Star Trek

Mouse Guard Hacks and Expansions
1

Yesterday we burned up characters using a combination of the Starship and Starmen post on these forums, and my own take on Trek.

I was on the fence about using MG for a Trek game, mainly because I didn’t want to do tons of work to make it work.

However, after PLAYING a game of MG for the first time Friday, the system was so easy to use, the game almost playing itself, that I fell in love and HAD to use it for Trek. (Mainly because I realized that like most RPGs once you have a way to create a character, the rest is just icing.)

So I created a Trek Character Burner, and we got our characters created. And it felt just like Trek.

My plans are to create a Trek Starship Burner, that will replace Nature with Purpose, perhaps a few “skills” but the crew giving helping dice to the ship. But I am still thinking on that.

Pure Fun!

d :smiley:

2

Here is the Trek Character Burner, what did I miss (thanks to whoever did the spacemen and space ships thread (I borrowed some of what you did))

http://www.mediafire.com/file/5yvy1gwqg5i/TrekBurner.doc

3

That would be me.

Interesting. I don’t like the unified nature; by caling it training you have also robbed the story rationale for being pulled out of play at nature 8.

4

I disagree, the higher the training, the more “by the book” the player would be, and hence more suited to a “desk job”, not out in the inky black.

d :smiley:

5

But the attribute functioning as it does, makes them more competent in the field. I don’t see it.

Likewise, Training is not something that logically (by the term, not your implimentation) should not go down. And yet, it can.

It just seems a bad fit.

Oh, and FYI, the Word Doc opened very poorly laid out… column breaks in odd spots, etc. Word Docs are NOT platform independent for layout.

6

RE competency: How is that any different mechanically from Nature in MG?

RE: training as a term: Do not people become less competent in training? from new innovations? Lack of diligence in advancing knowledge? Actively acting against your training?

RE your natures: I did that because I didn’t like your non-unified natures. To me it unneccessarily complicated a simple system designed to pull together a group of disparate individuals at a mechanical level. So I tried to do something that was similar within Trek, and for me it works.

As for the layout: that is unfortunate, perhaps later today I shall create a PDF. I did it in doc so others could change it as they see fit.

7

Trek: Neat hack!

Re. Nature: This continues to be a tough-to-hack bit of MG, I think, because it’s not really intuitive how it works. I mean, yeah, mechanically it’s pretty clear but a lot of emergent behavior arises from players avoiding either end of the spectrum.

p.

8

re: nature; I agree, it is very problematic, tricky at best to model.

9

Just for laffs:

Nature: Bold

Used for daring fights, outrageous plans, and negotiating with implacable enemies.

Too low, and you’re not Bold enough for Star Fleet Academy. Too high, and you can’t tolerate their rules and regulations.

Ooh I like that.

p.

10

That’s a much better fit to the setting, and not something that should be static. Excellent idea.

11

Could you have something like “Prime Directive” for nature? Maybe just call it Directivity?
Low directive your a bit of malcontent, high your excellent officer material, then when your directive gets too high you become an admiral or something?

12

How would that reflect the mechanic of calling upon nature with a persona to add your nature to a task, or to substitute your nature for any skill?

13

I like that idea, and the Prime Directive inspired me to come up with the Training ability. I tried to model the actions on the Prime Directive. Obviously too in tune with the Prime Directive and a character looses the flexibility that life demands, being to far from it, makes them a liability to the Federation.

So I remain with Training as a substitute for Nature, and haven’t seen a better alternative yet.

d :smiley:

14

Well Im pretty sketchy on my Star Trek canon but you could probably tap it for things like “Diplomatic Relations” “Peacekeeping” “Humanitarian Aid”. Calling it directive might carry too much baggage, you could just say Nature(Starfleet) perhaps?

15

Upon further consideration, if I were doing a MG-Trek hack, I’d focus more on playing in Roddenberry’s Trek universe and not necessarily restrict the Nature mechanics to the Star Fleet Academy structure.

Thus, because Roddenberry’s Trek is fundamentally racist (or perhaps, more kindly, race-focused), I’d do it this way (totally off the top of my head)…

Nature: Human
Used for: Being bold or impulsive, dealing with new alien types, fighting
At 0: No longer interested in space travel, return to Earth
At 8: Disappear into space forever, forsaking Federation space for the great unknown

Nature: Vulcan
Used for: Being logical, intelligence and knowledge, controlling one’s emotions
At 0: Give up on Vulcan life, go to Romulus and join your emotional brethren (start Nature: Romulan at 3)
At 8: Return to Vulcan (or Star Fleet if in the Abrams alternaTrek) to contemplate science and logic

Nature: Romulan
Used for: Being impulsive or angry, scheming, fighting
At 0: Give up on Romulan life, go to Vulcan and join your logical brethren (start Nature: Vulcan at 3)
At 8: Burn out in flare of rage, perhaps returning to Romulus but most likely suiciding into a Federation warship

Nature: Klingon
Used for: Matters of pride or honor, fighting, feats of strength
At 0: Debase yourself before Klingon High Command for cowardice, accept their final ruling (OR travel to Federation Space and live as a Human)
At 8: Honor-bound and unable to operate among weaker aliens, return to the Klingon Empire … never to leave again.

Nature: Android
Used for: Logic and intelligence over emotion, learning and training, feats of physical improbability
At 0: Become a real boy, gain full scope of emotions and live as a human
At 8: Lose any chance at gaining an emotional life, and submit to being a tool for someone’s use.

Nature: Ferengi
Used for: Scheming, sneaking, haggling
At 0: Give up the scheming, sneaking, haggling life and live in Federation Space as a fair-dealing merchant
At 8: Not trusted by even your own people, you create one enemy too many and are found knifed in a service shaft somewhere

Nature: Borg
Used for: Assimilating, logic and intelligence over emotion, fighting
At 0: Overcome assimilation and return to your original race (restart your “original” race at 3)
At 8: Final assimilation complete, join with the borg cube as an undifferentiated cog in the machine

Idea: Hybrids
If you’re half-something, pick ONE of your race’s “Used for” lists. Then, pick ONE of your race’s “At 0” result and your OTHER race’s “At 8” result, representing both ends of this particular combination’s arc. So, like Spock would choose the Vulcan “used for” list, the Human “At 0” and the Vulcan “At 8”. I might even call Geordie a “Human/Android” hybrid, taking the human “used for”, human “At 0” and android “at 8”.

Anyway, something else to chew on.

p.

16

I like that, but I won’t be using it, I chose Training: Starfleet because I wanted to play exclusively in Starfleet AND I wanted to use Traits to define races.

d :smiley:

17

Hey those are better aspects! If it isn’t obvious I am going to keep using Training, instead of nature, because I think it fits better as a term, but consider your aspects for that Training SWIPED!!!

d :smiley:

18

Well…it sounds like you’re pretty set on a solution. Good luck!

p.

19

For Nature/Training yes, in fact I have already used it in a session, and it worked well for waht I wanted it to do, there isn’t any better solution to me than one that works for me in play.

d :smiley:

20

Paul: Love your nature version… It mirrors my approach, as well.