[Professor Scott]

My active hologram was randomly selected by 1 Tribble to be stopped. It can't beam just like any other stopped personnel.

Can one of my unstopped personnel deactivate this hologram, and thus allow it to be moved including beaming to another location?

I realize it cannot reactivate this turn, but assuming it can be moved this way to another holodeck, when it is activated on my next turn, does it activate stopped or unstopped since unstopping occurs at the beginning of the turn?

[AllenGould]

I don't believe so, because I don't see anything that lets you choose to turn off your own holograms.

edit:

If we trust that you have some way to deactivate your holograms, I still don't think this stunt works, because I don't see anything that says you can't be stopped *and* disabled at the same time. So while you could beam the disabled card, getting disabled doesn't stop them, and you can't beam stopped cards.

[Armus]

Plus, Holograms like the cute little fuzzballs too!!

[Professor Scott]

I don't believe so, because I don't see anything that lets you choose to turn off your own holograms.

edit:

If we trust that you have some way to deactivate your holograms, I still don't think this stunt works, because I don't see anything that says you can't be stopped *and* disabled at the same time. So while you could beam the disabled card, getting disabled doesn't stop them, and you can't beam stopped cards.

That is kind of what I was leaning to. While it makes Treksense that you can turn on or off your holos at will, there is no action equivalent of "End Program" that I could find to willingly disable your own holograms.

As far as I know, disabled holograms are treated like equipment and not like personnel, so if I could disable them somehow, I would think they would be no longer stopped unless the entire ship was stopped; in which case activated holo or equipment it would be stopped as part of that crew.

Since there is not direct way to disable them at will currently, I guess their status at activation is moot, though I would lean towards unstopped.

[BCSWowbagger]

Just my instinct, but I don't see why deactivating a holo card (if it were possible) would unstop the card. It's true that an Equipment card wouldn't get normally stopped unless it were part of a team that got stopped -- but holo personnel aren't equipment cards (they just move like equipment). And even if they were fully "used as" equipment cards, the card would still be stopped because it was stopped as a personnel and isn't unstopped by the transition.

So: very clever idea! But I think it fails at every single possible step.

Again, just my instinct, not official rules. Too interesting a question not to opine on.

[Professor Scott]

Just my instinct, but I don't see why deactivating a holo card (if it were possible) would unstop the card. It's true that an Equipment card wouldn't get normally stopped unless it were part of a team that got stopped -- but holo personnel aren't equipment cards (they just move like equipment). And even if they were fully "used as" equipment cards, the card would still be stopped because it was stopped as a personnel and isn't unstopped by the transition.

So: very clever idea! But I think it fails at every single possible step.

Again, just my instinct, not official rules. Too interesting a question not to opine on.

There is also a Treksense precedent for this as well. Both Professor Moriarty and Vic Fontaine are self aware holograms. They both retain this state of self-awareness even while deactivated. Upon reactivation, they retain this state as well.

It therefore stands to reason, that in game, a deactivated hologram should retain it's state of "stopped" when deactivated, and retain that state once activated again.

This doesn't really answer question 1 about whether they can be deactivated and moved, but reasonably answers question 2 that they would still be stopped. Since at present, there is no way to voluntarily deactivate my hologram without some creative setup, (such as if by chance that holo was wearing a Mobile Holo-Emitter with no other holodeck present, and I simply remove it), it would appear that moving them is also not an option.

[SAM2000]

Any official “Rules Master” ruling?

[BCSWowbagger]

Any official “Rules Master” ruling?

We usually only rule on things officially when they're controversial, because it takes a lot of work to get a good bluetext up. (Gotta consult the full Rules Committee, figure out exactly how all the different parts work, and answer the question.)

This one doesn't seem controversial. Everyone seems to agree that there's nothing in the rules allowing you to voluntarily deactivate a hologram.

Rereading the OP, I think the question I answered was slightly different from the one that was actually posed. (If it's not reactivated until the next turn, the Magic Wand of Unstopping will unstop the deactivated holo at start of turn, so it will be unstopped when reactivated. But reactivating it on the same turn somehow would not unstop it.)

[geraldkw]

Any official “Rules Master” ruling?

We usually only rule on things officially when they're controversial, because it takes a lot of work to get a good bluetext up. (Gotta consult the full Rules Committee, figure out exactly how all the different parts work, and answer the question.)

This one doesn't seem controversial. Everyone seems to agree that there's nothing in the rules allowing you to voluntarily deactivate a hologram.

Rereading the OP, I think the question I answered was slightly different from the one that was actually posed. (If it's not reactivated until the next turn, the Magic Wand of Unstopping will unstop the deactivated holo at start of turn, so it will be unstopped when reactivated. But reactivating it on the same turn somehow would not unstop it.)

Vote that we don't introduce cards that "reactivate" holograms and save ourselves the headache.

I would prefer that holograms were handled differently in 1e vs just being (mostly) regular personnel who can't be easily killed. I know it's never going to happen because we are too entrenched but at least we can not make the rules more complicated.

[AllenGould]

Vote that we don't introduce cards that "reactivate" holograms and save ourselves the headache.

Well, those already exist in part - Holodeck Door will prevent deactivation, and any ol' Joe can reactivate someone. The restriction is that you can't do it the same turn they turned off (and the rule is pretty strongly written - a card that just turned a holo on might not actually cheat past it).

But I think the better answer is "why on earth would we need to make holos better?"

[BCSWowbagger]

I would prefer that holograms were handled differently in 1e vs just being (mostly) regular personnel who can't be easily killed.

Sheerly out of curiosity, how WOULD you like Holos in 1E to work?