Overview
The R10 System in 10 Seconds
You are a skilled professional. You are expected to succeed. The question is what it costs you.
How It Works
Roll d10s. There are only two types of rolls:
You vs the situation. The GM tells you the Risk. Cancel 1-for-1 with your Skill. Roll Ability + whatever's left. Read the result.
You vs someone else. Both sides roll Ability + Skill at Risk 0. Successes cancel. Whoever has leftover wins.
That's it.
The Five Results
| Result | What Happens |
|---|---|
| Critical Success | You nail it. Best possible outcome. |
| Success | You do what you set out to do. Clean. |
| Costly Success | You succeed, but it costs you something. |
| Failure | You don't pull it off. |
| Critical Failure | It goes wrong in a way you didn't expect. |
Most rolls land in the middle three. Costly Success is the most common dramatic result. You got what you wanted. Now deal with the price.
The Two Numbers
Skill is how good you are. It cancels Risk before you roll and adds dice that can crit.
Risk is how dangerous the situation is. It adds dice that can fail or crit fail.
They cancel 1-for-1. What's left is what you roll. A skilled character in a dangerous situation still rolls well. Their training eats the danger. An unskilled character in a safe situation still faces risk. They don't know what they're doing.
What Matters
When the fiction puts you in real danger, you take Wounds — serious harm that sticks. A starting character survives about four of them. Take too many and you're dying.
The optional Basic Combat module layers a Condition Track on top of Wounds — Normal → Winded → Injured → Impaired → Staggered — so hits accumulate before they turn into permanent harm. It adds round-by-round pressure for firefights without changing the core rule: Wounds are still what actually change you. See Basic Combat for the full mechanic.
Your group shares Momentum — a pool that measures how well you're controlling the situation. Spend it to push harder, reduce danger, or seize the initiative. When it's full, you can end the scene on your terms. When it's empty, the GM can end it on theirs.
Who You Are
Species determines what you are. Occupation determines what you do. Background is where you came from. Flaws are what make you interesting.
Pick up an archetype and play in five minutes. Or build from scratch and make exactly the character you want.