I created a small random table for the Root Around move that allows the player(s) to mechanically explore their town (going to shops & restaurants, visiting helpful townies, finding inspiration, etc), and I wanted to share it. I hope people find it helpful if they use it.
This game is an absolute gem! I'm about one season into my solo campaign, and just played a co-op game with a friend tonight. It has brought me so much joy and calm in a stressful season, and I cannot recommend it enough. It's easy to pick up, easy to teach, and so much fun to play in both co-op and solo mode. If you're a Stardew fan looking for a tabletop alternative, or just someone looking for a way to unwind and stretch the creative, playful side of your brain, I'd highly recommend picking up a copy!
As a side note, regarding printing, once I worked through a couple weeks, I haven't had any trouble running solo sessions with just the player sheets and the moves, though I'll occasionally pull up the oracles on my laptop or to reference certain holidays. I also suspect it would be easy to track promises in a dot-grid journal, which is what I plan to switch to once I've made it all the way through the journal I'm writing in currently.
Such a wholesome game! It feels like playing an indie. I didn't expect to find such a good game when trying to emulate the Stardew with an roleplaying game. <3
the entire IV system has yet to make it to the table, but the Oracle tables are BY FAR the best low impact tables out there! They are worth every penny of the price just for them. I’m currently using them to run my Apthecaria game. Works perfectly.
I would buy a physical book version of this immediately!! wow wow wow, this really seems like a lovely, soft, wholesome, and cute. I looked into printing this out, but dang, all print places are so expensive.
Hey there! New player here. I absolutely love the vibes of the game and how simple but deep the promises systems works for this!
I do have a suggestion though regarding Make a Promise. Rather than determining the number of progress boxes based on Complexity X Urgency, I suggest determining it by Complexity X Scale instead (Or Quality X Quantity). I found the original system kind of paradoxical in that more urgent matters took more progress boxes to fulfil which meant that they took more time to complete despite being more urgent.
But that's just a suggestion. I appreciate all the hard work that went into this thing and hope y'all have a good time!
tl;dr edit: "complexity" represents how difficult the task is, while "urgency/importance" represents how much achieving the goal means to you.
One thing that I've found helps me conceptualize my promises when I'm playing is to reframe "urgency" as "importance". It's pretty much an identical concept, and unlike adding something like "scale" it doesn't overlap with the idea of complexity. A big task means it's got more things to do, which I would say means a higher complexity score. But an important task doesn't say anything about how much there is to do, just how much completing that goal is weighing on you.
This works for me for two reasons: one, literally all I need to do is change "urgent" to "important". "laid back" and "critical" still make perfect sense when you're talking about just importance instead of importance+time-sensitivity. And two, having more promise boxes to fill means you'll spend more time thinking about it or working on it, which has the emergent effect of it feeling more important. If the goal is important, you'll put more attention into completing it, right?
Hi! Love the game, got a quick question regarding Reap the Benefits and Progress Tracks.
Can you fulfill a promise and Reap the Benefits without filling all the boxes on the progress track, similar to how you could fulfill a vow early in Ironsworn? With the consequence in this case just being less rewards?
Apologies if this is covered in the book, I thought to have looked through but couldn't find an answer anywhere.
Hey! Will there be combat mechanics later on? This is pretty much exactly what I'm looking for, but I'm itching to play something like Rune Factory or the My Time series :D
You should probably look at the rules for Ironsworn, the game this is based off of. It might take some work and hacking things together, since actual conflict seems to be against the purpose of this game, but it's the whole core of Ironsworn. I don't think you're likely to get official combat rules for Iron Valley, unfortunately.
Thank you for your question~ 🌸 I'm also a huge fan of Rune Factory so I totally get you! I do want to clarify that you can do combat in IV, it would be a Try Your Best!! roll. That being said, IV is meant to be more about personal conflict and relationship-building, so crunchy combat with armor classes and to-hit dice is kind of out of the scope at the moment.
Of course, I will never say never to adding combat because one day I might get a spark of inspiration in the middle of a walk/shower and realize how to add dungeons to this game. Same goes for adding a more in-depth farming simulation aspect. There is a lot of room for IV to grow as you can see~
I hope this answer helps, don't hesitate to ask or reach out to me 💚
It's good! I wouldn't mind at all if any hypothetical combat add on wasn't crunchy, would go against the spirit of Ironsworn and Iron Valley. Thanks for the reply ☺️
Before I even get to playing yet, I wanna say: the writing in the rulebook is a delight. You have the perfect Cozy Tone and sense of humour. Actually, I also find the order it's written to be incredibly nice, as well. Links to other sections are perfectly placed, and I thought I needed to know what skills/stats/options/traits the town experience had before I started playing (the Truths sections) but you know what? You were right! I was already scheming in my head anyway, and I did not need to know much more than what I wanted out of this game before we got to these questions. OK maybe I could have used a lil bit on how items worked first, but I ended up rolling on the oracles by rolling a number and then choosing the most appealing answer from any of the item lists, repeat 3 times total, and I think that's going to turn out just fine.
