Disclaimer: I took notes but I'm no reporter, some of my observations are bound to be more or less correct. For greater clarity, I saw Ross Payton recording the panel so I recommend you look to The Unspeakable Oath or Role Playing Public Radio for a full audio file of the seminar within the next few days if it hasn't been posted already.Now onto my notes:In an unassuming conference room of the Indianapolis downtown Westin we assembled for, waiting patiently for the meeting to begin. As I sat there, I couldn't help but notice that sitting next to me were  two men who, upon overhearing their conversation, I recognized as being of British upbringing. While trying to remain casual, I quickly glanced at their badges. To my surprise, they were none other that Paul Fricker and Mike Mason, two of the main authors of Call of Cthulhu, 7th edition. It was all I could do to maintain my composure.Shane Ivey kicked the meeting off by welcoming everyone. The room was modestly-sized and just about packed. Let's just say that if we get any more people attending this seminar they'll want to look at booking a larger venue. I wonder if all of them participated in The Unspeakable Oath's subscription drive?Soon after beginning, Kenneth Hite walked in to exclaim that he was late for an appropriately Delta Green (DG) reason: he'd been drinking bourbon.To which Adam Scott Glancy, who followed closely behind Mr. Hite, remarked that his reason for walking in late was much better: he'd been running a game of DG. Both excuses were met with much applause by the audience.All in all, just about every person associated with with DG books past and present were there with the only exception being John Tynes. By that, I mean that Shane Ivey, Adam Scott Glancy, Kenneth Hite, Dennis Detwiller, and Greg Stolze all took turns talking about their involvement in the upcoming publication. Shane reassured everyone that Tynes was indeed still heavily involved with DG.Ivey then went on to expound upon the purpose or DG for anyone in the audience who was unsure. DG is, in essence, an interpretation of Cthulhu mythos Role-playing in the modern day. It has a heavily military bent but, for all that, is no less nihilistic in the face of cosmic horror. The main effect is to show players that, even with all the weapons you could possibly want at your disposal, there's very little anyone can do to turn back the tide of inter-dimensional destruction and the mind-shattering madness that follows shortly thereafter. This is no better illustrated than in one of the first DG scenarios, the now famous, "Convergence", by John Tynes (I don't know what the big deal is, all my players survived when I ran this scenario, although, one character was huddled in a fetal position in the parking lot of Merle's Shut-eye wetting himself, before it was all said and done).Shane Ivey was clear to point-out that Delta green isn't just about letting people play around with theCthulhu mythos but rather is centered on cosmic horror (in much the same way much of Lovecraft's works were). The incorporation of the military-industrial complex allows players to mix modern-day human abuses of power (and I should think hubris) with this fascinatingly bleak view of man's place in the universe. Delta Green, perhaps more so than many other table-top role playing games reflects issues that surround us on a daily basis.So, with that out of the way, we got down to more pressing questions, namely, the new DG game.It is currently set for a 2014 release date. There are now two books. The first will contain all of the information that players and GM's need. It was described as a player's handbook. The second, described as a "case officer's handbook", will contain, according to Mr. Ivey, "All of the mythos-y stuff". Additionally, it'll include tips on how to change-up things for well-informed players. Anyone who's played these games with Lovecraft fans will know they're constantly trying to guess at what the beast they're fighting is. The second manual also includes advice on how to run your game differently based on the number of session you will be running. I'm going to think of the case officer's handbook as "pro-tips from people who've been playing DG for years". All in all, both books currently top out at a whopping combined 600+ pages but Shane Ivey was unclear on how those page numbers broke down between the books. As much as I'd like to assume it's 300 pages for each, I'm leaning towards the idea that the players manual will be a much shorter book. I'd love to see some information to prove otherwise. Based on their track history, Pagan Publishing does not put out short books with limited information. Every official DG release is extensive and chock full of endless detail and information. The Pagan Publishing crew are also looking at detailing how magic and psychic powers work in the game. My first assumption is that it will be devastatingly destructive to any player character (PC) who's foolish enough to dabble with it. That would certainly fit with DG as currently established. However, I can see how it would be interesting to throw-in a way for PCs to use these without becoming  irreversibly insane or host to malevolent, intangible space-parasites.Shane then talked about future supplements that would come after the release of the new DG books.He mentioned that they've already planned to handle "Pisces" (first detailed in Delta Green: Countdown) as a book and they are redeveloping a World War II treatment of DG. Anybody who knows these guys wouldn't be