Tales from a Distant Galaxy

Intro

Now that the Kickstarter for Boldly Go! has finished, I am hard at work on some other projects. One of these projects is tentatively titled A Distant Galaxy, which uses roughly the same rules system as Boldly Go!, but which is set in a world reminiscent of another popular sci-fi franchise.

To be fair, it is actually set in universe that is a nice mélange (if you will) of several sci-fi franchises. Which means that I have either avoided lawsuits or have invited all the lawsuits.

The draft rules for A Distant Galaxy have been finished for quite a while now, and my first playtest of the game was at Metatopia 2019. I haven't been able to get much playtesting on it since then, because of the pandemic, but yesterday, some friends of mine had openings in their schedules and we were able to sit down for a bit of the old virtual gaming!

It actually went very well, and the rules seem to mostly work. Things went well enough that the players wouldn't mind playing again, which is always a heartening thing to hear. 

Some highlights on the game, as well as some notes on the setting, are below.

The Setting

Humans spread out across the galaxy ages ago, aided in their endeavors by their little robot friends. Some humans were able to keep their DNA strands relatively intact over the thousands of years that followed. Many couldn't and wound up genetically adapting to new situations and environments. They're still human, they just look a little bit different.

Explorers attempting to travel past the galaxy's edge returned with tales of a strange "frequency" that, when attuned to, allowed practitioners to draw upon the latent energy that permeated every lifeform in the galaxy. Practitioners of this discipline soon came to refer to the frequency as the source of all life, and so dubbed it, unimaginatively, "The Source."

In time, the humans and new humans all united into a vast galactic empire, aided by their robot friends, their advanced technology, and their mastery of the Source. Some of the most prominent users of the Source were the legendary Solar Knights, who were held in very high acclaim until about a century ago. At that time, it was learned that the Solar Knights, who desired peace in the galaxy, had been subtly manipulating humanity with their Source disciplines in order to promote certain behaviors and quash others. When they learned this, the people revolted, disbanding the Solar Knights and driving them to the far corners of the galaxy. 

Though the people gained their freedom, many were much less altruistic when left to their own devices. Corruption and avarice spread.

Such issues might have been survivable were it not for a new production line of robots known as the "Automata." On the first day of their activation, they went rogue, murdered the Empress of the Galaxy and her court, and destroyed the Imperial Capital World of Kanolphan. The imperial citizens rallied and, after a long and costly war, drove the Automata to the furthest edges of the galaxy.

In modern times, the empire is rather quickly coming apart at the seams as warring noble houses fight for political control and scavengers pick at the fringe systems. Robots, once the companions of Humanity, are now widely distrusted for the Automata Betrayal and are no longer manufactured.

The galaxy is becoming a wilder and more dangerous place, where adventurous people, deluded citizenry, and criminals struggle to live and survive as the cracks in the infrastructure widen.

Dramatis Personae

Rex Manoo

A true human mercenary who is incredibly sexy and has a large fan following.

Lyra Sylph Erevan IV

A new human noblewoman from an ancient world of Loud Hedonists. One of Rex Manoo's biggest fans.

Liriak Khron

A true human from KolVor, a peaceful core world devoted to learning. She is a brilliant, but constantly tired pilot. She was hired by Lyra in her quest to seek out and befriend Rex Manoo.

Ket Tunan

A new human shuttle driver from an apocalyptic world of factionalized biologists. He wound up involved in the gang's previous adventures and who is just along for the ride.

Highlights

Our heroes are eating in a space diner on a spaceport on a lonely moon. They have been there for some time while their ship was undergoing extensive repairs. They didn't have the cash to repair their ship themselves, so they borrowed money from a Very Nice Lady.

An orange-haired gentleman with an eyepatch saunters into the diner and introduces himself as a business associate of the lady. He says that, in return for the ship repairs, the heroes will take a shipment to Algo X.

PLAYERS: What's in the shipment.

GENTLEMAN: You don't need to know that!

They eventually agree. The gentleman departs.

KET: I *think* that man was a *criminal!*

LIRIAK: Really?

Meanwhile, Rex goes over to the spaceport kiosk to get some additional provisions.

REX: I think I'm gonna buy some handcuffs.

LYRA: Oooh, ReeeEEEEeex. I didn't think you were into that.

REX: Oh. Uh. I also buy some throwing weapons.

ME: You get three kunai in clamshell wrapping. They're a genuine "SPACE NINJA" product. The mascot is a ninja in a space helmet.

The heroes get into space. They are pursued by three mysterious ships, which they manage to elude thanks to Liriak's skillful piloting. Once they're sure that they've lost their new friends, Rex decides to open the box. 

ME: You see a robotic arm coming out of the box. It is currently grabbing Rex Manoo by the throat and lifting him off the floor.

REX: Aargh! Gurgle!

A fight ensues! Lyra fries some of its circuitry with her stun pistol and makes it drop Rex. Liriak attunes to the Source, gives herself incredible strength, and tears the robot's arm off. Rex decides *not* to throw a grenade and instead shoots it with his blaster rifle. Ket gets in a couple of good whacks with his powered wrench!

During the battle, Rex's player loses connectivity with Discord!

REX: I'm back, did I miss anything?

ME: I don't think so, no.

REX: Okay. The robot that I shot. Is it still a problem?

ME: Thankfully, no. However, it seems as though the other pair of mechanical hands is...

REX: OTHER pair of mechanical hands?!

ME: Okay, so you did miss something

The RPG Character Library: Gamma World 3rd Edition

At least, I think it's 3rd Edition.

