I'm posting draft rules for the first three games in the overall Tyrants game I'm working on. If administrators think that posting three 5-6 page posts the same night is excessive, I'm happy to stagger them, but prefer to put them out in clusters since they are parts of a whole.

The explanation of the concept is here:

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=11277

Any feedback on this game is welcome. Here are two specific questions:

1. Do the rules suggest that players should choose accusations and evidence that help create an interesting and semi-coherent snapshot of the Tyrant and his regime (as opposed to something solely designed to win an easy conviction)? Should the rules push players in this direction? Or will players just tend to focus on winning their case? I can’t decide how these goals will interact.

2. Does it make sense that witnesses in a trial can later vote on guilt/innocence? I set this rule so you could play with 4-5 players and still have 2-3 people voting on each charge.


Crimes Against Humanity

(Nine Short Games about Tyrants)



“The official position of defendants, whether as Heads of State or responsible officials in Government departments, shall not be considered as freeing them from responsibility or mitigating punishment.

The fact that the defendant acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior shall not free him from responsibility, but may be considered in mitigation of punishment if the Tribunal determine that justice so requires.”

-- Articles 7 and 8, Charter of the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal



Game Summary: The Tyrant has fallen, and at last faces justice. The international community has charged the Leader and his main subordinates with war crimes and human right abuses. Players take the roles of prosecutors and judges, defendants and witnesses in a trail that is part political theatre, part excavation of the dark secrets of a crumbled regime.

Crimes Against Humanity is played like a very simplified trial. There are two versions. In The Main Event, the Tyrant is the only Defendant. In Following Orders, several of the Tyrant’s top officials face the court.

Getting started. To play Crimes Against Humanity, you’ll need at least 4 players, pens or pencils, at least one piece of paper or index card for each player, and a way to keep time. You may need a randomizer such as a dice or a coin. A mallet or toy hammer for use as a judge’s gavel can add to the game’s atmosphere.

1. Create the Defendant
a. Players collectively invent the name of the country the Tyrant ruled and the Tyrant’s name. Players can brainstorm a few possibilities and then use consensus, voting, or some random method to pick the final names.
b. Each player invents and states one fact about the Tyrant’s country or one fact about the Tyrant’s ideology, support base, or apparatus of power (not specific acts or crimes – those come later – but generalities about the Tyrant’s regime.) The facts may not contradict a fact that has already been stated (for example, if a country is a naval power, it cannot be landlocked.) One player should volunteer to write down these facts.

2. Create the Prosecutors
a. Each player is individually responsible for inventing one of countries that is trying the Tyrant. Each player invents and writes down the name of their country. (Option: if all players agree, players can choose real world nations rather than inventing new nations.)
b. Write down 1-2 facts about the relationship between this country and the Tyrant’s nation. For example, country X is the former colonial power of the Tyrant’s nation; country Y shares a long border with the Tyrant’s nation and the two countries have fought small border skirmishes several times in the last few decades.)
c. Write down the county’s top two goals for the trial. These can be as general as “guilty on all charges” or specific like “avoid setting the precedent that all aggressive wars are illegal,” “condemn mass bombings of cities,” or “preach the superiority of our socialist/capitalist/whatever way of life.”
d. Write down the name of your prosecutor and his or her normal occupation (retired senator, judge, law professor, etc.)

3. Create Accusations.
a. Based on goals of your country, write down the top two counts (accusations) that you would like to bring against the Tyrant. The counts should be specific (for example, mass execution of prisoners of war, as opposed to “war crimes” in general. For ideas on the kinds of charges you can bring, see the appendix, which contains a list of crimes from the International Law Commission’s 1996 Draft Code of Crimes Against the Peace and Security of Mankind. The charges should not contradict the facts established and written down in step 1.a.

4. Create (and assign) Judges
a. Each player is assigned to be the judge from one of the other players’ countries.
b. Name the Judge (a last name will suffice.)
c. Write down one personal goal for the judge (ensure that the rule of law and fair procedures apply, get revenge for the death of son who fought as a soldier against the Tyrant’s nation, expose the fact that county X is almost as brutal of a tyranny as the conquered nation, etc.)

5. Assign Prosecution
All players meet for a prosecutor’s planning session to decide which counts to bring, and who will be prosecuting each count. If two or more players want to bring the same count, they should negotiate to resolve the dispute. Any player may choose to reveal any of their country’s goals that are directly or indirectly related to that count. The player who reveals a goal the most closely tied to the count should be allowed to prosecute it. At the end of this planning session, each prosecutor will have been assigned one count to bring against the Tyrant. Players should also negotiate the order in which the counts will be prosecuted.

6. Assign Defense and Witness Roles
a. For each count, 2 players who are not the prosecutor and not the Judge from that prosecutor’s country will be assigned to be either the witness for the count or the defense team for the count. By the end of this assignment process, each player should be prosecutor for one charge, witness for one charge, and defense team for one charge.
b. Players should decide whether the Tyrant has a team of defense lawyers, or is defending himself. (This will not affect the structure of the game at all, but may influence the defense’s rhetorical style.)

