This will be the Q&A thread for the moderated freeform game Star Trek: No Good Deed.

Posts in a Trek game need to be structured, else things quickly devolve into chaos. Therefore, I ask that you follow some guidelines.

First, start every post off with the date, location, and the time (in 24 hour, or military, format). We will be using "actual" dates insted of true stardates, as stardates are much more difficult for the casual player to keep up with. You will hear Captain Blair reference these in character, however. If anyone cares, our trek tools page include a stardate calculator.

Your post header should look something like this:

Stardate: 2368.04.25
USS Discovery, Main Engineering - 1615
Your text starts here...

The very nature of a Trek game - with everyone working independently - means that there will always be several storylines going at once. If we wait for one another, the game will almost immediately become so mired down that we wo't be able to continue. By giving our posts headers, we're able to back post, change scenes, etc, without too much confusion.

Please stay on the same mission day, except when backposting. In other words, if the rest of the ship is on day three, the CSO doesn't need to be sharing the discoveries he makes on day five. It's okay to go back and post a conversation you might have missed, but don't go ahead. As captain, my main function is to keep the story as organized as possible - I'll do this by regulating mission dates.

Be creative. Improvise. Add wrinkles to the plot. It's perfectly acceptible for the chief engineer to suddenly report a problem with the transporters just as we're about to visit a planet's surface. Maybe he'll need to fix it, or maybe the need for us to go is so pressing that we're forced to take shuttles.

If there's a problem on the table, don't be afraid to come up with solutions. If you have any doubts or questions, email me.

Please, by all means, create NPCs as needed. If you're the chief of security, you'll obviously need security personnel to flesh out your duty roster. We won't be having twenty people playing those roles, so you'll need to create them.

There's no need to go so far as to create a bio for most of them, but if you plan to use them in a recurring role, it wouldn't be a bad idea.


Don't be that creative! Don't "God mode" - i.e., don't play your character in such a way that he solves every problem without help, knows the answer to every question, never has any trouble, etc. Share the spotlight - everyone deserves a chance to contribute on the missions. Don't control someone else's NPC wthout conferring with them first.

Never, ever control another person's main character. It's okay to make reasonable assumptions, but post them as such. This is bad:

Captain Blair nodded to Commander BillyBob. "So commander, what is your plan?" he asked. The commander paused for a moment, then spoke, "Captain, we should fire up the xyz in order to make the abc work correctly."

In this case, I'm posting the commander's intentions and speech for him. No, no no.


Better:

Captain Blair nodded to Commander BillyBob. "So commander, what is your plan?" he asked.

OOC: assuming BillyBob shares the plan...

Blair nodded again. "Carry on," he stated.

I'm reacting to what I anticipate the answer to be, but giving myself edit room if it happens differently than I expect. I am not controlling the commander.

Format your posts.
This is a writing intensive game, and we all have different styles of posting. That's fine, but I want some standards, so that no one is confused.

Speech should always be included in quotes.

"How are you doing today, ensign?" Blair asked.

No bold, no other colors. Just quotes.


Internal throughts should be italicized.

Why does he keep blathering on? his players wondered.

Italics is done by adding the tag before the italicized text, and adding the tag after the italicized text.


Communictions via a communicator or other device is set aside with a special symbol.

Captain Blair keyed the intercom. "Blair to engineering."

=/\\= Engineering, Thompson here. =/\\=

"Thompson?" Noah asked. "Where is Commander Kennedy?"

There was a moment's hesitation before the reply.

=/\\= Commander Kennedy is a little... preoccupied right now, sir. =/\\=

Computer speech uses this same notation. It might seem cumbersome at first, but this makes the posts so much easier to read!

Some links you may find useful!

Memory Alpha: the biggest Star Trek wiki on the internet. If you need to know canon trek info, check here.

RDI Trek Tools: our own in-house trek tools include the ship's roster and logbook, among other items. Use these to help keep things straight in our game.

