Gloomy Talks About Stuff

[GloomCookie]

Gloomy Talks About Stuff
Part 1: In Defense of Dr. Pulaski

I think I've made it pretty obvious over the years that I adore Star Trek and I am also not afraid to stir up all kinds of shit both for and against my favorite franchises. Since I want to talk about stuff, I felt like I'd start a semi-blog here where I talk about stuff, and I figured I'd come out swinging with a defense of Dr. Pulaski from Season 2 of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

So why? Why the absolute hell do I care about a character whose only appearance was a single season from 1988 on one of the worst seasons of the franchise? Because almost everywhere I look, someone somewhere has something negative to say, and I feel she gets a bad rap, especially since the actress, Diana Muldaur, has been a fixture in Star Trek since the early days. She played Ann Mulhall and Miranda Jones on the Original Series. Now sure, there are other actors/actresses out there who have played more roles and certainly more iconic roles, but at the same time it's annoying that she landed in a role that most people hate and thus feel it's ok to overly criticize her for.

The problem I think is that first, Gates McFadden left the show. The reasons behind her leaving are a topic for another time but it left a hole, and so they tapped Muldaur to come in and take her place as the Chief Medical Officer. Almost immediately she got off on the wrong foot by going to see Counselor Troi, who was dealing with Sudden Onset Baby Syndrome because it was "The Child" (S1E1). I did promise that it was a bad season. Pulaski goes to see Troi first since she's dealing with a rather profound medical issue what with suddenly growing a baby real quick and Riker's dick being suspiciously absent. But, alright, not the best start but it's clear she has some interest in the wellbeing of the crew.

Then of course we have the issue with her animosity with Data, and I think that was a stumbling block because of the numerous strikes by the Writers Guild. Long and short of it was they felt Pulaski could be used similar to McCoy from the Original Series and his frequent antagonizing of Spock. The problem was they didn't have Spock who was often just as witty and willing to turn the tables, they had Data, who was still being fleshed out by Brent Spiner. For every jab that Spock might have turned around on her, Data just took it, making it feel like Pulaski was bullying him.

Where I think Pulaski started to shine, especially compared to McFadden, was in the relationship with Worf. She had an almost intuitive understanding of his honor and what it demanded of him, as well as how he sometimes needed to keep a secret to preserve his 'honor'. One particularly nice touch I feel was that Worf, what amounted to the measles (rop'ngor in Klingon), decided to perform the Klingon tea ceremony with Pulaski as a sign of friendship. Given that Worf would take quite a while to break out of his shell with other crew, the fact they hit it off so quickly was amazing.

What I would love to see is perhaps a revisit of Dr. Pulaski, perhaps in the Lost Era between the end of Star Trek VI and The Next Generation. Show her career in Starfleet prior to stepping onto the Enterprise D and what all she did in that time. Imagine a medical drama set in a Starfleet hospital where you have strange aliens coming in with unknown illnesses and all that jazz, perhaps someone explaining that maybe yes it is possible they got a little frisky with an alien that's not exactly biologically compatible. Given that we know Pulaski is rather discrete, I could see her being the opposite of a Dr. House, being compassionate while still having quite the brain on her, figuring out medical mysteries and such.

I dunno, that's just me. I like Pulaski, thought she got a bad rap, if you don't agree, fight me.

Next time I'll probably bitch about dystopias or something, especially YA dystopias. Those things are just stupid.

[TheGlyphstone]

She did eventually start to warm to Data as well, at least from what I remember/have read - by the end of the season, she's counseling him and encouraging him to compete in a strategy game. But she left the show before that character development arc could really complete itself, so all anyone remembers is 'mean to Data'.

[GloomCookie]

Yeah. It's unfortunate because I feel she had real potential but she ultimately decided she didn't want to star in regular TV so was like "Aight Imma bounce" and then Gates McFadden came back.

I don't mind McFadden but... she feels rather bland most of the time. Even my thing for redheads can't save her. The only time I feel she was really good was when she was in the alternate future timeline when she was a captain in her own right and mostly because she gave Picard so much sass.

[TheGlyphstone]

She was badly under utilized, though I think Troi got an even worse deal on that front.

[GloomCookie]

I swear to God...

Troi was like... she was meant to be the Deltan chick from the first movie but somehow along the way became completely lame and uninteresting. They basically stuffed her in skimpy outfits because Season One was a mess of trying to make the future seem sexy for anyone and everyone regardless of which way you swung.

I think she actually got sexier in a proper uniform but that's just me...

Oh and I think the best time she was utilized...

[Jelico walks away after detailing their plan against the Cardassians]

Riker: Well, he's certainly confident.

Troi: No, he's not.

THAT! THAT is what you should have aimed for, writers! Jelico seems like such a confident man with a plan that it's hard to realize deep down he's scared to death he's about to get the Federation into another war if he fucks this up.

[Beorning]

I admit I had a crush on Troi in my early teens. Nowadays, when I think of Troi / Marina Sirtis, I think mostly two things:

1. Demona!

2. The one time she blew the whole Earth up in one bad TV disaster movie...

[TheGlyphstone]

Troi had three roles on the ship.

1: Eye candy.
2: Stating the obvious. "Shields at 70 percent!"  "I sense...hostility."
3: Generating unresolved sexual tension with Picard.