ALSO ALSO, unlike the robust roleplaying games (with more firm rules, especially when multiplayer-centric) I actually uh... read most of the rulebook in one night just fine without overwhelm. Not all at once mind you, but it was a really nice change from the slogs I'm used to when the books are longer~
PS:I'm using another solo game establishing a character already, and decided to magically slip them between worlds to Iron Valley when their time there is done at the built-in end of the game. That's why I'm not playing this one quite yet c:
Thank you!! I'm a fiction author so a little bit of my writing voice got in there. I'm happy to hear that the fun I had writing the book shone through! It just makes me smile that the book flows well. I have had my share of experiences trying to read a TTRPG book and it feeling like a chore. Reading a book like this in one sitting is no small feat!
Once again, thank you so much for this lovely comment! Don't hesitate to reach out or ask more questions once you are ready to step into the Valley~ 💚👩🌾🥕
This is absolutely delightful. Someone on Reddit recommended the game as his favorite "happy-place game"so I had to check it out!
I'm lately just discovering "cozy" games - found an MMO today called Palia that's got a similar vibe to this.
I know you said a printout isn't really necessary but I love the art style (It's Honest Work is my favorite little thing) and I would love to have a print copy somehow. Sadly it would be pretty costly to print in color at home, or to order in full color from Lulu or PrintMe1. If the opportunity ever presents itself for you to offer an affordable PoD through one of those services or your own means, I promise I'd buy a copy.
psst, some libraries offer affordable printing on regular printer paper like you'd use at home. It may take a few visits due to reasonable limits on it, but it could be available if that's accessible to you. Mine offers free X pages per week with my card, another one charged like a few cents USD per, what, 10 pages for colour, maybe? :3
Hi there! I love this project and the possibilities and the setting and the vibes, great work!
I need advice tho, I am very bad at playing solo, I immediatelly got stumped at the first "Time Passes" roll... so... any help in how to define what happens?
I really want to play solo but this is the the point that always stop me, being unable to define what happens next
Any help is appreciated, and again, this is a great game, great setting, I will be looking closely for any update on this project
Solo role-playing can be hard, so don't feel bad! I would be delighted to help you. 🌷🌼🌻
First, context for anyone reading this answer in the future: Time Passes is the move that is triggered any time your character loses track of time, usually as part of a weak hit or a miss on an action roll. This move calls for you to 'envision how your character loses track of time'.
Now, one of the coolest things about solo role-playing is that you can be as detailed or as brief as you want, you are ultimately the boss and as long as you're having fun then you're doing it right. That being said, I've seen two kinds of approaches to dealing with Time Passes, some players like a macro approach while others prefer a micro one.
The macro approach: if you think something dramatic should cause you to lose track of time or prefer lots of drama in your stories, when you lose track of time either (a) envision something bad/dramatic to get in the way or (b) roll on an oracle to get inspiration; preferably action+theme. This approach is very involved and considerably slows down game-play, but players who love twists at every turn swear by it.
The micro approach: treat losing track of time as a transition between scenes in a movie, the camera fades to black... and then it's hours later in the narrative. Players who like the micro approach don't worry a lot about the little things that happened in between. They only 'zoom in' on moments like these when they think they are important. Otherwise they just accept they lost track of time and move on to the next story beat or action.
As you can see, there's a lot of flexibility here! Personally I use them both. I like to really think about the consequences of a big roll, but when it comes to small things I skip right past 'em. In here lies the power of solo role-playing: you have the freedom to decide how much detail you want.
I hope this comment helps! Please don't hesitate to reach out if you have more questions~
PS: Remember that if you are ever at a loss, there are a lot of oracle tables at the end of the book filled with ideas just a dice-roll away~
I was frustrated with the progress / vow system in Ironsworn, but it looks IDEAL for this game. This might actually be a better use of that mechanic than the original! Excited to dig deeper into this. Smart idea!
Hi there! I just did another play through video of Iron Valley, this time I try using it to play Stardew Valley and complete the bundles to fix the community center. It was a fun time and I made some good progress. Feel free to check it out here:
I've been loving this game and don't feel like it needs anything else, but there's some notes on your site and in the book about how you have more planned for the game and I'm curious if that's still the case. (Absolutely no pressure, though! If you never put out another update, it will still continue to bring me joy and delight.)
There's definitely updates in the future! Romance and marriage can still be expanded on and there is lots of room to add a "museum" system and I really wanna explore that. Aside from those, there's also a couple typos and I really want to make the book (a) more clear and (b) have play examples!
That being said, I'm working on quite a few things so I can't make a promise as to when this will come out, I recommend following me / my stream to stay up to date on what I'm working on! My current project (coming out this month) is an Ironsworn hack in the style of Monster Hunter ♥
The game looks so awesome but Is there a condensed version anywhere? I'd love to print it out but the font and format seems really big and spread out and would cost a bit to print with it being so many pages.
Hi there! Unfortunately at this moment there is no version of the book like that. You could print 2 book pages per real page, since the book was formatted for 6x9, though I'm not sure if this would work. I'm very touched that you would want to print my game.
That being said, if you wanted to print the book for reference while playing, I honestly don't think you need to do that! Once you get a handle on the rules the game pretty much plays itself. The only things I would strongly recommend printing is the move reference sheet and the oracles, since these are the two things you are guaranteed to need on a play-by-play basis! Hope that helps 👍
I'm not affiliated at all with Iron Valley, but I just want to second what the author said: almost all the references you need are on the printable reference sheets and fillable forms. I have the "game creation" worksheet and three* move sheets printed out single-sided because I don't like flipping pages, but you can easily condense those down to two pieces of paper by printing double-sided. Those plus the calendar (which I have as one double-sided sheet, because I only need to see one season at a time) cover pretty much everything!
