Trooper

Tools of War

Though they may not regard it as such, troopers identify with their weapons in a way that is almost spiritual. It’s easy to see troopers as mindless soldiers—or even worse, heartless killers—but the truth is much more complex. Troopers believe that they must sacrifice a part of themselves to their weapons to use them most efficiently. In this way, they are as much a tool of war as the weapons they wield. This philosophy is supported by the lives of military service to which many troopers dedicate themselves. As one of the rank and file, troopers become part of something larger than themselves, but sometimes lose their individuality in the process. The alternative, however, means endangering the lives of those who fight alongside them. A trooper who puts themselves above their allies, or who wields their chosen weapon recklessly, is a loose cannon—in some cases, quite literally.

Armies of One

Even in a party of voidrunners, troopers may find themselves to be lone wolves. The life of any voidrunner is a dangerous one, but few willingly put themselves as much at risk as a trooper. When combat breaks out, troopers are often on the front lines, taking the brunt of the enemies’ attacks or holding the line so that their allies can marshal their defenses. Demolition experts have perhaps the most dangerous role to play of all, for while they rarely meet with the enemy head on, they must handle dangerous materials and routinely separate themselves from the group in order to place their explosive charges. Thankfully, their military backgrounds ensure that troopers are uniquely equipped to work as part of a team. Even troopers who have never fought alongside others quickly learn that their surest chance for survival is to have the backs of their fellow voidrunners—and to let their new friends have theirs?

Creating a Trooper

The lives of troopers are filled with violence, but warfare isn’t all they know. When creating your trooper, it’s important to consider not only how they fight, but why. Were you conscripted into military service, or did you enlist? Perhaps you were never a part of a formal army, arriving at your current life from a criminal or law enforcement background. You might even be the product of a top-secret project aimed at creating the perfect super soldier and have never known a life before this one. Even as a fledgling voidrunner, you’ve probably already seen more bloodshed than most people do in a lifetime. How have those experiences affected you? Are you hardened to violence, or has what you’ve seen made you even more certain that life must be protected? Do you have friends and family elsewhere, or are your current companions all you have left? As with many classes, the archetype you choose for your trooper character plays a large role in who they are. Many armigers, with their focus on individual combat, once served as bodyguards, or as swordmasters and advisors to feudal houses. What became of the people you once served? Are your weapons family heirlooms, or were they forged by your own hands as a part of your training? Gunner and demolition experts are more likely to have been soldiers in larger organizations. If so, were your fellows all killed in a disastrous assault? Or were you dishonorably discharged, rightfully or not? Are you a mercenary, a deserter, a reservist, or are you retired? The answers to these questions not only says a lot about where you’ve been, but where you’re going.

CLASS FEATURES

As a trooper, you gain the following class features.

Hit Points

Hit Dice: 1d10 per trooper level

Hit Points at 1st Level: 10 + your Constitution modifier

Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d10 (or 6) + your Constitution modifier per trooper level after 1st

Proficiencies

Armor: Light armor, medium armor, heavy armor, shields

Weapons: Simple weapons, martial weapons, starship weapons

Tools: Weapon and armor maintenance tools, one vehicle type

Saving Throws: Strength, Constitution

Skills: Choose two from Acrobatics, Athletics, Culture, Engineering, History, Insight, Intimidation, Medicine, Perception, and Survival

Equipment

You begin the game with 450 credits which you can spend on your character’s starting weapons, armor, and adventuring gear. You can select your own gear or choose one of the following equipment packages. Also consult the Suggested Equipment section of your chosen background.

• Demolitionist’s Kit (cost 447 credits): grenade launcher, frag grenades (3), smoke grenades (2), personal communicator, light maul, multitool, synthweave armor, tactical case

• Master-at-Arms Kit (cost 251 credits): duffel bag, heavy shock polearm, hyperweave armor, personal communicator, light blade, medium blade, pistol (20 rounds of ammunition)

• Merc Kit (cost 411 credits): backpack, first aid kit, personal communicator, pistol (20 rounds of ammunition), plasma auto-cannon (1 energy battery), riot armor

Drills

Thanks to your years of training, you know how to handle yourself in almost any situation. At 1st level you gain two drills of your choice, detailed at the end of the class description. The Drills Know column of the Trooper table shows when you learn more drills.

