The Star Trek RPG Player's Guide is, as you can guess from the name, the book designed for the players of the Star Trek RPG. It covers character creation, history of the Star Trek universe, and basic rules that players will need to know. All the information that is gamemaster-only is found in the Narrator's Guide, a review of which by me can also be found on rpg.net. Narrators (Gamemasters) will still need to read the Player's Guide to be able to run the game.
You may become confused as you read my review, and feel I'm referencing things I've yet to cover, and acting as though you should know them already. This is intentional, and mirrors the way the book is laid out. Many times throughout this book terms and rules are referenced without giving the reader a page number to turn to so they can comprehend what is being talked about. What this means, among other things, is that a person should read through the entire book (which is 256 pages, including character sheet) at least once before creating a character.
When I initially read through the book I created a sample character as best I could as I went through each chapter, only to find myself having to go back and change things as I read further on and found things acted differently in the game than they seemed to portrayed in earlier chapters, or as I learned that certain things that seemed minor were invaluable in the course of play. I ended up reading the book twice before I felt comfortable enough that I understood the rules and the proper way to make a character; RPG fans who are used to the likes of Feng Shui or Hunter in terms of ease of character creation may be rather scared by the in-depth nature of character creation in Star Trek.
Now, on page 19 of the book, it does say to read all chapters of the book, then come back and make characters. I probably wouldn't have any problem with this, or mentioned it in my review, if this complexity wasn't unnecessary. All it would have taken was a flip-flopping of a few chapters (putting the Attributes and Skills chapters before the Profession chapters) and 99% of all the confusion I had while initially reading this book, and the problems my players had when trying to make characters, would never have come about.
With that out of the way, let me begin my chapter-by-chapter review of the book, starting with the:
INTRODUCTION This has the basic "What is Roleplaying" deal found in almost all RPGs, plus a two-page glossary of terms unique to the Star Trek RPG. DO NOT SKIP OVER THIS SECTION! The confusion I mentioned earlier about lack of references/expecting you to know things from later chapters will be tripled if you skip this section, thinking you'll be able to easily pick up on things as you go along. You have been warned.
CHAPTER 1: 35 YEARS OF STAR TREK This chapter gives us a nice, general summary of the original Star Trek, TNG, DS9, Voyager, and even a little bit about the Enterprise series. No mention of Captain Pike, though....
By no means an episode guide, this section sums things up nicely with regards to the major events of the various series, along with ideas for adventures based on the various shows, though that does seem like something more appropriate to the Narrator's Guide. It also does well in summing up the various tones each show had.
Next up is an overview of the character sheets for ST (as the game shall be called from now on), with each section it described to the reader. This is the first time I've not liked a game's character sheet. I appreciate what whoever designed it was trying to do, namely cover all the possible things a PC might have on his sheet, and color-coding Skills with Attributes to help determine bonuses you might posses (which was very clever). But it comes off very cluttered, and I was a bit confused by one bit of it: there's a space to note Attribute modifiers for the species your PC is, but that will never come up during the actual play of the game, as it only effects initial Attribute scores and the maximum you can raise a stat to during Advancement.
I've heard on rpg.net that some people judge if an RPG is worth their time by looking at the character sheets for it. Testing this, I showed the ST sheet to gamers unfamiliar with the game. Sure enough, they all expressed the opinion that the ST system "must" be complicated and forces you to keep track of many, many things, given the number of items on the character sheet.
Some pregenerated characters are next in the book, and they were NOT done on the standard character sheet. They look nice, both in terms of layout and the artwork used to depict the sample characters. Just for the record, this is the only artwork in the book: stills from the movies and shows and pictures of props make up the rest of the pictures in this book.
Three things to note on the pregens: the Trill Diplomat character has the Entrepreneur listed as her Professional Development, though it's not actually available to the Diplomat Profession. I've gone through the character sheet, and it looks like she was created as a Diplomat, and someone just put "Entrepreneur" on it by mistake. I note this because it confused one of my players into thinking you could take Professional Developments outside one's Profession, which is just not the case.
The second oddity is that for the Klingon Rogue pregen his Professional Development is listed as "The Streets." There is no such Development listed anywhere in the rulebook. Perhaps this was a Development that was dropped from the final draft of the book.
