By Jim Johnson, Star Trek™ Adventures Project Manager
Art by Nick Greenwood
In the previous How to Play article, we discussed running your first Star Trek™ Adventures mission, focusing on using and adapting pre-written adventures or mission briefs. Now, let’s talk about flexing your imagination to create and run an original adventure tailored to your crew of player characters, through five steps: conceptualize, research, outline, prepare, and run.
Conceptualize Ideas and Themes
Start by jotting down some story ideas or themes you want to explore through a Star Trek RPG lens. What excites you; what scares you? What sparks your players’ interests? Do they like mysteries to solve, combats to fight out, or puzzles to assemble? Perhaps they enjoy tense courtroom-style dramas, or light-hearted romps on a newly-discovered planet. Maybe there’s an episode you liked from one of the many Star Trek series you want to retell with your crew. Perhaps there’s a current event or scientific discovery you’d like to use as the centerpiece for a mission. Maybe there’s a historical event you’d like to adapt.
Whatever the case, jot down those ideas in a journal, an online document, or even a stack of note cards. Try to limit yourself to one idea per line or one idea per note card. That way, you can look at your growing list and think of ways to combine them into something new and exciting. Review the list and pick one item (or a couple to combine) and use that as the basis of your new adventure.
For example, let’s say our ideas and themes list includes “gender inequality” and “newly discovered ring system.” The gamemaster wants to incorporate both into their adventure, so jots them down to use as the basis for their adventure outline.
Research Your Cast of Characters
Now that you have the core idea or theme for your adventure, review your crew’s character sheets, especially their lifepath choices, and their values, focuses, and talents. Which player character has an element that might connect to the idea or theme of your mission? Perhaps there’s more than one. Could two characters work the same side of the problem, or is there potential for conflict?
Do any characters have something in their lifepath, such as an environment, upbringing, or career events, that might connect or work in opposition to the story’s idea or theme? Have any players expressed an interest in growing their character in a direction that might connect with your idea or theme?
Continuing the example, let’s say the crew’s science officer has a focus in Planetary Systems and the operations officer has a value, “IDIC means everyone.” Since both elements tie into the story the gamemaster wants to create, they plan to focus the episode on those two player characters (while also thinking about ways to keep the other players engaged).
Outline the Mission
Now that you have your story idea or theme, and know which player character(s) you’re most likely to focus on in the mission (or perhaps have decided it will be an ensemble episode with everyone getting equal focus), note some high-level major story beats and a couple of minor story beats you’d like to include in the mission.
To continue the example, the gamemaster pulls together their research and ideas and jots down the following outline:
- Major Beat: While investigating a newly discovered star system, the crew receives a distress signal from a ship drifting in a resource-rich ring system.
- Major Beat: The crew rescues the damaged ship, and while assisting in medical care and ship repairs, pieces together its same-gendered crew as part of a resistance cell fighting their oppressive government.
- Major Beat: The crew learns the ship was in the ring system to gather volatile resources just as a warship from the opposing faction shows up to demand the ship and crew be turned over to them.
- Minor Beat: Opportunity for one of the player characters to build a connection or relationship with the alien crew.
- Minor Beat: One of the crew members might be a spy from another faction in the alien society.
- Minor Beat: Opportunity for the crew to study and explore the dense ring system, which contains clues about the alien society’s history and/or key resources that would benefit several factions on the planet.
The gamemaster knows their group and knows this is enough detail to run an engaging mission across two to three game sessions. You can adjust your outline to add more detail as desired, or less, depending on your needs and your group’s preferences.
Prepare the Mission
Now that you have an outline in hand, either a detailed outline or a short list of bullet points, review your notes and determine what game mechanics you should review ahead of the game session. Your list of major and minor story beats should help you to create a short list of Directives, which players can refer to as needed during the adventure.
Gather any supplies or game components you may need to execute the story, assuming the players generally follow the story path you’ve sketched out. This includes name lists, maps, tokens, dice, props, musical cues, or other key elements you like to use in your game sessions. Also, prepare any NPC stat blocks, extended task tracks, or other mechanical elements you may need, to minimize page-flipping during the game session.
Continuing the example, since we know the mission will include opportunities for a rescue, research, and the potential for a conflict in the climax, the gamemaster decides to review the mechanics around first aid, ship repairs, and extended tasks and challenges. They also bookmark the sections on social conflict and starship conflict, in case the players move toward either option and want more detailed mechanics than standard task attempts.
Run the Mission
Now it’s time to gather your crew, gaming supplies and snacks, and run the game! Get your group together, socialize a bit to get settled, and then start the adventure. Perhaps you’ve chosen to have the commanding officer or another player character open with a captain’s log or personal log, or perhaps start with a cold open or teaser. Whatever the case, launch into the story you’ve constructed, and feed your players information and plot elements as outlined to get the story rolling.
Once you’ve set the first scene and established where things are going, be flexible in how the story plays out. Listen to your players and encourage them to approach the challenges you’ve built into the story with boldness and curiosity. Work through the outline beat by beat, and be willing to change it and move the story in new directions based on the actions the player characters accomplish or fail. In this way, the players don’t feel like they’re on a railroaded, pre-set story, but rather, are in a dynamic storyline that changes based on the joys and challenges their characters face and overcome (or fail to overcome).
Following this simple process and putting in a few minutes for each step will help you create an ongoing stream of stories for your crew to experience. That being said, this is just one way to prepare and tell a Star Trek-style story. There are as many ways to plan and prep an adventure as there are gamemasters. Experiment with this process and adapt it to your taste. As you gain more experience as a gamemaster, you’ll develop your style of creating and running adventures.
Next week we’ll take these concepts and expand them into a discussion on planning and running multi-episode seasons and campaigns.
Order your print copy of the second edition Star Trek Adventures core rulebook now in standard format or one of three limited edition covers! And order a print copy of the second edition Game Toolkit as well, to expand your options for exploring the final frontier.
2nd Edition Core Rulebook (Command):
2nd Edition Core Rulebook (Sciences):
2nd Edition Core Rulebook (Operations):
All print orders will also receive the digital versions right away.
Alternatively, you can order the digital editions by themselves of the standard core rulebook and the Game Toolkit.
2nd Edition Core Rulebook PDF:
Thanks for reading this article, and thank you for your interest and support of Star Trek Adventures! Keep frequencies open for news about other upcoming Star Trek Adventures product releases. Live long and prosper!
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