Category Archives: Captain’s Log

Play

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If there’s one thing I’ve picked up from watching more Solo RPG videos, especially from The Grouch Couch, it’s that I should be playing more, not trying to write a novel.

There should be more dice rolling and less treating the play session as a creative writing exercise.

And that goes for any other tabletop games I’m trying to play, like Five Leagues and Five Parsecs.

I’ve found myself lost in simple things like trying to hard to come up with background details for a character I may or may not ever play, or trying to come up with names for regions/cities for my Five Leagues map.

And that’s probably one of the things that subconsciously prevents me from delving more into any of the Solo RPGs that i’ve already set up, all three of them.

I have one campaign underway (Star Trek Adventures/Captain’s Log), and two ready to start (Dragonbane, D&D 5E) but  now I believe that the issue I was having was trying to describe events THAT HAVE NOT HAPPENED YET.

You can’t write a good story without an outline, so how can I describe how my adventure is going without playing out the situation?

For Star Trek: Excalibur, we’re about to continue our mission of exploration.

Irony: the last bit of storytelling for Star Trek: Excalibur was *totally* a creative writing exercise, no dice were rolled, just trying to advance the plot.

For Dragonbane, my character is about to delve into the unknown catacombs.

For D&D, my two-man party is about to enter the forest in search of a lost scouting party from a local town.

Other games will have some sort of after action report as they are played.

Don’t touch that dial!

Star Trek: Excalibur, S01E03

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Ship’s Log, August 3rd, 2154.

The Excalibur has returned us back to our original position prior to our little trip through the spatial rift.  We have resumed course to explore the unknown space before us, and have run smack dab into an Andorian patrol.

The Andorians have not acknowledged our hails and appear to have their weapons trained on the Excalibur.

Commander Saguisag orders the hull polarized and to continue hailing the Andorians.

“Charge cannons?”

“No, let’s keep a defensive posture for now.”

The gambit worked, the Andorians do not fire on the Excalibur.  The Andorian ships power down their weapons.

“We’re being hailed by the lead ship.”

“On screen.”

A male Andorian appears.

“I am Captain Shabaav of the Andorian Empire.”

“Commander Saguisag, Starfleet.  What’s your business here, Captain?”

The Andorian captain furrows his brow.

“You should have received a transmission from your superiors, Commander.”

At that very moment, the communications officer reports a message from Earth, recalling Lt. Commander Riordan back to Earth while the Andorians transfer a member of their race to join the Excalibur crew as an observer and first officer.  This crew change is meant to strengthen relations between Earth and the Andorian Empire.

The message is checked and double checked for authenticity, while the Columbia NX-02 arrives to bring Riordan back to Earth.

As Riordan was a popular shipmate aboard Excalibur, some of the crew are not happy with him leaving, nor the idea of an Andorian taking his place.

A goodbye party/welcome ceremony is held aboard Columbia, where Excalibur‘s new XO, Threvak, is introduced.  He seems less aggressive than the typical Andorians we’ve encountered in Star Trek.

The Andorian and Earth ship crews say their goodbyes, the Andorians go back to their patrol route, Columbia heads back to Earth, and Excalibur continues on her mission of exploration.

“Ready to resume our mission?”

Looking around the bridge, Commander Saguisag gets nods from his crew.

“Let’s Go!”

And the ship goes into warp.

[end credits]

—

Far too long between these sessions, and this wasn’t even a proper session, just an exercise inmoving the plot along.

I wanted to go back to having an Andorian aboard that I had originally rolled up for this crew, oh so many months ago.

I hoping to find the time to expand this campaign, either through actual play or through just simple writing, even if it looks like an outline more than an actual story.

And yes, “Let’s Go!” is Commander Saguisag’s “Engage!” or “Hit it!” or “I would like the ship to go.  Now.”

Beginnings Revisited

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Star Trek Adventures has a new sourcebook, The 23rd Century Campaign Guide, and per usual, they included a new career path option:

NOW I can recreate my original FASA Trek trader captain, Mackenzie Decker, if I so choose.

I’m actually thinking of having Decker as an NPC, and maybe pull a nuBSG and do a gender swap on Mackenzie Decker?

File:Big Wow 2013 - Indiana Jones (8845876192).jpg

I’ve met this cosplayer, Abby Darkstar, and her partner, Keith Zen, both are really nice people.

Anyways.

Decisions, decisions.

Star Trek: ODT

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About 4+ years ago I had an idea for a Star Trek RPG campaign with an espionage twist.

With STA Captain’s Log I think I can run this one as a solo campaign, which a few changes.

It’s still called Outpost Delta Tioga, in reference to my old house located in San Francisco.

It’s still based out of Science Station D-5 on the Romulan Border.

It’s still an unofficial Starfleet listening post, officially listed as a science station.

Originally I was going to run this during the Lower Decks-era  With the California-class U.S.S. Colma.  I may switch to late the TOS-era with a modified Archer-class scout ship, since I already created a Captain’s Log crew for a ‘spy themed’ campaign.

