willy met while Willy was looking into magic. She helped him with the runes to permanently enchant his shovel for killing demons.

Grady is her ex-boyfriend. His recklessness and obliviousness eventually ruined the relationship. They still care about each other's well-being but the romance is truly dead. She is still mystified about how much he changed so suddenly. Like he just decided to be a jerk one day.

Mariketh is a mystic warrior from a long line of mystic warriors. There's never really many of them in any particular place, most of the family tends to go off to live mild and normal lives. But she's one of the set that sees it as a duty to try and protect good people, mortal and supernatural both, from the evils of the world. She was the last to join the app of the group, but after hearing about the others getting involved, she was already thinking about it. Being officially told by her sect to investigate the matter finished the matter.

Back the new books here:

[zelroy]

I just watched Slow Horses 1x03 "Bad Tradecraft"

[warderfromtheborder]

Brennan spent a bunch of time establishing a couple things in the last two episodes:

1 Dead god trying to be revived

2 The name of that god is knowledge that cannot be given to mortals by gods

3 Someone/someThing put that god's name on Lucy's paperwork

For spies, figuring out how to use information you arent supposed to have is one of the main challenges, because when you act on secrets it tips your enemies off that they had a leak and they can start to identify you based on what you seem to know and where you could have gotten that information from. I think 'spies, curse, tongue' is referring to this concept of tradecraft-it's brennan trying to point the players that they need to focus on who is capable of putting such a secret into play, and Im sure that it will also be revealed as another part of Spyre's very tongue-in-cheek theology/worldbuilding.

And that idea of spies and secrets, is making my gears turn on what is this unknown god's deal. When you're hunting a spy and making no progress, it makes you angry, and paranoid, and more likely to hurt people you probably don't want to hurt. There's been a lot of talk at the table about rage as a bad partner to uncertainty, and finding the right context for anger. 'I liked you better when you were the Nightmare King'. Wasn't part of the climax of sophomore year that Cassandra became the Nightmare King out of fear, as a kind of defensive lashing out to protect herself from what she saw as a completely unsafe environment? What if this god's deal is specifically anger that is reactionary, that has to lash out at a target that feels like a threat. Slights, resentments, grudges, unprocessed trauma, perceived injustices that are actually just some shit that isn't anyone's fault. Cassandra's transformation at the mall was triggered by a very real hurt that Kristen failed to address, which then bloomed way out of proportion. The Rat Grinders hate the Bad Kids even though (as far as we know) they've never been hurt by them directly or via collateral damage. The Rat Grinders have turned the Bad Kids' success into 'special treatment, so now we gotta overturn the school charter to take them down'. That's not just jealousy, that's overblown anger. If I had to distill it to one single concept, I would say it's: Provocation. This god provokes anger at the worst times, carried along by other strong emotions and some amount of real or perceived hurt.

Maybe the stress tokens aren't a mechanic of 'oh you got five of them your character is disabled by blind rage', if they really are related to the rage stars from the mall fight they're probably going to be something like, 'the next time you feel slighted, or hurt, or endangered, you aren't going to be able to stop yourself from lashing out.'

It's also probably not a coincidence then that so much of Gorgug's story this season is about the context of rage, 'I want it to be justified'.

I can't wait to find out who is playing Iago opposite Cassandra's Hamlet in this story.

I'm so intrigued by what cassandra meant when she said "spies, tongue, curse"

[vroooom2]

Yank the supply chain demand the respect

🏆 Thad:

The xz backdoor was the final part of a campaign that spanned two years of operations. These operations were predominantly HUMINT style agent operations. There was an approach that lasted months before the Jia Tan persona was well positioned to be given a trusted role. The trigger for this “Quest for Maintainer” operation was a very long patch which was exactly the sort of thing that the maintainer was not able to process particularly well. New personas appeared to push on this issue. Jigar Kumar was the spearhead for this op.

This is exactly the style of operation a HUMINT organisation will run to get an agent in place. They will position someone and then create a crisis for the target, one which the agent is able to solve. Every intelligence agency in the world could run this campaign, design and execute these operations. There is a serious level of technical acumen on display as well, the Jia Tan persona has to be able to do the work and talk the talk, but the core of this campaign is HUMINT.

The real treasure in the GitHub repository was the pull request comments. This is where the tradecraft of agent interactions could be observed. The PR threads and the xz mailing list reveal the tradecraft used by this group. Including some revealing errors in their persona covers.

The xz campaign was patient, but it wasn’t slow. Jia Tan introduces himself around March 2022, and by January 2023 he is announcing an xz release. In March 2023 he takes over signing release tarballs. 12 months to go from zero to maintainer. That is not slow, that’s fast af.

In 2023 the operation to get the ifunc hook added to xz takes up the latter half of the year. They aren’t merged until October of 2023. There are cover operations that happen during this time as well, including an operation to lend credibility to the ifunc patch. The entire campaign is very reasonably paced for an intelligence agency. They approach, get an agent in place, move the pieces into location, and then pull the trigger. Every stage is accomplished smoothly and with sufficient cover for action. The way the campaign is falling apart under scrutiny is to be expected. They did not build a campaign to resist investigation, they built a campaign to avoid investigation. And they were successful. At no point in the campaign did they raise suspicion. It was just their bad luck.

Briefly, I want to address the issue of who is to blame. Easy — the people behind the attack. Lasse, the maintainer of xz, was the target of a patient intelligence campaign that invested more resources into subverting him than anyone invested into his project. It is important to remember that Lasse is blameless in this. There is no individual, and very very few organisations, able to detect, let alone resist!, the directed interest of an intelligence agency.