Favored Ordance

All weapons are deadly in your hands, but one type of weapon is your favorite. At 1st level, choose a specific category of weapon, such as light mauls, medium casters, or cannons. You can also choose a miscellaneous weapon (such bio-chakram or combat chainsaw) as your favored ordnance.

Attacks you make with your favored ordnance deal an additional 1d4 damage of the weapon’s type. Your favored ordnance damage applies only to damage that requires an attack roll. Thus, you can’t increase the damage dealt by a grenade or a weapon’s burst property, unless you have a special ability that allows you to do so. This extra damage increases as you gain trooper levels, as shown in the Favored Ordnance column of the Trooper table. Once you deal your favored ordnance damage, you can’t do so again until the start of your next turn.

When you gain a level in this class, you can replace one of your favored ordnance selections with another weapon.

Tenacity

Your courage never wavers, even in the face of overwhelming odds. Choose one of the following options.

Cool Under Pressure

Regardless of the pressures placed upon you, you somehow manage to keep it together. You have advantage on saving throws against effects that inflict strife or mental stress, as well as on Constitution saving throws to maintain concentration.

Indomitable Soul

You never back down, not while lives hang in the balance. While you are bloodied, you can use a bonus action on your turn to gain temporary hit points equal to 1d10 + your trooper level. These temporary hit points last for 1 minute. While the temporary hit points last, you are immune to the frightened and rattled conditions. If you are frightened or rattled when you use this ability, the effects of these conditions are suspended until the end of this effect. Rounds spent under the influence of Indomitable Soul count towards the duration of these frightened and rattled conditions.

Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.

Tireless Loyalty

Nothing can convince you to turn on those you’ve promised to protect or break the ideals you’ve sworn to uphold. You have advantage on saving throws against being charmed. While you are charmed by a condition that allows a saving throw at the end of your turn, you can choose to make the save at the start of your turn instead.

Basic Training

Your training brought you into contact with people from all sorts of different backgrounds. At 2nd level, choose one of the following options.

Chains of Command

You know who’s in charge—and more importantly, who’s really in charge of an organization (such as a police precinct) or group of individuals (such as a party of rival voidrunners). If you have encountered an organization's leader, you know who’s officially in charge according to that group’s chain of command, as well as the attitudes of each of the group’s members towards their leader.

Soldier of Fortune

You’ve worked (or currently work) as a mercenary, taking part in military conflicts for personal profit. Anyone in need of a little extra muscle may come to you with job offers, and you have advantage on ability checks you make to find such jobs or negotiate their terms. The jobs may involve some measure of danger, and they may not pay particularly well. But you’re never out of work, at least not for long.

War Stories

Even soldiers who haven’t fought together often share similar experiences. If you spend a few minutes swapping stories from your past with someone from a military background, you have advantage on the next Persuasion check you make to influence them.

Combat Maneuvers

At 2nd level, you gain the ability to use combat maneuvers. You gain proficiency in two combat traditions of your choice. You learn two maneuvers of your choice from traditions you are proficient with.

You gain an exertion pool equal to twice your proficiency bonus, regaining any spent exertion at the end of a short or long rest . You use your maneuvers by spending points from your exertion pool. The Maneuvers Known column of the Trooper table shows when you learn more maneuvers from a tradition you are proficient with, while the Maneuver Degree column shows the highest degree you can select maneuvers from at a given level.

Additionally, whenever you learn a new maneuver, you can choose one of the maneuvers you know and replace it with another maneuver of the same degree from a tradition you are proficient with.

Martial Archetype

At 3rd level, choose a trooper archetype. Though you are familiar with weapons of all sorts, your archetype represents the types of weapons you’ve chosen to focus your training on. You gain benefits from your choice of archetype at 3rd level, then more at 7th, 10th, 15th, and 18th level.

Ability Score Improvement

When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can’t increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.

Extra Attack

At 5th level, you can attack twice instead of once whenever you take the attack action on your turn.

Combat Theater

If your experience on the battlefield has taught you anything, it’s that warfare is as much psychological as it is physical. At 6th level, choose one of the following options.

Crowd Control

With a few simple, barked commands, you can impose order on an otherwise unruly crowd. You gain an expertise die on Intimidation checks.

