Prelude

Welcome to my SOLO play-through of the Alien RPG. This game is played in campaign mode and is based on 3 novellas I wrote when I was very young. The novellas were pretty amateur and incoherent (Actually the 3rd novel I wrote was pretty damn cool. You could see how my writing had progressed since before highschool) so I decided to re-write the stories now, but as an RPG. 

My 3 novellas are a continuation of Aliens: Alien Harvest a 1995 novelization of the comic book series. The book was a bit rough, and is clearly for a younger audience. I recently re-read it and was surprised with how bad some parts were. Still the story was compelling and the ending was pretty awesome and left enough for a continuation to be written. I remember why I had liked the book as a youngster and felt that my continuation badly needed a retelling. That brings us to now. Since this playthrough is based on pre-written material the opening scenes have been removed since they were not "played" as part of the game.

In will include a brief Prologue for the story just to give some background, but it will be a bit rushed.

 

For those who haven't read it, in Alien Harvest, a dying scientist/inventor, Dr. Stan Myakovsky teams up with professional thief Julie Lish to recruit a ragtag group of convicts in order to a raid an Alien Hive planet known as AR-32. Their prize is a large quantity of Royal Jelly that is created by the queen. Royal Jelly is known to have medicinal properties and Stan is hoping it will combat the cancer eating away at him. Julie of course hopes to sell it at a huge profit (Women be shopping!). They plan to infiltrate the hive with assistance from Myakovsky's latest invention, a robotic Xenomorph who will be able to blend in. Of course the mission ends in a catastrophic failure, with only Stan's cybernetic Ant "Ari", having a complete record of what really occurred. The ship's captain, Thomas Hoban escaped with his life and has since become a recluse.

 

 

Here is a list of some of the tools I used to play this game solo:

 

The Mythic GME, The Core Rule Book, Alien solo rules (Mainly the tables), AI text to art generators and to provide some specific options within the scene I used ChatGPT.

If you don't care how it was played you can skip this part and dive into the story.

Rules

• Questions will be asked to fate and I will check it against a fate chart once I determine the odds. I will state the odds whenever possible. 
• I will be using a number of different tables for inspiration. Certain tables will be used at the time that is most obvious, for example if I am dealing with a ship repair I will be rolling on a "Ship" table. If I am dealing with a specific character I will be rolling on a "Personal" table.

Scenes

• Each scene will have a Chaos rank. Chaos runs on a scale from 1-9, starting at a 5 (which is normal). At the end of each scene the Chaos rank will fluctuate based on if my characters are in control. It can only decrease or increase by 1 point per scene.
  

• At the start of each scene I will roll for a Random Event. If a random event is generated then it could take the scene in a new direction. For example, I have a basic idea of how the scene will unfold, but if I roll a Random Event the scene may become Interrupted or an NPC might take a negative action, or it could introduce a new NPC and so on and so on... With that in mind the scene heading could look something like this. Scene 15 - Chaos 7 - Random Event (NPC Negative). The scene will then play out as expected but will have to have something Negative happen to an NPC.
  
  
• At the start of each scene I will also roll for an "oddity" by rolling a single stress die for the corresponding Act (Act 1= 1 Stress die, Act 2= 2 Stress dice). If any roll comes up as a "1" then an oddity will occur. Small oddities (A single 1) have little effect on the crew. Anything higher will require a roll against a table for something unexpected to happen.
  

• There is one final way a Random Event can be introduced. When a fate question is asked and a double number is obtained (i.e. 11, 22, 33, 44, etc.), then a random event may have occurred. If this number (the single digit, 1 for 11, 2 for 22, etc.) is equal to or less than the chaos factor then something random happens. Example, if I rolled a 55 to a question, and the chaos factor was 8, then a random event takes place.

Notes

• I have never played and RPG before and therefore I have never played a Solo RPG, because of this I may have made some errors along the way so please keep that in mind. I was also playing as multiple characters (including semi-GM) so it is possible that I forgot a rule or two.
• Slow actions/Fast actions may be blurred and vehicle zone movement was secondary.
• Please excuse switches from tenses and perspectives - it's difficult to play journal style from the POV of so many characters, including narrator and GM.
  
• My goals were to have fun and to create a good story.

 

What's the story MU/TH/UR?

It's been over a year since the thing burst out of Dr. Myakovky's chest. The hive on AR-32 is now a hollow husk, dead and dormant it rises out of the otherwise flattened landscape of the planet, only to cast shadows.

All mining operations (legal and otherwise) have ceased on AR-32 and Weyland-Yutani have recruited our team to pay that shithole a visit. They want to know what really went on down there so they can retrieve Myakovky's notes on his breakthroughs in robotics, engineering and up-close-and-personal studies of the species known as Xenomorph XX121. All of this intell is sealed up tight in his invention, Ari, the cybernetic ant. The only problem is that Ari's hard drives are encrypted with a molecular compound lock that the doctor never told anyone. A Bio-DNA scan secured from the good doctor may give Weyland-Yutani a clue to this combination. Weyland-Yutani wants us to descend to the surface, enter the inactive alien hive, locate Myakovsky's body and retrieve a bio sample... and if available, any remaining royal jelly. 

 

Cinch, right?

 

Okay, that's probably enough of a briefing. Don't forget to check out the Character lists on the other page that includes some AI Art. 

 

 

And now, I'd like to officially welcome everyone to...

  ALIENS:
HOBAN'S GOLD