I decided to jump from the earliest edition of this game (Metamorphosis Alpha) to the most recent version of the game that I own (and also, the only other version of the game that I own), to see what had changed and what had remained the same.

The short-short version is: The rules are better. It feels like it's a much better thought out game and game world. A lot of the early ideas (mutants, etc.), have been updated and expanded to differentiate them and make them more interesting. There's still a bizarre preoccupation with future tech, for reasons I can't quite explain. The game is set on an irradiated, post-apocalyptic earth instead of on a space ship, which helps to explain all the wilderness and the stable populations of various mutant beasties.

Once again, I went in without any idea of what I was going to make, other than that I wanted to make some kind of mutant creature, because that's way more fun than playing a straight human.

The game starts me off with the Mutated Animal template. I get some Physical and some Mental Mutations. +2 Stealth, -6 to Robot Recognition (robots once served human masters, and I am not human), and I get some abilities from the animal stock, which I must choose.

Amused that it's an option, and reminded of a certain character I played at a LARP once, I choose Weasel. Weasel gives me a Physical Strength (PS) 9, Dexterity (DX) 12, and Constitution (CN) 5. I can also bite for 1d6 damage, get Night Vision (per the mutation), and have a Base Speed of 14 (9 if I walk just on my hind legs).

I can also choose to have my mutant be of a stable strain, which means there's a village of weasel-people just like me off in the world somewhere. Cool. I can dig that. Let's do that. Maybe they live somewhere in the ruins of Venice. (Inside joke)

I now get to do adjustments. To start with, I look exactly like a weasel, except I’m smart. If I was under a meter in height, I’m now a meter in height. I cannot talk or use tools, however, various mutations can remedy this. If I don’t take any mutations to make me more human, I get +1 Physical Mutation, but have -8 Robot Recognition.

I get all of the stats listed above, plus a 2d4 roll. There are also other attributes for which I must roll. Different species (Mutant Plant, Mutant Animal, Human) all have different ways of rolling for their listed attributes. For every other attribute but Senses and Mutation Power, I roll 3d6 (like you do). The other two are calculated by 4d6 drop the lowest. Thank you, TSR.

I should also point out that Mutation Power seems to need to be rolled for each power that requires it (it's basically a casting roll). At least, I think it does. The rules are quite extensive, but I was skimming.

Now I roll for my mutant powers (1d6, consult chart). I will always get five mutations, but the roll tells me how they split. In my  case, I get three Physical and two Mental. I now roll percentile dice and consult the appropriate charts. 

Unlike Metamorphosis Alpha, there's a wide variety of powers that are all very well described and defined. In addition, the GM doesn't get the ability to hobble me with a randomly awful power. There are still powers that are defects (marked with a D), but I'm not guaranteed to have one (or any), and if I roll them, it's my fault. In addition, I can only have one physical and one mental defect maximum, so I won't wind up playing a character whose mutant abilities only weaken them.

Now, the mutant powers that turn my animal from a mutant animal into an uplifted, bipedal animal are not listed in this section. They are listed in the animal section, however, and they are Talk, Bipedal, and Manipulate Tools and Objects. I spend all three of my Physical Mutation points to buy these. I am now a chatty, humanoid weasel. Yes.

And now I determine my mental mutations.

99: Roll 2 mental mutations. Okay!

95: Pick any one mental mutation of your choice.

I was bound to roll well sooner or later!

I roll for my two random mutations and get:

04: Death Field Generation (This ability has a Mutation Power score. It's 11.)

28: Heightened Mental Attribute

This is funny, because the character that I played, who was nicknamed "Weasel," was a super-smart necromancer. So I decide to go whole hog (full weasel?) and name the character "Callen."

Death Field Generation allows me to damage the life force of all living things around me. The field isn't as game-breaking as one might thing it is, because it also targets me. I can also only use it once per week. 

Heightened Mental Attribute randomly affects one of my three mental stats (Mental Strength, Intelligence, or Charisma). I add a number of points equal to 6 - the attribute's modifier. This is nice, because it's guaranteed to give low attributes a nice bump. I roll 1d3 and get 3. My Charisma gets improved. It's modifier is +6, so I raise it to 18. Hello, cutie!

Telekinetic Hand is the power I took for my selected power. It doesn't have the oomph of true Telekinesis, but it allows me to make fine motor manipulation as if I was using my hand.

Now I get to pick my character class. There are four: Enforcer (Fighter), Esper (Magic User), Examiner (Good with Tools), Scout (Rogue). I decide to go with Examiner, because it's the different one, and because the character that this character is loosely based on was interested in ancient history and magical artifacts. 

My class gives me a whole pile of things, including one randomly rolled Tech IV item (I get a parachute), +1 Robot Recognition, +1 Use Artifacts per level, 16 points to distribute between four skills: Avoid Artifact Disaster, Jury-Rig, Read Schematics, and Repair Artifact. Since I have 16 points and 4 skills, I make them 4 each. Mostly because I don't know what's better.

All classes have several common skills, with percentages based on the class itself. These are Read, Write, Ride, and Swim.  Examiners have Read 100%, Write 100%, Ride 25%, and Swim 10%. 

After that, I get my derived attributes. They are also called skills and everyone gets them. I will say that this rulebook is laid out in kind of a strange way. For instance, my derived attributes are based on my primary attributes, but are listed after classes, not with the attributes themselves. But what do I know? I'm not a game designer.

The derived attributes are a big, long list, and it sort of clunks up a game whose design I felt was running pretty smoothly thus far. I won't copy the list here, but you can see it at the end, with the character. I will note that they kept CN as hit dice, just like it was in Metamorphosis Alpha, which is something I rather liked.

