The Original Starfleet Battles Board/Miniatures Game is hidden in the documentation!

[SlowhandKev]

The ST: SC PC game was based on the Starfleet Battles Miniatures Board Game that I played as a teen in the early 80's when PC's were just a rumor. We used to have Mega Battles among ourselves using Star Trek Ship Models and it was insane. You can find everything at programfilesx86)/steam/steamapps/common/StarTrekStarfleetCommandGoldEdition/SFB and the Counters, Rulebook and Ship System Displays are there for you to print and enjoy.
The fantastic ST inspired Apple II classic 5.25 Floppy DIsc game The Warp Factor from SSI was based on the Starfleet Battles game system.
You're all going to laugh but if you print those pdf's out, get some cool ship miniatures and play this you're going to have a blast. Worth the price of the Steam game just for this...

[kalnaren]

That edition is actually called the Cadet Training Handbook, and is basically a very, very very slimmed down version of Star Fleet Battles.

Still, if anyone wants to see what some of the underlying "crunch" is behind Starfleet Command, there's part of your source material.

Star Fleet Battles is a remarkable board game, but it's just too hard to get on the table these days. I never branched out beyond Basic Set simply because I never had any opponents willing to learn the rules enough to play it.

[baldrick]

Federation Commander is similar but more streamlined.

[kalnaren]

It is indeed, but I never enjoyed it as much as SFB. Partly because the rulebook for it is terrible by comparison, it does away with fitting anything into different parts of the SFU timeline, and it constantly makes references that pull the player out of the game context. For a "modern" game its production quality is also severely lacking.

On the personal preference side they also got rid of some of the rules I really enjoyed (like different drone types), though I understand why they did.

I do like the laminate ship cards though.

[KOOLLAYDTAC]

I was reading this over and thought I'd drop this for those interested.

I was curious if anyone actually played this online lately given the state of the world today. I found this so far. So I just thought I'd share it with the rest of you.

SFB Online.
https://www.sfbonline.com/index.jsp

Dropping this game because they do have a variety of workshop content dedicated to Star Trek including some SFB content. I haven't tested any of it yet so can't say how much of it works or not, but the game itself is worth it if you catch it on a Steam sale.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/286160/Tabletop_Simulator/

SFB PDF's.

http://www.starfleetgames.com/sfb/sfin/index.shtml

http://www.mit.edu/~locutus/SFB/rules.pdf

http://www.starfleetgames.com/documents/Module_MO3.pdf

That's just a few. There are more if you Google star fleet battles pdf in search for it.

I found some old school Star Trek RPG's on this web site, but sadly they don't have SFB or Federation Commander up on it as of yet.
https://www.theoldsystem.com/downloads.php?content=%2FforDownloads%2FTabletops%2FStar+Trek+RPGs

This was a discussion thread on it I ran across which I found rather interesting in terms of kind of getting an update on what's been going on with the game.

https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/is-star-fleet-battles-officially-dead.299611/

If anyone has any information and/or links they'd like to share please by all means feel free to do so. I'm sure it'd be greatly appreciated.

The closest I think I ever had seen anything come to this online was the old SFA Map game we had in both the SFA and SFC community among all our respective Fleets.

Now I never played Federation Commander myself and I'll probably be curious to look in to it, but I did try out SFB with some friends back in the day when I was still in my teens. I actually enjoyed it and sadly I did not get to fully learn the entire game past the newbie phase of it. Largely in part like with a lot of friends some of mine got their first taste of some of that tail-a-tang and completely lost their minds after that. lol That's another story though. lol

Point being when it came to that game or any RPG's for that matter I ever looked in to I think the issue I had was the same that a lot of people have and just could never find anyone to play them with. So if any of you are ever interested in revisiting this game and looking for people to play with online then I'm game and up for an old farts game night of talking story mates. lol Have a good one everyone and stay safe.

[kalnaren]

I always wanted to pick up more modules for SFB, but the lack of anyone to play it with meant that never happened.

SFB's got a couple of problems it can't break out of.

Obviously all of this is "IMO", so take it for what it is: Some random internet dude's opinion.

