Ironsworn Starforged: Yet another tale of loss, horrible dice rolls and death!

 

My tale begins in August 2023, when I received the printed copies of Ironsworn Starforged from my brother. We went to Plettenberg Bay for a couple of days and I started immediately to play the game.

Those who know Ironsworn games would know by playing I kinda mean prepping. But as Shawn Tomkin says "Prep is play". It took me a couple of hours to write out the 'Truths' of the galaxy I was going to have my character run around in and came up with a fairly interesting idea. The people had fled their former galaxy because of an AI war that broke out. But later in the truths it came out that AI were still something that some people had. So I imagined that the Ironsworn I was going to play would have strong feeling about AI and the cultivation of AI in the galaxy they were in now. She would probably do her level best to destroy any AI she could find.

There were a couple of other things I thought would be rather interesting to try out. I've always played close-combat, bashy-bashy characters, but in this world which takes inspirations from Battlestar Galactica and Firefly, there is a more gunslinger type feel. so I decided to make her a gunslinger and also an explorer - someone curious about this galaxy that they were still trying to figure out three-hundred years after arrival.

Because this game allows for improvements of assets (but not of stats), I sorta noted down some other things that she'd be interested in doing or things that could happen to her. Of course, the quest to destroy AI would be on the top of the list. She had lost her family, maybe finding a relative would be a nice thing to have her stumble over. 

I began my 'actual play' in December when work had calmed down to a crawl and life had decided to stop kicking me in the teeth. It was very slow going.

My character's first mission was to retrieve a data drive from a bandit camp. This drive would contain information on the transportation of an AI by ship to somewhere to be determined. I wanted to be cautious and play it safe, to not kill off my character in the first thing she tries to do. So I didn't make the firefights that ensued too difficult. She did get hit and such, but she didn't die and she got the drive and took it to the person who had initially wanted it. Their relationship was complicated. This helper wanted to sell the information on the drive, but kept her word and allowed my character to access the info first, not knowing that the latter's intention was to destroy the AI.

From the drive, they learnt that the AI was on it's way to Rhiannon and so the race from Argosy to Rhiannon began.

My character had a choice. She could either fly through the known routes to Welkin via Elysium and then cut to the unknown Rhiannon or go straight into the unknown. Being a bit of a hard ass and, seeing that I had gained confidence over the matter, the decision was made to go straight for Rhiannon. It would be a formidable journey that could lead to multiple discoveries.

It would also be a journey she'd never finish.

Along the way, she would encounter a pirate ship. This would be my first attempt at fighting in ship-to-ship combat. I again decided to play it safe and choose an 'easy' opponent. 

I Entered the Fray and the trouble immediately started.

*rolls the dice* 

Miss.

This meant that the opponent had the upper hand and I would be reacting to them rather than fighting from a position of strength. My character would not dodge immediately, exchanging fire with the other ship.

Clash.

*rolls the dice*

Miss.

The miss meant that my character's ship had taken damage, but that was okay. One of the assets I had selected in the beginning of the game was a reinforced hull. So that meant that these rolls wouldn't be too difficult to do well in.

Withstand Damage.

*rolls the dice*

Miss.

...

By this point I was getting annoyed with my dice. But I'm not superstitious. I wasn't about to haul out another set of dice to try and break the curse that was befalling these ones. Besides, it was loadshedding and I was already playing by battery-powered lamplight. Trying to find it in the dark would not have been so easy.

This time I would try to dodge though.

React under Fire.

*rolls the dice*

Miss.

The ship bobs and weaves and still gets singed by the pirate. Damage is dealt and again I take heart in the fact that I have that reinforced hull.

Withstand Damage.

*rolls the dice*

Miss.

I almost head-desked at this point. My character's ship integrity was now zero, it was battered to bits and anything harder than a sneeze would make it fall apart completely. She'd be desperate now. Desperate to score a hit on this pirate and destroy it outright.

Clash.

*rolls the dice*

Strong Hit.

It was a feeling of elation that is matched only by having spent four hours in the dark and having the power finally come on. A strong hit meant that I didn't just mark one damage to the track of this pirate, but two. And because it was an 'easy' opponent, that would mean that I could finish off this combat with one last hit - even a weak hit would do.

