Heritage Star Trek #1632 - Romulan Assault Unit

Manufacturer: Heritage Models, Inc.

Set #: 1632 Romulan Assault Unit

Scale: 25mm

Year: 1978

MSRP: $2.95

Notes: I don't actually have these. The Hoplite-like helmets remind me a little too much of Marvin the Martian to take seriously, so I've never gone out of my way to get them. These photos are from the collection of Dave Berton, from whom I obtained most of my collection.

It appears that there are 3 poses: 2 with pistols, 1 with rifle down, and 3 with rifle ready.

But wait! There's more.....

Review: Michael Giacchino's Star Trek Score

When I first heard in 2006 that J.J. Abrams was going to have Michael Giacchino do the score for his Star Trek film, I'll admit I was more than a little underwhelmed. Don't get me wrong, I knew Giacchino was very talented and I enjoyed his scores for the television series Lost and the film The Incredibles a great deal.

"But c'mon," I thought. "Giacchino isn't Jerry Goldsmith."

I have a passion for film soundtracks. They make up a good 25% of my entire CD collection. And the musical legacy of Star Trek over the years is easily some of my favorite music. I even listen to the isolated music tracks of TOS DVDs just to hear the work of composers such as Alexander Courage, Sol Kaplan and Fred Steiner. I have all the CDs -- and even some vinyls! -- for the Trek films over the years, except for Leonard Rosenman's score for Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (the only thing I didn't like about that movie). James Horner's work for Star Trek II and III are so powerful, though in retrospect they sounded like nearly everything else he was doing at the time. I have Dennis McCarthy's soundtrack for Generations, but I probably only remember the first and last two minutes of it.

Fortunately, the master of Trek soundtracks -- Jerry Goldsmith -- would return for First Contact. Despite all the fine compositions for Star Trek films both good and bad, I'll always consider his score for Star Trek: The Motion Picture the masterpiece. His main theme was triumphant, "Ilia's Theme" is so beautiful, and I still get a little chill up my spine when I listen to "Klingon Battle". When I hear it, I'm 14 again seeing Klingon battlecruisers in 70mm Panavision for the first time. And, in a reversal of my feelings for Trek IV, Goldsmith's music is pretty much the only thing I love about Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. I would go so far as to say that Jerry Goldsmith's Trek music was the music for the Star Trek series. Yes, TOS had Courage's immortal theme, but Goldsmith's music was bigger than that.

So, for me, Giacchino would have some pretty big shoes to fill and I didn't think he could pull it off. How wrong I was.

My perception of what Michael Giacchino could do completely changed when I saw Cloverfield in early 2008. That films single piece of music, "Roar! (Cloverfield Overture)", was the perfect distillation of master composers such as Akira Ifukube, Masaru Sato and Yuji Koseki and the outstanding work they had done over the decades for kaiju eiga (another of my passions) such as Godzilla, Mothra and other Toho classics. Would he take a similar approach to Star Trek?

The answer is an unqualified "Yes".

Michael Giacchino's score for J.J. Abrams' Star Trek is not only a worthy successor to the work of Goldsmith but also captures the essence of the contributions of Horner, Courage, Kaplan and Fried, with a little Bernard Herrmann (The Twilight Zone, The Day the Earth Stood Still) thrown in for good measure. But, like "Roar!”, Giacchino makes it wholly his own and in the process continues the memorable legacy of Star Trek music.

I've not yet seen the film, so I can't yet say how well the score for Star Trek supports the movie itself. Like much of Goldsmith's work, Giacchino builds his score around a single recurring musical theme. It's not quite the leitmotif approach of composers such as John Williams in his Star Wars soundtracks, full of individual themes for characters and settings. Based on what I know of the story itself, the score focuses on Kirk and (I suspect) builds in variations along with the character throughout the course of the film. There seem to be identifiable melodies for the Enterprise, the villain Nero, and his vessel the Narada, but in most cases are used to intertwine with and modify the main Trek theme. Through the course of the score, Kirk's theme builds from soft and tentative ("Star Trek"), to contemplative ("Hella Bar Talk"), to brash ("Enterprising Young Men"), to mature and triumphant ("That New Car Smell"). It is, at times, as strong a theme as Goldsmith's "Leaving Drydock" in TMP.

Two of the finest moments in the soundtrack don't involve Kirk's theme at all. "Labor of Love" is an aching, building, beautiful melody that at times seems mournful and turning unexpectedly blissful. I suspect it accompanies the birth of Kirk in the midst of the tragedy of the USS Kelvin, and may have the audience holding back tears in the first 10 minutes of the movie. It has the same effect on me that Giacchino's "Life and Death" theme from Lost does. Another, "Nero Sighted", weaves moments of brass and moments of isolated percussion in such a way that it evokes Horner's track "Surprise Attack" from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. It's one track that I'm sure will please fans of Horner's classic space combat music.

