Star Trek Modiphius 2nd Ed Quickstarter

Best Selling RPGs - Available Now @ DriveThruRPG.com
James Gillen

James Gillen

Proud to be an American
Joined
May 28, 2018
Messages
813
Reaction score
1,947
I just noticed the offer for the 2nd Edition Quickstarter for Star Trek 2nd Edition was free, so I downloaded it.

I'm not seeing much difference from previous 2d20 product.

However I noticed that one of the sample characters is a Human, and one of her species abilities is called "Faith of the Heart."

This alone is enough reason not to buy the game.

JG
 
"FAITH OF THE HEART (SPECIES ABILITY): Humans seem to have an irrepressible drive to explore, both the mysteries of the universe and the depths of their own natures. When Hernandez uses one of her values to spend or gain Determination, she may also add 1 Momentum to the group pool."

I'm not getting what would be wrong with this.

Edit - also:
 
Moracai said:
"FAITH OF THE HEART (SPECIES ABILITY): Humans seem to have an irrepressible drive to explore, both the mysteries of the universe and the depths of their own natures. When Hernandez uses one of her values to spend or gain Determination, she may also add 1 Momentum to the group pool."

I'm not getting what would be wrong with this.
Click to expand...
This is so, so much better than "Human: You are the baseline, boring and generic. Take an extra feat, I guess." that we see in 90% of the games out there.
 
James Gillen said:
I just noticed the offer for the 2nd Edition Quickstarter for Star Trek 2nd Edition was free, so I downloaded it.

I'm not seeing much difference from previous 2d20 product.

However I noticed that one of the sample characters is a Human, and one of her species abilities is called "Faith of the Heart."

This alone is enough reason not to buy the game.

JG
Click to expand...

Moracai said:
"FAITH OF THE HEART (SPECIES ABILITY): Humans seem to have an irrepressible drive to explore, both the mysteries of the universe and the depths of their own natures. When Hernandez uses one of her values to spend or gain Determination, she may also add 1 Momentum to the group pool."

I'm not getting what would be wrong with this.

Edit - also:
Click to expand...

Greatest Star Trek theme song of all time is an ability in the game? Absolutely fucking sold.
 
I'm amazed at how few people got the joke.
Faith of the Heart was of course a hit single for Rod Stewart, written by Diane Warren, the Queen of Hack Songwriting. (She was responsible for much of Aerosmith's comeback, such as it was.) But when they wanted to use it for ENTERPRISE, they had the rights to the song, but they didn't want to pay for the Rod Stewart recording, so they hired a no-name English singer to do a cover. So you had a pale, whitebread imitation of something that was pretty whitebread to begin with, and if that isn't a perfect description of ENTERPRISE, I don't know what is.

:grin:
 
James Gillen said:
I'm amazed at how few people got the joke.
Faith of the Heart was of course a hit single for Rod Stewart, written by Diane Warren, the Queen of Hack Songwriting. (She was responsible for much of Aerosmith's comeback, such as it was.) But when they wanted to use it for ENTERPRISE, they had the rights to the song, but they didn't want to pay for the Rod Stewart recording, so they hired a no-name English singer to do a cover. So you had a pale, whitebread imitation of something that was pretty whitebread to begin with, and if that isn't a perfect description of ENTERPRISE, I don't know what is.

:grin:
Click to expand...
Yeah well, we take our Star Trek serious! You!
Bobby hey now.JPG
 
I guessed the OP was having a pop at Enterprise! Not a massive fan of the theme tune, but I never understood the hate for the show itself. You can say some of the story, character or design decisions were off, but one thing it wasn't was bland. And the 2 mirror universe episodes are among my all-time favourites.

I nearly said which series I prefer it to, but we all know where that ends up...
 
Triumvir said:
I guessed the OP was having a pop at Enterprise! Not a massive fan of the theme tune, but I never understood the hate for the show itself. You can say some of the story, character or design decisions were off, but one thing it wasn't was bland. And the 2 mirror universe episodes are among my all-time favourites.

I nearly said which series I prefer it to, but we all know where that ends up...
Click to expand...
The two Mirror Universe episodes, and much of the work of Manny Coto, demonstrated that there were great elements to work with, elements that were criminally wasted.

JG
 
Yeah, I reckon it was only just finding its feet when it got cancelled.
 
