GoB Con IV took place Thursday July 25 through Sunday July 28. And this year’s convention was bigger and better than ever! Games of Berkeley hosts the event every year.

And what better place to debut Star Trek Adventures RPG 2e to a new batch of players. I was thrilled when five people signed up to try out my favorite game system.

I provided them each with a copy of the free QuickStart guide. They selected their preferred pregens and we were off on the U.S.S. Challenger. I modified Michael Duxbury’s “Propaganda’s Shadow” mission brief from the Federation-Klingon War Tactical War Campaign into a two act a scenario that involved navigating through an asteroid field to repair a Klingon relay station before an attack by a lunatic, genocidal Klingon captain, and—wow—did the adventure take off! (Limiting spoilers—read the brief and it will make more sense.)

Once again, I am always impressed with how quickly players pick up rolling tasks, momentum spends, and using foci and determination to maximize their rolls. What really stood out this time was how this group picked up the power of Traits! Soon, they were creating, eliminating, and modifying Traits to try and sway the story in their favor. They forgot about the mechanics and dove into the improv with a gusto I have only seen achievable in STA.

One player commented on how he loved the ease at which a B-plot can be brought in simultaneously to action and that “it felt like a real episode”. Man, I love the hear stuff like that! And I agree!

I invite people to run games at your local game store and at cons. You will have the distinct pleasure of seeing eyes light up and imaginations soar into the stars!