Generating Command Rank Characters by Don Mappin
PREFACE:
There has been some discussion and criticism of Last Unicorn Games (LUG) for not including
rules for generating player-characters of Command rank for use with their role playing
game, Star Trek: The Next Generation RPG (ST:TNG).
The designers consciously made this decision to avoid players from “buying”
their way to the rank of Captain and instead earning their advancement through
role-playing. Although I admire this position my years of experience in running Star Trek
RPGs has taught me a valuable lesson: never ever make the Commanding Officer a Non-Player
Character (NPC). In any game I have had the players assume the key commanding positions
aboard a Starfleet vessel. Although it is possible to run the Executive (First) Officer as
an NPC, the Captain, the character to which all others on board look up to and take their
‘lead’ from, must be another player. (Preferably one with good leadership skills
and can actively assist in keeping other characters involved in the game.)
These rules are provided as a guideline to allow the generation of said characters.
METHOD:
The actual framework for creating Command rank characters for starships is actually given
in the Core Rule Book for ST:TNG RPG. All it
takes are a few moments and some common sense to draw these rules together. The basis of
the methods used are derived from the following:
Page 104: “To achieve the rank of Commander or better, the character must possess
at least one skill level in the primary skill in three departments, such as Engineering,
Flight Control, Security, or Science.”
An example of a Captain character, Captain Ann Potrikos (page 191), actually fits within
the guidelines that I have developed below.
CREATION:
Select a Racial Template as per the rules.
Select an Overlay for the character. If an Overlay other than “Command” is selected then at some point during the course of the character’s career they transferred into the Command branch.
Complete the character’s “Early Life History” of their background as per the rules.
Complete the character’s “Academy Life History” of their background as per the rules.
Complete the character’s “Cadet Cruise” as per the rules.
Do the character’s initial “Tour of Duty” either by spending Development Points or by selecting a Package. (NOTE: It is highly suggested that characters spend the Development Points to customize their character, especially if they intend to be of Command rank. However some skills can only be raised by selecting Tour Packages!)
Complete multiple “Additional Tours” with
the following provisions in the following order:
a) Character must purchase the Promotion (Lieutenant, jg) Advantage.
b) Character must purchase the Promotion (Lieutenant) Advantage.
c) Character must purchase the Department Head Advantage (NOTE: This may be
interposed with the above requirement).
d) Character must purchase the Promotion (Lieutenant Commander) Advantage.
e) Prior to purchasing the rank of Commander the character must have at least
some skill (Rating of 1) in the Primary Skills of two other professions (Branches). The
initial Overlay the character selected in step 2 is already considered towards the total
requirement of three. (EXCEPTION: If the character in step 2 above selected an Overlay
other than “Command” then one of the two Branches that the character fills out
skills in must be of the “Command” Branch.)
f) Character must purchase the Promotion (Commander) Advantage.
g) Character must purchase the Promotion (Captain) Advantage. (NOTE: This
step is optional if the character intends to be a Commanding Officer of a smaller vessel,
such as an Oberth. A rank of Commander is sufficient to command such a size vessel.)
Calculate character’s initial Courage and Renown as per the rules but also include bonuses for any Commendation Advantages purchased during the creation process. (See page 181 for Renown values for Commendations and Medals.)
Tally age (see note below). Character is complete!
A character may make as many “Additional
Tours” as necessary to achieve the requirements above, HOWEVER PLEASE NOTE: the
length of each tour is 2-7 (1d6+1) years! Excessive tours could make a character quite
old!
As a general rule-of-thumb page 182 of the Core Game Book provides
suggested key skill levels for various positions, including Captains. In this
author’s opinion those values are exceedingly high and should only be used as a meter
of what skills are valuable to a Captain.
Unless a character originally chose the “Command” Overlay it is suggested that
characters from other Branches that transfer into Command not be given key assignments
until their ratings in the Primary Skills for the “Command” Overlay are of equal
value.
Using the above the absolute minimum that a character could attain the rank of Commander
(and command of their own, albeit small, starship) is five tours. This assumes the
character takes the ‘fast track’ and selects the Promotion Advantage during
their Cadet Cruise, advances to the rank of Lieutenant Commander during their first tour
of duty, fills out their required skills during the next three tours, and selects the
Commander Advantage on their fifth tour. Such a character would be the exception, and not
the rule, and certainly would not be able to command a ‘ship-of-the-line’ such
as a Galaxy-class starship.
I welcome any comments or questions regarding these supplemental rules.
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