Today we embark on a journey with Modiphius Entertainment’s “solo adventure wargame” Five Parsecs from Home!
If you’re not familiar with Five Parsecs, it’s a sci-fi, miniatures-agnostic solo game that has the player working through a procedurally generated campaign of mission-driven battles punctuated by some downtime maintenance and other activities.
I’ve played a few campaign turns of Five Parsecs before, and thoroughly enjoyed it. The first time I played was before I had really begun collecting and scratch building miniatures, so I mainly used my old Star Wars miniatures. This time, I’d like to scratch-build a custom figure for each crew member (This is also a good excuse to start working through my pile of shame). I’ll be trying to find a balance of real-time commentary and post-game editorializing and creative writing. So let’s meet our crew members!
The standard method for crew generation nets you 3 human characters, 2 human or alien characters, and 1 human or bot character. But for this crew, I’ll be using the fully random method, rolling on a d100 table for each of the six starting crew members. I’m trying to put as much randomization into this game as possible (my only exception is I might lean on the scales to make sure I have at least one bot on the crew so I have an excuse to build a Bill Making Stuff-style Bead Bot).
- 1 Human
- 2 Primary Aliens
- 1 Bot
- 2 Strange Characters
Ok, we got our one bot with no need to fudge! We also have a very alien-heavy team, which is great. Now let’s find out a bit about our crew members:
Crew Member #1 – We’ll start with the human. Humans start with middling stats, but they are the only character which can exceed the standard 1 point of Luck, a narrative currency which can be used to avoid injury. Our single human gets a roll on the Background, Motivation, and Class tables, with the following results:
- Background: Tech Guild (+1 Savvy, +1d6 Credits, +1 High-tech Weapon)
- Motivation: Faith (+1 Rumor, +1 story point)
- Class: Primitive (+1 Speed, +1 Low-tech Weapon)
This is why we love random tables. We have a character who comes from the Tech Guild (whatever that is) who is now working as a primitive fighter driven by faith. I’m imagining someone who was raised in the Tech Guild but who took some kind of religious oath to swear off technology. We’ll see how this fits in with the rest of the crew, but it’s a good start.
Next, our two primary aliens. Primary aliens are the most common creatures found in the setting of Five Parsecs. Like human characters, primary aliens also get Backgrounds, Motivations, and Classes. Our two primary aliens will be a Precursor and K’Erin.
Crew Member #2 – The book describes Precursors as “Graceful and refined alien humanoids who were traveling the stars when other species were still lingering in caves.” They move faster than humans, but are a little less tough. They also get to roll twice for Character Events, picking either result. The design in the book is pretty robotic looking, but I might take some liberties. Let’s find out a little more about our Precursor crew member:
- Background: Low-tech colony (+1 Low-tech Weapon)
- Motivation: Glory (+1 Combat Skill, +1 Military Weapon)
- Class: Trader (+2d6 Credits)
Took a turn there at the end. I’m thinking this Precursor might have been a warrior at some point in the past before being stranded on a deserted world. A new colony on the planet discovered them, and they helped support the colony with their ancient knowledge. Now they’re traveling the stars again, still with a warrior’s spirit but also with a new interest in trade. We’ll see how that connects with everyone else in the crew.
Crew Member #3 – K’Erin are described as “Proud and warlike aliens with a penchant for brutality and a peculiar sense of honor.” They read as a Klingon analog to me. They’re a little tougher than human characters, they’re better at Brawling, and they are compelled to engage in melee if they can.
- Background: Frontier Gang (+1 Combat Skill)
- Motivation: Survival (+1 Toughness)
- Class: Petty Criminal (+1 Speed)
#3 is going to be a combat badass, that’s for sure. This seems pretty straight forward – a former frontier gangster driven only by a need to survive. I’m thinking I might try to put a Western spin on this character’s design, not sure yet.
Next up, our strange characters. These include rarer alien species as well as mutants, specialized aliens, and other unusual character types. Our two stranges are a De-converted (only a 2% chance of this!) and someone with a “Mysterious Past.”
Crew Member #4 – De-converted characters were once prisoners of the Converted, an enemy type in the game very reminiscent of the Borg. De-converted are tougher than humans, and they can’t increase their Savvy score. This makes them less effective at things like repairing ships and gathering information. They come with built-in armor, can support up to 3 implants (ordinary characters can have only 2) and their Motivation is always Revenge.
