Tag: Modiphius

Anime, Character Creation Challenge, Dungeons and Dragons, Horror, Humor, Role Playing Games, Science Fiction, Star Trek, Top Secret, Westerns

2024 Character Creation Challenge After Action Report

Written by TardisCaptain February 4, 2024February 16, 2024 1 Comment

And we’ve reached the end of the 2024 #CharacterCreationChallenge. If you made it to 31 days, congratulations. Send me a note via email (carl (at) tardiscaptain.com) on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. My daughter is currently working on a new graphic for those that completed the challenge and I’d like to make sure that it gets sent to you upon completion.

I did make it to 31 characters, but I was delayed by a few days due to a family emergency. Thank you to everyone who reached out to me to ask. One poster mentioned that they had seen a lack of entries for the last two days. My mother and grandmother were involved in an automobile accident. The good news is that they are OK with no injuries and they are just fine (other than needing to replace a minivan). But it was a little scary for me when I found out.

I noticed that the Scooby Doo gang was used in a lot of different themes by participants (seeing Velma and Daphne in the Doctor Who RPG was a hoot). It was interesting to see them show up in different gaming systems. On the discord server there was a very good representation of characters from 80’s movies represented in the Power Rangers Roleplaying Game. It was kind of a trip down memory lane since I hadn’t seen some of these moves in a LONG time. There was also a participant who was making Star Trek characters for three different RPG systems for several entries. It was interesting to see the characters side-by-side. One of the most unexpected discoveries wasn’t a current participant, but someone who participated back in the first challenge in 2021. Apparently it got him out of some serious mental funk that he had been dealing with. It got him back into blogging and eventually back into writing RPGs (that he had done before). It was an emotional moment for me when I read his blog post.

Of the entries that I used for 2024, the games that stood out to me were Monty Python, Fallout, White Lies and Star Trek Alpha Quadrant. I really enjoyed making a character for Teenagers from Outerspace and I’ve been watching some classic comedy anime lately While Vintage Space didn’t fully scratch the FASA Star Trek itch that I was trying to recall, it did get some gears turning that may result in a future project. I also appreciated the publishers that responded when I posted characters for their games. They were able to answer some of my questions that I had raised in the blog posts. I tried to post those responses in the “Additional Notes” section of an entry a day or two later.

The disappointments were those games that were needlessly crunchy or overbearing. I had a few readers on Mastodon and a few of the message boards respond with similar experiences, which made me feel like I wasn’t such an idiot. I’m still digesting Cowboy Bebop and I have a few things I want to check out before I post my unboxing and final thoughts entry.

Here is my 2024 list of characters:

Day 1: Fallout Character: Ragnal Walker of Vault 47
Day 2: Hackmaster Basic Character: Cid the Kid
Day 3: White Star Galaxy Edition Character: Jenker Slix
Day 4: Fantasy Quest (Dicing w/ Dragons) Character: Alric Hinman
Day 5: Top Secret S.I. Character: Nick Tanner
Day 6: Tiny Wastelands Character Stewart Barlow
Day 7: The Dark Eye Character: Halmar
Day 8: Star Trek: Alpha Quadrant Character: Tropp
Day 9: Monty Python Character: Sir Richard Hammond
Day 10: Basic Fantasy 4th Edition Character: Durlan Torven
Day 11: Teenagers from Outerspace Character: Prince Zaxxod
Day 12: The Spy Game Character: James “Captain Slow” May
Day 13: Star Ace Character: Balkor
Day 14: Ninjas and Superspies Character: Luke Ward
Day 15: Conan Character: Braga
Day 16: Boot Hill Character: Noah ‘Lasso’ Johnson
Day 17: White Lies 2nd edition Character: Jack Sterling
Day 18: Vintage Space Character: Troxtor
Day 19: Fantasy Hero Character: Drokkin the Dwarf
Day 20: Shadowrun Anarchy Character: Spike
Day 21: Nights Black Agents Character: Kendal Barker
Day 22: Barbarians of Lemuria Character: Kruk
Day 23: Starfinder Character: Sarangari
Day 24: Crypts & Things Character: Azor
Day 25: Cyberpunk Red Character: Indigo
Day 26: Dungeons and Dragons Essentials Characters: Pelloth Graysoul
Day 27: Cowboy Bebop Character: Wayne Wolf
Day 28: Rolemaster Fantasy Character: Hobson Silversting
Day 29: Tiny Frontiers Character: YYZ-2112
Day 30: Pathfinder 2nd edition Character: Rogar of the Granitebender Clan
Day 31: Anarchy Character: Marcell Freeman

Also, if you purchased anything after clicking on the link to DriveThruRPG or Amazon, thank you. I’m not doing this blog to make money, but the kickback helps when making game purchases for future challenges.

