Editor's Note: Ironsworn: Starforged was designed and written by Shawn Tomkin. It can be found on DTRPG.
Character Information Rolls
Name: Talia (88) Bridger (42)
Background: 44, monster hunter
Background Assets: gunner, slayer
Backstory Prompt: 67, you were denied a birthright
Final Asset: Utility Bot
Backstory
Talia was born on the planet Mirage, a humid, rain-soaked planet that keeps its secrets under a thick canopy of vegetation. Secrets such as being the illegitimate child of the wealthiest timber baron's wife in Terminus Space. When the secret became known, Talia was 17 and well on her way to taking over the family business, and it's wealth. Her life was thrown awry when her biological father, another wealthy timber baron on Mirage, revealed her parentage--in front of the entire population of the lumber village. The man she had called father disinherited her on the spot and kicked her out, demanding she leave Mirage forever.
Talia joined up with what she thought was a merchant ship transporting various goods around the Terminus. She soon discovered the ship, and its rambunctious crew, were monster hunters. The captain, a middle aged woman by the name of Breanna Keelan, took Talia under her wing and within a few years the young Talia had become a crack shot with a heavy repeater carbine and an expert in monsters of all kinds.
Background Vow
Rolling on the Character Goal Oracle: 69, seek Redemption. "I vow to one day redeem myself in my family's eyes."
Starship
Starship Name: Sparrowhawk
Starship Acquisition: 95, won in a bet
Ship features: 78, powered by an ancient precursor device;
49, old bloodstain in the airlock reappears even when painted over.
Starship Backstory
Talia won the Sparrowhawk from a fellow monster hunter, Roland Beckett, when they made a bet on who could bring down the Toriddian Sandwurm Matron. Talia found and defeated the monster before Beckett had even begun the hunt.
Background Connection
Cortez (Omega) Creed, a shifty but attractive mercenary who is suspicious of most folk. Wants to build a relationship. Bond track set to dangerous.
Truths
The Forge - The Forge is a perilous and mysterious part of space. The many sectors that make up the Forge are far flung and many people never leave their planet or station. The survivors of the Cataclysm that led our ancestors to the Forge were from various cultures and ethnicities, and in the centuries since our arrival, these cultures have melded and become new, vibrant and multi-faceted. Technology has devolved since the time of the Ancestors and much of what we had was lost. Powerful crime lords, and selfish governing bodies abound in the Forge, and few have the resources to stand up to them.
The Cataclysm - (84) We escaped the ravages of a catastrophic war with (24) religious zealots.
The Exodus - (72) Mysterious alien gates provided instantaneous one-way passage to the Forge.
Communities - (95) We have made our mark in this galaxy, but the energy storms we call balefires threaten to undo that progress, leaving our communities isolated and vulnerable.
Iron - (03) Iron vows are sworn upon remnants of ships that carried our people to the Forge.
Laws - (23) Much of the settled domains are a lawless frontier. Criminal factions and corrupt leaders often hold sway.
Religion - (custom) Because of the religious zealotry that destroyed our home, the people of the Forge have by and large forsaken religion of any kind, trusting instead in their ships, their weapons and their wits. Religion is viewed with disdain by most.
Magic - (12) Magic does not exist.
Communication & Data - (55) Information is life. We rely on spaceborne couriers, members of the Forge Messenger Corp, to transport messages and data across vast distances between settlements. Larger settlements often keep the most recent public data that they have stored on public access terminals, usually in the Messenger Corp station, that citizens can download to their private devices.
Medicine - (43) To help offset a scarcity of medical supplies and knowledge, the resourceful technicians we call riggers create basic organ and limb replacements.
Artificial Intelligence - (06) We no longer have access to advanced computer systems. Instead, we must rely on the seers we call Adepts.
War - (87) War never ends. Talented weaponsmiths and shipwrights craft deadly, high-tech tools of destruction. Dominant factions wield mighty fleets and battle-hardened troops.
Life Forms - (69) Life in the Forge was seeded and engineered by the Essentia, ancient entities who enact their inscrutable will in this galaxy.
Precursors - (51) The Ascendancy, an advanced spacefaring empire, once ruled the entirety of the Forge. Vaults of inscrutable purpose are all that remain to mark the Ascendancy’s legacy, but those places are untethered from our own reality.
Horrors - (100, modified) The strange energies of the Forge give unnatural life to the dead.
Flint's Edge Sector
Editor's Note: The sector map was made using the Sector maker found on the Stargazer app by N. Boughton. It can be found on their site.
All that is known of the Terminus sector known as Flint's Edge is that it is one of the last sectors settled by the Ancestors. The sector was mapped and settled by one of the early pioneers, a man named Drythan Flint. The pioneer gave his name to both the sector and to the warm yellow star that brightens the dim stretch of space.
Drythan's people settled first on the singular habitable planet, which they named Demeter after Drythan's daughter and successor. The jungle planet is covered in thick canopies and broad, sweeping rivers. The Ancestors soon learned, however, that the flora and fauna of the planet were vicious and unwelcoming. Now, only a few outposts remain on the planet. The rest of the people either departed for more welcoming sectors or live in the deep space station called Deception.
Deception specializes in agriculture and risk management. If you need food, or mercenaries, Deception is the place to go. The government, however, is corrupt and many of the people live in squalor on the lowest levels of the station.
Glimpse the Hoard: Flint was the surname I gave to my very first Ironsworn character, Toran Flint. My head canon is that Drythan and Demeter Flint were Toran's descendants. Thus, Flint's Edge evokes (for me) memories of that first experience with the Ironsworn system.
The first entry in Talia Bridger's adventure in the Forge will begin next Tuesday with Ship Log 1: Who's Askin'?
Check out my interview with Tavon Gatling, the creator of the adventure we will be playing for this mini-series! You can find it here.
Affiliate Note: The Dragon's Den is an affiliate of DriveThruRPG and receives a small amount of kickback whenever you purchase something using the provided DriveThruRPG links. Its a way for you to passively support the blog! Thank you for all of your support!
