& # 039; Star Trek Adventures & # 039; Is the Franchise & # 039; s Best RPG Yet

& # 039; Star Trek Adventures & # 039; Is the Franchise & # 039; s Best RPG Yet

& # 039; Star Trek Adventures & # 039; Is the Franchise & # 039; s Best RPG Yet







		On February 11, 2018, the last episode of the excellent "Star Trek: Discovery", the first season aired on CBS All Access. For 45 glorious minutes, I was able to enjoy a new adventure "Star Trek", full of action, drama, intrigue and classic science fiction and great idea. And then, like that, everything was over. After 15 episodes, CBS would not provide more "Star Trek" until 2019.

		And if CBS would not do a series of "Star Trek" for me, I had no choice but to do mine.

		Last June, British editorial. Modify launched "Star Trek Adventures:", a table-and-pencil role-playing game that allows entrepreneurial players to bring their own futuristic journeys to life. I had not played a tabletop RPG since 2012, and I had not played a tabletop RPG "Star Trek" since 2005. But in recent years, I've in love with the franchise all over again. After 741 episodes and 13 movies, was not it time to try to make one of your own?

He[[6 captains of 'Star Trek', classified from worst to best]

		The Modiphius developers were generous enough to send a PDF copy of the rules to Space.com. I quickly realized that I had a lot of work ahead of me if I wanted to make an adventure worthy of Gene Roddenberry's world; just working through the rule book and organizing my first session took me about three months. But if you are patient, imaginative and have a good amount of income available in your hands, you may find that the most memorable adventure of "Star Trek" is what you create with your friends.



		What is "Star Trek Adventures"?

		The Venn diagram of "people who like 'Star Trek'" and "people who play role-playing games" probably has a fairly large intersection, but large and licensed games almost always attract a new crowd. As such, it is possible that some Trekkies who read this piece have never played a tabletop RPG before. Is that how it works:

		You and your friends gather around a table, armed with paper, pencils and dice. (Pizza and beer are optional, but highly recommended.) Three to five players assume the role of characters in a Federation ship. Perhaps one of them is a curious Vulcan science officer, or a hardened Bajoran freedom fighter, or a human captain of uniform temperament; The rules allow almost any type of character you've seen in the shows, and more.

		The last player is called Game Master. It is your responsibility to tell the story, award actions, represent non-player characters and structure the adventure in general. In other words, the players are like the star actors, while the GM is like the writer, producer, director and cast of cast, all in one.

		In summary, tabletop role-playing games are half board game, half improvisational theater. The rules dictate the general actions you can take, such as shooting a phaser or piloting a starship, but it is up to you how to face the challenges and interact with your teammates. Role-playing is a form of collaborative storytelling, with game systems in place to keep things fun, unpredictable and fair.





						


Normally, players roll two dice and combine with their statistics to determine if an action is successful, but an "impulse" mechanism allows players to buy additional dice to improve their odds.

            						    Credit: Marshall Honorof / Space.com 




		The basics

		While "Star Trek Adventures" is the new "Star Trek" RPG, it is not the first in any way. The companies have given players the opportunity to sit in the captain's seat since 1978, and everyone, from Heritage Models to the role-playing editor FASA, is testing the design of the game.

		I can not talk about the whole history of "Star Trek" role-playing games, but I played two of them in high school: the next generation 1998 ruleset of Last Unicorn Games, and the role-playing game of " Star Trek "by Decipher 2002. Without going into exhaustive details about either, I can say that" Star Trek Adventures "is, for the most part, a cleaner, simpler and more balanced experience than the games that preceded it. .

		"Star Trek Adventures" runs on the 2d20 system of the Modiphius firm. All you need to play, either as a player or as GM, is the basic rules book ($ 59). As in most role-playing games, every time you take an action whose outcome is uncertain (hit a Gorn warrior on the head, blow a flyer through a star flare, persuade a hostile Romulan ship to be remove (standard material from Starfleet), you will roll Dice to determine if you succeed or fail.

		To help determine success or failure, each character has six attributes: Control, Fitness, Presence, Dare, Insight, and Reason. These represent the physical and mental features of a character. In addition, each character has six disciplines: Command, Security, Science, Conn (computers and piloting), Engineering and Medicine. These represent the training of a Starfleet character. These statistics, combined with throwing two dice of twenty sides, determine whether an action succeeds or fails. The characters can also "buy" additional dice to improve their odds with a resource called "boost", which they will earn and spend constantly throughout an adventure.

		Now, this is the fascinating thing about "Star Trek Adventures" instead of, say, "Dungeons & Dragons": their Disciplines are not inherently linked to any attribute. You can not "min-max" your statistics, assuming your tactical officer will need high audacity, high security and nothing else.

		In contrast, the attributes and disciplines are both situational. For example, let's go back to our hypothetical security officer. Daring + Security is indeed very useful for fighting enemies in close combat. But firing a phaser requires Control + Security instead. Interrogating a prisoner may require Presence + Security; investigating a crime scene could be Reason + Security; chasing a Cardassian who runs away could be Fitness + Security. Both specialized and generalized characters are viable in "Star Trek Adventures," and that's a refreshing change of pace.

