Day 4 Prompt: Charm Week 1 Prompt: Intellect Weekday Prompt: Full of Grace
Eagle eyed readers may notice that I didn’t change the prompt for the Day 4 entry in the RPGaDAY 2026 Challenge. The reason for this is that I’m writing these on the fly. When I saw the title “Charm”, the first thing that came into my head was the first-level Charm Person spell that always made me raise an eyebrow. First-level? It seemed like a powerful spell at this level, especially if it isn’t done right.
So I pulled out my books for Basic Fantasy, Castles and Crusades, Labyrinth Lord, Dungeon Crawl Classics and even the new Dungeons and Dragons 5.5 players handbook that I just recently obtained with a gift card. They were all variations on the same thing. The target thinks that the caster is a friend. As long as the caster or his party doesn’t attack them or do anything that wrongs them, then they can continue to be charmed with some options to make a save vs the spell effects. Perhaps the name of the spell is altered to avoid OGL license issues, but the process is similar.
I’ve never really cast this spell in all my years of gaming. I don’t recall ever seeing it cast. I asked one of my Geek Kids who has been in several D&D campaigns, and they hadn’t seen it used either. So it got me thinking, if this comes up in my current Castles and Crusades game, or at a one-shot at a convention, how would I handle this as a GM.
I think this is a perfect opportunity for role-playing instead of roll-playing. I’d rather have the table play more of the first than the later. I’d ask the caster how they are going to handle the charmed person. Take into account the current scenario involved (social, physical combat, bartering for goods and services?) and make adjustments to any saves vs affects from there.
Then there is the after affects. Once the spell has worn off or is resisted, how does the target(s) react? Will they know they’ve been charmed? Will they feel violated? Confused? Resentful? The response could make for an interesting roleplaying experience.
Every time there is a tactic that comes up in a magical universe like this, there is also defenses against them. Could shopkeepers, community leaders and other likely targets invest in rings, amulets or other worn items of defense against such spells? That would make for an interesting roleplaying event when a PC tries to be sneaky and suddenly finds out that the town sheriff doesn’t take too kindly to being targeted like this. And for every genuine magical item, hucksters could sell fake items that are promoted to assist with a charm resistance.
I wonder if that’s why this was a first-level spell. A good GM could see the opportunity to get some roleplaying going at the table?
What are your thoughts? Now that I’ve let my muse type this out, I think I’m glad I didn’t go with my initial idea of making a Wild West bordello with charming ladies. Still might, but not with this prompt.
Have you seen this spell in play at your table? How did it go? This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com or click on my social media links with any comments.
Day 3 Prompt: Poise Week 1 Prompt: Intellect Weekday Prompt: Fair of Face
Another day where I take the recommended prompt for the RPGaDAY 2026 Challenge and I twist it on it’s side. I’m still intending to blog about RPG vehicles or exotic locations that, I hope, inspire others. Today I’m twisting Poise into Poison.
Memo for Administrator 7 eyes only. In our effort to track down the rogue agent “Dutch”, we have been following up on possible locations where he might be able to obtain an antidote to the Ticking Poison that was administered to “Dutch” in order to keep him compliant with our orders. As you know, unless “Dutch” receives regular injections once-a-week of the antidote, the Ticking Poison will slowly shut down his digestive system. This will result in his painful death by starvation as the poison prevents his body from absorbing the nutrients in food.
Unfortunately, since the untimely demise of Dr. Meredith during Dutch’s escape, we were unable to locate in his notes where the source of the Ticking Poison originated. Several documents remain encrypted in the late doctor’s personal code. Cryptography is continuing their efforts in decoding these documents.
We did find one possible lead, one that Dutch may also have. Eomma’s Hanseon. The rumored nautical home of the reclusive biochemist only known as “Mother” in the espionage underground. We strongly believe that Dutch is now searching for Mother in the south oriental seas. Attached is the report that we have on Eomma’s Hanseon.
==Start of Report==
Only known photograph of Eomma’s Hanseon.
