Star Trek Games
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I have no clue why there aren’t any Star Trek MUSHes out there. I know it’s really popular in the PBP / PBEM world, and there are dozens of Star Trek Bridge Crew / Artemis Bridge Simulator groups out there.
I wouldn’t play on one though, and it wouldn’t surprise me if my reason why is the reason there aren’t any of them already. I believe that Star Trek tells a really solid story about the primary crew of a starship (or station in DS9’s case) and trying to expand that story to a wider group of characters loses a lot of the Star Trek charm for me.
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@Raistlin I wouldn’t make reports mandatory, maybe treat them like Arx Journals? Or scenes can start in media res with a log voice over giving a brief setup (although technically, the log overview means it isnt in media res, but nya, nya I say!)
Questions are mostly ‘Spaaaaaaace Code?!?’ and ‘What rules?’ Star Trek Adventures is the latest and doesn’t have XP progression, more milestone, as Modephius do, so catchup is easy, ‘anyone with X or lower major milestones, gain a major, anyone with more, gain a minor milestone instead’. Admittedly, I haven’t looked at the 2nd edition yet.
@MisterBoring said in Star Trek Games:
really solid story about the primary crew of a starship
Probably a factor. Sure, the Modephius rules include ‘we dont need the doctor for this mission but dont want the player to feel left out… lets roll up a temporary PC called Chief O’Brien to come along’, but a MU will have probably have a person playing that character. (This could be a neat way to fill out a roster, though, so keep roster game in mind. Can also give people having an opportunity to play guest of the week NPCs).
Tangentially important to point out the entire point of Lower Decks is that we don’t focus on the primary crew, and it has given us some of the finest Trek in decades.
Mummy Pun? MUMMY PUN!
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RE: Code & System
Not much, if any, real thought has gone into this, so the answer to those questions doesn’t really exist.
However, I am a fan of the Modiphius Star Trek Adventures, and I’ve actually coded up a system for it in Ares. So, I’d have that out of the box.
As for the space code, there would likely be none. Just regular RP rooms and whatnot using the Ares scene system.
That’s if I did it anyway.
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@Jennkryst said in Star Trek Games:
Tangentially important to point out the entire point of Lower Decks is that we don’t focus on the primary crew, and it has given us some of the finest Trek in decades.
True, but that’s - what, one show out of a dozen that went that route? The default Trek would play like a FC-driven game, with the department heads as coveted positions and everyone else feeling like second fiddle. That was also how the old-school Trek games I tried felt, and why I believe they were never as popular as some of the other genres.
I certainly think it’s possible to make a game that worked differently, but you’d have to deliberately make game design choices to break that mold.
The other challenge is figuring out what people actually do. Like, say I’m a junior Engineering crewman. What is my RP about?
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@Faraday said in Star Trek Games:
Challenge is figuring out what people actually do. Like, say I’m a junior Engineering crewman. What is my RP about?
I guess I’ve never had this problem, I can always find something to do if I have willing RP partners. For a junior engineering crewman, I’d see these options:
- Jump into whatever active plots are happening
- Find some available people and do “Star Trek-y” things; take a shuttle out to explore an anomaly, run some training scenarios, tackle an engineering problem that’s cropped up
- Social RP at Ten Forward
As for feeling like second fiddle, that’s one of the things I really like about Star Trek Adventures. Everyone is built from the same point pool, so everyone feels like a real part of the crew rather than just backup.
And honestly, it’s totally canon for junior officers to step up. We see ensigns on away teams and covering bridge positions all the time in the shows. Having lower-ranking characters take on bigger roles isn’t breaking the mold, it’s perfectly in line with how Star Trek actually works.
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@Faraday said in Star Trek Games:
Like, say I’m a junior Engineering crewman. What is my RP about?
Hobbies. You’re in a classical quartet or jazz band that puts on shows at the bar… or do a Doctoro Picardo and recreate old opera houses to do… opera. Go fill up the biofilters on the
fuck simulatorholodeck with your inceedibly inappropriate hologram girlfriend. Build a racing shuttle. Write holonovels. Save humanity by completing a Q test. Do weird yoga. Invent silly sports. Have sex with a ghost. Visit Risa. Have sex with a ghost on Risa in a holodeck. Do unofficial war crimes.
Maybe you’re on duty. Every time an alert happens, system diagnostics are run, go go go! Even when there isnt an alert, you still need to run regular diagnostics to make sure that the ~~ LCARS is properly filled with rocks so there is debris when it dramatically overloads~~ self-sealing steam bolts are properly bolted in place. Go crawl through the Jefferies Tubes to replace the bio-conduit before it catches the flu from alien cheese. Realize it’s the wrong tube when you meet Jeffrey Combs. Get sent on an away mission.
