Star Trek: Dreadnought Atlas (Name Pending, TOS game)
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First off I'd like to start by saying it's been quite a long time since I've posted anything here and I'm aware there are concerns that would be valid to raise due to a number of past failed projects. As such I would like to start by saying that what makes this different then past projects is its code light nature making it fairly easy to develop for.
Let's answer some questions about this project:
Q: When is Star Trek: Dreadnought Atlas set?
A: Star Trek: Dreadnought Atlas is a code light mush set in The Original Series timeline.Q: Is there going to be piles of paperwork?
A: No, we're going to be attempting to capture the Star Trek feel without all the piles of paperwork. That's actually part of the reason for TOS era as the setting. So things are going to be more loose and free in that regard.Q: Will Discovery be cannon?
A: As the series is still ongoing, and tends to contradict established lore no. This is a firm decision on the part of myself and is not likely to change.Q: What //IS// Atlas?
A:The USS Atlas is the ship the game will be taking place on. A prototype ship built with the most advanced and bleeding edge technology Star fleet has to offer. The tech is so cutting edge it is hard to work on, regularly breaking down and tends to have issues with being highly over-engineered.Q: So it's a dreadnought, does that mean this'll mostly be a combat game?
A: The conflicts with the klingons are ending and a peace is being aligned. Despite the ship being entirely designed for war during the time the game is set there's no war to fight. Part of the games focus is trying to live on a ship designed for war in a time of peace.Q: What's the mission of the Atlas?
A: The Atlas is going on a mission to put it through its paces. The ship was rushed into and through production in order to get ready for a war that didn't go the way the federation had prepped for. So it's been sent to explore and put the ship through its paces learn its faults and fix them in case war should break out fresh with the klingons. At the end of the day it's your good ol: To seek out new life, and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before.Q: Can I be the captain?
A: The role of captain is going to be an NPC position. The character will have a personality and history guide for how he should act in scenes. Though the Captain may change over time in order to keep everyone from fighting over the position of Captain the role will remain an NPC role. This game is a mush and so it shouldn't HAVE a 'main' character.Q: Can I play a fighter pilot?
A: Of course. There are two shuttle wings with dedicated piloting staff whose job it is to protect the Atlas during combat situations. With the ship unstable as it is there may well be situations where the Atlas has no weapons and its only defense will be the shuttle pilots.Q: Will there be a real time travel space system?
A: There is not planned to be any space system. This game is planned to be code light focusing on role-play over roll-play.Q: So it's a sandbox game?
A: There will still be character sheets and stats to keep track of peoples abilities and focus. While it's RP first there need to be limits.Q: Can I run events even if I'm not event staff?
A: Of course. There's no problem with people running as many events as they want, so long as you run them by staff to make sure they're reasonable. We don't need 5 different people running missions where the ship gets evacuated. Or a new one every day!Q: Can I play Q, Borg, Undine ect ect?
A: The only playable races, at current are as follows: Aenar, Andorians, Axanari, Catullan, Deltans, Ithenite, Tellarites, Tiburonian, Vulcans, and Zambeans. Effectively any of the races who attended the Babel Conference.Q: Can I make a custom race?
A: No.Q: Will I get to play as factions other then the federation?
A: No. This is a mono faction game where everyone on game is a member of the federation. This is to keep a narrow focus.Q: Will we be trapped on the ship all the time.
A: Not all the time, there will be missions down planet side, time spent at space stations, various events to avoid people getting too bored.Q: Will it only be officers allowed on away Missions
A: Actually for the most part officers will not be going on away missions and instead will be doing their jobs of managing vital functions of the ship. The players at large will be the ones going out on missions for the most part. This is an ensemble mush not just a few command officers having all the fun.Q: Will it be serious melodrama all the time?
A: Not all the time no, I really want to make this a nice wagon train through the stars. There will occasionally be rough issues tackled and difficult times to be had, but there's also going to be fun action and mysteries. There's certainly going to be serious moments and lighthearted camp as well but I hope not to overload on either.Q: What system are you planning on running?
A: We are going to be using ARES, and FS3 as it's what I know and it seems fairly easy to configure properly. This should allow the server to get up and playable in no time at all so we can all start building those stories we want to tell together.Q: Why are you posting this here?
A: Because I could use some help. This is a one man project at the moment and though I already have a few volunteers who want to help run events and the like I could always use some more people along for the ride! Event managers and heck if people want to join in who know how to code that's fine to, because I was planning on just using a nice pre-existing code layout to get things off the ground and get people roleplaying because there seems to be a serious interest. This also will be a good way to progress track on the way to a proper launch!Q: Are you just going to abandon this project as well?
A: Not planning on it. Star Trek is a real passion of mine. The Original series to be precise is something I grew up on something I've had in my life the whole way through. This in a way is something that'll let me enjoy that world and bring other people into it with me.Q: Why the Q and A format?
A: I enjoy the Q and A format, because it lets me scattershot some of my thoughts on the game without having to really order things myself. It lets me just get the info out there and get back to working on actually making sure this game can see a launch.Q:What happens if no one plays it?
