Some thoughts on that star galleon post

I was thinking about that post this morning and realized that there's a small flaw in the scenario for wargamers: the treasure. While the loot would be a good reward for treasure hunters in a role-playing scenario, it probably wouldn't be in wargaming. It would be a drop in the bucket for all but the most impoverished of star nations. Of course, there are simple fixes for this:

1. Hybridize it. Start out with a wargame with the players trying to secure the wreck so that they can send a boarding party over to begin exploring, which would be the RPG side of the game. This would either work as a solo game or you could have the losing players control whatever nasty things are inside the galleon.

2. Add another objective. This is pretty simple and I can't believe that I didn't think of it when I was writing that post. Tell all the players that the star galleon's has an intact datacore that contains the potential locations of other wrecked galleons and long lost storage depots. However, the datacore has to be physically collected and returned to your ship in order for the information to be retrieved. Any damage it takes while being removed and transported will cause loss of data and some of the locations of the other wrecks and depots. It's very old, so any excessive jostling or banging around will cause damage. In other words, whoever is carrying the thing has to move slower than they normally would.

Another thought I had is the type of ships that would battle it out in a wargame. I would bar any large ships like carriers, dreadnoughts, battleships, etc. because it just wouldn't make any sense to scramble the big guns for a single wreck. Instead, I would allow only smaller ships like destroyers and frigates. Maybe some cruisers, but only a very small number. Fighters would be okay, I suppose, unless they require a carrier, then no. The idea would be that each star nation would like to get their hands on the content of the star galleon, but they're not going to send in an entire battle fleet for it.

Inspiration: Wreck of the old star galleon

I saw an article the other day on NPR about the discovery of the wreck of a galleon from the legendary Spanish treasure fleet and my initial reaction was "wow, this would be good inspiration for a fantasy RPG" and indeed it would be. Buuuuuuut then I started to think about it tonight and realized that hey, this would work for scifi too. Here's the scenario I've come up with:

An ancient star galleon from a fallen space empire has been discovered in some remote reach of space. All that's known about the galleon is that it was once part of the aforementioned empire's treasure fleet, hauling fortune from its far-flung reaches and sometimes high technology. The contents and defenses of the galleon are unknown, but the potential for incredible riches and technology make its exploration well worth any dangers.

This could work for a wargame setting as well. In that situation, you'd have several star navies rushing ships to secure the galleon and its contents. Its worth noting that the technology in both scenarios are still very advanced even though the empire that created it has long since expired. Speaking of which, while that empire has gone the way of so many real world analogues, the star nation that spawned it still does, which adds another element to the scenarios: They themselves would love, love, love to get their hands on their former riches and technology in order to restore themselves to their former glory.

Thoughts?

The Decker-class was one ugly FASA ship

From the front, it looks fine. From the top and the side, it looks whoever at FASA designed it was really hitting the bottle. Here's the description from Memory Beta:

The Decker-class was a Federation class X destroyer starship in Starfleet service in the 23rd century, becoming active on reference stardate 2/7502.

The Decker-class vessels crewed 200 officers and crew, with room for up to 10 passengers and about 100 Starfleet Marines. Additionally, the Decker could carry 10,000 metric tons of cargo, rated at 200 SCU (standard cargo units). The vessels weighed 140,603 metric tons, measured 288 meters in length, 120 meters in width and 52 meters in height. The Decker had four standard (6 person) personnel transporters, four 12-person escape transporter stages and four cargo transporters, two for large scale cargo and two for small scale cargo. The control computer of the Decker vessels was of the M-6A type.

The Decker had warp engines of the FTWC-2 type, rated, in original cochrane unit scales, to cruise at warp factor 12 and max out at warp factor 14. The Decker impulse engines were of the FIF-2 type. The Decker weapons had five FH-11 phaser banks, with forward port, forward starboard and aft firing arcs. The vessels had three FP-4 photon torpedo launchers with forward port starboard and aft firing arcs and was defended by FSM model deflector shields.

The commissioning of the prototype USS Matthew Decker marked a new use of advancements in technology and ship-mounted weaponry that were originally fielded in Starfleet's Excelsior-class, but in a lighter, more maneuverable destroyer vessel designed for patrol, escort and deep space combat. The class ran into initial delays as advanced technology required redesign to fit into the compact spaceframe. Most of these problems were solved by the introduction of Daystrom Duotronics' M-6A/M-9A computers, integrating synoptic duotronics with artificial intelligence. The Marine contingents frequently refer to these vessels as "Damn Fine Deckers" because of their quality as a fighting ship.

The destroyer class was named for Matthew Decker, namesake of the first ship of the class, as well as other members of his family who had given their lives in Fleet service. Other ships in the class are also named after Starfleet officers that had given their life or otherwise sacrificed in the line of duty. By 2364, of the 40 Decker vessels that had been constructed, 20 remained in active service, with an additional two used by Star Fleet Training Command as training vessels, and the rest listed as missing, scrapped or destroyed.

They may have been a "damn fine" ships, but they're never going to win any beauty contests.

Here's the first episode of On The Table

On The Table is that show on YouTube that I posted about two weeks ago that covers wargaming, RPGs, and other tabletop gaming. The premiere episode went up on Geek & Sundry's channel the other day and I finally got around to watching it.



It's okay, but I wasn't particularly blown away by it. I was hoping for some actual discussion or coverage of the subject matter, not just a guy reporting gaming news. Then again, it's the first episode (of the fifth season, since the show just changed hosts to G&S), so it'll probably get better. They should add a co-host to split the reporting so that it isn't just fourteen minutes of one guy.

So, thoughts? Is On The Table worth watching?

Best reason to donate to Hulks and Horrors' IndieGoGo fundraiser: Space Bears

Arguments are now invalid. But in all seriousness, Hulks and Horrors looks like a fun scifi RPG that has, inexplicably, not reached its goal of a meager $5,000. I say meager in the sense that compared to other fundraisers on both IndieGoGo and Kickstarter, $5,000 is a small sum. Currently, it's just barely past the halfway point, but only has 38 hours left before the fundraiser ends, so check it out and maybe donate? There's always room for a scifi RPG.

Do it for the space bears.

h/t EXONAUTS!.

For the Rogue Space fans

I think you might like these pictures I found.

Space Tea.