30 Politicians
Whilst few games involve politicians directly, they are often in the background. Sometimes one of them might have been the patron of the PCs, who sent them on their quest, or the chief evil villain that the PCs have to defeat. Other times law enforcement is chasing the PCs after they broke the laws of the region, laws that are made by politicians. Even an iron-fisted dictator needs to know how politics works. And so I present you with 30 politicians to use in your games. I have made them senators, but they could just as easily be Members of Parliament, Mayors, Councillors or whatever politicians are called in your world.These are really meant for a modern or sci-fi game although one or two might fit in an old-time world.
1- Senator Clean
Senator Clean was not a politician before he won his senatorial seat from a senator that was notoriously corrupt even by the standards of the Senate. He does things by the book, refuses to take backhanders, and tries his hardest to help his constituents. He wears a clean white suit to show off his honesty. He is also tactless, has few friends as many of the other Senators think that he is trying to make them look bad, and has no real idea how the Senate or indeed politics works.
2- Senator Green
As a former captain of the park rangers with a medal for bringing poachers to justice, Senator Green came to office on a save the planet ticket. He truly cares about the wild animals, has helped to keep the national parks safe and the green belt from being built upon, and is trying to get a law passed to help protect coral reefs. He is also disliked by some as they think he cares about animals more then people. He has privately said that poor people should be sterilized to prevent overpopulation, and has also managed to annoy some powerful mining magnates who would love to have him voted out or otherwise dealt with.
3- Senator Mean
As the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Senator Mean is in charge of the governments taxation. He makes a great effort to make sure that government finances are not wasted and has partly managed that unlike many of his predecessors. But he has done so by reducing the benefits paid to the poor and the disabled and many think that he only cares about the rich. He does his best to see that tax evaders are prosecuted and put into prison.
4- Senator Keen
A bubbly I-love-life sort of person, Senator Keen does his best to see that bills are pushed through, mistakes and miscarriages of justice are corrected and his fellow senators do not simply use their positions to enrich themselves. As such, apart from a few that are his friends, he is disliked by many of his fellow senators who often filibuster his proposals out of spite.
5- Senator Glad
Another person who is happy most of the time, Senator Glad appears to be always smiling at least in public. Some of his fellow senators wonder what makes him so happy, and there are persistent rumours (probably untrue) of drug use or extramarital affairs.
6- Senator Sad
A melancholy man who always seems, when he is not sitting in silence, to be complaining or moaning about something, Senator Sad understandably has few friends amongst his fellow senators, who wonder how such a miserable man ever managed to get himself elected to the Senate.
7- Senator Bad
On the surface Senator Bad appears a perfectly nice person, whilst in face he is a money launderer and gangster in his own right, who became a senator to make it harder for the police to arrest him, as they would need to persuade his fellow senators to lift his parliamentary immunity. His campaign for office was funded illegally by drugs money, and he has filibustered an attempt at a witness protection program, used his contacts to have villains paroled early, and had at least one person murdered by a hitman, after the man made the mistake of blackmailing him.
8- Senator Dad
This senator has a wife, two mistresses and a score of illegitimate children, some of them known about by the Press. And yet it has done his political career very little damage, probably because he has never been a hypocrite about it and many of those who vote for him are themselves having secret affairs and siring illegitimate children of their own.
9- Senator Plaid
A proud wearer of tartan, including the kilt at festival days and at weddings, he represents the Highlanders of the far north, and is happiest when at home, stalking deer on his extensive estates. A firm supporter of Highland independence, and a hater of anyone trying to get right to roam laws passed, poachers, and ramblers, he keeps his estate protected with gamekeepers and high barbed wire fences.
10- Senator Mad
A fine Senator in his youth, Senator Mad is quietly starting to slip into delirium and madness. At first he was far too proud to seek help from a doctor or anybody else, now he no longer thinks he is ill. He does think that people are persecuting him, and has made up his mind that the President is responsible for it and deserves to be assassinated with the pistol that he has, a weapon handed down to him by his Army father in his will along with other things.
