31 Questions for Barking Alien - Question 6

My answer to this particular inquiry is very much unique to me I'd wager. Maybe not. It's possible that others share a similar opinion. We'll see. 

Question #6 from the ever excellent Tim Knight 

What do you consider to be the most ‘elegant’ (however you choose to define it) roleplaying system you have encountered?

First, let's define elegant shall we? At least how I am going to view it for the purpose of answering this question and just so we're all on the same page. According to an Oxford Dictionary search we have 'pleasingly graceful and stylish in appearance or manner'. Ooh. I like that. OK, so a stylish, graceful system, a good looking game, and one the runs smoothly and in a pleasing manner.  

The one that stands out to me is...

The ALIEN RPG by Free League Publishing is one of my all time favorite tabletop roleplaying games and its only five years old. It is definitely the most elegant and IMHO one of the easiest systems to learn, play, and run to come out during the last decade. It's elegance comes from an 'economy of rules'. It has what it needs, uses what it has well, and doesn't add unnecessary rules it doesn't need.

Utilizing a variant of Free League's 'Year Zero System' (aren't they all - variants that is), it wasn't a rules set new to me when I read the ALIEN corebook. This version of Year Zero clicked with me more than my previous experiences with the system had, for reasons I will go into later.  

The game has a largely traditional TRPG structure, simplified so as to run quickly and efficiently. The rules are reasonably easy to learn and understand. As I get older I find it difficult to grok the mechanics of many games just from reading them. Often these days I have to play the game to comprehend how the game is played. Not so with ALIEN. I read it and got it right away because honestly, it isn't hard to get. Plus, it's a Dice Pool system and I've played and enjoyed quite a few Dice Pool systems.

Added to the basic Dice Pool mechanic is a subsystem involving Stress and Panic. Even with a table to reference, the Stress/Panic rules are very smoothly integrated into the standard Action Roll. What results is a game that runs fairly effortlessly and creates an atmosphere perfectly in-line with the ALIEN setting. 

There are additional rules and mechanics but they all build off that base die resolution or interact with it in a way that never bogs down the flow of a session. Like I mentioned in a previous post, having a unified approach to all rule judgements is what I am after and what ALIEN delivers.

ALIEN does a particular thing and it does it well. It handles a fast-faced, cinematic action setting with a major horror component very nicely. Perhaps, in fact very likely, one reason I connected with this version of the game and its system moreso than other incarnations is the relationship between the rules and the ALIEN universe. This is also why I've used the basics of this version to create other games such as Red Dwarf and my homebrewed Ghostbusters kitbash. All these worlds are cinematic action settings with a horror [and humor] component, so they work for much the same reasons. 

If I had to award a runner-up or honorable mention I'd go with the new SMURFS RPG. Seriously. It is a great game that works really well, adding depth to a franchise you wouldn't think needs much depth. At the same time, it just makes for a really awesome system. The only reason I don't speak even higher of it is because its not out yet. I don't know all the rules, having only run the quickstart rules. We'll take a look at it again when it comes out in its full form. 

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Barking Alien