The Power of Asset Cards

Building a Deck of Asset Cards

Besides the fact that cards are fun to collect, Asset cards play an important role in the game mechanics for The Untrodden Ways, an Ironsworn game-engine based role playing game. 

  • Asset cards enhance your character
  • Asset cards change the play mechanics dynamic,  and
  • Asset cards bring friendly NPC characters into focus.

As you start your next adventure on the Untrodden Ways, take stock of your character’s Asset cards.  If needed, use a Move or fiction to modify your character’s Asset card deck.

Asset Cards

Asset Cards Enhance your Character

When you create your character for the Untrodden Ways, you pick three Asset cards to represent your character’s personality, skills, philosophies, weapons/tools, companions, and more.

We are working on a new character for the next Quick Quests adventure module. Her name is Kari Woodengown. Kari has a big heart and is quick on her feet. She lives in a city but is within a short drive to Texas’ dry southlands. Her wealthy father is the CEO and owner of a large agri-business and ranch. She’s worked on the ranch and is familiar with all the animals.

For her character sheet, we’ll distribute Kari’s stats primarily to her Heart and Edge. That means she’ll be low on Iron. The Core Stats give us ‘what Kari is’, but they don’t tell us ‘who Kari is’. The Asset cards will complete our picture.

Looking at the entire deck of Asset cards, these cards seem like a good fit for Kari Woodengown.

  • Companion, Horse
  • Path, Entitled
  • Path, Improviser
  • Path, Forest Folk Friend
  • Path, Rider
  • Path, Animal Kin
  • Enchanted Item, Woodengown*
  • Enchanted Item, Summoning Stick*
  • Enchanted Item, Copper Leaf*
  • Enchanted Item, Silver Leaf*
  • Enchanted Item, Golden Apple*
  • Companion, Speaking Blue Bull*
  • Weapon, Slide-action Shotgun
  • Tool, Hatchet

*new unpublished cards

From that list of Asset cards, we can pick three.

  1. Path, Entitled
  2. Enchanted Item, Woodengown
  3. (saving for her NPC companion)

Path, Entitled

Kari’s character arc is about losing her Entitlement and regaining it through a quest. The third bullet on the Asset card perfectly illustrates who Kari is “When you forgo your title or lineage and Forge a Bond as an equal, or when you Swear a Vow to serve someone of a lower station, add +1 and take +1 momentum or +1 spirit on a hit.”

Enchanted Item, Woodengown

This is a new Asset card for the Kari Woodengown Quick Quest. A woodengown is the common name for a Greensward Elven Living Armor. Thin as cloth but strong as steel, a woodengown is a weapon that draws its power from the sun and lives on water like a plant. It makes up for Kari’s weaker Iron core stat. When Kari finds her woodengown, it has been neglected and near death. She’ll need to invest Heal/Fix moves to bring it back to full strength. This will be one of her vows.

As you can see, the Asset cards I picked both fit Kari’s personality and help me expand her backstory.

Asset Cards bring friendly NPC Characters into Focus

For Kari’s last Asset card, we want to pick a companion to assist her. Living and working on a ranch, Kari has access to horses and hounds. On the ranch, they regularly lead hunters on local safaris. Kari could also have Asset cards for Weapon, Slide-action Shotgun or Tool, Hatchet (not companions but worth mentioning).

On the ranch, Kari befriended a speaking-animal called a ‘nilgai’ or blue bull. The Great Blue Bull helps her throughout the quest. This is a new Asset card for the Kari Woodengown Quick Quest. We will add the Companion, Speaking Blue Bull Asset card as Kari’s third and final starting Asset card.

The Great Blue Bull is a powerful magic user. Throughout Kari’s quick quest, she will have the opportunity to accumulate more enchanted items.

Great Blue Bull V1g
Iron-racked Giant

Asset Cards Change the Play Mechanics

There is a great example of Asset cards changing the dynamic of game play in the Ask the Oracle – The Official Ironsworn RPG Podcast. If you haven’t listened to Ask the Oracle yet, follow the link to Spotify.

One of the characters in the podcast’s campaign has a magic sword and follows the Keen path. In podcast episode 9 at 30:00, the adventurers encounter an Iron-racked Giant (see the free Iron-racked Giant NPC sheet). At 37:37, listen as Matt (one of the podcasters) adds up all the harm his character can inflict. Harm that was enhanced by the Asset cards he picked for his character.

The Asset cards changed the outcome of the battle and gave the characters a chance to defeat an Extreme foe. Choose your Asset cards wisely as they can benefit or hinder your character’s quest in interesting ways.

Always Free Asset cards

When we adopted Ironsworn’s game-engine for the Untrodden Ways, we made a pledge to keep our Asset cards always free for our customers. With each publication, we increase the size of our Asset card deck. 

In addition to the Asset cards directly related to the story in the adventure module, we always publish a handful of Asset cards unrelated to the story that could enhance or take the adventure in unexpected directions.

Ironsworn RPG, Starforged, and The Untrodden Ways Playing cards

If you are ready to start on The Untrodden Ways, you’ll need The Player’s Guide and one of our adventure modules. We suggest you start with The Untrodden Ways: White Bluff.