The topic for today, day 8 of RPG a Day 2025, is Explore, which is very appropriate with my new obsession, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.
“Space. The final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before.”
While I have enjoyed both Star Wars and Star Trek, I’ve always been more of a Star Wars fan. For clarity’s sake, my favorite sci-fi series is Babylon 5, but among the two big franchises, Star Wars has always been more of my cup of tea. But I enjoy Trek, I grew up watching reruns of TOS, and was a huge fan of TNG. DS9 is a great series. I sadly believed it was an either/or situation between B5 and DS9, and stopped seeing the latter. I finished it later, and it was my favorite Trek until recently.
Voyager and Enterprise were not readily available in Puerto Rico, so I didn’t watch either when they were on. I’ve seen the occasional episode, but not the whole series. I enjoyed the Kelvin Timeline movies, but since Paramount+ is not available in Puerto Rico, I have not seen recent Trek series such as Discovery, Picard, Lower Decks, or Strange New Worlds.
A few years ago I became a fan of The Orville, which was very much a love letter to Trek, so when I recently got a chance to see all of the currently available episodes of Strange New Worlds, I jumped at the opportunity, and have fallen in love with the series, the characters, and how it reimagines Trek.
Which led me to my question today. If I were to play a Star Trek game, which system should I use? Let’s explore.
I played and enjoyed the FASA’s Star Trek game, but never played the Last Unicorn Trek System. Logic says the logical choice should be Modiphius‘ Star Trek Adventure game. Michael, the Stargazer himself, has previously written about the game, and I own the original book, published in PDF.
The books certainly look nice, but I have never been much interested in the 2d20 system. Maybe I should give it a chance, but Iam hesitant to invest in the system without trying the game first. For that reason, I grabbed the Star Trek Adventure Game Second Edition Free Start Guide (which you can get in PDF by clicking the previous link) during Free RPG Day.
But besides the obvious choice, what other options would I have to play a Star Trek Game?
Five-Year Mission is a White Star/White Box compatible game that allows you to use OSR rules to play a Star Trek Game. I own the PDF, which could serve as a source of rules and inspiration for adapting another game that I think would be a good fit for a Star Trek game, specifically, Stars Without Number. There is a SWN 1e fan-made conversion, but I can see myself making a quick conversion. I could adapt The Orville to the system as well!
There is a Prime Directive d20 Modern game. It is not strictly canon Trek, but it could be an easy adaptation. I am not a stickler for canon these days, and it could also serve as a reference for a Star without Number adaptation.
Michael previously wrote about Where No Man has Gone Before, a rules-light system to play Star Trek, which became Far Trek. The game appears to be an interesting free system with many supplements. It might be worth checking out.
Since I am currently playing Savage Worlds and I am a massive fan of the system, the most straightforward adaptation would be using that system. With the Science Fiction Companion, running a Star Trek game would be a breeze.
What do you think of the options listed above? What system would you use for a Star Trek RPG session? What did I miss? Let’s explore the possibilities together.
I would love to read your comments here in the blog, or tag me wherever you make them. If you choose to join in the conversation, don’t forget to tag your entry with the #RPGaDay2025 hashtag so the community can find your contribution.
