What Have I Been Up To?

Regular readers may have noticed another long absence, well, I'm back, and I'll share (guiltily) what I've been up to...

There's been quite the gap in posts lately, and it's entirely my fault - we haven't been able to link up with my friday group, and I've only been to one Mid-Week Wargame Wampage since January.

Not that I haven't been gaming - but, dirty secret, it's been online. After some 15 years of being online, I finally found my first MMORPG, and Megz has been sharing the madness.

For the stone-knives-and-bearskins fans amongst the readers, that acronym stand for Massively Multiplayer Online Role Play Game, and in this case, it's Star Trek Online (hereafter STO).

Character Screen - Note the Traveller reference name...

Yes, space-cadets, it's now possible to boldy split an infinitive, where no on has split, before  - online. STO is a combination of the Sims 2 meets FASA'a Star Trek Combat Simulator, all in the universe of Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek.

Players may select Federation, Klingon or Romulan as their character.  There's also an "alien" sub division, which is allied to either Fed or Klingon. Also, the Romulans aren't exactly a full faction (locals call them a "fraction") since Cryptic Studios decided it would be easier to ally the higher ranked Romulan characters to either the Federation or Klingon Empire (to be clear, I think this was a bad, sloppy, lazy decision...)

Gotta love the "bad" guys

Your character progresses from a Cadet to a Fleet Admiral, over the course of play. Lower level missions are more reminiscent of the TV series - there are some negotiation missions, search party missions, patrol missions and such like.

That said, most missions, either ground-based or in space, are combat oriented. As you character gains rank and prestige, new venues will open: there's the planet Nukara - hot as hell where an environmental suit is all standing between you and fiery doom.  There is New Romulus, where the refugees from the Hobus Supernova are rebuilding their home.  There is Defera, which is being invaded by the Borg. There is Kobali Prime, under invasion from the Vaadwaur, and harbouring an unpleasant secret.

Marooned on a barren world...

In addition to these "Adventure Zones" there are the canon worlds of Vulcan and Andoria (which seem to have been forgotten by the developers at Cryptic) and Risa, the Resort World, where the Galaxy Relaxes (for a short time during the summer).

This game is not without its drawbacks - the social element is a trifle...awkward. If you thought miniature gamers had genetic social handicaps, just have a read thru a MMORG's user forum: after following a few threads, you might think you were reading an HMGS "Lets Move/Not Move Historicon Thread".

That said, there are some delightful people playing Online, with the advantage of being able to meet ad hoc, and with no boxes of miniatures, terrain, dice, measuring tapes to cart about. Players organise themselves into fleets, the STO equivalent of World of Warcraft guilds.  Fleets can be helpful resources, providing access to rare equipment and supplies, or they can be barren monuments to their founder's vanity.  Megz and I have been in both kinds.

Other hitches include a lack of Quality Control in the programming department - there are harmless bugs that are so old ("Talk to Loot Critter" springs to mind) that the current programmers seem to have no idea how to fix them. These aren't glaringly bad, but they serve as a pointer to a deeper issue...

Probably the greatest drawback - which some might label a "feature" - is how much TIME this game will burn. Many tasks have a 20-hour cycle (or "cool down") which encourages the player to log in daily.  At the higher levels, assigning Duty Officers, R &D, plus supporting the various "fronts" (Borg front, Tholian front, New Romulus, etc) can easily add up to an hour, and more if one wishes to play some tactical encounters.  Include making friends (most of the other characters are players - especially the ones running and jumping about like idiots) and one could easily spend four hours and up online.  It's happened to me.

After six months, the obsession is passing, and I find myself able to go back to working on miniatures, or work, or watch the news (bleah!) without wondering if that Level XIII Anti-proton bank my engineers are working on is finished...think I'll log in for a minute...


...nah!  I'll check in tomorrow.  I have miniatures to paint...Ω

5150 Star Navy and Star Trek Wargaming

Federation Squadron: miniatures by FASA and Starline

As an end-of-year experiment, Megz and I engaged in a friendly game of 5150 Star Navy, by Two Hour Wargames.  We used my old collection of FASA and Starline ships from the Star Trek franchise.  