Since my first session, I've only brought up the book while playing if I want to use one of the many roll tables (which you can use one of the handy oracle sites for instead) or I need to check details on one of the festival days.
*Edit: I just remembered, I think I might have condensed the move sheets into fewer pages by putting more of the tables on each page? So if you do it as-is, it's probably more than 3, but you can easily combine them to fewer printings.
Do you have any suggestions on how to narrate the very beginning of the story? I always have difficulty with this, and its not detailed much in the rules. Thanks in advance if you do <3.
(A) The Long Way Envision your character leaving the place they were in and the steps they take to get to the Valley. You don't have to do role-play or even big scenes, just go step by step the same way that I person would recall a trip. This is not my favorite way to do it, but it helps some players to have the chronological series of events. That leads to them ending up in the Valley.
(B) The Short Way Or you could also just... start right at the Valley. As a fiction author, I'm a big fan of just skipping to the fun part. Most of my actual-play sessions of Iron Valley have started with my character literally getting off a Taxi/Bus and finding themselves in the town. Anything that happened before that we need to come up with can usually be communicated in the form of brief flashbacks.
Bonus tip(s)! Remember that as part of character creation you have a series of truths that define why your character is in the Valley and where they are staying! These starting promises are a great way to direct your first days of play since your character is getting their bearings around town. Also, remember that this game is about the journey, the act of discovery, and seeing what happens--and as long as you are having fun then you are playing it right.
so far this game has been very fun. i moved into town, did some farming and fishing. opened up a fortune telling shop and traded a week's worth of tarot readings for a cow. am i doing it right? it feels right. thanks for the cool hack!
Where is the site to get fillable character sheets? I have scoured to try and find it but can't. Also, as a blind gamer, from a first glance at the main book, thank you for properly tagging this. I have just gotten this thanks to someone mentioning it on the Solo RPG reddit post about Solitaria and wanted to check it out because I'm a sucker for Animal Crossing esque games. Thanks for this. I'll report back if I run into any issues and my screen reader, hee.
Hi! I love the idea of this game so much. But I did think your animal ancestry table was a little overwhelming, so I made one based on canon Animal Crossing characters, according to this site (https://animalcrossing.fandom.com/wiki/Species). All regular villagers are listed twice, and all special characters are listed once. That left one spot open, so it can be a robotic version of another animal or a human, since canon AC has only the PC as a human. Thank you for making such an amazing game! I can’t wait until I have appropriate time to play it!
A very well-designed and well-written game to play some Stardew Valley/Harvest Moon with all the advantages of TTRPG (freedom !). Can't wait to test that !
This game is so good, I love it so much that I have downloaded it on three different devices! You really can play this anyway you want or even with friends
I personally suggest this as a solo ttrpg on GoodNotes :)
Iron Valley is so cute, so colorful, so trans rights, so anti-capitalist. It's truly the chill, relaxing, full of love game we all need sometimes. It's super duper that it's name your own price, accessibility rules! That said, I did pay real money for this, and I use the oracles all the time for everything and every game.
Thank you so much for this lovely message!! These are all the things I wanted Iron Valley to be and I'm happy other people see that as well. Thank you for supporting my little game 🙇♀️💚
I’ve been going through so much recently and the escape this game has provided has been immeasurable. Thank you for making it accessible as name your own price, thank you for making the game, thank you for absolutely everything! 💙
i’ve been absolutely loving this game. i’ve never played a solo RPG (and my time in a group RPG campaign was short-lived). i love writing, and this feels like guided noveling, for lack of a better phrase. i’ve only created my character and built up my own version of iron valley, but as somebody who loves stardew valley, harvest moon, and animal crossing, i can already feel the magic of this game.
because i love making templates, i whipped some up in notion for myself (before realizing others had already done the same)! i plan to add more, but right now i have a calendar, promises, moves, and townies.
You mentioned that you love writing and I do too! I'm actually a fiction author so I completely get where you're coming from. I hope you have fun playing my little game. Don't hesitate to ask questions~ 💚
Just downloaded last night and started playing and I love it so far! I found the world building element fun, and I enjoy being able to very easily customize gameplay. I'm glad I got this just in time as I'll be going camping soon and this will keep me entertained during the rain. Can't wait to see the next update!
I love this game so much. I've been playing Ironsworn for ages and when I found the original version of Iron Valley I was overjoyed. And this new update? OMG! I can't believe how well it's all come together. And the art is absolutely adorable and totally sells the whole theme and aestetic. Super fun to play! Super simple too! Can't wait for those romantic updates 😗 I really wanna ask my grocer to marry me!
Thanks so much for the quick response! I had already checked that links were working in other files, including your 1.1. When I reloaded the same 1.2 file just now, they suddenly worked fine there as well. Go figure. Anyway, now I can check out your community resources!
Yesterday evening, I did a playthrough of Iron Valley testing out some of the new stuff in version 1.1. I had a lot of fun and figured I'd share my playthrough here in case anyone was interested:
Hello, I have some questions about the rules. Sorry if this gets too long, but I'm quite new to TTRPGs and I want to get the rules right.
1. For Spirit of the Forest: What does "it complicates things" and "you're asking the wrong question" mean?
2. When working on a promise and journaling the events, does each written record need to be connected? Or is the journaling process more like a bunch of snippets out of a day?
