FACTIONS

Factions are groups and organizations that either may come into direct contact with the Investigators during a scenario or have some connection to the horrors. These fall into two categories: minor and major.

MINOR FACTIONS

These factions are those with limited overall impact, straightforward goals, or ones where the individual NPCs are more important to the scenario than the specific faction they’re aligned with. For example, standard law enforcement will usually fall under this category, as their goal is straightforward and it’s typically one or two key members that will rise to the forefront in a scenario, with their personal goals being more important than those of their faction.

MAJOR FACTIONS

These factions are those more active within a scenario or have more complex motivations. As such, it may be useful to give these factions more defined details.

Description: Who are they? Where do they come from? When were they founded? Are they secretive or is their existence public knowledge?
Goals: What do they want? What are they willing to do to achieve this? What happens when they achieve this goal? What happens when they fail?
Key Personnel: Who are the major NPCs within the organization? This list should include a mix of leadership and the folks who are the most likely to come into direct contact with the Investigators.
Headquarters: Where is their base of operation? Do they operate satellite locations? How quickly can they respond when altered to a subject of their interest?
Resources & Methods: What materials and resources do they have at their disposal? How do they leverage these resources to go about attempting to achieve their goals?
Allies & Adversaries: Do they have any connections to the other factions? Who are they aligned with? Who are they starkly opposed to?
Contracts: How do they relate to the Investigators? Do they have jobs or tasks available? Do they offer payment or use coercion?

IDEX

Example Factions Here are three Factions we’ve included with an open license (CC-BY 4.0). Our hope is that these Factions can both serve as an exemplar template for your own Factions, and to serve as three pillars in regards to types of factions that typically show up in modern horror. Given the open license provided in this SRD, you can use them fully in your own publications.

The Bureau (corrupt government organization involved in the weird).
Panopticon (a perfect stand-in for evil mega-corp)
The Archivist (a mysterious patron with connections to the weird and otherworldly)

THE BUREAU

The Bureau is a clandestine United States government agency that is tasked with controlling paranatural phenomena. The agency as it is known today was created in 1905 by the Roosevelt Administration due to pressure from several key government figures after the truth behind the assassination of President McKinley was leaked to them.

Due to the nature of their work, the Bureau operates outside of official oversight. While federal and state agencies are aware of the Bureau as an agency and the subsequent chain of command, their existence and operations are kept secret from the public and there are very few outside of the agency that are truly aware of their operations.

GOALS

The official directive of the Bureau is to “protect mankind from the threats of the Unknown”. In practice, this means safeguarding, controlling access too, and protecting all information related to the paranatural. This includes dimensional bleeds, planar anomalies, non-euclidean mathematical incursions, monsters, and “magic”. They also conduct extensive research in an attempt to better understand these phenomena and learn to utilize them to aid in the fight against the horrors.

The Bureau maintains jurisdiction on all matters paranatural or unknown, superseding all other federal, state, or local agencies. They can apply whatever scope and scale the current Director deems necessary to combat these threats, including the complete suspension of the civil liberties of normal citizens in service to “the greater good of humanity”.

KEY PERSONNEL

John Harrison: Bureau Director
- Janet Garcia: Personal Aide to the Director.
Dr. Stephen Gal: Executive Assistant Director of the Research & Development Branch.
- Dr. Cassandra Meadows: Head of Extraplanar Research.
Harlan Fowler: Executive Assistant Director of the Security Branch.
- Emma Roan: Head of Investigations.
- Anna Reyes: Head of the Operations & Acquisitions.
- Lance Rogers: Head of Containment.
Elias Hullux: Executive Assistant Director of the Administration Department.
Hanna Yu: Executive Assistant Director of the Human Resources Branch.
Amos Mortimer: Maintenance Director of the Monolith.

HEADQUARTERS

While the Bureau was originally based in Washington, D.C. upon their founding, their headquarters was officially moved to the Monolith in Seattle, WA in 1967 under the tenure of Director Greymoor.

