From the publisher's website:

On behalf of the Federation, you explore space with your starships and build outposts and starbases near valuable planets. There you extract important resources such as the coveted dilithium. But the Federation has also sent out other expeditions. Therefore, you have to be wary of competitors - and of the Klingons, who want to give the players a hard time. With the aid of Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock, however, keeping the adversaries in check and outperforming your competitors should be an easy task. With this in mind: Live long and prosper! Star Trek Catan is basically a direct adaptation of the Catan base game. But what would Star Trek be without its protagonists Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock? That's why Star Trek Catan also contains the card set “Helpers of Catan” – the set was adapted to the Star Trek universe, of course. The players thus receive direct support from Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and another 7 famous Star Trek characters. Illustrator and Star Trek fan Franz Vohwinkel provided completely new illustrations of all printed game components, including the characters, based on motifs from the popular TV series and the movies with William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy. Hence, Star Trek Catan is set in the second half of the 23rd century, the classic Star Trek era.