New to Decipher

[Tricky]

I finally broke down and bought a copy of the Player's Guide from a local Comic/Gaming store that just opened near me. (Support your local store, that's my motto! )

And he has a copy of the Gamemasters Guide just waiting to come home with me!.

Anyway, I noticed that the game is alot like the d20 stuff, which is good. I think.

Anyway, I have a question about edges: I get one to start with. I pick it from either my Devopmental package or my Professional package, right? I don't get one from Dev., one from Pro., and another free one (that would be cool!)?

Also, as an aside: of all the races to include as PCR's (player character Races), why include the Ocompa and Talaxians? You pick one of them, you're making your GM work hard to include you in a game. Wouldn't Andorian's, Romulans, Bolians, Tellerites, or El-Aurians been a better pick? I would have loved to see the Gorn, and I'm real surprised that "Reformed/Unassimilated Borg" isn't available.

[Space_Cadet]

Welcome to the club Tricky.

IMO, you need more than the core books (PG and NG) for Coda Trek. You need the Aliens sourcebook if you want to play the other races, plus you need the Starships for updated ship related stuff.

[Sea Tyger]

Originally posted by Tricky

Anyway, I have a question about edges: I get one to start with. I pick it from either my Devopmental package or my Professional package, right? I don't get one from Dev., one from Pro., and another free one (that would be cool!)?

You get one "free" edge, either during the Personal Development or the Professional Development phase of character construction.

Should you decide, you may take a second edge, but at the cost of taking a flaw at the same time.

That's all you can do with edges before you enter your advancements.

Also, as an aside: of all the races to include as PCR's (player character Races), why include the Ocompa and Talaxians? You pick one of them, you're making your GM work hard to include you in a game. Wouldn't Andorian's, Romulans, Bolians, Tellerites, or El-Aurians been a better pick? I would have loved to see the Gorn, and I'm real surprised that "Reformed/Unassimilated Borg" isn't available.

This was something that was a point of concern when the PG first came out, but Doug, Jesse and Don were kind enough to explain the developers' decisionmaking process concerning which races to include.

Essentially, it came down to the fact that they wanted to include PC races from all four (at the time) series. Seven was a unique character (human recovering from being Borg), I'm assuming that she was too unbalancing to create a "race" around. So, that's why we have the Talaxians and Ocampa, instead of minor races from other series.

I don't agree that was the way to go, but I certainly understood and accepted their mindset.

As Space_Cadet stated, I recommend that you also pick up the Starships and Aliens books. With those four, you can do just about anything with Star Trek.

[Ineti]

Originally posted by Tricky
Also, as an aside: of all the races to include as PCR's (player character Races), why include the Ocompa and Talaxians? You pick one of them, you're making your GM work hard to include you in a game.

Not necessarily. The GM could place the onus on the player to come up with a reason why the Talaxian or Ocampa is in the Alpha/Beta Quadrant. Perhaps some strange Trek-ish thing happened to cause them to be far from home.

Such a character could serve as the 'fish out of water' concept along the lines of Odo. Could be interesting.

[Doug Burke]

Originally posted by Sea Tyger
You get one "free" edge, either during the Personal Development or the Professional Development phase of character construction.

Should you decide, you may take a second edge, but at the cost of taking a flaw at the same time.

That's all you can do with edges before you enter your advancements.

Remember that you can have a total of two flaws during character creation, thus allowing up to three edges during the development process.

This was something that was a point of concern when the PG first came out, but Doug, Jesse and Don were kind enough to explain the developers' decisionmaking process concerning which races to include.

Actually, to be completely fair, it was Ross Isaacs, the original line developer for the game who did the explaining. I just passed it on.

[Lancer]

Originally posted by Ineti
Not necessarily. The GM could place the onus on the player to come up with a reason why the Talaxian or Ocampa is in the Alpha/Beta Quadrant. Perhaps some strange Trek-ish thing happened to cause them to be far from home.

Such a character could serve as the 'fish out of water' concept along the lines of Odo. Could be interesting.

That aside, you could always use them as a base line for a new race. Just change a few minor details (and especially the description/appearance) and you can always use them as a new race from the Alpha or Beta quadrant. The Talaxians for example could easily (IMO at least) be turned into some sort of Orion "lost-colony race" if you only change their looks, given their focus on social skills and Enterprise.