[Editor's Note -- I just plopped all the mail messages from the fasatrek list to
make this file. I hope to format
it a little better if I ever get the time...]
For more details on this campaign, see the Star Trek: Colony
http://travel.to/startrekcolony webpage.
Subject: Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony"
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 1998 18:32:41 +0100 (BST)
From: Ian McDonald <ikm@netserve.ft.com>
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
Someone asked about campaign ideas. I am thinking of running a
colony-based campaign, and wouldn't mind comment.
The setting; a small (10m people) Federation colony which has a large
minority of people from outside the federation. Naturally, there is a
certain amount of weird stuff [tm] that was not picked up by the surveys.
The colony is about 100 years old. The nearest major Federation system is
Cestus. The nearest border is with the Tholians, who [non-canonincally]
have a very fluid concept of borders. It is the TNG/DS9 era.
The PCs; the small Starfleet presence sent to check out the 'weird stuff',
the colony authorities, and some major community figures.
The Starfleet presence is led by an avuncular old Captain who is looking
for a final command somewhere he can put down roots. He has a somewhat
paternal fondness for the other PCs, and believes in delegation. He is an
NPC, and a walking plot device to keep everyone involved.
**
I would welcome any comments. Has anyone ran a game in the Colonial
Operations command, rather than Exploration?
I chose the Tholians because TNG/DS9 barely uses them, and that gives me a
lot of freedom to do what I want with them. Has much non-canon stuff
developed them?
Subject: RE: Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony"
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 1998 13:46:42 -0400
From: "Gard, Richard" <Richard.Gard@teligent.com>
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: "'fasatrek@iastate.edu'" <fasatrek@iastate.edu>
Ian McDonald [mailto:ikm@netserve.ft.com] wrote:
>I chose the Tholians because TNG/DS9 barely uses them, and that gives
me a
>lot of freedom to do what I want with them. Has much non-canon stuff
>developed them?
I haven't seen all the TNG/DS9 episodes yet. Can you tell me which one
or ones had the Tholians in it? I'm real curious to see how they were
portrayed with the bigger special effects budget.
Thanks,
Rich
Subject: Re: Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony"
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 1998 15:12:00 -0400
From: "Christopher A. Bourassa" <bourassa@ma.ultranet.com>
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
Ian McDonald stated that he was going to start a campaign based on
colonization of a planet near the Tholian border in the time period of
"Star Trek: The Next Generation" because the Tholians weren't often
used in that time period. My first question is what did the original
series really do with the Tholians? I have nothing against the time
frame of "Star Trek: The Next Generation". To be honest, I think
that
that series is my favorite of all. I just don't believe that you should
limit yourself. You could actually play in any of the time frames
whether it be the original series or any of the current series.
However, I wonder if you won't have a problem with the general plan of
your campaign. I admit that I don't have much experience as a Game
Master, but I urge you to look at "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" for an
example. I love "Star Trek" and "Star Trek: The Next
Generation", but
I've never really been able to enjoy the two newest series. I admit
that I have begun to appreciate "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" a bit more
in the season that just concluded, but I still cannot even begin to put
it in the same light as the first two series. In my opinion, "Star
Trek: Voyager", aka "Lost in Space: The Next Generation", is
entirely
unwatchable. Again, these are just my opinions. I'm sure that there
are classic Trekkers who said the same, and probably still feel that
way, about "Star Trek: The Next Generation". But that is the series
that I grew up with as a teenager (I was a freshman in high school when
the show premiered), and thus it is my favorite of all the series. It
took some time for "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" to find its niche, if
it indeed ever has, because I feel that they limited themselves too much
with what they could do for exciting stories that Trekkers have come to
appreciate by setting the show on a space station. There really wasn't
that much room for exploration any more, hence the creation of the "USS
Defiant". Granted, it took some time for "Star Trek: The Next
Generation" to become interesting, the entire first season in my
opinion, but that was far less than the time it took "Star Trek: Deep
Space Nine". Please don't misunderstand me. These are just my
opinions, and I am not in any way trying to dissuade you from creating
the type of campaign that you are thinking of. I'm sure that you have
many ideas to make it work, but I do have a suggestion that might be the
best of both worlds. What if your characters were stationed on a
colonization vessel that would bring settlers to a new planet to
colonize, help them get settled, and then move on? They could then lead
the bulk of the colonization to the right individuals. Or your
characters could be stationed on a ship designed to protect the colonies
and mediate any disputes, similar to the new novels "Star Trek: The New
Frontier"? These are just possible ideas that you might think of, but
in no way am I trying to change your mind. My aim was just to give some
alternate ideas that may make more story possibilities. Just be sure to
make the colonists so interesting that your player characters have no
desire to leave if you use your ideas.
