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To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest)

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To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) Starfleet Ship Design Bureau, Refit ("To Boldly Go...")
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OneirosTheWriter said:
By the way, I'd love to hear how people felt about/enjoyed/didn't enjoy the Biophage emergency from a mechanics stand point and a narrative stand point to help me improve things in future.
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Mechanically, it seems like there's a lot of "get more people task slots, do this no-brainer stuff". The actual decisions with impact and possible immediate consequences seems to be few.

If we can get all the teams dumped on us in the beginning with hardly any reinforcements AND have some/most of them capable of being threatened/eliminated (like how that one work crew got trapped in a station that had been hit), it'd give more variety and consequences to any decision we make.

Also mechanically... ... I'm just glad the Beast did not figure out how to disable Warp safeties and Warp their suicide shuttles straight through our fleet.

Narratively, there's no real complaints. Your writing does suck us into the situation, and keeps our attention there.
 
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OneirosTheWriter said:
By the way, I'd love to hear how people felt about/enjoyed/didn't enjoy the Biophage emergency from a mechanics stand point and a narrative stand point to help me improve things in future.
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I for one found it bracing, but as with all crisis, I welcome its end with a sigh of relief.

Now we can get on with the business of exploring the final frontier, turning foes into friends, etc, so on and so fourth, and all that other stuff that makes up Starfleet's bread and butter.
 
OneirosTheWriter said:
By the way, I'd love to hear how people felt about/enjoyed/didn't enjoy the Biophage emergency from a mechanics stand point and a narrative stand point to help me improve things in future.
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I liked it from a thematic/narrative standpoint but it was a bit lacking in the execution, especially in regards to the large number of options. Too many of them had little or no observable impact while a few other's were so elemental that we would not ever not pick them - and the fact that you introduced a lot of "pick this option to get more options" actions didn't help. Admittedly the massive number of possible actions did a good job of portraying the dilemma a real leader would likely face but I don't think they make for good questing, especially in regards to crisis which I think should be a bit more actiony/feel tighter. Because on the other hand the many options really robbed the crisis of most its momentum, which got worse the more the crisis progressed.

I also a bit torn about the fact that you made the probably most important decision every turn (how the fleet would deploy) a non-entity by having a clearly superior, let the NPC decide option. Seemed like a lot of wasted potential to me.
 
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We have some ships whose repairs will complete in the middle of Q2. Will they be available for Five Year Missions and other tasks in Q2, or will that have to wait til Q3?

OneirosTheWriter said:
The experience of this encounter, and the feeling of needing extra ships everywhere, and more acutely the current vulnerability as the Excelsiors are repaired, has also led the Council to believe that an expansion of Starfleet is required. The details remain to be ironed out, but we are looking forward to working with you on authorising this expansion.
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Interesting!
I suspect these'll be Centaurs, Oberths, Constellations, and Excelsiors still; the next canon generation will take 5-6 years just for the research project alone, and then another 4-8 years for the prototype to complete construction. We could try developing a larger, more survivable Oberth (a project that'd only take two years to develop, plus prototyping time)... but even that could wait a few years before we start on it.

We also could try designing a mid-generation light cruiser - something like this?
aledeth said:
Mechanically I liked it, but it does make me worried about a longer, year+ emergency like a war. The format was getting to the point of stale right at the end there, because almost every turn felt like 'do the same things you did last time & mobilize more dudes'.
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Erandil said:
I liked it from a thematic/narrative standpoint but it was a bit lacking in the execution, especially in regards to the large number of options. Too many of them had little or no observable impact while a few other's were so elemental that we would not ever not pick them - and the fact that you introduced a lot of "pick this option to get more options" actions didn't help...

I also a bit torn about the fact that you made the probably most important decision every turn (how the fleet would deploy) a non-entity by having a clearly superior, let the NPC decide option. Seemed like a lot of wasted potential to me.
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Pretty much in agreement with both of these posts here.
I wonder if it might work better to have expanding the mobilisation level be tied to using pp (and to narrative, of course), and to just always recruit teams up to the max when doing so, rather than making 'mobilize a team' and 'expand the mobilisation level' be actions taken by crisis teams themselves.
 