[GloomCookie]

Gloomy Talks About Stuff
Part 2: Heists in Tabletop RPGs

Anyone who knows me knows I'm a huge fan of Shadowrun, the cyberpunk tabletop RPG currently in its 5 edition we don't talk about 6th edition where you and your friends do various jobs for money like 95% of all tabletop RPGs out there do. And there are two major schools of thought when it comes to play in Shadowrun: kick in the door guns blazing and basically do this fast and hard and damn the consequences better known as Pink Mohawk style and the cold, calculating, we're gonna spend 20 hours elaborately planning every step we take inside this facility until we're satisfied the GM can't throw any curve balls at us better known as Black Trench Coat. Both have their merits and both have their own unique fun qualities.

What I wanna talk about today though is I was in a game of Pathfinder with some friends and the GM sort of set up this elaborate heist where we enter an ancient underground Drow city with the sole intention of finding and brutally murdering the cousin of one of our main characters as a side quest. The GM has explicitly made it clear she wants it done in a Black Trench Coat style but the game itself and our own particular style has is leaning more towards a Pink Mohawk style, and I can't help but ask that particular question: Are all RPGs even built for a heist style game?

Now, I get it, not all game sessions go the same way, even with the same GM, and each TTRPG has its own unique flavor and given enough time and energy and effort you can try to shoehorn in any scene into any system. But, is that necessarily the best thing to be doing? I ask because I never really associate Pathfinder and by extension Dungeons & Dragons with the heist concept. It's not outside the realm of possibility given you have enough skills and abilities but is the system itself necessarily geared for it? Most of the players I've dealt with and we're talking near 100% have characters built to kill kill kill. They're made to fill out a traditional party role such as tank, healer, spell caster, etc., so is it possible to take this style group and put them in a scene where they're required to be both stealthy, pull of disguise, and in general limit fighting to small ambushes instead of dramatic confrontations?

I'm of the belief that you can pull off almost any style of game so long as everyone's on the same page, but I'm also aware that most characters have a specialty and focus and trying to squeeze them into a particular box both robs the player of some agency and takes away what they're built to do in order to fit a particular story. Another example would be the game I ran Saturday night (I figure Glyphstone will be in here eventually so hi Glyph you remember this one) where the session wasn't really meant for any of the characters but it was a starting session so I feel it went ok. We've got a pilot, a medic, an engineer, and a security officer/face. That session wasn't really aimed at any particular person but it was clearly an engineering heavy one so our engineer got a lot of lead spotlight. I highly doubt a game about space truckers will do for a space heist anytime soon. I could probably shoehorn one in but I'm not planning to (or maybe I will to give Glyph anxiety).

My point is that after today, it's really reinforced my feelings on the whole situation regarding what is and isn't best for my players and myself as a GM. I have a ton of stories (most of them shit) that I would love to tell, but I'm not going to ever tell them because either the game isn't the right fit or it's not the type of story I can find players for. I'm not going to force someone into a story they don't want to be in, no matter how much I want to see them in it.

I'd love to get thoughts and opinions on this. I know Pathfinder is a rather robust system but is it the best for a heist? How do you feel about certain stories not being a good fit for a game? Did you even read this far? Am I just ranting to the void? I probably am. Anyway, hope you found something to think about.

Kisses,
GloomCookie ♥

[TheGlyphstone]

I'd say you could definitely run a heist scenario in D&D. In fact, its roots as a loot based dungeon crawler were very heist-ish in principles; you only got XP for loot, injuries took a long time to heal, and magic was carefully rationed. So it ended up as a weird hybrid of trenchcoat (avoid fights whenever possible) and Mohawk (march animals and hirelings over suspected traps).

Many of the concepts you'd use in Shadowrun can actually be translated over relatively intact as well - instead of a Street Sam, Adept, and Mage you've got a Fighter, Rogue, and Wizard. You'll be raiding an evil castle or wizards sanctum instead of a corpo office building, but there will be guards, traps, and if the target is wealthy enough magical defenses (which covers both magic-magic and stuff that would be handled by tech in SR). You'll see many of the same problems, like how the Sammy Fighter has horrific Stealth abilities, and some different ones (a Mage who casts carefully can spam spells with abandon where a Wizard/Sorcerer has to avoid going dry on slots too soon).

If you drop a heist scenario on a party built for kill kill kill, obviously you'll run into issues. But the infrastructure to run such a campaign is definitely there.

[Oniya]

I used to have a TTRPG group that would trade off systems and GMs fairly regularly.  We played D&D (2nd ed, since we were tired of buying books), Amber, Shadowrun, Paranoia, World of Darkness (plus the Internet splats), and I've probably missed a few.  We had 'combat-assumed' campaigns turn into elaborate ruses, and (less often) 'negotiation-assumed' campaigns turn into 'Hey, we could actually march on this town...'

I think the only limitation on Systems and Scenarios is that brought in by the players and GM.

[SummerDawn]

I think she actually got sexier in a proper uniform but that's just me...

Troi, Kira, Seven, T'Pol. They all got sexier thrown into the series specific Starfleet uniform.

I never understood the need for the catsuit type uniforms they threw on some of the main female characters. Kira's they tried to make it fit with an overall military esthetic by making the other Bajoran uniforms similar so I'll give DS9 a pass on her's. But the other three. No.