Our ship currently has an admiral onboard. She came aboard on the last mission, and since we haven't stopped anywhere is still aboard. Also she was the former helmsman on one of our ships ancestors so is also a bit reluctant to leave though she won't admit that.
She's started as a guest star, but is on her way to being a main character. Any of your series have an admiral in that position? How do you keep the admiral interesting/involved while still leaving the ships captain a job to do?
At the beginning of my first series, I placed a retired admiral from the Medical Branch in the ship. He was my character from teh very first campaign of Star Trek in which I played. It used the FASA system and the setting was the Movie Era.
After seeing McCoy in the TNG pilot. I thought it would be fun to age my charcater and post him at the PC's ship. And I was right. Being really old and retired, he couldn't interfere with command etc, but since he was an admiral, he couldn't be simply dismissed. Mostly, he worked as slight comic relief, although I based one episode around him.
Maybe you could do the same to your admiral. However, if she's from command, you might end up having your captain and her butting heads.
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"As long as you can laugh, you are not
defeated."
If the Admiral in your case is not retired, then he/she/it has duties to perform. If those duties relate directy to what the starship is doing, they can justify being posted there for a while provided the admiral has at least semi-regular subspace contact with their office.
Otherwise, if the Admiral is hanging around because of sentimental attachment to the ship, he better be taking vactaion time. Otherwise, it would be deriliction of duty. Somewhere there is an office or Starbase or lab requiring the admiral's attention.
Now, if the starship is in a Voyager-esque situation, the Admiral might be with them for the whole series. Otherwise, the admiral would be expected to take a shuttle, commandeer a runabout, hire civilian transport, arrange a rendezvous with a courier, or divert the starship a little to a friendly planet where further transport could be arranged.
One of my players recently recieved a brevet promotion to Admiral, to head up the scientific survey of the particular sector our campaign is set in.
He is semi-based aboard the PC starship, but his duties relate solely to the scientific mission. He interacts regulalry with all NPC starships, and the PC senior staff. In crisis situations, he can (and has) assume command, but it depends upon which characters are also involved as to whether he takes the lead or not. If not, he simply involves himself with his scientific duties.
I should also point out, that we have quite a large group, 9 players when everyone turns up, so we often split the group into 2 different rooms, and have a 2 pronged adventure.
So far, it's worked quite well.
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Captain Daniel Hunter
CO NCC-73602, U.S.S. Intrepid Star Trek: Intrepid
If your ship is the admiral's flagship then she may be aboard for however long you'd like. However she isn't in command of the ship - she can tell the Capt where and when to go to a place, but not how. Real life example, the names have been removed to protect those involved.
A US ship I visited had this as a favorite story in the wardroom:
They were on deployment and the admiral came over for dinner (from the flagship). At dinner he began berating the C.O. telling him how to run the ship, what watch hours to set, etc. etc. The C.O. simply reached down to the phone called the flight deck and told them "get the admiral's helo ready, he's leaving". End of discussion, C.O. finished dinner, admiral left.
Now, there were repercussions. But if you're a CO you have ultimate power (and responsiblity) over things happening within the hull of your ship.
I use admirals as foils for the characters often. A few of teh characters are related to one in command of their fleet. He shows up mostly to hastle them about family matters and take control of things when they get hot.
I had considered having an admiral on their ship (a Galaxy)primarily as a mission commander. but decided it might be a bit too restrictive.
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How to handle admirals?
Being really old and retired, he couldn't interfere with command etc, but since he was an admiral, he couldn't be simply dismissed. Mostly, he worked as slight comic relief, although I based one episode around him.
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