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The Genius of Dan Hamman

    Submitted by Telak on Wed, 03/29/2017 - 22:00

    Hideaki Chang

    Conscientious corporal from Hawaii. MACO who joined Enterprise for a crusade into the Delphic Expanse. Feared getting lost. Likes fast motorcycles.

    Starfleet Starfleet icon  Personnel Personnel
    Gender: male. Species: Human.
    Command & Staffing abilitys: Staff Alternate Universe 22nd Century
    Classification: SECURITY
    Red Dot Computer Skill   Red Dot Physics   Red Dot Stellar Cartography  
    Red Dot Biology   Red Dot Your other MACOs here are attributes all +1.
    INTEGRITY: 6  CUNNING: 6  STRENGTH: 7

    Characteristics: Affiliation Starfleet affilition, 22nd Century 22nd Century, Corporal, MACO, Human species.
    Requires: MACO.

    Rule hint for this card

    OTF-Conversion-Rules:
    If you play OTF this card replaces the backward compatible 2E card Hideaki Chang, Conscientious Corporal from These are the Voyages - ST1E compatible These are the Voyages - ST1E compatible (the 2E card is no longer valide in OTF).

    Card logging info: First edited by Telak at Mar 30th, 2017. Please support openCards and validate game text of this card!
     

    		Hideaki Chang

    This Card-Review article was written by Kaufman and was published first on "The Continuing Committee (trekcc.org)" at Mar 29th, 2017.

    Let’s talk about the genius of Dan Hamman for a second. Gifted designer doesn’t come even close to describing him. You can catch a glimpse of his brilliance not only in Broken Bow, but in The Terran Empire as well.

    Nowhere is his foresight more evident than in the design of the MACOs. There were so many directions he could have gone with them. There’s the lore solution that we have now, but they could also have the skill or even the icon courtesy of the mission patch.

    At first glance, the icon seems ideal. It takes up very little real estate, making it easy to reference on cards. It has a distinct shape, meaning that it won’t be confused with other icons despite the small size it has to have in gametext, and things look good.

    However, you can’t forget the Mirror Universe. There are just so many icons that those personnel get by default, making another one rather challenging to fit. They need the Expansion, Quadrant, and Era icons on the right and Staffing, Alternate Universe, and Terran Empire Icon on the left. In fact, Corporal Scottimage had a restriction box for a great deal of time during design and development. It became apparent that for him to have the icons he needs, the box had to go. He might be able to lose the staffing, but there was nothing to go on the other side.

    Lest you think that a smaller gametext box would solve that problem, it would open up new ones. It would require that every MACO have an entirely different template, and that is not a good thing. By giving them the standard skill box, it opens up design possibilities for things along the lines of Hideki Chang, who has a really nice boosting ability, which stacks fairly well with the MACO Disruptor Rifle.

    So the solution has to be a skill. Put into the box, it is very clear who is and who isn’t a MACO. Except then you suddenly lose the prospect of having a Mission Specialist MACO. And Support Personnel just aren’t that sexy. Plus, you can jumpstart your Terran Empire deck by seed phase downloading Mission Specialist Sargent Mayweather.

    Smack dab in the middle of Starfleet week, we hope you’ve enjoyed this look at one of the hidden treasures of the Design team. Others have spoken about how neat the MACOs are and you’ll be able to print them out yourself in a couple days’ time. Hideki Chang may not be your favorite, but suddenly that MACO only achievement isn’t as unique to Second Edition as you thought.

    by Kaufman, Staff Writer