2300 AD
Core RulebookCore Mechanic
For a task, roll d10 and add modifiers from applicable skills and characteristics; meet a difficulty target from 2 for Simple to 18 for Impossible to succeed. A natural 1 fumbles, while failed checks use a separate roll to determine whether the character may retry or suffers a mishap. Hasty, hazardous, uncertain, and cooperative tasks modify time, failure risk, information, or group participation without changing the core check.
Best For
Groups who want career-shaped crews exploring a politically divided interstellar frontier where starship operations and hard-science constraints drive missions.
Highlights
Career terms turn pre-play service into skills and organizational ties, giving each crew member a practical history that feeds later missions. Space combat uses hex movement and signature-based detection, making maneuver and sensor discipline as important as weapon range. Linked world-generation and mapping procedures build planets down to regional terrain, giving exploration campaigns playable locations instead of setting prompts.
Considerations
Character creation can end when a turning-point roll fails, leaving a concept in its current career before the player intended. Combat routes each hit through location and damage-type tables, adding several lookups to a fight. The future history assumes a World War III and French hegemony, so campaigns are tied to a specific 1980s vision of the 24th century.
Third-Party Publishing
Original noncommercial fan works for 2300AD, including websites and fanzines, subject to notice, notification, attribution, and limited-quotation conditions; paid use and rulebook rewrite or republication are excluded.