Planning a Sci-fi Adventure: Need a system!

[Avista]

I got an idea for a story to run, but I need a system that could support it.

The setting is to be science fiction, so no magic allowed. I will accept 'pseudo-magic' like an augmented person being able to hack people's minds, or throw fireballs from their hands.

I want a variance of humanoid races, but I want to avoid aliens as much as possible. Normal humans, augmented humans, cloned humans, robot humans, cyborg humans, etc. This is going to be limited to 'inter-solar' (Is that the right term?). No intergalactic or interstellar travel. I can probably homebrew this if needed, but I want to be sure it stays balanced.

I want to try and do a 'detective' story, but I still want combat to be involved. Most of the people in the group I'm in are familiar with D&D mechanics, so I don't want to deviate too far from that norm.

Edit: I forgot to mention I also need a race variant to include androids and AIs, not just transhumans. I know one of my friends love transformer-inspired characters. Again, I can attempt to homebrew this, but I'd rather trust printed material that's been tested than to make it myself.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

[Thrudd]

GURPS, look through the Ultra-Tech, Bio-Tech, GURPS Space. Or you might just look at "Transhuman Space", which is a whole pre-made setting for GURPS that is specifically in a period beginning to colonize the solar-system (obviously focusing mostly on the different forms of augmenting of humanity).
Transhuman_Space (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhuman_Space)

[LibraryOgre]

Eclipse Phase would work, and is free, but is not the most intuitive system.

I usually lean towards Savage Worlds.

[Rhedyn]

I got an idea for a story to run, but I need a system that could support it.

The setting is to be science fiction, so no magic allowed. I will accept 'pseudo-magic' like an augmented person being able to hack people's minds, or throw fireballs from their hands.

I want a variance of humanoid races, but I want to avoid aliens as much as possible. Normal humans, augmented humans, cloned humans, robot humans, cyborg humans, etc. This is going to be limited to 'inter-solar' (Is that the right term?). No intergalactic or interstellar travel. I can probably homebrew this if needed, but I want to be sure it stays balanced.

I want to try and do a 'detective' story, but I still want combat to be involved. Most of the people in the group I'm in are familiar with D&D mechanics, so I don't want to deviate too far from that norm.

Does anyone have any suggestions?
Nova Praxis for either Strands of Fate (Stand-alone Setting Book) or Savage Worlds (Requires Core Rulebook).

Savage Worlds is the more traditional game.

[Avista]

These all look pretty solid! I'll have to go through each one separately and see which fits the best thematically.

I forgot to mention I also need a race variant to include androids and AIs, not just transhumans. I know one of my friends love transformer-inspired characters. Again, I can attempt to homebrew this, but I'd rather trust printed material that's been tested than to make it myself.

[Particle_Man]

Maybe Alternity?

https://www.alternityrpg.net/

[Avista]

Maybe Alternity?

https://www.alternityrpg.net/

That is a lot of resources...thanks so much. I could definitely pick and choose different parts to make the system I need.

[Rhedyn]

These all look pretty solid! I'll have to go through each one separately and see which fits the best thematically.

I forgot to mention I also need a race variant to include androids and AIs, not just transhumans. I know one of my friends love transformer-inspired characters. Again, I can attempt to homebrew this, but I'd rather trust printed material that's been tested than to make it myself.

So for Nova Praxis "People" can have mechanical brains in purely mechanical bodies or exist as virtual constructs.

The additional rules needed to make native androids and AIs is exactly 0 (which becomes kind of a philosophical issue in transhumanist sci-fi)

[lightningcat]

Savage Worlds has Interface Zero, which I think has everything you want.
The setting has been ported to Starfinder, FATE, Pathfinder, and Modern20 as well, and was originally a Tru20 product.

[Anonymouswizard]

Maybe Alternity?

https://www.alternityrpg.net/

There's a new edition out, which is quite good. It replaces the four classes with five archetypes that streamline character creation and the option to go completely freeform.

Possibly the only thing it's truly missing is augmentation. Although in a pinch some Talents can be fluffed that way, and I'm sure there will be a cybertech book asking soon.

