#RPGaDAY2026 /19

When I design a source, I start with motivation before statistics.

What does this person want badly enough to take a risk?

That answer usually tells me more than another half-page of mechanics.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

OSINT-6 CHANGELOG 260818

The first design problem for the OSINT-6 CIA Fact Sheet was deciding how to make a real intelligence agency playable when much of its work remains classified. Filling the gaps with dramatic invention would produce a recognizable spy story, but it wouldn’t produce a reliable agency reference.

We divided the problem into public institution and fictional operation. The Agency chapter uses documented information for the CIA’s mandate, legal limits, leadership, organization, careers, oversight, public facilities, and stated priorities. Those facts establish what the institution is and the kinds of work it publicly acknowledges.

The Game Master creates the mission, targets, personnel, sources, facilities, and classified details needed for play. Fiction stays inside the documented framework. A fictional field office can support a campaign, but its existence doesn’t alter the CIA’s statutory role. An invented operation can involve secret collection or covert action, but the characters still need the authorization, reporting chain, access, and resources required by the campaign.

This separation also prevents secrecy from becoming a universal explanation. “Classified” means the relevant information isn’t publicly available. It doesn’t establish that a rumored capability exists, that every officer knows about it, or that ordinary institutional limits disappear. Where the public record ends, the book says so.

The method gives the Game Master room to create without presenting fiction as research. Players can work for the real CIA, use its public career language, and operate within a plausible institutional environment. The campaign’s invented secrets remain campaign material.

That boundary matters throughout the OSINT-6 line. A real organization supplies constraints as well as possibilities. Accuracy comes from respecting both, then placing fictional operations in the space the public record can’t and shouldn’t fill.

#RPGaDAY2026 /18

A design principle I keep returning to: tell the players what their characters know.

Mystery should come from incomplete intelligence, not from the GM hiding basic briefing information.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

OSINT-6 CHANGELOG 260817 /2

In trying to post an announcement about the Strait of Hormuz Fact Sheet on RPGnet, we kept getting a message that it could not be posted because the system we reading it as either spam or containing content that went against the site’s rules. We figured that “Strait of Hormuz” might be on the site’s blacklist, to keep heated political discussions out, so we rewrote the announcement so that it carried no mention of the title. It went through.

Hopefully the moderators will understand that we’re trying to promote a thoughtful, factual product that contains no political views whatsoever, and that we aren’t trying to promote any ideology or provoke a flame war.

Get the Strait of Hormuz Fact Sheet FREE

Buy the OSINT-6 Core Rulebook directly from OSINT6.com and receive the Strait of Hormuz Fact Sheet at no additional charge. The Fact Sheet is a focused, neutral reference covering the strait’s geography, maritime use, principal concerned states, countries and economies dependent on passage through it, civilian shipping, and OSINT-6 game material.

The Fact Sheet is included in the Core Rulebook download package. There’s no coupon to enter and no separate purchase required. This bonus applies to direct purchases from OSINT6.com.

OSINT-6 CHANGELOG 260817

Generative AI has become another subject on which silence is treated as a position. OSINT-6 doesn't use generative AI in producing its books. That statement describes our production practice. It isn't an invitation to declare that every use of the technology is beneficial, that every use is unethical, or that everyone must adopt our position somewhere between those claims.

The technology has damaged trust in publishing. Readers have encountered undisclosed synthetic text and images, fabricated citations, misleading credits, and low-effort products. Writers have also faced demands to disclose private working material, document every stage of creation, and prove that a prohibited tool never entered the process.

That second demand doesn't restore trust. Showing drafts can document part of a process, but it can't prove a universal negative. An automated detector score can't establish authorship or demonstrate non-use. Requiring writers to satisfy an undefined and potentially endless burden turns suspicion into the standard and treats an accusation as its own evidence.

Our position is narrower. We believe in the principle of innocent until proven guilty, including in the court of public opinion. This isn't a claim that public criticism operates under criminal procedure. It's a refusal to reverse the burden of proof merely because verification is difficult.

Specific, credible evidence can be examined. Errors in a published book can be identified and corrected. Sources, licenses, factual claims, and credited contributions can be checked. A demand to prove that something never happened is different, and we won't build a public performance of innocence around it.