A: Well then I'll keep hosting the game anyway. Just run little things for whoever does want to play and have fun with little stories along the way. Really big or small it's all just about having fun. -
I really like most of what you're laying down here. I don't care for Rhost and am not familiar with it so, sadly, I can't offer any staffly assistance but I wanted to post to show that there is interest in such a game; a TOS game that takes place on a single ship. I'd been waffling for some time now about trying to do just the same so I'm quite happy to see someone else giving it a shot! Consider me at least interested as a player.
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@ZombieGenesis Hey if you can sell me on another system go right ahead. I'm not picky at all on system, I mostly just want to get the work going get things done and get people able to enjoy the universe. I'm a writer not a coder so it doesn't matter much at all the framework we're using.
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While I'd have to think about a staff/help/code position(and speak to some people) first I can say that, regardless, I would suggest Ares over Rhost for the following reasons...
1: It can be largely used "out of the box" for a game like this.
2: It has tremendous support both on the Ares forums and the Ares discord for any changes that do need to be made.
3: You could use FS3 pretty much as is for a Star Trek game and it'd work well. Beyond that you could customize it quite nicely using the various configuration options to make species feel unique and help people spend their points based on position and rank and what not.
4: It has a built in combat system that would support both personal level combat and ship level combat. It's pretty simple and straight forward while offering a bit of depth with various options. I've been playing around with it on a Star Wars themed build and the people I've beta tested stuff with have had a blast(especially the starfighter battles).
5: The web integration is some next level shit. If you went with FS3 it's have online character generation, profile pages are made automatically, almost anything you can do on the game can be done via the web, and my favorite part is that scenes can be done piecemeal style for those players who may need to do some on the game but then some on the web for various reasons.Anyway, that's my sell for Ares.
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@ZombieGenesis Doesn't it also have that battlestar galactica loadout that it just comes with? I mean that's already got a bit that change some names and it's more or less trekish
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It does, yes. It really could be used almost out of the box as a Star Trek game. I think you could drill it down and customize it some more to get a really good Trek feel but even if you just changed some names around you'd be good to go.
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I'll certainly give it a think over some sleep.
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Doing some test runs of a few different concepts for the game on a home box. Trying out the new Rhost roll code, and the Ares FS3 character sheets. Doing a bit of a 'feel test'
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Had me curious until Rhost. With you considering Ares, I'm curious again. Although I've got to admit I'm more of a Wars guy than a Trek guy.
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@Mr-Johnson said in Star Trek: Dreadnought Atlas (Name Pending, TOS game):
Ares FS3 character sheets. Doing a bit of a 'feel test'
Feel obliged to mention that Ares supports more than just FS3. There are a number of skill systems available out of the box. Only FS3 has the web chargen and automated combat, but you'd have to code that on rhost too, so... that part seems kind of a wash. Also feel obliged to mention that Ares is still in beta. It's very stable, overall, but bugs do happen (generally fixed within a week) and things are still evolving.
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Sounds awesome.
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@faraday May sound silly, but I honestly didn't know there are. For some reason in my head Ares is 'the FS3 engine' Didn't even think about there being different ones for it.
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@Mr-Johnson Lots of great plugins, I've seen fate, the star wars one, and WoD I think (thenomain did it?? or I could be wrong).
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I did a plugin for the A Song of Ice and Fire RPG by Green Ronin games but never released it publically. I did it as a way to learn Ruby and Ares. I coded it over the course of a vacation last year. So there are already lots of options and learning how to do it, if you have the desire obviously, isn't that hard(the learning curve is fairly reasonable).
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@Kitty-Kat said in Star Trek: Dreadnought Atlas (Name Pending, TOS game):
@Mr-Johnson Lots of great plugins, I've seen fate, the star wars one, and WoD I think (thenomain did it?? or I could be wrong).
No WoD. Just FS3, Fate, Cortex, FFG (technically it's base on their generic Genesys RPG but it fits the Star Wars ones pretty decently), and a generic comic-like traits system.
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That in mind I suppose a good question to ask would be recommendations for these packages
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I thought the FATE package looked fine. I dug into the SW/Genesys package and it just wasn't complete enough for me. It might be good more for the Genesys side but for Star Wars you'd need to do some work to make it functional(gear, Jedi c-gen, and a few other things). Cortex has so many variations you'd have to look at what they built to see if it's what you're looking for.
All are good and functional though...if they fit what you're looking for.
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Yeah, none of them have gear, combat (except FS3), or other ancillary systems. It's purely chargen and a skill roller. (FS3 is the only one with web chargen; the rest are via MU client commands.)
Like @ZombieGenesis said, it really just comes down to which skills system fits the game you want. They each have pros/cons.
Side note - I coded jedi stuff for the FFG plugin, so I'm not sure what's missing from "jedi chargen". That's off-topic here so if you want to PM me, feel free.
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Switched meds, so I'm taking a break from dev for the switch over to be proper, but so far I've got grid work done and preliminary testing of several Ares and Rhost systems. The most likely candidate is now Ares. Soon as I finish cycle over I'll do one last bit of testing and then it should be good to go full dev.
Once I get the game to a position I'm fairly happy with I'll be launching. I'm not going to be calling it an Alpha, but more a.. Season 0 Where we get some bounds and lay the groundwork for future stories.
With hope the transition space between meds will be quick and we'll have this game up in no time.
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Server purchased. Ares is being installed now comes the configuration part and the actually getting it ready for launch bit. Then I get to make it all nice and pretyty to look like.