3. Getting to know my host: Do I fill in their Townie sheet little by little as I work on the promise, or is this promise meant to be like additional info about the host?
4. Skills Chart: How much satisfaction do I have at the start? Second, how do I know which skill to use? Is it basically open to interpretation, like imagining which skill could work best?
5. Try Your Best: When losing track of time, what kind of consequences would it include? What could "failure" look like in Iron Valley? Any examples would be good!
6. Can I choose to cancel a promise?
7. Stats: Since some stats are stronger, what's the purpose of using the weaker stats? Is it mainly for adding variety to the narrative? Also, what could stealth be used for in Iron Valley? Couldn't this create conflicts or mistrust within the community?
Hi Rina! Sorry for not getting back to you sooner. Thank you so much for reaching out, I really appreciate your feedback and hope that these answers help. 💚
1. My intention with those results is to spice things up! Those additional results (although rare) gives the player a chance to look at an otherwise binary situation through a new lens.
2. This is completely up to you! When I play on my own, I like to write a simple list of the events that happened. Sometimes it's just one, summarizing the entire day in a sentence, sometimes it's a long list carefully describing everything that happened. When I play on stream I don't journal at all! So whatever works for you is valid~
3. The latter is correct! The information you get through making a Townie is just the start. Getting to know them is all about spending time with them, learning about their past, their dreams, and so on~
4. You start with no satisfaction (and earn it as part of completing promises). You do start the game with 2 skills with the first upgrade (+1 to Rolls) and 1 skill with the second upgrade (+1 to Rolls and +1 Tick on Hit). As to what skills to pick, go what feels right for your character, you may not have the best skill set--but that's okay! Alternative, you could also build the perfect character for your story. There is no wrong answer as to how you build your character~
5. The tone of Iron Valley is a cozy one, meaning that failure doesn't always have to include dramatic retribution or anything like that. Losing track of time can be as simple as your character wasting time because they were not properly prepared, didn't have the right tools, or it could be simply because they made a mistake. Of course, one of my favorite ways of treating failure is to lose track of time chatting with other Townies. This is part of the heart of this game, sure it's a failure but it doesn't mean that it has to be heartbreaking. Your character can truly mean to finish building that chair only to lose hours chatting with their bestie.
6. This is the first time someone has brought this up--and I am endlessly grateful for your question. I will be adding an additional rule in the 1.2 update so here's a sneak peek:
If you wish to cancel a promise for any reason, envision your character explaining the situation to the person most affected by the breaking of this promise. Envision their response. If you fully filled any boxes, gain 1 satisfaction per filled box, then Time Passes.
7. Different stats serve different purposes. When you use the move Try Your Best you are asked to pick an approach, and each approach calls for a different stat. Sometimes you might have to use a low stat because that is the approach the narrative asks for. If you need to run as fast as possible to catch a train, you'd have to use Edge--even if it is your lowest stat. As for being stealthy, some more mischievous characters might have a good use for it. Or maybe a master bug-hunter who knows just how to sneak up onto the rarest specimens?
That being said, anyone can make use of Shadow. Sneaking out of the house? Shadow. Hiding from your boss? Shadow. Telling your crush you don't like them even though you really, really do? Shadow.
I hope this helps clear things up. Once again, thank you so much for your questions! I hope to keep making the game better and better. Please don't hesitate to reach out if you need more help 💚
I don't have any more questions at the moment besides this, but wanted to ask-
For skills such as Cooking and Blacksmithing, do we need to gain resources first in order to use them? I think you mentioned that we have the option to either work for resources or get it from someone/somewhere, but yeah I was also curious about this.
You can choose whether you want to gather all the resources manually or just abstract away that you have the materials you need on hand. This is to give players a little bit of freedom on how granular they want the game to be (for example if you're playing an alchemist you may want to be granular about potions but not about tailoring).
There is a mechanical change I want to highlight depending on your approach, if you abstract away having to get all the materials when you use the move Reap the Benefits then you'll only gain (1) value of your crafted item per filled box.
This means you ultimately get a little less for your efforts, but since you didn't have to get everything from scratch it all evens out. 🐮
← Return to solo roleplaying game
Comments
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
I created a small random table for the Root Around move that allows the player(s) to mechanically explore their town (going to shops & restaurants, visiting helpful townies, finding inspiration, etc), and I wanted to share it. I hope people find it helpful if they use it.
Thank you for sharing!! 💚
This game is an absolute gem! I'm about one season into my solo campaign, and just played a co-op game with a friend tonight. It has brought me so much joy and calm in a stressful season, and I cannot recommend it enough. It's easy to pick up, easy to teach, and so much fun to play in both co-op and solo mode. If you're a Stardew fan looking for a tabletop alternative, or just someone looking for a way to unwind and stretch the creative, playful side of your brain, I'd highly recommend picking up a copy!
As a side note, regarding printing, once I worked through a couple weeks, I haven't had any trouble running solo sessions with just the player sheets and the moves, though I'll occasionally pull up the oracles on my laptop or to reference certain holidays. I also suspect it would be easy to track promises in a dot-grid journal, which is what I plan to switch to once I've made it all the way through the journal I'm writing in currently.