We won't campaign for generative AI, campaign against every possible use, or demand ideological agreement from readers and other publishers. OSINT-6 will state its own practice, apply its sourcing and credit standards, and leave the wider political argument outside the books.

#RPGaDAY2026 /17

Espionage fiction gets interesting when legal authority, mission requirements, personal loyalty, and professional ethics stop lining up neatly.

The rules shouldn’t answer that problem for the players.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

OSINT-6 CHANGELOG 260816

The United States Factbook provides a simpler example of the same policy. Its government chapter identifies the President serving at the research cutoff. When an Executive Order affects a relevant authority, institution, or operational condition, the book can cite that order.

Those statements are factual and time-sensitive. The officeholder must be verified against a dated authoritative source. The order's number, date, title, and operative language must be checked against the official text. A later administration, amendment, court decision, revocation, or superseding order may require a revision.

Citing the Executive Order establishes that the President issued it and records what the text directs. The citation doesn't prove every factual premise stated within the order. It also doesn't tell the reader whether we consider the policy wise, harmful, effective, lawful, necessary, or irrelevant. Those are separate judgments.

This distinction applies to other primary sources. Legislation establishes enacted language. A court opinion establishes the court's ruling and reasoning. An agency publication establishes the agency's stated position, organization, or procedure. A treaty records agreed terms. Each source has evidentiary value within its scope, and each can require corroboration for claims beyond that scope.

Readers may ask us to condemn or praise the officeholder, order, statute, ruling, agency, or agreement. We won't use the Factbook line for that purpose. Refusing the request doesn't weaken the citation or change the documented fact.

The discipline runs in both directions. We won't insert approval into neutral description, and we won't omit a relevant official action because acknowledging it could be mistaken for approval. The reference states the current office, authority, action, and source. Readers retain responsibility for their political judgment.

#RPGaDAY2026 /16

I wanted social pressure to work without adding a special minigame every time somebody lies to a border official. Sometimes the whole scene is one check made while everybody knows what failure means.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

OSINT-6 CHANGELOG 250815

Some Factbooks will attract political demands before readers reach the rules. An Israel Factbook is an obvious case. Names, borders, institutions, wars, attacks, military operations, armed groups, territorial claims, displaced populations, alliances, and legal disputes can become tests of allegiance even when the text is limited to chronology and attribution.

The book will still need to state what happened, when it happened, who was involved, which authority made a decision, and what remains disputed or unresolved. Omitting those facts to avoid criticism would damage the reference. Expanding the chapter into a moral verdict or a comprehensive history would move beyond the product's job.

The governing standard provides the boundary. Setting material is selected for its effect on scale, authority, access, movement, communications, risk, and operational conditions. Current external pressures receive clear source dates and neutral wording. Conflicting accounts remain attributed, and a claim's official source doesn't convert it into independently verified fact.

The same policy applies beyond one country. Elections, territorial disputes, sanctions, policing, civil rights, migration, political violence, military intervention, surveillance authority, and emergency powers may be required to explain the environment in which agents operate. We will include the minimum material necessary to make that environment usable and accurate.

“Minimum” doesn't mean minimizing harm, erasing participants, or hiding a relevant fact. It means resisting the pressure to turn a roleplaying reference into an editorial platform. Necessary context stays. Polemic, slogans, declarations of loyalty, and arguments unrelated to play stay out.

No wording can prevent bad-faith interpretation. The standard can still require disciplined sourcing, limited scope, and consistent treatment. Readers will know what the book is trying to establish, which source supports it, and where the available record ends.

#RPGaDAY2026 /15

We capped OSINT-6 at 6th level partly because we want experienced agents to remain human. More capable, yes. Bulletproof, no. Endurance matters because attrition still matters.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

OSINT-6 CHANGELOG 250814

Avoiding political advocacy doesn't guarantee that every reader will perceive a reference as neutral. Some people treat silence as opposition. Others treat the inclusion of an unwelcome fact as support for an adversary. A refusal to adopt either side's preferred language can be read as choosing the other side.