7. Prepare the Cases
a. Next, players prepare their cases. Players split up in pairs, with prosecutors meeting with their witnesses for approximately 5 minutes. Prosecutor/ witness teams should jointly decide on the witness’ name, position, and basic content/purpose of the testimony. For example, for a count involving human rights abuses, the witness might be a trade union leader who was jailed and tortured. If the prosecutor and witness are having difficulty coming to agreement on the best way to utilize the witness, the player in the role of the witness should let the prosecutor make the main decisions.
b. After all prosecutor/witness teams have had a chance to meet, prosecutors get approximately 5 minutes to writes down notes for their opening statements and jot down some questions to ask the witness.

8. Give Opening Statements
a. Prosecutors take turns presenting their counts. The player prosecuting the first count gives an opening statement (no more than 3-4 minutes).
b. The player defending the Tyrant gives an opening statement (no more than the time the prosecutor used).

9. Question Witnesses
a. The prosecutor calls the witness and questions the witness (for up to 5 minutes)
b. The defense team player cross-examines the witness (for no longer than the time the Prosecutor used).
c. Any of the players who are not the prosecutor, witness, or defense team may have their judge ask the witness one question. (the question and exchange should not last more than 2 minutes).
d. Optional Rule. During the prosecution and defense question of witnesses, the opposing side can raise a limited number of objections (predetermine this number from 1-2). Opposing councils can object for any reason but can only request three outcomes: abandon a question, rephrase a question to be less prejudicial/leading, or strike all or part of the witnesses’ last response. The player who is leading the questioning may give a brief rebuttal to the objection. If a majority of judges agree with the objection, then they may order the relief sought by the objecting council. (If part of a witnesses’ response is stricken, players should not rely on that response when weighing guilt/innocence or deciding punishment.) Time spent on objections does not count towards the time limits of questioning a witness.

10. Give Closing Statements
a. The prosecutor gives a closing statement (up to 2-3 minutes)
b. The defense team player gives a closing statement (up to 2-3 minutes)

11. Repeat steps 8 through 10 for each count.

12. Determine Guilt or Innocence
a. Each player puts on their “judge’s cap” and consider the evidence and arguments presented for each of the counts that they did not prosecute or defend. Write down the judge’s tentative conclusion as to the Tyrant’s guilt or innocence on each of these counts. If any of the tentative verdicts is guilty, also write down a recommended punishment for the crimes (one cumulative punishment, not one punishment for each guilty verdict). The three possible punishments are a fixed term of 1-20 years in prison (write down the number of years), life in prison, or execution.
b. Prosecutors seek to influence judges from their countries. Players pair off with each prosecutor meeting with the judge from his or her country. The prosecutor tells the judge the country’s two goals for the trials, and may lobby the judge for a few minutes on how the prosecutor thinks the judge should vote on any counts related to the country’s goals. After these meetings, judges may choose to change the tentative verdicts they had written down (but can also ignore the country’s goals and prosecutor’s pleas.)
c. Judges announce or turn in their verdicts.
d. Votes are tabulated for each count. If a majority of votes are for guilty on any count (2 of 2, 2 of 3, 3 of 4, 3 of 5, etc.), the Tyrant is convicted of that count.

13. Determine Punishment
If the Tyrant is convicted of any count(s), all players reconvene for the punishment phase. All players participate in deciding punishment, even if they were prosecuting or defending one of the counts for which the Tyrant was convicted. Each player who wishes may propose a punishment and then all players vote on the proposals by secret ballot. The proposal that receives the most votes becomes the final punishment. If two proposals receive the same number of votes, then the lesser punishment is chosen. Optional rule: If execution gets a majority of votes but is not picked unanimously, then the punishment defaults to life in prison.

14. Reveal Motives
Players reveal their country’s goals and judge’s personal goal.

15. Optional: Introduce New Steps and Procedures
This game was written with the intent of keeping the trials manageably short in duration. But fiddle with the time limits as you see fit. And don’t hesitate to mine any personal or professional experience you might have with the law (and yes, watching T.V. legal dramas is legitimate experience), to add news steps to the process. For example, the defendant probably deserves the chance to call his own witness. Maybe a mandatory plea bargaining session would be fun. Etc.



Rules for the Following Orders variant.

The rules of Following Orders are the same as The Main Event, with the following modifications.

1.c. Identify Tyrant’s Status
After players collectively name the Tyrant and Tyrant’s country, they should agree upon the Tyrant’s status during the trials. Is he dead? In hiding? In prison awaiting a future trial? Already convicted?

1.d. Create Defendant
Each player should write down the name and position of a high official from the Tyrant’s regime, or other important member of society. This person will be the player’s defendant during the game. Players share the names and positions of these defendants with the other players.

