Who plays FASA ?

My third thread to start... I think.

Just wondering who still actively plays the FASA Star Trek RPG ?

I know Starship Combat game aka the "Combat Simulator" is still popular and you can even find info for most of the TNG/DS9/Voyager era ships on line.

But, I've always played more of the RPG than we've ever played a straight-on ship-to-ship combat game. I know that FASA's RPG has been off the market for 2 decades.

But, I still find it to be a lot of fun- a very entertaining and invigorating game- and I wonder if I have any kindred spirits out there... people who still enjoy having their Star Trek adventures with FASA's system ?

I run all my Star Trek games using FASA rules w/some homebrew thrown in.Currently an running a 2250's game,which started on a Mission Class vessel(I redid the deckplans & named it the Thatcher Class.) working out of Starbase 24.Did a few games w/them transporting digntaries back & forth & cargo to outposts on the Klingon Boarder.Star Fleet Intelligence "used" them a few times to transport "items" & personell.The 1st season is done & I'm moving them to a bigger ship & some more dedicated exploration missions.Lost one player in September to the USMC(he was the son of one of our former gamers from years ago.He gamed w/us for about a year & a half.) & haven't decided if I'm going to npc his character incase he comes home on leave & wants to play;or have his character take over the Thatcher as its C.O..
My other current game is a Dominion War game set on DS 18 a Regula style station combined w/a Deep Space Research Station from the FASA module "The Vanshed".It had been in civilian hands for a number of years & Star Fleet "reactivated" it. The game is set in 2374 after DS9 was retaken from the Dominion.
The Thatcher game is my 18th campagin I've ran(most were connected & continued from the last.)since I started running FASA Trek in 1983 w/the 1st ed rules.

I still run FASA and still enjoy the hell out of the game. My only real gripe is the lack of advantages/disadvantages to personalize the characters.

While I run the Coda system for Trek, I love mining out the game that brought me into the hobby, FASA Trek. My Cornucopia of Coda Craft have so far all been conversions of ships from FASA to Coda. Good memories, great material but my players are not into the fairly detailed nature of starship combat in FASA and they really like the edge/flaw system.

I am begining to appreciate the Edges/Flaws of CODA myself. When converting our FASA characters it's a lot of fun to bring in the edges and flaws that define the personalities that we've been playing them to have for so long.

But, there's nothing like the simple system of FASA to get a role-playing session going in a flash.

I'll probably bounce back and forth between FASA and CODA depending on what sort of flavor we're looking for in our Trek game.

On the subject of Starship combat, I couldn't find an affordable copy of the FASA combat game, so I had to design my own system. And I'm not bragging, cause it ain't much.

Basically, I use some of FASA's ship-stats and convert them to shield strength, weapon damage, etc. Then we use the character's skills to roll out the combat. So, I've never played FASA's starship combat game. But, it is interesting. My group prefers a pretty fast-paced ship combat session too.

FASA was, and is a great game. And although I am fastly becoming a fan of the CODA system, FASA will always be the sentimental favorite.

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Originally Posted by WarriorKnight

...The Thatcher game is my 18th campagin I've ran(most were connected & continued from the last.)since I started running FASA Trek in 1983 w/the 1st ed rules.

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My first FASA campaign was in 1992 - the USS Lexington, under Captain Michael Grant. He's a Commodore now and in command of Starbase Magellan, in the Triangle region.

The current campaign is the USS Legacy- an Expedition class ship (my own design), under Captain John Northcote. We have a kind of crazy crew - A bald, blue android at ops, a Caitian security chief who looks like a 7' lion and acts a lot like a certain Klingon security officer; and a wild half-Betazoid flight controller (she's actually flown the ship naked !).

The era is post-Nemesis (2385)

I've been mulling over using the Flaws/Edges for FASA,just don't know how I'd want to put them in.Plus a couple of my long term players didn't care for the idea,so I probly won't.