The final oddity concerns Species skills, or perhaps lack therefore. Each character gets points equal to his Intellect x2 to puchase skills from a set list, reflecting the species he is from and his upbringing within it. I haven't had the time (or in case of the Klingon Rogue a listing of "The Streets" skill availability) to break down the pregens and determine if the writers forgot to include species skills in the character write-up, or just invested them in non-language skills. The reason I bring this up is because, with the exception of the Trill Diplomat pregen, NONE of the characters possess ANY Language skills. And while universal translator implants allow for verbal communication between many races, the rules specifically say they provide NO help in actually reading languages. So, with the exception of the Trill Diplomat, ALL of the pregens are totally illiterate, even when it comes to their species language. This was especially amusing, since several of the pregens are Starfleet officers, including a ship commander!
Chapter 2: Species This section covers the races provided in the Player's Guide to be used as PCs. Bajorans, Betazoids, Cardassians, Ferengi, Humans, Klingons, Ocampas, Talaxians, Trills, and Vulcans are all available as PC races--a moment of silence for the lack of Gorns or Tholians, please.
With the exceptions of Bajorans and Humans, each race gets bonuses and penalties to its members' Attributes (which for the record are the base stats for the game, and consist of Strength, Agility, Intellect, Vitality, Presence, and Perception); these modifiers affect whether a race can go above the normal limit of 12 for a stat, or have a max value of less than 12, as well as affecting the initial stat scores. Each species has a two-page listing, giving a description of its culture and race members' physiques. Also, each race has its own special abilities. Some of these duplicate special abilities any character can get later on during the choosing of Edges for a PC, and others are unique to a race, such as a Ferengi being able to analyze a situation and determine how a profit can be made, or a Klingon's ability to go into a battle rage.
After years of seeing RPGs treating humans as the middle of the road, from which all other races are measured and having no special abilities to call their own, I was impressed by how humans are represented in ST. Humans get their own unique bennies, my favorite being The Human Spirit, with the strength, resolve, and determination of Humans giving them a bonus to their Courage ratings: this is well in keeping with the original tone of the series.
There are some very brief rules on half-breed characters, which I suspect will be supplemented and outdated by a future supplement.
I've only two problems with this chapter. The first is minor and can easily be ignored by a Narrator--for some reason Trill PCs without a symbiot are forbidden, despite such Trills being the majority of their race's population. My second problem, however, is not as easily rectified.
The problem stems from the Bajorans and Pagh. Pagh is a Bajoran's soul or lifeforce, and is represented by a Bajoran character's Courage rating. All PCs have a Courage rating, but in a Bajorans case it is a measure of their Pagh, though it does the exact same thing as Courage. If a Bajoran takes an action not supported by the Prophets (basically "good deeds")he would not gain any benefits from any Courage/Pagh points he spent to aid him on the roll. Additionally, we're told if a Bajoran rejects the Prophets entirely, the character loses the bonus point of Courage all Bajoran characters get until he atones for his action.
There's several omissions here which cause problems in running Bajorans. For one, if a character does reject the Prophets and loses his permanent point of Courage/Pagh, does he still lose any bonuses from spent Courage if he takes actions that don't conform to the Prophets' views? Also mentioned are Bajorans who've rejected the Prophets, and that those who turn away from the Prophets or act evilly have their Pagh become dark and corrupt, but no rules are given for either. Does a Bajoran who rejects the Prophets but still tries to be a good person automatically become evil?
I understand Decipher wishing to include Bajorans in the basic rulebook, but by limiting the description of player species to two pages (done both in this book and the Narrator's Guide) they gave us more questions than answers when it comes to Bajorans. All the other races are summed up nicely in their two-page descriptions. I think that maybe Decipher should have waited to include the Bajorans as a PC race until a book with a focus on them came out, so more focus could have been put on their spiritual side.
Also noteworthy is that Talaxians are listed as possessing good eyesight, but have no rule abilities for that fact.
Chapter 3: Professions The nine basic Professions (character classes) a PC may start as are covered here, with a note indicating future releases will add more to the game. For now PCs may be Diplomats, Merchants, Mystics, Rogues, Scientists, Soldiers, and Starship Officers. Each Profession has a list of Professional Skills, which cost less to increase or gain when a character Advances (levels up), than those not related to their chosen field. Oddly, it's said that a character "may never be as an accomplished in [a non-Professional Skill] as in his professional skills." This is strange, as NOWHERE else in the book does this idea come up.