First, it has some very severe restrictions on the license that really hurt it -particularily with the art. This isn't in any way a slight on Adam Turner (who does most of the current art for the game and does a fantastic job), the problem is that the overall aesthetic is beyond antiquated. I love spaceships and spaceship games.. they bring out my inner child more than any other genre.. and even I find the art doesn't stoke my imagination. Compare the cover of Star Fleet Battles, Captain's Edition (1998, IIRC):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Fleet_Battles#/media/File:SFB_Basic_Set.jpg

With Renegade Legion: Leviathans, almost a decade earlier:

https://cf.geekdo-images.com/wnJEHf6WzC54zu-rc1dg2Q__opengraph_left/img/y7H5x_kzhZ-wDbMMZ-RNQBiKxmM=/fit-in/445x445/filters:strip_icc()/pic818306.jpg

To me the RL one just oozes thematic presence and the SFB one seems very simple and generic (again, not a slight on Adam Turner).

This old aesthetic design is present throughout the entire game, and indeed the box cover is actually the only place we even really see any art. I won't bog this down in a 'game vs. game' comparison, but look at any part of the components in RL:L compared to SFB, and they're just better across the board. The game does such a better job of inspiring the imagination.. SFB is incredibly bland by comparison. The manual cover itself is just a bright yellow page with some text and a basic, front-view line drawing of an old style connie. The front of the Leviathan manual is full colour in the same consistent design as the box cover, and I guarantee you if I asked a starship junkie which board game s/he'd rather play based just on the art, 10 times out of 10 they'd say RL.

SFB did finally get a countersheet update so the counters aren't just two-colour anymore, but that was only for Basic Set, and only because FC did. SVC said they're not doing it for Advanced Missions or any other module.

Another problem with SFB is that SVC maintains an iron grip on it and seems to be flat out hostile to any external suggestions about ways to improve or modernise the game. I've read a few things over the years on the SFU forums about different ways to update SFB and get new blood into the game.. and they're universally shut down in an instant. The complexity of the game itself isn't necessarily a problem -people getting into SFB know it's complex. The problem here is that it does nothing to help itself (that Damage Allocation system is crap). Take a look at a game like Saganami Island Tactical Simulator. It's a very detailed starship combat game set in David Weber's Honor Harrington universe.. that uses full blown, three dimensional Newtonian physics, with three dimension movement and fire arcs. Mechanically I'd say the game is more complex than SFB (SFB is complex because of the number of rules, not because those rules are hard).. and yet Ad Astra Games did a phenominal job of designing good, modern play aids to significantly streamline the complexities of Newtonian math to something not just manageable, but enjoyable. SITS is complex, but when you're playing it, you're thinking about tactics. Not rules.

SVC's idea with Federation Commander was to strip out a lot of the heavy paperwork aspects of SFB and make it into a streamlined game. Mechanically I think he did a decent job... the problem for me comes right back to theme. He still has to maintain the same old, tired aesthetic. And he stripped out a lot of the nifty things that actually connected the Star Fleet Battles game to the living, breathing Starfleet Universe it takes place in. While mechanically FC is pretty good, it doesn't feel like it has any real thematic connections. And that's a problem for a game relying on 1960's aesthetics. Again.. it does nothing to stoke the fires of the imagination.. and that's a problem.

I think FC has some other issues that will keep it from being a great game, but that's another conversation ("FEDERATION COMMANDER is the exciting new full-color fast-playing game of starship combat" -full colour? Really? In 2005? Awesome, how modern of you). FC feels like a game that was made for SFB players that don't have time to play SFB anymore, not for gamers new to the game.

I think SFB could potentially have some real life if it broke away from the Star Fleet Universe, got out of the Paramount licensing restrictions, modernised a bit, and went with a completely new IP that didn't feel familiar and alien at the same time (I don't think the quasi-Star Trek setting helps it any for prospective players, despite the fact the SFU is actually quite interesting and very internally consistent). As one of the posters said in that thread you linked, FC is a distillation of SFB.. not a new game that seeks to accomplish the same thing with modern mechanics. And IMO that's really what SFB needs. Don't tell that to SVC though...

Sorry for the ramble :/