SFB Campaign Designers Handbook
This is a set of suggestions by Bruce Graw on setting up your own campaign games. There are no official new rules, nor are there any ready-to-play games of the sort in the T or U sections of the rulebook. Instead, there is advice and some options for each subject: construction, supply, and combat. The book is 96 pages and includes four new SSD's, a 4-page generic campaign map, plus 22 pages of ``techblocks'' (see below).
There are a large number of ideas here, making this useful if you cannot think of many options for a campaign game. However, most of the sections don't even include complete subsystems -- just general discussion. In designing a campaign, you cannot just pick-and-choose among the options presented, you have to write most of the rules yourself. Many of the sections do not have fully-fleshed out systems which you can use.
For those who have played in previous SFB campaign games or even just thought about it, many of these ideas will be old news and you'll be paying a lot for the tidbits. Having played campaigns years ago, I would have preferred a few well-developed campaigns which were playtested and balanced. These could easily be tailored by mix-and-match or altering rules. However, if you are unfamiliar with operational-level games or lacking ideas, this book has a lot of ideas. I will briefly go through the sections and what they cover.
- The Strategic Arena: (6 pages) This has a number of fairly obvious suggestions about how to set up your map (i.e. hex-map or square or warp-gates) and about exploration/surveying. It also has a ready-to-use random terrain chart. A key issue which is not covered is balancing the range of movement versus range of sensing versus the size of the map.
- Economics: (3 pages) This is covered even more briefly. It suggests various bases for economy (trading vs. population vs. prospecting) but with not much detail and no complete systems. The more notable suggestion comes from Star Fleet Warlord, which has four type of resource points: people(crew), ores(repairs), dilithium(ship speed), and food(ship support). One point of each combine to make an Economic BPV point, or they can be spent individually for the purposes listed.
- Logistics: (3 pages) This again is quite short. It mentions supply lines and gives ways they can be handled (suggesting 2-5 EBPV per cargo box). It also covers the different sorts of items to supply: mainly suggesting a per-turn percentage of the ship's BPV for fuel or maintenance (around 5%). Paying for replacement drones/t-bombs makes their cost prohibitively high. Paying for replacement fighters is neccessary.
- Construction: (6 pages) This is a bit more detailed, but only covers the most basic questions. Most of the space is spent on descriptions of the four new unofficial units (SSD's provided): Small/Medium/Large Naval Construction Docks, and Warp Gates (a la Babylon 5).
- Scenarios: (5 pages) This has a number of good hints about problems to watch out for. However, it is short on solutions. For example, it points out that floating map is difficult for plasma races -- but fixed map leads to the artificial problem of being `trapped in a corner'. The only advice offered is `decide carefully'.
- Command Limits: (7 pages) This courageously points out that the existing command limits in (S8.0) make for fleet battles which are enormously unwieldy. It includes several fairly complete options to deal with this problem.
- Technology: (27 pages) This has the largest complete subsystem: the ``techblock'' system, which takes up 22 pages. The other option offered is to simply have technology appear in the year it was `historically' developed.
Techblocks work by breaking up the development of SFB technology into many separate facets, which are researched in a flowchart-like manner. For example, the cloaking device is divided up into 12 blocks: you start with a 32-impulse duration limit and an 8-impulse fade. You must research different aspects to get to a full standard cloaking device.
However, the charts presented bear no correspondence to the development of technology in SFB history. Often technology which was around from Y120 is harder to develop than General-War-era inventions. They could be rewritten but it is a lot of work.
- Races: (6 pages) To SFB veterans, most of the notes on the races are fairly obvious -- pointing out potentially unbalancing technologies like SWAC's and web. It points out the web cost loophole (no charge for zero strength web) and suggests a minimum 5 EPV per hex. Other than that,
- Other Considerations: (17 pages) This covers a number of topics, specifically: Repairs, Refits, Sequence of Play, Legendary Officers, Crew, and Espionage. For officers, the obvious problem is noted that Weapons Officers and Engineers are unbalanced. It has a patchwork of suggestions to fix this, none of them very detailed.
The three complete systems included here are: (1) a system giving ten different levels of Outstanding Crew -- basically breaking the benefits apart into 10 categories and having them gained one at a time. (2) A random table of 36 minor ship improvements, like 1 extra lab box. (3) A table of 52 random campaign events, drawn by playing card.
The Campaign Designer's Handbook is 96 pages and includes 4 new base SSD's (of shipyard docks and a warp gate), plus a 4-page pseudo-historical campaign map similar in rough shape to the one in F&E.
(Out of Print as of October 1999)
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John H. Kim <jhkim@fnal.gov> Last modified: Thu Oct 21 13:01:30 CDT 1999Star Fleet Battles, SFB, Federation & Empire, Star Fleet Missions, Prime Directive, and all contents thereof are copyright (C) 1990 by Amarillo Design Bureau. Second Edition copyright (c) 1994 by Amarillo Design Bureau. These games were produced under license from Franz Joseph Designs, authors of the STAR FLEET TECHNICAL MANUAL. Elements of the Star Fleet Universe are the property of Paramount Pictures Corporation and are used with their permission.
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