That's a really good question; there's a few other ships named in the Star Trek mythos I'd love to have do cameos. Until they give a "go ahead", though, I've been erring on the side of caution & just not using those ships. The only thing in the universe scarier than the Borg is lawyers. Let's not give the lawyers a reason to go after the STO devs, eh? :p

Honestly, I like this policy MUCH BETTER".. as fun as it would be to create missions where we go back in time and help Kirk and Spock save the day (or Archer and Tripp)... this capability would lead to a lot of really dreadful missions with people taking all sorts of liberties with the characters... putting the Captain they like least in an un-flattering light...

This policy is much simpler, and clearer. We can have an NPC say "James Kirk reported in 2280, that the situation was _____"... but now we don't have to jump through hoops hoping that our rendition of Kirk is "different enough". This is much less muddy, and as someone who plans to add content, I appreciate the clear concise ruling here.

There's a saying.. "strong (tall/good) fences make good neighbors". It's good to know where the boundaries are.. it makes it much easier for everyone to play safe, and have a good time.

Well this is frustrating, I personally hate this policy.


My mission series revolved around a specific canon character at an older age. Now I can't do it.

I'm glad that this issue is finally settled.

And the credo "Reference is ok, physical appearance is not ok," is, I think, easy to follow.


And, again, I think there is no story that would only work, if you have the original character appearing. And every story is better when you use a character that you can shape however you want.



And Capt. William2, if you need help rewriting your story to a new character, I'm happy to help. Just PM me.

I'm canceling doing the story, without the character it loses its poinancy, emotional connection, and drama.

Reworking it would only make it another bland story, and only referring to the character would come across poorly.

Well, I'm on the safe side, because Vorta can be cloned and my character looks like the Eris on the show, but I'm a clone of the original Eris, so it's only logical that I look the same like her in the game.

Hrm. Does this extend to characters who are alluded to?

I'd imagine there's no issue with Trip Tucker's 14th cousin because, as a basic matter of genetics, almost everybody would be Trip Tucker's 14th cousin.

But if there's a character mentioned but never seen, can we invent a character to fill that role?

For example, a case where an order was given by Starfleet command, I'd assume we could invent an admiral.

Or if, say, (and I'm making this up for a convenient example), Riker mentioned having an academy buddy named Lenny Smith. Lenny Smith never appeared onscreen. Would we absolutely have to invent a new academy buddy or could we use Lenny Smith if he never, ever appeared onscreen?

I understand what you have written, but according to the Foundry EULA we are allowed to use everything from the series and the movies!

I may have missed something, so if you could post a quote of the point which states that we are not allowed to use characters from the series and movies I would be grateful.

What they mean is "recreate your favorite episode without the characters that made the story what it was"