Finger on the Trigger

Sometimes polite requests must be backed up with threats of violence. When one of your allies makes a Persuasion check, you can use your reaction to ready your firearm or brush the hilt of your blade. If the target of the Persuasion check can see you, your ally gains an expertise die on the check.

Hearts and Minds

It is a sad fact of war that the innocent are often caught in the crossfire, but you do your best to keep them safe. When you make efforts to keep a non-combatant out of harm’s way, word of your heroism spreads, and any members of their community who were previously indifferent to you become friendly.

Archetype Feature

At 7th level you gain another archetype feature.

Endurance

Starting at 9th level, you can use a bonus action on your turn to push your body and mind beyond their natural limits. For the next minute, you ignore the negative effects of any fatigue, strife, or mental stress effects you are currently suffering. At the end of that time, the negative effects return, and you gain one level of either fatigue or stress (your choice). 

You can use this feature once. You  gain an additional use of this feature at 13th level and a third use starting at 17th level. You regain all spent uses of this feature whenever you finish a long rest.

Pillar of Strength

In the heat of battle, others look to you for guidance. The faith that others place in you extends to non-combat situations, as well. At 10th level, you gain one of the following options.

Celebrity Soldier

Your victories on the battlefield have won you the respect of leaders across the galaxy. Regardless of your Prestige score, your Prestige Center covers an entire planet, or even multiple planets, at the Narrator’s discretion. In addition, prominent politicians, businesspeople, and celebrities come to you asking for favors and may be willing to perform favors for you in return. The Narrator determines the nature of these interactions. For example, the head of a shipping conglomerate may arrange transport for you and your companions to one of their off-planet facilities in return for a review of the facility’s security. Similarly, if you endorse a politician’s run for office, they may open doors for you in the future.

Impartial Judge

Your integrity is known to be above reproach, and others may call upon you to issue punishments or settle disputes. Your Prestige rating increases by an amount equal to half your proficiency bonus. In addition, other people can always sense when you’re telling the truth (or at least, the truth as you see it). While others may not always agree with your decisions, so long as you do your best to remain impartial, your integrity is rarely called into question.

Veteran’s Insight

Others seek out your advice, hoping to gain insight from the lessons you’ve learned on the battlefield. A creature that listens to your advice for at least 1 minute gains an expertise dice on one ability check of its choice that it makes in the next 24 hours. Once someone has benefited from your Veteran’s Insight, they can’t do so again for another 24 hours. If an NPC follows your advice and it works out well for them, they become friendly towards you and remain so until you give them reason to change their mind.

Archetype Feature

At 10th level you gain another archetype feature.

Archetype Feature

At 15th level you gain another archetype feature.

Legion Commander

At this point in your career, you may find yourself commanding hundreds, or even thousands, of people. At 18th level, you gain one of the following options.

Address the Troops

Your words inspire those under your command to fight without fear. You gain proficiency in Persuasion. If you’re already proficient in Persuasion, you instead gain an expertise die.

In addition, if you spend 10 minutes giving an inspiring speech, each creature you choose with an Intelligence of 4 or greater that can hear and understand you is filled with courage and resolve. Affected creatures gain 20 temporary hit points. While the temporary hit points last, the creature gains an expertise die on saving throws against becoming frightened. 

With the right technology on hand, you can greatly extend the number of creatures you can affect and the distance at which you can do so, even on a galactic scale.

Once you’ve used this ability, you must finish a short or long rest before you can do so again.

Security Clearance

Governments and military organizations trust you with their most guarded secrets. With a few phone calls to the right people, you can make a Prestige check to obtain a high-level security clearance, granting you access to data such as the location of a top-secret military installation, the blueprints of The Fleet’s capital ship, or the medical files of the Emperor. Organizations hostile to you will never knowingly issue you a security clearance. Under most circumstances, your security clearance expires after 2 days. Once you’ve used this ability, you must wait a week before you can do so again.

Thousand-Foot View

You can survey the broad strokes of a military campaign to pinpoint an enemy’s weak spot. This survey takes the duration of a long rest and might involve reviewing stacks of field reports, analyzing thousands of AI-generated combat simulations, or simply pushing a few small-scale models across a replica battlefield. At the end of the long rest (which you still benefit from normally), you uncover a fatal flaw in your enemy’s organization, such as an easily disrupted supply line or a shield generator they’ve left undefended. 