Another standout track is "Nice to Meld You". I won't identify what I suspect accompanies this track in the film, but it's dark, dramatic and ebbs in and out in such a way that I felt transported back to moments in The Original Series meshed with Herrmann's The Day the Earth Stood Still. I can't wait to have visuals to match with the music (one week!).

If anything feels out of place in this score, I'm afraid that it's Giacchino's take Alexander Courage's original Star Trek theme in "End Credits". It feels forced and unauthentic, like something off of the "Erich Kunzel and the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra" album I've avoided for 25 years. I can appreciate its inclusion as a tribute, but I'm just not certain that a purely symphonic approach to something so well-known and originally accompanied by a soprano voice and electronics could do anything but jar this listener. Perhaps that's why it's been avoided by other composers up to this point. More effective is the use of the opening fanfare in "To Boldly Go", and a familiar melody in another track that will come as a pleasant surprise when you hear it.

I'm also disappointed that the CD contains only 45 minutes of music from the film. I realize that not every part of a score is suitable for release on a soundtrack CD, but 45 minutes out of a possible 70 minute CD for a 126 minute movie leaves me wondering how much has been left out.
But for me, the most important question was whether or not Giacchino's score would be worthy of its predecessors. Would I get another Star Trek IV (not Trek-like)? Would I get another Generations (unmemorable)? Was it beyond hope to get a score better than Star Trek: The Motion Picture (the best)?

While Giacchino's Star Trek doesn't quite reach the heights of Goldsmith's masterpiece. I'm not sure how much it will appeal to those whose tastes run darker, and more towards the work of Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard. But it is at least as superb as James Horner's Trek scores and most of Goldsmith's later work. It sounds both fresh and classic and -- most important -- it sounds like Star Trek. The legacy continues. I suspect that once we hear the music in the context of the film itself, it will be perfect and we'll hope that Giacchino will be back for the next Star Trek in 2011.

But wait! There's more.....

Everything's Kooler in Kanji & Kana

I don't know what it is about the combination of Star Trek and Japan that fascinates me so, but I just love this. It's the cover to a new magazine/book ("mook" over there) coming out on Friday in Japan. Would love to get it, but shipping costs more than the mook itself (one of the reasons I've practically given up collecting Godzilla and Ghost in the Shell memorabilia).

Anyway, just too cool and had to share. Click it for the bigger version.

But wait! There's more.....

One Less Frontier

Bummer news today from Gareth-Michael Skarka of Adamant Entertainment. As you may remember in a previous post, I mentioned he was planning on doing a Trek adaptation for Mongoose's Traveller. Looks like it's not to be. From his LiveJournal...

...Cancelled our proposed Traveller sourcebook, Final Frontier: The Unauthorized Sourcebook to the World's Most Popular SF TV Franchise, for several reasons -- first and foremost being the amount of things on my plate at the moment (specifically the effects of the first bullet point, above). The thought of a potential legal scrum was there as well, although admittedly low on the list, along with doubts about potential audience viability. Really, though -- the main thing was that I've got enough irons in the fire right now, and I should be careful not to confuse what I'd love to see as a player with what I should be working on as a publisher.

Still, this could make things more interesting for me should I feel the initiative. I've been working on a lifepath-based character generation system for my Trek adaptation, and it would easily port over to Traveller. If, that is, I felt like going all out and doing something for Traveller. Not sure how I feel about that, especially for Trek and especially when I've actually got some original projects I'm working on as well.

Despite the fact a slot opened up, I'm still not going to call mine Final Frontier any longer, lol.

Got Michael Giacchino's score for Star Trek today from Amazon. It's really wonderful. I think I've listened to it a half-dozen times already. Big review to come, probably tomorrow.

But wait! There's more.....

FASA Star Trek #2603 - Dr. McCoy

Manufacturer: FASA Corporation

Set #: 2603 - Dr. McCoy

Scale: 25mm

Year: 1983

MSRP: unknown

Additional Notes: McCoy is in his jumpsuit and appears to be holding the anabolic protoplaser that he used in the Peter Preston sickbay scene of TWOK.

This sculpt is different than the "Dr. Leonard McCoy" included in FASA's Wrath of Khan box set (#3001 "Collector's Series Number One: USS Enterprise and Crew"), in which he's wearing his standard uniform and holding a hypospray.

The base is etched with what appears to be "SLP83" on the bottom and "ⓒ83 PPC" for Paramount Pictures Corporation.

But wait! There's more.....

Heritage Star Trek and Different Worlds

With the exception of a very few more miniatures sets, this post will wrap up my coverage of Heritage Models and Star Trek adventure gaming. Frankly, I'm surprised I've managed to get this many words out of the subject. At this rate, it may take me 4 years to cover FASA!

As I detailed in my two part review of Star Trek Adventure Gaming in the Final Frontier, the game's biggest weaknesses were that a) it didn't feel like Star Trek, despite all the name-dropping, and; b) there are virtually no rules covering themes of exploration, character building, starships and starship combat. In the age before the Internet, it would require some fan-written works published in a magazine called Different Worlds.