Thank you for the glowing recommendation!! I'm so happy to hear you enjoyed my game 😌💚
Such a wholesome game! It feels like playing an indie. I didn't expect to find such a good game when trying to emulate the Stardew with an roleplaying game. <3
Aww thank you!! It means a lot to hear that 😌💗
the entire IV system has yet to make it to the table, but the Oracle tables are BY FAR the best low impact tables out there! They are worth every penny of the price just for them. I’m currently using them to run my Apthecaria game. Works perfectly.
Thank you for the glowing recommendation! We had a lot of fun making the tables, love seeing them used in other games 💚
I'm looking forward to a more fleshed out romance mechanic <3
I would buy a physical book version of this immediately!! wow wow wow, this really seems like a lovely, soft, wholesome, and cute. I looked into printing this out, but dang, all print places are so expensive.
Hey there! New player here. I absolutely love the vibes of the game and how simple but deep the promises systems works for this!
I do have a suggestion though regarding Make a Promise. Rather than determining the number of progress boxes based on Complexity X Urgency, I suggest determining it by Complexity X Scale instead (Or Quality X Quantity). I found the original system kind of paradoxical in that more urgent matters took more progress boxes to fulfil which meant that they took more time to complete despite being more urgent.
But that's just a suggestion. I appreciate all the hard work that went into this thing and hope y'all have a good time!
tl;dr edit: "complexity" represents how difficult the task is, while "urgency/importance" represents how much achieving the goal means to you.
One thing that I've found helps me conceptualize my promises when I'm playing is to reframe "urgency" as "importance". It's pretty much an identical concept, and unlike adding something like "scale" it doesn't overlap with the idea of complexity. A big task means it's got more things to do, which I would say means a higher complexity score. But an important task doesn't say anything about how much there is to do, just how much completing that goal is weighing on you.
This works for me for two reasons: one, literally all I need to do is change "urgent" to "important". "laid back" and "critical" still make perfect sense when you're talking about just importance instead of importance+time-sensitivity. And two, having more promise boxes to fill means you'll spend more time thinking about it or working on it, which has the emergent effect of it feeling more important. If the goal is important, you'll put more attention into completing it, right?
Hi! Love the game, got a quick question regarding Reap the Benefits and Progress Tracks.
Can you fulfill a promise and Reap the Benefits without filling all the boxes on the progress track, similar to how you could fulfill a vow early in Ironsworn? With the consequence in this case just being less rewards?
Apologies if this is covered in the book, I thought to have looked through but couldn't find an answer anywhere.
Your first instinct was correct! You can complete a promise early, earning less rewards.
Also no worries, I love answering questions. I'm just happy that people are playing my game 😊💚
Thank you!
I poured hours into Stardew Valley and some of the older Story of Season games, so I'm excited to dive into this properly.
Hey! Will there be combat mechanics later on? This is pretty much exactly what I'm looking for, but I'm itching to play something like Rune Factory or the My Time series :D
You should probably look at the rules for Ironsworn, the game this is based off of. It might take some work and hacking things together, since actual conflict seems to be against the purpose of this game, but it's the whole core of Ironsworn. I don't think you're likely to get official combat rules for Iron Valley, unfortunately.
Thank you for your question~ 🌸 I'm also a huge fan of Rune Factory so I totally get you! I do want to clarify that you can do combat in IV, it would be a Try Your Best!! roll. That being said, IV is meant to be more about personal conflict and relationship-building, so crunchy combat with armor classes and to-hit dice is kind of out of the scope at the moment.
Of course, I will never say never to adding combat because one day I might get a spark of inspiration in the middle of a walk/shower and realize how to add dungeons to this game. Same goes for adding a more in-depth farming simulation aspect. There is a lot of room for IV to grow as you can see~
I hope this answer helps, don't hesitate to ask or reach out to me 💚
It's good! I wouldn't mind at all if any hypothetical combat add on wasn't crunchy, would go against the spirit of Ironsworn and Iron Valley. Thanks for the reply ☺️
Before I even get to playing yet, I wanna say: the writing in the rulebook is a delight. You have the perfect Cozy Tone and sense of humour.
Actually, I also find the order it's written to be incredibly nice, as well. Links to other sections are perfectly placed, and I thought I needed to know what skills/stats/options/traits the town experience had before I started playing (the Truths sections) but you know what? You were right! I was already scheming in my head anyway, and I did not need to know much more than what I wanted out of this game before we got to these questions.
OK maybe I could have used a lil bit on how items worked first, but I ended up rolling on the oracles by rolling a number and then choosing the most appealing answer from any of the item lists, repeat 3 times total, and I think that's going to turn out just fine.
ALSO ALSO, unlike the robust roleplaying games (with more firm rules, especially when multiplayer-centric) I actually uh... read most of the rulebook in one night just fine without overwhelm. Not all at once mind you, but it was a really nice change from the slogs I'm used to when the books are longer~
PS:I'm using another solo game establishing a character already, and decided to magically slip them between worlds to Iron Valley when their time there is done at the built-in end of the game. That's why I'm not playing this one quite yet c:
Thank you!! I'm a fiction author so a little bit of my writing voice got in there. I'm happy to hear that the fun I had writing the book shone through! It just makes me smile that the book flows well. I have had my share of experiences trying to read a TTRPG book and it feeling like a chore. Reading a book like this in one sitting is no small feat!
Once again, thank you so much for this lovely comment! Don't hesitate to reach out or ask more questions once you are ready to step into the Valley~ 💚👩🌾🥕
This is absolutely delightful. Someone on Reddit recommended the game as his favorite "happy-place game"so I had to check it out!
