5PH: Learning the ropes

In the previous post, we've successfully created our mercenary company The Immortal Children and gave them a bit of backstory to get going. As already mentioned, I'm going to play through the introductory campaign from the Trailblazer's Toolkit, and that's exactly where this post is starting off.

Scenario 0: "Your First Fight"

Welcome to the most basic tutorial scenario you could ever imagine. A handful of chumps and no special rules or goals. Perfect to learn the rules and get the dice warmed up. No campaign turn steps are done before or after the scenario, and no experience or long-lasting injuries will be tracked. That doesn't mean we can't have some fun and add some narrative to kick the campaign off. The presented story hook from the book basically boils down to "Local thugs want to make their name by beating you up." Good enough for a tutorial fight, but we can easily reflavor that to get us something more to work with.
As always, I'm going to be using my main oracle.

Why did the thugs attack our crew?
Crudely Share Desire - Their desire for what? (1: Revenge | 2: Money | 3: Violence) 1 ⇾ Revenge
Is the desire for revenge related to our crew's last job?
Likely ⇾ Yes, but… ⇾ Ok, this could work in many different ways, but I like the idea of a rival mercenary company that feels slighted because our crew 'stole' the contract from them. That also explains why it's not a deadly combat and more like a brawl.

What is the experience and reputation of the opposing mercenary company?
Experience: Expert | Reputation: Slandered
Sounds like the perfect reason to be angry at the lowly merc company that just stole a job from under your nose.

What is their mercenary company called? (Using Fantasynamegenerators.com once again)
Hidden Blades - Very edgy, I love it.

The setup

Battle Systems terrain from Core Space

The initial terrain setup took longer than playing the actual scenario itself, but hey, it was fun to play around with the fantastic Core Space cardboard terrain.

Eagle-eyed observers might spot the unpainted base rims on some of the minis and yes, I got impatient and played the first scenario before I finished painting the crew itself. Don't worry, they would be finished before the next one.

The Premise

The Immortal Children were just returning from their well deserved shore leave, when they noticed some strange behavior from the dockworkers. Usually friendly, people avoided eye contact and shuffled toward the nearest exit. Captain Edaro warned his crew to be ready for anything before a drunken roar interrupted the tense silence.
"Chiiiiiiildreeen!! Come out and show yourselves! I can smell your craven stench from across the berth."

Koah Keot silently pointed towards one of the windows. XO Janidri took cover at the nearby wall and tried to spot the origin of the booming voice echoing through the station. He saw several armed thugs strutting towards them with an overconfidence that only hard liquor invokes. Their once top of the line gear worn down and dirty. Nodding to his captain, Janidri readied his rifle. "It's the same guys from last week. Looks like they didn't appreciate how we took that contract from under their noses." Urtz sensors lit up in a bright orange, "Calculating fire solution. Requesting priority targets." The bot's enormous auto-gun already began to spin up when captain Edaro interjected. "Calm down, they're just drunk and looking for a tumble. I don't care for mindless brawls, but we have a reputation to uphold. Don't kill any of them, but make sure that they'll never want to mess with us again. Urtz, prioritize their kneecaps."

The Action

The fighting started off with a brilliant long distance shot from Koah Keot's hunting rifle. The hulking brute threaded the needle and managed to hit the enemy leader even though most of his body was behind cover. A loud crack confirmed the shattering of ceramic plate, and Keot knew how broken the shoulder beneath it would be.

Momentary hesitation showed in the rest of the thugs, before their desire for revenge overcame their fear once again. They charged with screams of anger on their lips. Taunts ringing hollow in the ear of the Immortal Children.

The ensuing close quarter combat was swift and brutal.
Selek Marfi got clubbed before she could even bring down her sword, while the rest of the crew found cover around the room and fired everything they got. Broken limbs and painful fleshwounds quickly depleted the enemies will to fight.

Suppressive fire allowed Koah Keot to move into melee, where he absolutely demolished two of the enemy thugs.

The scientist Steven Bramlet became a bit too curious for his own good, and he caught a stray bullet, while trying to observe the combat performance of his bot Urtz. Luckily, his armor absorbed most of the damage, and he was only knocked unconscious.

Captain Edaro shot the last remaining thug in the foot and 'convinced' him to stay down.
"Pick up Marfi and Bramlet, it's time to get out of here." He kneeled down beside the enemy leader and ripped his insignia from the blood-soaked shoulder. A black knife hidden inside a crimson cloak.

The Conclusion

No post battle steps for this tutorial fight, so I'll skip the aftermath portion of today's after action report.

As you can see, even a very simple scenario can give us plenty of opportunity to infuse narrative into the campaign. We now have a fantastic future opponent, and the crew members already got a bit of character to them.

I'm really glad that I did this 'no consequences' tutorial, because the combat system is extremely deadly and I definitely played too reckless. One false move can easily be the end of a beloved character, and that's something I want to avoid for as long as possible.
The reason Selek Marfi lost in her very first melee combat is also down to the fact that I forgot the special rule from her glare sword, that allows you to reroll the combat roll.

The only gripe I had with the rules is with the behavior of 'aggressive' enemies. RAW, they will never attack an enemy in melee if the opponent has a better combat bonus. This feels extremely gamey and immersion breaking. Stats don't exist in-universe, and for them to have clairvoyant knowledge about possible dice results just rubs me the wrong way.
Only the scientist in my randomly generated crew has a combat bonus of 0. Everyone else got an improvement, which meant that none of them would ever get charged by these 'aggressive' thugs. In the future, I'm just going to ignore that part of the AI behavior when it doesn't make narrative sense. This is something that you should always do in solo miniature games. Rules as intended; not rules as written.

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