[Closed] Starjammer (D&D 5e)

Wildspace, the final frontier.
These are the voyages of the spelljamming ship Enterprise.
Its five-year mission: To explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilisations.
To boldly go where no man has gone before!



Game System: Spelljammer - Adventures in Space. D&D 5e.

The Flavour, from the Lead Designer himself, Chris Perkins: "When Spelljammer [2e] came out in 1989 at the height of Star Trek: The Next Generation which I’m a big fan of, it hit me at the right time. Because I was looking to do a campaign in space but I didn’t know how to do it with D&D. I ran a Spelljammer campaign for 5 years and it was very episodic. My characters were just on a ship. And every session they’re just visiting a new world and dealing with a new problem, and then they resolve it and they move on."

Themes (what to expect): Exploration, crises and resolution, the prime directive vs first contact social encounters, space combat, home and away teams. The published Spelljammer Academy will serve as a proto-version of Starfleet. The ‘Federation’ exists in Realmspace and is about to extend its reach to Wildspace and beyond. Characters will be the bridge crew of the spelljamming ship Enterprise.

Character Options: All published resources are available for use, insofar as they reflect the Star Trek universe. Elves are Vulcans, orcs are Klingons, dwarves are Tellerites, goblins are Ferengi, lizardfolk are Gorn, troglodytes are Cardassians (I think), the undead are Borg, etc. Classes and sub-classes should be chosen which best represent the overarching theme. Proficiencies, skills and class abilities other than combat are a must. We will start at level 5.

Game Duration and Post Frequency: We will begin with one story arc, roughly corresponding to an ‘episode’, ie. a clear beginning, middle and end, with a main plot and one or two sub-plots, after which your characters will gain a level. If this is enjoyable for all, we can play through more episodes with an extended campaign story-arc, like a whole season. (A five-year mission?!)
Post frequency realistically depends on what the players can reasonably commit to. We can strive for 1 per day or 1 every 2 days, but experience with many games here tells me if we have a bunch of regular, committed players, we’ll be able to find a rhythm that works for us.

Specialised Resources: I typically like to set up a Discord channel for chat purposes, which we will use often. Other than that, everything else will be on Gamers Plane.

Player Experience: Some experience with 5e needed. No experience with Spelljammer needed as I’m happy to explain the new features as we go along. Some degree of fandom for Star Trek definitely needed.

GM Experience: I have run and played a ton of RPGs, D&D and many more, and with life being what it is now, I largely do play-by-post. I tend towards detailed setting creation with multiple plots and options in a sandbox, but for this game I will be relying on fixed episodic story arcs.

How to Apply: Some of you have already spoken up here. Thanks to everyone who’ve already indicated interest! A classic bridge crew needs 6 or 7 members, the game will only start if we have this number. If we have more than 7, I shall declare how I intend to pick players.

Welcome All: In the true spirit of Star Trek, EVERYONE is welcome! Explicitly embracing all races and genders.

I have an idea for a coms office

Awesome runekyndig, so glad you're jumping in straightaway on this! In the spirit of Star Trek, all races, all classes are available, and on-theme subclasses are particularly welcome!

I very much like this idea as jump-start to get the vibe of Spelljammer. I'm no Star Trek fan (yet) but the idea of a Star Trek campaign sure evokes something and sounds fun. I would be interested.

Yesyesyes! If you do it, I'm here for it along with my Plasmoid named Dod. :P

Beam me aboard!
I would love to play spelljammer.

That’s sounds cool. I love Star Trek. I’d definitely be down to play a security officer.

Is it Starfleet characters only, or is there room for non-Starfleet cast members á la Deep Space Nine?

I thought of DS9, but since we'd be on a ship instead of a space dock or space station, I figure the crew would be Starfleet. Although I'm open to collectively agree whether there are civilians on board. Alternatively, we can also imagine a Neelix or Kes type to be counted as part of the crew. If you pitch an idea, and I'm sure we can make it work!

I'm running on assumptions here, but I assume starting level is 5 (as this is where the Spelljammer academy adventure ends, indicating that fully trained cadets are level 5)
My concept is a rouge(soul knife)3/Sorceror(abarent) 2 resulting in a lot of telepatic abilities
She has lost her arm so she is sporting a permant magehand (she knows the spell) that can also be changed to a blade (soul knifes psy-blade)
And she is an astral elf

There is another image of her, but that is most serenely not safe for work or PG13. But it shows her in a pasioned relationship with a tiefling that is going to be part of her backstory somehow.

I'd love to get in on this as Science Officer. I'd like to play a clockwork gnome.

Sorry, I mean autognome.

I have been thinking about characters as well.

If I'd get in this game my idea of a character would be either one of the following two (character portrait can kinda work for both):

I have no experience with Spelljammer, but I'm willing to try it. Probably a Doctor or a Comm Officer, if that fits the party.

@BedzoneII you have seen a few concepts, do they fit with your idea?
Are we playing spelljammer with StarTrec theme or StarTrec with D&D5e rules?

Personally, I would prefer that we lean towards Voyger for inspiration for the ship and crew. When the ship becomes too big, there are too many npc and it can be difficult to have the player-group-cohesion.

My character concept is for a giff security officer. I’m thinking of playing him like a Klingon.

Do the giff in 5e still use black powder weapons? I know it was something they used in the 2e version of the setting.

Hi everyone, I've updated this thread to become a recruitment thread, and have replaced my opening post with the full details of what I imagine this game will be like.

In short, we are playing Star Trek as if it were set in a fantasy world, and not so much regular Spelljammer with token Star Trek references. So visualise the class, sub-class, skills and abilities of your character to be equivalent or akin to what a Star Trek character could be like.

I will have this up for a while more, and then announce players and send out invitations.

To flesh out some specific questions, the ship's population will be more like TOS or Voyager, less like TNG.

Still trying to figure out where to place the giff or hadozee. Telepathic races would be akin to betazoid or ocampa. The new plasmoid race is very much like Odo. Data is an autognome (not so much a warforged), etc etc. Part of the fun is discussing how it all fits together I hope!

Listing the possible roles: captain, first officer, helm, navigator, engineer, science, tactical, comms, security, counselor, medical, and even cook (morale officer!)

Already building my Autognome Sage College of Lore Bard. Heavily focused on knowledge skills, as befitting the science officer. What are we doing for equipment?

In terms of TOS/Voyager, the giff could be analogues to the Hirogen or Andorians.

I keep imagining Andorians to be tieflings, purely because of the antennae :D. Hirogen for giff feels workable for sure. I shall brainstorm some more!

Equipment-wise you can have anything reasonable on the regular equipment lists. I'm thinking one on-theme magic item for each PC, ie. its effect is something that approximates or duplicates some equipment in Trek.