Our old rules of choice were FASA's Starship Combat Simulator, with detailed SSD's and lots of damage rolls and adjustments for loss of power and superstructure, and while not as slow as Star Fleet Battles, a fleet-sized game could take about four our so hours.. I've been hankering to try the 5150 rules out, as they have been reported on The Miniatures Page as being fast and fun.

The rules themselves are available as a pdf, and are some 65 pages long, plus an index.  For our purposes, we can draw on the supplied races from the 5150 universe and adapt them to Star trek.  The Star Navy would form the template for the Federation, and the Hishen would provide the guideline for the Klingons.

Klingon Squadron: miniatures by FASA and Amarillo Design Bureau

 The Federation squadron featured a Constitution-class Cruiser (U.S.S. Exeter, sister-ship to the famous Enterprise) supported by two Larsen-Class destroyers.

Destroyer, damaged by hostile fire...

 The Klingon squadron was comprised of two D7-A Battlecruisers (IKVs Klothos and Tantarth - as seen in the original series and animated series) led by a D7-M (IKV K'Tinga) as seen in The Motion Picture.

Pregame and Turn 1: 5150 Star Navy has some interesting pregame scouting rules, which will affect set-up and deployment. It was determined that, while the Federation were defending the system, they had managed to jump the Klingon infiltrators. The Klingons rolled badly, and as a result, the Federation would be coming in to their forward port flank.

All ships were REP 4 (standard naval) except the cruiser Exeter, which had a TV crew aboard, and rated a REP of 5) .

The Feds came in at speed 6 (max for the cruiser) and one of their destroyers damaged D7(B)'s shields. The Klingons panicked and targeted the destroyer, bringing down her shields and damaging her hull.  Our first table rule was enacted, we halved the damage larger ships do to smaller ones.

Turn 2-3. The Feds targeted the D7-M, as she had extra guns and a photon torpedo tube.  Three ships on one - she blew up real good.

Turn 5 - 6. An attempt to avenge their commander, the surviving D7s took out both destroyers.  Then attempted to accelerate past the Exeter and exploit her weak rear arc.

The passing maneuovre fails, and a D7 dies.

Shouting some nonsense from the Next Gen TV series, the last D7 (the Klothos) decided to "ram these disruptors down their throats" and closes, batteries blazing...

The stars favour the Khomerex (Empire) and the Exeter is dispatched. Ka'plah!

Post Game Thoughts:  These rules, with some genre-specific tweaking, have a lot of potential.  We were able to complete the game in just under an hour, and that included searching for rules, pencils and dice. I imagine we could play a  four-to-six squadron game in two hours, given more experience.

There are some interesting game mechanisms, based on the 5150 house system, where reaction tests are made and are either passed, partially passed or failed. Partially-passed gunnery plagued the Federation in the mid-game, though not badly enough for the Klingons to walk over them.

I plan to bring these rules to the Friday Night Pals and see what mayhem can be wrought - I think I'll add some attack shuttles for amusement's sake.

Look forward to another post in the New Year....Ω

Kelvar Garth's USS Xenophon

With the release of the 20+ minute "supertrailer" on the upcoming film "Axanar", I decided to post some piccies of a conversion of the USS Xenophon, a Marklin-class destroyer, commanded by Captain Kelvar Garth, hero of Axanar.

Captain Garth was also James T. Kirk's hero, and his exploits were required reading at the Star Fleet Academy, as we learn in the classic Star Trek original series episode "Whom Gods Destroy".  The introduction of a mad captain, cleverer than Kirk, is a masterstroke, especially when seen through a lens that's nearly a half-century old. At every turn of the plot, Garth is ahead of Kirk, until a timely intervention by Kirk's First Officer.

To give Garth depth, the FASA Star Trek role-playing game introduced the concept of the Four Years War, between the Klingons and the Federation, about 20 years prior to Kirk's five year mission as captain of the Enterprise. Garth was a war hero, and his greatest victory  was at the Battle of Axanar.

The model was based on a FASA USS Baker scout hull, with the nacelles from a frigate attached, and a thin card wedge glued onto the primary hull.  From the RPG fluff, Marklins were scrappy ships, which makes it a pity that there were only about twenty built, with the design being unsuitable for extensive upgrading.


Now that the Star Trek Wargaming bug has bitten me again, I'll try to arrange a few games and post some pictures soon....Ω