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.

Character Creation Challenge, Role Playing Games

2024 Character Creation Challenge Day 15: Conan: Adventures In An Age Undreamed Of

Written by TardisCaptain January 15, 2024 1 Comment

We are half way through the month and half way through the 2024 #CharacterCreationChallenge. Today I will be using Conan: Adventures In An Age Undreamed Of by Modiphius. This is part of their 2d20 system. I’ve created characters under this system for Star Trek Adventures Core Rulebook, Star Trek Adventures Klingon Core Rulebook, Dune Adventures in the Imperium, John Carter of Mars and earlier this month, Fallout. So it will be interesting to see how the character creation process stacks up. Conan came out before Star Trek Adventures. So we will see.

There isn’t any availability for this game other than the physical books through Ebay. Modiphius gave up the license after they decided that they had completed the line. I’ve heard that another company will be picking up the Conan line, but I don’t think it will be using the same system. Just before the Modiphius license expired last year, they had a massive sale for all of the PDF books at a very good price. So I had to pick it up to use in the Character Creation Challenge.

The PDF of the core rulebook has 440 pages and contains bookmarks. The character creation process starts in chapter 2 on page 13. The character sheet is three pages long with the last page reserved for spells.

There are ten steps in the process. The first step is to select a homeland. The RAW states to roll 2d20 and check the chart. A roll of 21 resulted in the character being from Brythunia (and it gives a page number for more information). This gives us the Talent of Cosmopolitan and the language of Brythunian. The Cosmopolitan talent allows you to talk with other characters who also posses this talent.

Step two is the attributes. These are Agility, Awareness, Brawn, Coordination, Intelligence, Personality and Willpower and range from 6-12 when the process is completed. All of these attributes start with a value of 7. Now I am instructed to roll a d20 twice to determine the character’s two attribute aspects. These resulted in “Wise and Friendly” and “Socially Adept”. These both came with two mandatory attribute increases and I can pick one of two optional attribute increases. I adjusted my notes after making my choices.

The Caste is step three in the process. This is the social class that the character came out of. The caste will give the character two talents, one skill and a story. From the chart I rolled a Farmer. I wrote down the skills, effects and social standing and moved onto step four, the story.

A story has the background elements of the character and is rolled on a chart for the caste determined in step three. I found the Farmer stories and rolled a four “Ample for Winter”. For some reason there was a second line for caste on the character sheet, but none for story. So I assumed this was a mistake and wrote my story information there. No skills or other adjustments were provided here that I could see.

Here in step five we get to roll (or choose) an Archetype. This sounds like a class. I looked over the descriptions and decided to let the dice roll. If I didn’t like it, the example stated that I could just pick one. The d20 clacks on the table resulting in 11, a Pirate. Pirates are kewl, but how would a Farmer become a Pirate? Yea, I’m making the choice that this guy will be a Mercenary. More of a land based guy since he was once a farmer. Not only are there several skills obtained, but the first equipment items that I wrote down.

Next on step six, Nature we roll for what the character does or act in a certain way. Sticking with the randomness of the dice I rolled a 13: Sneaky. I looked up what is gained from this. +1 to a single attribute (awareness) and some more skills and my first talent (at least the first that I can see, the example had two listed for them by now, but they were on a different path so??)

Education is step seven. The dice rolled a 15 “On Your Own Terms”. More mandatory and elective skills were adjusted or added. Another talent was selected (perhaps I was just impatient). No new equipment however.

The War Story is step eight. I’m suddenly having to stop myself from saying “There I was…” It was a previous experience of some sort that happened to your character before the campaign started. I know that Star Trek Adventures has something similar to this. While STA has two of these events, Conan characters only get one. And for this guy I rolled a 19 which is “Survived witchcraft or sorcery”. This gave me a +1 Expertise and Focus to Discipline and Sorcery. Interesting.

On step nine we have some finishing touches. I can add +2 to one attribute or +1 to two attributes. I selected the later and decided to bump up my two lowest scores. I can then add several scores of Expertise and Focus to any skills (including skills that the character doesn’t have yet). I made my choices and altered the character sheet. It also explained that while expertise and focus were raised together during the creation process, during game play these would be increased separately. I was starting to wonder about this. I am also instructed to pick one additional talent as long as I can meet the prerequisite. I should also select a second language. The starting character gets three fortune points (i.e. luck points). For personal belongings, I get to roll twice on a table.

Step ten is the remaining aspects of the character. These include Vigor, Resolve and starting gold. It talks about courage and armor soak. It states that his persistent soak for courage is the sum of all soak bonuses bestowed by talents? But I don’t see any. Yea, I’d be asking a GM to clarify the soak stuff so I’ll leave this blank for now. Name, Age, Personality and Appearance discussions are here as well. I was thankful for the name examples.

