MikesMind

In UA Canon, the Mafia and other originised crime groups are very distrustful of anything Magickal in nature, in particularly Adepts (see Hush Hush on how the Sleepers helped bring this situation about as part of their campaign to knock NYC’s occult groups on the head)

If you follow this setting, then you could have your players set up as a group to keep tabs on the other mafia guys to make sure they ain’t getting mixed up with all this wierd and freaky magick stuff. They could be a kind of ‘in house’ Sleepers (which raises the question of what they do when the real Sleepers turn up for some reason.. and what will they make of the New Inquistion guys running about in surgical masks and trench coats?).

In the Swap Meet adventure in Weep you have a low level made guy secretly running around with a ChaosMage/Bodybag who could be a good place to start your players off. Later on let them find out that their local Don’s grandaughter has started hanging around with members of the Cult of the Naked Goddess 🙂

Paraphrased from Hush Hush (Sleepers Sourcebook):

In the 1950’s the Sleepers were getting worried about the growing Magickally aware community that was springing up in various sections of New York society.

In 1954 they organized a series of assassinations in the New York OU. In the period of quiet following this, Sleeper cliomancers and other specialists went to work. They started a campaigne of rumours and misinformation to turn the Mafia families against any Adepts that they were using.

As the criminal underground turned on the occult underground, the Sleepers blanketed the city with thaumophages (astal entities that can be bound to a place, object or individual. When an Adept tries to draw a charage off anything with one attached, they wake up and drain the Adept of all charges).

Current situation is that the New York OU has never recovered from the exodus of Adepts and other Magickally aware individuals so remain fragmented and quiet. The Mafia familes now consider any practicing adepts to be a target for swift elimination. Large numbers of thaumophages still remain ready to suck any unsuspecting Adept of their charages