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Dwarfs

2018-10-02T12:09:15Z

2600:1700:19C0:2760:1D8A:AD5:F3B2:D482: Assuming no one else caught this during the initial moves

#REDIRECT [[Dwarf]]

Discworld

2018-10-02T12:08:32Z

2600:1700:19C0:2760:1D8A:AD5:F3B2:D482: /* Dwarfs */

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{{Topquote|A world, and a mirror of worlds.|Terry Prachett}}

One of the most beloved book series' on [[/tg/]], '''Discworld''' is a series of fantasy novels written by the late Sir Terry Pratchett (who seems to have been a fan of Warhammer!) set on the titular Discworld: a round, flat world carried on the back of four elephants who in turn stand on the back of a turtle that swims through the cosmos. The Discworld novels do not have a single core protagonist across the entire series: it has a variety of characters starring over the course of the books. Over time certain "series" with the same cast and sometimes setting emerged, creating several parallel (and sometimes overlapping) storylines.

More than just your standard fantasy novel, Discworld plays with the conventions of storytelling and how people and stories shape each other. The writing is one of incredible wordplay, going from clever plays on words that more than once have been plot points to forehead-slappingly dumb puns. The books also include large amounts of footnotes to serve as worldbuilding, a joke or both. Some of these footnotes can take up the majority of a page or have footnotes of their own.

Another notable thing is that over time the Discworld began to escape [[Medieval Stasis]]. Towers for semaphore telegraphs are built so that messages can be transmitted at previously unheard of speeds, paper money and postage stamps are invented, the newspaper and journalism take form and even the steam locomotive takes to the field. Meanwhile, magic is present but not commonly used, and over the course of the books the young generation of wizards build Hex, a magical supercomputer who can do in hours what would normally take days or weeks for a human wizard.

Furthermore, the books carry a great mix of gravitas and comedy, making them both poingnant and funny at the game time. All these factors have added up to a great series of fiction that has been, is, and will be held close to the hearts of many a reader and nerd for years to come.

==Species on the Disc==
Aside from [[humans]], who appear to be in the majority, there are a number of other species living there as well.

===[[Dwarf]]s===
Discworld dwarfs are of the standard model: short, bearded, work in mines, enjoy booze and if you upset them they'll chop your knees off. There are a few differences though: their culture seems to contain a few influences based on Judaism in the form of the Grags, scholars on the laws of the dwarfs and seen as a kind of secular rabbis. Another quirk about them is that dwarfs seem to be a single-gendered species. Of course there are female dwarfs, but once the kids are off breastfeeding there is no such thing as "women's work" among dwarfs. Sexual dimorphism is incredibly discouraged in dwarf society, which means that dwarf courtship rituals are all about finding out whether that dwarf you fancy actually has bits compatible with yours. However, through the influences of Ankh-Morpork a small but growing number of dwarfs want to "come out" as being female and embrace their gender. While a number of the cityborn dwarfs see no problem with this the older generations and the conservative dwarfs who live in the mountains see this as an abomination upon their culture, decrying the female dwarfs as ''ha'ak'' (exact meaning unknown, roughly translated as "not real dwarfs").

===[[Trolls]]===
Discworld trolls are not creatures of flesh and blood. Instead they consist of metamorphorical rock: rock that takes the form of the stones and minerals around them. Trolls are nocturnal because of their biology: they have silicon brains that heat up when exposed to warmth, inhibiting their ability to think. This means that they're more intelligent and faster at night while being dumb and sluggish during the day. Likewise, trolls living up in the mountains become less intelligent when going down to warmer places like Ankh-Morpork.When a troll brain is sufficiently chilled the troll can become extremely intelligent, their silicon brains essentially serving as computer chips. Trolls can freeze to death this way, but they'd die long after any creature of living flesh would have perished. While trolls are more or less immortal, growing their entire lives. As they get older and bigger they become more sluggish and more inclined to sit around and think (which is why trolls call getting old "getting philosophical"). Truly ancient trolls are the size and shape of mountains, eroding in interesting ways and [[JoJo's Bizarre Adventure|eventually get so lost in thought that they just never come back]].

Because of this biology their alcohol is hideously toxic to humans and will likely devour the glass it is served in as well. Likewise, the troll diet consists mostly of rocks. To chew their way through this they have diamond teeth, who are very valued by humans and dwarfs alike.

Trolls hold that once in a while a troll is born whose body consist of nothing but diamond. This physique helps immensely to cool down the troll's brain, making them extremely intelligent even when standing in the burning sun. These trolls are seen as semi-mythical beings, and when one is born they are destined to be kings amongst trolls. They all carry the same name, though it always refers to a single individual: Mr. Shine. [[meme|Him diamond]].

===Igors===
Technically human, the Igors are a clan distinct enough to notice. As their name suggests they are based on the hunchbacked assistants of monsters and madmen from the Universal and Hammer horror movies: they lisp, they limp a bit, look quite ugly, help in their master's unwholsome experiments and so on. They are extremely skilled at appearing behind you as you call them, opening doors just before you knock them, all doors they open creak (they like to cultivate this), finding whatever unusual materials their master might need, and sensing thunderstorms days in advance. On top of this they tend to act like butlers as well: they clean (except for cobwebs, they cultivate those), cook and run errands. The code of an Igor is simple:

* Never question the master
* Never pass judgement
* Never grumble

Igor freelancers are rare because they like to work for people like vampires, mad scientists and the nobility of Überwald (the Disc's version of eastern Europe). They can be quite the traditional sort, insisting on calling their employers "marthter" or "mithtreth" and like to generally indulge in the traditional things you'd expect from an Igor. They serve loyally but up to a point: when the angry mob comes a'knocking they will hightail it out of there with no regards for their master's safety. Vampires are a personal favorite to work for, because of their employer's schedule they have plenty of time to indulge in their calling: surgery.

Igors are immensely skilled with needle and thread, being able to patch up pretty much any wound that did not kill someone (or when it did, make it look like it didn't). This makes them incredibly valued as surgeons, being able to reattach limbs, stitch up anything up to and including decapitation and know how to improve the human body. Regions where Igors are common have something like a public health care system involving them: all injuries an Igor can heal are patched up free of charge. However, upon death (and Igors somehow know exactly when this is) they come knocking, asking to havest any organs they might like in return for whatever procedure was done. This is done with the utmost respect for the dead, and once an Igor is done the body will look none the worse (not worse than dead, at least). Refusal is unheard of, mainly because if this is done the Igor will just shrug and leave, and no Igor will ever help this family again.

Igors are really into body modifications, but not on the level of [[Franken Fran]]. They will always look for ways to improve the body, whether through their own handiwork or by ways of transplants. They can remove a damaged kidney and replace it with a fully functioning one with ease and good survival rates for patients, which is surprising given the technology level of the Disc. When an Igor dies they are completely taken apart so that the parts can, in essence, be given a second life. Even brains are removed if possible, so that when someone suffers braindeath their dead brain can be replaced with another and, well, you keep meeting old friends like this.

The Igors are one big clan. When you mention one they immediately know which Igor you are talking about (but can get annoyed when other people don't get this). Female Igors exist as well and are called Igorina. Unlike their male counterparts who are quite hideous to behold Igorinas are beautiful, with only a few stichings in unobtrusive places to show their allegiance. This makes them quite the catch for men, but the same goes for male Igors. Young ladies seem to like them quite a bit despite their looks; it is hinted at that this is because of their huge, ahem, skill sets.

==Locations==
===Ankh-Morpork===
''Quanti Canicula Ille In Fenestra''<br>
- The motto of the city of Ankh-Morpork

The largest city on the Discworld, the capital of mercantile, a cultural melting pot and a hive where scum and villainy rule by law. Something of a bizarre mix of London, Florence, and Amsterdam, the Big Wahoonie (as it is sometimes called) is located at where the fertile Sto Plains meet the Circle Sea by ways of the River Ankh. This river is one of the vilest, unhealthy, life-bearing (which in case of a river like this is NOT a good thing) and toughest bodies of water in fiction. The sludge is tough enough to draw a chalk line on, you can walk across if you keep the pace up, no ship devised by the hands of man can sail its waters and the bloody thing tends to catch fire in the summer. Still, the people of the city are proud of their very own River of Life.

The founding of Ankh-Morpork is shrouded in legend. Some sources claim [[Rome|it was founded by twin brothers raised by a hippopotamus]]. The animal is the royal animal of Ankh. Eight stone hippopotamoi decorate the Brass Bridge, and legend states that if the city is ever in danger they will come to life and run away. Another legend states that long ago there was a great flood. An ark was built to house two of every animal on it. When all the dung from fourty days and fourty nights from these animals was thrown overboard it created the land that the city would be founded on.

Ankh-Morpork is currently an oligarchy. It used to be a kingdom, but the last king, Lorenzo the Kind, was overthrown and subsequently executed. He was said to have been monsterous and "very fond of children" (though no details were given). His executioner, Stoneface Vimes, wanted to introduce democracy to the city. [[Fail|This was voted against and Old Stoneface himself got executed.]] After this the city would be run by an official called the Patrician as part of a non-hereditary oligarchic system, appointed by the various powers in the city. In practice these patricians were just as bad as their royal predecessors, but at least they could be more easily done away with when they were total fuckups (which was often).

The current Patrician, Havelock Vetinari, decided to do things differently. Inheriting a city that was corrupt and crumbling he began to train it like a dog. Thieves were allowed to found their own guild and work semi-legally (they have to carry ID cards may only steal from people within certain quotas), the Seamstresses (hem hem) organised and even the guild of Assassins was allowed to function in the open. The guilds take violation of the internal rules very seriously and are allowed to punish transgressors that would otherwise be tried by the city. Guilds were made clear that a lower, but continuous source of revenue is better than large chunks of it laced with daggers in the back. This allowed the city to not only grow, but also prosper. Nobody (whether they are in power or not) likes Vetinari, but they prefer him in charge rather than someone under the thumb of a rival guild. Meanwhile, Lord Vetinari acts completely in the interst of the city with next to no ego, has no vices he indulges in, does not act like a despot despite being one and fully understands and acts on the human desire to have tomorrow be just like today.

Unless you're a mime of course, in which case Vetinari will have you hung upside down in the scorpion pit.

Under Vetinari's rule the Pax Morporkia turned from "Resist and we'll kill you" that was common under the monarchy to "Resist and we'll call in your mortgage". Ankh-Morpork has no standing army and instead relies on being the primary business partner of the nations around them, allowing the city to financially ruin anyone trying to invade them. The city has also started to see a large influx of migrants: humans, dwarfs, troll, gnomes and even the undead flock to the city in droves. While they generate some problems, above all they generate revenue. Vetinari has been very open to this growth, claiming that alloys are stronger.
===Lancre===
A small kingdom up in the ramtops (the mountains near the center of the world). For the most part it's the Shire if it had been put up on a mountain Plateau, mostly home to simple set in their ways folk as well as a trio of witches.

==The Books==
The Discworld series consists primarily of two series of books: the main series and the young adult novels. The former is the series of 34 books that people will think of when hearing "Discworld", and contains the most famous stories. The young adult novels are a half-dozen books aimed at younger audiences. Then there are the various spinoffs like a pair of children's books, the illustrated version of two other books and a variety of short stories and supportive material. Most of the books are parodying a specific thing first and foremost with some general asides.

===Main series===
====The Color of Magic====
Target of Satire: General Fantasy.

Debut of Rincewind. The world's first tourist, Twoflower, shows up in Ankh-Morpork. Rincewind, a failed wizard, is tasked with protecting him. This book is notable for being a parody of various tropes common in the fantasy genre like [[Vancian]] magic and parodies things like [[D&D]], Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, [[Conan the Barbarian]], [[H.P. Lovecraft]]'s work and more. This book is meant to set up the world of the Disc and, as a result, feels like only half of a greater story, part two of which is...

====The Light Fantastic====
Focus of Satire: General Fantasy.

It's a direct sequel to the first book, the first and last time this happens. This one has less of the world-building and single chapter adventures, replacing them instead with a more singular storyline. Makes fun of the fantasy genre as a whole again; Conan the Barbarian, the maiden in distress trope, the occasional dig at [[Tolkien]] and much more. Theoretically you COULD skip book one and go straight to this (they sum the major information points up, and this one is, marginally, better) but, regardless, the first book is still a good, fun read, as is this one.

====Equal Rites====
Focus of Satire: Gender Politics.

The debut of Granny Weatherwax, a witch who accompanies the little girl Eskarina to Unseen University in Ankh-Morpork to learn magic.

====Mort====
The debut of Death as a character. Death feels like he should take on an apprentice and picks the farm boy Mort, which causes trouble when he tasks Mort to gather the soul of a princess. Mort doesn't want her to die so he saves her, causing all sorts of trouble.

====Sourcery====
Focus of Satire: General Fantasy

The eighth son of an eighth son is a wizard. The eighth son of a wizard however is a Sourcerer, a wizard squared. Being an entity of intense magical power the Sourcerer Coin attempts to take over the world at behest of the spirit of his father, who inhabits the boy's magical staff.

====Wyrd Sisters====
Focus of Satire: Shakespeare (specifically Macbeth).

The debut of the Lancre Witches. King Verence of Lancre is murdered by his cousin Leonal Felmet. Felmet takes the throne and eventually turns on the witches, which is, as he learns, a very bad idea.

====Pyramids====
Focus of Satire: Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece

A standalone book (or part of an aborted sub series). Prince Teppic of Djelibeybi finishes his education at the Guild of Assassins in Ankh-Morpork and learns that his father has passed on, making him the new king of a heavily Egyptian-inspired kingdom. He travels back home only to find the court dominated by the ancient high priest Dios.

====Guards! Guards!====
Focus of Satire: Police, monarchy and Dragon focused fantasy.

Debut of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch. Carrot Ironfoundersson is a dwarf who isn't. An orphan found and raised by dwarfs in the mountains, at the urging of his father Carrot goes to Ankh-Morpork to join the Ankh-Morpork City Night Watch, an esteemed and honorable institute. Or so he's told: in practice there's only three people in the Night Watch: the alcoholic Captain Vimes, the bumbling Sergeant Coolon and the petty thief Corporal Nobbs. Possessing an immense sense of duty and a matching heap of charisma, Carrot and the other watchmen get dragged into a plot involving a shadowy group summoning a dragon in an attempt to install a puppet ruler on the throne of the city.

====Eric====
Focus of Satire: Faust.

The shortest of the main line Discworld books, the titular demonologist summon what he thinks to be a demon, only to get Rincewind bound to him.

