As we said in an earlier blog post, one of themes of Bulletproof Blues is power and its preservation. So how would the entrenched powers of the Kalos Universe prevent the hoi polloi from threatening their hegemony?

Individuals working in government seek to accrue power and wealth, and they do this by bestowing political favors and receiving gifts. To preserve that source of income, government agencies target problematic individuals, entrapping them and then charging them with whatever crime is most convenient, typically terrorism. In the Kalos Universe, roughly 90% of terrorism convictions involve a government informant choosing vulnerable individuals and working on them for months, sometimes years until the informant snares the individuals into a government created conspiracy. There is little risk in these operations for the authorities: no matter how poor the government’s case — no matter how unreliable the informant or how many crucial conversations go unrecorded due to equipment failure or obvious edits — when the jury hears the “T word”, the jury convicts. Out of over 500 cases in the last decade, every single defendant has either been found guilty or pled guilty. This sends a clear message to any malcontents: if you dream of challenging the 1%, living in tents, scaling skyscrapers, and dropping banners, you do so at your own peril.

This is, of course, simply the default setting of Bulletproof Blues. You are welcome to ignore it, if you would prefer a more optimistic setting for your games.