I'm lately just discovering "cozy" games - found an MMO today called Palia that's got a similar vibe to this.
I know you said a printout isn't really necessary but I love the art style (It's Honest Work is my favorite little thing) and I would love to have a print copy somehow. Sadly it would be pretty costly to print in color at home, or to order in full color from Lulu or PrintMe1. If the opportunity ever presents itself for you to offer an affordable PoD through one of those services or your own means, I promise I'd buy a copy.
psst, some libraries offer affordable printing on regular printer paper like you'd use at home. It may take a few visits due to reasonable limits on it, but it could be available if that's accessible to you. Mine offers free X pages per week with my card, another one charged like a few cents USD per, what, 10 pages for colour, maybe? :3
Hi there! I love this project and the possibilities and the setting and the vibes, great work!
I need advice tho, I am very bad at playing solo, I immediatelly got stumped at the first "Time Passes" roll... so... any help in how to define what happens?
I really want to play solo but this is the the point that always stop me, being unable to define what happens next
Any help is appreciated, and again, this is a great game, great setting, I will be looking closely for any update on this project
Hi there! Thank you for the lovely comment~ 😊
Solo role-playing can be hard, so don't feel bad! I would be delighted to help you. 🌷🌼🌻
Now, one of the coolest things about solo role-playing is that you can be as detailed or as brief as you want, you are ultimately the boss and as long as you're having fun then you're doing it right. That being said, I've seen two kinds of approaches to dealing with Time Passes, some players like a macro approach while others prefer a micro one.
As you can see, there's a lot of flexibility here! Personally I use them both. I like to really think about the consequences of a big roll, but when it comes to small things I skip right past 'em. In here lies the power of solo role-playing: you have the freedom to decide how much detail you want.
I hope this comment helps! Please don't hesitate to reach out if you have more questions~
PS: Remember that if you are ever at a loss, there are a lot of oracle tables at the end of the book filled with ideas just a dice-roll away~
I am kind of a grimdark person, but this gets me interested somehow. Let’s see.
I was frustrated with the progress / vow system in Ironsworn, but it looks IDEAL for this game. This might actually be a better use of that mechanic than the original! Excited to dig deeper into this. Smart idea!
Thank you!! I hope you have fun with my game! Don't hesitate to ask if you have any questions 😊
Hi there! I just did another play through video of Iron Valley, this time I try using it to play Stardew Valley and complete the bundles to fix the community center. It was a fun time and I made some good progress. Feel free to check it out here:
Thank you for sharing! 💚
This game has been a blessing for me as someone wanting more slice-of-life RPGs . I love it so much! It helps a lot with writing inspiration, too. 💛
I absolutely adore this game, it's stardew valley combined with ttrpg!
Also the fact that this is still being updated makes it into my favorite ttrpg. Also one of the first games that got me into solo ttrpgs!
Thank you so much for leaving these lovely comments! 😌💖
I love this game ♡
Glad to hear that! 💖💖💖
I've been loving this game and don't feel like it needs anything else, but there's some notes on your site and in the book about how you have more planned for the game and I'm curious if that's still the case. (Absolutely no pressure, though! If you never put out another update, it will still continue to bring me joy and delight.)
There's definitely updates in the future! Romance and marriage can still be expanded on and there is lots of room to add a "museum" system and I really wanna explore that. Aside from those, there's also a couple typos and I really want to make the book (a) more clear and (b) have play examples!
That being said, I'm working on quite a few things so I can't make a promise as to when this will come out, I recommend following me / my stream to stay up to date on what I'm working on! My current project (coming out this month) is an Ironsworn hack in the style of Monster Hunter ♥
Thank you for leaving such a lovely comment~!
Oh that's very exciting! I'll go check out your channel as well. Thank you for the reply! :D
The game looks so awesome but Is there a condensed version anywhere? I'd love to print it out but the font and format seems really big and spread out and would cost a bit to print with it being so many pages.
Hi there! Unfortunately at this moment there is no version of the book like that. You could print 2 book pages per real page, since the book was formatted for 6x9, though I'm not sure if this would work. I'm very touched that you would want to print my game.
That being said, if you wanted to print the book for reference while playing, I honestly don't think you need to do that! Once you get a handle on the rules the game pretty much plays itself. The only things I would strongly recommend printing is the move reference sheet and the oracles, since these are the two things you are guaranteed to need on a play-by-play basis! Hope that helps 👍
I'm not affiliated at all with Iron Valley, but I just want to second what the author said: almost all the references you need are on the printable reference sheets and fillable forms. I have the "game creation" worksheet and three* move sheets printed out single-sided because I don't like flipping pages, but you can easily condense those down to two pieces of paper by printing double-sided. Those plus the calendar (which I have as one double-sided sheet, because I only need to see one season at a time) cover pretty much everything!
Since my first session, I've only brought up the book while playing if I want to use one of the many roll tables (which you can use one of the handy oracle sites for instead) or I need to check details on one of the festival days.
*Edit: I just remembered, I think I might have condensed the move sheets into fewer pages by putting more of the tables on each page? So if you do it as-is, it's probably more than 3, but you can easily combine them to fewer printings.
Do you have any suggestions on how to narrate the very beginning of the story? I always have difficulty with this, and its not detailed much in the rules. Thanks in advance if you do <3.
