Star Trek: The Role Playing Game
| The Role Playing Game | |
|---|---|
| Designer(s) | Guy McLimore, Greg Poehlein, David Tepool |
| Publisher(s) | FASA Corporation |
| Publication date | 1982 (1st edition) 1983 (2nd edition) |
| Genre(s) | Science fiction (Star Trek) |
| System(s) | Custom |
Star Trek: The Role Playing Game is a role-playing game set in the fictional Star Trek universe published and edited by FASA Corporation from 1982 to 1989.
Jordan Weisman of FASA sought out one of the biggest licenses in the space adventure genre - Star Trek - and received it in 1982. Weisman and L. Ross Babcock III looked out-of-house for a Star Trek design team. Over the next several months FASA rejected four different designs for the game, largely because they all focused too much on combat, which did not fit with Gene Rodenberry's vision of a more utopian future; the fifth design team, a freelance group that called themselves Fantasimulations Association, was finally able to provide a workable design, and this team consisted of Guy McLimore Jr., Greg Poehlein, and David F. Tepool.Star Trek: The Role Playing Game (1983) had a very tactical combat system, where battles were played out on a square grid, and was based on a FASA board game called Grav-Ball (1982). The game was published as a boxed set with a 128-page book, an 80-page book, and a 56-page book, two counter sheets, and dice. Weisman and Babcock were insistent that the RPG not change into a board game when space combat occurred, so the Fantasimulations crew devised a system whereby each section head had their own "console" to operate during combat, and the captain oversaw and coordinated everyone, rather than doing everything himself. The supplement The Klingons (1983), co-authored by writer John M. Ford, was a book that notably influenced later Paramount productions. Paramount was unhappy with FASA's two Star Trek: The Next Generation supplements - including an Officer's Manual (1988) and First Year Sourcebook (1989) - which they felt did not entirely match their view of the Next Generation universe, and in 1989 Paramount pulled FASA's license for Star Trek.
Star Trek: The Role Playing Game was set in Fasa's Star Trek universe before Star Trek the Next Generation United Federation of Planets Star Fleet. Most player characters were assumed to be members of Starfleet, engaged in space exploration missions. They typically held senior posts on a starship bridge, and visited alien planets as part of landing parties.
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