My 1st game was set aboard the USS Einstein NCC-16603 a Mission Class Research ship in 2285 post Wrath of Kahn.The Commaning Officer was a Vulcan LtCmdr named Saark.One player had bad time with his dice when rolling up his 1st character;He had a Caitian Lt,jg who was to be the Security Chief.Failed his cadet cruise 3x & on the 4th try he only made it by 2%.He was in his early 40's & still only a Lt,jg.(The player missed out on all kinds of role-playing goodness due to the fact he was mainly a minature battle gamer.just couldn't connect with the character.).The Einstein crew broke into several diffrent groups.Part became the Crew of the USS Sol NCC-1733 a Connie Refit;The USS K'Hotan a Miranda Class(Destroyed during a battle w/a D-7) & The USS Roosevelt an Excelsior Class. I reused the Einstein later w/a new crew.(The Lt,jg was an npc at that point & still w/the ship several years later[2287].).

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Originally Posted by WarriorKnight

...I reused the Einstein later w/a new crew.(The Lt,jg was an npc at that point & still w/the ship several years later[2287].).

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Sounds like he's a loyal officer :)

Flaws & Edges in FASA ? Might work... you'd just have to add a box or two onto the character sheet, or a back page.

I think I'll always love the FASA game best, because it's so easy to run the rules. Easy when you have new players who are more into on-line writing games than actuall pen-&-paper RPGing.

And I've been playing for so long it's like an old friend.

Kinda like ICE's Middle-Earth roleplaying... aka MERP ! And now I'm looking forward to trying CODA in that setting...

I was looking forward to running a CODA Trek game but my gaming group didn't want to switch,so I started the Thatcher game with FASA.I agree the rules were so easy to learn(heck I even liked the AP rules).I've never been able to get into on-line games,I'm one of those players/gms that need to set across the table from my players/gm.
Never played Middle Earth,but had several ICE sourcebooks for diffrent settings(Mythic Egypt,Mythic Greese,Pirates,&The Old West;also had a space book for ICE),which I used w/Hero System.
Lt,jg M'Mar was run as one of those people who just can't find their footing(kind of like Lt Picard when Q changed Picard's history & Picard found himself as an almost 60 yr old Lt working in the Science lab on the 1701-D).I looked at the crew list for the last time I started to use the Einstein(a game set in 2290) I had promoted him finally & he was the 1st officer.(One of my new players wasn't sure about what he wanted to run & it was his 1st time playing Star Trek,so he took over the character.).I love using the Einstein so much when I ran a game for my god-daughter & a couple of her friends I did a 24th century game where they were lower deck officers assigned to the USS Einstein,NCC-72445;a Nova Class Scout.They were assigned to a Delta Flyer to scout around or what ever side trip the Captain wanted them to do.I only had the Capt,Executive Officer & Flight Manager of the Einstein written up.They actually did better RPing than players I've been gaming w/for 28yrs.

I tried my first CODA session last night... but I learned quickly the skill levels and the bonuses they apply are too low to reflect realsitic expertise, at least in combat.

I don't want to come off as if I'm bragging, and I feel I am since I've mentioned this in one other post and two private messages tonight, but I've studied Muay Thai kickboxing for 11 years.

I'm not a "master" or an expert by any means. But, I'm confident I can protect myself and my daughter if our drunken neighbor tries to kick his way into our home again this Christmas.

Last night, in our first CODA game my favorite PC, whom I've been playing for 5 years in FASA was beaten to death by a drunk in a bar. And she's been studying and practicing Muay Thai, Mok'bara, and Judo for 20 years (since she was 13).

And it was all because of a series of unlucky dice rolls.

The drunk scored 17 consecutive hits, while my PC missed all of her hits, and all of her dodges. And the skill mods, playing within the rules for character skill level and advancement, etc., were simply too low to reflect her skill in the fighting arts.

I could suggest a house rule to make martial arts function more like they do in reality:

Apply the combat skill bonus to all dodge rolls. And apply the combat skill bonus to all opponent test rolls as a bonus to the character's Defense if they are defending against a less skilled practitioner of the same art, or someone fighting with a less capable fighting style (a brawler fighting a Muay Thai master, for example).

It's too bad Decipher went under; maybe they would have done a second edition by now and fixed this somehow. That and the negative penalty in all physical skills for being "reckless" - at least cinematically this is usually the opposite case, with characters functioning as if they had a bonus when they "go wild" (Riggs in Lethal Weapon, for example).

