 April 24, 2016 - 11:01am | Thanks. Found a "make an ID card" online program. |
 April 27, 2016 - 4:45am | "LIKE" Thank you. "Never fire a laser at a mirror." |
 April 27, 2016 - 5:05am | How would this card handle the Dralasites who can change their gender? Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
April 27, 2016 - 7:39am | Either NA, or list their current "phase". |
 April 27, 2016 - 12:07pm | How would this card handle the Dralasites who can change their gender?
The dral gender isn't an issue, the problem arises with their handedness which takes roughly ten minutes to alter. The only answer here is "varies". |
April 28, 2016 - 5:56am | Don't want to get too political but there is this law in North Carolina which gender differences do seem to matter a little more than handedness. With the Dralasites or any race that is not set a more flexible ID card is needed. But ID cards by their purpose cannot be flexible or they do not serve as confirmation of identification. The above card looks great but for the Dralasites does not quite work. Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
April 28, 2016 - 6:14am | I already explained how a Dral could be described on such a card. Any bureaucracy is going to have a way to classify something that it feels needs classifying, even if that classification is something like "Other", or "Not Applicable" (which would be my choice). |
 April 28, 2016 - 6:51am | Just go for an embedded ID on the forhead for simplicity's sake -- such as Teal'k from Stargate SG-1. Otherwise, I think the ID card is great. Joe Cabadas |
 May 14, 2016 - 2:35pm | I'd love to see a character sheet where the ID card was in the upper left corner. The dream version, of course, would be a computer or on line application that would let you enter this info, insert a character portrait (if available) and print. NPC version is card on front, abbreviated stats and equipment on back. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
May 14, 2016 - 2:39pm | I assume professional credentials are skills + levels With modern ID's incorporating features to thwart forgery I'd put the UPF logo across the center of the card and large but at 35% like it was a hologram floating in the card and underneath the character info. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
May 14, 2016 - 4:55pm | There was only so much I could do with the sample maker I had access to. |
 May 17, 2016 - 11:40am | Perhaps with so many races and possibilities, things like sex and handedness aren't used on official ID cards. A simpler set of data may be used, with finger/psueodpodprint, voice-print, and retina pattern added for computer confirmation. Perhaps even a DNA sequence key. See, for example, the picture on page 8 of the Alpha Dawn Basic Game rules. Would the UPF issue Frontier-wide ID cards, or would each planet handle that themselves? The UPF seems to be fairly hands-off regarding the sovereignty of each planet, but that doesn't necessarily exclude requiring a standard ID card for all citizens. |
May 18, 2016 - 4:49am | I am thinking the ID cards are issued by "the governing body" some of which are mega-corps others planetary/base governments & in few specific cases the UPF. The cards can be scanned and thus can contain extra data. I have id that can be scanned and tah dah a whole lot of info is available to who ever scans it. The written info & usually crappy picture on them are very basic info relevant to the id and agency issuing it. So I sort of figure the future ID cards don't even have to have much on them as law/customs/bank and so on would scan them and get the relevant info they are allowed to access. "Never fire a laser at a mirror." |
May 18, 2016 - 8:02am | I am thinking the ID cards are issued by "the governing body" some of which are mega-corps others planetary/base governments & in few specific cases the UPF. That's a good idea: it seems like Pan-Galactic has its tendrils in everything, and is even viewed in a beneficial light by the common citizen, though this is tempered a bit by the corporate rules in Knight Hawks. I suppose it all depends on how much of a pain you want interplanetary customs to be. Do you need a passport to travel between worlds, do all worlds give full faith to the ID cards of other worlds, or will your UPF-issued ID card do? |
May 18, 2016 - 10:10am | When in doubt I tend to defalt to something similar in concept to (though perhaps more technically advanced in execution than) what we would use today to maintain a degreee of veritas. We are at or very close to the stage of a "one card for everything" society right now. Smart cards could easily replace every other card in your wallet plus passport. The only thing on the technical side still being worked out is data accuracy standards and those for central databasing. Socially is a different story. People are (rightly) suspicious of every bit of their lives being documented and potentially scrutinized. |