Take Decisive Action.

*rolls dice*

Miss with Match.

I considered how to save my character. She had failed utterly and her ship was about to be blown to bits. She could probably escape, get captured, try to escape that... I just didn't know if I wanted her to be a captive to a pirate. So I decided that the dice would decide for me. If I got a strong hit, she'd be fine and captive. If I got a weak hit... she'd die but would have one last act. And if I missed, then she'd just be dead. A fart in the wind.

Face Death

*rolls dice*

Weak Hit.

So she died. But maybe what she had done, the cylinder she had shot into the void would find a curious scavenger who'd take up her cause. Or who'd write a book about her. Or something.

As for me, I'm already thinking of how to start prepping for the next character. I still kind of want to use the same Truths. Maybe I'll change the locations and have the character be from a different sector - different planets, routes, dreams, and plans. We'll see.

As inglorious as this death was, it had kept me occupied for several months and I had fun with that.

Might consider new dice though...

Writing babble: It all starts with a little... and then it gets out of hand.

I didn't do any resolutions this year or anything. Maybe one: work on avoiding burnout by not committing myself to running a lot of D&D games. 

But in the absence of resolutions, I did commit to a writing project. Very small, very simple: Every week, I get given a prompt from a writing book and then I write about it. So far the longest I've spent on a prompt is forty-five minutes. So it's really not a big thing and it's challenging and fun.

If I manage to avoid the burn, I was thinking that I might do nanowrimo this year. And so comes the problem I always have: what to write about.

This question was quickly answered by a friend. I got excited, and inspired, and started making notes. I could already imagine the endless planning notes I would make in the months leading up to November. I would have a blast doing it. I was excited.

And then it all went to pot.

Why? Well... because the story didn't want to wait until November. It wanted to be written as soon as possible. And so instead of my usual fun and games with notes and highlighters and post-its, I now have Scrivener open and a thousand words in less than an hour.

Damnit. 😆

Babble: D&D and a reflection on the year without (too much) burnout

 In October, I wrote a blog post about my tracking of hours I spend preparing for DM-ing D&D. I'd like to share the final tally in this post and babble a bit about 2023.

In many ways, 2023 was a shit show. So many things went wrong in life at and away from the D&D table. But there has been some highlights too: The successful conclusion of my longest-running Dragon Heist campaign, 43 sessions in my South African TNO campaign, and the fact that I may have skirted burnout but didn't actually hit it.

I think what helped was that I was more cognisant of the time I'm actually spending preparing, playing and running games. I logged as much as I thought was sensible, so not everything, but mostly everything. It showed me when I naturally slumped and shouldn't be hard on myself for not doing more. It showed me the times I have energy and made me excited to capitalise on it.

So while the year was awful, my experiment in being mindful about how much time I'm dedicating to this game I like was a success.

Of 142 hours spent prepping/working on D&D-related things, I spent a total of 123 hours prepping my homebrew in 2023. Adding my time DM-ing to that 142 and I spent 228 hours prepping and running D&D games. This is not all the time I've spent on the game - I've played in other people's games too (and yes, I logged that as well) - but this is the time where I was basically being creative. It tallies up to about 10 full days, though I don't find that final stat particularly interesting.

DM-ing at Game Over Gaming: Here we go again!

I got a phone call today. I didn't recognise the number and, fearing some kind of scammer or bot or whatnot, I answered the phone without speaking. Because in this day and age, that's apparently what you're supposed to do. After an awkward 'uh hello?' from the other side of the phone, I realised I was speaking to the human variety and it didn't sound like a call centre. What can I say? I'm not used to being called by people who don't want my money.

The conversation was brief, but to the point. Game Over Gaming is having another event in March and they want me to come to Glentana and do the DM-ing thing again. Seeing as I have something already prepped sorta, I said yes and we discussed the details a bit. It might be streamed again, I'm not sure. But regardless, it should be interesting. Glentana was rather pretty the last time I went - migraine and all. 

They're promising everything that was the previous festival but bigger, grander, geekier. There's going to be multiple DMs running tables, more space for PC gaming (which I still won't partake in... I'm afraid of dropping my computer somewhere along the way and I'm very attached to it...), more in the line of cosplay, more comics and other geeky-related stuff. 