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AlphaDelta said:
As someone joining the quest, I felt that the votes ended up being walls of text that took too much time to comprehend, which is why I abstained from voting. If I had more time, I probably would have done more.
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This is pretty much the only issue I saw, however, IMO it's a necessary one.

In balance of that, the update speed was fast enough, and the narrative quality was high enough, to marginalize any feelings of stale monotony. The varied styles of each interlude in the crisis kept it from becoming a wall of text. In that vein, as a writer, you did an excellent job conveying the horror of the situation without excessive amounts of text. Personally I enjoyed the last few interludes from Captain Kasherren, as well as the later stage interlude from our own perspective.
 
Okay, accumulated omake rewards :D

For...
Ensign Wolfe Talks About Orion - @Iron Wolf - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 50
Ensign Wolfe Talks About Romulans - Iron Wolf - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 56


Well, in keeping with the Information Briefs!

(Pick 2)
[ ][IronWolf] Cultural Awareness - +10 Diplomacy with Orion
[ ][IronWolf] Story Telling Chance - Get to culturally define one of the new species how you like
[ ][IronWolf] Intelligence Community - Following the failures of Starfleet Intel during the crisis, the director tenders his resignation [0pp cost chance to replace intel head]

For...
Omake - Lt Usha's Dinner Date - anon_user - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 84
Omake - Lt Usha & How Starfleet Stopped the LCS - @anon_user - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 51

In keeping with the ship design themes!

(Pick 2)
[ ][Anon] Jane's Fighting Starships - Get to design ships for affiliates according to a brief
[ ][Anon] Lessons Learned - +5 EXP for one Ship Design team (40 Eridani A or San Fran, or future Utopia Planitia)
[ ][Anon] Literary-Industrial Complex - Utopia Planitia pp cost reduced by 10%

Omake - A Memo From Explorer Corps - @sebsmith - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 84

For Sebsmith! Trying to come up with options that related to your entry that didn't have unacceptable forced distortions on the game was really tricky. I don't want to rail-road people onto a path, after all. Your own words should be making your case, not your rewards, after all! So...

(Pick one)
[ ][sebsmith] Forward Thinking - Next time a ship is being designed, gain +10 to the first Extra Tech
[ ][sebsmith] Think Tank - Gain a free +4 to the next Doctrine that is researched.


And as for you, @AKuz, oh boy, what am I going to do with you :o

I need a bit more time to think of options here! But rest assured, you haven't been forgotten!
 
OneirosTheWriter said:
Okay, accumulated omake rewards :D

For...
Ensign Wolfe Talks About Orion - @Iron Wolf - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 50
Ensign Wolfe Talks About Romulans - Iron Wolf - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 56


Well, in keeping with the Information Briefs!

(Pick 2)
[ ][IronWolf] Cultural Awareness - +10 Diplomacy with Orion
[ ][IronWolf] Story Telling Chance - Get to culturally define one of the new species how you like
[ ][IronWolf] Intelligence Community - Following the failures of Starfleet Intel during the crisis, the director tenders his resignation [0pp cost chance to replace intel head]

For...
Omake - Lt Usha's Dinner Date - anon_user - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 84
Omake - Lt Usha & How Starfleet Stopped the LCS - @anon_user - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 51

In keeping with the ship design themes!

(Pick 2)
[ ][Anon] Jane's Fighting Starships - Get to design ships for affiliates according to a brief
[ ][Anon] Lessons Learned - +5 EXP for one Ship Design team (40 Eridani A or San Fran, or future Utopia Planitia)
[ ][Anon] Literary-Industrial Complex - Utopia Planitia pp cost reduced by 10%

Omake - A Memo From Explorer Corps - @sebsmith - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 84

For Sebsmith! Trying to come up with options that related to your entry that didn't have unacceptable forced distortions on the game was really tricky. I don't want to rail-road people onto a path, after all. Your own words should be making your case, not your rewards, after all! So...