Subject: Eomma’s Hanseon Report reliability rating: Medium (57/100) Last Update: 20260803 Access: All
“Eomma’s Hanseon” is the name of a luxury yacht of unknown origin that is owned by the reclusive biochemist only known as “Mother”. This biochemist has been credited in saving the lives of at least known fifteen individuals worldwide from rare poisonings or unknown illnesses.
There is no known port of registry for this vessel. Agents have spotted this vessel in territorial waters belonging to Taiwan, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, the Philippines and China. As of this last update, no known reports of governmental boarding or inspections have been discovered.
While the report on Mother states that she (gender unconfirmed), has been operating for over twenty-five years. The vessel believed to be Mother’s home base was first observed in 2012 at a port near Singapore. The last reported sighting was off the coast of Vietnam in 2025. No observations of this vessel have been made outside of the oriental region.
All agents have been alerted to report any sightings or any other gathered information immediately.
==End of Report==
On a personal note, while I can’t confirm it, I have a strong suspicion that the reason that “Mother” can cure these afflictions is that Eomma’s Hanseon is the source for these chemical poisons. I have dispatched an investigation team to the area to see if they can track down the vessel or pick up the trail for “Dutch”. I will keep you appraised.
–Supervisor 47
The royalty free image was found on Pixabay. I tried to find an image of a mutant bear for yesterdays post without any luck and I didn’t want to delay the post. I like having visual references when I can obtain them.
Oh, and I’m still open to suggestions from any readers on future vessels or locations to use in this challenge. They can be from any genre.
Did this inspire anything for a possible espionage or modern day RPG scenario? This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com or click on my social media links with any comments.
So I realized something after I had posted my Day 1 entry in the RPGaDAY 2026 Challenge. A few weeks ago I had posted a ‘prepping for’ blog entry asking for suggestions to use in the challenge. I did get two really good questions asked of me. However, since I decided that I was going to go with the starships/locations theme, I’ll save those questions for future blog posts. So… stay tuned.
I was talking with the Geek Wife while we were driving around today. I read off the list of daily prompts that were offered for the challenge. Her brilliant mind said “You can probably change some of those prompts into anagrams. So I may do that with a few of the future entries, like the one today. Statue is kinda-sorta an anagram of Stature. And actually I wasn’t the only person to think so as I saw another entry in the challenge to show a statue.
The Numpa Pack of UNU can be found in the lands east of the toxic salty lake near the mountains. This race of ursanoid mutants were blessed to find a safe haven for their tribe when they stumbled across an artifact from the ancients. A large metal bear statue with a plaque containing the unknown language of the ancients with the name “In honor of the University of Northern Utah Grizzlies, A gift from the graduating class of 2088”.
While they could not read the ancient text, they took the metal likeness of them as a sign that this was their land. It took several years but they were able to clear out the structures around the blessed statue including the evergreen bowl where the bulk of the pack lives. It was easily defendable when feline enemies of WSU pack and the tauran herd from USU came down on raids. There were rumors of other mutant packs to the south, but they seemed to be fighting amongst themselves instead of looking north for resources within the ancient structures around the bowl. Finding ancient technology was easier in these buildings.
When ever a lost ursanoid mutant was found, they were brought to the statue of the ancients. If they were recognized with the same features, they were welcomed into the pack despite of their fur color. Thus the pack consisted of those with the fur of black, brown, white or the rare black and white combination. This has lead to significant growth.
However the pack elders are worried about recent reports of hairless simians that have been spotted. Could these be the same referred to in the oral history passed down from elders to elders? If so, are these the same destroyers who scorched the Earth once before?
As posted yesterday, I’m also looking for suggestions for future entries in the RPGaDAY challenge. If something catches your eye and you would like to get my take on it, let me know about it.
Do you have a favorite mutant world RPG universe to play in? This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com or click on my social media links with any comments.
Day 1 Prompt: Discipline Week 1 Prompt: Drive Weekday Prompt: Works Hard
August 1st is here and it’s time for the RPGaDAY 2026 Challenge. I’ve been participating in this community event for a few years now (click here for my past entries) as I’ve found it challenging and rewarding. As you can see from above, there are some… unique prompts this year with a couple of side-prompts that were recommended by the organizers. I’ll try to see if I can work them into my blog posts, but honestly I’m not really feeling inspired by them. I even waited for a few entries to hit the interwebs to see if I missed anything and… I’m seeing subjects all over the place.