I now have the option of joining a Cryptic Alliance. I take a read through them and they are all silly. Like, okay, not silly-silly like Paranoia, but not too many steps removed from that. I find that I can't take any of them seriously and, so, I don't join any. Besides, I'm playing a charismatic loner. I don't need no allies!

Now we get to the Equipment section and, to my mind, the most baffling part of the game. The world is listed as being Tech III generally, which makes it Renaissance-times, according to the book. This would be fine, except things like laser pistols and micromissiles are listed under Common Equipment. It's fine, because I can't afford them anyway, but it seems like a very strange design choice. I would almost prefer it be split up like D&D, with regular equipment being more primitive and fancy future stuff being the "magic items."

The section also says that the GM gets to decide how much money and equipment I get based on where the game starts. Then it says, "oh, just kidding. Give them 250 + 1d10 x 10 donars." I roll a 1. So I get 260 donars. I purchase some basic weapons and armor and decide to call it a day.

Callen, Level 1 Mutant Weasel Examiner

Physical Strength: 13, +1

Dexterity: 18, +3

Constitution: 10, +0

Mental Strength: 13, +1

Intelligence: 12, +0

Charisma: 18, +3

Senses: 11, +0

Physical Mutations

Talk

Bipedal

Manipulate Tools and Objects

Mental Mutations

Death Field Generation: 11, +0

Telekinetic Hand: 14, +1

Heightened Charisma: +6

Class Skills 

+1 to Robot Recognition and Use Artifacts

+1 bonus to Use Artifacts per level

Read 100%

Write 100%

Ride 25%

Swim 10%

Avoid Artifact Disaster: 4

Jury-Rig: 4

Read Schematics: 4

Repair Artifact: 4  

Derived Attributes

THAC melee: PS mod (1)

THAC ranged: DX mod (3)

Armor Class:  10 + DX mod (13)

MD: 10 + MS mod (11)

Hit Points: CNd6, or 10d6 (39)

Health: 10 + CN mod (10)

Use Artifacts: IN mod, (0)

Perception: SN score + IN mod (11)

Stealth: DX mod (3)

Remain Unseen: IN mod (0)

Speed: Base + DX mod (14/9)

Robot Recognition: 20 - mods (15)

Equipstuff

Flintlock Pistol 2d8, 40 D

Dagger 1d4 5 D

Studded Leather AC 3 25 D

24 musket balls, gunpowder, and horn 10 D

Donars: 180

The RPG Character Library: Metamorphosis Alpha

I've always been a fan of the genre in which an apocalypse turns a far-future society into post-apocalyptic fantasy. There's just something about it that seems really cool and interesting. I had high hopes that the Covenant LARP (a game explicitly set in a post-apocalyptic fantasy world) would turn into Gamma World. Or, at least, Metamorphosis Alpha.

You've been on a giant worldship this entire time. Oh, and you're going to crash into a star. Good luck!

Oh, and it's written by Drawmij himself. So that's nice. I wonder if he can make the game rules appear in his hand as a free action?

It turns out that what one might think one wants can easily turn out to be something that one doesn't really want at all, and that, as it happens, is the case with Metamorphosis Alpha. I think I like the idea of this game much better than it's execution. I feel like if I were to do this sort of a game, my emphasis would be focused more on the culture, society, and world inside the ship and have much less to do with all of the cool ray guns and robots located on the storage levels.

I will say though that, in the game's defense, it was made in 1976, where the focus on games was quite a bit different than it is now. It's forgivable, but I don't think I could run this game without significant rewriting.

It also doesn't help that the rules feel more than a little bit slapdash (the errata in the back doesn't help). There's not a lot of them, but I definitely get the feeling that some of them are missing somewhere. It doesn't help that the book's layout is crude and kind of all over the place.

Still, I was able to make a pretty interesting character. Here's how I did that.

As per usual, I went in with no preconceived notions. There are six stats (Radiation Resistance, Mental Resistance, Dexterity, Constitution, Strength, and Leadership Potential). Frustratingly, the list of stats is given in that order, but the paragraphs describing the stats are arranged in a different order. Oh well.

I learn right off the bat that True Humans get all six stats, while Mutants of varying stripes only get the first five. I think making True Humans the only charismatic people in the game is one of the ways that they balance the fact that humans don't get awesome powers, but it still feels like not quite enough of a boost.

I decide that I will be a mutant, because that sounds fun. I do the roll and place in order, giving me an average character who is very clumsy and who has an almost statistically significant Constitution. I'm not getting much from these stats, but there's still more to do.

I should probably explain the stats at this point, as well as how secondary stats are derived from them, since they're somewhat unique among RPGs.

Radiation Resistance is the likelihood that I will resist dangerous radiation. A failure means that I will either die horribly or mutate.

Mental Resistance is my chance to avoid psychic attacks and mental mutations. Unlike the other stats, it is strengthened by use, provided I survive an attack that harms me.

Dexterity determines when I act in combat. So I'm not necessarily clumsy, but I am slow as balls. Interestingly, my Dex doesn't seem to impact my movement speed at all, from what I can tell.

Strength indicates whether and if I do any extra damage in combat. I don't.

Constitution determines the number of hit points I have and how likely I am to be poisoned. Since I have a Con of 11, I get to roll 11d6 to calculate my hit points. I roll reasonably well and get 45.

Because I am a mutant, I am allowed to have mutant powers. I get to roll 1d4 to determine how many physical mutations I have. Then I get to roll 1d4 again to determine how many mental mutations I have. It also says that my mutations are hand-picked by me, and not randomly rolled. Considering that there is quite a wide power range between powers (for instance, one of them allows me to control time or set up an aura of death around my body), this seems unwise. On the other hand, it's much easier to build the character you want.

