After examining the writeups for ToS, The Next Generation, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, I have to say I’m kind of disappointed that the stats are so samey. The captains, for instance, are almost dead-on the same in every stat, often separated by only 1-2 attribute points. I also have issues with some of the estimations. I refuse to believe that Geordi LaForge was a better Engineer than Montgomery Scott, the latter of which was known as a technical Engineering genius and was nicknamed “the miracle worker.”
Has anyone else felt this way when looking at these writeups?
It may be more an issue of the homogeneity of the Trek universe, especially the high level of competence of most series characters. This might suggest that the system is a bit over-complicated for the setting, as you can pretty much expect everyone to be brilliant at everything…
This the same Montgomery Scott who told Geordie he needed to pad his estimates if he wanted a reputation as a miracle worker.
I give you that they should probably be equal, but then that goes back to the original issue of everyone looking the same.
Foci and Talents are where real differences show up. Attributes and Disciplines tend towards homogeneity within a field because Star Fleet officers are very, very good at what they do. Individuality comes across in Foci, Talents and Values.
It’s buried within the forums now, but the writer of the Original Series write-ups did address Scott’s Engineering score when asked about it. Long story, but he was mandated to make it a 4 because an example from the main rule book had it listed as 4 even though that particular example had been written during the early stages of the game when they hadn’t decided to go as high as 5 with the disciplines. Long story short, he said Scott should advance to Engineering 5 and gain the new Miracle Worker Talent from the Operations Division book which didn’t exist as of the original write up.
I wouldn’t take any of the write ups that seriously since they have the level of starting characters rather than experienced ones. I just see them as fun examples of how to create a similar (starting) character within the rules and enjoy seeing what Values are assigned to them.
I have not seen all the write-ups but so far I don’t think STA is capable, as a system, of accurately translating the characters. Spock is an example that doesn’t work for me.
However, STA as a system itself works and we have fun. Nothing is perfect.
It is good that STA has maximum values for all stats. I remember a Star Wars d6 campaign in which in the end the weakest member of the group could easily eradicate a whole squad of stormtroopers in a single round. The rest was much more powerful (and no force users) so that they could (and did) defeat the Emperor and Vader easily. Such overpowered characters are not possible in STA.
And that’s the reason I do not believe that the official writeups are too weak. Those characters are no super heroes but normal people.
It actually does the job quite well because all the characters are already competent. Spock (or Kirk or Scotty) isn’t that far removed from a starting PC. This isn’t a system where the PCs are the lowest rung of the ladder and the canon characters are the upper echelon - it’s not like a starting PC is a level 1 Engineer and Scotty is a level 20 Engineer. Those characters, later in their careers, may have more Talents…maybe but they’re not inherently better or worse than a starting PC. That’s not a knock on the game in anyway - it’s actually a selling point for our group because it makes the PCs able to be the main characters in a Star Trek series.