Different Worlds began publication in 1979, amongst other adventure gaming magazines at the time such as The Space Gamer, Dragon, White Dwarf, Journal of the Travellers Aid Society and, shortly after, Ares. Despite the fact that it was published by Chaosium (Call of Cthulhu, RuneQuest), it remained remarkably independent in its focus on fantasy, sci-fi and horror games regardless of publisher, thanks in no small part to the vision of its editor Tadashi Ehara. It's also the only gaming magazine I remember that had a wonderful industry gossip column, "A Letter from Gigi". For someone like myself who was 15 years old at the time, it was really the only way I knew who was who working for whom on what way back when. Did I mention there was no Internet yet?

In Issue #4 (Aug/Sept 1979, above) DW published "A Star Trek Scenario Report: Kirk On Karit 2" by Emmet F. Milestone. The three-page tongue-in-cheek article is a little bit review of STAGFF, some background on the one-shot adventure the author created to run at DunDraCon IV, and special rules he created for STAGFF.

Kirk has Spock run a survey scan of the space surrounding Karit II. The sensors show the presence of a Klingon scout and an entirely alien vessel which appears to be a derelict from its utter silence on all the EM bands. Kirk decides that investigation of the geological disturbances has top priority, so he leaves Scotty in charge of the Enterprise and beams down to the planetary surface with Spock, McCoy, Lt. Uhura, and four security guards. The landing party materializes in front of the only entrance to a huge white dome.

As the people of the starship accustom themselves to the new environment of Karit II, the great double doors of the dome burst open and a group of figures comes flying from within. Three giant humanoid insects are obviously pursuing the lead entity, an orange floroid resembling a carrot, all using jump harnesses. The insects open fire with their disruptors and scorch the plant-man, who dives for cover.

The insectoids, it turns out, are Dreenoi from the 1974 sci-fi miniatures game Starguard (a game which still lives today!). Milestone provides STAGFF statistics for Dreenoi Warriors and Brain Bugs as well as the carrot of Karit II, Karitan Alpha. The noble crew of the Enterprise must infiltrate the mysterious dome, fighting off Dreenoi and Klingons, and repair a machine before the planet destroys itself. And along the way, Kirk may have to seduce a female Klingon lieutenant. In order to pull this off, Milestone created two additional mechanics for STAGFF, "Falling in Love" and "Making a Pass", noting that "Kirk never has luck in love, and can't add his Luck modifier" to his scores as a result.

In Issue #18 (January 1982, right) DW published the more serious and useful "Star Trek: Beyond the Final Frontier" by Paul Montgomery Crabaugh, one of the most prolific writers of gaming articles at the time (see Jeff Rients' Gameblog for two posts about the late, great Mr. Crabaugh). The article almost accomplished more in its six pages than STAGFF did in its 30+ pages. How much?

Written to supplement Star Trek: Adventure Gaming in the Final Frontier role-playing rules, this variant covers a wide range of topics including Experience, Skills, Aging, Salaries, Price Lists, The Referee 's Role, Chain of Command, and World Generation.

Not only that, but Crabaugh included tables for determining crew member species, rank, bonuses and skills, type of starship, warp speeds, department assignment, tech levels and about a hundred more pieces of equipment. In short, Crabaugh single-handedly managed to take STAGFF and transform it into a role-playing game, one worthy of campaigns rather than one shot, landing party dungeon crawls. It's an amazing achievement, eclipsed only by the fact that FASA's Star Trek The Role Playing Game would come out later that same year.

In fact, I would go so far to say that STAGFF combined with Crabaugh's "Star Trek: Beyond the Final Frontier" resulted in the first true Star Trek role-playing game as we know it.

Things coming up on Groknard: FGU's Starships & Spacemen, ADB's Prime Directive series yesterday and today, more FASA and Citadel miniatures, another surprise, two hybrid "role-playing boardgames" and -- in two weeks! -- my inevitable reviews of the new Star Trek film and its CD score by Michael Giacchino. Today, however, I'm off to EndGame in Oakland for their 6th Annual EndGame Auction!

But wait! There's more.....

Heritage Star Trek #1621 - Talosians

Manufacturer: Heritage Models, Inc.

Set #: 1621 - Talosians "Large Craniumed Humanoids - Zoo Keepers"

Scale: 25mm

Year: 1978

MSRP: $2.95

Notes: 6 figures with two poses. 1621 has its right arm raised, 1621b has its left arm raised. "ⓒ1978 PPC" (Paramount Pictures Corporation) etched on the base.

But wait! There's more.....

White Dwarf #18, Citadel and the TMP game

I'd actually planned on covering this in a few weeks once I had wrapped up my series on Heritage's Trek game, but the item in question just came up on eBay and it's rare, so this will double as Auction of the Week (link to eBay listing for White Dwarf #18, left).

White Dwarf is the insanely old UK magazine dedicated to science fiction and fantasy wargames, miniatures and role-playing games. It started its run in 1977 and is still going today, although its focus has been almost exclusively on publisher Games Workshop's own gaming products since the mid-80s.