The GM then gives me a physical or mental defect, so that I do not become god upon the Warden. If I have five or more mutations, I get both a physical and a mental defect.

I rolleth forth my d4s and get 3 physical mutations and 2 mental mutations. Since I have five total, I get two defects. Fun!

Here's the point where my character starts to gel. I decided that I would not game the system, instead choosing powers based on a core concept. I am given further guidance by the rulebook telling me that all mutants start in the forest level of the ship with no equipment.

Okay. So what do we have so far? A slow-moving, reasonably tough, arboreal mutant. Let's see if I can pick things to complement this.

Heightened Dexterity: Despite the name, this does not improve my Dexterity in any way. My AC is 1 (equivalent to the best armor listed in the game), as long as I am not encumbered. Since no one plays by the encumbrance rules anyway, I should be fine.

Physical Reflection: My skin reflects one type of damage away from my body in a random direction. One of the damage types listed is Radiation, so I'm going to powergame the shit out of this and choose that one.

Quills: I grow quills along my arms and legs. Anyone grabbing me takes dagger damage. I can also throw them 1-10 feet away from me.

Heightened Intelligence: Unlike Heightened Dexterity, this actually does modify my intelligence. I need it if I'm going to be a mutated plant or animal to have human-like intelligence, and I have to take it if I rolled a 4 on mental mutations. Since no Geoff character is complete without improved intelligence, I decided to purchase it despite neither of those things being true. It adds +4 to my Mental Resistance (to a max of 18) and allows me a better chance to operate devices found on the ship.

Intuition: Taking a page from the Jewel songbook, I have grabbed this mutation. It gives me limited precognition, which translates to a +1 to hit, +3 damage, and am never surprised. The power notes that it cannot work if any of my other powers are active, but, since my other powers are either passives or automatic, I don't think I need to worry about that.

I tried to pick defects that would make sense for my character, learning later that the GM could simply roll randomly and assign the defects to me. The defect tables don't make it obvious that a random roll is allowed (there's 6 physical and 10 mental defects, but the chart lists all the mutations in a group in order from 1-47, so you won't notice it unless you count). I managed not to cheese it, or hurt my character too badly, and picked the following.

Skin Structure Change: My skin has been altered significantly. The examples that are given are scales that reduce my movement (but not my Dexterity) and that I cannot bear heat above 76 degrees F. I decide to reverse the second one, taking one die of damage per hour if I am stuck in temperatures of 40 degrees or lower. I don't know if that's cheesy or not, but the book doesn't give much in the way of boundaries or examples.

Fear Impulse: I am afraid of certain objects or animals. I can't look at the thing (whatever it is) without feeling total fear and running away from it. Since I'm little more than a forest creature at this point, I decide that I have a fear impulse to "Uncontrolled Fires." Campfires will make me nervous. Forest fires will make me run screaming.

Since I don't have any equipment, I can safely ignore the majority of the equipment section. However, I do need to figure out how to calculate damage for my quills. Metamorphosis Alpha has an interesting way of doing this: Armor has a Class rating (which, I think, is different from AC), and weapons also have a Class rating. The higher the class of weapon, the better damage it does against armored opponents.

I thought this would be more descriptive. Like I have an Organic Dagger, which might be pretty good, but a Plasma Dagger would be way better. I'm going to have to wait a few decades to get something like that, though, because the determination of Class is a bit more byzantine and less free-form than that. I do find out that daggers of any type are a Class 3 weapon and do 1d4 damage against opponents.

Nav the Arboreal Mutant

Radiation Resistance:  9

Mental Resistance: 9 +4 = 13

Dexterity: 4

Constitution:11

Strength: 9

AC: 1

HP: 45

Physical Mutations: Heightened Dexterity, Physical Reflection (Radiation), Quills

Mental Mutations: Heightened Intelligence, Intuition (Follow Your Heaaaart)

Physical Defect: Skin Structure Change (Take 1d6 Damage/Hour at 40 F or Less)

Mental Defect: Fear Impulse (Uncontrolled Fires)

Equipstuff: None

The RPG Character Library: Star Frontiers

Star Frontiers! A game that I almost played once.

Way, way back in 6th grade, my friend Damian decided that he wanted to run Star Frontiers. We spent a whole afternoon making characters and then...never played, because kids are like that. One thing I remember from this time is that we were famously bad at the rules for all RPGs (well, okay, D&D), and no firmer example of this was the character generation section for this game. Damian allowed me to roll up a Sathar, an NPC-only race who are the canonical bad guys of the setting.

This time period was also illustrative of what a dink I was as a small child, because Damian told me that I had a secret power that would be revealed in-game, and I kept pestering him to tell me what that power was. We never played, so it was moot, but that was still really obnoxious of me.

On this attempt at character creation, I decided to limit myself to one of the characters from the four actual PC species. These include Humans (yawn), Dralasites (sapient blob people), Vrusk (cool bug people with centipede bodies), and Yazirians (violent, gliding monkeys that have to wear goggles). I was on the fence until I saw this bon mot in the advanced rulebook:

Dralasites are widely known for their strange sense of humor. They love old jokes and puns that make Humans groan. Many Human comedians who could not find work in Human cities have become rich performing on Dralasite worlds.

Punslinging blob critter? Sold.

Star Frontiers character generation consists of rolling d100 and looking up the results on a chart. This is similar (though slightly different from) the other TSR non-D&D games of the period, which makes me think that TSR could have come out with a universal role-playing system in the early 80s if they had wanted to and if that was, you know, a thing that people had conceived of at the time. It's too bad, really, because they could have had a genre-hopping game of gunslingers, spies, gangsters, archaeologists, and space adventure, to name but a few. How epic would that have been?