During the prosecutors’ planning meeting, rather than decide who brings which count against the Tyrant, players decide who will prosecute each defendant. A player cannot prosecute his or her own defendant, obviously. So by the end of this meeting, each player should be assigned to prosecute one of the defendants created by some other player.

When players plan their prosecutions, the player should decide what count to bring against the defendant they are prosecuting. As important figures in the Tyrant’s regime, the defendants were probably involved in range of questionable behavior. But prosecutors should pick a single count that will be easiest to prove and/or that most clearly demonstrates the need to punish the defendant.

12.d. Determine Guilt or Innocence
Votes are tabulated for each defendant. If a majority of votes are for guilty (2 of 2, 2 of 3, 3 of 4, 3 of 5, etc.), the defendant is convicted.

13. Determine Punishment
If any defendants were convicted, players who did not defend or prosecute a guilty defendant reconvene for that defendant’s punishment phase. Each player sitting in the punishment phase may propose a punishment for the defendant. Then all players vote on the proposals by secret ballot. The proposal that receives the most votes becomes the final punishment. If two proposals receive the same number of votes, then the lesser punishment is chosen. Optional rule: If execution gets a majority of votes but is not picked unanimously, then the punishment defaults to life in prison.



Appendix:

International Law Commission: Draft Code of Crimes Against the Peace and Security of Mankind, 1996

“A crime of genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) killing members of the group;
(b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

A crime against humanity means any of the following acts, when committed in a systematic manner or on a large scale and instigated or directed by a Government or by any organization or group:
(a) murder;
(b) extermination;
(c) torture;
(d) enslavement;
(e) persecution on political, racial, religious or ethnic grounds;
(f) institutionalized discrimination on racial, ethnic or religious grounds involving the violation of fundamental human rights and freedoms and resulting in seriously disadvantaging a part of the population;
(g) arbitrary deportation or forcible transfer of population;
(h) arbitrary imprisonment;
(i) forced disappearance of persons;
(j) rape, enforced prostitution and other forms of sexual abuse;
(k) other inhumane acts which severely damage physical or mental integrity, health or human dignity, such as mutilation and severe bodily harm.

Any of the following war crimes constitutes a crime against the peace and security of mankind when committed in a systematic manner or on a large scale:
(a) any of the following acts committed in violation of international humanitarian law:
(i) wilful killing;
(ii) torture or inhuman treatment, including biological experiments;
(iii) wilfully causing great suffering or serious injury to body or health;
(iv) extensive destruction and appropriation of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly;
(v) compelling a prisoner of war or other protected person to serve in the forces of a hostile Power;
(vi) wilfully depriving a prisoner of war or other protected person of the rights of fair and regular trial;
(vii) unlawful deportation or transfer or unlawful confinement of protected persons;
(viii) taking of hostages;
(b) any of the following acts committed wilfully in violation of international humanitarian law and causing death or serious injury to body or health:
(i) making the civilian population or individual civilians the object of attack;
(ii) launching an indiscriminate attack affecting the civilian population or civilian objects in the knowledge that such attack will cause excessive loss of life, injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects;
(iii) launching an attack against works or installations containing dangerous forces in the knowledge that such attack will cause excessive loss of life, injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects;
(iv) making a person the object of attack in the knowledge that he is hors de combat;
(v) the perfidious use of the distinctive emblem of the red cross, red crescent or red lion and sun or of other recognized protective signs;
(c) any of the following acts committed wilfully in violation of international humanitarian law:
(i) the transfer by the Occupying Power of parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies;
(ii) unjustifiable delay in the repatriation of prisoners of war or civilians;
(d) outrages upon personal dignity in violation of international humanitarian law, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment, rape, enforced prostitution and any form of indecent assault;
(e) any of the following acts committed in violation of the laws or customs of war:
(i) employment of poisonous weapons or other weapons calculated to cause unnecessary suffering;
(ii) wanton destruction of cities, towns or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity;
(iii) attack, or bombardment, by whatever means, of undefended towns, villages, dwellings or buildings or of demilitarized zones;
(iv) seizure of, destruction of or wilful damage done to institutions dedicated to religion, charity and education, the arts and sciences, historic monuments and works of art and science;
(v) plunder of public or private property;
(f) any of the following acts committed in violation of international humanitarian law applicable in armed conflict not of an international character:
(i) violence to the life, health and physical or mental well-being of persons, in particular murder as well as cruel treatment such as torture, mutilation or any form of corporal punishment;
(ii) collective punishments;
(iii) taking of hostages;
(iv) acts of terrorism;
(v) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment, rape, enforced prostitution and any form of indecent assault;
(vi) pillage;
(vii) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgement pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are generally recognized as indispensable;
(g) in the case of armed conflict, using methods or means of warfare not justified by military necessity with the intent to cause widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment and thereby gravely prejudice the health or survival of the population and such damage occurs.”