Now one of the suggestions strongly recommended by the organizers is, create 31 characters to use as NPCs in this challenge. That’s a little too close to the annual Character Creation Challenge that I run every January (New Year, New You). I really have to get myself pumped up and prepped for months to get through every January (and keep up with other responsibilities in my life). Especially since I’ve added two new ones recently. I’m also getting ready for SaltCON End-of-Summer coming up on the first weekend in September.
So I’m going to use an idea I keep wanting to use for the #CharacterCreationChallenge, but never get a chance to since I usually end up with some new games I want to create characters for. Gene Roddenberry said that the USS Enterprise was just as much a character in the show as Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock. As much detail had to go into the ship as it does in the cast of the show. I’ve been wanting to make a Ship Creation Challenge in honor of this. Then as I thought more about it, safe houses (espionage), sailing vessels (pirates), castles and towers (fantasy) and other locations basically fit into this same category. Batman had his Bat Cave with it’s unique features. Sherlock Holmes had 221b Baker Street where he could be found playing his violin. Han Solo had the fastest hunk of junk known as the Millennium Falcon. A Starship is a unique location like these that added to the story. So my entries for 2026 will be unique locations that may or may not be mobile. Some entries may be brand new, others may be recollections of past games. I’ll try to get the prompts listed above in the entry, but that’s not always going to be a guarantee.
My loyal readers will recall my many blog entries about the Dungeons and Dragons 3.5 campaign that my friend Jeff ran for several years. What they may not know is that he had ran another campaign before that one (early 2000’s) that I had the pleasure to participate in. I had introduced Tirik the Archer in an entry to the 2024 RPGaDAY challenge. What I didn’t mention then was how Jeff was having us roleplay (and plan) what would eventually be our strongholds in the game. I told him that I wanted to put together an Archery Academy. Jeff said sure, but he wanted plans before letting the construction start. I had an idea in my head and I had to get it down on paper. A paper that I just spent time going through my book of characters to see if I still had readily available. So, here is a quick re-sketch from memory.
When I showed the original to Jeff his response was “Oh Cool!!!!” Later I remembered that I could have had a basement put in for probably more room. But by the time I had remembered this, Jeff stated that the workers had already started on the construction. After it was completed, apparently a dragon flying overhead was intrigued with the landmark and had mentioned it to his fellow dragons (according to the DM, we didn’t get a chance to roleplay that out).
So I guess the students would have to work hard to get into the academy and be diligent to graduate if they had the drive? Yea, I think I forced that one a little too much.
Oh, additionally I’m open to suggestions for future unique locations or vessels that are characters in their own right.
Did you have an RPG campaign that made it to the stronghold level? This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com or click on my social media links with any comments.
So August is quickly approaching. This is the time of the year where AUOTCRATIK announces the latest #RPGaDAY challenge. There are 31 RPG topics to blog about for 31 days. You can read my past #RPGaDAY entries here.
As you can see from the graphic above, there are 31 topics, as well as modifiers and something that looks very familiar. They recommended a Character Creation Challenge. Well we all know that’s for January (new year, new you). But, they also gave us another option as seen in the graphic below.
They provided a blank graphic to come up with your own topics for the 31 days of the #RPGaDAY challenge. Suddenly I’m taping my fingers together and saying “excellent”. Because that’s where you come in.
I’m open to suggestions for 31 topics for me to blog about for the 2026 #RPGaDAY challenge. You can post them on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. Or you can email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com or even hit me up on one of the Social Medias that I still seem to be lurking in.
As per the rules, I will be posting positive things about our hobby. Sure, I may post a few things with constructive criticism, but this will stick to the positive side of the issues.
So I am requesting a topic or two (or 31) and when I get enough of them, I’ll use them in August. Will you help a fellow geek out? I’d love to hear what you’d like me to blog about.
