sigh. ive been on an xcom kick recently and now am thinking again about an xcom tabletop hack
I think a rough outline of what id like/look for in a tabletop xcom is like
- we dont need to translate the game's tactical layer perfectly and honestly id prefer if we didnt, but you of course need a nice tactical combat system, preferably with the same vibe and rhythms as to use of cover and the deadliness
- you gotta be able to play as aliens
- in a corollary from combat, you know your girl loves crunch but i think outside of combat you can get a lot lighter on complexity. if you wanted to more closely emulate the strategic layer of the games you could probably get pretty far with something like pbta/bitd move systems but idk how interested in that i'd be personally! but it would be cool to do
- which is a nice segue into my next point: rpg xcom would of course be perfect for smaller stories. i think chimera squad is actually a great example of a storyline on the larger side that would work pretty well in a tabletop format without many changes, copaganda aside
- there can (and should) be some amount of character progression but i dont think we need that much; no need for 20 levels. a largely unleveled game like cyberpunk RED is a good framework i think--a lot of your power in combat comes down to your equipment and how well you can use it. and a lot of your power out of combat is connections and skill checks