 May 18, 2016 - 7:55pm | I would think that governements would love to personalize ID cards for their citizens to show off their sovrentity. I go with the actual detailed data being imbeddeed in the card and the rest of the visible stuff being more generic. This gives the government the chance to spice up the visual with their logo, coat of arms, tourest advertisement photo, or whatever. My US pasport now is all pretty with pictures and historical quotes compaired to my old 1980 pasport that was just blue pages. All the details in the data is read from the chip inside and many countries do not even stamp the pages anymore, they just scan and log the visa electronically. Outside of government stuff my credit card is starting to act as ID because it tracks me. So I can see megacorp issued IDs being honored and used for general stuff like commerce. -iggy |
May 19, 2016 - 5:03am | Agreed. I like the idea of the PGC card being the instrument of tendering credit and a defacto ID card. Sure you're from Clarion too and have a very pretty ID card with the crest of the monarchy on it but you pretty much need a PGC card to function in the Frontier. As a matter of fact new aliens showing up in the Frontier find PGC is more than willing to issue a potential new customer a card which in turn gets them the default ID where none of the sovereign colonies are going to be in a hurry to issue identification documents, especially with that yazirian politician saber rattling about building a space wall to keep some of these aliens out. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
May 19, 2016 - 5:14am | Not to bring up an old debate/almost flame war that I was totally on the losing side of from the past butttt.... I have to point out that the UPF is not a government, it's an alliance like NATO (as much as i hate to admit it, so says the Basic Game rulebook) Would it really be issuing ID cards? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
May 19, 2016 - 5:43am | The thing about corporations is that they LOVE "externalization". Why go to the trouble/expense of maintaining the data network for a Frontier-wide commerce system when you can foist it off on the UPF and have them carry the costs. They may have had to do it themselves when there wasn't a formal central body, but once the UPF comes into being, PGC would pass it off as fast as they could get away with doing. Pass it off to the pols as "Well, we've tried doing it ourselves, but there are gaps and some people just won't play along. Now if you made it mandatory...and of course you'd oversee it to protect your interests in seeing only accurate data is used...we'll even show you how it's done and consult with you until you're ready to take it fully over..." |
May 19, 2016 - 6:00am | And yet the UPF can't make it mandatory. Also PGC has credit for creating the interstellar trade language, not sure but they may have been involved in establishment of the credit, and the Galactic standard calendar; this is the kind of thing PGC would go in for as the first mega corp. Corporations issue credit cards I can see PGC as the first interstellar pushing their card from the stand point of it oppenning markets. And to be sure it probably started purely as a credit card, evolved into a debit card and eventually became the "de facto" ID card of the frontier. Edit: Question on PCs and cash flow: any objections to letting an EMPLOYED PC borrow 1/2 of his next two weeks salary for the asking (no bank approval needed) it must be paid back in very short order. It gives a Player some more flexibility when a PC is starting a mission to pick up some needed equipment. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
May 19, 2016 - 10:50am | Whether an organization is a government or an alliance is not necessarily as clear-cut as that. The UPF can "collect taxes for the maintenance of the Star Law Rangers and the Spacefleet." Do they levy taxes on individuals or do they tax planetary governments? Can a planet withdraw unilaterally from the United Planets? Can a member planet's government refuse to allow Star Law to investigate a possible Sathar incursion on its soil? Are there any recourses the UPF can take if a member planet refuses to cooperate, say, by refusing to pay its taxes (if planetary governments are taxed)? In general, you're right: the UPF is a military alliance, not a central government. Spacefleet can only operate to defend member planets from a common enemy; Star Law can only operate to deal with Sathar and their agents. But the details can be a little tricky, and not necessarily absolute. |
May 20, 2016 - 9:50pm | I don't see the megacorps outsourcing. These are old school self seficient corporations not the 21st century specialized companies we have now. So, a PGC ID card is accepted as legitimate ID but there is also the Streel ID cards too and many other megacorp ID cards. This also creates a class system among beings, those that have megacorp ID cards and those that have only planetary goverment issue ID cards. Or maybe it is viewed more as are you planetary rights or corporate rights in your political views. -iggy |