AND a 3D printed ship as well.

We’ll see if I can flesh this one out a bit more over time.

Don’t touch that dial!

Beginnings

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The first character that I created in the old FASA Star Trek RPG was Mackenzie Decker, son of Matt Decker, brother of Will Decker.  He was ex-Starfleet,  resigning his commission after the disappearance of Will Decker after the V’Ger incident.  He became an independent freighter captain, and was known by his leather jacket and whip, looking much like Jake Cutter from Tales of the Gold Monkey but without the hat, and Indiana Jones without the fedora.

In the new Star Trek Adventures Exploration Guide, there are two new character creation options, Outpost Scientist (ex: David Marcus) and…

Independent Archaeologist (ex: Vash)

I’m not sure I’ll recreate Mac Decker as this new character option, or just make a new Indy-type character.  One of the example Values listed is ‘These artifacts belong in a museum!’ and one of the new Talents listed is ‘Make Your Own Luck’.

Steam コミュニティ :: ガイド :: Indiana Jones and the Great Circle • Achievement Guide

Don’t touch that dial!

Revision to the Revised Revision

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So I fire up an episode of Enterprise, and was immediately reminded that yes, Phlox is another alien aboard the ship, so I reinstated Botta, the Denobulan Engineer.

I thought about restoring the Andorian XO, but that still didn’t make sense to me, though it could have played into where we are in the current adventure, as the Andorian fleet is hailing the Excalibur.

Nah, too tropey for what came to mind for that possible interaction.  Maybe a tweak on that in a later installment.

Don’t touch that dial!

Revised Revision

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As I was reviewing the bridge crew of the Excalibur, I realized that I may have made a mistake by including non-humans, specifically an Andorian first officer and Aenar security chief.  So I swapped out all the non-humans.

Again, I may not be as well versed in Enterprise lore, so maybe there eventually are non-humans (besides Vulcans) serving aboard Earth ships by this time (2154).

I also figured that a majority of the crew should be from Earth or Luna, and not colony worlds.

Stay tuned!

Wait a minute….

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I’m thinking too big.

I’m thinking that Solo RPGs should be this big grand adventure similar to what happens when a group gets together.

It shouldn’t be that at all.

It *can* be, but I may have to work my way up to that.

I have ideas all the time of what should happen next, but I don’t have to set up the whole game on my tabletop in order to run with it.

It’s about the journey and what happens next, no matter how big or small or whether or not dice are rolled.

It’s story telling.  I’m trying to tell a story.  And I should not let the tools hamper me, they should help or enhance the experience.

—

So, as I had noted back in November, the Excalibur had run into an Andorian blockade, with hails being ignored and weapons being trained on the ship.

Commander Saguisag orders the shields raised hull polarized and to continue hailing the Andorians.

“Charge cannons?”

“No, let’s keep a defensive posture for now.”

The gambit worked, the Andorians do not fire on the Excalibur.

“We’re being hailed by the lead ship.”

“On screen.”

—

See?  Was that so hard?  I can do this, I just need to adapt my playstyle to something simpler.

DON’T TOUCH THAT MF DIAL!

Meanwhile, in the Solo RPG world…

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I’ve decided to put Star Trek: Excalibur on hiatus, for the simple reason that I’m not as well versed as I think I need to be in Enterprise-era lore to create a compelling story that I’d be interested in playing.

Instead, I’ll take a look at the other ship/captain combos that I’ve made and see if any of those pique my interest.

Don’t touch that dial!

Upcoming and Incoming

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I seriously think I have too many options for gaming, resulting in executive indecision.

I’m reading up on that and may ask my doctor about it during my next annual visit.

In the meantime, I hope to finally get around to playing something more consistently in the next few weeks.

I’ve neglected all of the solo RPGs as I’ve been hopping around reading up different systems, when I should just focus on continuing the adventures of the Excalibur.

– – –

Meanwhile, I’ve been preparing for a couple of games that should be arriving in the next month or so, both from Firelock Games.

Oak and Iron is a tabletop naval game in the age of sail.  They have a second edition coming out soon, so I decided to pick this one up since I finally watched Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World.  Ships are in 1:600 scale, and I found a few on MyMiniFactory that I’d like to have included in my games, including the HMS Surprise from the aforementioned M&C movie, and the USS Enterprise , from the late 18th century.

The core set comes with 6 smaller ships, but I did pick up a couple of expansions which contain much larger ships, including 1st/2nd/3rd rate Ships of the Line.

There was a Kickstarter for this last summer, which I backed.

This is basically a smaller scale skirmish version of Blood and Plunder from Firelock, based in the Jamaican city of Port Royal after the earthquake in 1692.

The miniature count for squads average about 6 models, and while I already have models for English, Spanish, Native Americans, and pirates, the core set contains15 models that will represent the French, and I included an add-on of the new Native American set with multi-pose plastic models that I will build as a Maroon (escaped African slaves) faction.

– – –

And of course, I have my sports games to play, but that’s another story.

Stand by!