Ironsworn is a dark fantasy tabletop roleplaying game by Shawn Tomkin that you can play by yourself, with friends and no game master, or with a game master. It came out in 2018, and its complete digital rules are free. You play a hero on a harsh frontier called the Ironlands, swearing vows on iron and trying to see them through. Random tables called oracles and a handful of simple rules stand in for a game master, which is why Ironsworn became one of the best known solo RPGs in the hobby.
The quick answer: download the free Ironsworn rulebook and playkit, grab one six-sided die and two ten-sided dice, make a character, and swear your first vow. From there, you play one scene at a time, rolling when things get risky and asking the oracles when you need to know what happens. Want to feel it before you read? Our free browser demo, The Bell Beneath the Fen, plays in about 20 minutes.
What is the Ironsworn RPG?
Ironsworn is a low fantasy RPG set in the Ironlands, a cold and sparsely settled land your people sailed to after leaving a ruined homeland. Villages are small, the wilds are dangerous, and the old powers in the land are not friendly. The tone is grim but hopeful: ordinary people making hard promises and keeping them.
The game was written and self-published by Shawn Tomkin, who now publishes under Tomkin Press. It won the Gold ENNIE for Best Free Game or Product in 2019. Its engine later became the base for Starforged, the science fiction follow-up.
Three things set Ironsworn apart:
- It is free. The full rulebook, playkit, asset cards, and a world workbook are free to download.
- It is built for solo and co-op play first. You can play with a game master, but the rules assume you might not have one.
- It is openly licensed. Fans have made apps, virtual tabletop modules, and adventures for it, and you can too.
Is Ironsworn really free?
Yes. Shawn Tomkin’s own itch.io page calls the Ironsworn digital package “free and complete.” It includes:
- The rulebook as a searchable PDF, plus a two-page spread version
- An 11-page playkit with the basic rules, the moves, and a character sheet
- A master set of 75 printable asset cards
- A world workbook for setting up your version of the Ironlands
The licensing is generous too. The full Ironsworn text is released under a Creative Commons non-commercial license (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). The Ironsworn System Reference Document, along with the text of the asset cards and oracle tables, is released under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0), which allows commercial use with credit. Images and trade dress are not included in either license.
What’s free and what’s paid?
The core game is free and complete on its own. A few add-ons cost money:
- Ironsworn: Delve is a paid expansion that adds expeditions into dangerous sites, more foes, new oracles, and more setting detail. It is optional; the core game does not need it.
- Ironsworn: Lodestar is a quick-reference guide sold as pay what you want. It gathers the essential rules, moves, setting notes, and oracles in one place. The expanded edition from 2025 adds key content from Delve.
- Printed books cost money, as you would expect. The free version is digital.
- Starforged is a separate sci-fi game with a paid rulebook. You do not need it to play Ironsworn.
If you are new, ignore all of it at first. The free rules will carry you through a full campaign.
How do you play Ironsworn?
A session moves in a simple loop. You describe what your character does. If it is risky, you make a move and roll. The result tells you what happens, and you describe that, and the story keeps rolling.
1. Make a character
Your character has five stats: edge (speed and ranged combat), heart (courage and charm), iron (strength and close combat), shadow (stealth and trickery), and wits (expertise and awareness). You also track health, spirit, and supply, which wear down as things go badly. You pick three assets, cards that describe your companions, paths, and skills.
2. Swear an iron vow
Vows are the heart of the game. Your character swears to do something hard: find a missing child, avenge a betrayal, drive a beast from the hills. Each vow gets a rank, from troublesome to epic, and a progress track of ten boxes. Harder vows fill more slowly.
3. Make moves
A move is a named rule for a common kind of action, like facing danger, gathering information, or striking in a fight. To make one, roll one six-sided action die and add your stat and any bonuses. Then roll two ten-sided challenge dice.
- Beat both challenge dice: strong hit. You succeed.
- Beat one: weak hit. You succeed, but at a cost.
- Beat neither: miss. Things go wrong, and the move tells you how.
