Starfinder Society Scenario #1-12: Ashes of Discovery

NO SPOILERS

Although I've run every Starfinder Society scenario up to this point, Ashes of Discovery is the first time I've been a player in one! This review is based off that experience and reading the scenario after the game. I recognise the criticism some people have online that it's far too easy but, although it may have just been the rum, I had a great time playing it. I don't mind an occasional softball scenario when, like this one, it's designed as an introductory, repeatable scenario with randomized elements. I think it gives players a good taste of everything Starfinder has to offer.

SPOILERS

The premise of Ashes of Discovery is that the Starfinder Society has been contracted by an external organization to explore and secure a staging outpost abandoned centuries ago on a planet in Near Space. After battling what's (essentially) a giant space shark in starship combat, the PCs land on the planet near a village of native inhabitants who can, with good role-playing and the right skill checks, be persuaded to take the PCs to the abandoned outpost. On the way to the outpost, the Starfinders have to survive treacherous weather and rescue a native lost in the storm. The outpost itself has been fortified by an exiled member of the natives and has to be overcome through force.

You probably noticed from the summary above that it's very vague. Which organization contracted the SFS? Which planet is the outpost on? What are the natives like? What kind of storm are they facing? What kind of threats are in the outpost? I had no idea while playing it, but *all* of these elements are randomly determined (or chosen) by the GM prior to the session. The hiring organization, for example, could be AbadarCorp, the Church of Desna, the Hellknights, the Knights of Golarion, the Skyfire Legion, Ulrikka Clanholdings, Veylen Enterprises, or the Xenowardens. The choice has cascade effects on the planet's biome, the outpost's security, the type of storm the PCs must brave, etc. In addition, the GM is given an unusual amount of discretion to customise almost everything about the scenario (including the native inhabitants) to "fit" the randomly determined elements and provide a unique experience for the players. I've played repeatable scenarios with some randomized encounters (like The Commencement and The Confirmation), and I can safely say they have nowhere near the amount of randomly determined elements as this one does. Although the core through-line of the plot is the same, almost everything else is mutable--which is exactly what a repeatable scenario needs!

The scenario starts with a mission briefing by Guidance that concisely explains the goal of exploring the abandoned outpost. It's not particularly memorable, but it does get things moving quickly.

On the way to the planet, the Starfinder's vessel is attacked by a "Besmaran whelp", a living creature the size of a starship that has massive teeth, claws, and a spiked tail. The creature also has some randomly determined special powers. Starship combat has never been a challenge in any of the SFS scenarios I've played (though I've heard that may be changing soon), so after a couple of rounds of combat I had my drug-addicted PC abandon his post for a quick fix and a nap. We still won handily, which is a good indication that the Besmaran whelp was way underpowered. It's a cool *looking* challenge, even though (in practice) it's a cakewalk.

The next part of the scenario is a classic first contact encounter. The starting attitude and interests of the native inhabitants depends heavily on their randomly-determined physical and cultural traits. This is essentially a role-playing and skills challenge, as a certain number of successful checks are required to persuade the natives to help point the way to the outpost. Again, which checks are useful depends on their particular cultural traits, and different classes or races might get bonuses when interacting with them. In the session I played in, the natives were led by solarian elders, so my solarian PC was viewed favorably.

Travelling to the outpost requires surviving randomly-determined weather hazard--it could be anything from rock storms to blasts of hellfire and more. Survival isn't hard, but the idea is to slowly wear down the PCs before they rescue a trapped native and then press on to the outpost.

The outpost features the most dangerous thing in the session: a laser security trap. Traps are appropriately lethal in Starfinder, one of the things I really like about the system. The Exile's special abilities (and motivation) are randomly determined, as are the nature of his minions. The minions only have 6 hp each and are dispatched with laughable ease, and the Exile himself is also a walkover (though he did hit me with a nasty crit--the jerk!). Computers in the outpost contain data that explains why the outpost was abandoned, and the more creative the GM, the more interesting the conclusion will be for the players.

Ashes of Discovery isn't going to impress anyone with it's encounter design or difficulty level, but I thought it was a really clever scenario that (unlike most) encourages GM creativity. I would happily run it or play it again, just to see how different rolls on the tables can change the gameplay.