====Moving Pictures====
Focus of Satire: Holywood

Debut of CMOT Dibbler as a major character and lays the foundation for the Wizards, as well as Gaspaud the Wonder Dog. Alchemists in Ankh-Morpork discover how to capture moving images and project them onto a screen. An entire industry dedicated to making these moving pictures pops up in the Holy Wood, located not too far from the city. But the threat to this new industry is not just because of Dibbler's business practices...

====Reaper Man====
Debut of the Auditors of Reality. The agents of the cosmic bureaucracy, the Auditors of Reality, decide that Death has become too human and is sentenced to live amongst mortals. But with Death out of the way nobody dies, which floods the world with life. This turns out to be a Very Bad Thing when Ankh-Morpork is beset by a living shopping mall.

====Witches Abroad====
Focus of Satire: Vacations and Fairy Tales.

Granny Weatherwax, Nanny Ogg and Magrat Garlick travel to Genua (not-quite <s>New Orleans</s> Genoa) in an attempt to, for a change, prevent a servant girl from marrying a prince. While doing so they come into conflict with Lilith, a woman Granny Weatherwax knows all too well.

====Small Gods====
Focus of Satire: Religion.

A standalone book. The Omnian Empire (which is sort of like if the Spanish Inquisition was run by [[Paranoia|Friend Computer]]) holds that the worship of the Great God Om comes above all. The novice Brutha finds a turtle dropped by an eagle, but is surprised to find that the turtle talks. Om has turned into a turtle because the people's faith has slowly been draining from Om into the church itself, meaning that he lost all his power and has been turned into this state. The book is infamous for fucking up the timeline: in ''Pyramids'' Omnia is as described in this book, but in later books it is far different, with changes that could not have happened in the mere years between the books.

====Lords and Ladies====
Focus of Satire: Shakespeare (specifically A Mid Summer night's Dream)

The Lancre Witches come into conflict with the Fair Folk, who enter the Discworld from their own parasitic universe. This happens right around Magrat's impeding wedding with the king of Lancre, making the conflict all the more difficult.

====Men at Arms====
Focus of Satire: Policing in a diverse society, [[Firearm]]s in Fantasy.

Debut of Angua and Detrius as a major character. Captain Vimes is going to marry and retire from the watch within the week. Before he goes though he has to train three new minority recruits he was forced to take on by Lord Vetinari: Detrius the troll, Cuddy the dwarf and Angua the w-, eh, that should be obvious. Meanwhile, a retired assassin deduces that corporal Carrot might very well be the heir to the throne of the city and hatches a plot to put Carrot there, all the while using an ancient and banned object.

====Soul Music====
Focus of Satire: Rock and Roll.

Debut of Susan. The elf-ish Llamedosian musician Imp y Celyn chafes at the rigid ways of making music in his native village and decides to make his way to Ankh-Morpork to make a living with his music there. After some initial hurdles and the breaking of his old instrument he buys a guitar from a mysterious shop that disappears and appears all over the place. The instrument seems to have a mind of its own, and while it plays some very powerful music it takes a toll on his psyche. Meanwhile, Death's granddaughter Suzan puts the powers in her blood that were passed down by her grandfather (somehow...) to the test as she tries to save Imp from himself.

====Interesting Times====
Focus of Satire: East Asia.

Rincewind is forced by the wizards to go to the Agatean Empire, located on the Counterweight Continent. Here he encounters old friends and is pulled into a rebellion against the overbearing empire, very much against his will.

====Maskerade====
Focus of Satire: The Phantom of the Oprah.

Phantom of the Opera redux. Now that Magrat is a queen Granny and Nanny need a third witch to fill out their coven. Their eye falls on Agnes Nitt, a sizable young woman with an amazing singing voice, who has recently moved to Ankh-Morpork to join the opera. The people there are very much impressed with her voice, but finds herself an understudy to the much less talented, intelligent and sizable Christine. While Agnes doesn't want anything to do with witchery, she cannot help but think like a witch when faced with the mysterious and murderous Phantom. Of the opera.

====Feet of Clay====
Focus of Satire: Police Procedurals and Whodunits.

Debut of Cheery Littlebottom. The City Watch is larger and more effective than ever. Their first major case is a pair of murders that may or may not involve [[golem]]s, the clay automatons working in the city. At the same time the Watch has to deal with the poisoning of Lord Vetinari, which puts the city in a delicate position.

====Hogfather====
Focus of Satire: Christmas.

Susan has taken up a job as a governess, trying to live a normal live despite all the supernatural things happening around her. Meanwhile, the Auditors hatch a plot to have the Hogfather, the Discworld equivalent of Santa, assassinated. The plan works, sort of, and now Death has to take his place. Regardless of what she wants Suzan is roped into the investigation of what happened to the Hogfather and ends up emproiled in a plot involving all kinds of supernatural being and a not supernatural but not any less monstrous assassin.

====Jingo====
Focus of Satire: Nationalism, Racism, Militarism and the Middle East.

The island of Leshp rises out of the sea, smack dab between Ankh-Morpork and the not-Arabic Klatch. When diplomatic efforts go awry it is up to Commander Vimes of the City Watch to keep the peace and find the would-be assassin of the Klatchian ambassador.

====The Last Continent====
Focus of Satire: Bladdy 'Strayla mate!

Rincewind is not dead, and in fact ended up on the continent of XXXX, where he does his usual running away from people who try to murder him. Meanwhile, the wizards try to find a cure for the Librarian's condition that interferes with his morphic field, causing him to switch into random animals and objects every time he sneezes. They discover that the only one who can help them with this would be Rincewind, and they set out on a quest to return him safely.

====Carpe Jugulum====
Focus of Satire: Vampire Fiction

Aside from their usual weaknesses, [[vampire]]s seem to have a psychological need to set up things for would-be heroes to easily slay them: curtains that can be pulled aside easily, objects that can be used as improvised holy icons, chairs with sharp legs that can be used as stakes and so on. A new generation of vampires, the de Magpyr family from Überwald decides to adapt to this and set up shop in Lancre. This pits them against the witches and a soft-spoken Omnian reverend, the former of which know all too well how stories work.

====The Fifth Elephant====
Commander Vimes is sent to Überwald on a diplomatic mission to attend the coronation of the Low King. With the theft of the Scone of Stone however this is made difficult, for without the Scone there can be no coronation. Meanwhile, Angua's past catches up to her and she needs to decide whether to return to her old life or stay with Carrot and the Watch.

====The Truth====
Focus of Satire: Journalism.

A standalone book. Scribe William de Worde teams up with a bunch of dwarfs to invent the printing press and essentially create the first newspaper. Meanwhile, the people who made an attempt to dethrone the Patrician return with a plot to replace him with a body double and hire Mr Pin and Mr Tulip (pretty much the Discworld version of Jules and Vincent from Pulp Fiction) to help them to this end.

====Thief of Time====
The Auditors of Realty make an attempt to stop time. They employ clockmaker Jeremy Clockson to build a clock that, when turned on last time, stopped time and shattered history. The History Monks, a monastic tradition dedicated to the protection of time, apprentice the know-itall student Lobsang Ludd to the sweeper Lu-Tze, who is far, FAR more than he lets on. Lobsang discovers that he has a knack for working with the Procrastinators, machines that can manipulate time. The two of them are sent to Ankh-Morpork by the abbot of the History Monks to discover what made the Procrastinators go haywire. All the while, Death attempts to recruit Suzan and his fellow Horsemen to ride out to not end the world, but save it instead.

====Night Watch====
Focus of Satire: Political Revolution and Les Miserables.

After an event in Thief of Time Commander Vimes is cast thirty years back in time, alongside the murderer that he was chasing. Vimes ends up taking the place of his old mentor John Keel and begins to take a pivotal role in the civil war against the mad Patrician Lord Winder. It's like ''Les Mis'' meets time travel, except Valjean is a psychopath and Javert is actually kind of likeable.

====Monstrous Regiment====
Focus of Satire: Military Humor, Women dressing up as men to serve in the military.

Oliver Perks wants to join the army so that he can find out what happened to his brother. He has a rough time there not just because of the hardships his country is going through, but because he's actually a girl named Polly. She finds herself amongst a motley group of fellow soldiers lead by the naive but dutiful Lieutenant Blouse and the hard around the edges but very protective Sergeant Jackrum.

====Going Postal====
Focus of Satire: The Post Office, Communications

Debut of Moist von Lipwig. Albert Spangler is caught for theft, tried, convicted, hanged, buried and receives an orbituary. Moist von Lipwig, what he is actually called, wakes up in the Patrician's office instead. Vetinari makes him an offer: take a second round on the rope or become the new Postmaster of the defunct Ankh-Morpork Post Office. He is assigned a parole officer (a golem) and reluctantly sets out to do his new job. Moist is a man who not only takes refuge in audacity but builds up its defenses, raises an army of shooting targets, and makes war on logic. The new AMPO turns out to be a success, but this pits him against the powerful Grand Trunk, the company running the semaphores. The Grand Trunk does not like competition ruining their bottom line, which consists of ruthlessly exploiting the workers and ruining the company's working culture.

====Thud!====
Focus of Satire: Race Relations, generations old grudges and policing around said issues in a multicultural society.

Right before the anniversary of the Battle of Koom Valley a dwarfish ''grag'' gets his head smashed in. On the scene a troll club is found, driving up the tensions between trolls and dwarfs. Worse, the Watch is forced to employ a new recruit: Salacia von Humpeding, who is a vampire. While investigating the murder Vimes hurts his hand, and is starts to itch strangely. With the threat of an all-out war looming over them Vimes and the Watch have to solve one of their most important cases yet.

====Making Money====
Focus of Satire: Money (duh) and Economics, Banking

After his success at the AMPO Vetinari assigns Moist von Lipwig to the Royal Mint. He gets to meet the majority shareholder, a clever old lady who immediately makes Moist out for the crook that he is. She dies not soon afterwards, leaving her shares to her dog Mr Fusspot, leaves the dog to Moist... as well as a significant contract on his head if something were to happen to the dog. Of course, the woman's family is not happy with this and try their very best to get Moist out of business or life, whichever comes first. Unfortunately for them, Moist too tries his very best to avoid this fate.

====Unseen Academicals====
Romeo and Juliet... WITH FOOTBALL! The Patrician tries to civilize the old game of Foot-the-Ball, complete with the traditional Foot-The-Ball hooliganry. The wizards end up getting involved, but they require a coach. The UU servant Mr. Nutt helps them out with this, but he turns out to be far more than meets the eye.

====Snuff====
Commander Vimes is dragged off on a holiday to the countryside. Being all to aware of what happenes the last time he went on one (see The Fifth Elephant), he is none too surprise to find that there was a murder. But nobody in the area seems to care on account of the victim being a goblin. Vimes however disagrees: a crime is a crime and criminals must be punished. He finds no allies in the area, with the local police actually working against him. But this does not stop Vimes, putting him in what is one of the more heavy-handed stories in the series. [[Wat|And Nobby gets a girlfriend]].

====Raising Steam====
Moist von Lipwig is once again given a new job: help develop the train line from Bonk all the way via Zemphis, Sto Lat and Ankh-Morpork to Quirm. This to the ire of Dwarfish fundamentalists who try to saboutage the rail line in every possible way in an attempt to dethrone the Low King, who is currently in Quirm for an intenational summit. Moist is charged with bringing the Low King home safely, but few things go as planned.

====The Shepherd's Crown====
The last book Terry Pratchett wrote before he dies. [[meme|mayherestinpeace]]. Anyway, The book begin with the death of Granny Weatherwax. [[meme|maysherestinpeace]]. Her death not only felt by everyone in Lancre, but also weakened the barrier of the world that allows the lovecraftian Elves to invade the world. Tiffany the young witch will had to stop the elves invasion.

==Characters==
The Discworld books have a vast amount of characters spread all over them, and the books frequently switch between points of view of the various characters. It's not as bad as [[A Song of Ice and Fire]], but there's still a massive cast spread throughout the books, many of whom are recurring characters. The characters below are sorted by sub-series.

