So I'm about a year into a heavy investigation

chronicle that I'm writing myself, and after two or

three excellent experiences in running
Investigations I thought I might pen a short
column on how a GM might go about this.
Dark Heresy especially is geared towards
investigation. Blindly rushing in guns blazing gets
you killed quick, and even if you survive, you're
left with a smoldering corpse instead of the next
lead in the link of conspiracy.
However, open ended investigation adventures
seem to be the most difficult to write and run for
even experienced GMs. I think I've stumbled onto
a good way to write and run the investigation
however, and I thought I'd put it up for
commentary. This is a setting-neutral column, and
can work for anything from Call of Cthulhu
onward.
Writing the Conspiracy
1.
Start with the hook- Every conspiracy or
investigation needs a beginning. Something
needs to go wrong or needs to not add up. A
building can explode, a ship disappears, someone
is assassinated, a cult freaks out and starts taking
hostages very publicly, whatever It needs to be
something that demands the player group or their
organization to look into it. The bigger the hook,
the more pressing and important the
investigation is. In my game for example, the
hook was an assassination attempt on a
planetary governor that the players were pulled
into to help stop. Midway through this mission the
Inquisitor herself is outright killed and her protg
demands vengeance and uses the PCs as the
implement of that vengeance. This sets up
immediacy, pressure, and a reason to keep
pushing even as the leads run thin. This hook also
needs to have a starting piece of evidence that is
given to the PC party and represents the goal of
the first of three acts. In my game, the explosives
and assassins used in the attack were traced
back to a planetary system where the adventure
was to take place. At all times in this first act, the
players had a set goal: Follow the explosives back
along the conspiracy chain and youd find the
conspirators.
2.
Create the agenda- This usually happens
sometime around the first point, but I like to flesh
it out better after I have the hook. Should the
hook have successfully been completed without
interference, what would have happened
afterwards? This involves creating a mastermind
or minds and an agenda. I dont flesh out the
masterminds at this point. Theres a reason for
this well get to later. However, having a basic
idea of who is doing what for why will let your
players piece together clues and have their own
ah-ha! moments. Dont spend too much time
on detailing out what would have happened had

the hook not occurred, unless you have a specific

idea youre pushing towards.
3.
Create the conspiracy chain one link at a
time- I work backwards from the hook now that I
have an agenda. Each link should be relatively
straightforward depending on how professional
the people involved in each link are. Using
mundane civilians is great for avoiding attention
to begin with and covers your tracks, preventing
patterns from emerging, but these people talk, or
have second thoughts, or motives of their own.
Each link is essentially a scene or mini-adventure
in its own right, leading further back into the
conspiracy. Eventually youll get to the point
where you link directly back to the conspirator.
The conspirator(s) need to be several links away
from the hook- maybe 5-7 major links will make a
good investigation. Too short and the players will
never feel like theyre unraveling a mystery. Too
long and the inertia of the investigation stagnates
and you get players who lose their focus and the
game risks falling apart. Branching links are nice
for this too. Every now and again create a
detour in your chain, where you can follow
sequential leads in one of two directions.
Following them both takes up valuable time and
well discuss that later, however it may fill in gaps
in the story youre telling. By the time youre
finished, you should have a timeline that
describes your conspiracy and the players, big
and small, in the chain.
3a. Obvious links are obvious... And good- Each
lead should be obvious once it's found. Definitely
not in it's implications in the grand scheme of
things, but when given a clue or a lead, the
players should know exactly what they're
following up on. Vague clues will sometimes fly
over the players' heads, to no fault of their own.
Keep the leads obvious- the evidence that they
uncover can be nebulous and vague.
3b. Parallel Chains are nightmare conspiraciesRunning two (or more!) chains of evidence and
leaping back and forth between the two can
sometimes work, but really is risking a whole
metric ton of confusion. Save the fancy multiple
conspiracies for a later date when you've got this
under control.
4.
Create a police force for your
conspiracy- Conspirators are often risking
everything on rolling the dice and trying to come
out ahead. Therefore, successful conspirators will
look to eliminate those chains of evidence that
link them back to the hook, thus increasing their
chances of success and survival. How will they do
this? Through a number of means- Violence
through thugs, gang members, private security,
or dark powers, political pressure on the PCs,
social pressures, etc etc They dont need to kill
the investigators flat out: in fact this often is a
delaying tactic as nothing raises a red flag like
the investigators being killed. What it can do is

