In this thrilling kick-off to the new Fly Free or Die Starfinder Adventure Path, a crew of scoundrels, rogues, and misfits finds it hard to survive in a galaxy where everyone has a price. Targeted by a crime boss and his army of enforcers, preyed upon by faceless mega-corporations, and hounded by rivals, the crew of the Free Trader Oliphaunt line up the big score that will at last make them rich beyond their wildest dreams. But when their many enemies join forces and the crew loses it all, they find out there's two things in the galaxy that can't be bought: freedom... and revenge.
It's just another day punching the clock when the player characters, a blue-collar transport crew, are blamed for a bad cargo and stiffed of their bonuses. They take a dangerous job smuggling weapons to a world conquered by militant hobgoblins, but one fiasco later, they're in debt to a crime boss and about to be fired. Their only chance is to steal the Oliphaunt, an experimental cargo hauler with a magical secret, and then survive long enough to collect the payoff!
“We're No Heroes" is a Starfinder Roleplaying Game adventure for four 1st-level characters. It makes an excellent introduction to the game for new players. The adventure begins the Fly Free or Die Adventure Path, a six-part, monthly campaign in which a merchant crew with an experimental starship tries to get rich, escape interplanetary assassins, and outwit their rivals. This volume also includes rules for finding, buying, and selling interstellar cargo (and using the profits to enhance your starship), a collection of deadly threats, and a player's guide that provides advice and new character creation options ideal for this Adventure Path.
Each monthly full-color softcover Starfinder Adventure Path volume contains a new installment of a series of interconnected science-fantasy quests that together create a fully developed plot of sweeping scale and epic challenges. Each 64-page volume of the Starfinder Adventure Path also contains in-depth articles that detail and expand the Starfinder campaign setting and provide new rules, a host of exciting new monsters and alien races, a new planet to explore and starship to pilot, and more!
ISBN: 978-1-64078-282-2
We're No Heroes is sanctioned for use in Starfinder Society Organized Play. The rules for running this Adventure Path and Chronicle sheets are available as a free download (5.3 MB PDF).
Other Resources: This product is also available on the following platforms:
We're No Heroes is a frustrating start to the Fly Free or Die AP. It sets a great tone and has a very cool core concept, but it quickly reveals itself to be very narrow in scope and very determined to deliver a "playable movie" sort of story. I went through it as a player and had a good time leaning into the concept, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't frustrated and emotionally disconnected from the events to a degree that I haven't experienced with other APs.
If I had to characterize We're No Heroes, its as a playable series of improbably persistent no win scenarios, crossed with the typical Starfinder writing and encounter design. Each of the scenarios involve the PCs being given a job, some improbable event causing the job to go bad, the PCs having to do some easy skill checks or combat to salvage the remains, getting some sort of moral choice, and then there being essentially no meaningful consequence for any choice made. The events are written such that there's no way to avoid things "going bad", and no way to turn them around.
It leads to an odd feeling in play. The amount of "things going wrong" is oppressive, but they're never all that hard to resolve. Narratively, the PCs are always down on their luck, but mechanically, you're getting credits and leveling up just fine. You're never in a position where you're really, truly, put on the back foot, and none of the bad twists are a result of your own mistakes - just the author's narrative chugging along. It's a format that delivers the right "feel" but only on a surface level.
Some specific annoyances:
Berry Selling:
Nothing about this scenario makes much sense, from the berries being completely unwanted in the market, to a criminal intermediary sending enforcers to attack the PCs for berries she doesn't even want. It smells like a sandbox of possibilities to establish merchant connections and leverage your social skills, but everything is just a dead end. It actively resists PC problem solving in order to leave them with the moral dilemma at the end.
The Stealing of the Ship:
Level 1 or 2 characters slickly stealing a high value super special experimental ship from right under the noses of a big corporation's highest security is an enormous stretch that requires exceedingly weak foes, humble security measures and incongruously low DCs. However, it's especially baffling in the context of this adventure, which has so far presented nothing but partial failures for even the most innocuous of tasks. It shatters any illusion that there's consistency and fantastical-realism to the world. These tasks are doable for low level PCs because the authors wanted to PCs to get the Oliphaunt, and they thought this would be a fun set piece to give it to them.
-----------
All these complaints said, the adventure definitely establishes that scrappy "feel", that the PCs are nobodies in an unfair universe and rolling with the punches. For a group willing to go along for the ride without thinking too hard, its quite the romp with some fun moral dilemmas to argue about and ponder in character. It has some great art and a wide variety of encounters and challenges.
All in all, a unique adventure, but with some irritations that are likely to break it for some groups.
The writing is disjointed and unclear. In the end, I had to write 5 pages of notes to tighten up the writing and make decisions about who does what and when. I really don't think anyone play tested this all the way through. The timing of the events makes everything happen at once, taking choices away from the players.
The economic parts of the game are silly and defy logic.
Railroad-y to the point of silliness as well, the storyline even comes right out and says, "no matter what choice the characters make, this is the outcome".
The NPC's are not compelling and there wasn't anyone to care about for the most part.
And the "Fly Free or DIE!" has like no flying. None. At all. I had 4 characters with a mix of starship combat skills that didn't get used. But they did die quite a bit in some of the unbalanced combat situations.