I think I’m done because the book goes into some alternate character creation options. I know that the weapons and animals don’t have stats, but I’m sure I could look them up. I didn’t scan the third page since Braga (name selected from the homeland list) has no spells.

Afterthoughts:

I liked the fact that this core rulebook got straight into the explanation of RPGs (standard in most books) and character creation process. Several of the other Modiphiuis books for different media franchises had contained a long explanation of the world. As a gamer, I just wanted the rules. This was very much appreciated.

Not bad for a character creation process. No annoying pop ups with sides of information. I did have to re-read a few sections to make sure I understood what they were trying to say. If I did anything wrong, please let me know. But after the annoying character creation process of the last two nights, this was a blessed change.

This game sounds more combaty than Star Trek Adventures and Dune. I wonder how it would play at a table. Hopefully someone would run it at a convention. I don’t think I’ll ever get a chance to participate in a campaign for Conan. But I’d love to see how it runs at the table.

Additional Notes:

I had quite a reaction to my Ninjas & Superspies entry yesterday. On Mastodon, I had several readers tell me that they had the same level of frustration with the system including an attempt at making TMNT characters. One poster on the RPGPub message board told me that the stick figure drawing on the character made them laugh. They could see my frustration in that quick one-second drawing. I don’t know why this person’s laughing made me laugh out loud as well, but I did. And I needed a laugh.

Coming Up Next:

Boot Hill 3rd Edition

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.

Character Creation Challenge, Role Playing Games, Science Fiction, Video Game

2024 Character Creation Challenge Day 1: Fallout

Written by TardisCaptain January 1, 2024January 8, 2024 2 Comments

War. War never changes. But it may use a different dice system to determine the outcome.

So let’s start this thing. Welcome to the 2024 #CharacterCreationChallenge. If you haven’t read up on the idea, click on the link above. Feel free to join the large online community that is participating in this event.

For the past several years, the first game that I create a character for in the challenge is a game that I’m really excited about. In 2022 I created one for Dune: Adventures in the Imperium and in 2023 I used Alien. I had my first chance to play Fallout The Roleplaying Game at SaltCON-End of Summer last year. I remember being very impressed. I’ve made a character for John Carter of Mars and I had played Dune and Star Trek Adventures, but there was always something that I felt that I was missing about the 2d20 system. I don’t know if it was the presentation or the GM, but it all clicked somehow. Since I was really excited about this game, my daughter purchased the book for me from a black Friday sale. Ding, here is my first day already taken care of when I started my list of what games I was going to use..

For those of you not familiar with Fallout, it is a series of video games about a post-apocalyptic world where survivors hid in underground bunkers (called Vaults). After several decades after the bombs drop they come out to a changed world. This has become a franchise with various games and merchandising (where the real money from the movie is made) and soon to be a TV series on Amazon Prime. I’ve attempted to play a few of the video games, with some success and some flat out flopping. But the game world is very well thought out. When I started gathering interest in this series, I started watching some fan-made videos that explain the world and history. They may prove useful to anyone wanting to run an RPG in this series.

The core book is hardbound with 429 pages in full color. The character creation starts in chapter three with the details on page 50. There is a two page character sheet.

Step one is to select the origin of the character. This is basically your race (such as Ghoul (humans suffering from prolonged exposure to radiation), Super Mutant (mutated human big and bulky) or Mister Handy (robot freed from programing) or starting group (such as Brotherhood of Steel (religious knights trying to recover technology), Survivor (humans that survived on the surface) or Vault Dweller (humans that survived in a vault)). Since the first video game I played (Fallout 3) had me starting as a Vault Dweller, I wanted to try another one. This comes with the trait, Vault Kid.

Next comes the attributes. They were pulled straight from the video games. S.P.E.C.I.A.L. or Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility and Luck. These all start with a score of 5 and I have 5 additional points to allocate. I can reduce a score if I wanted to but only to 4. I made my selections and wrote them down.

Skills is what I select in step 3. Like the attributes, these come from the video game (it was practically a computerized RPG). These skill include Athletics, Barter, Big Guns, Energy Weapons, Explosives, Lockpick, Medicine, Melee Weapons, Pilot, Repair, Science, Small Guns, Sneak, Speech, Survival, Throwing and Unarmed. In this 2d20 system, you tell the GM what you want to do, and they let you know what attribute and skill you add together for your target number. If it is an easy task, you may only need one (or even zero) successes. If it is a more difficult task, it may require three or four successes. I was instructed to pick three skills to be my “tagged” skills. These start with a base score of 2 with the rest starting at 0. I then add 9 plus my INT score to come up with a list of additional skill points that I can allocate. For this character it will be 14 in total. My three tagged skills are Small Guns, Sneak and Pilot. I then allocated my points.

