Like many of you out there I imagine, I’ve been spending my free time playing through the Mass Effect games with the release of Mass Effect Legendary Edition. Now this is not my first rodeo – I’ve played through the entire series once, played through the first two games multiple times and have immersed myself into the the lore of the setting on several levels. As I’ve been tearing through the galaxy in the SSV Normandy and exploring alien planets on the much improved Mako, I started to think again about how much I’d like to run a tabletop game set in this breathtaking and expansive IP.
Now I’m hardly the only gamer to feel this way. All you need to do is search for Mass Effect tabletop game and you’ll return multiple results of fan created games of various quality in a variety of systems. And I honestly haven’t read through many of them, because for me a lot of the fun of running something comes from the act of “creating” it. If I understand how things work and function, it can provide for a better experience for the players, if running the risk of “reinventing the wheel” so to speak. All that said, I wanted to take some time and dedicate some space on some systems that I personally think would work well with regards to a Mass Effect tabletop game.
The Good
- Star Wars Saga Edition – I adored this iteration of the d20 system that came near the end of its development cycle at Wizards of the Coast. And I think that this game is tailor made to run a Mass Effect game with minimal changes from the Core Rulebook. The Jedi could be easily reworked into a Biotic class. Write the various races that appear in the game. Tech and Biotic skills can function as Force Powers with two different associated skills. Finally, re-flavor some of the prestige classes and and write a few new ones and you’ve got a very solid system to run a Mass Effect game.
- Modified Genesys – Fantasy Flight Games’s Star Wars Roleplaying Game opened up a lot of doors with their Narrative Dice System. Then they developed Genesys which further refined some of the stickier rules from the Star Wars releases. I believe that this one fits right up there for me in regards to running a Mass Effect story. It trades away some of the tactical combat that a game like Saga Edition would provide in favor of more narrative mechanics and player agency that could work really well. But ultimately, I don’t know that I would want to run Genesys right out of the box. Within the setting we tend to see only a few types of Biotic powers and Tech abilities, with a user being able to devote more time and energy to increase their power and maybe even use them in different ways. So I could see treating them like Force powers from the Star Wars releases that a character buys and then spends XP to continue to improve being a good way to handle them instead of the standard “magic rules” from Genesys. I also don’t know that I would do talent trees per se, but I do believe that I would have a number of talents gated behind a specific “class” that you would choose upon creation or shortly after to model some of the more signature abilities of the game like the Vanguard’s Biotic Charge or the Tactical Cloak ability that Infiltrators learn to use.
- Modern AGE – We saw that this game can handle sci-fi and handle it well with the acquisition and release of the The Expanse RPG, and I have a good feeling that it could also be used to run a “fewer frills” version of Mass Effect. The stunt system is incredibly flexible and character creation and advancement are very freeform through talent selections. And the “specialization talents” allow you to put in the more iconic abilities of the various classes from the game as well as create some additional niches for characters to fill.
- Savage Worlds – This game system bills itself as “Fast! Furious! Fun!” which are all things that a pitched firefight in the corridors of the Citadel or on an alien world feel like. The focus on keeping the action moving means that your story won’t grind to a halt due to a lengthy combat and robust character creation and advancement will let players build the type of character that they desire, from a Spectre operative to a traveling merchant.
- Wild Talents – This is a weird one, but I’ve seen it pitched once before and I think it could work well by treating the class abilities and biotics as “powers” that would be bought through character creation. This would allow a character to define what kind of biotics or tech abilities they want to be strong with as well as develop other powers through leveling up and adding more dice or upgrading existing ones. It’s a lot crunchier than other suggestions on this list, but I think there’s some potential for the right group that likes that kind of granularity.
So what about you? What system would you repurpose to run a Mass Effect game for your group? Or what system would you like to use to play in one?
Ben Erickson
