Many Questions: Stations, Names, & Designs

[The Tatterdemalion King]

1) How would the Spacedock rules be modified for creating space stations? Will there be examples of stations in the Ship Recognition Manuals?
2) Where is the best place to find ship names? History books? Encyclopedias? How many of the Eighth Fleet names in the DWS are completely made up?
3) Where did Steve Long come up with the descriptions of the ships in the SRM? Sure, they seem to be an improvement on the TPOF ships, but they still don't seem right. Did you do sketches of them to get the ideas or what?

[qerlin]

Most of the ship names seem to be from famed ships, mostly American, though they got on an Amerind kick for a while there.

I use names from various ships from naval history.

[Brian K]

I think you could reverse engineer space stations by using the Spacedock to Core Rules information in Spacedock.

Also, I think a Spacedock Version of Terok Nor is somewhere on this board as well.

Brian K

[Steve Long]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">1) How would the Spacedock rules be modified for creating space stations? Will there be examples of stations in the Ship Recognition Manuals?</font>

I can't answer that question in a post here. That's a subject for an entire book. For some systems (recreation, security), you'd need altered rules; for others (docking areas, fusion plants), you'd need entirely new rules.

There are no example space stations in any planned SRMs. But a "Spacedock: Space Stations" book is definitely on my "to do" list.

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">2) Where is the best place to find ship names? History books? Encyclopedias?</font>

Well, there isn't any one "source" you can use (or at least, none that I or any other ship designer I know uses). Many you can adapt from Earth history, famous persons, places, events, etc. Others are made-up names based on alien people, places, things, and words.

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">How many of the Eighth Fleet names in the DWS are completely made up?</font>

All of them.

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">3) Where did Steve Long come up with the descriptions of the ships in the SRM? Sure, they seem to be an improvement on the TPOF ships, but they still don't seem right. Did you do sketches of them to get the ideas or what?</font>

For the ones for which we have canon depictions, the descriptions were taken from canon sources.

For the ones for which we do not have a canonically-established appearance, I made them up. In some cases I based the descriptions off of planning sketches created by the Trek staff when designing some other ship, but in most cases I just tried to come up with something I liked.

If my descriptions "don't seem quite right" to you, feel free to cross out what I wrote and make up your own.

Steve Long

[This message has been edited by Steve Long (edited 07-11-2001).]

[spyone]

Steal your ship names from other people.
Steal from sci-fi movies and TV. (Sulaco from Aliens, Atlantea from Battlestar Galactica, etc).
Steal from other trekkers. (Start at www.bravofleet.com and when you're done there follow some links.)

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You're a Starfleet Officer. "Weird" is part of the job.

[Dan Gurden]

You can also steal from History. I have a naval history book that I inherited from my Grandfather, that gives many famous vessel names.

The advantage here is that you have a real-world histoical reference that can link your crew to their ship...

This can show in game if you find picture of the ship and create a 'ship wall' of the names linage.

We see this 'in character' with the Enterprise ready room, with Picards model of the Stargazer, and Siskos Saratoga model, even with Geordi building a model of the HMS Victory for his old CO aboard the Victory...

If you can get this into your players it would add an extra level to your game...

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Dan.

"Hi, I'm Commander Troy McClure, you might remember me from other academy training holo-simulations as, Abandon Ship, the quickest way out, and I sense danger, 101 things you dont need a Betazoid to know..."

http://www.theventure.freeserve.co.uk

[Michael Brinkhues]

A few books will go a long way:

The "Odyssey" and Illias (or Zimmer-Bradleys "Fire of Troya") will give a host of classic greeks

A book about the Skagerak battle (The loosing brits insist on calling it Battle of Jutland ) with a ship list in back gives you about 50-60 ship names. Vary in language and you've got even more.

A book about Tsusima (1905) will get russian and japanese ships. As will Clavells "Shogun" and "Tai Pan" novells

A history book of the 18th / 19th / 20th century will yield quite a number of scientists. For that matter the Penemünde (V2) and Manhatten Project teams are "scientists are us"


Michael

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Target Sierra Two uses a "Spoon Head" wide angel sensor. That makes it a Galor.

[Castle]

When in doubt use the name of a Famous person from history.

USS George Washington
USS James T. Kirk
USS Steve Long

you get the idea

[Cochrane]

Sources I like:

maps, particularly places I've lived near and placed my ancestors have lived near. LUG planetary maps are a good idea too.

real life astronomy.

Andorian mythology.

characters from the history of Trek races.

Earth historical scientists and science fiction writers.

earth mythology and the Bible.

randomly generated alien words.

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Games. The Final Product. These are the books of the Star Trek RPG. Their five year license. To explore strange new roles. To breathe new life into get togethers. To boldly play what no fan has played before!

[Dan Gurden]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Don:
The Steve Long has a nice ring to it.

</font>

Uh Oh... This sounds like a hint for a USS Don Mappin. Of course the Mirror universe ship would be the ISS Dan Moppin.



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Dan.

"Hi, I'm Commander Troy McClure, you might remember me from other academy training holo-simulations as, Abandon Ship, the quickest way out, and I sense danger, 101 things you dont need a Betazoid to know..."

http://www.theventure.freeserve.co.uk

[Eric R.]

Another good place for na names is Morris's The US NAvy in WOrld War II Vol 7 or 8 I can't remember exactly but it is an book dedicated to name every ship in the US navy and Coast Guard during the war.

[Don Mappin]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Dan Gurden:
Uh Oh... This sounds like a hint for a USS Don Mappin. Of course the Mirror universe ship would be the ISS Dan Moppin.</font>

ROTFLMAO!


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[redwood973]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Michael Brinkhues:

A book about the Skagerak battle (The loosing brits insist on calling it Battle of Jutland)...
</font>

The battle (no matter what it is called) was a draw at best. However if you consider the tonnage lost by each, Germany did have some justification for considering themselves to have come away from the battle in a better position.
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As far as names go...

Go with something that has always stoodout for you; a person, place, feeling. The USS Roosevelt, The USS Grand Canyon, the USS Hope. The ship we use is the USS Nautilus (NCC-31910) from the novel "Twenty-thousand Leaugs Under the Sea."

[This message has been edited by redwood973 (edited 07-11-2001).]

[Don Mappin]

The Steve Long has a nice ring to it.

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[Antonio Cabañas]

The historical ships names are good, but be careful, I had to dodge a glass of cola when I said that the ship which we are rendez-vousing was the USS Juan Sebastian Elcano (named for the current schoolship of the spanish Navy). The reason?, he was a cadet on the ship when he discovered that he wasn't up for the Navy life (in short, he was seasick everyday). Since The, he hates the sea, the ships, and anything which had relation with that (he is a trekker, so...)