Quick Questions for you CODA guys

[The Transformed Man]

Okay, my group is about split 50/50 between giving CODA a chance, or sticking with ICON. Now to give you all some background, most of these guys are old FASA Trek players, so they are really enamoured with selecting prior Tour packages like you do in FASA and ICON.

So my questions...

1) In the SOM it introduces Advancement Packages, are these supposed to simulate previous Tours in Starfleet???

2) Also, the group would like to go back and play a SFA campaign... how do I simulate this? Do I just use base characters without additional advancements???

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Yancy (aka The Transformed Man)

[Sea Tyger]

Originally posted by The Transformed Man
So my questions...

1) In the SOM it introduces Advancement Packages, are these supposed to simulate previous Tours in Starfleet???

The additional advancement packages are "fleet/capital ship" related. Each fleet/capital ship advancement package is slanted toward a specialty...i.e., patrolling rimward space, terraforming and settlement of new colonies, emergency evacuation and resettlement, great battles, etc...

2) Also, the group would like to go back and play a SFA campaign... how do I simulate this? Do I just use base characters without additional advancements???

Certainly, your characters should have no advancements in an academy campaign. Further, you could break up the 20 skill picks that a character receives in professional development (I'm using the bottom of page 96 in the PG as a reference here) into blocks of 5 picks earned for each year the character in. So, a 4th-class cadet would start the school year with no picks in his professional development. A 3rd-class would start the year with 5 picks. A 2nd-class would start with 10 picks, and a 1st-class would start with 15 picks.

I think the "Pick 5" element would be a function of the Cadet Cruise, and would not be used for the academy setting.

The edges rules should remain untouched. However, I would discourage allowing the PCs to take a flaw to get a second edge (unless they have a really good background story to explain it).

[Sea Tyger]

Continuing on the Academy series idea, you should limit advancements to just the 5 professional skill picks that the characters would earn in their studies over each school year. To do otherwise would cause the characters to become too powerful by the time they graduate from the academy.

[The Transformed Man]

The additional advancement packages are "fleet/capital ship" related. Each fleet/capital ship advancement package is slanted toward a specialty...i.e., patrolling rimward space, terraforming and settlement of new colonies, emergency evacuation and resettlement, great battles, etc...

So how would you recommend going about simulating the Tour packages from ICON/FASA... that seems to be a big sticking point with some of my players... Should I just package advancements together in certain skills?

Just curious

Yancy

[qerlin]

Originally posted by The Transformed Man
So how would you recommend going about simulating the Tour packages from ICON/FASA... that seems to be a big sticking point with some of my players... Should I just package advancements together in certain skills?

That would work. Put together a couple of 5 pick advancement packages and call them 'tour advancements' or some such (just post 'em here! ). Might use the SOM ones for tours where the characters saw some real action -- Dominion War and such.

I really liked ICON, but CODA won me over pretty fast. You can still have fun making characters. Actually, this is the first system where sometimes I'll slap characters together for fun...

[Chris Landmark]

Originally posted by The Transformed Man
2) Also, the group would like to go back and play a SFA campaign... how do I simulate this? Do I just use base characters without additional advancements???

Well, I'm currently running an Academy game, and here is what I decided to do:

All steps of character creation remain unchanged, except for Professional Development. They do NOT get the 20 picks of skills & specializations which all professional development packages contain: these are handed out as "experience" at the rate of approximately 5 per Academy year, in addition to a small ammount of XP (I've yet to give more than 150 points to a character so far). They do get their "Pick 5: +1 to any professional skill," partially because I figure any Academy recruit probably has started picking up some basic skills in order to pass the entry exams, and partially because characters trying to operate on just their Personal Development would have lots of trouble coping with all those unskilled penalties.

My cadets start effectively as "No Profession", and any expenditure of earned skill levels must be justified by the classes they are currently taking (which, since I have the old ICON Academy boxed set, they have great fun selecting each semester). Sometime durring their second year, I'll allow them to officially enter the Starfleet Officer profession, freeing them to develop those professional skills, even if they aren't specifically studying them in class. Sometime after that, they'll get a summer assignment to a starship (thus gaining their obligatory Starship Duty professional ability) and will officially join their chosen Starship Officer elite profession.

It's working so far...
-Chris Landmark