Review: The Scoured Stars Adventure Path

Reading the Scoured Stars adventure path with a mind towards Starfinder actual play podcast creation and live-stream production.

Hi, and welcome back Paizoverse! I’m coming to you today to take a look at the Starfinder 1e adventure path “The Scoured Stars” adventure path from Paizo. They’ve been kind enough to provide me with a complimentary copy for review, and I’m excited to take a look at it with you with a mind for Actual Play podcasts and streams, and what this ttrpg volume could provide the current or aspiring audio or video storyteller.

For those of you unfamiliar with the first edition of the Starfinder role playing game, know that it first debuted in 2017 after a year of development (you can hear author James Sutter describe that process here) as a single volume that included all of the information a player or GM would need to create characters and adjudicate the main game modes: downtime (what characters do when they aren’t adventuring), exploration (interacting with the broader setting), and encounter (what characters do when they’re in social, martial, or starship combat with opponents). 

The system launched with organized play support, Starfinder Society Organized Play, and some of the missions that players went on over the first two years of that org play campaign have now been collected and edited together as a unified adventure path that takes them from 1st to 15th level.

Commence

First up, should a brand new actual play crew use the Starfinder TTRPG and this adventure path for their show? Great question! There are (at the time of this writing) roughly 40 actual play podcasts out there using Starfinder adventure paths and home-brews, both active and inactive. Quite a few live streamed shows have recordings on YouTube, too. But to date only limited runs of certain missions from the Scoured Stars set of Starfinder Society scenarios have been published, and I have not yet seen an announcement for anyone planning to run the entire collection as an adventure. There’s a great opportunity here for a recording crew that is new to podcasting or streaming to set themselves up for success by playing the Scoured Stars as a recorded adventure. 

This adventure path is a departure from the usual form for Paizo. The eleven previous entries in the Starfinder adventure path line were groupings of 3 to 6 volumes, with each book using the recommended Experience Point progression chart to take a 4 player party through 2 levels of character advancement. 

Scoured Stars changes this up, becoming the first Starfinder adventure to embrace milestone leveling. Characters will advance in level after each of the 12 scenarios, and sometimes they’ll even do so in the midst of a longer scenario. This format presents both a boon and a challenge to an actual play crew: fast advancement means seeing quick improvement in character skills and abilities, but comes with the possibility that characters advance so quickly that they might have difficulty keeping track of each of their abilities late in the adventure path. 

The 10 of the 12 scenarios are designed to be run in about 4-5 hours of play time, and the remaining 2 scenarios in 8-10 hours (as they were originally 2-part scenarios when first printed). Knowing how most actual play groups tend to go a bit long on chasing down role-playing options, this might get stretched a bit, but it’s possible that 5 to 6 one-hour(ish) episodes could encapsulate a complete scenario experience for a crew. 

Completing every scenario becomes a task of roughly 70-90 hours of recording, depending on how much is cut for the final product. Spread that out over a year, and the fledgling Starfinder actual play group has a really great project to cut their teeth on without committing themselves to a half-decade project of weekly recording to tell a complete story from a published adventure path. Not bad! 

And, of course, there are so many more Starfinder Society scenarios that the Game Master of this group could decide to include if they wanted to linger on a level of play just a little longer, or if they wanted to show off a particular subsystem, challenge, or storyline that they want to share with the world. This modularity is a great way to add some additional depth to the adventure path’s broader outline.

Pursuit

In terms of the story of the Scoured Stars, I don’t want to spoil much, but the players learn right away that they’re members of an organization that’s in trouble: over 80% of the Starfinder Society was lost in “The Scoured Stars” incident just a few months before the adventure begins. Their actions over the course of this adventure will help chart a renewed path forward for the society of explorers, archeologists, and opportunists, and will take them from one end of the galaxy to the other in pursuit of answers.

The kinds of characters they create can delightfully reflect how the Starfinder Society is desperate to bolster their ranks with just about any takers. No concept will be too weird and wild in this science fantasy game - with over 140 species and 13 character classes (each with myriad subclass options) to choose from, there are options for every kind of idea that players want to bring forward. 

Barring a few exceptions, Starfinder also has a reputation for being a rather forgiving system when it comes to combat difficulties, so a player has a good chance of seeing their 1st level character all the way through to 15th level at the end of the Scoured Stars adventure path. 

