Whats wrong with Security?

[Owen E Oulton]

Um, Eric, reghardless of the antic of "Harm" on JAG, JAG officer are not commandoes - they're lawyers.

[Lt.Khrys Antos]

Canon wise it always seems that the security personnel are always involved in shoot-outs and do little of the interrogation. their like the strong-arms of the command crew. In canon, I only remember Lt.Cmdr. in the role of security officers (or lower).

In a game, most narrators on these boards have PC's in at least the XO's position. And all the other PC's are lower rank and thus defer to his lead. PC's want to take the lead and I get the impression (and I know we've had a poll on this) that most people don't play security. So we have CMO and Chief Engineer's with the XO and CO running around doing the work of the security NPC.

I don't think any PC would like to stand-by while the security NPC's interrogates the evil guy for information. So security is given the short end of the stick unless its played by a PC with a high rank.

Just my thoughts.

[Eric R.]

Owen
My thinking was that the duties of a JAG are primarily Military in nature, I wasn't thinking of just commandos when I made the list up. Though I can see how you got crossed on my list intent. It was just that a JAG is essentually a military version of a Police internal affairs officer (Which should have been on the list as well.)

[Owen E Oulton]

Actually, they're a military version of a Crown Attorney (District Attorney to you 'Murricans). They're not cops, they're lawyers.

They should have the very basic military type training (phaser, martial arts, basic starship systems), but not the specialist training. The tope of stuff you list is real down-and-dirty specialist stuff which is not part of the training for a JAG officer. Sure, individual PCs could pick up such training, but that's because they're the stars. NPC JAG officers won't have any of this stuff.

[Sea Tyger]

Originally posted by Eric R.
Owen
My thinking was that the duties of a JAG are primarily Military in nature, I wasn't thinking of just commandos when I made the list up. Though I can see how you got crossed on my list intent. It was just that a JAG is essentually a military version of a Police internal affairs officer (Which should have been on the list as well.)

Owen is right. JAG officers (JAG stands for Judge Advocate General, in case you didn't know) are lawyers only. That's the entire scope of their job. They are not "internal affairs," although they do have investigative duties like any civilian officer of the court.

[Owen E Oulton]

I guess where a lot of the problem comes from is that people tend to think of the military only as a combat unit, when in fact the actual combat arms are a relatively small part of the military as a whole. Yes, everyone goes through basic training where they learn which end of the phaser points at the Romulans, but after that only a small proportion of Starfleet will ever actually fire a phaser outside of yearly requalifications.

Player characters generally have all the flashy skills because they're the stars of an action series. This is not the norm for the extras or NPCs. Unless the NPC is a special case (guest star on the show), they should not have all these extraneous specialist skills. This is not to say they should be cookie-cutter cyphers; they should have interesting personal skills to provide background colour - Ensign Smith is a skilled cook and holds a weekly barbecue on the holodeck, where Lieutenant Jones entertains playing classical Hank Snow tunes on his replicated guitar. Unless it's been established in some plotline, Warp Propulsion Tech 3^rd Class T'Vonn probably doesn't have Energy Weapon (Phaser) 5 (6).

Likewise, in the show JAG, Harm has many skills that a JAG officer normally wouldn't because he's the star, and can get away with interfering in CID investigations because as the star he has the all-important script immunity.

Yes, often it seems on the TV shows that the stars can do just about anything. This is reflected, rules-wise, in a player being able to take a fairly wide range of skills that a "real" person wouldn't be able to, and in the use of fairly broad skills with specialisations. Logically, the ship's counsellor should be about the last person put on the helm, but because Troi is a starring role, Marina Sirtis gets to crash the ship in Generations (Not a spoiler - everyone's seen it, right?).

[Sea Tyger]

Originally posted by Owen E Oulton
Logically, the ship's counsellor should be about the last person put on the helm, but because Troi is a starring role, Marina Sirtis gets to crash the ship in Generations (Not a spoiler - everyone's seen it, right?).

Wait, Troi crashed the Enterprise???? Arrrrrrrrrgh! The movie is ruined!!!

(pauses, looks around sheepishly)

Umm, yeah, I saw the movie.

I agree that most "star" characters have a broad range of skills and a lot of cross training (Uhura was, apparently, an efficient enough navigator to run the station in a pinch), but they still have things that they are much better on.

Odo (I know, he's a civilian) was a highly competent "sheriff," with significant investigative skills. Worf, well, Worf seemed best at getting his butt kicked by the alien bad guy of the week, but he also seemed to be a very skilled tactician (as well as weapons expert)...what we saw less of were his investigative abilities. They may have been there, but they were lesser.

Checkov became a security officer late in his career, so it seemed natural that his tactical abilities were more advanced than his law enforcement skills. However, in the latter movies, he seemed to become more well rounded.

The entire point of this is that even the main characters, as rounded as they are, still had area of relative deficiency. Now, I considered the situation with my character to have been one of rank and position, and not of mentality; however, maybe the captain perceives a lack of law enforcement capability in his security department, and orders some training (i.e., siphoning some experience toward those skills) for his acting chief and acting deputy chief security officers.... Just a thought.

