How do you send a private message in Iron Realms?

Open the Members roll on the forum, tap the lord you want to write to, and use the ✉️ Write to them button on their profile. Give it a subject and a body and it lands in their Conversations inbox with an alert.

Can anyone read your private messages in Iron Realms?

No. Membership is re-checked against the database on every read and every write. A lord who is not in a conversation gets a 404 rather than a refusal, so they cannot even learn it exists.

Is Iron Realms free to play?

Yes. Iron Realms is free to play in any browser with no download and no account required. Every building, troop tier and Seat of Power is reachable without spending money — purchases buy speed and cosmetics, never a higher ceiling.

Does spending money make you stronger in Iron Realms?

No. Nothing purchasable raises your power ceiling. A charter audit runs on every build and fails it if any offer would sell power. During the pre-alpha nothing is for sale at all — better than that, the store gives its goods away: everything in it is free to take, once a day per item, while the realm is being built. When payments do open, spending will compress time only: it clears timers, it never raises the summit.

Conversations

Quick answers

How do you send a private message in Iron Realms?: In the game, tap any lord's keep on the map and use the 🐦‍⬛ Raven button on their panel — that is the fastest route and it never leaves the game. From the site, open the Members roll on the forum, tap the lord you want to write to, and use the ✉️ Write to them button on their profile. Give it a subject and a body and it lands in their Conversations inbox with an alert.
Can anyone read your private messages in Iron Realms?: No. Membership is re-checked against the database on every read and every write. A lord who is not in a conversation gets a 404 rather than a refusal, so they cannot even learn it exists.
Is Iron Realms free to play?: Yes. Iron Realms is free to play in any browser with no download and no account required. Every building, troop tier and Seat of Power is reachable without spending money — purchases buy speed and cosmetics, never a higher ceiling.
Does spending money make you stronger in Iron Realms?: No. Nothing purchasable raises your power ceiling. A charter audit runs on every build and fails it if any offer would sell power. During the pre-alpha nothing is for sale at all — better than that, the store gives its goods away: everything in it is free to take, once a day per item, while the realm is being built. When payments do open, spending will compress time only: it clears timers, it never raises the summit.

Conversations — Iron Realms — Conversations — the board's private half.

Everything else on the board is public. A community also needs somewhere quiet — to recruit, to settle a dispute, to arrange a rally without announcing it to the lord you are about to hit.

Starting one

Open Members on the forum, tap the lord you want, and use ✉️ Write to them on their profile. Give it a subject and a body. It appears immediately in their Conversations inbox and raises an alert on their bell.

Recipients are chosen from the roll, never typed by name. That is deliberate: typing names would let anyone probe which names exist, and two lords may legitimately share a display name. A conversation holds up to ten lords — a private word, not a mailing list.

Reading and replying

Your inbox lists every conversation you are part of, newest activity first, with the participant count and an unread mark. Opening one marks it read and shows the whole exchange in order. Replying tells everyone else in it.

The lord who opens a conversation starts caught up; everyone else starts unread. That is what lights a badge for the people being written to and not for the person writing.

Who can read it

Only its members, and that is checked on every request rather than once when you sign in. A lord who is not in a conversation receives a plain "not found" — not a "you are not allowed" — because a refusal would confirm the conversation exists, and that is itself something they should not learn.

Signed out, there is nothing to read at all.

Leaving

Leave conversation removes it from your inbox and stops it reaching you. It does not delete the conversation for anyone else — the others keep the exchange they were part of. One lord walking out does not end a conversation.

What conversations are not

They are not a support channel. If something in the game is broken, a thread in the Bug Reports node reaches the people who can fix it; a private message to another player does not. And the house rules apply here exactly as they do in public — harassment is harassment whether or not it is in the open.