There's two ways I like to go about it:
(A) The Long Way
Envision your character leaving the place they were in and the steps they take to get to the Valley. You don't have to do role-play or even big scenes, just go step by step the same way that I person would recall a trip. This is not my favorite way to do it, but it helps some players to have the chronological series of events. That leads to them ending up in the Valley.
(B) The Short Way
Or you could also just... start right at the Valley. As a fiction author, I'm a big fan of just skipping to the fun part. Most of my actual-play sessions of Iron Valley have started with my character literally getting off a Taxi/Bus and finding themselves in the town. Anything that happened before that we need to come up with can usually be communicated in the form of brief flashbacks.
Bonus tip(s)!
Remember that as part of character creation you have a series of truths that define why your character is in the Valley and where they are staying! These starting promises are a great way to direct your first days of play since your character is getting their bearings around town. Also, remember that this game is about the journey, the act of discovery, and seeing what happens--and as long as you are having fun then you are playing it right.
Hope this helps 💚
Thank you :D
I hope you have a nice day.
How long did it take you to make this? I'm asking to get a general idea of how long it might take me to make a TTRPG.
Version 1 was made in about a month as part of a game jam. The updates since have taken anywhere from a couple weeks to a month!
so far this game has been very fun. i moved into town, did some farming and fishing. opened up a fortune telling shop and traded a week's worth of tarot readings for a cow. am i doing it right? it feels right. thanks for the cool hack!
You're doing it right, specially because you're having fun 💚
I just want to say thank you for this awesome game!
Thank you for giving it a try!! 😊
Where is the site to get fillable character sheets? I have scoured to try and find it but can't. Also, as a blind gamer, from a first glance at the main book, thank you for properly tagging this. I have just gotten this thanks to someone mentioning it on the Solo RPG reddit post about Solitaria and wanted to check it out because I'm a sucker for Animal Crossing esque games. Thanks for this. I'll report back if I run into any issues and my screen reader, hee.
The fillable character sheets (made by a lovely community member) can be found on by clicking this link. Please let me know if you have any questions!
Hi! I love the idea of this game so much. But I did think your animal ancestry table was a little overwhelming, so I made one based on canon Animal Crossing characters, according to this site (https://animalcrossing.fandom.com/wiki/Species). All regular villagers are listed twice, and all special characters are listed once. That left one spot open, so it can be a robotic version of another animal or a human, since canon AC has only the PC as a human. Thank you for making such an amazing game! I can’t wait until I have appropriate time to play it!
I hope you have fun with the game! Don't hesitate to ask if you have any questions, also loving this custom table~ 👍💚
A very well-designed and well-written game to play some Stardew Valley/Harvest Moon with all the advantages of TTRPG (freedom !). Can't wait to test that !
This game is so good, I love it so much that I have downloaded it on three different devices!
You really can play this anyway you want or even with friends
I personally suggest this as a solo ttrpg on GoodNotes :)
Iron Valley is so cute, so colorful, so trans rights, so anti-capitalist. It's truly the chill, relaxing, full of love game we all need sometimes. It's super duper that it's name your own price, accessibility rules! That said, I did pay real money for this, and I use the oracles all the time for everything and every game.
Thank you so much for this lovely message!! These are all the things I wanted Iron Valley to be and I'm happy other people see that as well. Thank you for supporting my little game 🙇♀️💚
Just bought a copy, this is so wonderful and I cant wait to see what else you do with this! It seems like the perfect thing to play with my friends!
Thank you for your lovely comment! I hope you and your friends have fun in the Valley 💚💙
I’ve been going through so much recently and the escape this game has provided has been immeasurable. Thank you for making it accessible as name your own price, thank you for making the game, thank you for absolutely everything! 💙
aww you're welcome!! I am so happy to hear you liked my game! thank you SO MUCH for going out of your way to leave this message 🥺💖
i’ve been absolutely loving this game. i’ve never played a solo RPG (and my time in a group RPG campaign was short-lived). i love writing, and this feels like guided noveling, for lack of a better phrase. i’ve only created my character and built up my own version of iron valley, but as somebody who loves stardew valley, harvest moon, and animal crossing, i can already feel the magic of this game.
because i love making templates, i whipped some up in notion for myself (before realizing others had already done the same)! i plan to add more, but right now i have a calendar, promises, moves, and townies.
Thank you for sharing!! 👍✨
You mentioned that you love writing and I do too! I'm actually a fiction author so I completely get where you're coming from. I hope you have fun playing my little game. Don't hesitate to ask questions~ 💚
Just downloaded last night and started playing and I love it so far! I found the world building element fun, and I enjoy being able to very easily customize gameplay. I'm glad I got this just in time as I'll be going camping soon and this will keep me entertained during the rain. Can't wait to see the next update!
Thank you for the lovely comment, hope the Valley is good company while camping!! 🏕💚
I love this game so much. I've been playing Ironsworn for ages and when I found the original version of Iron Valley I was overjoyed. And this new update? OMG! I can't believe how well it's all come together. And the art is absolutely adorable and totally sells the whole theme and aestetic. Super fun to play! Super simple too! Can't wait for those romantic updates 😗 I really wanna ask my grocer to marry me!
Thank you so much for your sweet comment! I owe IV's development to the community, who's given me lots of feedback 😌💚
I'm a bit deep on my next novel but I promise I'll get back to IV in time, not just for romance but also for the museum update~ 🏛🎣🦋
The art is so cute!