Thanks in advance.
This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com with any comments.
So apparently I am insane enough that I’ve been busy working on my two new campaigns (and getting ready for SaltCON End-of-Summer) that I haven’t blogged about them yet. So this is a quick catch up on what has happened so far.
We held a session zero where the players made their characters for the Starfleet game. We are going to run a six-episode season and then re-evaluate from there (keep going, change eras, etc.). We will be playing in the “Lost Era” just after the end of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country and before the end of the 23rd century. We did have one more player drop out, but that left us with seven players in total with the following crew:
Captain Fae Hy-Lyra- Efrosian Commanding Officer
Commander Jean LaFluer- Human Executive Officer
Lt. Commander Gemini Jones- Human Chief Engineering Officer
Lieutenant Clay Frtizberg- Human Chief Communications Officer
As for the vessel they would be serving on, while I was scanning their hand-written character sheets, I pulled out my massive book of FASA Starships and dropped it on the table. It was so heavy that it made the table bounce in a loud thud. I advised against any dreadnoughts or massive battleships. This crew would be filling in the gaps while there was a massive shift of fleet resources to help out with the Klingon evacuations. They almost went with the Chandley Class Starship, but they didn’t want to deal with a Marine contingent. They voted for the Miranda Class Starship that was used quite a bit in the show. The name of the vessel came down to USS Magnanimous or USS Taylor (to be named after Roger Taylor) with the Magnanimous getting the larger number of votes. So I reached out to a friend who was a massive starship fan and he generated the registry number of NCC-31947 (note the 47 in the registry). Another friend who generates starship SFX for several Star Trek fan films was generous enough to make a graphic that I could use for the campaign (see the image above). Thank you Dennis and Ross.
We were able to have the first session, but we haven’t completed the episode yet. So I’ll have another blog post when the episode is completed. So far, the crew is reacting in typical Star Trek fashion.
We had a session zero for this campaign as well. There are two less players for this campaign so we have five in total. I’m hoping that the last player who had to bow out at the last minute can get his his schedules freed up to play. I have a place in the campaign where he could be slotted in.
This world is a new one of my “making”. I’ve set down some basic items, but I haven’t filled in every nook and cranny. The reason for this is that I’m allowing the players to contribute to this world since this is a shared storytelling experience. They get to make up the names of the villages and kingdoms their characters are from. If they follow a deity, they get to make that up as well. This means that I don’t have to work on minutia that may or may not be used in the campaign. Already some of the players have come up with some items from their backstories that I’m weaving into the campaign.
The magic users in this world received a special “Puzzle Scroll” that challenges them (those that pass get a free 0-level cantrip that allows them to easily create the Puzzle Scroll on a blank parchment). If the magic user solves the puzzle, then they have made it to the next level and a new puzzle appears. This is how the player knows that their character has received enough experience points to go up to the next level. It also allows them to test possible recruits into the Magic User’s Guild.
After the session zero, I was able to get some one-on-one RPG sessions with individual players to find out why their characters are traveling to the Grand City of Roses. Think a medieval city with a cross between London and Venice where different races (even Goblinoids) have their own Petal (sector). Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get all of the one-on-one sessions done, so I ended up having a session 0.5 to get them all caught up. The players are under strict orders not to talk about what happened in their one-on-one with each other. I wonder how the married couple are getting along with this challenge? We will be having the session one very soon and I’ll blog about that separately as well.
So far the characters are:
Noturin Boshk- Half-Elf Rogue
Ellywick Cogsprite- Gnome Wizard
Victor Goldweller- Dwarf Bard
Lorelei Murphy- Human Cleric
Albert Shepherd- Human Ranger
I can’t wait to torture…. errr…. put the characters through the story that I’ve planned out.
Do you have any questions (that I can answer publicly) about the campaign? I’ve even set up special channels for the two campaigns on my Discord server. This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com or click on my social media links with any comments.
So just a heads up, while there might be some negative things in this after-action report, none of them are due to the many volunteers at SaltCON. The many volunteers and coordinators at the event were beholden to the same issues that affected the con as a whole, and they did an excellent job under the circumstances.