Each Profession also has a Favored Attribute, which costs less to increase when a character Advances. I feel this decision, rather than letting a player choose from a list of Attributes favored by each Profession, was a poor one. It's entirely possible for a player's concept for a character in a certain Profession to not fit in with what the Favored Attribute listed is. For example, I intended to play a Rogue, who uses his charisma and his intelligence to further his cause; his work was done in gatherings and meetings, not in seedy bars and alleyways. Imagine my surprise when I read that "With their reliance on physical activity...Agility is the favored Attribute for Rogues." Yup, my PC may be suave and debonair, but it all comes down to his physical agility to convince a Vulcan ambassador to agree with him on an issue. I'm sure all con men and hucksters in ST feel Agility is the most important Attribute to getting the best swindle or deal.
Admittedly, players are allowed to choose any one Attribute as a second Favored Attribute. I just think it would've been better to have a list of Attributes to choose a Favored one from for each Profession, or just let players choose any two. The Starship Operations Officer gets to choose his Favored Attribute.
Going on a tangent here, I want to take a moment to express my disappointment with the advancement system. Designating an Attribute as Favored simply means it costs less to increase it when a PC advances. If a PC near-maxs out on a Favored Attribute during character creation (reflecting that it is an Attribute that he depends on regularly) he's losing out on the benefit of having a Favored Attribute. I think some sort of bonus to rolls involving the Favored Attribute should also have been included. This is also a prime target of mini-maxing players.
Each Profession also has a favored Reaction (at this point in reading the book straight through, all we know about Reactions is that they are four Qualities, used for--duh!---Reaction tests) test. Again, your ideas for a character's concept might not match up with his Profession's Favored Reaction.
Backgrounds, concepts, and typical Species who have members of the Profession are listed, along with each Profession's "Professional Abilities." There are three tiers of Professional Abilities, with a PC getting one level-one tier ability to start. Others can be bought when a character Advances, but usually require the character to meet a prerequisite before doing so. Some abilities can be bought multiple times for added benefits.
Some of the Abilities seem odd (like only Merchants being able to take out loans, for example), but most of the time they are cool. There's also an apparent misprint on page 64 concerning a Professional Ability---if an Ability doubles a specialization bonus, it would then give a 4 bonus, not 2 as the text here says.
Chapter 4: Attributes Huzzah! On page 78 we finally start to learn about the base stats for ST characters. I ran through them earlier-hope you were paying attention. They run from 1 to 12 in terms of score normally, and while we're told none can go below one, the number zero is on the chart for some reason. Reading your Attribute score on a chart gives you an Attribute Modifier, which ranges from -3 to 3 for most PCs. This modifier comes into play onto all rolls related to the Attribute. So if I'm using the Ranged Combat skill to shoot someone, my Agility modifier would be added or subtracted from my die-roll, as appropriate, in addition to any other modifiers I have.
Determining values for Attributes is also covered, with the random method (roll 2d6 nine times, dropping the three lowest values) or the point value method (assign the #'s 10, 9, 7, 7, 5 and 4 to your stats, then split 8 additional points between them) available to players.
Rules for Attribute tests (and all other tests for that matter) are introduced in this section. A player rolls 2D6 whenever he needs to come up with a total, and adds it to his base Attribute (if an Attribute test) or his Skill (if doing a Skill Test), along with any modifiers. If double 6s are rolled, an additional D6 is rolled and added on. If that D6 comes up a 6, then the player keeps rolling and adding until a 6 is not rolled. This total is compared to a Test Number, or TN, which is determined by the Narrator.
Chapter 5: Development Now comes the part of fleshing out your character. First, you get points equal to your Intellect times 2 to assign to species skills. This is followed by Personal Development of your character. Basically the childhood and early years of your character's life are decided on here. Was he an orphan, or a member of the idle rich, free to do what he wanted? Or perhaps he was the son of Starfleet officers. There are 21 options to choose from, including a "make your own" Personal Development package, which offers freedom of choice at a cost of less Skills than other packages. Each Personal Development package gives you a list of Skills and Edges to choose from; more on the Edges later.
Once that is done you go on to Professional Development. Each Profession has subtypes. A Soldier, for example, might be a basic foot soldier, or a member of a law-enforcement group. From the subtypes you get a set of certain skills, along with points to put into other Professional skills, along with Edges to choose from. All skill numbers are cumulative, and you gain all specializations listed. Specializations give you a 2 bonus whenever you use your skill the specialized area.
Now we get to my confusion with Edges, or rather how many you get. In the listings for each Personal Development and Professional Development a list of Edges is shown, with the words "Pick 1 Edge" before it. You might think as I did that this meant that you got to choose one Edge from each Development package. However, according to the main text of the book this is wrong. In fact you only get the choice of one Edge, chosen from either the Personal Development or the Professional Development you have chosen; this is the way that the pregen characters are done, so I presume this is the "correct" way it is to be done. So a PC starts with one Edge, and make take a total of two Flaws, with each Flaw taken allowing an additional Edge to be chosen for a character.