The Bureau also operates field offices in a number of major cities throughout the country and maintains covert permanent and temporary monitoring stations in regions of frequent paranatural activity. Investigation teams may also set up within the offices of local law enforcement during coordinated operations.

RESOURCES & METHODS

As a government agency, the Bureau has been granted extensive federal funding. While other agencies and officials are vaguely aware of the Bureau’s existence and authority, few know of their true scope and operation, which allows for their funding to be tucked in as forgotten line items among national defense bills.

An extensive budget, scope, and access to paranatural resources allows for a wide range of methodology. Common operations include containment, field testing, extraction, extermination, counter-intelligence, psyops, and the application of paranatural abilities. The Bureau is also authorized to commandeer any local police resources deemed necessary for an operation.

Objects and entities that are deemed a significant threat are either terminated or captured and held in containment in the Monolith for further study. This includes an extensive collection of Resonant Artifacts, which are occasionally wielded by agents during investigations.

While the Bureau is a U.S. agency, their reach extends into a number of other nations, often without official approval.

ALLIES

Due to the chain of command, the Bureau often works directly with federal and state agencies. There have also been rare occasions when they contract with para-military private organizations for particularly dangerous jobs.

ADVERSARIES

As an official government agency, the Bureau naturally stands opposed to those that meddle with the paranatural.

CONTRACTS

While the Bureau is well equipped and well staffed, their reach and resources are not unlimited. They will often employ contractors to manage “low risk” investigative work that would otherwise pull agents from more important tasks. These contracts rarely offer more than cursory details and threat assessments, but the pay is moderate and per diem is offered if the appropriate paperwork is submitted.

The Bureau prefers to give cases to reliable individuals, so there’s always more work for those who succeed, and they will often use the promise of potential future full time employment as incentive. However, the Bureau keeps a close eye on contractors, even well after the terms of their contracts are up.

Below are some common contract types:

Resonant Artifact containment.
Destruction of threats to humanity.
Seizing or capturing assets that may be useful to the Bureau.
Gathering intelligence for potential Bureau intervention.

THE BUREAU NPC STATS

AGENT
STR: 10 DEX: 12 CTRL: 14
HP: 4 Armor: 1
Service Pistol (d6) or Taser (d6, non-lethal)

Requisition: While in the field, an Agent can request the necessary supplies to complete their objective. Requires access to cell service, the internet, or a field office and an hour to complete the paperwork. Basic goods arrive within 1d6 hours. More complex or specialized goods arrive within 1d12 hours or more.
Reinforce: With a radio call, an Agent can summon 1d4 Operators if any are in the vicinity. They arrive in 1d10 minutes.

Black suits, black ties, and dark sunglasses, Agents are the Bureau’s backbone. Field investigators, desk workers, scientists, intelligence, and counter-intelligence Agents perform all the necessary investigative work to achieve the Bureau’s prime objectives.

OPERATOR
STR: 14 DEX: 12 CTRL: 9
HP: 6 Armor: 2
Variable Weapons

Squad Tactics: When 3 or more Operators attack a single target, their damage die is Enhanced.

Armed and armored, Operators are the Bureau’s muscle. Special forces, security guards, and medics, Operators are charged with keeping Agents and Sonorous safe, both in the field and in the offices.

OPERATOR LOADOUTS

Assault Rifle (d8, bulky), Under-Barrel Grenade Launcher (d6, blast), Tactical Knife (d6, quick).
Shotgun (d8, bulky), Grenade (d8, blast), Retractable Baton (d6).
Stun Baton (d6, non-lethal), Tear Gas (d6, blast, non-lethal), Gas Mask, Riot Shield (+1 Armor).
Trauma Kit, Field Diagnostic Equipment, Battlefield Medicine, Service Pistol (d6).
Drone, Cell Service Jammer, Bluetooth Signal Hijacker, Mobile 3-D Printer, Service Pistol (d6).
Rocket Launcher (b8, blast, bulky), Service Pistol (d6), C-4 (d8, blast).