Each character gets a perk. Something that gives him an advantage. There is a large list available to pick from (some with minimum requirements). Think of the Dungeons and Dragons v3.5 traits. By this time I was starting to think of a possible backstory for this currently unnamed character, so I looked for a perk that I thought would fit him and wrote it down.

For step five we get to discover our derived statistics. These include how much the character can carry, damage resistance, defense, initiative, health points and how much damage he can do in a melee fight. I wrote these down.

The last step is to choose the starting equipment. I’m very grateful that starting packs were made available (depending upon your position with your origin). You also got a trinket, which is a special item that you own. I could make one up, pick from the list or roll for a random one. Since I haven’t rolled any dice yet, let’s see what the dice gives me. A postcard with an address. Interesting. Next is the tagged skill items. The skills I had tagged above came with their own special equipment items. I wrote these down.

There were still a few blank areas on the character sheet. What is my luck points (I think it’s the same as my luck score when starting out). What is TN and tagging in the weapons description? I had to track down some equipment information and I think I found most of it (especially since there is a carrying capacity within the game). I think I’m mostly done with the numbers side of the character, but I know I would have asked a few questions if I was creating this character in a session zero.

Ragnal Walker was born in Vault 47 (I don’t know if that number has been used in the game yet, so subject to change) and was one of the standard kids that got into trouble while growing up. While he didn’t have the smarts to be a doctor or scientist, he was always getting into places he shouldn’t be. In order to keep him out of trouble, the leaders instructed that he be taught how to drive some of the vehicles available to the vault for use in the outside world. While the leaders mostly kept the hidden vault sealed, they knew that they needed to trade with one of the other vaults several miles away. This loose relationship helped keep both vaults running. On one return trip, the caravan was ambushed by a band of raiders. Walker was able to fight his way out of the attack and headed back to Vault 47 on foot. A day later he discovered that the same raiders had just come from the vault and had destroyed it after the raid. Walker had to make a decision, start a new life out on his own amongst the surface dwellers (whom he had little contact with) or try to make it to the other vault to see if they would take him in. His adventure starts.

Here is the character sheet. After I had scanned it, I realized that I hadn’t added my vault kid trait onto the second sheet. So I added that afterwards.

Afterthoughts:

Unlike some of the other Modiphius products, Fallout is avoiding the “pop up” syndrome where you get distracted by the side notes in the book. This made it very easy to read (and I found myself reading more than I needed for character creation). While the creation process wasn’t 100% smooth, it wasn’t a frustrating ball of mess that I’ve experienced in other games.

Do I want to play this game? Oh yea. Do I want to homebrew for this game? At the least I’d like to write up something about the state I live in since I’m familiar with the area. As mentioned above, I’ve played this at SaltCON and I’ve signed up for another session at the next convention in March.

Additional Notes:

I’ve already had a ton of people reach out to me regarding the 2024 Character Creation Challenge. Several of you were looking forward to this event. Thank you, it is nice to know that my efforts have been appreciated. I hope that you all remember that this is for fun, so have fun with it.

A lot of blogs were added to the links section at the Character Creation Challenge page. I’ve also stumbled across another fan run message board for Alternity that apparently has an active thread running since 2021. Another participant has elected to post his entries on the TardisCaptain discord server (under the Character Creation Challenge channel). You are not required to use it, but it is there if you don’t have any other options. And (of course) you can email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain dot com or tag me on one of the social media platforms that I use.

Coming Up Next:

Hackmaster Basic

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.

Archer, Character Creation Challenge, Comic Books, Conventions, Doctor Who, Dune, Dungeons and Dragons, Horror, Movies, Music, Role Playing Games, Science Fiction, Star Trek, Star Wars, Video Game, Website

Moving from 2023 to 2024

Written by TardisCaptain December 31, 2023January 11, 2024

Stack of character sheets printed out for the 2024 #CharacterCreationChallenge

2023 was a weird year to say the least. I was able to see a ton of concerts including several that I wanted to check off of the bucket list. These included Duran Duran, Love and Rockets, The Cure, Garbage, and Depeche Mode. I was able to see a live show that featured some of the comedians from “Who’s Line Is it Anyway” (the show had a different name probably for copyright reasons). I’ll be getting the photos for these up in the photo albums.