Another thing that added confusion during character generation is that at least one Professional Development listing (in the Rogue section) had a Profession Ability listed as an Edge, leading to questions of whether or not a player could choose an additional starting Professional Ability in lieu of an Edge, or vice versa. I believe the inclusion of Fleet of Foot as an Edge was just an error on an editor/writer's part.
Chapter Six: Skills I think you can guess the skills a character can possess are covered in this chapter. They go from 0 to 12 in terms of rating normally. In this chapter we're told the normal difficulty for rolls are 5 (Simple) to 25 (Virtually Impossible) though modifiers can change those numbers either way. And there are several charts of those modifiers in this section, jam-packed with info.
We're also informed that there are four kinds of Tests-Social, Academic, Psionic, and Physical. This is important for determining modifiers, both from conditions and Edges you may possess.
Skills are broken down into those that only those trained (have points in) with them can use, and those that can be used untrained. Doing an untrained skill you have no points in gives a -2 modifier to your roll.
The rather unique idea of Affinity skills shows up in the ST game. Basically, if you have a skill whose area of expertise falls into another skill's area, you gain a bonus in using the second skill. So if I have Stealth and the Conceal skills, I would get a 1 to using them because I am so well-versed in being sneaky. It's a nice touch, though I can see headaches with characters that have lots of skills & players who can't keep track of which ones have Affinities for other skills.
Whenever a roll is made the amount by which you succeed or fail is read on a chart. Depending on the level of success/failure, either good things, bad things, or nothing unexpected occurs, with the Narrator having final say on the matter. Another nice touch is that the same chart also gauges how much extra or less time you take to do an extended action based on your roll.
The individual skills are well-done, with each having example Test Numbers for various activities involving them. Psionics are also covered here, with only four powers listed, and one mentioned (Psychokinesis) which does not show up in this volume.
Chapter 7: Traits Here we find listings of Edges and Flaws that a character may possess. Edges cover a multitude of things a person can have going for him. This can be having Wealth or an Ally, or even having Psionic powers when such is not the norm for your species. Flaws, as you can guess, are things that cause a character problems. Having a rival or having a condition which results in you healing injuries very slowly are examples of some of the Flaws you can take.
I love the variety of Edges and Flaws and feel they fit in well with the Star Trek universe. What I didn't like is the lack of varying costs in Edges. Some Edges give bonuses to all rolls for a particular area (such as a specific reaction test or social tests), while others allow for faster healing or being a friend to an entire species. Other Edges are almost pathetic by comparison, allowing you to always know exactly what time it is, or having an excellent sense of direction. Yet in character creation or when Advancing all of these Edges have the exact same cost. In playtesting I found players passing on Edges that were true to their character concept for fear that by taking them they'd be at a disadvantage to other PCs who took Edges that boosted die rolls or otherwise provided round-the-clock bennies. I think a varying point cost for Edges would've been helpful.
Interestingly enough, the Flaws don't seem to have the same differing levels of power, with all causing problems pretty much all the time. And no Greedy Flaw, which upset the Ferengi fan in my group.
Problems also arose when during character creation with the wording of some of the Merits. For example, there is the Edge Trait Upgrade, which says "You can upgrade one edge which can not normally be upgraded, for a cumulative effect, but only once." Does this mean you buy Trait Upgrade and it automatically doubles the effects of an Edge, or do you have to buy Trait Upgrade and then also pay for the second level of the Edge you wish to upgrade?
Another problem showed up with the wording of the Skill Focus Edge. I believe (based on the final example on the Skill Focus chart) the author intended it that it either gave you a minor bonus in regular skills and a better bonus when you used a speciality you possess with a skill. Unfortunately the wording of the text description of the Edge makes it sound as though if you use Skill Focus to get a bonus on a skill you have a specialty in, you get a bonus on ALL rolls you make for that skill, even those outside your specialty.
Chapter 8: Characteristics Aging is covered here (something I haven't seen in an RPG since my 1st edition AD&D and Star Frontiers days) and the four Reactions (Quickness, Savvy, Stamina, and Willpower) are finally covered. Each Reaction has two related Attributes, and your Reaction score is equal to the better of those two Attributes' Reaction Modifiers. These scores are used to dodge, resisting certain social tests, and other things when performing Opposed skill tests, with the Reaction score replacing your normal Attribute modifier.