In early 1979, GW helped form the spinoff company Citadel Miniatures, which itself partnered with Ral Partha miniatures here in the States for manufacturing and distribution. Citadel released miniatures based on a number of licensed properties including games such as Traveller, D&D and RuneQuest, and other media properties such as my beloved Doctor Who, Judge Dredd and, in 1980, Star Trek. Specifically, miniatures based on the 1979 film Star Trek: The Motion Picture. As I have with the Heritage, FASA and other Trek minis, I'll be covering that range in more detail soon.

In a move somewhat similar to that of Heritage, White Dwarf published a 4-page article in its April/May 1980 issue (#18) called "Star Trek The Motion Picture - Rules for Adventures in the Final Frontier" by GW/WD regulars Tony Yates (artist, AD&D Field Folio) and Steve Jackson (no, not that one, but rather the WD Editor and co-founder of GW, who probably is long tired of disclaimers like this after his name). The article consisted of about a page-and-a-half of actual rules, a game scenario, a map of the Enterprise Main Bridge (TOS version) that was obviously traced directly from Franz Joseph's Star Trek Star Fleet Technical Manual, and a one page "Alien Descriptions & Painting Guide".

As you've probably guessed, the article is not so much a detailed game as it is an incentive to run out and purchase the Citadel miniatures. "These are an introductory set of adventure rules for Star Trek games," the article begins. "They serve as a basis for conducting role-playing games and tabletop battles with miniature figures. Two people may normally play, one playing Admiral Kirk and the Enterprise crew, the other playing the enemy." It encourages readers to expand upon the rules and submit their ideas and further scenarios to White Dwarf, but I'm not aware that anything further was published.

The game requires three 6-sided dice and a pair of 20-sided percentage dice (in those days, 20-sided dice usually numbered 0-9, twice), and a ruler to determine movement, range, line-of-sight and so on. Each character has two stats: Ability Factor and Combat Factor of 3-18, checked by rolling under using a D20 and a D6 (the D6 is used to determine whether to add "10" to the result of the D20, i.e. was the result a "4" or a "14"). AF is used to determine success on pretty much any plausible action that is not combat, such as a repair, a translation or an alien special power. For the sake of comparison:

Admiral Kirk: AF 18, CF 17
Mr. Spock: AF 17, CF 18
Rand: AF 14, CF 11
Klingon Leader: AF 16, CF 16

Ah, and to think that I used to admire The Fantasy Trip for getting away with 3 stats!

Other rules detail the Turn Sequence, Movement, Combat ("Remember that Starfleet Regulations also require that all phasers carried by Strfleet personnel must be set to stun only at all times except in extreme circumstances or when firing at inanimate objects"), Close Combat and the Hero's Roll (basically a saving roll against death for elite characters, which apparently does not include Chekov).

The scenario, "A Guided Tour" has the Enterprise crew in drydock, giving a tour to the wide variety of alien miniatures available from your local Citadel dealer. While on the bridge, the Klingon representative gets a little too nosy about the computer system, is confronted, pulls a weapon, and action/hilarity ensues. Some aliens will ally with the Federation, some with the Klingons, and others will be neutral unless a dice roll says they're not. The Klingons win when they kill Kirk, Decker or Spock, thus changing history and preventing Star Trek V: The Final Frontier.

The article closes with a list of the miniatures, their game stats and a very simple painting guide that has as about much detail as the game itself. In short, it's not much of a miniatures game, and even less of a role-playing game (even for the time), but it probably squeezes about one evening of fun into its 4 pages. The highlight of the issue is actually a cool 6-page D&D adventure, "The Halls of Tizun Thane" by Albie Fiore that's much better than the Trek game.

If you collect or intend to collect the Citadel miniatures, the magazine is a worthy companion to your collection, especially if you can nab it in the Auction of the Week for $3 plus shipping. If nothing else, magazines from this time period are a great trip down memory lane, sometimes just for the advertisements and new game announcements (like TSR's Top Secret) and reviews.

There is also a full page ad for Citadel Miniatures Ltd near the front of the magazine, prominently featuring an advertisement for the STTMP 25mm miniatures range, and listing the figures (noting that each pack was 50p, and contained two different poses/figures even though Kirk actually had a 3rd variant):

ST1 Captain Kirk
ST2 Mr. Spock (right, painted by Mark Dixon)
ST3 Dr. "Bones" Mccoy
ST4 Scotty & Chekov
ST5 Sulu & Willard Decker
ST6 Uhura & Christine Chapel
ST7 Ilia & Janice Rand
ST8 Enterprise Crew
ST9 Security Guards
ST10 Vulcans
ST11 Deltans
ST12 Klingons
ST13 Aaamazzarites
ST14 Kazarites
ST15 Betalgeusians
ST16 Arcturians
ST17 Zaranites
ST18 K'normians
ST19 Rigellians
ST20 Rhaandrites
ST21 Shamin Priests
ST22 Megarites
ST23 Saurians
ST24 Andoreans

Note - It does not list the four 54mm miniatures that were released in 1980, which I include here just for reference:

ST5401 Captain Kirk Seated at Helm
ST5402 Mister Spock
ST5403 Ilia in Deltan Leisure Dress
ST5404 Klingon raider with Laser Pistol

Again, I'll be covering as many of the figures as I can at a later date. In the meantime, you can check out the Collecting Citadel Miniatures Wiki for a nearly complete reference on the range.

