M-SPACE vs The Expanse Roleplaying Game
Compare M-SPACE and The Expanse Roleplaying Game side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| M-SPACE | The Expanse Roleplaying Game | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Scifi | Scifi |
| Tags | Toolkit, Modular, Skill-Based, Classless, Ship-Based, Tactical, Social Combat, Character-Driven, Faction Play, Random Tables | Licensed IP, Space Opera, Ship-Based, Crunchy, Social Combat, Investigation, Faction Play, Social Intrigue, Strong GM Support, Tactical |
| Core Mechanic | Roll d100 at or below the relevant skill percentage to succeed. Difficulty changes the target percentage. Opposed tests compare success levels and then the highest successful roll. | Roll three six-sided dice, two matched and one differently colored Drama Die, and add an ability score plus a focus bonus of +2 if applicable. The total must equal or beat a target number set by the GM or an opponent's result. Rolling doubles generates stunt points spent on combat, exploration, or social effects. The Drama Die's value sets the degree of success. |
| Dice | d100 | 3d6 |
| Complexity | High | High |
| Accessibility | Medium | High |
| Runnability | Very High | Very High |
| License | All Rights Reserved | All Rights Reserved |
| Third-Party Publishing | No verified route found | No verified route found |
| Summary only, not legal advice. Check current terms before publishing. | ||
| Cost | $ | $$ |
| Publisher | FrostByte Books | Green Ronin Publishing |
| Year | 2020 | 2019 |
| Languages | English, French, Spanish | English |
| Best For | Groups who want to build a spacefaring campaign around a shared ship and conflicts between alien societies. | Groups who want a character-focused science fiction campaign of crew jobs, faction pressure, and danger across the Solar System. It suits tables that want structured action, investigation, and social encounters alongside ship travel. |
| Highlights | Modular ship construction connects crew space and equipment choices to handling and damage in combat. Extended Conflicts use depleting pools to make withdrawal a meaningful choice during negotiations and chases. Passions turn personal loyalties into skill bonuses and conflicts between competing commitments. | Backgrounds, professions, talents, and focuses build characters with mechanical ties to their lives before the campaign begins. Action, exploration, and social encounters each use dedicated stunts, giving different kinds of scenes procedures beyond a single skill roll. The Churn turns accumulated complications into escalating story events, giving the Game Master a structured way to introduce setbacks. |
| Considerations | The group must supply its campaign setting and adventures. Standard combat tracks injuries by body location and can leave permanent damage. Depleted conflict pools can impose skill penalties that persist into later scenes. | Combat stunts are drawn from six separate category tables covering roughly sixty options, requiring both players and the GM to check charts mid-fight to keep pace. Ground and air vehicles receive no example statistics, leaving their combat rules almost entirely improvised. The forty-page setting guide summarizes the solar system's factions and history at a survey level, so groups wanting deeper political detail need outside reading of the novels. |