Star Fleet Battles history

[ColBosch]

Originally Posted by ElLoboGordo

Because we're all huge nerds here, it bears mentioning that SFB was either out *just barely* ahead of CW, or is at least contemporaneous. The others were several years or more later.

Huh, I thought it was later, because FASA had the Star Trek rights for a while. But, well, Paramount; shouldn't be surprised that they pimped it around.

[ColBosch]

Originally Posted by KevinR

Star Fleet Battles (as Task Force Game #4) was published in mid-1979 (Origins). The boxed edition was released before the end of 1979. Car Wars, of course, is 1981.

So that means SFB predates FASA's Star Trek RPG. Eeeenteresting.

[adm]

Starfleet Battles is based on Franz Joesph's stuff, and widely divergent from the rest of Trek, since FJ only did design work on The Original Series (or TOS), some of which was also used in The Animated Series(TAS), SFB is limited to the forms, but not the characters of TOS/TAS, although it does use the TOS History and some geography.
Even at that, once Paramount more firmly established their control of the ST franchise SFB was limited to what they had previously published from Trek, and everything else is material they developed on their own, which is rather extensive.

Fair warning, there are people who view either SFB's version or, more commonly, Paramount's version as the One True Way. Such discussions can be pointlessly heated.

[43Supporter]

Originally Posted by ElLoboGordo

Because we're all huge nerds here, it bears mentioning that SFB was either out *just barely* ahead of CW, or is at least contemporaneous. The others were several years or more later.

Which version of SFB are you thinking of? The stick-and-string version by Lou Zocchi is a completely different beast than the 800-pages-of-Flyspeck-3-print version ADN/TFG produced.

Mention of _BattleTech_, again: It's interesting to note how _BT_ has sort-of evolved toward some _CW_-ish with the minis rules, which allows for more detailed movement; to where one could adapt _BT_ minis rules for a _CW_style gridless auto-combat game....

[adm]

Originally Posted by 43Supporter

Which version of SFB are you thinking of? The stick-and-string version by Lou Zocchi is a completely different beast than the 800-pages-of-Flyspeck-3-print version ADN/TFG produced.

ADB's SFB was released in 1979 in a pocket box version, and is still in print with new material being added now. GURPS:Prime Directive is based on it.

[ColBosch]

Pfft, I used to write for BattleTech. I'm well-used to silly fandom civil wars - and BT is a single timeline, as opposed to Trek's...three? Four?

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by ColBosch

Pfft, I used to write for BattleTech. I'm well-used to silly fandom civil wars - and BT is a single timeline, as opposed to Trek's...three? Four?

Depends on what you count. Orthodoxy says two. SFB doesn't count as "Star Trek" but rather its own thing. So there's just the main universe and the alternate Abramsverse (the mirror universe and individual episodes alternates don't count as actual timelines for this purpose).

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by ColBosch

So that means SFB predates FASA's Star Trek RPG. Eeeenteresting.

Yep. And SFB was originally licensed by Franz Joseph Designs, not Paramount. (Paramount had bought the rights by then, for the 1979 Motionless Picture.)

FASA's license was from Paramount. And FASA-Trek is ©1983.

Star Trek Battle Manual (Zocchi) was 1972.
Star Fleet Battle Manual (Zocchi) was 1977.

Star Trek: Adventure Gaming in the Final Frontier (Michael Scott Kurtik) was published in 1978. It was licensed. It expired before 1982...

as 1982 was the unlicensed revision of ST:AGitFF: Starfleet Voyages.

And Starships and Spacemen (for which FGU wanted a license, but they couldn't afford one) was the first Trek RPG that looks like an RPG rather than a minis wargame. It was also 1978.

Originally Posted by ColBosch

Pfft, I used to write for BattleTech. I'm well-used to silly fandom civil wars - and BT is a single timeline, as opposed to Trek's...three? Four?

Counting ADB's Star Fleet Universe, officially, 3.

• Ent, TOS, TNG, DS9, Voy and the movies
• The last two movies (which are an alternate timeline with a crossover character
• Star Fleet Universe (ADB - used in SFB)

Officially, TAS isn't part of the timeline last time I checked Paramount. It is, however, part of the sources which ADB considers relevant to the SFU.

And the Battletech fan-kerfluffles are quite trivial to the SFU/OfficialSTU divide.

Worse, the official novels and comics form at least 4 additional continuities, and are officially non-canonical.

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by adm

ADB's SFB was released in 1979 in a pocket box version, and is still in print with new material being added now. GURPS:Prime Directive is based on it.

And Zocchi's was 1972 with a 1977 rerelease... also predating it.

[ColBosch]

Originally Posted by ak_aramis

And the Battletech fan-kerfluffles are quite trivial to the SFU/OfficialSTU divide.

To be fair, it's all trivial. ;)