But wait! There's more.....

New Trek Monopoly Review/Contest at STG

Feel like taking a break from RPGs for an evening? Check out my review of the new MONOPOLY: STAR TREK CONTINUUM COLLECTOR’S EDITION over at Star Trek Games. We're also running a contest to give away one free copy of the game (deadline for entries is Wednesday April 22nd at midnight PST).

But wait! There's more.....

Star Trek Movie Tickets on Sale Today!

Today will be a day long remembered... it has seen my purchase of tickets for the early May 7th showing, and a ticket for the IMAX showing the very next morning, all in one swift stroke!

TOP THEATER CHAINS TO START SELLING “STAR TREK” EARLY SHOW TICKETS STARTING THIS FRIDAY, APRIL 17

May 7 Tickets Will Be Pre-Sold by AMC Theatres, National Amusements, Pacific/ArcLight, Regal & other theatre circuits

HOLLYWOOD, CA (April 16, 2009) –Starting Friday, April 17, many of the nation’s top theater chains will start offering early show tickets for Bad Robot’s production of J.J. Abrams' “Star Trek,” presented by Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Entertainment. The tickets are for May 7 evening performances of the film, which debuts worldwide on May 8, 2009. Participating chains include AMC Theatres, National Amusements, Pacific/ArcLight and the Regal Entertainment Group, among others. Additional theatre chains will offer advance tickets in the coming week.

Fandango
Fandango - The IMAX Experience
MovieTickets.com
Movietickets.com - The IMAX Experience

But wait! There's more.....

Heritage Star Trek #1618 - Phylosians

Manufacturer: Heritage Models, Inc.

Set #: 1618 - Phylosians "Plant Men"

Scale: 25mm

Year: 1978

MSRP: $2.95

Notes: Another set of 4 oversized figures with an identical pose. Each figure has "ⓒ1978 PPC" (Paramount Pictures Corporation) etched on the base.

The Phylosians of Phylos made two appearances in Star Trek The Animated Series, first in "The Infinite Vulcan" in October of 1973, and a month later as part of the Elysian Council in "The Time Trap".

It just occurred to me that there was a giant Spock clone in "The Infinite Vulcan". I could always use the 54mm Spock for that.

By the way, there's actually a pack of Phylosians up for auction on eBay this week.

Below is a close-up of a Phylosian next to Kirk for comparison.

But wait! There's more.....

Trek RPG Blog Roundup

Blog entries of note related to Star Trek gaming:

- Adam's Barking Alien moves forward with his Gaming the Final Frontier series, with "Strange New World" on how to structure a Trek campaign, and notes that he'll be running a new campaign soon.
- On Monsters and Manuals, Noism ponders the eternal question, "Why are we satisfied with substandard Trek role playing games, dammit?"
- Review of the new Continuum Edition Star Trek Monopoly by yours truly coming up on Star Trek Games in the next day or so, along with a contest to win it (the game, not the website)!

But wait! There's more.....

Trek RPG Auction of the Week - 4/13/09

Sorry for the prolonged absence, busy with real life and moving my office. Should be able to get back on track this week.

We'll start it off with Auction of the Week. Ask most Trek gamers over the age of 30 which system is their favorite, and they'll say something like, "I like the ____ system best, but the FASA one always holds a special place in my heart," or they'll just outright say that FASA's Star Trek The Role Playing Game is still their favorite.

This week's auction is for the 1985 Basic Game, Second Edition version (FASA #2004). This was the more affordable version with new and expanded rules, including the Star Fleet Officer's Manual (40 pages), the Game Operations Manual (48 pages), the Cadet's Orientation Sourcebook (80 pages), and two 20-sided dice (numbered 0-9, as real mens' dice were in those days) in a slimmer box with cover art by Rowena Morrill. Unlike the Deluxe versions, no separate starship combat system nor sheets and counters were included.

Also up for auction this week, more FASA goodness: the 1983 Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan Collector's Series Number Two: USS Reliant and Khan's Crew miniatures box set (FASA #3002), with USS Reliant (1/3900 scale) and these 25mm figures: Khan Noonian Singh (Ceti Alpha V), Joachim (Ceti Alpha V), Khan Noonian Singh (normal), Joachim, 2 male followers, 3 female followers.

But wait! There's more.....

Miniatures from STTNG Monopoly (1998)

As I previewed a few weeks ago in my post on Scale and Alternate Options for Trek miniatures, the Star Trek Monopoly games (link to BoardGameGeek) included some sweet pewter tokens that are perfectly suited for use in Trek RPGs, and certainly better looking than Heritage's minis from the 70s.

