Mirriam-Wester Dictionary defines resolve /rĭ-zŏlv′/ in a multitude of ways — as an intransitive verb that means 1. to deal with successfully, 2. to reach a firm decision, 3. to declare or decide, 4. to reduce by analysis, separate into components (or in the past to melt), 5. to make progress from dissonance to consonance, or 6. to work out the resolution of something.

Often, people see this as “grit” or “determination”, but I’m going to go with a combo of all of these definitions. In this example, crew of USS Fearless has been trying to find the culprit in a series of attacks on Federation shipping that have been attributed to Starfleet vessels. Central to figuring out the mystery is a player character, Ooloofar (or “Olaf”) the former operations officer, now promoted executive officer. A long time staple of the ship’s crew and one of the first two Saurian officers in the fleet, he had come aboard a year or so before the Federation-Klingon War, and was under the mentorship of the former XO (killed in combat) and the current captain, Fiona Kerr (from RPGaDay, Day 1). 

Having managed to identify warp signatures and the voice of the ship’s captain from some of the aggrieved vessels, Fearless is able to finally locate their prey — a Starfleet surplus ship that had been lost in the war and is being used by the Orion Syndicate, and captained by a disgraced but talented Starfleet officer. During the ensuing fight between their Walker-class ship — an older and less powerful design, vs. the newer but somewhat cobbled together Constitution-class vessel, Ooloofar gets his first real taste of command. His skills and persistence have frequently helped with scientific or engineering challenges, and during other ship-to-ship battles he was often instrumental in keeping the vessel in the fight…now, as XO, he finds himself in the position of having to assist the captain in the tactical side of the fight. 

Their opponent is good, and Fearless is somewhat outmatched by her opposition. As the fight went on, Fearless takes a couple of heavy strikes and is running low on shields and has suffered several “breaches” — damage that lowers the effectiveness of the ship in combat under STA rules. They are in a hell of a place, and it looks like they might just lose. It is at this moment, his technical skills and intellect tell him to cut and run. In the middle of the fight, he advises Captain Kerr to disengage until they can conduct repairs, then try to reacquire the vessel.

All of this plays into Olaf’s value “Fearless is My Home” and his tendency to try and use engineering and science to fix problems. However, this runs afoul of Kerr’s “spite is a Powerful Motivator” and her “A Fair Fight is the Fight You Lose”. 

Instead of breaking and running, she tries a wildly risky gambit, feigning worse damage than they have to lure the Syndicate vessel in, then executing a tight pass with weapons fire targeting the engineering section. Kicking determination to the tactical officer, Kerr directed (allows the helmsman an immediate action with her adding a d20 on her Control+Command) to do a tight pass of the enemy vessel. The direct allowed her to combine her move with the helmsman, without having to pass to the enemy after her action. The helmsman rolled very well, creating the trait Fire en Passant which lowered the difficulty to hit for the tactical officer. Using her Decisive Leadership, they cut out the enemy and the tactical officer got to go immediately with no cost in momentum. Instead, Olaf’s player suggested a repeat of her move — directing the tactical officer which allowed under his Advisor trait, a free reroll. The captain’s determination spend allowed one die to be set to a double success, and with a success from Olaf, and a reroll that increased the total to 5 successes, they were able to immobilize the enemy ship and force their surrender.

After the fight was over and the adventure mostly resolved, Kerr and Olaf discussed the fight. His instinct to withdraw and repair was a good one, but Kerr assumed that with the upper hand, the Syndicate ship would have given chase and prevented them from escaping, lest their ruse — a Starfleet vessel rendering assistance or performing health & safety checks on merchant vessels — be exposed. His resolution of the situation might well have worked, and was certainly more in line with the more defensive position that Starfleet suggests, but Kerr’s spiteful aggression, borne out of a hardscrabble life and harsh war time experience led her to believe that to deal with the threat successfully, they needed to end it quickly and with “violence of action” — a swift and brutal attack.

During their conversation, she admitted his idea was a good one, and had she thought the Syndicate vessel would have fled after the engagement was over, she would have followed his advice. His instinct to save the ship, get help, limit the potential loss of life was perhaps even the right call; her instinct was to end the threat as decisively as possible, thus saving ship and preventing further los of life. She won — but that didn’t necessarily mean she was right.