CHARACTER CREATION CHALLENGE 2023: Star Trek Adventures (The Ship)

THE GAME: Star Trek Adventures (2017)

Brad R. Torgersen’s re-draw of the Chandley-class Frigate at STSTCSOLDA

So, what is this vessel upon which our characters serve? We know she’s an older ship, and damaged badly by the recent combat with the Cardassians. Knowing what we know about early Star Trek: The Next Generation we know the Miranda-class and Excelsior-class vessels from the Original Series films are still in service in some capacity. This was as much an FX budget issue as any planned longevity of those spaceframes. As the series went on we eventually saw vessels from the missing years like the Constellation-class and the Ambassador-class. Our aging warhorse is going to be a Chandley-class Frigate from the TOS Movie era, far past her prime but still in service due to the Federation needing every hull they can get against an implacable foe.

Spaceframe Creation

According to the Utopia Planitia sourcebook for Star Trek Adventures, Federation vessels begin with a base of 40 System Points, give or take 1 point for every 10 years after 2200. This ship was constructed in 2280, a few years before Wrath of Khan, so would have begun life with an additional 8 System Points for a total of 48. Next, we choose the Scale of the spaceframe. The original Chandley-class was fairly near the size of the Constitution-refit, so we go with Scale 4. This is the “benchmark” scale, so no System Points are gained or lost with the choice of 4. Next we assign our System Points. We could go 8 across the board for an evenly-designed ship. This would make the vessel just a smidge more advanced than the TMP-refit of the U.S.S. Enterprise. Interestingly, the Chandley was a fair match for what the FASA Star Trek game called the “Enterprise-Class”- what we now know as the Constitution-refit. So… yeah. It’s simplistic, but it works.

• Communications: 8

• Engines: 8

• Structure: 8

• Computers: 8

• Sensors: 8

• Weapons: 8

The next step is to assign Department Points. This represents the amount and quality of crew assigned to the given departments of the ship. A spaceframe gets three Department Points. The ship was originally designed as a Frigate, for patrol and defense duties, so we’ll give it +1 to Conn, Security, and Engineering.

• Command: 0

• Conn: +1

• Security: +1

• Engineering: +1

• Science: 0

• Medicine: 0

A spaceframe may choose talents equal to its Scale. We’ll follow the lead of the sourcebook and only assign two to the actual spaceframe itself. The Chandley was originally designed to be able to board Klingon or Romulan ships, and had a lot of “marines” aboard for that purpose and a full dozen shuttlecraft. So we will choose Extensive Shuttlebays and Specialized Crew (Security).

The vessel, as a Federation Frigate, carries phasers and photon torpedoes.

The vessel has the traits “Federation Starship” and “Aging Warhorse.”

Being built in 2280, and the game taking place in 2360, the ship is due for 7 refits. However- this ship was placed into reserve fleet in 2320, the need for its designed role being seen as obsolete. So it only got 3 service refits before being mothballed, and is receiving one more as the story begins and the ship is being repaired from battle damage. With that in mind, the refits will be used to raise Structure and Weapons to 10 each.

Now we have to choose a mission profile for this specific example of the Chandley-class. Our ship’s mission profile since being thawed out from the reserve fleet is Tactical Operations. This finalizes our Departments, and gives us a choice of Talents, we choose Improved Damage Control.