Join us for another in a series of interviews with winners of awards from our recent 2022 Awards Ceremony. Our goal is to give you insight into how our fleet’s best simmers write, and imagine their characters.
This month we’re interviewing the writer behind both Lieutenant Vitor Silveira, a male human Tactical Officer on the USS Excalibur-A and Lieutenant JG Vitor Tito, a male human Intelligence Officer on Starbase 118 Ops. He won the Prestigious Service medallion for Tactical:
“Awarded to members in the fleet who are steady and unwavering from their chosen Duty Post. This is a divisional award for each (Gold, Red, Blue) to celebrate a continuing player in the divisional role who has already won (and still qualifies in the eligibility criteria) a duty post award.”
StarBase 118 Wiki: Prestigious Service Medallion
and the Xalor Clan Xifilis Award:
“Awarded to simmers who overcome a disadvantage throughout simming.”
StarBase 118 Wiki: Xalor Clan Xifilis
DeVeau: Tell us a little about the writer behind the character — where in the world do you hail from? Anything you’d like to share!
Silveira/Tito: l usually say that I am in the lower left corner of Europe. But truth be told it all depends on how the World Map is projected. I hail from Portugal, right across the Atlantic from those in the America’s. My name is Bruno and I was born the year after TAS premiered. I am a geek, a gamer of classics from PC to Board games. And I have been a Trekkie since my first TV memory, around 77 or 78 (that’s 1977) which is Kirk fighting the Gorn Captain in the TOS episode Arena. From then on I was hooked.
Would you please tell us a little about the two characters you play? Their similarities, differences, etc?
Silveira/Tito: So, there’s no word limit in this interview? Well, perhaps I better try and be succinct.
Let me start with Tito. Although he is the newest character, he was the first I created to sim in another fleet. He is a bitter guy, a friend of Sil but very different (at least I am trying, he is a bit more challenging to write) with a past of loss and substance abuse. He’s that grumpy guy that is rude to everyone and returns to the Fleet to have a place to be buried when he dies.
He is struggling to change but needs to move on from the loss of his wife and unborn child.
I am still finding my footing with him, I briefly wrote him before returning him to active, as I transferred Sil, so he is still developing.
Now Silveira. Sil… What can I say about him?
He was created to fill an important gap in the Trek Universe. There weren’t any Terran Portuguese Starfleet Officers, so I felt compelled to create him. As we say here, he is an “Artist”. The life, soul and everything in a party. He’s the guy with the naughty and politically incorrect jokes.
The professional flirter, the wildcard that thought he was going to rewrite “The Book”.
The guy stops at nothing to try and protect the crew, friends and family, even with impulsive decisions.
And that slowly he is growing up (but not losing what everyone loves and hates about him, hopefully) to finally come to terms and keep in check his tenacious will to live and have fun.
For Silveira, you were the recipient of the Prestigious Service Medallion for Tactical. How do you explore this duty post in your sims?
Silveira/Tito: The fact that here Tactical and Security were two different postings was what caught my attention. I was always fond of the Trek starship simulator games, namely Starfleet Academy, Klingon Academy and Bridge Commander (no not to be mistaken with Bridge Crew, totally different games). When I saw I could have a character that was a Tactical officer it was perfect.
I see Tactical as the ship’s defender, the gunman and shield manager, the guy that is to offer the quickest advice and follow the Captain’s orders, mostly in battle, but also in any encounter the ship faces. I try to have Sil provide not only the Tactical evaluation in case of conflict but also in unknown encounters, always keeping the safeguard of the ship, the respect for Starfleet’s directives and assisting the Captain, offering as many options as possible so they make the best decisions.
What is the hardest thing about playing a Tactical Officer?
Silveira/Tito: l am secretly proud that Sil was in relatively few ship battles and only has one confirmed kill (although a very impressive shot, unlike Sil I won’t brag about it). Finding usefulness on the Bridge as a Tactical Officer is challenging, that is one of the reasons why Sil is so proactive (read nosy) and goes around doing anything he can to help (sometimes bother) the others.
In the presentation of my Sisko Tactical Cross, my then Captain mentions just that, we don’t need to just focus on the bellic side of it. And Sil spent years before he actually fired a phaser in action.
Tactical is an integral part of any ship, working closely with Operations, Helm, Engineering, and Science, as such I was never afraid to steer Sil in aiding these different specialities, always bearing in mind the Tactical aspect to protect the ship from hostile forces.
You also won the Xalor Clan Xifilis award from Ops, where you play an Intelligence Officer named Vitor Tito. Writing in English is difficult, even more so when it’s not your native language! Would you be willing to share a little about your experience doing so?
Writing is difficult, period. And I was positively surprised by this award. I truly never expected to receive it. I consider myself fortunate because in Portugal we didn’t dub foreign movies or shows when I was growing up. That helped me with English and other foreign languages, mostly in speaking it. You can judge that for yourself in our Ops voice chat, but writing is a whole other challenge.
First I must certainly apologize, because I am pretty sure I still make a lot of spelling and grammatical mistakes, even if Google Docs and the PC I usually write is set in English.
Over the years I have set myself to think in English, rather than Portuguese when I write, but I admit that passing it to “letter of form” as we say here the ideas I have requires time and work.
I rarely take less than an hour to post one of my average sims, something between 2 and 3 pages.
Especially hard is that sometimes I don’t know the correct spelling of a word, I only know how it sounds in my accented English, which usually is pretty far from its written form.
However I feel that over the years, I am slowly improving, or everyone else is getting used to it and is able to understand my writing.
You also just celebrated your fifth year as a member here. Where would you like to see yourself and your characters five years from now?
I would like to see both Sil and Tito as active members of their ships. Sil isn’t Command material, so I won’t see him any further than heading a department. Tito might cut it, but admittedly as much as I love him, unless something unexpected happens, I won’t make him my primary, because Sil is really my SB118 baby. He is growing now and I want to keep him around for many years to come. Where will the future lead them? Up there, into the stars, going boldly where so many have gone before. And coming back to shore leave. Although I might need some help because it’s getting harder and harder to find new antics for Sil to perform.
Although neither of them are moved by awards, promotions and such, I admit that in five years’ time I want one award. The ten-year length of service award. That would mean I managed to keep active, kept writing with you all, balanced RL challenges and still telling the tales of Sil and Tito. And that this wonderful Fleet is still accepting me, even with all the curve balls I keep throwing.
Because of that, I would like to thank you for this interview (it’s my first one so forgive my excitement). To all those, I have written with and that put up with me, in the past, present and future. It is also thanks to you that I am becoming a better writer. To those who I interact with in the forums and discord, who make this a great community one of the greatest strengths of this fleet (and I have seen a few).
You are too many to name and I don’t want to forget anyone (besides I think this interview is getting a bit longer than it should) but there is one I have to point out.
My unofficial mentor. This is also your “fault”.
To all, I have to say.
Thank you very much.
Thanks for your time, Lieutenant Silveira/Lieutenant JG Tito!
You can read more about Lieutenant Vitor Silveira and Lieutenant JG Vitor Tito
on the wiki.