For the first time in a long time, I had the opportunity to attend a gaming convention. SaltCON Spring, SaltCON Summer and SaltCON End-of-Summer. I know at the beginning of the year, I stated that I only wanted to participate at this event and not volunteer. Well, after much thought and discussion with others, I’ll be running two games next spring. One will be a one-shot for Basic Fantasy RPG that I already had written up and did some polishing on. The other is a Star Trek Adventures: Lower Decks inspired game where the crew will be meeting the cast of Top Core (a sci-fi parody of the BBC show, Top Gear).

I’m still watching a ton of movies at home thanks to the many streaming services that I have access to. In the theater I did enjoy Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. I also saw Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. I also enjoyed this movie and I hope that the ending would lead to another sequel. But I wouldn’t be disappointed if there wasn’t one. My youngest is a Five Nights at Freddy’s fan so we had to go see the movie in the theater. Not knowing much about the video game series, I thought the movie was OK and I wasn’t bored. In 2024 I’m looking forward to seeing Dune: Part Two, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga and Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.

Television wise I’ve been soaking up all of the various Star Trek franchises (Picard knocked it out of the park and I demand more Lower Decks). The Star Wars episodes have been good as well. I’m sad that Archer is ending, but I’d rather have it end on a high note. What We Do In The Shadows has also continued to entertain me. MST3K season 13 was a blast. I watch so much TV that I am unable to list them all here. On the weekends I’ve still been enjoying Svengoolie and Creature Features. I’m really looking forward to the new Doctor Who episodes after the great introduction from the 60th Anniversary specials and Christmas episode. The Fallout TV series has also caught my attention. I did cancel my Peacock account because there was nothing on it to watch (and I’d go months forgetting it was even there).

Reading wise I’m still going strong on the Star Trek and James Bond comics. While I’m also enjoying the Star Wars comics, I had to move from buying the physical books to a subscription to Marvel Unlimited due to the high cost of the individual issues. Too many Star Wars comics to continuing to buy them all.

I may have made a mistake with my video games. I set up both a Steam account and a GOG account. So I’ve been getting deals on lots of classic games that I use to play. I’ve been trying to play a few others as well such as Fallout New Vegas and a couple of other hidden gems that were tossed my way. But when it comes to time crunch issues, the video games get put off to the side pretty fast. I need to make sure that I’m spending some enjoyment time playing these games.

I want to get some writing done in 2024. I’ve talked about it, but I need to sit down and do it. Hopefully the Basic Fantasy scenario will be good enough to submit to the BFRPG community for consideration. While I also have some fan projects in mind, I’d actually like to have a few publications that I could legitimately sell online.

Keep an eye on this blog for what happens in 2024. Now off to the USS Ticonderoga New Years Eve party. Tomorrow I dive into the deep end of the pool with the Character Creation Challenge.

What did you enjoy about 2023? What geeky things do you want to do in 2024? 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 or click on my social media links with any comments.

Character Creation Challenge, Dungeons and Dragons, Role Playing Games, Spy-Fi

Prepping for the 2024 Character Creation Challenge

Written by TardisCaptain December 24, 2023January 11, 2024 2 Comments

Some of the games that I plan to use in the 2024 #CharacterCreationChallenge

For the three previous years of the Character Creation Challenge (in 2021, 2022 and 2023), I’ve prepped ahead of time to make the challenge a little bit easier. Especially since I try to use a wide variety of games in January 2024. I’ve already had some people reach out to me using various methods to let me know of their participation. Please let me know, Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com if you plan to post your characters up on a blog. I’ll link to it from the Character Creation Challenge section of my website.

If you are posting on any of the social media websites, please use the hashtag #CharacterCreationChallenge so that other participants can find them. I love seeing what other RPG fans have come up with.

The photo above shows the physical books that I’ll be using. Some have been gifts, others were picked up at local gaming conventions or found at thrift stores. I also have a collection of games purchased from Kickstarter, DriveThruRPG, HumbleBundle and Bundle of Holding.

I’m once again using a spreadsheet with the date, day and game type to schedule my games. This way I won’t have two fantasy games next to each other. I can also plan a game that may take more time and energy on a day off. This is also a good idea for those dates I know are going to be busy, I can schedule the systems I’m more familiar with for these days.

As in the past, I’ll try to walk through the character creation process as I understand them in the rules-as-written (RAW). This also gives me a chance to do a review of the process. I will then scan the character sheet for all to see. And I will have all of the character sheets printed out before the challenge starts. I’ve found that this helps me get everything ready.

My entries will be blog posts on this website. Then I will post links on my various social media sites along with the three main roleplaing message forums at RPG.net, RPGpub and RPGgeek.

If you are reading this after January 1st and you still want to jump into the challenge, please do. A few participants last year either did a quick catch up or just made sure they ran a full 31 days. The choice is yours. This challenge is just for fun with our gaming systems.

Remember to have fun with this. That was one of the primary goals of the challenge.