Anywho, there are four groups of paired stats in the game. Each paired stat shares a single number. Your species gives you bonuses to one number pair and also gives you a penalty to one numbered pair. Humans get a +5 bonus to one stat in their pair (so their Strength/Stamina could be 55/50), but receive no penalties. After you've rolled your stats and applied modifiers, you can opt to move up to 10 points from one paired stat to another. (I could have had an Intellect/Logic of 30/50 if I had wanted to).

Stamina's your hit points. Weapons do a lot of damage in this game, and armor appears to be mostly ablative. Armor is also stupid expensive, so I couldn't afford any. Yikes.

Dralasites get two special abilities: Detect Lie at 5% and Elasticity. Elasticity's description is very long, but boils down to my being able to grow a maximum of Dex/10 limbs. I have control of them all, but one of them must be my "dominant" limb (I'm fifth-handed!) and, no matter how many limbs I have, I can still only use two weapons at a time. Also, the veins and ridges in my rubbery, protoplasmic body cannot be changed and provide an identification akin to fingerprints. So much for committing the perfect crime.

Skill are a little wonky and take quite a bit of time to explain. The gist of it is that there are three main categories (Military, Technology, Biosocial). At the start of the game, you pick your primary focus and get one skill from that group. You may then pick a skill from any of the other two categories. All skills have sub-skills and, if you pick a skill, you get all it's sub-skills too. This was nice, because I decided to pick Medicine and was dismayed when I misunderstood and thought I'd have to buy each sub-skill on its own. All skills are rated at base percentage + 10 x skill level percentage, and skills have a maximum rating of 6.

Oh, and I picked Weapon Skills from the Military category, because this is an 80s game and I am going to be shooting at things. This gives me proficiency with a bunch of the basic weapon types, which is handy. I feel like I put in 5% of the effort that I did making my Star Trek characters, and my Dralasite still feels competent and well-rounded.

I get d100 + 250 credits to buy my initial possessions with, so I proceeded to the equipment list in the advanced character generation section and found that everything was stupefyingly expensive. For instance, a med kit costs 500 credits, which is 150 more credits than I could possibly start with. How was I supposed to do medicine without a med kit?! Gaah!

It was then that I learned that a starting character could opt to spend 250 credits to get basic gear (Which comes with a first aid pack. Yes!). This gave me some money left over to buy a (very cheap) weapon. I picked up a vibroknife and am hoping that I get a lot more credits before I get into a fight.

Onivan Eht’eulb, Dralasite Physician

Strength/Stamina: 55

Intellect/Logic: 40

Dexterity/Reaction Speed: 45

Personality/Leadership: 55

Initiative Modifier: 5 (RS/10 round up)

Special Abilities:  5% chance to Detect Lie, Elasticity

  

Biosocial Skills: Administer Drugs 100%, Diagnosis 70%, First Aid 100%, Minor Surgery 50%, Major Surgery 30%, Controlling Infection 60%, Curing Diseases 50%, Neutralizing Toxins 40%, Activating Freeze Fields 40%.

Military Skills: Gyrojet 33%, Melee 33%, Projectile 33%, Thrown 33%.

Equipment

Credits: 42 (auspicious!)

Standard Equipment Pack: Chronograph/Communicator, Coveralls, Dose Grenade, First Aid Pack

Vibroknife: 2d10 +5 to hit

Exciting Crossover Event: Part II

With all of these related posts, it's starting to feel a bit like Marvel up in here!

Ahem.

Anyway.

In my previous post, I talked about my design philosophy for Boldly Go, (though, at the time, it was called Velour and Go-Go Boots), and the simple and straightforward stat/skill system I created for the alpha version of the game.

As is often the case with game design, the system described in Part I got tossed out of the window with both hands. The short reason is that I found a way to make the game do what I wanted it to do in a much better way. The significantly longer reason is...this post.

I made up a bunch of sample characters for the game, so that I could quickly run it for my friends, or for random strangers at conventions. These characters have become the "iconics," to use a D&D term, of the game and feature prominently in the rulebook.

The first versions of these characters were...well...they were okay. One of the problems that I noticed was this: With only a handful of stats and skills, there was going to be a lot of overlap between characters. In some ways, this is fine. Remember my example from last time: everyone on the Enterprise knows some Science, but Spock knows the Most Science, and it all works out.

The real trouble came when I started adding advancement rules. The iconic characters don't have to worry about advancement--they'll remain perfectly adequate starting characters from now until we have a soft continuity reboot 43 years from now, featuring more attractive art and better special effects.

Player characters, on the other hand, are going to advance. No matter how few advancement points one gives them, and no matter how rarely they are allowed to advance, players will buy skills. In a game whose skill pool is a very, very tiny pond, that means that all of the characters are going to look pretty samey pretty rapidly.

I want to park that train of thought in the station and get up a full head of steam on a second train of thought. This particular train started because I noticed something else about the TV show that I tried to emulate in the rules--interpersonal ethical conflict.

This is a thing that happens all the time on the show, but which doesn't really feature at all in any of the other Star Trek games. For instance, Spock will say something coldly logical about how people dying is inevitable, but...and then, before he finishes, McCoy jumps in and says terrible things about Spock's ears and/or blood and then demands that the crew SAVE those people, goddamn it, because he's a doctor and that's what you do.

This is one of those things that happens once an episode in The Original Series, and many, many times per episode once we get to The Next Generation, and I desperately wanted to get it into the game.

