I just KNEW it...

[Dan Gurden]

A while back there was a thread on the academy and the size of its outgoing class.

Eventually this came round to NCO's and the possibility that they are trained at locations around the galaxy. We were then told that according to Paramount there is only Starfleet academy and anyone wearing a S/F uniform had passed through the halls.

Thus the LUG official line was dictated by Paramount.

Seems a shame that the writers of DS9 have given us canon evidence to contradict this.

Watch season 4's 'Starship Down'. When Worf takes over the Defiant from engineering and has a rant at the Crewmen, O'Brien takes Worf to one side and points out.
"These men are not officers, they never went to the academy."

So it seems fair to assume. For the purposes of my game, that NCO's didnt neccesarily have to go to San Fransisco for their training, and that each major Federation planet has a training facility...


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Dan.

"A couple of thoughts from a random mind!"

[Dr. Jonas Bashir]

Wow, you're turning to be a hell of a nitpicker, huh?

It sounds really logical to have training facilities in the major planets. If they can take an Academy entrance exam in starbases, why not having training centers for NCOs in various worlds. I agree with you.

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Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?
Caught in a landslide, No escape from reality

[Don Mappin]

Originally posted by Dan Gurden:
So it seems fair to assume. For the purposes of my game, that NCO's didnt neccesarily have to go to San Fransisco for their training, and that each major Federation planet has a training facility...

You could have done this without watching the show...



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Don
trekrpg@trekrpg.net

[Dan Gurden]

true Don. But I was watching the shows anyway from the POV of the Trill book, and that very project has immersed me into the concept of watching the show to study every point of dialogue and interpretation of canon...

So when I heard this it really struck home because of what had been discussed about Paramounts view on acadamys anywhere else other than San Fransisco...

If I hadn't have got into the habit of studying the episodes I would have missed it.

Oh alright, I'll go away! :P

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Dan.

"A couple of thoughts from a random mind!"

[Steve Long]

...that very project has immersed me into the concept of watching the show to study every point of dialogue and interpretation of canon...

Very different sort of thing from just watching the shows for fun, eh?

Steve Long

[Don Mappin]

When I was writing up the NCO sections of the Players’ Guide and the character generation sections of SFA, I too was of the opinion that NCOs would go through a separate school. I envisioned a streamlined version of SFA, specific to the areas of specialty required. The Annexes could be found throughout the Federation and also served as testing facilities for the SFA entrance examination. I even wrote up some sections with that in mind.

All of my grand plans were shot down when Ross, under the direction of Paramount, emphatically stated that “everyone” goes to SFA and there is no division of schools between officers and NCOs as to foster teamwork and an esprit de corps. (I can see this point as well.)

As with all things, we did the best job possible with the restrictions imposed upon us and the material at hand.

Writers, obviously, don’t have to worry about canon – we did.


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Don
trekrpg@trekrpg.net

[AslanC]

A shame that you guys got that law handed down. Still as I have learned over time of runnng a canon camapaign. At some point you have to break with canon, it just depends where your line is

For me every major Starbase has a Enlisted Training facility, capable of handling an 3 month basic training. Then those people head off to speciality schools to learn what department colours they will wind up wearing. Certain schools are in certain areas. IE there may 4 Engineering Schools for 10 secotrs or some such. There maybe only 1 in your sector, or none forcing your character to travel to another sector, or reconsider his or her department.

This way there is still a chance of saying "Chief Daniels? Sure I went through Division Training at Belarcor VII with him. Good man." Or some such.

Just my two strips of latinum.

[SIR SIG]

True, True!

Typically over half your crew should be NCO's and enlisted.

Now if all of them went to the academy, and the only academy is at San Fransico, the Doctor Who exists in StarTrek.
Because if the academy ain't a bloody TARDIS then they must hold lessons out on the lawns and annoy Boothby!

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SIR SIG a Aussie TREK Narrator

[qerlin]

Good rule of thumb: NCO/enlisted should take up about 60-80% of the crew. They would do most of the actual work, while the officers are more supervisory/administrative (at least at the junior levels.)

[REG]

Personally, I like the idea of everyone having to go to SFA <u>campus</u> for basic training and use other campus specialty schools and training facilities located in other areas of Federation space (mainly the Sol System).

I also like the idea of having both officers and enlisted as instructors in the Academy, too.

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Anyhoo, just some random thoughts...

[This message has been edited by REG (edited 01-30-2001).]

[qerlin]

Our campaigns very heavy on NCOs and warrant officers. We've been running with the idea that the average enlisted has his little specialty (as per the players guide) and that training takes anywhere from 6 to 36 months, depending on the job.

Certain facilities are placed throughout the UFP to handle training: I came up with a list of where certain training centers were, if anyone's interested (non-canon, of course...)

Figure security and basic repair stuff is the shorter course time, with languages, medical, and heavy engineering courses taking the longer time. Much of their training would be cursory (based off my military experience) and there would be a lot of on the job training. (Which can make for good background stuf or tension heighteneing...'oh, no, petty officer third Snuffy just shut down the warp core by accident! Here comes the Romulans!)

[Modem]

Yah, but Reg; Soldiers don't have to go to 'Westpoint' for their basic (could just imagine how disruptive that'd be?)
Naa, I don't buy the "One SF/One training facility" (say...what's the point the "Paris" campus? Besides helping give Tom a last name )

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...and that's about the time it hit the fan...

[Capt.Hunter]

Even after O'Brien's line, you still couldn't say that it definitely means they weren't trained at San Francisco. O'Brien just meant that the NCO's hadn't been through the rigorous training demanded of an officer - they were used to doing their one job and doing it well, not thinking too far out of the box. Officers in Starfleet seem to be trained as jacks of all trades, and could be expected to work on projects removed from their normal fields when the situation demands. Still, personally I'd agree that NCO training probably doesn't occur entirely at the main Academy campus, but at other training facilities (possibly still on Earth though). As for the class size for the Academy proper, we know that only the best get in - so class sizes each year should be managable.

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"The more top brass briefings I attend, the more I want to take a phaser to the whole lot of them..."

Captain Matt Hunter, USS Tempest, NCC-81205

[CmdrBluejeans]

Personally, I've always been of the siding-with-canon opinion that the Academy handles all initial training of officers and enlisted specialists alike, as well as OCS for specialists who promote up to the officers' ranks.

I mean, if we posit, based on canon and LUGTrek example, that the enlisted specialist training program takes one year, then the Academy will graduate 4x as many specialists as officers in a 4-year span, *not counting the dropout rate*.

When you account for the fact that more officers will be 'lifers' than enlisted specialists, this allows you to keep the 70/30 split between specialists and officers in the field just fine.

However, the one thing I always found silly -- the place where I split with canon -- is on the Advanced Training classes. The idea that folks going back for training have to go all the way back to SFA for that just boggles me. The idea that one has to spend, for example, 2 weeks each way in transit just to take a 3 week advanced training class seems ... awkward, somehow.

So I allow major Starbases, perhaps one in every 3-4 sector radius, to be an SFA branch campus for advanced training, refresher courses, field proctoring (during cadet cruises, for instance, or in-the-field semesters), and so forth, but limit the bulk of the year-in-year-out initial training to SFA.

So far, it's been a good working compromise in my game.


BJ

[REG]

<font color="orange">Yah, but Reg; Soldiers don't have to go to 'Westpoint' for their basic (could just imagine how disruptive that'd be?)</font>

Yeah, but we're talking about Starfleet in the fictional future time period. And enlisted personnel are not soldiers, they are crewmen.