Galaxy Class Specs: complete details of the Galaxy class vessel. Use this to figure out what deck a given department is located on, what types of probes the ship carries, what a given security rating is, and on and on. Special thanks to the "Star Trek: a Call to Duty" community for this superb recource!

Galaxy Class Crew Compliment: a full breakdown of all officers and enlisted crew on the ship, by department.

Bridge layout: The current standard Galaxy Class bridge layout is as follows. In the center is Command area with three common seats, for the Captain, the Executive Officer to his right, and the Counselor to his left. Further out from these are two more seats that can be used by VIP or other non-stationed personnel.

At the front of the bridge is the Conn, starboard, and Operations, port, stations. Conn is the combination of Helm and Navigation, and Operations controls and monitors most vital ship functions. Operations is commonly in control of sensors aboard Galaxy Class starships.

Behind the Command area is the Tactical Rim. Here is the Primary and two Auxiliary Tactical stations. All tactical and security functions can be controlled and monitored from this point.

On the back wall from port to starboard are Engineering, Environment, Mission Operations, Science I, and Science II. These five stations are normally unmanned. The Chief Engineer is in Main Engineering, Environment & Mission Operations can be controlled at the Operations console, and Science I & Science II are the science department's presence on the Bridge. However, normally the Chief Science Officer [if the ship has one] is not a Bridge Officer. The position is a management and authority one, meant to control all the sub-departments which do their work in the various labs on board the ship. It is not uncommon however for some Chief Science Officers to conduct their business directly on the Bridge.

In the case of the Discovery, the captain has standing orders which require the presence of at least one science officer, one security officer, and one engineering officer on the bridge at all times in addition to the normal personnel.

For those that care, I have edited the second post of this thread to cover proper posting format. Please familiarize yourself with these conventions!

As you all know, I am the GM of this game. I am playing the role of Captain Blair, but understand that he is as much a plot device as a player character.

Commander Avanti (Alacrity) and Lieutenant MacTavish (Eol Fefalas) are the executive officer and second officer of the USS Discovery, respectively. This means that they have full authority to issue orders to anyone on the ship, if need be. There are other characters on board (the chief engineer and the ship's doctor are good examples) who technically outrank MacTavish, but in the absence of Blair or Avanti, he is still in charge - Blair, Avanti, and MacTavish are line officers. If you are unfamiliar with the concept, Google can be your friend (check "line officers" and "chain of command"). In the absence of the above, any officer may be given command of the bridge, and thus, the ship - but this is typically designated ("Lieutenant Ames, you have the bridge").

Somewhat coincidentally, Alacrity and Eol Fefalas make up what I refer to as my "command staff". While I am the only person who knows the full details of what will happen in our main plotline, I do share relevant details with the two of them, allowing them to act as co-GMs. If they see an area of the story lagging behind or wandering off into a tangent, they are fully within their rights to help get things back on track. This may result in one of them making a post or contacting you privately. Listen to them - they have the full authority of a GM in pretty much all matters.

Finally, my version of Trek is slightly more military than that often portrayed on the various TV shows. Unless a superior officer has given you leave to act more informally, assume that you should saulte, make formal reports, etc. Pay attention to the standard forms of address (which basically mimic those of Her Majesty's Navy):

Superior officers are always referred to as "sir" (unless you are using the proper rank address below). This is regardless of gender. Likewise, the term "mister" is pretty universal, regardless of gender.

All flag officers are always called "Admiral", regardless of grade. A commodore is called "Commodore".

The captain (or commanding officer) of a ship is always called "Captain", regardless of grade (such as when a commander is in charge of a smaller vessel).

A full commander is always called "Commander".

A lieutenant commander is called "Commander", unless a captain (or higher) elects to refer to him as "Mister". However, doing so is giving offense, as it indicates that the lieutenant commander is a junior officer.

Junior officers (ensign up to lieutenant) are referred to by their ranks or by "Mister" Lastname.

Cadets or warrant officers are referred to as "Mister" Lastname.