The rule behind it was easy: Any time something happens that triggers your personal code of ethics, positively or negatively, you get a Drama Point for it (Drama Points are those thingamajiggers in other games that allow you to spend them to alter reality, or improve your rolls, or whatever). If you get into an argument with another player and both of your personal codes fire (such as Your Needs of the Many versus their Still a Doctor, Goddamnit), you both get a Drama Point.

The implementation was much clunkier. Okay, so now we have this new mechanic, so there's this new spot on your character sheet where you list your characters basic ethics. Oh, but I need to have examples, so here's twenty ethical codes that a player can pick from, such as Honest, Compassionate, and all that, plus a brief description of what that means. Then there's the problem of whether or not players can take multiple ethical codes at once, because people are complex, and blaaaaahaaaahahaaa...

It was then that Bob Dunham, secret savior of all games, came swinging in on a vine and said (and this is paraphrased), "I think it would make more sense if you made all of character creation work like the personal code of ethics system works." Then he threw a smoke bomb and vanished. It was hella dramatic.

And thus (he said, in his best Cartoon Network announcer voice), the Traits System was born!

This required a couple of months of rewriting, in which I pulled out the old stats/skills system, along with the personal code of ethics system, and installed a brand spanking new thing that works a bit like this. Your character has X number of traits to start with. Some of those traits are determined by your character's species and occupation, but the others are ones that you get to pick. There's a short list in the book of example traits, but you can come up with pretty much any trait you can think of and add it to your sheet.

Since that all sounds terribly, terribly abstract, let me show you what it looks like in practice. Here's the first of the iconics: Janine Tarian, human security officer.

Species and Occupation Traits	Other Traits
Indomitable, Outside the Box, Warrior Species, Academy Training, Security	Alert to Danger, Cocky, Intimidating, Physically Fit, Weapons Training

One thing to note is that any trait listed in italics is a negative trait (usually), while any trait that's listed normally is a positive trait (usually). Positive traits usually help you, while negative traits usually hinder you, but, depending on the situation, they can flip. You never know what's going to happen.

The way the new version of the rules work is as follows: Any time you try to do something, you may list off any appropriate traits. You get one die for free (as described by one of my players as the, "I am a person doing a thing die"), plus one die for each trait you use. If Janine wanted to shoot someone with her rayser, she might pick Warrior Species, Academy Training, Security, and Weapons Training, giving her a total of 5 dice to roll.

In addition, any time Janine is in a situation where one of her traits forces her to do something or prevents her from doing something she wants to do, she gains a Drama Point. For instance, say she and a fellow officer are sneakily sneaking around a base somewhere when they spot a lone guard. The other officer might insist that they continue sneaking, but Janine is Cocky and knows that she can take this guy. So she steps out from around the corner and tries to hit him with a stun beam. Since that changed her plans, Janine gets a Drama Point.

Let's further say that the fellow officer has the Quite Discreet trait and wants to get through this base without attracting any attention at all. The officer and Janine might have a quick, whispered discussion right before Janine stands up and rayser blasts the guard. Since the fellow officer was trying really hard to be discreet and was trying to prevent Janine from doing anything cocky, they also get a Drama Point.

The nice thing about this system is that players don't just buy more points in a set number of skills. Instead, they get to increase the depth and breadth of their character's personality and knowledge through play. For instance, if your character got taken over by some kind of technological hive mind for a game or two, you might want to give him the Lover of Autonomy trait, or similar. Because traits are mostly picked by the player, and because every player and character is different, that means that no two Boldly Go characters will ever look exactly the same.

But that's more than enough of talking about why my game is awesome and great. Next post, I'll be going back to rolling up characters for other people's games.

Exciting Crossover Event! Part One!

Back when I started pumping out Star Trek characters, I mentioned that, should gumption win out and the stars align, I might feature an EXCITING CROSSOVER EVENT between two big themes on this blog: character creation and Boldly Go!

Oh, looky! That day has arrived!

Those of you who have been following along (and many, many thanks that you have and continue to do so), may have noticed one thing that is common to all of the Star Trek games that I own and have made characters for. They are all extremely fiddly and also have loads and loads (and also loads) of skills.

Boldly Go isn't like that at all, and not because of any conscious decision on my part to run as far away from the other Star Trek RPGs as I possibly could. I didn't wind up looking at any of them until well after I had started working on Boldly Go and had this odd idea to just go back and see if my ideas dovetailed at all with any of the ideas that had been previously published. It turns out that the answer was a big no.

Boldly Go's first system was something I cobbled together after watching about half of The Original Series episodes of Star Trek. I was, maybe, four episodes in when I decided that I might want to write an RPG, based on the show, and so I continued watching with a notebook and pen beside me, so that I could write down anything that was either obvious or repeated that needs to be in the rules.

One of the earliest ones (and a perennial favorite), is the Torn Uniform Rule. To wit: In the event that you suffer damage from an attack, you may instead tear your uniform to ignore the effects of that attack. So, for all of you who have been wondering just how Kirk can fend off Gorn, solid-light holograms of his Academy nemesis, and unruly children without suffering much more than a scratch, now you know!

And, yes, this rule is silly. This is because I am silly, and also because Star Trek can be, has been, and (thank you, CBS) will be silly in future episodes. It's not silly all the time, certainly, but it's not a deadly-serious, hard-SF series all the time in which there are no jokes and weird/surreal things and no laughing. That's one thing that makes my game slightly different from other games that have come before--the acceptance that some things in Star Trek are just goofy, and that that's okay.

