Play the gritty reboot of your favorite science fiction TV series.

Winner of the 2012 Silver ENnie award for Best Setting, designed by RPG legend Robin D. Laws and powered by the GUMSHOE investigative roleplaying system.

Out here in the Bleed, you’re the closest thing there is to a higher authority. You’re Licensed Autonomous Zone Effectuators —”lasers” for short. You’re the seasoned freelancers that local leaders call whenever a situation is too tough, too baffling, or simply too weird for them to handle. It’s a dirty job, but it pays. And sometimes, you get to make a difference.

In Ashen Stars you take on the role of freelance troubleshooters and law enforcers operating in a remote sector of space called the Bleed. Amid the ashes of a devastating war that ended with a massive retreat by the Combine, you’ll solve mysteries, fix thorny problems, and explore strange corners of space — balancing the promise of a quick buck against the need to maintain a reputation that wins you lucrative contracts, and pays the upkeep on your ship and your cyber- and viroware enhancements.

Play one of seven species:

• The eerily beautiful, nature-loving, emotion-fearing balla
• The cybes, former humans radically altered by cybernetic and genetic science
• The durugh, hunched, furtive ex-enemies of the Combine who can momentarily phase through solid matter.
• The humans, adaptable, resourceful, and numerous.
• The kch-thk, warrior locust people who migrate to new bodies when their old ones are destroyed.
• The armadillo-like tavak, followers of a serene warrior ethic.
• The vas mal, former near-omnisicent energy beings devolved by disaster into misshapen humanoid form.

Ashen Stars includes:

• Extensive, streamlined rules for space combat
• 14 different types of ship
• A rogues gallery of NPC threats and hostile species
• A short adventure to get you started in the Bleed.