In 1998, USAopoly released Monopoly - Star Trek The Next Generation Collector's Edition, which included 28mm scale tokens for Picard, Riker, Data, Troi, Worf, Beverly Crusher, La Forge and Wesley Crusher. I'm afraid I can't say much about the game itself as I've never played it. These days the game runs about $50.00 on eBay, so it's hard to justify just getting for the miniatures. If it's unlikely the regular crew would ever show up in your gaming sessions, you're better off to keep an eye out for Last Unicorn's Federation Away Team miniatures, which you can get for about half the price. The Worf miniatures from both the Monopoly game and the LUG box are pictured here, side by side. The rest of the set is pictured below:

Monopoly tokens for Deanna Troi, Lieutenant Commander Data, Captain Jean-Luc Picard and Lieutenant Worf.

Star Trek TNG's Monopoly miniatures for Wesley Crusher, Lieutenant Geordi LaForge, Commander Will Riker and Dr. Beverly Crusher.

Monopoly - Star Trek The Next Generation Collector's Edition box

But wait! There's more.....

Trek RPG Auction of the Week - 4/6/09

A bit of a depature for this week's Auction of the Week. Not a straightforward RPG or supplement, but rather a boardgame that has elements similar to that of a role-playing game: West End Game's 1985 Star Trek: The Adventure Game (link to eBay search).

STTAG was designed by adventure gaming luminary Greg Costikyan (SPI's The Creature That Ate Sheboygan and WEG's Paranoia and Star Wars Roleplaying Game) and is an obvious labor of love from a classic Star Trek fan. Like WEG's Tales of the Arabian Nights or the Choose Your Own Adventure series of books, STTAG is a paragraph-system boardgame: players refer to a book with 800+ numbered paragraphs, each which describes a situation that ends with options that lead the players to a new paragraph with the results. 120 different adventures are possible, and 2 players compete as either the UFP or Klingon Empire (solo games are also possible).

As I said, it's a boardgame and not an RPG. But I think most Trek roleplayers would find it a lot of fun for a change of pace, and see some familiar elements. For instance, characters have varying skills such as Command, Science, Navigation, Seduction, Charisma and so on, making some characters a better choice to resolve a conflict than other.

The game includes a short rulebook, the paragraph book, a mounted map depicting the space between Earth and the Klingon homeworld, counters for characters, starships, planets and other markers and dice, all inside a very nice game box with a lovely cover by Boris Vallejo (originally a painting for the Trek novel "Black Fire" by Sonni Cooper). Despite the TMP style of the box, the contents and the game itself are decidedly TOS. You can find more information on the game along with pictures at its BoardGameGeek entry.

But wait! There's more.....

The Shape of Things to Come

I've previously mentioned Patrick Goodman's invaluable CODA Support Site which, along with the TrekRPGNet Forums, has kept Decipher's Star Trek Roleplaying Game the most current and relevant of the Trek RPGs. Patrick and contributors to his CODA site have been pumping out a lot of great new material over the past few months and last night, he gave us another preview of a project he's been working on: Starships of the Star Fleet Technical Manual.

Last month he gave us a look at the cover (JPG) and a single page for the Constitution Class (PDF). Last night, as a gift to the community for his birthday, he previewed the starship (PDF) that IMHO best defines my nostalgia for Franz Joseph's wonderful book.

I won't say anymore so as not to spoil the surprise. Just note that there are two pages, and Patrick is working hard to finish the project by May 8th (to coincide with the release of the film). Thanks, Patrick, and Happy Birthday!

But wait! There's more.....

Heritage Star Trek #1631 - Klingon Stormtroopers

Manufacturer: Heritage Models, Inc.

Set #: 1631 - Klingon Stormtroopers

Scale: 25mm

Year: 1978

MSRP: $2.95

Notes:

- As noted previously, Paramount did not approve these designs so very few actually made it to shelves.

- The design is best described as "Darth Vader meets Stormtrooper"

- Intended to be released as 6 figures with three poses: rifle, bazooka, pointing. Actual assortment unknown. No labels or copyright notice on bottom.

- No picture of the original package available. I purchased these loose from Michael Thomas who owns the molds and rights, and is best known for running Disciples of Heritage and Classic Miniatures. These are new casts that he makes available as either Klingon Assault Team in his eBay store, or as Imperial Legionnaires (#2018) for the Galacta 25 line he is reviving. As a result of new materials and technique, these are the best looking casts of the entire Heritage Star Trek line.

But wait! There's more.....

Hiding a Tree in a Forest

The only thing worse than an April Fools' joke is the one that no one catches. Hmmph. From yesterday's entry on homebrewed Trek games:

Perhaps the most recent and disturbing homebrew is based on WOTC's D&D4E. Although I can see the appeal of a cross-genre "phasers vs. magic" style adventure, the conversion only provides stats for four characters: Kirk (Leader), Spock (Controller), McCoy (Defender) and Sulu (Striker). Furthermore, the powers are all combat oriented (i.e., the At-Will "Vulcan Nerve Pinch"), making Dungeons & Dragons: Final Frontier not very Trekish at all, and a rather foolish endeavor.

