So it’s been awhile since I’ve posted anything 5 Parsecs related, because it’s been awhile since I’ve posted anything. There are reasons for that – everything is fine, but I’m also tired in my soul. And I’ve been (thankfully) getting a ton of in person gaming in, which somewhat lessens the need for solo gaming.
But the 3d printer is currently humming away printing more cyberpunk-ish terrain, and I’m feeling the need to return to the campaign.
So let’s talk about a new planet!
When we last left Estelle and the crew of the Azure Dawn, they had decided to break orbit and head for greener pastures. The situation on Lycinis is getting…strange…and there have been slim pickings in terms of jobs. So the ship heads out to the void, and the crew has to decide where to go next.
This is where I’m adding something to the 5 Parsecs rules – system networks. Basically, rather than being able to go from any point to any other point in space, there are safe routes. You can consider this something hard and fast, like the jump points from Starfire, or something hazier – like the safe, stable warp lanes that people rightly prefer in Warhammer 40K. What this adds is a couple different things:
- Dead ends: It’s possible that the world the crew heads toward is at the end of a chain, and once they exhaust their prospects there, they have to head back the way they came. There’s not always a better place to sail to.
- Entrapment: There are invasions in 5 Parsecs, and primarily, the mechanics for this are largely forcing you to flee while under fire, potentially losing a lot of your assets in the process, as well as clearing the deck of rivals, patrons, etc. That’s all cool – but if a planet has been invaded, it can simply be steered around. Not so if you add a network – now, you can get cut off by an invasion, hoping the authorities reestablish control before the invasion continues – potentially herding you down the aforementioned dead-end. It’s possible for the crew to simply be cut off from much of the galaxy.
- A reason to revisit worlds. There’s no real reason to go back to a world you’ve visited unless there’s a particularly lucrative patron, or you want to go pick a fight with a rival. Here, while you’re in the neighborhood, you might as well put down and see if there’s maybe a job for you – you need gas money after all.
- Hazardous space travel. Going to multiple worlds involves multiple rolls on the various tables for space travel. Friends, not all of the things on those tables are good.
Adding Worlds
So how are we going to do this? Well, first, we’re going to start with our seed world, Lycinis:
This little “card” has everything we need to know about the planet on it. Right now it’s “Green” (i.e. a world neither invaded nor occupied), we know its properties, what patrons are on the planet, and what rivals we have, either known or unknown.
Then, we need to add new systems. Normally, you’d just create a new world. Now, however, we’re going to have to essentially dynamically create the universe. How I’m planning on doing this – it might get adjusted in time – is that every time the crew wants to go somewhere, 1d6 new planets are created. But here’s the catch – they’re not necessarily connected to the world they’re currently on. We’ll be building these as a preferential attachment network, meaning that well connected systems are more likely to get the newly added connections than sparsely connected ones. So, the further out into the fringe the crew gets, the more likely it is they’re going to need to turn around and head back toward the core to get somewhere new.
So let’s start that up.
A Whole New World…
I roll a d6 and get a three – we need to add three new systems. Now, the first one obviously needs to be connected to Lycinis. So we end up with this very simple network.
Easy enough. But each of the other two planets could connect to either one of these. There’s two issues here – how many connections does each planet have, and where do those connections do? For the first two planets, this was easy – each can only connect to the other planet, and the connections that form later determine if they ever have more than one. But for the other planets, both of these decisions have consequences.
More connections means there’s fewer “chains” and more clusters of planets. I want this to be a little bit random, but I also don’t want to give each planet line…d6 connections. Why not?
Because they’re not done. Think about the little “network” of two planets above – there’s going to be more added to them. So if I roll a six on a d6, a planet doesn’t have six connections. It starts with six connections, and will then add more as the game goes on. And because we’re using a “rich get richer” algorithm to build the network, that six-connection planet will be at a massive advantage for all future planets, and will, in essence, become a galactic hub.
So instead, on a 4+, the new planet will have two connections.
Which I promptly roll for the first planet, and not the second.
With the first of the new planets, with two connections, there’s no choices to be made – with only two existing options, we form a triangle.
With the second of the new planets, there’s an equal chance of its one connection going to any of the other planets, as right now, with two connections each, they all have an equal weight. On a 1-2 its Lycinis, 3-4 it’s Unknown #1, and 5-6 it’s Unknown #2. We roll a 1, and our first hub maybe starts to coalesce around Lycinis (it’s not too bad, yet).