SONOROUS
STR: 8 DEX: 10 CTRL: 16
HP: 3 Stability: 1
Service Pistol (d6) or Resonant Artifact

Pallesthesia: Sonorous can sense when a Resonant Artifact or dimensional anomaly is near.

The Sonorous are the Bureau’s bloodhounds, able to sense the resonant frequencies associated with Resonant Artifacts and dimensional anomalies. This ability is very rare, so only a handful are deployed into the field at one time and not all of them are employed by choice.

ASSETS
There are some horrors that the Bureau has deemed to be “too useful to destroy”. These horrors are captured and bound into service, often against their will for those that maintain some semblance of sentience, and are deployed alongside Bureau agents to fight the most dangerous threats to humanity.

While Assets can be anything from humans with strange abilities to warped and twisted creatures, common types are listed in the table below.

TRACKED
By default, Assets are implanted with a tiny device that monitors their location and biological activities. More dangerous Assets may also be fitted with a “behavior modification” collar to make them easier to control.

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PANOPTICON

Panopticon is a massive conglomerate that started with the merging of a data analytics firm and an insurance company. One of the few true megacorporations of the modern age, their internal structure and scope is so wide and varied that many portions of itself operate without the knowledge of what the other divisions are doing.

Due to a clever insurance adjuster’s astute investigation in the early 1900s, Panopticon was able to discern the existence of Resonant Artifacts and other strange incursions. Keeping it a closely guarded internal secret, they used this knowledge to grow, acquiring a wide range of businesses in order to leverage the opportunities offered by harnessing the strange. Their research has allowed them to reverse engineer a small fraction of the power of the Artifacts, leading to the creation of cutting edge innovations.

GOALS

Panopticon’s primary goal is profit stabilization and growth, with many departments harnessing Resonant Artifacts and other paranormal forces. Their approach to these resources is through a lens of them being manifestations of scientific concepts not yet fully understood. They believe they are the only ones with the resources and understanding to safely use these unstable-variables. Many employees leverage the opportunities for their own personal gains and pursuits, often in opposition of their peers.

Each department and division functions as its own entity in service of benefiting the whole. While opinions on exactly what is beneficial to the entire organization often varies, the entire operation must bend to the will of the Board of Directors.

KEY PERSONNEL

Samantha Palmer. Director of Operations and Chairperson of the Board. The true decision maker in the company.
Nicholas Allen. Research and Development. Coordinates progress across all subsidiaries towards a common goal.
Matthew Kim. Mergers and Acquisitions Director. Has an eye for potential.
Ryan Segal. HR Coordinator. Struggles to coordinate the HR managers across all divisions.
Beth Allen. Comms director. Secretly a devout member of the Church of Celestial Science.
Winston Neff. Heads the legacy insurance division. Works closely with data analytics to comb claims for signs of potential assets.
Kay Brake. Pharmaceutical division head. Functionally immortal.

HEADQUARTERS

While Panopticon was initially founded in New York, in 1918 they built their West Coast operations hub in Seattle, Washington. By 1972 a majority of their administrative capacities officially shifted to a new facility at the Apeiron Campus. The hub is a massive state-of-the-art campus that has grown significantly over the years, with a majority of divisions having offices kept on the main campus. Their headquarters is always expanding, both up and down, in order to accommodate the need for growth. A world renowned research lab and archive is housed there.

Given the scale and number of acquisitions in recent years, most major cities and towns in the US have an office, research lab, or distribution hub for Panopticon or one of its subsidiaries in their borders, and they’ve begun expanding significantly overseas in the last decades.

RESOURCES & METHODS

Panopticon’s size and scope allows them to shift financial assets under the table without regulators catching wind, giving them access to a variety of off the books resources. They also have massive influence in governments across the globe that allow them access to extra-judicial opportunities for action.

They maintain strict compartmentalization in order to keep information from leaking out to the public by means of spreading through the different departments. This means that most departments are unaware of what their counterparts are working on, but has also spurred intense competition between department heads on who can achieve their corporate milestones. As a result, many of the middle and upper managers have their own unique goals, interests, and ideas that drive their pursuits.

