So You Want To Make Player Characters?




David C. Sutherland III Star Empires 1977

In my studies on Star Probe, Star Empires and Original D&D it is clear that when individual player characters were created for Star Probe/Star Empires it appears Original D&D type abilities and rules were used. So a small discussion on older games from TSR is in order.

D&D circa 1973:

D&D used alignment which originated in Chainmail. Originally alignment was a way to know how fantasy creatures might ally themselves in mass combat. However alignment quickly evolved in D&D into much more though at this time it was very basic consisting of Law, Neutral and Chaos only. Classes exist in OD&D representing specific professions and thus skills. Early D&D races are also best thought of as classes, representing specific abilities and skills unique to that race.

The character abilities in D&D at this time were Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Constitution, Dexterity and Charisma. They were originally generated by rolling a 3d6 and adding the dice up for each ability, thus creating a range of 3-18.

Hit Points were originally based on a 1d6 which was modified by class, race and level per Men and Magic by Gygax and Arneson.  By 1975-1976 D&D changes the hit dice to 1d4, 1d6 or 1d8 depending on class. Also new classes are added in Supplement I Greyhawk by Gary Gygax and Rob Kuntz and Supplement II Blackmoor by Dave Arneson.

By 1976 Psionics entered D&D via the Supplement III Eldritch Wizardry by Gary Gygax and Brian Blume. In this supplement for a player character to posses psionic abilities they had to be human and could not be a monk or druid.

Star Probe was published in 1975 and Star Empires in 1977. Star Empires specifically mentions D&D in playing the effects of one of the hyperspace field generators. The Blackmoor Supplement adventure is actually the result of a Star Probe/Star Empires scout ship crashing on the then shared sandbox setting of D&D. Stephen the Rock is an alien space human.

Thus it is probably safe to assume Star Probe/Star Empires PCs were using D&D abilities. If one wanted to go old school the early D&D rules would be the ones to play such characters with.


The 1980 module Expedition to the Barrier Peaks is a later example of the Sci-fi cross over in D&D.

But TSR went on to develop several more sci-fi based games the Original Metamorphosis Alpha circa 1976 by James Ward and then Gamma World circa 1978 by James Ward and Gary Jaquet.

Neither of these two games used alignment but they have some ideas in common with old D&D but did use some unique abilities. Neither game had classes. Both games have research charts it is interesting to note Star Empires also employs similar charts to research technology.

Metamorphosis Alpha used Radiation Resistance, Mental Resistance, Dexterity, Strength, Leadership Potential, and Constitution. Like old D&D a 3d6 is rolled to determine these abilities using the same range of 3-18 for ability stats. Unlike old D&D the Constitution is used to determine the number of hit dice you roll and add together to get the player characters hit points.




Gamma World used Mental Strength, Intelligence, Dexterity, Charisma, Constitution and Physical Strength. Gamma World let players roll 4d6 and toss the lowest roll and then add the dice rolls for the six abilities and again resulting in a range of 3-18. Like Metamorphosis Alpha the Constitution is used to determine the number of hit dice which are then rolled and added together for starting hit points.



Finally Star Frontiers was introduced in 1982 this game deviated from the more traditional TSR abilities and multiple types of dice mechanics. This game used combinations of abilities that could be improved. The ability combinations used are Strength/Stamina, Dexterity/Reaction Speed, Intuition/Logic, and Personality/Leadership. Alignment is not used in this game. In addition Stamina replaces Hit Points and Constitution. Star Frontiers does not use the d6 rolls to determine abilities but instead use d100 roll compared to a chart to find the ability scores. By the time this game was published the idea of more versatile races that can learn many skills had become more popular in gaming and so this game allows for more flexibility in skill learning.

As you can see some concepts over the years were split or combined or even deleted from one game or another. Some concepts are easy to gloss from one game to another while others are more difficult. 

The oldest games tend to be rather rigid in the early forms with less choices and races basically acting as classes. The Pure Strain Human in the sci-fi games was often given perks the mutants could not gain and in D&D humans had the most potential for level advancement. It is important to understand this reflected both attempts at game balance in games like Gamma World and ideas about humans rising to prominence in fantasy settings. Original D&D always had a science fiction aspect along with it's more obvious fantasy aspect making it a prime candidate for heroic adventuring. Old school gaming was unfair, the rules often heavily favor randomness, super science and magic are blurred while rules seem unfair because that is how the game was designed.

There are several Original D&D style retro rules on the internet and lots of resources as there has been many editions of D&D. D&D or any of its retro clones could be adapted with some finessing of the Game Master.

Metamorphosis Alpha and Gamma World can easily be adapted and expanded on to create adventuring aspects in space as well. There are several editions of Gamma World and Metamorphosis Alpha.


Mutant Future is another modern system that can give you ideas and rules to apply towards a space fantasy setting.

Mutant Epoch is also another choice.


Star Frontiers offers a system set up for adventures in space. There has been continuing development of resources for Star Frontiers by fans for years. Most recently a new game produced under the name Frontier Space which uses a d100 system has been published. 




 Another option is GURPS Space, Gurps has a lot of sci-fi resources to draw on and editions.


I admit I lean toward Original (which is called Basic later) D&D, Original Gamma World type systems and Star Frontiers as being my choices for play. These games are the ones I have played off and on since childhood and I have some experience in converting between these game systems. However because no official rules were ever published for Star Probe/Star Empires Player Characters what matters is what system will work best for you as the Game Master. One reason I posted several future apocalyptical type games to consider is they tend to have a good range of technology, weird futuristic mutations (that can help you create aliens) and generally ways to improve player characters without getting pigeon holed into a class like in D&D. When converting games there are several approaches you can take, the easiest is simply to add missing abilities in games with similar systems, choose the default system and then tweak accordingly once you understand the differences. Drastically different systems such as OD&D to Star Frontiers require you to really spend time getting to understand the statistical percentages involved in each games's mechanics so you can get a close and balanced conversion. Again some finessing and tweaking will be needed to create the right feel, danger, or background in a conversion. 

Star Frontier Resources:

Star Frontiersman

Frontier Explorer


Happy Retro Gaming and Modern Gaming!









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