The VERY important Defense score is given only a line or two here. You add your Agility Modifier to the number 7, and this is the base TN needed to hit you with a combat roll, assuming you don't dodge.
Health for PCs are covered next. There are five Health Levels, after which they are expended you die. Your Health score determine how much damage you can take before a Health Level is marked off.
Courage is also explained here. Normally each point of Courage you spend gives you a positive bonus number on a die roll. Certain Edges and Flaws affect how much of a bonus you get from spending Courage, along with how many points you can spend at one time. Courage is recovered at the end of an episode, when a PC advances the plot, or according to a Profession or Species special ability.
Renown is the last thing covered here, and its how well-known you are, and sometimes helps on social rolls.
Chapter 9: Advancement This covers what a PC can do when they Advance (receive a 1,000 experience points). Each Advancement gives a PC five picks, with charts indicating how many picks it takes to acquire a new character Edge or Skill, or to improve an existing statistic.
One thing that left me confused was the notation that the Health value of a character could be increased by spending picks. Now, it's specifically mentioned elsewhere in the book that the reason Reaction scores can be increased by picks is because after character creation they are unaffected by future changes in the base Attributes they're calculated from. However, NO mention is made that I can find of having that same restriction on Health points. I presume that a character can both increase their base Vitality and Strength (from which Health is derived from) to increase Health, and buy additional levels with picks, but that is not specifically said. So it may be that after creation only by using picks can Health increase. Ah, more unnecessary confusion....
Also in this chapter are 12 Elite Professions. These are professions which a PC can change to once they meet certain prerequisites. I didn't always agree with the prerequisites some of the Elite Professions require, and some of the Professional Abilities seemed to have bonuses that didn't live up to their name. Like the Immunization Ability---instead of providing massive bonuses against resisting diseases or infections, it just gives you a bonus to your Health score.
Chapter 10: Equipment This chapter has good coverage of both mundane items and those unique to the Star Trek universe. I especially enjoyed that they made it a point of listing the differences between items that exist in both the 23rd and 24th centuries.
Chapter 11: Starships As you can guess, this section details the generals of starships, with crew positions, weapons and more being covered. No game stats are in this section; one must purchase the Narrator's Guide for those. Still, it's an excellent introduction to the starships of the Star Trek universe, with lots of good, detailed information. My hat is off to the author for mentioning the ethical ramifications of holodeck use, something that's bothered me since the first season of TNG.
Chapter 12: Adventuring Less than ten pages, half of this section contains good player info on gaming, while the other half seems more appropriate to a Narrator's book.
Chapter 13: The Galaxy Contained in this chapter is a very good timeline of the Star Trek universe, with listings of the current status of various races and some cute notes on roleplaying in the different eras of Star Trek.
Chapter 14: The Federation The Federation, Starfleet, and the Frontier of known space is covered in this section. It's very well-done.
Appendix More rules are introduced in this section, covering characters taking actions, movement rates, encumbrance and fatigue rules, and dodging attacks, among other things. There's a very important bit of information missing regarding dodging, namely that if a character rolls a total less than their base Defense rating do they automatically have a minimum Defense score equal to their base Defense rating, or do they have a score equal to their poor Dodge roll? As far as I can tell when Dodging a character rolls 2D6 as normal, plus/minus their Quickness Reaction score. Perhaps the game designer's meant to say it's a roll of 2D6 plus Quickness Reaction plus base Defense Score. You can't tell from the dodge example given, and nowhere is it stated. This is very important, given that most energy weapons in ST can kill a character with one shot without even being on their highest setting.
I normally don't bother explain how I decide on my Style and Substance ratings, but since I'm willing to bet I'll get complaints on my Style rating for ST I feel I should explain. I'm only giving ST a 2 in Style, primarily because of the needless confusion due to the layout of chapters. If it had just been me who had problems with this book I would have been willing to give it a 3 in Style, but every one of my players had the same problems as I did when they read through the book to create characters, with one being even more confused than I was. The other problems I listed in my review made me more willing to assign this book a 2 for Style.
As for the Substance rating, I can do no less than assigning this book a 4, the flaws I mentioned in the review keeping me from giving it a 5. The authors of this book really did their research when writing this book, with detailed information on the Star Trek universe and rules that do well to represent that reality. The fact that they made it accessible to both those with no or limited knowledge of Star Trek really boosted my opinion of the authors.
So, do I recommend the Player's Guide? If you don't mind wading through a very confusing layout for character creation, and the problems I mentioned above, I think you'd be in for a good time playing this game.
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