11- Senator Rope
A Senator that, if he were the President, would attempt to ram a long list of death penalty laws through the Senate. Not content with the existing death penalty in his country for first-degree murder, he wants it for all manner of violent or sexual crimes as he is convince that frequent executions will drive the crime rate down. Very few of his fellow senators share his views and it is just as well or his country would have to have a gallows and gibbet erected in every town.
12- Senator Dope
A Senator that has secretly tried all manner of soft drugs, whilst sensibly giving the hard drugs a wide berth, he privately believes in the legalisation of many of them. He knows that it would be political suicide to bring it up in the Senate, and might well result in the other Senators voting to lift his immunity from prosecution, resulting in a police investigation and a possible jail term for using illegal drugs.
13- Senator Cope
Be it floods, scandals, threats from abroad or overwork, Senator Cope can cope with almost everything thrown at him. He came up the political ranks from humble beginnings in the Civil Service and is a master of Machiavellian intrigue. Few of his fellow senators are as good at political skulduggery as he is. He is popular with the voting public because of his success. He despises Senator Clean and has allied himself with Senator Bad.
14- Senator Bash
An ex-General of the Army, Senator Bash believes that strict discipline and military conscription for the jobless would force lazy and feckless people to get a job or leave the country. He wants the country to have a hawkish foreign policy and many in the Senate and outside it worry that what he really wants is a war of conquest.
15- Senator Pun
One of those rare politicians who not only writes their own speeches, but can really hold peoples attention when he speaks, he is one of the more popular senators both inside and outside the senate. He hates war and the idea of conscription, and is a firm opponent of Senator Bash and his ilk, pointing out that war normally causes more problems then it solves as well as killing innocent people.
16- Senator Gun
He is one of those politicians who owe their election to the gun lobby (in a world where guns have not been invented, the bow lobby) and as such attempts to wreck any laws controlling lethal weapons, even the most sensible such as one to ban mental patients and under-18s from owning firearms. He has a large selection of legally owned weapons and would carry one everywhere he went, if he were legally allowed to. He also supports the death penalty and is one of Senator Ropes best personal and political friends.
17- Senator Nun
So nicknamed by her political opponents because she is very religious, thinks that abortion should be illegal and sex outside marriage should be punished, and that there should be no sex education in schools. She has never tried to get any laws favouring women through the Senate, thinking that if she can rise as high as she has done, that any woman can and therefore there is no need for laws to help them.
18- Senator Ban
This sour Senator is ridiculed by his political opponents, who complain about his frequent attempts to ban all sorts of things, including even the Small Town Festivals of his country. Many people doubt that he has a chance of being re-elected.
19- Senator Klan
This Senator is a racist and proud to be one, and always votes against any Civil Rights laws. His language in his public speeches never quite crosses the line into racial hatred but comes perilously close to it at times. Many suspect him of being a masked nightrider in his younger days, harassing members of other races, but there is no definite proof. Much to the despair of more liberal Senators, the voters in his area are as racist as he is and his majority is in four figures.
20- Senator Plan
One of those Senators who thinks he has more power and support then he really does, each year he comes up with all kinds of ideas as if he was the President. Very few of these ideas will ever come to pass and some have complained that he wastes the Senates time. He dislikes his fellow Senators, thinking they are conspiring against him.
21- Senator Rude
One of those people who treats his staff like dirt, he is not above using unparlimentary language on the Senate floor. He has twice been escorted out by the Sergeant At Arms after refusing to obey the Speakers orders. He has a grossly oversized ego and a horrible temper and dark rumours swirl about him.
22- Senator Dude
He tries desperately to get the youth vote and make the young like him and only ends up looking stupid in the process. His attempts to introduce the vote for 15 year olds and 24 hour drinking in pubs have been firmly sat on by the more conservative and sensible Senators. He greatly dislikes Senator Ban.