There is a whole chart, for roll d20 to [science] the [device] for [techbobabble].
There are a lot of options out there.
Edit: Yellow in TNG is also where temporal enforcement lives, so be a time cop when you get too many tachyons, or whatever the current wibbly-wobbly technobabble of the week uses.
Mummy Pun? MUMMY PUN!
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@Raistlin said in Star Trek Games:
what would stop you from playing on a Star Trek game?
Other people, generally.
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@Jennkryst said in Star Trek Games:
There is a whole chart, for roll d20 to [science] the [device] for [techbobabble].
@Raistlin said in Star Trek Games:
Find some available people and do “Star Trek-y” things; take a shuttle out to explore an anomaly, run some training scenarios, tackle an engineering problem that’s cropped up
Those aren’t the kinds of things that make Trek interesting, though. A team can’t just take a shuttle out, get some readings, and then go home. An engineer can’t just throw technobabble at a broken drive. That would be really boring to RP.
Stuff has to happen. There have to be stakes. The drive needs to be fixed in time to get the ship away from some threat. The anomaly has to put the crew in peril somehow.
Some players can generate those stories for themselves, sure, but many (most?) are going to need it handed to them. It’s much harder to craft engaging stories like that for a random assortment of characters from disparate departments than it is for a fixed group of series regulars + the occasional guest star/redshirt.
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@Faraday said in Star Trek Games:
Stuff has to happen. There have to be stakes. The drive needs to be fixed in time to get the ship away from some threat. The anomaly has to put the crew in peril somehow.
I think this might actually lead to more problems for a MU.
Assuming a game focuses on a single ship or station, and the majority of players are playing that ship or station’s crew, any problem that puts the crew in peril puts most of the playerbase in peril. And it’s been my experience that if a PC is in peril, that PC’s player would like their character to have some hand in thwarting that peril. And if only 5-6 PCs in the whole game get to thwart that peril, it leaves an untold number of PCs just standing in the wings waiting for their chance. I think lack of spotlight would build up way quicker on a Star Trek MU than any other for that reason.
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@MisterBoring “The crew” in that example could just be the crew of the shuttle, not necessarily the entire crew. But yes, you’re right about the general problem. My point is just that there needs to be something more going on besides just “Ensign Bob technobabbles the broken thing”, and players on the whole are not great at driving stuff like that (in my experience).
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I think this conversation is largely over with everyone’s opinions stated, but I did want to address how I would handle the various scenarios people mentioned if I were actually playing a character in this situation.
I’m making some assumptions here, including that staff supports player-driven RP. Honestly, I wouldn’t be on a game that didn’t.
- I log on and put out a call on the OOC channels looking for players who want to RP.
- I contact those folks and tell them their characters receive orders to report to Shuttle Bay 1.
- My character briefs them on a subspace anomaly that needs investigation. Should be routine sensor sweeps, but in Star Trek, it’s never routine.
- It’s not routine! The anomaly starts interfering with our warp core as we approach, meaning someone has to recalibrate the deflector array while another crew member pilots us to safety.
- We get dramatic RP with various characters contributing - someone pilots the shuttle, someone works the sensors to analyze the phenomenon, someone reroutes power to compensate for the interference.
- They make it back to the ship or station with their data, and now have something to debrief senior officers on and discuss in Ten Forward, setting up future RP hooks.
This small, initial scene could lead to all sorts of future RP opportunities. Engineering could discover that the anomaly is affecting the station’s reactors, a strange illness could develop affecting either the away team or other crew members, etc.
For me, I just don’t buy into the “there’d be nothing to do unless you’re a senior officer” belief. If you want RP, you can find RP. Star Trek has always been about the crew working together to solve problems, and there’s no reason a MUSH can’t capture that same collaborative spirit.
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@Faraday said in Star Trek Games:
Stuff has to happen. There have to be stakes.
This isn’t Trek-specific, it’s literally every MUSH ever.
Some players can be those three people on Voyager who never volunteer for any away missions and just do the social rp. Or be a Dabo Girl on DS9. It’s fine.
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@Raistlin said in Star Trek Games:
For me, I just don’t buy into the “there’d be nothing to do unless you’re a senior officer” belief
Historically, that has been the case. So you, or whoever is running this game, would have to prove otherwise. If you’re playing Crewman A. Nonymous you better not be anywhere besides a jeffreys tube and not getting in the way of the person we especially chose to play Lieutenant Commander Action “Buzz” Heroguy.