NCOs are addressed solely by their rate (the term rate is preffered over "rank" for enlisteds). It is appropriate to address a petty officer (of any grade) as "Petty Officer". A chief petty officer is referred to as "chief", a senior chief petty officer is referred to as "senior chief", and a master chief petty officer is referred to as "master chief".

In addition, note that chief petty officers are expected to assist in the training of junior commissoned officers, so while the lowliest ensign may technically outrank a chief, the ensign would be wise to pay proper respect!

Enlisteds are typically referred to as "crewman" or "yeoman", without the last name attached.

One question:

Do our uniforms have pockets? I'd like to think of Silvia having a number of odd but useful objects in her pockets like rubber balls (for testing for forcefields) or tough cord or something. Sort of like the Forth Doctor (the one with the scarf that he had a million uses for and had a bunch of odds and ends in his pockets for handling any situation).

...that the "standard" Starfleet Uniform has pockets at all, to be honest. Can't recall ever seeing anyone pull anything from a uniform pocket in any of the TV series or movies, anyway.

That said, I know that some engineering types have been seen to be wearing coveralls which have cargo pockets, loops in which to secure tools, etc, so it's not too much of a stretch to imagine that Silvia would have some sort of pockety-type thing in which she could carry her toys around... Fanny pack, perhaps?

GM has final say, of course... Just offering up my two bits.

Okay... Would Kennedy have some kind of 'Blackberry' equivalent computer thingy she could walk around with and get reports and messages and such?

And if so what is the thing called and can someone give me a real quick and dirty on how it operates?

Domo Arigato,

M.

Most communications are handled via the Combadges that are worn by all Starfleet personnel... I'm sure there's also the equivalent of a shipwide public address system that allows for "shipwide announcements," etc... anyway, typically, one will simply tap their combadge and...

"Kennedy to MacTavish; is TAC reading any anomolies in phaser cycling rate on the primary dorsal array?"

=/\\=Negative, Commander. Th' array seems ta be cyclin' wi' no problems.=/\\=

As to reports and such that may not be delivered verbally; those would likely be received on a PADD (Personal Access Display Device)... essentially a handheld computer that's tapped into the ship's computer, etc. Also, reports can be sent from any terminal on board to any other terminal throughout the ship, so, even in the absence of a PADD, Callie could get reports on the Level 1 dignostics she's asked her techs to run by simply calling the info up on any terminal she might happen to pass by.

Links to the Memory Alpha articles on these devices have been included in the above.

Also: randel - see the entry on Starfleet Uniforms for our particular era of play (2366-2370s) here.

Ever so kindly!

M.

BTW: Thought I would mention that the picture of the PADD from 2151 looks just like a Kindle! Might be a nice accessory for your Halloween Trek Costume... if you have an extra $300 dollars

M.

Eol hit the nail on the head - I do not believe that the unis have pockets at all. Some sort of small pack would be fine, espcially when leaving the ship (maybe not while sitting at a bridge station).

Seems to me there is no need for pockets in the future. You don't need a wallet, you don't need keys, you don't need a cellphone.

I think most accessories are designed to clip to the belt or pants (phaser, PADD).

Intro post #1 is done! (I simply edited my placeholder post)

Liking the first post: who could the replacement be indeed? Something's rotten on the ship Discovery. No doubt there is more to come and I'm eagerly awaiting that as well.

I have to say, thank you Olan for getting this game underway - it looks like it's going to be both exciting and enjoyable as well as, hopefully, long-running. I'm still spinning from how fast it got started... that said, I myself don't yet have a character in so I suppose that is my current priority (after I reread Twelfth Night of course - school, &c...).

Anyways, I love the first post and I'll have the character in asap - I have only to edit the service record and write the personal bio. Hopefully this weekend will be kind to me and unveil more than the standard 48 hours.

-Dragonblood

Glad that you liked it. We don't have to have 100% of all areas of the character sheets done in order to play, but I would of course like them to get that way as soon as we can.