Q & A
Last updated on 11/18/07
Whats the meaning of FASA Trek?
In the 80's Fasa Star Trek was the mainstream for official material on the Star Trek
universe. It was the only material that tackled the Trek universe as awhole, and what was
printed was considered the official Paramount word on what Star Trek was upto. It
explained many of the unexplained questions fans had and the core books remained faithfull
to the Star Treks ideas. Today much of this holds true and remains a great source for
original material from the TOS/TAS period and much of the early TMP-STIV era.
Whats the Differances of the Starship Combat Games?
There are many differances, too many to list but here are a few:
The ST:II version had 5 phases per turn instead of 3 phases per turn.
Also, Firing Charts were labeled 1 through 25 instead of A through Y. The ST:II and ST:III
games used a different ship construction method and manual (the 1st edition) than the
later ST:Starship Tactical Combat Simulator game.
The ST:III game(2nd Edition) went to 3 phases, and had the halved "TAC" values
for stats for quicker games. There are actually two versions of the ST:III game- a 1st and
2nd edition. The 1st evidently had the same 5 booklets from the ST:II game; the 2nd
edition (which is denoted on the box top of the game) went to one compiled rulebook. Also,
the blurb about the V-30 applies to this game as well.
The ST:II game can be updated to the STIII (1st Edition) Level just by adding the ship counters and data sheets to the game. There was no new rules updated.
FASA Star Trek is out of print and no new FASA Star Trek material, now
what?
To update your game, use the internet, find groups, sites etc that continue to play, use
or modify the game. There are people who are dedicated to expanding this system
accurately. Many focus on remaining true to FASA's original ideas and concepts, aswell as
'Canonizing' some of the material. The Xon site will help you find these people and
material, use it and support it to your and others advantage.
Where are the FASA Starship Combat Sites?
All over the place! , checkout my links section for some.
Where are the FASA RPG Sites?
Theres a couple of sites dedicated to modifing and supplying the RPG portion of the game,
checkout my links section for some. One in specific you should check out is UFC. Perhaps,
Maybe » you « should make a web site for the RPG portion, we all still love it and it is
used with the Starship Combat games. Remember FASA Covers some pre-TOS, all the TOS, most
TAS, TMP upto just after STIV. Then of Course some TNG.
Are there any FASA Rules from other games that work with FASA's Star
Trek?
Take alook at FASA's other games during the time FASA Star Trek was under production.
There are other games that had rules that where or would have been used in Star Trek if
the game was still in production. For an example; ST War game rules may have been some
sort of early variant of the Battletech Board Game rules. Another example is the Doctor
Who RPG, it was a game that took the majority of the Star Trek system and expanded,
modified and altered it. Its not exactly the same system, but it does hold several of the
same assumptions. Its not as streamlined as Star Trek but it has possibilities to work
with the ST:RPG.
About The FASA Star Trek TNG Officers Manual; Of course this is an odd addition to the game, but if one obtained an OCR scan of that manual and simply replaced the inaccuracies with in it, I'm sure the book would become a nice piece of work for the FASA ST:RPG. Its alot of work to do but its something someone may consider. The book probably would be alot smaller too.
Is there a FASA Star Trek V Sourcebook?
No, it was never started. But if you wanted to start making a FASA-Like Sourcebook, you
may want to start with the movie and then the Official Book Star Trek V: The Final
Frontier by J.M. Dillard, David Loughery, William Shatner(June 1, 1989). Apparently
Dillard extended allot of the scenes and provides details to help smooth out some of the
problems that where present in the movie. I'm unsure if Shatner has made available his
list of proposed 'fixes' for the movie, and the modify script. Another alternative is to
examine other ST: RPG's, homebrew and official to obtain STV updated information on the
Star Trek world. There are even conversion charts available to help you port and backport
stats to and from FASA.
Are all these FASA-Fan Starships from different groups compatible with
each other?
Starships from some groups to another are compatible, read on the insure you have
balance in your game....
There is one group that uses a FASA-'Like' Extension too the rules, the Design Consortium(DC). Many groups base there ship building on the charts and tables they provide since there publications are well thought out. They also provide there construction material for fan viewing and use, this helps get all the ships balanced and the construction errors weeded out. The Morena Shipyard uses the FASA 2nd Edition Construction Manual to update previous published ships and the DC's charts to extend the ship stats through the trek timeline. These two groups and associated groups are best for balancing a game, the fleets are combinable. Known associated groups; Vintage Starships ; Mustaka_Shipyards ; Salazar_Shipyards.
Other groups and sites use there own Construction Rules or Educated guessing to provide ship stats. These type of ships are not combinable with each other or with the FASA ships. Accuracy varies widely.
Mixing is normaly reserved for testing the starship stats accuracy. We can now do this with a computer game, with multiple computer and human run scenarios. See next Question.
Is there a Faithfull computer version of the Starship Combat portion of
the game?
Yes,specificly the STCS, its been released for free since 2004 and gets improved upon from
time to time. Its a board type game using some FASA graphics and some custom aswell. Fans
have added faithfull FASA scenerios to the game aswell as all the starships. The only hard
part about the game is keeping track what construction methods are used for the ships,
some are FASA others use custom tables. Check out the links pages to get ahold of it.
You'll also find old computer games that where made in the past for comparison.
Xon Gaming
http://www.anzwers.org/free/fasa