===Ankh-Morpork City Watch===
"Fabricati Diem, Punc."
-AMCW motto.
* '''Samuel Vimes''' is a cop through and through. He became captain during the decline of the Night Watch, which drove him to drink. During the events involving a dragon making a grab for power Vimes met Lady Sybil Ramkin, one of the foremost nobles in the city. They fell in love and eventually got married, launching him to the top of the social ladder. This did little for his cynicism (but did cure his tendencies as a drunkard) as he now finds that he is the establishment that he opposes. It's all quite zen. Over the course of the books Vimes develops a reputation as an incorruptible badass who arrested Vetinari and lived, arrested two armies for attempted murder, fought werewolves with his bare hands and (while not a lot of people know this) bested an ancient demon of vengeance in a battle of wills. He is the living example that being [[Lawful Good]] does not mean that you have to be nice.
:* '''Sybil Ramkin''' is the only remaining scion of the Ramkin family, one of the foremost real estate owners of the city. This means that her wealth is well into the millions, making her one of the richest, if not THE richest, people in the city. A fair deal of money goes to her hobby and calling: the breeding of swamp dragons. She is an authority on the subject and gladly carries the burden of caring for the little things, namely having all your hair burned off. She is an extremly nice and pleasant woman who can get along with people almost as well as Carrot does. She eventually falls in love with and marries Vimes, who loves her dearly but chafes at the trappings of the rich nobility. She takes an old-fashioned approach to the wedded life. She insists on cooking for her husband (she's rich enough to employ the best chefs in the world) who, despite her lacking skills, loves her cooking and mends his socks without complaint (they're rich enough to buy new socks for every day for the rest of his life), something she's less than good at but Vimes doesn't want to bring this up. Despite growing up in the comfort of nobility she's a massive woman who towers over her husband, a result of being the descendant of old-school barbarian warlords.
:* '''Willikins''' is the butler of the Ramkins family, having been with them since he was a boy. He appears to be the standard snarky-but-polite butler, but in his early days he was in a gang and can kill you with whatever he's got on him. He is almost as dangerous in a fight as Vimes, with much less holding him back from straight-up murdering you if you threaten the Vimes family.
* '''Carrot Ironfoundersson''' is a dwarf. All 6'6" of him. A young man found and raised by dwarfs, he eventually came to Ankh-Morpork to have it make a man of him. He joined the Night Watch and was instrumental in making the Watch what it is today. Carrot possesses MASSIVE amounts of charisma and naivete, which serve as his main weapons of choice: he treats everyone like jolly good chaps, and they don't have the heart to prove him wrong. Readers have noted that while some scenes describe him from another character's point of view and other scenes describe him, but not his point of view, there has never been a scene that describes things from ''his'' point of view. This has lead people (both in-universe and real life) to suspect that Carrot is a lot smarter than he lets on and might be playing everyone for some reason. He is pretty much guaranteed to be the heir to the throne of Ankh-Morpork, but he denies knowledge of this (without lying) and all evidence of this fact he gets his hands on tends to... disappear. About as [[Lawful Good]] as you can get: he sticks to the rules and makes them work for him.
* '''Sergeant Frederick Colon''' has been with the Watch longer than anyone, even Vimes. He appears to be a fat bumbling old fool but underneath that he's a... well, fat bumbling old fool that occasionally does something extremely useful. He is a very nice man even if not sharp on the uptake, and knows a lot of retired cops, old friends and former criminals with whom he'll gladly make small talk, which grants him an immense knowledge of what goes on on the street. Just don't put him in charge of things: it'll get ugly.
* '''Corporal Cecil Wormsborough St. John "Nobby" Nobbs''' is human. No, seriously, he has an official-looking piece of paper proving it. Extremely ugly, has lots of bad habits, is a petty criminal in his own right and has an odor best left undescribed, Nobby still somehow manages to be liked by people on account of being a common denominator. He gets along great with Sergeant Colon (often being on patrol with him), frequently popping up in books to comment on the crazy happenings ''de jour''. Is skilled at peacekeeping (that is, being on patrol in areas with lots of peace to keep), crime prevention (stay away from certain areas so that he doesn't steal anything there) and guarding city landmarks against theft.
* '''Delphine Angua von Überwald''' came to the city to escape her deranged family and shameful past. She turned out to be quite the formidable Watch member, a skilled cop in her own right and with a nose for sensitive cases. She has the tendency to be, in her own words, quite the bitch, but still gets along fine with the rest of the watch, including her boyfriend Carrot. While often cynical towards him and his innocence she cannot help but walk after him like a puppy. Dogged by the feelings that come up in her every month or so she tries her best to keep herself in check and do her job. The head of the City Watch's dog brigade, she can find clues that no other member possibly could. She frequently finds herself being taken hostage, only to turn the tables on her hostage takers and turning them into whimpering wrecks. She also frequently works with special police informant Gaspode; the two of them like each other more than they let on.
* '''Sergeant Detrius''' is a troll on the rise. Starting out as a splatter (like a bouncer, but trolls use more force) for the Mended Drum, he joined the City Watch. He quickly turned out into a natural sergeant, shouting at people until they got in line. Tends to be quite literal and too dumb to fool but is a good cop and a good troll nonetheless. His weapon of choice is the Piecemaker, a siege crossbow originally designed to shoot metal bars through city gates. He likes to load it with bundles of arrows, turning the thing into a massive shotgun capable of leveling houses. Is very staunchly anti-drugs, which makes sense given how overdose-related deaths by troll drugs are both incredibly common and incredibly messy.
* '''Cheery "Cheri" Littlebottom''' is the Watch's forensics expert. A former alchemist hired to fight crime WITH SCIENCE. A bit shy and hates to yell at people, which is why her promotion took a while despite her great competence. Became a leader in the dwarfish women movement when she started to wear makeup, earrings and wear skirts, kickstarting it with the encouragement of her close friend Angua.
* '''Salacia Deloresista Amanita Trigestatra Zeldana Malifee [...] von Humpeding''', aka Sally. The first vampire in the Watch, much to Vimes' dismay. Despite her looks she's in her early 50s, easily putting her in the top of oldest Watch members. A fine cop in her own right, she eventually leaves the Watch to join the Watch in Bonk, with her position as a Sammy (a cop who worked in Sam Vimes' Watch) carrying much prestige.
* '''Visit-The-Infidels-With-Explanatory-Pamphlets''' is an Omnian and the most religious member of the Watch. On his off days he and his fellow Omnian "Smite-The-Unbeliever-With-Cunning-Arguments" spread the good word of Om, much to the dismay of everyone else.
* '''Dorfl''' is a golem, hired by Vimes to piss off the establishment. The first golem who with the ability to talk, in and of itself an act of blasphemy, he is an unstoppable juggernaut capable of walking through doors and walls alike and can manhandle trolls the same way trolls take on humans. As a free golem he saves up his wages to purchase other golems, whom he then frees and asks to help free other golems in the same way. Despite being incredibly intimidating, he is also an incredibly moral being, having forged his own personal code of conduct after being given full responsibility for his own actions.
* '''Reginald "Reg" Shoe''' is a zombie and undead rights activist. He died during the events of Night Watch and was allowed to join the Watch because Vimes wanted to stick it to the establishment. A good cop who keeps his stuff together despite he himself falling apart frequently.

===Death and Company===
* '''Death''' is the anthropomorphic personification of death, which manifests as a traditional "Grim Reaper" figure (a scythe-carrying skeleton in a black robe). Initially portrayed as an actively malevolent figure in the first two books, he was subsequently retconned as being a very devoted professional who has become increasingly ''fond'' of sapient life over his long service. Being a personification, he has absolutely no proper understanding of human life, but his fascination leads him to keep trying, which tends to go quite wrong.
* '''Susan''' is Death's grand-daughter, by virtue of her mom having been Death's adoptive daughter and her dad having been Death's temporary apprentice. Unfortunately, her parents were so ashamed of their connections to Death that they brought Susan up with a strictly logical mindset and a belief in rationalism... which, given she lives in the Discworld, which can't make contact with either without the aid of a long stick and a lot of shouting, tends to leave her perpetually frustrated. She has white hair with a black streak in it, and when she blushes she develops three long red marks on her otherwise pale cheeks - when her father quit Death's service, the angry skeleton pimp-slapped him before letting him go, and that scar has carried down in a typical display of Discworld inheritance. This also gives her many of Death's inherent powers, like a mind-controlling voice and the ability to go ethereal when she wants.
* '''The Death of Rats''' is a rat, or at least the skeleton of a rat, who presides over the demise of rats, hamsters and other tiny rodents. Only speaks in capital SQUEAKS. Sometimes goes around mounted on a raven named Quoth (get it? Quoth the Raven?). Irks Susan on a regular basis by getting dragging her into events that involve her grandfather and/or the fate of the Disc.
* '''Albert''' is Death's manservant and the first Archchancellor of the Unseen University. He figured that he could become immortal by reversing the rite of Ashe-Kente, used to summon and interrogate Death. It... sort of worked? Essentially, it teleported him to Death's realm, where time stands still, and he's stayed there ever since as he finds it a comfortable enough existence. Most of the time he does the cleaning (which isn't a lot), receive guests (grumble at them), cook (he deep fries EVERYTHING) and help out the workers to make Death's mansion more like a human mansion by installing plumbing and a kitchen. A proudly self-professed evil-tempered old bugger, Albert acts humble to his master, but is still a wizard of the Old School, which means he's got a ''lot'' of boom hidden up his sleeves if he ever deigns to use it.

===Lancre Witches===
* '''Esmeralda "Granny" Weatherwax''' is the unofficial (because witches like to think themselves above that sort of "nonsense") leader of all witches in the Ramtops Mountains and alongside Samuel Vimes is Pratchett's iconic "Good Don't Mean Nice" character. By her own admission born to be "the bad witch", that karmic role was screwed up when her psychotic sister Lily instead became a truly ''evil'' witch whilst still thinking of herself as the good one, leaving a destiny void that Granny felt compelled to fill. She is short-tempered, abrasive, doesn't suffer fools, and imperious, but firmly believes in making the hard choices and doing what's right. It's well-acknowledged that she is "The Crone" of her personal coven, but everyone in the Ramtops discretely refers to that archetype as "The Other One", especially if it appears she's not within earshot. A formidably powerful magic user, she is a great advocate of not using magic and instead relying on "headology" - a mixture of down-to-earth common sense, folk remedies, observational skill and her own hefty reputation - to look more "magical".
* '''Gytha "Nanny" Ogg''' is the beloved matriarch of the sprawling Ogg clan of the Ramtops Mountains, an affable and rotund old lady who has lost none of the endearing sleaze that she developed over a youth as a lusty, highly sexual woman. She is "The Mother" of her coven, combining both lecherously good-humored attitude and a warm, maternal nature; people may fear and respect Granny, but they genuinely ''like'' Nanny, something that Granny Weatherwax sometimes shows signs of envying. It's been implied that she's actually more magically powerful than Granny, but it's just that A: she's too lazy to really use it, B: she gets a lot more sympathy for coming in second and C: she doesn't want to upset Granny by letting her find out.
* '''Magrat Garlick''' is the much-put-upon youngest member of the original coven. If Granny Weatherwax is the fairytale wicked witch turned good and Nanny Ogg is the wise earth mother, then Magrat is the good-hearted but soft-headed neo-pagan, who finds herself in over her head when her blissfully dreamy ideals are confronted with the cold, hard realism of her superiors. Despite everything, Magrat does have a heart of gold and dearly wants to help - even if most just ignore her "clearly dotty" ideas and suggestions - and she's got a core of steel deep, deep down inside.
* '''Agnes "Perdia X Dream" Nitt''' is the chubby "replacement Maiden" for the coven after Magrat leaves it by marrying the King (ex-Fool) of Lancre. A generally mild, inoffensive and shy girl, she's not unattractive but is the result of Lancre selecting for a Brawn Hilda style of beauty and hates herself for it. "Perdita X Dream" is Agnes' idealised fantasy self, a sharp-tongued, aggressive, take-charge version of Agnes who would take no crap from anybody... unfortunately, being a witch caused this fantasy self to become its own split personality and she now lives in Agnes' head, snarkily commenting on Agnes' actions and looking for a chance to steal control of Agnes' body.
* '''Jason Ogg''' is the eldest son of Nanny Ogg. Said to be the greatest blacksmith and farrier in the world: as long as he's got the horseshoes for it he can put them on it. One of his frequent customers is Death, who occationally drops by to get Blinky shoed. A giant, soft-spoken man who can pick up a pair of adult men by the scruff of their necks.
* '''Shawn Ogg''' is the jack-of-all-trades at Lancre Castle. If it doesn't require special training he does it with enthusiasm and skill: he delivers mail and messages, serves food, patrols the castle and a dozen other jobs. He is a one-man army, as in that he is the entire complement of Lancre's standing army (except when he is lying down).

===Wizards===
* '''Rincewind''' is a cowardly and cynical wizard who has absolutely no talent whatsoever at magic but does have the dubious favor of The Lady (the Disc's unnamed Goddess of Luck), which ensures his life is a constant stream of dangerous and terrifying misadventures.
* '''Mustrum Ridcully''' is the Unseen University's Archchancellor for most of the series, and effectively combines traits of the traditional wizard with that of the stereotype of the gruff, outgoing huntin'-and-sportin' British gentleman.
* '''The Librarian''' is a wizard and the Unseen University's librarian (obviously) who was polymorphed into an orangutan by a surge of wild magic in the second novel and chose to stay in that form afterwards, as it allowed him to much more effectively work in the library.
* '''Ponder Stibbons''': The youngest and most scientifically minded of UU's faculty who's basically running the discworld's version of the Manhattan project in the High Energy Magic building.
* '''The Bursar''' of Unseen University was originally a very mild-mannered chap whose only failing was not quitting his thankless job as UU’s accountant. Sadly, the constant abuse seems to have gotten to him over the years, as he is now quite insane. However, his skill with sums is completely unaffected by the madness, so all he needs to function in polite society is a hefty dose of drugs.
* '''The Chair of Indefinite Studies'''
* '''The Dean'''
* '''The Lecturer in Recent Runes'''
* '''The Senior Wrangler'''
* '''Professor John Hix''' is the head of the Necrom-*ahem* Post-Mortem Communications department at UU. Required to be evil by University law, but actually quite mild-mannered, he is also a keen member of the local amateur dramatics society.

===Citizens of Ankh-Morpork===
* '''Havelock Vetinari, the Patrician''' is the official Tyrant of Ankh-Morpork, a trained assassin who showcased his intelligence even as a youth by realizing how much the Guild's focus on ''style'' impeded its actual effectiveness. Though he could, as he repeatedly points out, rule as a brutal despot, he favors instead using a network of spies and his own high intelligence to manipulate the city into working the way he wants it (and because he's an extremely clever man, his way is pretty good). A magnificent scheming bastard, he's often seen as invincible and prepared for absolutely everything, but he has been caught off-guard a few times due to unforeseen circumstances.
* '''Rufus Drumknott''' is Vetinari's loyal and almost deliberately dull assistant.
* '''Moist von Lipwig''' is a former con artist officially hanged by Ankh-Morpork as a result of bank robbery. Instead, Vetinari arranges for his death and forces him to become the new Postmaster of the then-defunct City Post. To his surprise, Moist finds himself growing to enjoy the challenge and ends up becoming, in order, Postmaster, Head of the Ankh-Morpork Bank and a pioneer of the Ankh-Morpork steamtrain system, inventing stamps, paper money and a couple of other things along the way.
* '''Adora Belle Dearheart''' is the sharp-tempered, abrasive, cutting-tongued, chain-smoking head of the Golem Trust, who gets on better with golems than she does with people. Eventually becomes Moist's girlfriend and subsequently wife.
* '''William de Worde''' is an idealistic nobleman who becomes the leader of Ankh-Morpork's first newspaper.
* '''Gaspode the Wonder Dog''' is an ugly, disease-riddled mongrel of a dog who became sapient and capable of speech after eating out of the rubbish dumps of the Unseen University. Cynical and sarcastic, he mostly makes a living begging for food, taking advantage of the fact that most people refuse to believe a dog is talking and so his words have an effect like a Charm Person spell.
* '''Cut-My-Own-Throat Dibbler''', also known as CMOT Dibbler or simply Throat is a surprisingly effective street vendor who specializes in selling extremely dubious goods, most commonly his goddamned ''awful'' sausages-in-buns and meat pies. Apparently every large civilisation on the Discworld has it's own version, including Cut-Me-Own-Hand-Off Dhblah and Disembowel-Meself-Honourably Dibhala.
* '''Leonard of Quirm''' is the incredibly intelligent and multi-talented but super-naive and gentle mad inventor of Ankh-Morpork. Lord Vetinari keeps him secretly locked away in the Palace in order to protect Leonard from the world and the world from him. Invented the airplane, the handgun, the submarine, and the world's first unbreakable cipher.
* '''Chrysophrase''' is the head of the Breccia, a sort of Trollish Mafia.
* '''Hughnon Ridcully''' is the High Priest of Io and unofficial representative of all the priests and clerics in Ankh-Morpork. Mustrum Ridcully's brother and implicitly built along the same lines.
* '''Mr Slant''' is the city's most infamous lawyer, a zombie created from a man who came back from the dead to get his murderer acquitted and refused to die again when his family refused to pay for his legal counsel. Highly traditional, he continually gets involved in various schemes to disrupt Vetinari's reign, but always gets out unscathed even when they fail.

