Ashen Stars (2011)

(from the back of the book)

They call you Lasers, regulators, or, out in the Scylla Outzone, shinestars. To the lawless denizens of the Bleed, whether they be pirates, gangsters or tyrants, you’re known in less flattering terms. According to official Combine terminology, the members of your hard-bitten starship crew are known as Licensed Autonomous Zone Effectuators. You’re the seasoned freelancers local leaders call when a situation proves too tough, too baffling, or simply too weird to handle on their own. In the abandoned fringe of inhabited planets known as the Bleed, you’re as close to a higher authority as they come.

Ashen Stars is a game of mystery and adventure set in a gritty space opera universe. You play freelance law enforcers solving problems for pay in the Bleed, a war-ravaged frontier of colonized space. You're needed in the wake of a massive retreat by the Combine, the utopian empire that first colonized it. Amid the ashes of the devastating Mohilar war, the lasers solve mysteries, fix thorny problems, and explore strange corners of space. You balance the immediate rewards of a quick buck against the need to maintain your reputation, ensuring that you can continue to secure lucrative contracts, fix your ship and pay the upkeep on your weaponry and cyberware enhancements.

Featuring seven new and highly detailed playable species

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

Ashen Stars also contains extensive, streamlined rules for space combat, 14 different types of ship, a rogues gallery of NPC threats and hostile species and a full adventure to get you started in the Bleed.