The other big thing about my version of the rules, which is what I wanted to talk about here, is that my first version of a Star Trek game had very few stats or skills. In fact, there were exactly five stats, each of which each stat had four associated skills. This made a stat/skill chart that fit nicely on a character sheet and looked a bit like this:

Strength	Dexterity	Mental	Personality	Technical
Athletics	Agility	Culture	Charm	Medicine
HtH Combat	Dodge	Cunning	Intimidate	Pilot
Might	Rng Combat	Intellect	Trick	Repair
Resilience	Stealth	Science	Willpower	Use Tech

Where other games have, say, the Science skill broken down into a dozen different sub-categories (Astrogation, Astrophysics, Geology, etc., etc.), I only have the one skill. Why is that? Two reasons!

• Reason #1: I hate lists of things so, so very much. The fewer lists I have to deal with, the better.

• Reason #2: Because, in the show, just about every character knows some science. Spock knows the most, of course (unsurprisingly, his character wold have high scores in both Mental and Science, which would be representative of that knowledge), but Kirk, McCoy, and the others also know some science. 

During character creation, the player gets to assign some points to their stats and some points to their skills. Whenever something happens in the game that requires a skill roll, the player gets a number of d6s equal to stat + skill and rolls them. Any result of 5 or 6 counts as a success.

There's two paths to take at this juncture, and I decided to take the one that resulted in fewer lists. To wit: Rather than say, "here are a dozen different science skills. Spock has high ratings in most of them. Kirk has moderate ratings in, let's say two," I said, "there is one science skill that should properly be pronounced, 'SCIENCE!' Spock's score in it is amazing. Kirk may have one point in it, so he's familiar with science, but not particularly good at it."

Anyone who has played the game recently will look at the above and realize that this isn't actually how Boldly Go works. And that's true! That's because, with the help of Bob Dunham, I came up with an even better idea that makes even more sense in the context of the show.

I'll talk about that...next time!

The RPG Character Library: Star Trek (Decipher)

To finish out the Star Trek section of the character library, I made a character for the most recent, officially-licensed Star Trek game (at least, until Modiphius releases their game, unless it's already released, in which case, I'm at least one game behind). This version was published by Decipher Roleplaying & Miniatures Studio in 2002, and it allows you to play a character from any era of Star Trek except for Enterprise. It also boasts, "Original Star Trek canon consistent with previous versions of the Star Trek RPG."

There are quite a lot of similarities between this game and the version of the game made by Last Unicorn Games, though the rules are different enough that you couldn't easily switch a character between the two without serious reworking. Comparing the two, I like the Last Unicorn Games version a bit better because it's a lot more dialed-in on what you can play and where (and when) you're playing. Decipher's version allows you to play anything from any era and, because of this, adds in a lot of complexity and a lot of explanation.

As an aside: Last Unicorn's game is complete in one book. The Decipher book, while a bit smaller than the LU book, is just the player's guide, meaning I need at least one more book in order to properly play this game.

I won't say that the breadth of what you can do in this game is bad, necessarily, just daunting. This is also the first Star Trek RPG that explicitly allows you to play someone who doesn't work for Starfleet. I can understand the allure, but I also don't understand why you would do this. In my limited experience with Boldly Go, making a character that doesn't fit into the ship's hierarchy tends to leave one a bit outside of, and without a clearly-defined role in, the player group. Still, though, I suppose it's nice to have options.

Character creation sort of follows Last Unicorn Games. You pick your species, which gives you bonus skills, edges, and powers. You generate your stats. You pick a Personal Development template, which gives you some skills and edges. You pick a Professional Development template, which involves picking, say, "Rogue," and the one of the three options given under "Rogue," which gives you more skills and edges. If you want to be a member of Starfleet, you need to take one of the "Starship X Officer" development templates, which include: Command, Operations, and Science. Each of these covers way more than three templates, allowing you a lot of leeway in picking what you want to do.

As has become tradition with these games, the species you can pick from in the Decipher version is different from any species list in any of the other games. Decipher lets you pick from:  Bajoran, Betazoids, Cardassians, Ferengi, Humans, Klingons, Ocampa, Talaxians, Trill, and Vulcans. They also have rules to allow you to make a Mixed Species character and, though they are a bit clunky, they are a welcome addition to the game.

Amused and encouraged by the idea that I could literally make anything I wanted, I went ahead and made a Klingon who was a Starfleet ship's counselor. I gave him the Nomadic Childhood Personal Development, explaining why he's met so many different people and why he may not think about things the same way as more "typical" Klingons. I suspect much of his therapy involves forcing the patient to confront their problems head on and, possibly, using pain sticks whenever necessary.

Also: The character sheets provided in the book are very pretty and done up to look like something printed on a Starfleet computer in LCARS. Not all that easy to photocopy and probably very easily mangled once you had to change your character, but top-notch in the looks department.

T’ang the Intractable

Klingon, Starship Officer (Starfleet), Ship’s Counselor with a Nomadic Childhood

Strength	7	Quickness	+0	Defense	7
Intellect	7	Savvy	+2*	Health	5
Agility	5	Stamina	+0	Courage	3
Vitality	5	Willpower	+0	Renown	0
Presence	11
Perception	5

*Favored Reaction

Abilities: Pathos (Make people feel comfortable. Ignore all social penalties when making an Inquire (Interview) roll.)

Edges:  High Pain Threshold, Skill Focus (Persuasive), Brak’lul (Extra bones and organs. +2 Stamina reaction bonus. Half effect from stun weapons), Ferocity: RAMPAGE! (+2 Armed Combat +2 Unarmed Combat +1 Health. Spend 1 Courage point to break out of it prior to the end of the duration), Honor (Add Renown modifier when interacting with Klingons.)

