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[Big_James_B]

So joining ebbors space-based RP has given me a desire to get together my friends and do some good old fashioned pen and paper roleplaying in the same style. However, I do not really know where to start with when it comes to selecting a roleplaying game to do this.
So far I have Star Frontiers and Spacemaster (first, second and privateers). Is there anybody here who is knowledgeable enough in this area to direct me to a decent system? I like the complexity of Spacemaster, as well as the critical hit charts, but I don't want extremely complex character generation. Star Frontiers is good; simple yet enjoyable but I don't want to go through a lot of initial character development (from what I've read they need to pretty much level up to tenth before they're ready to own a starship).

Any advice is appreciated.

[RedKing]

Yeah, Spacemaster is just Rolemaster in space. Which is to say....CHARTS! IN! SPAAAAACE! 

I was always fond of Traveller/MegaTraveller. You can have very detailed character generation, but there's also a simplified version that works for most. Granted, the actual playsystem is somewhat kludgy (though I think Traveller: The New Era streamlined a lot of it) but the background material and the configurability of the starship construction rules is pretty awesome.

[Eagleon]

If you like Star Frontiers you could just modify the rules to give the characters the skills/stats/whatever of a 10th level character at first level, and go from there. Pen and Paper games are nice exactly because they're so easy to modify and cheat to make work for a group.

[Big_James_B]

If you like Star Frontiers you could just modify the rules to give the characters the skills/stats/whatever of a 10th level character at first level, and go from there. Pen and Paper games are nice exactly because they're so easy to modify and cheat to make work for a group.

Yeah just went through the Knight Hawks rules and found that the characters can jump into, what is essentially "Starfleet Academy" for two years and gain lvl 1 pilot and lvl 2 of another skill, also gaining the pre-requisite knowledge as well. I plan to do that in the case of Star Frontiers but not if I can help it.

I've heard of Traveller from both the net and "neckbeards" of pnp but can't really find a site that will give me an actual "low-down" of how it works, and tbh I really never searched like I should have.

[Lectorog]

The Star Wars RPG is actually pretty good, if you like the setting. Ship combat is as tile-based as the rest of the game, but it could be easily changed to make it more three-dimensional.

[LordBucket]

I've only played two: the Stars Wars RPG mentioned above and Robotech. Game mechanics seemed much smoother in Robotech. It's an old system but it was reasonably fast and it worked. Star Wars had a lot of strange quirks to it and often the system seemed mechanically gimmicky, but it's a roleplaying environment that your players are far more likely to be familiar with.

[Big_James_B]

I hadn't thought of Robotech being an rpg (however I did find a Sailor Moon one...), Star Wars on the other hand...I dunno. The old D6 one didn't impress me when I checked it out a few years ago, but having this one in D20 is interesting. I'll certainly check out Robotech sometime soon. A few more and I think I'll have enough to make a decision.

Actually I'll add this as well. I'm looking at the rpg with a decent ship-to-ship battle rules.

[Sirus]

Have you taken a look at Rogue Trader, perhaps? It takes place in the Warhammer 40,000 universe and has you and your buddies roaming around the edges of civilized space in a massive starship, snatching ancient artifacts or escorting planetary governors around. Stuff like that.

[Big_James_B]

Yeah I think I have that somewhere ()...But I looked at it more so as the starships were there just to ferry the characters to their destination rather than battle within space.

[Sirus]

Primarily, yes. However, there are plenty of rules for ship-to-ship combat included, including stats for different classes of ship and ways to upgrade your capabilities. Probably not the best system to use if you want lots and lots of ship combat though.