Your cleric is dead, your last adventure a bust. Now your dysfunctional party must retrieve your boss's Penguins of Destiny! Enjoy this one round adventure in Role-playing from the NASCRAG Vaults.
Description:
It really wasn't your fault the last adventure was a bust and your good friend the cleric died. Now the boss wakes you up in the middle of the night and sends your dysfunctional party traveling half-way across the world to retrieve his stolen Penguins of Destiny! But remember: Life is not the destination, it is the journey! Enjoy this NASCRAG Role-playing classic from GenCon 1988. Proceeds support the official Gen Con Charity sponsor.
Panel discussing 1945 final battles of WW II: Rhine crossing, drive on Berlin, strategic bombing-Dresden through Nagasaki, Okinawa, Iwo Jima, codebreaking. Presented by the NSDM staff.
Description:
Panel and seminar discussing 1945 final battles and events of World War II, including crossing the Rhine, the drive on Berlin, Okinawa, Iwo Jima, area bombing including Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Manhattan project, codebreaking achievements, the Potsdam conference, the Soviet war in the Far East. Members of the National Security Decision Making, Inc staff will present highlights and will lead a broad-based discussion of the events of this final year of the war.
NSDM: Chernobyl, Fact vs Fiction, Drama, Demagoguery.
Summary:
The story is generally told to stress drama or harangue over reactors, loose with facts. This gives the physics & engineering. Capt. Mark McDonagh, physicist, retired nuclear sub officer, NSDM staff.
Description:
What really happened at Chernobyl? What we see in miniseries and documentaries largely steers clear of technical details, or worse, was written by someone overly fond of exploring the drama but clueless on the physics, nuclear engineering and radiological details. Then there are activists, often clueless as well, who exaggerate the description of the damage and the potential consequences to their own ends. This lecture attempts to separate science and engineering and actual facts from drama and activist demagoguery. It describes the Chernobyl reactor design, including its advantages and its vulnerabilities in light of other nuclear reactor mishaps. It then goes on to describe what went wrong and why. Presented by Capt. Mark McDonagh, USN/ret., a career nuclear submarine officer with BS and MS degrees in physics with 12 years’ experience at the Naval War College, now on the NSDMG staff.
Peek behind the curtain at how governments, corporations and politicians use data about individuals like you for power, profit and to influence our behavior. Gregory Maus, MBA, MS, on NSDM staff.
Description:
The Information Age has become the Age of Omniscience: everything from your financial records, to your psychological profile, to your (smartphone's) location at any given time, and so much more is constantly up for sale to corporations, governments, and political parties so that they can better influence your behavior. The quiet wars to control, sell, and steal this data may be the most important conflicts of the 21st century. Presented by Gregory Maus, MBA, MS, on the National Security Decision Making Game staff.
Learn about some current and future robotic spacecraft exploring the solar system, and how you can interact with their photos and data. By Elizabeth Koprucki of the NSDM staff.
Description:
From a close approach to the sun to venturing into interstellar space, and many places in between, robotic spacecraft are expanding humanity's knowledge of the solar system. Learn about some current robotic missions, including the Parker Solar Probe, Curiosity Rover, and Juno, and how you can interact with their photos and data. Lecture will also talk about some exciting upcoming missions. Elizabeth Koprucki with the National Security Decision Making Game staff has volunteered as a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador since 2014, presenting robotic spaceflight to her communities. She is active in the Chicago maker community and runs the Fab Lab at the Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship at the University of Chicago.
NSDM: FLQ Crisis 50 years ago: Canada Declares Martial Law!
Summary:
What happened 50 years ago that pushed Canada to declare martial law? How did a Marxist independence terrorist group provoke a response that saw troops in the streets? By Mike Tucker, NSDM staff.
Description:
After a 7-year campaign of bombings, robberies and murder, the Marxist-Leninist pro-independence terrorist organization Front de Liberation du Quebec (FLQ) kidnapped both the British Trade Commissioner and the Deputy Premier of the Province of Quebec. These crimes prompted both the Mayor of Montreal and Premier of Quebec to ask the Federal Government to give them additional powers and support to resolve this state of “apprehended insurrection.” The Canadian government invoked the War Measures Act, which allowed the police to ignore various civil rights protections and detain people for extended periods of time without due process. The military was activated to protect Federal installations in Ottawa and Montreal. This lecture will discuss the events that lead to this crisis and the resolution of it. Presented by Mike Tucker of the National Security Decision Making Game staff.
The National Security Decision Making Game staff reviews recent changes and things to watch next year, including hotspots: China, Europe, Iran, Israel, Russia, North Korea. What’s CNN missing?
Description:
Overview, analysis and insights on current and near-future world affairs. This panel discussion and seminar, the signature event of the National Security Decision Making (NSDM) Game staff, explores current, and potential future, problem areas around the world. Want to know what to expect in the next year? What might happen and what are its implications? What are drivers, what indicators to watch for, and how might events be affected by the U.S. and the West? What potential catastrophes is CNN missing?
NSDM: Overview: Intersection of Cyber War and Statecraft
Summary:
With other means: an overview of the evolving nature of cyber warfare and its role in achieving the goals of statecraft. Joseph Shelby, on NSDM staff.
Description:
Cyber warfare represents not just an evolution of how we conduct warfare, but also a potent new tool in the statecraft arsenal. This discussion will focus on the intersection between foreign policy and cyber warfare, using a few key events, such as the Stuxnet attack on Iran, as case studies. The presentation will also be exploring the nature of this new threat, and what it means for how we will continue to both wage war and conduct our diplomatic affairs well into the future. Presented by Joseph Shelby of the National Security Decision Making Game staff.
NSDM: Preparing for a Pandemic: 2016 Rio Olympics.
Summary:
Reviews professional exercise simulating a pandemic starting at Rio Olympics. Participants played officials & groups affecting outbreak response. Insights from the game. Doug Samuelson, NSDM staff.
Description:
Case Study: Preparing for a Pandemic, the 2016 Rio Olympics. Review of a professional exercise focused on preparations, possibilities and potentials of a pandemic starting at a major public event. Participants took on the roles of key officials and groups that could influence the response to an outbreak. Lecture will review insights gained from gaming how mass gatherings of people can affect world health. Presented by Doug Samuelson of the National Security Decision Making Game staff.
Accidents, weapons: radiation is real, but effects dramatized? Fact v. fiction, potential. Capt. Mark McDonagh, USN/ret., physicist, 12 years’ Naval War College experience, NSDM staff.
Description:
Nuclear reactor and weapons accidents, radiological assassination tools and weapons of mass destruction, fallout from nuclear tests and combat, hazards of medical waste. Radiation is real, but how much of the threat is dramatized or fictionalized by authors and screenplay writers, or demagogued activists with agendas? Lecture discusses the history and the potential, and attempts to separate the facts, engineering and science from the science fiction. Capt. Mark McDonagh, USN/ret., a physicist with 12 years’ experience at the Naval War College, currently on the National Security Decision Making Game staff.