===Others===
* '''The Auditors of Reality''' are anthropomorphic personifications of physics, but they're possibly connected to taxes (which, as the old joke goes, are the only other certainty in the universe besides Death); as their title suggests, they basically see to the smooth, clockwork-like management of all the underlying mechanics that keep the universe spinning. Unfortunately, as the Discworld exists in a marginal area where the beliefs of intelligent beings ''can'' warp reality to comply, and they find life itself unbearably chaotic, they absolutely ''hate'' the very concept of life. Such is their sheer disgust that they undertake several schemes during the course of the series to destroy life, making them the closest thing the setting has to Bad Guys, and they have a bitter enmity for Death, who rather likes life. They appear as almost harmless; shroud-like gray robes with nothing inside of them, hovering silently in mid-air and communicating through telepathy. They always show up in groups of three or more and always try to avoid personal pronouns; because they believe that to have a sense of I means to have an identity, and to have an identity means to live, and to live means to die, any Auditor who does use a pronoun immediately disintegrates (indeed, they do it so quickly that not one of them has worked out the inherent flaw in their logic) and is seamlessly replaced by a new one. Also, don't tell them that their hatred of life and their dislike of all the extra work that living beings make them do means that they already have an identity independent of their functions.
* '''Twoflower''' is an accountant from the fantasy-China region of Agatea, who manages to leave the traditionally highly reclusive nation for a tourist visit to Ankh-Morpork. This ultimately leads to a revolution in Agatea when he publishes a book about what he did on his holidays, inadvertently revealing that life does not have to be the highly rigid, formalized tyranny under which the country exists.
* '''Cohen the Barbarian''' is essentially what you get if you ask "What if [[Conan the Barbarian]] lived to be an old codger but never stopped doing the Barbarian Hero schtick?" A cranky and bitter old bastard who is deeply offended at having outlived the era of the Barbarian Hero, sneering at how the world has gotten so soft and straitlaced since his youth. Ultimately, his dissatisfaction with the state of the world and its lack of respect for the Barbarian Heroes who ultimately carved out the foundations for civilization leads him to try and firebomb the gods themselves.
* '''Rhys Rhysson''' is the current Low King of the Dwarves after the events of ''Thud!''
* '''Mr. Shine (Him Diamond)''' is the current Diamond King of Trolls, a Diamond Troll whose unparalleled strength and intelligence makes him the traditional ruler of his race.
* '''Lady Margolotta''' is a female vampire and an intimate acquaintance of Vetinari.

==Other Media==
*'''TV Movies'''
**'''The Hogfather'''
**'''The Colour of Magic/The Light Fantastic'''
**'''Going Postal'''

==The Inevitable End==
Everything comes to an end, and this fact became apparent for even the Discworld series in 2007 when Terry Pratchett announced that he'd been diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's disease.

Like the badass that he was and didn't afraid of anything, Pratchett took this fact in his stride becoming the forerunner of Alzheimer's advocacy and assisted suicide AND still managed to release books on a regular, consistent basis whilst suffering from a disease that causes most sufferers to spend the rest of their days babbling in a retirement home.

But, unfortunately, despite much protestations from fans and signs to prove he was doing very well despite this affliction, Pratchett died in 2015.

What makes this whole damn thing so sad is that, given his relationship both literary and philosophical with death, we know almost for a fact that he was probably completely fine with it. To add a bittersweet bow to the top of the sadness cake, he instructed his assistant to post the following to announce his passing:

:"AT LAST, SIR TERRY, WE MUST WALK TOGETHER. <br> Terry took Death's arm and followed him through the doors and on to the black desert under the endless night. <br> The End."

After his death the hard drive containing all of his unfinished work was, as per his explicit wishes, destroyed by a steamroller. The wish was granted on August 25th by Lord Jericho, a vintage John Fowler & Co steamroller at the Great Dorset Steam Fair and overseen by Rob Wilkins, manager of the Pratchett estate. The wry sense of humor behind this act was appreciated by many fans.

TL;DR RIP Terry Pratchett. You will forever live on in the heart of fa/tg/uys and fa/tg/irls the world round.

[[Category:Literature]]

White Wolf

2018-10-02T10:10:21Z

2600:1700:19C0:2760:1D8A:AD5:F3B2:D482: I can't evene pretend to be surprised that sort of information would be from someone feeding people a line.

{{Publisher Infobox
|name = White Wolf
|logo = [[Image:WWlogo.gif|200px]]
|year = 1991
|notable = [[World of Darkness]], [[Exalted]], [[Scion]], [[Trinity]], [[Scarred Lands]], [[World of Warcraft: The Roleplaying Game]]
|website = [http://www.white-wolf.com http://www.white-wolf.com], [http://www.theonyxpath.com http://www.theonyxpath.com]
}}
{{stub}}

'''White Wolf''' is a game publishing company formed in 1991, known primarily for the [[World of Darkness]] and [[Exalted]] settings. Its less well-known but still viable settings are [[Scion]] (urban fantasy based on real-world mythology; basically, you get to play modern day demigods) and [[Trinity]] (a trinity of settings bound by common backstory; pulp age gadgeteers and mystery men, grimdark superheroes, and psychic warriors in a post-apocalyptic Earth. It takes its name from the heroic epithet of the archetypical fantasy edgelord, Elric of Melniboné, from Michael Moorcock's novels.

The game system is a d10 dice pool. It manages to make the simplicity of rolling a fist full of d10s and hoping for at least one numeral result sound complicated. A typical challenge may want you to roll 8-10; if you have, say, a five skill, roll 5d10 and hope for one to be 8-10. Because of the loosey-goosey rules, it could require more then one eight, something higher, something lower, maybe a specific number. This is why White Wolf is good.

White Wolf also has point buy with three categories of stats that you separate by tier in how many points you want for that stat. Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary. Something like eight points, five points, and three points. It may be more or less.

Typically White Wolf releases shit with A LOT OF FUCKING [[Fluff|FLUFF]]. So much fluff that the manual itself is just these gigantic pillow with pages inside of it. These hulking grimoires of GRIMDARK will talk all about how the World of Darkness is a shitty place to live. And to stick to attracting fat goth kids, you play as vampires, werewolves, sorcerers, ghosts, etc. However, as [[Games Workshop]] was already the undisputed master of GRIMDARK before any White Wolf employee was so much as a sperm in their father's ballsack, they just come off as being silly.

Everyone copies off White Wolf and White Wolf never gets credit. The movie ''Underworld'', for example, ripped off their werewolves vs. vampires thing, and Sony eventually lost a lawsuit over this. Twilight would do the same thing later, but White Wolf didn't sue because they didn't want to associate with glitter vampires. White Wolf is the red headed stepchild of RPGs, but has a lot more plot to it. Unfortunately, this attracts even worse players than typical neckbeards (e.g., wannabe actors and bad poets).

Every time a White Wolf employee plays a game at a convention, their characters will be blatant Mary Sues. The only way their Sueishness could be more obvious is if they had giant fucking purple neon signs saying "GOD DAMNED MOTHER FUCKING MARY SUES!!!"

They are also entirely unable to lay out a book, such as putting contents pages after thirty pages of novel/comic at the start of the book or forgetting about things like indexes.

In 2006, they were bought by Icelandic game company [http://www.ccpgames.com/en/home CCP Games] (better known for its work on the sci-fi MMO/spreadsheet simulator EVE Online), with an eye towards creating a World of Darkness MMO. Sadly this worked about as well as could be expected and in an ensuing financial crunch (caused by, what else, gross mismanagement) White Wolf took the brunt of a massive wave of layoffs. In 2014, CCP killed the WoD MMO to the surprise of absolutely no one.

Since 2011, White Wolf made a 20th anniversary edition of Vampire: the Masquerade, which sold well enough for them to do the same for Werewolf and Mage, was officially disbanded as a company, and turned into a new company called Onyx Path Publishing to handle making these books while [[Derp|CCP leases them the rights to make books for the games they created to begin with]]. They also discovered Kickstarter and indices, and have been making liberal use of both of them.

As of October 2015, CCP sold the White Wolf IP to Paradox Interactive; since then, Paradox has restarted the original World of Darkness line (as "classic World of Darkness") under a reconstituted White Wolf studio while allowing Onyx Path to continue working on the new World of Darkness line (now renamed "Chronicles of Darkness" to make the distinction between the two clearer), while allowing them to act as partners in redesigning the old games. Unfortunately, the executive who has "final cut rights" for their recent books [[That Guy|is a fucking oWoD LARPer]] who is using White Wolf to make his angsty-teenager oWoD headcanon canon and rewrite the metaplot based on the opinions of his LARP buddies. This has the lulzy effect of simultaneously pissing off White Wolf's traditional fanbase (who, despite their pants-shitting idiocy, are still sane enough to hate oVampire LARPers) ''and'' the reasonable human beings who just want to play monster politics for an evening.

In the days when [[OGL]] was a thing for [[Dungeons & Dragons]] 3.5, White Wolf published a number of D&D books under the "Swords & Sorcery Studio" imprint. These included the 3.5 update to [[Ravenloft]] (handled a ''hell'' of a lot better than either AD&D Ravenloft or World of Darkness), the [[Gamma World]] D20 edition (which caught a lot of flak for its [[grimdark]] status), a [[World of Warcraft: The Roleplaying Game|tabletop version of World of Warcraft]], and their own custom setting, the interestingly grimbright setting [[Scarred Lands]].

{{WW-Games}}

[[Category:Publishers]]

Star Trek

2018-10-02T08:50:34Z

2600:1700:19C0:2760:1D8A:AD5:F3B2:D482: /* The Orville */

{{cleanup}}
[[File:Enterprise.jpg|thumb|500px|right|If you aren't already hearing the theme song you might not belong here.]]
'''''Star Trek''''' is a multimedia science-fiction series and one of the cornerstones of nerdy media properties, and one of the few to crossover into mainstream popularity (alongside ''[[Star Wars]]'', ''[[Doctor Who]]'' and a few others). It's also one of the longest-running science fiction franchises, with over 50 years of geek history spanning several generations. Needless to say, it's had a huge influence on all things sci-fi, and, by extension, [[/tg/]].

Originally, ''Star Trek'' was [[noblebright]] beyond noblebright and, in many ways, was the polar opposite of ''[[Warhammer 40,000|Warhammer 40K's]]'' [[grimdark]]. The more recent reboot films, however, have taken a much, ''much'' more grimdark tone, which is delightfully [[skub]]tastic.

== Games ==
There's been plenty of tabletop games and [[/v/|vidya gaems]] featuring ''Star Trek'' without being merchandising bullshit (see: themed ''[[Monopoly]]'' sets), including one of the earliest action multiplayer wargame: ''Netrek''.

*'''''Star Trek: Adventure Gaming in the Final Frontier''''' (1978) The very first Trek tabletop [[RPG]]. Written by, I shit you not, Michael Scott. Groggy (grokky?) as all hell, and due for an OSR.
* '''''[[Star Fleet Battles]] (SFB)''''' (1979-) The crunchiest starship combat game you're ever going to find outside of a computer. Based on the original series and not any of the later series, for licensing reasons. Takes some liberties with the setting, which (combined with the aforementioned licensing) is why "''Star Trek''" isn't actually in the title.
* '''''Star Trek: The Role Playing Game''''' (1982-1989) Made by [[FASA]], essentially ''[[Traveller]]''-lite, or a happier, shinier ''[[Rogue Trader]]''. Hasn't aged terribly well, what with having been made when the only canonical ''Star Trek'' materials to work with were the original and animated series, the first four films, and a couple of now non-canon novels. If you try to dust it off, expect tons of conflict with the rest of the show. Died as they were trying to update it for ''TNG'', because Paramount's corporate suits (surprise, surprise) had no idea what an RPG actually entailed and were worried about violence, and getting their cut, and... oh you know the drill by now. Welcome to the 80's.
* '''''Star Trek: Starship Tactical Combat Simulator''''' (1983) FASA designed this, so it feels like ''[[Battletech]]'' but not as good.
* '''''Prime Directive''''' (1993-2008) The most successful tabletop RPG line (but that's not saying much), it's actually still in print. Produced by Amarillo Design Bureau, so again no direct name-dropping of "''Star Trek''." Lasted as long as it did by constantly evolving, in Borg-like fashion, to adapt to the current zeitgeist. Has had 4 editions, with the second using [[GURPS]], the third using [[Wizards of the Coast|d20]], and the fourth [[d20 Modern]].
* '''''Star Trek [[Card_Game|CCG]]''''' (1994-2007, 2011-2014, 2013-2015, 2018-) There's been a few of these, most notably the games released by [[Decipher]], but never globally popular. They also suffered from game balance problems from fans wanting their fave character, but needing extra rules for their quirks. There's also the problem of putting numbers to character stats, such as one game that asserted that [[Heresy|Picard having about twice the integrity of a Klingon pig]]. Later versions are "deck-building" games to try to cash in on the popularity of ''[[Dominion]]'' and ''[[Thunderstone]]''. And now virtual CCGs are the order of the day.
* '''''Star Trek: The Next Generation Role Playing Game''''' (1998-1999) The next attempt, made by Last Unicorn Games. Won an award for best new game, which makes it a complete shame that no one has ever played it.
* '''''Star Trek Red Alert''''' (2000) A Diskwars game themed to ''Star Trek''.
* '''''Star Trek Roleplaying Game''''' (2002-2005) When [[Decipher]] had the CCG license, they decided, "What the hell, let's make an RPG, too." It, like so many of its predecessors, died unnoticed and unmourned.
* '''''Star Trek Online''''' (2010-) An [[MMORPG|MMO]]. Decent gameplay mechanics, especially starship combat. Storyline leaves something to be desired, especially when the ostensibly [[Noblebright|peaceful]] Federation trades shots at least once with every other faction in the galaxy.
* '''''Call To Arms: Star Trek''''' (2011) [[Mongoose_Publishing|Mongoose]]'s license for ''Babylon 5'' expired, so they collaborated with Amarillo Design Bureau (the ''Star Fleet Battles'' guys), re-themed the game to Star Trek along with improving the system to make it more nifty. Less micro-management than SFB, and ships get some cinematic feats.
* '''''Star Trek: Expeditions''''' (2011) Ignore the tie-ins to the movie, Reiner Knizia designed this. Explore the gameboard, flip over missions, try to have the proper crew to get victory points.
* '''''Star Trek: Fleet Captains''''' (2011) Tile flipping, exploring, and spaceships fighting over resources
* '''''Star Trek: Attack Wing''''' (2013-) [[WizKids]] license the flightpath system from [[Fantasy Flight Games]] and adds ''Star Trek'' to the mix, [[Skub]] ensues. The game has been consistently plagued with balance issues, to the point that the rules errata is more than ten times longer than the actual rules. The actual current rules for things like the Borg special movement and fighter squadrons are completely different than the rules as written.
* '''''Star Trek Adventures''''' (2017-) The latest attempt at an RPG, by Modiphius, coming out soon to tentative praise. It also comes with a whole range of miniatures of the various crews from the show.

