If there's anything more numerous than commercial adaptations of Star Trek as a role-playing game (Part 1 of this series), it's homebrewed versions and resources written by fans, doing it for themselves using their favorite system.
There's also a lot of them called Final Frontier (guilty as charged).
This is by no means a comprehensive list. In the last post, readers mentioned a homebrew based on R. Talsorian Games' Interlock system, I thought I'd read of one using Chaosium's Basic Role-Playing and I'm sure there are many that never got posted to the Internet at all. D6, Unisystem, Action!... after finding all of these, I suspect there have been nearly as many custom Star Trek games as there have been generic RPG systems.
If you're just interested in converting from a licensed system to one of your favorites, a good place to start is where Owen E. Oulton (of Memory Icon) created a System Conversion Table as part of his own Star Trek Universe campaign. It features guidelines on conversion between various game systems such as ICON (Last Unicorn Games' Trek RPG), FASA's Trek (2E), Traveller (various), GURPS, Star Wars (D6), GDW's "House Rules" system (as used in Twilight: 2000 and Traveller: The New Era) and Babylon 5 (Chameleon Eclectic's The Babylon Project RPG).
But if you're looking for complete conversions by a man who knows his stuff, then you should head directly to the site of the Original Final Frontiers, that of Bob Portnell, King of Star Trek Homebrews (my words, not his). Like me, Bob's love of adventure gaming goes back to The Fantasy Trip and, like me, is "one of the last of the Baby Boomers or the first of Gen X, depending on whose math you use" (his words, not mine). He has not only written extensively about RPGs, but went on to team up with Guy McLimore and Greg Poehlein (co-authors of FASA's Star Trek The Role Playing Game) to co-author the Simply Roleplaying! game as part of their MicroTactix Games endeavor in 1999.
And when it comes to writing Trek games, Bob's got 17 years under his belt so far. In addition to resources like Speed-Trek (notes for faster character creation in FASA's Trek RPG), Bob has written a number of Trek homebrews ("I've been writing Star Trek rules for so long, I can't stop!" he says). While he's working on finishing EZFudge Final Frontier, you can check out his PlainLabel Final Frontier for the Simply Roleplaying! system (core SR! rules free from DriveThruRPG).
Bob's also done two versions of Final Frontier for 3E versions of Steve Jackson Games' GURPS: GURPS Final Frontier (160k zip file with HTML and TXT), and the more compact Final Frontier (2.1 zip with PDFs) based on GURPS Lite, which is included. His GURPS page includes some other resources as well.
I have to say that I really like FF for GURPS Lite (and I'm not at all fond of full-blown GURPS). It's very self contained, well-written and produced, and it's the one version out of all these games that I talk about -- pro or home -- that I would grab for a pick up session or to introduce someone new to RPGs through Trek. Bob's great strength in all of these is that he focuses on the elements that are most like Trek on the screen, and he presents it succinctly. The rules never get in the way, but his approach is not that of narrative games. The tools he provides give players the ability to quickly learn then play a game in the Trek universe that balances cinematic with (not against) realism. That's a hell of an achievement for free games, and similar to the model we've seen executed with the GURPS Dungeon Fantasy series. I'm planning on interviewing Bob here in the near future.
Curiously, there's a number of other homebrews that have been based on the GURPS system over the years:
GURPS Trek - The Unauthorized Sourcebook was a popular homebrew for GURPS 2E from 1996; "Mr. B's" original pages (text file format) can be found here and elsewhere.
GURPS Star Trek (for GURPS 3E?) features pages of races, starships, equipment and campaign notes (note, however, that the links to the Online Character Generator are broken).
GURPS Trek at the Traditional Games Wiki (GURPS 4E) provides a lot of stats, but is unfinished and hasn't been updated in 2 years.
If GURPS isn't your thing, there's Spirit of the Final Frontier, based on Evil Hat's pulp adventure RPG Spirit of the Century, which is not to be confused with Spirit of the 24th Century which ran at a few cons, but is also based on the FateRPG system, which itself is based on Fudge... feel free to stop me at any time. And check out the separate Evil Hat Productions Wiki entry on "Pulp Characters from Books, Movies, etc".