(Pick one)
[ ][sebsmith] Forward Thinking - Next time a ship is being designed, gain +10 to the first Extra Tech
[ ][sebsmith] Think Tank - Gain a free +4 to the next Doctrine that is researched.


And as for you, @AKuz, oh boy, what am I going to do with you :o

I need a bit more time to think of options here! But rest assured, you haven't been forgotten!
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Just so that you are aware, I am working on more > : P
 
OneirosTheWriter said:
Depends on the size. Takes a couple minutes to set up the spreadsheet, then I just hit Load File and then hit the "Fight" button. Copy paste the result text.

Small fights I just add within the program, takes about 2 minutes.
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How possible would it be for us to at some point ask for a match up between two hypothetical designs? We'd probably want to run the simulation a sufficiently large number of times, say 10,000, and then get the results as probabilities.


As to the crisis system, I think you'll need a way to simplify it or split it up. A Dominion war style scenario would take way more turns and each turn could easily end up with twice or more actions. I'm not sure anyone will want to write those plans, and writing up the results would likely take forever as well.
 
[X][Anon] Jane's Fighting Starships - Get to design ships for affiliates according to a brief
[X][Anon] Lessons Learned - +5 EXP for one Ship Design team (40 Eridani A or San Fran, or future Utopia Planitia)
Hmm, which team to pick... 40 Eridani is the most efficient, San Fran helps if we go for explorer doctrine... Utopia Planitia would be the truest to the story - space-LCS was going to be a light cruiser, after all.
Utopia Planitia it is!
 
While the ships are docked for repairs, can they be given upgrades?

The idea is that they would be better prepared to defend themselves during explorations and in case of another crisis.
 
anon_user said:
We also could try designing a mid-generation light cruiser - something like this?
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GM did say that we'd be getting a refit proposal for Constellation-class ships soon, so I'd rather see the stats on those before committing that 60pp it would cost to start work on that cruiser. Or just take the Renaissance class design option.
 
Well, I came in during the crisis, so I don't have much to compare it to mechanically, but narratively it felt like you intended - our responsibilities and power expanded to fit the crisis. I do remember business as usual being more fun to read, though.

Also,
OneirosTheWriter said:
My sector "fleet" as it stands, consists of myself, the USS Yukikaze, and the IRW Devoras after the Romulan Admiral was recalled to the Senate to answer for the near-total destruction of his command.

Suffice to to say, this is not how I envisioned my first taste of fleet command to be. Commander Velin reassures me that the Admiral will be fine, and that the victory and sensor logs will bear him out. More of a mandatory board of inquiry thing.
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While victory is the only defense I feel he should need, there's also the fact that we got pretty fucked up from that battle ourselves and probably couldn't try anything even if we wanted to.
 
A simple way to simplify the crisis turns would be to automate the various teams a bit more, and possibly lock teams in to multi-turn actions more often.


At the start of the crisis, we get the teams, and list of tasks for them to do. We assign them.
After that, they are pretty much automated and stay at that task till it is no longer a valid task. They get sorted in to an working list of teams, and a looking for work list of teams. We of course can pull teams off the working list if a more important task appears. But it on the unitive of the players to do so, not the GM.

Task would also be sorted into Five categories.
One-off: single use action that industry make the team available next round.
Ongoing: actions repeat turnafter turn, which the team sticks to. Research would be here.
Softlocked: actions that provided small benefits over several turns, and a large on at the end. Slight penalties for pulling off a team early on some such actions.
Hardlocked: actions that take several turns to complete and no befits till their done. Premature ending these gets nothing and often has repercusions.
Critical: actions that must be done each turn no matter what of we face serious penalties. Usually the focus of whatever crisis. The biophagebcure research would be this.
 
anon_user said:
I totally missed that!
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Going from his post:
OneirosTheWriter said:
Quick heads up for everyone who uses the custom ship worksheet. The calcs for Nacelle and Warp Core weights have changed a lot, scaling down a lot better, and I have added an ability to go down to shuttle scale.