		Between its accessibility and its versatility, "Star Trek Adventures" conquered me in a big way. Adjudging the actions is simple and clear, while almost all the characters will have time to shine. Whether a doctor is making a revolutionary cure for an alien plague or an engineer fixing a shuttle just in time to overcome the deadly ion storm (these two things really happened in my game, in the first session!), Players will be able to do the same amazing things that their favorite characters do on the screen, directly from the door.

He[[The evolution of 'Star Trek' (Infographic)]



		The best of Starfleet

		"Star Trek" is not about making a character that can do exactly one impeccable thing; it's about making a character that is versatile and adaptable, like any good Starfleet officer. It is good, then, that the creation of characters is as fun and accessible as the main game.

		If you have ever created a character in D & D, or "Pathfinder," "Star Wars" or any other general RPG, character creation for "Star Trek" will be familiar, but with some smart twists. The default setting for "Star Trek Adventures" is for a group of players to act as the superior staff of a starship or star, just like one of the television shows. As such, each character is an officer of Starfleet or a small officer, anything between a man and a captain.

		You have two options to make a character: Lifepath or creation in game. The latter allows you to distribute some statistics to start, then fill in the blanks while you play, and it is easily the least interesting of the two. Lifepath allows you to build a character that is uniquely yours, either through intentional construction or random scrolls. While it might be tempting to design the perfect Starfleet officer, my players and I had much more random fun of our Lifepaths. There are even random tables appropriate for the period to choose a race, since a Voyager era game will have more playable races that one of the company's era. It is that kind of attention to the canonical details that gives the book, and the game, much of its flavor.

		From there, he will choose his race (Andorian, Bajoran, Betazoid, Denobulan, Human, Tellarite, Trill or Vulcan), his education, his specialization of Starfleet and even two events that define his career, such as a transporter accident or a first Contact. process. As it progresses, it will also develop Focuses, which will help you get more success in good dice rolls, as well as in Values, which will determine what is most important for your character. An Approach could be something like a hand-to-hand combat or an astronavigation, whereas a Valor could be "Meticulous pride in my work" or "The price of peace is vigilance". Players are encouraged to create their own Focos and Values, which adds to the free and personalized nature of the game.

		The fantastic thing about the character creation system is that it is almost impossible to make a "bad character". Having moderately good attributes and disciplines in general instead of a handful of specializations can be a good thing, since you never know what combinations will be useful in a given situation.

		Another thing that I love about "Star Trek Adventures" is that the characters are balanced. In the "Ultimate Unicorn" and "Decipher" worlds, a team of players representing a bridge crew would have tremendously divergent skill sets. A captain would be a much higher level than an ensign and would have a full set of high level skills, while an ensign could have only one or two useful skills. It made it much more difficult for a GM to balance a game and for each player to take center stage.

		Instead, "Star Trek Adventures" removes the extensive skill trees and "levels". All Starfleet officers are extremely competent and have the opportunity to shine in their chosen field, regardless of the level of experience. Young officers get a talent that allows them to re-roll the failed dice; Seasoned officers get a talent that allows them to create advantageous situations more easily.

		Of course, this means that there are situations in which a badge could have almost the same skill level as a captain, but this did not cause any problems in my game. After all, all RPGs are an abstraction, and in theory, a player who creates a flag character did not do so with the intention of organizing a coup in the game.



		Fire phasers!

		While "Star Trek" as a series has a lot to do with getting along, it is impossible to pass more than one episode without the characters shooting a phaser or a punch. In addition, the combat in the games of roll usually is one of the most fun parts, where the dramatic tension arrives at a critical point and the personages can save the day through the tactical thought and the strategic maneuvers.

		The first thing you should keep in mind about combat in "Star Trek Adventures" is that it is not "Dungeons & Dragons". Your characters are not fantastic adventurers who fight against the impossible beasts. As such, the fight is usually fast and furious. A standard phaser burst can rip out half of your character's hit points in a single shot, and an unlucky stroke of luck bat'leth I could put him in the infirmary (if he's lucky) in less time.

		Still, I prefer combat in "Star Trek Adventures" to the approach of "Blink and you dead" of Last Unicorn, or the approach of "Deciphering the characters of the players almost can not die". Players have a "stress" group that represents the amount of abstract damage they can receive in combat. Drain that (or inflict a ton of damage all at once), and suffer injuries. If a character suffers three non-lethal injuries, or two lethal injuries, he or she is dead. An injury will usually bring down a character, but there are also ways to mitigate this.

		According to the free form nature of the game, you will not have to worry about battle grids and detailed orders and details. There are rules to crouch behind the deck, shoot powerful phaser beams and move around the battlefield, but they are easy to follow with a piece of paper and some glass beads, or even just some colored pencils.