Star Trek for the D20 System is an active Yahoo Group focused on (what else?) adapting the series for D20-based systems such as d20, d20 Modern, PD, True20 and more. There's a number of resources here, though only one completed set of rules which can also be found at...
TrekRPG.info, which hasn't been updated in awhile, but features conversion notes for the d20 System, a downloadable draft of d20 Warp, and links to a Traveller: The New Era adaptation called STrav 3 TNE (thanks to Jerry for the pointer).
WOTC's Alternity still lives on the web, and Scott Metz posted his notes about adapting Trek to the system.
Star Trek: Savage Worlds (1.6MB zip file) adapts Trek for Pinnacle Entertainment Group's Savage Worlds RPG, and features a character sheet, edges, weapons and equipment (requires MS Excel). Groknard reader steveraceuk is in the process of taking it a step further at his Savage Star Trek wiki.
Epoch is a wholly original homebrew system by Jonathan Clarke that's closely based on Star Trek, and focuses less on technology and more on a cinematic feel. It uses a D6 dice-pool system, and even provides guidelines for starship combat.
COSMIQUEST! The Very Final Regurgitation is a Risus-based parody of Star Trek by Guy Hoyle with a small set of guidelines for charcater cliches, technology and adventure seeds. There was another Risus-based Trek parody by "Dr Rotwang" (of the blog I Waste The Buddha With My Crossbow), but it's long gone and he doesn't seem to mind, but has posted some new ideas (that still verge on parody).
Speaking of parodies, I should mention Twerps Twek based TWERPS, "The World's Easiest Role Playing System" by Jeff and 'Manda Dee. Twerps Twek (Campaign Module 7) was by Jon Hancock and Niels Erickson and published by Gamescience in the early 90s. To sum up, it came with "the complete stat" for classic NPCs such as Yeoman Randy Jan and Loquacious of the Bore. This was a commercial product (check eBay or Noble Knight Games) so perhaps doesn't belong here, but I was going to have to mention it in this blog sometime. Mission accomplished.
Another "commercial homebrew" has been announced, this time as "Trek with the serial-numbers-filed-off" for Mongoose's Traveller. Gareth-Michael Skarka of Adamant Entertainment has said that he's working on Final Frontier: The Unauthorized Sourcebook to the World's Most Popular SF TV Franchise, described as a "set of rules and guidelines that will allow you to play races such as the Logical Psions, face off against Swarthy Aggressors, enter careers which represent the various service devisions within the Fleet, and boldly go across the galaxy using space-warp FTL engines." This I'd like to see because I've yet to see a Trek adaptation for Classic Traveller, and CT and MGT are pretty close.
Perhaps the most recent and disturbing homebrew is based on WOTC's D&D4E. Although I can see the appeal of a cross-genre "phasers vs. magic" style adventure, the conversion only provides stats for four characters: Kirk (Leader), Spock (Controller), McCoy (Defender) and Sulu (Striker). Furthermore, the powers are all combat oriented (i.e., the At-Will "Vulcan Nerve Pinch"), making Dungeons & Dragons: Final Frontier not very Trekish at all, and a rather foolish endeavor.
Finally (probably not!), there's my own totally non-commercial please-don't-sue-me venture, Thousand Suns: Final Frontier (35 pages, 1.7MB zipped PDF). It's only a preview version from December '08, but I've come a long way since "The Universe Trip" edition of 1981. Still, I'm not sure where I'm going to go with this. Since starting this blog, I'm asking myself, "Does the community really need another RPG based on Star Trek? Especially a homebrew focused on TOS? Especially called Final Frontier??"
Probably not. But I can't help but think that when the new film comes out, some people are going to turn their eyes back to Star Trek and think, "Hell, yeah, I want to play that!" And I love the idea of a Trek game based on Thousand Suns, one that takes place in a period not so constrained by the dreaded "Trek canon", where the future is wide open.
Perhaps, I'm thinking, I should be looking forward as much as I'm looking back...