surprised to learn that they probably have storage space rented to house their voluminous collections of WWII documents and paraphernalia. One of the aspects of WWII that the authors would like to focus on is Delta Green's operations and involvement in the war.Shane Ivey confirmed that they will run another kickstarter for the release of the new DG books. Personally, this is a no-brainer. With the current popularity of Kickstarter for funding games as well as the success Pagan Publishing and Arc Dream have had with their previous Kickstarter titles (specifically Bumps in the Night, Better Angels, and Sense of the Sleight of Hand Man). They are also hard at work rolling-out another fiction by Dennis Detwiller called Failed Anatomies. Honestly, I've been hearing about this one so long I thought it had already been released. The main theme of Failed Anatomies is that it serves as a cross-section of DG adventures leading up to the 2000's. This is significant in that it will serve to span the gap between old DG and new DG. At least, that's the plan only time will tell if it lives-up to the promise.But, what about the rules of the new DG. The story all along has been that the new system, replacing the BRP engine now that Pagan is dropping the Call of Cthulhu licence in favor of publication freedom, will be fully compatible with old DG scenarios and publications. It was clarified for everyone present that the authors have no desire to "reinvent the wheel", as it were. Following the adage that, "if it's not broke, don't fix it", they're sticking with something that's very close to the system that it came from. That having been said, they are adding a few mechanics to the system to improve the game play in specific ways.  Ever since I've heard rumblings of a new system, they've been talking about incorporating the personal lives of the agents into the game. The idea behind this is that it will affect the game play by allowing the PCs to refuel and refresh based on the time spent outside of the operations. This is how they regain sanity in the absence of seeing a psychiatrist of convalescing in a mental hospital.As the discussion of game mechanics had begun, it was time for Greg Stolze to take center stage. Stolze stood-up to expound upon the various additions to the game engine. First-off, he explained that porting will be easy. Building off of the idea of families and personal lives being a source of sanity restoration, once they exist, they can be lost, throwing PCs  into utter despair and affecting their effectiveness in the field. It reminds me of Night's Black Agents (although everything does because I just played it for three days straight) in which the characters have sources of stability that can restore stability points. These can be symbols, people, or activities. A new concept for me that was presented so quickly that I almost missed it, is the Build-Your-Own-Cell mechanic. Essentially, the larger a cell, the more powerful it is, but you can't have a cell that is both large and free from corruption. Any specific cell can not be both ruthless and official, meaning that your solutions must be authorized if your unit wants to be able to exist in the open. Another excellent example was that large cells can not be kept secret. So, conversely, the smallest cells are the most immune to oversight.The last I'd heard, Delta Green as a government agency had been brought out of the shadows and into the light and was now officially sanctioned by the U.S. government. It would seem as if they're leaving that to the individual GM to determine. Personally, I love it. It makes the game more modular and adaptive and works story-wise. Some cells obviously came in out of the cold (so to speak) while others are still operating under the assumption that the government cannot be trusted. Honestly, I'd love to play a campaign where you have a cell operating out of the Midwest that just never got the memo. I just love the idea of these poor saps having to figure-out every solution on their own while the rest of the cells in Delta Green lives the good life, all because a letter got routed wrong or a radio transmission was decoded wrong. Greg Stolze went on to discuss damage as applied in the game. The mechanic is still under discussion and thus could change but it all comes down to allowing players to deal damage to multiple opponents in a quick way. The old mechanics for DG handled single attacks to single opponents excellently and efficiently but when it came time to mow down multiple attackers in a spray of bullets, well, things kinda fall apart. It'll make players feel safe and secure as they cart around their assault rifles and machine guns. Stolze confirmed that it provides an illusion of security. There are also going to be rules to help the GM determine how much support a give cell can expect to have when calling-in for help.Shane Ivey joked that the best thing for the DG story and game recently has been the continuing exploits of the Obama administration. I can't argue there. Before his first term of office began, there was no knowing the extent to which those in power would go the "protect the American public (from themselves)".Adam Scott Glancy stood and took over the dialogue. He explained a little tradecraft for the new DG universe. Because of the currently insane amount of government oversight and the infectious nature that the mythos carries, where just learning about it, or reading the wrong thing could start a catastrophic domino effect, Glancy theorized that DG operatives