I find it a lot easier to do it the FASA way, and come out with an accurate portrayal of my character's skills, and abilities.

I do like CODA's system of flaws otherwise - this same character has the flaw of "Intolerant (Prudish People)". That's a perfect depicition of her personality as she's been RPd since '04.

But, I'll be sticking with FASA.

I love FASA and still have all my FASA books (I used the SRMs to build the Coda versions of those ships for posting here); however, I feel the Coda system gives a much better cinematic gaming experience (which is just a function of having 20 years of gaming design behind it).

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Originally Posted by FASAGrrl

That and the negative penalty in all physical skills for being "reckless" - at least cinematically this is usually the opposite case, with characters functioning as if they had a bonus when they "go wild" (Riggs in Lethal Weapon, for example).

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The Edges/Flaws that give +1/-1 to all skills in a categorie are, frankly, BS traits. They're attributes by any other name.

Did you build the character from the ground up? How many advancements did you give them?

Please continue the CODA-specific rules portion of this discussion over on the CODA forum. The FASA portion will remain here for those wishing to add to it. Feel free to elaborate on adapting elements of the CODA rules for use with the FASA ones, however. Thank you.

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Originally Posted by K.G. Carlson

While I run the Coda system for Trek, I love mining out the game that brought me into the hobby, FASA Trek. My Cornucopia of Coda Craft have so far all been conversions of ships from FASA to Coda. Good memories, great material but my players are not into the fairly detailed nature of starship combat in FASA and they really like the edge/flaw system.

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Completely agree -- FASA's scenarios are very nicely drawn. When I was running a STRPG campaign (which has been a couple of years now, unfortunately,) it was set in the year 2300, and the in-game universe was very strongly influenced by FASA. (We used straight CODA rules, just because that was what we had and the rules worked well enough.)

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Originally Posted by jkp1187

Completely agree -- FASA's scenarios are very nicely drawn. When I was running a STRPG campaign (which has been a couple of years now, unfortunately,) it was set in the year 2300, and the in-game universe was very strongly influenced by FASA. (We used straight CODA rules, just because that was what we had and the rules worked well enough.)

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Yes indeed. Whenever I get back into running Trek for my second group, set in 2278, I'll be kicking off the campaign with a Coda version of Decision at Midnight, a FASA classic.

This group had run through a mini-campaign set in the Academy to give everyone a feel for the rules. Since DaM has the set up premise of a "class reunion," it seemed a logical choice. :D

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Originally Posted by K.G. Carlson

Yes indeed. Whenever I get back into running Trek for my second group, set in 2278, I'll be kicking off the campaign with a Coda version of Decision at Midnight, a FASA classic.

This group had run through a mini-campaign set in the Academy to give everyone a feel for the rules. Since DaM has the set up premise of a "class reunion," it seemed a logical choice. :D

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Must be nice to have a FTF group. Can barely muster up two people for an online game.

My group has been together for the better part of 20 years - we broke up in the latter half of the '90's for a few years - and we began with FASA. It was good for the time, but began to show its age. We went to a modified Twilight 2K system for a while, then I found ICON. Never was tempted by CODA, though. FASA had some good adventures, but some spectacularly bad artwork, including most of their deckplans. All hail the Freedonian Aeronautical and Space Administration!

We have a group of 8 or 9 regular & another 3 to 5 who game when they can/want to.We lost one to the USMC in September.two of our regulars are next generation players(sons of two of our regular players).4 of us regulars have been gaming togther since 81; & the irregulars have been gaming with us since then also.

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Originally Posted by Owen E Oulton

FASA had some good adventures, but some spectacularly bad artwork, including most of their deckplans.

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I was in a group in the late 80s that was into a bunch of systems and in a sort of crossover thing, we always said FASA art caused SAN loss.

Wasn't it "Decision At Midnight" that had the Star Ship officer drawning of Sean Connery from "Hunt for Red October".:rolleyes:

Well, that's what happen when you have a game company run by a bunch of friends who hire their friends. The one shining light art-wise was David Deitrich. His covers were fantastic.

Oh yea,alway loved his work.One of the reasons I enjoyed Battletech.

I recently went back to the FASA game, nostalgia and all that.

Allen