The First City: An Ironsworn Actual Play (Session 4)
A reunion with a friend
An arduous journey. In the previous session, Lucia and Pendry made a perilous, miles-long trek from the forest to the town of Timberwall in an attempt to save Pendry’s life. Upon their arrival, town guards quickly seized the injured man from Lucia and carried him away on a stretcher. Now, Lucia must find a way to recover from her own injuries and also make sure that her newfound companion is all right.
Welcome back to The First City! This is an actual play of the Ironsworn TTRPG.
New to the series? Check out the introduction.
For an in-depth guide to the story, see the reference guide.
Characters
Lucia: A young woman living alone in the Havens. Although resentful of Ironland society, she vowed to travel to the town of Timberwall in an attempt to get Pendry vital medical aid. After a difficult journey, she has successfully brought him there.
Pendry: A young man who stumbled into Lucia while lost in the woods. After surviving a bear attack and falling into a ravine, he lies on the brink of death. Lucia has brought him to his hometown of Timberwall, where he seems to be a person of more importance than she realized.
Kormak: Lucia’s loyal hound companion, who protected Lucia and Pendry from an aggressive pack of hyenas as the two travelers reached Timberwall.
⚠️ Retcon Alert
Based on a great suggestion by Eric Dill (thanks, Eric!), I realized that Lucia’s journey to Timberwall in the previous session would have been better as part of an iron vow to save Pendry’s life.
I’ve therefore changed our story to include Lucia swearing an iron vow after finding Pendry in the forest ravine (this also gives our campaign its “inciting incident” vow). If you’d like to see the story updates, check out the end of session 2 and all of session 3.
Player Character Sheet
In the previous session, Lucia lost 1 Momentum, 2 Health, and 4 Supply. She also gained 10 Progress on her vow to bring Pendry home alive to Timberwall.
Lucia of the Havens
Edge: 2 | Heart: 3 | Iron: 1 | Shadow: 1 | Wits: 2
Health: +2 | Spirit: +1 | Supply: +1
Experience: 0 | Momentum: +1
Debilities: None
Bonds: 0
ASSETS
Archer
Abilities:
[X|_|_]Fated
Abilities:
[X|_|_]Hound
Name: Kormak
Health: +4
Abilities:
[_|_|X]LoyalVOWS
Found the first city of the Ironlands
Rank: epic | Progress: 0/10
Bring Pendry home alive to Timberwall
Rank: dangerous | Progress: 10/10
Gameplay
After an exhausting journey, Lucia has brought Pendry—barely breathing but alive—to his hometown of Timberwall, fulfilling the iron vow she swore to him the night before.
Fulfill Your Vow
(achieve what you believe to be the fulfillment of your vow)
Vow Progress = 10 >>> <3> <8>
STRONG HITExperience: 0 ==> 2
Bring Pendry home alive to Timberwall (vow, dangerous): FULFILLED
Reach a Milestone1
(make significant progress in your quest)
Found the first city of the Ironlands (vow, epic): 0/10 ==> 0.25/10
Upon the travelers’ arrival at Timberwall, town guards seized Pendry from Lucia and laid the injured man on a stretcher before rushing him in through the town’s gate.
Eager to rest from her tiring ordeal but concerned for Pendry’s safety, Lucia asks the guards where they’re taking him.
One of the guards reveals that Pendros (aka “Pendry”) is the son of the governing family of Timberwall.
Pendry had left Timberwall weeks ago on a journey to negotiate with a distant settlement. He had missed his expected return date by several days, and the governing family—particularly his mother—has been sick with worry.
Surprised and slightly amused at her companion’s noble heritage, Lucia is satisfied that the town guards will get him the medical help he needs. She turns her attention to tending to her own injuries.
Oracle: Ironlander Names
<34>"Deshi" or "Lili"
Lucia decides to seek out one of her only friends in Timberwall—Lili,2 a young woman around Lucia’s age whose family owns a small shop in the middle of town.
