smoothbrain coldtakes

I bought this when it originally launched, and unfortunately never really found the time to play a campaign.

We were workshopping a TMP-era story based around a crew serving on a Miranda class vessel. Kind of a “back to basics” sort of campaign. I had really high hopes because Star Trek is absolutely my favorite universe to roleplay in.

I hope a bunch of people pick this rulebook up and have a fun time with it!

Atmosphere got ionizing radiation, bro

Sure, the fanservice can be a lot.

My main thing is just that it’s clear how much McMahan loves the source material and it’s great how he can operate within the parameters of the universe with reverence despite being jocular.

I wouldn’t say mishandled but I would say both Disco and Picard’s first two seasons were incredibly sloppy due to a clear lack of planning, vision, and the difficulty of transitioning to a fully serialized format.

By contrast Lower Decks and Strange New Worlds were really able to find their footing quickly because they had season-wide arcs but outside of that they were generally episodic and allowed for a lot more exploration of the core of the universe. This is just a better format for the franchise in my opinion.

I find Kurtzman is occupied with making the series more cinematic than it needs to be. Overly cinematic Star Trek results in eye bleeding lightshows like the finale of Disco S2, while grounding the shows a bit more allows for more character growth and development. You can’t just always have Sacrifice of Angels all the time, you need to cut it with some Take Me Out to The Holosuite. I find that SNW and LD have found that balance for me.

I am very aware of Kurtzman’s influence on the franchise. I think he’s not the right guy to be in charge. It really feels like this is a Dave Filoni/Kathleen Kennedy situation but in Star Trek.

I dunno man, LD is like half fan service and half universe building, and it’s my favorite thing they’ve produced in the last decade and a half.

Can we just get Mike McMahan in charge of everything, please?

The Traveler!

Shows up, warps the crew to the center of the galaxy, refuses to elaborate.

Yes, transporters were originally made to avoid the high production costs of models, which would have been necessary to use for shuttles back then.

Very smart imo.

I think putting the face onto the source is what made it lose the value, unfortunately.

My comparison is what they did with the Borg and the Queen. Wolf 359 is a terrifying, tragic ordeal, made all the more serious by the fact that it was done by one cube that could not be negotiated or reasoned with. As soon as the Borg had a way to negotiate and reason, they became less scary because they had understandable motives and goals that could be bargained with, as excellently demonstrated by Janeway.

Ultimately, I agree with you that it’s kind of more of a TOS-y sort of plot device. I do feel like back then they really followed the science being indistinguishable from magic logic, and we’ve progressed over time to wanting more hard and serious technobabble. I think that’s kind of a disconnect for me, personally, is that they had to dip into a serious explanation for something that effectively functions like magic.

SNW rocks. I’ll follow Pike and the crew anywhere.

We can replace the words “magic” with “strongly telepathic” and it’s basically the same problem.

It’s a great idea to fuck warp travel right on its head as a concept, but the execution was majorly lacking for me. I would have much rather had a continuation of the plot from Force of Nature where warp had significantly damaged subspace gradually (like a climate change allegory), rather than a universe-wide explosion that happened all at once in a flash.

I really like The Drumhead from TNG. It establishes the nature of Star Trek at its most essential. It’s mostly a talking episode, although there’s some action with an explosion, which is perfectly average to me. It gives you a feel of the dynamics of some of the politics in the universe, which I think is a great way to get people involved. It’s got one one of those great Picard speeches that puts a badmiral in their place, solving the problem non-violently. It’s also a great parallel to any slippery slope security tightening after a major event happens, which is basically always a timeless message of avoiding overreaching authoritarianism at all costs.

Another TNG one I’d pick is probably The Ensigns of Command. It’s another example of an episode that’s mostly talking, a little bit of action, with a non-violent resolution. It’s fun watching Picard come up with inane legal bullshit to deal with the very strictly by the books alien species, satisfying their requirements in a way that meets his agenda while also being within the rules.

Honestly, I could rationalize different episodes all day, but since those were the first two that came to mind, I’ll just leave them at that.

That’s interesting. Toronto often fills in for other major metros that are more expensive to film in like Chicago or New York relatively effortlessly. San Francisco seems more difficult to fill in for. I’m interested in how they pull it off as a local Torontonian. I’m hopeful to see random locations I know when they venture off the campus.

Either that or it’s just going to all be inside Pinewood itself. From what I understand it has some of the largest stage space available in the region.

I would love to tour the studio one day.

Temporal Prime Directive typically means not messing with the past. I think it would be a bigger violation to bring them back to their original timeline depending on how much knowledge they had attained of the parallel future. I think your final point of Starfleet having no way to know the natural development of either timeline is the key here. There’s a reason it’s a Temporal Prime Directive and not a Multiversal Prime Directive, which is putting Starfleet in kind of a divine arbiter position of deciding what is the correct path of history for any given universe.

It feels like many things leak through weird anomalies, and parallel realities are shown and dismissed without a second thought. Like in Voyager, both Harry Kim and Naomi Wildman are technically from an alternate reality having crossed through the anomalies to the surviving ship’s timeline. Everybody just kind of welcomed him with open arms while acknowledging that the universe is just a super strange place.

If the accident was an anomaly and not an experiment, Starfleet probably wouldn’t really care. They would find them and determine how disruptive they may be through an interrogation with a full telepath Betazoid and let them loose on a Federation world with an equivalent lifestyle to their era and locale. Unless this was like some kind of potential intergalactic criminal, it’s just some dude who deserves to live out their life as normally as possible given the situation. If it was an experiment, though, they probably would just confine the dude until a badmiral decided to try to have them recreate the universe-hopping device or otherwise consult them on how to safeguard against the intrusions.

I think the precedent would be the way that the Kelpians and Saru were treated with the Prime Directive. Saru having knowledge of what was beyond his planet essentially allowed him to be uplifted individually. If somebody crossed over similarly having knowledge beyond their planet in the same way could potentially also be uplifted and serve in Starfleet in some capacity, but my money is on anomaly dude just wanting to vibe somewhere chill. Otherwise, it’s as dangerous as anybody from the Mirror timeline would be, and they typically defend against trans-universal attacks like that, so I would assume the fugitive would be considered hostile.

Augment virus!

Long Live Phlox!

BRING ME PICTURES OF JULIAN BASHIR

I was kind of annoyed in Picard when the Changeling infiltrator was genetically modified by Starfleet. I thought it would have been way cooler if the physiological changes were a result of working alongside 8472, given that 8472 also wanted to infiltrate Starfleet and potentially didn’t have the same blood test vulnerability.

I thought it would have been a neat reference but instead it’s just another one of Starfleet’s evil secrets.

Trust me, it’s more fun to fail the test.

He put out a 100 ways to die in Starfield trailer, but it’s been years since he put out a gamer poop. Probably been close to 5 years now.

Everybody wants to…Mount Anson