Bottom line up front (BLUF): Attendance was down at this particular event due to the economy.
When I talked with several coordinators, they mentioned that they had seen the same pattern previously over the past seventeen years. When money gets tight, the attendance drops as people try to trim the budget. How this affected me and some of the other volunteer gamemasters is that some scheduled events didn’t “fire”. This is the metric that the convention uses to state that the game started on time with players. All three of my scheduled games did not “fire” which disappointed me. With the lower attendance, the players flocked to the games that had other attendees signed up so that they could get a full experience (kind of hard to play in a game with only 1-2 players). At first I wondered if I had picked the wrong games or time-slots, but I saw that other GMs had the same issues that I had. So while talking with the RPG coordinators, they encouraged me to continue to volunteer as they appreciated my efforts. So yes, I’ll be signing up to run some games at SaltCON-End of Summer in September. Hopefully the economy will not be as skitterish as it is now (crosses-fingers).
There, now that the elephant in the room is out of the way, I can tell you what I enjoyed this weekend. First, the hugs. Thank you to those who provided or accepted them. I had a chance to see a few friends that I see regularly and a few that I hadn’t seen in a while. A convention is also a chance to network with other geeky people. I had a chance to meet the organizer for ICON, a gaming convention that happens in eastern Idaho three times a year (once in Pocatello and twice in Idaho Falls). I’m giving some thought to possibly volunteering to GM some RPG one-shots at this event in the future. But there is more logistics that will have to be put into place before I can commit to it.
The game swap room was moved to a larger location which was very nice. Usually it’s stuck in a narrow room where the attendees are shoulder-to-shoulder as they try to look over the selections. I liked the additional room much more and I hope that we can keep this at the new location. I’d like to thank those who brought in roleplaying books. I was able to pick up the Creature Codex and the Tome of Beasts at a decent price. From the photo above you can also see that the free boardgame was something called Tiffin (which I honestly picked up because it was the smallest game to grab). As my thank you gift for GMing at the con, I picked up a $20 gift certificate to The Queen’s Realm. The convention t-shirt is blue with a pirate crab and a pirate parrot playing cards with the caption “It’s all fun and games until someone loses an eye.” My geek wife liked mine so much that she asked me to pick her up one as well.
An interesting twist this year is that a collectable card event was happening in the same convention center on Saturday. I walked through it since it was free. But I didn’t pick up anything since it was mostly Pokemon and sports cards. A nice thing about having that part of the convention center open was the better food options were available within. I wonder if this event will happen again at the same time next summer?
Mini-posters the convention used to advertise my games.
As for the games that I played, Everyday Heroes was a time-travel adventure where we had to prevent Professor Moriarty from messing with time by preventing the Titanic from not being sunk. We were only able to get through one scenario since we had to create characters from scratch. But I was a pirate from the 1800’s which helped with the naval theme. Since one of my games didn’t ‘fire’, I ended up jumping into my first ever HeroQuest game, which was interesting. It was a cross between an RPG and a board game. The Savage Worlds one-shot was also fun. Apparently it was for a sci-fi setting that had just been released called the Han Cluster. It was ‘technology is magic’ based and was an interesting challenge. I had forgotten that I had already played Savage Worlds previously (and it was from the same GM). But it was good to be reminded about the system. Lorecraft 5e was very different. It was a homebrewed game that took Fifth Edition and added some additional items to it. Which explains why I wasn’t able to find anything for it online. But the GM/designer put a lot of work into it. The character sheet alone was a laminated folder with character and equipment card slots. You would write on any side with a dry-erase marker and included a booklet for additional abilities and equipment slots (see photos below since he let all players keep their characters for possible future gaming sessions). He had an interesting lazy-susan grid-playing field where he could put on our figures and terrain (all held with magnets). He could spin the playing field around to move characters or point things out. What I really appreciated with this GM was the way he handled two young RPGers (possibly 14 years old) at the table who attended all seven of his events that were all linked together. They were really getting into the system and their characters. When he cornered me after the session I played in he really wanted to ask me some feedback questions about his works. I let him know the encouraging things that I saw in the game. I didn’t really see any improvements he needed to make, but perhaps I could have noticed something if I had played in other sessions.
