Rumor Control: The Facts (Five Klicks

Posted by E.S. Wynn August 14, 2021

Rumor Control: The Facts (Five Klicks - Xeno-Mod)

Premise:

I'm having a lot of fun with the Five Klicks system. I love the simplicity of it, so I wanted to see how I could mod it to run a campaign set in the universe of one of my favorite franchises-- the ALIEN franchise.

EDIT: 1/12/22: I condensed these rules, edited and revised them, then uploaded them to the Nordic Weasel Discord. You can find the current PDF version in the "Weasel-Files" thread of that discord.

Most of the changes I'm making to run the campaign are cosmetic, but one major change is that all encounters are going to be against one enemy type (at least in the beginning) -- the xenomorph. The following statistics will be used for all Xenomorph encounters:

Xenomorphs: Number: +4; Speed 5"; Combat +1; Toughness 4; Armor 2; Nerve 4. Psycho AI. Claws and Fangs +1 DMG, +1 Penetration. Acid Blood: When killed, deal a damage 0 hit to all squad members within 2 inches. Roll for accompanying Face Huggers. 1-3 (1); 4-6 (2).

Facehuggers: Number: N/A; Speed 5"; Combat 0; Toughness 3, Armor 0, Mindless + Psycho. Will dodge any shot on a d6 roll of a 4+. A natural hit roll of 6 negates the dodge attempt. Melee attacks with damage 0 and penetration 0. If it wins a brawl or creates a casualty, the target is face-hugged instead and rendered incapacitated. Remove the Facehugger from play. There is currently no cure, and the person will effectively die. Synthetics that are face-hugged roll on the Casualty table instead, as the Facehugger may damage them while attempting to infect them.

Facehuggers also replace the "Critters" that can be discovered when Suspicious Activities are rolled for.

Additionally, any casualties / incapacitated characters which are abandoned on the field (due to withdrawal or TPK) are carried away by aliens and cocooned. In the event of a TPK, everyone is carried off and cocooned. This creates a special condition where your characters that weren't cocooned must choose whether to abandon, or try to rescue, their cocooned friends. Synthetics are never carried off and cocooned. They are left to recover normally, as the aliens have no biological use for them.

When a character is cocooned, and every campaign turn thereafter, roll 1d6. On a 1, they get facehugged and infected and are essentially dead. At any point after the cocooning, you may attempt a rescue with characters from your remaining roster. Beware: if you TPK during the rescue, everyone dies.

For the rescue scenario, place your cocooned crew as close to the enemy table edge as you can, in a hive-like structure. Your rescue crew is placed on the friendly edge. Roll up a force of xenomorphs but do not place them yet. Place 1 xenomorph egg in front of each cocooned crew member.

At the beginning of each turn, roll for initiative as normal, even for the cocooned crew. Crew that are cocooned have only one action-- they must try to break free. To break free, a crew member must roll 2d6 individually and must roll under their Toughness on each die. Squad members that are not cocooned can break cocoons as a non-combat action. The goal is to get everyone out of the cocoons and then retreat back to the friendly edge. You cannot Hold The Field in this scenario, but if you kill all the aliens, casualties are considered "carried to safety" by your squad.

On the enemy turn, roll 1d6. On a 1, a random alien egg opens and spawns a facehugger. The facehugger will attack the closest squad member on its next turn. This only continues until the rolled force of Xenomorphs is deployed.

If any eggs or facehuggers are harmed, any violence occurs, or if all cocooned squad members are broken out, the force of Xenomorphs you rolled deploys along the friendly edge of the board. You must get past them and exit from that edge to escape. Any squad members abandoned during this scenario will not be rescuable next turn as the aliens will move them deeper into the hive.

Starting on Turn 4, I will also be utilizing a heavily modified dynamic from Nordic Weasel's Rules Pack 1 (Battle Events) for Five Leagues From The Borderlands. I'll be following the basic rules in that pack for spawning Battlefield Events, but I'll be using my own custom table for what appears in play (see below:)

1. The Queen: You've stirred up the nest, and big momma is coming to set things right. Place an Alien Queen on the enemy edge of the table. She acts starting on the next turn. If you Hold The Field, everyone gains an additional +1XP. Alien Queen: Speed 5"; Combat +2; Toughness 5; Armor 4; Nerve 6. Psycho AI. Claws and Fangs +2 DMG, +2 Penetration. Acid Blood: When wounded or killed, deal a damage 0 hit to all squad members within 2 inches.

2. Working Joes: Someone got APOLLO humming, but something is wrong with his androids. They wander around like the living dead, attempting to choke everything to death. Roll a force of Blanks (per the Five Klicks encounter table) and deploy it on a random, unoccupied, neutral table edge. This extra force will act as a third (or fourth) army in play. If you Hold The Field, everyone gains an additional +1XP.

