Foes and Encounters

PART FOUR: FOES AND ENCOUNTERS

An NPC (non-player character/creature) is anyone who inhabits your setting other than your character and those portrayed by your fellow players. They can be a person, being or creature. You will roleplay your interactions with NPCs, and make moves when you attempt to influence them, aid them, gain their help, or act against them.

Components of an NPC

Because gameplay in Ironsworn is centered on the abilities and actions of your character, NPCs are primarily represented through your fiction rather than mechanics. They don’t have stats, assets, or tracks. Instead, the sample NPCs in this chapter include some broad details to help guide their actions and the threat they pose in combat.

When you interact with an NPC, envision their personality and motivations. A brutish character leverages their strength, or attempts to bully and intimidate. A sly character acts through manipulation or trickery. A noble character behaves according to her sense of honor. An animal, depending on its disposition, may attack when threatened or may run away. A supernatural being may act with mindless malice and hate for the living, or may have more complex needs. When you are unsure of an NPC’s traits or next action, Ask the Oracle. Then, envision what they do and make moves to aid or oppose them as appropriate.

Rank

NPCs have a single mechanical attribute, their rank. From this, their ability to resist and inflict harm in combat is derived, as follows:

When you engage a foe in combat, give them a standard progress track (10 boxes). When you Strike or Clash and inflict harm, mark progress for each point of harm based on the foe’s rank. For example, you mark 2 ticks for each point of harm inflicted on an extreme foe, and 2 progress (2 full boxes) for each point of harm against a dangerous foe.

When you fail to defend against a foe’s attack and face physical harm, you make the Endure Harm move. As part of that move, you reduce your health track by the amount of harm your foe inflicts, per their rank.

If appropriate to the NPC, they can also inflict stress equal to their rank when you fail to resist an action which frightens, demoralizes, or rattles you.

Use the End the Fight move, adding your progress against this foe, when you attempt to resolve the combat.

The ranks for the sample NPCs represent a typical individual of that type. For unusually powerful NPCs, increase their rank by one (to a maximum of epic). For less powerful foes, decrease their rank by one (to a minimum of troublesome). You can also adjust the rank of a foe when circumstances give you significant narrative disadvantage or advantage before the fight.

Features

These are the typical characteristics of appearance and personality for an NPC. They are not universally true, especially within diverse societies, but can provide some common impressions as a starting point.

Drives

Drives reflect the motivations and instincts of an NPC. For creatures, these are relatively simple: Hunt, eat, defend territory. For intelligent beings, drives are the typical goals and beliefs of their society, but do not represent the complex range of motivations you will encounter. Drives are a starting place, giving you the rough outline of a typical NPC to be fleshed out (or contradicted) appropriate to their role in the fiction.

NPCs who are prominent in your campaign will have more detail. Depending on their role in your story, their drives may support—or conflict with—your own goals. As you discover details about an important NPC, make note of it. Look for opportunities to introduce interesting and surprising backstories and motivations for these characters.

Tactics

Tactics provide a reference for how an NPC might act in combat. These give you a sense of typical maneuvers, but do not represent the possibilities of a complex and dramatic combat scene. You should let NPC actions flow out of the fiction. What is the situation? What is their goal? What will add to the excitement and danger of this moment? Make it happen. When in doubt, Ask the Oracle.

Your foes should do more than simply try to inflict harm. A fearsome roar or demoralizing boast might cause you to Endure Stress. Tactical maneuvers reduce your momentum. Fictional complications—the appearance of new foes, putting companions or allies at risk, or a realization that undermines your quest—will heighten the drama of the scene.

NPC Packs

When you fight a group of troublesome or dangerous foes, you may combine them into a single progress track. This is called a pack. It’s more convenient than tracking progress for each individual foe, and the scene will move faster.

When you group foes into a pack, increase their rank to represent their combined ability to inflict and resist harm. For a small pack (about 3 to 5), increase the rank by one. For a large pack (about 6 to 10) increase the rank by two. For example, a pack of 4 troublesome foes are treated as a single dangerous foe. If you are facing more than 10 troublesome or dangerous foes, you can group them into smaller packs and associated progress tracks.

When you inflict harm on the pack, you can envision it as appropriate to the fiction. You might wound them, put one or more of them out of action, or drive some back. When you successfully End the Fight, you have defeated the last of them, or broken their fighting spirit.

Formidable, extreme, and epic foes may not be grouped into a pack. Each must have its own progress track.

Joining Forces with NPCs

If your story leads you to cooperating with helper NPCs to overcome challenges, you need to consider how they impact the fiction and your moves. NPCs—unless they are a companion asset—won’t give you mechanical bonuses on your moves. They also won’t make moves of their own. They are simply a part of your story, perhaps impacting the moves you make, the results of those moves, and the rank of your challenges. Gaining the aid of an important NPC might also allow you to Reach a Milestone.

For example:

• If you are charged with protecting NPCs, they might be placed in danger or suffer losses as a result of your failures on moves.
• If you are fighting alongside NPCs, you can reduce the rank of your foes. For example, battling alone against a large pack of raiders might be an extreme challenge. If you are aided by a stalwart band of villagers, you could shift the enemies’ rank to formidable.
• If you are being led by an experienced scout, you might choose to skip the Undertake a Journey move, or reduce the rank of the journey.
• If an NPC leader agrees to support your quest by allowing passage through contested lands, you might Reach a Milestone and mark progress.

As with any NPC, you can Ask the Oracle to see how a helper NPC responds, how they fare in a challenge, or what they do next. You can make moves to influence them, such as Compel. If you develop a strong relationship through your story, or if you Fulfill Your Vow in their service, you can choose to Forge a Bond.

In short, make them characters, not numbers. Give them personalities. Give them quirks and motivations. Let them impact your story and your quests, for better or worse, but always keep the focus on your character and your allies.

Creating NPCs

You should create NPCs that fit your version of the setting, enhance your story, and enrich your character’s adventures. Because NPCs don’t have mechanical detail, it’s easy to bring them to life without advance preparation.

If you face an NPC in combat, give them a rank. If you like, you can also make note of their drives and tactics. Otherwise, their motivations, abilities, and actions are entirely part of your fiction. They may ignore you, aid you, or oppose you. Make moves to resolve your intentions with them as appropriate. Springboard off those moves with new details and complications to flesh out these characters.

For reoccurring NPCs, make note of what you learn of them over time. If you share a bond, mark it down.

Sample NPC

Wyvern

Wyvern’s Rank

• Extreme (2 ticks per harm; inflicts 4 harm)

Wyvern’s Features

• Huge, bat-like wings
• Rows of knife-sized teeth
• Thick hide with a metallic sheen
• Long tail

Wyvern’s Drives

• Watch for prey from high above
• Feed

Wyvern’s Tactics

• Swoop down
• Snap up prey
• Fearsome roar
• Bash with tail