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RPG of choice help...
Hello
I am trying to start setting up a solid trek rpg so I recently purchased a HUGE boxed lot of Trek RPG materials on ebay. In the set I got I had alot of books.... an I mean alot. But unexpectedly it had both LUG an CODA books in it. So since the net so far has not helped me to fig out which is best... as it seems that trek rpg gamers are VERY divided on this... I was hoping for a more direct look at the materials I have here an someone could tell me which would be the best route for me "personally" top go with to start my trek rpg.
Here are the materials that I recived in the pack.
Decipher Trek RPG Materials from "lot purchase"
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All the coda hardback books (numbers 1-6)
Coda Narrators Screen/toolkit
3 Printout booklets (Insurrection, Nemesis, Android Race booklets )
(20) 3 page color character sheets
(15) color starship sheets
(8) color space station sheets
(6) color vehicle sheets
(1) CD burned with several PDF files - (Enterprise, Expanded Spacecraft, Mirror Universe, several single pdfs of ships, cheatsheats, maneuver cards, 6 newer style starfleed PADDS for printing)
A coda character generator
(10) zip files of Beyond the Final Frontier
LUG Trek RPG Materials from "lot purchase"
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TOS Core RPG Game Book
TNG Core RPG Game Book
TNG Narrators Screen/Toolkit
A Fragile Peace v1 - Neutral Zone Campaign
Holodeck Adventures
Planets of the UFP
Way of the Kolinahr
The Price of Freedom
(stapled printout) Voyager Sourcebooklet
(printout in binder) SpaceDock - Advanced ship construction man.
(1) Starfleet PADD game prop
(20) extra races (from memory Icon I recently discovered)
(10) color character sheets
(10) color starship sheets
and a TON of deckplans/schematics/3d illustrations of TREK ships.
.....so I hope someone out there can help me fig out which is the best option for me. Go with coda? or Buy the remaining lug books.
I look forward to any an all help.
thanks again.
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What a great score!
I suspect my answer will be "Go with CODA, enjoy the LUG books and use them for additional flavor and GM assist", but it may depend on what kind of Trek game you're hoping to run. Do you have a particular favorite era/series for your game? How heavy will ship combat figure into it, if ever? Starship and Starfleet characters setting, or broader? Things like that. And what is your favorite non-Trek (and perhaps non sci-fi) RPG, and why?
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Well atm my choice of era/setting will be a will be starting in 2379 "post nemesis" at the lauch of my Olympus class starship. the campaign will feature alot of full game flashback adventures to the characters glory days durring the dominion war also.
As to the ship/combat. My group is "REALLY" into the starship/character side battles of trek... so prob more than an average ammount of combat an action in the stories.... lol.
Alot of my plans I have in the works atm will involve them traveling into the Gamma Quadrant for exploration, and dominion battles durring some flashback adventures, a bit of Neutral zone fun at a few intervals for some rumulan fun, an some HEAVY borg battles and action "with a touch of Elite Force style character missions for the times they get that wild hair for some "sneaking around action" missions in 2 "in"game years time in 2381 when the major borg invasion occurs as protrayed in the Destiny trilogy novels.
hmmm non scifi rpg... prob 2nd edition D&D/D20 DragonLance, an old Mekton II/Mekton Zeta... or any anime setting rpg.
Drama works well in my adventures with my group.... they get WAY into it an tore up EASY. lol.... which works VERY well for adventures. :)
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My response is just the opposite of the above poster. Go with ICON and use the background material in CODA for flavour. ICON has a much more elegant system than CODA's version of class'n'level which, IMNSHO only ever works at all for fantasy.
The only real weak point in LUG's system is the odd skills ablation in chargen, which is avoided by using a very simple house rule, posted on my Universe page.
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Well, based on KYGuy731's response, I'm going to adjust my answer:
Lean on LUG and your great TNG-era supplements for characters and GMing (because "Drama works well in my adventures with my group"), use CODA for starships, design and starship combat that moves fast and easy or LUG + Stardock for very detailed starship gaming (at the expense of speed).
But action+lots of starship combat+TNG era says (IMO) you'll get the best bang with the above combination, and you pretty much have everything you need. Just my opinion, I really don't think you have to buy any more, with the possible exception of the First Line: Starfleet Intelligence Manual (for some of that covert Elite Forceiness!). Save your money, you've got a hella lot material there!
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Having used both systems I have to say that LUG's ICON is the way to go, CODA was heavily inspired by d20 and suffered because of it - it's a little clunky and actually kind of awkward in operation. I run both tabletop and play-by-post Star Trek campaigns and ICON works well for both of them. I do agree that with starship combat you are better off with CODA or Spacedock, which is what I use especially if your players are into starships - they can all download Spacedock and there you go. Also as Owen says character generation is a little awkward with ICON, but just use development points or be a little flexible.
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First off I wanted to thank everyone that took the time to read my post. I also "REALLY" app ever reply in regards to my Q.
All the replies helped me alot in guiding me to which setting that I will be using.
After setting down an doing some heavy comparing of the CODA/vs/LUG rules. I find Coda to be very heavy "eye candy" set of rulebooks but very loose, LUG not as much eyecandy but alot tighter feeling when messing with.
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On the character creation side, Coda and its sheets feel like it has alot of depth even at a glance. To fix that feeling with my LUG sheets I am currently modifying one of the 3 page color sheets I have for Coda atm... which will nerf the feeling of the lack of depth on LUG's sheets.
[I will post a link here for anyone that wants to take a look at it when its done].
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On the starship side Coda again looked nice... but I found the starship rules.... [VERY... "VERY"] loose... an generic feeling. Alot of information seemed generalized an at times overlooked. Computers, power, things that I felt should be more important when dealing with starships an starship combat.
LUG covered all of this almost routinly with its starship rules setup in the fast construction and in "EXTREME" depth spacedock rules... which made me [VERY] happy to look thru.
So after looking thru it all, I "100%" agree that LUG is the best TREK RPG choice... at least wtih the books and information that I have.
LUG is as others have stated.. alot more "crunchy" feeling than the CODA rules. I feel like I am really getting into the TREK setting with LUGS rules.
...I have to say tho. I would really love to see a Rules setup released for a TREK RPG with the wonderful "Eyecandy" feel of the CODA setting but the tight rules of the LUG setting.
Wouldnt that be a wonderful thing to see one day.
...one can dream.
I have uploaded the sheet I promised to make. It can be found in this thread.
http://forum.trek-rpg.net/showthread.php?t=15322