Subject: RE:Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony"
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 1998 15:29:19 -0400
From: Joe Lemoine <omnibus@lycosmail.com>
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: FASATREK-DIGEST <fasatrek-digest@iastate.edu>
> Someone asked about campaign ideas. I am thinking of running a
> colony-based campaign, and wouldn't mind comment.
>
> The setting; a small (10m people) Federation colony which has a large
> minority of people from outside the federation. Naturally, there is a
> certain amount of weird stuff [tm] that was not picked up by the surveys.
> The colony is about 100 years old. The nearest major Federation system is
> Cestus. The nearest border is with the Tholians, who [non-canonincally]
> have a very fluid concept of borders. It is the TNG/DS9 era.
>
> The PCs; the small Starfleet presence sent to check out the 'weird stuff',
> the colony authorities, and some major community figures.
I REALLY like this idea! I always wanted to use the Tholians more
myself, but I'm afraid I have never been able to think up a very
creative way to do so (other than the passing ship encounters here and
there throughout the years.) You end up having plot potential with 1)
the weird stuff on the planet, 2) the weird stuff with Tholians and 3)
potential weird stuff in a section of space that is mostly ignored by
Star Trek.
I believe you have all the element of a great campaign. I do have one
question. Will there be any sort of Starfleet ship(s) involved? I mean
like a small survey vessel or runabout. Maybe you should have the SF
personnel depend on a small ship owned by one of the civilians at the
colony (who's very protective of it.)
I hope you will post whatever you come up with for your Tholians. I
think it would be very interesting.
Subject: Re: Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony"
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 1998 15:45:48 EDT
From: EnsTrek5@aol.com
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
In a message dated 98-07-16 13:50:42 EDT, you write:
<< I haven't seen all the TNG/DS9 episodes yet. Can you tell me which one
or ones had the Tholians in it? I'm real curious to see how they were
portrayed with the bigger special effects budget.
Thanks,
Rich
>>
Actually the Tholians were only mentioned(ie. I think Quark said something
about Tholian Silk once) and never shown in TNG and DS9.
EnsTrek5@aol.com
<A HREF="http://members.aol.com/EnsTrek5/index.html">The USS Regayov
NCC-2002B Page</A>
<A HREF="http://members.aol.com/EnsTrek5/banshee.html">The USS
Banshe SIM
Group Page</A>
<A HREF="http://members.aol.com/EnsTrek5/FASA.html">The
Triangle</A>
Subject: Re: Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony" + ramblings
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 1998 23:18:40 +0100
From: "Steven Parnell" <PHP97SRP@sheffield.ac.uk>
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
> From: EnsTrek5@aol.com
> Date: Thu, 16 Jul 1998 15:45:48
EDT
> To:
fasatrek@iastate.edu
> Subject: Re: Campaign, "Star Trek:
Colony"
> Reply-to: fasatrek@iastate.edu
> In a message dated 98-07-16 13:50:42 EDT, you write:
>
> << I haven't seen all the TNG/DS9 episodes yet. Can you tell me which one
> or ones had the Tholians in it? I'm real curious to see how they were
> portrayed with the bigger special effects budget.
>
> Thanks,
> Rich
> >>
> Actually the Tholians were only mentioned(ie. I think Quark said something
> about Tholian Silk once) and never shown in TNG and DS9.
> EnsTrek5@aol.com
Actaully I think Sisko mentions the Tholian ambassador owing him a
favour and giving Kassidy Yates some Tholian silk, but thats not too
much to build a race on. The only other occurance of the Tholians in
any Trek publication to my knowledge is in Marvels short lived Pike
series where they mentioned some Tholian shock troops. If memory
serves these were a seperate race similar to the Jem' hadar in DS9.
They were also covered in (Shane Johnsons ?) Races of the Federation
book
released by pocket books some years ago, I thing this had a picture
and a little info. This may have suggested that they were an
insectiod sort of hive mind.
Personally I used the Tholians very little in my game, although when
I did they were always portrayed as mysterious and rather more
advanced than they let on. I always envisioned the Tholian homeworld
to be totally alien to anything else shown on Trek.
