Dungeons & Dragonsis without a doubt the most popular TTRPG ever made, focusing on a traditional medieval high fantasy experience that appeals to a wide audience. Although D&D offers supplements and optional rules that can help it lean more sci-fi or grounded low fantasy, other TTRPG systems are made with those themes and mechanics in mind.
While it can be a chore to have to read through and learn a whole new system, it can be worth it to experience a wholly unique experience after playing your hundredth campaign in D&D. While there are hundreds of TTRPG systems published and more each year, a handful can easily be considered rivals to D&D in execution, variety, and detail.
10Stars Without Number
Revised Edition
Far removed from the swords and sorcery of Faerun, Stars Without Number focuses on a hardcore space opera adventure filled with intense shootouts and starship dogfights. The handbook itself is also the only thing you need, as it is a tool for both game masters and players, with rules for creating unique worlds and a fat lore dump on the events of the canon world.
Compared to traditional D&D, the character creation of SWN is a lot more open-ended, allowing you to mix and match abilities from different classes with a ton of foci to obtain that give unique abilities. It also does not hold back when it comes to combat, as players have to be more careful about who they pick fights with, or end up dead in one shot.
The world and mechanics feel very similar to the Mass Effect series, and would slot perfectly into a campaign using that setting.
9Pathfinder
Second Edition
Pathfinder, specifically the second edition, feels like the creator of D&D was stuck in a room for months, only tasked with adding more rules and options to the handbook. This is the best and worst thing about Pathfinder, offering players far more choice in making their character with specific rules for social interactions that are usually glossed over in D&D.
The classes, although chunky, feel more fleshed out from one another, making each character wholly unique and prone to having you make backup after backup. Pathfinder also has some of the mostextensive fantasy loreavailable, which is a rabbit hole that can keep you stuck in a room for months.
8Call Of Cthulhu
Seventh Edition
A mix of horror and detective work, Call of Cthulhu focuses on players in the 1920s, using mythos and clues to uncover curses, monsters, and the unknowable plaguing their town and beyond. Character death is common in CoC, that is, if they haven’t already lost their minds, and feels more grounded compared to traditional RPGs.
CoC doesn’t use classes; rather, you build up a character using several different traits and background details that give you multiple specializations. This is ideal for a party format where each investigator can still put points into skills they like while working with the table to make sure they have all of their bases covered for when a faceless demon inevitably traps them in a basement.
7GURPS
Fourth Edition
More of a general rule system than a way for players to explore a specific theme or world, GURPS, or Generic Universal Role Playing System, is as generic as it is complex. That is, GURPS allows players and DMs to build anything using this system, from a post-apocalypse zombie survival to a generic medieval fantasy with magic and spells.
However, as a player, you can end up spending hours on character creation, as instead of a traditional leveling system, GURPS uses a points system that makes characters more specialized over time. The great thing about GURPS is that many of its rules are optional, meaning you can make it as simple or complex as you and the table are prepared for.
6Monster Of The Week
More streamlined than most modern TTRPGs, Monster of the Week relies on the tropes of the genre it is named after, putting players into familiar archetypes as they hunt a different monster each week. It very much emulates shows like Stranger Things or older pulpy ones likeBuffy the Vampire Slayer, which this system is perfect for playing.
MotW also focuses on the roleplaying aspect, encouraging the table to pick characters they want to play rather than attempting to min/max a perfect team that wins every week. However, this makes combat more cinematic, as instead of just swinging at damage sponges until they reach zero, you need to investigate their weaknesses and create a strategy for defeating them over many days.
5Star Wars
Fantasy Flight Games
There are many Star Wars RPGs, and diehard fans will always have their favorites, but the Fantasy Flight Games version is the most recent and most developed for modern RPG enthusiasts. Since Star Wars is such an expansive universe, three different core expansions allow the table to choose which kind of Star Wars game they want to play.
SWFFG puts more focus onroleplay over combat, using a fairly unique and detailed dice system that determines narrative outcomes rather than traditional skill checks. However, character creation isn’t wholly alien, as careers and specializations feel very similar to classes and subclasses, each granting unique abilities to overcome challenges.
4Cyberpunk Red
If you loved Cyberpunk 2077, then Cyberpunk Red is an RPG set in the same universe and follows the events of the previous editions of the game. It is considered a more streamlined version of the previous edition, Cyberpunk 2020, but this works in its favor as a modern, roleplaying-focused RPG that allows players more freedom when designing their characters.
Yet this doesn’t mean Red is simple, still offering many unique starting lifepaths and ways to specialize in unique skills and netrunning abilities. The main corebook also includes a serious amount of lore, keeping you up to speed on everything within the world of Cyberpunk, or even just inspiration if you want to homebrew a unique city.
3Warhammer 40,000: Dark Heresy
Dark Heresy takes place in the well-known Warhammer 40k universe, putting players in the position of acolytes for the Inquisition, working under an Inquisitor of the Imperium. Like CoC, Dark Heresy uses a d100 system where you are rolling against your own skill values, which can be influenced by your equipment, talents, traits, and levels of insanity.
There are many Warhammer 40k systems, each with its own pros and cons, but Dark Heresy Second Edition is the most streamlined and most recent, making it ideal for new players or those without extensive lore knowledge of the franchise. However, the core book includes more than enough lore to get you started rooting out heretics and rising through the ranks of the Imperium.
2Mork Borg
What Call of Cthulu is to the 1920s, Mork Borg is to medieval fantasy. An extremely dark and grueling system, Mork Borg is a gothic adventure that feels akin to the Dark Souls series in tone and difficulty. Mork Borg is also table-heavy, meaning there are plenty of rolling tables for random generation and creating a very flawed character.
The art style in the core rulebook is exceptionally punk, with trippy visuals next to fleshy monsters that feel like it should be accompanied by a metal guitar riff. Like any good TTRPG system, Mork Borg also comes with extensive lore that involves corrupted prophecies, monks communing with demons, famines, plagues, and all kinds of grimdark disasters.
There is a cyberpunk version of Mork Borg called CY_BORG if you want a gritty, cyberpunk-themed game.
1Apocalypse World
While many systems can work in an apocalypse setting, like GURPS and CoC, none do it better than Apocalypse World. Focusing on raiders and scavengers in a Mad Max-style world, AW forces players into making difficult choices and dealing with the consequences of their own survival.
AW also gives the GM a surprising amount of power, not ever having to rely on roles but instead deciding what happens based on realism and the roles of players. The table doesn’t have a heroic adventure where they cure the wasteland, but rather frequently have to make immoral choices and fight rival gangs for supremacy, with a focus on fear and intimidation mechanics over combat.
