After about 20 years of not having an aquarium, I decided it was time to set a new one up. I have been thinking about it for a couple of years now and with the COVID19 pandemic and a permanent change to working from home the time was right. There was a good deal on a 35 Gallon bow front aquarium on Kijiji so that’s where I started. This was mid January, a good project for the new year.
Adventure Source: Living Campaign Adventure 06
Meetup Link: https://www.meetup.com/Star-Trek-Gaming/events/269404676/
Game Date: February 14 2021
Session Post: No Session Post
Teaser: A month ago, Starfleet picked up an unusual alien signal emanating from the Seku system, deep inside the Carina Nebula. The runabout Susquehanna was initially dispatched to investigate, but the crew failed to report and is presumed lost. Starfleet must investigate the source of the signal and locate the missing runabout.
Active Characters:
Important NPCs:
Notes: This was a straight run through of the adventure as published so I have not provided a detailed description.
Notable Information: The signal is being sent by ancient alien technology similar to that discovered on Orgun III (Decision Point). The signal performs like an echo locator – it’s waiting for a response from other obelisks in the Expanse.
Mission Recap: The Crew of the Kimura arrived in system and do an initial scan of Seku VI. They pick up signals from two Federation comm badges as well as indications that two small ships were recently in the system. One crashed on the planet and the other left.
Further scans reveal that the ship that crashed was a Romulan shuttle. They also pick up a settlement near where the source of the alien signal is coming from.
After carefully considering the dangers of trying to fly a shuttle down to the planet vs beaming down, they decide to risk the transporters, taking extra time and precautions to ensure a safe beam down.
They successfully beam down and as they start to move towards the Federation comm signals, they are attacked by two Romulans.
Continue reading ‘STA Mission Report 16 – Signals’ »Adventure Source: Living Campaign Adventure 05 (slightly modified)
Meetup Link: https://www.meetup.com/Star-Trek-Gaming/events/269404676/
Game Date: January 10 2021
Session Post: No Session Post
Teaser: Extended stellar and planetary survey missions to a remote part of the Shackleton Expanse near Sigma Librae and the Romulan Star Empire find an interesting planetary system that contains two Class-M planets that orbit each other, that show signs of a sublight spacefaring civilization that has recently destroyed itself.
Active Characters:
Important NPCs:
Notable Information: The solar system surrounding the star HIP 73513 is the location of a very rare Trojan pair of Class-M planets that both developed their own native sentient life. The first species to develop was on the smaller of the Class-M planets, a humanoid species that had developed in the tidal areas of their oceans and sharing many traits with Terran canines.
The other, larger world was named ‘Five Turns’ or more literally ‘Everything’ by its non-humanoid, radially symmetrical sentient species. The ‘Us’ didn’t evolve flexible manipulative digits equivalent to human thumbs and fingers, thus they were never able to develop any technologies besides fire.
Continue reading ‘STA Mission Report 15 – Tug of War’ »Adventure Source: Last Unicorn Games – A Fragile Peace – The Neutral Zone Campaign Vol. 1
Meetup Link: https://www.meetup.com/Star-Trek-Gaming/events/274517982/
Game Date: December 13 2020
Session Post: No Session Post
Teaser: Having successfully tested the three new sensors, and determining that one indeed works, the U.S.S. Kimura now turns to rendezvous with the U.S.S. Fortunate, a starship heading directly back to Earth to take the scientists home.
Each of the scientists are anxious to report to Starfleet Command: Sarok, to get his device into production; Kragen, to file a formal complaint to have the tests redone; and Nakamura to move on to her next assignment.
Captain Georj Brandt has arranged for a Yuletide celebration as a way for new and old crew members to get to know each other, and has invited the visiting scientists to join in.
The recreation room on Deck 2 has been decorated for the occasion, tasteful floral arrangements, platters of delicacies from throughout the Federation, guests dressed in their off-duty finest. A small band, comprised of fellow crewmembers plays requests.
A very peaceful and relaxing event. What could possibly go wrong?
Active Characters:
Important NPCs:
Notable Information: Traveling to rendezvous with the U.S.S. Fortunate for the scientists’ return trip home, the Crew and scientists have another opportunity to socialize, this time at a Yuletide celebration. The revelry is interrupted by another distress signal, from another freighter. The Crew attempts to locate the attacker, using the new sensors, only to discover they no longer operate. In between the time of the test and the celebration, someone sabotaged the new sensors. It turns out that Gretel is a Romulan spy. She attempts to take Sarok hostage and escape but is quickly subdued. The Romulans leave with the information Gretel sent them about the sensors.
Adventure Source: Last Unicorn Games – A Fragile Peace – The Neutral Zone Campaign Vol. 1
Meetup Link: https://www.meetup.com/Star-Trek-Gaming/events/273527600/
Game Date: November 8 2020
Session Post: No Session Post
Teaser: “We have received orders to rendezvous with the U.S.S. Bradbury, en route to Starbase 173. We are to transfer over a Federation science team and take them to the edge of the Neutral Zone. It appears we’re hunting cloaked warbirds.
Recent encounters with the Romulans has convinced Starfleet there may be many Romulan vessels entering the Shackleton Expanse through the Neutral Zone and Federation space.