- - - - - - - -
ADDENDUM #1: I completely forgot one that's the most current of all -- Federal Space (link to wiki). Federal Space is a unique group project started by some folks on RPG.net, and is described as "a decidedly non-canonical spin on the familiar Star Trek universe, refracted through a lens of harder science and (hopefully) more consistent worldbuilding... it's Star Trek: Stand Alone Complex, or Star Trek run at GURPS TL10 (hard science path) instead of TL12 (with superscience), or a pacifistic version of Star Fleet Battles, or simply 'Star Trek with hats.'"
Not my cup of tea, but still, it belongs here more than TWERPS Twek.
ADDENDUM #2: Jerry (below) mentions the FASA Trek Sourcebook for Hero System (5th ed.), at the Star Hero Fandom website, which also includes TNG Hero for the TNG/DS9 era. Very extensive work and templates for Hero Designer software.
ADDENDUM #3: Probably my last update (4/8/09) as this could go on forever, far longer than anyone will actually look at this post! Mike Berkey has composed some rulesets called Where No Man Has Gone Before based on the TOS setting. This is an exceptionally cool document and full of great ideas and random tables (examples: "First Beam In Location", "
Random Interior Set Generator") useful to anyone interested in Trek RPGs, regardless of system. Version 2.0 is the most recent, and based on the Microlite20 system. Version 1.0 is more heavily drawn from d20Modern. Seriously, check it out now, it's a really fun read.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Homebrewed Star Trek RPG Adaptations (Part 2)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Wow, that's a lot you've found. I don't have anything more profound to say, but I wish I did.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the kind words, Robert! My modesty quails at the title you're bestowing on me, but I'll have to leave it in your hands, as you've done all the research. Is it really "good to be the King"? I guess I'll find out.
ReplyDeleteLet me try to briefly sketch some of the history and rationale behind my projects. ("Briefly," forsooth. Don't hold your breath.)
In the mid-90s I persuaded my game group to give Star Trek a try under GURPS (this after long success with FASA). I went out on the web to find resources and found Mr. B's "GURPS Star Trek." All deference to Mr. B and the contributors, but I took one look and knew my group would never sit still for it. So I started to "roll my own," on the core premise of leveraging as much existing GURPS rules as possible, setting some benchmarks, and keeping characters in the 150-200 zone. I got some good feedback, made a few changes and adjustments based on comments, and that was that. And I kept it under 60 pages, which I thought was good enough. That was GURPS Final Frontier.
Not long after, looking for something lighter and simpler than GURPS, I fell in with Guy McLimore and Greg Poehlein, who were just kicking off the Plainlabel games enterprise with Pocket Fantasy. I loved the premise of the standalone weapon/equipment cards, and so a set of Classic Trek cards were some of the first things I did. Then I set that aside for a while, as we started up Microtactix Games and punched out three editions of Budget Battlefield and two editions each of Compact Combat and Simply Roleplaying!, plus a bunch of scenics, cardstock figures, and etc. thanks to the talented hand of artist Gary M. Williams.
I was getting better as a writer and editor, I had some better tools for the jobs on hand ... and then Sean Punch delivered the original GURPS Lite for GURPS 3d edition. Since GURPS Final Frontier was heavily leveraged to the core rules, and GURPS Lite was just an abstraction of the core rules, it didn't take much to convince myself I could redo GFF as a lighter, even leaner product. Making the rules wholly dependent on the content in GURPS Lite proved a bit of a challenge, but I was able to rename some disads, scale back some other content, and completely cheat on the psionics rules ... but it got there. Any comments on the attractiveness of the package should definitely go to Adam Jury, who was kind enough to give me a nigh-professional layout and who has since gone on to be a production powerhouse in the Shadowrun and Mechwarrior worlds. That was Final Frontier, for GURPS Lite.
After that, I'd gotten GURPS Black Ops and thought it a wonderful setting shackled to insane rules. After much gnashing of teeth, I finally found a way to work uber-competence into Plainlabel rules. Some of those ideas finally set off the rest of the bells and I was able to abstract my Trek ideas and refit them to the Plainlabel engine. And of course I had better tools now, so I was able to create a decent-looking set of example gear cards. That was Plainlabel Final Frontier (finally!).
