Ensnared - Conviction Battle Report I
A Five Parsecs from Home Skirmish in the Warhammer 40k Universe
“Duplicity! Deceit! Deception! To arms, Missionaries of the Burning Wrath! Fire with the fury of the Emperor or we will surely be overcome. Emperor Protects!”
Surging forward, the Missionaries ready their weapons and prepare for battle against the hated traitors.
Welcome to Conviction, a Five Parsecs from Home campaign set in the Warhammer 40k universe. You may have some questions, but that is going to have to wait because the Missionaries have just been ambushed in a meeting gone wrong. Every second counts, and the minutes will feel like days.
When you see italics, it means I am speaking directly to you. I’ll often break in to provide some context, comment on mechanics or provide some flavour. Now back to the battlefield.
Bishop Feverous cursed the traitorous heretics for catching his band in a compromising position. Arrayed for a meeting with an ally, not ready for mortal combat, Bishop Feverous feels a slight flicker of doubt, which is quickly quelled by his love for the Emperor.
The Bishop sees various traitor heads peering from behind the rockcrete structures of this rundown section of an abandoned refinery. He spots rifles, one with a handheld autorifle, and a leader carrying a cursed blade and a stubber pistol. These traitorous scum have come to kill. Unless they are killed first.
On his left, Sin, the assassin on loan from the Officio Assassinorum and Cumulous, the Cerub servitor, react with superhuman speed and dash forward into battle. They know no fear.
The cybernetic construct unleashes a fury of bolts at a traitor and riddles them with holes. The heretic drops in a pool of their own fluid. Sin repositions closer to the enemy.
Seeing the heretic traitor gurgle his last breaths fills the Bishop with the joy of the Emperor. Before any prayers could be offered up, the traitors struck back.
Five Parsecs’ combat is ordered into three stages. You roll dice equal to your band’s number, and models with high reaction can go in the Fast Stage. Then the enemies go as a group. Finally, the rest of your gang go in the final Slow stage. Above, Sin and Cumulous went in the fast stage. Now it’s the traitor’s turn.
Sin trusts in the Emperor’s protection as bullets from the traitor leader smash into the old crate they huddle behind. Rotten wood flies as chunks are carved out of it by stubber rounds. Sin’s faith protects them this day.
The other heretics open up with their looted rifles, driving back Brother Scarus, the hulking brute and Lumous, the mysterious psyker.
Bishop Feverous bellows a prayer as the rest of the missionaries surge forward. Brother Ignis draws a bead on a heretic, says a silent prayer to the Emperor and the machine god of his rifle, and squeezes the trigger. The Brother is rewarded with another dead heretic. Emperor be praised!
Seeing the situation is hopeless, a heretic soldier drops his weapon and runs. Bishop Severous nods in approval. This is why the Emperor’s agents will always prevail over those of the dark powers. It boils down to faith.
That is the end of turn 1. Overall, a successful one for the Missionaries, with two kills and one enemy panicked. But things can change quickly in Five Parsecs from Home.
A brief moment of silence descends on the battlefield. The heretics are afraid —scared —shaken in their faith in their dark protector. Still, they pledge to sell their lives dearly and to kill as many of the Emperor’s servants as they can.
Again, Cumulous and Sin move faster than an unagumented human can. Sin is a blur, running through stubber rounds as if they weren’t there. Their goal? A clear shot at the heretic traitor leader. Clearing the corner, Sin is so close he can nearly touch the former soldier.
When Sin looks into the eyes of the heretic leader, he doesn’t see the soul of a loyal servant of the Emperor. No, he sees corruption, lies, and decay. Sin levels their hand stubber and unleashes a volley of fire into the heretic, riddling him with bullets and sending his soul to the great abyss.
Cumulous follows suit by ending another traitor. With only one heretic on the field, the lone traitor fires feebly at the Missionaries, but Brother Ignis downs him with a righteous stubber fire.
Bishop Feverous bellows a prayer of thanks to the Emperor for protecting them all this day. But questions remain. What happened to the contact they were supposed to meet at this location? Who do these heretic traitors report to? One did get away, so it is only prudent to expect more battles with these hated foes.
The battle is over, and it went well for the Missionaires of the Burning Wrath. Maybe too well. I am using the modified campaign found in the Five Parsecs from Home core book. The first scenario looked scary at first, but your crew is typically stronger than normal regular baddies, so against equal numbers, the enemy doesn’t have much chance.
It won’t always be like this. I’ve played Five Parsecs skirmishes that have been quite deadly, even in victory. There are also difficulty levels I can institute if things stay a bit easy.
Let’s see what the Missionaries do next!
Celebrate the victory by leaving a comment or liking this post!
Bishop Feverous walks amongst the skirmish field. The day went well for the Missionaires, but he knows it won’t always be that way. Picking over the dead heretic traitors, the Bishop is filled with disgust at the tainted bodies. To a man, they were all once loyal followers of the Emperor. They’ve hence been corrupted and turned, obviously due to their weakness and lack of faith.
The Missionaries of the Burning Wrath were called to Tamelius VI to root out this corruption. And there is deep corruption here on this planet. Chaos traitors and rumours of xenos, the Missionaires will have to cut deep to ensure the cancer does not spread.
Tamelius VI is an essential cog in the Imperial war machine. Providing much-needed promethium, the planet is essentially one mega-sized refinery. If Tamelius VI were to fall to darkness, the ships of the Empire would run dry.
After a battle, the crew earns certain bonuses for victory, including XP and loot. In this case, they made some gelt (money) and found a Scrap stubber. There are some post-battle events that take place, but in this case, they didn’t effective the narrative much, so I don’t mention them.
As we come to the end of each battle turn, I’ll write up a short biography of one of the Missionaries, starting with Bishop Feverous himself.
Missionary Annals - Bishop Feverous
In Bishop Feverous’s life, there are only three things: The Emperor, Faith, and Duty. Feverous grew up in the Eclisiarcy; it is all he knows and all he ever will know. Not satisfied with tending records or preaching to the converted, Feverous demanded a posting to one of the many combat zones in the Imperium.
Showing bravery and tactical intelligence, Feverous rose through the ranks after every battlefield success. He became known as a man you could send to the worst corners of the Imperium to root out the worst corruption.
Armed with his ceremonial, but deadly, power mace, Bishop Feverous will suffer no heretic or xenos to live.
Bishop Feverous is the crew’s leader and has a point of luck that may keep him alive in the future. His Power Mace is a reflavoured Boarding Sabre. All around decent stats for this point of the game.
End Notes
The first skirmish won, who will the Missionaries face next? Using the rules in the core rulebook, I’ll roll up the next mission. I have three enemy bands built and painted, one primed and dry-brushed, one on sprus still, and one coming that might work. So I’ll have a decent variety of baddies to roll for.
I’m also trying to scratch-build some refinery-type terrain, which is fun and adds more colour to the skirmish.
My goal is to post these every few weeks, between regular Lone Toad posts, and to play through at least a half dozen battles.
If these posts turn out to be successful, I’ll consider moving on to different skirmish war games and Solo RPGs using my minis to help narrate.
Thank you for reading, and stay froggy out there, Toad Warriors.
Great report! Really interesting to see how you fit 40K into 5PFH. It's something I'd like to do myself, one day.
Can't wait to see what happens next!
Hearing awesome things about Five Parsecs. Keen to get stuck into more narrative tabletop.