Well, that's the last time I try to have fun with you guys. In fact, I'm tempted to write it just to spite you all.

But wait! There's more.....

Homebrewed Star Trek RPG Adaptations (Part 2)

If there's anything more numerous than commercial adaptations of Star Trek as a role-playing game (Part 1 of this series), it's homebrewed versions and resources written by fans, doing it for themselves using their favorite system.

There's also a lot of them called Final Frontier (guilty as charged).

This is by no means a comprehensive list. In the last post, readers mentioned a homebrew based on R. Talsorian Games' Interlock system, I thought I'd read of one using Chaosium's Basic Role-Playing and I'm sure there are many that never got posted to the Internet at all. D6, Unisystem, Action!... after finding all of these, I suspect there have been nearly as many custom Star Trek games as there have been generic RPG systems.

If you're just interested in converting from a licensed system to one of your favorites, a good place to start is where Owen E. Oulton (of Memory Icon) created a System Conversion Table as part of his own Star Trek Universe campaign. It features guidelines on conversion between various game systems such as ICON (Last Unicorn Games' Trek RPG), FASA's Trek (2E), Traveller (various), GURPS, Star Wars (D6), GDW's "House Rules" system (as used in Twilight: 2000 and Traveller: The New Era) and Babylon 5 (Chameleon Eclectic's The Babylon Project RPG).

But if you're looking for complete conversions by a man who knows his stuff, then you should head directly to the site of the Original Final Frontiers, that of Bob Portnell, King of Star Trek Homebrews (my words, not his). Like me, Bob's love of adventure gaming goes back to The Fantasy Trip and, like me, is "one of the last of the Baby Boomers or the first of Gen X, depending on whose math you use" (his words, not mine). He has not only written extensively about RPGs, but went on to team up with Guy McLimore and Greg Poehlein (co-authors of FASA's Star Trek The Role Playing Game) to co-author the Simply Roleplaying! game as part of their MicroTactix Games endeavor in 1999.

And when it comes to writing Trek games, Bob's got 17 years under his belt so far. In addition to resources like Speed-Trek (notes for faster character creation in FASA's Trek RPG), Bob has written a number of Trek homebrews ("I've been writing Star Trek rules for so long, I can't stop!" he says). While he's working on finishing EZFudge Final Frontier, you can check out his PlainLabel Final Frontier for the Simply Roleplaying! system (core SR! rules free from DriveThruRPG).

Bob's also done two versions of Final Frontier for 3E versions of Steve Jackson Games' GURPS: GURPS Final Frontier (160k zip file with HTML and TXT), and the more compact Final Frontier (2.1 zip with PDFs) based on GURPS Lite, which is included. His GURPS page includes some other resources as well.

I have to say that I really like FF for GURPS Lite (and I'm not at all fond of full-blown GURPS). It's very self contained, well-written and produced, and it's the one version out of all these games that I talk about -- pro or home -- that I would grab for a pick up session or to introduce someone new to RPGs through Trek. Bob's great strength in all of these is that he focuses on the elements that are most like Trek on the screen, and he presents it succinctly. The rules never get in the way, but his approach is not that of narrative games. The tools he provides give players the ability to quickly learn then play a game in the Trek universe that balances cinematic with (not against) realism. That's a hell of an achievement for free games, and similar to the model we've seen executed with the GURPS Dungeon Fantasy series. I'm planning on interviewing Bob here in the near future.

Curiously, there's a number of other homebrews that have been based on the GURPS system over the years:

GURPS Trek - The Unauthorized Sourcebook was a popular homebrew for GURPS 2E from 1996; "Mr. B's" original pages (text file format) can be found here and elsewhere.

GURPS Star Trek (for GURPS 3E?) features pages of races, starships, equipment and campaign notes (note, however, that the links to the Online Character Generator are broken).

GURPS Trek at the Traditional Games Wiki (GURPS 4E) provides a lot of stats, but is unfinished and hasn't been updated in 2 years.

If GURPS isn't your thing, there's Spirit of the Final Frontier, based on Evil Hat's pulp adventure RPG Spirit of the Century, which is not to be confused with Spirit of the 24th Century which ran at a few cons, but is also based on the FateRPG system, which itself is based on Fudge... feel free to stop me at any time. And check out the separate Evil Hat Productions Wiki entry on "Pulp Characters from Books, Movies, etc".

Star Trek for the D20 System is an active Yahoo Group focused on (what else?) adapting the series for D20-based systems such as d20, d20 Modern, PD, True20 and more. There's a number of resources here, though only one completed set of rules which can also be found at...
TrekRPG.info, which hasn't been updated in awhile, but features conversion notes for the d20 System, a downloadable draft of d20 Warp, and links to a Traveller: The New Era adaptation called STrav 3 TNE (thanks to Jerry for the pointer).

