What's this ?
R.A.S. is a French sci-fi RPG (written in the French language), which is interesting for some reasons :
it's self-published by 2 young amateursit's the come-back of space-opera French RPGs years after old successes (Mega, Empire Galactique ...) and some failed attempts (Multimondes, Empyrium ...)the quality of the presentation is amazingThis is a game about military SF action, and Starship Troopers is definitely the main inspiration for it (with Aliens, Star Wars, Dune and others).
What does RAS means ?
R.A.S. means, in French military slang "Rien à Signaler", that is : "Nothing worth reporting".
The kind of thing you say in a walkie-talkie when you're guarding a place, just before a drooling alien jumps on you.What does the book look like ?
R.A.S. is a 224-page book, extremely well-presented. The two authors are also the illustrators of the book, and they've done the layout themselves. The result is top-quality, and actually looks much better than the average professional work.
The art is computer-manipulated for very good effects (especially for the spaceships). It is originally in colour, but the authors have made excellent efforts so that the art is still enjoyable in black-and-white.Where can we see some sample art ?
On the authors' siteWhat does the book contain ?
After a short introduction, the game system is presented in some 20 pages (including combat with a funky martial art system, and the spaceship combat rules !).
After that, there's a very short (8-page) chapter called La Galaxie. It explains some basic cosmic phenomenon (nebula, black hole, etc) and describes a few locales from the game world.
Organisation de la Galaxie is a 10-page chapter describing the main races of the universe. The Humans, Ullar, Adharax and Shankkar will be detailed later on, so the chapter mostly taks about secondary races. The chapter also describes a few galactic organisations, and there's a short part about daily life and the prices of non-weapon equipment.The next (12-page) chapter is about the "evil" empire of the Shankkar, a warlike race of cat-people. They will certainly be the basic honourable ennemies of your PCs (like the Klingons in Star Trek, the Original Series). Their history is exposed, and their organisation, the most important NPC's, etc.PNJ (the French expression for NPC's) is a 8-page chapter giving the complete stats for 18 generic PC's from different races.Equipement is the 24-page chapter about (military) equipment.Les Humains is a 22-page chapter about Humans. Besides background informations it contains the rules to create a human character, or a robot character (called E.G.O.).Les Ullars is a 18-page similar chapter about this race of interstellar mercenaries (their home planet has been destroyed). Those aliens are humanoïd and land-dwelling, but are descended from orca-like creatures. They have a black and oily skin, no nose nor ears, and are very tall and muscular. The females are extremely sexy by human standards, and they use this advantage.Les Adharrax is another 16-page chapter about the third race allowed for PC. They come from outside known space, and have to mate with other species to reproduce. They have a very bad reputations thanks to their strange behaviour, strange weapons, strange appearance (no face, tentacles on their back ...) and annoying habit to kidnap females.Qualités et Défauts is a 8-page chapter giving some supplemental rules for Advantages / Disadvantages for your PC.Révélations is the GM's secrets. This 21-page chapter is printed in white-on-black and give many details about things only hinted at in the previous chapters ... most of them deal with three mysterious superior races, who seem to have evolved far beyond the other races : the Illuminated ("guardian angels" of a few races), the Woarius (their strict opposite, apparently very dark and cruel) and the Insects (no ones likes them). Of course, the frontier between "good" and "evil" is not that clear, and the chapter does a very good job at explaining the motives of everyone.L'Aventure is the longer chapter of the book (38 pages) : after some general advice to the GM, it contains three complete scenarios : one for the Humans, one for the Ullar and one for the Adharrax. Although it is possible to mix races in the same scenario, it is not really advised by the authors (well, the odd Ullar mercenary in a human team can be welcome).the book ends with play-aids : a 2-page character creation summary and seven 2-page character sheets (male Human, female Human, male Ullar, female Ullar, male Adharrax, E.G.O., war E.G.O.)What is the rules system ?
In a few words :5 main attributes (physical, mental, social, senses, dexterity), 3 secondary attributes (willpower, luck, courage), skills, advantages / disadvantagesthe roll : attribute skill (exploding) d10 against a 5-35 difficulty. In some rare cases (skill expertise), you may roll 2 or 3 d10 and keep the best one.damage : another dice roll, your subtract armor, then you look at a table to see the loss in Wound Levels
The martial arts are very powerful in this game : besides devastating special moves, they also allow to make many different moves in the same round (with an increased difficulty, of course). Martial Arts is a skill, but you need the "Martial Arts" advantage too.
In the main book, everybody has got 3 wound levels in every body part (head, legs, armes, torso, abdomen), regardless of their attributes.What is enjoyable about this game ?
Minimalist rules. This may be a drawback if you want realism ...All the book is written in a clear and concise manner. No fancy in-character fiction (well ... not a lot), just facts.Anyway, the authors manage to slip humour from time to time. It's action-movie humour, but it's fun.No psionics and other mystic s**t : it's pure SF mayhem !The GM's secrets are all layed out in a very interesting chapter. Things are actually happening behind the scene, and evil is not really where you think ...What supplements are available ?
For the moment (january 2003) :The extremely beautiful 4-panelled screen, with its booklet (new spaceships and a scenario). After some feedback from the internet, the GM screen contains some rules missing from the very minimalist main book (take the Physical attribute in consideration for wound levels, surprise attacks, firing with two guns, use of Willpower to withstand wounds).Grisons / Reivax : a book about those two alien races, with details and rules to play them as PC's
Other supplements are planned, and everyone is eagerly waiting for the Humans supplement, with details about Earth and the Human colonies.| | Style | Substance |
| good | a very beautiful bookstraightforward explanation of the rules and settingeverything is about military SF action | three meaty scenariiover-simplified rules |
| bad | everything is about military SF action | lack of details about the secondary alien racesover-simplified rules |
| Rating | 5 | 4 |
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