		(At first I tried the "theater of mind" style combat, without beads or paper, but it's too hard to keep track of distances like that. "Star Trek Adventures" is not as demanding as fantasy role-playing games heavy in combat., but it is still important to know if you are within an enemy's melee range, or how far you are standing when firing.

		The combat itself is delightfully simple, with a couple of clearly defined rolls for different types of attacks. Characters can take many more actions during combat, from aiming with their weapons to creating elaborate traps, but the rules for those additional actions tend to be a bit complex and esoteric, especially for players who may not have a copy of the rule . book at hand This is a recurring theme with "Star Trek Adventures". The basic concepts are simple, but the details can be complicated, sometimes unnecessarily.





						


A look at the "Star Trek Adventures" boats.

            						    Credit: Marshall Honorof / Space.com 




		The final frontier

		You can not have a "Star Trek" game without starships, and "Star Trek Adventures" offers many of these. Just as players create their own characters, they will also collaborate to create their own starship, complete with a name and an NCC number.

		Creating a spaceship is, for the most part, as smooth and interesting as creating a character. I was worried that my players might have very conflicting ideas about their home in the stars, but within half an hour, they had resolved everything from their mission profile (border patrol), to their special abilities (versatile laboratories on board), to their name and registration number (USS Kumari, NCC-1066).

		Like the characters, there are many ways to make your ship unique, from its spatial framework to its profile. You could have a Galaxy class ship like the Enterprise-D on a deep space exploration mission or a challenging class ship that defends the Jem'Hadar Federation. When you perform an action on board a starship, the ship itself receives an additional roll to help the players. Easy enough.

He[[The 15 best boats in Star Trek, from V-ger to the USS Vengeance]

		But things get complicated in the combat of spacecraft. Honestly, what the rules book needed was an example of starry combat in play, from the start of the match to the end. What we got instead are about 20 pages of complicated rules, procedures and strategies. After reading the whole section about three times, it still took an hour to execute our first two rounds of combat (the Kumari against a Klingon battlecruiser), and my players were not entirely clear about what actions required them to take turns (shield refills). ), and that they were passive (certain sensor sweeps).

		To be fair, after those two clunky rounds, we all understood much better how things worked. And the battles in space feel exciting, dangerous and shocking; two rounds were enough for the players to disable the engines of the battlecruisers, and for the Kumari to suffer damage to the hull. As in ground combat, you can decide epic matchups in just a few rounds, but space combat rounds take much, much longer.

		It is also worth noting that while the basic rule book has a generous amount of "Star Trek: The Next Generation", it only has one original ship in the series (Constitution class), and absolutely nothing for "Star Trek: Enterprise -it was games.The Command Division manual fills the gaps, but it is a little disappointing that the rules say you can play in any "Trek" period, and then everyone requires you to buy another book to get the most out of some from them.



		Structural deficiencies

		I feel comfortable saying that "Star Trek Adventures" is the best of the three "Trek" RPGs I've played. However, that does not mean that it is impeccable. The main rules book has two main flaws: its design and its overwhelming focus on the games of the TNG era.

		While most of the core rule books of RPGs start with mechanical information and discuss the story later, the main rule book of "Star Trek Adventures" loads the background information, although it is the type of Background information that most people who want to play a role-playing game "Star Trek" will already know.

		After a brief game example (and, again, more of these would be useful), the book is launched in 70 pages of extensive background story about the United Federation of Planets and Starfleet. This does not really explain how to play, and while I understand that you must present this information somewhere in a basic rules book, the front loading prevents players from getting to meaty things immediately.

		In addition, the chapter on combat is separated from the chapter on performing basic tasks by creating characters and a long and strange digression about the exploration of alien worlds. The whole book is a bit like this; All the information you need is there, but the data that should go together is often with dozens of separate pages. At least the index is quite complete.

		As mentioned above, there is also a lot of focus in the TNG era, regardless of how it would be to run a game in the time of Archer or Kirk. Some sidebars clarify how to deal with previous eras, but a full section or a dedicated chapter could have been useful. Some of the reference books delve deeper into this information, but they are expensive (around $ 40 per book) and prioritize information from traditions about mechanical additions.



		Bottom line

		Despite a confusing design and some unnecessarily crunchy rules, "Star Trek Adventures" is the most accessible, balanced and imaginative game "Star Trek" to date. Everything, from creating characters to buying impulse, incorporates a bit of unpredictability, resulting in adventures in which characters can succeed and fail in spectacular ways. Both the players and the GM have to play fair, and it is clear from the magnificent design of the book and the informative sidebars of how much developers love the source material.

		If you can find some like-minded galactic explorers, you should at least try the free quick start rules for "Star Trek Adventures". It will take about 3 hours to collect and play, and at the end of it, you will know for sure if you want to continue your explorations. My players sure did; We have been going strong since June fighting the Romulans, solving murder mysteries, rescuing Federation scientists, eliminating spies, facing moral dilemmas and more. I even wrote something theme song for the group.

		Once you feel comfortable with the rules, there are only two directives you should follow: commit and go boldly.



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