I don’t know what’s wrong with my brain, but I am incapable of learning and internalizing the 2d20 system.
I usually enjoy learning new systems, it’s one of the ways I mentally cope with boring times at work.
I love Conan and I love Star Trek. I wish that was enough. :sad:
 
DornKratz said:
This is so, so much better than "Human: You are the baseline, boring and generic. Take an extra feat, I guess." that we see in 90% of the games out there.
Click to expand...
Sometimes I also prefer the boring part as well.

Coming from Paizo where they put two-there paragraphs of descriptive fluff text. Only to read the crunch which is “ +. 1 to Sunder Objects “.

Give me the boring text if your going to give me equally boring game mechanics.

No reason fluff can’t match crunch .
 
sureshot said:
Coming from Paizo where they put two-there paragraphs of descriptive fluff text. Only to read the crunch which is “ +. 1 to Sunder Objects “.
Click to expand...
IMO Paizo is notorious for putting more words than needed for anything. One example (I'll try to avoid spoilers) is one full page background for an NPC, where a text "This dude is crazy and will fight to the death. PCs can't get any useful info out of him, even with a Speak With Dead spell" would be enough.
 
James Gillen said:
I'm amazed at how few people got the joke.
Faith of the Heart was of course a hit single for Rod Stewart, written by Diane Warren, the Queen of Hack Songwriting. (She was responsible for much of Aerosmith's comeback, such as it was.) But when they wanted to use it for ENTERPRISE, they had the rights to the song, but they didn't want to pay for the Rod Stewart recording, so they hired a no-name English singer to do a cover. So you had a pale, whitebread imitation of something that was pretty whitebread to begin with, and if that isn't a perfect description of ENTERPRISE, I don't know what is.

:grin:
Click to expand...
Meh, I remember the internet discourse from when the show first came out, it was all about how shitty the song was.

Also I like Enterprise. The first season is meh, but it’s still better than the first two seasons of TNG, so I ain’t gonna bitch about that :tongue:

If a Star Trek first season isn’t allowed to be bad, we gotta throw out everything but DS9!
 
I’m not sure we can be internet friends if you feel the first season of TOS is bad :shock:

I could probably make an exception though, you do have the good taste to post here at the Pub.
 
James Gillen said:
I'm amazed at how few people got the joke.
Faith of the Heart was of course a hit single for Rod Stewart, written by Diane Warren, the Queen of Hack Songwriting. (She was responsible for much of Aerosmith's comeback, such as it was.) But when they wanted to use it for ENTERPRISE, they had the rights to the song, but they didn't want to pay for the Rod Stewart recording, so they hired a no-name English singer to do a cover. So you had a pale, whitebread imitation of something that was pretty whitebread to begin with, and if that isn't a perfect description of ENTERPRISE, I don't know what is.

:grin:
Click to expand...


Oh, it's worse.

"Faith of the Heart" was originally written for Patch Adams, the notorious Robin Williams "doctor heals cancer kids with laughter" tearjerker largely regarded as the worst film of the actor's career.

The single dropped about a month after Stewart split from then-2nd wife Rachel Hunter amid allegations of womanizing. After seeing the story splashed over the tabloids every time we stood in the checkout line, NOBODY wanted to hear this guy singing about faith of the heart.

Then Enterprise got ahold of it, and Trek fans have embraced it as a sort of scruffy misfit mascot. Seriously, stand in the hall of a Star Trek convention and start singing it, and the whole room will start in after a few bars. It's hardwired at this point.

Chef's kiss to Modiphius for making it an ability.
 
sureshot said:
Apparently one can no longer use terms such as Fluff and Crunch over on the Paizo boards. As apparently the devs dislike both terms.
Click to expand...
Hmmmm...

I'm not sure I'm really against it.

I have noticed how those terms in particular really do warp discussion and have done so for a very long time.
 
TJS said:
Hmmmm...

I'm not sure I'm really against it.

I have noticed how those terms in particular really do warp discussion and have done so for a very long time.
Click to expand...
Eh, a void is going to be filled. If you ban the word fluff people on that forum will just find a substitute for it.
 
sharps54 said:
Eh, a void is going to be filled. If you ban the word fluff people on that forum will just find a substitute for it.
Click to expand...
Yup. Totally pointless. Better to crack down on shitty usage of a word than ban it. This will just make conversation harder until they come up with new words which will immediately take on identical connotations and fix nothing.
 
The issue is not the words but the concepts.

Fluff vs crunch has led to big misunderstandings about how games work, weird ideas about reskinning, the idea that rules don't need to be adapted to settings, and the bizarre concept that descriptions of things are somehow completey separate from mechanics.

The flat distinction is the shitty usage.