The science team brings with them three different sensor devices Starfleet Command wants tested. One of these sensors will, the confidently expect, be able to detect cloaked Romulan vessels. If it works, the cloaking device will be much less of a tactical advantage for the Romulans than it was in the past, giving the Federation a great advantage in the event of future hostilities.”
Active Characters:
Important NPCs:
Notable Information: Several members of the U.S.S. Kimura, including Captain T’Kor, Cmd. Xedrik, Lt. Cmd. Sivath, Lt. Oqwadel, Chief Petty Officer Winston Emmet, and Chief Petty Officer Dallas Brenner have been transferred to the U.S.S. Galvarino after a sneak attack by Romulans killed many members of the Galvario’s command crew.
Captain Georj Brandt has been pulled out of Academy duty and assigned as the new Captain of the U.S.S. Kimura.
Three teams of scientists have been assigned to the Kimura to test out three different devices for locating cloaked Romulan vessels.
I thought it might be interesting to look at the weekly progress reports that Fitbit emails me each week. Here they are from most recent to oldest in mid July. Although there are a couple early on where I didn’t sync my Fitbit in time to get the last couple of days steps into the weekly report. It’s been a pretty steady improvement from week to week, which makes me happy. Although it also makes it harder to do better each week as well, but even if I can stay about where I am at now I’d be happy. The stars in the top row are days that I hit my goal of 7500 steps. And I do like to take Sundays as a rest day each week so I’m fine with missing that one.
Continue reading ‘Health and Fitness – Fitbit Progress Reports’ »It’s been one month since I first posted about making some changes, and things have been going well. I’m going for a two kilometer walk each weekday at lunch, and for the last two weeks I’ve added in a one kilometer morning walk to the coffee shop. My wife has started working from home, so instead of doing the drive thru on the way to dropping her off at work, we walk over to get our coffee and tea.
The focus of this plan isn’t specifically weight loss, but it’s easy to measure and is hopefully a beneficial side effect. My scale went weird for a few days, according to it, I dropped almost six pounds over night and then suddenly gained it back a few days later. I’m sure that didn’t actually happen but I’ve left those numbers in for now. I’ve dropped a little, about five pounds. I’ve gone from being around 255 lbs to being a little under 248 lbs.
What is really interesting is the Percent Body Fat numbers which dropped significantly on September 20th and seems to be staying low.
About ten years ago I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. It came with the fairly common companions of high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and obesity. I’m still on medication for all of those and haven’t had much success in dealing with them, although I haven’t gained weight in that time, I’ve stayed fairly consistently in the 255 lb range, occasionally get up near 270 and occasionally getting down as low as 240. Here is what my weight looked like since Jan 2012.
Adventure Source: A Forest Apart – Published Adventure
Meetup Link: https://www.meetup.com/Star-Trek-Gaming/events/272008003/
Game Date: August 8 2020
Session Post: No Session Post
Teaser: On the frontier of Federation space, the Player Characters encounter a vessel of unknown origin: a forested geodesic dome. The damaged craft appears to be well over 1,000 years old and foreign to the Milky Way Galaxy. It does not respond to hails and no intelligent life readings are detected.
Active Characters:
Important NPCs:
Notable Information: The Forest ship comes from a planet where millennium ago two astronauts crash landed. One astronaut died but the other merged with the newly sentient trees to become the First Tree.
As the sun of their home system started to die, the trees build the Forest ship and sent a colony of trees out into the stars to find they promised land, the astronaut’s home, Albali Prime.
Albali Prime has reverted to medieval level of civilization and are a very peaceful people. It seems that at some point in their past they were much more advanced but suffered some sort of catastrophe and nearly destroyed themselves.
The Trees land on Albali Prime and are accepted by the inhabitants, thanks to the story telling preparation from Lt. Asha and the work of the rest of the Kimura Away Team.
The Jahan !xu are cured of their addiction to the Tree’s sap, and their neurodegenerative disease, and a new home is found for them in a nearby asteroid belt.
Continue reading ‘STA Mission Report 12 – A Forest Apart pt 2’ »Adventure Source: A Forest Apart – Published Adventure
Meetup Link: https://www.meetup.com/Star-Trek-Gaming/events/271356987/
Game Date: July 12 2020
Session Post: No Session Post
Teaser: On the frontier of Federation space, the Player Characters encounter a vessel of unknown origin: a forested geodesic dome. The damaged craft appears to be well over 1,000 years old and foreign to the Milky Way Galaxy. It does not respond to hails and no intelligent life readings are detected.
Active Characters:
Important NPCs:
Notable Information: The domed ship is made of organic material. The tress on the ship are dying because they are losing sap from holes made by wood-poring creatures. These creatures small sentient insectiods call the Jahan !Xu which exist in hyper-accelerated time, making them invisible. They suffer from a neurodegenerative disease that has nearly wiped out their species. Only the sap of the ancient trees, to which they are addicted, slows the progress.
Dr. O’Nnyah and the crew of the Kimura, working with one of the Jahan !Xu have developed a treatment for the addiction but need additional test subjects to develop a full on cure. An away team has beamed over to the ship to try and establish communication with the ship and with the other Jahan !Xu.
Continue reading ‘STA Mission Report 11 – A Forest Apart pt 1’ »