Mission Types & Ongoing Stories

Part of the beauty of Star Trek's story structure has been the mix of episodic and season-long arcs, allowing many fans to drop into an episode and pick up on the action while still having its place within the overarching story. Our goal here at STF is to continue that tradition by allowing missions to fit in however the GM wants. To help staff keep track of who contributes what to the story, we've come up with mission types. 

When you (the GM) submit an After Action Report (AAR), you'll note what type of mission it was based on the types below. Some will require coordination with Staff to ensure the overall story remains consistent.

Alpha Mission

Star Trek: Frontier will often host seasons, which are multi-session missions that all tie together into one large plot. Alpha missions are those missions that tie into these larger arcs, giving GMs a chance to contribute to the overall story. Because the story affects nearly every player, these missions will need to be coordinated with staff, but staff will give individual GMs the opportunity to help direct the story in their own way. This back and forth helps steer the overall season without staff having to write the entire story and allows the community to directly influence the direction the story goes in.

Beta Mission

Not all GMs want to have their missions tied directly to the overarching story or want staff influencing what they can and can't do, but still want to reference some of the larger events going on in and around the station. These missions are considered Beta canon, and while it grants more freedom for a GM to explore their own way, it can be overruled in terms of its lasting effects on the story's canon. In other words, go nuts, but if you accidentally blow up the station we reserve the right to hit the reset button and put it back.

Gamma Mission

Gamma missions are those that allow players to explore beyond the sector, and are a way for players to visit locations like Earth, Deep Space Nine, etc without having to worry about the larger story. These missions might sometimes reference events in the greater Federation, but isn't necessarily going to work its way into the overall story line.

Delta Mission

Delta missions are one-off missions that have zero impact on the overall story and are there only for fun. This lets GMs take advantage of idle players who want to do fun one-off missions like explore the Mirror Universe, go back in time, start and end a war in an afternoon, make out with someone on Risa, etc. Basically, go nuts, nothing make it back to DS13.

Omega Mission

Omega missions are special and require special authorization from staff. These are missions that will permanently affect everyone else on the station to some degree, such as DS13 gets attacked and severely damaged, or one of the ships assigned to the station is permanently lost with all hands. The GM must get permission from staff and in the event of character deaths must get authorization from the players to do so.

Announcing an Upcoming Game

Within the STF Discord server, there is a special room that GMs may post in called #mission-board. The Mission Board is where GMs post their upcoming games and what parameters they're looking for in the players. First, here's the template, and we'll explain each part as we go.

**<Mission Name>**
Date & Time:
Expected Length:
Starship(s):
# of Players:
Roles:
Basic Objective:
Mission Type:

Mission Name is self explanatory, and is the name of the mission you plan to run.

Date & Time is where you'll post the date and time your game begins. Because of multiple timezones, we recommend you use the Discord Timestamp Tool set to Long date with day of week and short time to let everyone know precisely when it's set to begin.

Expected Length is approximately how long you think the game will run. We recommend approximately 4 hours, but longer runs are up to you.

Starship(s) simply refers to the primary ship or ships that will be used in the game.

# of Players is how many players you want to join the game. We recommend at least 2 but the upper limit is dependent on the GM and their level of comfort.

Roles is what types of characters you want. For example, if you want 2 Security, 1 Medical, and 1 Engineer. 

Basic Objective is what the crew is told they're being dispatched to do. This could be played straight or be a twist somewhere along the way, but this is what they know when they're leaving out on the ship. It could be a distress call, delivering supplies, studying a quasar, you name it.

Mission Type is the kind of mission based on the mission types listed above. In other words, how dramatic will the impact of the player's actions be on the station in the end.

Create a Thread

When the GM has made their mission board post, the GM should then create a thread starting with that post for players to apply. The GM should try to give players enough time (we recommend at least 48 hours in advance) once final decisions are made. This is so that players can know if they are in the GM's game or if they should seek adventure elsewhere.

Players should post a link to their character's wiki page and what qualifications they think might be useful for the mission, such as if they're proficient with transporters on a mission to deliver a new cargo transporter hub to a colony nearby.