Edit: Of course I suspect it's somewhat hypocritical of Paizo to be the ones pushing back against this, because unless 2e is very different from 1e in this regard their whole design ethos is caught up in this issue.
 
Last edited:
James Gillen said:
I'm amazed at how few people got the joke.
Faith of the Heart was of course a hit single for Rod Stewart, written by Diane Warren, the Queen of Hack Songwriting. (She was responsible for much of Aerosmith's comeback, such as it was.) But when they wanted to use it for ENTERPRISE, they had the rights to the song, but they didn't want to pay for the Rod Stewart recording, so they hired a no-name English singer to do a cover. So you had a pale, whitebread imitation of something that was pretty whitebread to begin with, and if that isn't a perfect description of ENTERPRISE, I don't know what is.

:grin:
Click to expand...

LOL, I never watched the show, so this is the first I learned of this. What, were Bryan Adams or Michael Bolton unavailable?
 
Johnny Utah said:
I don’t know what’s wrong with my brain, but I am incapable of learning and internalizing the 2d20 system.
I usually enjoy learning new systems, it’s one of the ways I mentally cope with boring times at work.
I love Conan and I love Star Trek. I wish that was enough. :sad:
Click to expand...
Oh yeah, that's the other reason I'm not buying this game.

JG
 
I'm sure I remember commercials for Enterprise before it started with a totally different theme:



("Wherever You Will Go" would also be a decent ability name.)
 
Gabriel said:
There were also notably absent in Captain's Log, so no surprise.

Oh, and also...

Click to expand...

I liked how at the end it warps off into the narrow gap between the moon and the planet, presumably just to show off

No idea what the lore is around warping near atmospheres, but that might get you a traffic violation / cause a mass extinction event?
 
James Gillen said:
I just noticed the offer for the 2nd Edition Quickstarter for Star Trek 2nd Edition was free, so I downloaded it.

I'm not seeing much difference from previous 2d20 product.

However I noticed that one of the sample characters is a Human, and one of her species abilities is called "Faith of the Heart."

This alone is enough reason not to buy the game.

JG
Click to expand...

Star Trek has always been corny as hell. That's part of its charm.
 
James Gillen said:
I'm amazed at how few people got the joke.
Faith of the Heart was of course a hit single for Rod Stewart, written by Diane Warren, the Queen of Hack Songwriting. (She was responsible for much of Aerosmith's comeback, such as it was.) But when they wanted to use it for ENTERPRISE, they had the rights to the song, but they didn't want to pay for the Rod Stewart recording, so they hired a no-name English singer to do a cover. So you had a pale, whitebread imitation of something that was pretty whitebread to begin with, and if that isn't a perfect description of ENTERPRISE, I don't know what is.

:grin:
Click to expand...

Never seen Enterprise but I'm vaguely aware of this amusingly terrible song. I tuned out of ST for a long time after DS9 ended as it just got really boring but Strange New Worlds has won me back.

Warren writing shitty songs for Aerosmith Part II is also news but makes sense as until I discovered the deep cuts on their 70s records I thought Aerosmith were the least cool rock band in history next to U2.
 
Triumvir said:
I liked how at the end it warps off into the narrow gap between the moon and the planet, presumably just to show off

No idea what the lore is around warping near atmospheres, but that might get you a traffic violation / cause a mass extinction event?
Click to expand...
I mean, there’s more than one instance of warping IN atmosphere, iirc
 
SpaceCadetElle said:
Oh, it's worse.

"Faith of the Heart" was originally written for Patch Adams, the notorious Robin Williams "doctor heals cancer kids with laughter" tearjerker largely regarded as the worst film of the actor's career.

The single dropped about a month after Stewart split from then-2nd wife Rachel Hunter amid allegations of womanizing. After seeing the story splashed over the tabloids every time we stood in the checkout line, NOBODY wanted to hear this guy singing about faith of the heart.

Then Enterprise got ahold of it, and Trek fans have embraced it as a sort of scruffy misfit mascot. Seriously, stand in the hall of a Star Trek convention and start singing it, and the whole room will start in after a few bars. It's hardwired at this point.

Chef's kiss to Modiphius for making it an ability.
Click to expand...
According to the Modiphius AMA they did on Friday night, the name for this ability was originally just a placeholder until they could come up with another title. When they got to the end of editing and a better title had not materialized, they kept it. Since a lot of people are noticing it and talking about it, they are glad that they kept it.
 
They need to have a Pakled ability called "Brain, Brain, What is Brain?"

JG
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Banner: The best cosmic horror & Cthulhu Mythos @ DriveThruRPG.com
Back
Top