The Narrator determines the nature of the information you uncover. Your stratagem is often time sensitive, and even if you act on it, there’s no guarantee the plan will succeed. Once you’ve used this ability in a campaign, you can’t do so again until the specifics of the campaign you’re analyzing significantly change.

Archetype Feature

At 18th level you gain another archetype feature.

No Surrender

Even a mortal wound can’t stop you from fighting—at least for a while. At 20th level, when you take damage that reduces you to 0 hit points but doesn’t kill you, you don’t fall unconscious and can continue acting normally. You still make death saving throws at the start of your turn, suffer death saving throws whenever you take damage, and die after three failed death saving throws. If you are stabilized during this time, you remain conscious, but fall unconscious after 1 minute if you do not regain at least 1 hit point.

Drills

When you gain access to a new drill, choose one of the following.

Action Hero

You’re daring, dynamic, and rush headlong into danger. On your turn, you can take an additional Dash action and gain an expertise die on Acrobatics and Athletics checks you make during the Dash. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.

Combat Medic

Even under the worst conditions, you can apply first aid to keep your allies alive. You can use an action to restore a number of hit points to an ally within reach equal to twice your proficiency bonus. You can use this drill a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus. Your expended uses are restored when you take a long or short rest.

Defensive Reload

You can keep your wits about you as you get ready to fire. You can reload a weapon with the reload property as part of a Dodge action.

Double Time

You move efficiently while on the march and can help those you travel with keep pace. You can move twice as fast on a journey. Any allies without this drill that you choose to keep pace with can move 50 percent faster than they would normally be able to.

Favored Front

You’ve learned to fight in different kinds of terrain. Choose one type of terrain: arctic, coast, desert, forest, grassland, mountain, subterranean, or swamp. You gain an expertise die on Perception, Stealth, and Survival checks made in this terrain. You can take this drill multiple times, choosing a new terrain each time.

Gear Up

A soldier’s gear helps keep them alive, so you’ve learned to pack and handle it efficiently. You can don and doff armor in half the time it would normally take. Your Strength score is considered 5 higher when determining your carrying capacity and the weight you can lift, push, or drag.

Grunt Work

You’re not above getting a little dirt under your fingernails. You gain proficiency in carpenter’s tools, cook’s utensils, or another set of artisan’s tools allowed by the Narrator. In addition, when performing manual labor, you gain an expertise die on Constitution saving throws to resist fatigue.

Lead the Charge

When the time comes to engage the enemy, you make sure you’re always on the front lines, with your allies close behind. You gain an expertise die on initiative rolls. When you roll initiative, you can select one willing ally who rolled lower than you. For the rest of the encounter, that ally acts in the initiative count directly after you.

No One Left Behind

You gain an expertise die on Acrobatics and Athletics checks made to climb, jump, run, and swim. When your party makes a group Acrobatics or Athletics check, you may apply the results of your roll to yourself and one ally. You can choose which ally to apply your result to after everyone has rolled, but must do so before the Narrator says whether you succeed or fail.

Paratrooper

You gain an expertise die on Acrobatics and Athletics checks you make while falling or skydiving. When you take falling damage, you can use your reaction to make an Acrobatics check and reduce the damage by an amount equal to the result of the check.

Quick Reload

When reloading your weapon in the heat of battle, your hands act from muscle memory alone. You can reload a weapon with the reload property as a bonus action instead of an action. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.

Recon

Hours spent on patrol have honed your senses. You gain proficiency in Perception. If you’re already proficient in Perception, you instead gain an expertise die. Additionally, when performing the Scout journey activity, you don’t suffer a level of fatigue on a critical failure.

Rest and Relaxation

You know how important a little R & R can be. When you spend hit dice during a short rest to recover hit points, you can roll each die twice and use the better result.

Security Detail

You’re always on the lookout for trouble. Your passive Perception score increases by 3, and you can never be surprised.

Starship Trooper

You’re well accustomed to life aboard starships. While aboard a starship or similar vehicle, you gain an expertise die if you’re using a skill you’re proficient in.

Tour of Duty

You’ve learned to interact with people of cultures different from your own. You are proficient in Culture and gain a skill specialty in Culture. In addition, you learn three languages of your choice.

Weapons Maintenance

Keeping your gear in proper working order can mean the difference between life and death when the bullets start to fly. You gain an expertise die on checks to maintain or repair weapons and armor.