I have been playing Ironsworn: Starforged for a couple of weeks now. I love how its open-to-interpretation rules push me to build a dynamic world, allow myself to be surprised, and take weirder gaming risks. The starter downloads for both Ironsworn and Ironsworn Starforged are free, so I definitely recommend checking it out.
Here are a few of my tips for Starforged.
You'll be rolling on many oracles (random tables) to answer questions and dealing with many open-ended moves. Instead of saying X happened, Y oracle result, or Z move outcome in your notes, try capturing how your character would witness or uncover it.
In my campaign, I followed the instructions for setting up a sector using my own sector creation tool. When my other starting rolls determined that there was a lot of cult activity in my starting area, and someone close to me was in that cult, I decided it was my character's own parents. The effect this has is that my character is in the dark about the world around them. There are other habitable planets, settlements, and well-travelled paths between them, but my character doesn't know about them yet. This is purely a POV narrative choice to make things more interesting.
It can be easy to fill in too much of the narrative based on popular media, our own experiences, or where we want to see things go, even veering toward the comfortable area of tropes to help fill things in. But sometimes, that's the best time to stop yourself and make a roll. Does the hero get away with the beautiful NPC, or is there a complication? The more interesting bits of gameplay and narrative can be hidden within the complications we allow to surface.
Don't dictate rigid outcomes for yourself.
Recently, my character got in a big raider battle with an NPC, and they were growing close to dying. I rolled extremely poorly (and chose poor moves in hindsight,) and the NPC almost died. I debated just filling in how they survived after the battle and how things progressed afterward. Instead, I trusted the dice to tell me if they made it through. And when the dice threw another complication our way, bringing them closer to death, it actually strengthened the bond between character and NPC in a much more meaningful way when I found a more creative outcome supported by oracles, moves, and a well-timed advancement.
Each time I explore a new aspect of the game, I start small. I don't want the stakes to be huge the first time I use a certain move or oracle and then realize I misunderstood it (one of the game's downfalls is that it can be exceptionally wordy). For instance, I intentionally made the first area I went to smaller. Even then, when the oracles directed my character to discover that the area was larger than it initially seemed, I opted to come back later.
I'm a creative person. At first, I thought this meant I should challenge myself to think of interesting things instead of using the oracles. Oracles are excellent tools, though, for solo play and for breaking writer’s block. They provide prompts that can inspire interesting plot twists, new characters, or unforeseen obstacles. Using oracles is not about strict randomness but about giving your story a push in unexpected directions.
Every time my character fails, I imagine them growing in some way, too. Failures are story opportunities. A game or story with no complication, setback, or challenge isn't much of a story or game. Failures shouldn't be roadblocks, either. They can just mean one door closes, and another opens.
The best sessions I've had so far were the ones where I went in without much of a plan and just saw what happened.
To me, the game is basically a glorified writing aid. That being said, even if you weren't interested in using it as such your story will grow very quickly. NPCs, locations, items, plot points, factions... it adds up. As soon as you want to return to a previous location from several sessions ago, you'll know what I mean.
Given all of my previous tips, it makes sense to just jump in and trust the oracles. That being said though, there can be something good to just playing around with some of the world-building tools before getting going with a session and seeing where that takes you. I had a really fun session where I played around with creature tables, the core oracle, and some locations, thinking about what the planet we were on was like. I didn't introduce any of the things the oracle revealed for me until a full session later, but it ended up being pretty cool.
Before a session, I used tables to create a giant serpentine water monster. I also rolled on a table that insinuated to me there was a desert area and crashed ships. Later on, my character encountered a great crash site where the skeleton of a creature still had the remnants of a ship stuck in its jaws. All of the pieces came together.
Some of the most innocuous content out there to add to any TTRPG is a random table of some sort. They're a dime a dozen, and you can tell if it's for you your game with a quick skim. Starforged provides a lot of great oracle tables, but they aren't exhaustive. Some of my favourites to add to the game so far have been the Starsmith Expanded Oracles by Eric Bright. In particular, the item tables have added some great flavour and narrative interest.
If you're struggling or don't know what to do, take a break. The game rewards this by giving you momentum when you stop and start sessions. Momentum can be a valuable roll in influencing your rolls.
A big tip I have is to not be afraid to break out of the rules if need be, or do things it doesn't tell you to do. For example, I've been doing hex crawls when I land on a planet. There aren't really any rules for this, so I just roll for expedition rules on each hex. I find it more fun to explore areas this way, but it's not a core part of the game.