== So why should I care? ==
Because between them, these six TV series and their assorted spinoff movies, books, etc. can provide inspiration for any sci-fi game you could care to run. If you want light-hearted action, look at the sort of things that happened in ''TOS'' or ''DS9'' to get the crew into some dangerous situation. If you want a charismatic villain, look at Gul Dukat or the Borg Queen. If you want moral issues and debates, look at the shit that happened to Voyager and remove all the transparent deck-stacking and cheesy moralizing (or you could read any decent SF book/watch a ''Twilight Zone'' episode written in the previous 50 years, if you don't need your source material to be served at a 2nd grade level). Like [[Tolkien]] is to fantasy it's a prime gateway drug to science fiction and especially science fiction which is more than "action movie IN SPACE!"

Not to mention in any sci-fi RPG with remotely free-form rules you're likely to encounter ''Star Trek'' fanboys, so you might as well know what they're talking about. The unholy spawn of a Trekkie and a [[Furry]] is known as a [[Chakat]], and you should fear it.

At its best ''Star Trek'' is thoughtful, optimistic futurism with a positive human element and brings you to strange new worlds in the grand tradition of speculative fiction which is accessible to even the layman. At its worst ''Star Trek'' is arrogant, smug, hypocritical, preachy, dull, sloppy and prone to the strawman fallacy.

== Setting ==
Here's the Cliff's Notes on ''Star Trek''. A couple of general warnings; firstly, ''Star Trek'' likes to ''really'' take its "racial themes" bits just a little too far. Second, despite this, it's rare for an entire race to be completely irredeemable the way many fictional aliens are: there are heroic and sympathetic characters from nearly every race listed below, able to put more-positive spins on their racial themes. Thirdly, aside from very occasional appearances by [[H.P. Lovecraft|aliens who are so bizarre that humankind can barely comprehend them]], all of the aliens look like dudes with rubber masks on (because they are). In real life, this was because there was no budget for anything else, but in-universe it's been explained by some kind of [[Old Ones|Precursor]] race who seeded all of the planets with their broadly humanoid DNA, and every race evolved slightly differently from there. There isn't much [[fluff]] on what these precursors were like, and some of it was contradictory, and Gene Roddenberry didn't like the idea (although he still had to work with the rubber forehead stuff). The good news for fa/tg/uys who like [[homebrew]] is that this makes it fairly easy to write [[d20 system]] rules for all of the races -after all, most ''D&D'' races are just humans with rubber masks on...

=== A Composite Creation ===
This is a general note that one should consider: Star Trek was created in pretty much the opposite way as The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien worked out a bunch of linguistic stuff and general history of Arda in his spare time, then decided to use that as the basis for some stories that he eventually gave to some publishers which in the end sold quite well. Roddenberry by contrast pitched a very broad general idea (it's the future, things are good, we got guys some on a ship exploring space) to the networks who eventually took it up on it and had him work with a variety of writers and actors who added to this rough skeleton of an idea in a process that would continue on to this day. This is not to knock either approach, but both have their advantages and disadvantages. In regards to Star Trek, a franchise which relies mostly on an episode of the week format that's been going on for more than half a century this means that the canon is a fucking mess. There were numerous people at the helm and many of them had often very different ideas about what should be done that were just thrown out to see what stuck, many of which were contradictory and some of which we'd frankly rather forget. In general fans and fluff writers have been spending a whole lot of time trying to straighten out things and much of the lore is basically a rough consensus of what people like and what fits in with it. Latter series got more systematic about this, but there are still points of contention and a lot of flat out contradictions due to it's scattershot nature.

=== Factions ===
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'''The Federation'''
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[[File:Federation_Ships.jpg|thumb|500px|left|Starfleet's ships of the Line (pre-reboot)]]
Might as well talk about that main faction. The United Federation of Planets is what the [[Tau]] think they are. Its backstory is that in the distant future of the 1990s, [[God-Emperor of Mankind|übermensch]] [[Space Marines|created by genetic engineering]] began conquering the Earth. The [[Imperial Guard|normies]] fought back and won through sheer numbers, cryogenically freezing the Augments and kicking them out of Earth, but the damage and mass political unrest of World War III got half the planet nuked. This was why genetic engineering was banned. Fortunately, in 2063, <s>a drunkard asshole</s> a heroic visionary named Zefram Cochrane created humanity's first warp drive (based on the Alcubierre drive of wonky gravity manipulation to contract spacetime in front of you, instead of going through a Hyperspace full of Lovecraftian horrors i.e. the [[Warp]]) and made first contact with the Vulcans. The Vulcans eventually helped humanity rebuild and overcome poverty, disease, war and hunger. With its Earthly problems solved, man turned to the stars and found out its three closest neighbors were [[Imperium of Man|racist xenophobic dicks trying to murder each other]]. Since any war between them would've swept up puny little Earth and gotten it glassed, humans decided to force their neighbors to sit down and talk things out. Incredibly, it worked, and the United Federation of Planets was born.

The Federation is a commie [[noblebright]] hippieland society with a strong democratic government ([[Mary Sue|pretty much Roddenberry's idea of utopia]]). As a result, Federation citizens work not because they have to, but because they want to. However, despite their advanced technology, transhumanism, that is intentionally making [[Space Marines|SPESS MEHREENS]] and mutants like the infamous antagonist Khan Noonien Singh, is illegal.

The Federation's Navy is almost always called Starfleet. It's a mix between a military, a coast guard and a space agency, and usually rates scientific research as a higher priority than defense. One of its quirks is that it doesn't subscribe to the "bigger is better" policy used in most [[Warhammer 40K|sci-fi]], and even by most of the other ''Star Trek factions''. If the Federation ''does'' make a large ship, it's because they want it to have a daycare, swimming pool and ice cream bar. If they want a warship, they'll take a little gunship half the size of a modern day destroyer and pack it with enough antimatter nukes and guns to exterminate a solar system. In some cases, especially when dealing with ships from several centuries into the future, the ship is bigger on the inside than on the outside [[Creed|allowing it to hide a vast array of powerful armaments, ''space-bending'' equipment, and even whole planetary landscapes]]. They can get away with this because they out-tech almost everyone else by a country mile. The reason for the series' infamous "technobabble" is that <s>even ''they'' don't know everything their tech can do!</s> their technology is always evolving, and they know it so well that they can often use it in ways that even the original in-show design schematics did not intend.

In theory, Starfleet follows a rule called the "Prime Directive", which says that you're not allowed to interfere with low-tech races ("low-tech" being defined as "not having invented the warp drive", since warp technology apparently follows naturally from the laws of physics) or else things like turning the locals into Nazis might happen. The Original Series talked about this rule all the time, and Captain Kirk threw it aside whenever there was a sexy alien babe in sight. From ''TNG'' onward, it tended to instead be brought up whenever a hack writer needed a reason for the heroes to ''not'' instantly resolve a given problem with their superior technology or a way of making our heroes look like assholes for following it rigidly (yes, we could save this species from extinction but that would be interfering with the cosmic plan!), though there were a few good episodes that took it seriously.

Some of the more important member races are:
* [[Humans]]: You know 'em, you love 'em. Comprise 90% of Starfleet for reasons in no way related to the cost of makeup/CGI.
* Vulcan: The Original [[Eldar|Space Elves]], very emotional, especially during "pon'farr" (see below), who embraced rationalism after their emotions nearly led to them wiping themselves out. They are what the average race of fantasy elves think they are, except on ''Enterprise'' because the writers wanted to artificially inject tension into the show (and much of that was revealed to be a Romulan plot). Occasionally enter a state called "pon'farr," where they need to either [[Dark Eldar| fuck something half to death]], kill it with the nearest sharp object, or die of a brain aneurysm to let out all that pent-up emotional tension. Fa/tg/uys may recognize this as the sensation they feel every time [[Games Workshop]] puts out a new army book. Pretty bro-tier overall
* Andorians: Blue dudes with antennae and constant fits of passion, the polar opposite of Vulcans and there one time foes. Pretty much fa/tg/uys, right down to the romantic streak, in the technical sense. Also, they live underground on a diet of meatbread and rage.
* Tellarites: Space [[Dwarf|Dorfs]]; like insulting everyone and arguing a lot (no, really, petty insults are considered a polite gesture in Tellarite culture).
* Betazoids: Humanoid aliens with empathic powers. Well-regarded by Starfleet captains for their ability to point out the obvious. Their homeworld is like dropping a really hippie college and Space Vegas into a blender.
* Trill: Originally a one-off race introduced as a sapient parasite that possesses and controls a barely, or even unintelligent humanoid host, they were radically reworked in ''Deep Space Nine'', right down to losing their rubber foreheads in favor of spots. Now, the host is itself an intelligent humanoid, and some, but not all, of their kind are able to willingly merge with a symbiont (because someone can't spell) that allows them to access a mixture of the memories and personalities of all previous hosts, though in a way that, theoretically, enhances the host's personality rather than destroying it or subsuming it. Then, when they die, they can pass on the symbiont to another host, theoretically one they mentored.
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'''The Klingon Empire'''
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[[Image:Batleth.jpg|thumb|right|A Bat'Leth (sword of honor), one of several types of Klingon bladed weapons. Frequently mocked IRL for being a poorly designed weapon.]]
[[Commissar|''"It is a good day to die!"'']]

The Federation's main rival and (movie era and afterwards) the quintessential ''Star Trek'' race of lumpy foreheaded aliens. Originally they were a rough analogue to the Russians (though they took elements from [[Communism|communist Chinese]]) in a rough cold war allegory with the Federation (even though the Federation are as commie as they come). Their defining feature was that they were militaristic while the Federation was scholarly. This gradually moved more and more into them becoming Imperial Japan/[[Vikings]] In SPESSS obsessed with honor, fighting and dying honorably in battle while worshiping at the altar of [[Sigmar|warrior Jesus]], even as they turned from the Federation's bitter enemies into that friend who's fun to be around when he's not getting into drunken bar fights. You see shades of it in during the movie era and it became more and more prominent through ''TNG'', culminating in ''DS9''. Do not make the mistake of thinking that Klingons are nothing more than barbaric savages however; with Worf being part of the crew, and with ''DS9'' dealing with Klingon politics an awful lot we can see Klingon society as it truly is. Even so they do often wander into self parody territory.

The Klingons, in their current iteration, are a feudal society ruled by a council made up of the most powerful families. Klingon society holds very little value on things such as currency and material gain (which results in the Klingon empire [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q65l7RHUx2A having a very simplistic understanding of economics]), believing that anything you acquire without some form of blood, sweat and/or tears on your part is a pathetic way of going about things. Another thing to keep in mind is that a Klingon's reputation is literally everything. This can be easily seen in the episode "The House Of Quark" where dying honorably can literally change the outcome of an entire noble house, later when the Grand Council is visibly disgusted at D'Ghor. No respectable Klingon uses ''money'' to defeat his opponents. And no respectable Klingon would be so eager to perform an execution of an unarmed Ferengi in what was supposed to be an honorable duel. Klingons are still capable of being cunning and crafty however, and having a high diplomacy score is viewed as honorable as they still have examples of cunning and clever heroes tricking boorish and stupid monsters.

[[Warhammer 40000|Klingons often carry swords into battle in an age of energy beam guns]]. In-universe, this is less suicidal than it sounds in the context of boarding actions and tight starship corridors. The Bat'leth is actually a rather shitty weapon. The Mek'leth is noted to be better in most situations in universe. They use the same Disruptor weapons as the Romulans. While is explained as a temporary alliance. It was just excuse to not make news props due to the show's limited budget in the sixties or to save time so the animators don't have to rebuild their SFX each time characters get caught in a firefight during the post TNG era.

The Klingons are tied with the Vulcans and The Borg as being the most prominent and recognizable non-human species in Star Trek. Beloved of the Internet and the general public, to the point that there are published books like "A Klingon Christmas" in the world. The Klingons have their own constructed language. If you are ever worrying that you might not be a nerd, learning Klingon will solve that problem for you. They also wrote Shakespeare.
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'''The Romulan Star Empire'''
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''"It's always chess with the Romulans"''

You know those [[Eldar|Vulcans]]? Well a few thousand years ago, their planet was ravaged by war. A few of them turned themselves to intense emotional control and logic to tame their murderous passions, while most others left the planet altogether, founding a colony on the planet Romulus and dubbing themselves [[Dark Eldar|Romulans]]. Since said planet shares a name with a mythical figure known for founding [[Roman Empire|a city which built a vast empire]], and they had warp drive while those around them did not, you probably know that they turned to building an empire of their own. They hold the second place of prominence as immediate rivals to the Federation. Comically, they actually have better emotional control than the average Vulcan, since they gene-engineered most of their problems away years ago, and don't have to deal with the emotional blowback from pon'farr. The downside is that they lost some of their cousins' niftier powers, like mind reading and being able to transfer their soul into a jar for safekeeping. Although Star Trek Online also revealed that their trip to Romulus was a terrible ordeal, and their gene-engineering was taking during that time resulting in them losing most emotions save for bitterness of being "forced out".

The difference between the Klingons and the Romulans is basically the difference between Gork and Mork, or Khorne and Tzeentch. Klingons will fight you up front with simple brute force. Romulans are sneakier guys, preferring to fight you when you're not looking with spies, cloaked ships and complex plots behind the scenes and playing the long game. There is a lot of political infighting among them, though where the Klingons would duel to the death Romulans would seek to discredit their rivals, have them die in unfortunate 'accidents' or disappear. This difference has left both Romulans and Klingons with a big hate-boner for each other, to the Romulans the Klingons are crude brutish barbarians and to the Klingons the Romulans are a pack of scheming cowardly weaklings.