will be using very low tech methods of operation and communication. No cell-phones, no electronic information networks. In his mind, the new agency will operate as if it was a spy agency in the 1950's just to prevent the spread of knowledge about the mythos. They would rely upon typewriters and newspaper clipping services to stay updated and abreast of the situations. The would work against agents, necessitating slower travel and communication.Never one to look back, Glancy confirmed that there is not a shred of nostalgia in the new game. Gone are the Greys (first written about in Delta Green) and Majestic (again, Delta Green), they've served their purpose. They were '90's concepts when the public was flailing around for something to be afraid of. That is not the world of today. In the past, the American public had plausible deniability. We could act shocked when informed about how the CIA was preserving democracy in America by violating laws throughout the world. Today we argue not about whether we should be water-boarding, but rather about how we should be doing it, what brand of water should be used.So now, the agents are faced with the dilemma of whether they want to follow the rules or break them, all while asking themselves if the world is a better place because they waited for permission and obeyed the protocols.Soon it was Kenneth Hite's turn to talk. He explained that the new DG is set in 2014. It's about dealing with these timeless horrors today. The old DG was the giant cellphone paranoia of the X-files. Those things are in the past. Today it's about those things that make you squicky and uneasy about the earth. But rather than severing all connections with the past, the decision here is that the world changes and moves on and so must the Delta Green agency set in this world. In this world, there is something horrible wherever you look. The Mi-Go (from Delta Green) were perfect for the '90's but what is perfect today? Ken Hite spoke about the Tsan-Chan and the inter-dimensional entities that might benefit from ushering-in the Empire of the Tsan-Chan sooner rather than later. Hite made it clear that he wants to focus on some mythos entities that up to this point have been ignored. He drew parallels between faceless entities that can transcend time and subjugate and subsume untold thousands of innocents, and corporations. Another great insight was that the mythos is now in-house and there will always be that department of wierdos trying to make it work for them, believing that it can be tamed and turned to their will. ***Spoiler Alert*** it can't ***End Spoiler Alert***. Hite then entertained the idea that Majestic is still around but its members have been spread throughout the world among various independent security companies. Such a scenario can bring about absolutely outrageous scenarios like, private enterprise using mental radios from beyond the wall of sleep as prototypical weaponry to wage war against their competition and those that would get in the way of their visionShane Ivey then chimed-in to remind us all (as if we'd forgotten) that the Cthulhu mythos is toxic and dangerous to humanity and permanently part of the environment. As confirmation of this fact, he promised us that magic in this world will be considerably less safe.Dennis Detwiller took a moment to talk about the ambiguity of the conspiracy. He stipulated that in this new world, half a dozen conspiracies believe they are the only conspiracy. This means that now, when agents get orders from A-cell, they need to stop and ask themselves, "which A-cell?". This of course brought-up once more the idea that characters are going to have to choose between their social and familial connections and emotion-numbing drugs. Glancy confirmed this with the remark that they are aiming towards making players answer the question, "How do you deal with the time when you are not on mission?"Finally, they opened the floor for questions. Only a few are worth mentioning here. Ross Payton asked about quick start rules and their availability. The authors confirmed that quickstart rules were definitely going to be availableThe authors are not interested in dramatically altering or rewriting history. Rather, their main priority is describing how these things could be going on in our world all along without the majority of the population knowing about it, an even more impressive accomplishment in this day of instant video and rampant government surveillance (great, now that I've typed that I've just ensured my placement on a watch list, as I go on optimistically believing I wasn't already on one).Another wrinkle in the story is the possibility that both the legal and illegal conspiracies fighting the mythos can exist at the same time.Somebody then asked how the fresh-eyed 20-something agents are supposed to learn the low-tech tradecraft, before offering the solution of learning from Vietnam vets. To this the authors, particularly Glancy exclaimed a resounding, "yes".Finally, somebody asked about how to stay updated on the happenings with the development of the book.Shane Ivey offered three solutions:Sign-up for the Delta Green announcement newsletter on the Delta Green website,become a fan of Delta Green on Facebook,and finally join the Delta Green Yahoo groupWell, that's all I have. What do you guys think? What questions about the new game do you want answered?One of my big questions is, "who is working on the game mechanics for testifying in front of a congressional subcommittee for protocol violations?"