Star Fleet battles and/or Federation Commander

[Dabat]

I think this is the right board for this. It seems back in 1974, before Paramount bought the rights for all things Star Trek, a pair of men approached Gene Roddenberry with an idea to make a ship combat game for Star Trek. At the time Star Trek wasn't doing very well, and so Paramount had no objections to Gene giving these two men the license in perpetuity... Something Paramount has come to regret, as it is the only thing related to Star Trek they do not now own in it's entirety.

Long story short Stephen Cole and (I forget the other person's name) were granted the rights to use anything but what Paramount already owned, which at that time was little more than the OST's first three seasons. Because they could not use what Paramount owned their timeline has diverged significantly from Paramount's timeline; but as everything they did had to have the green light from Roddenberry before they could print it (up until his death) it should be at least as cannon as the EU.

So now I ask you how they rate? Among other things the much more militarized Federation, greater involvement of the Gorn and Kzinti, other raced only mentioned like the Hydran, the Andromidans, the Vudar and the ISC, even an entire new quadrant of the galaxy. Does anyone know what I am talking about or am I just barking up the wrong tree?

[Mike DiCenso]

I used to play SFB for many, many years. I even had the original Gamescience miniatures based on Franz Joseph's blueprints and Technical Manual that were released in the mid-1970's for the game.

SFB has gone through a large number expansions over the last 30 odd years, dozens of miniatures of all the various factions' starships were made. So what is it that you want to know about it? It's not a canon game and Roddenberry reportedly never allowed them to make anything for Star Trek beyond TOS, though players and Task Force found some creative work-arounds for that.

Amarillo Design Bureau currently has the rights to SFB and continues to publish it.

As for your question, SFB takes place in it's own special continuity, and it is really difficult to tie it in beyond TOS to anything else in offical and canonical Star Trek since it diverges in an extreme way in history and technology. Also, the game system would have a deuce of a time with the vastly larger TNG-era starships, like the Galaxy class or a D'Deridex warbird. Hell, can you imagine the insane SSD sheet for a Borg cube with all of it's hull points?
-Mike

[Admiral Breetai]

if you mean how they would stack up in terms of a vs debate? Unless you use the kree or Skrull or Shi'ar empire or possibly the common wealth your not cleanly clear cut beating them.

the shuttles are capable of mass scattering planets in some of the more recent games from what I heard and their ships do Flash style speed blitzes of enemy vessels from what I heard

[Dabat]

Mike: I was more interested in what you guys thought of it, and if I could use it as evidence. I feel it should count at least somewhat as it was okayed (at least as much as the EU is) by Roddenberry.

You said that Roddenberry limited their access, but Mr. Cole told it differently. According to him the only thing they didn't have the rights to when they first began to publish Star Fleet Battles were the parts of Star Trek that Roddenberry did not own, which at that time was the intellectual property and likenesses from the TOS and one or two books. Roddenberry (according to him) allowed them to use anything else he had already thought of, or had rights to. That is why the Kzinti are such an important race in the game. Larry Nivens was a huge fan of Star Trek and gave Gene Roddenberry the rights to use the race in any way he say fit.

To be fair, the last paragraph is anecdotal, and came from Mr. Cole himself, so it may not be the most reliable source on the matter.

Breetai: The ships are based on the ships from the TOS, and several receive upgrades over the timeline of the game (not to mention new ship types, like X-ships, which are supposed to be the ships that use the tech which is in wider use in TNG). So they are at least as powerful as the ships in TOS, if not more.

[Mike DiCenso]

Mike: I was more interested in what you guys thought of it, and if I could use it as evidence. I feel it should count at least somewhat as it was okayed (at least as much as the EU is) by Roddenberry.

Roddenberry, and other Paramount folks okayed a lot of things in the 1970's for Star Trek licensing, but that does not mean they are canon. Do not forget the nasty parting of the ways Roddenberry and Franz Joseph had in the late 70's over the validity of the TM and blueprints simply because Roddenberry felt that he never would have approved something like that had he known that Star Trek was going to be on screen again. He did a similar thing to TAS as well, and he really parted the ways in the mid to late 80's when TNG got started. That's allegedly why FASA lost their rights to do further Star Trek RPG works.