I'll babble more about it as I get more info... or maybe after the fact haha. For now, I figure it's worth noting on this little blog.

The Homebrew that keeps Growing...

The year was 2016. 

I had only been playing D&D for about two, maybe three years at this point and something interesting occurred.

I. Had. An. IDEA!!!

It was very vague still. There were going to be these heroes who have lived long lives and then died. Then they're going to come back while only slowly regaining their memories and it's going to be a big, great thing. I had only two settlements in mind, no pantheon, no map and it all was... not quite glued together. 

It's from this half-assed campaign that I attempted an email story game. It didn't last long but it began solidifying the things in my mind. And then it faltered in the same year... turns out time zones suck. Plus I had never run a play-by-post game and never been in one and it probably sucked. haha 😉

As the years moved on, the idea grew and reformed. Why take away their memories when you have that backstory to mine from? Why not have a character in a level 1 body with a level 15 mindset? 

I started running Dragon Heist online and the idea kept percolating in the back of my mind.

And then I started playing on Inkarnate and Roll20 and the Cartographer's Guild icons on there and a half-assed map was born.

The early version map of Rheas (2021)

I started documenting the progress here on this blog and yeah... it's spiralled and grown into one helluva ride. I feel my map making skills have improved and the story also began shifting into something more concrete. I attempted a couple of game runs (going on four so far, with only two surviving) and throughout, the lore kept accumulating and I haven't scratched the surface of this world that I'm creating. 

A portion of Rheas (2023)

And now, as the year 2023 too quickly draws to a close, I've hit the milestone of 40 sessions with the South Africans... I don't know how that happened. We've explored maybe 30% of the island/continent(?) of Ocruan. I'm both excited and daunted by the thought of churning out more content. I have it in my head somewhere, but getting it to spill onto paper is sometimes quite challenging. Maps are easier to make, I've found. 

Anyway, I felt to document it here. I am excited at my little homebrew that could. It keeps going despite setbacks and is growing into a rich experience that I am enjoying thoroughly.

Curse! Splat!

So I know this isn't a life blog, but the fun has to be documented somewhere and it influences my future geekiness.

It's almost a week into nanowrimo and it's already very quickly going to pot. I can still catch up - if I can write 15 000 words in one day to win like I did a couple of years ago, anything is possible. So I'm not going to say that I'm giving up on nanowrimo just yet, but it's going to the backburner while I recover a bit more karma.

Now, those who know me should be aware that I don't actually believe in luck or karma or stuff like that. But just because I don't believe in them don't mean they're not going to screw up my circumstances right good. 

Last Friday I had courier package trouble, then got home late, and found a pigeon in the kitchen which promptly shat on my head. On Saturday, I rolled so poorly on Roll20 that people were suggesting I roll with actual dice (which I could have fudged the rolls for) because clearly digital dice hate me. 

And then came Sunday. Beautiful, beautiful Sunday.

I had an Arkham Horror date with friends. First, I overslept. Then I got the car out of the garage to discover the tyre is flat. Then I tried to move the car to find the battery was giving issues and not letting me restart the car.

Joyous.

So I put on my big-girl pants and changed the tyre while my mom coordinated with a neighbour to give me a jump start. And then we discovered that one of my mom's friends had "borrowed" my jumper cables without asking me. I was livid. But, long story short: tyre got changed successfully (yay), jumper cables were returned (yay), car got jumped (yay), and off I raced to go play a card game (yay) in which we died (well..... shit).

I would like to say yesterday wasn't a train smash but I'd be lying. Continued car trouble, evil meetings, poor conflict resolution, it had the makings of a disastrous day and it delivered.

And then we have today. I'm honestly terrified what today is going to bring.

All of which is to say, nanowrimo is the furthest from my mind right now. I had dnd games to prep, life's crash helmet to fasten, and just general work mayhem to navigate.

So what about streaming? I'm going to try to keep the Wednesday weekly stream going. Instead of doing nanowrimo like I did last time, I'm just going to play games. It'll be fun, relaxing, and not nearly as exhausting as trying to pull words out of thin air.

That's the hope anyway.