While Panopticon has their hands in everything from federal security to e-commerce, the attention of the Board is most focused on their technologies department and their research into Resonant Artifacts. The work has hit a period of stagnation as of late, so in order to meet growth metrics, the company has begun financing fringe groups, unorthodox scientists, and cults in order to increase the likelihood of a breakthrough.

ALLIES

Many department managers prefer to use para-military sub-contracts, as it allows them to keep operations off the books. Panopticon has been known to enter into co-ventures with both the Devotees of Bael and The Barrons.

ADVERSARIES

Panopticon is often in direct opposition to the Bureau, believing that paranatural resources are best left in the hands of the private sector. Panopticon typically resorts to using proxies to interfere with Bureau affairs. Another group that is a constant thorn in the side of Panopticon are the Knights of Amelioration (link). There is also an almost universal disdain and confounding when the entity labeled the Archivist (link) comes into play.

CONTRACTS

Panopticon’s wide array of departments, internal goals, and needs means there is ample opportunity for contract work. The pervasive culture of success and growth by any means often puts departments at odds with each other. Due to their internal struggles, coupes, acquisitions, and vendettas mean that outside proxies are often needed in order to operate in secret.

The most common contracts revolve around either asset recovery or information acquisition. Panopticon has ample resources and will pay handsomely after events in order to obtain what they need. No approach is off the table, so when money does not work, another form of payment or leverage may be used.

Below are some common contract types:

Resonant Artifact acquisition.
Information gathering.
Containment and delivery of interdimensional beings.

FACTION STAT BLOCKS

JUNIOR EXECUTIVE
STR: 10 DEX: 10 CTRL: 12
HP: 3 Armor: 1
Pistol (d6, discreet)
Future middle managers, the Junior Executives are Panopticon’s eyes on the ground. Often wearing clothing appropriate to the situation, but well tailored as to denote an almost chameleon like uniform, one of the primary roles of a Junior Executives is to act as a department liaison for field operations. This level of autonomy and lack of direct oversight makes a perfect opportunity for Junior Executives to make bold plays in order to drive their careers.

UPPER MANAGEMENT
STR: 10 DEX: 10 CTRL: 14
HP: 5 Armor: 2
Silenced Pistol (d6, discreet)
Dressed in tailored best, or what is currently fashionable for the corporate elite, Upper Management personnel take their positions as department or subdivision heads seriously. With resources and teams at their disposal, they will not hesitate to leverage their position to get what they want.

BOONS
Most people who have achieved this high position in the company have come in contact with Resonant Artifacts or other dimensional anomalies. Their proximity to the strange has gifted them boons that they use to maintain their position. These assets vary, and are one of the cruxes of their positions.

d6 Assets
1. Resonant Artifact 2. Rituals 3. Fallout 4. Contained Lesser Horror 5. Contained Greater Horror 6. Pact

ANALYST
STR: 11 DEX: 14 CTRL: 14
HP: 8 Armor: 1
Sonic Amplifier (d6, blast, nonlethal)
The true backbone of Panopticon, Analysts are the technicians, engineers, and scientists that research and develop the company’s products. More laid back than management, Analysts are often far more interested in their paychecks or personal research than having blind corporate loyalty.

PROTOTYPES
Analysts are typically found in the field if they are testing a new prototype. Some of the projects result in unfortunate side effects, resulting in a variety of Fallout for those that have been with the company for an extended period of time.

ASSETS
Growth is progress, and Panoption’s ever expanding nature gives it a plethora of assets with which to work with. From fiscal, material, human, and otherworldly resources, each part of the business serves the goal of expansion.

HUMAN
Given the size and scope of the Panopticon portfolio, the company and its subsidiaries have access to a wide range of employees with a variety of skills.

