Common house rules/common decency for game night

I know that there are many emotionally-powerful, educational, even cathartic role-playing games out there, but that scene is not for me. Daily life is often too stressful, too draining, too mundane for me to play or run anything but crazy adventures or bizarre investigations.  Therefore, most of the house rules I like to play with are of a decidedly relaxed bent.

Steal, borrow, modify, or comment below:

Menae in Full: Away team 2

As mentioned in an earlier entry, Away Team 2 acts as a followup for the 1st Away Tea, handling cargo (un)loading and on-site scientific survey.

Credit for writing the NPC backstories goes to a former co-GM and conspirator in writing who wishes to remain anonymous.

Mass Effect: 2166 political summary by species

Humans: Recently granted an embassy at the Citadel at the objection of the Batarian Hegemony, among other governments. The Earth Systems Alliance has heavily invested in the survey mission as a sign of their desire to participate in the Citadel government, alongside curiosity about the wider galaxy. 

Batarians: Deep-seated, often-violent opposition to recent Human expansion into the Attican Traverse has led to intermittent conflict featuring slaver raids, terrorist attacks, etc. against some human colonies. The Batarian Hegemony denies support of these attacks but is suspected to be bankrolling at least some of them. Illegal squatter colonies have been determined to exist on the fringes of this sector, in defiance of Council decisions to hold off granting colonization permits pending resolution of intersperses disputes. 

Council Species (Asari, Salarians, Turians): Having established large, stable governments for centuries, these species seek to know more about less-known star clusters for long-term planning of mining or colonization efforts. Records of ship disappearances in this part of space exist in the histories of all three council species - particularly for the Asari, whose home star-cluster is relatively close by. 

Krogan: Demilitarized after a war 1500 years ago, the Krogan were infected with the Genophage, a Salarian-designed, Turian-deployed virus that causes 99.9% of all births to be stillborn. In the intervening time, Krogan society has effectively broken down. Young males do their best to get off-world and find work as mercenaries. Krogan encountered this far out of Citadel space have likely regressed to barbarism due to centuries of isolation, although there might be populations not infected with the Genophage. If such populations exist, they could be a major threat to galactic stability. 

Hanar: Client relationship with Drell firmly established for decades. Drell are called up to serve the Hanar Illuminate under "the Compact," as recompense for their rescue from ecological catastrophe on the Drell homeworld of Rakhana. Hanar and Drell alike have a small stake in the survey mission to find more ocean and desert worlds for colonization, respectively. In particular the Drell are interested in "elbow room" to re-grow their population, as it currently measures less than 200,000. 

Quarians: An entirely space-faring species. Efforts are split between spacebourne survival, finding new planets to colonize, or organizing to take back their homeworld of Rannoch. Exploratory elements of their Migrant Fleet might be encountered during the mission. They should be treated with courtesy, as they might have valuable information to share. Elements of the Quarian Migrant Fleet have also been rumored to perform unorthodox, if not illegal, research in deep space.