More Homebrew Updates and Tidbits

So many updates and tidbits to share, so little time to put it into a cohesive format. But I don't want to delay and today is a holiday, so I'll get them out here.

First, this (left) should put to rest the question "How big is the new Enterprise??". It's really the best photo reference yet in which we can compare scales. The new Enterprise is 23 meters long and 5 meters tall. Let that be the end of it.

The new movie has certainly kicked up interest in Trek role-playing, big time. Google Trends indicates searches have nearly tripled over the past few months (as has my own traffic here), activity related to Trek old and new has really increased over at TrekRPG.net, there seem to be at least 3 new threads a week at RPGnet about Trek, and bidding has been somewhat fierce over on eBay for a number of Trek games and supplements, especially FASA (I curse whoever it was that outbid me on the Romulan Ship Recognition Manual last night, lol). It's a shame that there's no new game to take advantage of it, but it seems to me that it just doesn't matter right now. Interest seems to be evenly split between FASA, CODA and homebrews, which is really wonderful.

Speaking of homebrews, that series of posts seems to have been one of the most popular here at Groknard. As it happens, there are some updates worth mentioning (in no particular order):

- Mike Berkey's brilliant Microlite20 Where No Man Has Gone Before has been updated a few times. It's in Version 2.0, but he continues to update it occasionally (including today!), so bets to bookmark it.

- Jerry Cornelius of the Triplanetary and Jetan blogs has a compelling Trek TAS adaptation for R. Talsorian's Mekton Zeta.

- I don't even remember how I found this (right), but I dig it! DT Butchino's To Boldly Go... A True Trek Sourcebook for Star Trek TOS (PDF via Sendspace) for Green Ronin's True20 system. Great layout, tons of fluff and crunch.

- Bob Portnell has put out a call to those who would eventually like to playtest his EZFudge adaptation of Final Frontier. Drop him a line at nvdaydreamer (at) gmail (dot) com. Details at his blog.

- Speaking of EZ, fans of Atomic Sock Monkey Press' PDQ (Prose Descriptive Qualities) System should check out a series of blog posts in which a group uses it for their Trek adventure. The posts cover character creation, character descriptions, and the three gameplay recaps. RPGNow offers the updated PDQ# (PDQ Sharp), the basis of ASM's Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies RPG, for free.

- Although Adamant Entertainment has cancelled plans for their Mongoose Traveller sourcebook, Final Frontier, an effort to do a Trek homebrew for MgT has kicked up over at TrekRPGnet. Please jump in if you'd like to assist in this effort.

- Also at TrekRPGnet, CODA stats for the crew of the new Star Trek film and a call for submissions for a CODA Klingon Sourcebook is underway.

- At RPGnet, an effort to map out Trek for Troll Lord Games' StarSIEGE: Event Horizon, itself adapted from their Castles & Crusades d20-like re-imagining of OD&D.

- Again at RPGnet, running a Star Trek game using Cubicle 7's FATE-based Starblazer Adventures.

- GURPS and GURPS PD fans take note: Steve Jackson Games recently released the latest PDF from David Pulver's excellent GURPS Spaceship series, GURPS Spaceships 3: Warships and Space Pirate, which includes the "Intrepid Class Frontier Cruiser" which seems an awful lot like the Enterprise, and the stealthy "Eclipse-Class Battle Cruiser" which could possibly pass for a Klingon D-7 K'tinga class cruiser. Just sayin'...

- Speaking of GURPS Prime Directive, two threads over at the SJG forums about adapting the new Trek film to GURPS PD.

- Not necessarily Trek related, but Jason of Elf Lair Games has mentioned on his new blog that he's planning a science fantasy/space opera game (a "settingless toolkit") called Twelve Parsecs™. I absolutely love Elf Lair's Spellcraft & Swordplay, and you know what I'll be thinking about doing with this when it's released. It's still some time away, but I wish ELG best of luck as they get started on all these great endeavors. An Old-School Renaissance Space Opera game... yippee!

- Again, how did I find this? Bridge Crew by James Mullen over at the 1KM1KT collection of free rpg games, which is described as "a simple, narrativist style RPG of cheesy space opera, very much in the mode of a certain well known, heavily franchised TV show". I usually run from anything that says "narrativist", but there are a few interesting ideas worth mining here.

- You already know about the supremely cool Star Trek Miniature Maker, don't you?

- Remember my translation for Tsukuda Hobby's Enterprise Star Trek RPG from 1983? I was told awhile back that it ended up online. No biggie, glad to know it's out there and I can't be held responsible for distributing it! Anyway, I ran across it over at Scribd. Thank you, Vina, whoever you are. It even got a comment in Japanese: "This is a good translation. Thank you." Phew! I even found a copy of my Mothra vs Godzilla boardgame translation at Scribd. What next? My grade school book reports?

- And speaking of my projects, I have actually decided to postpone my TOS adaptation for Thousand Suns. Instead I will be doing one based on the new film. Why? Two reasons. One, as these posts make clear, there are already tons of options for playing TOS. I'll get to it, but there's just no rush. Second, I want to play in this new sandbox, both as a writer and as a player. "I like this ship! It's exciting!" There's a lot of freedom there, whether it be in deck plans for the new Enterprise, the backstory of events leading up to and following the Kelvin incident, and mapping out what could happen next. Thousand Suns is still the perfect choice to do so, so that won't change.

- Following that, there will be two, possibly three projects. One (or two) is a Trek game based on a wholly original system I've been working on, one that takes an approach similar to my beloved The Fantasy Trip games like Melee (1977) and combines that with elements similar to the RPG portions of starship combat of the FASA system and the exploration themes in boardgames such as FGU's Star Explorer (1982) and West End Games' Star Trek The Adventure Game (1985). I've already started writing it, though I'm hashing out some high-level details about how many books and how to break it down. I think it's going to be pretty different from much of what's out there, and I wouldn't categorize it strictly as an RPG. It's much more of an "adventure game" that will either have broad appeal... or no appeal at all! Nevertheless, I'm pretty excited about it. I think it's going to be the Star Trek game I've always wanted. I'll keep readers updated and, as I said, I also plan on returning to TSFF. All of these projects will benefit from each other.

That's all for now!

EDIT 5/27: Adam reminds me below that Owen Oulton of Memory Icon has been busy posting updates to his Rising Sun Campaign for LUG's Star Trek RPG. Of special note are new additions such as a full-color map of the infamous Triangle boardering Federation, Romulan and Klingon space, and Starbase T-1. Be sure to check out the extensive deckplans for the SS Rising Sun itself!