If the two challenge dice match, something dramatic happens on top of the result. That is your cue to add a twist.
4. Build and burn momentum
Momentum rises when you do well and drops when you don’t. At the right moment you can spend it to improve a roll you are not happy with. It keeps a run of good luck meaningful and gives you one way out of a bad spot.
5. Ask the oracles
When you want to know something the rules do not say, you ask an oracle. Ironsworn has a yes or no oracle, where you judge how likely the answer is and roll, and tables for names, places, actions, themes, and more. A result like “abandon” plus “promise” is not an order. It is a prompt you interpret, and that interpretation is where the surprises in solo play come from.
6. Fulfill your vow
When you have marked enough progress, you try to fulfill your vow. This roll does not use the action die. You compare the number of filled boxes against the two challenge dice. Fill the track and you are nearly certain to succeed; push early and you might miss. Keeping a vow earns experience, which buys new assets or upgrades the ones you have.
Ironsworn solo, co-op, and guided play
Ironsworn has three ways to play, and the rules barely change between them.
- Solo: one player and the oracles. This is how many people first meet the game, and it works on a quiet evening with nothing but a notebook.
- Co-op: two or more friends play together without a game master. Everyone shares the job of asking oracles and narrating results.
- Guided: one person runs the world as a game master, and the rest play characters. It feels like a classic RPG night, with Ironsworn’s moves doing the heavy lifting.
Solo is a great way to learn the rules at your own pace. Co-op is a lovely way to bring a friend into the hobby without anyone having to prepare a session. If you want the bigger picture of playing alone, our guide to solo RPGs covers oracles, game master emulators, and other games built for one.
What do you need to play Ironsworn?
- The free rulebook and playkit
- One d6 and two d10s, ideally in different colors
- A pencil and the character sheet
- A notebook or a document for your log
- An hour of quiet, if you are playing solo
Some players keep detailed prose journals. Others write a few bullet points per scene. Both are fine. The log is there to help you remember, and it can be as short as you like. If you like the writing side best, take a look at solo journaling RPGs, a whole family of games built around it.
Can you try Ironsworn in your browser?
Yes. The RPG Demo Library has a free demo called The Bell Beneath the Fen. For three nights, a drowned chapel’s bell has rung under the water. On the third night, the ferryman’s apprentice walked into the fen and never came back. You go after them.
The demo is Act One of a three-act solo adventure and takes about 20 minutes. You choose a character, and the page keeps your stats, health, spirit, supply, momentum, assets, and vow on screen while you play. By default, you click to roll each die, so you feel the result land.
It is an unofficial adventure made under Ironsworn’s open license, with credit to Shawn Tomkin, and it is not a Tomkin Press product. The full adventure is available as a PDF in our store, and the core Ironsworn rules stay free from the creator. The wider RPG Demo Library has demos for other systems if you want to compare.
FAQ
Is Ironsworn good for beginners?
Yes. The core roll is one mechanic used for everything, the playkit fits the essentials on a few pages, and the rules are free, so trying it costs nothing. If tabletop RPGs are new to you, our list of easy tabletop RPGs for beginners puts it in context.
Can you play Ironsworn solo?
Yes. Ironsworn was designed for solo play as well as co-op and guided play. Oracles replace the game master, and vows give your story a direction.
What dice do you need for Ironsworn?
One six-sided die and two ten-sided dice. Some players add extra d10s for oracle rolls, or use a free app that rolls everything for them.
Should I play Ironsworn or Starforged?
Pick by genre and budget. Ironsworn is fantasy and free. Starforged is science fiction, with a paid rulebook and more tools for generating places and ships. The core engine is the same.
Do I need Ironsworn: Delve?
No. Delve is an optional expansion for exploring dangerous sites. The free core rules are a complete game.
Where to go next
If you are curious about the space version, our Starforged beginner’s guide walks through what changes. If you want to know why grown-ups play pretend at all, read about the benefits of tabletop RPGs. Ludarium Letters, right below, sends new guides and demos when they go live.
The game is the reason. The people are the point.
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