The Stars Are Fire by Bruce R. Cordell is a role playing game supplement published by Monte Cook Games for use with Cypher System. This is a setting book and, although it does contain game mechanics, the Cypher System Rulebook is also needed to play.
The supplement is available as a 226-page PDF from DriveThruRPG for $18.99 but was purchased at a reduced price as part of a special bundle. One page is the front cover, three the front matter and one the Table of Contents.
Chapter 1: Welcome to Your Science Fiction Universe is a single page which mostly consists of some adventure seeds.
Chapter 2: How to Play starts with some Cypher System Basics, which are not enough without the core rulebook. Advice for Playing in a Sci-Fi Setting covers GM tips, exposition as a tool, stealing liberally from sci-fi properties and reverse metagaming. Metagaming in RPGs is usually frowned on, but in this case, it means the GM and players talking about what might be possible for their characters to know, or their equipment be able to do, in a future setting.
Part 1: Science Fiction Worldbuilding starts with Chapter 3: Assembling a Sci-Fi Setting. It starts by advising to steal liberally from popular media when creating a setting and that this can be useful to players to give them context. Design the concept of the setting, then decide its technology level; sci-fi can cover a whole range of settings. Three different levels are given; contemporary, advanced and fantastic. A sidebar suggests that if a player knows more about science than the GM, use their knowledge.
Chapter 4: Science Fiction Subgenres describes a range of popular subgenres, with examples for some of settings for the subgenre. There are a lot of different options here.
Chapter 5: Conflicts of the Future has what is essentially a d100 list of adventure hooks.
Chapter 6: Cosmic Set Pieces & Optional Rules has a number of options that can be added to a game, to make it more realistic to more fantastic. There are optional rules for harder science fiction, including d6 GM Intrusion tables, extended rules for vehicular combat, including spaceships, psionics, posthuman options, special effect suggestions, salvage, space hazards, different levels of AI, ancient unbelievably advanced species and incorporating fantastic elements.
Chapter 7: Equipment & Armaments starts by explaining the difference between these two, then explains that equipment can vary in price depending on a setting’s tech rating. Prices drop by a category if a setting’s tech rating is higher than that of the item. There are details on customising options and how appearance of an item will change depending on the setting. The items are then described, divided into different categories, with each category having Contemporary, Advanced and Fantastic types of equipment. The chapter ends with how to have equipment and weapons as artefacts, with some examples.
Chapter 8: Vehicles & Spacecraft is very similar to the previous chapter, but covering these instead of equipment and weapons. In many cases, there aren’t different tech ratings for forms of transport; whilst a motorcycle may come in the three different tech ratings, a stargate does not. Again, this ends with having vehicles as artefacts with examples.
Chapter 9: Creatures & NPCs starts with some suggested additional creatures from the Cypher System Rulebook that could be used in the Revel, and a list of the creatures and NPCs in this supplement by level and tech rating. Each creature is then described, with the stats, GM intrusions and how to use them, each taking up a page.
Part 2: The Revel is a setting that uses the options from this book.
Chapter 10: Welcome to the Revel gives some details on the setting. The Revel is primarily set in the Solar System, with some extra-solar settlements, ten years after something called the Event, when the Earth was lost. No-one knows what happened to Earth, other than a shroud blanking out the entire EM spectrum cloaked the planet, no-one can visit it. The remainder of the human race had to learn how to survive lacking the main source of pretty much everything. This section has details on gaming in the Revel, PC and NPCs in the setting, life, faster than light travel and the handful of starships that possess it, the method of making the drives being lost with Earth.
Chapter 11: Luna One describes this settlement, as well as Star Force and the Interplanetary Space Treaty, together with rumours and opportunities.
Chapter 12: Big Five Spirals explains that the spirals are similar to O’Neill space stations, only very large, each owned by a Big Five conglomerate. Each spiral is covered, and there are some more rumours and opportunities.
Chapter 13: Venusian Cloud Cities covers a number of cities floating in the clouds of Venus, above the level where that becomes rapidly fatal. Again, there are rumours and opportunities.
Chapter 14: Diaspora of Mars gives details on the Martian settlements; Mars is described as being very similar to the Wild West; perhaps with an emphasis on the “wild” part. Some locations are covered together with more rumours and opportunities.
Chapter 15: Opulence of the Outer Planets is the rest of the Solar System. Only a few places are described, along with space pirates, and more rumours and opportunities.
Chapter 16: Far-Flung Worlds are the extra-solar settlements. Only seven exist, many struggling, and only three are described. Again, there are rumours and opportunities.
Chapter 17: Ancient Tunnels & Quiet Earth covers the strange tunnels, predating humanity’s arrival in space, found on the Moon just prior to the Earth going quiet, as well as the truth of what happened during the Event and its aftermath, with more rumours and opportunities.
Part 3: Roleplaying in the Revel starts with options for getting PCs involved; working as part-time agents for the AI that runs Luna One is an option. Living in the Revel, along with income, having adventures, getting a spaceship and some character options are given.
Chapter 19: Full Adventure: Salvage Over Saturn is, as it says, a complete adventure in which the characters are sent to or encounter a drifting spaceship and follow clues to a lab on a moon of Saturn. This is definitely set in the Revel.
Chapter 20: Cypher Short: Prison Break is a two-page framework for an adventure, which could be set in the Revel.
Chapter 21: Cypher Short: Alien Planet is similar, but involves exploring an alien world.
The final page is a space combat status tracker.
The Stars are Fire in Review
The PDF is well bookmarked with major and minor sections linked. The Table of Contents is to less depth but is hyperlinked. There are also hyperlinks in the sidebars of the supplement, which are not easy to spot unless already familiar with how Monte Cook Games lays out supplements. Navigation is good. The text maintains the standard two columns with sidebar format, with the sidebar being used for internal links, stats, extra details, external references and other material, and appeared to be free of error. There are a variety of illustrations, most colour and up to about half a page in size, as well as some black and white ones, all of which may be custom. Presentation is very good.
This is essentially two different books in one. The first book, which is Part One and the earlier chapters, is a toolkit for roleplaying Cypher System games in a science fiction setting; not too difficult, partly because both Numenera and The Strange, the two largest settings, have strong science fiction elements to them. The second book, the rest of the material, is a specific setting that uses some of the material provided. With it choosing a particular era, not all of the options given in the first part of the supplement are used. The Revel is also, in some ways, a post-apocalyptic setting; after all, the vast majority of humanity has just been wiped out.
It would perhaps have been preferable to make this more of a setting book, rather than the combination setting and genre book it is, creating more content that is used in the Revel rather than having material that isn’t. Yes, that material can be used in other settings, but if that’s done then the material on the Revel is less useful, and vice versa if the Revel is used. Combined together, the focus feels a little diffuse when it could have been more concentrated. With science fiction already being a part of the Cypher System in places, this also makes the supplement feel, in places, like just some supplementary material tagged on to the core rules. Rather than feeling like this is two books, both might have been better served if they were two books. The Stars are Fire has some interesting parts but isn’t as focussed as some of the other setting books and it can be found by clicking here.
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