The back of the Lorecraft 5e character folder.
The front facing the other players and GM.
Again, if you are looking for a good gaming convention, please check out SaltCON. There are a ton of board games, card games, roleplaying games and more. The next two conventions at the Davis Conference Center in Layton, Utah are September 4-6 and March 11-14. I thinking of making a homebrew game for the Spring 2027 event.
Do you have any questions about the convention weekend? This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com with any comments.
Some of the games that I’ll be running at SaltCON-Summer 2026.
Holy cow. It has been so busy for me that summer sneaked up on me. In a few days it will be time to geek out with my fellow RPGers at SaltCON-Summer at the Davis Conference Center.
I volunteered to run three different games this round. I signed up for three games so far, but I’m keeping this year pretty flexible and I may sign up for some games on the spot. I will also be packing my Convention Backpack that I have documented about in a previous blog post.
I’m really excited about my Star Trek Adventures 2nd Edition one-shot since I’m running something special. I can’t really talk about it until certain things have passed. But the players in my upcoming STA2e campaign will also get to experience it as well. I will be running Basic Fantasy 4th Edition on Friday and on Saturday I’ll get a chance to run a game that I got as part of a Secret Satan gift exchange a long time ago. Mutant Crawl Classics. This last game is my ‘unusual’ entry that I always try to come up with. It makes the conventions unique by allowing others to participate in a game that they might not normally get a chance to play.
As mentioned above, I’ve signed up for three games. The first being Everyday Heroes that a friend is running. Yes, I ran it at the 2026 Spring SaltCON, but I want to actually play to see how it looks from the other side of the GMs screen. I’m going to get a chance to play a sci-fi Savage Worlds one-shot. The third game is something called LoreCraft 5E. From the description, it sounds like a sci-fi/fantasy combo that may or may not be like Spelljammer. I haven’t been able to find out anything from it from an online search so I’ll have to report back later.
Once again I’d like to give a tip of the hat to the volunteers and coordinators for SaltCON. I hope you realize how much these events are helping me out this year. I’m looking forward to leaving the real world behind when I enter the convention center doors. I’ll see you there. If you are coming to the convention, please come up and say Hi. I’ve met a few readers of this blog face-to-face at this event.
What should I be on the look out for? Any recommendations for the games I’m going to be playing? This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com with any comments.
My mission, which I chose to accept, was to back the KickStarter for Agents of AGEIS [Redacted] Edition from GeoffQuest. I received several bonuses for backing this espionage RPG which I’ve been given permission to reveal now. Be wary, TALON agents are around every corner trying to steal your secrets.
Agents of AGEIS [Redacted] Edition was released by the same small publisher that released Boldly Go! that I used in a previous Character Creation Challenge and uses a similar system. It was written by Geoff Bottone with the graphic design by Alia Hyman. Most of the art is black and white royalty free photos. Another proof that you don’t need AI slop to illustrate your books. For those of you purchasing the PDF, it’s only 8.26MB in size with an ISBN number of 978-1-7371457-9-7. The deadtree version (ISBN 2-370022-616684) of this softbound book has 96 pages with a color cover and black and white photos throughout. The format is like looking in a series of manila envelopes. An interesting inside joke is the handwritten notes by an infiltrator from TALON popping up in different locations of the book.
I was on a quest to search for these notes throughout the book.
The book has nine chapters, an introduction, appendix and index. The chapters include The Setting and the Meta, Core Rules, Vehicles, Base Creation, Character Creation, Assets, NPCs, TALON and The Play’s the Thing (GMs section). In the appendix is a random mission generator, base creation summary, character creation summary and some example sheets. This copy is a PoD from DriveThruRPG. I reviewed their PoD products here.
The back cover to Agents of AGEIS.
