Rise of the Inquisition
“Nobody expects the Imperial Inquisition!” —Inquisitor Fa'Zoll
It is a bright time for the Empire. After decades of instability, inept leadership, and political corruption followed by a destructive galaxy-wide conflict commonly called The Clone Wars, a man named Palpatine rose from the ranks of the feckless Senate to lead the galaxy into victory over the Separatists and founded the first Galactic Empire, imposing a New Order on a galaxy on the verge of collapse.
However not all is well in the New Order. The traitors of the Old Republic, the Jedi, were hunted down for their crimes but not all have been caught. To combat this threat, the Inquisitorius was formed to hunt down the remaining Jedi as well as other Force Sensitives.
But not all have seen the wisdom of the New Order. Troubling reports of sabotage, espionage, and small-scale rebellion not tied to former Separatist forces are creeping up through the new Imperial intelligence agencies and reaching the ears of Imperial leadership. These are hastened by reports of hidden Jedi who survived Order 66. One of these groups has been targeted by the Imperial Council for investigation. This is where you come in....
The Team
It is the ascendancy of the Empire. The chapter of the Clone Wars and the Jedi has recently been closed while the insurgency known as the Rebellion is still in fetal form.
You will be playing a member of a covert operations team assembled by the Empire to investigate a mysterious and troubling report of sabotage and treason uncovered by COMPNOR. Team members will be from of one of the following organizations: The Inquisitorius; the Imperial Security Bureau; or the Imperial Intelligence Agency. (I’m looking for at least one from each agency.)
Inquisitorius
As members of the Inquisition, it is your job to deal with Force Sensitive individuals and either turn them to the Dark Side, or kill them; there are no other options for them. Inquisitors were also occasionally called on to break the will of resistant detainees held by Imperial Intelligence. All Inquisitorius members are Dark Side adepts or Dark Jedi, trained in use of the Force to track down and deal with the most dangerous types of opponents: other Force Sensitives. Early on, Inquisitors were ex-Jedi who were turned to the Dark Side, but as time went on, Inquisitors replenished their ranks with Force Sensitives found and indoctrinated by the Empire. Technically, the Inquisitorius is a division of Imperial Intelligence (see below), but they operate independently and report directly to Darth Vader and the Emperor.
Inquisitors tend to wear enveloping dark maroon zeyd-cloth robes as a uniform. Other than Darth Vader, they were the only people who could wear a lightsaber openly.
The Inquisition is being called upon because either Force-Sensitives are suspected, or perhaps some Force-empowered backup might be needed as part of this operation. Inquisitors are looking to bring remaining Jedi to heel and excise any other traitorous elements from the New Order.
Imperial Security Bureau
The ISB is a part of COMPNOR and is one of two intelligence agencies in the Empire. It is tasked with maintaining morale and loyalty in the imperial military, functioning more as a police force than intelligence forces. They have more of a public face than Imperial Intelligence. The ISB has both open and hidden operatives in the ranks of the military to keep an eye on the troops. They even have their own stormtroopers which operate outside the military command structure.
Officers had white versions of imperial military uniforms when stationed as official ISB members on board a ship, station or base, while infiltrators and undercover ISB members wore uniforms of standard to whatever Imperial military posting they were at. ISB stormtroopers were occasionally transferred into regular stormtrooper units where their armour and equipment allowed them to fit in anonymously.
ISB agents are attached to this mission as Imperial leadership wants answers as to why and how the ISB underestimated the growth of these insurgent actions. ISB agents are looking to redeem their organization and prove their effectiveness in the New Order.
Imperial Intelligence
More intelligence-oriented than its rival ISB, Imperial Intelligence (ImpInt) concerned itself with gathering information from both internal and external threats, not just within the military. Its methods tended to be more covert than the ISB and they had a reputation for breaking people they thought had information. Imperial Intelligence is a separate, independent organization that descended from the old Senate Intelligence Bureau from the Old Republic days. Although Imperial Intelligence has far fewer agents than the ISB (the ISB has 20 for every 1 that ImpInt has), ImpInt has far more successful missions to show for it.
Imperial Intelligence uniforms wear a grey version of the imperial military standard with undercover agents wearing whatever was necessary for their cover.
Imperial Intelligence is included on this team because they were the ones who first alerted the higher-ups about this COMPNOR-related oversight. ImpInt agents resent the overlap of duties from COMPNOR and seek to stay ahead of their rival organization and demonstrate that their superior training and experience is what the New Order needs to thrive.