EZFudge is my preferred configuration for the Fudge engine, with four attributes, Risus-like skills, and all the rules for play on the character sheet. The EZFudge Final Frontier is mostly a port of the ideas in PLFF but now with Fudge's text-driven ranks on them. I've also restricted the scope on my EZFudge version to the "classic" era, which is the one I know and love best. EZFudge is so simple an engine, anyone can run with the principles I'm using to create NextGen, or Klingon, or what-have-you campaigns.
The major new-for-me feature in EZF-FF is the background information. In the previous iterations I've deferred to the shows, movies, books, etc. This time I've gone out on a limb and thrown canon (if not to the winds then) for a loop. I've even eschewed the Franz Joseph Technical Manual, which is an astounding thing to me. Funny thing is, I really adore these ideas, and they fit almost seamlessly against the classic episodes. (Another new-for-me feature is starship creation and combat rules ... which I'm also pretty pleased with.)
So that's EZFudge Final Frontier, to be posted in mid-May 2009 (after I've had a chance to see if it's still viable against the new film). It's way lighter than everything I've done before, but I think it hits the sweet spot between "game" and "Star Trek" and will make for good casual pick-up play. (If you'd like to preview / playtest it -- and this means you have to understand Fudge -- drop me a line via gmail to nvdaydreamer. I'd love to get some comments on this.) And that's enough pluggery.
Carry on, Robert! I look forward to seeing what's next for the Groknard. (And, my two cents, TSFF is very pretty indeed and very much worth a look, y'all.)
And there's Part 1 of my interview with Bob Portnell, lol! Thanks so much for that post, Bob. It's great to have that background as part of this entry and I really appreciate it. I'll definitely be in touch regarding EZF-FF.
ReplyDeletethis is a great overview of what's out there. i didn't know about some of these but i'll be sure to download them. the only omission i noticed is Rob "Eodin" Bruce's excellent FASA Trek sourcebook for Hero System 5th ed. definitely worth checking out.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.starherofandom.com/h_trekhero/index.php
Hee! Sorry to disrupt your planning, Robert. But it actually felt better to throw all that stuff onto this thread, and then when we get to discussion-land, we can discuss rather than being distracted by history.
ReplyDeleteGonna have to go read those links, now...
Excellent add, Jerry, thanks!
ReplyDeleteGreat stuff. I thought i'd seen most Trek conversions but you definitely uncovered a few more. Thanks for all your hard work and, for what it's worth, I also think FF for Gurps Lite is a great piece of work.
ReplyDeleteGee, maybe I'd better quit while I'm ahead...
ReplyDeleteNah. "I can't stop!"
Thanks, Robert! I can't believe how many conversions you've dug up--I'd thought I'd seen a majority of the released homebrews. Turns out I wasn't even close.
ReplyDeleteI have to admit, though, I'm glad you did this article now rather than a year or two ago. If I'd stumbled across Bob's stuff before I started, I might not have bothered writing my own conversions. :-)
You're welcome! Isn't it insane?! But there's so much variety, too. Looking at the list had somewhat the same impact on me, but it made me realize that if you're going to do a homebrew, contribute something unique.
ReplyDeleteI remember thinking that Thousand Suns would be very cool to do either Trek or Battlestar Galactica.
ReplyDelete"Since starting this blog, I'm asking myself, "Does the community really need another RPG based on Star Trek?""
Please don't stop your TS adaptation. In other words, yes, we *do* need another one.
It is true, though. The cool thing is that everyone brings their own point of view to the table when they write one of these things--it's interesting to look at each and see what each person values.
ReplyDeleteAnd what he said about the TS adaptation. It's already looking quite beautiful. I love the layout and writing.
I do have to admit that I laughed when I hit Nesma Thrall's writeup--did you snag her picture from where I think you did? :-)
Thanks, guys, don't worry, I'm still working on it and it will see the light of day... twice!
ReplyDeleteNesma Thrall... I'm think she's a modified Pet of the Month from 1967-ish! It's been a few months since I stumbled upon her. She's not really green, but she was red hot ;)
LOL. Thought I was going crazy there for a second until I remembered where I'd seen her before.
