General Chang was the primary villain from Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. He was one of the conspirators who helped carry out the assassination of Gorkon, Chancellor of the Klingon Empire. In Star Trek Fleet Command, he’s a rare command officer.
Getting General Chang
You can get General Chang in Klingon, Ulra, and Premium recruit packs.
Captain’s Ability
Cry Havoc – +10% to Damage if the opponent’s Hull Health under 60%
You can pop this up to 50% with full synergy, but doing so will eliminate his officer ability, the only one in the Klingon Patriots group who can set off a hull breach without being captain is Gorkon. But he’s also a command officer. So you’ll generally only get this up to 40%. (Azetbur can set off hull breach, but only as captain, so it’s moot here.)
Still a 40% increase in damage isn’t bad. It’s just fairly specialized, as it’ll only work when you’re opponent is already wounded. This means it will never work against mission bosses.
It’s useful against a wounded player or hostile enemies. But this is a specialized situation. If you’re trying to knock out a much stronger, but wounded opponent, then General Chang isn’t a bad option. Probably better than Gorkon in that specific scenario.
Officer Ability
Dogs of War – If the ship deals a Critical Hit to the opponent’s ship while it has a Hull Breach, Chang has a (30% 35% 40% 45% 50%) chance of delaying its next weapon attack by 1 round.
So this ability seems like it should be better than it is. Chang deserves better than this. This ability, unlike just about any other in the game, requires two conditions to be present to activate, and even then, it’s not that great an ability.
So first, you need your opponent to have a hull breach, so you will need to have Gorkon, Azetbur, Kang or Krell (or be fighting against Pan.) In addition, while that’s active, you’ll need to score a critical hit. And then you’ll have only (at best) a 50-50 chance of delaying some of the opponent’s weapons for one round.
I can’t see spending officer badges to upgrade Chang, which is a shame.
General Chang Trivia
General Chang was played by the great Christopher Plummer. After Klaa and the rest of the Klingons in Star Trek V were played by stunt performers, getting Plummer and David Warner as Gorkon was a big improvement.
Chang’s eye patch was inspired by Israeli General Moshe Dayan, who led the Israeli forces during the Six Day War of 1967.
General Chang was Gorkon’s Chief of Staff, and if you’ll remember Star Trek VI, he was part of the conspiracy to assassinate Chancellor Gorkon and frame Captain Kirk. He also had a penchant for quoting Shakespeare. For the most part, he did so in English, but it was of course, better in the original Klingon.
And obviously, somebody was going to sit down and translate Hamlet into Klingon, right?
Yep. Somebody did.
Christopher Plummer Background
Christopher Plummer, CC was born in Toronto in 1929. He grew up near Montreal, and attended McGill University (as did William Shatner.)
He made his Broadway debut in 1953. A few years later, he was in a production of Henry V at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival. His understudy was Shatner, and Plummer’s illness gave Shatner his first big break.
He’s probably best known for starring in The Sound of Music with Julie Andrews in 1965.
He’s the only Canadian to win the Triple Crown of Acting, having earned an Oscar for 2011’s Beginners, in addition to two Tony Awards and two Emmy Awards.
The first thing I remember Plummer from was the Tom Hanks/Dan Aykroyd movie Dragnet in 1987, where he was again, the main antagonist as the leader of the Pagan cult, the Reverend Jonathan Whirley.
I enjoyed the movie. Anything with Plummer and Dabney Coleman has to be good, right?
On the other hand, it did have the Hanks/Aykroyd rap theme. So there’s that.
Plummer’s last onscreen role was in 2019, on the Canadian-British series, Departure.
Amanda Plummer
And lastly, Plummer’s daughter is actress Amanda Plummer. She’s been an award-winning actress for almost 40 years, with 112 onscreen credits. You may remember her for being Honey Bunny in Pulp Fiction.
Or from trying to kill Mike Myers in So I Married an Axe Murderer.