Character help

[Commander Ramey]

We have a ship that has done the all Star Trek time travel thing. How isn't important, but I do have a question. The Commander (XO) of the ship fought the ship through a major engagement in 2297 and has arrived just prior to the DW in 2370. He was prepared to be a captain, excellent ratings on his reports and such, and he's always done very well.

Where would he go? All ideas welcome!

[Pericles]

Even though this guy may have been in the top of his class, his skill set is nearly 100 years out of date. He wouldn't know recent history on Federation member and non-Member races or "who's who in the zoo" as it were, so despite his previous life, he would be barely capable of taking the responsibilities of a TNG lieutenant. This guy would need to become the assistant department chief under an experieneced officer for a couple years before being able to handle being a department head, let alone an XO or Captain. The exigencies of the Dominion War would give him a boost and get him to the department head level, but he's not going to get to be an XO or Captain until after an extensive refresher course after the war. Except of course in an emergency that left him in charge, but he would be in a severe disadvantage.

[tonyg]

He'll also need some time to get up to date with the new technology.


On the plus side, he's be one of the first ones called when dealing with something from the 23rd century. If the ship runs across and old Constitution-class drifting in space, guess who'll be assigned for the away team? Guess who will and probably be the one left in charge of taking the ship back to the nearest Starbase? (Nice chance for a two-or three part sotryarc there).

A lot of the older ships get pulled out of mothballs during the Dominion war, and I could see this guy being assigned on one of them. He could rapidly get a promtion to XO or even CO as thing heat up. If he is good, they WILL use him. Strarfleet will just make sure that he is placed in a postion where his lack of knowledge won't hinder him-at least as much as they can.

Alternately, the character could spend some time at Starfleet Academy, both as a guest lecturer, and for "refersher" courses that could bring his abilities and knowledge up to date.

[LUGTrekGM]

Alternately, the character could spend some time at Starfleet Academy, both as a guest lecturer, and for "refersher" courses that could bring his abilities and knowledge up to date.

Exactly, with a slightly different emphasis.

Give him a year at the academy, with engineering, political sciences, and tactics refresher courses taken along with senior cadets (Keeping his rank, or losing a level of rank, to reflect "Broken Service", and perhaps a review of, or an abreviated Command School/Strategic School with current era Department Heads.

Meanwhile, he teaches his "Current" memory as "History of the Previous Century" at Starfleet Academy, Sciences Branch, as an adjunct History Professor.

This gives the Commandant of the Academy a year to watch him to see if all of this time travel has messed up his mind, he gets to or Starfleet Intelligence proves who he is during an extensive background check/security review (because he might be someone sent from a future hostile agency to change the past, at least that's what people might suspect), and he can take a year to catch up on things, which will mostly be history, as the Technology can be learned.

I'd think they'd then send him out for a one year cruise as a weapons officer, or engineer department head, perhaps on an Oberth class, or similar vessel. If he gets good fitness reports, no reason why he couldn't take any ship in the fleet after that.

The biggest aspect to leadership is the qualities of leadership, and management. The rest, the technology, tactics, etc. are just differences in degree of knowledge of specifics.

He left 100 years ago, when they had Excelsior and Stargazer ships flying around, now they have Galaxy, and all the newer ship classes. So that even though he predates Picard's experience, it won't be all that much different, in the end.

It's not like having someone from the age of sail of carribean pirates commanding a modern carrier.

That being said, if he was a guy from past the films to pre-next gen, going very very far into the future, where super-advanced time travel ships and dimensional hopping missions are perhaps the general reality, it would be a big problem.

Also, I just had a thought. What's to stop some kind of Starfleet Special Projects from sending him on a one-way trip to the past, after erasing his memory of his modern experience? Temporal Prime Directive, perhaps. I'm not really up on such things, as my group abhors time travel scenarios, so I don't typically run them.

The question is, is this an NPC or a PC?

As a GM, for continuity of game, I'd have him appear in the past, really fuzzy about the future that he "Might have recalled as some sort of dream."

As a player, I'd apply to the GM (unless the GM really wants this future campaign, in which case why do all this time travel, unless "All about Time Travel" is the theme?) to "Send me back, erasing my memory of the future."

*shrug* That's my input.

[spyone]

Very similar to what folks said above:
I think he'd be given some crash courses in "changes in the last century": at most 1 year at SFA. Then he'd get his own ship, preferably something small and old.

