The Recreation Room (OOC)

[Grognardsw]

Welcome Pulpatoon.

[FantasyChic]

I am here as well. Hello everyone!

[FantasyChic]

Before I begin the process, what available ranks are there to choose from?

[Starbeard]

The rank should be listed next to the officer role. All senior officers within a department are of the same rank. Aside from the Captain (who's now an NPC), the chain of command is largely meaningless: the PCs will do what they do, althoughthe seniormost officer always has the opportunity to pull rank and give an order (and answer for it at the debriefing later). In real terms, the rank just means a higher PC level, with a few extra skills, etc.

I've fallen sick, so I won't get back to the game until Tuesday, probably.

[Pulpatoon]

Folks, Apologies right out of the gate. I'm heading out of town until Sunday. Please delay the first appearance of Dorotea. Thanks!

[DadsAngry]

Away at NTRPCon will be back monday. NPC as needed.

[Starbeard]

Will do and will do, Pulpatoon and DadsAngry.

[FantasyChic]

I mean, I could still be introduced. Not sure if you wanna do it for both of us or not.

[Starbeard]

I've placed your character in the Bridge as the party arrives, FantasyChic, feel free to jump in right away if you like. T'Leia is the senior communications officer of the ship, and the human Mai Ly Chau is her relief officer.

T'Leia and Mai have been spending most of the past few of hours just trying to get communications back online.

[Inferno]

Welcome FC and Pulp!

[FantasyChic]

T'Leia's a lady, just FYI

[Grognardsw]

I am here as well. Hello everyone!

Welcome Fantasychic.

[Inferno]

T'Leia's a lady, just FYI

I know. "Mister" is a military term that disregards gender. I can go with rank instead.

[max_vale]

Sorry to jump in; but this is one of those head-scratchers that Star Trek (and other shows) have been doing for years that seem to be based off of myth or just made up.....no military I know of, except those in Sci-Fi television, refers to female officers as "Sir" or "Mister" instead of "Ma'am". This is right up there with using Lt. Commander (which, maybe is what the Brits/Canadians do?) instead of LCDR to denote that rank.....and another myth I've seen (not in Star Trek though) is that non-Navy officers with the rank of 'Captain' get unofficially called 'Major' when on-board ship as a sign of respect to the Captain of the ship......this doesn't seem to actually happen ANYWHERE and not to mention the fact that frequently, the 'Captain' of a ship may not actually hold the rank of Captain; but the commanding officer of a ship is always called 'Captain'; whether his actual rank is LT, LCDR, CDR, CAPT or whatever.

Now obviously this is a made-up universe were talking about and Starbeard's version of that universe, so whatever he holds to be 'cannon' is so; but I just thought I'd share some useless information with everybody. Back to your regularly scheduled program!

[Inferno]

Ha. Thanks!

It sure would be useful to have a guy like you jump back in the game.

Come on, Max!

[Starbeard]

Max hit it on the head.

It basically goes back to The Wrath of Khan, where the Vulcan female Saavik is named several times as 'Mister Saavik'. The character was originally male in the script, but the director had said later that he decided to keep her title as 'Mister Saavik' instead of changing it to 'Miss Saavik', partly because it gave her an alien quality, partly because it had a technical and military ring to it, and partly because it emphasized the gender neutrality of Starfleet in the future. This was only 10 years after 'Ms.' was introduced as a neutral replacement for 'Mrs.' and 'Miss', so it could be seen as an extrapolation of that thought process being carried into the far future. Star Trek pretty much ditched the concept after WoK.

I think the Peanuts strip has also been a major influence, where Marcie always refers to Peppermint Patty as 'Sir', which was intended to showcase her dorkiness but has since lent credence to the myth that officious and rigid protocol is to refer to everyone as 'mister/sir' regardless of sex.

Technically I've been ignoring anything from the movies or later, but fortunately I don't care whether people refer to Vulcan females as Mister or Miss, it's all Star Trek and it's all good.

[Starbeard]

Hi all,

I've got looming deadlines that will mostly keep me out of gaming until after next week (15th). It probably won't affect this game, since we're on a slower post rate and I should be able to peek in on Wednesday/Saturday/Wednesday to keep things updated.

[Inferno]

Inferno and Pulpatoon:
You know, it occurs to me that we now have two science officers in the party...

Two science officers in such a small group could be redundant. We're already duplicating actions.

PCs: Medical, Communications, Sciences x2, 'Red shirts'
NPCs: Captain, Engineering, Navigation, Helm, Security

Will have a think about a new character.

[Pulpatoon]

Sorry about this. I was confused about which positions were open and which weren't. Given the duplication, I'm especially embarrassed that I didn't realize that both SO's had the same speciality. Since deMattio is so new, it would be least disruptive for her to bow quietly out.

This time, I'll just straight up ask for guidance: Of the roles listed, the only one I wouldn't want to play is the captain, since he's an established personality. Of the others, which would the party benefit the most from having represented by a player?

Engineering
Navigation
Helm
Security

[Inferno]

Are you sure?

If you are, then I think a PC captain would be great. Maybe you can be First Officer and something horrible befalls Captain Wyse? Just a thought.