Last fall, the game publisher Paizo began releasing their line of Starfinder products, taking their Pathfinder setting into a distant science fantasy RPG setting. In addition to the main Starfinder Core Rulebook (Amazon, Paizo), they also began releasing the Dead Suns Adventure Path. With four of the six Dead Suns books now out, it’s about time to look back on what they’ve released to see what all the series has got to offer for fans looking for material.

Paizo’s Pathfinder Adventure Path books have long been a staple of the company’s product line. It provides a broad campaign of adventures across six 92-page books, each released on a monthly schedule. In addition to the adventure, each book contained setting, culture, and religious information, a Bestiary supplement, and original fiction.

Dead Suns continues that tradition in their Starfinder campaign setting, with the only significant difference in format being that these books are released on a bi-monthly schedule, so it takes a year to release the full Adventure Path as opposed to the two Adventure Path schedule for Pathfinder. Starfinder is on a less aggressive production schedule than Pathfinder, without associated Player Companion or Campaign Setting resources released monthly, so the Adventure Path provide supplements to the two hardcover Starfinder supplements slated for release each year. (The Alien Archive was released in the fall, and the Pact Worlds setting book is slated for release this month.)

As the first Starfinder Adventure Path, Dead Suns is a planet-hopping quest through the Pact Worlds, as the players get their own starship and begin following the clues across planets, running afoul of massive corporations, space monsters, undead starships and necrotech, and the troublesome Cult of the Devourer, as they uncover the secret behind a lost superweapon.

Even if you don’t go through and run the adventures exactly as written, there’s ample plot and setting material to give a Gamemaster plenty to lean on as they develop their own adventure. Personally, the one thing I’d like to see is some Starfinder fiction, because the world is so rich and involved I find myself lamenting the lack of a Starfinder line of novels. At present, though, Dead Suns doesn’t include chapters of fiction.

Here’s a breakdown of the information available in the books:

Incident at Absalom Station (Book 1 of 6)

• 32-page adventure
• 12-page chapter on Absalom Station, providing ample starting material for this central setting location
• 4-page chapter on Relics of Golarion, offering some equipment not available in the Core Rulebook
• 8-page Alien Archive chapter (featuring creatures that, from what I can tell, are not included in the Alien Archive book)
• 1-page description of the water planet Heicoron IV

Temple of the Twelve (Book 2 of 6)

• 32-page adventure
• 10-page chapter on the jungle world of Castrovel. (Can you guess where the Temple of the Twelve is located?)
• 8-page chapter outlining the feared Cult of the Devourer, along with new spells and equipment that they use to spread their corruption among the stars
• 8-page Alien Archive (which includes the Woioko, the species native to book 1’s Heicoron IV, and the displaced Ferrans as playable races)

Splintered Worlds (Book 3 of 6)

• 32-page adventure
• 8-page chapter on Eox, a world populated primarily by undead
• 8-page chapter on The Corpse Fleet, an undead space fleet that feels Eox is a little too touchy-feely with the living for their tastes. This chapter includes stats for a variety of new undead ships, beyond what is provided in the Core Rulebook.
• 8-page Alien Archive chapter
• 1-page description of the Corpse Fleet spacedock world of Barrow

The Ruined Clouds (Book 4 of 6)

• 32-page adventure
• 8-page chapter on the ruined floating city of Istamak, around the gas giant Nejeor IV, including some equipment that can be found among the remnants of the native population.
• 8-page chapter on The Drift (the hyperspace-like realm that starships use to travel vast distances in short times) and the hidden planet of Alluvion, home of the technology god Triune
• 8-page Alien Archive chapter

The final two books, releasing in April and June of 2018 respectively, will reveal more advanced technology from a lost alien civilization, a variety of new species, deck plans and details on a Devourer starship … and, of course, the conclusion of the Dead Suns campaign. You can pre-order through the Paizo website, including with a subscription that gets you the hardcover book and the free PDF as soon as they are available.

The Adventure Path is also fully compatible with the Starfinder Society Organized Play … but more details on that will have to wait for a future article.

More on Starfinder (and Related Articles)

• Buy the Dead Suns Adventure Path at Paizo.com or Amazon
• Starfinder Alien Archive review (buy on Amazon or Paizo)
• Starfinder Character Creation Deep-Dive
• A First Look at Starfinder
• James Sutter Starfinder Interview
• Pathfinder 2nd Edition Announced