Like the Klingons, they filled a rough cold war allegory. In this case, they were rough analogs to Communist China (as seen by 1960s Americans). A force which was threatening and vast, but also a secretive unknown. The first major Interstellar War that Star Trek Earth fought was with the Romulans, which was fought entirely in space with neither side ever seeing the other face to face. Afterwards they set up a 'No Fly Zone' between the Federation and the Romulan Empire that no one even tried to cross for a century. From the Original Series onward, they frequently squabble and bicker with the Federation, before joining forces with them to fight the Dominion in ''Deep Space Nine'' and having their government devastated in ''Nemesis''.
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'''The Ferengi Alliance'''
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[[Image:GW_Ferengi.jpg|thumb|left|A typical ferengi engaged in typical ferengi activities]]
''"A Ferengi without profit is no Ferengi at all."''-Eighteenth Rule of Acquisition

Introduced in ''TNG's'' early days as the villains for the series. What [[/pol/]] thinks Jews are. The idea was to make a caricature of capitalism as a contrast with the techno-socialist Federation. This might have worked if this were not [[FAIL|''TNG's'' early days]]. Instead they overshot the mark by a light year or so, on top of other bad decisions, and you got a race of short (Gene wanted to make an evil short race as big evil races were overplayed), big-eared, [[goblin]]-like losers about as threatening as a grumpy pug. Over the first and second seasons they tried to make these guys threatening, but they fell flat on their face every time. Eventually the writers just said "fuck it" and the Ferengi got demoted to comic relief species, and their status as terrible enemies was demoted to propaganda designed to scare the Federation while the Ferengi government tried to figure out what to make of a species that rejected the acquisition of wealth as a goal. The Ferengi had some good moments in the later seasons of ''TNG'', but most of the best stuff that fleshed them out came from ''DS9'', which had an [[awesome]] Ferengi bartender named Quark as a major character. For an idea of what the Ferengi might have been like if the writers had their shit together, look up the Druuge of [[Star Control|Star Control II.]]

Ferengi religion is only hinted upon in ''DS9'', but what is seen implies a simplistic system based on financial success. Ferengi all follow a rulebook/canon known as the Rules of Acquisition, which can be described as Ayn Rand IN SPACE and condensed into the form of Confucius' Analects. There are 285 of these, each a short piece of advice on how to stay in the black. Examples include "Peace is good for business," "War is good for business," "Never have sex with the boss's daughter," and "Dignity and an empty sack is worth the sack." The first, and most important, of these is "Once you have their money, you never give it back." Sometimes, the Ferengi Randian spirituality extends into outright interpretations of the afterlife: according to some, the afterlife consists of the Divine Treasury and the Vault of Eternal Destitution, which are respectively analogous to Heaven and Hell. Entrance into one or the other depends on one's business ventures at the time of death; those that were turning a profit are allowed to enter the Divine Treasury, and the rest are damned to the Vault.

Ferengi government is ruled over by a Grand Nagus, a mix between a pope and a CEO, and he basically treats his civilization like some sort of company, with citizens regarded as workers. Directly below him is the Ferengi Commerce Authority, a [[what|quasi-religious]] organization dedicated to ensuring that correct business practices were followed and correct moral behavior was shown (including keeping the proles in line), although to the Ferengi, these are one and the same. The agents of the FCA are the Liquidators, who are essentially Inquisitors crossed with IRS auditors on steroids. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
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'''The Borg'''
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[[Image:Borg cube.jpg|300px|thumb|right|The Borg have assimilated and improved your [[d6|die]]. It always rolls six. Crap your pants, 'cause resistance is futile.]]
{{Topquote|We are the Borg. Lower your shields and surrender your ships. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own. Your culture shall adapt to service us. Resistance is futile.|The Borg's opening hail. This is not a boast or a brag, it's them simply explaining you how things are going to go down.}}
{{Topquote|One other thing. You may encounter Enterprise crew members who've already been assimilated. Don't hesitate to fire. Believe me, you'll be doing them a favour.|Picard going full [[grimdark]].}}

The Ferengi were utter failures as serious villains, so they needed something to fill that gap. Thus they made the Borg, an aggressive [[Tyranid|hive minded]] collective of hyper-adaptive, [[Necron|regenerating]] cyborgs that assimilate entire species into itself in its attempt to improve itself. Shit, that's like coming up with [[Warforged]] while trying to replace [[Kender]].

In many ways, the Borg are the truest dark reflection of the Federation, and despite their name, they're not Swedish. While the Feds want you to join their little club on your own, to "add your culture to the galactic community," the Prime Directive means they will ultimately accept you turning them down, even if you have shit they really want. The Borg say fuck that and just absorb you. While the Federation believes everyone should work together [[Tau|for the greater good]], they still have a very strong sense of individualism and a culture of personal accomplishment (unless your individual belief happens to run counter to the Federation's principles anyway, in which case you're just WRONG because the Federation is the best). The Borg pool all their minds together into a massive collective consciousness in the pursuit of group perfection. The Federation is all about beauty and tranquility and all that hippie stuff, and their tech is eco-friendly and dolphin-safe. Borg [[Tyranids|strip mine entire planets and drain entire oceans]] in the name of growth and efficiency.

Your standard Borg [[cubes|cube]] is a huge multi-kilometer [[Firaeveus Carron|metal box]] (yes, bigger than most [[Imperial Navy]] cruisers) able to go up against an entire Federation warfleet and win. That's right, one of their ships could threaten the entire Federation and [[Exterminatus]] Earth. When done right, [[Necron|they are a cold, calculating, nigh-unstoppable force, a threat to all life]] that wants to retain free and distinct personalities (although they will ignore a single person if not on an assimilation mission, as what they really want is to absorb whole civilizations). Apparently, in Picard's nightmare in ''First Contact'', the Borg assimilation process includes a surgical [[Grimdark|drill through the eye. While awake.]] Of all the stuff to come out of the TNG Era they are undoutably the most well recognized.

Unfortunately the got a bad downgrade during ''Voyager'' (the Borg Queen blew up cubes full of tens of thousands of drones because a few of them have been severed from the Hive Mind), but even there they were frequently not to be messed with. One amusing thing to note for people that haven't watched ''TNG'': the Borg were actually only in six episodes (and three were breakaway drones) and one movie, yet they're arguably the franchise's most famous pure villains aside from Khan. Goes to show how good they were when written properly. Then in ''Voyager'' they get their shit completely pushed in when they discover a new race of extradimensional aliens which they label Species 8472, which were immune to being assimilated, and had to ask the Federation for help in dealing with them. [https://1d4chan.org/images/4/47/Bloodcrons.jpg Wait, this sounds familiar...]
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'''The Cardassian Union'''
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Introduced in ''TNG'', they are third fiddle to the Klingons and the Romulans. If the Klingons are hypothetically-honorable techno-barbarian warriors and the Romulans are an empire of civilized and refined but sly and ruthless expansionists, the Cardassians are essentially scaly fascists re-enacting ''[[1984]]'' IN SPACE. Their trials announce the outcome at the beginning, and the defense attorney is executed if he wins. Also, THERE ARE FOUR LIGHTS!

Originally a race of peaceable, spiritual artists called the Hebitians (ironically not dissimilar to the Bajorans), modern Cardassia was born in hunger and desperation when their homeworld began to suffer simultaneous mass famine, pandemic, resource depletion, and ecological collapse. A military junta seized power, literally auctioned off the soul of the world through liquidating all the planet's art and religious artifacts into cold hard cash, and turned the Cardassians into the opportunistic imperialists they are today.

Despite being a whole lot weaker than the Federation, the Cardassians manage to hold their own, partly because what they lack in resources and raw power is made up for by a combination of intense cunning and high charisma stats. Compared to the equally deceptive Romulans, the Cardies are more likely to flash you a smile while tickling your ribs with a knife. They'll use any tool they can to gain the upper hand and while that often means unpleasant and terminal sessions in dark rooms, strip mined planets and the enslavement of entire species, they'll gladly become your bestest buddy if it would achieve their goals. Their intelligence service, the Obsidian Order, is also one of the most ruthlessly efficient organizations in the entire sector, managing to outscale the Romulan Tal Shiar when it comes to producing magnificent bastards and manipulating the politics of entire worlds to their advantage. Unlike the Romulans or the Klingons, they don't tolerate the sort of literal infighting that is rampant in both those states, that shit only serves to weaken '''GLORIOUS CARDASSIA''' and needs to be stamped out with ruthless efficiency. Exposing that someone who just happens to be your enemy as being a dangerous subversive is just a benefit, although this can result in both sides of a conflict shouting "for Cardassia" as they charge each other. Sort of how Democrats and Republicans are both for America, yet oppose each other.

Cardassia has a very fluid hierarchical government, similar to the political realities of post-Stalin but pre-Collaspe Soviet Russia. Broadly speaking, there are three different facets of the government: the Militant arms (which holds all the power) the Obsidian Order (who holds the least amount of power, but controls the most puppets) and the Detapa Council (similar to the [[High Lords of Terra]] and just as worthless). Cardassian society holds a very strict view of family, placing family just below the needs of the State.

The State holds a semi-divine mythical status in the eyes of it's citizens, with it being viewed as impossible for the State to ever make mistakes. The ideal Cardassian life was one of complete loyalty and servitude to the State and family. The Cardassian government was assumed to be omniscient, omnipotent, and benevolent by pretty much everyone, with all Cadassians gladly giving of themselves to the State. Such was this level of belief that when Picard was tortured by the Obsidian order, the torturer saw nothing wrong with bringing his daughter to work because he was working for the State, and therefore the torture of Picard could never be disturbing or wrong.

As far as plot significant activities went, they had a war with the Federation a few years before ''TNG'' which ended in the creation of a Demilitarized Zone between the two powers and (significant to ''Deep Space Nine'') abandoning the previously occupied planet of Bajor they had exploited for resources. They joined the Dominion towards the end of ''DS9'', which was some serious bad news for the ''DS9'' crew.
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'''The Bajoran Republic'''
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The Bajorans are a species native to the Planet Bajor. They were, until shortly before the events of ''Deep Space Nine'', under a brutal occupation by the Cardassians who strip mined their planet. After that, they got their independence, although they're thinking about joining the Federation. The Bajorans have one system and are technologically backwards; the Federation is technically breaking the Prime Directive by interacting with them, but as they've spent years under the oppression of a warp-capable species, they can probably handle it. Also ''DS9'' proves that ancient Bajorans managed to travel at warp speeds to Cardassia using solar sails and an enormous amount of luck, which technically makes them a warp-capable species. The only reason why they are significant in terms of the politics of ''Star Trek'' is that they have a wormhole near their planet, which has some timey-wimey aliens living it that they worship as gods. Also, their species has the oldest civilization (roughly a half-million years) of any major ''Star Trek'' race.

The big thing that makes the Bajorans unique is that they actually have a serious religion going on -the human race is depicted as mostly non-religious. They're also probably one of the most accurate depictions of any highly religious alien race in a sci-fi franchise, because they are divided between the majority who interpret their religion as [[Noblebright|peace and love]], and a small but loud minority of bastards who interpret it as [[Grimdark|condoning acts of terrorism]]. A blatant attempt to simulate Israelis for criticism, although that can apply to some religions these days.
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'''The Dominion'''
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A vast empire which exists on the other side of the galaxy. The Dominion is ruled over by a species of liquid shapeshifters called The Founders. They have at their disposal a military composed of two genetically engineered species that worship the Founders as gods: the short and articulate Vorta who serve as ambassadors, bureaucrats and military officers and the big brutal Jem'hadar, who are vat grown drug addicted cannon fodder. These oversee a large number of vassal races, including (as of later seasons of ''DS9'') the Cardassians.

The Founders were once (according to them anyway) a peaceful, kind civilization of explorers who wished to see the galaxy, explore strange new worlds, and seek out new forms of life. Unfortunately, they did this in the wrong neighborhood, and quickly ran into species who did not tolerate others. The fact that the Founders were shapeshifters capable of mimicking almost anyone did not help either. Paranoia, mutual mistrust, and some very bad things eventually led to the Founders deciding "fuck this" and moving their planet into a nebula so nobody would bother them.

The Founders are both obsessed with order extremely racist and xenophobic, and believe that all alien life is inherently untrustworthy and evil, and the best thing to do is conquer/enslave them before they do the same to them. They don't care about the rights of "Solids", and will happily ignore any sense of decency when convenient. This can be seen when The Dominion runs a simulation of the Dominion dominating the Alpha Quadrant. When O'Brien is assaulted by a Jem'Hadar and severely beaten to the point of needing emergency teleportation to medical (the crime being "disrespectful"), the Founders (disguised as Federation Officers) do not press charges, and when Sisko comes barging in demanding answers, dismiss him with little concern about their own soldiers brutalizing citizens. Their overall ideology could be thought of as Thomas Hobbes IN SPACE: people are inherently evil and the only way to make a better world is to impose order upon them.

The Founders, when not wandering around in various forms, tend to spend their time in a massive ocean literally made up of countless billions of Founders, something which is referred to as The Great Link. According to the Founders, this allows them to share information with each other and come to peaceful decisions. This is rapidly proved to be bullshit; when Odo merged with them to share his memories of the Federation as peaceful and tolerant space hippies, not only did the Founders ignore his memories, but actively fucked with his mind in an attempt to turn him into a sleeper agent.

The Founders are massive dicks, even to their own people. Failure among Jem'Hadar is rewarded with slow and painful death, and to be even bigger dicks, the Vorta have no sense of taste and can't appreciate beauty. Not to make them better diplomats, but because they were raised from a primitive stone-age ape tribe, and the Founders think they shouldn't be ever allowed to forget that. (On the plus side, they did give the Vorta an immunity to poison that would make [[Mortarion]] himself jealous. [https://youtu.be/rACCZaBcq1g?t=1m29s| Observe.]) This may also stem from their own neuroses: the Founders themselves have almost no bodily needs at all and require no nourishment, so they design their slaves to be like them.
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'''Species 8472'''
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The one and only race in the galaxy even the Borg don't want to fuck with. Species 8472 are three-legged creatures that live in a space called Fluid Space. It's similar to the [[Eye of Terror]] for the fact that it connects to an alternate dimension and [[Khorne|everyone will be ripped apart upon entering.]]

When the Borg first came around to try and assimilate them they were completely obliterated in a war in which 4 million Borg were killed in the first few days at the cost of almost no members of Species 8472. This war was such a roflstomp that the Borg were forced to call on the Federation for help. [[Tau|The Federation being the better people swallowed their pride and decided to help their sworn enemies,]] [[Eldrad|but were dicks and sent only one ship.]]

Species 8472 fought with fast moving, small ships and devastating beam weapons so the small ship of the Federation could keep up with them and helped the Borg force the species back into Fluid Space. The Federation were the villains on this one.

That and that in ''Star Trek Online'', [[Awesome|they look like the fucking Predator.]]
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'''The Q'''

A race of beings which are so advanced they are basically gods that look onto the Federation judgmentally from time to time with a more playful one of their ranks, who's not above fucking with individual humans from time time. They are mostly a TNG thing and mostly works by grace of John de Lancie's acting chops.

On a side note all [[Chakats]] need to be launched into Fluid Space <u>right now</u>.

== The Star Trek crew ==
Whether the focus of the show is exploration, manning a space station in an important locale or trying to get home, all Star Trek series have a basic set up of casting and focus: namely on a collection of people who are usually the senior most officers on the ship. If you decide to make a Star Trek inspired game take this into consideration.