The basis of this game universe is the espionage adventures set in the 1960s similar to James Bond, Matt Helm, Derek Flint, Modesty Blaise, Cate Archer or Austin Powers. The players set up a base and build an espionage team for AGEIS (Allied Egalitarian Global Intelligence Service) which is a independent agency that was dedicated to fighting fascism, terrorism and tyranny across the globe. It kind of reminds me of the espionage comedy series Archer. Working with different governments, but not reporting directly to them. The default bad guys are TALON. A series of arms dealers that later switched to the goal of world domination.
Agents of AGEIS, like Boldly Go!, uses a dice pool system of D6s that they call the Traits System. A trait can come from the character, equipment, environment, etc. and can be positive or negative. When a player character attempts a task, they start with one D6. For each trait that they can justify to the Secretary (GM) they gain an additional die, up to six dice. Each roll of a 5 or 6 counts as a success. Depending upon the difficulty of the task, the number of needed successes can range from 2 (average) to 6 (almost impossible). The players also have Drama Points which can add additional dice or allow the player to manipulate the dice in the pool.
I’m getting smarter about adding my name to these thank you pages.
While going through the book I originally though that the term used for the GM was both Secretary and Director. But it turns out, the Director is an NPC used by the GM as the PCs handler. On page 59 the sentence ends on the page indicating that it would be continued on the next page, but I could not find where it was finished off at. From my first run through the book, this appeared to be the only editorial mistake. The mission generator looked really interesting. It gives you a series of prompts and lets the GM fill in the blanks.
Overall I’m very happy with backing Agents of AGEIS [Redacted] Edition and the physical book I received. While looking through this book I started wondering if I could run a one-shot at SaltCON. I could definitely use this for a future series of homebrew posts that I’m planning to release (more on that soon). I will be using this game in the 2027 Character Creation Challenge coming up in January.
Oh, before I let you guys go. A reader recently reached out to me in response to my Star Trek: Sky’s the Limit comic review. He was hoping that this special one-shot issue was finally available on digital format. I searched both Amazon and the IDW website with no success. But I was grateful to know that my past reviews are still being read.
Do you have any questions about the Agents of AGEIS [Redacted] Edition? Have you backed any Kickstarters lately? Tell me about it. This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com with any comments.
When I realized that I would have both books in my physical possession about the same time, I elected to review both in one blog post. As mentioned previously, if you buy a physical book from Modiphius on their website, they send you the PDF immediately. If you buy a deadtree version from another source, you can still send them a photo to Support@Modiphius.com and they will send you the PDF as soon as they have processed the ticket. This is usually done in a couple of business days and is very much appreciated.
The cover to the STA2e Exploration Guide.
As mentioned above, the Exploration Guide was released by Modiphius in 2025. This hardbound book has 144 pages and includes a two sided poster map for the 23rd and 24th century (see photo below). These same maps are on the front and back interior covers. The ISBN number is 9-781802-812749 and the product number is MUH0142514. Inside on the credits you’ll find names such as Nathan Dowdell (system designer), Jim Johnson (Many hats including Project Manager). I’ve noticed that there are more writers and artists in the credits for these books than there was for the STA2e Technical Manual. These writers include Eric Campbell, Marieke Cross, Michael Dismuke, Nathan Dowdell, AJ Fox, Jim Johnson, Aaron M. Pollyea and Al Spader. The cover artist was Rodrigo Gonzalez Toledo (who also did the cover for the Technical Manual) with interior art by Erin Arik, Marc Bell, Carlos Cabrera, Andrew Clark, Elena Conte, Albert Cordero, Enoch Driscoll, Aurea Freniere, Toma Fiezo Gas (kewl name BTW), Andrew Jarvis, Vincent Laik, David Metlesits, Wayne Miller, Berenice Buniz, Dat Phan, Paolo Puggoioni, Armin Rangani, Vadim Sadovsky, Nicola Sivani, John Teska, Rodrigo Gonzalez Toledo, Angelos Vadeiros and CBS Studios. Someday I hope to see my kid with the art degree from the University of Utah in one of these credits.
A photo of the map with the Exploration Guide.