WOTC's Alternity still lives on the web, and Scott Metz posted his notes about adapting Trek to the system.

Star Trek: Savage Worlds (1.6MB zip file) adapts Trek for Pinnacle Entertainment Group's Savage Worlds RPG, and features a character sheet, edges, weapons and equipment (requires MS Excel). Groknard reader steveraceuk is in the process of taking it a step further at his Savage Star Trek wiki.

Epoch is a wholly original homebrew system by Jonathan Clarke that's closely based on Star Trek, and focuses less on technology and more on a cinematic feel. It uses a D6 dice-pool system, and even provides guidelines for starship combat.

COSMIQUEST! The Very Final Regurgitation is a Risus-based parody of Star Trek by Guy Hoyle with a small set of guidelines for charcater cliches, technology and adventure seeds. There was another Risus-based Trek parody by "Dr Rotwang" (of the blog I Waste The Buddha With My Crossbow), but it's long gone and he doesn't seem to mind, but has posted some new ideas (that still verge on parody).

Speaking of parodies, I should mention Twerps Twek based TWERPS, "The World's Easiest Role Playing System" by Jeff and 'Manda Dee. Twerps Twek (Campaign Module 7) was by Jon Hancock and Niels Erickson and published by Gamescience in the early 90s. To sum up, it came with "the complete stat" for classic NPCs such as Yeoman Randy Jan and Loquacious of the Bore. This was a commercial product (check eBay or Noble Knight Games) so perhaps doesn't belong here, but I was going to have to mention it in this blog sometime. Mission accomplished.

Another "commercial homebrew" has been announced, this time as "Trek with the serial-numbers-filed-off" for Mongoose's Traveller. Gareth-Michael Skarka of Adamant Entertainment has said that he's working on Final Frontier: The Unauthorized Sourcebook to the World's Most Popular SF TV Franchise, described as a "set of rules and guidelines that will allow you to play races such as the Logical Psions, face off against Swarthy Aggressors, enter careers which represent the various service devisions within the Fleet, and boldly go across the galaxy using space-warp FTL engines." This I'd like to see because I've yet to see a Trek adaptation for Classic Traveller, and CT and MGT are pretty close.

Perhaps the most recent and disturbing homebrew is based on WOTC's D&D4E. Although I can see the appeal of a cross-genre "phasers vs. magic" style adventure, the conversion only provides stats for four characters: Kirk (Leader), Spock (Controller), McCoy (Defender) and Sulu (Striker). Furthermore, the powers are all combat oriented (i.e., the At-Will "Vulcan Nerve Pinch"), making Dungeons & Dragons: Final Frontier not very Trekish at all, and a rather foolish endeavor.

Finally (probably not!), there's my own totally non-commercial please-don't-sue-me venture, Thousand Suns: Final Frontier (35 pages, 1.7MB zipped PDF). It's only a preview version from December '08, but I've come a long way since "The Universe Trip" edition of 1981. Still, I'm not sure where I'm going to go with this. Since starting this blog, I'm asking myself, "Does the community really need another RPG based on Star Trek? Especially a homebrew focused on TOS? Especially called Final Frontier??"

Probably not. But I can't help but think that when the new film comes out, some people are going to turn their eyes back to Star Trek and think, "Hell, yeah, I want to play that!" And I love the idea of a Trek game based on Thousand Suns, one that takes place in a period not so constrained by the dreaded "Trek canon", where the future is wide open.

Perhaps, I'm thinking, I should be looking forward as much as I'm looking back...

- - - - - - - -

ADDENDUM #1: I completely forgot one that's the most current of all -- Federal Space (link to wiki). Federal Space is a unique group project started by some folks on RPG.net, and is described as "a decidedly non-canonical spin on the familiar Star Trek universe, refracted through a lens of harder science and (hopefully) more consistent worldbuilding... it's Star Trek: Stand Alone Complex, or Star Trek run at GURPS TL10 (hard science path) instead of TL12 (with superscience), or a pacifistic version of Star Fleet Battles, or simply 'Star Trek with hats.'"

Not my cup of tea, but still, it belongs here more than TWERPS Twek.

ADDENDUM #2: Jerry (below) mentions the FASA Trek Sourcebook for Hero System (5th ed.), at the Star Hero Fandom website, which also includes TNG Hero for the TNG/DS9 era. Very extensive work and templates for Hero Designer software.

ADDENDUM #3: Probably my last update (4/8/09) as this could go on forever, far longer than anyone will actually look at this post! Mike Berkey has composed some rulesets called Where No Man Has Gone Before based on the TOS setting. This is an exceptionally cool document and full of great ideas and random tables (examples: "First Beam In Location", "
Random Interior Set Generator") useful to anyone interested in Trek RPGs, regardless of system. Version 2.0 is the most recent, and based on the Microlite20 system. Version 1.0 is more heavily drawn from d20Modern. Seriously, check it out now, it's a really fun read.

But wait! There's more.....