* '''The Captain''': Big cheese. Makes the hard decisions. Needs to be able to talk, think or fight out of situations as needed. (Two least skubby examples: Kirk and Picard)
* '''The First Officer''': Second in command and trusted advisor. (Two least skubby examples: Riker and Kira)
* '''The Science Officer''': Got high Int stats. Can analyze the situation and work out solutions. The voice of reason. (Two least skubby examples: Data and Spock)
* '''The Engineer''': Hard working technically minded guy who gets shit done. (Two least skubby examples: Scotty and Geordi)
* '''The Doctor''': Ship's healer. The voice of empathy. (Two least skubby examples: Bones and the EMH Doctor)
* '''The Security Officer''': Rough and tumble no nonsense sort who's job it is to keep these guys alive when diplomacy fails. (Two least skubby examples: Worf and Odo)
* '''The Helmsman''': Got spacecraft piloting skills, either full sized starships, shuttles or fighters. (Two least skubby examples: Sulu and Tom Paris)
* '''The Other Guy''': Said individual might be a junior officer/butt-monkey, the ship's therapist, a bartender, communications officer, Linguist, Talaxian hobo or senior navigator whale who does not fit the generally established roles. (Two Least skubby examples: Uhura Quark)

Some of these hats may be worn by more than one character.

== The Shows ==
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===''The Original Series''===
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Created in 1966 by legendary sci-fi [[spiritual liege]] Gene Roddenberry (who ironically became controversial as time went on, [[Matt Ward|like a certain Spiritual Liege in Games Workshop did]] but worse; Ward wasn't syncretizing, hypocritical, didn't stiff his employees or do things that come across as a misogynist sex offender) and pitched as a "Wagon Train to the stars", it's a pulpy adventure sci-fi, full of fistfights and sword fights (the guns never work).

The USS ''Enterprise'' is tasked by the Federation to go on a five year mission to explore space: the final frontier, to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations and boldly go where no man has gone before, though due to budget constraints, her crew often finds that man has in fact gone there before. Or at least something that looks exactly like a man but is actually an [[Xenos|Alien]]. James T. Kirk sleeps with [[Hot Chicks|hot alien babes]] who either die tragically or leave tearfully at the end of the episode, but it's 'k because he's too in love with the Enterprise to ever love a mere ''woman'' more. Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy are cold and logical and rash and emotional respectively, and Scotty [[gets shit done]]. Uniforms, while iconic, tend to look a bit civilian though. Which was apparently an intentional design decision by Roddenberry who didn't want uniforms to look military. He also didn't want phasers to look like guns, which makes them look a bit weird and he didn't want ships to look like rockets, giving ships their distinctive saucer-engineering-nacelles look.

The Original Series frequently ran out of budget and entire episodes were filmed using spare costumes belonging to the production company, resulting in a series of extremely goofy excuses to go to planets full of gangsters or Nazis. This is often copied by shows who don't realize it was done out of pure expediency, and nowadays it's practically a box to check off when doing sci-fi adventure. The lack of budget also resulted in one of the more memorable inventions; unable to budget for a sequence showing the ''Enterprise'' or a shuttle landing on a new planet every week, the writers instead decided to invent the transporter to "beam" the crew wherever they need be. Also worth noting: despite its mediocre critical reception, ratings and eventual cancellation, not to forget the pretty poor quality of most third season episodes, ''TOS'' had a hell of a cultural impact thanks to syndication and it has been said that since it entered syndication in 1969, there hasn't been a 24-hour period without some TV station, in some country, playing Star Trek. Cancellation of The Original Series is now considered one of the worst decisions in TV history.

Fun fact: the ''Enterprise'' and each of her 11 sister ships have enough firepower to [[Exterminatus]] a planet by themselves, after getting issued an order called General Order 24. This however is likely a time-consuming task. According to a later DS9 episode, it takes a fleet of 20 warships 1 hour of sustained bombardment to destroy a planets crust and 5 hours of sustained bombardment to destroy a planet down to its mantle. These 20 ships were also in service 100 years after the Enterprise so they were also more powerful.
Kirk has the distinction of being the only known captain to issue a [[Exterminatus|General Order 24]], because a planet was ''too'' much into wargames (he changed his mind after they dropped wargaming).
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===''The Animated Series''===
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The often forgotten middle child. More or less "seasons 4-5" of ''TOS'' with the same writing staff and actors, sans poor Walter Koenig. He was replaced by a weird camel person. He learned this at a convention, from a fan, while he was trying to announce he'd be writing an episode. Being animated allowed the staff to get a lot more creative with the alien designs and plots, and the writing and acting remain... well, top notch is a stretch, but certainly at the same levels as ''The Original Series'', with the occasional low point. Not ''nearly'' as bad as you're probably picturing from the name, although still limited by the low budget and primitive animation techniques of the television era it was aired in. Notably some sci-fi novelists were brought in to write some episodes, such as Larry Niven and, yes, Walter Koenig.

Also, since the series now has no excuse for throwing in lots of Space Puritans and Space Wizards, it of course continued to do so to derptastic results, because by this point it had become traditional.
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===''The Next Generation''===
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Here's where it starts getting a little deeper and a little darker. The USS ''Enterprise-D'' (the original and C were destroyed in action while A and B were retired) is, like its predecessor, tasked with going where no-one has gone before, but this time around the problems are less likely to be solved in a single episode. Jean-Luc Picard is the captain and he plots and negotiates his way to victory; Mr. Data is cold and unemotional, though not by choice - as an android, he'd very much like to change that; Riker takes over the captain's "sleep with alien babes" duties since Picard is married to the job; Worf the Klingon gets beaten up by monsters to show how tough the monsters are, meaning that Worf winds up looking incredibly weak by the end of the show's run and doesn't regain his badassery until his run on ''DS9''; Dr Bev Crusher is a less interesting version of good old Bones ; Dr Pulaski is a less interesting version of Dr Crusher; counsellor Troy causes some love triangles nobody gave a crap about; and Geordi LaForge [[gets shit done]]. Only two things need to be said about helmsman Wesley Crusher: he was [[Mary Sue|Gene Wesley Roddenberry's self-insert,]] and his sueness got to the point that even his actor started to hate him.

Due to the massive success of The Original Series in syndication (and Paramount being [[Rage|pissed off]] by broadcast networks treating their most valuable IP like any other show), TNG was aired through syndication from the beginning. Although the first couple seasons were laughably bad, the quality began to improve dramatically after [[Meme|Riker grew a beard.]] The later seasons are widely considered to represent the apex of the franchise on the small screen (although ''DS9'' also had its moments); sadly, this series only got one good movie.
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===''Deep Space Nine''===
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Unlike all the other series so far, ''Deep Space Nine'' primarily takes place in a fixed location - the titular space station Deep Space Nine, out near the borders of Federation Space. Said space station is near Bajor, which was recently freed from Cardassian occupation, and a wormhole to the other side of the galaxy which allows [[Warp|all sorts of of crazy shit to go down]]. If the other shows are a wagon train, this one's a border fort.

Benjamin Sisko is the captain, and he alternates between blowing shit up like Kirk and talking people down like Picard in his ultimately-successful quest to become the baddest motherfucker in space. Kira the Bajoran ex-<s>terrorist</s> <S>''noble freedom fighter''</s> (who are we kidding she calls herself a terrorist) struggles to free and rebuild her people, Dr. Bashir struggles to find his character, Dax struggles to hold things down and has to switch bodies doing it, Odo IS ''Liquid Space Cop'', Quark runs his bar and heckles the Federation, Garak pretends to be a tailor while dropping killer lines, and Miles O'Brien [[gets shit done]]. Also, Worf wanders in halfway through, and actually gets to punch things instead of just getting punched by them. It's also a lot more political than other series (though ''TNG'' and ''Voyager'' have their moments) and the last series to have Gene Roddenberry's involvement.

It's the closest the canon series ever get to [[Grimdark]], especially when the Dominion show up. The show has aged remarkably well and the terrorist/freedom fighter debate was repeatedly explored in a very mature and honest way. Except that Bajorans and Maquis are a bunch of [[Tumblr|whiny and irrational dicks.]] "I feel oppressed, so I'm going to violate Starfleet regulation!" ''DS9'' is the most serialized of all Trek shows and could be considered a forerunner to the golden age of television with its long story arcs and deep character development. Overall, ''DS9'' has to be considered the most consistently good Trek show thanks to the excellent writing and fantastic performances from a truly wonderful ensemble cast. At least until the final season, when the writers who made it good were pulled to try and fail to make good movies, heralding the failure that was Voyager.

It wasn't without its controversies however. The show was airing around the same time as another thematically similar sci-fi show, Babylon 5. Not only that but characters also shared similarities, as did the episodes. Interestingly, beginning of both series, introduction of characters and airing of similar episodes were often too close to each other for one show to copy the other but this did not stop massive [[Rage]] and [[/v/|fanboy wars]] from starting between fans of the two series.

How good is ''Deep Space Nine''? Every Star Trek series and even the reboot movies have pretty much ripped off ideas and concepts established during the series.
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===''Voyager''===
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''Voyager'' is... decent. There is no debate on how it outshines Enterprise. The plot centers around the USS ''Voyager'', a smallish ship which gets teleported over to the other side of the galaxy, and the plot of the series as a whole centers on its efforts to get back home, with the primary obstacle being the consistently terrible decisions of its own captain. Think ''Gilligan's Island'' on a starship.

Like ''TNG'' and ''DS9'' it's a character-driven drama just as often as it is a sci-fi adventure romp, although it only has one half-decent character, called "The Doctor" ([[Doctor Who|No relation.]]); he's the solid-light hologram representative of the ship's emergency medical computer, who has to take on actual medical duties when their chief medical officer was conveniently killed in the pilot episode. Other than this, Chakotay is a peace-loving and spiritually rich indian <s>freedom fighter</s> <s>terrorist</s> [[FAIL|who was written with the help of a special cherokee consultant so native his name was Jamake Highwater and it turned out later on that he was actually jewish and didn't know dick about native cultures so he made everything up resulting in Chakotay basically being a borderline racist caricature of what you think indians are like. Akoochimoya.]] Tom Paris is an annoying jerk and is counterbalanced by Harry Kim who is the ideal boy-scout, making him only half as annoying and twice as boring. B'elanna Torres tries to perpetuate a lineage of dudes getting shit done but ends up blankly reciting her technobabble, having second degree plasma burns and – worst of all – systematically fails to get shit done whenever the warp core goes nuts. Tuvok tries hard to be as cool as Spock but ends up being a lame version of the n°1 Vulcan who uses logic to justify everything and makes it short for "you are wrong, I am right because I said so." Kes is passed as a fragile and nice character but it takes a couple of episodes to realize that having a short lifespan does not change the facts: [[powergamer|when you can boil someone to death from the inside of their body, drain life from everything around you to become stronger and do anything you want without knowing how, just by thinking of it]], you are a goddamn Mary Sue. From the fourth season onwards the only character the writers seemed to care about are Seven of Nine, [[Mary Sue|a human woman who recently escaped from Borg control and kept all of her cyborg enhancements but regained her free will]]; another Mary Sue, to be sure, but she's [[Hot Chicks|hot]], and the other characters are much worse, so that's not really a bad thing. (Fortunately, the one good character on the show, namely The Doctor AKA the EMH, still received a lot of attention from the writers and almost single-handedly made the show watchable). There was also Neelix, who was the apparent inspiration for Jar-Jar Binks, and any sane crew would have pushed him out of an airlock on the first episode. Fans who stuck with the show despite its glaring failings were given one final slap in the face with the <s>controversial</s> shit final season, in which the producers decided "screw steadily crafting a satisfying conclusion to a story which we have wasted for most of the last seven years anyway; lets just ignore it until the final episode and then throw in some shit about trans-warp conduits and time travel, bitches love time travel!" If you did not care about any of the characters or the subplots or time travel making sense (the writers sure didn't), then the final episode was explosions (and the Borg got a major setback, just don't think about the setup too hard).

The Doctor never once stopped being totally fucking awesome though, and the great acting from the cast carries the series from being horrific to watchable. Just goes to show that no matter how good your actors are, they can't make diamonds out of shit.

Hopes that the franchise had sunk to a new low from which it could surely only get better were about to be proved wrong in spectacular fashion...
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===''Enterprise''===
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A [[Indrick Boreale|bald, foolish]] and (according to some) successful attempt to create a series even worse than ''Voyager'' was, from the minute the Nickelback-tier theme tune started the fans knew in their hearts it was fucking doomed. So bad that even the most devoted Trekkies gave up on it, in just four seasons this series almost single-handedly killed off the ''Trek'' franchise (which is actually quite impressive, in a perverse sort of way).

It's a prequel to the rest, taking place on the first ''Enterprise'', before the Federation was founded, and Earth was an independent power- so there's a lot of primitive versions of things from other series. At least the uniforms were pretty cool in an Air Force sort of way, although when that's the best thing you can say about a series, that tells you all you need to know about its quality (or lack thereof). Captained by <s>that guy from ''Quantum Leap''</s> Jonathon Archer, in hindsight the fact that they had to rename him from their original choice of Jeffrey Archer to avoid confusion with the disgraced British MP and author of the same name probably cursed the series with bad karma before it had even begun shooting. In an unusual twist for a ''Trek'' series, his first officer isn't a <s>terrorist</s> ''noble freedom fighter,'' however she does share a trait with her ''Voyager'' predecessor in that the actress who portrayed her frequently criticized the show's writers in interviews. Other than that, well, Hoshi Sato screams a lot, Travis Mayweather was so dull even the writers forgot he existed, Malcolm Reed has an accent, Dr Phlox is a weird creepy alien with weird creepy alien moral (and gets surprisingly interesting when given enough screentime, which hardly happened), and Trip also has an accent and [[gets shit done]].

Was retooled twice, the third season tries to be ''24'' IN SPACE (stop some guys the Xindi from blowing up Earth) while the 4th season is a massive apology about the last three seasons that tries to fix all the problems they had, and as a result, the only season that's close to being good.

Amusingly the final episode is set on the holodeck of the Enterprise-D and leaves us with the firm impression that the producers would have much rather have just continued making ''The Next Generation''; considering the mediocre quality of the ''TNG'' movies we got instead, this probably would have worked out better for all involved (Or not since ''Voyager'' was that; its first episode was even numbered 901, as in Season 9 Episode 1).

Yet despite all this bad directing, subpar plots, and frankly boring episodes, ''Enterprise'' still manages to be moderately enjoyable with occasional moments of awesomeness if you can suffer through it. The focus on founding Federation races like the Andorans was refreshing and the technology level, being somewhere between the original series and the real world present-day, was quite interesting. We also got to see the Vulcans portrayed as arrogant, superior dicks. Which makes a lot more sense than the way they're usually portrayed as fairly submissive towards humans because they are, obviously and objectively, the superior race. The Klingons certainly still considered themselves to be honorable but the show made it clear that the Klingon notion of honor is rarely analogous to the human concept which was interesting as all hell to watch. There have been a few small nods to it in discovery and the abrams movies.