Maybe that's the way to approach the game just allow the Tholians to
be as mysterious as they seemed in the original series episode, if
the players know nothing about them then it's more fun for them to
find out that way. Or did you imagine the Federation having opened up
a dialogue with the Tholians and the players having quite a lot of
information on them when your campaign starts ?
Oops there's also Task force games's turn on the Tholians, although
I can't really remember what they said about them.
Good luck with the campaign, it sounds interesting. I did a brief
campaign some years ago set on a space station in orbit around a
planet. The station was similar to Babylon 5 and Arthur C's
Rendezvous with Rama ship, although it was inspired by the station in
Diane Duane's excellent novel The Wounded Sky. The campaign worked
quite well and still gives the characters a 'home' so to speak now
and again. I choose this option as I ran out of ideas for ship based
adventures for a while.
Best Wishes
Steve
======================================
Steve Parnell - Research Student - D38
Tel; +44 (0)114 222 4271
Fax; +44 (0)114 272 8079
Low Dimensional Semiconductor Devices/
Neutron Scattering Group
Department Of Physics
Hounsfield Road
Sheffield
S3 7RH
======================================
Subject: RE: Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony"
Date: Fri, 17 Jul 1998 09:32:32 +0100 (BST)
From: Ian McDonald <ikm@netserve.ft.com>
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: "Gard, Richard" <Richard.Gard@teligent.com>
CC: fasatrek@iastate.edu
They have never shown. They've just been mentioned a few times - as
purveyors of silk, as belligerents in tactical simulations and backstory
conflicts, and as diplomats on DS9.
On Thu, 16 Jul 1998, Gard, Richard wrote:
> Ian McDonald [mailto:ikm@netserve.ft.com] wrote:
>
> >I chose the Tholians because TNG/DS9 barely uses them, and that gives
> me a
> >lot of freedom to do what I want with them. Has much non-canon stuff
> >developed them?
>
> I haven't seen all the TNG/DS9 episodes yet. Can you tell me which one
> or ones had the Tholians in it? I'm real curious to see how they were
> portrayed with the bigger special effects budget.
>
> Thanks,
> Rich
>
Subject: RE:Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony"
Date: Fri, 17 Jul 1998 09:50:31 +0100 (BST)
From: Ian McDonald <ikm@netserve.ft.com>
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
On Thu, 16 Jul 1998, Joe Lemoine wrote:
> I believe you have all the element of a great campaign. I do have one
> question. Will there be any sort of Starfleet ship(s) involved? I mean
> like a small survey vessel or runabout. Maybe you should have the SF
> personnel depend on a small ship owned by one of the civilians at the
> colony (who's very protective of it.)
I was going to give the Starfleet folks a ship, yes - probably something
large than a Danube class but smaller than an Intrepid class. I don't
think it would be like Starfleet to 'borrow' a private ship. (And we don't
really know what 'private' means in the context of Star Trek.)
One thing that the original 'Voyages of the USS Darwin' campaign taught me
is that players hate being in a ship without photon torpedoes :).
Subject: Re: Campaign, "Star Trek: Colony"
Date: Sat, 18 Jul 1998 01:05:37 CDT
From: grimjack@iastate.edu
Reply-To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
To: fasatrek@iastate.edu
> Ian McDonald stated that he was going to start a campaign based on
> colonization of a planet near the Tholian border in the time period of
> "Star Trek: The Next Generation" because the Tholians weren't often
> used in that time period. My first question is what did the original
> series really do with the Tholians? I have nothing against the time
> frame of "Star Trek: The Next Generation". To be honest, I
think that
> that series is my favorite of all. I just don't believe that you should
> limit yourself. You could actually play in any of the time frames
[snip-aroonski]
Just had a passing inspiration that's a loose fit on the colony world
idea, so it could be used pretty much anywheres (plural intentional).
What about a series of adventures set in the Trek Classic, TNG and DS9
eras that interconnect?
There have been examples of this both in the comics, and to a limited
extent in TNG and DS9.
A short adventure in each era, in the same place, involving a mystery
(either external like an era where ships mysteriously disappear, to
internal, a series of murders that never got solved, or both, a
murderous collaberator in a Starfleet uniform secretly helping the
people making the ships vanish).
You'd have to make seperate PC stats and account for aging, etc, but the
whole thing would be perfect for a series of one shots at a con.
---
------------------------------------------------------------------------
|"Just me,| grimjack@iastate.edu| Sometimes gamer, writer,
reader |
| my Muse,| All rights reserved.| I don't speak for
ISU.
|
| and I." | Copyright 1998. | ISU doesn't speak for
me. |
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