[iTreeby]

I'm going to second eclipse phase. It has everything you want plus pod-people. Just toss out the uplifts and maybe change the Scum and you should be good to go. (unless you are okay with furries)

Scum and villainy (by evil hat) could work but you'd have to throw out the Mystic and rework attune but it's very rules light.

[Anonymouswizard]

I'm going to second eclipse phase. It has everything you want plus pod-people. Just toss out the uplifts and maybe change the Scum and you should be good to go. (unless you are okay with furries)

Uh... Uplift morphs are just altered versions of the animal in question. There are almost certainly furry morphs available (I remember a pig-based one), but an octomorph is still an octomorph.

[Avista]

If I go with Eclipse Phase, I'll have to cut out the uplifts. It won't fit with the theme I'm trying to build.

I also want to stress that I've never dabbled with any system outside of traditional D&D, so the closer it is to that system, the less time consuming it will be to learn and implement it. I'm skimming through some of these resources and while they look pretty basic, I'd like to work with something familiar with the stats and combat systems.

[iTreeby]

I guess that means starfinder? It is less bulcky than pathfinder. It is a d20 system with Str Dex con wis int Cha. Hp is a little different I think but eh. Not too different from 3.5 which I suppose is "classic" dnd for some people.

[5crownik007]

GURPS 4e is a very good system.
It is a rather crunchy system and is a far departure from D&D.
It can look rather complicated, but it makes more sense once you actually experience play. Or at least it worked like that for me.

It's adaptable to any setting and any type of campaign (action, realistic, cinematic).

As far as I'm aware, equipment from 3e source books is backwards compatible.

[Silva]

Forget Eclipse Phase, as it has too much "junk" that has nothing to do what you ask (E.Ts, wormholes, apocalyptic events, overt psychics, etc).

Transhuman Space, on the other hand, matches 100% your requirements.

- Have PCs as agents for the Genetic Regulatory Agency investigating illegal mind-emulation and AIs rights violations (sexual bioroid trafficking, forced labor, memory theft, etc) across the inner solar system.

- Or make PCs the AIs and bioroids proper having rights violated.

- Or make PCs the Black Trojan mafia traffickers perpetrating the violations.

(or have each PC in it's own side pursuing conflicting goals, with their lives crisscrossing like an ensemble cast drama series)



Three sides to the same "coin".



P.S: I would ditch Gurps, though, for something simpler and more narrative. Maybe Fate Accelerated or Cortex, don't know.

[Silva]

Oh, almost forgot: Android: Shadow of the Beanstalk was just released and is all about transhumans/androids/AIs and their issues in a hard sci-fi setting.

Take a look: https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2018/10/2/shadow-of-the-beanstalk/

[Rhedyn]

Forget Eclipse Phase, as it has too much "junk" that has nothing to do what you ask (E.Ts, wormholes, apocalyptic events, overt psychics, etc).

Transhuman Space, on the other hand, matches 100% your requirements.

- Have PCs as agents for the Genetic Regulatory Agency investigating illegal mind-emulation and AIs rights violations (sexual bioroid trafficking, forced labor, memory theft, etc) across the inner solar system.

- Or make PCs the AIs and bioroids proper having rights violated.

- Or make PCs the Black Trojan mafia traffickers perpetrating the violations.

(or have each PC in it's own side pursuing conflicting goals, with their lives crisscrossing like an ensemble cast drama series)



Three sides to the same "coin".



P.S: I would ditch Gurps, though, for something simpler and more narrative. Maybe Fate Accelerated or Cortex, don't know.
I have the Transhuman Space book for GURPS 3e, but it comes with its own GURPS lite. The book by itself could make for a decent game.

[Silva]

I have the Transhuman Space book for GURPS 3e, but it comes with its own GURPS lite. The book by itself could make for a decent game.
I have this version too, it's fine yeah. The only sourcebook I'd recommend besides the core is Deep Beyond, not so much for the description on the outer system environments (though those are good too) but mainly for the wild ideas and possibilities presented, like sentient snacks, a AIs-only rebel faction, radical bioroid and genemod templates, orbital fringe societies based on wild ideologies like anarcho-capitalism, clone-societies, etc. It's really good. (I've heard a gossip at the time that lots of these ideas were to be present in the corebook, but the dev team ultimately decided to separete them in it's own book for page-count sake)

[Kadzar]

If I go with Eclipse Phase, I'll have to cut out the uplifts. It won't fit with the theme I'm trying to build.