And let's be fucking honest, [[/tg/]] loves 40k and the Xindi arc was about as grimdark as shit gets. And that was awesome.

Also makes a neat pairing with ''Voyager'' in that they really mess with the Prime Directive and question the Federation.
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===''Renegades''===
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Kickstarter ''Trek''. It's basically comprised of a good ''Star Trek'' movie, a mediocre ''Star Trek'' season, and a shitty ''Star Trek'' fanfic, with all sharing equal screentime. The makers submitted their pilot made-for-TV movie to CBS trying to get it made into a legit on-the-air series (and by god it shows). They said they can still make a season, just not one on TV. Pretty much has good and bad in equal measure. Some characters are actually interesting (about time we saw more of the Breen!) while others are pure [[Mary Sue]]s (including a male Seven of Nine with a built-in Borg-gun/personal shield/fully-functional hand). Some of the ideas are interesting while others are boring or already-been-done. The CGI is all Hollywood-quality, but the practical effects are okay at best.

Most of all, the biggest thing this needs/needed is time. It's obvious that they made this without knowing that they were going to be able to make a TV show or not, and tried to cram the sort of build-up and intrigue we saw in ''DS9'' into a span of 90 minutes. For now though, it's decidedly meh.
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===''Discovery''===
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----
A new "prequel" series set 10 years before ''The Original Series.'' Run exclusively on CBS' paid streaming service (unless you live outside the US and Canada, in which case you can get it on Netflix) to try and drum up sign-ups and revenue, it features a mix of ''Enterprise'' and Abramstrek aesthetics despite supposedly taking place in parallel to the TOS "The Cage" pilot while [[what|having technology superior to late DS9]] and introducing [[dune|mushroom-based space travel]] that would imply [[retcon|all later events and warp travel would be outdated]]. The trailer has attracted a lot of concern over the fact that Klingons have been completely redesigned to look like slit-nosed ogres wearing ancient Egyptian cosplay, and rumors that the Klingons shown were [[Racial Holy War|primitives who had been trapped in stasis]] proved to be unfounded, so there is no excuse. Not having a cold war to posture about, the new villains are based off of Trump-inspired xenophobia by the admission of the authors. Also the lead character is Spock's human sister that he never mentioned before, aka the ''exact'' origin of the [[Mary Sue]] which is just fucking depressing. Want a new Star Trek episode about racism and immigration? Try the now-banned [https://youtu.be/3VEZH8bqytA Star Trek Continues]. Want Star Trek about other modern issues? Try ''The Orville'' below; that's right, American Dad In Space may be a better Star Trek than an actual Star Trek series.

Initial reviews have been... well, it's shit. The writing is overly convoluted, the massive injection of grimdark into pre-TOS continuity is anathema to the hardcore fans (the ''human'' characters are often the ones doing the nastiest shit, including [[Marines Malevolent|trying to kill a Klingon party by planting an explosive on the corpse of one of their comrades for when they came to collect the dead]]) and the Klingons are so flat and devoid of characterization that they might as well be Larry the Cable Guy lookalikes wearing Trump hats, which is a massive disappointment for a series that promised to put a spotlight on Klingon culture but ended up retconning all the characterization that happened in TNG and DS9. It ''may'' get better with time (remember that it took two seasons for TNG to get really good) but given the release schedule (split between 2017 and 2018 with a long break) it may come too late for the fanbase to care. Currently it's better than Enterprise or Voyager. But that's like saying water tastes better than piss. Releasing the show on CBS All Access instead of cable or broadcast TV makes it seem that executives don't really give a shit if the show succeeds or fails.

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===''The Orville''===
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Not actually Star Trek, but a drama-comedy homage to Star Trek, that's pretty much to Star Trek what Family Guy is to The Simpsons, created by and starring Seth MacFarlane of ''Family Guy'' infamy. No wait, come back. The guy's a huge Star Trek fan and he felt that too many shows nowadays were up in their ass with grimdark, so he convinced the execs to make a loving comedic sendup of The Next Generation. Seth's signature style of humor is evident, but here it does share time reasonably well with dramatic elements and the sci-fi material. Many of the executive producers are actually Trek alumni or notable industry Trekkies (including the guy who wrote the ''Futurama'' Trek parody episode) and the episodes aired so far have featured the same kind of themes that you would expect from a new Trek series. The series itself is about the strung-out captain of the eponymous not-Enterprise "The Orville", with his ex-wife as first officer - the first episode is about them reconciling for the sake of getting shit done, and the not-Spock character as his (female) love interest. While The Orville does contain some left wing-politics, it's lighter on them compared to Discovery.

The shows reception is so far quite [[Skub|mixed]]. Some see it as a breath of [[Noblebright|fresh air]] in an overly [[Grimdark|stagnant]] genre (with a few splashes of genius, particularly [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright_brothers#Orville naming the ship after one of the Wright Brothers] and an episode commentating on the pitalls of trusting everything to popular opinion), others see it as derivative, low-brow and preachy on certain subjects, which is common for anything McFarlane has a hand in. Trekkies are divided on the show, with many [[butthurt]] over Discovery endorsing the Orville and others seeing The Orville as [[Original character, do not steal|piggybacking on an existing fanbase]]. As always, stay tuned for how this turns out.

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== Films ==
As a general rule, the even-numbered ones aren't complete shit.

* '''''Star Trek: The Motion Picture''''': AKA: The Slow Motion Picture, or the Motionless Picture. Old school sci-fi geeks like the ideas, but terrible pace and interminable special effects that were clearly meant to capitalize on this newfangled ''3011'' doohickey all the kids are yammering about kill them dead for everyone else. Besides the uniform worn by Kirk, the uniforms also look like pajamas. So no wonder they were changed only a movie later.
* '''''Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan''''': [[Meme|KKKHHHAAAAAAAAAAAANNNN!!!!]] Widely considered the best of all the films, and the only one considered a straight up great film, no qualifiers. If you haven't seen it, see it. Interesting fact: Due to time constraints, actors of Kirk and Khan weren't available at the same time. So the entire script was written so that Kirk and Khan never need to meet face-to-face. ''Nemesis'' and ''Into Darkness'' tried to recreate it's success without getting that it worked because Khan and Kirk had a history together.
* '''''Star Trek III: The Search for Spock''''': Where is Spock? ''He's on Genesis.'' ALL AHEAD FULL! Not really bad, just run of the mill compared to the superior films that surround it. It was also saddled with the misfortune of undoing some of the previous film's more-daring decisions, and having its only daring decision reversed a film later. If you had to say that any film broke the "odd numbers suck" rule, it would be this one.
* '''''Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home''''': The crew of the ''Enterpise'' travels back in time to save the whales. No, really. Somehow it works; ''The Voyage Home'' is a zany comedy romp beloved by the general public and fandom alike, leaving only the most intractable fanbois to bitch and moan.
* <del>'''''Star Trek V: The Final Frontier''''':</del> <s>The epitome of the "odd-numbered Star Trek films suck" rule.</s> {{BLAM|Lies! There is no}} '''''Star Trek V'''''{{BLAM|! It was not called}} '''''The Final Frontier'''''{{BLAM|! It was not directed by Kirk's egotistical actor and did not have a plot that could literally be summarized as "Kirk is betrayed by his incompetent crew, yet goes on to fight God and win!" The films mysteriously moved from four to six and ''we are all improved because of this!''}}
* '''''Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country''''': The Space Cold War ends amidst Tom Clancy-esque drama. However unlike his work, it's actually watchable. The sendoff for the original cast. Gene Roddenberry watched it, hated it and was going to seek legal advice but died a week later. And good riddance to that, because it's a pretty sweet political thriller if your hippie-panties don't get into a twist at the thought that the Federation isn't a perfect place full of perfect people.
* '''''Star Trek Generations''''': Malcolm McDowell blows up planets to get into a magic space ribbon to live forever, no it does not make any more sense in context. An already-weak story hamstrung by its obsession with being daring and unconventional rather than good. Also, Kirk dies on the bridge in the most face-palming manner possible.
* '''''Star Trek First Contact''''': The ''TNG'' crew face off with the Borg to ensure the future happens. Lots of action and some good performances make this the only good ''TNG'' movie. It sadly is also the only appearance of the Defiant on screen. Doing a pretty decent job of fighting the Borg. Before the Enterprise E saves the day of course. The Borg Queen was also introduced here before Voyager, ruining what could have been a good idea. It also has enough snark to rival a Marvel Cinematic Universe movie.
* '''''Star Trek Insurrection''''': If you thought the [[Avatar|Na'vi]] were a bunch of badly-written [[Mary Sue]]s, you ain't seen nothing yet! B-b-b-baby you ain't seen n-n-n-nothing yet! Also, Riker shaves his beard, and that's basically a war crime.
* '''''Galaxy Quest''''': Not officially ''Star Trek'' but good enough for an honorable mention. Built around the basic premise of "What if the cast of ''Star Trek'' ended up on a real spaceship and had to actually do the shit they did in the show, including saving the world." Featuring a veritable all-star cast of talented comedians and character actors, this is one of the best parodies ever made.
* '''''Star Trek Nemesis''''': The last stand of the ''TNG'' cast, ending not with a bang but a whimper. It also required amending the even=good/odd=bad rule to "''Galaxy Quest'' counts as a ''Star Trek'' film so this one is also odd."
* '''''Star Trek''''' (2009): Alternate timeline "reboot" (sideboot?) with the original crew, albeit with new younger actors. Timey-wimey shit happens and old prime timeline Spock (reprised by old Leonard Nemoy) is hurled back in time along with a bunch of Romulan assholes. The dickbag Romulans begin fucking shit up, slightly altering history in a way that ensures gratuitous lens flare. [[skub| Skubtastic]], but at least watchable, which is more than ''most'' odd-numbered films can muster. If you still even count it as odd, without the ''Galaxy Quest''-amendment.
* '''''Star Trek Into Darkness''''': The second of the alternate timeline ''Trek'' films. Terrorism, conspiracy and flapdoodle. Even more skubtastic, but generally considered worse than its predecessor, partially because (like Nemesis) it tries to be a remake of ''The Wrath of Khan''.
* '''''Star Trek Beyond''''': Fairly good, but lacking in the high-minded themes that even the previous two reboot films explored. More fun and adventure-y, almost like something you'd see in a TV series plot, and with a pared-down scope. At least they don't feel the need to threaten to blow up Earth again under the mistaken logic that nothing less will get us to care. Not enough lens flare though, so it looked more like ''[[Star Wars]]'' than ''Star Trek''.
* '''''Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning''''': Another parody, parodying not only ''Star Trek'' but ''Babylon 5'' as well. Captain Pirk builds a starship called CPP ''Kickstart'', allies with Russia and takes over the world. He wants to take over more planets but the ships of his P-Fleet aren't fast enough to travel outside the Solar system. A maggot hole opens and it leads to an alternate reality. Pirk wants to take over the Earth of this reality, which leads to an [[awesome]] space battle between the P-Fleet and the fleet of the space station Babel 13 led by Johnny Sherrypie. The movie features some of the best special effects ever put in a sci-fi movie, which is pretty impressive, considering that this is an amateur film with a very low budget and was rendered in five years in someone's bedroom. The film is spoken in Finnish but subtitles are available for a wide variety of languages, including Klingon.

=== Novels ===
Like most long time franchises ''Star Trek'' has a massive line of books. Unlike most they're basically just fanfics as nothing but the show and the movies is canon so the writers can do whatever they want. This changed after ''Nemesis'' since they might never have another show or movie in the "Prime" universe, so the writers got their shit together and wrote a group of books as a tight community very close to the shows. The relaunch novels are a continuation of the show they're about. Also there's the ''Titan'' book series which is about Riker and Troi getting their own ship, which happens to be staffed by every race in the Federation including living rocks, [[awesome|space dinosaurs]] that smell like [[meatbread|toast]] and a [[what|space cyborg ostrich]].

During yet another novel continuity (Star Trek: Destiny), the Borg go nuts and eat Pluto... yeah... and then they finally get sick of the Federation somehow managing to not get assimilated all the time, so they finally just send every last cube they have with orders to Exterminatus the absolute SHIT out of the entire Alpha Quadrant. Pretty much every important character from TNG, DS9, and Voyager has to team up to stop them, and even then the Federation still get its shit pushed in and winds up having to rely on a vaguely ridiculous deus ex machina to win, and [[Grimdark|billions of people still die and dozens of planets are blown to shit]]. It was pretty insane.

Then all the Federation's main enemies get together to form an anti-Federation and start poking the bear, all the while telling their allies that they're somehow warmongering dicks.

== Video Games ==
''Star Trek Online'' is the free-to-play online game built by Cryptic Studios and run by Perfect World. With an official license CBS, recurring characters voiced by various Trek alumni, and recently a license to include references to the reboot chronology (officially known as the "Kelvin Timeline"), it's the closest existing thing to an "official" continuation of the "Prime" timeline, and contains history and fluff extending nearly 40 years from the end of Star Trek: Nemesis.

Taking place in the 25th century (around the year 2409-2410), the Hobus supernova (the event that kicked Nero and Spock into the past during Star Trek 2009) has devastated the Romulans, and its near-collapse and fragmentation causes tensions between a resurgent Klingon Empire and the Federation. The tensions blow up into a war, with members of a new, nicer, breakaway Romulan Republic playing both sides in exchange for development aid.

The game contains deep cuts from all over Trek lore, and answers questions about what happened to various key characters, including Data (took over the Enterprise-E, then retired), the Enterprise (now an even bigger ship run by Andorian captain Shon), and the Voyager crew (it took Harry Kim 30 years to make Captain lol). Raises barely-shown, unnamed, and otherwise obscure races to new prominence as big bad foes, including the Iconians (ancient aliens with god complexes who mutated into energy beings, currently live in dyson spheres and were only defeated by predestination paradox), Tzenkethi (4-armed halo guys whose weak points are the FRONT of their shields), and Nak'hul (the alien nazis from Enterprise as time-traveling terrorists who blame the Federation for a throwaway event that happened in TNG's beach episode).

== Would you like to know more? ==
*[http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/ Main Memory Alpha: A ''Star Trek'' wiki]
*[http://memory-beta.wikia.com/wiki/ Main Memory Beta: The flip-side of Memory Alpha for the less than official stuff]
*[http://sfdebris.com/ SF Derbis: opinionated episode reviews, has some non ''Trek'' stuff as well]

[[Category: Television]]