You adventures in Ironsworn: Starforged take place ina sector of The Forge globular cluster that you develop in play. This where I will begin my adventures of the gunslinger James “Basilisk” Rokuro, as he both hunts and is hunted by those that massacred his community.
In this game, humanity has fled the Milky Way Galaxy for a globular cluster called The Forge approximately 1700 lightyears above the galactic plane. It is a place of nebulae, stellar phenomena, uncertain physics, and lost alien civilizations (NOTE: Starforged is human centric sci-fi and PCs are always humans descended from people who fled human space 200+ years ago).
STEP 1: Starting Region
There are 4 choices for this, going from the most “settled” to the least: Terminus, Outlands, Expanse, and Void. I am going to go with Outlands. It seems the right choice for my “gunslinger” in search of revenge on whoever killed his community.
STEP 2: Number of Settlements
Choice of region determines the number of settlements. In the case of the Outlands, there are 3 settlements. As the book states, they are “a nexus for roleplaying and quest opportunities.”
STEP 3: Generate Settlement Details
Finally, we get to roll some dice and find out!
Every settlement needs: a name, a location, a population, an authority and a project or two. I will be using the random tables for all of these. Note that against the book advice I am going to roll on one additional table: first look.
SETTLEMENT 1: Lastport (roll=44)
Location (roll=95): Deep Space
Population (roll=68): Thousands
First Look (roll=77): Sprawling or dispersed structures
Authority (roll=45): Tolerant
Project 1 (roll=54): Mining
Project 2 (roll=17): Defense
Lastport is a jumbled mass of a settlement, essentially a number of massive ships and small stations linked together into a single structure. It exists solely to mine the most valuable commodity in the Forge (whatever that is). A large asteroid or small planetoid was ejected from its original system billions of years ago and is composed entirely of the substance. Because it is so valuable, though, pirates make regular attacks and so the second biggest industry is fortification.
SETTLEMENT 2: Prism (roll=65)
Location (roll=66): Orbital
Population (roll=51): Hundreds
First Look (roll=40): Industrial Architecture
Authority (roll=35): Tolerant
Project 1 (roll=24): Engineering
Project 2 (roll=96): none
Prism is an engineering research station where the smartest minds of the Forge try to solve the most difficult problems for humanity in their new home.
SETTLEMENT 3: Forsaken (roll=29) — Fitting!
Location (roll=32): Planetside
Population (roll=53): Hundreds
First Look (roll=85): Toxic or polluted habitat
Authority (roll=81): Corrupt
Project 1 (roll=68): Salvage
Project 2 (roll=27): Entertainment
Forsaken was once a terraforming outpost with a lot of potential, but something horrible happened and now it is an ecological nightmare. After the terraformer colonists and scientists fled, criminal gangs flooded in to dismantle the facility and sell off the valuable equipment. Amidst the lawlessness, an opportunistic entrepreneur (who?!?) made the place a hotbed of sex, drugs and other illicit entertainments.
STEP 4: Generate Planets
Settlements orbiting or on a planet get some extra information about that world.
PRISM’S WORLD
For Prism’s world I am going to just generate it’s type, since Prism is an orbital station only.
Class (roll=21): Furnace World
No wonder they stay in orbit! Maybe they chose this location because the intense volcanic and tectonic activity of the world is somehow useful in their work?
FORSAKEN’S WORLD
Since this settlement was a failed terraforming project, I am going to roll on some additional tables just to figure out what the planet looks like.
Class (roll=41): Ice World
Atmosphere (roll=45): Marginal
Settlements (roll=39): None, (besides Forsaken)
Observed from Space (roll=87): World spanning ice chasm
Life (roll=29): Extinct
When humans arrived at Forsaken’s world they found a hothouse world teeming with lower order life not entirely incompatible with Earth life. But the terraformers decided they needed to cool the planet a few degrees in order to make it habitable. Unfortunately, they lost control of the process and now the once blue-green world is a frozen lifeless hell.
STEP 5: Generate Stars
Mostly for flavor.
Prism’s Star (roll=18): Glowing Orange Star
Forsaken’s Star (roll=69): White Dwarf (I originally rolled a black hole, but since I already decided this was a terraforming project it did not seem a good choice.)
STEP 6: Sector Map
I am going to leave this one alone for now.
STEP 7: Create Passages
Passages are charted space routes. The Outlands get 2 passages, which must either a) connect two settlements, or b) connect a settlement to the edge of the sector map.
I am going to connect Lastport and Prism since the engineering facility probably needs what Lastport is mining, but also connect Lastport to the edge of the map since they probably don’t trade exclusively with Prism. Forsaken’s location was wiped from cluster GPS but some folks still know how to get there…
STEP 8: Zoom in on a Settlement
I feel like Lastport is the best “starting place” for Basilisk’s adventures, so I will roll on the “Settlement Trouble” table for it. (NOTE: The book instructs me to roll on the First Look table as well, but as noted above I did that already because I wanted additional information.)
Settlement Trouble (roll=76): Someone is ill or injured.
I am not sure what to do with this yet. Let’s see if further steps help me figure it out.
STEP 9: Create a Local Connection
I need a connection in the Sector. I don’t have a clear idea of who that person should be, so I will roll.
Connection Name: Logan MacKenson
Home: Lastport
Connection Character Role (roll=37): Historian
First Look (roll=71): Shifty
Character Goal (roll=15): Cure an ill (ooooh!)
Revealed Character Aspect (roll=69): Proud
Clearly, Logan MacKenson is ill and wants to find a cure. He thinks Basilisk must have a clue to that cure and summons him to Lastport (probably under pretense since he is Shifty). Maybe it has to do with why Basilisk’s people were massacred? Or possibly the living ship? Only time and dice rolls will tell…
STEP 10: Introduce a Sector Trouble
Let’s roll to find out!
Sector Trouble (roll=27): Energy storms are rampant!
STEP 11: Finalize the Sector
I need to give it a name, but I will decline giving it a powerful faction until I know more through play.
Name (roll=46/28): Hidden Desolation. I like it!
I.E. 