I also want to stress that I've never dabbled with any system outside of traditional D&D, so the closer it is to that system, the less time consuming it will be to learn and implement it. I'm skimming through some of these resources and while they look pretty basic, I'd like to work with something familiar with the stats and combat systems. In that case, Stars Without Number might work for you. There's a free version (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/230009/Stars-Without-Number-Revised-Edition-Free-Version) if you want to check it out, and then the paid version (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/226996/Stars-Without-Number-Revised-Edition) has optional extra rules add-ons, one of which is for transhuman campaigns.

Depending on your desire for complexity, the transhuman rules may be either too much or too little for you. How it works is you roll the standard D&D-style attributes, just like you would in the baseline game, along with picking a class and background. Then you choose a starting shell to inhabit, which kind of works like D&D-style races except that they set your physical stats to a certain number. Also, you get extra affinity abilities with a certain type of shell if you've trained at least a month with that type, though you can only have affinity for one type at a time.

There's eight different types of organic shells, 7 different types of mechanical shells, and digital shells (of which there's only one type, and doesn't work like the other shells, having no physical attributes and being mostly defined by what digital programs it carries). The different shell types can actually cover a wide range of forms (for instance, Uplifts cover basically any kind of organic animal form) and mostly serve to mechanically define different sort of things each is good at, such as the Pontifex being made to boost psychic abilities or the Omen being basically a warbot shell.

Also, there's rules for using Face, which is basically a type of currency that only works with specific faction that you get it from (there's also the option to just switch to using credits, like in the base game). Along with just buying normal stuff, it's used to do things like back up your "soul", create new shells, or create more of the grails that are used to make everything (though there are two tiers of grails, and the ones that can make more grails require special resources to make more of themselves).

And that's about it for the transhuman rules. Alternatively, there was a free supplement from the previous version (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/94471/Mandate-Archive-Transhuman-Tech?manufacturers_id=3482) that did things a little differently by having more basic shell types and then being able to spend points for various augmentations. You might have to convert a few things like armor class (which isn't too hard), unless you want to just use the original version (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/86467/Stars-Without-Number-Original-Free-Edition?manufacturers_id=3482).

Also, if you want to focus on non-FTL travel, there's a paid supplement also from the previous version (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/134968/Engines-of-Babylon?manufacturers_id=3482) that focuses on such things (along with land vehicle modification and adding new treasures for players to find), and someone on the Stars Without Number subreddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/SWN/comments/amzgpx/engines_of_babylon_full_conversion_document/) actually made a conversion document (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1y5PH6quafD7PoDNKz3Q1fbnXL21BbvMjIA7jDLo07QQ/edit) for it.

[Duff]

You could also go cyberpunk if you wanted.
Augment as much as you want to let them. I can't remember how much getting into orbit stuff is in the basic book, but if it's mostly a detective story "You can't afford passage off planet, you have to convince the boss to authorise funds".
Most sci-fy systems include lots of space ship combat stuff which you probably don't need.

[Avista]

You could also go cyberpunk if you wanted.
Augment as much as you want to let them. I can't remember how much getting into orbit stuff is in the basic book, but if it's mostly a detective story "You can't afford passage off planet, you have to convince the boss to authorise funds".
Most sci-fy systems include lots of space ship combat stuff which you probably don't need.

Now that you mention it, I didn't plan to have any space dogfights, and there's only one instance where that could happen (Traveling to Europa to investigate a startup colony, so outside the safety of the inner planets). I wonder if I should actually do it.

Or just go 'you are boarded, the people you hired are busy piloting, go fight the invaders' schtick.

[Joethegoblin]

Bit too late to the party, but.....

Mongoose Traveller.

It´s simple, but with depth. Tons of interesting rules and a character creation system which is a game onto itself!