I've always felt there was good roleplay potential in the USS Bozeman (which came through a temporal rift in the TNG episode "Cause and Effect"). Here's a ship from 90 years ago, with a crew from 90 years ago. It is going to need a refit to bring it up to modern standards, and they are going to need some retraining, and perhaps they can be combined to some degree. The refit will likely reduce the required crew, so a bunch of the crew transfer out and maybe some new folks transfer in. And then the ship sets out to explore the 24th century.

I suspect Starfleet maintains a refresher program for officers who left Starfleet and return some decades later, as Tuvok did. This guy would need basicly the same thing. (Game effect: old skills work in new environment without penalty.)

Especially given the Dominion War, there would be a push to get him out and in service as quick as possable, so he may have skipped a few classes.

[spyone]

Also, I just had a thought. What's to stop some kind of Starfleet Special Projects from sending him on a one-way trip to the past, after erasing his memory of his modern experience? Temporal Prime Directive, perhaps. I'm not really up on such things, as my group abhors time travel scenarios, so I don't typically run them.

I think that's it: If your "history" shows he disappeared 100 years ago, sending him back is changing the past, so you can't do it.
"Yesterday's Enterprise" was a special case: Picard violated the TPD because he was desperate, and because he had a "hunch" that the "changed" version of history was the one he was in. If he hadn't been eliminated when his timeline got cancelled out, I expect he'd have been in Big Trouble.

[tonyg]

Yup, the whole time travel thing is generally restricte to preserving the timeline. They wouldn't send the guy back unless the believe he got here by some sort of mistake and needs to b returned to his own time. Even so, it wouln't be easy, since Starfleet hasn't prefected time travl in the 24th century, and the most reliable method they have, the "slingshot-breakway" is dangerous, and could wind up doing more damage t the timeline.


BTW, Is this a case of a player bringing in an establisehd TOS-Movie era character into a TNG era campaign? Or is this somthing that just happened with your TOS era group? How you can handle it can be adjusted a bit depnding upon what is going on "off camera". What does the player want to do, and how well does he now TNG stuff? If he is up to date, then you could can say that the the character got brought up to date prior to beginning the adventure. If the player isn't familar with the TNG era, it makes sense to roleplay some of it, lore him the books to read, etc. There is nothing wrong with having the character make slight errors or laspes--as long as they are minor. It can help to illiustrate the situation.


"Helm, set a course to Vulcan, Warp Factor 12!"

"Twelve, sir? But Warp Ten is infinit veloci-"

"Yes, thank you ensign. Set a course for Vulcan, Warp Factor Nine point two six. Engage."

[Tricky]

This is slightly outa left field, but when I was younger, I remember all these movies/shows about people from the modern era in the future (Buck Rogers, and some show by Rodenberry where the hero was 'Dylan Hunt', a scientist from 1970), where their 'primative' knowledge and 20th Century sensibility helped them save the day time and again.

I would imagine someone from the TOS era would almost have a leg up on DW era SF characters, coming from a time with more threats and enemies. Sure he wouldn't know a quantum flux regulator becon from a self sealing stem bolt, but when the gagh hit the fan, he would be more willing to reach for his phaser than the SF negotiators manual.

I think there would have to be adjustment time; the tech would be intimidating, but the interface on most Fed equip is user friendly. Understanding the galactic politics and assimlating the history would be more daunting.

Also, think of the change in the world view; coming from the out of the Cold Warish TOS era to the very hot war of the DW: It would be like taking a miltary officer from the 60's and putting him into the frontlines of the War on Terror. (Imagine finding out the enemy you spent your whole life preparing to fight are now allies, while your own nation was attacked by people you didnt even know existed, and now your in a war in a place you've barely heard of...)

[tonyg]

It would be ironic that the threats that the officer was trained to counter (Klinogns and Romulans) would be his ALLIS against a entirely new threat.

[spyone]

Also, think of the change in the world view; coming from the out of the Cold Warish TOS era to the very hot war of the DW: It would be like taking a miltary officer from the 60's and putting him into the frontlines of the War on Terror. (Imagine finding out the enemy you spent your whole life preparing to fight are now allies, while your own nation was attacked by people you didnt even know existed, and now your in a war in a place you've barely heard of...)

I think the Cold War may be too soon: most of the people we're fighting now are the people we were backing in the 60s because they were anti-communist.

Think a little further back: You are Captain America. You were out there fighting alongside our allies from England, France, and Russia against the dread Nazi menace and their sympathizers in Spain. Then you get frozen, then thawed.
Welcome, Captain. We'd like you to fight alongside our allies from Germany and Spain against people from parts of the world considered so unimportant in your time that many of them were actually neutral.
Bwha?