buy hours/days/weeks while a new investigative

crew gets back up to speed that the conspirator
can focus on eliminating those links of evidence.
However, because violence is a means to an end
and not an end in itself, when the conspirators
resort to violence, more clues need to be left
behind for the survivors (potentially resulting in a
branch in the chain of evidence).
5.
Figure out how much time pressure youll
put on the PCs- Now that you have the cleanup
crew/policing force for your conspiracy, you have
a ticking clock. The longer they wait, the slower
they go, and the more exhaustive they are in
examining every single lead possible, the more
likely theyll have a harder time finding
subsequent leads and chain links. Unless the PCs
completely screw things up you should never
break the chain completely, but put a little
thought into ways you can complicate the PCs
jobs. Dont write anything specific for this stage,
but be ready with some brainstormed ideas.
6.
Create out-of-order leads- This is where
things *really* start feeling open ended (but is
secretly under your tight control). Your chain is a
list of evidence that leads straight back to the
conspirator. We don't want the players to follow
this path. Instead, look at each of the links, and
start creating leads between disparate links in the
chain. Link A should have a lead that reveals link
D (two people who go to the same social club and
often play cards together), which might have
leads that link to A and C (A is D's coworker, and
C is D's jealous former fling), but the players only
have time for one of those leads before the other
is policed up. It's like working on a puzzle where
you're given the pieces randomly. Some fit
together and you work on those for a while, the
pieces that don't fit anywhere are set aside until
something *does* fit, and slowly you build the
picture up by guessing what's in between the
pieces you *have* finished. Don't be a slave to
this initial map however, because your players
will often start forming connections and leads of
their own in the course of gameplay. Run with
this. Consider these initial leads to be fall backs
and ready when needed.
7.
Figure out a good climax- This is probably
the hardest part. Get a conceptual framework of a
good, exciting climax. It doesnt have to involve
combat- often times the conspirators are not
combat savvy and the PCs will outclass them
entirely. You shouldnt write specifics up yet
though, because things are going to change a lot
once you start running the game. When you're
finishing up Act Two, your players should have
given you an idea of what is satisfying for them.
Maybe it's shooting the dude in the face, maybe
it's arresting him in a big sting or turning his allies
on him. The mood of the party at the end of Act
Two and the beginning of Act Three will really
help you write a good climax.

So now you have a conspiracy chain, a hook for

your players, and an agenda that is getting
interrupted. You basically have a skeleton
adventure. How to you run it? Thats surprisingly
pretty simple.
Running the Conspiracy
1.
Start in media res- You dont always have
to do this, but starting out with a big, action-filled
BANG engages players, especially new players.
The satisfaction of starting out on a crescendo or
doing something highly unusual will often keep
players feeling warm and fuzzy about their
participation while you lay the groundwork for the
investigation. Hopefully by the time that starts to
fade theyve had their first ah-ha! moment and
theyll be hooked.
2.
Throw clues at the players out of order- If
you can manage it, those connections should
introduce leads, clues, and links in a non-linear
fashion. Too many links being discovered
sequentially creates a trend, a direction the
conspiracy is headed in. Youll want that
sometimes, but generally speaking players are
bright and will figure the plot out well in advance
if you keep moving that way.
3.
Ambiguity is your friend- Give definite
leads that go somewhere to the players to
discover. Just make those leads seem to go in all
different directions until most/all the dots are
connected. When your players discuss what do
we do next? Whats going to pay off for us best?
and they have the conversation without
frustration you know youve hit gold. Remember,
youre seeing links in a chain that youre dishing
out of order to the players. It looks overly
simplistic to you because you have your timeline.
To your players, its a real mystery because they
cant go from A to B to C and onward. They start
at point G, go to B, stumble over F, trace that
back to E, track down A, and so on.
4.
Combat is a seasoning, not an entre- Your
PCs will probably start focusing on social abilities
in an investigative game, but dont be afraid to
spice your sessions up with a tussle. Every group
will have a different rate at which they burn out
on the investigation and will want to knock heads.
My group ended up wanting an action session
every 2 sessions or so. It changes things up and
is a quick/cheap shot of adrenalin to the story.
5.
When the players run out of leads, attack
them- Not necessarily with physical combat, but
put a direct, adversarial challenge in their way
that they have to focus on. In other words, give
them a short term goal that can be achieved in a
session or maybe two. Investigations are trying
and can burn out players, so its important to give
them a good bang to keep them engaged. These
challenges should, naturally, have clues in them
to rekindle the investigation. By hiding handouts
in a direct challenge, players won't feel like you're