Geeky Babble: Con.ect 2023

This year's Con.ect seemed a little smaller than last year, but I don't know whether there's truth to that statement or not. There was definitely more marketing, more hype about the stalls that was going to be there, etc. That said, I enjoyed both days and felt a little overwhelmed on Saturday by the amount of people that rocked up.

When things were still quiet...

I decided to support the convention with a VIP ticket. I heard there was going to be a goodie bag and was pretty hyped about the idea... That didn't pan out exactly. The bag had a decent looking Con.ect hat and pin, and an energy mixer. But otherwise it was just filled with business cards. A missed opportunity, I think. 

As is the custom now with this convention, there were a large number of cosplayers. I didn't snap a lot of pictures of them, but did get two that I thought was rather well done.

Cosplay of For Honor character

Cosplay of Reverse Flash

Bubbly goodness!

I also got to try out 'Bubble Tea' though admittedly, I avoided the tea part and went for a fruit slushie. Still, really good! If they return next year, I'll definitely be another soul who stands in the queue for them. 

I didn't buy a lot of stuff, some armbands, dice (of course), and a little dragon statuette. I did end up buying a lot of food-related things. On the dice baggie that I got was a website link, which I promptly followed and found more stuff to splurge on. 

As mentioned above, contrary to last year, there were dice to be had this time! I went for the most legible which ended up being the cheapest. I also tried to ask for Mordenkainen's Monsters of the Multiverse, but it wasn't available for purchase. The first vendor I asked had a whole bunch of D&D books, but was absolutely bewildered by the question. Poor thing. The second was less bewildered but also not any more helpful. I'm also worried as to how much it would have cost had it been there. Book prices have sky-rocketed to something crazy. It's okay though. I have it on DnDBeyond, so it was more a collecting thing than a 'I need to have it' thing.

The Dune RPG handbook's price was absolutely shocking. Good thing I bought the pdf and that pdfs are a thing that can be purchased, because I would never be able to justify the price that the printed book was going for.

In any case, Con.ect seemed to have been a success with a lot of people arriving and partaking in what they had on offer. 

Cutesy dragon statuette

A brief update: I'm doing it again!

I don't have much to report this month. Things have been very much the usual tedium of working till I can escape and escaping until I have to go back to work. That said, I have been up to some shenanigans in that I've started Streaming again.

Every Wednesday at 20:00 GMT+2, I stream on Twitch for about an hour. The streams are very low key and calm. I sit and play Colostle by myself (babbled about the game on my blog here) and throw in ideas from those who watch. It has been fun. I've had about four sessions so far and the story is progressing steadily. Don't get me wrong: The writing is sub-par from my side as I just sit and waffle, but that doesn't really matter. It's still fun and good practice and that is part of why I do it.

I've been given a lot of guidance from my friend Discarded Dork and they've been kind enough to actually assemble these incredible layouts for the stream too.

I'm still learning the ropes - streaming, writing, writing while streaming, using OBS Studio, etc. But it's going well and that's all that matters.

I don't know what I'm going to do for nanowrimo with regards to the stream. Seeing as 1 November falls on a Wednesday, I feel like it is a good opportunity to actually do like a stream for it... 

I don't know. Much to think about.

DnD Prep Stats babble

One of the weird and wacky things I decided to do in the beginning of the year is to start logging how much time I spend prepping and playing D&D games.

The motivation behind it was to see what I could work on to help fight back against the last-quarter-of-the-year burnout I have endured the past couple of years. I had to be realistic and I had to make liberal use of my scalpel in an attempt to trim down on how much time I spend in and around games. And I was somewhat successful. I've trimmed down how many games I play in and how many games I run. 

Besides cutting things down to size, I kept a monthly log of the number of hours I spend prepping. And... It's a lot. Even having cut things down, I spend a ridiculous amount of time prepping my games. Considering how liberal I was with that scalpel, I can imagine why previous years have been so exhausting.

Things I've included as prep are map making, summarizing previous sessions, reading certain materials that involve D&D (like The Griffon's Saddlebag for magic items), and everything that basically took longer than 30 minutes to do. That was my mark. So if I only spent a minute on something, I didn't log it... which probably means I spend even more time than I have logged but I figure 30 minutes makes sense.