The contents of the book include an introduction and five chapters. These includes Supplemental Game Mechanics, Sector Generation, Star and System Generation, Planet Creation and Planetary Biomes. In the back of the book there is both an Index and a List of Tables. There are a lot of tables in this book which makes me happy. We also have flowcharts (with page numbers) that are similar to those in the STA2e Core Rulebook which made it soooooo much easier to read as compared to 1st edition. Proof that Modiphus listens to the fans of the game that provided them with feedback.
A partial sample of one of a flowchart found in the book.
The Independent Archeologist and Outpost Scientist (both of which we see a lot in Trek) are two new career paths that are available for characters. I had to giggle at one of the value suggestions for the archeologist that sounds like it could have been said by a man with a fedora and whip. There are also several possible career events and an interesting sidebar on the Officer Exchange program. A handful of new talents are also listed for players to use that fit the theme of this book. But one very interesting addition to the character creation is the Secret. This could be a secret value, trait or talent and would need to be coordinated between GM and player. New awards and honors are also provided for use by the GM. Now exploring is about observing and becoming aware of unknown things. There is an entire sub-chapter about how the different player attributes and departments can be used in spotting or revealing items during play. This is good as I’ve wondered about this in some of my past one-shots. The use of Challenges and Extended Tasks in exploration is also presented.
As noted in past reviews, I love how Star Trek quotes were utilized to give the book some flavor. Well this book also includes quotes from notable scientists. This made me smile. When talking about the various biomes that are present on the different worlds, the writers elected to provide a list of Star Trek episodes that matched those biomes. I will say that I was confused by The City on the Edge of Forever being recommended for the Forest biome or The Crossing for the Water biome. Various story seeds are also provided for each biome which may assist some GMs in planning out their adventures. I wonder what the pilot of the runabout was thinking in that image on page 119?
The back cover to the Exploration Guide.
The cover to the Species Sourcebook.
Currently the latest publication for STA2e is the Species Sourcebook. While the Exploration guide was a book primarily for GMs to create those strange new worlds, this book is the new life and new civilizations that can be used as possible player characters. Sixty new alien templates are made available in this book with entries from The Original Series all the way to Section 31. There are some species that may not be considered to the “good guys” available in this book, but that would help if a player wants a character that may be an exile or a cross-breed.
The ISBN number for this hardback book is 9-781802-812183 with a product number of MUH0142601. Inside there are 133 pages. The introduction is found at the start and the index at the end. And while there is only one chapter, there are a LOT of sidebars for different chapters species and talents (such as shapeshifting, breathing apparatus requirements or something from the IDW Star Trek comics). After all of these are presented, there is a section for GMs on how to create an original species. I can see myself using this for homebrewing from other Trek sources.
The cover for this book was provided by Paolo Puggioni. Some of the additional art credits include the Star Trek Online MMORPG. The talented wordsmiths mentioned above are all present in this publication. When I showed this book to my daughter with the art degree, she pointed out how much she loved the artwork for the Deltan (how the dress flowed over the character) and the Risian (the shading in the clothing that covered the figure and how it made the character stand out without the use of heavy lines.) She spent some time talking with me about the different styles in the book and what worked for her and what didn’t. I really wish I had been smart enough to write it all down or record it.
Don’t take the lack of photos or description on the Species Sourcebook to mean that I loved it any less than the Exploration Guide. Both books filled different niches within the Star Trek Adventures 2nd Edition RPG system and were very well thought out. Recently I was able to convince another GM into running 2nd edition as compared to 1st by my past reviews. If anyone is considering running or playing STA2e, I can’t recommend these enough.
I’m already trying to save my Quatloos for the next book. Jim Johnson has been giving hints about it on the Modiphius discord server. So far, my money is on a book based on the medical aspects we’ve seen in the different Star Trek shows. Is my guess the right one? I hope we will find out soon.
And one last thing before I wrap this up. Modiphius has a system set up to report typos in the various books. I found one in the STA2e core rulebook that I submitted to them. And they recently released the latest errata that contained my corrections. I was tickled to see that.
Did you have any questions about the Exploration Guide or the Species Sourcebook for Star Trek Adventures 2nd Edition? Ask me about it. This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com with any comments.