There's also a legitimate criticism behind some of that suspicion. Facts don't select, organize, and describe themselves. Editors decide which details are relevant, how much space each receives, which sources meet the standard, and where uncertainty must be stated. Claiming complete freedom from judgment would be dishonest.

Our answer is a controlled method, not a claim of perfect objectivity. The Factbook standard limits country information to material that establishes scale, authority, access, movement, communications, risk, and plausible operational conditions. Time-sensitive statements receive a research cutoff. Material claims require recoverable sources. Reported fact, disputed claim, incomplete information, and editorial assessment remain distinct.

Source treatment matters as much as source selection. A government document can establish what that government officially ordered or reported. It can't independently prove every premise in the document. A news report can record attributed statements and observed events, but its wording doesn't become OSINT-6 terminology by default. Conflicting accounts remain conflicting until stronger evidence resolves them.

This method won't satisfy readers who want public agreement with their position. That isn't its purpose. The aim is to make editorial decisions visible enough to examine and consistent enough to repeat across books.

Disagreement with a conclusion remains possible. A reader can challenge a date, source, classification, omission, or inference. That gives us a factual question we can investigate. A demand that we announce which side we're on asks for a different kind of publication, and we won't turn the Factbook line into one.

#RPGaDAY2026 /14

One design goal for OSINT-6 was to make professional reputation matter without turning it into another numerical resource. Who trusts you, whose judgment you trust, and why can all change an operation.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

OSINT-6 CHANGELOG 260813

OSINT-6 publishes reference books about real countries, governments, institutions, weapons, and events. Political material is unavoidable whenever a book identifies who holds authority, what an institution can legally do, which order changed a policy, or what occurred during a conflict. Political advocacy is avoidable.

Our job is to establish the facts required by the reference. That includes names, offices, dates, jurisdictions, organizations, documented actions, and the status of claims at the research cutoff. It also includes uncertainty. A disputed claim must be identified as disputed. Incomplete information can't be presented as settled, and an official statement can't automatically be treated as independent confirmation of its own assertions.

None of those decisions requires us to announce whether we approve of the person, government, policy, institution, or event being described. Listing an officeholder isn't an endorsement. Citing a law or executive action doesn't express support for it. Recording that a military, agency, political organization, or armed group took part in an event doesn't declare allegiance to or opposition against that participant.

This boundary doesn't make the books empty or evasive. A useful Factbook still has to explain authority, capabilities, relationships, conflicts, restrictions, and operational conditions. Removing every politically sensitive fact would make the reference inaccurate. Adding our personal judgment would give the book a second purpose it isn't meant to serve.

Readers can reach their own conclusions from the documented material. They may agree or disagree with one another, the sources, or the decisions made by the institutions described. OSINT-6 won't attempt to settle those disagreements through an editorial declaration.

The policy is straightforward: state what the reference needs, identify the source and date, distinguish fact from claim or assessment, and stop before description becomes advocacy.

#RPGaDAY2026 /13

One thing I wanted OSINT-6 to preserve was strain.

Characters get tired. Injuries matter. Resources run down. Plans start accumulating compromises. A competent agent under pressure is more interesting to me than an action hero who resets after every scene.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

#RPGaDAY2026 /12

We deliberately didn’t design failure as a dead end.

An operation can cost access, trust, equipment, cover, intelligence, a source, or political support and still continue. Those losses give the next mission something to inherit.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

#RPGaDAY2026 /11

Espionage games need room for solving a problem without making another one.

Sometimes the technically successful move burns a source, embarrasses an ally, exposes a method, or creates a diplomatic mess. I want those consequences to matter.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

#RPGaDAY2026 /10

A secret by itself isn’t an adventure.

I start asking who knows it, who needs it, who benefits from keeping it hidden, how reliable it is, and what happens if it becomes public.

That’s when intelligence becomes a mission.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

#RPGaDAY2026 /9

Credentials are mechanics in OSINT-6 because access matters.

A badge, clearance, diplomatic status, press credential, professional license, or institutional connection can open a door that no skill check should magically replace.

#RPGaDAY2026 #OSINT6

United States Factbook print edition available from Amazon

United States Factbook print edition available from Amazon