So without further ado, the most recent results:

Homebrew refers to everything prepped for my two homebrew games... it's definitely what I spend most of my time on. Oneshots are sessions that conclude within one or two gatherings - I haven't done a whole lot of those, and it's interesting that it takes between 2-3 hours for me to prep them. Written adventure specifically relates to my Dragon Heist Campaign which has now been concluded. I'm fiddling with the idea of possibly running Phandelver and Below in a year or two... we'll see. And then Other refers to things like making maps for other people or fiddling on World Anvil (which I'm admittedly struggling with, but I'm trying to use. My brain hasn't figured it out yet).

What I found particularly interesting about this logging exercise is the very visible ebbs and flows that naturally occur without my pushing myself. Some months I'm excited and full of ideas. Other months I'm lazy and tired. My games don't become more or less. They remain fairly constant. And yet, I still have more than enough material to supply... well sort of. I still feel like I don't have enough material, but I think I'll never stop feeling like that.

TTRPG Babble: Ironsworn Starforged

For some reason, this particular post feels very difficult to write. I guess it has to do with the fact that I don't consider myself a persuasive writer and the things that I enjoy the most tend to require persuasion? I dunno.

Ironsworn - Starforged is a TTRPG that can be played solo, co-op (without a GM), or with the traditional GM-and-player setup. I would say it's primarily designed with solo in mind, but it provides you with the tools if you wish to play with friends.

Setting

Where the original Ironsworn had you roam the lands of a gritty fantasy scape, Starforged is a science fiction game inspired by the likes of Battlestar Galactica and Firefly. Your character is an Ironsworn: a capable person who takes on quests in the form of Iron Vows - just like the previous game - but you're travelling the vast space of The Forge as opposed to the Ironlands.

The Forge is a large cluster of systems and planets that orbits your character's galaxy of origin. Due to cataclysmic events (defined during the setup of the game), your character's people fled their galaxy to inhabit the Forge and has resided there for two centuries now.

Amazing art by Joshua Meehan

Setup

As with its predecessor, Starforged embraces 'prep is play' and the first thing you'll do is set up the circumstances your character will find themselves in. Things like religion, information technology, horrors, medicine, magic, laws, etc. are all covered in the setup so that you have a rich and unique environment at the start of the game. 

The second thing you create is the immediate sector of space your character will find themselves in. Starforged has an amazing range of oracles to assist with everything from the planets' habitability to the settlement's law enforcement. You're never really without help when setting up the circumstances of your character's journey.

And then finally, you'll create your character. Are they augmented in some way? Are they a sword wielder or do they shoot their gun from the hip? There are so many options that you can decide from. 

Character creation

I feel I should elaborate a bit on this aspect. In Ironsworn Starforged, your character has five stats that remain static throughout the game:

• Edge - agility and distance fighting
• Heart - courage, empathy, sociability
• Iron - physical strength and close-quarters fighting
• Wits - expertise, knowledge, and observation
• Shadow - sneakiness and cunning

These stats make up your character's immediate strengths. But then comes the asset system. In the beginning of the game, you select a number of assets that defines your character. As you progress through the game, you can gain experience points which essentially act as 'currency' to either purchase more assets for your character or to add features to an existing asset. 

The book says it better.

Game Mechanics

Inspired by Powered by the Apocalypse, the game has a number of moves that can get triggered by your character's actions. Once a move is triggered and a dice roll is required, you roll two 10-sided dice and one 6-sided die. The d10s are your challenge dice; your score will hopefully beat both for a strong hit or one of them for a weak hit. The d6 is your action die which is rolled to help determine your score. It along with the relevant stat and any bonuses will form your action score which you compare to the numbers of the d10s.

So pretty much the same concept as I babbled about in Ironsworn.  

How to get it

Purchasing the PDFs are fairly easy and can be done via DrivethruRPG, but getting the print version might be a little trickier. As of the time of writing this, a reprint is planned next year as most of the books have been sold out. For all the info of pdf and print copies, see here.

Thoughts

Ironsworn Starforged gives you the opportunity to have a rich adventure within the vastness of space that's only limited by your imagination (and the dice rolls). The rules are similar to the original Ironsworn, with very few changes, and yet it feels like an update to the original recipe. If you're into solo roleplaying and science fiction is a thing for you, then I'd heartily recommend Ironsworn Starforged.