Every Friday at 4:00 PM PT, a talented crew roleplays their way through the galaxy to fulfill a mission: to boldly go where no one has gone before. Follow the adventures of the USS Sally Ride on Shield of Tomorrow on Twitch and Alpha.
Playing tabletop RPGs are fun, but most people start the experience by filling out some paperwork. Different games handle this necessary process in a different way. Some offer templates to speed the process, while others turn it into a mini-game. Star Trek Adventures uses what’s called a lifepath system, which creates the history of the character in a way that also puts together the mechanical components of the character for play. This allows players to start thinking about their character stories as quickly as possible even as the crew is coming together.
To make things even easier, Modiphius has created a browser-ready generator that lets players make their characters with a few clicks of a button. Let’s use the new app to go step by step and create a new Starfleet officer!
Choose Your Era
Since we’ve already taken the time to recreate William Riker using these rules, let’s explore a different era. We’re going to make an officer that served during the Original Series era!
Select Species
The generator allows for random or selected characteristics. Humans are the most common type in Starfleet, but we want something a little more exotic. Let’s select a Trill—that way, we can still play the character if someone else decides to run a game in the Next Generation.
Environment
We’ve chosen the first few parts of our character; let’s let fate decide a few pieces. We hit the random environment button and our Trill was born on a Starfleet vessel. I think being an old soul gives our Trill some Insight, and it also gives the character some skill in Command. The Value we choose reflects our character’s nature as Joined: Born On A Vessel, Became A Vessel.
Upbringing
Our random selection turns into Business/Trade as an upbringing. Looks like our Trill was part of a merchant family, possibly stopping at a Starbase to be born. I think our character rebelled against this upbringing, as their time on the Starbase as a young child gave them the Starfleet bug. They’ve got more Insight, more Command and a Linguistics specialty coming from all the different species encountered.
Starfleet Academy
We’ll take control back for a moment as our Trill enters the academy. He’s going to school to become a communications officer and enters the Command School. We increase his Reason and Presence to reflect this and give him a Command major with a Science and Security minor. He’s going to need Science to decipher new languages and Security to protect himself when he’s brought along as a translator. This idea sparks his specialties centered around persuasion and diplomacy. What Value did he learn at the Academy? Careful Words Solve Big Problems.
Career
We randomly determine that at the start of play, our Trill is a veteran officer. We think he still has a bit of wanderer in his heart from his merchant upbringing that Starfleet hasn’t completely fulfilled. Still Seeking Meaning adds a spiritual component to this idea. Trill’s are effectively immortal but don’t have all the answers. Why is that?
First Career Event
We roll a random career event and we get a curveball. A transporter accident! Trill aren’t supposed to use transporters (even though Dax does all the time). Since this is the Original Series time period, perhaps the physiology of Trill and transporters are not as well understood and our Trill ended up going through an illness where various memories and personalities of the symbiont took over until the medical officer could restore the current Joined personality. That gives him the Small Craft focus and he only uses transporters when absolutely necessary.
Second Career Event
Another unexpected random event, as this cool negotiator developed a New Battle Strategy. We’ve envisioned this character as something of a pacifist, but we also know that when innocent lives hang in the balance, they need to launch into action. Here, we envision an away mission gone wrong against the Klingons. They think our Trill won’t fight back, but he does, and protects his wounded commander until help arrives. That lets him Lead By Example as his focus.
Finishing Touches
The time has come to finish up our character. We add some Daring and Fitness to reflect his unexpected heroics along with a little Security and Medicine to patch up and protect fellow away team members. We choose the character’s rank and role on the ship. He’s a Lieutenant Commander as a Veteran and Ship’s Communications Officer seems like a good fit. Out of the suggested names we select Torias Pohr. His final value shows what he’s learned from his experiences in Starfleet: Fear Is Not An Option. The final screen allows us to export the character to PDF, so without further ado, we present Lt. Commander Torias Pohr!
How would you use this character in your game? Tell us in the comments! And be sure to tune into our Star Trek RPG show, Shield of Tomorrow on Geek & Sundry Twitch and Alpha every Friday starting at 4 PM PT, followed by our aftershow on Alpha, Behind The Shield, where the crew discuss the episode and other Star Trek topics.
Want more Star Trek goodness?
- Have you experienced Bij’ with the interactive VCR board game?
- Get more information on playing a Klingon with the Beta Quadrant book for Star Trek Adventures.
- Did you know Worf was an excellent D&D Fighter?
Image Credits: CBS, Modiphius (Screenshots by Rob Wieland)
Rob Wieland is an author, game designer and professional nerd. He writes about kaiju, Jedi, gangsters, elves and is a writer for the Star Trek Adventures RPG line. His blog is here, where he is currently reviewing classic Star Wars RPG adventures. His Twitter is here. His meat body can be found in scenic Milwaukee, WI.