Over all, not a fun story.
Atmosphere is everything. And an AP having a plot is not a railroad.
If your group are pampered brats who always expect to win, this starter AP is going to make them incredibly mad. I see so many groups coming up with schemes to try and 'win' this AP. This is the Kobiyashi Maru and you are NOT Kirk (and even then, he cheated). Take your lumps in-character and get over it or find a new AP. But if your group are a bunch of crybabies, then just skip parts 1-2 and go straight to part 3 -- seriously, do NOT get sidetracked trying to come up with ways for them to win parts 1-2. Not only is it thematically not appropriate for the mood trying to be conjured, but you're going to wind up sidetracked. The point is to hijack the ship. That's it. How you get there is irrelevant if you want to come up with your own ideas.
4 stars.
Probably would've been higher but the first 2/3rds of the adventure can be very swingy and lethal. That junkbot at the beginning gets a 2d6 breath weapon with no delay between hits and a slam that does 1d6+5. It will murder you. The Graviton Solarian after that can lay out a party of 4 if the dice go against you.
"Good work," Jackie said, grabbing a cup of coffee from a nearby machine she kept in the cockpit, "I'll take us down. Go wake up the other two, would you?" She asked while sitting down, drinking and finally getting the ship prepared to land while getting permissions to land from ground control. She flipped but button that would alert the crew that re-entry was soon...
"BD514, this is Qabarat Ground Control. Be advised that Tropical Storm Daerunia is currently 30 miles off the coast and it is currently 100% precipitation. Begin your approach along heading 090...."
Jackie comm'd back over to them, "This is BD514, we read you, coming along at heading 090. Thank you." Then flipped her A1 switch, "This is your captain speaking..." Jackie trailed off, like pilots did in old trids. "We are preparing for reentry. We know you had little choice in taking this s#&*ty job but appreciate you not complaining, Thank you." She clipped off.
The VI honked at Jackie and a small receipt was printed off a printer nearby. "5 credits have been deducted from your salary for violating workplace codes against profanity."
This adventure felt quite fresh and unique, offering a scenario I hadn't used before but wouldn't have thought to write.
My players (IC) really enjoyed repeatedly getting screwed over even as their characters hated it - and the payoff at the end worked well.
It does a good job of giving the illusion of choice (you get screwed either way - but you can choose how you get screwed) even though you end up at the same destination.
This is why no one takes "Fight for $15" seriously
You would think I would have learned by now to only expect the worst from these adventure paths but nooooo, I still held out hope for this one. Managed to find a copy of We're No Heroes in my local book store so I sat down and had a read... and even speedreading through it, I had to fight to get through it before putting it back on the shelf in disgust.
Speaking as someone with a decade in logistics and clerical data entry: It was so blindingly obvious that no one working on this adventure ever worked for a logistics company that it hurt my soul. Act One is so contrived that I have to ask how anyone stays in business in the Pact Worlds. The entire thing can and SHOULD be easily resolved by five words: "let me get our lawyer." Seriously, Act One is so unbelievably stupid that it makes the bureaucratic snafu in Act Two hurt even more. Because THAT is something that actually does happen in the business world.
Speaking as a writer: It's clear that the writers started with the third act of the adventure and worked backwards. Because the actual heist where you steal the ship is the most coherent and well-written part of the adventure. It's also quite clear that authors do not even remotely comprehend how much of an impact the magical technology of the Pact Worlds should have on pretty much everything including the lives of the average worker. Tools ALWAYS come before toys.
While I already stated my issues with Act One, I'd be remiss if I didn't remark how dark Act Two got; particularly once the party got to the hobgoblin planet. Christ and I thought Grimmerspace was bleak. Just... why? Why do you pride yourselves on a setting that "isn't about war" and fill it with antagonists that practically beg for an Iomedae-approved thrashing? Seriously, what is wrong with you Paizo?
Struggling and dissapointed trying to use the BD514 map on the virtual tabletop system I and my all over the country players use.
After an hour of trying and failing to get the grids of the ship to match the VTT, we realized the GRIDS ARE NOT SQUARES....seriously. Not only are the grids not truly square, but the 'not squareness' is not even consistent across the map, so adjusting for it with ratio tweaks is a failure too.
Of course problem would be solved or ignorable if the ship had been included in those interactive map pages with the adventure, but for some reason is not...
Have had issues with Paizo maps like this before, and becoming increasingly disheartened by my purchases in the last year.
I hear you. Paizo is a print tabletop roleplaying game publisher. I see the maps as inspirational illustration. The GM can use them to recreate for their game around the table. Paizo has not focused on digital VTT play and has historically used VTT partners to convert the maps and images as best they can. We continue to work to expand and improve our product design for these pandemic times. I don't see Paizo circling back to update already published adventures, but we work to ensure the VTT playability of future products.
How is this adventure? Anyone feel like writing a review? Considering purchasing it but want to know a bit more.
Fun. Not a railroad, but definitely not something I'd recommend for first-timers.
If your players aren't all in on the "This gig sucks" train, they're going to be whining that they're being put in no-win situations. You won't get any gear/disposable income until about 2/3rds of the way through (unless your party are psychos).