Sojourn
(spend time in a community seeking assistance while sharing a bond)
[3] + Heart(3) + 1 = 7 >>> <2> <10>
WEAK HITRecuperate and Consort
Health: +2 ==> +4
Spirit: +1 ==> +3
Lucia and her hound Kormak walk into Lili’s family’s shop, where Lili is alone at the front counter.
Lili is surprised to see Lucia, but she greets her with a warm hug. The two childhood friends haven’t seen each other in almost two years—not since Lucia’s parents died.
Lucia recounts to Lili her adventure with Pendry. Lili is amused that Lucia has rescued the governor’s son, who is widely known around Timberwall to be a good-natured but soft and naive young man.
Lili catches Lucia up on the goings-on in Timberwall:
Lili’s parents have retired from shopkeeping, so Lili runs the shop now.
A charismatic woman has been preaching radical new religious ideas in the town center, and she’s been steadily gaining followers.
A ruthless general has gained tremendous influence over the governing family over the past few years. There are whispers that he intends to overthrow them and take control of the town government.
Concerned at the news about the governing family, Lucia tells Lili that she wants to visit Pendry the next day to make sure he’s doing all right. Lili says that she’ll accompany her.
Her spirits lifted by the reunion with her dear friend, Lucia gratefully accepts Lili’s offer for her and Kormak to spend the night at Lili’s home to recover from their journey.
As Lucia sleeps, she is haunted by dreams of a mysterious and impressive, stone-walled city. It looks like no place she’s ever been.
The next day, Lucia and Lili walk over to the governor’s house to see if they can visit Pendry.
Oracle: Ironlander Names
<78>"Zanita" or "Reema"
<73>"Perella" or "Sendra"
<94>"Keeara" or "Kato"
As soon as Lucia is spotted by the governor’s guards, they begin talking among themselves.
Shortly thereafter, one of the guards walks over to the two women and places Lucia under arrest. Lucia has been accused by the governor—under the influence of his general, Kato—of the attack on Pendry, the governor’s son.
Commentary
A short session today. I’m returning to this campaign after a month-long hiatus, so I thought I’d move things forward just a bit as I get back into the swing of things.
Challenge Progress
For our Quest Starter challenge, we need to incorporate into our narrative every Quest Starter associated with our truths and starting Ironlands region.
Now, we’re cooking! We made progress on three Quest Starters this session: Religion, Beasts, and the Havens.
[X]1: The Old World - During character creation, we described Lucia as having Skulde ancestry and being ostracized by Ironland society as a result.[ ]2: Iron[ ]3: Legacies[ ]4: Communities[X]5: Leaders - During character creation, we said that Lucia is haunted by dreams of a wondrous city, and we defined her background vow as being to found the first city of the Ironlands.[ ]6: Defense[ ]7: Mysticism[X]8: Religion - In this session, Lucia heard about a charismatic cult leader preaching radical new religious ideas in Timberwall.[ ]9: Firstborn[X]10: Beasts - In this session, Lucia was accused by the governor of Timberwall of harming the governor’s son, Pendry, even though the attack was actually perpetrated by an elder beast.[ ]11: Horrors[X]12: The Havens - In this session, Lucia heard about a ruthless general who has gained influence over the governing family of Timberwall and seems to have designs on taking the governorship for himself.
Coming Up Next
In session 5, we’ll see whether Lucia can clear her name of the terrible crime she’s been accused of.
Because we only get 1 progress tick per milestone for Lucia’s background vow (which has a challenge rank of epic), I’m going to be fairly generous with making Reach a Milestone moves for it. Otherwise, our campaign would take forever! Anytime Lucia makes significant progress related to politics or making allies, I’m going to count that as a milestone for our background vow.
During character creation, I opted not to give Lucia any background bonds so that we could instead define those bonds as good opportunities came up in our narrative. I’m going to use one of those background bonds (we’re allowed to have three) for Lucia’s friend, Lili.
Interesting journey so far. I’m planning on starting a playthrough of ironsworn soon so have been trying to get a feel for how the game should go by reading/watching other people’s playthroughs. Looking forward to seeing how Lucia’s story goes.
Excited to see how the other quest starters come into play as things progress! (Also how Lucia gets out of Timberwall alive!)