23- Senator Demagogue
A true man of the people, he can whip up a crowd with ease by appealing to what it wants. It is said of him that he could calm a violent riot with his voice, or turn a peaceful crowd into a lynch mob thirsting for blood. Many of his fellow Senators dislike or fear him, and there are whispers going around that he is plotting a coup to set himself up as a dictator. Senator Bad wants to befriend him and use his powers for his own ends.
24- Senator Neat
Understanding fully the part that ones looks play in politics, he is always neat, clean, well dressed and polite at least in public. He is also enormously vain and proud and obsessed with his self-image.
25- Senator Cheat
He won his election by the careful use of election fraud and bribery, and he is a close personal friend of Senator Bad. He knows several of the things that Senator Bad has done, and Senator Bad knows he knows but does not mind as he trusts him not to reveal his secrets. He hates Senator Clean with a passion for throwing one of his cronies out of office and wants revenge somehow, perhaps by trying to get a band of PCs to do it for him.
26- Senator Beat
On the surface a perfectly law abiding politician, he has a secret vice-he likes a fight. He goes out at night to the rough parts of town looking for a fight, and he doesnt just bully the weak either. He will be happy to fight those as tough as him, and if he does pick on the wrong person and get beaten up, he never goes to the law about it, he just accepts it and avoids the one who did it. Once he punched someone in public who threw an egg at him, but it didnt do his political career any harm.
27- Senator Dumbeldore
He is a skilled user of magic, but he keeps it to himself and rarely casts spells unless he feels that he really needs to. This may be because he lives in a world where magic is top secret, outlawed, or both, or it may be because he does not want to be continually bothered by people asking him to cast spells for them.
28- Senator Ma-O
This Senator secretly despises his fellow Senators and joined the Senate to try and find some way to bring it down from inside. He is the kind of man who the PCs might find out has been secretly smuggling barrels of gunpowder into the basement of the Senate House, with the intention of setting it off
29- Senator Letch
This Senator thinks badly of women, seeing them as potential sex partners and not much else. He has no intention of staying faithful, not that many women think much of him. He has influential friends, and does his best to pass laws to keep women at the bottom.
30- Senator Rich
Even richer then most of his fellow Senators, he thinks that money can solve any problem. Having had his wealth passed down to him instead of earning it the hard way, he has no real idea of the true value of money. Senator Mean despises him because of his spendthrift ways.
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? Responses (9)
No, it did bold, but you lost the numbers on 29 and 30. I'll read this one in more detail later..
You can't see the bold?
I can see it :)
Now that's more like it! Formatting is much better, and what is more important, the NPCs are a strongly cohesive group, that you can transplant into your Senate, Congress, Assembly, or what-have-you. The vibe is decisively modern, but most of them can be taken outright or adapted. Heck, even their (nick)names strangely rhyme. :)
There are games focusing on the intrigue and backstabbing inherent in politics, and many that at least brush against the topic... sad but true, we have use for these politicians in a game. Good work, Cheka.
What Manfred said, and one of your better 30's!
Agree with val on this one. This is one of your better 30's. Some thought went it to it, and it shows. Kudos. The rhyming entries are nifty too.
With formatting, much better.
These senators are really only for a modern game, as there are nothing but references to modern issues and values through most of them. You really should mark them as "for a modern campaign".
Looking at the senators, there are about 6 which appear to be too aligned with modern sensabilites, but these could be adapted. The majority are really timeless personality types or are quite suited to a campaign, especially one with a Roman, Ancient Greek or Parlimentry political structure.
(I had a more detailed assement which got lost when the site went down hard yesterday.)
I see no need to mark this one as exclusively modern.
The rhyme scheme was nice, and to echo what the others said above, good job!
The rhyming was a nice touch. I may have to use that one day.
Commented on for the Commenting Challenge