You can also use this graphic to help promote the #CharacterCreationChallenge.

31 Day Character Creation Challenge — Feel free to share this image on social media to spread the word.

You can also post your characters on my discord server in the #Character-Creation-Challenge channel. 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.

Reviews, Role Playing Games, Star Trek

Modiphius celebrates Star Trek: The Animated Series 50th Anniversary with a supplement

Written by TardisCaptain September 8, 2023September 8, 2023

Back in 2021 I remember getting a surprise from Modiphius when they released the IDW Year Five Tie-In for Star Trek Adventures. I was so inspired that I wrote a review of that product here on my blog. Well on Star Trek Day (September 8th) for the 50th Anniversary of Star Trek: The Animated Series, Modiphius dropped another surprise on me by releasing the Star Trek: The Animated Series Supplemental Guide.

Can you say “Instabuy”? Yea, spoiler. But I’ll still give you a full review. This book had a lot of good effort put into it.

As I was looking through the PDF, I knew that I had to write a blog post about this. But the real world gets in the way and I had to wait for the workday to completed. Stupid real life.

The Star Trek: The Animated Series Supplemental Guide is a PDF only release from Modiphius. The document comes in 69 pages (compared to 26 for the Year Five Tie-In) with ten chapters in total. This PDF is bookmarked for easy navigation. The writing was done by Aaron Harvey, Jim Johnson, Fred Love and Aaron M. Pollyea. There wasn’t an ISBN number listed, but it did have a product number of MUH0142322-PDF. The copyright is 2023. The foreword is written by Aaron Harvey who is the co-author and designer of the Star Trek: The Official Guide to the Animated Series that was released in 2019.

There was an interesting tidbit in the foreword regarding the writers strike that was happening in the 70’s when the Animated Series was in production. I thought this was interesting considering the current state of affairs between the studios and the unions currently going on now. Considering the production schedules that corporations follow I’m fairly certain that this was written before or just about when the current strike started.

So the first chapter gives us the stats for the characters that we see in the Animated Series. I had to chuckle when I saw that the Department of Temporal Investigations had redacted a piece of information in a couple of the bios (and where they missed one). Not seen in other publications are the stats for Lt. Arex, Lt. M’Ress. The second chapter covered some additional crewmemers from both the Enterprise and other Starfleet services.

New Life and New Civilizations is the title of the third chapter. Here we find information on various planets that were visited in the Animated Series. And since they were colorful, there is a lot of color in this section.

For those of you wanting new races for the game, Chapter Four gives several new lifepath options. We get stats for the Aquans, Aurelians, Caitians (yes we had them before, but this was to be complete), Edosians, Kzinti (Yay, I’ve been waiting for this one), Pandronians, the plant like Phylosians and the Skorr. I did notice something when I first saw the Kzinti, the stats were different than they were in the Star Trek: Lower Decks Campaign Guide. When I inquired on the Modiphius discord server, Jim Johnson (Project Manager) replied that the Lower Decks guide was a misprint and that I should use the stats in this book. I did like that the Kzinti entry gave information on why some Kzin are members of Starfleet.

Chapter Five gives us the Equipment and Gear. This includes the Life Support Belt, the Automated Bridge Defense System, the Phaser Bore and the Telefocals.

Gamemasters may find the items in Chapter Six interesting. This is Science and Spatial Phenomena. I’ve seen Pocket Universes used in several different stories.

Being a Treknologist, I was glad to see the starships in Chapter Seven. Besides the Enterprise, we get to see the Inflatable Decoy, the Aquashuttle (loved the Monty Python joke embedded here), the Stormbird-Class Romulan Battlecruiser (chef’s kiss for the FASA reference), the IKS Devisor, the Traitor’s Claw (a Kzinti police vessel), the Orion Orchid-Class and more.

Chapter Eight provides the different Allies and Adversaries that were seen in the Animated Series. We get information on Harcort Fenton Mudd, Ari Bn Bem, The Aprils, Thelin, Cyrano Jones, Spock 2 (no Electric Boogaloo jokes please) and more.

We get some additional creatures in Chapter Nine. Do you want genetically modified Tribbles? Because this is how you get genetically modified Tribbles. Plus Glommers, Le-Matyas, Shelats and a host of others.

The last chapter is the Index. Something that may come in very handy while trying to look something up.

For the art and layout, it’s very easily to read. There is some original screen captures from the shows and some very well done new art. It captures the feel of the Animated Series with a modern twist. The usage of pink is a tip of the hat to the usage in the series (partially because the producer had some colorblindness).

