Android character help

[Owen E Oulton]

A dog is not a humanoid at all. It's quarupedal mammal. Humanoids in Star Trek are upright bipeds with at least two manipulatory arms and a head. In point of fact, in broader SF terms, that's only humaniform (meaning shaped like a Human). Humanoid actually means "Human-like", meaning that the individual has many similarities to a Human with only internal or cosmetic differences. Trek is often quite loose with such designations. Most Trek aliens are indeed humanoids, although some, like Tellarites, are best described as near-humanoid. Klingons, with only forehead differences to the casual observer, are true humanoids, as are Vulcans/Romulans, Bajorans and even Ferengi. And don't get me started on the real differences between androids and robots... (said B'rer Rabbit).

[The Tatterdemalion King]

A dog is not a humanoid at all. It's quarupedal mammal. Humanoids in Star Trek are upright bipeds with at least two manipulatory arms and a head. In point of fact, in broader SF terms, that's only humaniform (meaning shaped like a Human). Humanoid actually means "Human-like", meaning that the individual has many similarities to a Human with only internal or cosmetic differences. Trek is often quite loose with such designations. Most Trek aliens are indeed humanoids, although some, like Tellarites, are best described as near-humanoid. Klingons, with only forehead differences to the casual observer, are true humanoids, as are Vulcans/Romulans, Bajorans and even Ferengi. And don't get me started on the real differences between androids and robots... (said B'rer Rabbit).

The scale of 'human-like,' here, includes things like chairs and energy beings that look like transparent overlays of the Crab Nebula on the far end, so yeah, things that have 4 limbs and a head count as more human than not. I mean they even have eyes and a mouth in the same arrangement.

[flaeryn]

Is "Engineering certification" giving any modifications, or just that the character have the paperwork stating he or she is qualified? That sentence could be read as if it is 3 picks toward the skills, but just because someone has the skill to do it don't necessary means they have a diploma or certificate.

The certification just lets you use the skills untrained where you normally wouldn't be able to. I believe you would still take a -2 for being untrained. It also gives you a specialty if you train the skill later.

As it is an android character without much of (intentional) personality, I guess "species skills" isn't really a good fit and it would make more sense to focus those points on things making sense to know to be able to carry out the tasks the android was designed to do. Perhaps having a good knowledge of where to get spare parts and tools, and understanding non-UFP designs within the androids area of expertise?

Not all checks will be against TN 5. The routine ones will be, but suddenly there is the "understand and do surgery on an alien physiology, without the proper tools or diagnosis equipment, within a very limited times and while everything is shaking;" then we are not talking about a TN 5 anymore

Reading the database ability more closely, I see that it says TN 5 for public domain knowledges, so maybe I will put some points at least into history and specific world (not sure which specialties yet) for less common knowledge.

Thanks for the suggestions. I'm still not sure when we will be starting this game, as we created a bunch of characters for different systems.