Five Parsecs from Home - First Encounter Campaign

[Torben]

I recently picked up Ivan Sorensens excellent little set of rules called FiveCore and the supplement Five Parsecs from Home on Wargame Vault. I read it through and halfway through it I could already feel ideas brimming inside of my head and found a perfect excuse to use some painted lead!

On the surface, this set of rules seems to be just what me and my local buddy (Duncan) had been looking for, for a long time and before long I had rolled up a group of six characters (why start out small, eh?) for the game as pictured and described below:

Characters are detailed from left-to-right

T3-ODR 'Theodore'
Origin: Wartorn Hell Hole
Motivation: Wealth
Class: Soldier
Special: Droid

Salvik Desny
Origin: Research Outpost
Motivation: Power
Class: Scientist
Special: Cybernetic Enhancement, People Skills

Haakon Asaldi
Origin: Lower-Class Mega City
Motivation: Loyalty
Class: Unity Agent
Special: Charisma

Germain Aschen
Origin: Subjugated Colony World
Motivation: Escape
Class: Traveller
Special: Jump Belt

Stephan del Castillo
Origin: Wealthy Merchant Family
Motivation: Freedom
Class: Trouble Shooter
Special: Brave, Tough

Sylvain Bure
Origin: Urban Hell Hole
Motivation: Escape
Class: Technician
Special: Unhinged

I had great fun thinking about why these guys got together (I rolled a Mutual Protection result for them) and I already have a couple of ideas, but they'll have to wait until Duncan (my gaming buddy) and I get together tomorrow and have ourselves a game. I'm thinking that the campaign, for as long as we want to, should start out with our two groups coming to blows tomorrow and then we'll take turns in playing the opposition for a bit and most likely meet up again.

So, there's most likely going to be a little update, with some pictures sometime tomorrow, cheers!

[commissarmoody]

They all look, pretty badass. I might have to check out the rules myself.

[phreedh]

Nice colouring in, Torben!

Tell me more about FiveCore! I can't access WGV from work.

[Momotaro]

Ivan Sorensen is "weaselfierce" isn't he?  I loved his Fast and Dirty rules - I'll follow this thread with great interest!

Nice paintjobs too - clean and muted and tied together nicely with the sand colour and flashes of blue.  Ace!

[bobwithasilentc]

Love the paint jobs!

The rules also sound intriguing, but I cant find much about them on the net. Could you give us a run down of how they work?

[Torben]

Cheers everyone!

As for a bit more detail on the rules, then I'll try and write something up when we actually get to play tonight. The rules, i.e. those used when pushing miniatures around on the tabletop, aren't really detailed or complicated or anything of the sort. Some might even say that they are pretty basic - but that's just the charm for me as all I personally need in a game is some tactical influence, not tactical complexity

One little interesting thing about the game is that you don't have "stats" as such; all die-rolls are handled by 1d6. On a 1 or a 6, stuff happens. All other results are just blanks. You then increase the number of dice, add some modifiers here or there, but the core is a 2-in-6 chance to do stuff, for everyone.

Then you add the various stuff as presented above, to each Character (and roll for Class, I think it is, for Goons) to flesh them out. If you like that sort of thing (and I really do) then there's tonnes of excitement to go for with the Five Parsec Supplement.

And yes, it is indeed 'weaselfierce' who wrote the rules, the author of Fast & Dirty that I also liked a lot.

[commissarmoody]

Looking forward to seeing more of your background for your crew along with the game report.

[Ajsalium]

Nice team you have there!

Is that droid a kryomek talos? I didn't know they were that big.

[YPU]

Ivan Sorensen is "weaselfierce" isn't he?  I loved his Fast and Dirty rules - I'll follow this thread with great interest!

He is, I was trying to figure out what I knew the name from, and that's it. I purchased these rules as well. And to be honest I have to say they don't really do it for me. FAD is one of the best rule-sets I have laid eyes on, both unit creation and pre game set-up both and these five parsecs rules just don't do it for me.

I must say tough I have only taken a loot at the five parsecs book and not the five core book yet, it may be that that is where I will find the meat I am currently missing, since they are the core rules and all. 

[phreedh]

Hey torben, how did 5PFH work out for you and Duncan?

[dijit]

Well I'll let Torben answer for his part, but for mine (and I think Torben will probably answer the same) we found it a bit dull. That said the 5Parsecs part is great for adding character, background and RPG elements to any scifi game, and will certainly get used as such. However, the core rules didn't seem to support the RPG elements, and the rules don't differenicate much between different types, classes, etc. other rules are perhaps better for that. I think you could get quite a way with combining AE bounty (perhaps diverting from the crew building structure a bit) and the 5 parsecs supplement.

[Torben]

Basically it ended after one game for the reasons that Duncan mentioned; it wasn't bad per se, just didn't have enough meat to the actual game-bones. The campaign supplement is superb however!

[Jonas]

Looks good, too bad about the rules.

[phreedh]

Bummer, I had high hopes for it.