Does it give us all of the items from the Animated Series, no. I’m not certain what the limits are on a PDF production. If there is a time limit or just a need to keep the document to a certain number of pages, but there are a few items that didn’t make it into the book. The Copernicus shuttle, the Bonaventure, the Lactrans, the USS Huron, the Dramians, Sord, Vedalans and other entries are now fair game for homebrewers. I feel that about a good chunk of what was seen in the series is listed in this book. So, overall it is an excellent source for any Star Trek Adventures campaign. Ever since Deep Space Nine, elements of the Animated Series were inserted back into “canon” after being pushed out in the late 80’s. Lower Decks has practically dragged the Animated Series back into the light so I would highly recommend picking up this book.

What do you remember from the Animated Series? What would you like to use from it in your Star Trek Adventures game? 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.

Conventions, Dungeons and Dragons, Role Playing Games, Star Trek

SaltCON-End of Summer After Action Report

Written by TardisCaptain September 5, 2023January 14, 2024

SaltCON t-shirts I had picked up at all three conventions

So Father’s Day finally arrived for me on Labor Day Weekend. My wife had purchased my SaltCON-End of Summer ticket as a Father’s Day gift. I had a chance to meet up with some of the friends that I had met at previous conventions. Some people were stating that they had recognized me from before. But I had also missed out on talking with a few others. We saw each other at a distance while getting to different events but didn’t get a chance to stop and talk. So sorry if I missed out on talking with you.

One of the things that I had not mentioned in my SaltCON-Spring and SaltCON-Summer after action reports was the available convention t-shirts (now seen above). These shirts were very reasonably priced for the sizes offered. So I made it a habit of picking one up each con when checking in at the registration desk. I’m grateful that they had a non-blue shirt for the end-of-summer event. And speaking of picking things up.

The dealer that I had picked up several Star Trek Adventures sourcebooks now had the Star Trek: Discovery (2256-2258) Campaign Guide. This was one of the last books that I need (I’m only missing the Strange New Worlds Mission Compendium 2 hardback). From the game swap area I was able to track down a used copy of Ninjas & Superspies for a good price. I was also able to pick up a used copy of Rolemaster Fantasy Role Playing as well. Both of these will end up being used in the 2024 Character Creation Challenge as well as other future themed blog posts.

Not in the photo was several gifts that I had picked up for my geek wife. But from one dealer I was able to pick up a Boba Fett pin and a D20 pin to go on my convention backpack. Hopefully you can see them at the bottom of the photo.

Some of the characters that I had a chance to play

I was able to attend all of the games that I had mentioned in my Prepping for SaltCON-End of Summer post. Here is how the games went.

Hyperborea– Yes this was definitely weird and ran pretty smoothly. The GM knew the game pretty well having backed the kickstarter. I wouldn’t turn down an opportunity to play this game again.

Dragonbane– This game really impressed me. The character sheet made sense and I could see the logic behind both the system and the setup. I was originally thinking this was going to be my highlight game of the con, but another game knocked it off on Saturday. In this game your player character could be an intelligent duck. I played a wolfkin who was an excellent fighter.

Fallout– And the game that did grab my highlight of the con was Fallout. Most of us at the table were playing this 2d20 RPG for the first time and it actually made a lot of sense. I quickly understood how it ran (and it explained some items I had questions on other games using this same system). One of the players let me look at his dead-tree version of the book and I’m seriously thinking of adding it to my collection. Especially after I stated thinking of what a Salt Lake based Fallout campaign would be like.

Low Fantasy Gaming– This ran like a D20 clone. In true OSR style fashion, it was quick and deadly. Luckily the rolls went our way and we actually finished the scenario before the allotted time had expired.

Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition- We had to stop some highway bandits while investigating a logging camp that had stopped sending logs down the river. As it turns out, we had to make peace between the loggers and a Fae queen who was not happy.

Star Trek Adventures– A session that a friend ran that was from one of the adventure books. He ran it pretty well, but it also went really late on a Saturday. I took some of the stuff I had learned from Fallout and was able to apply it here. I’m starting to get a better grasp for the game.

Pathfinder 2nd Edition- The first game I was in was part 4 of 5 of a connected story ran over the weekend. The gamemaster gave us a “Previously on…” flashback so that we understood where we were in the storyline. In the last event, we connected all of the clues together and confronted the final boss. The GM had a homebrewed system that he used to allow us to put all of the clues together and find our suspect. Luckily we had rolled well and was able to catch the bad guys before they realized we were on to them. Had we not rolled well, they could have been more prepared for the final confrontation.

Ghostbusters- It was weird when this game ran because most of the other games had concluded for the con. We had a big quiet room to ourselves. I could see where this early D6 system eventually developed into the Star Wars RPG by West End Games. We had to investigate dinosaur ghosts at the New York Museum of Natural History. Yea, we made a lot of Night at the Museum jokes while playing.