Thank you! I'm really happy to hear that 🙈💖
Really psyched for this. I notice the hyperlinks (a great feature) seem to be broken in 1.2.
Hi Grey! Thank you for your comment. I just checked the files I uploaded and links are working on my end?
Here are two possible solutions:
- Redownload the rulebook and see if that does it
- Check your PDF reader settings to see if it needs your permission to trust links
I hope this helps! Thank you for checking out my book 💚
Thanks so much for the quick response! I had already checked that links were working in other files, including your 1.1. When I reloaded the same 1.2 file just now, they suddenly worked fine there as well. Go figure. Anyway, now I can check out your community resources!
No worries! Glad I could help 👍
This is absolutely delightful and rich and thoughtful and WELL DONE, YOU
Aww, thank you!! 🥰💕
Yesterday evening, I did a playthrough of Iron Valley testing out some of the new stuff in version 1.1. I had a lot of fun and figured I'd share my playthrough here in case anyone was interested:
Thank you for sharing, Thomas! 💚
Hello, I have some questions about the rules. Sorry if this gets too long, but I'm quite new to TTRPGs and I want to get the rules right.
1. For Spirit of the Forest: What does "it complicates things" and "you're asking the wrong question" mean?
2. When working on a promise and journaling the events, does each written record need to be connected? Or is the journaling process more like a bunch of snippets out of a day?
3. Getting to know my host: Do I fill in their Townie sheet little by little as I work on the promise, or is this promise meant to be like additional info about the host?
4. Skills Chart: How much satisfaction do I have at the start? Second, how do I know which skill to use? Is it basically open to interpretation, like imagining which skill could work best?
5. Try Your Best: When losing track of time, what kind of consequences would it include? What could "failure" look like in Iron Valley? Any examples would be good!
6. Can I choose to cancel a promise?
7. Stats: Since some stats are stronger, what's the purpose of using the weaker stats? Is it mainly for adding variety to the narrative? Also, what could stealth be used for in Iron Valley? Couldn't this create conflicts or mistrust within the community?
Hi Rina! Sorry for not getting back to you sooner. Thank you so much for reaching out, I really appreciate your feedback and hope that these answers help. 💚
1. My intention with those results is to spice things up! Those additional results (although rare) gives the player a chance to look at an otherwise binary situation through a new lens.
2. This is completely up to you! When I play on my own, I like to write a simple list of the events that happened. Sometimes it's just one, summarizing the entire day in a sentence, sometimes it's a long list carefully describing everything that happened. When I play on stream I don't journal at all! So whatever works for you is valid~
3. The latter is correct! The information you get through making a Townie is just the start. Getting to know them is all about spending time with them, learning about their past, their dreams, and so on~
4. You start with no satisfaction (and earn it as part of completing promises). You do start the game with 2 skills with the first upgrade (+1 to Rolls) and 1 skill with the second upgrade (+1 to Rolls and +1 Tick on Hit). As to what skills to pick, go what feels right for your character, you may not have the best skill set--but that's okay! Alternative, you could also build the perfect character for your story. There is no wrong answer as to how you build your character~
5. The tone of Iron Valley is a cozy one, meaning that failure doesn't always have to include dramatic retribution or anything like that. Losing track of time can be as simple as your character wasting time because they were not properly prepared, didn't have the right tools, or it could be simply because they made a mistake. Of course, one of my favorite ways of treating failure is to lose track of time chatting with other Townies. This is part of the heart of this game, sure it's a failure but it doesn't mean that it has to be heartbreaking. Your character can truly mean to finish building that chair only to lose hours chatting with their bestie.
6. This is the first time someone has brought this up--and I am endlessly grateful for your question. I will be adding an additional rule in the 1.2 update so here's a sneak peek:
7. Different stats serve different purposes. When you use the move Try Your Best you are asked to pick an approach, and each approach calls for a different stat. Sometimes you might have to use a low stat because that is the approach the narrative asks for. If you need to run as fast as possible to catch a train, you'd have to use Edge--even if it is your lowest stat. As for being stealthy, some more mischievous characters might have a good use for it. Or maybe a master bug-hunter who knows just how to sneak up onto the rarest specimens?
That being said, anyone can make use of Shadow. Sneaking out of the house? Shadow. Hiding from your boss? Shadow. Telling your crush you don't like them even though you really, really do? Shadow.
I hope this helps clear things up. Once again, thank you so much for your questions! I hope to keep making the game better and better. Please don't hesitate to reach out if you need more help 💚
--Maxi
Thank you so much!! <3 I might have additional questions in the future, so thanks as well for offering!
I don't have any more questions at the moment besides this, but wanted to ask-
For skills such as Cooking and Blacksmithing, do we need to gain resources first in order to use them? I think you mentioned that we have the option to either work for resources or get it from someone/somewhere, but yeah I was also curious about this.
You can choose whether you want to gather all the resources manually or just abstract away that you have the materials you need on hand. This is to give players a little bit of freedom on how granular they want the game to be (for example if you're playing an alchemist you may want to be granular about potions but not about tailoring).
There is a mechanical change I want to highlight depending on your approach, if you abstract away having to get all the materials when you use the move Reap the Benefits then you'll only gain (1) value of your crafted item per filled box.
This means you ultimately get a little less for your efforts, but since you didn't have to get everything from scratch it all evens out. 🐮
i love this game so much!!!!!!!!!!!