<GM'd in both tiers in Play-by-Post>

Ashes of Discovery is an odd scenario when compared to most SFS offerings. It has PCs sent to a randomly generated planet to learn the fate of an outpost from a randomly chosen organization, while meeting randomly generated aliens and dealing with randomly flavored hazards. Each time you play it, you're going to be in for a new mission of first contact. That's pretty exciting! Unfortunately, printed space limitations mean that all these variations only affect the "window dressing". The mechanical elements of the scenario vary almost not-at-all, leaving this scenario somewhat unimpressive on repeat playthroughs.

Nevertheless, Ashes is a decent scenario that sends PCs on a journey to do some of the most Starfinder-y things they could be doing: Exploring distant worlds, meeting new aliens, undertaking archeological data-gathering, and more. Its a great introduction to SFS and with a GM willing to put the extra effort in, a great RP and exploration experience. On the other hand, it also has an unsatisfying story (with many unexplained holes), some frustrating railroading and lack of player agency, and it suffers from being incredibly easy (particularly at high tier), so your own mileage may vary.

Based on my experiences GMing and playing at my local gaming store and PaizoCon 2018…

First, making SFS 1-12 a repeatable is excellent. As a GM of a group that plays one-to-two tables of SFS weekly, having another easy go-to scenario that can fit in literally anywhere is great. “Starfinders, Organization A wants you to go to B and tell them about the status of C” is probably the bread and butter of the junior members of the organization, and with SFS 1-12 there’s never a shortage of planets with abandoned outposts that need investigating!

However, in my experience the difficulty of the scenario is way, way down from even The Commencement and Into the Unknown. As of now (having ran and/or played every SFS scenario through 1-15), SFS 1-12 is the easiest scenario, and it isn’t close. While that isn’t in-and-of-itself a bad thing, at no point have any of the encounters (starship or otherwise) proven even something approximating a challenge to the PCs in any of the groups I’ve ran or played in (admittedly all of which have been at the low tier, but one was four level ones). This, along with the overall structure of the scenario, has led to games being wrapped up under the 3-hour mark (closer to two hours of actual game play, in one instance), which, while able to fill a slot at a moment’s notice, limits this scenario to being only that – something you run to make a second table when you’re 15 minutes past starting time on game night.

Don’t get me wrong, the scenario fills a niche, but I wouldn’t be putting this one up for any awards.

The good

First off, I just want to say I love repeatables. I play in a community that is very active, so we quickly burn through scenarios we can play, and then it becomes a rigamaroll to find something that everyone can do. So I really appreciate repeatable because then, at least, we can all play.

And the basis for this scenario is pretty good. A group (there is a table to roll on randomly for the GM, so it is not always the same group) has recently rediscovered an outpost lost 200 years ago, and have hired the Starfinders to go check it out. This makes sense in universe (Starfinders ARE explorers, it makes sense to hire a team of experts). It is also GREAT setup for new players to learn what Starfinder-ing is all about.

Along the way they meet natives (which the GM gets to make up their own alien species, with special abilities from a random chart) and and fight a random magic storm, and whatnot. Even the ultimate fate of the outpost is different from time to time. So one playthrough you might be asked by the knights of Golarian to go to an idylic world and meet kind centaur-like creatures who thank you for destroying a great evil. Another time you might be on a nasty blasted hellscape for the Hellknights, and the aliens could be the Biker Mice from mars!

Really, the only major hiccup is that the storm that the PCs navigate is rather . . . tacked on and not entirely believable. There is a storm that the PCs must navigate in all tiers that just does damage, and it 'can last from hours to weeks' meaning the PCs can't just wait it out . . . And it just so happens to be centered over the outpost? And it's just randomly there, and not the mechanisms of the outpost, and presumably disapates after the PCs complete their mission because they don't have to navigate back OUT of the storm. It just . . . breaks suspension of disbelief. Additionally, that section of the adventure is just a slog to get through, as you just move, make a check, (maybe) take damage, then move again. There's no tactics and you are more or less moving in a straight line.

Other than that, though, fun scenario with a lot of replayability because of all the different types of planets, atmospheres, and aliens you can meet.