spoon feeding them. Besides, it makes sense this

is going to happen- they're mucking about and
upsetting powerful people, interrupting agendas,
and diverting precious resources towards
covering up something that should not be an
issue. They're going to get *someone* angry, and
that someone will probably make a rash decision
and try to stop the players.
6.
Say "yes, but..." whenever you can- Youve
written an intentionally vague skeleton of an
adventure for a reason. Your players are going to
come up with solutions to problems and
directions that you could never anticipate.
Instead of doing the heavy lifting and railroading
your players, listen to their discussions of what to
do next and how, and let them do the heavy
creative lifting. Say no most of the time to boring,
straight-forward, unimaginative solutions
however (I say most of the time because the
times when you *do* say yes to those, everyone
appreciates them more). The more outlandish the
idea, the more you should try to run with it. Inject
your own complications into their plans. You
already know what they need to find out, youll
be amazed at how often a player party will come
up with the idea of how theyre going to find that
information out. Theres no shame or problem
with calling for a 15 minute break to generate up
something that specifically came from a players
ideas- in fact its rewarding for your players to
know that their choices matter in the story.
7.
Avoid total exposition- If the players
uncover every link in the chain, no matter how
minor, more power to them. However, they will
probably skip links and forge ahead, with some
parts of the conspiracy simply being a mystery to
them while they chase after the conspirator. This
is fine. In fact, this is excellent. Use your police
force to keep them moving along the conspiracy
and not focus on the minor details too heavily.
This is another reason why you don't script the
adventure out in advance: Adventures go off the
rails all the time if they're scripted out with any
real detail. I never write more than one session in
advance, and even then I might only use 60% of
what I write. Too much writing wasted is
disappointing for the GM: It's double the work for
half the payoff. Avoid it in the first place and only
write what you need to find your way along the
adventure.
8.
Avoid dead ends- One or two increases the
sense of pressure- its lost time. More than that
and it gets totally frustrating. Use them sparingly.
9.
Avoid Deus Ex Machina Usually- Every
now and then you can throw a left-turn into your
conspiracy. Unexpected allies or enemies, divine
providence drops needed evidence into the PCs
laps, whatever. Try to make it fit within the frame
of your adventure though, and try to foreshadow
it if you can.

10.
Chekovs Gun- If theres a gun on the wall
in Chapter 1, it needs to be fired at some point in
the story. Youve got a lot on your plate.
Foreshadow is fine, but keep your investigation
fairly streamlined and don't introduce too much
extraneous detail into your game. Your players
are going to be muddled as all hell as is if youre
doing your job right. Extraneous details that need
to be paid attention to are functionally equivalent
in-session to dead ends. Thus this sort of ties into
dead ends and DEM above.
11.
Set Pieces- Once per investigation you
should try to do something novel or even
gimmicky. Ive had the players design strike
missions based off of an orbital map, or played a
round of high-stakes cards, or any number of
other things that tie into the story. Its a big break
from the investigation and gives players
something novel to remember about the story. If
you cant think of anything, dont worry about it
too much. Its cool to do but not vital.
12.
Three Acts- Generally, plan for your
investigation to consist of three acts. The first act
is resolving the goal presented in the initial hook.
At the end of this act you should have an idea
that there is an agenda and a conspirator out
there. Act two consists of tracking down and
learning of this conspirator. You can use another
evidence chain to great effect here, especially if
you turn up the non-linear clues at this point. Let
them form an idea of the mastermind by creating
a silhouette of clues. By the end of act two they
should have an idea of who they are up against.
Act three is thusly the confrontation of the
conspirator and can be again another
investigation to find out where the enemy is or
just a big blow out combat orgy. Your players will
probably be ready for it.
13.
The next step- Is that it? Is there another
conspiracy that this links into? Every now and
again I like to foreshadow/introduce crossconspiracies into my storyline. The players make
a note of it and say when were done here we
need to look into this and that moves organically
to the next linked story. Otherwise, consider a
good epilogue. The conspiracy crumbled, the bad
guys served out justice, the players praised for
their diligence and quick wit. Either way, aim for
an air of accomplishment and resolution at the
end of your third act. The occasional
disappointment in act three is fine as a twist, but
should never be relied upon too heavily as its
incredibly discouraging to the party.
Other things that probably don't warrant points of
their own is to take copious notes. Write down
names uses, make notes of major conversations
among the PCs, and when you brainstorm, write
all your ideas down in a journal of sorts. Later
when you're running the session you can pick
these ideas up and bring them into the story
where appropriate.

Also, use time where the players are talking in

character as a chance to catch up or prep for the
next section. If you've split the party up and run
separate leads down, the players will need to
update each other on what's happened and that's
precious in-game time they're having fun that you
can be prepping the next scene.

And really thats it. The trick is to write a

timeline/evidence chain and then present it out of
order to your players. Engaged, motivated
players will do most of the heavy lifting for you.
You just have to provide the scaffold for them to
climb.