Heading Out
The Azure Dawn takes off, and we deduct the crew’s stockpiled fuel from our current inventory to pay for the travel. We don’t have any intelligence on the other systems, so we roll a d6 to determine which to head to. Rolling a 4, it’s the 2nd new system we created, which is nice – leaving from there won’t necessarily involve a flight back through Lycinis.
Next up is a d100 roll on the Starship Travel Events table. We roll a 78, which is an Uneventful Trip. Trouble uses the downtime to fix their damaged belt of fragmentation grenades, not telling the rest of the crew that they’re working on damaged explosives that are apt to hurl a bunch of shrapnel in a confined space.
The first navigation beacon they encounter in the new system informs the crew they’ve arrived a Nocarth. What they don’t necessarily know is that one of the unknown Rivals Trouble has picked up has followed them there – or word has reached a local branch. It also cheerfully informs the crew that the Nocarth Mercenary Licensing and Regulation Act requires the purchasing of a freelance licensing in order to take compensated combat contracts on the planet. Estelle begrudgingly forks over the two credits necessary for such a license, after Trouble informs her that, upon considered reflection, the encryption standards being used by the local authorities is sufficiently robust as to be not worth trying to crack to forge a license.
Trouble also suggests that, given the sheer volume of criminal complaints currently downloading themselves onto the Azure Dawn’s computer that Nocarth is “a lawless shit-hole” and that there’s a good chance those two credits are either a desperate attempt to curtail mercenary bands that are basically just gangs, and/or lining the pockets of those gangs. Either way, there’s ample opportunity for someone looking to do violence for pay.
Putting Out Feelers
Upkeep is paid via trading the purified water the Azure Dawn produces, and the crew gets down to the business of trying to find a paying contract. Estelle really doesn’t like the idea of being in debt on a planet like this – it feels like a good way to find yourself having an indenture contract put on you – so she dips into the crew’s coffers to pay it off in full. The Dawn is hers, but best case, right now the crew only has enough money to pay for one jump of fuel. They need a paying gig.
Estelle, Alexis and Felix all set out to try to find potential paying Patrons. Garret goes to trade, while Viv goes Exploring. Trouble claims he’s going Exploring as well, but is actually tracking these Rivals down.
There’s enough people in need of protection and security that even the unproven crew lands a patron.
The patron is a wealthy individual, Hiram Nox, and his offer comes with a modest +1 credit bonus for Danger Pay. Unfortunately, the timeframe for the mission is this campaign turn only. This will come up…shortly. In addition, should the mission succeed, he’ll make some of his corporation’s inventory available to the party off the books, and he’ll provide private transport for the mission – meaning rivals can’t track the crew this turn.
Garret’s trading adventure is only modestly successful, selling of excess scrap and unneeded equipment for an extra credit. Viv, on the other hand, gets spotted by someone, who connects her with the known associates of Trouble, and tips off those looking for them. We’ll be fighting them first, and unfortunately because Trouble didn’t get the jump on them, they’ll be taking the crew by surprise.
If you’re noticing a collision in conditions here, you’re not wrong. We’ve been tracked down by rivals who can’t track us. So, narratively, what I’ve decided is this – the rivals do track the crew, and set an ambush. But they’re waiting for the wrong vehicle – they’re not looking for Nox’s transport, and so they’re waiting for a crew that’s already left.
These things happen.
So here’s where we stand:
The Mission
So what’s the job?
Playing to the apparently strengths of the party, it’s going to be gloomy when they set out. That seems fitting for our somewhat dour, cyberpunky planetary vibe. There’s going to be a curious item that can be picked up, worth either a credit or, long shot, a roll on the loot table. And it is indeed a protection mission – we’re to get Hiram to and from a meeting. We’ll be fighting some hired muscle who have been contracted to make sure that doesn’t happen – specifically some Guild Troops. Hiram appears to be trying to upset the natural order of things, and perhaps…he should not be.
We’ll be fighting five of them, including one specialist and one lieutenant. They’ll be relatively lightly armed, with Colony Rifles, their specialist armed with a shell gun, and the lieutenant carrying a plasma rifle and a blade.
This is gonna go great. Let’s go skulk in the darkness.
Enjoy what you read? Enjoyed that it was ad free? Both of those things are courtesy of our generous Patreon supporters. If you’d like more quantitatively driven thoughts on 40K and miniatures wargaming, and a hand in deciding what we cover, please consider joining them.