[pesterfield]

Security should be divided into two sections, depending on assignment.

If you'll be on ship assignments you're taught how to keep aliens, spies, etc. away from the ship's computers and weapons. How to repel boarders and such.

If you're on a station that's open to visitors you'll get courses in law enforcement, civilian relations, criminal investigation, etc. With the more martial skills likely covered in a short add on course.

Of course this slots security into two group, those who'll spend their career on ships and those who'll spend it on stations.

[Owen E Oulton]

Yes, it does mean that you'll run into Security types who specialise in starship security, and those who specialise in base security. There's no need to split Security in two, though, any more than you need in game context to split Engineering into forty bazillion groups, just because you have people who specialise in warp propulsion as opposed to starship hull maintenance. Those are just jobs within the larger Security/Tactical Department. CID (Criminal Investigations Division) is best handled by an Advanced Training School, a la ICONTrek's Player's Guide. Not sure how you'd handle it in CODA - maybe an Elite Profession... Likewise with Crime Scene Investigators.

[Eric R.]

Originally posted by Sea Tyger
Owen is right. JAG officers (JAG stands for Judge Advocate General, in case you didn't know) are lawyers only. That's the entire scope of their job. They are not "internal affairs," although they do have investigative duties like any civilian officer of the court.

1st) JAG officers are lawyers, I know this. However they have at least completed Basic Officer classes such as OCS, ROTC or even a few are West Pointers. Even direct commisioned JAGs (ya I now about that too) must take some basic officer classes before becoming a JAG. At the same time they are able to aquire some specializations such as taking Airborne school and etc... granted it it would be damn hard to fine a JAG who completd Ranger school after becoming a lawyer or was an Army Airvator but it is a possiblity however remote.

2nd) I will not go into telling you about the difference between Line and staff officer position as that would be redunant for the both both of us surfice to say I know plenty about this from the study of the history of Military affairs for the last 500 years.

3rd) As JAG oficers are responsible, with MP help (who I might add were orginaly set up as traffic cops in World War I), with investigating and policing the Militaries own they are a very rough allagory to Internal affairs if a very simplistic one.

4th) Allow me to clarify this I was NOT saying a JAG was a Commando I was saying that some seem to think a Security officer is responsible for being both a JAG and Commando officer. I was simply listing a series of skills that was all.

Sorry if I got a bit tepit in my response, but the tone suggested by your "If you don't know" comment hit a raw nerve with me. I have spent a good part of my life to the study of the Military and how it works and like Marty McFly with the word Coward, to say something like "If you don't know" is fighting words with me.

[Doug Burke]

Originally posted by Owen E Oulton
Not sure how you'd handle it in CODA - maybe an Elite Profession... Likewise with Crime Scene Investigators.

Actually, In CODA the different types of Security Officer would be handled during character creation, depending on which Professional Development Package you take. In fact, there are three listed for the Security Officer: Basic Security Officer, Investigator, and Tactical Officer. They would seem to cover the three varieties most under discussion here....

[Lt Cmdr Matt]

And if you don't want to be any of those three as Mr. Burke said, then you can easily create your own package to use for your security character that you had in mind!

[pesterfield]

You can call McFly a coward all you want, it's calling him chicken that starts the feathers flying.

Do any of the characters in your games have something that just lights their fuse?

[Eric R.]

pesterfield,

Boy I really need to break down and buy that box DVD set, thanks for the correction

In my sorry defense at least I was thinking along the right path.

[Sea Tyger]

Originally posted by Eric R. Sorry if I got a bit tepit in my response, but the tone suggested by your "If you don't know" comment hit a raw nerve with me. I have spent a good part of my life to the study of the Military and how it works and like Marty McFly with the word Coward, to say something like "If you don't know" is fighting words with me.

Honestly, your earlier post sounded like the extent of your military knowledge came from Hollywood. And since you apparently weren't aware enough to notice, I didn't write "if you don't know, Eric R." I was trying to be helpful to people who may not know what JAG stands for. Geez, get that burr out of your backside and calm the @#!% down.

And in my informed opinion, "basic" military knowledge doesn't qualify a character with skill levels, so your point is irrelevant. "Basic" miitary knowledge is effectively knowing how to put on your uniform without looking like a slob, knowing who to salute and when to do it, and having a general idea of who does what on a ship or in a unit. Sprinkle in a bit of military history and some basic weapons familiarity (so you can point the gun the right way), and that's it. The vast majority of military doctors and lawyers don't go beyond that level of military knowledge. It's not significant. Enlisted personnel receive much greater training in those areas.

Although I can't speak for West Point or Colorado Springs, the Naval Academy doesn't give out pre-law degrees; it is a school of engineering and naval sciences. I have never met a JAG or medical officer who graduated from Annapolis in my 15+ years of Federal service. ROTC? Yes. OCS? Yes. Direct Commission? Yes. USNA? As I've said, I've never seen it. Maybe there's a few who have, but it would be extremely rare.