The dice will always tell their own story, of course, and so even if a player character falls in battle (or is retired by their player), there is an on-ramp for a new PC at the start of each scenario. This flexibility of having Starfinder Society field agents come and go could be a great way for a crew to invite in a guest from another podcasting or streaming group to join them for an arc of the adventure, or perhaps a friend that wants to be part of the project but can’t commit to the entire adventure path. 

Setting Up

A podcasting or streaming GM does have their work cut out for them in terms of preparation. The first scenario alone has around 15 NPCs, mostly one-time appearances, but many who will recur over the course of the adventure, so there’s plenty of head spaces you’ll need to get into over the course of this adventure path. Plan your voicing choices accordingly!

If you’re playing around a table, then you’ve got your map-making work cut out for you, though Paizo helpfully tries to use as many pre-printed flip-mats or flip-tiles as possible so that you don’t have to hand draw everything. For virtual tabletops, only Fantasy Grounds has the entire adventure available to purchase for their system, so if you’re using a different VTT you’ll be doing a lot of resizing and editing to get things in place for tactical combat. If your approach is much more “theater of the mind” then you’ll save a bunch of time on mapping that you can put into making those combat moments as cinematic as possible. 

In terms of subsystems that you’ll need to be ready to run, know that you’ll encounter Starship combat a handful of times over the course of the entire adventure. The Influence system comes into play during some social events, as well as a number of other Victory Point-style challenges like chases or rescue missions that will affect the overall outcome of their story. Prepare yourself by getting ready for a galaxy-spanning mystery that leads to an interstellar war between the forces of the Starfinder Society and that of the Jinsul Hierocracy. It’s a classic approach for a big space opera, with lots of memorable characters and locations for players to point back to and say, “Remember when we were on …” if you play it right.

As a result of all this galaxy hopping, there’s also a LOT of lore over the course of this adventure. While there are handouts included in the adventure that are to be given out during play, you may need to help make sure your players are keeping track of all the details that they’ll come across over the course of this adventure. Names, events, histories, planets, asteroids, ships… you might need to build your own codex to keep it all clear! 

A gaming crew that is recording their adventure has a great way to put some “fill-in” content between scenario arcs by having the players record in-character reflections on the experiences they went through and the training they undergo during downtime to prepare for what’s to come. These can be great ways to introduce new abilities gained when the milestone level-ups come quickly at the end of each adventure, and can be touchpoints for them to refer back to about what they’ve learned so far.

Finally, when you do start your prep, don’t forget your best source of support on this adventure: the Paizo forums! For years, GMs have been sharing their joys and frustrations with these scenarios, and while the final edited form of the adventures has trimmed away some of the most criticized components (like the race in the Commencement), or at least made them more manageable (like streamlining a scenario to all take place in one location instead of just a quick visit before departing), you’ll still find great support from those archives of play reports from these seven years of Starfinder 1e’s life.

Sharing the news

A new Starfinder actual play podcast has a big boon coming up in a few months - the launch of the Starfinder 2e playtest is going to put “Starfinder AND actual play” into a lot of search bars! But obviously there’s a challenge here: played as written, this is a Starfinder 1e adventure path, and listeners and viewers might need a reminder that this adventure is designed as such. 

If you’re worried about folks not having interest in the Starfinder 1e system, you might want to grab their attention by letting them know that - in addition to your stellar performances - the events of this adventure path help influence the setting of Starfinder 2e. 

However, there is a dedicated contingent of folks who still very much love and will keep playing Starfinder 1e for a long time, and targeting those audiences where you can find them will keep their headphones tuned in to your adventures for as long as you’re willing to run them.

Let’s go!

Overall, the Scoured Stars adventure path is a great entry point for a gaming crew that’s been thinking about starting up a podcast or live stream but isn’t quite sure how much of a commitment to jump into. With (relatively) bite-sized story arcs, easy on-ramps for change-ups in the player character roster, and lots of community support for prepping these scenarios, you’ve got tons of options for putting together a killer actual play creation for all of us to enjoy for a long time. I look forward to listing your adventure on my spreadsheet that lists all the recordings I’ve found so far. 

Good luck out there, Starfinders!