The problem isn’t maintainer burnout. That was just the vulnerability that was exploited this time. Intelligence agencies aren’t waiting for the right opportunity to come around, they find or create opportunities when they want them. Stop blaming mental health, and see a therapist for yourself instead. If the xz maintainer wasn’t burnt out then the agency would find another susceptibility, maybe he needs money, or has relationship problems, or likes to drink or gamble or collect rare books, or something. Anything. Intelligence agencies do their homework and play for keeps.

[marjaystuff]

Interview with Tess Gerritsen

The Spy Coast by Tess Gerritsen has her venturing out from a traditional mystery to a spy thriller. In this story she expertly mixes spy drama with romance while adding some humor.  Not only is this a riveting tale but the main character is very engaging as she tackles the ghosts of her past.

Former spy Maggie Bird came to the seaside village of Purity, Maine, eager to put the past behind her after a mission went tragically wrong. These days, she’s living quietly on her chicken farm, still wary of blowback from the events that forced her early retirement. Her final assignment left her very disillusioned. Out of the blue, she finds a young woman calling herself Bianca at her home looking for Diana Ward, another old CIA colleague of Maggie’s. Diana had a talent for making enemies, and Maggie blames her for the debacle in Malta that tore her life apart.

When Bianca’s body is dumped in her driveway and someone takes a few shots at her from across a field, Maggie connects the dots to the tragic case that led her to retire from the CIA. She enlists the help of her baby boomer drinking buddies, four ex-agents with a full assortment of tradecraft skills. The Martini Club, as the retired spies are called, realize that someone is seeking revenge on Maggie. They work together to identify and locate those people and are forced to revisit her role in a mission designed to flush out a Russian informant. It was the mission, Operation Cyrano, that changed Maggie's life and the last one before she resigned. The story bounces between 18 years ago, 16 years ago, and the present, with locations across the globe.   

The Martini Club also must match wits with Purity’s acting police chief, Jo Thibodeau who is investigating the murder and shooting. Jo is puzzled by Maggie’s reluctance to share information and wonders how they seem to be a step ahead of her at every turn. She realizes there is more to this bunch than meets the eye and is frustrated at being outmaneuvered by them at every turn. 

Readers will not want to put the book down as they search for answers along with Maggie and her retired CIA buddies. The book is refreshing and an entertaining departure from spy thrillers because the protagonists are senior citizens. The story is amusing, suspenseful, and at times intense. 

Elise Cooper: How did you get the idea for The Spy Coast?

Tess Gerritsen: I moved here thirty-three years ago and found out that the town has many retired spies. My husband, who is a medical doctor, had patients who used to work for the government but could not talk about what they did. We found out they were retired CIA including two who lived on my street. 

EC:  Did you think of the movie “Red?”

TG:  I thought a lot of the Helen Mirren character. I did not want to deal with assassinations.  What I wanted to write about is the tragedy of the last operation that has haunted the main character, a spy, Maggie Bird. Maggie is made up.  Yet, all the spies in the Martini Club are like those retired spies who live in Maine. They are smart and very educated.

EC:  The setting in Maine-why?

TG:  It is a beautiful setting.  This location has many safe houses. We have an International Conference in this little town of 5,000 people.  They bring in every year leaders, politicians, and foreign policy experts from around the world. They come and speak here every winter. The town has residents with a lot of international experience. 

EC:  How would you describe the two spies, Diana Ward versus Maggie Bird?

TG:  Diana is a bit of a sociopath. She does what needs to be done and does not care about the consequences or morality. She is the equivalent of the assassins in so many spy novels. She is very efficient.  Diana is not someone who could be trusted, not loyal, and self-centered. Everything is all about her. She might be a good spy but is a bad person. On the other hand, Maggie is a spy with a conscience. She is in it to help her country.  She was forced to cross a line she did not want to cross.  It moved into her personal life, which had everything fall apart for her. Maggie is loyal, calm, friendly, accomplished with a strong sense of morality. 

EC:  How would you compare the two teenage girls, Callie versus Bella?

TG:  Callie is the ultimate innocent. She is a farm girl who is hungry for a mother.  She likes to lean on Maggie.  Callie is a very vulnerable character.  Bella starts off as a vulnerable character but ends up as a nightmare in training. She is being groomed for a bad role because her father is a powerful Russian oligarch, Phillip Hardwicke. Her father sees her as a tool. Her mother is much more of a traditional mom who cares about her daughter. Yet, her mother is disappointed Bella is not more like her.  Bella is disrespected by both parents. 

EC:  Why make Danny, Maggie’s husband, a doctor?

TG:  I started off making him a professional chef. But I needed someone who had close contact with the bad guy. It did not feel right so I made him a doctor who would know Phillip’s most intimate secrets. He traveled with him. I gave Hardwicke a lifelong history of seizures.

EC:  How would you describe Hardwicke?

TG:  He wants power, money, and prestige. He likes to get his way and does not care who gets hurt.  He is a control freak, obsessive, intense, cruel, and very smart. 

EC:  How would you describe the spies in The Martini Club reacting with the police chief Jo Thibodeau?

TG:  They simultaneously are cooperative but also antagonistic. At the beginning Jo does not know who these people are, but later realize they are retired spooks. As time goes on in this book and the next, she realizes they are a big help to her.  

TG: Did you get any movie deals?

TG:  It has been optioned by Amazon for a television series. This is one of the reasons I went with this publisher.  They attached a TV deal. There is already a screenwriter, and they are talking about who will play Maggie Bird. 

EC:  Next book?

TG:  I am working on the sequel now. The second book will take place entirely in the town of Purity Maine. It will be titled The Summer Guests and is scheduled for the spring of 2025.  It will still have the five retirees and the police chief. The plot has a family visiting in the summer whose teenage girl disappears, plus there is a cold case mystery. The sequel will be more of a classic mystery.  If I do a third book that is when I will probably go back to the international setting again. 

THANK YOU!!