The First City: An Ironsworn Actual Play (Session 1)
Our story begins
In the previous entry of this series, we created our player character and finished setting up our campaign. In session 1, we’ll witness the start of Lucia’s story!
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. Skilled with a bow and arrow and burdened with disreputable ancestry, she is as resentful of Ironland society as Ironland society is of her.
Player Character Sheet
Lucia of the Havens
Experience: 0
Edge: 2 | Heart: 3 | Iron: 1 | Shadow: 1 | Wits: 2
Health: +5 | Spirit: +5 | Supply: +5
Momentum: +2
Debilities: None
Bonds: 0
Assets
Archer
Abilities:
[X|_|_]Fated
Abilities:
[X|_|_]Hound
Name: Kormak
Health: +4
Abilities:
[_|_|X]LoyalVows
To found the first city of the Ironlands
Rank: epic
Progress: 0/10
Gameplay
🎲 Moves and Action Rolls
In Ironsworn, moves are the primary mechanism by which you take action in the game. Depending on your narrative situation, you may choose a relevant move (all the moves are explained in the Ironsworn rulebook) and then take an action roll.
An action roll involves an action score, which is equal to 1d6 (your action die) plus the value of one of your stats (Heart, Wits, etc.) plus an extra add value (if any). You must compare your action score to two separate challenge dice, which are each 1d10.
An action score greater than both challenge dice (individually) results in a strong hit. An action score greater than one challenge die results in a weak hit. An action score greater than neither challenge die results in a miss.
Lucia is hunting in the forest by herself.1
She gets an uneasy feeling that something is wrong.
She looks around, trying to sense what’s amiss.
Secure an Advantage
(assess a situation through observation)
[1] + Wits(2) = 3 >>> <3> <7>
MISSPay the Price
Lucia gets distracted and fails to notice anything unusual.
(continued below)
As Lucia makes to leave the forest, she’s distracted by SOMETHING,2 and a young man bursts suddenly out of the surrounding trees and runs into her, knocking her over. She takes 10 embarrassment points.3
(continued)
Pay the Price (continued)
As a result of her distraction, Lucia is knocked to the ground and becomes flustered.
Momentum: +2 ==> +1
The young man is extremely apologetic. He’s dressed like a merchant and has a soft and naive air about him. He introduces himself as Pendry.4
Pendry says that he was traveling across the Havens and sought shelter in the forest but got lost and has been hearing troubling noises in the trees.
Lucia agrees to lead Pendry out of the forest, but as the two of them turn to leave, they hear something large and horrific approaching.
Lucia tries to ascertain where the sound is coming from and steel herself.
Secure an Advantage
(assess a situation through observation)
[6] + Wits(2) = 8 >>> <8> <9>
MISS(continued below)
An elder beast bursts out of the trees—a giant bear, terrifying to behold and roaring with rage (challenge rank: extreme).
(continued)
Pay the Price
Lucia isn't prepared for what she sees, and her heart quails in fear at the sight of the monstrous beast.
Spirit: +5 ==> +1
Endure Stress
(face mental shock)
[3] + Heart(3) = 6 >>> <5> <10>
WEAK HIT
Commentary
Boy, the dice rolls in this game are unforgiving! Two misses in a row aren’t a great start, but luckily, those moves weren’t for anything too consequential.
I kept this first session short to make it a gentle introduction to our campaign. Hopefully, the way I’m notating my moves and dice rolls is fairly intuitive.
This session ends with our hero and the strange young man she’s just met being attacked by an elder beast. According to our truth for Beasts, the beasts of old are only legends, which is why the appearance of this giant bear is so shocking for poor Lucia.
I set up this scene as a way to incorporate our Quest Starter for Beasts into our story. We’ll see whether my plans for this storyline pan out!
Quest Starter: You were witness to an attack by what you thought was an animal of monstrous proportions. No one believes you. In fact, you are accused of the murder you blame on this beast. How can you prove your innocence? Can you even trust your own memories of the event?
Challenge Progress
For our Quest Starter challenge, we need to incorporate into our narrative every Quest Starter prompt associated with our truths and starting Ironlands region.
We made no new progress in this session.
[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[ ]8: Religion[ ]9: Firstborn[ ]10: Beasts[ ]11: Horrors[ ]12: The Havens
Coming Up Next
In session 2, we’ll see how Lucia survives her encounter with this terrifying beast of legend.
Lucia has a Hound companion asset—Kormak—who should be with her at most times during the game. I had a vision for this first scene, though, that I thought would work better if Lucia were by herself, so narratively, we’re going to say that she left Kormak home while she went out to hunt. After all, someone needs to protect the house while she’s away, right?
Words in ALL CAPS are placeholders for ideas I’ll fill in later when I expand these outlines into a more novelistic account. While playing the game, I’m going to try to keep things moving and not get stuck on details.
Bonus points if you know what this is a reference to!
For readers with a good memory, “Pendry” is one of the names I rejected for our player character during character creation. The same goes for “Kormak,” our hound’s name. I felt guilty about taking a mulligan on those dice rolls, so I put the rejected names into a pool that I’ll try to draw from for other characters in our story.