Cool, and that’s everyone!
We should start character creation, and this is a good news, bad news sorta deal:
Good news! There is a very robust character creation website that helps make ST:A characters and does a great deal of hand-holding to help you out!
Bad news! It’s hard to explain nuances and uncertainty through the format of play-by-post, but I will do my best.
First things first: if you don’t want to make a character at all, that’s fine! Let me know and I’m happy to whip one up for you based on the information you’ve provided in the blurbs above (great job, everyone!).
Second things second, the website is:
https://sta.modiphiusapps.hostinguk.org/
Start by selecting “Characters and Starships”… ooh, before we go any further, note that you cannot use the back button to revert any mistakes you’ve made. You have to use the buttons on the left side of the screen. Important.
Okay, now select the following books: Core, Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, and then scroll down and select “TNG Era.”
You are making “Starfleet Personnel,” so select that.
Click “Select species,” and then pick the species you said you want to play. It will list a few perks for your species.
The next screen gives a little bit of history of your selected species, and a list of the 6 Attributes in the game. Since none of you are super familiar with the rules, let’s run through those Attributes now.
Attributes!!
The six stats that are intrinsic to all characters (and most NPCs and many objects) are:
Control (your fine motor control, your mental control, your ability to maintain your cool)
Daring (your bravery, courage, mental fortitude, your drive to get things done)
Fitness (health, combat ability, strength, agility, your training in Ferenghi-fu)
Insight (flashes of inspiration, your ability to make sense of chaos, your instincts)
Presence (your charisma, command ability, your ability to evoke fear or loathing or trust)
Reason (logic, deduction, training, education)
It is very important to note that this attributes are vague by design. You should have a sort of idea of what “Daring” means, but there isn’t a chart anywhere that says “This specific attribute is used for this specific thing.” Instead, much of ST:A is figuring out what your character is good at, and how they can leverage that attribute (and skill, we’ll get to those) to get the thing done.
For example, Dr. Simpson has had a few of his medicinal fluids, and has spotted an attractive Cardassian across the bar. He decides that it is in Starfleet’s best interests to open hailing frequencies and see if he can find the shield frequencies that will expose the most sensitive areas. For science, of course.
DJCT might say “Okay, I’m going to use my Presence (plus a skill) in order to flirt with the Cardassian.” But he might just as well say “I think Simpson has flirted with many a-biped before, and therefore he’s going to use Reason (plus a skill) to approach this situation.” Or he might say “The alcohol has had its intended purpose, and therefore Simpson is using his Daring (plus a skill) to approach this potentially hostile, potentially jazz-music-playing situation.”
The point of most of the skills is that they can be interpreted broadly.
Now, there are a few instances of very specific Attribute + Stat combinations: flying a shuttle is almost always Control + Conn. Firing a hand phaser is Control + Security, and landing a doublehanded Kirk-Chop to the back of an enemy is Fitness + Security. But even then if you want to try and justify a different skill set (“I’m going to modulate the phaser to fire bright, blinding flashes of light instead of stun, so I’m going to use Insight plus Science because I think our enemies are weak to bright light!”), that’s okay.
Okay. All that to say that don’t worry too much if you’re a little low in one or two or, heck, five stats. Part of the joy of the game is thinking like A Starfleet™, and that involves figuring out what these Attributes mean to you and your character.
Right! Pick a few to buff.
Next, you may have a Trait or not (humans don’t), and then you will select a Talent. Your first! Huzzah! You will end up selecting… I think 2-4 Talents before we’re done.
Don’t check the “allow cross species talents” (unless you have a very good reason, and if you do, feel free to do so and let me know your reason), and then select a Talent.
The Talents are all described pretty thoroughly on this screen. As a word of advice, don’t focus too much on the combat ones (although our Security crew might want to pick one). There won’t be too much fighting in this adventure… there may be some, but there is a perfectly acceptable way to get through the entire adventure without firing a shot, lobbing a rock at a lizard, or firing a full spread of photon torpedoes.
Crap, I gotta get to work. Okay, well, hopefully that gives you enough to get started. Next you’ll click “Environment” at the bottom, and you can either wait for me to get back from work tonight (in about 9 hours), or you can take a stab at character creation on your own and fire me off questions as they come up.
I’ll talk about Skills next time, but the Cole’s Notes are that they are very much like the Attributes: broad and ambiguous by design.