Conclusion:

I had a blast at all three events this year. If you are reading this and can make only one event, I’d recommend making it the spring one as it is the largest. The End-of-Summer event was the second largest in scope and layout at the convention center. I was also able to put a bug in the ear of some people to, hopefully, see more of an expanded used-RPG book swap for next year. The bulk of the convention is boardgames, but I’m there for the roleplaying side of things.

Not only am I making plans to attend next year, I’m also starting to give serious thought about GMing a few games. I really like that classic games such as James Bond and Ghostbusters can find themselves on the schedule. Considering I can play 5E or PF2 anytime, I really want to play the more rare games at conventions to make it more unique.

Have you been to any gaming conventions 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.

Role Playing Games, Star Trek

RPGaDay2023 Day 21: Favorite Licensed RPG

Written by TardisCaptain August 21, 2023August 18, 2023

So, Favorite Licensed RPG is the topic for Day 21 of the #RPGaDAY2023 Challenge. I’ll give you three guesses and the first two don’t count.

I have sections of this website already dedicated to the FASA Star Trek game. I’ve started a LUG Star Trek section and plan to create sections for Decipher Star Trek and Modiphius Star Trek Adventures.

Not only am I collecting any of the Star Trek licensed RPGs, but I’ve been gathering the unofficial ones as well. Some of these are games where the IP elements have been filed off, but the game is clearly Star Trek. One example of this is Starships & Spacemen 2nd Edition. Far Trek and Where No Man Has Gone Before are fan created games based off of the Original Star Trek series. Star Trek Alpha Quadrant is a fan-made game based off of the Cepheus Engine. I haven’t had a chance to try STAQ yet, but I may in a future Character Creation Challenge.

What is your favorite licensed RPG? 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.

Dungeons and Dragons, Role Playing Games, Star Trek

RPGaDay2023 Day 18: Favorite game system

Written by TardisCaptain August 18, 2023January 11, 2024

OK so Favorite Game System is the subject for Day 18 of the #RPGaDAY2023 challenge. And I have to think about this one. While there are a few systems I’d prefer not to play (such as something really crunchy or overly-complicated) I’m pretty much open to playing just about anything at least once.

There is the old standby of the standard D20 system that has been seen in the various flavors of Dungeons and Dragons or the various retro-clones such as Basic Fantasy, Castles and Crusades, OSRIC or Labyrinth Lord. There are a ton of other options in this category as well that covers other genres.

Lately, I’ve been impressed with the 2d20 system put out by Modiphius such as Star Trek Adventures, Dune: Adventures in the Imperium or John Carter of Mars. I even picked up the Conan books before they lost the license and I look forward to creating a character for the 2024 Character Creation Challenge.

Probably on the not-so-well known stage is the d100Lite system that is seen in such games as Barebones Fantasy, Covert Ops and Frontier Space. While I haven’t had a chance to play these systems yet, they look and read amazing.

There are also several other systems that I haven’t really mentioned here. But I’m sure my readers don’t have time for me to list just about everything. So my answer is kind of like Bubba’s answer to what his favorite beer is. But replace beer with what game system is currently being played at the table.

What is your favorite #TTRPG system (or systems)? 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.

Conventions, Role Playing Games, Star Trek

RPGaDay2023 Day 14: Favorite Convention Purchase

Written by TardisCaptain August 14, 2023August 11, 2023

Day 14 of the #RPGaDAY2023 Challenge and the subject is “Favorite Convention Purchase”. Well I’ve been to a ton of conventions. I really need to get my convention resume updated and placed on this site. However since this is a challenge geared towards roleplaying games, I’ll have to think about an item I purchased from an RPG convention.

My very first convention ever back in the late 80’s was an RPG convention. It was held at a local library and there were a ton of D&D games going on. Comics Utah ran Kublai Con when it was still around, but heck if I can remember if I had purchased anything from that event. Another gaming store that had been located in the Southtown mall that ran a quarterly gaming convention (I met several friends there for the first time). But I don’t recall if I had purchased anything from these events. In the 90’s to early 2000’s, CONduit had some gaming going on and I know I purchased items there. But it was primarily a literary convention so I don’t know if this would count?

This year I’ve been to SaltCON-Spring and SaltCON-Summer. And I documented what I had purchased from these events. So from those two events my favorite convention purchase (at least for now) are the Star Trek Adventures Player’s Guide and the Star Trek Adventures Gamemaster’s Guide. I had purchaesed these from a small local RPG store that had a table at the convention. I was able to support a small business. If you read my after action reports for both events, you’ll see that I also picked up several other books that I plan to use in the 2024 Character Creation Challenge. So it is a possibility that I may change this answer in the future.

What is your favorite convention purchase? 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.