To get an idea of how this kind of thing worked, read the articles here at Trekplace.

You said that Roddenberry limited their access, but Mr. Cole told it differently. According to him the only thing they didn't have the rights to when they first began to publish Star Fleet Battles were the parts of Star Trek that Roddenberry did not own, which at that time was the intellectual property and likenesses from the TOS and one or two books. Roddenberry (according to him) allowed them to use anything else he had already thought of, or had rights to. That is why the Kzinti are such an important race in the game. Larry Nivens was a huge fan of Star Trek and gave Gene Roddenberry the rights to use the race in any way he saw fit.

Again, look at what Roddenberry did when dealing with the canoncity of TAS and the FJ TM and blueprint material. Why don't you think the late TOS movies, or the TNG-era material is included in SFB? They are not allowed to do it. Period.

To be fair, the last paragraph is anecdotal, and came from Mr. Cole himself, so it may not be the most reliable source on the matter.

Breetai: The ships are based on the ships from the TOS, and several receive upgrades over the timeline of the game (not to mention new ship types, like X-ships, which are supposed to be the ships that use the tech which is in wider use in TNG). So they are at least as powerful as the ships in TOS, if not more.

The X-ships are not TNG-era. The SFB material is not allowed to use the TOS movies, nor TNG-era. It was just a clever workaround so that fans could have something like the refit ships from the movies without actually calling them that. I remember a number of fans submitting SSD sheets for the Miranda/Avenger class after Wrath of Khan and getting turned down, and they were told that SFB could not use them because they were forbidden to use anything from the movies.
-Mike

[watchdog]

How does the Starfleet Command computer games fit in? They were based on SFB but used the designs from the TOS movies and updates to the old designs.
I never played the original game, only the computer version of Starfleet Command, in the verses debate they add a whole new dimension to Star Trek vs Star Wars, one that is in many ways more fun than the usual debate.

[Dabat]

*snip*

Mike, while you do point out very good points regarding FJ and Roddenberry, and the articles were very insightful. But much of their problems seemed to be interpersonal issues. If GR were always as hard to work with as he was with FJ (perhaps backstabing might be a fair word), then I have trouble seeing why Mr. Cole would not have brought it up during our conversations. And as I didn't see anything on the site you mentioned about Roddenberry retconning the alt-universe of SFB, I still feel that the ranges and speeds mentioned there-in should be at least as usable in debate as the EU is for Wars. Where it is not contradicted by higher sources of cannon, that is.

The X-ships are not TNG-era. The SFB material is not allowed to use the TOS movies, nor TNG-era. It was just a clever workaround so that fans could have something like the refit ships from the movies without actually calling them that. I remember a number of fans submitting SSD sheets for the Miranda/Avenger class after Wrath of Khan and getting turned down, and they were told that SFB could not use them because they were forbidden to use anything from the movies.
-Mike

At first I thought you mis-read, then I realized I typed that out poorly. As the SFB timeline simply merges with that of TNG; X-ships in SFB, according to Cole, represent the first generation of tech utilized in TNG and/or the movies, to help explaine the tech jump, when the two re-merge.





Watchdog: That was another thing I meant to bring up, but forgot about. As the two games set pretty firm ranges and time frames. They establish pretty firm effective and maximum ranges for weapons, as well as the speed of which the ships fight.

[Mike DiCenso]

Mike, while you do point out very good points regarding FJ and Roddenberry, and the articles were very insightful. But much of their problems seemed to be interpersonal issues. If GR were always as hard to work with as he was with FJ (perhaps backstabing might be a fair word), then I have trouble seeing why Mr. Cole would not have brought it up during our conversations. And as I didn't see anything on the site you mentioned about Roddenberry retconning the alt-universe of SFB, I still feel that the ranges and speeds mentioned there-in should be at least as usable in debate as the EU is for Wars. Where it is not contradicted by higher sources of cannon, that is.

Dabat, it is interesting that you did not read what I wrote. I gave the Roddenberry-FJ interactions as an example of how Roddenberry treated these materials, and I also mentioned what happened with TAS and FASA as well. Roddenberry came to disagreement with FJ over what he percieved as the excessive militarization of Starfleet, and a similar issue came up years later for FASA and some of the TOS movies. You have yet to provide proof about Cole's statements. Also don't forget, I lived through that whole time period and read all the Federation Commander zines and such. Why do you think there aren't any Miranda SSDs in the early 80's expansion packs? Why no Excelsiors? Because they were off limits.