Researcher STR: 9 DEX: 12 CTRL: 12 HP: 3
IT STR: 11 DEX: 9 CTRL: 10 HP: 3
Warehouse: STR: 13 DEX: 12 CTRL: 8 HP: 4
Scientist: STR: 10 DEX: 12 CTRL: 14 HP: 4
Office Worker: STR: 10 DEX: 12 CTRL: 14 HP: 4
Receptionist: STR: 10 DEX: 12 CTRL: 14 HP: 4

OTHERWORLDLY
Panopticon strives to harness and replicate objects and beings associated with dimensional bleed. They will harvest them for parts, utilizing every bit possible in the name of progress. Panopticon views human collateral damage as an acceptable cost of harnessing otherworldly assets.
› Resonant Artifacts: The two primary approaches are using Resonant Artifacts for corporate gain and attempted artificial replication of Resonant abilities.
› Horrors: Researchers use a variety of approaches in order to learn from, replicate, and modify horrors to make them usable assets. One approach currently in vogue is Algorithmization, merging lobotomized horrors with a server farm in order to create an Artificial Interdimensional Intelligence.
› Fallouts: Deliberate exposure of employees to dimensional bleed is used in order to facilitate fallout acquisition and study their potential use.

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THE ARCHIVIST

The Archivist is a faction of one, often presenting himself as a journalist, a writer, or sometimes a private eye. His extensive network of Investigators is ever growing, much to the frustration of his adversaries, though his true nature remains a mystery. A common theory is that the Archivist is an otherworldly entity of some sort, as there are at least five reported instances of enough physical harm befalling him that no human should be able to survive.

GOALS

The Archivist’s goal is to catalog and understand paranatural threats. He strives to obtain Resonant Artifacts and other dimensional anomalies to keep them safe, storing them in the archives in order to provide an external resonant order to them.

The Archivist has cultivated relationships with many who he then recruits to act as his Investigators out in the field. Bringing others into the fold, opening up the mysteries in order to entangle them seems to be a tertiary goal. The number of active Investigators that he employs fluctuates depending on active recruitment effort. Some joke that the Archivist collects people tainted by the strange as much as the anomalies themselves.

HEADQUARTERS

The exact location of the warehouse is unknown. Bureau records theorize that it must be an interdimensional space as it seems to exist in multiple places at once. The warehouse is massive, consisting of a web of interconnected storage rooms and basements. The main room is packed full of items of various sizes, spanning most recorded history. There is seemingly no rhyme or reason to the distribution of items other than to create winding pathways through the space, hopping from alcove to alcove. Most items seem normal upon first glance, as if being stored there soothes the resonant energies within. It is nearly impossible to tell what is simple antique vs a dormant Resonant Artifact.

RESOURCES & METHODS

Given that his primary goal is to collect evidence in all its forms, all of his extensive resources aim to make that a reality.

Often the Archivist will use paranatural events as a means of recruitment. By helping those touched by the weird, he places himself in the role of “Patron.” The Archivist will provide information, resources (money and/or Investigation Kits) to aid in investigations. It is rare that the Archivist will take to the field himself, he typically employs others.

His extensive collection provides a fairly comprehensive ability to offer aid but, often to the frustration of Investigators, the how and what form that aid comes in follows a logic all its own.

ALLIES

The Archivist has been known to aid the pursuits of the independent Investigators as their goal to uncover truths often aligns with his own. While not directly aligned to any of the other major factions, the Archivist has been known to cultivate relationships with members of each faction. These direct connections are often kept secret from their respective organizations and are the Archivist leveraging a specific need of those employees, creating a connection that can be used down the line.

ADVERSARIES

Given his massive collection of dimensional anomalies, his constant recruiting of others to become Investigators, and their inability to contain or control him, the Archivist is often in direct opposition to the other major factions. The Bureau (link) classifies him as a potential anomaly and has a warrant out for his arrest, Panopticon (link) covets his rumored archives.

CONTRACTS

The Archivist’s pursuit of knowledge and acquisition make him a perfect patron to those Investigators looking to battle the weird, or learn more about a mystery that has plagued them. He will provide direct support, providing information and connections, driving the Investigators into situations that drive the deeper and deeper into the strange. Some tasks the Archivist has been known to give Investigators are to:

Investigate strange occurrences that are plaguing a town.
Destroy or contain dimensional anomalies.
Acquire Resonant Artifacts.

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