Fluent Languages: Klingon, Federation Standard

Skills

Armed Combat (Klingon Traditional Weapons) +3

Athletics: +1

Computer Use (Retrieve) +1

Culture (Ferengi) +2

Culture (Earth) +2

Energy Weapon +1

First Aid +2

History (The Klingon Empire) +3

Influence (Charm) +1

Inquire (Interview) +4

Language (Ferengi) +2

Language (Vulcan) +1

Medicine (Psychology) +3

Negotiate +1

Politics (Federation) +3

Repair: +1

Specific World (Ferenginar) +2

Specific World (Earth) +3

Specific World (Vulcan) +1

Survival: +1

System Operation (Command) +1

Unarmed Combat (Shat-Fu) +1

The RPG Character Library: Star Trek: The Next Generation (Last Unicorn Games)

As previously mentioned, I have multiple different versions of Star Trek roleplaying games. The one I'm covering in this installment of ye blog is the one produced by Last Unicorn Games. It is specifically set in the era of The Next Generation (it's right there in the title!), with show-appropriate species to choose from and whatnot.

Of the three Star Trek systems that I have, I liked this one the best. That's not to say it was easy--by no means, no--but in comparison, it turned out to be significantly less work than FASA's game and...I guess differently convoluted than the one I'll be reviewing next time. I will say that it covers everything that you would need to make a Starfleet character, and even has some hints on how to make a non-Starfleet character--if you want to make an ambassador, or merchant, or something.

It starts out simple enough: Pick a species template. Add a professional overlay. These snap together in a satisfying way with stats and skills already filled out.

It gets a bit more complicated when we move on to backgrounds. This is a life path system where you decide how your character grew up, where they studied, who they know, and so on. You get a different number of points to spend on each step of your background, and you may either use these points to pick and choose skill bonuses, advantages, and disadvantages. Or, if you're lazy, like I am, you can use your points to buy one of the pre-built packages. This is actually much faster, less fiddly, and still allows you to create an interesting character. I'd imagine I'd use the other method once I was familiar enough with the system to know how everything works.

And that's...pretty much it. Much less hideous when compared to the FASA system, though it does have rather large bits of kludge stuck to it. Do you want to see the biggest one? Okay! Here it is.

It is possible for you to get the same skill from two (or more) different sources during character creation. There is a half-page table that explains that this is something to be expected, that it's normal, and that you don't need to see a doctor, probably. It also tells you how to resolve it.

• If both sources provide the same skill with different specializations, I know two specializations. So I'd get History (Tellar) 1 (2) and (Federation) (2).
• If both sources provide the same skill with different specializations at different levels, I take the higher skill and know two specializations.
• If both sources provide the same skill with the same specialization at the same level, I add one point to either the skill or the specialization.
• If both sources provide the same skill with the same specialization at different levels, I take the higher skill level, then add one point to either my skill level or my specialization.
• Skills without specializations (such as Dodge), simply add together.

For those following along, the skill number (what my skill currently is) is the first number. My specialization is in the parentheses. I'm still not 100% sure how that works, since I read the character creation rules and not the "how to do things" rules. That said, it only took me about 40 minutes to make a character that might a) be correct and b) be ready to play.

I find it interesting which species make it into which Star Trek games. This one, being set in the Next Gen era, allows Andorians, Betazoids, Bolians, Centaurans, Humans, Tellarites, and Vulcans. I guess, since Worf was the only Starfleet Klingon in canon in this era, I can't play a Klingon.

Don't worry, though. I'm going to scratch that itch...next time!

Lieutenant Bashlan Cov, Tellarite Engineer

Fitness 3 (6)	Strength +0	Courage	3
	Vitality +1
Coordination 2 (5)	Dexterity +0	Renown	1 in Skill
	Reaction +1
Intellect 3 (5)	Logic +0	Rank	Lieutenant
	Perception +0
Presence 2 (5)	Empathy -1	Wound Levels	4
	Willpower +0
Psi 0 (5)	Focus +0
	Range +0

Advantages: Alertness +2, Commendation +2 (Famous Incident), Infrared Vision +2, Promotion to Lieutenant +3

Disadvantages: Argumentative -1, Intolerant of Poor Maintenance Procedures -1, Slow Healing -2, Vengeful (Frigging Cardassians) -1

Early Life: Failed Colony

Academy Life: Advanced Research Engineering

Tour of Duty: Hostile Frontier Defense Mission

Skills

Athletics (Parrises Squares) 1 (2)

Dodge 2

Computer (Modeling) 1 (2)

Culture (Tellarite) 2 (3)

Energy Weapon (Phaser) 1 (2)

Engineering, Propulsion (Impulse) 2 (3), (Warp Drive) (3) (Ion) (3)

Engineering, Systems (Environmental) 2 (3), (Transporter/Replication) (3)

Engineering, Material (Mechanical) 1 (2) (Starship Design) (2)

Material Engineering (Starship Design) 1 (2)

History (Federation) 1 (2) (Tellarite) 1 (2)

Language (Federation Standard) 1 (2), Tellarite (2)

Law (Starfleet Regs) 1 (2)

Persuasion (Debate) 2 (3)

Personal Equipment (Communicator) 1 (2)

Science, Physical (Computer) 1 (2)

Planetside Survival (Arctic) 1 (2) (Mountain) (2)

Shipboard Systems (Envi) 2 (3) (Transporter) (3) (Tactical) (3) Sensors (3)

Starship Tactics (Cardassian) 1 (2)

Vehicle Operations (Shuttlecraft) 1 (2) Ground Vehicles (2)

World Knowledge (Tellar) 1 (2)