Edit: Further news is that I'm adding requests for refit programs to your list of thing you can request from the Federation Council.

Edit 2: Modified some of the stat profiles of upcoming canon ships, incl Ambassador, Renaissance, New Orleans.
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I misremembered and it's something we'd need to spend PP on as well, but I have to imagine it'd be cheaper than spending 60pp on a custom design that's unfortunately going to be obsoleted by the next Canon model.
 
OneirosTheWriter said:
Depends on the size. Takes a couple minutes to set up the spreadsheet, then I just hit Load File and then hit the "Fight" button. Copy paste the result text.

Small fights I just add within the program, takes about 2 minutes.
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No Python? :( Python probably could get it done in less than a minute, plus setup. With a file of all of the named ships, it would probably take 1-2 min to setup. Python master race.

How does combat work? I know from an earlier post that shots are randomized, but I don't quite get what the effect of the stats are.

What does the reserve power stat do?
 
Omake - Enterprise & the Orion Trade Deal - @AKuz - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 46
Omake - Lt Kuznetsova Gets It Right - AKuz - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 47
Omake - Ragnarok - AKuz - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 51
Omake - Enterprise & the Evacuation - AKuz - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 74
Omake - Lt Kuznetsova and the Tiger (Team) - AKuz - Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 84

Ooookay.

(Pick four)
[ ][AKuz] Learning on the Job - Starfleet Tactical research team gains +8 Exp
[ ][AKuz] Dispatches from the Front - Lt Leaniss' tales from the battlefront inspires the people of Amarki, gain +25 Diplomacy
[ ][AKuz] Upwardly Mobile - Next set of Research Team options will include Lieutenant-Commander Kuznetsova's Doctrine Team
[ ][AKuz] Who You Know - Auto-success next Enterprise mission involving Orion
[ ][AKuz] Mr Zaardmani - Enterprise auto-passes sensor-based Science tests
[ ][AKuz] Build-a-Captain - Create a character who will be added to the Explorer Panel
[ ][AKuz] Mauve Ship - USS Challorn now rates as a Veteran Crew (+1 Ratings)
[ ][AKuz] CYOA - Design a Captain's Log event for Enterprise.
 
[x][AKuz] Mr Zaardmani - Enterprise auto-passes sensor-based Science tests

This is NICE. For an Explorer this is great. He is the Best of the Best after all. And he knows it!

[x][AKuz] Dispatches from the Front - Lt Leaniss' tales from the battlefront inspires the people of Amarki, gain +25 Diplomacy

I want to push the Diplomacy... and it feels good, part of the narrative we have going of Leaniss being the vanguard of the Amarki and an inspiration to her people back home.

[x][AKuz] Mauve Ship - USS Challorn now rates as a Veteran Crew (+1 Ratings)

How can I not choose this? I've been impressed with Challorn and her crew's service for the entire Crisis, even as a semi-obsolete Constellation she deserves this.

[x][AKuz] Upwardly Mobile - Next set of Research Team options will include Lieutenant-Commander Kuznetsova's Doctrine Team

Filling in the last spot was a hard hard choice and I was wavering a lot between them. Now Alexandria Kuznetsova doesn't strike me as a conventional leader ( > : V ) But Starfleet does seem to allow unconventional people to operate unconventionally as long as results happen. RIP Lunches o7. And from another perspective, we do need a Doctrine team and having a named one to start with when we grab it would be nice.
 
Thanks to everyone who has contributed feedback. As the first run of this system, I think that could have gone a lot worse :)V) but obviously there are a lot of ways that I think I can improve emergency handling in future. I do especially like @TerrisH's ideas. I might toy around with those and at some point put forward a prototype for future crisis/emergencies.
 
Hey, can we get the name Challorn as the first of the Rennies? It seems like an appropriate honor for a ship performing so well
 
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