Supplement written by master writer
Steve Long for
Last Unicorn Games'
Star Trek roleplaying line.
After
LUG and the
Star Trek RPG liscense were purchased by
Wizards of the Coast, and then the Star Trek liscence was handed to
Decipher by
Paramount, all Star Trek RPG books in the pipeline were put in (seemingly) permanent limbo.
However, Long and many other writers were granted the rights to the material that they themselves had written by
WOTC. Since Long had written
Spacedock completely on his own, Long was quite generous, and released it online in
Adobe Acrobat format (after being laid out by Don Mappin).
The book itself is in two main sections. The first, is the Starship Construction Rules, in which custom ship classes can be created using an in-depth rule system. The section also introduces an expanded set of ship stats, which must be five times as complex as the relatively simple set of statistics provided for each ship class by LUG. Everything from number of
transporter rooms, to the amount and type of crew quarters, to the location and strength of
phaser banks can be modeled. New ship classes are frequently uploaded to the message boards at www.trekrpg.net.
The second section concerns itself with a vastly expanded set of rules for starship combat. The original LUG system was relatively simple, in which a ship's energy weapons could fire in any arc, shields were a simple affair, and the main rolls to be rolled was that of the tactical officer trying to score a hit on the opposing ship. The new rules, however, certainly allow the other positions on the bridge much more interaction in combat. The
Chief Engineer can help squeeze out more power, the
flight controller can perform a multitude of
attack and
defense maneuvers, the captain can make starship tactics skill rolls, the sensors operator can try to establish target locks on enemy ships... along with new firing arcs, and a generally more robust set of combat rules, LUGTrek space combat just got a whole lot more exciting.
Spacedock can be downloaded (for free!) at www.trek-rpg.net