- Background: Peaceful, High-Tech Colony (+1 Savvy [negated], +1d6 Credits)
- Motivation: Revenge (+2 XP, Rival)
- Class: Working Class (+1 Savvy [negated], +1 Luck)
Damn shame about both of those Savvy boosts going to waste. We’ll get into Rivals a bit later, but I imagine this character’s Rival will be the Converted agent sent to retrieve them. Other than that, I see them as a kind of workhorse, possibly the heart of the team. Perhaps this is our captain?
Crew Member #5 – A character with a Mysterious Past is basically a baseline human but with two rolls on the Background table applied simultaneously. They ignore any extra Story Points though, which we haven’t discussed yet.
- Backgrounds: Drifter (+1 Gear), Subjugated Colony on Alien World (+1 Gadget)
- Motivation: Wealth (+1d6 Credits)
- Class: Agitator (Rival)
This is a pretty straight-forward character, and I think they might be our captain. A drifter from a subjugated world who has drawn some enemies in their travels. Part of me wants them to be from the same planet as the De-converted, but I think I’ll have them be two different planets in the interest of having two distinct rivals. But these two definitely have a sympathetic relationship from their shared history. While this character is mechanically identical to a human, I think I’ll make them a different kind of alien just for design reasons.\
Crew Member #6 – And finally, our Bot! Bots are all mechanically identical – They are quite handy in combat, they have a high Savvy, and they work a bit differently when it comes to advancement and injury.
Now, the unofficial seventh member of our crew: The ship. The ship isn’t used in combat, but it does define how a lot of our downtime will go and the long shape of our campaign. For this game, the ship will be an “Unreliable merchant cruiser,” which doesn’t have any additional tags. It has 30 hull, which is on the higher side, and we owe 22 credits on it (1d6+20). I’ll do one final roll on the “crew” table. I might toss this out, I already have a nice idea of where our team comes from, but let’s find out.
- We met through: Pursuit of a random group member’s motivation
- We are best characterized as: Loveable rogues.
This tracks pretty well with what I’ve already come up with. I rolled Crew Member #1 for the random group member’s motivation, which isn’t quite what I had in mind, but I kind of like it. Crew Member #1 is motivated by faith and I have some very clerical-looking Warhammer model parts kicking around, so I think I’ll call them a sort of clerical-type, sworn to help the downtrodden. At this point, the story is coming together in my head, but I’d like to name everyone before I write it all out. In the spirit of randomness, I’ll be using donjon’s name generators to name everyone.
- Arlont Loraay, he/him (Star Wars Male Names) – A human from the Tech Guild motivated by faith. Arlont is a holy warrior who left the Tech Guild in order to become a wandering warrior-priest helping the down-trodden.
- Lani, she/they (Space Alien Names) – An ancient Precursor warrior-turned-merchant. Lani is always looking for a good fight and a good story.
- T’Kara, they/them (Star Trek Klingon Female Names) – T’Kara was a petty gangster, and old habits die hard. They are loyal to the crew, but only because it’s nice to have a ride off-world.
- Kham Cyone, he/him (Star Wars Male Names) – Kham was a white collar worker on a high-tech Core World, but his life changed when he won a cruise for being “salesman of the year.” His spacer cruise was attacked by the Converted, and Kham was captured. Now he’s escaped, ever-changed.
- Eelin Kinall, she/her (Star Wars Female Names) – Eelin was raised in a harsh and authoritarian colony, where she grew up running with underground agitation efforts. She had a run-in with the planetary authorities and had to escape, but now travels the Fringe helping where she can and sending money back home as often as possible.
- TW-K0 (Two-Ko), he/him (Star Wars Droid Names) – TW-KO is a pilot droid that came with the ship, and the crew has adopted him as an official member.
How the Crew Came Together – In his travels, Arlont caught wind of a Converted enclave on a remote Fringe world. He recruited Eelin and Lani to help attack the cell and free the hostages, and the three set off into the wilderness. They discovered T’Kara had stowed away on their transport hoping to rob them. But after a Converted ambush, the team of four found they fought well together. After taking down the Converted and rescuing the prisoners, Eelin invited them to join her crew on her newly purchased ship, the Spirit of Inquiry (Spaceships Generator). Now this team of loveable rogues travels the stars in search of the next job, doing good whenever and wherever they can.
And just like that, we have a crew! I still need to roll up some gear and assign it before I can get cracking on building, but I think that’s enough for today. Let me know if you have any ideas for a name for this crew, they really feel like they need a good squad name.