3. Weyland-Yutani PMCs: Deniable ops, paramilitary independent contractors paid by the company to handle the tricky situations. Roll a force of Warlord Troops (per the Five Klicks encounter table) and deploy it on a random, unoccupied, neutral table edge. This extra force will act as a third (or fourth) army in play. If you Hold The Field, you may make an extra Loot Roll. Variant: W-Y "Dogcatchers." Treat as PMCs, except they get +1 armor against hits from Xenomorph Acid Blood.

4. Poor Maintenance: The company hires execs who trim the maintenance budget, which means the suits and the guns are about as trustworthy as the execs. All squad members roll an Ammo Check as if they had fired one shot.

5. A Friend In Need: There are other survivors on this station, and it's our job to save them. Roll up a single new character using the Recruitment Table and give them one roll on the Firearms table under Character Creation in the Five Klicks, Chapter 1 book. Deploy them to a random, neutral table edge and count them as part of your squad. If they survive, you may add them to your roster.

6. They're Coming Out Of The Walls! The hive is awake and things are about to heat up. Roll 2d6 and pick the higher number, then deploy that many Aliens to the Enemy table edge.

7. They Cut The Power: How could they cut the power, man? They're animals! All visibility drops to six inches for the rest of the turn. If visibility limitations were already in effect, take the lowest number.

8. Last Stand: Abandoned supplies? Don't mind if I do. One of your Squad stumbles across a jumble of supplies. Gain +1 Scrap.

This page will serve as a consistently updated roster for the survivors as the game progresses.

The Story So Far:

From the personal log of Station Security Officer Ellen Schwarzschild,

When The Company bought Tulloch Station, I thought it was a joke. Seegson had been running the place into the ground for years, was talking about closing the whole thing down and letting it fall into the gas giant LV-3940, which the station orbits. When Weyland-Yutani moved in, I thought maybe our fortunes had changed, like maybe the whole place was about to go hi-lux, VIP and classy as hell. When people started disappearing, I started snooping, and that's how I ended up with a front-row seat to a horror show unlike anything I ever dreamed was possible.

Xenomorphs. That's what the company stooge called them. Aliens. The perfect organism, the perfect weapon, and Weyland-Yutani had been breeding them in a lab on Tulloch Station, feeding the queen colonists and prisoners redirected from ships bound to other worlds. Problem is, the queen turned out to be a lot smarter than any of the suits from the bio-weapons division realized. Well, at least until it was too late. When they found the eggs one of her drones had been stashing in the tunnels near the reactor core, they didn't realize it was just one of many stashes. Within hours, the station was crawling with huggers, and instead of mounting a defense, The Company turned around and pulled out completely, evacuating key personnel and leaving the station to the bugs.

We weren't evacuated. We were left here to fend for ourselves against the aliens.

We can't leave. The station is quarantined and any ships that try to escape get nuked into oblivion.

All we can do is fight. Fight, and hope it's enough that we survive.

But hey, Tulloch Station's been home for a long time, and if the people left behind here with the bugs have any chance at survival, it'll only be because we did something. Me, and the squad I've gathered to stand against the hive.

The Roster:

There are currently no squads in play.

Unused Roster:

Everyone is currently in the field.

The Settlement:

Hiding in a sealed-off section of the station, The Settlement is currently a 1/1/2 Settlement.

Unused Inventory:

2 Scrap

Military Rations

Damaged Scout Armor

Those Who Have Been Lost:

Darius Tyson came to Tulloch Station to meet a friend and pick up an order for a shipment of very expensive cigars. Shortly after he arrived, the station locked down and he got stuck. Good thing he's no stranger to using a gun.

Statistics: Settler; Trading Post; I (1) SP(4), CO(0), TO (3), NE (1); Speech +1; Lvl 0; EXP 0.

Model: From the New Angeles Board Game.

Infected by Facehugger on Day 1

Ellen Schwarzschild was born to spacer parents running freighters for The Company. Before she came to Tulloch Station, she saw how corporate negligence could cost lives first-hand when a shipment of engineered plague got loose and infected the entire crew of her freighter. The plague ripped through the ship and killed everyone except Ellen, including her parents. When The Company tried to blame the leak on Ellen, she fought The Company in court until a settlement and a gag-order was reached. After that, she started working security on Tulloch Station, but couldn't keep her nose out of Weyland-Yutani's business when people started disappearing. By the time she discovered their dirty secret (that they were breeding xenomorphs on the station) it was too late. The shuttles packed with researchers took off, and Ellen was left to gather the survivors for a last stand against the alien hordes.

Statistics: Enforcer; Roaming Survivors; Leader; Lost Family; Accused; Got Revenge; I(3), SP(5), CO(+2), TO (4), NE (3); Pistol; Hafted Weapon; Smoke Grenade (x5), Field Armor; Lvl 0; EXP 2.

Model: 3D Printed Supportless model from Punkin' Figs.