Read here for the similar story for FASA's Star Trek RPG.

Simply put, none of it is canon, though it is based on the canon.

[quote="Dabat""]At first I thought you mis-read, then I realized I typed that out poorly. As the SFB timeline simply merges with that of TNG; X-ships in SFB, according to Cole, represent the first generation of tech utilized in TNG and/or the movies, to help explaine the tech jump, when the two re-merge.[/quote]

No, they do not. They never did. Either you are mistaken and misrepresenting Cole, or Cole is just self-aggrandizing himself. There is no remerging in any of the current Amarillo Design Bureau material with the canon TNG-era series, nor ST:ENT. Please provide proof of this.
-Mike

[Dabat]

Mike, while you do point out very good points regarding FJ and Roddenberry, and the articles were very insightful. But much of their problems seemed to be interpersonal issues. If GR were always as hard to work with as he was with FJ (perhaps backstabing might be a fair word), then I have trouble seeing why Mr. Cole would not have brought it up during our conversations. And as I didn't see anything on the site you mentioned about Roddenberry retconning the alt-universe of SFB, I still feel that the ranges and speeds mentioned there-in should be at least as usable in debate as the EU is for Wars. Where it is not contradicted by higher sources of cannon, that is.

Dabat, it is interesting that you did not read what I wrote. I gave the Roddenberry-FJ interactions as an example of how Roddenberry treated these materials, and I also mentioned what happened with TAS and FASA as well. Roddenberry came to disagreement with FJ over what he percieved as the excessive militarization of Starfleet, and a similar issue came up years later for FASA and some of the TOS movies. You have yet to provide proof about Cole's statements. Also don't forget, I lived through that whole time period and read all the Federation Commander zines and such. Why do you think there aren't any Miranda SSDs in the early 80's expansion packs? Why no Excelsiors? Because they were off limits.

Read here for the similar story for FASA's Star Trek RPG.

I read them. I read them all. I lost count of the pages off the first link you sent me to. Fortunately I read really fast and was able to cover them all. I even went to the base site, trekplace.com and read several of the other interviews. I even googled "Gene Roddenberry is hard to work with" (as I had always been under the impression that he was likable, if eccentric) for more information. I was not able to find anything that said he felt the same way about SFB as he did about FASATrek. In our conversations Mr. Cole even said that he has had far more trouble with Paramount then he ever did with Roddenberry.

If this is so much of a problem for you, we have three options:

A: You and I can agree to disagree.

B: You can find something verifiable saying how Roddenberry felt about SFB.

or C: Mr. Cole is a friend of a friend. Assuming his health holds out I will be seeing him again in a few months. I am already intending to ask him about a few of the things we have gone over in this thread, if you want I will post them here on this forum after I see him again and/or you can leave me a list of questions you want answered and I will ask them to him myself.

Simply put, none of it is canon, though it is based on the canon.

That is my point, it is a separate universe, but based on cannon. Like the EU. I do not see the problem with using things like effective ranges from SFB in places where they do not directly contradict higher cannon.

[quote="Dabat""]At first I thought you mis-read, then I realized I typed that out poorly. As the SFB timeline simply merges with that of TNG; X-ships in SFB, according to Cole, represent the first generation of tech utilized in TNG and/or the movies, to help explaine the tech jump, when the two re-merge.

No, they do not. They never did. Either you are mistaken and misrepresenting Cole, or Cole is just self-aggrandizing himself. There is no remerging in any of the current Amarillo Design Bureau material with the canon TNG-era series, nor ST:ENT. Please provide proof of this.
-Mike[/quote]

Aggrandizing what? That he does not have rights to do a game set in the TNG years? (I am assuming this, but the assumption seems safe). The merging that i told you about came from A Captain's Log in an explanation on why there were never going to be any products past game year Y (just what year I can not recall). I am currently going through my collection of Captain's Logs to find it. Long story short it said that the reason there will not be any products set ofter year Y is because year Y is getting close the time that TNG begins and that the 'alternate universe' SFB continuity remerges with the main continuity at that point; and that X-ships represented, in part, the advances in technology the SFB continuity needed to reach the TNG level. I always thought the two continuities were supposed to be totally separate until I read that paragraph.