ReplyDeleteIt does make sense. You want a suitably hot Orion slave-girl, then pulling 1960's Playboys is not a bad idea at all. :-D
I've been making notes towards a GUMSHOE version. Don't know if it'll make it to print, though : P
ReplyDeleteI tried homebrewing a conversion between Trek and FGU's Space Opera back in the summer and it nearly drove me out of my mind !
ReplyDeleteI sometimes don't think Space Opera is playable.
I had too much trouble with my Captain being killed after he was kicked in the thigh to actually concentrate on how strong a Klingon is...
As of now I play FASA and just homebrew rules and modifications to bring the system up to date with TNG, DS9 and the 24th century era as portrayed in on-line writing "SIMs".
It works well - Android stats are easy to figure since FASA included game stats for Data in one of their last books. Our stunt-flying martial artist helm-grrl didn't get killed after taking one punch to the jaw (as per Space Opera), and the Captain hasn't gotten any more lethal thigh-kicks... so... all's good !
Hi, my name is Eric Phillips, and I wrote the version 1 of "GURPS Trek - The Unauthorized Sourcebook," which Mr. B later took over, so a lot of it is mine, and I am quite proud of the whole thing. Just to clarify an error, it is definatly for 3rd edition GURPS, not 2nd as you listed.
ReplyDeleteIn Summer, 2009, we tried adapting some non-Trek systems for use as Trek games before trying our first authorized system (FASA). This is how it went
ReplyDeleteClassic Traveller: Characters statted out well, even though some of the attributes (Social Standing) were virtually useless in the Trek universe (it doesn't matter if you're a Princess if you're an Ensign on a Klingon ship !). Starships were a pain, though, since a lot of the Traveller tech (sand-bag defenses, etc.) is more antiquated than current military tech.
Space Opera: This worked well at first, but the combat system killed the thing, when one character was killed by an elbow to the face off a bad-luck dice roll. It seemed the system was geared to give all the good rolls to the bad guys. A serious House Ruling of SO, that drops the "hit location" and "wound severity" rolls from the combat system (which have no bearing on character skill, and are governed only by player luck)would be needed to make Space Opera a Trekable system.
Finally, we went to FASA and it played well for close to a year before the "player luck" elements started ruining games. A PC with a 96 Unarmed Combat skill should not be consistently easily out-fought by baddies with >40 in the same Skill. Not just because the player has bad luck rolling d10.
Next came Decipher's CODA system, chosen over LUG since a) it seemed to be the most popular and lauded system on the TrekRPG forum, and b) LUG books were selling for up to $300 a book on Amazon, $700 per volume, after a 3-week auction and 47 bids on eBay. In contrast, a complete set of Decipher books went for $35 on line.
We got the game and really got into it, but it did require some House Ruling to get it to the level of cinematic play we wanted in a Trek game (no more Captains having their legs kicked off, or Muay Thai experts being no match for drunken miners). Since then CODA has become our system of choice for Trek.
Last summer (2010) the LUG books suddenly stopped being so "collectible", people were actually selling them for $15-$20 a book on Amazon, and we picked up the basics (TNG, TOS, DS9, and a few sups) and have given it a try.
And while not as cinematic as our House Ruled CODA, it is a good system and definitely captures the feel of modern Trek (esp. TNG), as well as TOS in play.
All-in-all, I think the reason people keep Homebrewing Trek is because no official Trek game gives everyone exactly what they want in a Trek game. CODA was able to be House Ruled into a perfect system for our group, but I've often wondered if Homebrewing EDEN's Cinematic Unisystem (Buffy / Angel) might not work better.
LUG has a good balance of rules crunch & cinematic without sacrificing Trek feel for "Dice-Goddery" as FASA often did.
FASA was the first for most players, and is usually the nostalgic favorite, but any game that is so based on player luck it can contradict its own rules in active play is not going to win the loyalty of the Trek fanbase.
And thus, so many homebrews. Trek fans want an RPG that says Star Trek, not just on the cover of the box, but in how the game feels to play. And Trek engenders so many different feelings and opinions that if the game you're playing doesn't feel like Trek to you, and embrace your idea of Trek then the game wont work for you as a Trek game, but might work famously for someone else.
Homebrewing, in this case, becomes the standard instead of the alternative.