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.

Observations

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A couple of decades ago I dived back into Warhammer 40K, choosing to go that route because I still had some old armies from the 80s and saying that I felt better playing in a sci-fi world instead of the real world when it came to table top wargaming.

I tried to get into Flames of War, a 15mm World War II miniatures game, but that never got past the painting stage.

Eventually I grew tired of Games Workshop’s business model of new rules every 2-3 years with enough changes that you had to pick up some new toys to replace the now invalid ones.  So I sold off almost my entire GW Warhammer 40K collection, saving a few units for possible Kill Team play.

And now even Kill Team has lost my interest, with Blood Bowl very close to the same level of general disinterest.

Some months back I decided to pick up one of the new starter sets for Bolt Action, a 28mm scale World War II game.  For some reason the idea of US soldiers fighting Nazis appealed to me in a big way.

I put together the 2 dozen miniatures and painted them up, but of course my sense of… duty?  (Patriotism?  Attraction to the Pacific Theater?) led me to picking up a set of both Imperial Japanese and US Marines for Bolt Action.  And they sat around untouched for about 3 months.

Two weeks ago I felt a surge of interest in World War II again, so I opened up the Marines and began assembling them.  At the same time I caught a few videos on how to play Bolt Action, along with videos on it’s sister game, Blood Red Skies, which is a World War II air combat game.

Once again I picked up starter set, based on the Battle of Midway, so it contained a squadron of Japanese A6M Zeros, along with a squadron of my beloved F4F Wildcat, the first plane model I ever built, when I was maybe 10.

These games from Warlord are very easy to pick up, with fantastic miniatures to build and paint.  So I’ve been jumping between assembling 28mm soldiers and painting 1:200 scale fighter planes.

And this past weekend I finally set up and played 4 of the scenarios in the Bolt Action Starter Set.  The Americans won the first and fourth scenarios, the Germans won the second and third.

My interest in this game has increased so much that I’m planning to start a British Army, which would technically be my largest compared to the smaller US, German, and Japanese forces that I’ve already collected.

Soon the Germans will be dealing with the British Airborne and the SAS.

I know, it’s kind of shocking that I didn’t start with SAS in the first place, but they weren’t in the starter set.

And I suppose I can send in a small British commando force to steal some valuable intel from the Japanese?

I’ll have to look that last one up.

Oh, and I also picked up 3 additional squadrons for Blood Red Skies, Messerschmitt BF109Es, Supermarine Spitfire MkIIs, and F4U Corsairs, along with an Ace set for Pappy Boyington.  Battle of Britain and Black Sheep Squadron on deck for tabletop play.

Stand By!

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!

Combat in Dragonbane

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If there’s one thing I’ve learned while getting ready to play the solo campaign in Dragonbane it’s that combat is fast and deadly.

I just had Splats run another encounter with a pair of orcs, and I learned how to ‘push a roll’ in order to avoid him getting killed by one orc who was armed with a spear.

He eventually managed to kill the two orcs, with 4 of his 15 hit points left.

MEDIC!

Prelude: The Duck Knight of the Misty Vale

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Splats Gleamhelm stood before the gaping mouth of the cave

The cave where the troll had been spotted the previous night by the anxious onlookers who now stood a good distance behind him.

Go on then, Splats, he thought to himself, what’s the worst that could happen, besides getting killed by a troll?

Upon entering the cave, Splats found it unusually well lit, for a cave that is.  He didn’t need to light a torch or an oil lamp, it was lit as well as the morning was, just outside.

“Boo,” said a voice ahead of him.  It was the troll.

Wasting no time, Splats took a defensive position as the troll strode toward him and proceeded to bite the young Mallard-kin.

“Ack!” Splats exclaimed excitedly, then realized that his armor had taken the brunt of the bite.  The troll then gurgled and spit up a tooth and some foul liquid that barely missed Splats, but did piss him off a bit.

Splats then took a couple of swings with his broadsword at the monster, connecting both times and visibly causing the creature some harm.

Another couple of sword strikes by Splats, and the monster spit up again, this time the stench of the troll vomit causing Splats to waver a bit.  The troll picked up Splats and hurled him across the cave, his armor once again saving him from serious harm.

Now Splat was really mad.  He picked himself up from the ground where he landed, charged the visibly weakened creature while yelling a battle cry, swung for a killing blow…

… and missed, his sword clattering to the floor between himself and his opponent.

Shit, good thing no one saw that, he thought to himself.

Before he could pick up the sword, the monster clawed at him, troll nails scraping against his armor, which protected him once more.

Splats recovered his sword, slashed at the creature once, then twice, and the troll finally fell.

Breathing heavily, Splats proceeded to check the troll for any treasure that it had, but found nothing but a rusty nail, which did actually poke and hurt him and later required a tetanus shot from the local healer.

***

And thus begins the epic tale with the Dragonbane RPG system.

Don’t touch that dial!

Crossover

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One reason I’m excited about this Space: 1999 RPG is that it’s produced by Modiphius Entertainment, the same company who produces the Star Trek Adventures RPG.

And they both use the 2D20 game engine.

Which means I’m gonna try to run both solo, with a Star Trek: Excalibur adventure as a pilot for whatever I end up doing for Space: 1999.

I also found a channel on YouTube of opening titles for RPGs, and they made one specifically for the Space: 1999 game.

Don’t touch that dial!