I am going through my collection and I will provide the issue and page # when I find the paragraph in question. On the off chance it was from an issue that I borrowed (I have only been playing FC for about two years) I will ask my friend to re-borrow the issues that I borrowed in the past so that I can provide you with this information.

I don't think you meant to come across as caustic at I read you (or maybe I just totally mis-read you). I understand that you have to deal with some aggravating people on this forum, but please understand I am not one of them. I understand that I am not as well versed in the debate field as some are, and I also understand I can be wrong at times, which is why I try really hard not to post something unless I am absolutly sure it exists. I also am not going to lie to you, and unlike some who shall remain nameless I try my best not to distort facts, as I like both wars and trek and have no desire to see one win out over the other.

*EDIT* In my first pre-write, I said "Year X" Instead of "Year Y" I changed this to avoid confusion with "X-ship".

[Mike DiCenso]

That's fine if you want to talk to Mr. Cole (he's actually available on the SFB forums BTW). But all I ask is if you would just follow the simple lines of reasoning and the evidence here.

A.) Roddenberry and or Paramount approved certain material for licensed merchandise.

B.) Roddenberry in the late 1970's seeing that Star Trek was once again going to be on screen as a movie, began to systematically change things where possible to disclude the Franz Joseph material and concepts of the Federation and Starfleet.

C.) In the late 1980's, when TNG was in production, Roddenberry pulled the plug on all material other than movies and live-action TV being canon, in particular FASA losts the rights purportedly because Roddenberry felt it portrayed too militaristic a vision of Star Trek not in line with his own.

D.) No Task Force, nor any Amarillo Design Bureau SFB material produced anything that included the ST movies, nor any TNG-era material because they had a limited license and Roddenberry never, ever would have granted his approval to canonize anything as blatently militaristic as SFB, especially since SFB uses a significant portion of FJ's materials.

That's what all those articles and such I've pointed out to you show. All you have given me is annecdotal information. From the Memory Alpha article on SFB:

"While this is a Star Trek product officially licensed by Paramount Pictures, it is granted only a partial license, and as such cannot mention specifics of canon Trek in the games, save for basic information. This game does not use the name Star Trek in its title, but incorporates the design of the Constitution-class heavy cruiser and the uniforms, weapons, aliens, and some of the terminology of The Original Series era. Part of this license allows the game to depict information from the Star Fleet Technical Manual by Franz Joseph (such as the Federation dreadnought and Ptolemy tug) and also information from Star Trek: The Animated Series (including the Klingon projected stasis field and Larry Niven's rarely-seen Kzinti. It should be noted that the SFU Kzinti are very distinct from those of Larry Niven's works). This game's license forbids the release of characters, aliens, ships or situations taken from any of the Star Trek movies or the Next Generation era series (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, Star Trek: Enterprise, etc.)"

There is also nothing about SFB being canon or specially Roddenberry-approved on the offical website and it's forum. I know you love the game, so do I. But please. It is obvious from the evidence that Roddenberry did not grant such licenses special canon status, therefore they must be disregarded in any discussion of canon material, and are only vaild for a more "what if this was canon" kind of debate.
-Mike

[watchdog]

I agree with Mike on this, SFB is not canon to Trek, it's more like it's own seperate universe.
However the claim that TNG never showed up is 'kinda' wrong, the Starfleet command computer games are based off of SFB if only in a loose sort of way and they certainly used TNG ships in some of the sequals.
Take it for what it's worth, it aint much. I would love to see another debate of SFB vs Star Wars as the ones back on SB never went very far.

Beyond that I've always thought that Rodenberry's dislike of Star Trek being militaristic was always a bit odd, giving the distinct militarism of TOS well into and throughout the movies (exception being the motion picture). Starfleet obviously always had a military role especialy in the defence of the Federation.

[Dabat]

Sorry it's been so long since I was last here. I have been busy enough over the last week or so that I have had no time to write a reply.

Long story short: While I still have some objections, I do agree that the SFB should be limited to threads where they are specified ahead of time, or in other 'anything goes' threads.